Wednesday, August 31. 2005
Nervy pilot: Air Force One drops to 2900 feet to view hurricane damage, here. And from around the world (from Opie, back from Alaska): Where is the compassion? I have searched high and low but perhaps I haven't read enough newspapers. Can anyone tell Maggie's Farm what the world is saying about America's present tragedy? I remember France among others telling us how we did not give enough aid when the tsunami hit Asia, but where are they now? I suppose the world feels Americans can take care of themselves. And we can, but wouldn't it be nice to have a little compassion for those folks who have lost everything including their lives. The following International papers and what their headlines are today: The front page in the Herald Tribune is Baghdad: The Guardian UK: headline Baghdad with New Orleans running second: Eureka! Der Spiegel has the outlook:"When a tsunami hit South Asia in December, the world mobilized to help and aid poured in. Now that parts of America are underwater, the US is handling the relief work virtually alone. What is going on? By Jody K. Biehl in Berlin more...
You Got To Be More Than Street-wise Some of the reports of looting and lawlessness in New Orleans have been quite shocking: police officers joining in the looting, an entire Walmart ransacked and all the guns stolen, gangs of armed men roaming the streets, officers getting shot by looters, prison riots, citizens breaking into jewelry shops, pharmacies, clothing retailers and the like directly in front of watching police and national guardsmen. This activity is no doubt fueled in part by New Orleans' already very high crime rate, which has risen in the last several years despite rapid decreases in almost all other major U.S. cities (as this article reported just two weeks ago, also here). Not coincidentally, New Orleans also has only 3.14 officers per 1,000 residents, half of what Washington D.C. has and less than most big cities, and those relatively few officers have had to deal with uncooperative, suspicious citizens and even charges of police brutality when attempting to carry out their highly dangerous jobs. As the foremost priorities for the city are rescuing stranded residents and plugging the massive breaches in the levees, it looks as though this situation may deteriorate further.
God Banned from US Air Force So who is your co-pilot now, fly-boys? The ACLU? You will not believe this. What weenies let this happen? Never give in to the Moonbats because it will only encourage them. How California Destroyed Rambo and anyone else who tries to govern a wacko state. Good, serious piece by Judis at New Republic. High Water Just when everyone relaxed on Monday night, figuring New Orleans had been spared the brunt of the storm, we started to see the high water rising. You don't need me to bring this news, but surely it is scarey to think you're out of trouble, and then begin to notice the water coming up. Can you really blame these people for not believing the government? It's clear to me that the USA, and the Red Cross, are on the job. How does Norm find this stuff? Check this out - Word Count - which has now ranked the top 88,000 most commonly-used words in English. My only problem with it is that it lists plurals, verb forms, etc. separately from their roots. "Shotgun" is number 12559, and "chagrin" is number 25703. Thanks, Norm at Normblog. Coffee good for your health: Here Sheehan antics backfiring, here:http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2005/8/30/163939.shtml
Tuesday, August 30. 2005
Crash on the levee, mama, water's gonna overflow 
Swamp's gonna rise, no boat's gonna row 
Well you can train on down to William's Point, you can bust your feet, you can rock this joint, but hey, ain't you gonna miss your best friend now 
Gonna have to find yourself another best friend somehow 
Well the high tide's a risin', mama don't you let me down, 
Pack up your suitcase, mama don't you make a sound 
Well it's sugar for sugar, salt for salt, you go down in the flood, gonna be your fault 
Oh, mama, ain't you gonna miss your best friend now, you're gonna have to find yourself another best friend somehow... 
National Catastrophe: Despite fierce rainstorm in Mississippi and Louisiana, needed military equipment is far away, in Iraq. (doing nothing, and for no good reason, is the implication). Thanks, RWNH. Murdoch does China, and blows it. Even though he tried to play ball with their police state dictatorship: Click here: TIME.com: Testing Beijing's Limits -- Sep. 05, 2005 -- Page 1 The Monitor has no cat, no coat, inside the cannons. Still cool. Free San Francisco. Let 'em go. Miller at TCS.
