BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, MONDAY JULY 9 & BEYOND, 2018) — As THE PLANET continues out summer hiatus (the bees are particularly needy at this time but the honey … oh, mercy … the honey is out of and around the world), we open up a new commentary […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, FOURTH OF JULY ETC., 2018) — In honor of the 4th, THE PLANET will take and enjoy a brief hiatus. In Vegas, they call it “going dark.” Check back Monday to see if we’ve taken down the “Gone Fishin’” sign or if we’ve decided […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, MONDAY JULY 2, 2018) — This is THE PLANET‘s 1,800th column since we began in late September-early October of 2010. We saved it for something, and someone, special. The week before last, THE PLANET was honored to accept an invitation from our Right Honorable Good Friend […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, THE WEEKEND EDITION, JUNE 29-JULY 1, 2018) — Our good friends in local culture love them, especially the theaters (Berkshire Theatre Group, Shakespeare and Co., Barrington Stage, Williamstown Theatre Festival), Tanglewood, the Norman Rockwell Museum, and the like). THE PLANET does too, especially when […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, WEDNESDAY JUNE 27, 2018) — “To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive.” So wrote Robert Louis Stevenson, author of one of THE PLANET‘s favorite books from a childhood full of them. We speak of Treasure Island. Stevenson’s aphorism works so profoundly that when the […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, MONDAY JUNE 25, 2018) — Finding patches of scribbles in THE PLANET‘s notebook, we look to make another quilt. Hasta La Vista, Baby! — President Trump did the right thing by doing what he first said he could not do when he signed an […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, WEDNESDAY JUNE 20, 2018) — Trump spied on Clinton. Hillary spied on Donald. Every campaign does it, and that we remain surprised or interested might be the biggest surprise of all. That makes laughable the current, money-wasting probes into the Trump-Russia connection and the […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, WEDNESDAY JUNE 20, 2018) — Now that we know what kind of politician Donna Todd Rivers is, the only question remaining if you want her vote is the price. When Rivers flipped her vote and decided to stick Mary Jane and Joe Kapanski with […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, MONDAY JUNE 17, 2018) — Contempt should only be spent on someone you take seriously. For the lightweights, pick from among ridicule, mockery, and flicking of the kind you do to an insect — three forms of abuse that cozily fit under the heading […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, THE WEEKEND EDITION JUNE 15-17, 2018) — Last week THE PLANET enjoyed morning coffee at a well-known local coffee house. We asked for “a cup of coffee.” Are we ever going to learn? It used to be you went into a diner or sat behind […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, WEDNESDAY JUNE 13, 2018) — From the instant of the Clasp, the Summit de tutti Summi has exceeded all expectations. THE PLANET finds it incredible that President Donald Trump and DPRNK leader Kim Jung Un have pulled off the unpullable, even though many ideologues refuse to […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, MONDAY JUNE 11, 2018) — They have arrived. Early. Folks, we have unfolding a breathtaking moment. Someone, apparently, not only thought but actualized the unthinkable. Slam the two major participants in what is the most historic diplomatic outing since 1950 if you insist, but […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, THE WEEKEND EDITION JUNE 9-11, 2018) — Rounding up the flotsam, jetsam, an unclesam of a writer’s notebook: Oh Say Can You See? — As a matter of fact, we can’t. THE PLANET, however, can propose an equitable solution to the NFL’s kneeling dilemma. That would […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, WEDNEDSAY JUNE 6, 2018) — She’s a comedian and actress. Like many comics who have come before, her humor pushes the envelope up to and sometimes past tearing. Her jokes can be in bad taste and twisted, raunchy and rough. THE PLANET could cite a […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE MONDAY, JUNE 4, 2018) — We lip-service freedom, but we as a nation no longer want it. The American people find it too scary. Freedom’s flip side of the coin, personal responsibility, asks too much of a people gone intellectually soft, ethically lost, and […]
BY DAN VALENTI PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY (FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, THE WEEKEND EDITION, JUNE 1-3, 2018) — Indulge THE PLANET in a thought experiment. Picture this: A black police officer responds to a report of burglary in a section of a large city. She arrives at the scene of a house and sees a white, 16-year-old male […]
