Sunday, July 18. 2010
Penn and Teller interviewed. They are not friends.
AVI begins:
Why is it the folks who are most suspicious of nationalism want to nationalise everything?
From Kristol's Yes, A Period of Consequences - The time for evasion is over.
We’ve allowed—nay, in many cases encouraged—our government to become unlimited in its goals, bloated in its size, and arbitrary in its action. In this respect Obama-care is more the culmination of decades of policy-making than a deviation from them. We’ve indulged in the fatal conceit that we can ask the state to attend to all our cares and invite the government to correct all our perceived problems, without considering either the counterproductive practical consequences ...
Via Thompson's It Pays To Be Unobvious:
In many arts subjects, especially those tethered only loosely to evidence, logic or practical verification, there’s often pressure to avoid the obvious and prosaic, even when the obvious and prosaic is true.
Noonan: Youth Has Outlived Its Usefulness
American politics is desperately in need of adult supervision.
Libs feel we have too much freedom and too many choices. Self-anointed elites want to chose for us. That is not, in my opinion, an American view of life. See Waiting for the Revolution:
Angelo M. Codevilla wonders how long two-thirds of America can possibly be ruled by a well-entrenched elitist third.
One quote from Codevilla:
The polls tell us that only about a fifth of Americans trust the government to do the right thing. The rest expect that it will do more harm than good and are no longer afraid to say so.
While Europeans are accustomed to being ruled by presumed betters whom they distrust, the American people's realization of being ruled like Europeans shocked this country into well nigh revolutionary attitudes.
America does not do the "betters" thing.
Luke 10:38-42
10:38 Now as they went on their way, he entered a certain village, where a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home.
10:39 She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to what he was saying.
10:40 But Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to him and asked, "Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me."
10:41 But the Lord answered her, "Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things;
10:42 there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her."
Saturday, July 17. 2010
My a/c is turned off. Who is inspired during these dog days? Let's see...
Slow down and think when you read. Whenever I do that, I fall asleep. It's my ADD.
S'fumato? That's Italian.
Villainous: Narcissism and the Counterfeit Life
Financial "reform" - Yet another exercise in stimulating the Washington, DC economy.
The monotony of the ruling class:
Differences between Bushes, Clintons, and Obamas are of degree, not kind. Moreover, 2009-10 establishment Republicans sought only to modify the government's agenda while showing eagerness to join the Democrats in new grand schemes, if only they were allowed to. Sen. Orrin Hatch continued dreaming of being Ted Kennedy, while Lindsey Graham set aside what is true or false about "global warming" for the sake of getting on the right side of history. No prominent Republican challenged the ruling class's continued claim of superior insight, nor its denigration of the American people as irritable children who must learn their place. The Republican Party did not disparage the ruling class, because most of its officials are or would like to be part of it.
Never has there been so little diversity within America's upper crust.
NYC vs. London: New York is missing a once-in-a-generation opportunity to seize a competitive advantage.
AGW isn't killing Polar Bears, but the heat is killing illegals. Pathetic. Why can't Mexico create jobs?
Megan: Does Regulatory Risk Matter? Of course it does.
Small businesses are going to have lots of fun figuring out this bs
The descent of the NAACP. Typical of what happens to non-profits when their work is done. They try to stay alive.
More on kids without summer jobs
Pat Condell is not pleased by the ground zero mosque. It is, indeed, triumphalist - and intended to be.
Money is just a type of information, a pattern that, once digitized, becomes subject to persistent programmatic hacking by the mathematically skilled.
