by Ethan Johnson
April 9, 2008

Back in the days when I had ready access to WSCR AM (Chicago), someone was about to ask Norm Van Lear (former Bulls player) about college basketball, and then stopped short, assuming that he'd only want to discuss pro teams. "Basketball's basketball," he replied, and the conversation resumed.

by Ethan Johnson
June 25, 2007

It's official: I have political hand-wringing fatigue.

by Ethan Johnson
February 20, 2007

With apologies to Scott Adams, I consider myself to be something of an "idea rat." Some ideas are best served by being released to the wild, where someone with the ways, means, and motivation to bring it to fruition might have at it, no strings attached. This one is maddeningly simple, and I can't believe that nobody has acted on this yet (to my knowledge).

by Ethan Johnson
November 29, 2006

I'm still recovering from the recent holiday (US), so here are some random thoughts for your edification and amusement.

by Ethan Johnson
October 30, 2006

Plato was arguably the most famous philosopher in human history. He also loathed democracy.

In short, Plato argued that to leave the act of decision-making up to the common folk was akin to buying bread from a blacksmith. Plato was pretty "elitist", when you get right down to it. After all, his ideal leader was, wait for it, the Philosopher-king. Ya think?

Plato's dislike of democracy echoed forth in the commentary dished up by one Mike Hashimoto today in the Dallas Morning News:

by Ethan Johnson
October 5, 2006

Apropos of nothing, but submitted for your amusement nonetheless:

by Ethan Johnson
September 12, 2006

Back in April of this year, I wrote an article titled Wound on the subject of transgendering. I struggled with this topic, and recognized even as I went to press that there were fundamental gaps in my understanding, causing me to not "get it". Koan Bremner, arguably the most prominent TG blogger, offered these thoughts in the comments section of that article:

by Ethan Johnson
August 30, 2006

Back when Copa Mundial 2006 was happening, I bought some soccer-related t-shirts, and now am receiving print catalogs from the mail-order company. I don't mind, because they're fun to flip through, but they're going to be rather disappointed that I'm just not a "preferred" customer in that area.