Monday, March 31. 2008
 Tis Issat is the Smoke of the Nile - the falls of the Blue Nile in Ethiopia (map). The Blue Nile, arising in Lake Tana, provides most of the water to the Nile proper.
Here's a better photo of the falls. You can learn a lot about 19th C. Ethiopia (Abyssinia) in Flashman on the March (he survives a tumble down the falls - and then a tumble with an obese Queen). The subject comes up today because, after church yesterday, friends were discussing their upcoming mission trip to Ethiopia and I regret that I cannot join their group. On the other hand, maybe Ethiopia ought to be sending some missions to the USA and Europe. The Ethiopian Orthodox Church (previously the Coptic Orthodox Church) has been around since about 300, and has taken its own path. Note the outfits of the Deacons. I would love to see that country.
Quoted from Roger K: Let’s see, on our side we have: - political, economic, and religious liberty
- full citizenship for women
- separation of church and state
- freedom of inquiry
- embrace of the free market as an engine of wealth
Etc. On their side we have: - absolute submission to the will of Allah
- religious intolerance
- servitude of women
- barbaric ritual punishments for crime
- recourse to suicide bombers as an instruments of policy
Etc. Pace Mr. Buruma, I think that part of what makes “our culture” ours are the customs, values, and practices that have defined it. Some of those values are “Enlightenment values,” some long predate and even conflict with Enlightenment values. But we subscribe to it not because of any abstract inventory of merit but, on the contrary, because it is ours.
Saturday was Opening Day of the 2008 Trout Fishing Season (private waters) on the Eightmile River in Connecticut. As you can tell from the size of the trees, the land along this stretch was probably farmed 50-60 years ago. Dairy, most likely, with sun on the stream, cattle wading though it, and surely no trout. Now it is an excellent habitat for Wood Turtles. And for trout-eating Otters and Mink - fortunately or unfortunately. Beaver too. 
 Michael Yon's book is out. This is the least we can do for that good guy.
You can buy it here.
 You bought a house two years ago, no money down, with a one-year teaser interest-only rate. You knew what you were doing: you gambled that in a year you might be able to make the second year's payments and, if not, the house would have more equity in it. That equity would belong to you.
Can you really blame the mortgage broker? Or, maybe, you bought a second house or two to rent out, as an investment a speculation, with that same deal, planning to flip it when the time seemed right. You had no skin in the game, except for your hope for wild profit - it was all the bank's money. You had nothing to lose. Now the house is worth less than your buying price, and you can't keep up with this year's payment because you didn't get the promotion you hoped for. Logical (if dishonorable) person that you are, you consider dumping your committment and going back to renting again - or hoping that the taxpayer will somehow rescue your reckless real estate investment gamble. Well, not to worry. The Dems want to bail you out. McCain thinks it's nuts, and so do I. Am I a heartless Scrooge? In truth, buying a home mortgage is no different from an LBO, or buying options on margin. Didn't these people ever play Monopoly? Newspapers and pandering politicians call these unlucky gamblers "homeowners," but they aren't. They own nothing but debt and a contract. As prices drop, houses are becoming more affordable to credible buyers instead of crazy gamblers. And, in ten years, there will be another housing bubble. You can bank on it. If your house is an investment, and not a home, sell it then. Editor's note: There are comparable moral hazards with rescuing the banks. See Fed eyes Nordic-style bank nationalization. I am not convinced that we are at that point. Power-people see every problem as an opportunity for a power and/or money grab. Just label it a "crisis."
Libertarian Leanings has a good summary of yesterday's events. A turning point? Now Al Sadr rips Iran. It is a difficult thing to deal rationally with rabid barbarians.
 Surrender by Al Sadr. This kind of thing might explain why.
Global warming is making people crazy? Unbelievable. (h/t, Carnival of the Insanities) "Hillary flings dirt but it sticks to her." Sullivan. Also, "Obama didn't go to law school for nothing." neoneo/ Also, "Barack Obama: Our new appeaser." Michael Goodwin Bobby Jindal update. Blue Crab How over-rated is John Steinbeck? NY Review of Books Farm Scams. Conspiracy: Whatever you want to say about the sharpies on Wall Street, they are pikers compared to Max's and Chuck's friends down on the farm when it comes to picking the pockets of taxpayers and consumers, or concocting a system in which the farmers get all the gains while the government assumes most of the risk.
