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.
See how the Orient Dew, Shed from the Bosom of the Morn Into the blowing Roses, Yet careless of its Mansion new; For the clear Region where 'twas born Round in its self incloses: And in its little Globes Extent, Frames as it can its native Element. How it the purple flow'r does slight, Scarce touching where it lyes, But gazing back upon the Skies, Shines with a mournful Light; Like its own Tear, Because so long divided from the Sphear. Restless it roules and unsecure, Trembling lest it grow impure: Till the warm Sun pitty it's Pain, And to the Skies exhale it back again.
So the Soul, that Drop, that Ray Of the clear Fountain of Eternal Day, Could it within the humane flow'r be seen, Remembring still its former height, Shuns the sweat leaves and blossoms green; And, recollecting its own Light, Does, in its pure and circling thoughts, express The greater Heaven in an Heaven less. In how coy a Figure wound, Every way it turns away: So the World excluding round, Yet receiving in the Day. Dark beneath, but bright above: Here disdaining, there in Love. How loose and easie hence to go: How girt and ready to ascend. Moving but on a point below, It all about does upwards bend. Such did the Manna's sacred Dew destil; White, and intire, though congeal'd and chill. Congeal'd on Earth: but does, dissolving, run Into the Glories of th' Almighty Sun.
As much as I hate that wind turbines have become this symbol of youthful "green action" and as much as I love birds....
They kill an estimated 40,000 birds a year -- compare that to the hundreds of millions that domestic and feral cats kill, 174 million killed by power lines, 1 billion killed by windows, 70 million killed by pesticides, 80 million killed by cars, and 50 million killed by lighted communication towers. I know you're targeting the hypocrisy of the green movement, but there are better hypocrisies to target.
You might as well be protesting windows here, BD.
If you want green hypocrisy and stupidity, check out the green plastic hard hats distributed at "Power Shift" and all the students who drove across the country to go the event (as I'm sure you'll be excited to target young, misinformed enthusiasm). A ton of my friends went to that inane, completely masturbatory event... Ridiculous. This is the kind of thing I hate: http://i.imgur.com/UTHSn.jpg
Or even look at the "greenwashing" of GE, AEP and Exxon.
Turbines are not effective energy in urban areas, but are entirely helpful in at least reducing nuclear waste in rural ones. You would need something like 1700 turbines to generate the same power as a nuclear power station, but doesn't that make sense in a smaller setting?
What is unusual in the human record is not men stepping out on their wives. What is unusual is the model of faithful monogamy, a model that takes for granted the importance of women’s experience, not just men’s. Before the 18th century and outside of Western Europe, marriage was a social and economic as well as sexual arrangement; it had little to do with love and companionship, and no one much cared about whether women were fulfilled or not. But with the emergence of what sociologists and historians refer to as companionate marriage, intimacy became the marital ideal. Instead of arranged unions, the young made their own choice of mate based on shared interests and deep affection rather than on social requirements. Fidelity followed naturally, or so it was hoped, and it meant that, yes, people gave a merde.
While giving all your power to unelected and unaccountable leaders is one of those ideas so profoundly stupid that only the very well educated and conventionally intelligent could believe in it, many accepted the root idea that all which stood between Portugal and competitiveness was its lack of size. If Portugal joined with the other countries of Europe, all of Europe would show America a thing or two.
If my family and friends became a stone-age tribe, would the government leave us alone? I'd be willing to grow my hair down to my knees so strange, I'd look like a walking mountain range...
Remember when Hillary said that the government shouldn't be concerned with "every undercapitalized business"? These people are not aware that the majority of Americans work in or for small businesses, and that, in this economy, they are all undercapitalized to the point that higher taxes can destroy them.
They need to get out of the EU and be free to destroy their lovely country's marginal economy however they chose to do. The German Empire's rules do not suit them, and they don't care much about their economy. "Free the Greeks!" (I can't decide whether to nickname the EU the German Empire or the Holy Roman Empire ll.)
“But liberalism, Mamet thinks, is dismantling culture. The problem is that “the Left today is essentially an elitist movement, and it has invested a lot of time and money in the idea that they know better.” Elites have been led to think “by getting the grades, and getting into good schools and think-tanks and government positions that they are fit” to reorder society more rationally. But this requires first demolishing the order produced by the organic processes of tradition, democracy, and markets — the culture. Why are some so susceptible to this fatal conceit? “They get out of elite schools being told nothing but, ‘You’re the best.’” Hubris — a dramatist’s area of expertise. (The liberalism of his own elite group, the literati, he blames on “devotion to fantasy — this sort of Manichean view.”)
Left or right, the elites always know what's best for you - and what's best for themselves.
An attempted palinization of Michelle Bachmann, by Taibbi
In modern American politics, being the right kind of ignorant and entertainingly crazy is like having a big right hand in boxing; you've always got a puncher's chance. And Bachmann is exactly the right kind of completely batshit crazy. Not medically crazy, not talking-to-herself-on-the-subway crazy, but grandiose crazy, late-stage Kim Jong-Il crazy — crazy in the sense that she's living completely inside her own mind, frenetically pacing the hallways of a vast sand castle she's built in there, unable to meaningfully communicate with the human beings on the other side of the moat, who are all presumed to be enemies.
It doesn't matter who you are: if you raise your head up over the trenches, they do this to you. And they are rougher on Conservative women than on the men - although Taibbi would have written a similar hit piece on Reagan - "ignorant and batshit crazy" - I'm sure.
I home, and there we to bed again, and slept pretty well, and about nine rose, and then my wife fell into her blubbering again, and at length had a request to make to me, which was, that she might go into France, and live there, out of trouble; and then all come out, that I loved pleasure and denied her any, and a deal of do; and I find that there have been great fallings out between my father and her, whom, for ever hereafter, I must keep asunder, for they cannot possibly agree. And I said nothing, but, with very mild words and few, suffered her humour to spend, till we begun to be very quiet, and I think all will be over, and friends, and so I to the office, where all the morning doing business.
Plus sa change, plus c'est la meme chose. Sam is frequently figuring out how to deal with Mrs. P's complaints and discontents. He liked to hang out with jovial, cheerful folks between business or government deals, often returning home late from the theater or from taverns in a well-lubricated condition.
One can spend many enjoyable hours keeping up with Sam's diaries, which are more interesting - and better-written - than any Tweets or Facebook posts you will ever read. He did love life, and entered fully into it with a sense of fun and with enough discipline to make it work.
Boskin: Five Lessons for Deficit Busters - A recent study of successful deficit reductions found they averaged more than $5 in spending cuts for every $1 in tax hikes.
Note the surrealism of the European unrest: who are the “they” who “stole” the money that is now no longer there to fund socialism? Did not the socialists at last get what they wanted? The “they” who used to fund it by expanding the economy disappeared a long time ago and now are in the graveyards of Europe.
Don't Know Much About History- The popular historian David McCullough says textbooks have become 'so politically correct as to be comic.' Meanwhile, the likes of Thomas Edison get little attention.
Interestingly, NYC's Broadway was an old Lenape Indian trail into the Bronx and Westchester, later extended by the Dutch to run up to the Dutch settlement of Albany (the current Rte. 9).
We now call the North River the Hudson River. The road along the wall is Wall St. That canal, now filled in, is Broad St. Another Dutch canal further uptown, long filled in, is now Canal St.
Father's Day dinner last night with the in-laws at the Red Hat restaurant in the charming riverfront village of Irvington, NY (pop 6000). Was the town named after Washington Irving? Yes. Re-named after its distinguished resident. In fact, the hamlet of Sleepy Hollow is just north of there.
Now mainly a bedroom town, it once housed the Lord and Burnham Co. which built greenhouses and conservatories, including those of the NY Botanical Gardens. In fact, Red Hat is housed in the back of one of the old Lord and Burnham buildings. (Mrs. BD knows Irvington as the location of the home office and shop of Eileen Fisher.)
If you look south from the water's edge, you can see Manhattan 20 miles in the distance. My pic, looking north up the Hudson, has the Tappan Zee bridge. Gal in the foreground looks like Botticelli's niece - angelic, but with a sadness.
Mrs. BD cannot stop talking about this week's WAFA show in Boston. The exhibits blew her mind - and she knows about these things.
For flower art, the WAFA is the World Soccer competition. Competitive sculpture, really, but ephemeral. Four days, then it's all in dumpsters.
She said New Zealand, Pakistan, Japan, Russia, and South Africa were well-represented by designers. Even a highly-talented mother-daughter team from Zimbabwe.
Mrs. BD and her pals had nice chats with an exhibitor from Wales and one from Pakistan. They also chatted with a priest from Northern Ireland who is a famous designer, and a guy from Russia who won his division, who was there with his blond bombshell girlfriend.
I would post pics but Mrs. BD lost her iPhone right before she went. Some pics are here.
Today is the last day of the show, and it probably won't be scheduled back in the US for a decade or more. People come to the WAFA events from all over the world, and filled up Boston's hotels.
This world is full of so many interesting things to see and do that it is a wonder that anybody finds time to look at the internet.
“When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years.”
"If you have a Dad who didn’t beat or molest you, didn’t embezzle money from you or your family, and kept his whoring enough on the down-low that he has never had to address it in a press conference, you better be getting that man a present.
Dads who manage to avoid all of the things mentioned in the previous paragraph are hard to find, and deserving of praise."
It's a sad and difficult thing to grow up without a father.
My rather good post about our visit to Norcia showed a road sign to Cascia. We did not visit Cascia, but friendly folks at our Abbazia hotel later informed us that St. Rita is the saint of hopeless causes.
I thought to myself, Hmmm. Maybe a saint for Maggie's Farm, if her soul is willing.
Now back to farm work, then we're going for special celeb dinner with my Dad-in-law. Tomorrow, lunch with my own Dad and the entire family, while in-laws go to celebrate their cousin's retirement after 27 years as a beloved parish priest in Pennsylvania.
On A Drop Of Dew
One Cosmos: 
Kentucky Bourbon Distilleries 
It's been quite a while since we've had a Pepy's Diary post, but this piece of 
Mrs. BD cannot stop talking about this week's
My 