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.
5:1 Naaman, commander of the army of the king of Aram, was a great man and in high favor with his master, because by him the LORD had given victory to Aram. The man, though a mighty warrior, suffered from leprosy.
5:2 Now the Arameans on one of their raids had taken a young girl captive from the land of Israel, and she served Naaman's wife.
5:3 She said to her mistress, "If only my lord were with the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy."
5:7 When the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his clothes and said, "Am I God, to give death or life, that this man sends word to me to cure a man of his leprosy? Just look and see how he is trying to pick a quarrel with me."
5:8 But when Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes, he sent a message to the king, "Why have you torn your clothes? Let him come to me, that he may learn that there is a prophet in Israel."
5:9 So Naaman came with his horses and chariots, and halted at the entrance of Elisha's house.
5:10 Elisha sent a messenger to him, saying, "Go, wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored and you shall be clean."
5:11 But Naaman became angry and went away, saying, "I thought that for me he would surely come out, and stand and call on the name of the LORD his God, and would wave his hand over the spot, and cure the leprosy!
5:12 Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them, and be clean?" He turned and went away in a rage.
5:13 But his servants approached and said to him, "Father, if the prophet had commanded you to do something difficult, would you not have done it? How much more, when all he said to you was, 'Wash, and be clean'?"
5:14 So he went down and immersed himself seven times in the Jordan, according to the word of the man of God; his flesh was restored like the flesh of a young boy, and he was clean.
5:15c Then he returned to the man of God, he and all his company; he came and stood before him and said, "Now I know that there is no God in all the earth except in Israel."
Mrs. BD is wondering what the Dems would have done if they had had had Bill on tape talking like a lowlife as he is widely known to do? Everybody knew Bill was a lowlife, and Mrs. Clinton an enabler and attacker of his assault victims, but the party rallied in his defense. That is called power politics. Same with JFK and LBJ, but no audio tapes and the press covered for them or, you might say, colluded. A sample: He (Bill) said Hillary had eaten more p***y than he had.’
Mr. Trump has no such amoral supporters. The Repubs rarely do. Hearsay, however accurate, might be manageable but the tape is a killer. The context is irrelevant. Mrs. BD is with Hinderaker: We’ve Had About All the Genius We Can Stand.
She has already written Pence's speech in her mind. Mike, give us a call. No charge.
A thorough review of the history of medical care in America along with the legal rationales for government regulation of a variety of industries: Medicine as a Public Calling
Had medical care become an industry? A single industry? A monopoly? It's complicated, and like all areas in which government gets involved, it is more political than logical. As FDR said about Social Security, "This is not about economics, it's about politics."
At issue, in part, is whether medical care is a commodity. As my practice goes, it is far from a commodity. After studying the article, I began to wonder whether similar arguments might be equally-applicable to the legal and the accounting businesses. Even to the plumbing business.
The EU, of course, is a solution to the past. More precisely, it is what the Europeans wish they had done before the Great War, believing it would have prevented all of it. Like all solutions to past mistakes, it is wildly miscast for the present. That does not bother the Eurocrats. They are convinced their way is correct and they run forward, head down, into the block wall of reality. It is precisely this sort of stuff that led a majority of Brits to vote their nation out of the project, but facts and events play no role in EU thinking.
Why would someone raised in Gothenburg want to leave one of the most peaceful and progressive countries in the developed world to join a violent extremist group in the Middle East?
Because there is more to life than comfort. Humans are not cows.
Homecoming Marine, by Normal Rockwell. I've been to the Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, but missed this one. I'd love to look at all of the detail. (h/t Ace)
So much for that major threat to the US. The hype certainly keeps people watching the news, though, with the dopey reporters in rain jackets saying "Wow, look at that wind." Of course, if you live in storm or flood zones, you must always expect such things. The poor people of Haiti can not be prepared even though storms are part of life there.
The War on Cash: Banks, governments, credit card companies and fintech evangelists all want us to believe a cashless future is inevitable and good. But this isn't a frictionless utopia says Brett Scott, and it's time to fight back
Getting into pretty good condition from ordinary condition (ordinary is somebody over 30 who is not fat, hikes, walks daily, plays some recreational sports) takes about two years of commitment. Longer if pudgy, mostly sedentary, or if complicated by some physical impairment (which almost everybody over 40 is).
Yes, two years - and that means ideally 5-6 days per week. I can witness to that because at 16 months of my program neither I nor my trainer feel I am ready for a maintenance program yet. I had thought that I might have graduated by now but I have a ways to go. Part of what has slowed me down has been an old skiing shoulder injury and some non-arthritic hip pain.
If you feel inspired to take on such a slow but ultimately-rewarding process, I would recommend getting an evaluation from the smartest trainer you can find - not a musclebound musclehead, but one who knows physiology and anatomy, etc - and being taught a recommended program. Unless you were a well-trained lifter in high school or college, you can not walk into a gym and begin lifting weights, or even dumbells. You will do it wrong and injure something.
