As an anti-drug slogan, “just say no” was pretty lame in that it totally ignored the difficult psychology of why people, especially teenagers, do drugs and what it takes to counteract those influences.  But as an explanation of why President Obama and the Democratic Party seem poised to suffer a loss of their majority in […]

Congress recently passed a bill that includes the establishment of a Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection, designed to prevent the kinds of consumer debt so many consumers took on during the recent housing bubble, with mortgages they had no hope of paying for without continuously increasing borrowing, ostensibly made possible by the theoretically ever-increasing value […]

Two issues involving the Muslim religion — the so-called “ground zero mosque” and the Koran burning in Florida — have recently dominated the news and have been linked by commentators and politicians as though they are issues in common.  In fact, both do revolve around Muslims and both share the protection of our Constitution (despite […]

Every so often, I come across an article that echoes things I have been writing about and does so with less angst and a nicer, more reasonable tone.  So I pass this one along, by Timothy Egan in The New York Times, in the hope that his kinder, gentler argument will add to mine. Building […]

We’ve called him a “maestro” and an “oracle” and a “guru”.  The media adored him, the U.S. Congress genuflected before him, and the world of finance — Wall Street, the investment and commercial bankers, the funders and advisors of mergers and acquisitions, the hedge fund managers, and the boardrooms of America  — revered him as […]

It is clear that a ridiculous number of Americans believe that President Obama is a Muslim, not a Christian.  But when you break down the numbers, an interesting pattern emerges. A survey by the Pew Research Center has just shown that in a variety of demographic, political and religious groups, only among Republicans do more […]

We’ve often heard the expression “no one is above the law” which usually means that even those in the most powerful positions in society must be held accountable if they act illegally. Actually, I think everyone should be above the law, by which I mean that we should conduct ourselves according to a higher standard […]

During the more than forty years that I spent in advertising, I have on many occasions found myself having to defend it from popular culture’s depiction of the integrity and socioeconomic benefits of advertising as somewhat below that of used-car and insurance salesmen. The recent television show, “Mad Men” has only further lowered this opinion. […]

It is difficult to look at America today and not react with great cynicism. A Congress of clowns paralyzes our country.  Our political parties have splintered into groups characterized at one end of the spectrum by ignorant fanatics who can’t understand that without government, there is only chaos and no country, and at the other […]

February 22, 2010 marked the fourth consecutive year since U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas asked any questions of any lawyer arguing either side of any issue during oral presentations of cases to the court. Some observers think Justice Thomas’ silence offers relief from the often self-serving, time-wasting questions put by his colleagues.  Maybe so, […]