Frank Capra’s America

In the mid-90s, a mini-comeback of slasher films was ignited when Kevin Williamson wrote the screenplay for Scream. Rather than taking credit for reviving the genre, Williamson always insisted that he had actually driven the final nail in the coffin by exposing all of its tricks. See, we were the Blockbuster Generation, too savvy to [...]

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Things that went unpublished #1

Crazy making days, an Iowa kind of night. What a country. It’s an unusual thing to think about today, but I have in my head the infamous Obama “bitterness” comment. I was one of the people critical of him when he said it, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t ‘get’ what he meant. I’d add [...]

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Auld Lang Syne for the (belated) 4th of July

I’ve been fiddling with this thought all month, and actually drafted most of this before the 4th of July – that seeming an appropriate date for overall thoughts on the past and future of the country. But I don’t know… it never came together. The 4th in reality was sort of a forced holiday for [...]

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Optimistic, Patriotic, American Left

Al Franken once wrote that conservatives love America the way a six year old loves his mother. Mommy is perfect, don’t be mean to mommy, etc… Liberals, according to Franken, have a grown-up love for America — the kind that recognizes faults and works to improve the nation out of love. This seems to be [...]

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The inverted Churchill

Everyone loves a good Churchill quote, and for a lot of people I know, none can live up to the famous: “If you’re not a liberal at age 20, you have no heart. If you’re not a conservative at age 40, you have no head.” Sure, whether or not he actually ever said that is [...]

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