Category Archives: America

“Song of America” by George Mardikian

Posted on April 4, 2021 by Joel D. Hirst

There is something extraordinarily good, tremendously fresh and clean and pure about “Song of America” by George Mardikian. Mardikian is a now-famous Armenian-American restauranteur and philanthropist who became successful despite the ‘old world’ difficulties – genocide by the Young Turks … Continue reading →

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A River Runs Through It

Posted on January 28, 2021 by Joel D. Hirst

In days of angst and rage it is to art, and specifically to literature that we return to remind us of the American experience and what it means to be part of each other. “Eventually, all things merge into one, and … Continue reading →

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Why Not A Jubilee?

Posted on January 11, 2021 by Joel D. Hirst

There’s nothing that highlights the coming financial debacle like the news I read this morning: Costa Rica is considering open-pit gold mining and deep sea fracking to cover the epic, yawning, gaping hole in their finances. Um, say what??? Now, … Continue reading →

Posted in America, International Affairs, Uncategorized | Tagged | 2 Comments

The Suicide of California

Posted on September 26, 2020 by Joel D. Hirst

Civilizations fail, and then they fall. That is the natural order of things. They fail because their ideas buckle; their discipline withers away; their common culture becomes brittle – an adhesive which no longer binds. Then they fall, a crash … Continue reading →

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On 9/11

Posted on September 11, 2020 by Joel D. Hirst

Remains true, so long as we remain optimistic: “We are sometimes naïve in our goodness – Americans are. It’s part of the nature of our life lived in a free society; part of our ‘social contract’ in which we each … Continue reading →

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Nature and Nature’s God

Posted on July 30, 2020 by Joel D. Hirst

It seems to me ironic that the last four years of socialist rage were finally met by pandemic. We who work in the field of peace know that it is violence more than anything else that begets more violence, in … Continue reading →

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Old Yeller

Posted on July 28, 2020 by Joel D. Hirst

It’s time we return to that which is good and true. We need to abandon the nonsense, and quick, lest we are swept away into the turbulent waters of politics and victimization and forget that which made us. Things that … Continue reading →

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Our Changing World

Posted on July 16, 2020 by Joel D. Hirst

While my little boy plays water-guns, builds Lego sets, learns to type and do extra-math and watches Alvin and the Chipmunks, the world in which he will live is being formed — and in fast forward. So far, the attempts … Continue reading →

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Born Defeated

Posted on June 29, 2020 by Joel D. Hirst

“I want to tell you that you did not win, as you believe, because despite having been born defeated, I still dreamed.” And with those words I ended my first play. Because there is nothing wrong with being defeated, as … Continue reading →

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The End Of It All

Posted on June 27, 2020 by Joel D. Hirst

An unsteady stillness has fallen across the once-hallowed battlefields. The blazing has not stopped, but for the absence of its most-prominent belligerent it might even feel like the glory days of yesteryear when medals were earned and careers made in … Continue reading →

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