Dan Rodricks

In the wake of the Rittenhouse trial and verdict, here's a hypothetical to ponder from Arnold "Skip" Isaacs, former Baltimore Sun correspondent and editor: Isaacs Imagine that last January 6 a concerned citizen -- let's call him LyleKittenhouse -- became worried that the Capitol police were beingoverwhelmed by the mob, that he picked up a … Continue reading What if Rittenhouse had taken on the Jan. 6 mob?

This terrible week in Baltimore got worse Thursday night with a 13-year-old girl shot to death in West Baltimore. My column in Friday’s Sun was written and filed before this happened so this girl's death is not listed among the others I cite from a week of violence that took the lives of a 69-year-old … Continue reading This I must do, this you should know

I always have more to share after I write a column, and today is no different. There are more things you should know about David Gordon and about the whole question of what we — this state, this country — do about teenagers who kill.  Clearly, there needs to be punishment for the taking of … Continue reading On time, crime and punishment: More on the David Gordon case and juvenile justice

Today is Veterans Day, formerly Armistice Day, originally meant to commemorate the end of World War I and the sacrifice of Americans who died in that absurd war’s last 18 months. But here’s the thing about 11/11/18: There was a period of time on the final day when, instead of quietly receding into history, The … Continue reading 11/11/18: The horrible, absurd end of the War To End All Wars

My Wednesday column in The Sun is about a depressing series of break-ins of establishments in the 1700 block of North Charles Street, in Baltimore’s Station North, but it could have been about graffiti. Graffiti and grime in the blocks north and south of North Avenue, along Charles Street and Maryland Avenue, are particularly disturbing. … Continue reading An epidemic of grafitti in Baltimore

In the recent New Jersey election, a Republican truck driver (in photo above) with no political experience beat the incumbent Democratic state Senate president while the Democratic governor narrowly won re-election. And now The New York Times declares that the “Republican Party seems to be marching back to relevance.” Only the Times could come up … Continue reading The Do-Nothing Party and Know-Nothing Politicians

I wrote this column about Raoul Middleman in December 2013. The artist died Friday night. His obituary appears in today's Baltimore Sun. The photo above shows Raoul with one of his portraits of the Great Dantini. The photograph is by Algerina Perna This update on the life of Raoul Middleman was not meant to be … Continue reading From the archive: Raoul Middleman, the artist at work in Baltimore, his city forever

Dear Michael Bloomberg: Now that you’ve given another $43 million to Johns Hopkins University, on top of the amazing $3.55 billion you already gave your alma mater, maybe you can do something directly for Baltimore. I’ve suggested it before in my column. Here’s another try: Give $1 billion over 10 years to the nonprofit Baltimore … Continue reading Dear Mike Bloomberg: A request and an invitation

My latest column in The Sun is another about Living Classrooms, and I'll tell you why:  Until recently, I considered myself to be among the many Baltimoreans who think of Living Classrooms as “field trips on boats for kids on the Chesapeake.” But it’s turned into a lot more than that over the last 36 years. I … Continue reading Catching up with Living Classrooms, a Baltimore do-good that’s grown far beyond ‘field trips for kids’

Norway has one of the lowest recidivism rates in the world at 20%. The U.S. has one of the highest: 76.6% of prisoners are rearrested within five years. -- Harvard Poltical Review It seems to me there are three purposes to prisons: They are clearly essential for public safety, to keep criminals away from the … Continue reading What’s the purpose of our prisons?