Tuesday, June 13. 2006
What I say is that, if a fellow really likes potatoes, he must be a pretty decent sort of fellow. A.A. Milne
Monday, June 12. 2006
Your devoted editor will be too busy today to review any entries, so we won't have much new. But I have a stash for such days, if I can find it. An email from a reader and fellow blogger: "We read you daily, as our daily dose of grounding sanity." Aw, shucks! Ain't that nice? That is our goal, here at Maggie's Farm - solid ground. Dirt, rocks, and stubborn roots - good old terra firma: nothing fancy, and we try to be devilish to BS, in the sceptical, plain, unadorned, rock-ribbed, cantankerous Yankee manner, mixed with a dose of joy in God's creation (along with the recognition that He never meant to make it easy for us).
Sunday, June 11. 2006
The dailykos is the Amway of Bile. If you're unfamiliar with the multi level marketing approach, you're lucky. It's exemplified by Amway. Amway's often emulated approach to making money for its primary investors is by selling motivational and instructional marketing materials to an ever increasing pool of participants in a pyramidal formulation. Somewhere down the line someone's supposed to buy something besides marketing materials, but that someone never seems to show up. For those of you lucky enough not to know what the dailykos is, it's the exemplar of a stripe of endless vitriol masquerading as political action that infests the blogosphere at the far left hand margin of the internet world. What do they think? Democrats are too Republican for them, is the short answer, if there is an answer; their message generally is encapsulated by Brando's dopey answer to "What are you rebelling against?" in The Wild One. "Whaddya got?" asked Brando in return, never answering the question, but nonetheless saying a lot. Never Answer The Question But Say A Lot should be on the masthead atop lots of websites, dailykos especially. The sentiment's the same, even if the average kos denizen has more of an air of Mr. Limpet than Marlon Brando about them; I bet one real biker could clear the room at the Yearlykos convention they're having this weekend in two minutes flat. They're throwing this little Multi Level Snark Marketing rah rah get-together in that perfect pyramid scheme hideout: Las Vegas, Nevada. They're getting together to earnestly massage one another's sense of importance and well-being and purpose, while they're milked for donations and fees, and then sold t-shirts and tschotschkes and bumper stickers and myriad other assorted piffle. Then they'll be thoroughly and generally farmed for massive donations of their remaining money and their time, in perpetuity -- like a kind of indulgence or tithe. Their time is worthless enough, I guess, as it is spent in a kind of 24/7 alternate reality, a mirror image of real activity. They support quixotic candidates as a kind of kabuki political theater. The US military acts; they try to hamstring it, all the while holding their nose and claiming to support it. Their political opponents do things; they say they are against what is being done, or that it doesn't count anyway because their evil opponents did it for the wrong reasons. If unemployment drops from 4.6% to 4.5%, it means that we've all been forced to take crummy jobs that no one would want. If it goes to 4.7%, well, see-- there's no jobs for anyone. If it stays the same-- see? Another quagmire. Every day is 1931, in Vietnam circa 1969, to a koskid. There is an expression for a force from nowhere that swoops in inexplicably and saves the day: deus ex machina; literally, God from the machine. The cadres of the Amway of Bile rely on the reverse -- the devil will come out of anything, no matter how benign, productive, wholesome, or innocuous, and that devil will allow them to hate that which is objectively good, while simultaneously allowing them to preen morally. Give me Beelzebub from the Machine, they fervently pray; defeat me, and concurrently absolve me of guilt in my defeat. We don't lose elections, they tell themselves; they are stolen. We argue; you smear. We have facts, our opponents hatch machiavellian plots to misinform. Our opponents are too stupid to understand the TRUTH, and simultaneously so wily and clever they can't be defeated by logic. The US doesn't win wars; anyone we beat wasn't worth defeating. We were on the wrong side anyway. We're not prosperous; we're slaves to money. Well fed? It's a conspiracy to make us fat. Long lived? Social Security's going broke. Good news? Karl Rove planted it to trick us. I will log on to dailykos, and he will tell me why everything --no matter how good it manifestly might be -- is bad, and tell me how I can blame it on The Other. And we will chant it together. People who prey on such people -- the people looking for meaning where there is none -- know exactly how to appeal to their desires and manipulate them. First, there will be lots of "information." There will be brochures and websites and teach-ins and workshops and group motivations and seminars and sign up sheets and stickers and petitions that will live in file cabinets forever like trolls. There will be torrents and cataracts and deluges of words -- cut and