The current spectacle of angry mobs fulminating against government by using degrading images and violent language to incite others has its echo in the past. Using the poor, disenfranchised and minorities as targets embedded in a protest against government is eerily familiar, harkening back to... Continue

If there is a heaven, and many believe there is, it has a hot tub. Three hundred years ago there were perhaps ten or twenty people in the entire world, kings and queens all, who at any hour day or night could lower themselves into... Continue

The financial demographic of America was displayed to me recently through the juxtaposition of two illuminated scrolling posters displayed on the side of a Plexiglas transit shelter on East 72nd Street in New York City. One poster promoted Charles Schwab, the “Talk to Chuck” stock... Continue

Our granddaughter Isabelle is now two years old, speaking in sentences and learning how to work with the world. Along the line she started calling others “honey,” most likely because that’s what she’s been called; either that or in a past life she was a... Continue

Separating an object into component parts and then ascribing that object’s existence to the coming together of those parts is reflected in the way most of us conceptualize the world. We call this reductionism, and from one perspective it is correct. For example, taking an... Continue

I never expected to feel upset about banks. Growing up, I was taught that banks were places where you put your money into a “savings account” and over time it would accumulate. The bank paid something called “interest” which added more money to the savings... Continue

My old man, he’s a corker, always ready with the comeback line. Take the time we were at the airport; he’s in a wheel chair being pushed by a hyper-active airport employee and I’m power-walking alongside while lugging my Eddie Bauer bag from the gate... Continue

We tend to classify events into those that are good and those that are bad, the reference point being our own well-being. When things happen that we don’t like, when the world seems terribly unfair, we wonder why bad things happen to good people, good... Continue

I received a letter in the mail the other day, a nondescript white envelope from my credit card company. It was the sort of envelope I’d usually toss into the recycling figuring it just contained special offers on merchandise purchasable for all the points my... Continue