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.
There is no "should". This foolish and, I think, exhibitionistic piece in the WSJ, How Often Should Married Couples Have Sex?, has been getting attention all over. I don't think it is very illuminating. Sexual frustration, however, does make both guys and gals cranky, and tends to make them want to look elsewhere for their instinctual romantic and sensual drives (which normal people do anyway, but even more so).
In my professional opinion, younger guys seem to be OK and relatively calm with sex twice daily. They are monkeys. Older fellows seem to get by with anywhere from daily to 3-4 times/week, depending on how hard and long they work at their jobs. Women are an entirely different topic, but my general advice to women is to remove the TV from the bedroom. Not to worry ladies - they will put it back in our bedrooms 24 hrs/day when we're demented widows in the nursing home. We can catch up with our shows and movies then. Carpe diem.
Apropos of the topic, I saw that Glenn Reynolds linked this book: Lube Jobs: A Woman's Guide to Great Maintenance Sex. Library journal commented about it, "Most people spend the largest part of their adulthood slogging through committed relationships, and they need books like this."
Good cozy marital snuggles can make up for a lot of troubles. But "slogging"? If you're slogging, it's your own darn fault. I have patients deep into their 70s and 80s with quite satisfying and jolly sex lives even when they know far more than they want to know about their spouses, and when their equipment is not what it once was. We are, in part, biological beings.
I've been an admirer of Heather MacDonald for years and we have linked her essays many times, but it was not until last week when I read her review of the 2013 new productions at the Metropolitan Opera that I felt motivated to find out who she really is. She is versatile. I admire/envy her brain and her fearlessness.
She is a Fellow at the Manhattan Institute and a frequent researcher/reporter/pundit at City Journal and many other places. She lives in NYC. I guess she qualifies as a "public intellectual." I've never heard her speaking on TV, but we don't watch TV here.
Were she a Leftie, she'd be a star at The NYT, the WaPo, TNR, or anywhere.
I hope to have the chance to meet her sometime. If I had the spare $, I'd be a significant donor to the Manhattan Institute and meet some of the folks I admire like Rudy Giuliani, Heather MacDonald, Roger Kimball, John Leo, Kay Hymowitz, et al.
For the time being, I've decided to split the difference and keep the Internet line but dump some other things (I was actually getting a little tired of Netflix anyway), enabling me to further corrode your mind with inane movie reviews, subliminally imply you should dump your job to concentrate full-time on engaging computer games, warp and usurp your very being by tempting you to leave the warm bosom of alcohol and join the ranks of the pothead, ravage and destroy your last vestige of reason with a heartwarming post on the swastika — and that's not to mention filling your sleep with nightmares of gigantic, human-gobbing insects.
So I plan to be busy.
Also, under the heading of "Duh!", my thanks to BobZ for mentioning starting up a wi-fi from scratch. I had tried a unit out, just to see if there was anything around, but I hadn't thought of getting one of the line-of-sight neighbors around me to let me hook into their (duh!) Comcast cable line (!), then beam me a signal. I'll have to shell out for the hook-up, but it looks like the service, itself (as an add-on to the cable line), is only $20/mo, so I'll start asking around. It'll be wi-fi slow, but what price, freedom?
I'll be on the road today, but have a couple of promised goodies ready for tomorrow and Friday. My post tomorrow on 'Meaningless Words' is a hoot.
Again, my deepest thanks to those who donated a little something to help me out of this bind, and if I can get a wi-fi going and dump the expensive Internet company, I should definitely be in the clear. This morning I'm going up to Homestead to talk to another prospective web site client, so things are lookin' good. I also made an appointment for next Friday at the hospital to do some extensive blood tests.
In the meantime, here are two of the best AGW articles I've read in a while:
Not in $ terms, not anymore. In other ways, perhaps. Connections, networking, first spouses, intellectual fun, etc.However, these days it's the sub-Ivy networkswho take the best care of their grads.Georgetown, Boston College, Bucknell, Duke, Syracuse, Indiana -their loyal alum networks work hard to make sure every grad finds a good first job to launch a career of hard white-collar work.
With the gun control measure failing miserably in the Senate, it's thought that the next thing Congress will turn its attention to is an online sales tax.
As the bloggers fall all over themselves decrying this outrage to humanity, bear in mind that the entire sales tax issue is inconsequential compared to what's really going on.
I thought the following deserved a repost at this point in time.
