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Articles by Michael C. Blumenthal
Michael Blumenthal: The speech a member of Congress must give (Opinion)
The following is the speech I believe a member of Congress must now deliver. “Dear colleagues, my fellow Americans, I have thought long and hard before standing here before you to utter these words. Long and hard because there is a certain profound sadness that accompanies what I feel as an urgent need to speak out loudly and clearly about the danger to the very existence of our democracy that we now face.
Michael Blumenthal: A good time to remember Aharon Gordon (Opinion)
This tragically hate-filled time between Israelis and Palestinians in Gaza, and in much of the rest of the world, might be a good time to remember Aharon David Gordon, one of the leaders of the significant Jewish immigration to the Land of Israel that took place between 1904 and 1914, known as the Second Aliyah.
Self-Portrait as Combination Taco Bell / Pizza Hut / KFC
the unholy trinity of suburban late-night salvation barring seemingly endless options of worship bean burrito breadsticks and mashed potatoes or a soft taco pan pizza and a buttered biscuit an unimaginable combination of food flavors for people not ready to go home to their parents and yet none of the options feel quite right so maybe I should call it Self-Portrait as idling in a drive-thru with your friends crammed across the sunken bench seats avoiding the glow of the check engine light...
Michael Blumenthal: Requiem for a nation (Opinion)
”A nation with no equality, no solidarity and no belief in its own cause is not a nation worth fighting for.” — Ari Shavit, My Promised Land ”A good society is one that makes sense of being good.” — Ian McEwan, Enduring Love ••• Inspired by the recent tragic events in Israel and Gaza, I recently decided to re-read Ari Shavit’s remarkable book about what he refers to as “the triumph and tragedy of Israel.” I did so in the hope of more deeply understanding the current situation and its...
Michael Blumenthal: Choosing power over nation a mistake (Opinion)
“The purpose of getting power,” the late Welsh Labor politician Aneurin Bevan once wrote, “is to be able to give it away,” an ideal that, for liberals and conservatives, has traditionally been far easier to articulate than to execute.
Michael Blumenthal: Hamas did what my parents never could (Opinion)
I swore at a very young age that I would never be like them. My parents were bigots, racists, paranoiacs, anti-Christians — you name it. They saw persecution and anti-Semitism wherever they turned. The joke in my family was that, when my brother was turned down by an all-Jewish fraternity at Rutgers, my parents attributed it to anti-Semitism. When I gave some of my spare shirts to a poor Puerto Rican friend, they reprimanded me for not giving them to a Jewish boy.
Michael Blumenthal: If Trump is reelected, I'm done with US (Opinion)
On the morning after Donald Trump was elected president of the United States on Nov. 8, 2016, I awoke to a single, unusual (for me) and deeply disturbing thought: I should leave this country — the nation I was born and grew up in and that saved my parents’ lives from Hitler’s Holocaust. I should not continue to live in a nation that, on that infamous morning, had done something of which I was so ashamed to be a part.
Michael Blumenthal: The road now taken (Opinion)
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Michael Blumenthal: Enough about Biden's age (Opinion)
Just a few months from now, I will turn 75, both a fact and a number I find difficult to swallow, and even more difficult to accept. Growing old is, indeed, not for sissies, and being the most powerful man on the face of the earth at the age of eighty is certainly not for a sissy either.
Michael Blumenthal: Time to end political games on guns (Opinion)
“The most obvious, ubiquitous, important realities are often the ones that are hardest to see and talk about.” — David Foster Wallace ••• They are killing our children. They are killing our friends. They are killing our neighbors and our neighbors’ children. They are killing our national pride and spirit.
Michael Blumenthal: The myth of common ground
There is much talk, these sad and troubled days, of common ground, and of how we should be searching for, and finding, it. As if common ground were simply off somewhere in hiding, or that had been misplaced. That’s a consoling, but purely sentimental thought, largely ignorant of the historical and political fact that common ground is something not that a society “finds,” but that it, through hard work and deep commitments, creates.
Michael Blumenthal: Why such ingratitude among such plenty?
Country United States of AmericaUS Virgin IslandsUnited States Minor Outlying IslandsCanadaMexico, United Mexican StatesBahamas, Commonwealth of theCuba, Republic ofDominican RepublicHaiti, Republic ofJamaicaAfghanistanAlbania, People's Socialist Republic ofAlgeria, People's Democratic Republic ofAmerican SamoaAndorra, Principality ofAngola, Republic ofAnguillaAntarctica (the territory South of 60 deg S)Antigua and BarbudaArgentina, Argentine RepublicArmeniaArubaAustralia, Commonwealth...
