That the U.S. became a democracy for the first time in 1965. What! you say. The breaking point is whether you can say any nation (Continue Reading)
Pat’s Polemics
On-going brilliance
the pursuit of happiness
05/16/2019 Pat Barrett 2 CommentsI’ve been looking up this phrase and trying to remember where I heard, on TV recently, that it substituted for “property.” According to an article (Continue Reading)
What is the Freeport Doctrine
08/05/2018 Pat Barrett Add CommentStephen Douglas said, “Slavery cannot exist a day or an hour anywhere. unless it is supported by local police regulations.” That is the Freeport Doctrine (Continue Reading)
Four hundred sixteen!? CONFIRMED!
08/04/2018 Pat Barrett Add CommentThis is a figure I absolutely must check out. I’m reading Max Boot’s Invisible Armies about guerrilla warfare. I noted somewhere how I went to (Continue Reading)
Untangling Police-on-Black violence
07/26/2018 Pat Barrett Add CommentThe reasoning that goes on behind the shootings protested by Black Lives Matter seems shallow. Why does the story run so often along these lines: (Continue Reading)
Magnum Opus Secundum
06/16/2018 Pat Barrett Add CommentSo many themes, they get scattered and lose impact. It seems time to pull some threads together and knit a rope, or rather a hawser. (Continue Reading)
less people
03/01/2015 Pat Barrett Add CommentChris Hayes on MSNBC said the NYPD is pulling over less people. The Mavens would insist on fewer, but he is obviously thinking of people (Continue Reading)
How does a language serve as a vehicle of intellectual discourse?
10/23/2014 Pat Barrett Add CommentI thought these comments printed under the byline Harris Khalique quite interesting. Such comments are directed toward every language and my commentary follows. I e-mailed (Continue Reading)
Let the love light in….
09/30/2014 Pat Barrett Add CommentIn reading about the troubadours, the critics mention how the great scholar of the troubadour phenomenon understood everything about the poetry except what it was (Continue Reading)
Early attack on English grammar instruction
09/26/2014 Pat Barrett Add CommentThe author of a study that was sponsored by the National Council of Teachers of English died in 1931, just before the study was released. (Continue Reading)
Greece – her heritage
02/21/2014 Pat Barrett Add CommentIf you deconstruct Greece, you will in the end see an olive tree, a grape vine, and a boat remain. That is, with as much, (Continue Reading)
Grandkids
09/04/2011 Pat Barrett Add CommentTo my grandsons: “Nyah (their female cousin) is coming over.” “Oh, let’s get some pants on!” – six year old grandson