Tik Tok

China is a real geopolitical threat because of Xi. TikTok is Chinese owned and the potential for data mining is real. But Washington’s reflex has been fear mongering rather than analysis; turning a genuine security concern into an excuse for domestic control. Technological advances have always favored tyrants, so we are right to be circumspect.Continue reading “Tik Tok”

Neptune’s Fountain

Las Vegas is a temple of the ersatz celebrating the vacuousness of gambled fortunes. For all the glitz and neon grandeur (quickly being replaced by LEDs), Las Vegas is usually an honest thief. Everyone knows that isn’t the Eiffel Tower, nor the Montgolfier balloon in front of Paris; New York, New York’s scale is wrongContinue reading “Neptune’s Fountain”

Robert Ruark

We come to know characters in books far better than we can people in our own lives because characters are immutable, crystalline in their structured captivity. I stole that thought from Milan Kundera – there is likely something similar in The Unbearable Lightness of Being. My mother sent me a book my father had wantedContinue reading “Robert Ruark”