Brad Rourke’s Blog
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Books You Don’t Have To Read
The long knives have been drawn and sides chosen over Kitty Kelley’s new book that purports to uncover generations’ worth of scandal in the Bush political family. It’s now a political football, but there are far darker books on the shelves of your local bookselling conglomerate. Books you…
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Democracy's Open Book Test
(From the July 28, 2004 Washington Post) The recent study by the National Endowment for the Arts that reveals a precipitous drop in book reading among Americans has many wringing their hands. But the trend is nothing new, and its increased intensity over the past decade is only…
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Democracy’s Open Book Test
(From the July 28, 2004 Washington Post) The recent study by the National Endowment for the Arts that reveals a precipitous drop in book reading among Americans has many wringing their hands. But the trend is nothing new, and its increased intensity over the past decade is only…
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The Head and The Heart
(Also appeared in The Christian Science Monitor [pdf here]) Among certain opinion-makers, it is fashionable to talk about how “bankrupt” the division between left and right is, pointing out that it is the “middle” of America that holds the key to the future. Others stress the polarization between…
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Honest Values
Often, when we think of career-ending ethical lapses, brash young people come to mind. We think of people such as Nick Leeson, the Barings Bank rogue trader who single handedly brought down England’s oldest financial institution. Or Jayson Blair, the relatively young reporter on the rise at the…
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Looking For A Voice in All The Wrong Places
(From the April 5, 2004 edition of The Christian Science Monitor) If you’re someone who believes the right wing has more “opinion leader” outlets than it can shake a stick at, and that the left has done a dismal job of keeping up, these are heady times indeed.…
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Or Give Them Death
Last month Montgomery County, Maryland high school students were let out of school early and offered community service course credit for attending a rally to press for more education funding. There were two small pieces on it in the local weekly paper. Such news stories typically get short…
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True Leadership
The man over at the edge of the room had the look on his face that people get when they really need to say something. He raised his hand. “We need to remember,” he said, “that as public leaders we need to hold ourselves to a higher standard.”…
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In The End, It's The Hands
My daughter is an animal person; has been ever since she discovered them. She loves farms, pet stores, the pound, and the zoo. So I have been closely following the sad spectacle at the National Zoo. Management has fallen victim to a classic nonprofit ethics trap, one to…
