Baksheesh

Baksheeh is a Persian word widely used throughout the Arabic world as well as in south east Asia and India to describe tipping, charitable giving and certain forms of political corruption and bribery. Think of it. With the same word, one can be said to be inducing someone to conduct illicit behavior or giving them alms.  Isn’t language wonderful. I come to this subject because of the landswell of press reports about that poor, struggling retailer, Walmart. You know them, they are the ones who have killed small town America by offering low, low prices on poor quality goods they acquire anywhere but America made by anyone but Americans and sold to those...

The Supremes

Perhaps I would be safer writing about those other Supremes.  You know, the Diana Ross ones, but I’ve never been one to shirk my duty.  One might think it presumptuous for me to opine about the holy of holies, the highest court in the land, but I’m no stranger to the Court, the Constitution, or its rulings thereupon. Unlike most of the great unwashed in our land, I’ve actually studied the relationship between our Constitution and the law as interpreted by the Court.  For I, you see, took Constitutional Law 101.It was in the spring of 1963 to be exact.  Dr. S. was the professor whose job it was to introduce a group of twenty or so mostly reluctant students to...

Do Guns Make Us Safer?

Oh, controversy.  Get thee behind me.  Yes, I know a lot of you are, shall we say, not completely of open mind about the issue of gun ownership, but I am, nevertheless, compelled to speak my mind on the subject.  I am myself a gun owner having a Browning 20 gauge secreted somewhere at my ranch.  I even have some shotgun shells around, but I can only find them when I have no use for them. A few years ago in a fit of excessive gun safety, I bought and installed a trigger guard, and promptly lost the key.  I’ve hunted off and on since the age of twelve, but not distinguished myself at it, and during my brief military career, I qualified, or at least shot, ...

Final Thoughts on Cuba

In no particular order:   What an odd country where health care is free but you can’t buy an aspirin. The best restaurants are private (paladares) which compete with state owned restaurants.  Guess where all the gringos go.  The state fights back though.  They make the tour buses dump the tourists out at least four blocks from the private restaurants.. Artists are the elite of the country, but they mostly sell out of there home and you pay by wire transfer to another country. Their national ballet company is as good as any in the world, but their ballet theatre had restrooms with urinals torn out of the walls and no toilet paper. There’s an eight lane highway...

Fidel, the Embargo and More

In Cuba, every one calls him Fidel as if they not only know him, but have a personal relationship with him.  In a way, they do.  He has cast a long shadow over the island and those who live there or lived there at one time.  He has, directly or indirectly controlled almost every aspect of their lives.  Those who live in Cuba today depend on Fidel and his regime for their livelihood, their well being and even their sense of self worth.  Those who are Cuban, but have left Cuba are, for the most part sustained by their hatred of him and a desire for revenge that transcends reason. Fidel was born to the middle class in Cuba, but he, of course, rejected class in...