Harvey Weinstein. Bill Cosby. Roy Moore. The list of men disgraced (finally) by their assumption of male privilege over the bodies of women grew for months. So much so that it was hardly news when another man harassed his way onto the list. After Cosby, whom many of us had thought of as “America’s dad,” […]
The Countryman
There's more to the South than prejudice and accents
“Honey,” the telephone operator in Nashville told my wife, “y’all dahllin’ too fayast.” That was Marilyn’s welcome to the South. On her first day at work at the Graduate School of Management at Vanderbilt University, her calls didn’t go through. So she called the operator, who said to slow down her dialing finger. Remember rotary […]
Mitch McConnell makes it clear moral fitness does not matter
When Mitch McConnell, majority leader of the U.S. Senate, accused those questioning the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court of playing politics with the nomination, his was the voice of experience. For me, it was McConnell’s third strike. Actually, it was after the third strike, but you’re only allowed three strikes. To be […]
Numbness of number-ness
What can be more precise than numbers? Ten is 10. No argument. But Brooks Hamilton, my colleague at the University of Maine, used to grumble that journalists were too often dazzled by numbers. We had been taught to be as precise as possible in writing news. That often meant throw in some numbers, even if […]
Let the madness begin
For the next 51 days, we’ll be in the midst of Silly Season, the biennial statewide election campaign. You’ll see and hear things you don’t see and hear the rest of the time. Silly as it may seem at times, the election is sacred to our democracy. If we have a civic equivalent to attending […]
Democracy needs more tribes to survive
At age 72, the only quickness about her was the speed of the arthritis overtaking her body. She had to use a walker, but she was determined to participate in two rituals, holding her new grandson and hurrahing with her tribe. In July 1972, my mother flew from Florida to North Carolina, then rode with […]
Surviving suicide
When a friend’s son committed suicide, she told me she had read that people killing themselves want to kill at least one other person, likely the person closest to them. When my father killed himself in 1950, he may not have killed anyone else — each survivor might wonder who was the other person he […]
On balance, a human and a hero
The photo shows a youngish John McCain, wearing the three-day growth of beard that so many guys flash these days. The caption reads: “The Last Republican, 1936-2018.” If McCain wasn’t the last Republican, he may have been the last of what we traditional-minded people think of as a Republican. Cautious, practical, steadfast, cooperative. My kind […]
Consider the consequences first
Waiting for a trolley at the 30th Street station in Philadelphia, I saw two clumps of weeds pushing up through the rock ballast and over the creosoted crossties, seeking sunshine and water to stay alive. That put me in mind of my father, now dead for nearly 68 years. If these brainless shreds of grass, […]
Can the church turn shame to hope?
The news last week of Catholic priests defiling children in Pennsylvania should have shocked us. But many of us may be beyond shock. Haven’t we seen all this before? Well, in a way, yes. This was the 11th report by a grand jury or attorney general detailing sexual abuse of children and young adults by […]