From a letter to the editor by Don Boudreaux: So I commend you on your "Earth Hour" effort. Persuading people across the globe to turn off lights for one hour supplies the perfect symbol for modern environmentalism: a collective effort to return humankind to the dark ages.
This is the 28' Alerion Express day sailer, at Cape Yachts. Nice boat. 
Sunday, March 30. 2008
Yu Tang with Kreisler's soulful Praeludium and Allegro (h/t, Classical Virtuoso). It's a wonder to me how youthful musicians can put so much heart into music. Perhaps the young have hearts too. I can't remember.
 The NYT did a piece on So You Want to be a Blogging Star?
I guess we would welcome fame and fortune, as long as we could maintain our anonymity. What we would prefer would be to deserve it. But, as Bird Dog often says, we are an "elite boutique blog for the cognoscenti - not mass market." I know he puts it in those transparently flattering terms to feed our vanity and to keep us working without pay, but I know we have some modest impact and some utility for those who have found us. Anyway, Glenn Reynolds is quoted in the piece: Fit blogging into the holes in your schedule. “Deal with the rest of your life first,” advises Glenn Reynolds, a law professor at the University of Tennessee who posts constantly throughout the day on his site, Instapundit.com. The volume and regularity has helped make his political opinion site one of the most popular on the Internet. “The blog is best handled by inserting it into the small bits of free time that rest among the bigger chunks of your work.” Mr. Reynolds slips in posts between classes, as a break from writing law review articles and during slow time at home.
We do that too, Glenn. But what is "slow time at home"? Oh, I get it: the wife has a blog too (our blog-friend Dr. Helen). Photo is the Farmington River, in CT, in autumn.
"Preach the Gospel at all times - and use words when necessary." St. Francis of Assisi "Let your lives preach." George Fox
Here's Charlie Munger: ...almost everyone thinks he fully recognizes how important incentives and disincentives are in changing cognition and behavior. But this is not often so. For instance, I think I've been in the top five percent of my age cohort almost all my adult life in understanding the power of incentives, and yet I've always underestimated that power. Never a year passes but I get some surprise that pushes a little further my appreciation of incentive superpower. ...We [should] heed the general lesson implicit in the injunction of Ben Franklin in Poor Richard's Almanack: "If you would persuade, appeal to interest and not to reason." This maxim is a wise guide to a great and simple precaution in life: Never, ever, think about something else when you should be thinking about the power of incentives...
Read all about it at Marginal Rev.
This medical post came in over the transom - a cautionary tale about certain handguns: A St. Louis Missouri guy had a bad accident with his S&W 460XVR Magnum. He was shooting with a two handed hold and got his left thumb up near the lower front of the cylinder. The normal (powerful) gasses blowing out at the barrel/cylinder gap ripped the top of his left thumb off. I've added some of his posts & some pics.460XVR blew my thumb off today! No joke, about 1/2 of my left thumb is gone what's left is a friggin mess. It's pretty hard to type, and I'm only posting because you never know, it might save somebody else a thumb. I was using a 2-handed grip, fired off a Cor-Bon DPX .460 and the blast came violently out the side of the gun. This is an example of how he was holding his revolver. Wrong, wrong, wrong! 
At first my thumb was so covered in blood that I couldn't see how bad it was ... and I was full of adrenaline and felt no pain. And honestly it looked really bad, my whole hand was covered in blood and it was kinda gushing. The blown-off thumb was on my support hand. I'll re-create the grip tomorrow to see where my thumb was, but it's not like I didn't already know not to get any body part near the cylinder gap. And even if I totally screwed up and did, taking my thumb clean off seems a bit excessive? Just be careful with those 460's. That case operates at such high pressure, it's just asking for trouble. BTW, I bought my 460 new and had exactly 12 rounds through it. Info about the gun, it's a full-size 460 with the 8 3/4' barrel and factory installed compensator.. It's one of the Whitetails Unlimited models. Ammo was 200gr Cor-Bon DPX.
