Thursday, March 13. 2008
High school girls learn auto mechanics. Central High School, Washington, DC, 1927 (via Shorpy) 
Wednesday, March 12. 2008
Quoted from Roger, who understands LaR's quip: La Rochefoucauld’s observation that “hypocrisy is the tribute that vice pays to virtue” will doubtless be trotted out early and often when in the case of Eliot Spitzer and the girls. It is a famous, though often misinterpreted, observation. The epigram has generally been presented as meaning—in the words of one journalist—that “the loudest moralizers may be most suspect.” But I believe that La Rochefoucauld meant to suggest that hypocrisy was an implicit acknowledgment of the claims of virtue. Otherwise, why bother with dissimulation? There are, as I say, many reasons to dislike Eliot Spitzer. I, too, hope he goes away, and quickly. The music critic Tim Page, referring to an unpleasant and pretentious college president, observed that he was the sort of chap that gave “pseudo-intellectuality a bad name.” I feel similarly about Eliot Spitzer and hypocrisy. His behavior gives that ambiguous vice a bad name. What’s wrong with Eliot Spitzer is not so much that he praised good things and did bad ones. Most of the items he championed in his various moral campaigns were, when you looked behind the rhetoric, of dubious value. Really, he was a power-hungry, regulation-crazed functionary whose chief sin was to harness the power of the state to destroy his enemies and aggrandize himself. Had he been a little more hypocritical he might have been less dangerous.
If the face of the current credit and liquidity tensions on Wall Street, the public humiliation of Spitzer has provided an occasion for laughter, countless cruel jokes, and general levity in downtown New York City, and many off-color jokes will be made tonight over drinks to celebrate his political demise. Multi-millionaire Spitzer (family real estate money, I think) is known not only for being a sanctimonious, arrogant, self-centered SOB, but also for following the Guiliani script of building a reputation by ruthlessly destroying the reputations and lives of white collar workers in finance - people who, at best, might have been subject to civil cases - or no cases at all. As they say in NYC, a NY Grand Jury will indict a ham sandwich if the prosecutor asks them to. The New York Post gets it. Nobody is perfect, but there is no sympathy for Spitzer.
Probably sold out already. Ewa, who we talked about earlier this week, will finally be back at the Met in October: "Why did it take so long? You'll have to ask them. I can understand if someone doesn't like my voice, my art, my interpretation, my way of singing, my behavior. I don't like Picasso, but that doesn't mean he is a bad painter." She shrugged off the importance of her Met return. "I am so busy — too busy. I've been onstage 30 years, really 50, since I played Madame Butterfly's baby when I was three years old."
"You can tell ahead of time, every time, which side of a dispute a lefty will gravitate towards. The one antithetical to the interests of America and capitalism. Period. Sure there's always greed, self interest, etc., but egotism is the most powerful motivator and the egos of leftists are built entirely on the foundation of the assumed moral superiority of their politics. Gramsci and his followers combined Marxism and Freudianism in a toxic brew devised to hold the indoctrinated masses' self esteem hostage to their leftist politics. That's why it is so durable in spite of all the contrary empirical evidence and the heavy burden of massive cognitive dissonance.'' A comment from Maggie's Farm reader Paul, this week, re our Chavez post
Definitely useful for low-life politicians too: The 48 Laws of Power. I was introduced to this book by a lovely but rather innocent and sheltered patient who was seduced away from her husband and three kids by a man who, she realized, lived by the principles espoused in this book. She came to see me for help in rejoining her family, but it was too late for that. (Dr. Scott Peck wrote one of the best popular books about sociopathy and narcissism, People of the Lie, which has helped many to become alert to some of the personality types one might wish to avoid.) Of the 48 Laws book, Publisher's Weekly said in 1998: Greene and Elffers have created an heir to Machiavelli's Prince, espousing principles such as, everyone wants more power; emotions, including love, are detrimental; deceit and manipulation are life's paramount tools. Anyone striving for psychological health will be put off at the start, but the authors counter, saying "honesty is indeed a power strategy," and "genuinely innocent people may still be playing for power." Amoral or immoral, this compendium aims to guide those who embrace power as a ruthless game, and will entertain the rest. Elffers's layout (he is identified as the co-conceiver and designer in the press release) is stylish, with short epigrams set in red at the margins. Each law, with such allusive titles as "Pose as a Friend, Work as a Spy," "Get Others to Do the Work for You, But Always Take the Credit," "Conceal Your Intentions," is demonstrated in four ways: using it correctly, failing to use it, key aspects of the law and when not to use it. Illustrations are drawn from the courts of modern and ancient Europe, Africa and Asia, and devious strategies culled from well-known personae: Machiavelli, Talleyrand, Bismarck, Catherine the Great, Mao, Kissinger, Haile Selassie, Lola Montes and various con artists of our century... Although gentler souls will find this book frightening, those whose moral compass is oriented solely to power will have a perfect vade mecum.
