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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Tuesday, June 26. 2007

Tuesday Morning Links

Iran at war with Britain? The Sun reports, via Drudge.

Lever rifles? Kim likes them. I have never used one.

Murdoch makes surprise bid for Hatemonger's Quarterly blog! Haha.

Truly we are governed by the mentally ill. Tangled Web

Nobody likes the immigration bill. And Rightly So

Signaling Theory and educational level. Stumbling. Calling it signalling theory glorifies what every grandma knows - past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior.

Many Alzheimer's patients claim they don't have the disease. ONN video. (h/t, Humbug)

Gaza is a forward position for Iran. Guardian

CT creates more gun criminals with a stroke of a pen. Alphecca

The Supremes support free speech (NY Sun), and Hinderaker agrees.  A telling comment re the dissenting opinion - telling in that it says nothing about the Constitutional speech guarantee, from the NY Sun piece:

The single dissenting opinion — penned by Justice Souter and joined by Justices Stevens, Ginsburg, and Breyer — argued that the majority's opinion flew in the face of Congress's will and would breed "pervasive public cynicism" about the American political system.

But I don't understand the Bong Hits for Jesus case. This adolescent bozo was off-campus, being provocative. Free speech must include the freedom to be a jackass. I agree with Moderate Voice.

Paying taxes doesn't count, morally, as charity. Indeed it does not. No Pasaran

Gas price gouging laws - possibly good boob bait, but terrible economics. NY Sun

Photo: a '95 Deere 8650.

Posted by The News Junkie in Hot News & Misc. Short Subjects at 06:00 | Comments (21) | Trackbacks (0)

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NJ.. fine selection of topics this A.M. Kudos

On the "Bong hits for Jesus" SCOTUS decision I disagree also.
While the banner may have been offensive and boorish it certainly was within free speech. The principal was out of her jurisdiction, off campus, and basically assaulted the banner and by implication the banner carrrier. She should have been cited.
The court decided many years ago that schools were not "in loco parenti", the local parent in off campus activities so the SCOTUS went some distance in reaching their decision.
In a country where you can tout revolution, carry the hammer and sickle Soviet flag, burn ours , all in the name of "free speech" this was a wrong decision.
#1 Habu on 2007-06-26 09:09 (Reply)
The American Thinker

June 26, 2007
Casting Terrorists as Defenders of the Constitution
By J.R. Dunn


At Guantanamo on June 4, a pair of military judges threw out the cases against two active members of Al-Queda. These were not trivial figures. Salim Ahmed Hamdan served as no less than Osama bin Laden's driver and bodyguard, apart from his role in planning and carrying out attacks against civilians. The second defendant, Omar Khadr, is of an altogether different order. The junior member of Canada's "Al-Queda family", a clan in which every adult male member was a made mujahadin, Khadr was picked up while fighting against U.S. forces in Afghanistan. *The soldier he killed there was a medic in the process of treating the injured*. You will look and hard to find that fact mentioned in any current coverage, though they have no trouble making the space to point out that Khadr was fifteen at the time.


If this doesn't make you mad, quickly check for a pulse. Please read the entirr article to really get the full effect of a collapsing country.


http://www.americanthinker.com/2007/06/casting_terrorists_as_defender.html
#2 Habu the Enraged on 2007-06-26 11:04 (Reply)
The ACLU may well force release of every enemy & criminal in the nation, habu, but i have no doubt that the ACLU would lock habu up in a nanosecond--
#3 buddy larsen on 2007-06-26 12:15 (Reply)
Great lever-action link--that Winchester 30-30 I remember sold brand new for just under $100 on up into the early 70s IIRC. What a bargain. I guess adjusted for inflation, it's not that much pricier today.
#4 buddy larsen on 2007-06-26 12:19 (Reply)
Buddy,
I'm working on insulating myself from the perils that may befall us WTSHTF ..When the Shit hits the fan.... the wife is getting tired of me around the house while she WANTS to work three more years (100k bonus)....SO, not wanting to go back into brokerage I decided.
1. who has ammo
2. who has private target ranges
3 who has no age limit on hiring
4..who,Habu,who ....... THE POLICE

So I just had my oral boards and they've checked out my background ... I may start as Department spokesman (unarmed,no arrest ability) but I told them that by 4/2008 I would have shed enough weight to do the 1.5 mile run in the req'd time..the rest of the physical test I could pass now but the run would stroke me out...they said great.

So I'll end my "working career" (I thought I was there) as a Deputy Sheriff .. free ammo, gun range, and that "Band of Brothers" espirit de corps .. I figure I'll get two years active deputy duty and head to Montana, a bonfide member of the Fraternal Order of Police with all the immunity we all know they give each other...I should say lattitude. No doubt not too many 60 year olds try this but I'm in good shape with the exception of some extra tonnage.

