Americans presidents often go through rocky periods and face withering criticisms. But you have to give their spouses credit that they have managed to avoid any public scandals. The first ladies have an excellent record of not doing anything to embarrass the country they represent, often being held in higher esteem than their husbands. [Read more…]
Stephen Colbert zeroes in on how Paul Ryan conveniently abandoned his enthusiastic promotion of Ayn Rand once her atheistic and political views became better known and uncomfortable for modern Republican orthodoxy and his own political ambitions. [Read more…]
Australian mining tycoon Gina Rinehart, reportedly the world’s richest woman, has some advice for all those whining poors. [Read more…]
Lying in politics is not uncommon. But it is a sign of weakness because it means that you really don’t have a good case as to why people should vote for you over your opponent. It is also risky. You can get away with a certain amount of it by but have to be alert to not cross an invisible line and gaining a reputation of being a chronic liar because then every statement starts to be scrutinized and even those that might earlier have been shrugged off as trivial or merely hyperbolic become further evidence of lying, as has become the case with Ryan’s claims about his marathon prowess. [Read more…]
Herman Cain was on The Daily Show a couple of night ago and once again made a fool of himself. He was once the head of a major corporation so that means that he cannot be a total idiot. Holding such a job requires one to be somewhat savvy and numerate and literate. So why is it that he now comes across as a grinning doofus? Has he realized that this shtick plays well with the Republican party and is his ticket to media fame in the twilight of his life? [Read more…]
I do not watch any of the convention proceedings because they are highly scripted and rarely produce any news. But I do read news items about them. One of the hot rumors that was going around was the appearance of a surprise speaker for the final night. I thought that was rather odd in itself, since it conveyed the underlying message that Mitt Romney and his speech were expected to be so boring that they had to find a way to attract a larger audience by promising a mystery guest. [Read more…]
I have been musing for some time on a curious feature involving the names of some key figures all of whom share the same fascination with objectivism.
Ayn Rand → Rand Paul → Paul Ryan → Ryan (loves) Ayn → Ayn Rand → …
Coincidence? I don’t think so. I think it is one of the circles of hell that Dante overlooked.
One of the puzzling things about the sexual abuse problems that have been exposed in closed, secretive, and hierarchical organizations like the Catholic Church, Ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities, and football programs is the fact that these abuses were so widespread and long-standing that they could not possibly have been kept secret from others in the organizations. So why did they not speak up? It is suggested that the reason is that the higher ups wanted to avoid damage to the image of the institution by a public scandal and thus tried to address the problem internally. [Read more…]
In the September 2012 issue of Harper’s Magazine, David Sirota had an excellent article (subscription required for the full article though you can see a shortened version here) that examined how the fact that almost all the major cities have become one newspaper towns lacking any competition has resulted in in an unhealthy collusion between the papers and local institutions and business leaders, with the papers often suppressing stories that might harm the interests and images of powerful people. [Read more…]