Even in the United States, land of diversity and individualism, there’s still nothing like race and ancestry to imprison you in other people’s dumbest assumptions and cruelest distortions. An American – American-born, American-bred, American-educated – is suspected of having committed the mass killing that resulted in the death of 13 people at Fort Hood on […]
Pierre Tristam
“60 Minutes”‘ $60 Billion Lie About Medicare
I haven’t watched CBS’ “60 Minutes” in years. But it was one of those stories that stops you in your tracks: Medicare fraud is “a $60 billion crime.” Medicare is the $456 billion government health insurance program serving 46 million elderly Americans. Its credibility as a government-run program is at the heart of the health-care […]
‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,’ Try to Survive Crushing Stones
The dishonor is the nation’s tolerance of a don’t-ask-don’t-tell policy no less offensive than segregation-era racism – or current-era worship of “diversity,” which stops at sexual preference.
Health Reform Nears Universal Coverage – Of Insurers
When Congress haggled five years ago over the prescription-drug benefit portion of Medicare, the government health-insurance program for the elderly, cost projections of the new benefit ranged from $400 billion to $720 billion over 10 years. Congress had not one penny in dedicated revenue to pay for it. Whatever the cost, it would all be […]
Locked and Loaded for Dignity Deserved but Withheld
There was the case of Milissa Holland, the Flagler County commissioner, who in June accused 81-year-old John Petyo of Palm Coast of making death threats. Petyo has a recent history of trespassing and mental-health issues. There was the case of 82-year-old Antonino Milian of Deltona, who in August was found dead in the woods of […]
Holes Still Scar Landscape from New York to Afghanistan
Terrorists dug the first eight years ago in Lower Manhattan. The hole is still there, visible live on Web cams keeping track of the crater’s make-work traffic. It was seven years from the time the design for the Twin Towers was unveiled in 1964 to the day the second building was topped out on a […]
CIA Fails Mission to Detect Danger
Franz Kafka’s “Trial” is the story of a nobody tried for crimes never made clear by faceless authorities upholding secret laws that never fail to get their guilty verdict. You could read it to understand how easily reality is distorted and justice impersonated, even in “civilized” nations. Or you could read the inspector general’s recent […]
‘Deadliest Catch’ a Cowboy Race to Cap-and-Trade
The Discovery Channel’s “Deadliest Catch” is a reality series based on the toil and tyranny of crab fishing in the Bering Sea. About 4 million people watch the show every week, making it one of the top-rated programs on cable. It’s a strange phenomenon, considering that it’s just watching people work. But it’s more than […]
Stoking Rage from Manipulated Fears
You remember the e-mails five years ago. They were all the same, junking up our in-boxes with bullet lists of how great things were going in Iraq – the exact number of new schools built, the number of Iraqis happily employed, the number of cell phones beeping everywhere (including, presumably, those used to detonate roadside […]
Atop a Decapitated Peak with Hoot
Mountain-top removal coal mining in West Virginia: the grinding tragedy of Kayford Mountain, where Massey Energy has been removing mountaintops to dig out coal.
