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.
My Lenten discipline this year focuses on gratitude.
I am disappointed by my tendency to get exasperated whenever something goes wrong in life, while taking for granted the 99.9% of things that go OK. For example, car goes 125,000 miles and provides a good service. Needs a new transmission? "Sh-t. Dammit. What a pain." Unexpected problems are always cropping up.
It's as if I carry some implicit expectation, hidden in the back of my mind, that life is or should be smooth and go right all the time. A sort of infantile utopian assumption probably partly engendered by growing up safe and comfortable in America in the 20th Century. It's a flaw, and I plan on going to war against it with gratitude for everything that goes well. For example, the fact that my heart continues to beat steadily and miraculously while I accept - and expect - that it cannot do so indefinitely.
Given time, some things will always go wrong or not work out well. When I am forced to be honest with myself, many of the things that go wrong are at least partly my own damn fault anyway, due to laziness, stubborness, poor judgement, boneheaded or wrong impulses, lack of planning, character defects, stupidity, ignorance, etc.
It's the opposite of the Wild Turkey phenomenon. People tell me that Turkey hunting must be easy, because they see Turkeys all the time. I remind them of all the times they don't see Turkeys - and tell them that's what most Turkey hunting is like.
The only thing surprising to me is that the Islamists have been emboldened so fast. I thought they would be cautious a while longer in their pretense at being moderate and pro-democracy. But revolutionary Islamists quickly become arrogant when people make concessions to them and they conclude that they are strong and victorious.
One of my staunchly Conservative brethren at church today (all are my brethren, regardless of their politics) was adamantly opposed to American intervention in a Libyan civil war, or uprising, or whatever the heck it is.
Naturally, we Americans are being labeled "Crusaders." Not an insulting label in my view (because I view the Crusades as an effort to push back against the Moslem invasion and occupation of the Holy Land which closed it off to pilgrims), but I think it's a roll of the dice, maybe too late, partly designed to prove Obama's - or Hillary's - masculine bona fides.
War is always interesting, horror that it is. I do not know whether this all makes sense or not. Latest update: Allied Forces Attack Libya. That article leaves me confused about goals and purposes, but I am not too smart and have never claimed to be.
Our Commander in Chief is partying in Rio but he knows nothing about military matters so it doesn't make any difference. The Libs are having a fit, and the Arabs suddenly are not pleased either.
Now back to yard and farm chores. Spring is coming, and I see the feisty Redwings at my bird-feeder. Lots to get done here to fend off entropy and nature's relentless rebellion against man's efforts to make things his way.
Squaw Valley got 76 inches of new powder snow in the past seven days and snow is expected to continue all week. 190 inch base; 570 cumulative inches for the season.
"Another 14-18" overnight is going to make for an amazing day on the mountain. The season snowfall total has already surpassed 500" [now 570"] guaranteeing spectacular spring conditions and powder for this week.
Weather experts are predicting more snow for a Miracle March and abundant coverage into May." Current report here.
Sugar Bowl to the immediate north has a 287" base.
What's the catch? Interstate 80 is closed from Applegate (on the Western slope) to the Nevada state line due to zero visibility, and most of the lifts are closed due to wind and snow!
Many have already read George Will's fine essay, Pencils and Politics. It's a brief intro to Econ 101. A quote:
Producing this simple, mundane device is, Ruth says, "an achievement on the order of a jazz quartet improvising a tune when the band members are in separate cities." An unimpressed student says, "So a lot of people work on a pencil. What's the big deal?" Ruth responds: Who commands the millions of people involved in making a pencil? Who is in charge? Where is the pencil czar?
Her point is that markets allow order to emerge without anyone imposing it. The "poetry of the possible" is that things are organized without an organizer.
Yes, it's the miracle (or poetry, or spontaneous order) of markets and the free flow of goods and services. Read the whole thing. Another quote:
The spontaneous emergence of social cooperation the emergence of a system vastly more complex, responsive and efficient than any government could organize is not universally acknowledged or appreciated. It discomforts a certain political sensibility, the one that exaggerates the importance of government and the competence of the political class.