Congress has only been talking about taxing online goods for, oh, about as long as the online has existed. But without any kind of precedent or track record to go from, they could never pull it off.
A wave of states, including Virginia, have passed laws that will require consumers to pay sales tax on all Internet purchases as soon as next year.
For states struggling in the troubled economy, this could mean $23 billion in new revenue each year, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Had online retailers collected sales tax this year, Virginia would have added nearly $423 million to its coffers, while Maryland would have seen $376 million and the District $72 million, the group said.
Now they have a track record (at least on paper) to point to and, sure enough:
The movement in state capitals is driving newfound support for a proposed bill in Congress that could make collection of sales tax a standard practice on the Web, no matter where a consumer logs in to shop.
Like you, my hackles bristle reading such words, because the Web is supposed to be free, Free,FREE! Always has been, always should be.
Mayor Mike, the Nanny of all Nannies, is a control freak. He could have been the inspiration for the quip "If you're so rich, how come you ain't smart?"
Well, I just can't decide if I should go offline for a few months or not. As I mentioned the other day, I need some expensive medical tests and dropping my $120/mo online fee and some other things (associated online services, Netflix, food) would save me about $300/mo, which is enough to keep the hospital happy as I rack up the costs from the tests.
Between a small handful of very appreciated donations, an unexpected check from the stock broker (one of the stocks I sold last summer had been held up in a court case) and getting a small retainer to construct a web site for a soon-to-be local businessman, I could stay online for now, but I'm worried that I'll be right back to square one in a couple of months, albeit this time with a large outstanding debt to the hospital that I'll have trouble paying.
Put another way, right now I feel great mentally but poor physically. Assuming they find out what's wrong, I'll then feel great physically but poor mentally!
Pic: Artist's concept of Doc's life right now
If I'm going to suspend the Internet service, I have to call them before 6 pm today, so I'll think about it. Any thoughts on your part are welcome.
On the subject (your thoughts), am I wrong in thinking there's absolutely no way to make money online outside of direct involvement, like webmastering? I spent half a day investigating all of the "5 Ways To Make Money Online!" articles out there a while back and not one of them is actually viable. I was thinking there might be a few things around, like the incredibly boring job of 'data input' (transferring data from paper or electronic forms into a database program), but I couldn't even find that. If anyone has any thoughts on the subject, I'd be interested.
Have Americans lost the sense of evil? I don't really think so. Some say that, nowadays, the cognoscenti can only use the word ironically, but I don't agree with that entirely either. After all, I have read too much vitriol from the Left directed towards people like me, labeling us (non-ironically) as evil.
In other words, I think "evil" has been secularized or politicized. At the same time, attempts are made to psycho-babbleize it away.
Without writing an opus on the topic, I'll make just a few points about evil (from a non-religious standpoint). Evil thoughts and impulses exist in everyone, to varying degrees, whether consciously or unconsciously. It never appears in pure form.
A normal human conscience, along with social pressures, fear, a desire not to be destructive, etc. permit most of us to live without enacting very many evil deeds. Some people, in denial of their own dark sides, project evil into others. Some people attempt to deny the existence of evil anywhere. Some people try to erase the presence of evil by what we call "identification with the aggressor", of which the Stockholm Syndrome is an extreme example.
This piece in The Atlantic is a good exemplar of the mushy liberal commentary that has proliferated in recent days. Authored by one Megan Garber, it is titled: “The Boston Bombers Were Muslim: So?” Before taking a close look at Ms. Garber’s article, let’s advise The Atlantic not to put away that headline. It could come in handy so often. “The Cole Bombers Were Muslim: So?” “The Embassy Bombers Were Muslim: So?” “The First World Trade Center Bombers Were Muslim: So?” “The September 11 Bombers Were Muslim: So?” “The Madrid Bombers Were Muslim: So?” “The London Bombers Were Muslim: So?” “The Shoebomber Was Muslim: So?” The Underwear Bomber Was Muslim: So?” “The Fort Hood Shooter Was Muslim: So?” “The Beslan Child-Murderers Were Muslim: So?” “The Times Square Bomber Was Muslim: So?”
I am sorry to say that Mukasey has it right: Make No Mistake, It Was Jihad - Let's hope the administration gets over its reluctance to recognize attacks on the U.S. for what they are.
All sorts of things can help unleash the cruelty and destructiveness in people, but I won't get into all of that now because I only want to mention one of the things: communal support of evil. If only 7% of Muslims are inclined to active Jihad, that's 100 million people. That's no mob - that's a large nation of killers and would-be killers of infidels and they are all on the same page.
