Quick Read
Somehow, despite ample reason for civic disappointment, I find I’m becoming less cynical as I get older, not more. Even now, when I come across reasoning like that expressed by young progressive Democrat Representative David Morales, I can’t help but feel hope that we can salvage reason from the flames of ideology: Here’s the reality:…
The point can’t be stressed enough that Rhode Islanders should understand the Washington Bridge debacle as a representative lesson on our state government. For that reason, not the least, Mark Patinkin’s conversations with local affected business owners is an article to print and review periodically in the future. Restauranteurs and venue owners bought and built…
Arguably, Eric Abbenante— overstates the degree of “debate” in this clip featuring Dr. Phil and Bill Maher, but the difference in point of view he highlights is the crucial one. Here’s Abbenante: Bill Maher and Dr Phil debate the importance of family and religion: “You think family and faith are a big fix to the…
Brandon Busteed’s argument in Forbes well taken: U.S. teachers are dead last among all occupational groups and professions in feeling their opinions count at work, that their supervisor creates an open and trusting environment and that they are treated with respect each day. Teachers are also the highest of all professions in experiencing burn-out and…
Whatever one’s political leanings, the incentives of government must be understood as simply reality. Government agencies don’t have to create a product or service that people will voluntarily purchase. Rather, they must find activities for which they can justify forcing people who are not the direct beneficiaries to pay. This model is justified, in some…
By its nature, advocacy journalism glosses over the details that many would consider crucial. Headlines from a pair of such articles by Katie Mulvaney in the Providence Journal illustrate the point: Six months pregnant with nowhere to go – an unhoused woman’s plight on RI’s streets After months of sleeping on the street, pregnant woman finally…
In the last couple decades, Americans (at least those who occupy seats in academia and mainstream media) appear to have lost their ability to distinguish between upholding a principle and supporting any given people who might benefit from that principle from time to time. Nobody likes to defend groups that are broadly deplored, like Nazis…
Almost in passing during a recent podcast featuring Greg McKeown, Tim Ferriss stepped into an idea I’ve been contemplating lately: [A]s my job, I interview some of the top performers in the world, hundreds of them, and the change that I have seen for those people in that subset who are already, I think most…
Lance Lambert, who appears to be a reporter on the housing beat, shared a table of increases in housing prices in the 50 largest metro areas. As the following snip from the table shows, Providence experienced the third-largest increase over the past year: Various contextual points are important to remember. Metros can vary in size,…
For those willing to step outside the boundaries of “just the way we do things,” the justification for mandatory schooling backstopped by taxpayer-funded government schools is an interesting question. I’d pick up the rope and pull for the “yes, justified” side. A country founded on freedom and individual achievement and held together by abstract agreement…