IMPORTANT READS

CRIMES OF INTIMIDATION-With all the current stories about endemic sexual harassment in the entertainment industry from the likes of Harvey Weinstein, Bill O'Reilly, and others, I find it surprising that one critical point is never discussed in the media: What Weinstein, O'Reilly, and others have engaged in has little to do with sex and everything to do with criminal assault, battery, and other crimes of intimidation by men with profound feelings of inadequacy. 

NEW GEOPGRAPHY--Perhaps nothing has been more ironic than the canonization of respectable, moderate-seeming Republicans. People like Mitt Romney and the Bush family, once castigated as practitioners of unmitigated greed or even Hitlerian fascists, have suddenly become laudable in the mainstream media.

NEW GEOGRAPHY-“Civilizations die from suicide, not by murder.” — Arnold J. Toynbee. From the heart of Europe to North America, nativism, sometimes tinged by white nationalist extremism, is on the rise. In recent elections, parties identified, sometimes correctly, as alt-right have made serious gains in Germany, Austria and the Czech Republic, pushing even centrist parties in their direction. The election of Donald Trump can also be part of this movement. 

PER DAILY-Probably the greatest mistake made today in liberal and progressive thought and in the political opposition to Trumpism is believing that, in the end, truth will out. Nothing could be less true. More and more, a dominant narrative composed of alternative facts (aka fake news) has supplanted the truth. In our present-day reality, truth is often labeled fake news by those unwilling to hear it. 

DEMS NOMINATION PROCESS RIGGED---In an explosive and "deeply disturbing" piece for Politico Magazine on Thursday, former interim chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) Donna Brazile drew upon her brief experience at the organization's helm to reveal the extent to which the 2016 nomination process was "rigged" in favor of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.  

POLITICAL SECURITY-Seasoned conspiracy buffs refrained from getting their hopes up too high after President Trump’s announcement that he wouldn’t prevent the scheduled release of thousands of files pertaining to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy by the National Archives. They were right to do so; hundreds of files ended up being held back which won’t be released until well into 2018, if at all. 

CORRUPTION WATCH-Rose McGowan alleges that after Harvey Weinstein raped her, she was blacklisted. In an industry which made the phrase, “You’ll never work in this town again,” world renown, one should not be surprised. That phrase sums up both the predator’s modus operandi and the fact that entire industries and professions protect predators and further victimize the innocent.  Unless moviedom sided with Weinstein, his blacklisting would not have worked. 

MY TURN-I freely admit that I am a news junkie and have been most of my life. I also admit I am becoming increasingly bored with many of my favorite newscasters, panels and opinion makers. It feels like every other story or expert panel is about President Donald J. Trump. So, maybe he has given an economic boost to both print and digital media... but when is enough enough?  

CORRUPTION WATCH-The Republic is broken! As a federated democratic republic, the United States of America was supposed to balance political power to ensure that too much power would not accumulate in one place. As Americans once knew, the genius of the U.S. Constitution was in its balancing of power against power in order to avoid tyranny. 

HALLOWEEN POLITICS--The Mars family has made billions selling us M&Ms, Snickers, and countless other Halloween treats for a century now.  But when it comes to paying tax, the Mars family seems to be all tricks and no treats.

PERSPECTIVE--Do you remember when, in first grade, you made mosaics out of colored construction paper?  You carefully cut the different pieces of paper into little half inch tiles and patiently pasted them onto a bigger paper with many other little tiles to make a picture of a whale, or George Washington, or a house.  Remember?  

WAR POLITICS--America’s endless war quietly moves across the broken nations of the world. Every so often, U.S. soldiers die, as four Green Berets did several weeks ago in … Niger.

CURRENCY POLITICS-Digital currencies, in their current form, should be prohibited by law. And not because they are a Ponzi scheme (which they are), and not because they can help facilitate criminal activity (which they do), but because they incur colossal social waste. 

AT LENGTH-As the resident skeptic in this part of the great metropolis at the Port of Los Angeles, I tend to have contrarian reactions when I hear people start repeating mindless refrains about making America great again or insisting that standing for the National Anthem is somehow a mandatory expression of patriotism. 

GUEST WORDS-It never ceases to surprise me how the mere suggestion that our current global capitalistic system is not the best humanity can do for itself, is so often met with virulent hostility. One would think that when we are still recovering from the economic crisis of 2007-2008 (and many economists see an even worse crisis on the horizon), when inequality has been steadily rising since the neoliberal turn of the early 1980s, when real wages have remained virtually stagnant, and the list goes on – one would think that perhaps we would keep an open mind regarding alternatives; instead of buying the tired old argument that anything else must either lead to totalitarianism, or be incurably utopian.

MY TURN-Having just had a birthday, I must admit I am considered chronologically old. At this stage in life, we are happy to still celebrate birthdays but they seem to come around a lot faster than they used to. But I don't feel old! And therein lies the problem. Gail Sheehey wrote in her book, "Passages," that all of us are ten to fifteen years younger than our parents were at the same age. 

BELL VIEW-While Trump angles for war anywhere he can find it, many of his supporters are asking for peace. We need a reasonable debate, they say. We need to pull together as Americans. Mass shootings like the one in Las Vegas will only stop, they say, when we stop the hate. Can’t we all just get along? 

CORRUPTION WATCHAs Secretary of State Rex Tillerson noted, we elected a freaking moron as President. Let’s remember that Rex Tillerson was CEO of Exxon Mobile and the recipient of the Russian civilian honor bestowed by President Vladimir Putin.

TRUMP WATCH-An elderly elephant with a blond pompadour inhabits the Oval Office. The elephant is not the physical being of Donald Trump but rather his unbalanced mental health. Trump is mentally unstable in a fashion and to a degree which is properly characterized as mentally ill. As often occurs with elephants in the room, the nation has refused to deal with this looming nightmare. An intervention is long overdue.

GUEST WORDS--I haven’t stepped foot on a playground in decades, but a recent conversation revived that sinking feeling I used to get every time I was near a dome climber. All the other kids seemed to rise to the top with ease, but I always struggled to make it only halfway up. 

ALPERN AT LARGE--Man, there's a lot of things we didn't ask for, but we're getting, anyway.  On the other hand, we NEED some McDonald's Szechuan sauce.  You know, from the McDonald's promotion of the 1990's Disney Mulan movie?  That was AWESOME, and what do we do when we don't have Rick Sanchez's ability to go back in time to GET that awesome Szechuan sauce!