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.
Just what is it that academics have to fear if they stand up for common decency, instead of letting campus barbarians run amok? At a prestigious college like Swarthmore, every student who trampled on other people’s rights could be expelled and there would be plenty of prospective students available to take their places.
National Community Reinvestment Coalition president John Taylor points
to “racial disparities in mortgage lending” in Baltimore as reason
enough for government to force banks to make more loans to blacks
“Future generations will wonder in bemused amazement that the early twenty-first century’s developed world went into hysterical panic over a globally average temperature increase of a few tenths of a degree, and, on the basis of gross exaggerations of highly uncertain computer projections combined into implausible chains of inference, proceeded to contemplate a rollback of the industrial age.”
He was fortunate to be a guest at the Alhambra (when it was not in very good shape) for a month or so, exploring Grenada. Lots of treacherous travel, and many historical reminders - especially the remarkable contributions of the Moslems to Western civilization via Spain. As in Sicily, the Moslems had been good, intellectual rulers who were interested in justice, careful governance, science, architecture, music, and technology.
There was no sharia law or any of that barbarian nonsense. I suppose the Spanish natives were dhimmis, in a sense.
The Christian armies which chased them out were barbarians by comparison, but that was long ago. A quote from the book:
There are two classes of people to whom life seems like one long holiday - the very rich and the very poor; one, because they need to do nothing, the other, because they have nothing to do. But there are none who understand the art of doing nothing and living upon nothing , better than the poor classes of Spain. Climate does one half, temperament the rest...
Talk of poverty! with him it has no disgrace. It sits upon him with a grandiose style, like his ragged cloak. He is a hidalgo, even when in rags.
Most of the short book consists of tales and legends from the time of Moslem rule: genies and sorcerers and talking owls, hidden treasures, princes and princesses - even a Moslem prince who marries a Christian princess.
Photo: It's a dumb holiday, meaningless. Drinking until midnight with a silly hat on no longer appeals to me. Never did, really. Furthermore, I am meeting my trainer at our little gym at 5 tomorrow am to get the year started on the right foot. And champagne gives me heartburn.
I’m
not convinced women who are on Tinder who say “no hookups” actually
mean that. - See more at:
http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2015/12/ninjaeconomics-on-tinder-from-the-comments.html#sthash.D8NZrvy2.dpuf
Building strength, power, and endurance are our goals (along with minimizing disgusting body fat) until we reach a point of satisfaction and can move into fitness-maintenance. The "Body-building" is not a goal per se, but some of that accompanies strength improvement. Vigor and "functional fitness."
I did heavy weights this morning. It is so damn difficult mentally and physically. On several sets I reached muscle failure and pain before meeting my boss' expected goals du jour. There is no way for an amateur to do weight work without a trainer (need a spotter, a constant technique-correcter, and somebody to push you harder and to raise the weights each week). He said "Good, we're breaking down those muscles, tearing those fibers." Indeed. Body feels like jello.
A little liquid carb and protein are supposedly good after heavy weights - and an Advil: Why Bother With Recovery Drinks? I need to do that, but one salted hard-boiled egg is all I can handle in the morning on a normal day. Carbs feel revolting to me before 6 pm unless I am in a diner with a friend. Part of my problem is that I do not really like food very much, however elegant and fancy. It just doesn't do much for me or my soul. Just makes me tired.
"Recovery" time and nutrition do not apply to cardio (aerobic) exercise and conditioning, only to heavy resistance efforts where it can take 3-5 days for recovery and reconstruction of a given muscle group. We only do dead lifts once a week, for example, but we push it to the max - to the point when one asks "Why the hell am I here doing this when I could be in bed instead of lifting this f-ing Volkswagen only to put it down again at 5 a.m.?"
It is interesting to learn that cardio exercises (aerobics), over time, can reduce muscle size and power. Cardio training and strength training do not mix well, in fact, because the body responds to them differently: Controlling Muscle Breakdown
Still, most of us white-collar, sedentary fitness-seekers want improvement in all areas so we have to do the best we can with them. Push them all and hope for the best. If we were peasants in the fields, we'd be in better shape. Over the next four or five months I hope to build towards a simplified work-out of multi-muscle-group exercises: Dead lifts, bench press, chin ups, pull-ups, rows, barbell squats, step-ups with military presses, planks. That will have taken one year in May 2016 to maybe reduce my wonderful trainer from 3 to 1 or 2 days/week.
That, plus combos of jump (speed) rope, stair machine, elliptical, treadmill for the cardio part on my "off" days. In total, moving with maximum exertion and intention 40-60 minutes per day, 5-6 days/week for the indefinite future. I gave myself 12 months to get into half-decent condition for my age, and have approached it with total dedication despite my lazy-ass body yelling "Stop! I don't feel like doing this!"
"I don't feel like it" is the death of decadent Western Civilization and of the human spirit. It is spirit-less. So is gluttony, and all of the other deadly sins. I think Character, like muscle strength, is built through pure, ungratifying, unpleasant effort. I have almost always done my best with that. On occasion, not - to my endless shame.
To look at me with clothes on, no difference is noticeable except for better posture and slight bulging in the shoulders of my old suits. I was never in bad shape, but was beginning to lose fitness and energy over time and to create a small paunch. I am glad to see that some of my pals are getting on board with this pursuit of the fountain of youth.
(At some point in the future, Crossfit (the regular, not the competitive version) might be a good addition to a maintenance work-out program, and more fun with a cohesive random group and lots of exercise variety. Their programs seem to push you to your personal max, whether you are fat or a 95-lb hollow-chested weakling, 18 years old or 80 years old, an athlete or a heart-attack survivor or stroke patient.)
“Social justice” was purportedly a new addition to the classical legal, distributive, and commutative justice ideas found in Aristotle. It was rather connected with the Leviathan state. Social justice was based on the idea that what is “due” to people for their flourishing is what decides their good. It was not personal virtue that was at the center of moral and political life. Social and political “structures” determined virtue and vice.
So the “vocation” to “social justice” derived its nobility from “service” to the poor and down-trodden through promises to “re-structure” the state or economy. Oftentimes this renovation of society was promoted in revolutionary terms, because state and social “structures” determined the meaning of virtue and vice. “Social justice” always hovered in the shadow of totalitarianism. The state became the center of all human life. Social Justice received its self-justification from what it distributed to everyone.
I found the movie tedious. In addition, it ignored obvious factors which were crucial to the story:
For starters, everybody knew there was a US housing bubble and a mortgage bubble. Dr. Burry was not the only one, but the credit default swaps was a brilliant approach to shorting what was bound to fall sooner or later.
Everybody knew that a large number of mortgages were junk. You could read about it on the internets every day.
Everybody knew that, since Clinton, banks were required to expand mortgage availability to high credit risks. This was not voluntary.
Naturally, banks did not want to keep that junk on their books. They packaged them and sold them to sophisticated willing institutional buyers around the world, same as any other asset a bank did not wish to hold. Can't blame the bankers for doing that. It's their job to sell stuff. It's common sense.
One good thing was included: the slipperiness of the debt rating agencies.
Everybody likes to find a scapegoat. Moral of the story, in my view: Bubbles happen, and always burst. Shorting bubbles makes sense. It just takes balls. Other morals: Abolish Freddie Mac And Fannie Mae - and the Fed. And the notion of "too big to fail."
How silently, how silently, The wondrous Gift is giv'n! So God imparts to human hearts The blessings of His heaven. No ear may hear His coming, But in this world of sin, Where meek souls will receive Him still, The dear Christ enters in.
'A cold coming we had of it, Just the worst time of the year For a journey, and such a long journey: The ways deep and the weather sharp, The very dead of winter.' And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory, Lying down in the melting snow. There were times we regretted The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces, And the silken girls bringing sherbet. Then the camel men cursing and grumbling And running away, and wanting their liquor and women, And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters, And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly And the villages dirty and charging high prices: A hard time we had of it. At the end we preferred to travel all night, Sleeping in snatches, With the voices singing in our ears, saying That this was all folly.
Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley, Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation; With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness, And three trees on the low sky, And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow. Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel, Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver, And feet kicking the empty wine-skins. But there was no information, and so we continued And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.
All this was a long time ago, I remember, And I would do it again, but set down This set down This: were we led all that way for Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly, We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death, But had thought they were different; this Birth was Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death. We returned to our places, these Kingdoms, But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation, With an alien people clutching their gods. I should be glad of another death.
Theodore Dalrymple - 
In 1829 the great American author 
John 1:(1-9), 10-18
Goodbye to 2015, 
Photo: 55 Plus MPH: 
Christmas Eve in the Ardennes 1944
Psalm 148
"I can explain it to you, but I can't understand it for you."
Sippican: