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.
It's all about "The Dark Triad." From Yes, Chicks Dig Jerks, and evolutionary science gives us a good idea why:
The Dark Triad is a combination of psychological traits — subclinical psychopathology, subclinical narcissism, and what Professor Jonason calls “Machiavellianism” — that are, he believes, in fact a unitary phenomenon associated with a higher level of sexual success, defined in the literature as a larger number of total lifetime sexual partners. The correlation of the Dark Triad with larger numbers of sexual partners holds true for both men and women, but the effect is much more pronounced in men. This is unsurprising, inasmuch as men’s relative preference for larger numbers of short-term sexual relationships and women’s relative preference for long-term relationships is, as Professor Jonason notes, “one of the most consistent and strongest sex differences in the field.”
So: Machiavellianism, subclinical psychopathology, subclinical narcissism: not exactly the stuff of a Jane Austen romance, but apparently the stuff of sexual success. Professor Jonason concludes: “Together with low amounts of empathy and agreeableness” (I warned you this was depressing stuff) “such traits may facilitate — especially for men — the pursuit of an exploitative short-term mating strategy.”
But you knew that already, if you are a homo even half sapiens and went to high school.
That's all true of my experience with skirt-chasing seducers. They know how to say exactly what you need to hear but, in the end, you will never be enough for them because, Psychiatric as it may sound, they are really manchilds looking for Mommy while having fun with pseudo-adult seduction, romance and sex along the way.
Image is Luigi Bassi in the title role of Don Giovanni in 1787, via Wiki.
This is as fresh as the day he wrote it. The great (young) man himself conducted the premiere of this astonishing (comic?) opera in Prague, in 1787:
James Q. Wilson had been frequently referred to that way. He knew about everything.
My first reading of him was in his The Moral Sense, back when it had just come out. The book made a lot of sense to me (if you haven't read it, those Amazon comments on it are helpful).
Here's a Wilson quote from the end of the book:
Mankind’s moral sense is not a strong beacon light, radiating outward to illuminate in sharp outline all that it touches. It is, rather, a small candle flame, casting vague and multiple shadows, flickering and sputtering in the strong winds of power and passion, greed and ideology. But brought close to the heart and cupped in one’s hands, it dispels the darkness and warms the soul.
Well, the OWS Movement didn't last through a rather mild winter. They may have some vigor left as the election cycle heats up, but for the most part the press has ceased to be impressed with their value.
It seems the Fed isn't all that impressed, either. While I'm no fan of the Fed as a manager of the economy, they do some fine research.
Income inequality should not be vilified, and public policy should encourage people to move up the income distribution and not penalize them for having already done so.
Here's the heart of the matter. The Fed is a patsy. It is a pathetic dependent of the big Wall Street banks, traders and hedge funds. Everything (it does) is designed to keep this rickety structure from unwinding. If you had a (former Fed Chairman) Paul Volcker running the Fed today — utterly fearless and independent and willing to scare the hell out of the market any day of the week — you wouldn't have half, you wouldn't have 95%, of the speculative positions today.
Being a loyal and dutiful husband, of course I showed up. All the husbands show up in their finest and tend bar for the opening night cocktail party, and later to see the big show again. We learn to look at these things, and to appreciate them as ephemeral sculptures.
Garden clubs, I know, are not only great creative outlets for gals, whether they work at jobs or not, but, like so many organizations, they also constitute a form of social capital. I even met a lady at this show who lives down the street from my Mom and belongs to my Mom's garden club.
I grabbed a few pics right after they folded up the show, before we took it down:
Except for some Romanesque churches and monasteries, and a few old tenuta, there is very little Medieval left in tourist Italy.
The reason is because they became so wealthy during the Renaissance that they knocked down all of the old stuff to build new. The "old stuff" in Florence today is mostly Renaissance-era, except for some early churches. San Miniata is a good old one, and it's a fun walk over the bridge, over the Michelangelo-designed defensive walls, and up the hill from downtown, and you can sit and listen to the monks chant if you visit during a chanting time. Very friendly monks, too, who speak excellent English.
Italy never really bought into Gothic style in the 1200s. Too French. Many Brit builders did buy into it, though.
