The Weekly Screed

The conscience of the news

By David Benjamin | 10/12/2023 | Comments Off on The conscience of the news

by David Benjamin    MADISON, Wis. — My first assignment in journalism, as a college-student stringer for the Rockford (Ill.) Morning Star, was a murder. Alas, it was no mystery. A guy had been killed in a bar fight in Beloit, Wisconsin. The killer was in jail. My editor wanted me to go over to…

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The once and future zombie apocalypse

By David Benjamin | 10/06/2023 | Comments Off on The once and future zombie apocalypse

by David Benjamin    “This is the way the world ends; not with a bang or a whimper, but with zombies breaking down the back door.”  ― Amanda Hocking, Hollowland   PARIS — It has long been one of my items of faith that actor Stanley Tucci has never accepted a bad script. This conviction…

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Paris in an American

By David Benjamin | 09/28/2023 | Comments Off on Paris in an American

by David Benjamin    “They’ll never want to see a rake or plow/ And who the deuce can parleyvous a cow?/ How ya gonna keep ’em down on the farm/ After they’ve seen Paree?” ―Sam Lewis & Joe Young    PARIS — Among my grandfather Archie’s four brothers, my favorite was Uncle Harry, partly because…

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Welcome to the Middle Ages

By David Benjamin | 09/20/2023 | Comments Off on Welcome to the Middle Ages

by David Benjamin    “I don’t want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.”           ―Grover Norquist   It all started when the earth-moving equipment arrived and commenced ripping up the pavement…

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Karma? Schadenfreude? Quel dommage?

By David Benjamin | 09/14/2023 | Comments Off on Karma? Schadenfreude? Quel dommage?

by David Benjamin  “Rodgers’ career probably is over. Few athletes come back stronger than ever from an Achilles’ rupture and, given Rodgers’ flirtations with retirement this past offseason, it’s hard to imagine him putting in 11 months of rigorous rehab just to play one more season.” ―Tom Silverstein, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel MADISON, Wis.—For the last few…

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Barefoot in the past

By David Benjamin | 09/08/2023 | Comments Off on Barefoot in the past

by David Benjamin  “You can burn my house, steal my car/ Drink my liquor from an old fruit-jar/ Do anything that you want to do/ But uh-uh baby, lay off of my shoes/ Don’t you step on my blue suede shoes.” ―Carl Perkins   MADISON, Wis.— One of my guilty pleasures is Emile Ardolino’s sneaky-smart…

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Parents: Got a life?

By David Benjamin | 08/31/2023 | Comments Off on Parents: Got a life?

by David Benjamin  “Schoolboys are a merciless race, individually they are angels, but together, especially in schools, they are often merciless.” ― Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov   MADISON, Wis.— Let’s try to overlook the screaming irony of the Republican Party fighting for “parents rights” after winning a fifty-year crusade against women’s rights to control…

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It’s the Vatican’s jalopy. Ship it back.

By David Benjamin | 08/25/2023 | Comments Off on It’s the Vatican’s jalopy. Ship it back.

by David Benjamin  “Catholic teaching was that no homicide was involved if abortion took place before the foetus was infused with a soul, known as ‘ensoulment’. This was believed to occur at ‘quickening’, when the mother detected the child move for the first time in her womb. It indicated a separate consciousness. “In 1591, Pope…

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Welles’ Law and the Ogden Nash Dilemma

By David Benjamin | 08/18/2023 | Comments Off on Welles’ Law and the Ogden Nash Dilemma

by David Benjamin  “What finally saved the movies was the introduction of narrative.” — Arthur Knight, The Liveliest Art   MADISON, Wis.— Most contemporary writers crib from the movies. I do so voluminously and shamelessly. I grew up watching movies. I was the first kid in my grade to shlep downtown and go to the…

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An open letter to my high-school best friend

By David Benjamin | 08/10/2023 | Comments Off on An open letter to my high-school best friend

by David Benjamin    Dear Dick: At long last, I’m writing to apologize for mooching my way, uninvited and unwashed, into your life and the bosom of your family.  If you recall, it all started one summer day in 1964, when I mounted my bicycle and pedaled the three miles from a cramped, cluttered and…

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