Maggie's FarmWe 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. |
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Wednesday, July 5. 2023Boating in fog
Got stuck in a fog bank this morning for an hour or so. Not fun. Where would recreational boaters be without GPS? I do have radar but not expert with it. I am a fair-weather boater. Not in the past, but now.
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Wednesday morning linksScientists find that the boost you get from a morning coffee can’t be replicated with plain caffeine. Great White Sharks Are Surging off Cape Cod. Cape Cod has quickly become one of the largest white shark hotspots in the world and the first ever in the North Atlantic Elizabeth Warren Says Without Affirmative Action, A Native American Girl Like Herself Would Never Have Been Accepted To Rutgers No One Is Happy About Diversity Efforts at Work. The Supreme Court’s decision to eliminate affirmative action hits workplaces as diversity initiatives face pressure from supporters and skeptics; ‘Stop being so woke’ Don't Get The Idea That Internet Censorship Is Diminishing Michigan Hate Speech Bill Would Make Using Wrong Pronouns A Felony With $10K Fine, Prison Time NY Times opinion: Affirmative action mattered a lot for very few and very little for most White Penn State professor who resisted race-based grading files discrimination lawsuit Villanova University declares LGBTQ+ identity "sacred" Bisexuality Has Nearly Quadrupled in the U.S. Colleges should apply affirmative action—based on needs, not race WILL THE SUPREME COURT DISMANTLE THE ADMINISTRATIVE STATE? Leftist mag Mother Jones: Let's celebrate govt. bureaucrats on Fourth of July Paris Resembles War Zone as France Endures Sixth Night of Migrant-Driven Rioting The Guardian's view on the riots in France: a grim tale of the growing gulf between haves and have-nots Tuesday, July 4. 2023Boats and thunderstorms
I've been boating in thunderstorms. Not recommended.
Happy 4th
We are lucky to have readers all over the world. To all of our American readers, Happy 4th of July. Monday, July 3. 2023Sunspots reach a highDo you know how to make an alternator?Even in theory? Much less a marine alternator...Yeah, we had to make a little one in Jr. High School Science. Fun with wires and magnets and stuff. But a functional explosion-proof marine one? God forbid. A/C current is cool. The people who design and make such things are smarter than I am.
Of course that was not a Roman pizzaThat Pompeii fresco could never have been pizza as we think of it. Sure, humans have put stuff on breads since bread was first made because bread alone is boring. It probably was like focaccia with stuff on it. No tomato or mozzarella though. Maybe fruit, oil, herbs. Pastry stuff less boring, as in our galette post yesterday. Looks like a pizza. While the typical Italian-American "tomato pie" is what Americans tend to think of, pretty much anything can be cooked on a pizza crust. In Southern Italy and Sicily, the menu will have 40-50 choices, most without tomato. Consider figs with goat cheese. Or, in my photo from Sicily, egg and olive with pureed red pepper.
Reposted: The interview with Bari WeissMonday morning linksSome US cities are replacing 4th of July fireworks with environmentally friendly drones Isn't the noise the thrill? Success Academy smashes Regents AND lefty lies on standardized testing Wow. Do NYC charter schools admit any white kids? RFK Jr. denounces Supreme Court ruling striking down affirmative action Hmmm Musk's Tweet-Limiting Move Is To Prevent The Completion Of The "AI-Censorship-Death-Star" And Just Like That, Sex Talk Comes to Work. Younger workers have less sex, but they talk about it at the office I'm Afraid We Have To Talk About "Her Penis" The trans revolution, the most startling and unforeseeable in human history, is all the more remarkable for its scientific illiteracy and philosophical incoherence. Defiant Harvard vows to continue to use race in admissions decisions Of course. They do not want to be an all-Asian school The shoplifting epidemic taking over America with a $100B annual price tag Asian Americans Celebrate Affirmative Action Ruling With 5-Minute Study Break More gloomy news from Biden! White House backs plan to BLOCK sunlight from hitting surface of the Earth in bid to limit global warming Bill Gates wants to spray millions of tonnes of CHALK into the stratosphere to reflect sunlight and slow global warming EVs pay no gas taxes LIBERALS BECLOWN THEMSELVES IN REACTION TO SCOTUS DECISIONS Winsome Sears Nukes Ketanji Brown Jackson's Dissent: ‘Chosen Because She’s Black’ Michelle Obama rage-tweets about blacks being oppressed -- from a fancy Greek yacht vacay out in the Mediterranean THE FRENCH RIOTS: WHAT HAPPENED? France Has Fallen: Migrant Mob Torch Mayor’s Home, Wife and Kids Injured Escaping The Wagner 'Coup' Was Staged by Putin—and the West Fell for It | Opinion Sunday, July 2. 2023Summer dessert: Fruit GaletteThe 80/20 Rule