Big Win For Small Refineries | JD Supra
On June 25, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court sided with small oil refineries by making it easier for the companies to win exemptions from the existing mandate that they mix ethanol and other renewable fuels into gasoline and diesel, known as the Renewable Fuel Program (RFP). When these mandates were adopted in 2005 and 2007, Congress granted temporary exemptions to small refineries and authorized those refineries to apply for extensions at any time.
What’s In Your Permit? | JD Supra
On November 30, 2020, a workgroup within the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released information about a memorandum to the U.S. EPA Regional Administrators summarizing an Interim Strategy for Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS, also known as “forever chemicals”) for sites with federally issued National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits for addressing PFAS in wastewater and stormwater permits under the Clean Water Act (CWA).
Michael Blumenthal: Overjoyed, but bewildered
All those who know me, or who have read my writings on the subject, will realize that, along with many millions of other Americans and citizens all over the world, I am overjoyed at the thought that Donald Trump will shortly no longer occupy the highest office in our land.
Michael Blumenthal: Time to start thinking about good and evil (Opinion)
I am not one who, under ordinary circumstances, thinks in the often-oversimplified categories of good and evil. My usual attitude is that human life and character are complex, multi-dimensional and that most of our souls contain plenty of both.
Michael Blumenthal: Fidelity to what?
Traditionally, in our political lives, our loyalties have tended to be relatively clear: We are Democrats or Republicans, liberals or conservatives, socialists or capitalists, big government supporters or devotees to individual freedoms. Until the last four years, it might be said that these divided and opposing fidelities have served us rather well as a nation.
Michael C. Blumenthal: How Trump will make America great again
In under 100 days — if the predictions of the political prognosticators and the most fervent wishes of my own heart prove correct — the voters of our nation, having no choice but to come to grips with the grave and tragic error they committed four years ago, will vote to return Donald Trump to life as a private citizen.
DOJ to Stop “Piling On” and “Overfiling” Under Clean Water Act | JD Supra
Is federalism alive and well? Has the federal government decided to give up “piling on” and “overfiling” in environmental enforcement actions? It seems so. On July 27, 2020, in an effort to promote federalism, U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) Assistant Attorney General (AAG) Jeffrey Bossert Clark issued a memorandum limiting federal civil enforcement discretion concerning certain Clean Water Act (CWA) matters involving prior state proceedings (CWA Memo).
Michael Blumenthal: The distance between Minneapolis and WV
It is about 940 miles from where I live in Morgantown, a city about 5% of whose citizens are black, to the spot where George Floyd was slain in Minneapolis, the site of our current days of infamy and about 19% of whose citizens are African American. But, as I have come to feel more and more in recent days, that distance is not as far as it seems. I am one of the “innocent,” or so I would like to believe.
Michael C. Blumenthal: The missed opportunity for redemption (Opinion)
Michael Blumenthal Blumenthal Blumenthal Essential reporting in volatile times. Not a Subscriber yet? Click here to take advantage of All access digital limited time offer $5.99 per month EZ Pay. Interested in Donating? Click #ISupportLocal for more information on supporting local journalism. Learn more about HD Media Learn more about HD Media Imagine that you are a 70-year-old man, your biblically-allotted threescore and 10 already behind you.
SCOTUS Clarifies Uncertainty Surrounding Restoration Damages Under Superfund Program | JD Supra
Updated: May 25, 2018: JD Supra is a legal publishing service that connects experts and their content with broader audiences of professionals, journalists and associations.
Do we need to comply with EPA regulations during COVID-19? | JD Supra
Updated: May 25, 2018: JD Supra is a legal publishing service that connects experts and their content with broader audiences of professionals, journalists and associations.
Environmental Due Diligence In The Wake Of COVID-19 | JD Supra
Updated: May 25, 2018: JD Supra is a legal publishing service that connects experts and their content with broader audiences of professionals, journalists and associations.
PHMSA Relaxes Regulations in Wake of COVID-19 Crisis to Keep Pipelines Open | JD Supra
Updated: May 25, 2018: JD Supra is a legal publishing service that connects experts and their content with broader audiences of professionals, journalists and associations.
Michael C. Blumenthal: The tragedy of Bernie Sanders (Opinion)
I have admired Bernie Sanders since the time I first interviewed him in 1984, when he was still mayor of Burlington, Vermont. I admired him, mostly, for the strength and consistency of his idealism, for his deeply held belief that the highest moral purpose of government and society was to assure the human dignity of every individual, no matter from what class, color or persuasion.
