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.

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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)
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Easy for you to say: To the elites on mass immigration
For NYC on 9/11, Sailors' Snug Harbor
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Saturday, May 31. 2008

Saturday links

The Army of Two: The legend of Rebecca and Abigail Bates and the Scituate lighthouse. (Image from the essay)

Unbelievable: Obama on how the Christian right drives people apart. Related: Dem women increasingly wary of Obama

Right Wing Prof notes uncontacted tribe sighted in Amazon, and links to his post on The Utter Intellectual dishonesty of Anthropologists

At No Pasaran:

When the Soviet Union invaded Czechoslovakia in 1968, there were no mass demonstrations in London. Why was that? Can anyone around at the time enlighten me on that worrying issue?

Perfect roommate? Blue Crab

Rubik's Cube links

Bob Dole fires both barrels at McClellan

Warren Buffet is now giving essentially all of his money away. Well, I guess that dude has more money than I could spend in a morning at Costco, mid-day at the gun shop, and an afternoon at the Maserati dealership.

Repubs have the chance to be the party of cheap energy. Good idea

The banana problem, and how bananas are a parable for our times

The Wall St.-driven NY metro area economy beginning to show some strain. In the current slowdown, women, children and minorities Wall St. hardest hit.

Excellent piece on oil profits, at Outside the Beltway

Has women's suffrage messed up democracy? Villainous. Excellent comments

Al Franken: A serious candidate? Note the link to his Playboy "essay"

Chances dim for climate change legislation. Good news

Posted by The News Junkie in Hot News & Misc. Short Subjects at 07:24 | Comments (6) | Trackback (1)

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It Must Feel Like Hitting The World's Biggest Speed Bump
Obama throws his whole church under the bus. Reverends Otis Moss, James Meeks, Michael Pfleger and Jeremiah Wright could not be reached for comment... Yet. Update: Found Via Maggie's Farm, "Faith Flashback: Obama Says Christian Right Drives People Apart". Except...
Weblog: Ed Driscoll.com
Tracked: May 31, 18:24

Comments
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Re: Perfect Roommate

They were living in Fukuoka, Japan. When you live in a place like Fukuoka, you should expect things like this to happen.
#1 Jephnol (Link) on 2008-05-31 07:57 (Reply)
Not one more word about Roger, please. He is our hero and benefactor.

Please elaborate. How is he a hero? How is he your benefactor?
#2 Anonymous on 2008-05-31 08:19 (Reply)
Great set of links, Junkman. The Right Wing Prof's article on dishonesty was particularly interesting. Along with his example of the Maya, I'd add the American Plains Indian. We're led to believe that they were all living in perfect harmony with each other and the universe and had been peacefully living there for millennia before the bad, evil white man came along.

In truth, they were some of the most bloodthirsty savages in history and archeological records indicate that not only did they force the previous occupants off the land a mere 150 years before the white man came, but the previous residents had knocked off the prior residents 150 years before that. The only reason the words "Cherokee", "Cheyenne", "Blackfoot", etc, exist today is simply an accident of timing. If Columbus had arrived 200 years earlier or later, we'd be seeing a whole different set of tribal names.

Great accompanying article by Steyn, too:

"The Mexican drug gangs weren't Muslim last time I checked, but evidently decapitation isn't just for jihadists anymore: if you want to get ahead, get a head."

Great stuff.
#3 Dr. Merc (Link) on 2008-05-31 09:20 (Reply)
Makes me want to watch Redford in Jerimiah Johnson, but I prefer the grit of the real Liver-Eating Johnson.

Just for grins I'm playing Bruce Cockburn's Indian Wars while I write:

Out in the desert where the wind never stops
A few simple people try to grow a few crops
Trying to maintain a life and a home
On land that was theirs before the Romans thought of Rome

A few dozen survivors, ragged but proud
With a few woolly sheep, under gathering cloud
It's never been easy, or free from strife
But the pulse of the land is the pulse of their life

(CHORUS:)
You thought it was over but it's just like before
Will there never be an end to the Indian wars?

It's not breech-loading rifles and wholesale slaughter
It's kickbacks and thugs and diverted water
Treaties get signed and the papers change hands
But they might as well draft these agreements in sand

Noble Savage on the cinema screen
An Indian's good when he cannot be seen
And the so-called white so-called race
Digs for itself a pit of disgrace


Doc, you hit the nail on the head. The noble savage of Dances with Wolves is the popular conception, fueled by the shear idiocy of academics how study bias rather than facts. Steyn's article should be a sobering read for those who believe our generation is the aberration.
#3.1 Jephnol (Link) on 2008-05-31 11:07 (Reply)
Am I the only one who can no longer stand Warren Buffet? He's a billionaire many times over who gets preachy about how I don't pay enough taxes and may inherit some of my parents' relatively minuscule wealth someday.

Then he commits the biggest tax dodge in history by giving away his cash before he croaks. I think his donations should be taxed.
#4 NJSoldier on 2008-05-31 21:38 (Reply)
NJSoldier, you are not alone. First, much of Buffet's wealth is unnecessary or surplus for his material needs and lifestyle, and is useful primarily for purposes of control. He who holds the wealth has many who defer to his wishes.

Then, consider that the gift is to the Gates Foundation, with his stipulations as to use. In effect, he retains all the value of the wealth, the element of control, while simultaneously avoiding an enormous transfer to the taxing authorities.

Buffet eats his cake and has it too, while being praised effusively for his "generosity".
#5 Seppo on 2008-06-02 12:26 (Reply)

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