In a normal political world, congressman Allen West (R-FL) would be considered a crazy person. West is one of the most extreme of the Tea Party favorites, making one absurd claim after another to their great delight, his latest being the charge that 80 members of the Democratic party were also members of the Communist party. [Read more…]
In my review of the futuristic novel Super Sad True Love Story by Gary Shteyngart, I mentioned one element that the author envisaged which was an iPod-like device that people carried with them that would immediately calculate your attractiveness, informing everyone nearby both of your absolute score as well as your ranking in a room full of people. It sounded a little disconcerting, even creepy. [Read more…]
The US First Circuit Court of Appeals has dealt another blow is favor of same sex marriage by uninanimously ruling that the infamous Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) is unconstitutional. [Read more…]
One of the things the US administration and Congress is really good at is grandstanding when the media is around to take note. Take for example, the rapidity with which the US government arranged for the visa for the Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng and the moves by congress to fast-track US citizenship for the Pakistani doctor Shakil Afridi who aided the CIA in its search for Osama bin Laden. [Read more…]
Although his trial ended yesterday with a partial acquittal and mistrial, it is clear that John Edwards’ life in politics is over, even though a case can be made that these charges should never have been brought in the first place, and mainly benefited a politically ambitious prosecutor. [Read more…]
A couple of years ago, I wrote about my inability to understand the appeal of the Spelling Bee competition. It seemed to me to be not worth the enormous amount of time that people expend on it. A recent NPR report examines the extraordinary success of the ethnic South Asian community in this contest. [Read more…]