Kelly, at Wired
A quote from "Harnessing the Earthworm" by Dr. Thomas J. Barrett, Humphries, 1947, with an Introduction by Eve Balfour; Wedgewood Press, Boston, 1959:
For more than sixty years these 160 acres had been farmed without a single crop failure. My grandfather was known far and wide for the unequalled excellence of his corn and other grain, and a large part of his surplus was disposed of at top prices for seed purposes. The farm combined general farming and stock raising; my grandfather's hobby, for pleasure and profit, was the breeding and training of fine saddle horses and matched Hambletonian teams. He maintained a herd of about fifty horses, including stud, brood mares, and colts in all stages of development. In addition to horses, he had cattle, sheep, hogs, and a variety of fowl, including a flock of about five hundred chickens which had the run of the barnyard,with a flock of ducks. Usually about three hundred head of stock were wintered. The hired help consisted of three or four men, according to the season, with additional help at rush seasons. This establishment was maintained in prosperity and plenty, and my grandfather attributed his unvarying success as a farmer to his utilization of earthworms in maintaining and rebuilding the fertility of the soil in an unbroken cycle. The heart of the farming technique was the compost pit.
It takes you back in time. Read the whole essay, My Grandfather's Earthworm Farm
Your lunch today, h/t Theo:
Don't let your kids join a 4-H club
Montana update: Which Sex Position Will Your Kid Learn? Start 'em young. The front seats of a Ram pick-up with the big stick shift present all sorts of gymnastic challenges.
Oops. NAACP Forgot to Scrub Their Rally Video With Farrakhan Before They Started Pointing Fingers at Tea Party Patriots (VIDEO) …Update: Rev. Wright Too. That Farrakhan is so silly.
Related, Chantrill is sick of Liberal racist politics
Fed's turn-around sends the dollar tumbling. There is a problem. I tend to agree with Ace about the 2012 GOP nominee
Obama analyzed and integrated Einstein's theory of relativity, the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, as well as the concept of curved space as an alternative to gravity, for a Law Review article that Tribe wrote titled,"The Curvature of Constitutional Space."
Amateurs should never play with curved space-time.
Next thing, they'll make us license our gardens. Authoritarians Target Our Bellies
 Two in the Campagna
I wonder how you feel to-day
As I have felt since, hand in hand,
We sat down on the grass, to stray
In spirit better through the land,
This morn of Rome and May?
For me, I touched a thought, I know,
Has tantalized me many times,
(Like turns of thread the spiders throw
Mocking across our path) for rhymes
To catch at and let go.
Help me to hold it! First it left
The yellow fennel, run to seed
There, branching from the brickwork’s cleft,
Some old tomb’s ruin: yonder weed
Took up the floating weft,
Where one small orange cup amassed
Five beetles, -blind and green they grope
Among the honey meal: and last,
Everywhere on the grassy slope
O traced it. Hold it fast!
The champaign with its endless fleece
Of feathery grasses everywhere!
Silence and passion, joy and peace,
An everlasting wash of air-
Rome’s ghost since her decease.
Such life here, through such lengths of hours,
Such miracles performed in play,
Such primal naked forms of flowers,
Such letting nature have her way
While heaven looks from its towers!
How say you? Let us, O my dove,
Let us be unashamed of soul,
As earth lies bare to heaven above!
How is it under our control
To love or not to love?
I would that you were all to me,
You that are just so much, no more.
Nor yours nor mine, nor slave nor free!
Where does the fault lie? What the core
O’ the wound, since wound must be?
I would I could adopt your will,
See with your eyes, and set my heart
Beating by yours, and drink my fill
At your soul’s springs, - your part my part
In life, for good and ill.
No. I yearn upward, touch you close,
Then stand away. I kiss your cheek,
Catch your soul’s warmth, - I pluck the rose
And love it more than tongue can speak-
Then the good minute goes.
Already how am I so far
Our of that minute? Must I go
Still like the thistle-ball, no bar,
Onward, whenever light winds blow,
Fixed by no friendly star?
Just when I seemed about to learn!
Where is the thread now? Off again!
The Old trick! Only I discern-
Infinite passion, and the pain
Of finite hearts that yearn.
Friday, July 16. 2010
 Here's proof: I, the world-famous Founder and Editor of this here popular knuckledragger website, am not on the speaker list for the November post-midterm cruise.
I double-checked, just to make sure my picture wasn't there. Nope, wasn't there.
Oh well, no matter. That's poachin' season anyway, so I'll be busy.
If by any chance I decide to show up on my own nickel at the last moment, say hello. I'll be the big fellow in the camo with the plastic turkey superglued to my right hand by Mrs. BD last month, to slow down my drinkin.
