This short monthly post is meant to be a postscript to a longer essay I wrote nine years ago, which focuses on two “big picture” aspects of Thanksgiving. I just re-read it, and I don’t think I’d change a word. Please take a minute to read the earlier post, Why Thanksgiving?, and then come back. Within the framework of that larger perspective, in November, 2024, I now want to be specific about several people and events for which I am particularly thankful. Although our large family has some...
It’s twelve days before the 2024 Presidential election, so as I write this monthly post I have no idea who the winner will be. But if Donald Trump is elected, itwill be mostly because he has a huge, loyal following, but in part because many Democratic policies of the last decades have been so stupid and so dangerous, defying common sense, that they make any flawed but more conservative candidate seem attractive to a lot of independent-minded voters of both parties. And a corollary to that...
Everything has become way too complicated. I understand it will usually be that way in science, engineering, and technology, but I’m focused here on our personal lives and on national programs and policies. Instead of adding amendments, clarifications and exemptions to direct almost every aspect of government action and our personal behavior, let’s cut to the simplest way to get something done, without trying to rig the outcomes. It will take some courage, but here are some initial ideas to...
This is a bit of an unusual post for me. As always, I want it to be informative and filled with truth. But this post begins with a dream. I dreamed that a year ago both of the self-centered old men finally got out of the Presidential race to become the Elder Statesmen of their respective parties. They were then able to share advice and to weigh in with opinions, while letting the next generation of potential leaders battle it out in the primaries to define the best ideas and the best talent to...
Can we agree that both parties are offering candidates with some less-than-perfect personality traits, and that both parties have lied on numerous occasions? If that’s the case, then how does one decide how to vote in November? I suggest by looking beyond the personalities and the accusations, and focusing instead on the policies that each party supports, which usually are written down, straight forward, and hard to lie about. Another reason to do so is that it is these policies, if and when...
This post has two parts: The Big Picture, and then Application. I’m a slow learner. I finally had an epiphany about what specifically bothers me so much about DEI—Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. I’m a huge fan of Diversity. It’s one of our nation’s greatest strengths, and we all benefit from interactions with diverse people-types, backgrounds, characters and arguments. The main reason I like Diversity is because we don’t create it—God does. From the color of our skin and our gender to our...
Several months ago this post began as research for what I hope will be a fifth novel. The action in that story will take place in the near future, when the negative effects of a National Debt “death spiral” begin to impact everyday families and businesses. I wish the following were also fiction, but unfortunately it will be quite real. “The current levels of National Debt and of Budget Deficits are unsustainable.” We read that sentence a lot, but what does it actually mean? This may be the...
This post has two audiences. For those who’ve known my writing for a while, I’m simply adding my mostly-monthly blog posts to a new platform: Substack, which has enhanced capabilities for organizing and communicating. If you don’t know me, I very much enjoy writing novels, because truth wrapped in a good story can be transformative; but I’m a slow writer and need a way to express my thoughts on current issues while slugging away on a novel’s intricacies. Hence, these posts, which began in 2010...
Let me stipulate up front that this post contains several generalizations which I know do not apply to everyone in every case described. But focus with me on the larger picture, and I hope you will find the generalizations to be useful, as well as the many embedded reference links. Given my history in Russia and Ukraine in the early days of commercial real estate, friends often ask me why the Russian people don’t stand up more to the obvious lies and terrible consequences of Putin’s war on...
We are collectively dealing with too many unnecessary social disasters. Henry Hazlitt called these disasters the inevitable result of focusing on the immediate and the isolated, rather than on the long term and the whole. Others call them unintended consequences. Parents warn about them by saying to their children, “From my experience, you should be more careful, because here’s what’s going to happen…” In Hazlitt’s short book, Economics in One Lesson, he wrote in Chapter 15: “In studying the...
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