Let’s Rise to the Challenge and REALLY Make America Great Again.

So, I find myself driving alone late at night across Pennsylvania and in the interest of staying alert, I turn on the radio (mistake #1).  The music kind of drones on and doesn’t really help so I switch to “talk radio” (mistake #2).   Have you noticed that despite their arguments to the contrary, bigots, anarchists, …

Making Perry

Perry is made by fermenting the juice of freshly squeezed pears with the help of natural yeasts. As apples are to cider, so pears are to perry. Perries have complex but subtle flavors that are typically more delicate than cider; good perry can be like a subtle white wine. In some parts of West England …

THE BILL OF RIGHTS: A BRIEF HISTORY #8

Insurrections often are propagated upon misinformation.   So too are the most recent band of domestic terrorist who like to hide behind our most sacred American institutions.  In this series, I want to explore the Bill of Rights and why some of the hype and hyperbole thrown around by the extremist is not just wrong but …

The Evil Gerrymander

In March 1812, the Boston Gazette ran a political cartoon depicting “a new species of monster”: “The Gerry-mander.” The forked-tongue creature was shaped like a contorted Massachusetts voting district that the state’s Jeffersonian Republicans had drawn to benefit their own party. Governor (and future vice president) Elbridge Gerry signed off on his party’s redistricting plan …

Ben Franklin DID NOT Invent Daylight Savings Time!

Well, today we lose an hour of sleep to the interest of commerce. Don’t worry, you will get it back in November.  Before the middle of the 19th Century, keeping time was more of an art than a science.  Time pieces and clocks were available, even common in certain circles but they were notoriously inaccurate.  …

Where do “Boycotts” Come From?

This is off topic for me but I often remind my readers that when they frequent businesses and companies that support issues that they find abhorrent, for example Chick-fil-a ACTIVELY discriminates against LBGTQ and non-Christian people (both potential employees and patrons); and GM. UPS, American Airlines, Tyson Foods all made multimillion dollar donations to Donald Trump …