Tuesday, February 16. 2010
 From the post:
The Nazi propaganda poster says: "This person suffering from hereditary defects costs the community 60,000 Reichsmark during his lifetime. Fellow German, that is your money, too."
We visited the New Britain Museum of American Art this weekend, known as one of America’s most welcoming, distinguished, dynamic, and educationally ambitious art museums. They have a current exhibit (through April 11, 2010) entitled Inspired Innovations: A Celebration of Shaker Ingenuity.
The exhibition, organized into 12 Zones of Innovation and with three rooms resembling traditional Shaker quarters, will showcase some 350 objects spanning over 200 years from 1800 to 2000. A testament to the durability, practicality, and simplicity of Shaker ingenuity, with a focus on functionality, each piece is gracefully formed with a genuine devotion to ones craft that reflects the words of Shaker founder, Mother Ann: "labor to make the way of God your own; let it be your inheritance, your treasure, your occupation, your daily calling."
Maggie's readers will like this quote from Shaker Martha J. Anderson of Mt. Lebanon, NY: "The lamp of genius burns as it is supplied by the oil of enthusiasm."
The New Britain Museum of American Art's founding in 1903 entitles the institution to be designated the first museum of strictly American art in the country. That year, a $20,000 gift of gold bonds to the museum's former parent, the New Britain Institute, from industrialist John Butler Talcott, created funds to purchase "modern oil paintings." Subsequent purchases, with advice from New York museums and galleries, further defined "modern" to mean American works of art, now numbering more than 10,236. With particular strengths in colonial portraiture, the Hudson River School, American Impressionism, and the Ash Can School, not to mention the important mural series The Arts of Life in America by Thomas Hart Benton, the museum relies heavily on its permanent collection for exhibitions and programming, yet also displays a significant number of borrowed shows and work by emerging artists. The singular focus on American art and its panoramic view of American artistic achievement make the New Britain Museum of American Art a significant teaching resource available to the local, regional, and national public.
As the Guide Michelin might say, "worth a detour".
A bit of a rant, Get Rid of the Holy Crap, From Mead. One quote:
...let me post a provocative thesis on the wall: If virtually the entire regional and national staff of every mainline denomination were to be called home to heaven overnight in a mainline version of the Rapture, leaving only the equivalent of Bishop Baker and his secretary in their place, I am sure that someone somewhere would notice a difference, but the effect on either the spiritual state of American Christians or the health and well being of local congregations throughout the United States would be hard to detect with the naked eye.
Just the sort of thing our friend Sippican loves: Spray-on glass.
Is glass really technically a liquid? No, it's best classified as an amorphous solid, but Nature doesn't always follow our human categories very well. Why would it?
Dead at 89. h/t, Jungleman. The guy provided me many hours of delight by the pool and on the beach.
The Fable of Market Meritocracy
"Markets don't reward smart people. They reward value." Yes, that is what markets are for. Markets are ultimately about human psychology; the only way to determine value and price, given human nature, fiat currency, and the annoying limitations of reality.
Grad school in the humanities is a big lie
Soda = Big Tobacco, According to No-Fun NYT Food Writer
Was there any actual warming to begin with?. Well, don't tell Cambridge, MA because they are going to save the planet!
WSJ: The continuing climate meltdown. And WaTimes: The Scam Unravels. One quote:
Not everybody is on to the global-warming scam, not yet, but all the people — or enough of them — are getting there. "Global warming," or even "climate change" as Al's marketing men now insist that it be called, is becoming the stuff of jests and jokes. Sen. James M. Inhofe of Oklahoma, a Republican, built an igloo of that hot stuff that buried Washington last week on the Capitol lawn and dubbed it "Al Gore's new home."
It has been a topic of jest at Maggie's Farm for years.
Glenn says the Climategate story reminds him of the Bellesisles story
The skeletons of wind energy. Meanwhile China is buying Canadian oil sites
Race and fairness:
A few years ago, however, when I worked as a reader for Yale’s Office of Undergraduate Admissions, it became immediately clear to me that Asians - who constitute 5 percent of the US population - faced an uphill slog. They tended to get excellent scores, take advantage of AP offerings, and shine in extracurricular activities. Frequently, they also had hard-knock stories: families that had immigrated to America under difficult circumstances, parents working as kitchen assistants and store clerks, and households in which no English was spoken.
But would Yale be willing to make 50 percent of its freshman class Asian? Probably not.
Why not?
Somin on political ignorance
Amy Bishop Is A Far-Left Extremist "Obsessed" with the President
Obama's chance to be next FDR or Reagan fading fast. The fellow is a classic Legend in His Own Mind.
Why the Russkis still see the US as an enemy
Monday, February 15. 2010
It's like a full-time job trying to keep up with all of the debunking of the IPCC report. Today, Hurricanegate. There has been no increase in tropical cyclones, contrary to the IPCC claims.
She's my new favorite chanteuse. Here's a snip from the unembeddable My One and Only Thrill TV ad. Here's another song:
From Glucksman at City Journal's The Velvet Philosophical Revolution -Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the battle for political freedom goes on.