Actually for me the biggest plus is that if TSHTF I'll be ready to help out instead of waiting for the bus.
#5 Habu on 2007-06-26 13:31 (Reply)
Sounds like a plan. Congratulations. Being ready to help out is always a plus.
#5.1 Skookumchuk on 2007-06-26 15:08 (Reply)
CONGRATULATIONS, Deputy! Way to step up!
#6 buddy larsen on 2007-06-26 13:34 (Reply)
Good plan H. I've thought of doing that myself but have too much invested in present career. I especially like that helping out part.
#7 Luther McLeod on 2007-06-26 13:49 (Reply)
You make me proud of us Habu!

My step dad retired after 30 years as a salesman for a basic household product manufactured in the midwest. He then took classes and became a broker(he had a Jr. College education). At the age of 55 he began his second career as a broker that was about 1970. He worked for IDS, within two years he had quite a good number of customers--neighbors, who trusted him. When the market crash of 1972 hit he was devastated. He vowed that not one of his clients would loose any money. He took a job as a security guard, and another as a chaueffeur for a retirement center. Within four or five years he had re-imbursed all of them. You guys would have loved him!
#8 apple pie on 2007-06-26 14:43 (Reply)
That's inspirational, AP. What a mensch!
#9 buddy larsen on 2007-06-26 15:37 (Reply)
Thanks folks. Maybe I'm putting too much emphasis on the negative but I just want to go down swing'in if the bad guys ride into town look'n for trouble.

Maybe run across the dusty street and swoop up the crying baby just before the outlaws rampage through, then still have time to unload a clip.
#10 Habu on 2007-06-26 15:48 (Reply)
Well, t'warn't no clips when the hosses wuz riding down the babies in dusty streets. Yew'd have to unload a tubular magazine, or a pistol cylinder.
#11 Image Realism, Inc. on 2007-06-26 17:00 (Reply)
IR,Inc,

Well, then I'd giv'm two wheel guns a'blaz'n and then rech for the Yellowboy.

Course then I'd hav'da take the appreciat'n a man would get from the ladies.
#11.1 Habu on 2007-06-26 17:59 (Reply)
Why yew kin git yo sef ovah t' Miss Kitty's whar she jes' got hersef a fresh wagonload o Chinee gals plus a coupla big ole Scandyhoovians who dont speak no lingo A-TALL!
#12 buddy larsen on 2007-06-26 18:16 (Reply)
Habu,

That is fantastic what you're doing. I like the part about helping people, but I'm wondering about the influence you'll have on the younger guys. .... They'll be a fierce bunch when you leave. :)

AP,

The story about your step-dad is almost unbelievable. For sure, it is unheard of today. Wow. It chokes me up.
.
#13 Phoenix on 2007-06-26 22:30 (Reply)
(It's really me - Phoenix. But that tractor brings out the Corn Goddess in me.)

That is a really sexy tractor.

.
#14 The Aztec Corn Goddess on 2007-06-26 22:32 (Reply)
Phoenix:
I was so angry at him when he did that. IDS, the company he worked for, was not going to cover the client's loss (nor would any other brokerage have covered the client's loss of course). They told dad it was just the market doing it's thing. I thought I was so much more savvy than him--but, now so many years later I understand why he did it--it made him a truly good and decent human being and he felt better knowing that he had done the "right thing". Nobody could have bought that for him.
#15 apple pie on 2007-06-26 22:36 (Reply)
Luther,

I was talking to someone about my pushmower and he said exactly what you said far below in my Sunbitch Snit comments. I looked at him and said, "Is your name Luther?"

I just wanted you to know I was thinking of you and thanking you for the good advice eventhough you weren't there to note it. He did say to buy a Honda next time, and I am now filled with knowledge, and I said, "They have spark plugs, too, right?"
.
#16 Phoenix on 2007-06-26 22:38 (Reply)
Thanks P. That's funny. I can be sane on occasion, though rare. Honda tries, usually succeeds. I could recommend no other. And yeah, they all have spark plugs, unless they're diesel. But no lawn mowers have that as yet, as far as I know. For insight on mechanical things I would recommend "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance", its all about the melding of mind and metal, well, maybe a wee bit more. Anything between 10 and 600 in. lbs I'm normally off no more that 2-5 percent by feel. We strive for the intellect but it is the material we live with on a day by day basis that delineates us. Make fire or not....ugh, I'm cold :-) A prod to man for untold millennium.
#17 Luther McLeod on 2007-06-26 23:16 (Reply)
Dang. Luther, are you a mind-reader? I was going to extend my comment and ask how it is that men 'know' this stuff. I mean, you all just know it.

Ahh. I know. We are on a Zen wavelength. :) You weren't reading my mind, you Zenned me.

I do the "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance." Alla time. When a machine won't work, I open something. Then I stare at it real good. I know it's Zen. It works good when you open the hood of your car and stare into it. Pure Zen.

I can't believe how much I'm learning! :)
.
#18 Phoenix on 2007-06-27 00:00 (Reply)
Well Phoenix you have the staring part down, that's good. Now just remember to have a very large hammer next to you at all times. When all else fails, apply hammer appropriately :-) As for 'know' this stuff, naw, just well trained after all these years...ugh...cold...fire...well you get the gist. OTB now.
#19 Luther McLeod on 2007-06-27 00:23 (Reply)

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