paste tsunamis. Then there will be slogans. And not just slogans, but everything reduced to slogans of the Sukarno or Mugabe or Goldstein variety: simultaneously vapid and wretched, a kind of accusation lodged in a bad pun or non-sequitur; unanswerable because it is essentially meaningless, and yet it encompasses an entire wordlview. And when all else fails, they'll claim that a cataclysmic end to the world is nigh, like some disheveled disturbed prophet on the streetcorner, simultaneously cadging change. Their opinions are that important and prescient -- the very future of the universe depends on their misspelled keystroked rants. Come to our meeting. We have some literature for you to look at. It's fun to try to guess who at the meeting isn't a plant, after your eyes glaze over from all the motivational brochures. When someone screams "I'm Somebody," and that person is manifestly nobody, just like we all are, it's not worth the effort to argue with them. When your toddler shows you the first turd he made in the bowl, and tells you he wants to bronze it because it's a faerie house, you flush the bowl and pat them on the head, you don't tell them there are no faeries. What do you tell an adult, whose car is covered in Kucinich for President bumper stickers, wearing a "Bush is Hitler" shirt, when he tells you he's "Against War?" That's nice, you'd say, if you were kind; those mean fellow citizens of yours that absolutely adore war are everywhere, and if not for you and your bumper sticker, we'd be invading Canada for their maple syrup right now, I bet! Then you'd roll your eyes and cast a knowing look towards the other adults. Or if you were Kos, you'd sign them up, and yoke them to your mission; your mission to have a mission. Would you like a Bush is Hitler shirt in red? All the Platinum members are wearing them. Black is so 2004. Don't forget to double click the links on my webpage. I get paid for clickthroughs. I'm somebody, Markos Moulitsas, the head of dailykos crows; you can be somebody too, if you can get enough of your friends to say so. I did. The appeal of the multi level marketer is the appeal that works with the child: You can have the trappings of the adult life; you can talk adult talk and go to adult places and get adult things. Other adults will talk to you. But only the child could believe that if I have ten dollars, and you have ten dollars, and we give each other our ten dollars ten times, we'll both have one hundred dollars. The Amway of Bile says: if you say Bush is Hitler, and I say Bush is Hitler, and we say it to each other 50 million times, we'll have 100 million votes and we'll be winners. You'll be winners. Yes, yes you will. Now run along and play.
I only have a minute to post, but I 
was amused both by a comment,
and by Bird Dog's response. He should have asked me to do it for him, but he would never bother me on a beautiful weekend. Mr. Anonymous, our critical blog friend and a sporadic reader of Maggie's, seems to feel offended by Maggie's "misogyny" for referring to female's desire to breed. Misogyny? Two out of our five regulars are women, with 7 kids between us two. Breeding is our thing, and semiotics comes second! (joke) I know Bird Dog would be happy to take on another one, too, but counting genitalia is not his thing (as far as I know, but I know him well enough to know that he would not be that wierd). Our blog is not totally into genitalia - mostly into ideas, but we do like humor and irony (despite being a no-irony zone). And we cheerfully defy any PC bull. But let me inform Mr. Anonymous about something his daddy never told him: men are sex objects for women. We spend a heck of a lot of time and money and energy looking for good breeding partners with decent genes and morals, and when we find them, we do not give them a vacation from their manly task: we put them to work and expect that they will give us their all. I wonder what asexual world he grew up in, or what lesbian college orthodoxy he was indoctrinated into, but it is not the real world. Maybe he went to Swarthmore? True, occasionally we enjoy getting one over on you guys with our "boo-hoo-hoo," but it's just a game we play. We do not appreciate males who do not respond to our sexual, feminine selves. In fact, we are painfully hurt and offended if you do not. Truth. (My 16 year-old daughter concurs with this statement.) If we flirt with you, you had damn well better flirt back with interest and some snappy repartee. We lovely, charmin' women women are breeders. We are designed for it - read our hips - and you fellows know you cannot resist our charms. No doubt about it. Sometimes we take an evil delight in toying with you, using our magical, witchy powers. Almost anything else we do is for fun or money - and this is not the time to get into the life of the spirit. Got it? Enough said? Now I have a tennis match - and my pal and I are gonna crush our hubbies. David - now there is a real man and a fine hunk, and I'd love to fantasize about trying to "receive his serve". Rock-hard, I am sure. Nude tennis - there is an idea for the club: nude mixed doubles. A good thing. No distraction whatsoever! Haha - we are not a libido-free zone at Maggie's Farm!
