Maggie's Farm

Luskin on Obama, with comments on the Social Security mess

Today's Insanities

Repubs cannot reply to obvious Leftist intimidation

Maternity Prom dresses? How enlightened and progressive.

Just give me a dang table gift. Capt. Capitalism

A deep thinker? Justice Kennedy's Song of Himself. Related: Liberals collectively pee in their pants. I just want one more guy or gal in there who reveres the Constitution more than their personal preferences.

The self-inflicted economic death of Ohio. WSJ. A sad story. I like Ohio.

A website about "Creative Capitalism." My view: "Creative Capitalism" is the opiate of the mega-wealthy. If I invest in a business, I want my full share of the profits. I will decide, myself, what to give away, and to whom.

Nanny state fest, at Blue Crab. Just read a few of his latest. Related, at Betsy: No scores for games. As she comments, "It's clear that future battles of Britain won't be won on its playing fields."

The greatest student prank of all time. Tiger

Please remember this 13th Century Law from the City of Augsburg:

The selling of bad beer is a crime against Christian love. — Law, the City of Augsburg, 13th Century

Via Free Republic:

DURAGI, Afghanistan -- Early morning, and 14 U.S. soldiers stand in a semi-circle for a mission briefing. Four Humvees, engines running, rumble beside them. "We're going to Warshallah today," Army Capt. Sam Karr, 28, of Manhattan, Kan., tells his platoon. "I guess it has, like, 200 bad guys in it. That's nothing, dudes -- we've got 14, so we're good."

We re-post this essay by Gertrude Himmelfarb each year. One quote, on the thoughtful Columbia guy Lionel Trilling's thoughts about T.S. Eliot:

Marxism was not the only thing that Trilling (by way of Eliot) called into question. He challenged liberalism as well. Totalitarianism, Eliot had said, was inherently "pagan," for it recognized no authority or principle but that of the state. And liberalism, far from providing an alternative to paganism, actually contained within itself the seeds of paganism, in its materialism and relativism. Only Christianity, Eliot argued--the "Idea" of Christianity, not its pietistic or revivalist expressions--could resist totalitarianism, because only Christianity offered a view of man and society that promoted the ideal of "moral perfection" and "the good life." "I am inclined," Trilling quoted Eliot, "to approach public affairs from the point of view of the moralist."

Trilling hastened to qualify his endorsement of Eliot in "Elements That Are Wanted"; he did not believe morality was absolute or a "religious politics" desirable. But Eliot's vision of morality and politics was superior to the vision of liberals and radicals, who had contempt for the past and worshiped the future. Liberals, in the name of progress, put off the realization of the good life to some indefinite future; radicals put off the good life in the expectation of a revolution that would usher in not only a new society but also a new man, a man who would be "wholly changed by socialism."

Marxism was especially dangerous, Trilling found, because it combined "a kind of disgust with humanity as it is and a perfect faith in humanity as it is to be."

A "new man" was all the rage for those who wanted me to be just like they weren't - but who wanted people like me to become some subservient but heroic prole they fantasized about. They were just the new version of the same "old men" of history - self-anointed for "virtue" and "wisdom," and seeking power and perks on our backs and on our nickel while they spun their grand theories. I think they forgot that proles like me learned to read in the meantime.

Eliot, and Trilling, knew otherwise.

Photo: Lionel Trilling. As demanding a Prof as you could ever have.

The equally-great Jacques Barzun was out of that same mold: dignified, formal, remote, but willing to give you two chances to prove that you weren't a complete idiot and just an educated fool. No tolerance for fools, and these guys had a radar for glib assertions, shallow sentiment, and cant - and for out-of-context quotes. Academic boot camp is what these guys offered you.

I'll begin with the hopeful message of Jeremiah 29:11-14 (which is not from today's Lectionary), regarding the dispersal of the Jews and their 70 years of captivity in Babylon. God does not like false prophets. As Matthew Henry's Commentary on this part of Jeremiah says: "Let men beware how they call those prophets whom they choose after their own fancies, and how they consider their fancies and dreams to be revelations from God. False prophets flatter people in their sins, because they love to be flattered; and they speak smoothly to their prophets, that their prophets may speak smoothly to them."

11 For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. 12 Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. 14 I will be found by you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back from captivity. I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile."