Monday, August 29. 2005
Is this a war? Illegals bring down chopper in Calif. Balloon Juice. Ben and Jerry are paying the bills for Cindy's PR: at GOP and Ankle Biter. A Chupacabra caught. What's that? Wierd. Here, with a photo. I'd love to see Free Market Fairy Tales take on a chupacabra infestation. The Methodist Church tries the PR and advertising route. I am afraid they have it backwards. Michael Yon: Gates of Fire. A gripping and terrifying report from the battlefield. Mehan considers St. Thomas More (thanks, Prof. Bainbridge) Mike Adams considers perversity at his university Why union members are leaving the Dems. Right Thinking How Pres. Ford banned assassinations by the CIA. (Will no-one rid me of this meddlesome Chavez?) Studies prove men smarter than women. Duh. Woops, sorry sorry sorry, it must only be in England. Time for new ideas for the Dems - not better marketing. Determined marketing didn't work for the Edsel, and it won't work for appeasement, pacifism, redistribution economics, contempt for tradition, hatred for the US, and moral relativism. Kinsley quoted in the Hasset article: Even Los Angeles Times columnist Michael Kinsley, no fan of the Republicans, has noticed. ``It's true that the Republicans are the party of ideas and the Democrats are the party of reaction,'' he wrote earlier this month. ``Republicans set the agenda, and Democrats try to talk the country out of it.''
In Praise of Hitchins by Simon
Sunday, August 28. 2005
Crash On The Levee (Down In The Flood) Hurricane Katrina has now strengthened to an extremely powerful category 5 storm with 175 mph winds, making it one of the strongest storms ever to threaten landfall on the United States. The storm's pressure of 907 millibars is lower than any storm other than the 1935 "Labor Day" hurricane that devastated Florida (though that storm was considerably smaller and more compact than Katrina). The only really comparable hurricane is Hurricane Camille, which caused massive damage to the Gulf Coast back in 1969. Check out post-Camille photos here, and note how the satellite images of that storm correspond to those of Katrina. Models are predicting the storm to track almost directly over New Orleans, a city that is located below sea level and which keeps the waters at bay only by a system of pumps and levees. A direct hit from a category 5 storm could potentially flood the entire city, in addition to the severe wind damage that can be expected from such a storm. Stormtrack has a discussion of potential damage here - this sounds downright scary. Probably a good idea to pack up your suitcase if you're a New Orleans resident - this could be the meanest flood anybody's ever seen. (Note: Hurricane Gilbert, which struck the Yucatan in 1988, had the lowest recorded pressure of any system in the Atlantic Basin, with 888 mb, but the above link only refers to hurricanes that made landfall in the U.S. Some typhoons in the Pacific have had even lower barometric pressure.)
Friday, August 26. 2005
Future of Photography: Don't miss this piece in the NY Sun if you dig pictures and cameras. Malkin's Update on MSM's lies and fables, here. UN tries to hassle UK over expulsion of terror supporters. Hey, UN, take a hike. The UN is a joke. Thanks, Samizdata. Rick Moran on the future of information, blogs, media, etc. Plus some good insight into the thinking of a serious blogger. Why do we like to hire illegals? Eric says it's because it's the old-fashioned way. I tend to agree. Here. NY Games is fairly cool. You missed yesterday's game, but these are worth following for serious gamers who will get off the computer and into the game world. Gasoline prices: Check this graph of gas prices adjusted for inflation, and quit whining. A nation of babies. Anyway, haven't the Left and the enviros been longing for higher gas prices? They should be happy. But have you seen this graph in the news? Translated Iraq Constitution, via MassRight. And the media flip-flop on the new middle-east constitutions. The relationship between wealth and welfare states. Interesting discussion. Meme: A popular blog-world word. It's a cool word: it means a cultural gene; an idea or thought which is transmitted culturally, but has come to be used as an idea or thought that is transmitted widely. The basic meaning is more valuable, I think. Another aspect of a meme is its self-replicating ability, like a virus. Sick of Cindy: This gal was a loony tune before her son was killed, and enough is enough.
Bainbridge on the Vioxx verdict, juror ignorance, etc., here. An excerpt: In any case, in her WSJ op-ed McCaughey offers an alternative that would retain the juries that Beldar praises, while still strengthening barriers against junk science and support for good science; namely, specialized courts: The jury's verdict shows that our system is failing to provide justice reliably in medical cases. The remedy? Specialized state medical courts, where judges stop lawyers and hired-gun witnesses (for the plaintiff or the defendant) from misleading juries with theories disguised as science, something Judge Ben Hardin failed to do in the Ernst case. ...