Photo: The Baptisterie in Firenze is Medieval, begun in 1059 long before the current duomo was built (by Cannobio, with the dome by the great Brunellesci in the 1400s. The fancy facade of the duomo is new - 19th C - which most visitors do not realize. The churches were always renovating and updating.) The previous church had stood in the square when the Baptisterie was built. A Baptisterie was always needed then: unbaptised kids could not enter the duomo. As in many areas of northern Italy, the Eastern Orthodox style of art (thought, at the time, to be based on original images of Jesus, Mary, etc) is prominent inside this wonderful jewel-box. The doors are masterpieces, as is the ceiling art inside. The Baptisterie in Pisa, just down the road a piece, is similarly wonderful.
The Obama worldview based upon retreat from engagement from confrontation with sworn, active enemies of the West and apologies for past resistance has proven time and again to be both fruitless and has increased dangers. This is starkly evident in President Obama and his administration badgering and undermining Israel while turning the other cheek to Palestinian and Arab and Moslem outrageous behavior. This video ably sums up the first three years of the Obama administration's policies with respect to Israel.
Anyway, the birth control ruse is merely the KY Jelly to ease us into the giant butt-fucking that is nationalized health care. If conservatives buy into the frame that liberals are trying to push birth control on us – and, as a commenter pointed out, if we start talking dollars and cents – we’ve lost the game. The response should always be that any sort of government mandate – whether that be for individuals to buy health care or companies to provide certain pre-approved plans – is unconstitutional and coercive. To get sidetracked by birth control or morality plays is to let mandated health care become the norm. To let mandated health care become the norm is to set the table for a debate on nationalized health care. And who do you think will win that debate?
That's right. Never debate on the other side's premise, unless you accept their premise
4:13 For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the law but through the righteousness of faith.
4:14 If it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void.
4:15 For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation.
4:16 For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us,
4:17 as it is written, "I have made you the father of many nations") --in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.
4:18 Hoping against hope, he believed that he would become "the father of many nations," according to what was said, "So numerous shall your descendants be."
4:19 He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was already as good as dead (for he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb.
4:20 No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God,
4:21 being fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.
4:22 Therefore his faith "was reckoned to him as righteousness."
4:23 Now the words, "it was reckoned to him," were written not for his sake alone,
4:24 but for ours also. It will be reckoned to us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead,
4:25 who was handed over to death for our trespasses and was raised for our justification.
And Bob Dylan. Very cool arrangement by Bob - best version of the song I've heard:
I've driven through the Shenandoah Valley a couple of times. Lovely country. Reader wants me to add Van Morrison's version with The Chieftains. Here 'tis:
Sadly, I can't find the video, but a classic SNL skit for the season. One of the best minute and a half seasonal sketches. Belushi was a great talent, unable to tame his demons.
I've seen the embattled winds hurtle together, Uprooting, tossing high and scattering The lush-eared crop; then the onrushing gale With black tornado carry off light stalk And flying stubble. Oft advances huge A host of waters in the sky, and clouds, Gathering from the sea, marshal the storm, Foul, dark with rain. Down pour the heavens sheer, In mighty flood sweeping away glad crops And labours of the ox. The ditches fill: Deep rivers rise in thundering spate: the seas Breathe and boom in the narrows. Jove himself, In blackest darkness of the storm-cloud, wields With flickering hand his bolt, at whose dread shock Earth trembles, wild things scurry, and stark fear Lays prostrate, nation-wide, the hearts of men.
From A Farmer's Calendar, 40 BC. (You can spell Vergilius' name as Vergil or Virgil)
The main drag on the isola is an alley (pic from a couple of years ago). Our advice in Italty: Never eat the pizza. Terrible stuff. Sit down someplace and grab a gelato and a tiny coffee instead. Hazelnut gelato is my favorite.
Last night, I helped my son prepare an Op-Ed piece for his high school class on Economics and Financial Literacy. He chose the Durable Goods report, and we sat down to dissect and discuss what it told us. As a neophyte, he naturally saw discussion of "Shipments rising" and "Orders increasing" and asked "this means things are getting better, right? We're in an uptrend?" Linear thinking is easy. Being human, we do it all the time.
Yes, I told him, but there's much more to the report. I pointed out that Inventories were growing rapidly, Unfilled Orders were increasing, and while Shipments were increasing, the rate of increase was slowing. None of these are particularly good signs of future activity. More importantly, Capital Goods, the building blocks of future productivity, were declining. At best, we decided, the report was neutral, showing that things may have improved somewhat, but many other signs were indicating a stall or slowdown.
