Recent Citizenship Commentaries

Featured image for “It’s Time.”
It’s Time.
In 1940, journalist Edward R. Murrow stood in a church in England while the country endured German bombers night after night. Inside the church was a crudely written sign which read, “If your knees knock, kneel on them.” It’s time for Americans to get up off their knees and fight. Like a hamster on a wheel, we’ve become stuck going...
Read More
May 16, 2023
Featured image for “Lessons From Ukraine”
Lessons From Ukraine
Think about this. Because of Putin’s war against Ukraine, millions of Ukrainian men, women, and children are enduring the harshest conditions imaginable: nightly bombing; an absence of light, heat and water. Ukraine’s health system cannot keep up with the sick and injured. Schools have closed in much of the country. Despite help from European and Western allies, life in Ukraine...
Read More
February 24, 2023
Featured image for “Memo to Democrats: Don’t Gloat”
Memo to Democrats: Don’t Gloat
Note: On assignment, but I’ll be back! No high-fives. No victory laps. No champagne room. You’re not out of the woods, yet. Watching Democratic leadership win back the Senate, you’d think they had won the Super Bowl. They didn’t. What we all won was a return to democracy, and a keen sense that most Americans don’t want to hand over...
Read More
November 15, 2022
Featured image for “Stand for What’s Right!”
Stand for What’s Right!
Integrity: firm adherence to a code of moral values—uprightness. A rap star spouts antisemitic and anti-Black remarks and refuses to apologize. A basketball star apologizes for antisemitic remarks only after he was suspended for his actions. A Supreme Court Justice will not step aside from legal decision-making on any issue brought before the court regarding the 2020 election involving the...
Read More
November 7, 2022
Featured image for “Hurricane Ian Reminds Us of All That is Good”
Hurricane Ian Reminds Us of All That is Good
Attending a Padres/Dodgers game in San Diego, I’m sitting next to a die-hard Padres fan. Despite my lifelong Dodger fever, we shared laughs, baseball stories and favorite teams: he loved the Yankees; I loved the Red Sox. What makes baseball so compelling is that while both sides want to win, they play on the same field, follow the same rules,...
Read More
September 30, 2022
Featured image for “Books Unite Us, Censorship Divides Us”
Books Unite Us, Censorship Divides Us
“The reading of all good books is like a conversation with the finest minds of past centuries. — Rene Descartes, 16th century French Mathematician While I talked about this earlier this month, we need reminders . . . a lot of reminders. Last week was Banned Books Week. It’s hard to imagine an America—a country that places free speech at...
Read More
September 27, 2022
Featured image for “Will Donald Trump Finally Get His Comeuppance?”
Will Donald Trump Finally Get His Comeuppance?
Is there any Rubicon, despicable, illegal or otherwise, that Trump could cross that would change the hearts and minds of loyalists? Fox pundit Sean Hannity asked former president Donald Trump about Top Secret, classified documents he took with him to Mar-a-Lago. This was Trump’s response: “If you’re the president of the United States you can declassify just by saying it’s...
Read More
September 23, 2022
Featured image for ““I. Do. Not. Like. Bullies.””
“I. Do. Not. Like. Bullies.”
That’s Arizona Republican and Speaker of the House . . . correction, former Speaker of the House, Rusty Bowers who had been abruptly shown the door by his own Republican Party after Bowers refused to accede to Donald Trump’s wishes and overturn the will of 3.4 million Arizona voters who voted for Joe Biden in the 2020 election. If his...
Read More
September 16, 2022
Featured image for “What Do We Truly Value?”
What Do We Truly Value?
Thirteen mass shootings since last Friday, and while victims’ families grieve, we all continue to hear and read the same words and see the lack of meaningful actions from lawmakers: “thoughts and prayers”; moral outrage commentaries (this being one of them); bipartisan talks; and proposed water-downed bipartisan bills. According to a CBS/YouGov national poll: 81 percent of Americans favor background...
Read More
June 7, 2022
Featured image for “From Hürtgen Forest to Snowflakes”
From Hürtgen Forest to Snowflakes
In honor of Memorial Day, last Friday I began by describing the longest battle American forces faced in the the Hürtgen Forest during World War II. I wrote how my father, Private James Lichtman, survived an 88mm German canon attack, and a minefield as he crawled to an aid station to receive medical attention for his frozen feet. This is...
Read More
May 30, 2022

Read Some of the Most Recent Articles
The Latest... And Often Greatest