No Picture
Empire

Movie – War Machine – a misplaced parable

Netflix has just released War Machine onto the streaming media waters. This movie fits into the long tradition of American media mostly puffing up our military exploits or turning them into light tragi-comedy.  Brad Pitt, applying the acting style of a trimmed down George Clooney, portrays the fictional General Glen McMahon. Broadly and —>> read more –>>

No Picture
Politics

Update on Trump’s Mental Capacities

The state of Trump’s mind has been a matter of continuous discussion ever since he came on the scene as a presidential candidate. Mental health professionals have weighed in despite their professions rules against doing so. More recently in an op-ed piece David Brooks posed the idea that we are —>> read more –>>

Capitalism

Naive Talk about Healthcare from Adam Davidson in the New Yorker

The solution to our healthcare problems cannot be clearer. Look at Canada, Germany, France, Japan, Australia, Netherlands, UK, Denmark, Sweden, and others. Plenty of healthcare systems with decades of operational experience producing much better outcomes for very single person in these countries at less than half the cost!! —>> read more –>>

Politics

Firing Comey and Trump as Solipsism

In his letter firing James Comey, now former Director of the FBI, Trump once again displayed the completely self-centered world that he inhabits. The second paragraph in this thankfully short letter reads:

While I greatly appreciate you informing me, on three separate occasions, that I am not under investigation, I nevertheless concur with the judgment of the Department of Justice that you are not able to effectively lead the Bureau. —>> read more –>>

No Picture
Politics

Obama, Wall St. and Big Money

New evidence of how big money works has turned up last summer in the WikiLeaks dump of Democratic National Committee emails. Included are an exchange between John Podesta, Co-Chair of the Obama Campaign in 2008 and later Obama’s Councilor and John Froman who was working at Citibank at the time of the emails and has held positions at Treasury and elsewhere. —>> read more –>>

Capitalism

Regulations vs Protections – more than just words

The word “regulation” has been used as an epithet and rhetorical sledge hammer by Republicans and the centrist Bill Clinton Democrats as part of a general campaign to discredit anything that the government might do. This is part of the decades long political strategy of the rich and corporations to puff up the delights of “free markets”. —>> read more –>>

Healthcare

Trump Loves Australia’s Universal Government Paid Healthcare, “Better than ours”

Trump loves Australia’s universal healthcare: Speaking to Australian Prime Minster Trumbull, Trump said, “We have a failing healthcare. I shouldn’t say this to our great gentleman and my friend from Australia, because you have better healthcare than we do.” A day later Trump repeated his praise for the Australian healthcare system, “Of —>> read more –>>