1976, Clayton Junior High. The jocks against the hoods. Me and others somewhere in the middle or maybe on the outside — nerds, bookworms, artists-in-waiting, ROTC members, goody two-shoes. We were too uncoordinated to excel in sports, too scared of getting in trouble to be really bad, and too much (or too little) of something [...]

Radio Flyer is a small 1992 film about two brothers, Mike and Bobby, who invent a flying machine out of a little red wagon so that Bobby can escape the brutal abuse he regularly suffers at the hands of his drunken stepfather.
The end of the film never baffled me. It seemed clear that Bobby’s escape [...]

When I was nine years old, I was very excited about ordering the Jumping Spider toy that Bazooka Bubble Gum was offering for .25 cents and a few wrappers. After I sent off my envelope, I waited for the mailman every day like some kids wait for Santa Claus. The summer ended, school began, winter [...]

I was a 16 year-old wanna-be love child in a lace shirt, faded jeans, and moccasin boots. Bill was a real 30-something hippie, who had camped out at Woodstock and demonstrated at Berkeley. He drove an old Volkswagon Bug the color of chewed-up Wrigley’s gum, and was fond of quoting both Carlos [...]

When George W. Bush was campaigning for President, I thought there was no better man he could have in his corner than Rush Limbaugh. After all, who could understand the political aspirations of a privileged, party-going, service-avoiding, C-average candidate better than a privileged, two-and-a-half semester college flunk-out, with a penchant for Oxycontin and [...]

When an idea is not just flawed, but based on a pervasive lie, it needs to be called out until facts overcome propaganda and truth rings from the rafters. In McCain’s case, the lie is that businesses are overwhelmed by taxes, and that a business tax cut is necessary to stimulate the economy.