Maggie's Farm

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.

Our Recent Essays Behind the Front Page

Much Sorry with Delays
Birth, Death and All That Stuff in Between
How to Honor Labor Day, Every Day
My Yom Kippur Miracle (Repost from 2010)
Good intro to fly casting
Peach update, with pie
NYC update
Easy for you to say: To the elites on mass immigration
For NYC on 9/11, Sailors' Snug Harbor
Pickled Peaches
Water Shoes
Labor Costs in U.S.
Your "identity"
Good news about The Great Courses
Uses of Hot Pepper Jelly/Sauce, Chutneys, and Jams
A Saturday Drive to Litchfield County, CT
How to Pick a Kayak
Civilized: Fruit forks and knives
Loads of kayaking on Cape Cod
Psychology Experiments' Questionable Results

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Thursday, February 4. 2016

Thursday morning links

Bob Elliott dead at 92


Toxic Turf? Movement Grows Against Synthetic Turf


The Amazon-Store Mystery


10 Tips for Making Long Flights (Somewhat) Bearable


Private jet, with mini-gym and bed, works best


The New Religion of Anti-Racism Can Turn Disagreement into Heresy


WHY ARE CORPORATIONS INCREASINGLY LEFTIST?


Enough With Ethanol


‘Public servants’ vs. the public: the arrogance of our political masters


‘That’s What They Offered:’ Clinton Explains Why She Took $675,000 for Three Wall Street Speeches


The Clintons have turned lying into performance art.


Hillary sends an army to New Hampshire


But not to Benghazi


For Venezuela, the End Is Near.


Merkel’s Deadly Misstep



Posted by Bird Dog in Hot News & Misc. Short Subjects at 05:29 | Comments (24) | Trackbacks (0)

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Didn't Amazon but Borders as they were shutting down their retail stores? Or am I mis-remembering?
#1 NJSoldier on 2016-02-04 07:39 (Reply)
Q: A man at the hotel bar asked you for a "date" and handed you $500?

A: Well sure, that's what he offered.
#2 forest on 2016-02-04 08:07 (Reply)
Comment at another site: Benghazi--the H is silent
#3 Ann K on 2016-02-04 08:12 (Reply)
Bob and Ray, two great skits, the pretty face award and the four leaf clover farm, the latter being my favorite ever.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HANGnBFRLuc

Bob is the small one.
#4 rhhardin (Link) on 2016-02-04 09:03 (Reply)
"WHY ARE CORPORATIONS INCREASINGLY LEFTIST?"

Because leftism increases corporate power, and it's easier for big corporations to rig the game to their advantage if there's a large powerful government for them to buy and use for that purpose. They can afford lots of lawyers and lobbyists. You and small businesses cannot.
#5 RonF on 2016-02-04 09:42 (Reply)
Many people think that big business interests are for free trade and deregulation, but instead they support the markets and regulations that are advantageous to them and/or disadvantageous to their competition (usually smaller). Democrats love regulations because they are not subject to the democratic process. The closer the corporate interests can get to the folks who write the regulations, the more that will be written to favor them.
#5.1 mudbug on 2016-02-04 10:02 (Reply)
Usually, at some point, at least here, those larger companies are staffed by retired government bureaucrats and Party members, who are hired because of their connections to government, so it all works well. Part of the Democrat Party platform here for many years was to gain control of Republican corporations who they deemed were not adequately for the people. So many Party functionaries and members now sit on the boards of these companies, and pull down $150,000 per annum director fees for making sure that the companies are "responsible."
#5.2 Jim on 2016-02-04 13:01 (Reply)
Merkel's deadly misstep:

If you want to help refugees and people suffering than help them where they are. That is their home. Dragging them across oceans and borders to places they do not like and to people who do not like them is stupid. The UN should have pressured a few of the very rich and sparsely populated Arab/Muslim countries in the ME to accomodate these people. Merkel has committed her country and Europe to civil war and years of turmoil. When the immigrants commit horrible crimes they will be forgiven and the politicians will stumble over themselves to rationalize away the concerns of the citizens. But when the citizens rise up to do what their government fails to do the politicians will quickly accuse the citizens of being 'radical'. Go figure.
#6 GoneWithTheWind on 2016-02-04 09:47 (Reply)
Ref turf fear mongering

http://acsh.org/2016/01/19/cancer-killing-young-soccer-players-are-turf-fields-the-cause/
#7 jay on 2016-02-04 09:53 (Reply)
Re: ethanol

Along with all the other negative things about ethanol the article mentioned, there is the effect on small engines like lawn mowers, chainsaws, etc. It eats the plastic fuel lines often requiring a trip to the shop for an expensive repair. Ask me how I know...
#8 mudbug on 2016-02-04 10:09 (Reply)
"Hillary sends an army to New Hampshire
But not to Benghazi"

Army? Hillary and Obama tried to keep the rag-tag group of volunteers from going to Benghazi. But as soldiers, they had been trained to follow orders, as Americans, they were wired to know when to ignore orders.
#9 JK Brown on 2016-02-04 10:09 (Reply)
Merkel - Bringing the Peckerhead in her Ph.D.
#10 JK Brown on 2016-02-04 10:11 (Reply)
White Privilege as a subject, an agenda and a statement of fact was created by the "dirty girls of Seattle". You know the ones.
#11 faculty wife on 2016-02-04 10:23 (Reply)
Re: Hillary send an army to New Hampshire

Running a presidential campaign is now supposed to be evidence that you can do the job if elected. Obummer said that when asked what experience he had that would indicate he could be president. Watch for somebody to say the same thing about Clinton since she is absent any other "conventional" qualifications.
#12 mudbug on 2016-02-04 10:23 (Reply)
Really? I thought she had been in a cabinet-level position for 4 years, a senator for 8, a "full partner" in the third oldest law firm in the US, a WalMart board-of-directors member, and someone who in the 70's published lots of influential scholarship in family law?