Here's the reading from today's lectionary, with the context of Jeremiah 28:

In that same year, at the beginning of the reign of King Zedekiah of Judah, in the fifth month of the fourth year, the prophet Hananiah son of Azzur, from Gibeon, spoke to me in the house of the Lord, in the presence of the priests and all the people, saying, ²“Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: I have broken the yoke of the king of Babylon. ³Within two years I will bring back to this place all the vessels of the Lord’s house, which King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon took away from this place and carried to Babylon. ⁴I will also bring back to this place King Jeconiah son of Jehoiakim of Judah, and all the exiles from Judah who went to Babylon, says the Lord, for I will break the yoke of the king of Babylon.” ⁵Then the prophet Jeremiah spoke to the prophet Hananiah in the presence of the priests and all the people who were standing in the house of the Lord; ⁶and the prophet Jeremiah said, “Amen! May the Lord do so; may the Lord fulfill the words that you have prophesied, and bring back to this place from Babylon the vessels of the house of the Lord, and all the exiles. ⁷But listen now to this word that I speak in your hearing and in the hearing of all the people. ⁸The prophets who preceded you and me from ancient times prophesied war, famine, and pestilence against many countries and great kingdoms. ⁹As for the prophet who prophesies peace, when the word of that prophet comes true, then it will be known that the Lord has truly sent the prophet.”

¹⁰Then the prophet Hananiah took the yoke from the neck of the prophet Jeremiah, and broke it. ¹¹And Hananiah spoke in the presence of all the people, saying, “Thus says the Lord: This is how I will break the yoke of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon from the neck of all the nations within two years.” At this, the prophet Jeremiah went his way. ¹²Sometime after the prophet Hananiah had broken the yoke from the neck of the prophet Jeremiah, the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah: ¹³Go, tell Hananiah, Thus says the Lord: You have broken wooden bars only to forge iron bars in place of them! ¹⁴For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: I have put an iron yoke on the neck of all these nations so that they may serve King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, and they shall indeed serve him; I have even given him the wild animals. ¹⁵And the prophet Jeremiah said to the prophet Hananiah, “Listen, Hananiah, the Lord has not sent you, and you made this people trust in a lie. ¹⁶Therefore thus says the Lord: I am going to send you off the face of the earth. Within this year you will be dead, because you have spoken rebellion against the Lord.” ¹⁷In that same year, in the seventh month, the prophet Hananiah died.

Image: The Prophet Jeremiah (1311, Siena)

Stumbled into this Teddy Roosevelt web site recently. Teddy is a hero and a role model to many because of his overcoming illness as a youth, his adventures in the West, his wide range of interests, his voluminous writings on all subjects from hunting and natural history to policy (he published more books than any other President), his robust approach to life which allowed him to gallop his horse straight down the sand dunes of Oyster Bay and straight up San Juan Hill, and to hike through the chest-deep ice-covered Rock Creek in January as President, often with diplomats in tow. Not to mention his achievements as President, from negotiating the truce in the Russo-Japanese War, projecting American power world-wide, championing conservation, and championing economic justice for workers. The two Edmund Morris volumes tell it all, down to the details of Teddy's wacky tennis game and his remarkable skills as a rifleman, despite poor eyesight. This bird-watching family man with the high squeaky voice, a fine pedigree but chronic money problems, and a giant faith in America, was larger than life.

It's well-known that folks from the NY Metropolitan area rarely or never visit their own tourist attractions, but a visit to Roosevelt's relatively modest home, Sagamore Hill, in Oyster Bay on Long Island (not far from NYC) is a good outing. Little has changed there since his death, except, sadly, for the selling off of much of his farm, which originally extended down to the shores of Long Island Sound. Read the Sagamore Hill sites here and here before you go, because tickets sell out.

Photo of Teddy as NYC Police Commissioner around 1895.

Think about it for one second - don't you have a little itch somewhere on your skin right now? It's considered poor manners to scratch in public, but sometimes you just have to do it. I am not watching you.

Learn all the latest about The Itch.

The Wild Swan is a 39' Sparkman & Stephens-designed sloop, built in 1947. Mahogany over white oak. She is for sale, here.

This is a perfect example of why boats are called "she."

I know nothing about Italian gun laws, but it seems timely to post this photo I took of a poster for Delta Firearms Academy last week on a street in Domodossola, while wandering around waiting for the train to Locarno.

Our friends in DC should maybe give Inizio a call.

For the birds that cannot soar, God has provided low branches.

Turkish proverb

Losing the poetry is losing the soul.

Neoneo on how the modern translations of the Bible drain it of vitality, and turn it into a Hallmark card. I rarely use the King James here, even though it's my favorite.