In other words, those without a functional moral compass and lacking in human empathy: those for whom people are just tools. Everybody has his dark side, but fortunately most of us are not ruled by it. Books like this can let people be aware of what sorts of people there are out there in the big world - even if it is not the intent of the book. As I have said, I trust people who pursue money more than I trust people who pursue power because, best used, money gives you power over your own life - not the lives of others.
Meet the Empire State's new governor. Sounds like a moonbat. I think Bloomberg will run for governor, next chance he has to do so.
"There may well be outrage amongst the prostitutes of the District of Columbia this week."
via Tigerhawk. If you ask me, there's only one of those that has no accent at all.
Politicians have so many ways to get rich. Quoted from Bloomberg: March 11 (Bloomberg) -- Al Gore's Generation Investment Management Ltd., a fund that invests in companies that follow socially responsible guidelines, plans to close its main Global Equity Fund to new money as assets approach a $5 billion target.
Like raising one eyebrow, licking your elbow, and other important manuevers.
Embattled prostitute Kristen expected to resign Goldwater, The John Birch Society, and Me: Buckley Symbolism can save the planet. Walmart States vs. Starbucks States. Am Digest Geraldine Ferraro speaks truth - or part of the truth. Fact is, though, that Obama would be a talented politician no matter what his skin color. But not running for the presidency, though, if he were white. Not now, anyway. Amusing comments on this dumb kerfuffle at Insty. Same kind of thing applies to Mrs. Clinton. Would she be in this race if she were a guy, and never married to a president? David Mamet: "Why I am no longer a brain-dead Liberal." Fascinating essay from someone who thinks (or thought) like the average Upper West Sider. A quote: The play (his new play about politics), while being a laugh a minute, is, when it's at home, a disputation between reason and faith, or perhaps between the conservative (or tragic) view and the liberal (or perfectionist) view. The conservative president in the piece holds that people are each out to make a living, and the best way for government to facilitate that is to stay out of the way, as the inevitable abuses and failures of this system (free-market economics) are less than those of government intervention. I took the liberal view for many decades, but I believe I have changed my mind. As a child of the '60s, I accepted as an article of faith that government is corrupt, that business is exploitative, and that people are generally good at heart. These cherished precepts had, over the years, become ingrained as increasingly impracticable prejudices. Why do I say impracticable? Because although I still held these beliefs, I no longer applied them in my life. How do I know? My wife informed me. We were riding along and listening to NPR. I felt my facial muscles tightening, and the words beginning to form in my mind: Shut the fuck up. "?" she prompted. And her terse, elegant summation, as always, awakened me to a deeper truth: I had been listening to NPR and reading various organs of national opinion for years, wonder and rage contending for pride of place. Further: I found I had been—rather charmingly, I thought—referring to myself for years as "a brain-dead liberal," and to NPR as "National Palestinian Radio." This is, to me, the synthesis of this worldview with which I now found myself disenchanted: that everything is always wrong.
and And, I wondered, how could I have spent decades thinking that I thought everything was always wrong at the same time that I thought I thought that people were basically good at heart? Which was it? I began to question what I actually thought and found that I do not think that people are basically good at heart; indeed, that view of human nature has both prompted and informed my writing for the last 40 years. I think that people, in circumstances of stress, can behave like swine, and that this, indeed, is not only a fit subject, but the only subject, of drama.
Tuesday, March 11. 2008
-I told her that I was a flop with chicks -I've been this way since 1956 1959. Whatever. 
 The proprietor of the blog Mister Snitch has contacted us in a friendly manner to find out what Maggie's Farm is up to. He is interested in blogs.
I'd like to be able to answer his questions, but cannot. We have no mission and no goals other than a steady growth in readership. All we do is to follow our doggy noses, and try to learn something - and to amuse ourselves - in the process. Yes, we want readers, but if we are to be a boutique blog, then so be it: We started this experiment as a lark, and it has become a somewhat serious hobby. Our March stats surely are gratifying, but most of those visitors won't settle down by Maggie's fireplace for a smoke, a chat, and a glass or two of scotch. Alas.
 Two bored casino dealers are waiting at the crap table. A very attractive blonde woman from South Carolina arrived and bet twenty thousand dollars on a single roll of the dice.
She said, 'I hope you don't mind, but I feel much luckier when I play topless.'
With that, she stripped to the waist; rolled the dice; and yelled, 'Come on, Southern Girl needs new clothes!'
As the dice bounced and came to a stop, she jumped up-and-down and squealed 'YES! YES! I WON! I WON!'
