Press "Enter" to skip to content

Public Citizen

Tearing the ties that bind

What's to be done when those we love and care about become the potential agents of our own demise? This pandemic presents us with an entirely foreign situation in America, where we have been largely spared the horror and pathos of war and the intimate... Continue

America’s not ready

Super Tuesday appears to have provided the likely answer to the question of who will be the Democratic Party’s candidate for President this November, and it ain’t Bernie Sanders. Despite his win in California, the combined votes for Biden and Bloomberg in this state outweighs... Continue

The growth paradox

Life on planet earth is a complex, adaptive system programmed for growth. Thus despite periodic major extinctions over its long history, earth continues to be populated by millions of species of plants and animals which have variously adapted to a wide range of habitats and... Continue

The problem of evil

As I see it, evil is the willful infliction of pain and suffering on others. It's been with us for a very long time, and will continue to plague humanity into the future. Although people have wrestled with the problem of evil in various ways... Continue

The homelessness Tsunami

Sonoma County estimates 3,000 people are homeless in the county, and is struggling to respond to this human crisis. $11 million was recently allocated by the Board of Supervisors, this largely in response to a homeless camp now occupying the Joe Rodota trail in the... Continue

Accessory Dwelling Units — a building industry dream come true

"We'll make you big money by renting your backyard, and it won't cost you a dime!" So advertise backyard lease, development, and property management companies in the process of aggregating an ADU portfolio. Promoted as a solution to California's affordable housing crisis, new ADU regulations... Continue

Progress at all costs?

A recent article in The Atlantic about seabed mining points out that the metals targeted for collection include copper, manganese, nickel, and cobalt, all used in the production of batteries. The impetus for this sudden industrialization of the ocean bottom, in part, is carbon emissions,... Continue

1967 and the death of Groovy

1967 was one hell of a year. I'll try to make it short. It broke open in February, six weeks into my second semester at Rhode Island School of Design; the art school administration, in an attempt to purge hippies, used rule 153.b. in the... Continue

Homage to The Great Waveform

While enjoying my daily five-mile walk I found myself attending to each foot coming into contact with the ground, and reflecting on the nature of densely-packed space, as Buddhists refer to matter. That ancient Buddhists determined that solid-appearing matter is mostly space, albeit densely-packed, is... Continue

A not so grand theory of herstory

History is written by the victor, and for the past 10,000 years that victor has been men. Accordingly, history (his story) concerns itself with power-based theories of patriarchal social order: styles of rulership, the role of warfare, and economic systems. Herstory (not his story) is... Continue