While I’m still struggling with jetlag, excuse me for some more non-wonky less-enviro posts…here’s an etching by perhaps the greatest American artist of melancholy, Edward Hopper. And here’s what I learned about melancholy while on vacation in Turkey. For the Turks, melancholy is a collective phenomenon that they call huzun. Orham Pamek, in his greatContinue reading “Mr. Melancholy (Americana edition)”
Author Archives: Kit Stolz
The Secret Blogger of the 19th Century (and Emily)
Some people (including James Wolcott) put Ralph Waldo Emerson at the top of the list of America’s greatest writers. Read his journals and you’ll see why: Emerson talking to himself outshines even the greatest of today’s bloggers with apparent ease. Which is why, on this day, the occasion of my youngest daughter’s 18th birthday, I’mContinue reading “The Secret Blogger of the 19th Century (and Emily)”
A Black Swan in White Face (The Great Correction)
Wendell Berry, the conservative poet without a website, has a phrase for the slightly crazed exuberance of American culture in the last few decades. With a caustic shrug, he calls it the "cheap energy mind." Problem is, our time in this mindset — and its denial — seems to have run out with $4.00 gas.Continue reading “A Black Swan in White Face (The Great Correction)”
The Burden of Freedom
"Unless a man has the taqlents to make something of himself, freedom is an irksome burden. Of what avail is freedom to choose if the self be ineffectual? We join a mass movement to escape individual responsibility, or, in the words of the ardent young Nazi, "to be free of freedom." Eric Hoffer — TheContinue reading “The Burden of Freedom”
Woody Guthrie l945
Found not too long ago in the Federal archives, a clip of Woody Guthrie performing "Ranger Command" on the road:
Cartoonists Everywhere Agree on Bush
Boy, the editorial cartoonist reviews of Bush’s latest statements on energy are just harsh, dude:
Black Kaweah
While I’m on vacation, I thought I’d leave you with vacation-y posts. Here’s one from the Southern Sierra. If you haven’t walked over the Great Western Divide or the Whitney Crest, you may not realize that between these two rather intimidating mountain ranges, in the middle of an enormous valley at roughly 9,000 feet, liesContinue reading “Black Kaweah”
ON VACATION — BACK IN AUGUST
I’ll put up a few musical posts saved up over the past couple of months, but be back with increased vigor on the first weekend in August…check me then.
McCain: At Least He’s Capable of Embarrassment
In the liberal New Republic, Jonathan Chait confesses that despite John McCain’s "nauseating" attempts to deny his bipartisan past, he can’t get too upset about the possibility that McCain might win. Chait writes: Liberals tend to view the press’s love affair with McCain as a wildly unfair act of bias. They have a point. OnContinue reading “McCain: At Least He’s Capable of Embarrassment”
How Barack Can Reach Out to Disaffected White Males
Simple: Talk to Merle Haggard. Charm the SOB, just a little. He’s waiting to be asked. Back when Barack was duking it out with Hillary for the Democratic nomination, Joe Klein for Time interviewed the country music legend (here). Klein argues, with justification, that Haggard has his "guitar hardwired to the gutbucket pulse of MiddleContinue reading “How Barack Can Reach Out to Disaffected White Males”
Kit Stolz 