Straight From The Hart

If you value your free and open Internet, then I urge you to read this column and take appropriate action with regard to contacting your representatives in Congress.  I don’t usually begin my columns with a warning, but in this case it is justified, because in less than ten days from today, our president will be fulfilling and finalizing a promise he made early on in his presidency to turn over the control of the Internet as we know it to a multinational corporation which includes the countries of Russia, China, and Iran, and which do not have a First Amendment right to free speech. If you do not trust these countries to always provide free and unrestricted access to your use of the internet, including your confidential information, and your expression of freedom of speech, then you have one week to contact your senator and representative and as many other members of Congress as you can, to express your opposition. The Internet was started by the United States, in particular th...

Confessions Of A Linguaphile There’s nothing more diverse than people  The things they cherish, that turn them on  The things they collect and want to “keeple”... Their treasure stashed when day is done. Some like their cars, matchbox, antique  Old and battered or shiny and sleek.  They polish and buff them then drive them around  Taking pleasure in gear shift and motors that sound. Some delight in dishes, with patterns that match  And vases and pitchers, or just one of a batch.  Some collect ducks, or elephants, or pigs  Some look for paintings to enhance their “digs”. But for me, I love words,  How they sound, how they rhyme,  How they roll off my tongue,  Absolutely sublime. Like abstruse and duende, oppugn, fancify,  Prodigious and resile, cachinnate,and belie,  Vademecum and bedizen, coterminous too  Fugacious, inexorable, and then derring-do. I...