The Unclad Soul

I have started watching Season 6 of the Netflix series, House of Cards. President Frank Underwood (Kevin Spacey) is dead, and his wife Claire (Robin Wright) is the new president. She takes charge with ferocious scheming using all of her wily skills, which are sometimes frightening, to make sure people know she will not be denied. Anything. This series closely identifies our own emotionally and spiritually bankrupt political system, although in HOC things are, well, dramatically excessive. The characters in the Claire Underwood (which she changes to her maiden name, Clair Hale) administration are about as corrupt as a gang of Capone criminals in the 1920s. Like those guys, they’re all in nice suits with clean looks, but underneath the urbane clothes beat hearts of stone. The tortured and deranged Doug Stamper (Michael Kelly) returns from prison and ruin and God knows what else, to pick up his old expertise in doing relentless damage to those Claire Hale finds in the way...

I am still bewildered by the actions of both Judge Brett Kavanaugh and South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham at the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing last Thursday. The anger, no, the rage in them was shocking. But it was their blatant partisanship that ended any respect I might have for either of them. Yes, Judge Kavanaugh was facing a humiliating time before the Senate Judiciary Committee, having to deny the allegations of sexual assault as a high school teenager. And of course, he would be angry about having his good name, his integrity questioned. After what, as far as we know, has been an exemplary life and an impressive career, it is natural he would be flustered by having all of that ignored because of things he may or may not have done in high school and college. And yet, as a nominee for the highest court in the nation, a position that requires, even demands, an even temperament and the ability to remain politically and religiously impartial and non-partisan, he ...

Stephen Paddock, the mass murderer in Las Vegas, continues to puzzle law enforcement and investigators. He will most likely never be understood. As I mentioned in my last essay and blog post, I think we have to seriously rethink our humanity, and consider how vulnerable we all are both personally and as a society, to the deadly effects of mental illness. This is not something new, and it is not something that will go away. I have no confidence in our political system to do anything useful regarding gun legislation. Congress will talk about it, offer their empty prayers to victims, and say perhaps the gun issue needs to be looked at. But the NRA has a death grip on Congress and state legislators across the nation. The NRA controls gun manufacturing, gun sales, and the gun lobby. Nothing will change there. Money, and lots of it, fuels our political system. Not the safety of the nation. Not the value of our children. Not the security of special events outdoors or indoors. The...

There is a coarsening of our senses and our spirits these days. Much of it comes from the influence of Washington, D.C. The political landscape there is now a drearisome, scorched desert. Nothing exists in most of politics but roaming predators stalking their prey viciously waiting to attack. The scene is so bizarre now that nobodies from nowhere who are inexperienced, inept, discourteous, and amateurish, have taken the spotlight and never stop standing in it. And worse, they have been given just enough power from the media, and from muddleheaded voters, that they perceive themselves to be important. The truth is they are a dangerous threat to the stability of our country and our ability as citizens to function in a healthy and thriving society. We have Congressmen apologizing to BP Oil whose carelessness and cutting of corners has all but destroyed Gulf coast marine life, tourism there, not to mention the death of 11 workers. Such apologies leave reasonable people startl...