Category: Society

About Supreme Court Nominations

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No Better Time Than Right Now to Talk About “Qualified Candidates”

 

Oh, the Horror!

Right-wing media is afire with angst and anger that the president is about to follow through on his commitment to nominate a Black woman to the Supreme Court. How could he?! What about qualifications?! Is everyone else ineligible for consideration?!

As soon as they finish hyperventilating, let’s see what this really means. And what they really mean.

Any Relevant History Here?

Yeah, just a little bit. Over 300 people have sat on the Court. About 99% of them had a screening criterion – they needed to be white men.

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Read This – It is Someone Else’s Blog – But You will be Better for Reading It

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A Fine and Detailed Recap of Biden’s First Year – A Lot to Celebrate

Press Coverage of The One Year Mark

I find much of the press coverage of Joe Biden’s first year in office to be off the mark, in both content and tone. There is an interesting phenomenon within the media that I have noticed ever more in recent years. I refer to it as me too-ism.

A story gets picked up from one media source and is replayed by many more, at times it seems without much reflection,

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A New Golden Age for Labor?

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Maybe. Smart Businesses, Workers, and Unions Will Get It. Others Will Not

 

The New Normal

 Probably the most overused phrase of the past year was “the new normal.” That has been such a hot topic for good reason. Something as fundamentally earth shaking as this pandemic comes along very rarely. To be honest, we haven’t a clue as to what will change fundamentally and at what pace.

Nevertheless, with all the unknowns still shaking out, it appears glaringly obvious that the labor market has changed profoundly, and likely forever. Perhaps the labor shortages we see in so many sectors now will define that new norm for the foreseeable future.

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Odds and Ends Rattling Around of Late

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A Lot of Us are Snowed in Now – It’s a Good Time for Some Assorted Observations

Supreme Court on Vaccination Mandates

 The current Supreme Court looks increasingly less supreme with every ruling. I keep thinking it cannot get worse, but they continue to raise the ante. At least they kept the health care workers mandate in place (barely – by 1 vote).

Gutting the large employer mandate on the basis that OSHA is the wrong agency for such a mandate enforcement is ridiculous. This is what happens when you have a court anchored in rigid ideology rather than real life.

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People are Confused About COVID Guidance?

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 Really, Folks? The Guidance Has Been Pretty Consistent. Changes Match the Changing Virus

The Snivel We Hear

 OK, snivel is admittedly a snarky word to start off this conversation, but it really does seem to me that a lot of people, the media in particular, is regularly crying out that there is so much guidance from so many sources, always in a state of flux. As a result, people are confused and don’t know what is expected of them.

To which I say, Poppycock. Yes, there is a lot of information out there,

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About Birthdays

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Birthdays are Benchmarks of Life, But in Very Different Ways Over the Years

 

Ah, Birthdays

We have a couple of birthdays in our home about now, only 3 weeks apart. That got me to thinking about birthdays. Given the numbers in our case, we are thinking of converting to dog years, to minimize the fire risk with all those candles. Replacing every 7 candles with just 1 seems a prudent safety move, doesn’t it?

Of course, we could also consider the Chinese approach to counting birthdays, starting at conception. Better plan?

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What Would You Put in a Time Capsule?

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The History of These is Fascinating

 

Why Do These Things?

They seem to have some popularity throughout the ages. One could even say they are… timeless.

Time capsules have been in the news lately. Not one, but two were found under a statue of Robert E. Lee that was recently removed in Virginia. Here in my hometown, one was unearthed a few months ago, also from a site that once hosted a statue of a civil war figure.

It is not hard to find news items and historical write ups around the world and through the ages of such capsules being implanted,

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The Good, the Bad and the Hopeful

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A Trimates Reflection on the Past Year

What happened to the optimism that permeated most of America when 2021 dawned? New energy filled our hearts and minds as we confronted a murderous pandemic and began to reinvigorate our economy. Progress was made and national spirits raised. Then a slow drip of opposition became a flood of negativity and the country split into warring camps.

Why? What lies ahead in 2022? We are a diverse group of three (a soldier, a priest, and an advocate). Each has a blog, but we are joining together here as “trimates” to reflect on the past and imagine the year to come.

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It’s Time for a Favorite Holiday

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No, Not That One Next Saturday. The One Today.

 

 Tis the Season – For All Kinds of Celebrations

As has been noted earlier in this space, this seems to be the time of year that people and cultures all over the world choose to celebrate some larger-than-life theme. From Thanksgiving to Christmas to Hannukah to Eid to Kwanza to Diwali, to New Year’s Day, and more.

Something like 19 major holidays are celebrated world-wide in the late NOV-early JAN time frame, and countless more withing individual societies. And that does not even count those like National Doughnut Day or Stout Day!

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Animals in Our Lives, and We in Theirs

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This is as Magic a Relationship as Can Be – If You Have One, Revel In It

Christmas Came a Bit Early in Our Home This Year

The picture you see at the opening of this posting is of Bonnie, the newest member of our family. Bonnie is an 8-year-old border collie who was in need of a new home just about the time we were looking to adopt. The universe lined up, and here we are together. Nice.

Friends who read this blog will know that we lost our beloved Lizzy the Lab a year and a half ago.

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