The gun only had 12 or 13 rounds of the Cor-Bon through it, and 10 45 Long Colt rounds through it. So it was essentially still brand new. Saw a hand specialist while there today. Lots of ways to try and save what's left, but first I just have to hope it doesn't get infected in the next few days then surgery early next week. The hand specialist I spent a few hours with last night said that in gunshot wounds there is always a lot more damage than is first visible ... same with things like fireworks going off in your hand. A lot more flesh around the wound is dead, and will rot and fall off over the next couple days. That's why it's so important to keep clean, and that's also why they can't do surgery now. If they wrapped new skin over dead skin it would just flake out, possibly turn gangrenous, and they'd have to start all over again. If you aren't squeamish, what's left of the guy's thumb is on continuation page:
Continue reading "How NOT to hold an X-treme revolver"
I guess I am a bit of a Gilbert Munger (1830-1904) fan, although I cannot say that he had an entirely coherent body of work - but who does? Others of the Hudson River School achieved much more prominence, and one of Munger's claims to fame was spending a day sketching with Bierstadt, the master of the School. But Connecticut-born Munger did get around a bit, from Yosemite to Venice, his work evolved, and did not have the over-dramatic Victorian quality that Bierstat is sometimes accused of. But man, would I like to have a Munger over my office fireplace. The image is is Cazenovia Cornfield, but look at his pictures on the link - good stuff. This is his Lake Marian, Humboldt Range, Nevada, 1871: 
 Like all thistles, Sea Holly likes sun and poor or sandy soil.
Like campanula, it's a blue late-summer bloomer for a perennial border. I found this one here. I like it.
 Could any magazine come closer to Maggie's Farm's interests? It's time for another free plug for Garden & Gun - 21st Century Southern America. One blogger snarked the magazine - until she read it.
Two candidates who missed a generation. Barone Borat is gone. Now it's Bruno, in Kansas. (h/t, Althouse). Cohen has fun with life, doesn't he? How to turn a bread basket into a basket case in ten easy steps. It's not Malthusian - it's another socialist train wreck. How to retire cash-rich. Dr. Helen. I don't want to retire cash rich: I'd rather be cash-rich now. Plus I have no intention of ever retiring. Retirement seems like a foolish goal to me, but sometimes it is forced upon one. If one has Yankee values, one turns leisure into effort anyway. Cell-phones dangerous? I don't believe it. I rarely use mine, though. I thought he hated "middle classism" Jail Camp. The new American vacation An economic stimulus policy for the inner city. SDA  Cowboy deaths, in order of descending dignity
World's second-largest oil reserves. Canada Condy on race. Powerline The Bosnia tall tale flap is a proxy for all the Clinton lies John Dean said: "Who would you rather have in charge of the defense of the United States of America, a group of people who never served a day overseas in their life, or a guy who served his country honorably and has three Purple Hearts and a Silver Star on the battlefields of Vietnam?" Driscoll notes: McCain, by the way, has been awarded the Silver Star, the Legion of Merit, two Bronze Star Medals, a Purple Heart and the Distinguished Flying Cross.
Photo: One of my wren houses. Those shrubberies are a tall variety of smooth Ilex as an unkempt wind-breaking hedge.
"Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are they who mourn,
for they shall be comforted.
Blessed are the meek,
for they shall inherit the earth.
Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
for they shall be satisfied.
Blessed are the merciful,
for they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are the pure of heart,
for they shall see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they shall be called children of God.
Blessed are they who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."
Gospel of Matthew 5:3-10
Saturday, March 29. 2008
 It says 1997, not 1998, on these fine cigars our friend Nathan sent me. Many interesting tart, sweet, funky, sexual, and multi-layered aged flavors in them. I like the 43 ring size, but my humidor is a bit too high on the humidity right now - I think. Stepped on the meter like a complete klutz and broke it a while ago, and I think it is like the Everglades in there right now, judging from the draw.
