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Volume 2, Number 8   Monday, February 23, 2004
Current Events
  • Religion: Some of us think life is a bit too dukkha these days, but some of us don't.
  • Political Losers: Musical Chairs - Colin Powell loses
  • Military Talk: Kerry, Edwards, Reverend Al and Denny - Take a Break!
  • Election Notes: New information that will have some impact on the upcoming election...
  • The Economy: Fixing the job situation in an otherwise booming economy...
  • Odds and Ends: Doctor Dean is gone, but we'll always have good science...
Features
Volume 2, Number 7   Sunday, February 15, 2004

Current Events

  • The Economy: Should we stand by and hope?
  • Mailbag - The Puritan Dialogs: From Houston to Paris via Boston
  • Religion: From Mel Gibson (Serious) to the Pope a Pogo-Stick (Not)
  • Leadership (2): Plato's Cave, the Titanic in the Caribbean?
  • Why We Fight (3): The Evolving Consensus View for Perplexed Americans
  • Comedy: Political Comedy This Week (Picking on Southerners)
  • France: All the world envies the United States and wants to be just like us!
  • Odds and Ends: Minor odd items...
Features
  • Book Notes: Albert Camus? Meet Paul Wolfowitz.
  • Quotes: New useful, pithy observations this week!
Volume 2, Number 6    Sunday, February 8, 2004
Current Events
  • Why We Fight: Revisionist Logic to Make Us Feel Good (and Noble)
  • Competitions: This is not to say we are a shallow, frivolous people...
  • Leadership: Is our leader dumb as a post, a liar, or mad as a hatter?
  • Trends or Anomalies: Born Again at 35,000 Feet and Busted in Des Moines
  • Allusions: One last reference to Jonathan Swift
  • Sidebars: Evidence of drug related program activities is a serious matter!
  • Odd and Ends: The Bumper-Sticker Version Of Existentialism
Features
  • Book Notes: On the importance of being dubious...
  • The Arts: The Third International Conference on Neuroesthetics
Volume 2, Number 5   Sunday, February 1, 2004
Current Events
  • The Rich: Feeding the fantasies that keep ordinary life from being overwhelming...
  • Sexual Politics: The problem with strong, educated women with opinions...
  • News Wrap: Where is Swift when we really need him?
  • Evil is Easy: It is NOT George Bush or Dick Cheney or Karl Rove...  It is us.
  • Spooks and Spies: Why George Should Call Lord Hutton and See if Hutton is Free Next Week
  • Anger Management: Not too Swift...
  • Good Deeds: Guantánamo: We are a good, kind and generous nation after all!
  • The Uses of the Past: Bush - Not a deserter, maybe just AWOL
  • Sidebars: Mind Games (Bush and Ellsberg)
  • Odd and Ends: This Week in the World of Humor and Satire

Features

Volume 2, Number 4   Sunday, January 25, 2004
Current Events

Features

  • Escape: Thoughts on chucking it all and moving to France, and a Henri Cartier-Bresson bonus
  • Quotes: Three More Useful, Pithy Observations

The Arts

Volume 2, Number 3   Sunday, January 18, 2004
Current Events
Features
  • Science: Being timid can kill you...
  • Quotes: Useful, Pithy Observations
The Arts
  • Film Notes: Will Harry and Hermione get down and dirty?
  • Book Notes: John Gardner - No Happy Endings
  • Music Notes: European Union Directive 2003/10/EC - The End of Classical Music As We Know It
Volume 2, Number 2    Sunday, January 11, 2004
Current Events

The Arts

  • Books: Political Bombshells Dropping Left and Right.
  • Music: John Cage in Persepective

Volume 2, Number 1    Sunday, January 4, 2004

Current Events
The Arts
  • Film Notes: Cowboys and Indians (Tolkien and Bush)
  • Books: Orson Welles and his Psychoanalyst...
  • Music Notes: Gotta have more of that "world music" stuff...
And...

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Volume 1, 2003

Archives

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Volume 1, Number 27   Sunday, December 28, 2003

  • Gift Theory: Toward a Unified Theory of Christmas Presents (Scrooge Revisited)
  • The Coalition: Tony's Fed Up With George?  How Likely Is That?
  • Film Follow-Up: The Return of the King - as seen by a columnist who claims to be a novelist, a Christian libertarian and member of both Mensa and the Southern Baptist Convention.
  • Press Magnates: Citizen Kane Returns, sort of...
  • Humor Defined: Well, We're Not French!
  • Kerry's pretentious Yale parrot and how the perfidious French are undermining everything good in America in Odds and Ends
  • In Links and Recommendations a new page of year-end lists of the best and the worst and all that (2003 Lists)

