We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
The Bird Dog pup and his bride have just returned from a friend's wedding in Murcia. The pup was best man, and his friend's lovely Spanish bride did indeed wear a lace mantilla.
They emailed me a few photos of Murcia. View from the cathedral:
A nation of Watanabes. My view? There is no such thing as predatory lenders. There is such thing as greedy, predatory, amoral borrowers and risk-takers on the bank's nickel.
Sometimes Ace gets serious and, when he does, he says wise things. As in this piece (which is not really about Palin). h/t, Villainous. One quote:
...politics is not about Simon Pure purity on questions. They are advancing the idea that politics is about coalition-building, doing what is necessary to attract 51% to your flag, and that those they consider too hardcore about conservative principles are doing the party a disservice by elevating philosophical integrity and ideological coherence above the vagueries and punts often necessary to negotiate a rough consensus.
An outrage indeed. The re-do of the Sunmaid girl. They made her less ethnic, and no longer a field worker.
I have heard many views on this: House Republicans Seek Reprieve For Navy SEALs. I tend to think it's like those cases where they arrest a 6 year-old girl for having a butter knife in her lunchbox.
NSFW: Obama's Safe Schools Czar. This creep would have been arrested if he came by my elementary schoool.
For just a little while, enjoy a truly remarkable, unique, more than pleasurable musical experience.Experience the cross-blending of superb musicians and voices from around the globe.
My family, from 4 to 62, sat transfixed before the TV one late night last week as this concert on PBS, this tale and result of ten-years’ creation, literally had us all smiling and lifting our jaws from our chests.The story of this effort is told here.
Click on the YouTube link, for "Stand By Me," then click on some of the others, like "War/No More Trouble," "Don't Worry," "One Love."
May peace find us all, and may we find and deserve peace, brothers and sisters.
It is the most important scandal of our time. Climate alarmists are trying to impoverish the world, ostensibly in order to cool it down but really, in my view, to achieve the liberal holy grail of government control over everything. The scandal comes along at a critical moment to cast doubt on whether the "scientists" behind the global warming scare are doing science at all. Rather, their own words suggest that they are engaging in a combination of politics and fraud.
The skeptics were regarded as cranks and shills for evil polluters, such as the oil companies. If they got coverage at all, it was negative.
Now comes Climategate. It is out of step with the media agenda. What does the media do now?
“Ignore it,” has been the first answer.
Regard it as an unimportant story[4]. Not nearly as important as Tiger Woods or the couple that crashed a White House party. It is just another hacker, and undoubtedly the work of one of those oil company shills. Yes, ignore it. It will fade away.
The second answer: Write about Climategate’s general unimportance and give the parties involved a platform to dismiss the charges. Various outlets took minor steps to cover the story in a limited, dismissive way.
SCIENTISTS BEHAVING BADLY: Steve Hayward on the ClimateGate scandal. “The behavior of the CRU circle has cast a long shadow over the entire climate science community, and many honest scientists will now undeservedly bear the stigma of Climategate unless a full airing of the issues is conducted. Other important climate research centers with close ties to the CRU–including NASA’s Goddard Institute and the Climate Change Science Program at NOAA–should not be exempt from a full-dress investigation. Such a reevaluation must begin with an understanding of the crucial role the CRU circle has played in the global warming drama.” Read the whole thing, which provides a nice summary of the issues so far.
Image: The new palms and rising balmy waters at Maggie's Farm Resort and Spa in central New England. It's about time. We bought the place for that exact purpose, cleverly anticipating the arrival of the palms and beaches.
3:1 In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene,
3:2 during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness.
3:3 He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins,
3:4 as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah, "The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: 'Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
3:5 Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth;
3:6 and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.'"
Another offering from Capt. Tom, from his home town.
The East Woodstock, Ct, Congregational Church
Founded in 1760 and built in 1801, the North Woodstock Congregational Church is a prime example of the "barn" style church found in rural New England (there are two other churches in Woodstock that are clones).
This church is particularly interesting in that, other than the addition of electricity and new roof, it has not been modified at all since it was first built. It still has the gated seating areas for those more affluent parishioners where families would sit together the more important sitting closer to the front.
The interior is original plaster with dark oak trim - the kind of varnished oak that becomes deep and rich color that only time can provide. Just looking at this church, one feels the weight of history and time.
Side note: One of the social/historical features of Woodstock that has always fascinated me is the variety of the ways its citizens worship. Three Congregational, one Baptist, one combination Unitarian/Congregational hybrid, one Baptist/Congregational hybrid and two Fundamentalist Evangelical.
Kind of makes us Roman Catholics, Episcopalians and Lutherans the odd ones out.
Ed: Thanks for these posts, Captain. We'll take more whenever you are ready.
Some people like to crate their dogs at home, and some do not. Furthermore, some dogs love their crates and some hate to feel confined. We tended to crate our previous dog, but not our current pup. I never minded the look of a dog crate or two in a family room, but Orvis has some that are more functional for people - and which look more like furniture.
A wonderful story. The Dutch colony of New Amsterdam, owned and run by the Dutch West India Company, was a quickly growing and boisterous commercial settlement of over 200 when the Pilgrims landed in Massachusetts. When the Dutch sent a friendly delegation up to Plymouth in 1624 or so with goodies and gifts of sugar, William Bradford sent a letter back with the delegation saying that he was sorry that he had nothing desirable to offer to return the favor.
