It’s that time of year again — you know, when Clint Eastwood releases a trailer for a movie that looks fascinating and completely different from the last thing he did, and your trio of reactions run something like this: 1)…
I know it’s been a week and a bit, which in the contemporary mode suggests that ancient history has already passed under the bridge since the Nobel Committee announced its decision, but I wanted to comment about Obama’s prize. I…
I’m reluctant to comment regarding film-maker Roman Polanski’s arrest and the attempt to extradite him to the U.S. to face charges stemming from his admitted sex offence against a 13 year old girl in 1977, because the issues are complex…
I have friends in the UK who are doctors, men and women who work in intense, busy careers. Like many salaried positions, things get exponentially better the longer you’re in the system. And, like their counterparts in the U.S., UK…
Regular readers will know that in the past year, I embarked on a genuinely life-altering journey. I emigrated to the United States, got married, and now make my home in North Carolina. I love this country – its culture, its…
Let’s get one thing straight: I have no idea what war is really like. I’ve seen ‘Saving Private Ryan’ and ‘The Thin Red Line,’ I grew up in a place colonized by a long-running civil conflict, and I’ve been to…
Sometime in the spring of 1974, my world was somewhat disturbed by the event of my conception, in Belfast, Northern Ireland. When this became obvious to my parents, they went to see a doctor, employed by the UK National Health…
A couple of weeks ago on Glenn Beck’s talk radio show, a woman called in to suggest that because President Obama appears to be raising the tax rate to around the same as what it was under President Clinton; is exercising…
Yesterday, under the headline ‘Obama’s Apology Tour’, FoxNews.com, in typical sneering style, published the following story [alas, they did not opt to print my not always entirely serious commentary alongside, which I have included below in parentheses for God's Politics readers]:
Imagine a world in which a human being developed godlike powers and put them to military use. War might soon be a thing of the past. Imagine this world also tolerating people who dress up in costumes to avenge crime…
On Saturday night, two young soldiers preparing to go to Afghanistan were murdered in Antrim, Northern Ireland. Four other people, including two men delivering pizzas, were injured. The people who carried out the attack — members of a group that…
With the bad economy leaving people without a lot of extra money, many of us have been hunkering down at home with a movie and homemade popcorn. Also, the Oscars are coming up, so I thought it would be a…
It’s a significant week in Northern Ireland, with the latest development in the long-running peace process. The report of the Consultative Group on the Past – established to recommend how we might find ways to deal with the legacy of…
The other day I heard a 78-year-old man sing, through a cracked voice, one of the most moving and gentle jazz melodies, as the iconic image of a fetishized sports car being driven into the sunset was projected. And, not…
I’m always somewhat suspicious of “top 10″ lists, despite the fact that I’ve written one. Too often they become reasons for people not to see films that aren’t included, but I suppose I err on the side of offering the…
Looking back on the year’s movies, I’m struck by how many of my favorites featured the theme of family and community — perhaps this reflects only my current personal concerns, or maybe there’s a bigger invisible hand at work. For…
Bill Maher is that rare thing: a media figure unafraid to say what he really thinks. When he intervened in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, suggesting that it’s better to deal intelligently with terrorism than to indulge in absurdist name-calling,…
Last week two films were released that present propagandized visions of the United States. Bill Maher’s Religulous suggests that religion is poison and its adherents are crazy; the spoof An American Carol wants to say that questioning President Bush is itself an…
It’s that time of year again — you know, when Clint Eastwood releases a trailer for a movie that looks fascinating and completely different from the last thing he did, and your trio of reactions run something like this: 1)…
Imagine a world in which a human being developed godlike powers and put them to military use. War might soon be a thing of the past. Imagine this world also tolerating people who dress up in costumes to avenge crime…
The other day I heard a 78-year-old man sing, through a cracked voice, one of the most moving and gentle jazz melodies, as the iconic image of a fetishized sports car being driven into the sunset was projected. And, not…
