by Seth Rogovoy Every summer, performing arts organizations in the Berkshires offer an embarrassing wealth of riches in theater, music, dance, and other arts. This isn’t news. The greatest obstacle for audience members is figuring out where to be and when. I’ve even seen people walking around with spreadsheets they prepare in advance of the…
by Seth Rogovoy The idea that our smartphones are somehow sacrosanct and should be off-limits to the government is a sincere wish, but also an exercise in a kind of naïve romanticism about our phones and digital technology. What are our smartphones, after all, other than digital file cabinets, housing information that otherwise is and…
Why do highly respected mainstream news outlets, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, and National Public Radio, report on the Republican senators’ opposition to President Obama’s nomination of a replacement for the Supreme Court seat vacated by Justice Antonin Scalia when he passed away as if this is a genuine political power struggle, rather…
by Seth Rogovoy (HUDSON, N.Y.) – Usually no-show jobs are reserved for professions like dockworker or construction worker. But in this riverside city, even the mayor can be a no-show. According to civic journalist Carole Osterink, writing in her Gossips of Rivertown blog, two days after it was confirmed that outgoing mayor Bill Hallenbeck lost…
In one short paragraph, the great German-Jewish critic and philosopher Walter Benjamin connects the dots among art and creativity, language and perception (epistemology), and the Creation story of the Bible, thus conjuring his own mysticism, his own Kabbalah: “The name receives and assimilates the ‘language issuing from matter,’ the ‘communicating muteness’ of nature through which…
There is gross hypocrisy and greed with large food and beverage corporations selling billions of dollars of organic and “natural food” on the one hand, while on the other hand bankrolling the food industry opposition to non-GMO labeling. Some of these organic “traitor brands” that you will likely find at your neighborhood food co-op or…
(COLUMBIA COUNTY, N.Y.) – While the finalization of the odious Ginsberg’s deal by the IDA (Industrial Development Association) may be the end of a controversial, hard-fought battle, strewn with conflicts of interest and cronyism, there is apparently an epilogue to the story: several advertisers with close relationships to Ginsberg’s have withdrawn their support of imby,…
The Berkshire Eagle finally did respond by publishing this letter in its edition of August 31 ,2015. I sent this letter to the editor of the Berkshire Eagle on 8/24/15. They apparently have declined to publish it. So I am publishing it here: To the editor: Kudos on giving such prominent play to pending legislation…
WAM Theatre is generously offering a pair of tickets ($100 value) to “Stars In The Orchard: A magical midsummer night’s cocktail party to benefit WAM Theatre,” to be held at Hilltop Orchards in Richmond, Mass., on Wednesday, July 15, 2015, at 6:30pm, to a lucky contributor to the Rogovoy Report in support of the Rogovoy…
(SHEFFIELD, Mass.) – Once again, the good folks at Magic Fluke, the Sheffield-based company that designs and manufactures a whole line of affordable, USA-made ukuleles – and the new Cricket violin – are offering the opportunity for contributors to the Rogovoy Report to be enrolled in a giveaway to win a free ukulele as a…
