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The Weekly Screed
“I will bomb the shit out of ISIS…” by David Benjamin “I am tired and sick of war. Its glory is all moonshine. It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, for vengeance, for desolation.” — William Tecumseh Sherman…
Read More...“… A new nation, conceived in lunacy…” by David Benjamin “There was a young lady named Bright, Whose speed was far faster than light. She went out one day, In a relative way, And returned the previous night.” — Reginald Buller MADISON, Wis. — Sometime last year, the Day of the Tachyon dawned. There is…
Read More...Pain in the morning by David Benjamin “Paris is always a good idea.” — Audrey Hepburn PARIS — Paris is not the city that never sleeps. It not only sleeps, hitting the sack by 5 a.m. at the very latest, but it has a hard time getting up. Paris is the city that rolls over…
Read More...The Packerscreed, by David Benjamin Who put the “mock” in all those mock drafts? PARIS — One of the perverse pleasures of being a hardcore fan, in any sport, is the discovery — as you get deeper into the intricacies of inside baseball, inside football, inside croquet, whatever — that the season never ends. As…
Read More...Franco lives by David Benjamin “We do not believe in government through the voting booth. The Spanish national will was never freely expressed through the ballot box. Spain has no foolish dreams.” ― Generalissimo Francisco Franco BARCELONA — Every time I come back to Spain, I get this vague inkling of a nation teetering perpetually…
Read More...The blurb culture by David Benjamin “Question: Does it turn out that social media is better at breaking things than at making things?” — Thomas L. Friedman PARIS — How would Einstein “tweet” the Theory of Relativity. I thought about this after reading Dennis Overbye’s lyrical New York Times story about physicists working with the…
Read More...It’s bean-bag season in America by David Benjamin “ ‘You’re not a politician,’ the man said. ‘You’re a public servant.’” — New Hampshire voter at a Donald Trump forum, 8 Feb. ‘16 “This is real retail politics, the way it’s supposed to be…” —N.H. voter Tom Lovely at the same forum PARIS — Tom Lovely…
Read More...Donald and Sarah in my mother’s living room by David Benjamin MADISON Wis. — I couldn’t help it. There on TV, broadcast from somewhere in darkest, dimmest Iowa, was the second coming of Sarah Palin, riffing and jiving, flapping her arms, cackling at her own jokes and speaking fluent bumper-sticker — while Donald Trump stood…
Read More...A high-tech solution to the battle over Roe v. Wade by David Benjamin MADISON Wis. — Visitors to this year’s Consumer Electronics Show, in Las Vegas, had a thousand reason to be distracted. They were buzzed by drones, dazzled by chrome-crusted cars that run (without a driver) on everything from Wesson Oil to isotopes, and…
Read More...“Live long and prosper” by David Benjamin “To the moon, Alice!” — Ralph Kramden My wife, Hotlips, crack technology journalist, is in year-end listmaking mode. Everybody in the news biz does this. Among my favorite examples of this genre is the New York Times’ annual cavalcade of obituaries. The Times 2015 death march includes Leonard…
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