Today I am reprinting a Gallup poll that shows most Americans have a pessimistic and gloomy outlook about 2023. Why am I not surprised by that? What is there to be optimistic about? Inflation continues unabated; our border is a sieve, with millions of people flooding into our country illegally …
For almost three years, we have been bombarded with misinformation, misperception, and one lie after another when it comes to our seemingly never-ending battle with the COVID-19 virus and its apparently endless variants. First, we were told cloth face masks didn’t work when it comes to avoiding infection from COVID. …
I am sharing this look back at 2022 that I received from USAFacts. It is a numbers-driven, all-angles look back at 2022. Here are some highlights. This has been a year of rising prices, the war in Ukraine, landmark Supreme Court decisions, and delayed flights. The nation still averages thousands …
There is an old maxim that goes: “Figures lie, and liars figure.” What follows is an excellent example of that adage. We are constantly bombarded by images, commentaries, and dodgy statistics about our nation that do not reflect demographic or social reality. Watch movies, TV series, and television commercials critically …
Recently I received an e-mail reminding me that December 29 will be the 131st Anniversary of the murder of 297 Lakota Sioux at Wounded Knee Creek on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. These Native Americans, in their winter camp, were murdered on Dec. 29, 1891, by federal …
During my 27-year career with the Chicago Tribune, I rubbed elbows with some of the best journalists in the world. Anthony “Val” Mazzenga, my friend and colleague at the Tribune, was one of those. Val passed away on December 2, and with his death, one of the greatest careers ever …
I was getting ready to post today on Elon Musk’s release of damning emails regarding the Biden crime family. Then I read the column below by former Chicago Tribune colleague and columnist John Kass. John left the Tribune a little more than a year ago, the victim of “cancel culture” …
During the Obama administration, MIT professor Jonathan Gruber, one of the chief architects of Obamacare, said the “stupidity of the American voter” and a “lack of media transparency” were critical to the passage of the 2010 Affordable Care Act. Needless to say, Gruber’s comments ignited a firestorm of outrage. But …
During a recent “virtual book tour” with several book bloggers, I was asked what three lessons I learned while writing my Finding Billy Battles trilogy. It was a good question because it caused me to stop and think about the fiction-writing process in a way I never had before. Here …
When I was signing copies of my Finding Billy Battles trilogy at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books recently, I was asked several times how I conduct research when writing historical fiction. I explained that researching the Finding Billy Battles trilogy began with my memories. I grew up in Kansas …