Posted on March 21, 2014 by Robert Ringer
Freedom is not about government-enforced security and equality. On the contrary, freedom is about insecurity and inequality. The price of freedom is not only eternal vigilance, but also self-responsibility. And an integral part of self-responsibility is that no one has a right to anything other than what others are willing to pay him, without government […]
Posted on March 17, 2014 by Robert Ringer
Rather than banning the word “bossy,” why don’t we just ban people who actually are bossy, starting with those who want to tell others how they should live their lives. It’s the height of arrogance to tell others what is right and wrong for them, yet politicians and self-anointed moralists are obsessed with doing just […]
Posted on March 14, 2014 by Robert Ringer
Beware of overconfidence. Always keep in mind that fate sits on the other side of the table of life plotting future problems and obstacles for you. It’s not a question of whether you will experience adversity (You will!), but how you handle it when it makes its appearance — as well as what you learn […]
Posted on March 12, 2014 by Robert Ringer
In offering their opinions on just about every issue imaginable, all media pundits — repeat, ALL — totally ignore the F Factor: FORCE. Mao had it right about the underlying source of all political power — the barrel of a gun — but the normalcy bias lulls naïve Americans into believing it could never happen […]
Posted on August 23, 2013 by Robert Ringer
The big question I have about this song is whether the lyricists were being literal about a circus coming to town and “Baby” becoming involved with a real circus clown, or did they mean it to be one big metaphor? If it’s the latter, it’s an extremely clever metaphor. The singer seems to be giving advice to a younger friend or sibling (“Baby”), advising her to be strong and hide her true feelings…
Posted on August 16, 2013 by Robert Ringer
Last week I featured Josh Groban’s version of “You’re Still You,” and mentioned that when he sang that song on the sitcom Ally McBeal, it was probably one of the two most surprising and spectacular musical debuts in television history. The other, to which I am obliged to accord number-one status, is Susan Boyle’s performance of “I Dreamed A Dream” on Britain’s Got Talent in 2009…
Posted on August 9, 2013 by Robert Ringer
“But when we … when we press the thorn to our breast, we know … we understand … and still we do it.” People have often asked me what my all-time favorite movie is, and when they do, I don’t have to stop and think about it. Hands down, it’s The Thorn Birds, which was […]
Posted on August 7, 2013 by Robert Ringer
What makes this song extra special is that it was sung by Josh Groban when he stunned the world with his performance on Ally McBeal, a sitcom that ran on Fox from 1997-2002. I never saw the show, because I don’t watch sitcoms, so I missed what was probably one of the two most surprising and spectacular musical debuts in television history (the other being Susan Boyle’s shocker on Britain’s Got Talent).
Posted on August 2, 2013 by Robert Ringer
“You can’t handle the truth.” During a heated exchange in a classic court-martial scene from A Few Good Men, U.S. Navy Judge Advocate General’s Corps lawyer Daniel Kaffee (Tom Cruise), who leads the defense team in the trial of two U.S. Marines who are accused of murdering a fellow Marine, shouts at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base commander Colonel Nathan […]
Posted on July 31, 2013 by Robert Ringer
Some pretty heavy thoughts going on here. One can only guess at how many millions of people have not thought, at one time or another, what it would be like to just take off one day and leave their daily routine behind — the alarm going off in the morning, eating breakfast, dropping the kids off at school, etc. Welcome to suburban America! Like all good lyrics, those in “Right or Left at Oak Street” are vivid. You can just picture Roy Clark, on the way back from dropping the kids off at school, sitting at the corner of Main and Oak Streets, thinking the unthinkable…
