With the 2008 presidential and congressional elections less than one year behind us, the list of Republican, 2012 presidential-wannabees is beginning to take shape. Although the list currently contains over a dozen names, at least half of them have already begun the early stages of campaigning. At this point in time the Republican candidates are all attempting to highlight their right-wing, “party line” values in order to win over the conservative vote, which will be critical in the primaries. No one has yet painted a clear vision …

It is a new axis of evil, this triumvirate, consisting of Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh and Representative Joe Wilson. They are demagogues, all. Truth has no place in their repertoire and their only seeming goal is that of disseminating false information in egomaniac self-promotion.
Palin pontificates about the non-existent “death panels” in Obama‘s proposed Health Care Reform legislation. Her outrageous claim that end-of-life counseling would entail pulling the plug on terminally ill patients and the elderly is ludicrous. It would have involved counsel on hospice care, living wills and matters of quality …

Elocution is defined as the art of effective public speaking. The art of oration once taught in public schools has become a lost discipline. Elocution emerged as a formal discipline during the eighteenth century and and instruction included proper diction, use of gestures, stance and dress. Having been a Speech major in college, I was able to teach this for some time in public schools. It was determined by powers-that-be, however,that this discipline was unnecessary and could be taught as part of the English curriculum. I saw it as a …