Books

January 2019

28 Jan

Posted at 06:00h in Uncategorized

For the first time in the history of the Republic, a Speaker of the United States House of Representatives barred a President of the United States from entering the House.  In 1986, Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill refused to let President Reagan address the House before it voted on an aid package for the Contras, right-wing Nicaraguan rebels for whom Reagan hoped to persuade Congress to appropriate $100 million.  O’Neil offered a joint session with the Senate instead, but Reagan turned it down because he wanted to focus on the purse strings of the House. That’s the only time anything has happened remotely like what we’ve just witnessed. It’s worth repeating: For the first time in the history of the Republic, a Speaker of the United States House of Representatives barred a President of the United States from entering the House. This is completely within the rights of the Speaker’s power, since the...

21 Jan

Posted at 06:00h in Uncategorized

Nancy Patricia D'Alesandro Pelosi, age 78, married to the same man for more than 50 years, mother of five (five) children and grandmother of eight, may be the most strategically brilliant political leader since Elizabeth I (Tudor) of England. Both women went into the family business, although Thomas "Tommy" J. D'Alesandro, Jr., a Maryland congressman and then mayor of Baltimore, was not lethal to his (one) wife, unlike Henry VIII. Pelosi herself was the last of six children and the first daughter—who had to negotiate herself out of expectations that she would honor the family by becoming a nun. An activist behind the scenes in local Democratic politics while raising her own kids, she then ran for and was elected to Congress from California in 1987 and has served ever since, posting landslide electoral victories and dropping beneath 80 percent of the vote only twice. She made history being...

14 Jan

Posted at 06:00h in Uncategorized

Susan Zerinsky, age 66 and 5’1” tall, has just become the first woman to head the legendary CBS News division. Yes, that CBS News, as in Murrow and Cronkite, which once set the gold standard for broadcast journalism, of late severely tarnished by #MeToo scandals necessitating the firings of Charlie Rose and Les Moonves. Zerinsky came to CBS at age 20, worked her way up, has produced “48 Hours” for years, exercises seven days a week, boxes, lift weights, does Pilates, and has taken SLT classes because she heard they might make her taller. Of the sexual misconduct at CBS, she vigilantly declares, “#MeToo isn’t behind us, it’s part of us.” Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg is working from home since being released from the hospital after surgery for two malignant nodules on her left lung. She’s 85 and this was her third bout with cancer. She expects to be back on...