The next Presidential election will be in less than four months, or it is supposed to be. That something unforeseen could delay or even prevent an election has now become a concern in some quarters. After all, since the last Presidential election, how many times a day have you said, “This is all too fantastic to… Read more »
“The main thing was all the girls used to come to the best group. And we were the best group … they used to come and crowd and load up our corner.” The Drifters’ Charlie Thomas on the motivation for starting a vocal group, then he pauses and looks off-screen and says, “Excuse me wife,… Read more »
New York Times-bestselling author Robin Cook wrote Pandemic, his medical-thriller more than two years before Covid-19. The pulse-pounding story begins when an unidentified, healthy, well-dressed woman is struck down by a sudden respiratory illness on the subway as opportunist thieves snatch her phone and backpack. By the time she’s rushed to hospital, she’s dead. Ending up on forensic pathologist… Read more »
Peter Bergen – Trump And His Generals; The Cost Of Chaos It is a simple fact that no president in American history brought less foreign policy experience to the White House than Donald J. Trump. The real estate developer from Queens promised to bring his brash, zero-sum swagger to bear to cut through America’s most… Read more »
Since its publication in 1966, Jacqueline Susann’s Valley of the Dolls has reigned as one of the most influential and beloved pieces of commercial fiction. Selling over thirty-one million copies worldwide, it revolutionized overnight the way books got sold, thanks to the tireless and canny self-promoting Susann. It also generated endless speculation about the author’s… Read more »
Imagine you have the task of cooking meals for a dictator? What was Pol Pot eating while two million Cambodians were dying of hunger? Did Idi Amin really eat human flesh? And why was Fidel Castro obsessed with one particular cow? Traveling across four continents, from the ruins of Iraq to the savannahs of Kenya,… Read more »
The Bird Way: A New Look At How Birds Talk, Work, Play, Parent and Think by Jennifer Ackerman “There is the mammal way and there is the bird way.” But the bird way is much more than a unique pattern of brain wiring, and lately, scientists have taken a new look at bird behaviors they… Read more »
In Hyper Education – Why Good Schools, Good Grades, and Good Behavior Are Not Enough, Pawan Dhingra uncovers the growing world of high-achievement education and the after-school learning centers, spelling bees, and math competitions that it has spawned. It is a world where immigrant families vie with other Americans to be at the head of the… Read more »
Barzin, the talented singer-songwriter, poet, all-round good guy, and friend of Life Elsewhere alerted us to a new compilation he had contributed a previously unreleased cut to. If Barzin was involved it had to be seriously worth checking out. We did. And, it is. “Love In The Time Of Covid” curated by Andrea Vascellari, is… Read more »
The fourteen-hour time difference hardly seems to matter when you are self-isolating. Days seem to run into each other. Cable news doesn’t help, everyone is jibber-jabbering from their homes via Skype or Zoom, etc. The only slight relief from the monotonous drone of doom and gloom from the endless rotation of hostage-like videos is peering… Read more »
Each August staff and volunteers begin to construct Black Rock City, a temporary city located in the hostile and haunting Black Rock Desert of northwestern Nevada. Every September nearly seventy thousand people occupy the city for Burning Man, an event that creates the sixth-largest population center in Nevada. By mid-September, the infrastructure that supported the… Read more »
No matter who you are, where you live or how much money you thought you had at the beginning of this past week, the fact is, we are all now living in uncertain times. Is this the same feeling of uncertainty my parents suffered at the beginning and throughout World War Two? Can we equate… Read more »
Often in writing a promotional piece for an upcoming show, we attempt to come up with a clever alternative to the title of a book as a headline. James Shapiro’s new book is so incredibly good, so perfect we could not even try to better the title for our header, Shakespeare In A Divided America…. Read more »
After November 8, 2016, first came the sadness; then came the rage, the activism, and the protests; and, finally, for thousands of women, the next step was to run for office – many of them for the first time. More women campaigned for local or national office in the 2018 election cycle than at any… Read more »
“Would you listen to this again?” We asked the jurists after playing each new release. We didn’t want boring answers, so we selected three guests we knew would provide intelligent, and entertaining critiques of every song. The first edition of Life Elsewhere’s Juke Box Jury features three highly qualified guests: Mark Haskell Smith, author of… Read more »
Why are we devastated by a word of criticism even when it’s mixed with lavish praise? Because our brains are wired to focus on the bad. This negativity effect explains things great and small: why countries blunder into disastrous wars, why couples divorce, why people flub job interviews, how schools fail students, why football coaches… Read more »
Do you believe part of Nostradamus’s prophecies has come true? The famous French doctor and alchemist from the 16th century, apparently predicted the beginning of the Second World War, Hitler’s ascension, the fall of communism, President J. F. Kennedy’s assassination, India’s independence and the occurrence of Israel State on the world map. According to Nostradamus… Read more »
Journalist, author and CNN national security analyst, Peter Bergen’s timely new book, Trump And His Generals reads like an outrageous fantasy thriller, set in Washington DC. The antics of the president and his cohorts as they proceed without customary norms to select generals for major posts in his administration could be sub-headed, “Truth Is Definitely… Read more »
Why are so many humans religious? Why do we daydream, imagine, and hope? Philosophers, theologians, social scientists, and historians have offered explanations for centuries, but their accounts often ignore or even avoid human evolution. Evolutionary scientists answer with proposals for why ritual, religion, and faith make sense as adaptations to past challenges or as by-products… Read more »
The Robles Park Village government housing project that sits atop Zion Cemetery is falling apart. Apartments are riddled with dangerous mold. Leaks and structural issues disturb the residents. Many are without air conditioning to ward off the deadly summer heat. Daily life is a struggle, and now there’s a spiritual fervor in the air. Since… Read more »
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