Friday, February 29. 2008
Theodore Roosevelt speaking from his porch at Sagamore Hill, 1916. The man could talk...and talk and talk. People who travelled and camped with him said he would never shut up, but he was a great storyteller. In fact, in 1912 he was shot in the chest by an assassin in Milwaukee - but insisted on finishing his speech before going to the hospital. (His eyeglass case probably saved his life.) The guy needed no teleprompter.
"Own a complete library of the most influential books of all time!"It's remarkable that things like this are produced today. Gutenberg would be pleased. Of course, there is Project Gutenberg too.
The Petersburg Courthouse, 1865, from photos of the siege of Petersburg, via Shorpy: 
Pirate King: | | For some ridiculous reason, to which, however, I’ve no desire to be disloyal, | | Some person in authority, I don’t know who, very likely the Astronomer Royal, | | Has decided that, although for such a beastly month as February, | | | twenty-eight days as a rule are plenty, | | One year in every four his days shall be reckoned as nine and twenty. | | Through some singular coincidence – I shouldn’t be surprised if it were owing to the | | | agency of an ill-natured fairy – | | You are the victim of this clumsy arrangement, having been born in leap-year, | | | on the twenty-ninth of February; | | And so, by a simple arithmetical process, you’ll easily discover, | | That though you’ve lived twenty-one years, yet, if we go by birthdays, | | | you’re only five and a little bit over! |
That entire section of The Pirates of Penzance is here.
Thursday, February 28. 2008
If you could kick the person in the pants responsible for most of your trouble, you wouldn't sit for a month. Theodore Roosevelt
Vote for your favorite English landscape (h/t, Theo). This is Dorset: 
Wednesday, February 27. 2008
 The New Yorker piece linked this morning, "What Was I Thinking?", about behavioral economics is well worth reading. It's a fascinating field of study.
Snake eats family dog. A little science education for the kiddie-poos. Insty: JOHN STOSSEL: Guns save lives. Keith Richards talks Adding to blogroll: Q and O on the economy. Ten quotes against work. (h/t, Grow a Brain) Is Obama a feminized male? The larger question: Have our politics become feminized? The case against govt. subsidies for college. NAFTA nonsense. Milbots. Is there an ethical question? I do not see one. A comment on the Sam Zell piece linked earlier: He is at least right about one thing - the Dems' needing to talk down the economy as much as they can. Doom and gloom. Photo: A view of the back of the ocean dunes, Wellfleet, MA
Something for me to remember Bill Buckley with: the Contrapunctus 1 from Bach's The Art of the Fugue, with Glenn Gould.
Gordontown, NC. Dorothea Lange, 1939 (h/t, Dr. X, who we trust does not mind the occasional theft from his remarkable photo stash) 
From So What?, by Sippican: The stage is exactly three inches and a galaxy away from the dance floor. Dance? Please. Stumble around with a woman that ain't your wife, I think. I like the old dude that looks like Batman's butler or a fruity sort of baron or something that conducts or sways or whatever it is he's doing. He's possessed with it, same as me. He's usually possessed of plenty of cake, a desire to buy a man a drink, and an aversion to arithmetic, too. The waitresses adore that.
The curtain is dirty from wiping your hands on it. Me included. It's dirty like life is. Up high, it's dirty with cobwebs and dust and corruption because you can't reach up there. Down low it's dirty with the grubby hands of all of us trying to wipe off the sweat and grease of what you're doing.
I listen for the cornshucks of the brushes on the snare. He hits it, but I don't care about that. In between -- the faint circular sketching he does without thinking -- that's what I'm after. He's lathering the dry face of the song so I can shave it with the sharp edge of the brass. The bass rumbles like thunder in the distance.
I can taste metal and blood and booze in my mouth. Tastes like life.
I wish to preach, not the doctrine of ignoble ease, but the doctrine of the strenuous life.
Theodore Roosevelt
Tuesday, February 26. 2008
I am only an average man but, by George, I work harder at it than the average man. Theodore Roosevelt
Monday, February 25. 2008
It ain't Baryshnikov - it is square-dancing tractors and a real Maggie's Farm sort of simple, county fair entertainment (h/t, Theo):
“Liberals, it has been said, are generous with other peoples' money, except when it comes to questions of national survival when they prefer to be generous with other people's freedom and security.” William F. Buckley, Jr.