I did spill some water in there, too - don't ask. I think I will leave the thing open for a few hours to dry out a bit, and order another crappy $5 hygromificateristicalmeter. Got some fine tobaccy in there: I want it in perfect condition when Nathan visits from Jerusalem next month.
We'll all know those numbers soon. How soon before they're a bumper sticker? McCain's first national campaign ad:
Jim Kweskin's Jug Band with Geoff Muldaur, 1963. Good stuff, but unfortunately without a video:
 Yes, it's another Home Depot morning for me. Black Forest mulch and other stuff.
Political monoculture in the academy. Tiger FITNA is spreading virally. Larry Kudlow said today, on the radio, that the Obamas have no retirement plans or savings. They have no investments either, other than real estate, despite making well over a million a year for a while and making de minimus charitable contributions. What's up with that? The UN's farcical Human Rights Council The Chronicle of Higher Ed wondered how university presidents do compared to others: CEO of S&P 500 company—$8.5-million
NBA player—$4-million
College football coach (NCAA Division I)—$1-million
Neurosurgeon—$530,000
President of public research university—$397,000
U.S. Senator—$162,500
NASA astronaut (top pay grade)—$130,000
Reporter—$42,000
The neo-Malthusians in the environmental movement religion. I learned a new word today, in relation to that: "cornucopians." I guess I tend to be one of those - although I would guess that the human race would be better off achieving a sustained human population rather than continued growth. The checkout lines at Costco are too long as it is. Let them eat cell phones. Opie tells me that this essay pretty much captures her view of the Iraq war: Sixty-three years ago, Nazi Germany had overrun almost all of Europe and hammered England to the verge of bankruptcy and defeat. The Nazis had sunk more than 400 British ships in their convoys between England and America taking food and war materials. At that time the US was in an isolationist, pacifist mood, and most Americans wanted nothing to do with the European or the Asian war. Then along came Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, and in outrage Congress unanimously declared war on Japan, and the following day on Germany, who had not yet attacked us. It was a dicey thing. We had few allies. France was not an ally, as the Vichy government of France quickly aligned itself with its German occupiers. Germany was certainly not an ally, as Hitler was intent on setting up a Thousand Year Reich in Europe. Japan was not an ally, as it was well on its way to owning and controlling all of Asia. Together, Japan and Germany had long-range plans of invading Canada and Mexico, as launching pads to get into the United States over our northern and southern borders, after they finished gaining control of Asia and Europe. America’s only allies then were England, Ireland, Scotland, Canada, Australia, and Russia. That was about it. All of Europe, from Norway to Italy (except Russia in the East) was already under the Nazi heel. The US was certainly not prepared for war. The US had drastically downgraded most of its military forces after WW I because of the depression, so that at the outbreak of WW II, Army units were training with broomsticks, because they didn’t have guns, and cars with “tank” painted on the doors, because they didn’t have real tanks. A huge chunk of our Navy had just been sunk or damaged at Pearl Harbor. Read the rest on continuation page below -
Continue reading "A few Saturday Links"
From The Art of Literature and the Science of Literature by Brian Boyd in The American Scholar (an excellent magazine, BTW). A quote: For the last few decades, indeed, scholars have been reluctant to deal with literature as an art—with the imaginative accomplishment of a work or the imaginative feast of responding to it—as if to do so meant privileging elite capacities and pandering to indulgent inclinations. Many critics have sought to keep literary criticism well away from the literary and instead to arraign literature as largely a product of social oppression, complicit in it or at best offering a resistance already contained.
Literary academics have also been reluctant to deal with science, except to fantasize that they have engulfed and disarmed it by reducing it to “just another narrative,” or to dismiss it with a knowing sneer as presupposing a risibly naïve epistemological realism. They have not only denied the pleasure of art and the power of science, but like others in the humanities and social sciences, they have also denied that human nature exists, insisting against the evidence that culture and convention make us infinitely malleable.
Read the whole thing.
And death shall have no dominion And death shall have no dominion.
Dead men naked they shall be one
With the man in the wind and the west moon;
When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone,
They shall have stars at elbow and foot;
Though they go mad they shall be sane,
Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;
Though lovers be lost love shall not;
And death shall have no dominion.
And death shall have no dominion.
Under the windings of the sea
They lying long shall not die windily;
Twisting on racks when sinews give way,
Strapped to a wheel, yet they shall not break;
Faith in their hands shall snap in two,
And the unicorn evils run them through;
Split all ends up they shan't crack;
And death shall have no dominion.
And death shall have no dominion.
No more may gulls cry at their ears
Or waves break loud on the seashores;
Where blew a flower may a flower no more
Lift its head to the blows of the rain;
Though they be mad and dead as nails,
Heads of the characters hammer through daisies;
Break in the sun till the sun breaks down,
And death shall have no dominion. You can hear Thomas reading the poem here.
Dr. Sanity posted this one as an Easter poem.
Friday, March 28. 2008
 Last skiing trip of the year. Leaving tonight for Killington. Looks like excellent snow conditions. Will leave you with these:
Yard Sale of the Century. US Equities. The average bear market lasts 10 months. We're roughly at month 6. Exurban Existentialism for Bozos, with a nod to our friend Sippican. Brave, brave Sir Robin. No Pasaran Incomes up, inflation moderates. Here. Warren Buffet invests like a girl. h/t, Wall St. Fighter Is Mitt a good VP choice? I didn't know that being an inner-city pastor was such a good gig. White UCC pastors don't live like that. Speaking of Rev. Wright, is it racist to quote him? The will to power. Stumbling. As regular Maggie's readers know, we believe that people who want power are insane. From Betsy: Michael Medved notices that people seem to be personally content with their own situation while pessimistic about the country at large.
Her? She is one of Theo's gals. Hope to find her skiing.
 It appears Maggie's Farm readers and contributors were taken in by a hoax photograph. I hear tell that such things are rife on the Internet. I'm in a hurry, as I have a date witha Canadian Moose/Elk hybrid tonight, but I had time to locate the actual original source photograph for the now infamous Obamaphone hoax. As you can see, Obama's people have obviously airbrushed out the artery-clogging submarine sandwich Obama always devours for his lunches -- before having an evil cigarette. It's an obvious attempt to pander to the Minivan Mom demographic to "disappear" the sandwich like one of Stalin's out-of-favor colleagues, but politics is a rough and tumble business these days. And a man's gotta eat.
Right Wing Prof likes this place, and I know I would like it too because it seems like a Maggie's Farm sort of joint. Wonder if they deliver to New England states: 
Even if you are faking it for a photo op, you might have the presence of mind to get the phone right. On the other hand, maybe the younger generation doesn't know how to use a land line. (OK, maybe it's photoshopped. The truth, these days, is getting harder and harder to discern...not that it was ever easy.) 
 We linked to Geert Wilder's short movie on the Koran last night. That movie is becoming a cause celebre.
Here's Diana West on "Pre-emptive Rage" at the Wash. Times. My only reaction to the fuss and the predictable Moslem "rage" and the rush of the Left to disparage and attack the film is this: What if Geert Wilders had made a short movie critiquing the Holy Bible? Would anybody say anything? The Left likes the Islamists (only in the abstract, mind you - not for their dinner parties) because they imagine themselves to be rebelliously anti-Western civilization as they sip their Pinot Noir. The rest of 'em are just scared pantywaists, as Teddy Roosevelt would say, and don't want to poke a rattlesnake. Photo: Time to bring out Rage Boy again
 Canada's #1 Dating Site: Adult Moose Finder
Roger de H. advises: Make sure you plug in "man" seeking "interracial elk" from the drop down list. And check out the dropdown list for "Country"
James Lewis at American Thinker.
 Obama doesn't like the "You're on your own society." But he's on his own, despite his wife's absurd complaints about their million dollar annual income. Does he think I am a child? Related: His wife thinks I am ignorant. Me?