Centrist as we are, would they invite me to speak if I added a bow tie to my November cruise attire I am wearing in my photo? I have the outline of my talk all ready to go.
Or should I go totally macho, and wear my Lily trousers? Country club camo. Only a real man can wear their cool stuff, but I doubt they have my waist size at the shop at Sea Island.
That's Great Island out there, across from Chequessett Neck. I have done the Great Island long walk several times (8-10 miles). Last time, we saw the resident Great Horned Owl. On this trip, the heat defeated us before we got very far.
I recommend the hike as a way to immerse onself in the salty, piney goodness of the Outer Cape. (Bring hat, sneakers, and backpack with water and things to munch, or you will regret it.)
For me, my annual trek to the Cape is an annual (pagan?) re-baptism. I lived there until I was 5 or 6 (do not remember a thing), but have returned almost every year since then, often with extended family and often not. I believe I converted the now-Mrs. BD to me partly by taking her up there.
Or maybe it was a test to see whether the lovely, spirited young Jersey gal could love something that I loved. She did. Still does.
 VDH nails it, from our link last night to The Psychology of Recession. It is what I am hearing from everybody on Main St. around here. One quote to encourage reading of his post:
Obama, past and present, seems always to talk of how someone else’s money should be spent, dispersed, and redistributed, but never to worry about how it can be made in the first place.
So, fairly or not, when the president talks, business people do not gain confidence that he knows, or cares, much about them or what they do. If he thinks even surgeons are greedy profiteers, who then escapes presidential disdain?
Rainbow ponies do not create jobs or careers. Politicians can create temporary make-work - with our money and our kids' money - but that's all.
A fake tea party video is making the rounds. Totally manufactured. Politics at its most despicable.
Expect it to be widely distributed, since the political meme for July is "Dissidents = Racists." Boob bait for the bubbas is what I call this crap. Call me "offended."
It is one you cannot do drunk, and other fun topics.
My job, like journalism and electricianism and professorism, is famous for being done by daytime drunks, so I guess it's not a real job. It is, in a sense, parasitic on the producers, makers, and builders - the wealth-creators. I do try to help people with their problems, but my main contribution to the important things is my investing (which has not worked out too well for me during the past decade).
Whenever I am invested in a growing biz, the Dems try to tear it down. What's up with that?
Our shrink friend Shrinkwrapped terms this "possibly the best therapy session ever."
Cracked: The 6 Most Misguided Causes Ever Made Famous by Celebrities. Only six?
Dumb and dumber. You've probably seen this already somewhere: When Did John Edwards Become President of Vietnam?
To our friend Sissy: Take a chill pill, or a Cape Cod Marguerita. You will never have a pol in MA who will agree with you all the time about everything. Ideological purism does not work in politics, most places - and especially in the Northeast. If Brown is not re-elected, it will be a loss of all of us. More right than wrong is all one can hope for.
Poll: Obama tied with Palin for 2012. Interesting. She's really something - a celeb pol like the O was - but she is not my candidate. Not yet, anyway, because I have not had the chance to discuss the Federalist Papers with her yet. Our wise but truant poster Roger de Hauteville said that candidates are just figureheads on political ships, and no doubt Sarah makes a good one of those. In a funny kind of way, I think the O knows that he is a figurehead, and not a leader. Which is all for the best.
Thursday, July 15. 2010
 Ancient Buried Ship Found at Ground Zero Site. Not sure I would have used the word "ancient."
Politico: Why President Obama loses by winning
At AVI:
Chris Matthews of MSNBC's Hardball took exception to a Tea Partier's comment "We're not racist, we're anticommunist." He claimed that this is exactly what the John Birch Society used to say, and went on to add "this is the old Dixie crowd."
Hello, Chris. That old Dixie crowd died with Dem Robert Byrd and the rest of the Dixiecrats
Bush's book: Decision Points
VDH: The Psychology of Recession - Obama and his team speak the language of redistribution and entitlements — not the language of opportunity and prosperity. And Main Street is listening.
