by Alison Bass | Oct 25, 2022 | Uncategorized
I was in Santa Cruz this weekend for a family occasion and we had to walk past a large homeless encampment on the way to the hotel. Like many cities (especially those in warmer climes), Santa Cruz has a significant homeless problem. And like many cities, it tries to...
by Alison Bass | Sep 27, 2022 | Uncategorized
What might the actress Constance Wu, the fictional character Tracy Flick and the mother of Emmett Till, the 14-year-old lynched in 1955, have in common, other than the fact they were all featured on the Atlantic Festival’s Ideas Stage last week in DC? You...
by Alison Bass | Sep 23, 2022 | Uncategorized
At an event organized by the Atlantic magazine in D.C. yesterday, I attended two back to back panels on seemingly disparate topics: the impact of social media on teenagers’ mental health and America’s gun crisis. In the first panel, a mental health...
by Alison Bass | Sep 16, 2022 | Uncategorized
A few days ago, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis flew two planeloads of migrants from Texas to the Massachusetts island of Martha’s Vineyard, the latest political stunt by GOP officials to draw attention to the political live wire of immigration. DeSantis, who is...
by Alison Bass | Sep 8, 2022 | Uncategorized
Last night I attended a preview of the latest Ken Burns documentary about the U.S. response to the Holocaust and the discussion afterwards with Burns and his two co-directors Sara Botstein and Lynn Novick, moderated by Jeffrey Goldberg, editor of The Atlantic...
by Alison Bass | Aug 31, 2022 | Uncategorized
Moving is hard work! My move to Washington, D.C. went extraordinarily well in large part because my movers (Helix Transfer and Storage, a Maryland company) were quite professional and went beyond the call of duty in assembling a new bed frame for me (I could never...
by Alison Bass | Aug 16, 2022 | Uncategorized
This past weekend, I took a stroll into my past, attending a gathering of old (and new) friends at Bryn Gweled, the intentional community in eastern PA where I grew up. Bryn Gweled was founded in 1940 by far-sighted Quakers who envisioned a rural utopia where members...
by Alison Bass | Jul 28, 2022 | Uncategorized
The setting could not have been more incongruous. Inside a tony home decor store on Martha’s Vineyard, where soothing blues and beiges make one think of ocean breezes and cool martinis, the president of the National Institute of Reproductive Health was talking...
by Alison Bass | Jul 21, 2022 | Uncategorized
I can’t help but laugh at this New Yorker magazine interview with the lawyer Alan Dershowitz, in which he complains about being “cancelled” as a speaker at events on Martha’s Vineyard. I’m amused for two reasons, one, this is old news....
by Alison Bass | Jul 12, 2022 | Uncategorized
As some of you may know, I’m moving from West Virginia to Washington, D.C. in late August. Now that I’ve retired from teaching journalism at West Virginia University, I have felt increasingly isolated in the Mountain State, far from family and the...
