Showing 231 - 240 of 311
Endless struggle
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 19/08/2013
» Of all the conflicts of human history, that between the haves and have-nots is the most enduring. The owners determined to keep the profit, the workers demanding a better wage. Both feel in the right. When negotiations are fruitless, each resort to force. Strikes. Strike-breakers. Broken heads. Broken bodies.
Two iconoclasts
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 15/07/2013
» Of all the thieves through the ages, far and away the most accomplished were those in ancient Egypt. No pikers, they went after treasure: Gold, silver, gems. Nor did they have far to look. However well hidden, they found it. Pyramids housing pharaohs and their wealth for the next world were filled with curses and booby traps.
The aggrivated
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 22/07/2013
» If there's one thing people the world over agree on is that while they love their country, it needs improving. The Establishment isn't right. Election promises notwithstanding, national and private grievances are being ignored, if not aggravated. Is too much expected of democracy?
Europe in chaos
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 29/07/2013
» Born and bred in the Big Apple, my first memory of war was of a photo of a near naked native standing with a spear on the front page of a newspaper. Upon enquiry I was told that he was a soldier of Ethiopia, of which I had never heard. It was at war with Italy, of which I had.
Psychics in suburbia
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 05/08/2013
» Want to become rich and famous? Be a psychic who accurately predicts the future. "Accurately" is the operative word. For millennia there were people who claimed to have this gift/ability, but in fact were only guessing. According to the law of averages, they were probably right some of the time.
Winners and losers
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 12/08/2013
» Among our basic instincts are survival, sex and competition _ the urge to win. To be the fastest, the strongest, the smartest, the best. In sports, in school, in business, in politics, in war. There is no second best. If you are not best, you're a loser. There is pride in being best _ honours, rewards.
Will it bring a fatwa?
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 08/07/2013
» The major religions of the world base their legitimacy on the approval of God, gods, goddesses and angels. Their holy books, as well. Their founders are venerated by churches, temples and mosques. And public celebrations. Doctrines are laid out, heresies punished. Followers go to heaven, disbelievers to the other place.
Crime in the city
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 13/05/2013
» Born in the Big Apple during the Great Depression, I learned a lesson I never forgot: Have nothing to do with the stock market. (My father bought war bonds in WWII). The US _ the world _ economy tanked in 1929 for a dozen years. Frankly, I don't understand financial fluctuations. Obviously, stockbrokers don't either.
The true story
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 17/06/2013
» When picking up a biography of a revered national personage which isn't meant to be a eulogy or a whitewash, the reader must be prepared to accept him or her to have been a human being, warts and all. Great they may well have been, yet in many ways less than exemplary.
Literary poaching
Life, Bernard Trink, Published on 24/06/2013
» When a writer first puts pen to paper, he or she is often unclear about how to carry on for hundreds of pages until the pen (typewriter, computer) is put aside. Some head off in one direction, then change course. More than a few go in circles, hoping to stumble on a plot, a unique niche.