The Big Picture – By Glynn Wilson – GETTYSBURG, Pa. — They say if you listen close enough at night by the creeks in these parts, you can still hear the cries of some of the ghosts of the 51,000 soldiers who bled and died here in the effort to save or break up the…
On Steinbeck’s Travels and Robert Mueller’s Testimony Before Congress
The Big Picture – By Glynn Wilson – THURMONT, Md. – Imagine this: What if, back in the 1960s, you could have been reading John Steinbeck’s Travels With Charley: In Search of America in daily bytes on a website and found out when he posted something new with a social media platform like Facebook? Would…
Escaping the Heat Dome and Heading for Walden Pond
“The Revolution had come and passed, And Young America, gathered about, Received his tales with many a doubt…” – George P. Webster, Legend of Rip Van Winkle Sunday Reader – By Glynn Wilson – THURMONT, Md. — The heat pressed down over Washington and came with a suffocating invisible cloud of ozone, making it hard…
Senators Press Trump Administration to Implement ‘Operation Safe Return’ on Southern Border
By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. – A bipartisan group of Senators are indicating they will attempt to step into the policy vacuum on the southern border, where current policy has fueled a humanitarian crisis, with a program called “Operation Safe Return.” U.S. Senator Doug Jones, the Democrat from Alabama, announced the decision publicly by…
A Dangerous Heat Dome Covers the Country, and Clouds Our Brains
Alabama Democrat Doug Jones Takes to the Senate Floor to Speak on the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 Mission
Acknowledging Huntsville Alabama’s Role in Building the Saturn V Rocket – By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. – It’s not hard to remember exactly where I was 50 years ago when the Apollo 11 space craft launched for the moon on July 16, 1969 with Saturn V rocket motors built in Huntsville, Alabama. Or where…
Nature Abhors a Vacuum: From Aristotle to Thoreau
The ‘Worst Fourth of July Ever’ Thanks to Trump’s Takeover of ‘The Peoples” Independence Day
By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. – The verdict of “the people” is in: “It was the worst Fourth of July ever.” That’s the conclusion I heard the most out of locals from Virginia, the District and Maryland about Independence Day 2019 that will be known forever as the day President Donald Trump took over…
We Have Met the Enemy and He is Us
The Big Picture – By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. – Everyone should be familiar with the apocryphal phrase, often turned into a cliché by winners on television reality shows or sporting events and sometimes attributed to being popularized by American transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson: On life, he allegedly said, “It’s not the destination, it’s…
American National Pride Hits New Low as Final Planning Takes Shape for Trump’s ‘Salute’ to the U.S. Military on July Fourth
By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. — On the eve of the Independence Day celebration in the nation’s capital and around the country on the Fourth of July, patriotic American pride and national morale are showing record lows, according to public opinion research, largely based on the disgraceful performance of the occupant of the White…
Standing Up to Trump’s Tyranny on Independence Day
“These are the times that try men’s souls: The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us,…
Senator Doug Jones of Alabama Joins Criticism of ‘Dysfunction in Washington’
By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. – People have been complaining about “dysfunction” in Washington, well, since George Washington was drafted to become the first president of the United States. Politicians who want to come here to the so-called swamp, for all kinds of strange reasons, have been campaigning on the issue for decades. Candidate…
Judge Rules Against Trump in Federal Corruption Case
By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. – In a significant blow to Donald J. Trump’s legal attempt to block a lawsuit and investigation into how his private business practices violate the anti-corruption emoluments clauses in the U.S. Constitution, a federal court denied a series of motions by attorneys for the president this week and allowed…
Lessons for Progressive Democrats on Theodore Roosevelt Island
Secret Vistas – By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. – Lurking on a wooded little island in the Potomac River just across the water from Georgetown, there lie important lessons for progressive Democrats from the most progressive president in American history. In continuing our exploration of the U.S. capital region, not just the partisan politics,…
Roy Moore for the U.S. Senate Again? Doug Jones Says ‘Bring Him On’
By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. – Everybody knows the news by now. Ole Ten Commandments former judge Roy Moore just couldn’t resist the opportunity for a little more publicity and another fund raising op. He announced down in Alabama that he’s by god running again for the U.S. Senate seat he lost to Birmingham…
National Park Service Works to Save Mulberry ‘Witness Tree’ by the Washington Monument
By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. – It was a cold day in the nation’s capital on February 21, 1885 when the Washington Monument was finally dedicated on the National Mall after decades of fits and starts and problems finding matching stones and money to build it, according to the National Park Service, and there…
Trump Officially Takes Over Independence Day Celebration in Washington for 2020 Reelection Campaign
By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. – Since no-one around East Potomac Park had heard anything official about the Fourth of July fireworks launch site being moved from the Washington Monument to West Potomac Park when I went nosing around down there by Hains Point golf course today to scout the new location as tweeted…
Controversial President Donald Trump Officially Kicks Off Reelection Bid in Orlando
By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. – Nearly four years since he officially announced his unlikely run for president in the basement of Trump Tower in New York in 2015, the controversial President Donald J. Trump kicked off his 2020 reelection campaign in Orlando, Florida on Tuesday in one of his signature football stadium rallies…
We Should Have a Lively Public Debate About This Moon-to-Mars Mission
Unfortunately, that probably won’t happen – The Big Picture – By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. – It’s Sunday in the campground just 13 miles north of the White House and summer is right around the corner after a few glorious spring days just over the District of Columbia line in Maryland. We had a…