Most importantly, I pointed him to the Inventory-to-Sales Ratio, which is a harbinger of true economic activity. A rapidly climbing ratio does not forebode good times, but rather difficulty with pricing and sales in the future. As consumers, we rarely pay attention to what goes on 'behind the veil' with items like inventories. We like our answers pat, easy and predictable. It's a shame they never are.
The case for rewarding performance is that we can do it, not that it is the same as rewarding merit. Likewise, holding individuals personally responsible for the consequences of their own actions is a social expedient for prospective control, not a cosmic retrospective moral judgment.
When I was young I affected to believe that to look a mess was a sign of inner profundity. I made the mistake of supposing that if the wise are bearded, the bearded are wise. If I adopted the supposed manner of an artist, therefore, I too would be an artist, or at least artistic. And, conveniently enough, the sloppiness of inner profundity required no effort on my part. As everyone knows, a lot of human history consists of man’s attempt to escape effort.
Here at Maggie's, we might be termed "skeptics" but, when it comes to climate, we're really of the "Who cares?" school more than anything else. (Of course, worrying about the next Ice Age and its effects on real estate values does keep us up at night.)
Best summary I have seen of The Skeptics' Case, presented in a way that even non-scientists can easily follow.
I think of them as the nighttime version of the Marsh Hawk, because they like the wide open spaces, grasslands, fields, and marsh edges. They are not woodland birds.
I know we do not have them at the farm, because we have a hundred acres of meadow and a perfect barn loft open for them to use, and they have never used it. Plus there are hundreds more acres of horse field and cow pasture nearby. I think we're at the northern edge of their range. For owls, we have only Great Horned, Barred, and Screech as far as I know. Probably Saw-Whet in winter, but I haven't seen one there.
The last time I saw a Barn Owl was when one flew across the road in front of me at night in the headlights, between a marsh and some large estate fields in lovely Lloyd Harbor, Long Island. Lloyd Neck, actually.
Breitbart was a new media pioneer and hero. God bless him.
A comment from his family's announcement: "Andrew lived boldly, so that we more timid souls would dare to live freely and fully, and fight for the fragile liberty he showed us how to love."
From Heather MacDonald's review of The City That Become Safe: New York's Lessons for Urban Crime and Its Control, It's the Cops, Stupid!
A quote:
New York’s safety surge torpedoes all conventional understandings about crime. To be sure, the country as a whole experienced its own record-breaking crime drop in the 1990s, but New York’s crime freefall was twice as steep—80 percent, as opposed to 40 percent—and lasted twice as long. Whereas America’s crime decline stalled in the 2000s, New York’s continued, cementing Gotham’s previously unimaginable status as the safest big city in the country.
You might think that criminologists would have flocked to New York to study how such a paradigm-shattering development happened. Instead, for the last decade and a half, the criminology profession has tried to look the other way. A favorite criminological pursuit in the 1990s was finding cities that equaled New York’s crime decline on a single front—homicide, say—in order to diminish the significance of what was happening in the nation’s largest city. San Diego and Boston were favorites of New York Times reporter Fox Butterfield and his professional sources, no matter how wildly different those localities’ demographics and overall crime rates were from New York’s. When, by the late ’90s, the crime drop in the rival cities had petered out or, as in the case of Boston, reversed itself, the profession lost interest in New York entirely. The city, after all, had two counts against it: it was presided over by a crusading Republican mayor, Rudolph Giuliani, who was targeting New York’s welfare culture as well as its violence and disorder, and all early indications suggested that responsibility for the crime decline lay with the newly focused, assertive tactics coming out of the New York Police Department.
Read the whole thing. I suspect that one reason NYC's success (and it is palpable when you visit these days) is not widely imitated in the big urban areas is because it doesn't fit Blue Social Theory. Blue Social Theory wants to deal with the "root causes of crime," when we already know the cause of crime is people - often bad people or addicts - behaving badly.
It's all about "The Dark Triad." From 
James Q. Wilson had been frequently referred to that way. He knew about everything.
Bacon Jam?
Except for some Romanesque churches and monasteries, and a few old tenuta, there is very little Medieval left in tourist Italy.
I do not understand 
I think of them as the nighttime version of the Marsh Hawk, because they like the wide open spaces, grasslands, fields, and marsh edges. They are not woodland birds.