John Banzhaf was a lawyer at a high end law firm in New York City. He was against smoking and wanted to get cigarette commercials off the air. The problem was his firm represented Phillip Morris. Needless to say, he needed to find a new job, which he did at […]
Ada Mark Strausberg
16 posts
My dad came from a very difficult family, and he himself was not easy to please. I was born when he was 40 and I guess times were different. I know he loved me, but feeling someone loves you is different but almost more important than knowing. We were living […]
When will we recognizeWhen one is not freeThen no one is free? If we allow masters;If there’s even one slaveWe’ll all be enslaved. When there’s not justice for oneHear the call!There’s no justice for all. If we don’t realize the painIn another one’s lifeThere will always be strife. If we […]
Return to normal – is it true?Is it possible for me or you?Is it possible for the world or us?After the settling of the dust. The past is gone, not coming backThe only thing that’s writ in black Nothing can be truly the sameSo now we need a different name. We’ll get used to the […]
The purpose of this vignette is to give a humorous example of what I believe is a not so uncommon phenomenon: old habits don’t die, pun intended. My mother died in the summer of 1990. I was born in 1947 and grew up in the Flatbush section of the borough […]
April 7, 2021 is this year’s Holocaust Remembrance Day. It is always the 27th of Nisan on the Hebrew calendar. It doesn’t synch to the Gregorian calendar, a solar one. The Islamic and Hebrew calendars are lunar based. Like the Chinese calendar, the Hebrew one adds an extra month for […]
That was in Cambodia, a basis for a movie But we are sowing our own fields, our own streetsWith violence and murder. It’s here in our backyardsThe tragedy, the sorrowWe are bombing our buildings. We are killing in our schools, our churchesOur homes are not havensOur students are not safe. Blood […]
I was touched to write this poem because of the prevalence of “anti” in the news. When this was covered on my local TV station about the incidents against Asian Americans, an Oriental woman made the comment, “Why are they hurting us? They like our food.” The four stanzas below […]
Let’s talk about the COVID-19 anniversary. Yahrzeit is the Yiddish word for “a year’s time” and is used only in reference to the death of a human being, not a birthday, wedding or specific event. Each year, as with all Jewish events, a candle is lit the evening before the […]