More from The Amazing Rhythm Aces:

This is the old Grand Hotel des Isles Borromee, a 5-star place built in 1863 on the Stresa waterfront.

Story at Powerline.

Related: Mr. Mashangva loves Dylan's music

Our friend Nathan, whose Aliyah Diary you may recall on this site and who now is based in Jerusalem, gets around. He sent this email note to us yesterday:

Who'da thunk that in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, the Region VII meeting of the American Guild of English Bell Ringers would meet today?  Sioux Falls, ground out by the Sioux River well after the Permian-Triassic, has quartzite boulders that churn-up the river waters which were unable to wear them out 10,000 years ago. Pipestone, used for peace pipes, and cordovan-tinted quartzite remain here. You can go to the remains of the Falls just south of downtown to stroll and be sprayed by the Falls. Best to go when the wind is Southerly, as a Northerly summer wind will suffocate you with the stench of carcasses from one of the largest packing plants in the US. While levees are undermined or overflowed in bordering Iowa and Missouri, the quartzite here holds up to the tumultuous torrents.

But bell ringing? I slipped into the rehearsal last night around 830, after they had heard a performance by the group from England. The night before, the hotel manager revealed to me, the Brits had gathered for tea around 10 pm in the cafe at the base of the Hyatt-like atrium. Then, they burst into music, filling nearby empty wine glasses with carefully aliquoted water, then rim-ringing the glasses.  A glass harmonica they transformed into. This high-pitch rose in the atrium and arose the other denizens of the Sioux Falls  Sheraton, who generally dress cowpokey. The manager, a sliver-coiffed Mr. Russo, who dresses in stylish Italian silk and tassled loafers, quietly grumbled that he has had to toss rowdy drinkers from the atrium. But, tea-drinkers, Tea? Russo was incredulous.

Nevertheless, by Thursday night, the bellers were gathered in the nearby conference center, which, in fact, is an indoor sports stadium with signs for "Ticket Purchase" or Ticket Pick-up" and "No Outside Liquor Permitted" guarding the entrance. I was porting my J. Lohr Cabernet, which I could not finish at dinner and no one challenged me. But, there was no booze being served here. Perhaps tea later.

Here are just a few of my observations and thoughts about our trip to northern Italy:

1. There must be a law that, in settled areas, there can be no spot from which one cannot hit a Gelateria with a stone.

2. Essentially no American visitors up there. Lots of Scandinavians, Germans, Swiss and Brits - and Italians from the south. Plus some French and Japanese. A small handful of American honeymooners. All of the trattorias have some German stuff on the menu, like wiener schnitzel with French fries.

3. Never eat a pizza in Italy, except maybe around Naples. The Italians make terrible pizza. Domino's is far better, and Domino's ain't so good. The Dyl says that the California Pizza chain is the best, California Pizza Kitchen or whatever it is called. They should open some in Italy.

4.  The driver who drove us to the airport in Milan (who had been a sous-chef in London in a previous life and who is planning a trip to Montana in September) brought us up to date on the Wall Street arrests. He said that the Italians were mightily impressed. "Here," he said, "businessmen and politicians never get arrested. That is why we have no trust in our institutions."

5. The microclimate around the large lakes of the Piedmont permits the growing of palms and citrus within view of snow-capped Alps. Quite unique. You can grow anything there, hence all of the famous gardens.

6. Internet access there is a major pain. They don't seem to have wireless anywhere, and the hotels charge you between 15-22 Euros per hour to use their half-assed and temperamental connections.

7. It was great fun to hang out with the Dyl. He has big energy and a strong sense of adventure, and his Italian came in handy at times, too. He beat me at chess on one of those outdoor giant-size boards you can walk on, on the edge of Lago Maggiore. I played White: my attack was overly aggressive and I stubbed my toe with my bishop. He knows how to exploit somebody's error.

More observations to come over the next week or so...and more photos, including ones from our side trip into the Italian Alps.

Here's one of the albino peacocks that inhabit the Borromeo islands, perched on an urn in the rain in the incredible gardens of Isola Bella. The cliche "proud as a peacock" is not without merit. The baroque style Italian gardens of Isola Bella are among the most famous gardens in the world, and parts of them are reminiscent (I think) of the hanging gardens of Babylon.

More photos of Isola Bella below:

A video tribute to the guys (and gals) in harm's way, from Theo

Why are they sending me this advt? "You may qualify for Medicare to pay for your powered wheelchair." Sheesh. Not quite yet.

The Caracas-Jihad connection. NY Sun

The train wreck of single-payer medical care in California.

