Maggie's Farm

Relationships: 10 Reasons You Should Break It Off (h/t Linkiest)

Refuting a Myth About Human Origins

Schneiderman: The Meaning of Life

It's the Enlightenment secular-humanist view. Not bad at all. Me? I take a Christian view.

“Conyers: Obamacare Is ‘Platform’ for Creating Single-Payer System”

I think it's designed to drive private insurors out of business

Housing starts see biggest drop since 1984

Lots of inventory out there. Lucky time to be a buyer, lousy time to be a seller. Them's the breaks.

Insty:

THE INTOLERANCE of the avant-garde. “That helps to explain why the ideas of the avant garde have been the same for more than a century, and why, today, avant garde means defending the statist status quo.”

And that’s a good excuse for linking this piece.

McArdle: When rail becomes ridiculous

Portland Bans Scent

I wonder if that includes anti-perspirant

Common-Sense Meltdown

Nuke terror - but it's the old-fashioned tsunami that killed thousands

Jammie on Atlanta: A Lesson In How To Scam Tax Dollars

Problem is, there is nowhere to go to in Atlanta. There's no there, there - except the airport.

Waxman-Markey:

Our agenda is more important than any constitutional principle that might interfere with it.

They aren't joking and, of course, the Left can apply that argument to anything. "By all means necessary..."

JPC: Palestine Betrayed

Rubin Report: The weapons-laden ship marks a big transformation

I believe (Jesse) Jackson and company are intentionally distorting the truth, misleading, manipulating and abusing the American people. They have been getting away with it for far too long. It is time they are called out and held politically accountable.

From Mead's A Red Dixiecrat Dawn?

Krugman and the Times editorial board are both examples of something important in American life today: left-liberal intellectuals are increasingly able to understand that individual supports of the blue social model are crumbling.  But they are still so captivated by the blue model, so profoundly convinced that the Progressive movement’s solutions to America’s social ills in 1910 are still valid today, that they cannot yet look beyond the blue model to imagine a different and brighter future for the United States.

Are Christians Obsessed with Gays and Abortion?

Hansen in 1986: 2°-4° warmer in 2010. Reality: No change

It's not from The Onion, and it's not about a community college: "Community college overwhelmed by dumb students"

Food price inflation

Wind Farms Blamed For Stranding Of Whales

Also slice up hawks

J Street: 'Maybe Israel really ain't a good idea'

Why It’s Bad Business to Hire the Long-Term Unemployed

Prelutsky: Trying to Make Sense of Liberals

Nearly 2/3 Of Americans Say Afghan War No Longer Worth Fighting

Paul Krugman Admits He Lives in a Bubble

GOP 2012 theme: American 'decline'

I suggest "Hope and Change"

Slacking off as self discovery: The Rebranding of Indolence as ‘Emerging Adulthood’

Reynold's Law:

“The government decides to try to increase the middle class by subsidizing things that middle class people have: If middle-class people go to college and own homes, then surely if more people go to college and own homes, we’ll have more middle-class people.

But homeownership and college aren’t causes of middle-class status, they’re markers for possessing the kinds of traits — self-discipline, the ability to defer gratification, etc. — that let you enter, and stay, in the middle class. Subsidizing the markers doesn’t produce the traits; if anything, it undermines them.”

The case that Immigration Doesn't Hurt Native-Born Workers

Intellectuals and tyrants: The Intellectual as Courtier

Powerline: The White House is trendy and ignorant

Tennessee:

"This General Assembly will not be intimidated by nomadic bands of professional agitators on spring break bent on disruption," he said. "We talk through our differences here. Tennessee is not Wisconsin."

How close did we get to the Humpback whales last week, on the Zodiac? Almost close enough to touch them. You can see another one underwater, swimming under the Zodiac. Friendly whales who like to interact with Zodiacs.

This little kid is in the music more than in the performance, it seems to me. Her body says so.

What it's like to have an ax murderer in your classroom

A survey … invited the very rich to write freely about how prosperity has shaped their lives and those of their children

Grabar: No Longer Academic: When Activism Is on the Curriculum

We missed this: Question Insanity: What to Ask Progressives - An ex-Soviet immigrant goes Socratic on his liberal American critics.

Smart comment from Eric: Have conspiracy theories have become the modern equivalent of P.T. Barnum's freak shows?

Yes, like the warmist hysterics.

