Upcoming Events:
Thursday, 20 March, 9 am
Interview with Phil Nee, live on the WRCO morning show, Richland Center, Wis.
Thursday, 20 March, 5-7 pm
Tomah Chamber of Commerce Author Showcase, Three Bears Resort, 701 Yogi Circle, Tomah, Wis.
Thursday, 24 Apr., 6 pm
Book Talk, An Apartment in Paris, Waterloo Public Library, 625 N. Monroe St., Waterloo, Wis.
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The Weekly Screed
Only the white guys live forever By David Benjamin “We here have little chance for glory or advancement. While some of our brother officers are leading their well-publicized campaigns against the great Indian nations — the Sioux and the Cheyenne — we are asked to ward off the gnat stings and flea bites of a…
Read More...The Big Orange: Number 7 with a bullet By David Benjamin MADISON, Wis. — A new index is effectively making more coherent the wave of repressive and reactionary “populism” that has emerged in the last decade on every continent. Compiled by the International Council on Political and Ideological Measurement (ICPIM), based in Bern, Switzerland, this…
Read More...No tomatoes for you. You either. Or anybody! By David Benjamin “Philip answered him, ‘It would take more than half a year’s wages to buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!” — John 6:7 PARIS — Taken literally, capitalism is the most ruthless and horrifying economic system ever conceived. Lately however, as…
Read More...Make America Gangland Again By David Benjamin “To me being a gangster was better than being president of the United States.” — Ray Liotta (Henry Hill) in Goodfellas (1990) PARIS — It’s a photo that’s been sticking in my memory — Donald Trump toddling along meekly beside North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, blessing the…
Read More...Peggy Sue Got Sabotaged By David Benjamin “Well, Mr. Snelgrove, I happen to know that in the future I will not have the slightest use for algebra, and I speak from experience.” — Kathleen Turner, in Peggy Sue Got Married (1986) PARIS — Having long ago shut down our link to French broadcast, we use…
Read More...The Popinjay principle By David Benjamin “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.” — attributed variously to Mark Twain, Josh Billings, Artemus Ward, etc. PARIS — I was scheduled to address the Paris chapter of the British National; Union of Journalists…
Read More...“I know a guy” By David Benjamin “After 2½ years we’ve seen enough. Enough of the chaos, the division, the schoolyard insults, the self-aggrandizement, the corruption, and especially the lies.” — Orlando Sentinel PARIS — The mass psyche of the Trump cult is a matter of undying mystery, not just for me but for the…
Read More...What do you see on the insides of your eyelids? By David Benjamin PARIS — Perhaps the most felicitous happenstance in my return here last week was an encounter with Dr. Patrick Keeffe, Ph.D., MBOE, LSMFT, who told me over frog legs at a sprawling brasserie near the Gare du Nord, about his groundbreaking research…
Read More...Heartland carnage By David Benjamin “You must never run out on the meadow. There might be danger. Out there, we’re unprotected.” — Bambi’s mother MADISON, Wis. — If you’re a deer or a driver in Wisconsin, sooner or later, your number’s up. Archie, my grandfather was an avid motorist who managed to dodge deer on…
Read More...Our bodies, in deed By David Benjamin “Once you shift the focus of the abortion from the unborn fetus to the full-grown woman, and once you shift attention from the realm of safe medical procedures in a sterile environment to a last-ditch effort to save the life of a mangled mother, the anti-abortionists lose interest.…
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