Gentle Ramblings

    In November of 2020 the United States government granted 1.95 billion dollars to Pfizer for Covid vaccine research and testing, according to the New York Times. This billion dollar handout was also given to pressure Pfizer to not only develop an inoculation for Covid but to also expedite the process.  Donald Trump was up against the proverbial clock to rush out a vaccine months before the election and succeeded in writing blank checks to a number of other pharmaceutical companies. As we now know, the vaccinations weren't quite ready by November and Trump was easily defeated by Joe Biden. On December 14, 2020 the first non-clinical covid vaccine injection was given to a nurse in New York City ( date courtesy of wsj.com). Although the rollout for these shots happened in less than a year, an absurdly ambitious amount of time, most people were overly optimistic about the chances for success.      The calendar flipped to 2021, a new president was in the whit...

     When I decided the History of Gun Violence in the United States was going to be my topic for this editorial I faced a conundrum on where I should begin? The wild west and its anti-heroes such as: Billy the Kid, Jesse James, etc,  or something along the lines of the Al Capone styled mob violence of the roaring twenties? Since I usually attempt to keep these pieces as current, and more in tuned with modern times as possible, I came to the conclusion that since much of what I'll be focusing on will be the scourge of Mass Shootings. So what more infamously memorable event would I start this piece with than the Columbine Colorado School massacre, which happened on April 20th, 1999 ( date courtesy of brittanica.com).   I remember that date well, personally, I was a Freshman in High School and at the time 4/20, was a day that was and still is celebrated amongst marijuana enthusiastists. The video footage that is engraved in my memory from that most horrifying day ...

         It was two days until the completion of the Muslim holy month Ramadan, May 10th, which also is the date of an Israeli celebratory holiday, Jerusalem Day. The significance of the day is meant to commemorate the reunification of Jerusalem into Israeli control following the 6 day war in 1967 (theguardian.com). The Al-Aqsa Mosque is one of, if not the most important holy sites in the Muslim religion, but on May 10th it was, more or less, invaded by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) early that morning. Worshippers were attacked with stun grenades, tear gas and a vicious dose of police brutality, only for the fact, Benjamin Netanyahu and his Likud Party seemed to want to incite Hamas to retaliate which they naturally did later that day. After the IDF perpetrated violence occurred, several rockets were launched from Gaza toward Israeli occupied territory. More then likely Israel's state of the art, Iron Dome anti-rocket defense system intercepted those missiles...

      On March 3, 1991, which was an early Sunday morning, a man was pulled over for driving erratically, as well as, reaching speeds over 100 miles per hour on the Los Angeles Freeway (lattimes.com). The man took the police on a short, yet dangerous chase through residential neighborhoods before finally giving up and exiting his car. That man's name was Rodney King and what occurred seconds later became a historical incident and certainly not one that you should show your young children. I was 6 years old at the time of this barbaric, criminal act, which thanks to a person with a camcorder named George Holliday, the whole country bared witness to police brutality at is most violent, racist and bloodthirsty. King, supposedly out of his mind on PCP, laid helpless and I'm sure expecting to be killed by these men who were paid to "serve and protect the community." The gangland style stomping and clubbing lasted (on the footage at least) for one minute and nineteen second...

      On March 15th, 2021 it became 10 years since a war which was born out of the Arab Spring with hopes of overthrowing dictator Bashar Al-Assad and wound up becoming something so much more complex, involving several world powers, numerous proxies and militias, as well as the most brutally barbaric terrorist group in modern history (date courtesy of apnews.com ). Thanks to Russia, and the many various battles between different factions, Bashar Al-Assad is still President of Syria. It doesn't appear he'll be giving up his position any time soon as long as he continues to have Russia in his corner, at least militarily. The war weary nation dealt with extreme unemployment, severely damaged infrastructure and empty supermarkets in Damascus throughout 2021. Still, Assad actually held a press conference with a hand picked group of Syrian journalists shortly before the tenth anniversary of the calamitous conflict. When one reporter dared ask Assad an unscripted question about ...

                         The so-called "Jewel of Democracy" in the Middle East has melted down into a chaotic, mismanaged mess when it comes to its Parliamentary style election of Prime Minister. The Knesset, which is Israel's version of the House of Commons in Great Britain, has been unable to claimed a winner in four elections over the passed two years. We'll get to how this is a perfect, deceitful ruse to keep Benjamin Netanyahu, and more importantly, his ultra-right wing, imperialistic, Likud Party in power as long as possible. Unlike, say Vladimir Putin in Russia, with his phony, perpetually rigged "elections” aimed to present him a lifetime seat as President for life, Israel must portray the facade of an actual functioning Democracy that the International community can be assured that Israel's elections are free and more importantly, fair elections in the mold of the US, UK and other Western Democracies. After a stal...

      It was a quarter passed 9 am, my wife and I had just exited the PATH train from our home in downtown Jersey City, to Penn Station in Newark, NJ. Upon exiting the West end of the transit hub I bared witness to a fifty yard line of dusty blankets, shopping carts, sleeping bags, the occasional tent and lastly the wrinkled faces freezing in the January air. This was a Monday morning in a fairly large, well known city, at least in the New York metropolitan area. I've been through this section of walkway before and never seen so many cold, desperate and somewhat ghostly looking figures before. And no, these weren't some of the phony homeless you'll come across on occasions who'll ask you for a five dollar bill and they're dressed better then you are. These folks were wispy, smelling of mildew from never having the luxury of washing their clothes. As we did our best to politely give what we could fiscally, we continued only two blocks up Broad Street and to our left ...