Michael Blumenthal: Don't vote Trump, even if you agree with him (Opinion)
A strange thing happened to me shortly after Donald Trump was elected president of the United States, and it has not ceased happening to me since. I discovered very early on that I had ceased listening to what the president said, and begun listening only to how he said it. I had stopped, in some sense, caring whether the economy was good or bad, the stock market up or down, immigrants admitted or deported, unemployment up or down — though some of these matters affected me rather directly.
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Be Kind
Born in Vineland, New Jersey, on March 8, 1949, Michael Blumenthal grew up in a German-speaking home in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan. He received his BA in philosophy from the State University of New York in Binghamton in 1969, and his JD from Cornell Law School in 1974. From 1985 to 1986, he studied clinical psychology at Antioch University and worked in private practice as a psychotherapist with Anglophone expatriates in Budapest.
Ignite Live Blog: BRK3230 Learn how Microsoft does IT: The journey from Skype for Business to Teams
Most people don’t have to figure out how to migrate 220,000+ users from Skype for Business to Microsoft Teams, then share their process with the world. But that’s just what Pouneh Kaufman and her team of 10 had to do. She, and three of her team members, spoke at the Microsoft Ignite 2018 conference in Orlando this week, explaining just how they did it. Pouneh, who is responsible for End User Services Engineering for Team Productivity, shared the stage with Sara Bush, Anas Shaikh, and Dan Benedict.
Ignite Live Blog: THR3081 Top 5 things you need to know to optimize your network for Microsoft Teams
Too often, network issues are blamed for poor performance of Microsoft Teams calls, meetings, and video conferences. However, if you address the five things that Johan identifies, you can eliminate many of these problems. The guiding principle here is that Office 365 network traffic should go as directly as possible between your end user computing devices and Microsoft’s global network. To achieve this, your organization’s network engineers need to do these five things: Check the reverse proxy.
Michael Blumenthal: Hope to never see a Trump in office again (Gazette)
You can hate Donald Trump or love him, agree or disagree with his policies, like or dislike his family and associates, but one thing about our 45th president is eminently clear: He is the least virtuous human being ever to occupy the Oval Office.
Michael Blumenthal: The soul of WV, seen from afar (Gazette)
H — I doubt there are too many people in this tiny, remote Hungarian village of mine (pop. 270) this bright May morning who are thinking of West Virginia, but that is what I am doing right this minute. I’m about 4,600 aerial and nautical miles from Morgantown, where my “real” life resides, as I write this, and yet here, too, feels like “home” — wild and wonderful, strange and, in many ways, downright West Virginian.
Michael Blumenthal: Another endangered species, the educated citizen
MORGANTOWN — “Democracy is the worst form of government,” Winston Churchill famously said of our current political system, “except all the others that have been tried.” I’ve been thinking about democracy a lot in recent months, and of something Churchill didn’t say about it, but which his quotation implies — namely, that democracy is a system which, for it to function properly, requires an informed and educated citizenry, capable of making wise and future- (not merely present) oriented...
Michael Blumenthal: Left should not do unto GOP as they have done unto us (Gazette)
Much as I despise a great deal of what President Donald Trump stands for and the policies of his administration, it has occurred to me recently that the Golden Rule (known to some as the Kantian categorical imperative, and which demands that we act only according to those maxims that we feel should become universal law) may be particularly worthy of our attention at this particular moment in our history that Trump has come to dominate.
Michael Blumenthal: The university and the state of WV (Gazette)
— Very few of us would deny that these are difficult times for the State of West Virginia, both economically and psychologically. West Virginia is a state deeply in need of a new employment base, renewed optimism and hope, a way out of an epidemic of opioid addiction and obesity, the flight to other states of our best and brightest, and widespread depression.
The Writer's Almanac with Garrison Keillor
Not merely because Henry James said there were but four rules of life— be kind be kind be kind be kind—but because it’s good for the soul, and, what’s more, for others; it may be that kindness is our best audition for a worthier world, and, despite the vagueness and uncertainty of its recompense, a bird may yet wander into a bush before our very houses, gratitude may not manifest itself in deeds entirely equal to our own, still there’s weather arriving from every direction, the feasts of...
Michael Blumenthal: What a philosopher can teach the president
— Tzvetan Todorov, a Bulgarian-French literary theorist and historian of ideas with whom I was superficially acquainted while living in Paris some dozen years ago and who wrote dozens of books, died Feb. 7 in the French capital. He left behind a diverse body of work ranging from fantasy in fiction to the moral consequences of colonialism, fanaticism and the Holocaust.
