Must Read Or Listen

Tuesday, Bonnie Bossert suggested I read Timothy Egan’s A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan’s Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them.

Now that I have (with my ears at 1.25X speed, which took a quick round-trip flight to DC and one power walk), I can confirm it is a MUST READ.

I’m pretty sure you will find yourself wanting to share it with everyone you know.

Please do.

“Drown the government in a bathtub?”  Turns out: They may not need the bathtub.

And, yes, I’m mindful Monday is Christmas.  As long-time readers know, I love Christmas.  Not for the religion of it — although I do think Jesus was one of the two greatest Jews who ever lived, the best little boy in the history of the world, basically, yet one whose teachings seem largely to have been lost on many of his worshippers (see, for example, the millions of Klansmen-and-women whose story Egan tells, above) — but for the spirit of Christmas embodied in so many beloved songs and movies that celebrate love and family, peace and goodwill, hope and charity and the wonder in a child’s eyes.

May yours be merry and bright, in the words of Irving Berlin (Israel Beilin), even if the chances grow slimmer each year it will be white.