Has religion become a political wedge issue? First Things. The Clear Channel story is becoming a good legal soap opera. Already, a Judge takes a stand. "At the consideration of our comparative insignificance." Sissy. It's about warming - and larger topics. The return of the Mercedes Benz of Peace The pressure politicians feel to "Do Something!" The Law Prof on the subprime mess. Uranium found in the hands of our Lefty South American friends. Dangerous buffoons. More evidence that Dems do not donate, Repubs do - regardless of income. Blue Crab. Exposure to Western ways makes Moslems more hateful. The corner I do not smoke pot, but criminalizing it is ridiculous and expensive. If people want to be potheads, fine. Let them be lazy bozos, but just don't make me pay their bills. My opinion on Obama's race speech: Condescending to white folks. We aren't stupid, and we aren't racist - and we are sick of "conversations about race." If black folks want to join Team America, then somebody like Obama ought to tell them how to do it, because he joined it, like so many fine black folks I know.
The artist Samuel F. B. Morse (Phillips Academy and Yale) is better known as an inventor - and for Morse Code. This is his Niagara Falls from Table Rock (1813), owned by the MFA, Boston. 
Thursday, March 27. 2008
Possibly not safe for work. Here's the movie on Islam made by Dutch MP Geert Wilders. (h/t, Samizdata)
Thought I might share the data from a meeting tonight about vitamins, health, and cancer. The short version: - Do not take folate-containing supplements unless you are bearing babies. (Unfortunately, the government in its infinite wisdom mandated its addtion to bread and other foods for the benefit of child-bearing women who eat terrible diets.)
- Adults should not bother with vitamin supplements, except...
- it's probably a good idea for most people to take 2000 iu of Vit D3 daily (which is actually a hormone, not a vitamin) even if you spend time outdoors, and...
- 20 minutes of daily exercise is a good thing. That's just one researcher's opinion, of course.
"High water risin' - risin' night and day
All the gold and silver are being stolen away
Big Joe Turner lookin' East and West
From the dark room of his mind
He made it to Kansas City
Twelfth Street and Vine
Nothing standing there
High water everywhere
High water risin', the shacks are slidin' down
Folks lose their possessions - folks are leaving town
Bertha Mason shook it - broke it
Then she hung it on a wall
Says, "You're dancin' with whom they tell you to
Or you don't dance at all."
It's tough out there
High water everywhere
I got a cravin' love for blazing speed
Got a hopped up Mustang Ford
Jump into the wagon, love, throw your panties overboard
I can write you poems, make a strong man lose his mind
I'm no pig without a wig
I hope you treat me kind
Things are breakin' up out there
High water everywhere
High water risin', six inches 'bove my head
Coffins droppin' in the street
Like balloons made out of lead
Water pourin' into Vicksburg, don't know what I'm going to do
"Don't reach out for me," she said
"Can't you see I'm drownin' too?"
It's rough out there
High water everywhere
Well, George Lewis told the Englishman, the Italian and the Jew
"You can't open your mind, boys
To every conceivable point of view."
They got Charles Darwin trapped out there on Highway Five
Judge says to the High Sheriff,
"I want him dead or alive
Either one, I don't care."
High Water everywhere
The Cuckoo is a pretty bird, she warbles as she flies
I'm preachin' the Word of God
I'm puttin' out your eyes
I asked Fat Nancy for something to eat, she said, "Take it off the shelf -
As great as you are a man,
You'll never be greater than yourself."
I told her I didn't really care
High water everywhere
I'm getting' up in the morning - I believe I'll dust my broom
Keeping away from the women
I'm givin' 'em lots of room
Thunder rolling over Clarksdale, everything is looking blue
I just can't be happy, love
Unless you're happy too
It's bad out there
High water everywhere." "High Water (For Charley Patton)," from 2001's Love and Theft. Here is a decent performance from the spring 2007 tour (the album version, BD will agree, remains the best, never really topped in live performances).
There are several good protections against temptation, but the surest is cowardice.Mark Twain
The essay, Are We Really That Ill? (in which the author notes that, according to that Psychiatric diagnostic manual "DSM", half of us are mentally ill) in the NY Sun has been referenced frequently this week. And regrettably so, because the author is a Professor of English and knows little of the practice of Psychiatry. I only have the time to address one of his statements: With over a million copies in print, the manual is known as the bible of American psychiatry; certainly it is an invoked chapter and verse in schools, prisons, courts, and by mental-health professionals around the world.
