What Have We Done to the Rain?

When Joan Baez recorded that song, the fear was that the testing of nuclear weapons was releasing so much radioactivity into the atmosphere that living things (including humans) would be adversely affected. We don’t yet know, of course, the degree to which living things might have been (or are being) influenced by the radioactivity, but—so far, at least—we haven’t had any major biological disasters (that we know of). The current fears about the climate are based primarily on what has been global climate change” or Global Warming And it certainly seems as though our climate has been . . . → Read More: What Have We Done to the Rain?

What a Week

The impetus for this blog is the recent spate of race-based violence we have experienced following the deaths of Philando Castile and Alton Sterling. The history of the US has, of course, a long record of race-based violence. How could it be otherwise when slavery was present from our earliest days. It is easy to forget, for example, that the White House was built by slave labor.

I am old enough to remember early TV news coverage of what were deemed “race riots” in the 1950s and ’60s. The principal minorities in the town where I grew up (Los . . . → Read More: What a Week

Are We There Yet?

The question, “Are we there yet,” is a cliché of traveling with children. We expect adults, even those grown weary with traveling, to have a better understanding of how long it takes to get from Point A to Point B. This blog entry is about our collective journey from racism to a “postracial” culture. It was prompted by recent events in Ferguson, Missouri, following yet another police shooting of an unarmed black teenager. The policeman, as is usually the case, was white. One such shooting isn’t the real issue, of course. The problem is that this one was just one . . . → Read More: Are We There Yet?