Winter of Our Discontent

I take my title from Shakespear’s play, Richard III. The main character, Richard, who is about to become king of England. is not a nice person. It is no surprise that he becomes a terrible king. The play is a tragedy (everybody dies). Although the time the play was written (1593) and the time depicted in the play were very different from our political situation today, the politics of power were similar. A few centuries later, another English writer, Lord Acton, said, “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

Although the current political situation in the States is . . . → Read More: Winter of Our Discontent

“What’s a Book, Daddy?”

As I am starting to write this electronic blog, one of the headlines for the day is that one of the principal bookstores in the U.S., Borders, is filing for bankruptcy. Electronic readers—e-readers—are gaining market share. In related stories, Amazon recently announced that Kindle e-book sales have surpassed sales of both hardcover and paperback books. For those of us who have spent a lifetime reading books, the move to “electronic literature” is a bit unsettling. I still have books on my shelves that I read as a college undergraduate. They have moved with me at least eight times and kept . . . → Read More: “What’s a Book, Daddy?”

Details

One of the things NLP teaches is that details are important. Details have always been important, of course, but they are often overlooked. A TV show I saw recently had a couple of detectives enter a mosque to talk to the Imam. He has them leave their shoes in the entryway. We see them remove their shoes, and we watch the female detective use her shawl to cover her head. We watch them have their chat with the Imam, and then we watch them leave the mosque without stopping to put their shoes back on before hitting the cold and . . . → Read More: Details