First they ignored Donald Trump's self-dealing and shattering of norms. Then they pooh-poohed the plot to abduct Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer. Then they bought into the lies about election fraud and attempts to overturn the results of the election. Today, they sheltered in place as mobs of Trump fanatics, heeding his incitement to violence and …
Continue reading Despair, disgust, danger and domestic terrorism on Capitol Hill
For more than a decade, my year-end blogs have typically presented readers with a list of headlines I hoped to see in the coming year. Some were aspirational, some were funny, some were caustic. You often contributed your own imaginings to the list. Last year, my top headline for 2020 announced Donald Trump's defeat and …
Boston City Hall, often damned for its award-winning but decidedly Brutalist architecture, is nonetheless home to Boston's fundamental humanity. Mayor Marty Walsh is a man of the people, and the people who work there, who serve the public, who represent government to the citizenry, are the glue that holds together all the disparate and diverse …
Continue reading Famed documentarian captures City Hall and Hizzonah
FICTION Homeland Elegies, this year’s novel by Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Ayad Akhtar, is a stunning book about what it means to be Muslim - in America and in the author’s father’s home country of Pakistan. It is so autobiographical it's easy to forget that it is fiction. The thread among the stories is the …
Donald Trump's use of lies and deceit to swindle the American people out of an authenticated election, the very cornerstone of our democracy, is just part of the problem. Dozens of legal challenges to the November 3 results have been thrown out of court. Recounts and audits have been implemented, by both Republican and Democratic …
Continue reading Monetizing the Presidency for a last big pay day
The United States, with four percent of the world's population, has 25 percent of COVID deaths. And, by any measure, this pandemic is only getting worse. Many Republicans, especially Trump supporters, not only disbelieve the outcome of the election; they challenge the scientific basis for understanding the COVID-19 threat. They won't socially distance. They refuse …
Continue reading Democratic officials undermine COVID response
This will not be a Norman Rockwell Thanksgiving. As the coronavirus rampages, in an abundance of caution, Thursday will be solely for my husband and me. If the weather obliges, (light rain is forecast), we can meet up with relatives for a walk. And the dreaded but essential Zoom is always available, and we'll probably …
Little by little, Donald Trump is running out of time and techniques to deny the reality of President-elect Joe Biden. Trump's refusal to acknowledge he's a loser may be embraced by 70 percent of Republicans, some of whom demonstrated their unmasked fealty in a noisy D.C. demonstration yesterday, but that doesn't change the election results. …
There were tears of joy. Family members and friends calling, emailing and texting each other. Popping open a bottle of bubbly with two neighbors (socially distanced, of course). The knot is gone from the pit of my stomach. My step is a little lighter. (not so my body). Joe Biden, the youngest man ever elected …
For decades, sports and entertainment celebrities avoided political endorsements lest they hurt their personal brands and lucrative pay days. This, despite notable exceptions like Ronald Reagan, John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, John Voight and Kelsey Grammer on the right and Mohammed Ali, Alec Baldwin, Barbara Streisand, LeBron James, and Carole King on the left. Their numbers …