Michael C. Blumenthal: Donald Trump and the rewards of Hubris (Gazette)
MORGANTOWN -- Perhaps I have read too many Greek plays, but it seems to me that, thanks to the recently-inaugurated 45th President of the United States, we have now entered what might be called the Era of Hubris.
Centre County is listening to the Surgeon General’s report on addiction | Centre Daily Times
In November 2016, the Office of the Surgeon General issued its report, “Facing Addiction in America; The Surgeon General’s Report on Alcohol, Drugs and Health.” This is the SG’s first-ever report regarding addiction, and like its landmark 1964 report on tobacco use, seeks to sway public opinion and inspire broad action.The SG urges that “all Americans” have a “strong economic imperative” and a “moral obligation” to address substance use disorders.
Michael C. Blumenthal: Welcome to the Era of Ignorance
— I have never been one of that much-maligned group of intellectuals who think that all of our political problems would be cured if only our political leaders read Plato’s “Symposium” and Charles Dickens’ “Hard Times,” along with the “Meditations” of Marcus Aurelius. But I am also not among those anti-intellectuals, apparently empowered by our recent elections, who think of intellectual life — and, with it, the reading of books — as an enterprise reserved for the weak-spirited and timid.
Michael C. Blumenthal: Lessons on humility from Donald Trump
— I never thought I would say this, but I have learned something about humility, of all things, from Donald Trump this week. I learned that — despite having lived in no fewer than nine of our states and taught at 10 of our universities — I didn’t seem to know my own country. I learned that, for the past 50-plus years, I have been living an illusion of what America is and of who my countrymen are: In other words, I have been living a fantasy.
Michael C. Blumenthal: A (very) few words in support of Donald Trump
Before Donald Trump goes down to the ignominious and overwhelming defeat he so richly deserves as the most vulgar, undignified, ill-prepared, ignorant and bigoted candidate in American presidential history, I would like — finally — to write a very few words on his utterly reprehensible behalf.
Michael C. Blumenthal: The test of our intelligence, and our heart
“The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.” — F. Scott Fitzgerald Wisdom and intelligence are hard traits to come by these days, particularly in a nation such as ours that is undergoing great political and spiritual ferment, as well as being one whose Puritan origins explicitly argue for clear delineations between right and wrong.
Michael C. Blumenthal: Guns are the simple solution
“Grief is not as heavy as guilt, but it takes more away from you.” There are many tragedies in this life, none more painful than those that are avoidable — or, worse yet, those that take place with our tacit complicity.
Michael C. Blumenthal: Donald Trump and America’s Viagra moment
Despite finding him odious and alarming, I watched all of Donald Trump’s speech in Charleston the other night and, when it ended, felt I finally understood the source of Trump’s amazing rise to power and political potency (pun intended): Donald Trump — braggadocio, puffed up rhetoric, beautiful young wife and all — is our moment’s Viagra, the darkly incarnated satire of our longing for our country’s past dominance and youth.
Michael C. Blumenthal: Who does WV really punish in its prison system?
Prisons are an expensive business — not just in the toll they enact on taxpayers, but in terms of their cost to society writ large, and, ultimately, to the prisoners themselves. In fiscal year 2014 alone, the total cost of West Virginia’s prisons — which incarcerated an average daily population of 9,700 (a population greater than that of every West Virginia city and town but 14!) — was $192 million. The average cost per inmate for that year was $28,195, or an average cost per day of $77.25.
Michael C. Blumenthal: What Bernie needs, millionaire friends, not billionaires (Gazette)
There are, according to recent statistics, some 536 billionaires — the favorite (and, to me, rightful) target of much of Bernie Sanders’ “revolutionary” rhetoric and disdain — in the United States, along with some 10.1 million households (rarely mentioned by the candidate, and most surely including his own and, nearly, mine) that qualify as millionaires.
The Writer's Almanac with Garrison Keillor
A cricket chirps in the grass. Another cricket, all ears, joins him. Now there are two. Up above, birds shriek like drunken gods, the air is atizzy with the melodrama of what is about to be. The two crickets eye each other out of the corner of their cricket eyes. Each desires something the other has, each abhors its own desire. After a brief silence, there will be little cricket mating, a little cricket love.
Michael C. Blumenthal: Universities and the culture of advertising
— There’s a lot of talk in Morgantown these days about changing WVU’s “brand,” talk which gives me an uncomfortable foreboding of toothpaste sales and ketchup, rather than of university life.
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