From The Times December 12, 2008 Look up tonight for a spectacular treat in the sky Biggest full moon for years enhanced by shooting stars Paul Simons If the full moon tonight looks unusually large, it is not your imagination – it is the biggest and brightest full moon to be seen for 15 years. Each month the Moon makes a full orbit around the Earth in a slightly oval-shaped path, and tonight it will swing by the Earth at its closest distance, or perigee. It will pass by 356,613km (221,595 miles)...

There’s an apocryphal story told in our neck of the woods… When the men came shuffling home after the auto plant closed suddenly that day– without prior notice to the workers– many of the factory men had left their cars at the plant… They were in the midst of purchasing a family sedan, but now, suddenly without jobs, with not even a remote prospect of a job in auto manufacturing ever again, the naturalized USA citizens who’d escaped Poland, Hungary, Lithuania,...

Most persons are not Democrats or Republicans. They’re more like a car engine: cylinders made in the USA, valves made offshore in the Marquesas, rotors made in Mexico… in other words a mix. And somehow, it all works pretty well together. Much of the time. Take this mini political quiz and find out your mix. Brought to you in the interests of taking a semi-rational break from our daily psychosis of pursuing breaking-news politics. P.S. according to this quiz I seem to be a centrist with...

There is story told by the old people about the wages of lusting for gold… Regarding the Conquest of Mexico: The conquistadores, were not as many think, Spanish only, but rather a group of mercenaries from Greece, Spain and Italy with quite a few mongrel types thrown in… all sailing under the flags of the Spanish king and queen with one mission only: get gold, get slaves, loot property, murder whoever resists, and what you do otherwise to please yourself with women, men and children,...

Another conglomerate who bought up newspapers. Prestige in owning Pulitzer Prize winning writers who work for your papers, will be a thing of the past soon. The Rocky Mountain News had four Pulitzers in the last few years. No prophylactic against anything, sadly. We all know what it means, I think, when a company says ‘we don’t comment on that.’ Especially a news organization that’s supposed to be forthcoming about NEWS. As Holden Caulfield would say, fer Chrissakes. By Richard...

(If you like, see on page 2 of this story, old tale called, “The King Who Demanded Too Much Tribute without Having Earned It By His Good Works” “Election 2008, RIP, The Death of Newspapers” That was the headline I wrote in Aug 2008, and the text for that TMV article is in the CODA below. (I never finished that article because a loved one of our family was suddenly diagnosed with an horrible terminal disease. Day and night then, hospital became focus of all life.) It’s...

Scripps, owner of The Rocky Mountain News, has put the Denver paper up for sale. The Rocky (tabloid size, like the Chi Sun,) is one of the two long-term news rags in Denver, the other, The Denver Post (full sheet). The Rocky tended to lean left, the Post tended to lean right… though frankly both were pretty well-balanced, giving voice to many disparate views… and differing most on their editorial pages written by anon. Over the years there have been a few blood fights between the two...

From Lin, who is trying to survive in Zimbabwe. Along with others on that patch of earth, with few resources, defending against men with rifles who lust for money offered by those who sell, not cocaine, not opium, but another addictive substance: the superstition of aphrodisiacs. Her story arrived in my mailbox this evening via a friend who has been to Zimbabwe many times, and knows Lin and her husband, Clive… “That Lonely Thorn Tree” by Lin Barrie Tuesday 11th November, 2008. Sometimes...

Tell me why, how. I myself, run out of ideas, words, concepts when I try to understand the unrelieved ugly. I came to my desk to write about two persons murdered in Mumbai, Alan Scherr and his daughter Naomi, age 13… he a meditation teacher and astrologer and his daughter an irrepressible, lively soul. They belonged to a group called Synchronicity Community, which seems an offshoot of transcendental meditation. I’ve dear spiritual family in Mumbai for 30 some years now, and yet I have...

Rabbi Gabriel and Rifka Holtzberg Have Been Murdered, and There Will be a Strong-Gentle Young Leader Rising up in the East….but he is only two years old now… His young mother, Rifka, which is Hebrew for Rebecca, and means ‘to bind,’ as in to hold together, to wrap round with protection, and with love, to keep together, as in keeping family close, binding as in a promise, a promise that is a debt of honor to love no matter what, to hold the binding made of love’s sinew....

UPDATE …a few moments before Attorney General Mukasey fainted at the podium during his speech last night, he had been attempting to give “a stinging rebuke to intellectuals and others who ‘have viciously criticized’ the Bush Admin” saying their arguments are completely untethered to Legal Reality. When Mukasey said he had been criticized for his stances and for defending the Bush Administration, a man in the audience called out loudly for all to hear: “Tyrant!...

A statement from Department of Justice just released says about Mr. Mukasey who is 67 years young/old: “The Attorney General is conscious, conversant and alert. His vital statistics are strong and he is in good spirits. He is receiving excellent care and appreciates all of the good wishes and prayers he has received. The doctors will keep him overnight for further observations.” OK then, maybe just a blot of mustard, an under-done bit of potato… that would be great news for his...