That's longer in the senate than any of the other senators running for president except one.
#12.1 Douglas2 on 2016-02-04 13:20 (Reply)
And what are the results of all that "experience?" In what way did she positively distinguish herself as a Senator or the Secretary of State? She became a partner at the politically connected Rose firm while her husband governor - but maybe that's just a coincidence.

As for the lack of experience of the Senators running on the Pubbie side, I agree. I would be much more comfortable with a successful governor running but this is the anti-establishment politician election and she doesn't qualify on that score either.
#12.1.1 mudbug on 2016-02-04 13:32 (Reply)
I doubt we'll ever again see a former governor as the Dem candidate for President. When you govern, you've got to have results that work in reality -- not just lefty la-la-land fever dreams. Lights gotta come on. Police gotta keep the peace. Balance sheets gotta, you know, balance.

No one, no matter how progressive their bona fides, can have an actual track record as governor and still maintain the pretense that they will walk the liberal talk once they're president -- their record will undermine them every step of the way.

Heck, any real time in charge of anything will be sufficient to show that they can't deliver on the promise of progressivism. Rahm Emanuel's fight with the public sector unions in Chicago shows that much. You can say whatever you want, but when you can no longer run from your responsibilities, you're going to end up sticking a knife in to one liberal sacred cow or another.

In fact, I think the trend in Dem candidates is going to be more and more toward empty suits. Having any kind of a track record at all will increasingly become a liability (as Hillary is finding, to her chagrin).

You'll have to be able to pretend that you can just magically make everything rainbows and lollipops, and your track record will have to be completely devoid of any evidence to the contrary, or you'll never get the nod. It worked for Obama.

Now, if this were true for just progressive candidates, it wouldn't bother me all that much. But I'm not sure it isn't true for Republicans as well.
#12.1.1.1 Thos. on 2016-02-04 14:20 (Reply)
I agree with the conventional wisdom that says this is an anit-establishment election. I think the combination of the feckless GOP establishment and the inept Obummer administration is what is largely what is causing this environment. Pat Caddell suggests that we are pre-revolutionary because nobody in Washington pays attention to the public. I'm not sure he's wrong (my preference is for peaceful secession though there are some geological challenges.)

I think that is the main reason for the failure of most (all?) the Republican governors to catch fire even though they had real success and accomplishments in office.
#12.1.1.1.1 mudbug on 2016-02-04 15:17 (Reply)
I think your prediction will hold up for a while. Democratic governerors are probably far more used to working across the aisle, and have to be more than blank screens.
#12.1.1.1.2 Assistant Village Idiot (Link) on 2016-02-04 16:36 (Reply)
Name me the one single piece of legislation in her four years as the junior Senator from the state of New York, that Hillary Clinton had anything to do with?

Name me the one accomplishment in the four years as Secretary of State, that Hillary Clinton had anything to do with?

The fact is, that without her husband as Attorneys General and Governor of Arkansas, she would have been one of the many hundreds of personal injury lawyers floating around Little Rock chasing clients.

The woman failed the DC bar, for Gods sake.

Although later in life, the Miracle of The Rose Law Firm Billing Records would be attributed to her. After answering a Federal Subpeona in the negative about their existence, the billing records miraculously appeared, two years later, from behind a bookcase in the private quarters of the White House.

She could probably put that as an accomplishment.
#12.1.2 Scullman on 2016-02-04 15:41 (Reply)
Name me the one accomplishment in the four years as Secretary of State, that Hillary Clinton had anything to do with?
She is a world-famous wordsmith.
QUOTE:
“At this point, what difference does it make?”
At this point, I bet more people know that phrase than a phrase of Mark Twain or of Will Rogers.

As for me, I never met a shyster politician I didn't like.
#12.1.2.1 Gringo on 2016-02-04 16:09 (Reply)
Really? I thought she had been in a cabinet-level position for 4 years, a senator for 8..

Secretary of State and US Senator are great qualifications for President. Look at how James Buchanan turned out.
#12.1.3 Gringo on 2016-02-04 17:03 (Reply)
@ Merkel’s Deadly Misstep

If you want to see how our neighbors in the south are dealing with this issue, check out the link below. The posters are classic Swiss. It's not actually a new poster, they've been using this one, and several others like it, for years.

At least in Switzerland, where the people vote on everything from buying fighter jets to banning minarets, no one gets called a Nazi for this sort of thing.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/switzerland/8105745/Swiss-poised-to-vote-on-controversial-immigrant-law.html

,
#13 Karl Horst (Germany) on 2016-02-04 11:09 (Reply)
Where is the Gang of Z?
#14 Sam L. on 2016-02-04 15:46 (Reply)

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