Cooking the Books on Your Dime by G. Murphy Donovan “All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred and schizophrenia.” - Orwell I am an equal opportunity political observer.  I watched or listened to both the Democrat and Republican national ...Read More...

No Noose Is Good News?               by G. Murphy Donovan Most media outlets attribute civic upheaval in 2020 to historical social injustice or Donald Trump, or maybe both. Before the history of 2020 gets written in stone, let’s suggest an alternative explanation; the self-inflicted, state ...Read More...

by G. Murphy Donovan I have always been more than a little ambiguous about about taking a knee. For me, genuflection or submission is something you do to express humility before an idea or tradition greater than yourself. Kneeling in church captures the idea. You might also hit you knees ...Read More...

by G. Murphy Donovan A quintet of unmasked white tweens, oblivious to Covid social distancing, has been plastering our neighborhood with flyers. One reads “You are contributing to killing black people…do something you racist fucks.” Another reads “A man was lynched by police. What are you doing ...Read More...

by G. Murphy Donovan Donald Trump provoked a controversy mid-way through the 2020 Covid-19 crisis by asserting that he, the president, set national pandemic policy. If the truth be told, he stepped onto a political minefield, the predictable push/pull of state versus national control on any matter. ...Read More...

by G. Murphy Donovan “Most Americans say they do not trust the media.” -  Columbia Journalism Review. Murray Kempton once said that “a critic is someone who enters the battlefield after the war is over and shoots the wounded.” Kempton, earned his spurs at Hopkins and then at the Baltimore ...Read More...

by G. Murphy Donovan “There is no greater misfortune than dying alone.” – Marquez The Corona pandemic has precipitated a behavioral sea change across the land. We all now do things that might have seemed ludicrous just a few short months ago; no handshakes, no hugs, no kisses, and no large ...Read More...

by G. Murphy Donovan “The duty of a true patriot is to protect his country from its government.”-- Thomas Paine A tired American political axiom claims that “money talks and bull s--t walks.” Clichés are, unfortunately, often the most pernicious varieties of bravo sierra. Presidential primary ...Read More...

by G. Murphy Donovan “Believe nothing until it has been officially denied.” - Claude Cockburn Not many things get better with age. Clint Eastwood might be the exception. At age 89, Eastwood still manages to redeem a film industry that usually panders to liberal tropes or adolescent morons. ...Read More...

by G. Murphy Donovan We like to think of military officers as political eunuchs, but that fairy tale, like free lunch, is a smug myth. No American government institutions, including the military services, thrive or survive in Washington without vigorous internal and external political engagement.  Outspoken ...Read More...

“It is the wise man who knows where courage ends and stupidity begins.” – Jerome Cady by G. Murphy Donovan  Kurdish fighters weeping Gun slinger is one of those good news/bad news metaphors. President Donald Trump might be the poster child for that kind of ambivalence. First, there’s good ...Read More...

by G. Murphy Donovan “The lady doth protest, too much, methinks.” - WS Surely the Super Bowl game itself wasn’t a fail; if you like defense and fourth quarter suspense.      What’s not to like about the New England Patriots, America’s team it seems. Tom Brady and Jules Edelman, just as ...Read More...

by G. Murphy Donovan “There are some assholes in the world that just need to be shot.” – James Mattis Foreign policy in the Trump era is a tug-of-war, a test of wills between national pragmatists and global utopians. Binary equations might be simplistic, but if it has done nothing else, the ...Read More...

by G. Murphy Donovan If I want to, I can take Kiev in two weeks.” - Vladimir Putin After WWII, Soviet Communists played an outsized role in American Intelligence operations, threat analysis, and defense budgets. If America didn’t have the Soviets or Russians as straw men, we probably wouldn’t ...Read More...

by G. Murphy Donovan Celebrity is the knife that cuts two ways; fame on the left, shame on the right. David Hogg is learning that lesson today. Alas, Mister Hogg is a child trying to navigate puberty on national television. He casts himself as a victim, a “survivor,” a spokesman, if not a ...Read More...