Capra-corn and the life of our time
There’s a quote about Carl Jung that I’ve come across a couple of times and shamelessly stolen every chance I’ve had: “We live a double life whether we know it or not. We live...
Author: Lisa Kramer
World’s Greatest Deliberative Body
Fantastic article on the modern Senate by George Packer – it’s a long one, but well worth the full read for those who have the time. For the totally inadequate, bullet-point version, Packer blames...
For the democratic process…
Let me start out by saying that had I been a California voter in 2008, I would’ve voted against Prop 8. Period. Easy choice. As a self-described traditionalist, I support same-sex marriage because I...
Sam Smith’s Progressive Populists
Serves me right… go on vacation, miss a bunch of fun realignment posts. Anyway, I’m still sorting though and catching up, but I do hope to have some more complete thoughts on the subject...
The Outsider Elite
Interesting article about the “grassroots” nature of Obama’s Organizing for America: [Organizing for America] also holds online strategy sessions, offering supporters the chance to “join the discussion,” “interact,” and “ask questions.” But amid the...
Is winning everything? (for an athlete)
I’m not much of a basketball fan – correction, I’m not a basketball fan at all – but the heavily-reported saga of Lebron James’ free agency has struck a bit of a chord with...
Honor and the past
This might be the most ridiculous article to which I’ve ever taken the time to respond. Seriously, I keep pausing and deleting, as though I was about to draw a larger lesson from an...
Pork and Deliberation
After the news of Senator Robert Byrd’s death broke this morning, I exchanged a couple of text messages with my brother. In one of them, he wrote that Byrd’s “style of governance has been...
Another casualty of the recession…
From The Los Angeles Times: Maywood, a small working-class community south of downtown Los Angeles, plans to lay off all its employees, disband its Police Department and turn over its entire municipal operations to...
Matt Bai’s strange populism
Couple of pieces caught my attention this week, the first on a “new American populism” by Matt Bai, and the second, a response by Michael Kazin: Bai: Most Democrats, after all, persist in embracing...
The South, realignment, and the consistency of political parties
I just got back from a family reunion in the South, specifically, the North Carolina/Tennessee mountain region. It really is a breathtakingly beautiful part of the country. In part because of my family roots,...
Work, as a financial reality: The lesson of Norma Rae
It’s hard to pinpoint a year more emblematic of second-wave feminism and its emphasis on career than 1979. In popular entertainment, The Mary Tyler Moore show had concluded its seven-year run only two years...
Senioritis
Response to E.D.: I’ve felt for a while that the pendulum was starting to swing and that cracking the teachers unions would soon become an issue that lacked ideological definition (I compare it to...
Greetings from a Loyal Democrat
I’ve been invited to contribute here at the League of Ordinary Gentlemen, even though, as you can tell from my name, I don’t quite fit the “gentleman” label. That aside, I’m proud to join...
