The Spirited Reasoner

Today is Juneteenth, our newest national holiday. Or to be more precise, today is June 19th, the annual date around which the national holiday will be celebrated in the future….

Undaunted by the naysayers on the progressive left and intransigent right, a Senate group of five Republicans and five Democrats has been quietly fashioning infrastructure legislation. They believe their bill…

Spirited Reasoners will be happy to read a blog having nothing, well, almost nothing, to do with politics. This week we ponder the quality of the healthcare each of us…

Last night’s PBS News Hour included a segment on the family carnage that has been wrought by Q-Anon, specifically in the way some family members feel they can no longer…

Throughout my lifetime (rapidly approaching seven full decades) the term “Middle East” has been synonymous with any problem that has become intractable to the point of hatred and war. I…

Spirited Reasoners of my generation will remember the many bracelets and t-shirts we saw, especially during the 1990s, with the acronym WWJD, which stood for “What Would Jesus Do?” The…

In a passionate op-ed published this past Wednesday in the Washington Post, Rep. Liz Cheney, Wyoming’s only member of the U. S. House of Representatives, had this to say: “I…

Every ten years, state legislatures across the United States use newly released Census data to redraw the lines that separate one Congressional district from another. Sounds easy at first blush….

This week’s news is rife with headlines about killings involving our state and local police. Since we’re so inured to polarization, it’s tempting to take sides. Spirited Reasoners don’t fall…

During the heat of last year’s presidential campaign, I made the mistake of engaging in a Facebook debate with a disciple of the Second Amendment. “Surely,” I posted, “you would…