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.
...the entire notion of academic freedom was boosted mostly to protect campus communists. Once lefties were fully in charge, their commitment to academic freedom evaporated. If lefties find themselves in the crosshairs again, I predict a newfound movement in favor of free speech and free thought.
We’ve blown past the antiquated mores in which living on charity was shameful. What’s shameful now is not spending enough money to subsidize the inflated entitlement of the perpetually outraged
....
If an immigrant with eight kids and fewer language skills than even one of the graduates of Baltimore’s overfunded and thoroughly broken schools can swing the financing to open a store that provides vital malt liquor, lottery and potato chip services to the neighborhood, why can’t the looters pawing through the debris of his store figure out the same trick?
Pic is preparation for the cocktail hour shrimp boil at the Greyfield Inn.
Why are the shrimp so tender? They are bought directly from the shrimp boat, and they are in the boil in their shells for 2 minutes max - 90 seconds preferably - just until they turn pink. I tend to find shrimp boring but these were sweet and not chewy.
The square hole in the table is for the shells. Works for oyster roasts too.
Harvey Silverglate is a Maggie's hero despite his lefty tendencies. A founder of FIRE, civil liberties fellow. The book title over-promises, but it's an important topic.
“We define transability as the desire or the need for a person identified as able-bodied by other people to transform his or her body to obtain a physical impairment,” says Alexandre Baril, a Quebec born academic who will present on “transability” at this week’s Congress of the Social Sciences and Humanities at the University of Ottawa.
"Power is not a means, it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship."
17 miles of beach with excellent Atlantic body-surfing surf - and nobody on the entire thing but Mrs. BD (in photo) and me. Tempted to try some nude surfing but would hate to sunburn sensitive body parts. (Also, with a good wave ride you can scrape the sand.)
We are not accustomed to swimming and surfing in 75-degree ocean water, as Cape Codders. In warm surf, I get tired before I become hypothermic. That's good, but the warmth feels decadent.
I will throw some pics together when I get the chance.
"Show me that age and country where the rights and liberties of the people were placed on the sole chance of their rulers being good men, without a consequent loss of liberty! I say that the loss of that dearest privilege has ever followed, with absolute certainty, every such mad attempt."
"...the wind of opinion in recent years appears to have begun to blow against those who insist that Western liberal societies owe nothing to the religion from which they arose. Partly because the more we become acquainted with other traditions, the harder it becomes to sustain. Indeed, although some people still hold out, it should be evident by now that the culture of human rights has more to do with the creed preached by Moses and Jesus of Nazareth than that of, say, Muhammad. Nevertheless, the question of whether this societal position is sustainable without reference to the beliefs that gave it birth remains deeply pregnant and troubling in the West."
6:1 In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and the hem of his robe filled the temple.
6:2 Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings: with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew.
6:3 And one called to another and said: "Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory."
6:4 The pivots on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called, and the house filled with smoke.
6:5 And I said: "Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!"
6:6 Then one of the seraphs flew to me, holding a live coal that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs.
6:7 The seraph touched my mouth with it and said: "Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out."
6:8 Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" And I said, "Here am I; send me!"
Pic is preparation for the cocktail hour shrimp boil at the 
Ten Ways Men
California drought 