She hugged each of the dealers...and then picked up her winnings, and her clothes, and quickly departed.
The dealers stared at each other dumfounded. Finally, one of them asked, 'What did she roll?'
The other answered, 'I don't know... I thought you were watching.'
(Artwork courtesy of Theo)
From "The River War," Vol. II, by Winston S. Churchill, pages 248-50 (Longmans, Green & Co., London, 1899):
How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy.
The effects are apparent in many countries; improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live.
A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement, the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property, either as a child, a wife, or a concubine, must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men.
Individual Moslems may show splendid qualities, but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it.
No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilization of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilization of ancient Rome.
Lately I have been thinking about the difference between learning things and learning about things. The difference operates on several levels, I think. In the end, learning things is effortful but rewarding, while learning about things is effortless and much more fun. I have always held that, if you cannot reconstruct a Chemistry equation from scratch, from pure reasoning, you really do not know the thing at all: You just know about it. (Yes, I am thinking at the moment about the Gas Laws.) Had I a hundred free hours today, I would go on about the implications for psychotherapy, blogging, education, God, and life in general. But I don't.
 It has nothing to do with Rudy Giuliani's "broken window" approach to restoring civilization to NYC (which is no fallacy - it worked well, because providing latitude in the little things, filth, petty crimes, bums and addicts sleeping in parks, hostile squeegee men, etc. implicitly endorses latitude in bigger things, leading to an atmosphere of anarchy that nobody wants to experience).
The excellent Bastiat QQQ yesterday brought it to mind. Bastiat's famous parable of the Broken Window explains how a kid breaking a window, despite the expenditures to repair it, on the bottom line does no favor to the village's economy. While some Keynesians might argue otherwise, I would make the case that, although maintenance of things we care about is a large part of an economy - cars, houses, boats, gardens, horses, dogs, bodies, etc - the fallacy there is the failure to reckon the opportunity cost of the money on the part of the window-owner. I recently posted on the subject of the pseudo-rationality that ensues when the costs of an event are calculated, but is not compared to the costs of inaction or of alternate actions - or the advantages thereof. If anyone were to calculate the global economic advantages of global warming, for example, I think everyone would be praying for it - but I doubt it will occur in any meaningful way.
 Well, it's that time again on Wall St. In my experience, when the banks start letting people go in sizeable numbers, it's a sign that we're near a bottom of some sort of periodic mess.
They are always behind the boom-and-bust curve, and there is no such thing as job security on The Street: everybody needs an exit strategy. So it's a good time to be a young, junior person on The Street, because they mainly focus on dropping the expensive people. That means the junior folks might get a good 7-10-year run until the next round happens.
Erroll Flynn's rape trial. Scott at Powerline. A quote: Giesler later said that Flynn was the best witness he ever had. Flynn, in his autobiography, says, “Maybe he meant I made the most skillful liar under oath.”
"My friends, we live in the greatest nation in the history of the world." "I hope you'll join me as we try to change it." Barack Obama
Any government that has the power to regulate ketchup can regulate your very life. Noted curmudgeon and frequent Maggie's Farm commenter Habu St. John du Plessis
 Not your father's Ukrainian Army (photo)
Greenies want us back to the Stone Age. After you, friends. Rick Moran has some job ideas for when the Greenies take over. Related: Have you checked in with Junk Science recently? Related: What do warming religionists do when their faith is challenged? Am Thinker Just meat. Press privilege? I agree with Glenn. We are The Press, aren't we? In a land of free speech, anyone can be The Press. Two current examples of government making things worse. Viking The two Americas of Michelle Obama The ten top reasons bloggers fail. Hawkins Our Gwynnie on Spitzer: Interested in hearing from Dr. Joy. This guy is an angry, ruthless man who used the law to crush people for his personal political advantage, dropping charges after the headlines faded, and eradicating billions of shareholder value (mostly pension fund) from the companies he assaulted. It seems his aggression was somehow sexually inspiring (wrong word) to him, that he sought a sexual outlet for his violent inner self. Scary man!
Similar thoughts from Luskin Also, over heard this morning at the coffee shop by a guy looking at the Spitzer headline: Stupid bastard. These people think they're above it all.
Also, at Insty: "There is no honorable alternative to Spitzer’s resignation." Which doesn't narrow the field as much for him as it might for some . . . ."
Also, a quote from Spitzer the prosecutor: "Never talk when you can nod, and never nod when you can wink, and never write an e-mail because it's death. You're giving prosecutors all the evidence we need"
Editor's comment: The guy's political rise was a mirror image of Rudy Giuilani's, and his personal life is like Bill Clinton's. But Spitzer won't get away with this the way Bill did because he is an unlikeable person: having to pay for it is the proof.
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