Midlife Meditation

Three police officers were shot and killed last weekend. two in New York City, one in Florida. In the New York incident, the shooter then killed himself. The shooting may have been a reaction to the deaths of Eric Garner and Michael Brown. In the Florida shooting, the perpetrator is in custody; no word yet as to what motivated him. Spokespersons for police unions blamed politicians and protesters for the New York killings, insisting the cause was that too little has been done to defuse anger over the Brown and Garner killings, and suggesting that more stringent measures should have been taken to put down protests. If the context of these words wasn't so tragic, the sentiment expressed would be laughable. In fact, though, police daily put themselves on the front line between order and chaos, and from time to time, they die for their efforts. I propose a different interpretation, one that anyone who has read my blog in the past will find completely unsurprising: what ties these...

Have you checked Facebook lately? That's a silly question. If you're reading this, you probably came to it via the link I posted on Facebook. So for all of us who spend reasonable to large chunks of time on Facebook, here's an observation: there's been a lot about the death of Robin Williams. I've clicked on some of it. I even contributed to it with an essay of my own.  It's understandable many of us would be affected by this great artist's tragic death. One also has to wonder, though, whether it's getting maybe a bit too much attention, especially when, in some outlets, it's crowded out coverage of what's happening in Ferguson, Missouri. That seems to be abating: a cursory glance at my Facebook feed just now (though please note that my friends list is rather heavily weighted with progressive activists) revealed more Ferguson than Williams links. Perhaps it's just people getting past their momentary obsession with a celebrity's dea...