Yes, it is invoked often - but it is no bible. No well-trained Psychiatrist uses it as a tool for understanding or treatment. It was designed as a research tool, so that researchers would share definitions. It rapidly became a tool for filling out the "diagnosis code" space on insurance forms so that patients might be eligible for some medical reimbursement. Many of the "diagnoses" listed are not illnesses in any usual sense: nictotine addiction, insomnia, alcohol abuse, post-traumatic stress, personality disorders, ADD, and "adjustment disorder" are just a few examples of the listed items which are common parts of the human condition, but which are subjects of medical research and which are things for which people often ask for help. But they aren't illnesses - they are insurance codes.
 I heard one whinny at around 5 AM on Good Friday. It's a treat to hear, and I hope that it means we will have a nesting pair of these pigeon-sized little owls in the area.
Maybe I should put up a Screech Owl nest box, but there are so many trees with holes around here that it's probably not necessary. I have never had to chase them out of any of my Wood Duck boxes, but they are known to occupy them. I had neighbors who had a pair for years using their Wood Duck house on a tiny island in a pond (which seemed reckless of the owls, to me). You could see the owl's face, sometimes, sunning itself in the hole. It's unusual to see them. Practically speaking, the only way you would know that they are around is by hearing them at night. These owls do not mind suburbia at all, and are probably breeding in all five boroughs of New York City. These nocturnal birds are not rare everywhere east of the Rockies, and come in Red, Brown, and Grey races. They do not screech; they have a trill and a ghostly whinny. One more of those eery night-time sounds. Here are their calls. Read the detailed CLO entry on the Eastern Screech Owl here.
The Dems refuse to understand it, but Q&O gets it. Lots of charts. There is no such thing as American "Big Oil." American oil is "Little Oil."
E-mail petitions are NOT acceptable to Congress or any other municipality. To be acceptable, petitions must have a signed signature and full address. Almost all e-mails that ask you to add your name and forward on to others are similar to that mass letter years ago that asked people to send business cards to the little kid in Florida who wanted to break the Guinness Book of Records for the most cards. All it was, and all this type of e-mail is, is to get names and "cookie" tracking info for telemarketers and spammers to validate active e-mail accounts for their own purposes. Any time you see an e-mail that says forward this on to "10" of your friends, sign this petition, or you'll get good luck, or what ever, it has either an e-mail tracker program attached that tracks the cookies and e-mails of those folks you forward to, or the host sender is getting a copy. Each time it gets forwarded, then the origination is able to get lists of "active" e-mails to use in spam e-mails, or sell to others that do. (If you have been sending out the above kinds of email, now you know why you get so much spam!) More on E-petitions at Snopes.
 Elephant with camera. Wonderful stuff.
The geezer acts like a normal person. McCain. More on McCain's speech and the "league of democracies." Hillary's List of Lies. Dick Morris Moronic reporters. Even I know that Blackwater Fever is malaria. The Mahdi "Army" is back in business. How is the MSM reporting this? Pat Dollard's war on Hollywood Pregnant man. He is very happy. Chavez "endorses" Obama. Busted: Ivy League hos in trouble in NYC. 10,000 names on file - their client list could make for good entertainment. These gals aren't hos - they are courtesans. Homo antecessor in Europe 1.3 million years ago Calmly rational as always, Neoneo on autism If Dems had a good candidate, GOP would be toast. Are biofuels to blame for rising food costs? Same topic: Let them eat Ethanol. Why don't they call it alcohol? Sharper Image goes bust. Making a perfect macaroon for The Century Club Take time to grow up a little between college and grad school Leftist churches set a time bomb for the Dems Marriage in the UK, quoted in full from Insty: NO MARRIAGE, PLEASE, We're British: "The number of Britons tying the knot has collapsed to a record low, it has emerged. The proportion of men and women getting married is below any level found since figures were first kept nearly 150 years ago. . . . The evidence that marriage is withering away at an increasing pace was met with a furious response from critics of Labour's benefits system, which disregards the status of husbands and wives and pays parents extra to stay single." Well, that's certainly going to produce the ideal society.
