Readers often ask, “Dave, why you always pickin’ on the right?” Nick Land, a rather well-known bloke, commented back in January: “Cole’s basic, consistent thesis is that the Left is just way better at politics than the Right. It’s not that he’s wrong, but if he’s right, can ...

Two weeks ago I wrote about the folly of viewing “I’m fleeing to a red state” as a panacea rather than a postponement, and last week I dealt with the right’s disdain for details and fondness for “paint with a wide brush” worldviews. Those themes are interconnected. “Wide ...

Here’s a fun fact: My cousin was one of the attorneys who got silicone breast implants banned in the 1990s. As regular readers know, my biological dad killed Elvis. So my bloodline took away Elvis and boobies. That’s why I never had kids—Lord knows what manner of villainy they’d inflict ...

All last week, something seemed...off. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but something wasn’t right. Like there was a void. Then it hit me! As Texas Republicans were slaughtering each other in the statehouse, “red state Twitter” had gone silent! You know, those rightists who arrogantly ...

Well, so much for last week’s experiment with a race-and-politics-free column about the entertainment industry; it landed with a thud so loud I checked my roof for Eric Clapton’s son (I did that joke years ago and it provoked a furious email from a deeply offended reader. So I’m repeating ...

My friends (and one or two foes) have informed me that my past few columns have been downers. “Can’t you do something a little lighter?” they ask. “Also, what’s your take on the WGA strike?” Happy to oblige, friends and foes who for once are not an imaginary opening-paragraph device ...

Last week a clip from something called “Timcast” went viral. Some round-faced, beady-eyed stoner (I think that’s “Tim”) was debating a manic Robert Downey Jr. look-alike (I guess that’s “cast”) about trannies. Robert Downeysyndrome was telling Tiny-eyed Tim that the massive uptick ...

Call it prescience...or bad timing. The moment I finished last week’s column, Pew released a poll proving my point about the difference between 1970s urban blight and that of the present; how it comes down to optimism back then (the belief that “the powers that be” opposed the rot) vs. ...

“Circling the drain.” It’s a phrase I first heard in a non-plumbing context when a doctor said it in reference to my elderly father’s condition. It basically means dying, but not yet dead. The end seems certain, but the patient clings to life. It’s a terribly brutal phrase to use ...

Continuing with last week’s theme—the decennial of my “outing”—let’s talk about the Holocaust. Because I’m never going to be allowed to not talk about it. Lord knows I’ve tried. I stopped speaking about it publicly after 1995. Returning from a monthlong gig at Waseda University in ...