Upcoming Events:
Monday, 9 June, 10:30 am
Book Talk, An Apartment in Paris, Fitchburg Community Center, 5510 Lacy Road, Fitchburg, Wis.
Saturday, 14 June, 1-3 pm
Meet & Greet, Barnes & Noble, West Towne, Madison
Thursday, 19 June, 10 am
Book Talk, An Apartment in Paris, Middleton Community Center, 7448 Hubbard Ave. Middleton Wis.
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The Weekly Screed
by David Benjamin MADISON, Wis. — One of America’s most familiar figures, Rush Limbaugh, projected a persona that offered barely a smidgeon of nuance. Rush, who died last month, was a two-dimensional construction whom you either loved or hated, No middle ground between. This is how he chose to be esteemed. When interviewed about his…
Read More...by David Benjamin “The arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold…” — Robert Service MADISON, Wis. — Although systematically hushed up by the mainstream media, there are signs that the Wisconsin tradition of setting surplus children out in the snow in the dead of winter to be eaten by…
Read More...by David Benjamin “If a slave say to his master: “You are not my master,” if they convict him his master shall cut off his ear.” — The Code of Hammurabi, No. 282 MADISON, Wis. — Since the establishment of public schools, one of the hallmarks of American education has been the suppression of knowledge…
Read More...by David Benjamin “Then oddly there are all these people who have said they saw what looked like lasers or blue beams of light causing the fires, and pictures and videos…” — Marjorie Taylor Greene MADISON, Wis. — Whenever I catch up on the antics of QAnon Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, The Sound of Music…
Read More...by David Benjamin “And it is not necessary to have great things to do. I turn my little omelette in the pan for the love of God.” — Brother Lawrence MADISON, Wis. — We left Paris last year just as the pandemic was starting and we haven’t been able to return. But when we go…
Read More...by David Benjamin “A car doesn’t understand why it’s driving anywhere.” — Bart Selman, computer science professor, Cornell University MADISON, Wis. — My mom drove a ’61 Fairlane until the day it more or less exploded in the left lane of Interstate 90 just north of Wisconsin Dells. I was driving, both hands on the…
Read More...by David Benjamin “The good writer seems to be writing about himself (but never is) but has his eye always on that thread of the Universe which runs through himself, and all things.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson MADISON, Wis. — No writer who feels secure is likely to be very good at what he or…
Read More...by David Benjamin “As our Word of the Year process started and this data was opened up, it quickly became apparent that 2020 is not a year that could neatly be accommodated in one single ‘word of the year’…” — Oxford English Dictionary MADISON, Wis. — Really? The Oxford English Dictionary chickened out on Word…
Read More...by David Benjamin “I shall always identify Washington with that huge… towering bulge of pure white… [that] vast eggshell, built of iron and glass… a beauty and genuine success.” — Walt Whitman MADISON, Wis. — This week, on the feast of the Epiphany, we learned perhaps why Walt Whitman described the Capitol Dome as an…
Read More...by David Benjamin “When trust was in the room, whatever room that was — the family room, the schoolroom, the locker room, the office room, the government room or the military room — good things happened. When trust was not in the room, good things did not happen.” — Former Secretary of State George P.…
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