Wednesday, March 26. 2008
What a good thing Adam had. When he said a good thing he knew nobody had said it before. Mark Twain
As I have discussed frequently here, people in America who fall into the poverty income stats (which significantly do not include govt and charity help - or take assets into account like our Maine blueberry famer with a 200-acre farm) because: 1. They do not function well or adjust well in civilized society, for whatever variety of reasons.
2. They don't care and are content with - or at least not motivated by - their economic condition (eg organic farmers in VT, moonshiners in the Kentucky hills, starving artists and actors, people following their hearts, blueberry farmers in Maine, Maine Guides, Indians on reservations where there is little work, ski bums, real bums (including San Francisco runaway kids), welfare and disability addicts, Vermont farm hands, people who remain in the old town after the jobs have left, old hippies in N. Calif., etc.).
3. They don't report their income (there's a huge cash-only economy in the US - not to mention "real" crime).
4. They are the temporary poor - students, new immigrants, people between jobs or people starting out in life or new careers.
5. They ran into some bad luck or made some bad financial decisions and life choices (eg getting over their heads in debt, crushed by medical problems, being single moms, having no savings and living on Social Security, drug addicts, folks in jail, etc.). Furthermore, as long as poverty income stats are based on the lowest X%, it will never go away - even if, as it appears now, American poor have large-screen TVs, air-conditioned homes, and cars - and tend to be overweight. Somebody - not a sociologist - should go out there and interview some poor people and get their real stories. It would be revealing. I know plenty of their stories and know what poverty is about because I work one day a week, pro bono, at a charity medical clinic in Boston - but I cannot tell those stories here. The subject comes up because Steve Malanga has written the definitive report at City Journal: Getting Poverty Wrong, and it turns out that family structure accounts for the main problem. One quote: The Census Bureau’s study on the living arrangements of American children appeared in mid-February. The data show that the number of children now living in two-parent families has dipped just below the 70 percent mark for the first time since the Census began collecting data on family formation nearly 130 years ago. After peaking in the 1950s—when about 87 percent of all children lived with two parents—the traditional family went through a rapid decline beginning in the 1970s and has continued to shrink over the last three decades, though the rate of decline has slowed somewhat. As part of this sweeping change, the percentage of children living with married parents has fallen more rapidly, down more than two full percentage points, to 66.6 percent of all kids, in the last 10 years alone. Consistent with these decreases has been a sharp rise in the number of children living with single parents and with unmarried parents. The economic impact of this breakdown has been profound. Researchers estimate that the entire rise in poverty in America since the late 1970s can be attributed to “changes in family formation,” a euphemism for the decline of families headed by two married parents. The latest Census data illustrate the problem. Only one out of ten American kids living in two-married-parent families is in poverty—and about one-third of these families are recent immigrants whose poverty is temporary. By contrast, 37 percent of children living with single mothers are impoverished.
Read the whole thing (link above).
Eleanor Powell and Fred Astaire, 1940. The film is a bit washed out, but it's worth it.
Quote from Icecap: Last year when Antarctica set a new record for ice extent, it got no media attention. They focused on the north polar regions where the ice set record low levels. This summer when unprecedented anomalous cover continued in the Southern Hemisphere again no coverage. Then this report in the news today. You probably saw it on your favorite network or internet news site (pick one, anyone).
Read the whole thing.
 World's tallest man gets custom car.
A Dem wonders why nobody tells Hillary to quit. The Obama's tax returns. The Corner If politics is about branding, then what car are they? The joy of free markets. Coyote What feminism has descended to. A new book: Slavery, Terrorism, and Islam Can't Make This Stuff Up Department. The National White Privilege Conference Are the successful living too long? About that ice shelf. Castle Eli Lake at the NY Sun bothered to study the Saddam and Terrorism report. (h/t Anchoress). That's what we need full-time reporters for.
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