Folks in the business world sometimes survive the political one by appeasing both sides of the aisle. When I sought corporate contributions for my campaigns,  I wasn’t surprised to learn my  opponent had left some office with a check before me. I felt no ill-will.  I usually left

Make no mistake, after a writer completes a book, the work is less than halfway done.  Of course, there’s the editing and the publishing, but the greatest piece is  the promotion.  As publicist Joanne McCall made clear in the first of my free summer seminars for writers, the tric

I joked  with a friend, recently, that if religious conservatives have their way, abortions will be illegal at the point of coitus.  We both laughed.  But I’m not laughing anymore.  Iowa’s woman governor, Kim Reynolds, has signed a bill that makes abortion illegal at the first

I have a friend who thinks whatever appears on YouTube must be true.  Though a sensible woman in all other respects, she thrives on conspiracy theories, and YouTube abounds in them. There, she can find fake news on the cabal to poison our water systems; a threat to destroy organic fo

If the young want to know why the old keep looking to the past, I’ll tell them.  Sometimes, we old folks  don’t like where the future is taking us.  Our measuring stick is Time and being  longer than theirs, the old can recognize the difference between progress and change.  W

When I served in public life, common knowledge was that the number of jail inmates swelled in winter.  Desperate to come in from the cold, the indigent resorted to petty crimes and waited for the police to arrest them.  Law enforcement officers became social workers.  Their job was

Recently, Ben Carson, head of Housing and Urban Development, proposed reducing rent subsidies almost threefold for the poorest of the poor.  If his proposal were to pass Congress, it  would mean the indigent would have to spend almost 2/3 of their income for housing, leaving 1/3 for

President Donald Trump will probably appoint a Supreme Court Justice during his presidency.  That appointment will tilt the current balance between liberal and conservative justices on that bench.  His choice will be of great concern and keep journalists up to their elbows in ink fo

I bumped into an acquaintance at the grocery store the other day. He said the previous weekend he’d attended a conference for writers.  What he learned from one book agent surprised him.  According to her, some authors are finding inspiration by using Google’s search engine.  T

I live two lives, one as a writer of books and the other as a blogger.  I love both.  The memoir I’ve been working on has been intensely satisfying.  But to complete the memoir, I’ve obliged my readers to live on blog re-runs.  I am thankful for their patience.  During the in