They sure are. Nobody is hiring.
Berwick the Magnificent. Sheesh. Hypocritical Lefty putz.
NYT: When Did Cheating Become an Epidemic?
Being Traditionalists at Maggie's, we are opposed to cheating in many if not most circumstances.
Slate: Death of a Salesman- A slew of new polls suggest Obama is not a great pitchman for his policies.
Let the cracker cops die. What is this, a new race war?
Politico: On being labeled as 'racist'
Rove: My Biggest Mistake in the White House - Failing to refute charges that Bush lied us into war has hurt our country.
Krauthammer: Al Qaida not using affirmative action
Two terribly immature offerings from our Obama fans:
 Washington is talking about raising the "retirement" age, whatever that means. Since when did the US have a "retirement age"? Most Americans like to work hard: it's part of being an American.
In fact, most (non-unionized) Americans are willing to work harder and longer if their compensation is commensurate with their time, effort, and skills.
Still, re Social Security, that might be a good idea, since people live longer and healthier, and the golf courses around here are getting too crowded with totally functional codgers while other guys their age are still making a useful contribution to society and to themselves.
Plus they are talking about income-adjusting, ie means-testing, Social Security. Should be done. What bugs me about the notion of government income-based entitlements is that they disregard wealth. Why should I be working to pay the Social Security payments for people with a paid-off condo in Vero Beach and a house in Granby, CT - and a state government pension or a hefty IRA or an old-time corporate pension, just because their retirement fixed-income is relatively low in retirement?
Go ahead, argue this with me if you wish (but I can anticipate all of the historical arguments).
In this life we cannot do great things. We can only do small things with great love.
Mother Teresa
 Boxing gloves increased morbidity and mortality in boxing
Stossel: Parasitic Tort Lawyers
New Massachusetts law extends censorship to IM, e-mail, Web
Via Newsreal:
Attorneys for the leftist American Civil Liberties Union are busying themselves with a campaign that would make Saul Alinsky proud. Their target? Catholic hospitals exercising their religious freedom to refuse to perform abortions.
A different kind of Gated Community in China
Subsidize journalism with public funds? The bad idea that won’t go away
Driscoll: NAACP Brilliantly Alerts MSM of Tea Party’s Post-Racial Platform. But the race-mongers are on the job: Al Sharpton on Tea Party: “There Clearly Are Some Racial Leaves In Their Tea Bag”. That is a total malevolent lie. He tries to link States' Rights with racism. Well, Federalism is good. You might just as well try to link Individual Rights with racism too, in which case their logic comes around and bites them in the behind.
(Ed. comment: So what? It's about politics, not a logical exercise.)
Related: How do I prove I am not a racist?
Semi-related: Slavery, Democrat-style
Willie Brown On "Out of Control" Civil Servants
Thanks to ACORN, Felons Put Franken Over the Top
Jonah: Dems' Lament: It Wasn't Supposed to Be Like This
Analysis: Dems show signs of battle fatigue
Carpe: Double-Dippers Are All Wet: Towel Off Already
"Choose Death!" billboard advertises assisted suicide service
Even The Atlantic, Lefty as they are, gets on climategate
Speaking Up for American Capitalism - Business has taken a pounding on Capitol Hill and at the White House and for the most part has remained silent. It's time to make our case.
I am certain that the O will carefully study VDH's Ten-Step Reset Regimen for the President
Praying for Hitchins. He doesn't mind if you do, but it sounds like he's a goner anyway. That is a nasty cancer.
Here's the most crowded beach we found in Cape Cod on the 4th weekend. Hope not to get accused of posting Charles Johnson-like pics.
Wednesday, July 14. 2010
This is sort of brilliant, at Phi Beta Cons. Want to learn Math? Hire a Math teacher.
I posted tons of Wellfleet architecture a couple of years ago, but here are some fresh ones from last week. Such a small town, I will run out of them fast, having already almost fully and unintentionally documented the village for posterity.
I include the antique, the regular, and the ordinary, while excluding the occasional eyesores.
Continue reading "Wellfleet architectural photo dump #1, 2010 Edition"
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