Merriam-Webster defines reactionaryism as follows. Attitudes or opinions tending to favor established ideas, conditions, or institutions (The region’s entrenched reactionaryism made it one of the major battlegrounds for the civil rights movement in the 1960s.) Synonyms: conservativeness, die-hardism, reactionaryism, traditionalism, ultraconservatism Related Words: neoconservatism, Toryism; bigotry, illiberalism; conventionalism, conventionality, fogyism (or fogeyism) Near Antonyms: neoliberalism;…
Stuck in the middle
January 24, 2024
I’ve always loved “Stuck in the middle with You,” by Stealers Wheel. You hear it once, and it’s in your head for good. Trying to make some sense of it all But I can see that it makes no sense at all Bassist Tony Williams has a Fender Musicmaster, a short-scale and the first bass…
Fraud is the new normal
January 24, 2024
I hate fakery. When I was in college, a guy on my dorm floor overturned his BMW as he tried to pull into the parking lot. He ended up in a ditch, upside down. A tow truck was called, and his Beemer was removed. He and I were not exactly friends, but we spent a…
Introducing my two favorite con artists
January 23, 2024
I’d like to introduce you to my two favorite con artists, Mike Albee and Lura Dold of Sandpiper Publicity. Stand up, kids! Don’t be shy. Mike also runs another fake company, Magnus Publicity. Let’s give Mike and Lura a hand! Mike has a long history of defrauding people. Unfortunately for me I didn’t see this…
Time to embarrass Scott Thunes
January 22, 2024
Well, it’s time to embarrass Scott Thunes. I’ve written two books that are mostly about him, In Cold Sweat and Ghosts and Ballyhoo. I’ve interviewed him several times. Requiem for a Heavyweight? Scott Thunes: Unghosted. Scott Thunes on the Ghosts and Ballyhoo Album. Although it’s blasphemy to say so, I listen only to the Zappa…
I met the real Jason Bourne
January 21, 2024
On May 3, 1986, I met the real Jason Bourne. It was on a ferry between Korea and Japan. I’d gone to Korea to extend my tourist visa so I could work another three months before having to find a work sponsor. Korea was a nightmare of inexplicable, shudder-inducing strangeness. It was the only nation…
Cronyism
January 19, 2024
I was surfing around, waiting for next week to begin so I can start up the next phase of my publicity campaign. On a blog that’s run by two brothers whose work has appeared in The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times, I found a post on the movie Lone Survivor. In the piece…
Excised Snippet Number Two
January 18, 2024
Here’s the second passage from my novel Invisible Idiot, which became Chasing the Last Whale, Volume Two of the Ghosts Trilogy. Though I agreed with the need to remove these scenes, I liked them, so I’m publishing them here when I get the urge. Tonight I have the urge. Excised Snippet Number Two: Terrible Pagan…
The stinging pebbles of virtue
January 18, 2024
I just read an article about how the Saudi Mutawaa (religious police from the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice) have banned women from using swing sets. The rationale is that the police are protecting the women from any men who might see them and get excited. Thus, Saudi culture not…