There’s a space between what I once was and what I am now. When I ask others to travel it with me, they can’t. It’s not their fault. It’s just too far.
About a year ago, I had the opportunity to present one of the products I work on at a technology expo in Manhattan. It was a good day for me. Continue reading
A few days ago, I started to write the Harvey Weinstein opinion that’s already been written a hundred times by a hundred people. It was a story about how many hands were dirty and how many moral failures and complicit cowards there were that never spoke up in the presence of the horrors Mr. Weinstein is alleged to have committed. It was a story of how hypocritical gender signaling Hollywood was to allow or even support the reprehensible behavior of a monster for decades. Continue reading
I’ve done the work on guns. I own one. I’ve fired just about every kind. I’ve packed them up in containers and hauled them around the world and spent hours lining them up and taking inventory and maintaining them. I even spent about six months walking around in a foreign country with a Sig Saur P226 strapped to me under my shirt. Continue reading
Larry Mullen’s snare drum rips a hole in the darkness and silence with that iconic march. The unmistakable metallic, rattling scream of The Edge crashes off the walls of the stadium and down over you—through you. Then above it all, the voice, that soulful Irish wail falls down from the heavens like a war cry. Continue reading
Dunbar’s Number is 150. That’s the number of people anthropologist Robin Dunbar claims we humans can maintain social relationships with based on our cognitive limits. Dunbar calculated that number from the ratio of the size of the human neocortex—the part of the brain responsible for higher thought function in mammals—to the size of the rest of our brain. Continue reading
A few weeks ago, a reader posted a question in the comments section of an essay I wrote on the topic of Confederate monuments. I’ve said just about all that I think I should on that subject. If you’re interested in my perspective, you can find it here. I’m not interested in old statues today. Today I’m only interested in the question. Continue reading
America is eiight regional cultures. At least that’s what historian Colin Woodard says in his extremely relevant book American Nations: A History of Eleven Rival Regional Cultures in North America. Each culture was created by a region’s original settlers or those that came immediately after. All those that followed for centuries were assimilated. Continue reading
Between 1974 and 1991, thirty nations around the world formed democratic governments where there were not democratic governments before. It was what we now call the third wave of democratization. The first wave started within a generation of American independence, as suffrage and liberal humanism took hold in Europe. The second wave was after World War II and the defeat of nationalist fascism in Europe and Asia. Today, planet earth is about 40%, democratic if you hold the standard of true liberal democracy without including democratic autocracies like Russia or Venezuela. Continue reading
Matthew Gentzkow and Jesse Shapiro of the Bureau of Economic Research published a working paper a few years back on political media bias in American print newspapers. It was the kind of study that told you something you already knew but couldn’t prove before the dawn of the digital age. Continue reading
Last night was “back to school night” in our neighborhood, that fun time where they cram all the parents into the classroom built for third graders to meet the teacher so she can explain exactly what goes on there every day. It’s year-round summer here in Southern California. So, we’ve got year-round school in my town. The party starts in July.
The classroom itself wasn’t remarkable. The teacher seemed fine. The technology was the modern-day version of what I experienced as a kid. The little plastic chair I was crammed into hadn’t been innovated on in at least 40 years. All of it was exactly what you would expect it to be. Continue reading
Chartwell West 