 Exodus 3, 1-15
Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian; he led his flock beyond the wilderness, and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. 2There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of a bush; he looked, and the bush was blazing, yet it was not consumed. 3Then Moses said, “I must turn aside and look at this great sight, and see why the bush is not burned up.” 4When the Lord saw that he had turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.” 5Then he said, “Come no closer! Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” 6He said further, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God. 7Then the Lord said, “I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know their sufferings, 8and I have come down to deliver them from the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the country of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. 9The cry of the Israelites has now come to me; I have also seen how the Egyptians oppress them. 10So come, I will send you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.” 11But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh, and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?” 12He said, “I will be with you; and this shall be the sign for you that it is I who sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall worship God on this mountain.” 13But Moses said to God, “If I come to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” 14God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.” He said further, “Thus you shall say to the Israelites, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’“ 15God also said to Moses, “Thus you shall say to the Israelites, ‘The Lord, the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you’: This is my name forever, and this my title for all generations. Image: An part of a triptych (a good spelling bee word) by Nicholas Froment entitled The Burning Bush (1475). Consistent with the "cult of the Virgin," the Virgin and Christ child appear to Moses in his vision, rather than the voice of God, which I think is a bit odd. It is better seen in the larger image, with the child holding a mirror in which he and his mother are reflected: this cool picture has symbols coming out of its ears.
Saturday, June 10. 2006
Maggie's Farm remains a "Marauding Marsupial" in the Truth Laid Bear ecosystem. We'd love to move to the next step up to reinforce our fragile egos, but I am not certain that we deserve to.  Maybe we are destined to be an elite, boutique blog for our discriminating high IQ, irony-minded six few readers, but there is a mass-market dream hidden deep inside of us. The Wombat can be a marauding marsupial at times, but he tends to be fairly agreeable unless he feels attacked or happens to be in a grumpy mood. A charging wombat can knock over a man and tear a big hole in him. Maybe Maggie's Farm is a Wombat. I hear a song in my head: "Wombats in the Snow," to the tune of "Strangers in the Night." Anyway - do us a favor. Send our blog to all of your friends, relatives, colleagues and enemies. We want - and deserve, 100,000 readers per day - visitors, not hits. We have tons of "hits," and do not need more "hits" looking for Farm P*rn: we are a clean-cut blog and not one of us has ever had a mean, ugly, dirty, angry, perverted, lascivious, schadenfreudenous, illegal, adulterous, covetous, larcenous, or mean-spirited thought - ever. We are as pure as the driven snow upon which the Wombat poops in the Australian winter which, perversely, arrives in the summer. (What a mixed-up country they are, down on the bottom of the planet, where their floors are roofs and vice versa. How can they think, standing upside-down? And how come they don't fall off? Do they wear magnets in their shoes? Keep those magnets on your boots, Aussies! You are the only sane friends left in this crazy world.)
