A recent email to me from a frequent correspondent right after the SVB/Signature bank failures criticized some conservative news sources for blaming the banks’ problems on being “woke.” And he asked what does being woke even mean? He wrote: “Being ‘woke’ doesn’t mean anything except to right wingers and boomers. And no bank fails because of being ‘woke.’ They failed because of basic poor asset-liability management due to no supervision and being able to borrow billions from short-term...
I want to share my thoughts on the two ends of a conceptual telescope I will call “Character." Not character like someone in a novel, but as with: The aggregate of features and traits that form the individual nature of some person or thing. Qualities of honesty, courage, or the like; integrity. Reputation. Good repute. (Character Definition & Meaning | Dictionary.com) At the larger end of the Character telescope is the big picture view of our nation's Virtue that everyone can see. For...
In the space of just four hours last week two different friends mentioned to me the article “Complications of the Ukraine War” by Christopher Caldwell in Hillsdale College’s monthly newsletter, Imprimis. Complications of the Ukraine War | Imprimis (hillsdale.edu). I perk up at those kinds of coincidences, and I’d already read the article, which lays out several reasons why Mr. Caldwell believes the United States is significantly responsible for Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, due to our past...
This month, just before the Midterm Elections, I’m focused on the perfect storm created by the intersection of three disastrous forces running amok in our nation today. I wrote about the first force back in 2013, in “What We Don’t See is Killing Us”—I hope you will take a moment to read it, because it sets the stage for what is to follow. In that post, I extolled the writings of Henry Hazlitt on Economics, and particularly his observation that policies always have two effects: immediate and...
Several years ago my friend and teacher, Ken Boa, in his Wednesday morning Bible Study, mentioned how Moses, in Psalm 90, instructs us to number our days for a specific purpose. “Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” (v. 12) Just before that, in verse 10, Moses states that it’s reasonable to expect a lifespan of 70 years, but we might make it to 80. “Our days may come to seventy years, or eighty, if our strength endures;” After thinking about it a bit, and already...
We all occasionally reflect on the larger decisions we’ve made, and on how those choices have impacted us. Like where we decided to go to school, our first and subsequent career moves, and whom to marry. Today, at age seventy-five, I want to reflect on the decisions I’ve made and the opportunities I’ve followed that, at the time, seemed like no big deal; but then, looking back, have had a profound impact on virtually every aspect of my life, and on others, over a long period. I call those...
This month I have another Summer Quick-Post on a few problems, the solutions to which seem so obvious to me that either I am a simpleton, or the ruling class makes everything far too complicated (to try to stay in power?). Here they are: 1.There are millions of people desperately braving the worst possible conditions to get to America across our wide open and therefore dangerous southern border, mostlyhoping to work for their families. And there are millions of jobs going unfilled in America,...
The confluence of Father’s Day and my 75th birthday within two days of each other this year reminded me of the power of families, and of the key role of fathers in the family. My father turned 75 in 1993, when I was 46. Like all of us, he was imperfect. But he was faithful, loyal, and loving. If he had a motto, it was “Always Do the Right Thing.” He put himself through Georgia Tech after the Depression and then fought in World War II. His father was in the first class at the Auburn University...
I don’t have an erudite solution to a pithy issue this month. I really don’t even want to look for one. Perhaps like you right now, I find myself pulled down by events and headlines. The world is unhinged, and the headlines are not good. Evil seems to be on the rise. And not just bad actions, like the terrible revelations of sexual abuse by trusted leaders in the Southern Baptist Convention. No, Evil associated with human beings choosing to kill other human beings. Putin’s unprovoked attack on...
This month’s post will probably be labeled by many as right up there with Don Quixote's "Impossible Dream", but I still have faith in people, and so I'm going to write it anyway. It's addressed to everyone, and particularly to Woke, secular progressives, who think the Judeo-Christian foundations of our nation’s laws and principles are not important today. They are. Please follow this argument: The terrible, destructive impact of Evil, always present but usually doubted by modern thinkers, has...
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