When I think of trade and markets, I think of the paleolithic (500,000 years ago) trade in amber (for jewelry) and flint (for tools). Scandinavian amber being found in Italy. Or obsidian from Idaho being found in Indian sites on Long Island.
But when I think of pencils, I think of the Thoreau Pencil which, in the 1830s, was the finest pencil made in America. Thoreau supported himself during most of his life by working at that Pencil Factory. There is no reason to think that he enjoyed a minute of that work, but everybody has to make money.
We have to give Henry David Thoreau credit for this, though: He was a practical Civil Engineer and inventor and not just a dreamy transcendentalist with a love for nature and a way with words.
"...my eye caught The Gospel of John. Now this was the film I meant to see in February 2004 when The Passion of the Christ came out, but I missed the brief window of opportunity for catching it here in Fresno. Slasher flicks play for weeks and weeks and weeks at the monsterplexes, but at the brave art theater, gospel films (without Mel's name attached), sad to say, don't."
While I do not believe that a parent owes a kid a free college education, I think it can be a heck of a nice present for a kid who is eager for it, and can use it. Those without an avid hunger to learn things in a formal format need not apply.
Nothing is more costly, or more over-priced, than education today. At the same time, knowledge has never been more available and accessible - few people remember more about Plato from college than they can read as a refresher on Wiki. (I always believed in reading an encyclopedia entry on a topic before studying it, to get oriented.)
With some gracious grand-parental assistance, we have paid for private college 2 1/2 times thus far - one half to go. Prep-schools too, but that's another story. (Like the Obamas and Clintons and most Dems, we are not huge fans of government schools when it comes to our own kids. It's an investment - we expect them to take care of us in our old age when we are broke or broken-down - and will be happy to do the same for our parents if and when they want it or need it.)
Because most colleges and universities today have relatively few standards about what a college-educated person ought to know, I had to do it myself. Re-inventing the wheel, you might say, because Socrates and Aristotle might have made a comparable list.
Here are Bird Dog's Basic, Minimum Requirements for payment for his kids' "higher" educations, whether in school or outside of formal schooling (high school AP counts, as does a serious approach to a Teaching Company course):
1. Calculus 2. A Shakespeare course 3. The Bible 4. Physics, Chem, and Bio. I would have liked to see some Organic and Biochem in there too, so they could understand what's in the newspapers. These are not "difficult," but require some simple discipline. 5. Western Civ, Hammurabi thru Plato through Nietzsche 6. Western Lit, The Book of the Dead and Gilgamesh thru Homer and Hesiod through Melville 7. Art history 8. Music history 9. English Lit, minimum of 2 courses 10. Econ, macro and micro 11. Intro Geology 12. Intro Philosophy 13. American history (not from Zinn or some Lefty nut, but the real deal) 14. European history 15. One classical language - Greek or Latin, plus one modern language 16. Basic Business and Accounting (unfortunately, most of my kids' schools are too elite to offer such mundane and practical courses, but they need to learn this somewhere.)
I put "higher" in quotes because this doesn't sound very higher, does it? My requirements leave plenty of room for a major in Underwater Basket-weaving or Female Studies. (When I was in college, we did our studies of females mostly on weekends with beer, and usually flunked the quizzes.)
My kids have mostly kept to this. In my view, if you don't know this basic stuff, you are not fully schoolin'-eddicatedand not fully and cushily prepared, as the cliche goes, "for a lifetime of self-education and informed citizenship." After all, this stuff is just foundational and all of it could be self-learned, but college makes it more likely to happen, and a good guide is always helpful.
When you think about it, a decent high school ought to be able to do most or all of it. After all, they take four years to do two full years' worth of hard work. Why else did they call it "high" school? (My theory is that they slow it all down to the pace of the stragglers and slackers.)
I also advise them that any random course with a great teacher who knows everything about everything is worth many courses with ordinary profs in subjects they think they are "interested in." How do you know whether you are "interested in" something until you dig into it? Everything is interesting, in my opinion.
