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I wrote this poem in late 2008 after Barack Obama was elected president but before his inauguration. The title is from his campaign chant that he got from a woman who supported him: “Fired up! Ready to Go!” The poem is not so much about him as the sense of…
Read More »Civic Engagement by Local Artists By Mimi Parseghian Last night I visited the LTC Gallery to view the current exhibition “20 Lessons from the 20th Century History or Civic Engagement as Visualized by Artists.” The list that comprised the topics for the posters came from an article written by a…
Read More »Economics scholar Bill Lazonick, who teaches at UMass Lowell, contributes to the global discussion about money, labor, and ownership. Here is his latest, co-written for the Korea Times. “Disappearing Act of the U.S. Middle Class.” While pressing for restructuring, value extractors and academics who justified this activity argued that…
Read More »I’m not insensitive to the condition of the White Working Class today, which as an identity politics category seems accepted by chin-stroking pundits in comparison to Environmentalists, now some kind of No Go Zone for political strategists if you listen to the opinion writers (Don’t pander to those Green people).…
Read More »The entry below is being cross posted from Marjorie Arons-Barron’s blog. As befits the season, here are some little gifts, selected headlines I’d like to see next year. I have little expectation they will top newspapers or tease newscasts. Still, a gal can dream. Please add your own in the comments section…
Read More »I knew a politician who used to say that he inflated the skill and strategy of an opponent whenever he ran for office, typically worried about his opponent locking up volunteers, endorsements, and donors before he himself would get to the sources of those advantages. Inevitably, though, he found that…
Read More »UMass Lowell history professor Bob Forrant spoke at Saturday’s Pollard Memorial Library “Community Conversation” on the 2016 election. Here’s what Bob had to say: We Have a Basket Full By Robert Forrant First, some historical context: Hillary Clinton will be the fifth candidate in the nation’s history to win the…
Read More »The entry below os being cross posted from Marjorie Arons-Barron’s own blog. The world was simpler when Donald Trump was merely spouting off slogans or saying offensive things at rallies. But every day brings worse news. The three a.m. tweets, which once showcased his ignorance and lack of discipline, now have real-life consequences, and…
Read More »This past Saturday, more than 60 people gathered at the Pollard Memorial Library do discuss the 2016 presidential election. Community librarian Sean Thibodeau was the moderator. There were two groups of speakers, each of whom was given three minutes to speak, however, the bulk of the morning was spent in…
Read More »Sue Kim is a Professor of English and the Co-Director of the Center for Asian American Studies at UMass Lowell. She was the opening speaker at this past Saturday’s “Community Conversation” on the 2016 election at the Pollard Memorial Library. In her remarks, she discussed the term “the white working…
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