Sipowicz, Rockford, and my all time favorite, David Addison of the Blue Moon Detective Agency, played by Bruce Willis. (Moonlighting was a wonderful show in its first 2 seasons).
I read Lewis' Screwtape Letters about once a year, and The Great Divorce every few years. Wonderful books.
I've read "Downriver". Peter Collier's gripping novel of family, redemption, and revenge, several times. It is an outstanding story which deserves to be better known than it is.
David Klinghoffer's memoir of his journey from atheism to Jewish orthodoxy, "The Lord Will Gather Me In," is another that I have read more than once, to great profit. I'm not Jewish, but Klinghoffer's determination to follow his understanding of the truth wherever it led him, is an inspiration all the same.
In the last two years, I've read Orwell's 1984 at least twice and listened to it on audiobook another time. (There is an outstanding audio version available on youtube). I hadn't read it before a couple of years ago, and it completely shook me up.
As to number 5, nope. If Lincoln thought the union was worth preserving despite *slavery*, it is surely worth preserving despite creeping socialism and lots of other bad things.
Also nope as to No. 3. We dont need to make voting tougher, we just need to make it less succeptible to cheating. Photo-ID laws are a good start.
It sounds crazy to say this the morning after such an disheartening defeat, but what we-- and particularly the GOP House --have to do now is: go on offense, including by passing a replacement for Obamacare. It won't get anywhere but it will show the country that we have an agenda and will give that agenda a public airing. Otherwise the debate will continue to be on liberals' terms.
The House should take on one issue after another with bills (health care, balanced budget; reforming FEMA so that it doesn't leave American citizens without water for two weeks after a storm we all could see coming) and/or investigations. Demonstrate over and over again that the GOP is the party of responsibility; that we believe in limited government but also a government that takes its (limited) responsibilities seriously.
More seriously, I'm going to give less to groups and organizations (such as the college I atteneded) that preach and support mores of which I disapprove. I'll make it up with contributions elsewhere.
And I might be tempted to contribute to groups doing poor relief, storm relief, etc. that are run by people who believe in a robust private sector, rather than groups that are run by people who believe, or at least, tend in the direction of the belief that, government is the protector of us all. · · 26 minutes ago
I never, ever donate to my university, which has an incredibly large endowment yet raises tuition every single year. (There is no way I could afford to attend now). There are so many other charities that need the money more, waste less, and serve needier people, that it doesn't make sense to give money to wealthy (liberal) institutions.
"The Best of Bill Cosby," and Cosby's "To Russell, My Brother." His story about the game "Buck Buck" and had me laughing un-controllably as a 4th grader. I still love it.
Radical Son, by David Horowitz. This book, the story of the author's long journal from Red Diaper Baby and New Left radical to Reagan conservatism has everything. Ideas, family drama, the tensions between father and son, loves won and lost, murder, deceit, the sweep of history and the breaking and mending of the human heart. Just marvelous
In a similar vein, I recommend Peter Collier's autobiographical chapter, "Something Happened to Me Yesterday" in Collier & Horowitz's Destructive Generation: Second Thoughts About the '60s. It is simply a beautiful piece of writing, tracing Collier's own political journey (similar to Horowitz's) and his relationship with his father. His telling of the last long car-trip he took with his father before the elder man passed away is incredibly beautiful.
After the debate, I loved the sight of one of Ryan's son's, perhaps this same one, lounging in his dad's chair at the debate table. Like sitting in your father's chair at his office. Ryan gave him a high-five.
An entire continent receiving the Peace Prize? This reminds me of those every-kid-gets-a-trophy trophies I got for riding the bench in little league. Suretly Alfred Nobel intended for this prize to mean more than that.
I agree, Lucy it is a concern, for lots of people. So even if your father's experience is in some sense a "hard", meaning "somewhat unusual" case, it is the sort of hard case that plenty of people experience, and nearly everyone worries about. Which suggests it is politically necessary (and in my view morally important) to think hard about such cases.
Perhaps the medical-expense deduction could be exempted from the cap altogether, or means-tested, or capped at a much higher level, to reflect that (unlike, say, donations to charitable causes), medical expenses cannot always be completely planned-for, and cannot be put off for another day.
I wonder what impact such a cap would have on charities and churches, who benefit from the incentives created by the charitable deduction. They’d presumably suffer, at least somewhat, from a cap on overall deductions. How much, I don't know. I suppose the $20k deductions cap is high enough that it would reduce the charitable giving only of the very wealthy.
It would be a semi-interesting experiment to see which non-profit organizations suffer, and which ones don’t, under this proposal.
Also, it would be interesting to see what effect, if any, it would have on the current stats regarding party-affiliation and charitable giving (Republicans currently give more to charity than Dems, at all income levels). There’s no logical reason why it would necessarily make a difference, but it might, and would be interesting to watch.
Re: A Valentine's Day Playlist
A few great ones by Nick Lowe:"Rome Wasn't Built in a Day""You Inspire Me" (the first song my wife and I danced to at our wedding)