Spare Change News

Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.

  • Cleaning Up Democracy

    Victory is in the air, and the smell is sweet. 14,000 New England janitors have succeeded in preparing for battle without having to go to war. September 17th, it was a Thursday, I found myself at Copley Square witnessing what could only be preparation for inevitable civil disobedience—a demonstration of how to peacefully disobey, and…

  • The Real 47%

    James Shearer Spare Change News As I watched the Presidential debate, the one thing that struck me was not how bad the president looked, but how neither one of the candidates talked about the subject that neither of them seems to want to address. The only exception was of Mitt Romney’s inane remarks at a…

  • Meeting My Father For the First TIme, Again

    A gentleman and I recently had a brief conversation about an article I had written for Mother’s Day. He congratulated me on the article, and suggested I write one on behalf of Fathers. Upon hearing the mere suggestion of paying homage to fathers, I experienced a barrage of emotions. I felt anger, sorrow, hurt and…

  • Fathering: A Short Story

    When I was asked to write something about my father, I first thought to myself, “That will be a short story.” See, there isn’t much I can tell you about my old man because I never really knew him. I don’t remember him as a child, and I only saw him once or twice when…

  • The Poetry of Martin Espada

    Sheep Haiku Achill Island, Ireland A lone sheep cries out: There are more of us than them! The flock keeps grazing. —– Alabanza: In Praise of Local 100 For the 43 members of Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Local 100, working at the Windows on the World restaurant, who lost their lives in the attack…

  • The Lady: Aung San Suu Kyi in the US

    “I’ve always thought of myself as a politician,” Aung San Suu Kyi explained to a packed audience at the Harvard Kennedy School’s John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum on September 27. Suu Kyi is the daughter of General Aung San, who founded the modern Burmese army and is considered the father of Burma’s independence from Britain.…

  • Inside the Arab Autumn

    Mona Eltahawy held up her arms to block the blows from gendarmerie batons. The police had crossed from the cool evening exterior of the crowd into the steaming, dusty, tear-gas-choked innards of a movement. The rule had been that when the police enter the heart of the square, the weight of a dying regime lands…

  • Romneycare vs. Obamacare

    When Mitt Romney spearheaded the healthcare law here in 2006, supporters shouted that “Romneycare” ushered us into the mythical realm usually reserved for unicorns: Healthcare reform that worked. Then the Feds joined the fray. Obamacare was upheld in a legendary 5-4 ruling by the Supreme Court this summer, so the Affordable Healthcare Act (AHA) jumped…

  • The Liberal Lion

    “I am working to reduce crime.” In a spare, direct, and intelligent speech, Congressman Barney Frank emphasized, to the rapt Freedom Rally crowd on Boston Common September 15th, how “politicians are continually pressed for ways to lower crime…” and that his efforts to stop prosecution of marijuana usage would do exactly that. The Congressman is…

  • An American Journey Across Expendable Communities and People

    In a journey across expendable communities and people – the collateral damage created by an elite oligarchic and political class – Chris Hedges, along with illustrator Joe Sacco, trenchantly and compellingly write of an America in which democracy has become a façade, not a functional tool of change. Read an excerpt, below. Chapter Two: Days…

Got any book recommendations?

Get In Touch