Good details of the battles of Staten Island at Walking the Berkshires

Sipp: Marketing, Advertising, and Sales 101. Great video ad for Telluride. Skiied there one week, a few years ago. Great. I hate the chair lifts without bars, though, especially when you're going over canyons. Yikes. I still have the Osprey backpack I bought there for dumping kids' clothing in when it warmed up during the day, and things were shed. You find challenging and exciting skiing there. Same as tennis: keep those knees bent.

Scorsese’s Gangs of New York: How the Left Misuses American History.

It's called "propaganda."

The BD family contains avid snorkelers, but only Mrs. BD is a skilled scuba diver. But even snorkeling, she can swim down 20 feet easily to inspect something. Loves it.

But about the peas. On good advice we bought a big bag of frozen peas at the Cabo WalMart, filled a plastic water bottle with them and then added water to the bottle. When you are diving or snorkeling near rocks or a reef, just squirt a few peas out of that bottle. You will be swarmed with tropical fish. Works like a dream. Like tossing bread to pigeons in a park. Fish were crashing into me, some over a foot long, and one bit Mrs. BD while trying to get to the pea bottle. Very cool thing to try. Wish I had had an underwater camera.

We had to go on a goofy party boat to get to a good snorkeling area, and they provided the equipment. Unlimited free drinks. It was jolly. On the way back, Mrs. BD danced the Macarena and YMCA without touching a drop of drink (not a photo of her). I didn't, and I did.

T-shirt via Q&O -

Belmont on urban renewal: Saving the village in order to destroy it  h/t Dr. Sanity

Are People Nicer In Cities?

Family breakdown was elephant in the room at anti-bullying circus

Medicare paid $3.1M for Viagra, other erectile-dysfunction drugs

Dead Men Risen: The snipers' story

Why is there no looting in Japan?

The Law of Demand: Pirates Cut Ransom Demands

Re taxes: How Much Money Do the Rich Have?

Internet will soon be top choice to get news in America as it overtakes newspapers for first time

Is the iPad magical?

Hennessey: The President’s budget: whistling past the graveyard

Breaking: Bill Clinton Diagnosed With Psychiatric Disorder

Not a joke

Military 'diversity': more DC silliness

 God forbid you bought an original Powerbook in October 1997 instead of buying shares (in Apple)

When Are Religious ‘Progressives’ Going to Get Serious?

Not from The Onion: Climate Change Advocates Glom Onto Tsunami to Advance Arguments

Always remember: It's always the Jews' fault

Steyn: Dead Jews Is No News

Met the pupette in NYC yesterday to take her to brunch and to take her to look at some Kandinsky at the Guggenheim. Clever of those Guggenheims to buy so many Kandinskys before he became too well-known, but you have to figger they got rich by being perceptive.

Readers know that I am a Kandinsky fan.

Mrs. BD wanted to get lunch first at the Viennese cafe, Cafe Sabarsky, in the Neue Gallery up the street. Having been in Vienna last summer, I can say that it sure feels like Vienna in there. Wonderful. Gallery worth visiting too.

A few more pics below -

Sometimes you eat something that disagrees with you, sometimes something that disagrees with you eats you.

Buddy Larsen.

Independents want government to do more

Related, good interview from Canada: The Dependency Trap

World's capacity to store information

Alexandria has changed: Arabian Nightmare?

Pakistan council protests use of padded bras by Muslim women

Owsley Stanley is dead

Detroit Plan Makes Big Charter School Bet

Reacting with hysteria: Lieberman: Stop new nuclear plants in US

Related: WARNING: Fear-Mongering And Health

David Thompson on the Wisconsin union protests

We missed Pi Day yesterday

Not that he needs one. There's a line waiting down the sidewalk for supper at Maro's, for his simple menu of grilled shrimp and lobster. And for his Bulldog cocktails. It's like a rustic Cape Cod seafood joint.

It's not our Yankee lobster - it's the lobster that grows down there. Yes, you order by the kilo.

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The invention of adolescence

"Liberals want to eradicate bullying. Conservatives want to raise kids strong enough to handle it."

One of the functions of Maggie's Farm is to push back against the Leftist bullies and Nanny State bullies and government bullies.

Moonbattery: The Ultimate Dirty Job

Are these really adults? Looks like the State Troopers are taking out the trash.

Karzai: Leave our country, please

Illinois Governor Signs Amazon Internet Sales Tax Law

So Amazon says they'll quit the state

Betsy:

When your FICA tax is taken out of your paycheck, it does not get squirreled away in some lockbox in West Virginia where it's kept until you and your contemporaries retire. Most goes out immediately to pay current retirees, and the rest (say, $100) goes to the U.S. Treasury - and is spent. On roads, bridges, national defense, public television, whatever - spent, gone.