Evolution, Religion, Cultural Matters Lee Harris at TCS has written one of the most thoughtful pieces on this subject - a subject which I have been avoiding because I see no conflict between evolutionary theory and Christianity. But that is just me. Harris has many things worth saying about knowledge and culture. Excerpt: Left unmentioned in the movie, however, is (Wm Jennings) Bryan's actual motive for coming to Dayton. He came not to defend his own theological creed, but his political creed. He believed that the people of a community should be permitted to control what their children were taught; he believed it was wrong for an elite outside of a community to come into that community and to commandeer the education of the children for its own purposes and to promote its own agenda; he believed that human beings had a fundamental right to imagine the world as they saw fit, and to teach their children to imagine it in the same way.
Before we scoff at this position, let us make a thought experiment. Suppose that tomorrow aliens of a vastly superior intelligence were to land all over the world. Because they have mastered technology that is far beyond our ken, and because their science is (literally) light years ahead of ours, there is no one on the planet who is in a position to evaluate or assess their enormous fund of knowledge. Would we, the human community, be willing to turn over our schools to this alien elite, and let them decide what to tell our children about the universe and our place in it? Would we say to ourselves, "Look at their superior knowledge-it makes ours look shabby and pathetic. Let's abandon our scientific tradition and simply adopt theirs, lock, stock, and barrel. So what if we don't understand it. So what if we can't even begin to understand it-at least, by taking it on blind faith, we will be able to believe the right things, even if we cannot hope to know them for ourselves."
But even this analogy is not strict enough. Because the alien elite in my thought experiment would also have to tell the leading authorities in our scientific community, "What you think you know is all wrong. Your so called scientific tradition is a joke, and should not be treated with seriousness or dignity-it just needs to be junked."
If an elite group of men enter into a community and claim to possess a truth that no one in the community can judge for himself, by the standards of common sense that the community normally falls back upon to make judgment calls about the ordinary questions, then this elite group may be said to possess a gnosis-a Greek word that we shall use to indicate a special source of knowledge that gives cognitive authority to those who have it, and where those who lack this knowledge are in no position to be able to evaluate it. For example, if you tell me that a long series of numbers add up to 123, and if I can check your addition by adding these numbers for myself, either in my head, or on paper, or by means of a calculator, then we are not dealing with gnosis, because we each are capable of adding the sum, and because we both recognize the legitimacy of the other's method: if our tallies conflict, we both agree that one of us has made a simple error in our calculations, and we will redo them until we find the error and are thus able to come to an agreement.
Read the whole thing.
Thursday, August 25. 2005
Brewton digs into Marbury v. Madison, here. The BBC on Brother Roger's death, about which we posted yesterday. The CAIR-Graham story, Dallas Morning News: My unease with this is the victory it chalks up for the kind of ideological thuggery that passes for public discourse at CAIR. If all criticism of Islam is hate speech, debate has no meaning. And until CAIR sprouts the guts to point fingers at the radical, murderous wing of its own faith, its claims of moderation are meaningless as well. Read entire.
Australia: Love it or leave it. Right on! LGF has the story. Chastity scholarships in Uganda. There's an idea. Any takers? Prager on Marxism, materialism, etc: First, devoid of religious meaning in their lives, for many on the Left, social change -- or as it is known today, "social justice," the term for left-wing social change -- has become their substitute religion and provider of meaning. Second, given that the only reality is material, any denial of materialism's supremacy disturbs the Left. The true leftist objects to the notion of poorer people leading happy lives. For the heirs of Marx, which is what the Left is, the "good" is not so much a moral, let alone a spiritual, category, as it is an economic one. Hence the left's preoccupation with economic inequality, taxing the rich, etc. Read entire: Click here: Dennis Prager: The rejection of materialism (Part XXI)
UMass vs. Ole Miss: Not football or basketball - growing pot. Kudlow is sanguine about oil prices. Read why. Powerline bashes Joanie: C'mon guys. Pick on someone your own size. Try to remember Joan Baez in 1965. Nyhan has some fun facts about Election 2008 Jaws in Ammagansett?
