News & Commentary from Veteran Writers/Activists
Perhaps the most chilling movie I’ve seen during the past decade -- while the American led, once-termed “Global War on Terror” rages on and on and on, ever-expanding both overseas as well as within the Homeland -- was the 2006 movie Children of Men. Its Mexican director, Alfonso Cuaron, has described his dystopian film as the “anti-Blade Runner". The 1982 Ridley Scott directed film, Blade Runner, likewise … [Read more...]
This past Monday, October 31st, was All Hallows’ Eve in the Catholic tradition, secularly known as Halloween, a time of ghosts and goblins when children dress up in costumes to scare each other and go trick-or-treating. Today, unlike in my childhood well over half-a-century ago, kids are accompanied by their parents, since today’s streets in many areas, whether rural, suburban or urban, are mostly unsafe for children … [Read more...]
[ A FILM REVIEW ] Last Tuesday, September 13th, I was back in one of my old neighborhoods, the Stuyvesant Square area of Manhattan, where I lived when I first moved to New York City in 1972. The neighborhood is contiguous with the sprawling Beth Israel Medical Center, where I was both a client and later worked as an alcoholism counselor in the mid-70s, my first job as a medical professional. It was a nostalgic trip … [Read more...]
I first visited the Angel Fire Vietnam Veteran Memorial in New Mexico on February 9, 2002. Angel Fire -- a sacred burning -- is an appropriate name for this first national memorial for Vietnam Veterans, built to quell, not cure, the flaming love of a father for his son lost in war. David Westphall, a Marine Platoon Commander was killed in that abysmal war, killed along with 15 men in his platoon in a brutal ambush in Con … [Read more...]
Another Memorial Day, and it’s been thunder storming here in Woodstock, NY most of the morning. I love it! It’s exactly the kind of weather that I prefer on Memorial Day. With rain, thunder and lightning about, perhaps Memorial Day parades will be cancelled. A Vietnam Veteran, I have never been impressed with martial music from marching bands, us old veterans sporting remnants of too-tight uniforms, or the profusion … [Read more...]
Tonight on primetime, national TV a yearly sports ritual will commence, the National Football League Draft of the most gifted college players by the 32 NFL professional football teams scattered throughout the continental US. The NFL with its 32 teams comprises a monopoly of billionaire businesspersons, who hire some 1700 elite athletes that make up the 53-man rosters. A goodly number of the star players become … [Read more...]