Grading on a curve: Law Prof Volokh defends the idea. My opinion? It depends. We are importing teachers from the Phillipines to fill the need. News to me. Don't we need more leaf-blowing professionals? PoliPundit The US matters to the UN, but the UN doesn't matter to the US. Brown stepped in it. Arrogant Soros ass-kissing jerk. Belmont Tom DeLay gave a fine good-bye speech. I still don't know whether he did anything wrong. Lib Leanings Read this yet? You probably did. Scott Ott: Dems determined to fight on despite Zarquawi Loss That frame around the Zarquawi photo really bothered me. Huh? What a moron. RTLC. Perhaps a different frame? Gold, but with some red highlights to pick up the color of the blood on the bastard's face? Dutch Poll: Islam not compatible with European civilization. Finally. Allah The big lie of the Senate Immigration Bill. VDARE
Friday, June 9. 2006
We hate to be a cut-and-paste blog, but this is too good.  Quote from Lileks at NNS: You're an enlightened world citizen. Your T-shirt says "9/11 was an inside job." You're pretty sure we're living in a fascist state, that President Bush taps the Dixie Chicks' phones, Christian abortion clinic bombers outnumber jihadis, and the war on "terror" is a distraction from the real threats: carbon emissions and Pat Robertson. Then you learn that 17 people were arrested in a terrorist bomb plot. How do you process the information? Let's take it step by step.
Gosh, that's horrible, you think. But no -- that's what they WANT you to feel. Recall the prime directive: Question Authority (unless he's a college professor). The plotters must have been impoverished olive farmers radicalized by the removal of Saddam Hussein. Why, if someone came in and toppled your president, you'd go to their country and ... well, you'd thank them. Unless they did it for the wrong reasons! Then you'd blow something up. Like an SUV dealership. At night. Anyway, you understand; you care a lot about Iraqis these days. You think about Iraq more than China, to be honest, but it's not as if you'll scrape off your "Free Tibet" bumper sticker -- unless it's to make room for "Free Darfur." Or "Hands Off Darfur," depending.
Wait a minute: The "terrorists" were Canadian? You can understand someone blowing up trains in Spain and London. They sent troops to an illegal war cooked up by neocons who want to kill brown people for Exxon and Jesus, or something. You can understand, reluctantly, blowing up teens in an Israeli pizza parlor, because the Jews took the West Bank from the sovereign, ancient nation of Palestine. (How can a liberal socialist country behave so poorly? The world is full of mysteries.) But Canada? Isn't Michael Moore from Canada? You can get medical marijuana from married gay doctors in Canada, and no one has guns. You console yourself: Maybe they were really planning to attack the U.S.
Take a minute and read the rest.
We all learned about it in High School, but we can easily forget, when we see the amazing blooms of early June, that we are looking at the personal, private, and always fascinating sex organs of angiosperm plants. They do not hide them in shame or modesty, do they? Not at all: like lovely young women, they just want to be fertilized. Details here. (Every time I label something as "Farm P*rn", we get a ton of hits from perverts around the world. I find it amusing. No doubt I add to their frustration. On the downside, it gets us blocked by the Merrill Lynch censorship system, so our Merrill friends cannot catch up with Maggie's Farm at work.) 
Quote from Owner's Manual: Judge not, lest ye be judged judgmental. On and on it will go, until the humble vacation postcard reads: "The scenery is beautiful, wish you were here to help me end racism."
Dance - Or else... The EU wants everyone to celebrate 50 years of the EU. They really are like the Soviets: the peasants WILL dance joyfully and in gratitude. In my opinion, the EU governing body lives on its own planet, in its own time zone, and is a legend in its own mind. Not to mention the fact that it is an Evil Empire. Gates of V. Is anti-Zionism anti-Semitism? Augean Stables says Yes. Smart love, and Philippians, from Middlebrow. Savvy judge throws out lawsuit by customer who found shells in her mussels marinara. Overlawyered. Finally, a judge who knows his shellfish. Egypt's Sandmonkey blogger has a small bone to pick with Nicholas Berg's father. # 76 of Why hasn't the idea of socialism died yet? Can't they pull those tubes out, like they did with Schiavo? Alpha Patriot. How long on life-support?
For 100 years, New Jersey was a promised land for middle class New Yorkers, fleeing New York taxes and pursuing the American dream of a little cottage with a yard. What went wrong? Now it is a state with net outflow of population and business, decaying, dangerous cities, state and property taxes which crush the middle class, routine corruption, unions which seem to have more power than both the government and the voters, and Tony Soprano. Malanga at City Journal gives the whole history. An excellent history of The Garden State, which typifies the "blue state blues".
