Not long ago, I read the incredible book “Strangers in their Own Land,” by the sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild. She visited Louisiana and interviewed scads of people to ask them about their voting habits. Specifically, she wanted to find out why these decent and smart people continually voted against their own interests. If you lived […]

Sugar is everywhere, almost impossible to avoid.  It’s in foods like bread, pasta sauce, salad dressing, and ketchup. It can be challenging to find sugar in your food because nutrition labels are not required to list all sugar.  In 2018, nutrition labels will be required to call out all added sugar but, in the meantime, […]

When I was in high school and college, I fancied myself a bit of an actor. During that time, I learned two things. The truly great actors have impeccable timing, a precise understanding of their character and how it fits into the larger piece, and are compelling to watch. I was blessed with none of that. […]

If you haven’t heard about the current Congress’ plans to repeal the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, you may have been hiding under a rock.  The Congressional Budget Office (CBO), a federal agency of the US government that provides budget and economic information to Congress, recently released a report outlining the anticipated consequences of repealing […]

Never shall I forget the little faces of the children, whose bodies turned into wreaths of smoke beneath a silent blue sky. Elie Wiesel wrote that, in his astonishing memoir Night. He survived the Holocaust, and he later wrote about how his faith was consumed by flames. Who can blame him? He, and millions like him, cried out […]

The way we read, write, and talk helps to determine the way we see the world. Recently, economist Keith Chen published a paper that asked the question, are languages with less decisive future tenses more thoughtful about the future because they consider it grammatically equivalent to the present. For example, in English, we say “I will go to […]

In today’s America, the easiest thing in the world is to be a straight, white male. I don’t mean that us white guys get our pick of great jobs and get handed sacks of money. Instead, we have a base level of presumed competency. If we say to society that we want to become an […]

People don’t  make resolutions and then spring into lasting action. Behavior change researcher James Prochaska and others (link is external) have written about how people actually change — in stages. The actual behavior change, like starting to exercise, or going on a diet, is not the first stage of change, but rather comes after contemplating a change and then preparing […]

Dear reader, I have to be honest with you. I have a problem. As much as I want you to read this review of the new film Passengers, you really don’t need to read it. All you need to do is direct your eyeballs up a few inches to the picture of the pretty people, and […]

I’ve always held musicals at arm’s length. I’m weak that way. Everybody has a blind spot when it comes to movies, a certain genre or actor that they just can’t stand. My wife’s aunt has an irrational hatred of Tom Hanks. Every time she sees him in a movie, she shakes her head and says […]