Finally, I expect them to earn their spending money. Jobs during college. (My lad bussed tables at the B-school faculty dining room while being reporter, editor, then Editor in Chief of the newspaper and running a softball team. My middle pupette was a restaurant receptionist, then a part-time assistant at Merrill-Lynch - while playing Div. 1 Tennis and majoring in Econ and Math. I don't know how they did it all. I admire their energy and initiative. My little one would too, but there are no jobs in a tiny college out in the lovely woods and fields of central Ohio. She works hard in the summer, though.)
What do you require of your kids?
(Pic is an old one-room schoolhouse in Westport, CT. Those kids could learn more than our kids do, as witness Abe Lincoln, John Adams, Tom Jefferson, etc. Of course, exceptional individuals who were highly motivated.)
What happened in Wisconsin was no less than a fascist putsch, their aspiring oppressors lost only because of the dignified and stubborn leadership of their governor. Its failure was not a sure thing. Americans saw the true face of those who want to rule us. It is a vicious, arrogant and voraciously greedy face, full of disdain and contempt for our institutions and the rights of our citizens. It is in its bones anti-Democratic and anti-American. It will do whatever it takes to take and keep power; it will break any law and crush any opponent if it can.
The Jewish Bible is full of miracles from G-d. Yet, in the Book of Esther, G-d’s intervention is not mentioned.Rabbinic commentary says that the hand of G-d is hidden but manifest in the saving of the Jews from the genocide plans of Haman.That may well be so. However, if there was divine intervention, it took the trembling will and the actions of a few of his earthly humans to bring about the good outcome.
Reminds me of this story. On January 1, G-d tells a very good, pious and observant man that in reward he will win the lottery that year. The man waits and waits, and on December 31 asks G-d why he hasn’t won the lottery yet. G-d answers, “meet me halfway, buy a ticket.”
It is up to us, each and everyone of us, regardless of religion, to buy a ticket, to speak and act for safety from sworn enemies and to further justice in this world. This year, the reading aloud in our synagogues of the Megillah, the scroll of the Book of Esther, is on Saturday and Sunday. Haman’s name is drowned out by noisemakers, groggers, and Mordechai and Esther’s names are cheered. Purim is accompanied by celebrations for the children – to fix the meaning of Purim in their minds, and the adults giving food packages to the needy and to friends – to build community and spread blessings of plenty and caring.
In an apparent connection made by Hitler between his Nazi regime and the role of Haman, he stated in a speech made on January 30, 1944, that if the Nazis were defeated, the Jews could celebrate "a second Purim".[51][50] Seconds before he was hanged, Streicher called out "Purim Fest 1946!"[51]
Haman exists in every generation, and must be confronted, or allowed to prevail. We are G-d’s hands.
Purim is a fun holiday, so here’s SpongeBob’s version of the Megillah.
The keen stars were twinkling, And the fair moon was rising among them, Dear Jane. The guitar was tinkling, But the notes were not sweet till you sung them Again.
As the moon's soft splendour O'er the faint cold starlight of Heaven Is thrown, So your voice most tender To the strings without soul had then given Its own.
The stars will awaken, Though the moon sleep a full hour later To-night; No leaf will be shaken Whilst the dews of your melody scatter Delight.
Though the sound overpowers, Sing again, with your dear voice revealing A tone Of some world far from ours, Where music and moonlight and feeling Are one.
If you can believe it, I have no strong opinion. The Islamic middle east, and its peripheral outliers like Libya will be sad, barbaric, prehistoric dumps where people live crappy lives (by our standards) for a long time.
It's Cocktail Hour, and I am headed out on the town to meet gals and friends in my local dumps, and to be grateful that I am in NYC and not in Libya.