Volume 1, Number 26   Sunday, December 21, 2003

Current Events

The Arts

  • Books: The Globalization of Everything but Paris
  • Film: Return of the King - three hours of atavistic classicism, racism and xenophobia as if the age of reason never happened 
  • Music: Garner, Glass and Reich (and Edward Hopper)

December 2003 Links and RecommendationsChristmas in Paris updated; New Years Eve in Paris added (with menus) - and two new pages of useful links: Everything Los Angeles and Links to Media in French, Worldwide

Volume 1, Number 25   Sunday, November 30, 2003

Current Events:

The Arts:

New December 2003 Links and Recommendations added November 30, 2003: Christmas in Paris: holiday events and live webcams, and a live webcam of the beach here!

Volume 1, Number 24   Sunday, November 23, 2003

Current Events:

The Arts:

December 2003 Links and Recommendations added new links to affiliated sites - published by people this editor knows, and consults...

Volume 1, Number 23   Sunday, November 16, 2003
Volume 1, Number 22   Sunday, November 9, 2003
  • In Defense of Los Angeles: Steven Hawking, Jacques Derrida, Aldous Huxley and the Rand Corporation in November 9, 2003 Opinion
  • Phillip Raines on James Brown in I WAS JUST THIS CLOSE
  • In November 9, 2003 Reviews
    • Books: Kurt Vonnegut discusses humanism, and his new but unfinished novel...
    • Film: Jessica and Elizabeth get their movies, for no apparent reason...
    • Music: James Brown, an appreciation by Phillip Raines
  • Iraq.  Getting things right in an occupation not going so well.  "If we have to, we just mow the whole place down, see what happens."  Really?  Readers discuss this and offer alternatives in November 9, 2003 Mail
  • In November 9, 2003 Other Mail
    • Drugs and the Fourth Amendment - making sense of nonsense regarding improper search, probable cause and all that.
    • Words, words, words - are these terrorists or resistance fightersIs the press pre-loading public opinion or not?
  • In November 9, 2003 Odds and Ends the French take on lemmings and Harry Potter, and suggestions regarding Mecca Cola and Salam Cola
  • November 16, 2003 Sidebars this week:
    • On the uses of humiliation as a tool for foreign policy, and a teaching method, and as a management tool...
    • A retired "hawk" (Zbigniew Brzezinski) has a problem with the current war...
Volume 1, Number 21   Sunday, November 2, 2003
  • The Frame Game - a professor of linguistics and cognitive science explains the overwhelming success of conservative Republicans, and a blogger suggests "People like that can get us all killed."  In November 2, 2003 Opinion
  • The American Story - "It's true, it's true, it's really true!"  In November 16, 2003 Sidebars
  • In November 2, 2003 Reviews
    • Books: Words and Music - Elevated and Simplified Language (Johnny Mercer, Abe Lincoln, George Bush)
    • Film: You CAN go home again because the Ozzie and Harriet house is for sale!
    • Music: The "Catalina" that is not an island but actually a jazz club...
  • After a careful analysis of the implications of having a president who not only does not believe in evolution, but also believes he was chosen by God to bring about the apocalypse, friends in Atlanta, Boston and Hollywood discuss The Rapture.  Will we be left behind?  Probably.  In November 2, 2003 Mail
  • In November 2, 2003 Other Mail
    • Bushisms - making sense of nonsense 
    • Notes on Fox suing Fox
  • November 2, 2003 Odds and Ends from France this week
  • A new link to a superb, detailed guide to some great restaurants in France in December 2003 Links and Recommendations
Volume 1, Number 20   Sunday, October 26, 2003
  • The Epistemology of the News.  If epistemology is the study or a theory of the nature and grounds of knowledge especially with reference to its limits and validity, then we have an issue. How do we know what's true?  In October 26, 2003 Opinion
  • In October 12, 2003 Reviews
    • Books: Mark Twain? Is he still dead?
    • Film: Bleak Chic (a subset of "chick flicks") examined...
    • Music: The First Viennese Vegetable Orchestra is touring again.
  • God and Country.  Our Crusade to Rid the World of Evil.  In October 26, 2003 Mail
  • Real men.  The only ones.  Republicans.  The dialog continues in October 26, 2003 Other Mail
  • Canadian cars and sex, the Virgin Mary tree stump, and Fish on Prozac in October 26, 2003 Odds and Ends
Volume 1, Number 19   Sunday, October 19, 2003
  • Thoughts on nailing mashed potatoes to a wall.  Or - "We report, you decide."  "Disseminating Ignorance."  Basically, how watching the news can actually sometimes make you dumber, and have you believe things that just aren't so.  In October 19, 2003 Opinion
  • In October 19, 2003 Reviews
    • Books: Scholarly Paranoia - A Study of Institutionalized Meanness
    • Film: It takes about four hours to learn all the necessary skills to make a movie?  Maybe so.  Ask Claude Chabrol.
    • Music: Seventies Rock and Roll Dies, and Irving Berlin Lives.  Rod Stewart explores the unknown...
  • Class Warfare / Political Warfare or Who's meaner, conservatives or liberals? /  The rich deserve a tax break?  In October 19, 2003 Mail
  • Real men.  The only ones.  Republicans.  Dean and Clarke and the rest don't even have a chance.  In October 19, 2003 Other Mail
  • In October 19, 2003 Odds and Ends
    • Everyone really wants to be an American
    • Jazz as a weapon of war
  • Four political meta-sites added to December 2003 Links and Recommendations

