The Spanish Civil War of 1936-39 has always been somewhat a mystery to me, very often misunderstood, more often mischaracterized, and the players and factions were very confusing. It was, of course, a precursor to the main event, World War II, with Germany and the Soviet Union using it as a proxy for their respective […]
Archives for July 2012
The Genesis Particle?
A very intriguing story is unfolding this week with the announcement of the probable discovery of the Higgs boson by the scientists managing the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), made possible by its Large Hadron Collider on the French-Swiss border. I’m way over my head here in the physics, but I have read enough […]
Compounding Lawlessness
Those who would change a culture corrupt its language, particularly by hiding the reality of an evil they desire behind a less revealing name. — Politics and the English Language, George Orwell. I thought about Orwell’s quote when I recently caught an exchange between two friends and fellow CNN contributors on the terms we use […]
The Obamacare Decision
In the first 48 hours after the surprising Supreme Court decision in the Obamacare case, after recovering from the initial shock, I was prepared to give Chief Justice John Roberts a break, the benefit of doubt about his intentions and rationale. I drank some of the cool aid from the conservative bloggers about the genius, […]