Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Not every dollar spent to gain influence on Capitol Hill comes from a big global industrial behemoth. Hundreds of small advocacy groups and nonprofits spend thousands each year to lobby Congress and federal agencies on the issues they care about most, and their efforts often go under the radar.
Certainly, Occupy Wall Street protesters have different ideas about the movement's mission. Many of the marchers I met even disagreed on the purpose of their trek - some thought it was about getting to Washington to protest the 'supercommittee'; others thought it was about visiting other Occupations.
At first glance, The Color Run does look a lot like Holi. Its website is populated by photos of people throwing coloured powder at each other and in the air, outdoors, at the start of spring. The only difference, it seemed, was that there was a 5 km. run added in. And that it cost $54.99 to participate.
In 'Nineteen Eighty-Four,' protagonist Winston Smith works at a propaganda department for the state called the 'Ministry of Truth,' where inconvenient news can be discarded down a 'memory hole.' Orwell was fixated on the idea that under certain governments, the past can be altered or documents rewritten.
When American poet Alice Notley was very young, she used to sit in front of the radio and just listen. When she got older, she began to hear words and songs in her head everywhere she went - songs she loved, like 'Begin the Beguine' by Cole Porter, and her own words that sometimes tumbled out into poems.
The Food Stamp Challenge, which challenges higher-income families to live as if they are on food stamps, estimates that a person on food stamps has a budget of about $1.25 per meal. In other words, a family on food stamps must buy an entire meal per person for less than the cost of an average cup of coffee.
Buckhannon, population 5,639, is a deeply conservative town and long has been. While coal is its past, oil and gas are its likely future. It's a town where guns are sold at yard sales, where Pentecostal churches are nearly as common as restaurants, and where distrust of Hillary Clinton is visceral and deep-seated.
There is no denying that unhappiness - even violence - exists in some arranged marriages. Or that some arranged marriages are borne out of cruelty. And part of that six percent global divorce rate can be attributed to the powerful stigma against divorce that's present in countries where arranged marriage is common.
One of the most bitter complaints of craft brewers is that big beer wins consumers by introducing beers whose names resemble the names of actual independent beers. After New Belgium came out with a popular beer called Sunshine Wheat, MillerCoors, through its Leinenkugel brand, came out with a beer called Sunset Wheat.
Every Valentine's Day, I pretend I don't care. Like many of us, I say I don't want the flowers or chocolates or a homemade card. How cheesy. I pretend that it's over-the-top to want the person you like to make you a ridiculously nice dinner, or do some showy gesture, ala John Cusack with the boombox in 'Say Anything.'