My self-imposed exile from Facebook is over. There were a lot of good reasons for me to walk away when I did. There are good reasons to stay away. But there are also good reasons to return. I am under no illusion about my own importance or influence, nor am I running for anything. In … Continue reading Facebook reboot →

It's still way early in the 2020 presidential election campaign, but not too early to see some really dumb remarks being tossed around. Blundering Oracle is here to help: Knock it off. What do Mitt Romney and Hillary Clinton have in common? Both were major party nominees to lose the U.S. presidential race. Both also … Continue reading Pro tip: stop disparaging voters →

Election Day 2020 is scarcely more than 18 months away, so now is obviously the time to put forward a bold plan to take back the White House: https://twitter.com/GeorgeTakei/status/1121777343368974336 OK, I didn't say that it's a good plan. I like George Takei. I followed his Facebook posts for years, often finding them funny, insightful or … Continue reading The harder path to a better place →

There was a time when people used to say things like "I never thought something like this could happen here." Big news was something that happened somewhere else. We'd read about it in newspapers and magazines. We'd hear about it on the radio. We'd see it on the evening news, or sometimes, via the dreaded … Continue reading Twenty years and a day →

Nothing to see here. Or is there? The Mueller report went public today, sort of. The "lightly redacted" 448-page report by the special counsel was released to the public, preceded by a press conference by Attorney General William Barr. Barr continued to spin the report as he did in his March 24 summary as being … Continue reading What the blank? →

There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about. -- Oscar Wilde After about five weeks on Twitter, I realized the feed was making me nuts. I had followed people I liked, mostly political and media figures. A few people (very few, as it … Continue reading Change the channel →

Yesterday I saw a tweet that included a video clip of Donald Trump allegedly calling people animals. The tweet itself read @realDonaldTrump on people asking for asylum "These aren't people. These are animals." The undated video clip from C-SPAN was 47 seconds long, but I didn't bother to listen to it at the time. I … Continue reading A short adventure in misinformation and bias online →

On April 1, 2018, I burned it all down. More than nine years in Mark Zuckerberg's house of mirrors came to an end. Over 600 friends and 52,000 likes, gone. Countless thousands of posts -- links, quotes, comments, photos -- gone. The long goodbyeI'd wrestled with the decision to leave. Was it me? Was it … Continue reading A year away from Facebook →

Joe Biden is getting an awful lot of mulligans this week. Don't like golf? Me either. How about baseball? Biden is swinging at everything and hitting fouls -- in batting practice. This guy is not even a declared candidate yet. Last week a woman stepped forward to publicly accuse Biden of getting uncomfortably close at … Continue reading Get in the game or go home →

My brother-in-law is an elementary school music teacher. Early in his teaching career, students made thank-you notes at the end of the school year to show appreciation for their teachers. One of the notes stood out for the message inside. Feedback: You made some mistakes. Try not to do that next time. Right now Joe … Continue reading Try not to do that next time →