Monthly Archives: December 2021
Exodus 1-6: Brief Comments on Leadership
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 29th December 2021The beginning of Exodus is about the choosing of a leader. Moses’ birth and adoption by an Egyptian princess is told. As a young man he kills an Egyptian and flees to Midian. He marries a local girl, has a son, and works as a shepherd. God speaks to him out of a burning bush…
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Elon Musk’s Babylon Bee Interview
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 26th December 2021Elon Musk gave a long interview with The Babylon Bee that has received a lot of attention. If you missed it, it’s linked below. The Babylon Bee describes itself as a Christian, conservative, satire online magazine. They were as amazed as was everyone else that the busy industrialist and the world’s richest man (if not,…
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Entire World Tests Positive For COVID
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 20th December 2021In a stunning announcement The White House in cooperation with the CDC, the NIH, and the American Kennel Club revealed that all 7.9 billion of the earth’s inhabitants had tested positive for the coronavirus. The sole exception to this finding of universal positivity was Tom Brady who is exempt from the laws that govern biology….
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Time to Stop Testing Asymptomatic Subjects
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 17th December 2021COVID has made everybody a medical expert. Politicians, investment advisors, journalists, TV newsreaders all are full of analysis and advice about the virus now comfortably settled in throughout most of the world. In general our leaders and opinion setters seem unable to deal rationally with an epidemic that has been with us for two years….
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Gil Hodges Elected to Baseball Hall of Fame
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 15th December 2021Gil Hodges (1924-72) was finally elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame earlier this month. This overdue honor makes him the fifth member of The Boys of Summer ensconced in the Cooperstown hall. I would have written shrine, but Walter O’Malley’s also there. The other four are Duke Snider, Pee Wee Reese, Roy Campanella, and…
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Three Army Recruitment Ads
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 12th December 2021The video below displays three recruitment ads. One for the Chinese Army, the Russian Army, and finally one for the US Army. We seem to be willing to bring a cookie cutter to an artillery fight. We are in big trouble if our ad accurately reflects the warrior ethos of the US Army. One viewer…
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Miguel Fleta
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 10th December 2021I’ve briefly touched on the singing of the Spanish tenor Miguel Fleta (1897-1938), but until now have not devoted a full piece to him. His career was as brief and brilliant as the firing of a flashbulb. I want to mostly focus on his singing rather than his story. There are several excellent biographical sketches…
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Eurydice
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 4th December 2021More operas likely have been written, including the one that introduced the art form, about the Orpheus myth than any other subject. Today the Met’s HD series presented Matthew Aucoin’s Eurydice set to a libretto by Sarah Ruhl based on her 2004 play of the same name. The story in this version is told from…
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Vissi d’Arte
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 1st December 2021Giacomo Puccini knew as much about the workings of the theater as anyone whoever entered one. Accordingly, his mature works are models of dramatic cohesion. He lashed his librettists like galley slaves until they gave him scripts that satisficed his very high standards. These standards are why he produced only 12 operas in 40 years…
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