Puffin’s Place

[Read more →]

So Obama is going to toss a celebration of the 40th anniversary of the Stillwell riots. Hmm. That’s about like intoning, “Some of my best friends are gay” while festooning the White House with rainbow tissue paper.
It’s easy. Creates no discord or risk. Puts one on the side of the angels without risk of having [...]

[Read more →]

These post-election days are not as fiery as those before the vote, but I find myself unable to resist the temptation to come back and launch more regular words into Grand Canyon.
Thinking today, for example, of how I feel about Barack Obama.
I am daily proud of his demeanor and restraint. I applaud him for not [...]

[Read more →]

The more often Americans go to church, the more likely they are to support the torture of suspected terrorists, according to a new survey.
The Washington Region Religious Campaign Against Torture rallied on Capitol Hill in March 2008.
The Washington Region Religious Campaign Against Torture rallied on Capitol Hill in March 2008.
More than half of people who [...]

[Read more →]

The New York Times international edition includes info on the released torture memos as well as links to additional relevant info, including originals at the ACLU site.
Check it out here.

[Read more →]

[Read more →]

The current flogging of the torture issue may very well drive this blogger to a scream: the loathsome and without scruples Dick Cheney says such treatment called forth city-saving intelligence. Others argue that other, legal means would have had equal success.
And both side fog endlessly about who bears the ultimate responsibility: those who carry out [...]

[Read more →]

I’ll be returning to this blog regularly very shortly, but did want to jump in for a couple of quick thoughts.
Reading Christpher Hitchens’ God is Not Great recently and want to share a delicious last line: “We have first to transcend our prehistory, and escape the gnarled hands which reach out to drag us back [...]

[Read more →]

Yes, we have a president. And a first lady. And a first family. And the the bushes have made way for trees.

[Read more →]

Ann Coulter is a great example of casual cruelty. One wonders what pleasure she gets out of such ugly unpleasantness as that she fired at the incoming President’s wife the other night. One ought to be sorry for her, I suppose, but I would rather like to introduce her to a filled kitty litter box.
Israel: [...]

[Read more →]