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From today's LectionaryGenesis 22:1-14 22:1 After these things God tested Abraham. He said to him, "Abraham!" And he said, "Here I am." 22:2 He said, "Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains that I shall show you." 22:3 So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and his son Isaac; he cut the wood for the burnt offering, and set out and went to the place in the distance that God had shown him. 22:4 On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place far away. 22:5 Then Abraham said to his young men, "Stay here with the donkey; the boy and I will go over there; we will worship, and then we will come back to you." 22:6 Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. So the two of them walked on together. 22:7 Isaac said to his father Abraham, "Father!" And he said, "Here I am, my son." He said, "The fire and the wood are here, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?" 22:8 Abraham said, "God himself will provide the lamb for a burnt offering, my son." So the two of them walked on together. 22:9 When they came to the place that God had shown him, Abraham built an altar there and laid the wood in order. He bound his son Isaac, and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. 22:10 Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to kill his son. 22:11 But the angel of the LORD called to him from heaven, and said, "Abraham, Abraham!" And he said, "Here I am." 22:12 He said, "Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me." 22:13 And Abraham looked up and saw a ram, caught in a thicket by its horns. Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son. 22:14 So Abraham called that place "The LORD will provide"; as it is said to this day, "On the mount of the LORD it shall be provided." Saturday, July 1. 2023Beautiful tennisSaturday morning linksOld Weird America - The dark comedies of Charles Portis Ask Amy: We told him not to come to the wedding, but we still wanted his money Saturday Miscellany - STUART SCHNEIDERMAN Canadian smoke is racist Homelessness up 10% in LA despite a flood of money for programs They prefer camping ‘Quarantrans’: How the pandemic hatched a new generation of transgender people The Tide Is Turning On Transgender Tolerance WTH Is Going on with Hunter Biden? Boston University law students offered therapy in response to recent Supreme Court decisions Justices Thomas And Jackson Help Us Understand Judicial Activism Joe Biden to Announce New Plan on Student Loans After Supreme Court Strikes Down His Bailout Program Glenn Reynolds: Affirmative Action's Demise and Higher Education - Fruits of a credibility collapse France Deploys 'Armored Military Vehicles' To Combat Nationwide Riots Friday, June 30. 2023Americans don't want racial division
People, especially those with resources, often game college admissions for the most competitive and well-known names. That's how people tend to be. Despite the Supremes, very few colleges are highly-competitive. America has thousands of colleges, and most will give almost anybody a try. They need warm seats, and can be excellent for motivated young men and women. What is the history of the Racial Diversity ethic? The always thoughtful Peter Wood: Why the Supreme Court’s Harvard decision matters
Friday morning links
8 Surefire Ways To Get Your Wife To Stop Being Mad At You Glorious Renée Fleming on her Kennedy Center honor and wild, globe-hopping tour Feminists have a greater preference for premium beauty products, study finds Why do people think conservatives are mean? WSJ: Why K-12 education is in decline Rochelle Walensky: America needs more despair How Higher Ed operates as a cut-throat business Yesterday, Public reported on the new House Judiciary Commiteee report on how the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has been engaged in an effort with big tech companies to censor American citizens. Traumatized DeSantis Venezuelans: Martha's Vineyard ROCKS! ‘Affirmative Action’ Was Racist from Day One — And It Will Continue Harsanyi: Justice Jackson is free to make the case that our history has robbed black Americans of their agency, and so the Fourteenth Amendment should be rewritten. She is free to believe that Asian Americans and whites, and perhaps others, do not deserve equal protection under the law. But those arguments belong in the editorial pages of The Atlantic or The New York Times, not in the Supreme Court. Thursday, June 29. 2023Political fun
Yes, politics is entertainment. It's fun the way the Dems now term RFK "the threat to democracy and science." Sheesh - I thought Trump was. All he does is ask questions, but not too medically-sophisticated. Not dangerous. True, he has an allegedly ugly Kennedy-esque past which will all come to light (not just the drugs) but nobody's perfect. Tucker is wrong about autism. There is an explanation for the diagnosis rise: the diagnostic criteria changed to include many people who had been called Asperger's or other sort-off odd and eccentric things. Tucker is right about upspeak/uptalk. It is awful. Is Bobby Kennedy now the most censored person in the US?
