skipper

  • The disarray, some may say discontent, that the United States suffers today has been around for a while. Mariner has said that the damage to the American Dream began with the Reagan administration when regulations […]

    • Marty replied 4 years ago

      This is an excellent overview of what has contributed to the many problems that we have today. Not just the problem of angry mobs attacking the Capitol, but the more silent and insidious problems of jobs, housing, racial and class inequality, lack of universal health insurance, the cost of education–all the things that working people have carried on their backs for the past 40 years and more. I like this reasoned and reasonable approach. Ancient Mariner for Congress, 2022!

  • Regular readers are familiar with the skepticism of alter ego Amos. In this new century, one beginning with a multitude of new and unchartered worries for mankind, Amos feels increasing depression as his fellow […]

  • The following two paragraphs are from World Review, an online magazine sponsored by New Statesman, a British publishing Company. It makes the case that conservative political forces around the world are drifting […]

  • While the western world has survived the beginning of the twenty-first century more or less intact, getting organized for the rest of the century makes it seem as if the destruction of the Middle East is more […]

  • That is not an easy question to answer today. There are no clear hints about what is absolute or true or real. It used to be easier way back in the very old days. For example, if you lived 75,000 years ago, the […]

  • skipper wrote a new post, Tiny Tidbits 4 years ago

    ֎ When oldtimers use the stairs, keep a hand floating along the bannister in case that trick knee jumps out or a slipper catches the stair. It is important, though, to use the legs to carry ALL the effort of […]

  • The title is a quote from long, long ago when the local television station opened its late night movie show. For many viewers it was a successful ploy to sit back, relax, put the day behind them and get comfy – b […]

  • It was Robert Frost who wrote the familiar poem about two roads diverging in a yellow wood and at the end of the poem the author is pleased to have taken the road less traveled. Or perhaps Yogi Berra’s version, “ […]

  • Profound insight about the middle class. Skipper ponders whether today’s form of nationalism will even be around.

  • Most everyone (including mariner) points at the pandemic as an expediter, an accelerator of cultural change. Mariner checked out other cultural shifts that have occurred in history; it turns out big-time change […]

    • Can’t have a middle class without the printing press. Or, most likely, a Protestant reformation. It takes a while for a disruptive technology’s effects to be felt in a society. Perhaps less so in a late-stage capitalist society, but still, I wonder what the real shakeout of global real-time communication will look like. Computers only really became widespread in the 1970s; sixty years after Gutenberg first pressed parchment Martin Luther’s theses were still a generation away, Shakespeare three.

    • Profound insight about the middle class. Skipper ponders whether today’s form of nationalism will even be around.

  • Politico was nice enough to put some effort into analyzing the major issues that will confront Joe Biden whether he wants to deal with them or not. Mariner copied them into this post to give readers a quick […]

  • Regular readers are aware of mariner’s belief that, generally, changes in society reach a moment of significant pressure to change every sixty years. The basic pattern that encourages the sixty year cycle is the g […]

  • Vox News (reputable) published the results of a study that shows 18 US Senators represent 52 percent of the population. Is it any wonder that as Kentucky goes, so goes the nation? Is it any wonder that, in the […]

  • Similar to its addiction to Donald, the press has been consumed with Covid-19. Not that this is unwarranted but the world continues to live and breathe, to live day-to-day and to place each day into a continuing […]

  • Once in a while everyone stumbles across a short phrase that seems poignant, insightful or profound. Mariner has collected phrases over time that are significant. Just a few below:

    ֎ A very recent one from the […]

  • Watching the news today is not pleasant. It is wearing as a virulent war wages across civilization, as political collaboration collapses into populist and plutocratic conflict, as millions of families experience […]

  • A stick always has two ends – if it has been broken from its tree. When it is attached to the tree, it is part of a larger presence, something that has evidence of a higher calling as part of nature. It is true t […]

  • Mariner is fortunate that for the moment his financial status is sufficient, his curiosity in social studies has not waned and there are more physical chores than may be achievable in the gardens, home repair and […]

    • With the stay at home mentality required to guarantee our continued existence, we spent a great deal of time on our screened front porch, watching life in the ‘hood. Now that cold weather has arrived, that time well spent together reading and talking about big things and little things will be sorely missed.

  • Many, many years ago mariner knew a woman who was raised deep in the back country of Tennessee. In her forties, she was not literate. Don’t surmise that she was unintelligent or otherwise had shortcomings; a […]

  • Two topics today. First, Amos offers some observations about the election; second, some observations about the roles of nature on the one hand and mariner on the other.

    ֎ The campaign between Donald and Joe […]

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