“El ajedrez es uno de los medios que tenemos para salvar la cultura, como el latín, el estudio de las humanidades, la lectura de los clásicos, las leyes de la versificación, la ética. El ajedrez es hoy reemplazado por el fútbol, el boxeo o el tenis, que son juegos de insensatos, no de intelectuales.”–Jorge Luis … More Quote of the day
“Another bad habit of self-conscious writing is the prissy use of quotation marks–sometimes called shudder quotes or scare quotes–to distance the writer from a common idiom. . . . The use of shudder quotes is taken to an extreme in the agonizingly self-conscious, defiantly un-classic style of postmodernism, which rejects the possibility that any word … More Quote of the Day
Probably the most agonizing thing I have ever done is give up smoking. Throughout the 1970s and 80s my wife and I were avid smokers of at least a pack of cigarettes a day each, and I also smoked a pipe. I think I once tried to give up both by switching to cigars. We … More Quitting
“I have always regarded as a stroke of good fortune that I was not born or brought up in a small American town; they may be the backbone of the nation, but they are also the backbone of ignorance, bigotry, and boredom, all in vast quantities.” ― Gore Vidal, Death Before Bedtime
I just finished reading David Hartman’s The God Who Hates Lies: Confronting and Rethinking Jewish Tradition (2011). David Hartman was ordained an Orthodox rabbi at Yeshiva University in 1953 and moved to Israel in 1971. In Israel he became disillusioned with the rigidities of Orthodoxy and ultimately founded the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem in … More The God Who Hates Lies
“Everything Israel has done, and I emphasize everything, in the past 23 years is either evil stupidity or stupidly evil.“–Yeshayahu Leibowitz (said in 1990)
My father died when I was four, but even if he hadn’t, childcare would probably have been a problem for my mother. She had to work, and the one of my sisters old enough to look after me had to go to school. When I was five, a Catholic school agreed to take me into … More The Guardian Angel
“Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes you can do these things. Among them are H. L. Hunt (you possibly know his … More Quote of the Day
The Texas Republican Party Platform states the following in Article 84: “Homosexuality is a chosen behavior contrary to the fundamental unchanging truths that have been ordained by God in the Bible, recognized by our nation’s founders, and shared by the majority of Texans.” Click to access PERM-PLATFORM-as-Amended-by-Gen-Body-5.13.16.pdf Who knew the majority of Texans are gay? You … More A Surprising Fact about Texas
One sweltering August morning many years ago, Jimmy and I were in the alley by the hollyhocks behind my house smoking two long cigarette butts we had found in the street. Jimmy caught a honey bee in a hollyhock and pressed the glowing ember of his cigarette against the flower. The buzzing was furious for … More But for the Grace of God…
No Harm Spilt 