The term sound money, also known as honest, strong, or hard currency relates to its value in terms of the world’s standards.  For example, when you visit a foreign country, you may be compelled to exchange your U.S. dollars for the coin of the realm if you wish to purchase goods, pay the fee to [...]

Sometime before recorded history, mankind … some of mankind, anyway … learned that to trade with others was neater than killing to possess what another had.  Thus, the barter system came into being.  Swapping one’s goods for another’s goods was expedient, until the concept of money came into play. One of the earliest forms of [...]

“Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.” (President John F. Kennedy) Although John F. Kennedy’s reign as our nation’s 35th President was all too brief, he left behind a legacy of courage in action.  This included his support of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., resulting [...]

When humans began to walk upright, they relied upon the five senses endowed by The Creator to survive in a harsh environment.  Along with the organic senses of sight, smell, hearing, touch, and taste, God in His infinite wisdom included an innate sense of awareness.  This “sixth sense” existed to clue early man into the [...]

Frequently dubbed the sport of Kings, horse racing provides the origin of the phrase “dark horse,” an unknown horse on which handicappers have difficulty in establishing betting odds.  Later, the term was broadened to apply to any unexpected winner.  In American politics, the term was first applied to James Polk who, in 1844, wrested the [...]

The Feast of the Seven Fishes (la festa dei sette pesci), celebrated on Christmas Eve, also known as The Vigil (La Vigilia), is believed to have originated in Southern Italy. Today, it is a feast that typically consists of seven different seafood dishes (although some families may change the number to nine or eleven). This [...]

How often have you heard and dismissed the phrase “time is money” as an old cliché?  But, if you really give it thought, it makes a lot of sense.  If you hire a person to, for example, rake and weed your lawn, the cost includes that person’s labor as well as the supplies that he [...]

“We are products of our environment.”  This maxim accounts for the way that we relate to the world around us.  As a child growing up in the Great Depression, and as a young man serving his country during the Second World War, these events have colored the way that I view the world as well as [...]

In the beginning, God created light to take us out of darkness.  Between the dawn of time and 2011 A.D., man has done a helluva great job of blotting out the light, particularly here in the alleged Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave.  American citizens are besieged by economic blight, characterized [...]

In the long, rich history of Italian cuisine, there are few dishes as simultaneously beloved and detested as pasta e fagioli.  Despite its truly delicious flavor, nutritious and inexpensive ingredients, and ease of cooking, many Italian-Americans associate this dish with hard times, ergo, bad memories. During the Great Depression, when beans were a cheap and [...]