On quote from the book re the Wickquasgeck Trail:
Broadway does not follow the precise course of the Indian trail, as some histories would have it. To follow the Wickquasgeck Trail today, one would take Broadway north from the Customs House, jog eastward along Park Row, then following the Bowery to 23rd St. From there, the trail snaked up the east side of the island. It crossed westward through the top of Central Park; the paths of Broadway and the Wickquasgeck Trail converge again at the top of the island. The trail continued into the Bronx: Route 9 follows it northward.
The Customs House was the site of the original Dutch fort to protect them from the Indians. The Lenape Indians turned out to be friendly to the Dutch (believing them to be potential allies against other tribes), so the fort was never well-maintained. Hence the Brits had no problem taking the town in 1664.
Today the Customs House is the home of the Museum of the American Indian. Worth a visit.
Related, years ago I read Beverly Swerling's City of Dreams: A Novel of Nieuw Amsterdam and Early Manhattan, which does a great job evoking the times - and the medical care of the times. Many would argue, I think, that NYC remains more of a Dutch heritage city than an English one.
"Shopping in the sense of the ceaseless search for the next object that will thrill for a moment and satisfy for a minute is the main interest of people without a purpose."
...according to a number of recently released scientific studies, dogs are not merely emotional con artists: they are also intellectual con artists. They've learned not only to fake love; they've managed to convince us that they are a lot smarter than they really are. In both cases they play us for the saps we are.
The new analysis of the data will take three years, meaning that the Met Office will not be able to state with absolute confidence the extent of the warming trend until the end of 2012.
I recently posted on the subject of Death, taxes, and death taxes in view of upcoming legislative considerations of current death taxes, and I see a post by Patten at NRO which echoes my views. He explains:
Often referred to as the death tax, the estate tax was established under the guise of ensuring “fairness.” Progressive reformers of the early 20th century thought a tax on lifetime earnings and savings would prevent “gross inequalities of wealth.” Instead, the estate tax destroys capital, the fuel that keeps the economy growing. When capital is difficult to acquire, some people are unable to start businesses, and some of those who already have businesses can’t expand them — resulting in fewer jobs for others.
Read his whole brief and to-the-point post. Estate taxes are wealth and asset destroyers. I want more wealthy people and wealthy families, not fewer.
How about Florist's Transworld Delivery - FTD? Isn't that a sort of business that was waiting a long time for the internet to appear?
(Wiki says: FTD was founded as Florists' Telegraph Delivery in 1910, to help customers send flowers remotely on the same day by using florists in the FTD network who are near the intended recipient. It originated as a retailers' cooperative and began a process of demutualization in 1994.)
FTD was recently bought by an internet company, United Online.
While many if not most businesses have benefited in one way or another by the internet, some businesses like FTD seem to have been made for it - just born too early.
Post your examples/ideas about pre-internet businesses, which in retrospect seem to have been designed for the internet, in our comments.
...from a letter Jefferson wrote in 1762: “The old-fellows say we must read to gain knowledge and gain knowledge to make us happy and admired. . . . Mere jargon! Is there any such thing as happiness in this world? No: And as for admiration I am sure the man who powders most, perfumes most, embroiders most, and talks most nonsense, is most admired.”
The Massachusetts model, yet again - Boston Globe "Six hospitals to sue state over payment shortfalls": "The suit charges that Massachusetts violated a law requiring adequate reimbursement to hospitals for patients insured by the government. The hospitals contend the state set repayment rates so low they do not cover the cost of such medical care." Fear not, all these issues will be ironed out in the federal plan. Paul Krugman told me so.
You may suppose that those with a resilient faith in end-of-days global warming would be more distraught than anyone over these actions. You'd be wrong. In the wake of the scandal, we are told there is nothing to see. The administration, the United Nations, most of the left-wing punditry and political establishment have shrugged it off. What else can they do?
To many of these folks, the science of global warming is only a tool of ideology. To step back and re-examine their thinking would also mean — at least temporarily — ceding a foothold on policy that allows government to control behavior. It would mean putting the brakes on the billions of dollars allocated to force fundamental economic and societal manipulations through cap-and-trade schemes and fabricated "new energy economies," among many other intrusive policies.
Krauthammer spoiled his excellent piece on medical insurance by claiming a moral imperative for medical insurance.Not for medical care - for medical insurance. I agree with the Powerline guys that this part of Krauthammer's piece makes no sense.
It is a moral imperative for parents to take care of their kids as best they can. And, in a nation founded on equality in the face of the law, you could make a case for universal free national legal care.
Socialized medicine is no more insurance than Social Security is. What it is is having the government - ie your neighbors - pay your bills. That's not insurance.
Image via 
Just when it seemed as if, finally, there could be some real open discussion about the data, 
Luke 3:1-6
Tiger Woods drives 
The Glorious History of Handel's Messiah
How about Florist's Transworld Delivery - FTD? Isn't that a sort of business that was waiting a long time for the internet to appear?
A friend and beer afficionado responded to our post about Sam Adams' Winter Classics with this email:
Via