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I’m going to try something a little different for today’s post. The intent is to work on two things that are basic to growing a Substack newsletter: regular posting and building a sense of community.
There are some people who read me here but not availing themselves of content I write for other outlets. I think, then, a roundup of my recent output elsewhere might be helpful.
My oldest venue is my blog, Late in the Day, which I’ve managed since 2012. I kind of think of it as the outlet for somewhat shorter and more link-and-excerpt-intensive pieces. I have been busy there lately, as there’s no shortage of news items and other people’s observations grabbing my attention.
My post entitled “The West says, ‘We Stand With You, Ukraine’; Ukraine says ‘Could Have Fooled Us’” looks at the detectable tone of bitterness in some of Zelensky’s recent remarks, and what it could portend for Ukraine’s future direction.
In “Government’s Garbage Justification for Coming After the Home Appraisal Industry, I excerpt generously from a Wall Street Journal column by Edward Pinto and Tobias Peter of the American Enterprise Institute about the latest folly from our pointy-headed overlords.
I’m not exactly plowing new ground with “It Doesn’t Appear There’s Any Salvaging The Republican Party,” but I do provide some fresh substantiation for that assertion.
“Andrew Sullivan’s Experience on Jon Stewart’s Show Speaks Volumes About The Bleak Outlook For Our Society” is a look at how mean the race hustlers have become.
I’m now a contributor at Ordinary Times. It’s outlet with a refreshingly wide array of perspectives. If there’s one common thread, I’d say it’s that all the writers are interested in how to make life in our society and culture a richer, more humane experience.
“The Energy Factor” points out that the Biden administration’s approach toward energy policy does a disservice to its desired outcome regarding Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“The Moment and the Parameters of Happiness” poses a couple of questions: On what basis can we aim to be happy at a time of such gruesomeness, cruelty and suffering as is going on in Ukraine? And is joy fundamentally different from happiness, and if so, which is the more worthy of pursuit?
“Church Shopping, Again” is about the lifetime of head trips I’ve had to unwind as I strive to find a church home.
Finally, I’m the object of a Twitter pile-on that got started with my siding with The Washington Examiner’s Quin Hilyer in a divergence of viewpoint he had with The Bulwark’s Charlie Sykes.
Sykes had written a piece poo-pooing concern over the Disney corporation’s headlong plunge into wokeness.
Hilyer wasn’t buying it:
Replying to @SykesCharlie and @BillKristol
Give me an effing break. That's not cancel culture. That's pushback against an agenda dangerous to children.
I chimed in thusly:
Replying to @QuinHillyer @SykesCharlie and @BillKristol
I think @SykesCharlie does valuable work in a lot of areas, but I’m with you on this one, Quinn. What’s happened to corporate America and our schools is corrosive as hell. Dismantling the foundations of a healthy culture.
And that’s when I came in for a barrage of snark and vitriol. Stuff along the lines of “Yeah, maybe we should go back to the 1950s, when everybody repressed everything” and “Just what does this ‘healthy culture’ look like?”
I actually have an answer for that question, in the form of my next piece for Ordinary Times. I’m just going to let that suffice rather than try to handle each instance of incoming fire.
So that’s what I’ve been doing lately.
Well, that and my paid magazine work.
Anyway, good to be back here, and I’m really going to try to up my consistency.