Category Archives: Arts: Punditry

Thursday Grand Slam ‘Toons

Elsewhere on The Hill . . .

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And — Why Don’t We Do It in The — Seats??

Last but not least: All the Cool Scribes want this shirt . . .

Oh wait — All Joking Aside, Don’t Forget! Stay Strong, UAW!!

Gwynne Dyer: The Secret Life of BRICS

What’s BRICs? Does it Amount to Anything?

Gwynne Dyer, August 31, 2023

What’s BRICs? Does it Amount to Anything?


YOU can expand the curious organisation called the BRICS, but you can’t define it. In fact, it’s hardly even an organisation: no headquarters, no secretariat. Even the (British) Commonwealth and la Francophonie have more substance: at least they share a former oppressor. Yet the BRICS are expanding.

Continue reading Gwynne Dyer: The Secret Life of BRICS

Garrison Keillor: Out with the old, in with the young

Out with the old, in with the young

The Column: 08.25.23

I am delighted by the court ruling in Montana that the state, by encouraging the use of fossil fuels, violated the constitutional right of young people to “a clean and healthful environment,” something no court has ever proclaimed before.

“Clean and healthful environment” is in the Montana state constitution. The legislature had forbidden state agencies to consider climate change when considering fossil fuel projects, and this decision would change that, but the state will appeal and likely the decision will be tossed away like used tissue, but still it’s an interesting idea: that we have legal obligations to our kids beyond feeding and clothing them and not putting them to work in shoe factories before they’re 12.

Continue reading Garrison Keillor: Out with the old, in with the young

Speaking of Coups, Two Reports, Bloomberg on central Africa, and Dyer on the U.S.

#1 – Bloomberg: Out of Africa, a New World War

By supporting the coup in Niger, Russia proves again that it sees its struggle against the West as a global war, just not a declared one yet.

Bloomberg Opinion-You can think of the unfolding disaster in Niger in four ways, from embarrassing to ominous, catastrophic and apocalyptic.

Embarrassing, because the country’s coup on July 26 is blowback for a clueless West:

Neither the hapless former colonial power, France, nor the waning superpower, the US, saw this coming.

Ominous, because it’s a windfall for Russia and China, as they vie with the West for influence in the region and world.

Potentially catastrophic, because it’s a setback in the struggle against jihadist terrorism and uncontrolled migration.

Possibly apocalyptic, if it marks a slide into world war. Continue reading Speaking of Coups, Two Reports, Bloomberg on central Africa, and Dyer on the U.S.