by WALTER BRASCH It’s time to retire the 99 percent. Not the people, but the slogan that identifies the Occupy Movement. “We’re the 99 percent” slogan focused upon two completely different groups of people. The 99 percent are the masses, the impoverished, the disenfranchised, the middle class; the 1 percent refers to the concentration of wealth in the top one percent of the population and in the dominance of large corporate and global financial systems. The...
Posts Tagged ‘ Brasch ’
Spearing a Tax Deduction
by WALTER BRASCH On a bright Monday morning, a day before tax returns were due, I bumped into my ersatz friend Marshbaum who was placing a change container at the Gas-High Mini-mart on Low Octane and Greed avenues. “March of Dimes?” I asked. “Dimes. Quarters. Ten-dollar bills. Whatever.” Since he misunderstood my question, I tried it another way. “What charity? Humane Society? MS? Veterans Relief?” “Even better. A museum.” “Science museum for kids? Art museum?” “Not even close.” “I’m...
Reality, News Perception, and Accuracy
By Walter Brasch She quietly walked into the classroom from the front and stood there, just inside the door, against a wall. I continued my lecture, unaware of her presence until my students’ eyes began focusing upon her rather than me. “Yes?” I asked. Just “yes.” Nothing more. “You shouldn’t have done it,” she said peacefully. I was confused. So she said it again, this time a little sharper. “Ma’am,” I began, but she cut me off. I...
Collateral Damage in the Marcellus Shale
by WALTER BRASCH There’s nothing to suggest that in his 51 years Kevin June should be a leader. Not from his high school where he dropped out after his freshman year. Not from his job, where he worked as an auto body technician for more than 35 years. Both of his marriages ended in divorce, but did produce two children, a 31-year-old son and a 28-year-old daughter. June readily admits that for most of his life,...
FRACKING: Corruption a Part of Pennsylvania’s Heritage
by WALTER BRASCH (part 3 of 3) The history of energy exploration, mining, and delivery is best understood in a range from benevolent exploitation to worker and public oppression. A company comes into an area, leases land in rural and agricultural areas for mineral rights, increases employment, usually in a depressed economy, strips the land of its resources, creates health problems for its workers and those in the immediate area, and then leaves. It makes no difference if...
FRACKING: Pennsylvania Gags Physicians
by WALTER BRASCH (Part 1 of 3) A new Pennsylvania law endangers public health by forbidding health care professionals from sharing information they learn about certain chemicals and procedures used in high volume horizontal hydraulic fracturing. The procedure is commonly known as fracking. Fracking is the controversial method of forcing water, gases, and chemicals at tremendous pressure of up to 15,000 pounds per square inch into a rock formation as much as 10,000 feet below the earth’s surface...
Star Gazing: Comets, Actors, and Angelina’s Right Leg
In 1973, some friends and I went to the rooftop of our apartment building to watch Comet Kahoutek, touted by astronomers and the media as the comet of all comets. We were sure we’d see it since we had the requisite equipment—binoculars and beer. But we didn’t see the comet. Not that night nor the next night. What we did see was a lot of universe. And while we talked about the ungrateful comet that barely shone against a...
Tanness, Anyone? Oscars and the Bronze Beauties
by WALTER BRASCH It’s the end of February, and one of my friends is still sporting a summer tan. I know it’s phony—and she knows I know it’s phony—but I have long ago stopped teasing her about it. In her never-ending quest to appear to be beautiful and healthy, she has slathered skin tanning lotion into every pore of her body, laid out on roofs and beaches to catch whatever ray was passing by, and goes to...
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