Justice Thomas' commentThe Supremes' decision on affirmative action, I think, will make no practical difference. It's very American, though, to say that nobody is special. His comment on Justice Roberts' majority decision:
Don't let this guy debate Joe Biden
He's being censored.
Thursday morning linksImage from somewhere An Enormous Gravity ‘Hum’ Moves Through the Universe Yeah. I thought it was my tinnitus but it's probably climate change World Gone Cuckoo - Theodore Dalrymple Spectator: You can never escape the suburbs. How I learned to stop worrying and love the ’burbs Netherlands euthanizing autistic and intellectually handicapped people, researcher finds Jordan Peterson battles in court over demand to undergo remedial training or lose license UCLA refuses to hire professor who criticised DEI. Yoel Inbar's appointment has been blocked by a student petition The Demise of the Garage Inventor - How Hollywood forgot the tinkering dad NYC Mandates All Pizza Must Be Cooked Under A Bathroom Hand Dryer SWEDEN GOES NUCLEAR Man, I love hard work. I could watch it all day. Closing schools, forcing them to wear masks and endure the hardships of social distancing, and vaccinating them, could only be justified in terms of stopping community spread. None of these measures had a reasonable impact on the dynamics of infection. At $200B, COVID Aid was the Biggest Fraud in History. "17 percent of all funds issued under the two programs" Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs Signs Executive Order to Allow State Employee to Have Sex Change Surgeries Covered By Health Insurance Sheesh. At the least it's cosmetic surgery for Self-dysphoria "Nonbinary" claims in NJ are "skyrocketing" 250 Hollywood Celebrities Sign Letter Demanding Big Tech Censor Anyone Who Opposes Trans Surgeries On Kids Social contagion is an interesting phenomenon Even progressive voters don’t like racial affirmative action Ramaswamy on cultural rot THE NEW YORK TIMES CONFIRMS IT: IRS WHISTLEBLOWER TOLD THE TRUTH Wednesday, June 28. 2023"Musical theater genius"Two of Aaron Burr's homes (downtown and uptown), and Hamilton's farmhouse, are still be be seen on Manhattan. That's Mrs. BD's brief review after seeing "Hamilton" on Broadway last night. She's well-informed about such things. Snippets:
Common senseMusk is a common-sense fellow, and good fun. Tucker interviewed Elon Musk a few days ago:
Wednesday morning linksStill Waiting For The Magical Future Of Free Wind Power Why Pride lost the public - ‘Gays and women are bearing the brunt of the gender ideology nonsense’ NYT Accidentally Shows Why Sex Changes Are So Dangerous Economist: Should you send your children to private school? As shortcuts to elite universities, American schools work better than British ones School performance is even worse than you think Biden Admin Says Its COVID Spending for Schools Will Boost Test Scores. Districts Used the Funds for Staff Bonuses. Professor admits American flag makes him 'anxious' during Flag Day interview Out-of-Touch Obama in Massive Self-Awareness Fail NYC Milestone: Migrants Outnumber New Yorkers in Homeless Shelters Tucker Carlson Dares To Ask "Why Exactly Are We At War With Russia?" What We’re Reading About Russia - What does Wagner's failed coup mean for Putin, the war, and the world? Making sense of a baffling—and still unfolding—story. That was no "failed coup" Tuesday, June 27. 2023QQQ"Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it's time to pause and reflect.“ Mark Twain US marine radio performance
We're told it's always a good idea to have a hand-held VHF too. If not a boater, it's interesting anyway.
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