During four decades of ideological confrontation, theoreticians and journalists had argued about how a society should move from capitalism to socialism. There was no research on the opposite question—that is, on the transition from socialism to capitalism—apart from a few inconclusive studies, most notably in Poland, concerning the possibility of introducing some elements of the free market into a Communist society. As the philosopher Josep Ramoneda has observed, the whole world—Communists, anti-Communists, and those in between—took it as given that the Soviet Union and its satellites could not “return” to capitalism. So when, during the Velvet Revolution, demonstrators posed exactly this question—How can we go from socialism to capitalism?—there was no ready answer.
As Western intellectuals watched Berlin in November 1989, they reconsidered their long belief that the world was fated to be Communist—but retained their belief in fate.
Story here. His pictures kind of pleasantly remind me of 1950s illustrations. Image is his Motel Pool:
From Mrs Ike: Memories of the Life of Mamie Eisenhower, which contains a lot of letters Ike wrote to Mamie during the war. A quote from one of them:
"When I find myself contemplating a post-war experience, I always picture a little place away from the cities (but with someone near enough for occasional bridge) and the two of us just getting brown in the sun, (and possibly thick in the middle). A dozen cats and dogs, with a horse or two, maybe a place to fish (not too strenuously) and a field in which to shoot a few birds once in a while - I think that's roughly my idea of a good life."
Monster waves. Wonderful photos.
For those unfamiliar with sailboat racing, it's not just about a faster boat. It's about strategy, tactics, boat-handling, seamanship, fine-tuning, luck, and lots of other details.
Here's some dramatic footage from this year's race.
Image is Currier and Ives' 1851 portrait of "America," the first boat to win the famous race.
The America's Cup (named for the sailboat, not the country) is now sailed with multi-hulls with 17-story masts. 33 knots out of a 10 knot wind speed. Here's winner US-17:
h/t, SDA, with links to more details of the race
Sunday, February 14. 2010
Anyone who has coached or tutored their child knows how much resistance they meet. I call my sons the "mother's curse": "You should have children like yourself." I do, in trumps. My mother is surely laughing her head off, above. Still, after the daily battles, and perseverence, a light shines.
Keep on truckin', parents. And, thanks Mom. Couldn't do it without remembering you.
I am making my usual St. Valentine's Day day steamed mussels and lobster feast, but I did at least one other act of love today - remembering that love is action, not sentiment. Carpet cleaning done! (They have a special spray for dog pee bedroom carpet spots. Isn't it romantic? Carpet sucks, in my opinion.)
The University of California campus at Irvine was the scene a few days ago of pro-Palestinian demonstrators interrupting the presentation by Israel’s Ambassador to the US, Michael Oren. Scott Johnson at PowerLine sums up the demonstrators’ core proposition: “The actions are based on the proposition that the defense of Israel in speech is beyond the bounds of civilized discourse just as the defense of Israel in deed is illegitimate because Israel is illegitimate.”
Martin Solomon posted a video of the action. More details at Solomon’s post. Oren conducted himself with dignity in not backing down from free speech. This key question: “Where are the grownups in the UC Irvine administration?”
The usual suspects defend the protestors as somehow engaged in rightful “civil disobedience.”
Max Boot, a graduate of "Berzerkley", wrote at Contentions, of this and similar campus attacks, “Anything short of expulsion, or at least suspension, would seem to be a wrist-slap that will only encourage more such misconduct in the future and make a mockery of the free speech that universities are supposed to champion.”
The San Diego Union-Tribune editorial read: “It was an embarrassing display of inhospitality [at Irvine]. It was also a wasted opportunity. The critics should have stayed and listened. As a U.S.-born scholar on the Middle East and a best-selling author with a Ph.D. from Princeton, Oren has much to say about one of the most important and interesting corners of the globe.”
By contrast, Ambassador Oren appeared at the University of California campus at San Diego a few days later.
Thanks to the firm position taken by UCSD’s administration led by Chancellor Marye Ann Fox, this lecture was not a repeat of the unfortunate incident in UC Irvine on February 8th where the Israeli Ambassador’s speech was disrupted by a well-organized group of student protesters.
In sharp contrast, UCSD’s administration demonstrated resolve and determination to conduct a program in a peaceful and civilized manner and in the best traditions of the university’s commitment to freedom of speech and exchange of ideas. The presentation started with a strong statement from Peter Cowhey, Dean of the UC San Diego School of International Relations and Pacific Studies, that interruptions would not be tolerated during Ambassador Oren’s presentation and that members of the audience would have the opportunity to ask questions at the end of the presentation. The lecture proceeded smoothly…
Though the Q&A was dominated by pro-Palestinian students, “Ambassador Oren responded to each question with the knowledge of the accomplished historian that he is and with the wisdom of a true diplomat.”
The audience and the subject were treated with respect and benefited from civil discourse. University administrators or others who are willing to forfeit that freedom of speech and minimal manners themselves do not belong on campus.
Where is the MSM with this story?
We never doubted it for a minute: Moonbattery. Manchurian Candidate, thanks to the MSM's homo- or hetero- or Lefto- or whatever-eroticism.
I wouldn't mind if he had changed his view of the world since then, but I haven't heard that road-to-Damascus story yet.
No more eccentric than the rest of her Amherst family. Indeed, her life has been sentimentalized.
Well, always interesting to have an epileptic nympho around the place, especially on St. Valentine's Day when the Christian saint seems to give way to the celebration of Eros.
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