A Fable for Our Time

Long, long ago, in the days of Eisenhower, Kennedy and Johnson, there was a storybook neighborhood in Arlington, Virginia, called Dominion Hills. It was a prosperous place – quiet, middle class, very respectable and lily white. The people who lived there all either worked for the one of the many federal government agencies, served in… Continue reading A Fable for Our Time

An Open Letter to President Joe Biden

June 28, 2024 Tom Collins Martini Great Falls, Virginia President Joseph Robinette Biden The White House Washington, DC Sir, Earlier today, I received a verbatim transcript of last night’s presidential debate between you and Donald John Trump, in the form of a Rich Text computer file. Since your administration has been such a steady and… Continue reading An Open Letter to President Joe Biden

Silence of the Gats

The proposition that democracy is an imperfect form of government is nothing new. Plato wrote a book about his proposed alternative, where a class of philosopher kings would replace the rule of the people, and this year is the two-thousand four-hundredth anniversary of his writing it. Who would actually be good enough, wise enough, just… Continue reading Silence of the Gats

A Kennedy Off-Center Visit

As the Memorial Day weekend hails the start of summer in America (yes, the Rest of the World, I know summer actually begins in June in the Northern Hemisphere, but the last weekend in May is when we Yanks traditionally get our first beach sunburns and barbecue heartburns of the year) those of us not… Continue reading A Kennedy Off-Center Visit

Trigger-happy Cowgirl Shoots Self in Foot

During the late Upper Pleistocene Age, between thirty and forty thousand years ago, two predator species developed a synergistic relationship. The first was a now-extinct ancestor of the grey wolf, the other the ancestors of modern Homo Sapiens, a species who have yet to become extinct but are nevertheless diligently working on it. There were… Continue reading Trigger-happy Cowgirl Shoots Self in Foot