Four noxious bills — SB50, SB1279, SB330, SB592 — are currently up for debate and vote in the California State Legislature, an august body completely dominated by Democrats. For anyone who continues to operate under the misapprehension that there’s a substantive difference between the two major mafias — sorry, political parties — this quartet of...
The grave necessity of Paul Pierson and Jacob Hacker’s book, Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer–and Turned Its Back on the Middle Class, was never clearer than the 2012 elections, in which citizens were presented with a “choice” between two competitie sub-brands of The Money Party monopoly. If you’re pro-war, pro-assassination, pro-bribery and...
CLIMATE STRIKE WEEK at MICHAELKONIK.com, 9-15-21 In the days preceding the storm of the century, two candidates running for President of the United States strenuously assured voters that they would pump more crude, frack more natural gas, and burn more coal than the other guy. Whether or not an energy policy built on a fossil-fuel...
This Tuesday (October 23) there’ll be a fourth Presidential Debate held at the Chicago Hilton and moderated by wizened celebrity interlocutor Larry King. Didn’t hear about it? That’s because it’s not being broadcast on any television network – the debate is being streamed on the Internet – and neither Mitt Romney nor Barack Obama will...
Last week the Democrats had their convention. This week it’s the Republican’s turn. Much speechifying has and will be done, and some of it might cause those not yet irredeemably cynical to feel the frisson of uplift and inspiration. The powerful and transitive word “change” has and will be employed with a promiscuity befitting folks...
Hope RekindledThis past week has given us more hope for our diseased republic than any other time in 50+ years of paying attention. Observing and participating in a long-overdue peaceful uprising, occupying the streets, feeling the righteous energy of people of all ages, colors, faiths, and wealth (or lack thereof), has…
Clarinetist Glenn Dickson, master of klezmer, has made a solo recording, “Wider Than the Sky,” that’s been on perpetual repeat at our home office. Using over-dubs and electronic digital effects, Dickson fills the aural soundscape with a rich melange of chordal textures supporting the melody. His celebrated virtuosity is subsumed here to long, elegiac musical...
