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On a life empty of belief — So you’re a little kid, and every morning you walk out into this world full of wonder, a world so immense that it is beyond our comprehension and always will be. There is life continually springing from the earth, distant suns shining as stars flanked by their own planets, hard…

Not all of Putin’s propagandists know they’re working for him — Right now, Vladimir Putin’s Russia is committing war crimes in Ukraine, a peaceful neighbor whom it attacked without provocation. The Russian military is targeting civilians, including children, with bombs and starvation in its effort to end the Ukrainians’ resistance to annexation by democidal kleptocrats. As always, Russia’s crimes are staged…

What would a Bible-believing nation do about aliens? — Living in the South, you hear a lot of folks say we need to abide by Biblical teaching. You also hear people complaining about non-Americans coming to live and work here. So, I thought to myself, “What does the Bible have to say about that? What was Biblical policy for…

The curious history of an even curiouser phrase — It’s raining cats and dogs. A common enough phrase. Makes not the first lick of sense, though. So why do we say it? Well, there are several folk etymologies floating around, including these from the Library of Congress website: Odin, the Norse god of storms, was often pictured with dogs…

How “urban renewal” became the fig leaf for a land grab in the 1960s — On February 8th of 2021, the city of Athens, GA, issued an official apology for participating in the destruction of Linnentown, an African American neighborhood adjoining the University of Georgia, as part of a scheme to obtain the land and grant it to UGA as a location for student dormitories. …

You want the intro? You can’t handle the intro! — Songs are like meals, you know. Some start with the main course, with others you get appetizers. Now, me, I love a great two-minute punk blast as much as the next guy. …

Why neither liberals nor conservatives will allow reparations — In cities across the US — from Santa Monica, CA, to Athens, GA, to Evanston, IL — Americans who had their lives upended and their opportunities dashed by bigoted policies and actions by their own governments are receiving at least some measure of redress for their losses. …

How high do you score on the X-ometer? — It wasn’t until I got to high school that I really started to figure it out. My generation was radically different from our parents, who were living a lot like their parents had at their age, and wanted to. But clearly, we weren’t going to grow up to be like…

Grits can be terrific or terrible, depending on how you fix ’em — If you’ve seen the Oscar-winning, and hilarious, 1992 comedy My Cousin Vinny, you know the plot ends up turning on the question of how long it takes grits to cook. (That’s not a spoiler, by the way.) …