Sydney Williams

The short answer is ‘no.’ At least, that is my opinion. We all agree that STEM courses (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) are vital to the world we live in. But today’s emphasis on those four disciplines presumes knowledge about the future that is impossible to know.

First off, I have been wrong about Donald Trump. A few months ago, I thought that by now he would be gone. In terms of political ambitions, I have thought him a clown – not stupid, but neither funny nor nice. Now I fear he is a demagogue.

“Death to America!” scream Iranians who have just negotiated an agreement that has won them invaluable concessions from Americans, which includes the releasing of over $100 billion in assets that had been frozen. That deal assures that in fifteen years

By all accounts, the Pope is a man who cares deeply for the world’s poor. But he is less sound when it comes to matters of history and economics.

Nero, allegedly, fiddled while Rome burned. Today we have a Commander in Chief who seems equally unhinged from reality. In a world fraught with Islamic terrorists and muscle-flexing autocratic nations, the enemy on which he is focused is climate change.

In the spring of 1918, the influenza that would become pandemic was first detected. It was initially known as “three-day-fever.” Its effects were such that it caused few deaths. Nobody paid it much heed.  That fall, however, it reappeared in

The only difference between acts of barbarianism shown by Islamic extremists today and those exhibited by German and Japanese soldiers seventy-five years ago is that today we see them in real time. What the Germans did to the Jews in

Thousands of graduation speeches have been held or will be held during ceremonies at the nation’s 7,000 colleges and universities this spring. Some of those speeches delivered were inspiring, most were repetitions of trite sentiments, and a few were simply

Historically, there were two ways to get rich: hard work and inheritance, apart from hitting the jackpot or robbing a bank of course. Now, in a world of ethically challenged public servants, there is another way – public service. Inheritance,

Intolerance of tolerance is certainly no virtue. But bowing to pressure from the intolerant is cowardly. That is what Brandeis President Frederick Lawrence displayed when he revoked the honorary degree the university had planned to bestow on Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Hornswoggle is a word I have always liked. It is a verb meaning to bamboozle or to dupe. While its origin is considered “unknown,” the word is generally thought to be native to America. The word is said to date

Mothers are revealing. Most people my age lived in households where the father worked and mothers raised the children. Fathers were seen during evenings and on weekends, sometimes to punish their offspring for misdeeds performed during the day. Children were

Three people died in riots in Caracas last Thursday. Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro predictably blamed the deaths on “neofascists financed by the United States.” Nothing was said about empty shelves in stores, food shortages, or an inability to buy a

Having just finished Willa Cather’s evocative novel Death Comes to the Archbishop, I have been thinking of how much the world has changed, not just in the past ten years, but over the past two hundred years, since the start

In a vivid example of the pot calling the kettle black, California Democrat Henry Waxman said he would resign at the end of this year because of the “extremism of the Tea Party Republicans.” There are few in Congress whose

We live in a in a pluralistic country. New York State, with a population of about 19.6 million people, encompasses people from across the political, economic, social, and religious spectrums.  Governor Cuomo acted like an elitist and nativist when he

As Americans, we are all equal, yet unequal. Most world leaders preach equality but practice inequality. Exhibit number one is our president. Everybody realizes the presidency is taxing and the job demands periods of relaxation. Even so, the office is

While I am not a particularly religious person, I do know that Christmas is first and foremost a religious holiday. Next to Easter, it is the most important holiday on the Christian calendar – marking, as it does, the birth

Kim Jong-un’s killing of his uncle is a big deal. It is not as though Jang Song-thaek was one of the “White Hats” of North Korea. (There are none that we know of.) He was a notorious thug, a brother-in-law

As America was entering World War I, Joe Young and Sam Lewis wrote a song that became a huge hit at the time: “How ‘Ya Gonna Keep ‘Em Down on the Farm (After They’ve Seen Paree).” Something similar happened in

“Politics is the art of the possible,” so said Otto von Bismarck. He should know. He helped unify Germany, which had been a collection of states, into a single German empire in 1871. He served as Germany’s first chancellor, and

The Month That Was November, 2013   “November comes And November goes, With the last red berries And the first white snows.”                                                                                                                                                                               Clyde Watson – (1947- )                                                                                                                                                                               Author of children’s stories The month debuted with Typhoon

There is nothing wrong with “blowing the whistle” on someone doing something corrupt or unethical. In fact, it is our moral obligation to be the “rat” in such instances. For example, whistleblowers regarding the cover-up on Benghazi and the harassing

Life is an experiment. We begin as infants. Everything that comes later is untried, at least in our own experience, thus everything we face is new – every time we pick up the phone or cross a street. Almost exactly

“The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase Profits”; that was the title of an opinion piece in the New York Times in September 1970 written by Milton Friedman… and sounding like Calvin Coolidge.  It was received by some with

Paul Ryan’s call for fiscal sanity in early 2010 with his “Roadmap for America’s Future” was a rare voice of reason that periodically emanates from the asylum that masquerades as Congress. That he did so when he was barely 40

Senator Ted Cruz of Texas may not have advanced the cause of defunding ObamaCare on last Tuesday night and Wednesday morning, with his rhetorically fluent arguments on the floor of the Senate (and his still standing at the end), but

On Friday, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its “fifth Assessment report.” Climatologists from around the world have spent much of the week in Stockholm debating the thirty-odd page document that will summarize the (approximately) 2000-3000

Thanks to Russian President Vladimir Putin, the generally mis-defined concept of American exceptionalism has again come to the fore. In last week’s New York Times, Mr. Putin displayed his lack of knowledge of the United States’ founding. Toward the end

The cover of New York magazine, for the issue dated September 29, 2008, depicted a trader on the NYSE, his right hand covering his face, which has been thrown back in despair. The lead article was entitled “The Great Shakeout: Goodbye Masters

There are a number of underlying questions regarding Syria. Most important: is it ever right to go to war if we, or our allies, are not directly attacked? Even after we were attacked at Pearl Harbor and Congress declared war

In the real world, demand affects cost – the higher the price, the fewer the takers. In President Obama’s Washington, there is the belief that government policies – not markets – can better influence price, at least as far as

Armed insurrection, as Egypt is experiencing, is unlikely in America, but there are threats to democracy, many of which are more subtle. As much as anything, the founding fathers feared that too much power might accrue to any one individual

China has been both lionized and vilified over the past three decades. It has been seen as the saviour of Western capitalism, but also as a state-run economy intent on becoming the hegemonic nation in East Asia, if not the Pacific.

A fundamental premise of the coming together of the American colonies in 1776 was that a diverse people from myriad heritages with differing religious beliefs could flourish, as long as freedom prevailed. That demanded a government with limited powers, and,

The title is borrowed from Edwin Fadiman’s 1970 book. But the concern it expresses goes back almost two thousand years to the Roman poet, Juvenal. He became known as the first to use the term, Quis custodiet ipros custodes?, which literally