Blog
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Nell Irvin Painter’s The History of White People is wide ranging in scope and historical depth, covering the history of those people we deem “white.” In short, it is a remarkable work, taking a historical long view of the perception of the white race and its race discourse throughout history, starting with the ancient Greek…
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When the rain starts falling in Budapest it doesn’t come with a warning. The drops fall heavy and splatter on the cracked sidewalks and the citizens run for cover. Men in suits dash single file alongside the granite buildings. The windows of the tenements on higher floors that were open for the heat start shuttering…
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Saw the news today on Spain’s bailout. The market seems to favor this news. I don’t see how it can. We’re about to see the biggest market correction since the 30’s. And you thought 2008 was bad. There’s a very simple principle at play here. The more you borrow, the more you owe. If you…
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Recently I was having a spirited debate with a friend whom I suspect to be a libertarian sympathizer. His big criticism of libertarianism–a very fair one–was that libertarians tend to value Freedom as an end in itself, not more tangible and perhaps more measurable goals such as social mobility, humanitarianism, or even wealth creation. What…
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I recently met up with an old friend in Budapest and as we were walking near the city center, he asked me, quite randomly, “have you seen the Michael Jackson shrine?” I was intrigued, and it just so happened that it was less than a block away, so we went there, and sure enough, we…
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http://cnettv.cnet.com/av/video/cbsnews/atlantis2/cbsnews_player_embed.swf
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Because I have Jewish heritage it is only natural for me to have been inundated from birth with stories of the Holocaust, and of course it is only natural for me to have heard of the crimes of the non-Jewish witnesses of this 20th century horror. As my family was at Auschwitz and most lost…
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A friend of mine asked me why the 53% seem to be proud of working “shitty jobs” with hard hours while “not pursuing their dreams.” I thought the question was unfair. Certainly, I have philosophical disagreements with any group that claims or believes it is different from any other group (to quote Ferris Bueller, “isms,…
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When Occupy Wall Street began September 17, they received more than their fair share of criticism from both the right and the left, mostly due to their lack of a single message or central organization. The media on the right, especially, seemed to have forgotten the nascent waywardness of its own pet Tea Party movement.…
brian mayer 