Attorney General Michael Mukasey collapsed tonight while giving a speech to the Federalist Society in Washington, according to three senior administration officials. Details about Mukasey’s condition were not immediately available at 8:40 Pm MST. The film clip of Mr. Mukasey at the podium shows him wearing his glasses and in full formal business dress, talking away and suddenly slowing down, pausing, his head begins to lower toward his chest and it appears as the tape went to black that the...

According to Fox news, the Pentagon’s computer network has been breached, but to what extent is not clear. Unnamed sources are speaking about ‘a devastating virus.’ Orders have been given to cease using all phone drives and other external drives. One wonders about what billy goat gruff has not been leaving his/ her dorm while eating delivery pizza for breakfast, lunch and dinner…and plotting how to un-knit the five-armed sweater … a/k/a: the Pentagon’s electronic...

I hope during a season of so serious news and push-pull, this will make you laugh. Long ago, the American Psychological Association looked askance and considered it a breach of ethics for shrinks to psychologically advise callers on the radio. Dr. Laura has been grieved against in many states for ‘practicing without a license via radio’ in the state the program is heard. Except Calif, where last I heard, she had gotten a marriage and family license from the state. Before Dr. L., there...

The innocent; the children, the old people, the young policemen lying in their own blood, the relatives made instantly insane with grief. Seeing/ knowing of these events, I’d like to humbly suggest an exhortation for us all. The exhortation starts with “Never never never never ever ever ever …” then, you please personally fill in the blank with whatever will preserve your sanity whilst allowing you to keep speaking up, acting up, never standing down about egregious matters....

This is a clip of the opening of the pow wow at The Smithsonian … you will see some of my friends who are Veterans being the honored carriers of the United States flag. The veterans are most often in the front rows of the grand entry. Then will come the veteran’s honor dance, one of many this night… honor truly, because they carry proudly the American flag under which their own ancestors were murdered and persecuted. Even so: The American flag is given prominence over all the...

The last 18 months of rumor-mongering used to denigrate candidates and persons in general, especially innuendo that is untrue and not attributed to actual witnesses with actual names… all this has generated much fatigue amongst fair-minded people. But, today there is a new rumor, and one I sincerely hope is true, for it might be good for us all. The whispers are the Obama may appoint ” A Car Czar,”… a smart, insightful person to be in charge of development of different forms...

The Walking Wounded What can be done for the literally quarter million homeless vets wandering the highways and byways of our country, those who often walk miles every day and who have feet that look like bleeding lumber? The issue of homeless vets appears to be similar somehow to poverty in pockets of Appalachia, the poverty in the outback of the Navajo Reservation and up to Rosebud… the abject poverty through much of the tobacco belt in the South. So much resource is thrown at it all....

Makeba was the person who opened up “world music” to the majority of the western world. I wonder how many people currently listening to some of the newer singers and groups out of Africa/ India/ South America/ China / Russia / etc. realize it was people like Miriam Makeba that opened up the minds and hearts of people worldwide and made their hearts clamor for more. Quote from Ghostdreams, a music follower and lover. “[I] spent two years in Rhodesia just as the country was becoming...

Whose Shoulders Does Obama Really Stand Upon? Not Reverend Wright’s. Not all the old lefties cum bomb-planners who have faded. No, Obama stands on the shoulders of these brave souls who are most often forgotten by name, rarely referred to in media or by politicians, but souls, both black and white, who literally laid down their lives so that people of all colors could continually strive to implement new ways to live together without one or the other having to die…. like these dear ones...

Listening to many persons tonight who are moved by Obama’s being Prez-elect, seeing people in the moment changed by their own joy and awe… I just wonder sometimes, don’t we sometimes be changed, even slightly against our wills, when others are changed suddenly for the better? Or just out of their plain happiness for something they value deeply? Obama has said both parties will work together and he will lead the way. Can this occur really? Maybe hyper-partisanship needs aggression...

Senator Mitch McConnell, R, battered, relentlessly bold, and sometimes bellicose, has been projected to have won his race in Kentucky. His re-election, which was NOT a sure thing, means he will likely be up against a D majority in the Senate, but most importantly, as a minority leader, he may be able to initiate filibusters to prevent various bills from going forward in the Senate … assuming he can gain 41 out of 100 Senators to agree with him. So, watch for how many Dems are being returned...

In part, it might be “The Case of the Dueling Political Ads.” Incumbent Elizabeth Dole R, wife of Bob Dole, has lost her Senate seat according to Fox News which has called her opponent Kay Hagen D, the winner. “MoveOn.org had set its sights on U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole’s dust-up contest for re-election in North Carolina. MoveOn spent close to half a million dollars on an ad accusing the North Carolina senator and fellow Republican John McCain of being “in the pocket of...

I’m keeping an open mind, because it’s all rumor so far. Political gossip, this idea that all small businesses will be forced to pony up even more than they do already, just past the breaking point. It probably needs not be said, but I think most small business owners I’ve ever known, are the salt of this earth; the ones who keep wearing last year’s and last decade’s fashions, who drive the car ten years past its scrap pile date, who love their work and their customers, who...