I rely on the guys at Junk Science, who have no axes to grind, to detect the flaws in the ways in which scientific information is presented. Here are his conclusions in an excellent piece on climate and air chemistry:What are the take-home messages:- The temperature effect of atmospheric carbon dioxide is logarithmic, not exponential.
- The potential planetary warming from a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide from pre-Industrial Revolution levels of ~280ppmv to 560ppmv (possible some time later this century - perhaps) is generally estimated at less than 1 °C.
- The guesses of significantly larger warming are dependent on "feedback" (supplementary) mechanisms programmed into climate models. The existence of these "feedback" mechanisms is uncertain and the cumulative sign of which is unknown (they may add to warming from increased atmospheric carbon dioxide or, equally likely, might suppress it).
- The total warming since measurements have been attempted is thought to be about 0.6 degrees Centigrade. At least half of the estimated temperature increment occurred before 1950, prior to significant change in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels. Assuming the unlikely case that all the natural drivers of planetary temperature change ceased to operate at the time of measured atmospheric change then a 30% increment in atmospheric carbon dioxide caused about one-third of one degree temperature increment since and thus provides empirical support for less than one degree increment due to a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide.
- There is no linear relationship between atmospheric carbon dioxide change and global mean temperature or global mean temperature trend -- global mean temperature has both risen and fallen during the period atmospheric carbon dioxide has been rising.
- The natural world has tolerated greater than one-degree fluctuations in mean temperature during the relatively recent past and thus current changes are within the range of natural variation. (See, for example, ice core and sea surface temperature reconstructions.)
- Other anthropogenic effects are vastly more important, at least on local and regional scales.
- Fixation on atmospheric carbon dioxide is a distraction from these more important anthropogenic effects.
- Despite attempts to label atmospheric carbon dioxide a "pollutant" it is, in fact, an essential trace gas, the increasing abundance of which is a bonus for the bulk of the biosphere.
- There is no reason to believe that slightly lower temperatures are somehow preferable to slightly higher temperatures - there is no known "optimal" nor any known means of knowingly and predictably adjusting some sort of planetary thermostat.
- Fluctuations in atmospheric carbon dioxide are of little relevance in the short to medium term (although should levels fall too low it could prove problematic in the longer-term).
- Activists and zealots constantly shrilling over atmospheric carbon dioxide are misdirecting attention and effort from real and potentially addressable local, regional and planetary problems.
Read the whole thing: link above.
Kesler noted this question from Wolf Blitzer at the press conference today "In an otherwise good interview of the venerable Zalmay Khalilzad live from baghdad, Wolf wrapped up with the final Question: "Collateral Damage, Mr. Ambassador. Do you know if there were any innocent civilians killed as collateral damage in the double-bombing?" What an idiot. Kesler uncannily predicted this train of thought of the MSM. Some true ignorant insanity from Zarquawi's family and friends in Jordan. Jihad Watch. Telepsychiatry. Lacks the personal touch, but it's got to be better than nothing. NYT Bathing suits for fatties. Now this is a practical post for the blog. I think many, including RTLC, underestimate the calculations which are going on with Iran. Got a coupla minutes? This is a good brainteaster - for the whole family. Humbug No Magic Marker on your monitor, please. Dixie Chicks are struggling. Of course. What do they think this is, the 1960s? Shut up and sing. When they talk politics, they sound like old farts.
Thursday, June 8. 2006
Just a few notes and links. First, at the press conference it was observed that the Iraqi press cheered and clapped and the American press were silent. Second, Dr Sanity looks at the "reality-based" reaction to the news: they are clearly not pleased. Third, Nicholas Berg's dad is "sad" Zarquawi had to die. Blames Bush for the beheading of his son. Glad that isn't my Dad. Fourth, a statement by Al Quaida: "We want to give you the joyous news of the martyrdom of the mujahed sheik Abu Musab al-Zarqawi," said the statement, signed by "Abu Abdel- Rahman al-Iraqi," identified as the deputy "emir" or leader of al- Qaida in Iraq.
