Yesterday, CNN published an essay of mine on the Ethan Saylor case. Following the advice of some friends, I emphasized a classic point from disability studies: We are all, at best, temporarily able bodied. This hook seems to have worked as the piece is receiving a good readership. For new readers, twitter followers, facebook friends….
I am endlessly fascinated by the ways that people shape and appropriate historical memory. One common thread, as common in the 13th century as now, is to assume that historical examples support one’s own agenda, regardless of the facts. Here’s a doozy (originally from Talking Points Memo). A New Mexico lawmaker took to his blog…
#JusticeForEthan has a petition. If you read my blog, you have probably either signed it or chosen not to do so, so that’s not news. What’s amazing is that it is only 1200 from 300,000. Once, just getting to 1200 would have been an accomplishment, as petitions withered and died. Some of this is because…
I haven’t done as much writing about the humanities as I intended during the summer, as other topics moved to the fore. It was one of the sub-themes in my piece on public writing for the Chronicle. Yesterday, a good friend of mine, a libertarian medieval historian, linked to the “Imaginative Conservative.” There are essays…
Today is the first day of the new semester and my wife is out of town (she left at 4 AM). I rose at 6, woke up both my kids, snuggled them for a few minutes in my son’s bed, then went to the kitchen. I assembled breakfast for each, got my daughter onto the…
I often cook with a little more attention to detail on Tuesday, then post about it on social media. I’ve decided to bring some of those posts over here, especially on Sundays when news is lighter. Last Tuesday, I failed to cook pork shoulder in a roasted tomatillo sauce. Here are my directions for you…
Something is happening to the media narrative. Since Saylor died in January, the only people to cover the story were local reporters, especially the people for Washington Post Local (this op-ed from July has a wrap-up of links). This is part of why I tried to write about the story in a way that would…
A few weeks ago, after writing about Ethan Saylor for The Nation, I received a number of questions about why President Obama didn’t speak out about Saylor’s death the way he did for Trayvon Martin. I argued that these questions were misguided. People get murdered every day, the president weighed in because it became a…
Today began much the same as yesterday, except we walked out to the bus. Nico has always had a special needs bus, a “short bus,” pick him up, and for the last year it was right in front of our house. We’d watch the neighbor kids gather at the bus stop from our porch, but…
Today my son started first grade. There was no busing today, just hundreds of parents and kids in their various spots along the school. Nico was happy to walk from the car to school (it was a longish walk due to parking hundreds of parents) and was willing to leave the playground alone, but got…