Jihadists believe the West is evil. "Submit or die." They are convinced of their virtuousness, but they are as wrong as can be because all that we in the West want is to be left alone and to truly "coexist" peacefully.
There may be as many as 500,000 Muslims in Austria; a country with a population of only 8.4 million. Nearly 8 percent of Vienna is Muslim. The Muslim population of Austria doubled in two decades. It will take less time for it to double again. Half of the Muslims in Austria are under 25; twice the number for the general population.
Tony Soprano: [over the phone] It’s a bad connection so I’m gonna talk fast! The guy you’re looking for is an ex-commando! He killed sixteen Chechen rebels single-handed! Paulie ‘Walnuts’ Gualtieri: Get the fuck outta here. Tony Soprano: Yeah. Nice, huh? He was with the Interior Ministry. Guy’s like a Russian green beret. He can not come back and tell this story. You understand? Paulie ‘Walnuts’ Gualtieri: I hear you. [hangs up] Paulie ‘Walnuts’ Gualtieri: You’re not gonna believe this. He killed sixteen Czechoslovakians. Guy was an interior decorator. Christopher Moltisanti: His house looked like shit.
I'll bet you can guess which classic movie I'm thinking of:
— The same day repeats itself, over and over again. He wakes up, and it's the exact same day. He, alone, is stuck inside of some kind of crazy time loop.
— At first he's in despair, then he realizes he can use it to his advantage to land the fair damsel.
— This he does, then everything goes back to normal and they live happily ever after.
Yep, the movie 12:01 sure is fun.
Ah, but I know what you're thinking. Just another pale imitation of the immortal Groundhog Day, right?
Except it came out a year before 'Groundhog Day'.
Oh, and there might have been a few other small differences. What was his ultimate goal in Groundhog Day?
To get into her pants.
What was his ultimate goal in 12:01?
To save her life and the world.
Did he actually care for the girl in Groundhog Day?
Not in the slightest.
And 12:01?
He truly cared for her deeply and sincerely, if only from afar.
Of course, convincing someone you're actually stuck in a time loop — without them calling for Security or the medical staff — might not be quite as easy as it looks. Here are his first two attempts.
All in all, a warm, sensitive movie about a caring guy on a noble mission.
In other words, nothing at all like Groundhog Day.
"... the liberals who spent four days hoping and praying and predicting that this heinous atrocity was perpetrated by right-wingers are now busy telling us that we shouldn’t focus on the Islamic beliefs of these Chechen terrorists — disciples of radical imam Feiz Mohammad – or the fact that these guys were immigrants.
Our Moral and Intellectual Superiors are now lecturing us that it’s wrong to speculate about motives."
Students learn the new orthodoxy quickly. Fearing classroom humiliation, they keep any reservations to themselves, instead regurgitating on their exams their force-fed lessons. As a result, they learn little. The landmark national study, Academically Adrift, finds 36 percent of students show little to no increase in fundamental academic skills—critical thinking, complex reasoning, and clear writing—after four years in college. Their natural desire to know gives way to repeating whatever is required for a good grade.
And what good grades they get! Under the new student-teacher compact, professors award more A’s than ever in exchange for students’ acquiescence in the transformation of classrooms into ideological training camps. Fifty years ago, 15 percent of all college grades given were A’s. Today, an A is the most common grade (43 percent), despite the fact that, during the same period, average student study-time has fallen from 24 to 14 hours a week.
Come on, we all know that nowadays it's just a credential for most college attendees except for the special ones for whom it is a wonderful opportunity for intellectual adventures. The business needs to please the consumers. "The customer is always right."
Sad to say, an Ivy "A" means nothing today and everybody knows it.That's why so many firms these days avoid hiring Ivy grads. Too arrogant and entitled for today's world, often. I am happy to report that they still like Dartmouth kids, though.
I've been an admirer of Heather MacDonald for years and we have linked her essays many times, but it was not until last week when I read her review of 
After all, Spring is here and it's been a long cold winter in New Hampshire. Here 'tis:
Turbulence 
Put another way, right now I feel great mentally but poor physically. Assuming they find out what's wrong, I'll then feel great physically but poor mentally!
Have Americans lost the sense of evil? I don't really think so. Some say that, nowadays, the cognoscenti can only use the word ironically, but I don't agree with that entirely either. After all, I have read too much vitriol from the Left directed towards people like me, labeling us (non-ironically) as evil.