Hmmm. For once, I see things the same way as them. And finally, as some good blogger noted (I forget who), no words of sadness yet from Michael Moore on the loss of another heroic Minuteman.
"I pity the poor immigrant
Who wishes he would've stayed home,
Who uses all his power to do evil
But in the end is always left so alone.
That man whom with his fingers cheats
And who lies with ev'ry breath,
Who passionately hates his life
And likewise, fears his death.
I pity the poor immigrant
Whose strength is spent in vain,
Whose heaven is like Ironsides,
Whose tears are like rain,
Who eats but is not satisfied,
Who hears but does not see,
Who falls in love with wealth itself
And turns his back on me.
I pity the poor immigrant
Who tramples through the mud,
Who fills his mouth with laughing
And who builds his town with blood,
Whose visions in the final end
Must shatter like the glass.
I pity the poor immigrant
When his gladness comes to pass." "I Pity The Poor Immigrant," from 1967's John Wesley Harding. Download a performance of this song from the second leg of the Rolling Thunder Revue in 1976 at the link here.
A plane was taking off from Kennedy Airport. After it reached a
comfortable cruising altitude, the captain made an announcement over
the intercom, "Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking.
Welcome to Flight Number 293, nonstop from New York to Los Angeles.
The weather ahead is good and, therefore, we should have a smooth and
uneventful flight. Now sit back and relax... OH, MY GOD!" Silence
followed, and after a few minutes, the captain came back on the
intercom and said, "Ladies and Gentlemen, I am so sorry if I scared
you earlier. While I was talking to you, the flight attendant accidentally
spilled a cup of hot coffee in my lap. You should see the front of my
pants!" A passenger in Coach yelled, "That's nothing. You should see
the back of mine!"
The return of Patches generates hate mail against RI GOP. Surely that makes good sense. The science behind the swerve of the Adidas World Cup ball. BBC Louis Gottschalk. From a book review in the NYSun: "When he died in 1868, Louis Moreau Gottschalk was the most famous musician in the Western hemisphere." An early rock star, living an interesting life in interesting times. NY Sun Skinvisible kills avian flu on contact. There's an investment idea. Romney on abortion: Let the states decide. We agree. Sperm from older guys: It isn't as good. Science Daily Al Gore definitely into Green: His current finances. Forbes A nice nest egg, for a politician. Enviros split on wind power. We think wind power is ridiculous, and destructive, and a dumb feel-good thing that kills birds and bats. NYT Top 22 states for tooth loss. Haha. Could have guessed. Slower Pace. Yes, W Va wins! The past five years have been our 1930s. But we are learning. Dinocrat The missing tape of Pablo Neruda is finally found. WaPo Two opinions on the Bilbray election: Rick Moran says it doesn't mean much. Kesler thinks it means a lot. Am. Thinker accurately predicted that if Busby won, the MSM would play it up, but if Busby lost, the story would be bured as meaningless.
He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire. Winston Churchill
Wednesday, June 7. 2006
Another piece which dropped in over the transom while I was sleeping at my desk at my do-nothing job. No idea where it came from - a little birdie:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: AMERICANS WITH NO ABILITIES ACT (AWNAA) - A CONGRESSIONAL ACT. WASHINGTON, DC (AP). Congress is considering sweeping legislation, which provides new benefits for many Americans. AWNAA is being hailed as a major legislation by advocates of the millions of Americans who lack any real skills, ambition, common sense, reliability, or the ability to work effectively with others.
"They can't help it, because they were born this way" said Senate sponsor Barbara Boxer (D-Moon). "Roughly 50 percent of Americans do not possess the competence and drive necessary to carve out a meaningful role for themselves in society," said Boxer. "We can no longer stand by and allow People of Inability to be ridiculed and passed over. With this legislation, employers will no longer be able to grant special favors to a small group of workers, simply because they do a better job, or have some idea of what they are doing." Boxer concluded "This crisis must be addressed immediately, before millions are harmed or killed. It will be worse than Katrina if we do not act now. And think of their children!"