Wednesday, August 24. 2005
Free the Pritkin One and a Half Jihad sympathizer detainee denied Snickers. Iowahawk does Michael Moore at the spa.
Housing Bubble No doubt. Look at Shiller's graph, on Marginal Revolution. That is a Sell signal.
 No Turtles, Please
The entirely worthy, and still-available, American Princess wants a diamond, and not a turtle, when she becomes engaged. I just can't understand that, can you? What normal gal wouldn't rather have a nice turtle? (This one, as our readers know, is a nice Eastern Box Turtle.)
Daniel Pipes explains how terrorism is slowing the progress of radical Islam: before terrorism, they were quietly and successfully insinuating themselves throughout the world. Now, they are on the radar. Interesting. At Dhimmi Watch. Wind Power: We know it kills birds. Now we find it slaughters bats too. Rather than being environmentally friendly, wind farms are nothing but a mass of knives spinning in the sky. Nuclear is where we need to be going - this idea is environmentally nuts. At Env. Economics The "You dont speak for me, Cindy" Tour moves forward. At Move America Forward. Eric takes an open-minded look at the Green Party and their positions. Classical Values. The CT lawsuit against the Feds re No Child Left Behind and unfunded mandates - AG Blumenthal is doing it as a favor to the teacher's unions. Ex-Donk. More Krugman-bashing. Every bit of it well-deserved for this lying and distorting propagandist. Patterico. And Baer adds his two cents at RCP: Click here: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/Commentary/com-8_22_05_RB.html
Tuesday, August 23. 2005
Cindy Summary, at Cao. Barone's 2006 political almanac - good news for Repubs The world's 100 top universities, via Normblog, by the Institute of Higher Education at Shanghai University College prep, from Atlantic Blog: According to the NY Times, the ACT people say that fewer than a quarter of the students finishing high school who took their test are prepared for college in the four areas they test: reading comprehension, math, English, and science.
Read his piece. I disagree with his conclusion. I suspect that it means that only 1/4 of the test-takers should be college-bound. The remainder need more high school, which is what they often get in college.
Thursday, August 18. 2005
American Princess on Feminism - (which is losing politically and losing $) - "It's so 1992": Because frankly, that jerk just about every girl knows, who sleeps with a different girl every week, is the daddy of three babies, and of many more "fetuses" who never saw the light of day, is not the kind of guy that's coming home with me. So why would I think being equal meant being like that piece of bar poop? List of arrested Moslem fanatics in the US, to date. Dhimmi Watch 40% of Mexicans want to emigrate to US - and they will. Via Drudge. Osteoporosis treatments work. Important, esp for women. Science Daily Arlo Guthrie and Pete Seeger to perform together in Beacon, NY The Bush Boom - why isn't it talked about? Kudlow. Hawaiian Semi-Secession: Two ex-senators walk you through the BS, here. And the Hawaii Reporter reveals the BS. Is this worth a civil war? Doubt it, but it is truly a scam and a fraud. Bad News: Single-adult households pass two-adult households in US. WaTimes
Wednesday, August 17. 2005
Multiculturalism in Seattle, from Sound Politics: Last month there was an article in the Seattle Times on a program where city public swimming pools have regularly scheduled hours for the exclusive use of Muslims: "Preserving modesty, in the pool" It's Saturday evening, the end of a hot day, and a group of women and children have gathered at North Seattle's Meadowbrook Pool for their monthly swim ... The women and children — all Muslims — have been swimming in private once a month at Meadowbrook as part of a program organized by the North Seattle Family Center. Read entire.
Tuesday, August 16. 2005
Bill Weld for Gov (of NY)? It's difficult not to like the guy. Click here: Weld Eyeing NY Gov Race Star Parker on why blacks are moving away from the Dems (Click here: Star Parker: New ideas? ): It is ironic that Democratic strategists cannot seem to grasp that the big-government themes and moral relativism that define their party disproportionately hurt lower-income groups. Reconciliation with the truth that traditional values and ownership are the best ticket into the American middle class will open the door to fresh thinking and new ideas in the Democratic Party and build new bridges to traditional Democratic constituencies. From what I see, this new Democratic think tank initiative amounts to rich liberal elitists looking for new marketing techniques for their same old ideas.
