Author Archives: Kit Stolz

Earthquake forces us to “fight back” against Nature

This past week Ted Rall's Sleeper Agent made fun of those who would blame environmentalists for the deadly earthquake and tsunami in Japan.  You might be asking yourself: Who would do such a thing/ And even a man had such an impulse, how could it possibly be done? How could you blame environmentalists, who reflexively recoilContinue reading “Earthquake forces us to “fight back” against Nature”

Tennessee Williams: How to live (and love) past despair

How to live (and love) with despair in our hearts is a question our disaster-prone century must face. And with the possible exceptions of Shakespeare and Chekhov, no dramatist has shown us how to face emotional disaster with the verve of Tennessee Williams.  That's the subtext of this lovely essay on Williams, who turns 100Continue reading “Tennessee Williams: How to live (and love) past despair”

La Niña dry winter prediction fails in 2010, experts agree

This fall experts, including the Forest Service, were predicting a strong La Niña condition likely to produce a dry winter, with heat and Santa Ana winds. The oceanic pattern developed, but the prediction?  Bzzzttt! Wrong. Here in Ventura County, we're at roughtly 150% of normal, and got pounded by about six inches of rain over theContinue reading “La Niña dry winter prediction fails in 2010, experts agree”

Metaphor watch: Cliches get Obama in trouble again

As Matt Iglesias (channeling Paul Krugman) points out, the fact that the Obama administration used misleading, overused metaphors to describe the problems afflicting the American economy has a lot to do with the wide-spread but false perception that their efforts to revive the economy made it worse. Here's Krugman:  I still don’t know why theContinue reading “Metaphor watch: Cliches get Obama in trouble again”

The risks of profit dependence: McKibben and Toles

In the Guardian on Friday, Bill McKibben published an essay:  …Because the one thing we've never really imagined is going to the supermarket and finding it empty. What the events reveal is the thinness of the margin on which modernity lives. There's not a country in the world more modern and civilised than Japan; itsContinue reading “The risks of profit dependence: McKibben and Toles”

When Tennessee met Christopher (Isherwood, that is)

We need a break from all this disaster, don't we? Well, I do. To clear our minds, here's a note about the encounter of a couple of famous writers, who maybe should have gotten along, but didn't.   In the l940's, while working for M-G-M on a Lana Turner picture that never happened, young TennesseeContinue reading “When Tennessee met Christopher (Isherwood, that is)”

All Things Considered: Misjudging a catastrophe?

As a fan of National Public Radio, as someone who knows most of the reporters on All Things Considered by the sound of their voice, and as a reporter who knows how difficult it can be to get a fast-moving highly-technical story right, I tend to cut NPR some slack. But I must say, theirContinue reading “All Things Considered: Misjudging a catastrophe?”

“Radical libertarians” hijack GOP, says Republican

Andy Revkin interviews a frustrated David Jenkins, of Republicans for Environmental Protection, a group that has been around for decades, but has been pushed to the edge of irrelevance this century:   Jenkins speaks out:  …the Republican Party has been hijacked. I maintain that it is being unduly influenced by what I call “pretend conservatives.”Continue reading ““Radical libertarians” hijack GOP, says Republican”

What does this devastating earthquake say about God?

It's an age-old question that has arisen again, after the earthquake in Japan, in a most unlikely place — a remarkable front-page think piece by Scott Gold and Hector Becerra in the Los Angles Times this past Saturday morning.  Not having the ability to look at the event from the inside, because they weren't on the scene,Continue reading “What does this devastating earthquake say about God?”