Volume 1, Number 18   Sunday, October 12, 2003

  • The California Recall Election - A Dialog Concerning Political Theory, Arnold Shwarzenegger and Alexander Hamilton in October 12, 2003 Opinion
  • Book review: Ultimate Punishment: A Lawyer's Reflections on Dealing With the Death Penalty by Scott Turow in October 12, 2003 Reviews
  • Copyright, Libel, Slander - Danger on the Websites, as seen from Atlanta, Paris and Hollywood (using George Bush and Larry Flynt and, indirectly, Descartes to illustrate the issues) in October 12, 2003 Mail
  • Will the Kurds get their way?  Probably not.  In October 12, 2003 Other Mail
  • Odd Pronouncements About Diplomacy. A thoughtful writer says we should try to be more like the French, or at least we should treat the French as if they were Canadian, while a Christian conservative leader claims he would be pleased if some patriotic American bombed our own State Department with a nuclear weapon.  In October 12, 2003 Odds and Ends

Volume 1, Number 17  October 5, 2003

  • Politics: The week the country started splitting in two... in October 5, 2003 Opinion
  • In October 5, 2003 October 5, 2003 Reviews
    • BOOKS: The case for tolerating your local religious fanatic as mostly harmless - Americans and their Faith(s)
    • MOVIES: A subversive film on your television at home this week: Dr Strangelove
    • MUSIC: If the Dixie Chicks sang about what they say... Rickie Lee Jones has a new album that turns left.
  • Canadian politicians on drugs? A multi-national discussion in October 5, 2003 Mail
  • Liberals cannot take a joke (Fox News gets CNN) or are conservatives mean-spirited?  Another multi-national discussion in October 5, 2003 Other Mail
  • Bill Clinton, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sex and Outrage and, a bonus - The Poetry of Donald Rumsfeld in October 5, 2003 Odd and Ends
Volume 1, Number 16  September 21, 2003
  • Thomas Hobbes, "Big Minh" and how the world works - getting what you want (more notes on diplomacy by insult and assassination) in September 21, 2003 Opinion
  • In September 21, 2003 Reviews 
    • BOOKS: LBJ guilty of murder?  The colorful folks currently in Washington
    • MOVIES: Collective guilt as a theological concept, and Hollywood marketing tool: Mel Gibson and the ADL
    • MUSIC: Beethoven, skinny and popping speed...
  • Free Enterprise, a Poem in Poem
  • Chain letter - "If you haven't accepted Jesus as your personal savior and decided to follow Christ, well, sit down and shut up!  And don't be offended."  This is in September 21, 2003 Mail 
  • Political satire gets passed along the internet, and Just Above Sunset is asked to promote dissent in September 21, 2003 Other Mail
  • Objectivity at CNN, military training software and fried potato sticks in September 21, 2003 Odd and Ends
Volume 1, Number 15  September 14, 2003
  • Leadership, Management Theory and Saying You're Sorry or That You Need Help in September 14, 2003 Opinion
  • In September 14, 2003 Reviews
    • Books: Military History - from Shiloh to Baghdad by way of ancient Greece with a stop in Okinawa...
    • Movies: Smoke and mirrors - notes on attending a Hollywood movie premier...
    • Music: Upcoming pop music events...
  • International Chatter: Britney Spears on patriotism, as seen from London, Paris, Atlanta, New York and Hollywood in September 14, 2003 Mail
  • In September 14, 2003 Odd and Ends
    • Listening to angry talk radio...
    • The Italian Job - Silvio Berlusconi defends Mussolini
    • The way things are going: The Bush-Sharon solution has its curious appeal?
Volume 1, Number 14  September 7, 2003
  • This week in the world of diplomacy (on winning back the cooperation of those you've tried to humiliate) in September 7, 2003 Opinion
  • In September 7, 2003 Reviews
    • Books: Talking with terrorists and Bill O'Reilly, a new book on violence in God's name
    • Movies: Still offensive after all these years: the ultimate Monty Python movie...
    • Music: Jazz Notes
  • Near the treehouse -
  • The mail flies back and forth regarding the success of the American economy in September 7, 2003 Mail "Light"
  • The mail flies back and forth regarding life, death, murder, abortion and Monty Python in September 7, 2003 Mail "Heavy" 
Volume 1, Number 13  September 1, 2003
  • On telling others to "just shut up" in September 1, 2003 Opinion
  • In September 1, 2003 Reviews
    • Books: Our readers recommend....
    • Film: The Pentagon has a French Film Festival, sort of...
    • Music: Randy Newman anticipated the neo-conservative agenda, of course...
  • The mail flies back and forth regarding the Ten Commandments in Alabama and in history, and the mail flies from Albany to Paris and back regrading a high-level practical joke in September 1, 2003 Mail
  • Four most curious items from the business pages - Prescott Bush, Halliburton, the SCAQMD and Wal-Mart in September 1, 2003 Odds and Ends
Volume 1, Number 12  August 24, 2003
  • The week: our child prisoners in Cuba, WorldCom and a British reporter leaves America in August 24, 2003 Opinion
  • The much anticipated second installment of the photo-essay by Phillip Raines about The Treehouse in North Florida in Treehouse Chronicles
  • One of our readers, Gayle Lelyveld, explains what it was really like - she was there in The Blackout (NYC)
  • August 24, 2003 Reviews 
    • Books: Al Franken is NOT Laurence Sterne
    • Film: The Essential Adolescent Art Form
    • Music: Bugs Bunny and Vivaldi.  Really!  This does all fit together.
  • A bit of dialog with a Canadian friend about the economy, and how folks up there see things a bit differently, in August 24, 2003 Mail
  • A continuation of a meme - regarding last week's rant on Republicans and Coups d'Etat in August 24, 2003 Odds and Ends
Volume 1, Number 11  August 17, 2003
Volume 1, Number 10  August 10, 2003
  • California Politics and the Events of This Week - "The chi done gone." in August 10, 2003 Opinion
  • In August 10, 2003 Reviews
    • Mister Blue (Garrison Keillor) returns from a failed dot-com magazine... 
    • Jerry Lewis and the French Intellectual Tradition
    • If you had been in Los Angeles you could have seen... (recent stage performances)
  • War Crimes - Or Just Standing Up for Yourself?  From Dresden to Tokyo to Inglewood to Baghdad in August 10, 2003 Mail
  • Stuff beyond category in August 10, 2003 Odds and Ends  like a butter sculpture and head-butting elderly movie stars.
Volume 1, Number 9  August 3, 2003

