Joe Heller is right, though obviously we can’t buy everything that we’re going to need over the next four years between now and January 20. On the other hand, part of the strategy of hunkering down until the worst is over might include rushing to lock in any major purchases you had in mind. Our […]
When we were reading Hamlet junior year, the professor asked why there was the gravedigger scene, and we all dutifully responded about easing the tension, to which he said, “Shakespeare had a clown in his troupe and had to write something for him.” I don’t know if I accept that, but for either reason, here’s […]
Brace yourself, Willie. Here comes a flood, and it’s not just special sauce. Granted, I posted a David Rowe version yesterday, but that’s the advantage he gets with a 15-hour time difference between Sydney and New York: He slipped in ahead of the crowd. Jack Ohman — Smerconish Pat Bagley Phil Hands Nick Anderson — […]
I’ve often quoted a frustrated exclamation that pops up in commedia dell’arte plays, “I cannot tell if he is a knave or a fool!” The laughs in the farce are based in large part on it not being clear whether the harlequin is lying or truly believes the nonsense he spouts. It hardly matters, because […]
Reading Alex requires you to recognize the strict compliance requirements in the British workplace, but this one works anywhere because the IRS similarly allows you to write off business lunches, including alcoholic beverages, but with rules, including that things not get too “lavish and expensive.” Being able to write off a large, expensive bottle of […]
At the risk of sounding like an incompetent, unpatriotic university president, I think context matters, and Jefferson’s oft-quoted remark about government without newspapers versus newspapers without government deserves some. He was writing specifically about Shay’s Rebellion, but he might have been writing about January 6, except that, while Washington had political opponents, most hard-core Tories […]
I wish I didn’t like Megan Herbert‘s commentary so much. Advent calendars have become so commercialized that it’s not easy to find ones that just offer a small picture of a candy cane or something similarly of the season, hearkening back to a time when we were excited by the approach of Christmas but more […]
Ah, if only it were as simple as this! David Horsey is being sarcastic, because, of course, the destruction of the temple and the dispersal of Jews from the Holy Lands didn’t end the crisis of the Diaspora. The problem is that, while that event was cataclysmic, it was not definitive. That is, it’s a […]
It can’t get much simpler than Megan Herbert‘s illustration. We know what human rights are, and we claim to respect and revere them, and yet we consistently fail to provide them. It’s a bit like the way we save money: We know we should and we certainly want to, and we fully intend to and […]
I’m going to assume — given lead time for comic strips — that this Taylor Swift reference in Brewster Rockit (Tribune) is coincidental, but it fits well with the sudden explosion of geezers discovering the existence of someone who has been a major phenomenon for a decade and a half. And it fits particularly well […]
Offer to make dinner. Offer to rub her shoulders. Just don’t offer advice. You’re stepping on a rake. Daddy’s Home (Creators) demonstrates something I learned from Deborah Tannen’s 1986 book, That’s Not What I Meant, an analysis of men’s and women’s conversational styles that has since been echoed and confirmed, though mostly by other feminist […]
Scott Stantis (Counterpoint) notes another rate hike at the post office, but I’m not fretting over it. I don’t like how the USPS is being kicked around by the privatizers who would love to turn it over to their pals at UPS and Fedex, but the rise in postal rates doesn’t bother me. Well, at […]
Having waded through the Coronation (mostly, see below), National Cartoonist’s Day, Cinco de Mayo and the Kent State Anniversary, we’re left with today’s demonstration of Wretched Excess, the Kentucky Derby. Marc Murphy not only reminds us that Derby Day is a celebration of slavery but, in his comments, links to the author of an excellent […]
I’m with Katy in today’s Adam@Home. We haven’t had actual snow here lately but we’ve only had two days of warm sunshiny weather so far and even the warmish days that might have come close have, instead, featured cold winds. It might as well be March. However, the birds are back, including the cormorants, as […]
First, this commercial, or anti-commercial, from Joy of Tech. I’m a Windows kind of guy, so I wouldn’t have known this, but Apple is getting into banking, and offering some impressive interest rates. As this article suggests, their 4.15% rate is better than traditional banks are offering and may spark banks to raise their current […]