Here are three great snippets from Rain Dogs,the latest mystery by Adrian McKinty I just read, a terrific tale set in Northern Ireland during “The Troubles.” It’s Book #5 in a series I started just a week ago, and have binge read in seven days. Like I said in a blurb: Catholic & Protestant, war & … Continue reading Nuggets from a Mystery Reading Binge
One day in 1980, I was at my desk on an upper floor of a way-past-its-prime hotel that had become a staff office annex for the U. S. House of Representatives. My boss — Congressman Pete McCloskey of California, wanted some information about an obscure part of a not-so-well-known energy bill: say, Section 227D of … Continue reading Wanna Call John Dingell? Don’t Ring Through Hell
When I arrived at Quaker House at the beginning of 2002, work on domestic violence was not in my job description. There was already plenty else to keep a one-person staff busy: troops from Fort Bragg were already fighting in Afghanistan, and plans for invading Iraq were clearly taking shape. Besides, I had no experience … Continue reading Quaker House: Domestic Military Murders and the War at Home
“. . .[F]or a party that associates itself with Christianity to say that it is ok, to suggest that God would smile on the division of families at the hands of federal agents, that God would condone putting children in cages has lost all claim to ever use religious language again.”
Of course, that shot hit the target not only because of its truth, but also because Buttigieg actually takes religion seriously. Yet it’s also a useful example. If progressives are going to take on those who are whipping up the dark psychic forces, I’m one who thinks it will take more than position papers, polls and platitudes.
Below is a news photo from late February, 1965. It turned up several years back (hat tip to the sharp-eyed Lewis Lewis): it was taken on the steps of Brown Chapel AME Church in Selma, when John Lewis (center-left, with a tie) announced the plan to march from Selma to Montgomery. The goal of the … Continue reading A Hidden piece of Black History: “White Lies,” Selma, Two Murders, & A Cameo