In fact, without training you will not even do simple things like medicine ball slams or heavy rope slams correctly. Everything has a correct technique designed for minimal damage and maximum benefit.
I have the luxury of a superb trainer 3 days/wk, thanks to Mrs. BD. That seems ideal. At this point, though, I think I can do my "heavy calisthenics" hour on my own. You can always learn more, but I have the basics down and an hour of calisthenics is a hell of a total body workout and you sweat like crazy.
Advantages of supervision by a trainer:
correcting your technique and managing your recovery time the trainer is your spotter. you need that for some weights planning your program to match your strengths and weaknesses pushing you harder than you would yourself making adjustments for aches and pains holding you accountable trainer can give you his advice on what you should do on "off days" the well-educated trainers will give you a nutritional plan too, depending on your needs
A less-expensive alternative is a group conditioning program like Crossfit. Crossfitters have good fun and good group bonding while busting their asses, but the supervision is not as exacting as it with with an individual trainer who watches your every move and corrects you constantly.
For a "boot camp" program like mine, most trainers would recommend something like ours (that of me and Mrs. BD):
Mon: 1 hr upper body weights or push weights Tues: Half hour cardio intervals Weds: 1 hr. lower body wts or pull weights Thurs: Half hour cardio intervals or 40 mins speed walk Fri: 1 hr mixed "heavy calisthenics" Sat: Half hr cardio intervals or speed-walking, plus 1/2 hr calisthenics. Some days just 40 mins speed-walking when it's a beautiful day.
Most likely very few American blacks care about it at all, but there is a noisy group in New Orleans who want to get rid of a statue of Andrew Jackson, hero of the Battle of New Orleans. While the entire impulse to erase history seems crazy to me, there is not a single reason to hold anything against Jackson.
His post is grimly amusing, but I think he misses three points: 1)These "rioters" are rent-a-mobs," paid rioters and 2) rioting is fun, especially when you feel you have some sort of legal immunity and 3) I do not know any American blacks who would act like that.
- As we enter flu season, it's a good idea to take the flu vaccine around now. I can possibly save you from a few days of lost work, and if you get it at CVS they will give you a 20% discount card for all the Halloween junk and other junk you buy there that day. Flu shots do not always work, because the viruses mutate so quickly. Still, it is something to do to minimize the risk of the unpleasantness.
- Tetanus? (or Tetanus-Diptheria-Pertussis) vaccine? Adults who have had their booster shot long ago probably do not need to repeat, but people caring for infants usually get an adult booster dose. Most people who have had puncture injuries or sutures in the ER have gotten a tetanus shot on a precautionary basis.
The placebo idea has a long history, back to ancient Greek medicine. However, in my experience the placebo effect, such as it is, seems most powerful in the ignorant and the suggestible. Hence the enduring popularity of quackery like naturopaths and homeopaths.
While it remains true that modern physicians often recommend treatments with marginal effects, those marginal effects are likely not imaginary.
The Pew study shows that the endless repetition about climate, and blaming all bad weather on climate (while never blaming nice weather on climate)as in "Due to climate change, the US has gone 10 years without a hurricane") has had some impact, but people are not really too frightened.
For example, their survey indicates that climate-worriers do no more for "the environment" than anybody else. Of course, most of the cute greeny things people do "for the environment" are meaningless and pointless exercises in virtue-signaling and I have to suppose most people know that. More accurately, virtue-signaling and/or magical thinking.
That's on the advice of our NYC theatrical daughter, who thought Hamilton was a typical,schlocky, over-hyped pseudo-historical Broadway spectacle. We are generally off-Broadway if not off-off-Broadway people, but that daughter is discerning so I guess we ought to listen to her. Other daughter loved Hamilton.
This live recording is as close as I can find to the album version, which I feel is superb. Lyrics from this tune have been coming back to me for years.
Why bust your rear end when the government immediately will take at least 39.6 percent (actually more when you consider Medicare taxes, state taxes, and double taxation of interest, dividends, and capital gains) of your income, and then another 40 percent of what you’ve saved and invested when you kick the bucket?
Unfortunately, Hillary Clinton doesn’t seem to care about such matters. She actually just decided to double down on her destructive tax agenda by endorsing an even bigger increase in the death tax.
Kimball: One of the most conspicuous strategies to limit free speech on campuses
in the United States these last few years has been via the weaponization
of victimhood.
James Miller interviews Gregory Cochran, MIT Physicist, anthropologist, and geneticist. Polymath Cochran discusses everything from politics to racial genetics to medieval Chinese war strategy and pretty much any random topic.
It is a delight to be in on a chat with a true Smart Guy. A long Podcast, Meaty.
Children
Getting into pretty good condition from ordinary condition (ordinary is somebody over 30 who is not fat, hikes, walks daily, plays some recreational sports) takes about two years of commitment. Longer if pudgy, mostly sedentary, or if complicated by some physical impairment (which almost everybody over 40 is).
Greek