When all else fails, lower your standards:

The Dayton Police Department is lowering its testing standards for recruits.

It's a move required by the U.S. Department of Justice after it says not enough African-Americans passed the exam.    

Robert E. Lee, read your Sun Tzu!

Libya and War

Driscoll: We are the Euroweenies We’ve Been Waiting For

Well, it's our church's Men's Ski (and beer) Retreat weekend at Killington, and I think maybe our Women's Retreat Weekend too somewhere else. But we're just back from 8 days away, so we passed on them this year. I have not skied once this year. Damn shame, because it gives me the greatest joy to wrestle and sweat with a mountain and the trees in the snow and cold. Plus I really need new skis if I intend to stick with this crazy, exhilarating lifelong recreation of mine.

Finishing our Iris week with this tune. It reminds me of Roger McGuinn - another good Jesus freak.

Matthew 4:1-11

4:1 Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

4:2 He fasted forty days and forty nights, and afterwards he was famished.

4:3 The tempter came and said to him, "If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread."

4:4 But he answered, "It is written, 'One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.'"

4:5 Then the devil took him to the holy city and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple,

4:6 saying to him, "If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down; for it is written, 'He will command his angels concerning you,' and 'On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.'"

4:7 Jesus said to him, "Again it is written, 'Do not put the Lord your God to the test.'"

4:8 Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor;

4:9 and he said to him, "All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me."

4:10 Jesus said to him, "Away with you, Satan! for it is written, 'Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.'"

4:11 Then the devil left him, and suddenly angels came and waited on him.

I forget who found this one. Gotta love the dancing too:

Catrina dolls and other wonderful death dolls at Mi Casa Restaurant. They are hand-made, of painted clay appropriately enough, and expensive.

Whever I want something but have no use for it and don't want to spend the $, I just take a snap of it. Then I own it, in a way. I am trying to teach Mrs. BD that approach to things - symbolic possession by internalizing an image or idea. But does it work for designer shoes?

More below the fold -

Sipp: Business 101 with funk

Not from The Onion: global warming caused earthquake

Insane. But nuke plants in earthquake zones seems like a lousy idea on the face of it.

Why Moonbats Love Trains

I love trains too - if they make sense and require no more subsidies than our roads do. We have enough roads.

Obama Blames Oil Companies For Lack Of Drilling

NYM:

You do not have to be Tocqueville to recognize that the fundamental American character has always featured a powerful determination to get ahead, to build a better future on the basis of current effort and sacrifice. It is not sectional ethnic animosity that stands in the way of implementing socialism in the United States, it is the fundamental American character and the values and attitudes that the country was built upon.

We are not Canada, not because we have blacks, but because we are the rebels who threw off the yoke of monarchy in favor of Liberty and individualism, and Canada was, practically speaking, founded by the Tories who preferred being subjects and dependents. We will never be Canada.

Bjorn Lomborg on Ethanol

It's all about buying votes in Iowa. Ethanol belongs in beer and cocktails. I don't know why they don't call it "alcohol" - or moonshine, because that's what the pols want us to inflict on our teetotaling chain saws, lawn mowers, and outboard engines.

Nordlinger on O'Keefe

Factories having trouble finding skilled workers

Ready for Unionized Airport Security? As payback for union support, the Obama administration greases the wheels for the largest federal organizing effort in history.

Cute love song, but shut up and sing, John:

All Hail ... Analog? When it comes to the quality of photos and music, the digital revolution may be failing us

Our ancestors are the Bushmen

So much for my family geneology

Americans Line Up for the Jobs They Allegedly Won't Do

Honor killing in Leviticus

The therapeutic mindset:

...where Hanson says that the opposite of the therapeutic mindset is the tragic worldview, I would say that if therapy sees us living within a utopian world where price doesn’t matter and where consequences don’t count, then the alternative would be a world where thrift rules and where you earn what your work is worth.

Voegli: Thoughts on Wisconsin 

Neoneo: Peter King McCarthy

Teacher tenure is poisonous: Cory Booker, mayor of Newark, says it's time to put performance first

Editorial: Is America Becoming A Welfare Nation?

Yes. Entitlement is a cultural and spiritual cancer.

As I mentioned earlier, we stayed at Pueblo Bonita Sunset Beach. Nice place. No obnoxious LA celebs, just regular folks but well beyond the also obnoxious college crowd. You can see why I gave it the nickname, because everything there looked like this. Toto, I don't think we're in Maine anymore.

Betcha can't listen just once -

An interesting book that Mrs. BD and I read: Inside of a Dog: What Dogs See, Smell, and Know