Archive for ‘Opinion’

  • Uppermost house: My happiest to-do list

    By S. Peter Lewis BN Columnist My wife Karen was away recently on a mission of higher education. A mission to try and cram even more wisdom and understanding into a brain that she will lament (even in the midst of understanding biochemistry) probably has too many miles on it already. Inevitably, despite her prolific […]

  • Small World: Diagnosing the national malaise

    By Henry Precht BN Columnist “Where did we, where did our generation go wrong?” George asked. It was late at an evening dinner party. He was assuming the guests all shared his depression over the gridlock in Congress, Washington’s failure to manage the unending strife in the Middle East and our persisting economic recession. Most […]

  • My Irish Up: How about a poll on whether the earth is flat or round?

    By Mike Corrigan BN Columnist Feb. 21, 2014 — House members today reiterated that they will not vote to raise the debt ceiling because there’s only so much they’re willing to do for $172,000 a year. Cong. Useless Smith (R-Utah) said, “We just got through canceling the shutdown. That was a lot of work. And […]

  • Small World: Dealing with terrorists

    By Henry Precht BN Columnist Two weekends ago when Somali Islamic terrorists attacked an upscale Nairobi mall killing and wounding scores (mainly Christians), other Islamic terrorists in Pakistan killed as many by bombing a crowd coming out of church. These murders happened against a background of attacks on Christian churches by Moslem extremists in Egypt […]

  • My Irish Up: Quantum physics & government shutdowns

    By Mike Corrigan BN Columnist Nature claims scientists are seeking a new and improved word picture to describe the quantum micro- and macro-worlds. Ahem. I don’t know why they didn’t just ask me directly. To solve the basic questions of quantum physics — why scientists can’t measure both the spin and a charge of certain […]

  • Earth Notes: The Poppies

    By Susan Meeker-Lowry This past May, my oldest son, Jason, passed away unexpectedly. He was 36 and has two young boys. I’ve experienced painful losses — my mother died of cancer when she was only 53, younger than I am now, my father died after suffering a series of stokes shortly after I moved to […]

  • Small World: The bitter harvest of hate

    By Henry Precht BN Columnist Let us give thought to the attitudes of some people toward their leaders. These attitudes, we know from news, history and experience, range across the gamut of emotions. On the extreme positive side these days might be the apparent love and reverence that the North Korean people show for their […]

  • Uppermost House: Hope from axiomatic set theory

    By S. Peter Lewis BN Columnist I love encouraging people. Born for it. Called to it. Wife. Kids. Friends. Strangers. Anybody. I’m an equal-opportunity cheerleader. I wake up each day hoping to find creative ways to paste smiles on people’s faces. I keep lists and make phone calls and send emails and even write real […]

  • My Irish Up: The Weak in Review

    By Mike Corrigan BN Columnist Airheads Come Up With a Plan Dissatisfied with threatening to shut down only the government, House Majority Leader John Boehner hinted last week that his delegation was considering shutting down the supply of air in the United States. This plan remains “on the table,” he said, unless Republican demands are […]

  • My Irish Up: Friends & neighbors

    By Mike Corrigan BN Columnist Behind our three-story apartment house, Don lives with his adult son, Jeremy, in a small attachment that I have dubbed The Outback. Much in the manner of NSA, Don keeps an eye on the rest of us. “I believe in being a good neighbor,” Don says, and apparently he has […]