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TOO MUCH ADVICE, TOO LITTLE TIME TO BOTHER

TOO MUCH ADVICE, TOO LITTLE TIME TO BOTHER

The tra­jec­to­ry being pret­ty much set and relent­less­ly short­en­ing, it seems to me that we who are aging ought to be grant­ed free­dom from an excess of choic­es. Instead,  we get a seem­ing­ly inex­haustible well­spring of advice on how to have a longer and health­i­er, and ergo, hap­pi­er life. So far, all I’ve learned from it is summed up by screen­writer William Goldman’s descrip­tion of the movie busi­ness: “Nobody knows any­thing…Every time out it’s a guess and, if you’re lucky, an edu­cat­ed one.”Read the rest

HERD MANAGEMENT TIPS FOR THE PRIMARIES

HERD MANAGEMENT TIPS FOR THE PRIMARIES

The ancient Greek philoso­pher Pla­to (427–347 BC) wrote: “One of the penal­ties for refus­ing to par­tic­i­pate in pol­i­tics is that you end up being gov­erned by your infe­ri­ors.” For those whose par­tic­i­pa­tion includes choos­ing from the bloat­ing melange of medi­oc­rity being offered for the upcom­ing effort to pre­serve Amer­i­can democ­ra­cy, it might help to apply the Latin word, “col­ligere , the ori­gin of the word “cull”.Read the rest

GOING OUT OF FOCUS

GOING OUT OF FOCUS

Darwin’s the­o­ry of evo­lu­tion applies as much to humans and tech­nol­o­gy as it does to ani­mals and Nature. But some things are so root­ed in cul­tures, minds and mem­o­ries that their pass­ing seems to bor­der on trav­es­ty, irra­tional though that may be. The demise of the BBC radio’s “Focus on Africa” rep­re­sents that for me.Read the rest

THIS WEEK’S GRIPE: MANNERS NO LONGER “MAKETH THE MAN”

THIS WEEK’S GRIPE: MANNERS NO LONGER “MAKETH THE MAN”

In any list of qual­i­ties that ide­al­ly ought to define peo­ple, espe­cial­ly those who aspire to, or hold posi­tions of author­i­ty, I doubt there is much argu­ment that it should include cour­tesy, per­son­al integri­ty, con­cern for the com­mon good and dignity.
Yet it has come to pass that these virtues, along with per­haps less impor­tant, but still valid ones, have not just fall­en by the way­side, they are as good as scorned.Read the rest

A COLD WAR CLICHE IS A LESSON ON AI CHATBOTS

A COLD WAR CLICHE IS A LESSON ON AI CHATBOTS

Clichés are wide­ly den­i­grat­ed in writ­ing guides as indica­tive of lazi­ness and a lack of orig­i­nal think­ing. An iron­ic excep­tion is apply­ing the Russ­ian proverb “Doveryai, no proveryai”….“Trust, but ver­i­fy” when con­sid­er­ing the mer­its or oth­er­wise of AI chatbots.Read the rest

LIVE AND LEGITIMATE AREN’T ALWAYS LINKED

LIVE AND LEGITIMATE AREN’T ALWAYS LINKED

The metaphor­i­cal beat­ing of breasts and rend­ing of gar­ments over CNNs’ “town hall” with Don­ald Trump is a salient les­son that pro­vid­ing live air time for proven liars and dis­sem­blers, not­ed for a pro­cliv­i­ty to con­trol the nar­ra­tive, is the equiv­a­lent of allow­ing them to write the script, and there’s enough of that done by flaks and syco­phants with­out adding to the pool.Read the rest

THE AMERICAN KING CONUNDRUM

THE AMERICAN KING CONUNDRUM

The out­pour­ing of pun­dit­ry, com­ments and edi­to­r­i­al car­toons in the U.S. media and on social net­works, express­ing every­thing from bemuse­ment to crit­i­cism and deri­sion over the coro­na­tion of King Charles III, has led me to pon­der what it is about the Amer­i­can psy­che, or at least that of a sig­nif­i­cant por­tion of the pop­u­la­tion, that I don’t understand.Read the rest

A HOMAGE TO LIGHTFOOT

A HOMAGE TO LIGHTFOOT

Apart from the inevitable aches and pains, one of the draw­backs to aging is that you think the singers who were your sound­track are for­ev­er the age they were when you first heard them, and only real­ly accept that they’re not when they die. And so it was this week with Gor­don Lightfoot.Read the rest

SETTING A HIGH BAR DOESN’T EQUATE WITH UNFAIR

SETTING A HIGH BAR DOESN’T EQUATE WITH UNFAIR

The line between set­ting high stan­dards and bul­ly­ing is nigh on impos­si­ble to dis­cern in today’s hyper-sen­si­tive world. Since step­ping over it costs jobs and rep­u­ta­tions, I sug­gest those who would pass judge­ment con­sid­er this thought from the 1908 nov­el  “The Magi­cian” by W. Som­er­set Maugh­am: “It’s a fun­ny thing about life; if you refuse to accept any­thing but the best, you very often get it.”Read the rest