In the seventies, not to put too fine a point on it, everyone was still alive. Martha Graham and Agnes de Mille were no longer making great work, but they were vivid, high-profile totems. Antony Tudor had one more great ballet in him: 1974’s The Leaves Are Fading. Robert Joffrey and his Joffrey Ballet were going full speed ahead, an audience-friendly ballet troupe that toured the country like a young, hip, and sometimes hippie version of the old Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo. Alvin Ailey, Eliot Feld, and Arthur Mitchell had companies that brought different demographics to the theater, and Merce Cunningham and Paul Taylor finally had national stature and repertoires that placed them in the pantheon. Twyla Tharp was coming into her own, bringing her melting-pot style and antagonistic syntax to the mainstream when she choreographed Push Comes to Shove in 1974 for ABT and Baryshnikov. Meanwhile, at NYCB, Jerome Robbins was experimenting with different forms of narrative (Watermill, Dybbuk), and Balanchine was deep into the late phase of his genius, putting on festivals—Stravinsky in 1972, Ravel in 1975—and tossing off blockbuster ballets like Union Jack in 1976 and Vienna Waltzes in 1977. Vienna Waltzes, according to Kirstein, would rank as the company’s “most successful” ballet. “For four seasons every performance scheduled was sold out,” he wrote. “It brought into the theater a new public, many of whom had certainly never been in the State Theater before.”
Couple all this creative energy with cheap rents—for no artistic discipline needs as much space, from class to rehearsal to performance, as dance does—and you had yet another reason for the dance boom.
It's about time somebody wrote this essay. Prof. Thomas Reeves at Mercator: What do professors want?. h/t, Mankiw. He is harsh about the academic life:
On the Left and Right money means power, and we "pointy heads" and "eggheads" are on the outside looking in. One thinks of Arthur Schlesinger Jr swooning over the Kennedys for the rest of his life because they gave him a title and a silent seat in some White House deliberations. Those making as much money as, say, an experienced furnace repairman account for little in this world, despite the PhD. How many academics even sit on the governing board that sets policies for their campus? It is all most humiliating. (To see how intelligently and objectively academics use the authority they have, examine the political correctness the suffocates the employment practices and intellectual lives of almost all American campuses. Aberlour's Fifth Law: "Political correctness is totalitarianism with a diploma.")
and...
One way to compensate for this bleak and futureless existence is to become involved in left-wing causes. They give us a sense of identity in a world seemingly owned and operated by Rotarians. And they provide us with hope. In big government we trust, for with the election of sufficiently enlightened officials, we might gain full medical coverage, employment for our children, and good pensions. These same leftist leaders might redistribute income "fairly," by taking wealth from the "greedy" and giving it to those of us who want more of everything. A "just" world might be created in which sociologists, political scientists, botanists, and romance language professors would achieve the greatness that should be theirs. It's all a matter of educating the public. And hurling anathemas at people of position and affluence we deeply envy.
I am sure Prof. Reeves has tenure, but he might need police protection too, after writing that honest piece.
My friend Mark Safranski's blogZenPundit is one of my favorites. Its focus is on foreign policy, and more specifically on military affairs. The breadth and eclecticism of its links and discussions, agree or not, are of the highest order and center on rational discussion of complex issues. Most of us value the rational discussions we have, unfortunately though not often enough, because all parties come away with new appreciations and better understandings.
I found this graphic there, a flowchart of whether you are having a rational discussion.
Yes. It used to be that Psychiatrists were the only ones who would talk to a distressed person with some depth of understanding. Nowadays, everybody can be a "therapist," and the "New, Improved" Psychiatrists don't want to get to know who you are. They want a symptom for the right pill.
I kept going on doing what I knew how to do anyway – just kept "doing what I did before and what I loved." I was a late arriver, having had another career first, so I was never around for the days of wine and roses to "go backwards, moneywise, in [my] career." I’m retired with "the lifestyle that my wife and I have been living for the last 40 years." I live in a log cabin. We travel and buy the things we want. It was a modest life with a modest retirement. I wouldn’t have had it be much different. I get calls from Therapist friends often who want me to help them find a "good Psychiatrist" who will do their "meds." I don’t even know what to say. Good Psychiatrists don’t "do meds," they treat people.
In my view, all docs should treat people, not diagnoses and not symptoms. People aren't "cases" - not even to good surgeons and anesthesiologists. No two "cases" are the same. Medicine is a humanistic, humanitarian art as much as it is science, and people are too complicated for simple formulations - unless they are bleeding out in the ER or some such. As I read the medical literature, most people don't even take their prescribed medicines.
