Wednesday, December 27, 2006
And Now, for Something Completely Different
My friend Evan caught me on video telling the Chanukah story at my Chanukah party last week. The kids are all in the foreground, but parents are scattered around my living room.
Here’s a link to me as storyteller. Feel free to peruse Evan’s other video clips while you’re there.
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Thursday, October 20, 2005
Guest Blogger: Chaim Scheff on Global Temperature Management
My friend Chaim Scheff asked me to post his thoughts on Global Temperature Management. I reserve the right to agree or disagree with them as I think about them some more. - BA
From Chaim:
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Thursday, September 01, 2005
Atlantis Redux?
It’s hard to see the scenes of devastation from New Orleans without being affected. I keep hearing Satchmo sing ”Do You Know What it Means to Miss New Orleans:”
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Wednesday, August 17, 2005
Thoughts from the Road
Blessed are those who maintain nice, clean Internet cafes, for they truly do God’s work.
Starting a blog is like giving yourself a permanent homework assignment. I mean, news commentary, book reports, pithy thoughts, etc. Whew! Imagine if I actually had readers!
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Sunday, June 26, 2005
A Confession and a Clean Start
I haven’t really been blogging until today. I launched the site with some old essays. Then I spent a month trying to learn a little something about the blogosphere. I kept notes, posted elsewhere, and then backdated my entries throughout June. I figured that it would make an interesting record of how I learned to become a blogger. After all, I’m an essayist, not a diarist. The transformation to blogger wasn’t immediately obvious. And it may take me a while to backfill June. But from 6/27/05 on forward, I expect the timestampst to be real.
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Wednesday, June 22, 2005
A Promotion!
I got an e-mail from Kate Cambor and Joshua Michael Marshall today. Apparently, they “noticed your interesting and thoughtful contributions to the discussion at TPMCafe and wondered if you’d be interested in being an ‘author’ at the site.” That loftier status would allow me to start threads without allowing others to screen their propriety--and to screen threads that others would like to begin.
I accepted, of course. Who doesn’t love a promotion?
Baby blogger is learning to walk.
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Saturday, April 20, 2002
God—America—Faith
I was supposed to write about technology today. For some reason, though, I really don’t feel like writing about technology. I feel a strange need to write about faith. I’m not sure why. Faith has been my bete-noire for a long time now. In fact, for as long as I can remember. I’m afraid of faith because I have observed its power and I don’t understand it at all.
For a long time, I felt great anger at the concept of faith. Sure, I knew people who’d been helped by it. But I could also look around and see the pain and suffering that it caused, the crimes and unspeakable atrocities committed in its name. I have always considered myself fortunate to live in a country without an official religion, without an imposition of faith. And I have long been suspicious of those who attempted to interject faith into the American forum. Couldn’t they see what a wonderful thing we had developed here? Couldn’t they appreciate the brilliance of the Constitutional formulation? Free Exercise and No Establishment. The First Amendment sets out two rules for religion: every individual is free to exercise whatever faith—or lack thereof—they may possess, but the government may not favor any particular faith—or even a combination of faiths. Those two rules allowed us to develop into the most pluralistic, tolerant society in recorded history.
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