As near as I can tell it began in 1995, when Republicans won control of the House of Representatives for the first time in 40 years and captured a Senate majority.
We began the week by waking without power. Again.
Have you ever done something wrong? Of course you have! We all have. The Bible says, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23)
Michigan tax revenues won’t generate as much money for the state budget as expected last year. Lawmakers will have to re-examine their priorities as they won’t have as much revenue to spend. The state budget has increased over the past decade, so when tax revenues turn the other direction th…
‘The challenge of leadership is to be strong, but not rude; be kind, but not weak; be bold, but not a bully; be thoughtful, but not lazy; be humble, but not timid; be proud, but not arrogant; have humor, but without folly.” – Jim Rohn
It is the week of the Fourth, and COVID-19 or not, Americans are traveling. My family is no exception.
July the Fourth is coming up at the end of the week. How will you celebrate our nation’s independence?
What did we think would happen once boundaries were destroyed?
The New York Times opinion editor James Bennet resigned recently after the paper published a controversial opinion essay by U.S. Sen. Tom Cotton that advocated using the military to put down protests.
The Tri-Cities Historical Museum will open its doors to the public on July 7. In the meantime, members of the museum staff have been hard at work making changes to the museum exhibits to make social distancing easier in the era of COVID-19.
The administrators of Michigan’s economic development programs are handing out few awards for business expansion in the pandemic. In other words, they have effectively “unilaterally disarmed” the state in the battle for jobs. As the state reopens, they ought to ask for a general cease-fire, …
A few years ago, I joined several other people in a classroom and spent the day talking about nonviolent crisis intervention. CPI, or the Crisis Prevention Institute, trains caregivers in many situations.
The Bible records the words written so long ago by the writer of Proverbs: “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.” (Proverbs 14:34)
I took a walk with Dave Brubeck recently, and it was quite an honor. Like any great jazz musician, he improvised quite a bit. He was literally all over the place, and he barked a lot.
Merriam-Webster, the venerable dictionary publisher, announced two weeks ago that it would update its definition of the word “racism” in response to a request by a 22-year-old woman from Missouri.
Like the first shots fired at Lexington and Concord, George Floyd’s death has precipitated an upheaval whose consequences are hard to forecast.
Two words that sound the same but have different meanings can stump even the best writers. I know they fool me.
Each epoch in history is defined by a handful of symbols. The symbol of the cross, for instance, defines Medieval Europe and that era’s misguided Crusades. The swastika defines the rise of Hitler in Germany, and the hammer and sickle does the same for the Russian Revolution. The peace symbol…
We’ve faced many changes, but one still needs to be made.
The Minneapolis City Council has passed a measure to dismantle the city’s police department and replace it with what Council President Lisa Bender calls “a transformative new model of public safety.” This is supposed to better protect people in the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd by …
What began in Minneapolis with the murder of George Floyd did not remain in America. His death has not only shaken this country but has reverberated far beyond U.S. shores. And I’m not just referring to demonstrations from London to Berlin to Chile to Lebanon, Syria, and beyond protesting ra…
Amazingly enough, this year 2020 is approaching the halfway point already. The older you get the more you realize that you don’t have time to waste, yet we seem to be on hold waiting to return to normal life.
I spoke aloud watching TV news the other day. I did not yell, and I expected no one to hear me. It was a simple observation, a muttering to myself.
Last week gave us more reason to believe that our president is an illiberal authoritarian, much like Vladimir Putin and the other overseas autocrats he admires. Faced with massive protests following the murder of George Floyd, Donald Trump and Attorney General William Barr called on police t…
Several weeks ago, I was watching a television program on C-SPAN. At the time I had no idea how timely the broadcast of that show would be. I wish that all Americans could watch that program because the lecture by historian Jonathan White portrays the way all people of every race should trea…
I realize you’re not reading this. Your generation doesn’t read newspapers. That’s OK. Maybe your parents or close relatives will read it to you.
