Whether for a nation or even an organization, the nomination process is crucial in determining who gets elected. William “Boss” Tweed famously figured this out when he ran New York City from Tammany Hall in the 1860s. Tweed said that he did not need to care who got elected, as long as he controlled who… Read More Who Gets Elected?

It would be hard to miss that this is the 50th anniversary of “Star Trek.” There are few entertainment events in the past century that have had such an impact on our culture and on so many people here, and around the globe. Through its many TV versions as well as major movies, most scientists… Read More Star Trek and Public Service: Creating the United Federation

Our grim culture of killing continues. The month of June saw a new high for single shooting massacres with more than 100 people killed or injured in Orlando. The details are always the same. A shooter, who legally purchased guns including a semi-automatic rifle, shot, wounded or killed multiple people. In the end, it was… Read More America’s Gun Culture: More of the Same

I remember the first moon landing. It came a year after the film “2001: A Space Odyssey.” The film seemed less like a work of fiction than one of future fact. The war in Vietnam was well underway and the Cold War was still ongoing. But it was an optimistic and hopeful time and we… Read More No Longer Winner Takes All

About a decade ago, there was a movement to create a national academy for government along the lines of the military academies—the United States Public Service Academy. It was designed to attract the best and the brightest of each year’s high school graduates into government and offer a highly visible symbol of good government and… Read More A New Way to Look at Government

Much of the focus now, and for the next few months, is upon the fracas that constitutes our 2016 presidential primaries. It is at the same time funny, farcical and frightening. Not only are we returning to 19th century style mud-wrestling debates, we are also seeing echoes of the political rallies of the 1930s that… Read More Shadow Governments

There was a time when America was great. Not just because of its actions, but because of its dreams. In the middle of the greatest depression the world has ever known, we dreamed of a better society that offered a strong middle class, a security net for the elderly and a childhood for all free… Read More Being Great Again

Every New Year, we each take some time to look backward at what came before and to gaze forward at what looms ahead. What will the New Year hold? Will it be better or worse than the past? The 1947 movie “The Bishop’s Wife” contains a famous Christmas Eve sermon, which tells the story of… Read More Getting a Glimpse of Our Future

Another Veterans Day has come and gone. There have been some parades, some ceremonies and a few nice moments. The sun has set and the finger of attention has moved on to Thanksgiving, Christmas and the upcoming various holidays. It seemed like after 9-11 things would be different. Love of country and love of those… Read More Did We Forget?

There are so many interesting things happening at this time and it’s hard to decide just what to focus on. Perhaps it is the birth of a new granddaughter, but the ‘good’ interesting things seem better and the ‘bad’ interesting things seem worse. The one thing that seems to hover above them all is the… Read More The Overwhelming Ubiquity of Guns and the Consequences