I take note that the current head of the American Psychiatric Association, Dr. Carol Bernstein, has problems with the DSM model.
So do I. I have some hope for it too, but believe it to be of limited utility. It's largely pseudo-scientific, and pseudo-certain. "Sex Addiction"? Give me a break.
As 1 Boring Old Man says, "Don't mistake the pointing finger for the moon."
From a choice of offers, the lad has accepted a new interesting "opportunity" (as jobs are termed, these days) in NYC.
Now I will have two kids working there, plus one beloved daughter-in-law. It's all good.
I tend to think that all ambitious young folks need to do some time in the Big City, whatever their field, if only to find out what high energy and high demands and sharp elbows really mean. I did, and it didn't hurt me none. Well, maybe a few narcissistic scars, but that's good for one's character. If you haven't been introduced to your flaws, weaknesses, and deficiencies yet, NY will happily introduce you to them - and tax the heck out of you for the privilege. I think it's worth it. At least for a while.
Pic is Manhattan from the Whitestone Bridge at dawn, on my way to some airport
From Vietnam to today, the majority of US public opinion has supported confronting active threats to US security. And, naturally, Americans sympathize with the oppressed and their human rights. However, as the costs rose, time elapsed, and foreign policy dilettantes recoil from the realities of armed intervention, other firmer supporters increasingly bemoan the restrictions imposed by the half-hearted and the saboteurs of winning that not only cost more US military lives but place the end-goals in jeopardy.
In short, the inherent contradiction in US foreign policy is between those willing to undertake the burdens and those who undermine that will. This leads to initial enthusiasms that fade to regrets, and has created a new isolationism among many who favor strong actions but – having paid the price -- are unwilling to become wasted cannon fodder. This is particularly felt among many veterans who have felt the anguish of their efforts being undercut and frittered.
Most – but not all – of the usual advocates of an assertive US foreign policy argue for the US to be clearer and more forthright in standing by those in the Middle East fighting against its satraps – whether allied to or opponents of the US. The situation in Libya is the current front, while those in Tunisia and Egypt fade from the short attention span of the front pages.
The incoherency of President Obama’s foreign policies, from inauguration to now, however, undermines from the get-go the expectations of focus, perseverance, adequate means, and thus favorable results. The only consistent behavior shown by the Obama administration has been weak and dithering resolve to protect US interests coupled with rewarding enemies and undercutting allies.
There is nothing in the Obama administration’s handling of the current revolts in the Middle East that indicates a meaningful learning or reversal of this course.
Indeed, the ongoing dithering and waffling in the face of events only reinforces the view of an administration at best adrift in confusion, ignorance and denial, and at worst purposely dangerous in furthering US interests abroad.
There are good arguments to be made for the US intervening more actively and forcibly in the Middle East revolts, but in my view they pale before the lack of confidence that the Obama administration has labored so hard to deserve.This is especially so given the likely outcomes just enmeshing the US further in the Arab world’s self-inflicted dysfunctionality, with not even any worthwhile gratitude to result.
It is not easy nor consistent with our decency to see innocents or rebels slaughtered. It is less easy to send our sons and daughters into the cauldron created by the Arabs themselves, with only slightly marginal lasting results the best outcome and more likely not even that.
P.S.: Andrew McCarthy at National Reviewgoes into more detail. Read it all, and think, think, think.
My Lenten discipline this year focuses on gratitude. 
Many have already read George Will's fine essay, 
While I do not believe that a parent owes a kid a free college education, I think it can be a heck of a nice present for a kid who is eager for it, and can use it. Those without an avid hunger to learn things in a formal format need not apply.
Government unions gone berserker: 
To Jane
If you can believe it, I have no strong opinion. The Islamic middle east, and its peripheral outliers like Libya will be sad, barbaric, prehistoric dumps where people live crappy lives (by our standards) for a long time.
Good stuff on Ring Lardner: 
That is, of course, the title of