The President pointed to the success of the US Postal Service, which has a long and proud policy of providing opportunity without regard to performance. Approximately 74% of postal employees lack job skills, making this agency the single largest US employer of Persons of Inability. Politics is higher, at 99%, but the numbers are fewer. Government in general has an excellent record of hiring Persons of Inability (73%). Private sector industries with good records of nondiscrimination against the inept include retail sales (72%), the airline industry (68%),and home improvement "warehouse" stores (65%). Under the Americans With No Abilities Act, more than 25 million "middleman" positions will be created, with important-sounding titles but little real responsibility, thus providing an illusory sense of purpose and performance for POI and PLWF (Persons of Ineptness, and Persons Living With Fecklessness).
Mandatory non-performance-based raises and promotions will be given, to guarantee upward mobility for even the most unremarkable employees. The legislation provides substantial tax breaks to corporations which maintain a significant level of Persons of Inability in middle positions, and gives a tax credit to small and medium businesses that agree to hire one clueless worker for every two talented hires. In addition, POIs and PLWFs will be added to the group of "protected classes" in all US legislation, automatically, permitting lawsuits for discrimination, thus putting them on an equal legal footing with PLWDs (People Living with With Disabilities), PRCs (People of Rainbow Colors), PFSCWDUACs (People From Strange Countries Who Don't Understand American Culture), PLWRWRs (People Living with Rare, Wierd Religions), and PWAATNs (People Who Aren't All That Normal) and PWWFCs (People Who Wear Funny Clothes), and , last but not least, the PWWFCSOTECPOAYCTWTAHONs, (People Who Wear Funny Clothes So Only Their Eyes Can Peek Out And You Can't Tell If They Are Hot, Or Not).
Finally, the AWNA Act contains tough new measures to make it more difficult to discriminate against the Nonabled, banning discriminatory interview questions such as "Do you have any goals for the future?" or "Do you have any skills or experience which relate to this job?" or "Yo wo doona nuka nookie won?" (Australian aborigine for "How good is your linear algebra?", a phrase with which most B and C-level college admissions officers are well acquainted.)
"As a Nonabled person, I can't be expected to keep up with people who have something going for them," said Mary Lou Gertz, who lost her position as a lug-nut twister at the GM plant in Flint, MI due to her lack of notable job skills. "This new law should really help people like me who are victims of PLWF." With the passage of this bill, Gertz and millions of other untalented citizens can finally see a light at the end of the tunnel of many generations of discrimination.
Human rights and civil rights activists praised the Act, and encouraged its passage. "This will break down one of the last walls of discrimination in American," said Jesse Jackson. "Judging people just on the basis of performance is Un-American and cruel. We must consider other essential factors, such as skin color." Hillary Clinton, running for re-election, (D-Uranus) had this to say: "I think this advances the cause of fairness in employment. We can't all be Bill Clintons, after all, but we all need and deserve something to do besides baking cookies and watching the soaps. And think of the children."
Said Senator Ted Kennedy, "It is our duty as lawmakers to provide each and every American citizen, regardless of his or her adequacy, with some sort of space to take up in this great nation. This Act is for your kids, and especially for my own kids, and all of the next generation of Kennedy kids - and thus for the future of America. Together, we can build a great nation which respects fecklessness, ineptness, and victims of POI and PLWF - a truly inclusive nation that we can finally all be proud of."
College sports teams will be exempt from AWNAA, if enacted by Congress, thanks to an amendment offered by Sen. Joe Lieberman (D R- whatever- CT), Senator of the proud home of the Huskies (few, if any, of whom ever lived in CT). Harvard University science departments, on the other hand, have embraced and adopted the AWNAA concept whole-heartedly, to their credit, setting new standards for institutions of higher learning. Editor's note: We have been informed that this is a re-working, by us, aka a "plagiaristicalistical" adaptation, of an antique piece originally published at the esteemable and essential Onion, America's Finest News Source. When good bits come in, we cannot always determine what their provenance is, partly because we have jobs! Thanks to another alert reader. We try to be honest thieves but sometimes, as Paulie Walnuts would say, "things fall off trucks," and land in our front yard. So we bring them home to Maggie's. We "improved" this one by 50%, but the core of the recipe is from The Onion.