The Rolling Stones in 1972: Dr. Bob found some of his old photos: The Jack Daniels Tour. Saskatchewan by SDA: Since 1995, our provincial government has grown its payroll by 12,190 bodies and hiked the average wage by 22 per cent. The number of working people sticking around in Saskatchewan to pay these wages is in slow but steady decline. In 2002, 22.1 percent of Saskatchewan employees were on the public sector payroll.
At this rate - you do the math - when will it reach 100% ?
Photo via StormTrack of 
Hurricane Irene, nurtured by the Gulf Stream, being pushed out to sea by the clearly visible cold front which is happily passing through New England. While we welcome the relief from the heat, we are sorry we missed Irene. We like storms. They do not scare us.
More Krugman bashing. It's fun, I guess: The Conspiracy... Scandal goes on annan annan: Annan's brother. Here. A Failed actor? Read the truth about Reagan's career, GM Rice: Does anyone want it? Here. Hypocrisy about illegal immigration: John Fund Gambling and Alcohol Addictions: They are different. Here. Military reservations are nature preserves? Thompson on homeschooling - This piece made ne view it differently. Now it's the Lutheran's turn to bash Israel. One by one, the mainline Protestants are turning on Israel. Hinderaker: Click here: Fences and a "Just Peace" Johnny Cash's house still for sale.
Monday, August 15. 2005
Lunch with Chuckie "It's all about me" Shumer, here. Sheehan updates you won't get from the newspapers: Michelle and Powerline and Solomonia (HT- Cons. Grapevine) and David Duke celebrates her anti-Semitism, here. Abe Lincoln was burdened by a self-centered, not very popular, and not very likeable or warm wife. But was he gay? Or bi? Does anyone really care? Classical Values doesn't care. Nuclear - I mean Nucular - Hypocrisy: OK for Iran, not OK for the US: Robinson Getting real about Iraq: It's about time we recognized that Iraq will not be a mini-USA. Jihad Watch. How wierd are you? Blogthings. Another Guardian Leftist bites the dust: Cohen, in Blair.
The Commerce Clause: Brewton's consideration therof: View from 1776 Scotland has had enough multiculturalism: Dhimmi Watch Austin Bay: The truth is, after 9/11 we’re not engaged in nation building – we’re engaged in planet building (see here). I completely agree with Hitchens on this point. We should “consistently act” against internationalist totalitarian ideologies out of both principle and realism. “…[I]f you don’t fight them now you fight them later... We can't live on the same planet as them and I'm glad because I don’t want to.” That’s precisely why I went back on active duty and served in Iraq. Read entire.
A War for Oil? Who made up that lie?
Friday, August 12. 2005
Homelessness plummets in San Francisco: Here's why: (Am. Thinker) ACLU will not rest until Christianity is driven underground - back to the catacombs? Quoted in No Oil from Guardian Op-Ed: The least attractive characteristic of the middle-class left - one shared with the Thatcherites - is its refusal to accept that its opponents are sincere. The legacy of Marx and Freud allows it to dismiss criticisms as masks which hide corruption, class interests, racism, sexism - any motive can be implied except fundamental differences of principle. . . Read entire.
Thursday, August 11. 2005
An in-depth legal consideration of the Air America scandal - CQ The NARAL smear: Nyhan is good on this. Moonbats on parade, at Livermore. Here. Shape of Days re drugs: Look, if you want to stand up and say that you think drugs should be legalized because you really, really like to get high, fine. If you wanna say that drugs should be legalized because you don’t give a shit about America, go right ahead. Free speech, free country. But don’t you dare try to argue that drugs really aren’t that bad for you.
Does the NYT deserve a break? Tapscott asks that we give Keller a chance. Seeing is believing and I aint seen nuthin yet. Corzine's payoffs to girlfriends - jeez. He sure is generous. These stories can kill his chances in NJ. Going back to school: The Hawk Man: Dear Parent or Guardian: On behalf of the faculty, staff, administration, and grief counselors of Rockwood District 603, please let me extend a warm welcome to you and your student for the upcoming 2005-6 school year at Rockwood Public Schools. In the enclosed information packet you will find your student's classroom assignment and schedule, a calendar of important dates, staff contact information, and a handbook of detailed first aid tips. Please read and review carefully. Your cooperation will help insure that your student enjoys an enriching and survivable year of educational opportunities. Read entire hilarious piece.
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