Volume 1, Number 8  July 27, 2003

  • Two Weeks of Odd Reversals in July 27, 2003 Opinion
  • In July 27, 2003 Reviews
    • Books: Did Greta Garbo really want to be alone?  Does anyone?  Maybe they do.
    • Movies: I live in Hollywood. Don't we all?
    • Music: Connecting Mick Jagger, Vaclav Havel, Bill Clinton and Frank Zappa
  • Who is lying about what these days and what that means for America.  Predicting the future.  More pointed email bouncing between Hollywood, New York City, Paris and Atlanta in July 27, 2003 Mail

Volume 1, Number 7  July 13, 2003

  • When is it Time to Walk Away from America? in July 13, 2003 - Opinion 
  • Phillip Raines' extraordinary photo-essay on the treehouse he built deep in the wilds of northern Florida in The Treehouse by Phillip Raines
  • Kevin Klingler on "The Next Napa" and the extraordinary wines, and wineries of Paso Robles in Paso Robles - the Next Napa
  • What Jonathan Swift would say about Merrill Lynch were Swift still around / A test for readers who think they know a lot about the movies / Sex and Bach and Canada in July 13, 2003 - Reviews
  • The messages have been flying between Atlanta and Paris, via Hollywood, regarding the French and the French language in July 13, 2003 - Mail 

Volume 1, Number 6  July 6, 2003

Volume 1, Number 5  June 29, 2003

Volume 1, Number 4  June 22, 2003

Volume 1, Number 3  June 8, 2003

  • Two Canadian writers explain the French to us, or, do words really matter? June 8, 2003 Opinion along with the open forums (see June 1)...
  • Reviews - Automatic Writing Resources, Thoughts on Chick Flicks and Puccini, and a bit on French Electro-Trance Tango: June 8, 2003 Reviews
  • Mail - Readers weigh in on what is "happiness" -- a riff on a speech by Susan Sontag: June 8, 2003 Mail

Issue 1, Volume 2  June 1, 2003

Issue 1, Volume 1  May 26, 2003




























New format August 7, 2003