 Do our employees in Congress ever really work? Not very hard, and lots of free travel: Capt. Ed. The pay sucks, but the hours are minimal, your staff does all the work, and you can drink and chase skirts during work hours, and the benefits and retirement can't be beat. And you don't pay Social Security taxes! Plus you get to be Mr. Big...at least in DC.
How Evil are you? Quite evil, no doubt. Take the test. h/t, RTLC A fine piece re D-Day yesterday, at The Shelf. They used approx. the same photo we did: stirring photo, because you can feel yourself on the landing craft, having to get off. Jihadist predicted how they will defeat the West. Thus far, quite accurate. And Rightly So. the problem with the West is that we assume other cultures are as rational and civilized as we are. Guess again. Innocence can be suicidal. Repealing the Estate Tax forever is a good idea. It won't happen, though - for no good reason. Prof B. is on the story. Why is it a good idea to get rid of it? Because the tax is anti-family, pro-govt dependency, and because it damages family businesses. The mega-rich guys all get around it, which is why the Kennedys and Rockefellers are still rich, but the kids of the dairy farmer down the road had to sell his 200 year-old family farm because in MA the land is worth about 5 million now, and the kids didn't have a spare 2 million to pay the estate tax. Not to mention the fact that it represents double-taxation. I'd like to see every American family accumulate enough wealth to be independent of govt "largesse", in time. Things that the newspaper isn't telling you: Not only is a superb economy benefitting the entire country (blue states the least - no surprise there, because they tend to discourage growth), but industrial orders continue to put pressure on manufacturing. Powerline How's the fishin? Daily (almost) updates on Long Island Sound fishing - always here. Apparently the squid didn't like all the rain. Maybe I knew people jigged for squid, but forgot. I do like to eat them, but not fried like the Italians eat them -that's like fish-flavored chewing gum. Very lightly sauteed in butter, olive oil, and garlic, then add a bit of white wine, parsley and hot pepper flakes or Tabasco - a perfect appetizer, or a great topping for spaghetti. Never overcook squid, because it gets rubbery fast.
Some luck lies in not getting what you thought you wanted. Robert Frost
Continue reading "QQQ"
Tuesday, June 6. 2006
Grumpy and growly,  the Chesapeake Bay Retriever was made for busting through ice all day, retrieving ducks and geese in frigid salt water. From their eagerness to handle big water, they must have some fish genes, and they are as tough, rugged, and strong-chested as sporting dogs get. Powerful, often cantankerous, and protective of their master to a fault (they are known as "one-man dogs"), most of the ones I have known do not take kindly to strangers and need tons of daily exercise - preferably in the water. They love to retrieve heavy logs from heavy surf, preferably with ice in it. I think of them as professional hunting dogs more than as house dogs, but I have heard that some of them can be the latter, especially if female. But they are not really family dogs (I know I may get some flak for uttering this fact, but these are dogs for crusty old baymen, from the era of market hunting). Breed info here at AKC. Despite the similarity in appearance, the Chessie is a very distant cousin of the Lab, via their common Newfoundland blood, as is clear from the differences in personality. (The Newfie, while a work breed and not a sporting breed, might be my favorite breed in all of dogdom. But they are tough to train, which we humans, in our anthropocentric way, term "stupid." Loveable, cuddly, loving and protective - but big and dumb, and they need about 500 acres for exercise.)
 The Fjordman is back at Gates of Vienna, with a piece on the dangers of the EU. Is the EU an imperialist scheme to remove power from the people of Europe? One would tend to think so. A quote:
Booker and North calls the European Union “a slow-motion coup d’état: the most spectacular coup d’état in history,” designed to gradually and carefully sideline the democratic process and subdue the older nation states of Europe without saying so in public.
Read the entire excellent review of the long, sneaky history of the EU idea. Image: Stolen from the piece at G of V, above.
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