Same thing happens in China: Being a baby girl in India is a bad deal. The multiculturalist cult demands that we respect this, however.

Ten interesting facts about kissing

The Left takes on Toyota and the Prius. They can whine all they want, but I won't listen until a communist country builds a car anybody would chose to buy.

RIP Tim Russert. NYT

Psalm 17

¹Hear a just cause, O Lord; attend to my cry; give ear to my prayer from lips free of deceit.
²From you let my vindication come; let your eyes see the right.
³If you try my heart, if you visit me by night, if you test me, you will find no wickedness in me; my mouth does not transgress.
⁴As for what others do, by the word of your lips I have avoided the ways of the violent.
⁵My steps have held fast to your paths; my feet have not slipped.
⁶I call upon you, for you will answer me, O God; incline your ear to me, hear my words.
⁷Wondrously show your steadfast love, O savior of those who seek refuge from their adversaries at your right hand.
⁸Guard me as the apple of the eye; hide me in the shadow of your wings,
⁹from the wicked who despoil me, my deadly enemies who surround me.
¹⁰They close their hearts to pity; with their mouths they speak arrogantly.
¹¹They track me down; now they surround me; they set their eyes to cast me to the ground.
¹²They are like a lion eager to tear, like a young lion lurking in ambush.
¹³Rise up, O Lord, confront them, overthrow them! By your sword deliver my life from the wicked,
¹⁴from mortals—by your hand, O Lord— from mortals whose portion in life is in this world. May their bellies be filled with what you have stored up for them; may their children have more than enough; may they leave something over to their little ones.
¹⁵As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake I shall be satisfied, beholding your likeness.

Nice trip. Saw a lot. Nice to be back, too. Will share some thoughts about it shortly, and some photos, but I don't have time to do that right now. Many thanks to Dr. Merc for pitching in to help Team Maggie.

Also, on this trip I think I managed to persuade our Dylanologist (by plying him with Barbera D'Asti and plenty of food) to post, in the near future, some pieces about 1) The historical white slave trade in Africa 2) The new questions about Continental Drift theory and 3) The final days of the Roman Empire (with special attention to the last chariot race in the Circus Maximus and to the day that the aqueducts ceased to carry water to a dying Rome). The Dyl has a wide range of interests - as we all do, here on the Farm, and the catastrophic collapse of Roman civilization in the West is of great interest to all of us.

But, first, this unique and historically symbolic photo which demonstrates my successful delivery of the Skippy Peanut Butter (one Extra Crunchy, one Smooth) to the Dyl and his peanut butter-deprived friends in Italy, from my hotel balcony overlooking lovely Lago Maggiore. Where else would you find such an odd photo except here at Maggies?

The Amazing Rhythm Aces (1976) - h/t, Reader

Sonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed.
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;
Nor shall death brag thou wand'rest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st,
  So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
  So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

A re-post from the archives:

It feels very bad to me to know that the fate of the Everglades is in the hands of the notoriously and historically disreputable Miami-Dade County Commissioners.  I'd like to hope that their bad days are past.

It's tough to be an ideological purist in real life. I've known Libertarians who went nuts when a neighbor put in a tennis court too close to his property line. And it is true that we all have a stake in the land. Developers, and the folks they sell to - homeowners and stores and businesses - will always want more if there is profit in it; conservationists will always want more of which to be good stewards; farmers - and I don't mean small family farms in Fla - will always want what they need. So it's always a battle for conservationists. (I don't mean environmentalists, whatever they are.)

My solution tends to be to urge groups to assemble themselves to buy up land, or to buy up the development rights to land, if they want to protect and preserve it for the future. States, land trusts, conservation groups, ad hoc groups with an interest in a specific piece of land. This can be done without a sacrifice of property rights.

BUT it is best done BEFORE there is economic pressure on the land. Unfortunately, people tend to be of the Big Yellow Taxi school: "You don't know what you got til it's gone. You take paradise, put up a parking lot."

I have no doubt that one of my literary heroes, Carl Hiassen, is on the story. I missed him on 60 Minutes last week, but was told that he is as funny in person as he is in print. If you haven't read him, especially his early handful of books, they are absurdist, black humor mysteries set in South Florida, with memorably strange characters, many of them deeply depraved, corrupt, and plain evil.

Carl cares about conservation and he loves Florida, and, bless his heart, he remains a reporter in Miami, so I will count on him to take care of this story, and this problem.

This is the Fin-Duck Sauna Cruising Boat. It's probably a bit large to function as a decoy: