| brucekluger.com |
A Father's Day Story 6.20.2009 Bruce Kluger If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s unfinished stories. Which is why it's especially frustrating to me every June when I think of my father on Father’s Day, and once again confront the great unfinished story that was our relationship. READ POST Just When You Thought It Was Safe 5.22.2009 Bruce Kluger & David Slavin He's baaaa-aaack! Up from the primordial ooze from whence he sprang—and fresh from an extended vacay at Club Med Hades (wake- and water-boarding included!)— comes Dick Cheney, aka Dick the Impaler, our grumbling, bumbling, behated former Presi....er...Vice President. READ POST From the Mouths of Babes 5.15.2009 Bruce Kluger It's always rewarding to have one's efforts recognized. But I was especially touched to read an essay in this morning's Daily Kos, in which writer Michael Raysses gave a warm nod to my new book (co-authored with David Tabatsky), Dear President Obama: Letters of Hope From Children Across America... READ POST
5.2.2009 Bruce Kluger Will Rogers once noted, ""We can't all be heroes, because somebody has to sit on the curb and applaud when they go by." To that end, I found myself doing some seriously attentive curb-sitting—and applauding— when I read writer Michael Raysees' latest column in Vision magazine... READ POST A Proud Day in Lincoln, Nebraska 4.27.2009 Bruce Kluger A few weeks ago I posted here about my new book, Dear President Obama: Letters of Hope from Children Across America. I commented that my co-author, David Tabatsky, and I were crossing our fingers that good things came from the book—and not just in terms of sales. Well, last week one of those wonderful things happened... READ POST Zombie Bank! 4.22.2009 Bruce Kluger According to Wikipedia, a zombie bank is "a financial institution with an economic net worth that is less than zero, but which continues to operate because its ability to repay its debts is shored up by implicit or explicit government credit support." Okay. You can digest all that eco-mumbo-jumbo; but for a much more engaging description.... READ POST Three Reasons to Buy My Book 4.17.2009 Bruce Kluger Like any author, I would love to see my new book, Dear President Obama: Letters of Hope From Children Across America, become a hit. After all, who wouldn't want a bestseller? But there are three other reasons my co-author, David Tabatsky, and I would like you to consider picking up a copy of the book—reasons that became apparent only when the kids' letters first started pouring in READ POST The Book on Cancer 3.17.2009 Bruce Kluger When Taylor Gettinger, a high school junior from Dwight, Illinois, learned that she had brain cancer, it seemed as if the entire community showed up to support her. Taylor recalls this experience in the new Chicken Soup for the Soul: The Cancer Book: 101 Stories of Courage, Support & Love... READ POST OMG! A New Attack Ad?! 11.9.2008 Bruce Kluger & David Slavin Tuesday's election brought down the final curtain not only on a grueling, two-year presidential campaign, but also on a noisy season of political advertising—notably, the endless torrent of attack ads. Think we're done with all that for a few years? Not by a long shot... READ POST
11.04.2008 Bruce Kluger For all the Maalox moments of this raucous roller-coaster of a campaign season, one thing can be said of the American people: We sure know how to make each other laugh. More than once during the election season, my spirits were lifted by some rare glimmers of video genius, many of them downright hilarious... READ POST Give Bachmann the Boot! 10.20.2008 Bruce Kluger On Friday, October 17th, 2008, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) made the following comment on national television to Chris Matthews, host of MSNBC's Hardball: “I wish the American media would take a great look at the views of the people in Congress and find out: Are they pro-America or anti- America?..." READ POST I Want My Joe TV! 10.17.2008 Bruce Kluger & David Slavin Sometimes those notorious 15 minutes of fame turn into a lifetime—or, at the very least, an hour-long chunk of primetime television. Click the arrow below to hear a promo for America's most promising new candidate for TV stardom... READ POST
09.26.2008 Bruce Kluger & David Slavin As America faces her most calamitous economic crisis since the Great Depression, she seeks salvation not from some geeky bean-counter, but from a real macho money maven. Enter Henry Paulson: The 700-Billion- Dollar Man! READ POST Dick Cheney Exposed! (Again.) 09.16.2008 Bruce Kluger & David Slavin With the release of his new book, Angler: The Cheney Vice Presidency, Pulitzer Prize- winning Washington Post reporter Barton Gellman has lifted a dark veil from Bush presidency, confirming what we already knew, yet were probably too depressed to admit: that over the course of eight years, Vice President Dick Cheney has repeatedly and recklessly seized the reigns of the Bush Administration, in the process upending many of the fundamental freedoms of American democracy. READ POST Steps of Another Man's House 09.12.2008 Bruce Kluger And now for something completely different. Click the image below to see a music video from award-winning composer-lyricist David Yazbek, from his new album, Evil Monkey Man. The song is called "Steps of Another Man's House," and the remarkable animation was done by filmmaker Onur Tukel. Will watching the video change the world? Probably not. But it's thoughtful and lovely, and beats the hell out of watching one more clip of Sarah Palin trying to sound Vice Presidential... READ POST A Long Way From Birmingham 08.21.2008 Bruce Kluger Their names were Denise, Carole, Cynthia and Addie Mae, and 45 years ago next month, on an overcast morning in Birmingham, Alabama, their lives were taken as they prepared for a Sunday school program. A dynamite bomb, planted by local thugs from the Ku Klux Klan, exploded outside the basement of the city’s 16th Street Baptist Church, killing the girls instantly and tearing an irreparable hole in the American conscience.... READ POST Laughter and the '08 Campaign 07.22.2008 Bruce Kluger In discussing the 2008 election last week, Jon Stewart cracked jokes about orphans, Viagra and prehistoric monsters. God, I love politics. As someone who moonlights as a satirist, I’m intrigued by the ever-merging traffic on the election news highway, as the campaign bus brigade bumps along just ahead of the tailgating funny cars... READ POST Will You Watch the Olympics? 07.14.2008 Bruce Kluger As the 2008 Olympics in Beijing grow closer, global protests continue to swell. Decrying China's policies on Darfur and Tibet, as well as its notorious oppression of human rights, activists worldwide are keeping up the pressure on the Games' sponsors, most recently holding rallies outside of the corporate headquarters for Coca-Cola, Swatch, Volkswagen and General Electric... READ POST Dick Cheney: Environmental Hazard 07.10.2008 Bruce Kluger & David Slavin By now, we've all read about the latest environmental wedgie that Vice President Dick Cheney has given to the world's climate. If you somehow missed the story, here's the bad news: READ POST Religious License 06.21.2008 Bruce Kluger & David Slavin South Carolina passed a law this month allowing it to become the first state in the nation to offer its citizens specialty license plates that carry a Christian message. Adorned with a stained-glass window, a cross and the words "I Believe," the plates are already inciting protests... READ POST It's Safe to Laugh Again! 06.16.2008 Bruce Kluger & David Slavin Glowing words from this past weekend's Firedoglake Book Salon: "So here's a puzzler: How do you write a book about a vicious, evil man like Dick Cheney without turning it into an off-putting, angry rant? Well, I have read the answer, and it is called Young Dick Cheney: Great American..." READ POST Guns N' Robes 06.5.2008 Bruce Kluger I've always liked Canada. Its health care system apparently works; its comedians are consistently a hoot; and, with the exception of that tired old bickering over Quebecois sovereignty that seems to erupt every few years, the gentle behemoth just upstairs from us always manages to keep a cool head in a hot world... READ POST Go Tell Hillary! 05.27.2008 Bruce Kluger & David Slavin With the final Democratic primaries upon us— Puerto Rico, Montana and South Dakota— the question is no longer who willemerge the victor, but, rather, who will have the nerve to tell you-know-who that the game is over? READ POST Speak of the Devil 04.29.2008 Bruce Kluger & David Slavin Salman Rushdie knows Dick—at least according to this item that ran in the Rush & Molloy column in today's New York Daily News: READ POST Music From the Heart 04.27.2008 Bruce Kluger Amid the endless rattle and noisy clatter of the popular music industry, sometimes you run across a song that you just have to pass along. This is one of those moments. Now playing on iTunes—and available for purchase on, among others, CD Baby and PayPlay.fm—is Voices From the Hole in the Wall, a stunningly lovely neo-folk song written to benefit Paul Newman's Hole in the Wall Gang Camp for children with cancer and other serious illnesses. READ POST |