I want to use this month’s column to say a big “thank you” to the majority of Michiganders who have chosen to do their part to decrease the effects of this awful pandemic. Unfortunately, in the past couple of months, we have seen the worst of some folks, and they seem to be getting a lot of …
The state does a lot with its fiscal policy, and people – especially those providing services paid for by taxpayers – are concerned about how the COVID-19 pandemic will affect them. New revenue estimates gave the first look at how much the loss of activity because of the governor’s orders an…
“But you are a black boy, and you must be responsible for your body in a way that other boys cannot know. Indeed, you must be responsible for the worst actions of other black bodies, which, somehow, will always be assigned to you.”
It seemed that circumstances in our country could not get more difficult, more tense and more painful.
It was a night I shall never forget.
For a device used to conceal one’s mouth, masks have generated a lot of chatter in the recent months of the coronavirus pandemic.
People are driving less during the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result, the state government’s fuel tax revenue is falling. The state uses this money to pay for road repairs, and road funding was the biggest dispute in Lansing last year.
President Donald Trump is preparing to exit his second arms-control treaty with Russia since taking the oath of office, and the opposition is already in high dudgeon.
Almost sixteen years ago, I was banging down the doors of the OB ward at Munson Medical Center in Traverse City. I hadn’t realized that the baby I’d just given birth to would be immediately left with me.
One of the most unusual things about the COVID-19 pandemic is that it has forced schools to be closed and students and teachers have had to do their educating online. “Distance learning,” they call it. Thank goodness for the internet, right?
My brother and sister-in-law’s neighbor, Tom Staggs, recently shared a haiku that he wrote after an experience he had in Vietnam. The traditional Japanese haiku is a three-line poem that’s written in a 5/7/5 syllable count and is usually simple, direct and intense in style.
We are living through an unprecedented time, with dramatic changes to global health and the economy. The SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes COVID-19, is forcing people throughout the world to adapt to a new reality. Masks, hand sanitizer and toilet paper have all taken on new meanings in the mid…
High waters are an increasingly urgent problem of late, and only add to the complexity brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. Marinas around the state are feeling the effects, along with the boaters who use them.
The coronavirus will forever change our society from higher education to sports to organized religion. All of these changes will, perhaps, not be positive but some good things will come out of this pandemic.
It seems like just yesterday that I woke up, looked at the clothes I had worn the day before, shrugged, and put them back on.
I don’t know about you, but I have been tremendously disheartened by the discourse during this time of pandemic and Stay Home orders.
For three years former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn was put through a legal and financial wringer by top officials within the FBI, including its then-director James Comey. The FBI investigation threatened to destroy Flynn’s career, finances and life, as, according to the New York …
My column is due in about 20 minutes and I forgot. It’s not even 6 o’clock on this Friday night and I am in my pajamas.
I don’t remember a time when there wasn’t a dog in the house while I was growing up. Far more often than not, there were multiple dogs.
Little did I think that, after last month’s column, we would still be dealing with the COVID-19 thing in this month’s column. We seem to be treading water, as far as moving beyond the virus is concerned.
He drops our groceries on the front porch, like he has almost every Saturday since the world shut down. We’ve already had one hospital scare and we’re doing what we can to avoid another. As such, our friend takes our order every Friday and delivers the goods the following morning.
I read a story the other day that made me think of my mother. Probably I had been thinking about her anyway because it is that time of year with Mother’s Day soon approaching.
Protesters, several of them carrying semiautomatic rifles, swept into the state Legislature chamber in Lansing last Thursday in the second such action by people there who are upset with Michigan’s stay-at-home directives.
If you’re like me, and hopefully you are, you’ve spent a lot of time these past months sitting inside your home, keeping your distance from society and looking out the window.
‘It may be that when we no longer know what to do we have come to our real work. And that when we no longer know which way to go, we have come to our real journey. The mind that is not baffled is not employed. The impeded stream is the one that sings.” – Wendell Berry
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