Game with hunting equipment, by Willem van Aelst, 1660 
Sunday, February 24. 2008
Another shot of Cannon Mtn. Ski Area, where cannonistas appreciate the lack of upscale amenities: 
and a shot of the Franconia Inn, not far from Cannon Mtn. and Rte. 93: 
 "What office do I go to to get my reputation back?" The oxycontin story. Scary story, and I have yet to hear an apology from the NYT for the job they did on Purdue Pharma. (h/t, Town Hall)
Good example of food fear-mongering by know-nothings. The arrogant impotence of the EU. No Pasaran, who quotes a Kissinger interview: Kissinger: The major events in European history were conducted by nation-states which developed over several hundred years. There was never a question in the mind of European populations that the state was authorized to ask for sacrifices and that the citizens had a duty to carry it out. Now the structure of the nation-state has been given up to some considerable extent in Europe. And the capacity of governments to ask for sacrifices has diminished correspondingly.
SPIEGEL: Thirty years ago, you asked for one phone number that could be used to call Europe.
Kissinger: ... and it happened. The problem now is: Nation-states have not just given up part of their sovereignty to the European Union but also part of their vision for their own future. Their future is now tied to the European Union, and the EU has not yet achieved a vision and loyalty comparable to the nation-state. So, there is a vacuum between Europe's past and Europe's future.
Why Barack unnerves me. Roger Simon Try this. Something to do with the brain's wiring. Debunking Krugman about poverty in America. With some good info. (h/t, Viking) Hoyt: McCain story should not have run. 172 years ago: The battle of the Alamo began Wedding sleuths in India. Microsoft: Vista Update might mess you up. The moral hazard of a housing bailout. NYT Wild rattler in upstate NY - first film of a wild rattler feeding
(with thanks to The Anchoress for the reminder of this hopeful Psalm of David who was, indeed, a big-time sinner) Have mercy on me, God, in your kindness.
In your compassion blot out my offense.
O wash me more and more from my guilt
and cleanse me from my sin. My offenses truly I know them;
my sin is always before me
Against you, you alone, have I sinned;
what is evil in your sight I have done. That you may be justified when you give sentence
and be without reproach when you judge,
see, in guilt I was born,
a sinner was I conceived. Indeed you love truth in the heart;
then in the secret of my heart teach me wisdom.
O purify me, then I shall be clean;
O wash me, I shall be whiter than snow. Make me hear rejoicing and gladness,
that the bones you have crushed may thrill.
From my sins turn away your face
and blot out all my guilt. A pure heart create for me, O God,
put a steadfast spirit within me.
Do not cast me away from your presence,
nor deprive me of your holy spirit. Give me again the joy of your help;
with a spirit of fervor sustain me,
that I may teach transgressors your ways
and sinners may return to you. O rescue me, God, my helper,
and my tongue shall ring out your goodness.
O Lord, open my lips
and my mouth shall declare your praise. For in sacrifice you take no delight,
burnt offering from me you would refuse,
my sacrifice, a contrite spirit,
a humbled, contrite heart you will not spurn. In your goodness, show favor to Zion:
rebuild the walls of Jerusalem.
Then you will be pleased with lawful sacrifice,
(burnt offerings wholly consumed),
then you will be offered young bulls on your altar.
Saturday, February 23. 2008
"Oh crap, I agree with Paul Krugman." Coyote Michelle Obama's victocratic thesis. Does she imagine that only black women feel "out of it" in college? Wrong. Most people feel that way. The question that is never honestly answered: Why do Liberals idealize dictators? Steyn, (via Driscoll) Kling on the elections: In November, the United States may take its strongest lurch to the left since 1933. The trend holds: Obama leading in Texas polls. Did the Columbia prof put the noose on her own door? She was in a bit of a jam, and nooses were all the rage that week. Is the NYT looking to merge with The National Enquirer? How can they, if they are already a fully-owned subsidiary of the DNC?
This is a reposting from 2006, prompted by a post by Surber about the dramatic resurgence of the wolf populations in the northern Rockies. Also related to the Crichton video posted today.  The ways that ecological interactions take place is always fascinating to me, and unpredictable. The return of wolves to Yellowstone Park is a case study.
Wolves kill more elk, balancing the elk population and driving the elk to safe zones, thus permitting the return of normal willow growth along river edges, thus cooling and stabilizing rivers resulting in bigger trout, and happy songbirds, and generally more biodiversity. And the wolves kill coyotes, thus there are more fox and mice and little critters, and more and happier hawks. Sadly, a parvovirus from domestic dogs threatens the 170 Yellowstone wolves. I guess no-one brought them in for their shots. "Apex predators" are a key piece of any ecological puzzle. I'd like to see our native Timber Wolf returned to New England, along with the Elk who used to live in the Northeast. It would solve the deer infestation and the coyote infestation, and might reduce the number of cats and dopey little ankle-biter dogs in suburbia, too. Politically, it might be tough - can you imagine running for state office with a campaign promise to return wolves to Pittsfield, MA? But maybe they will come under their own steam, the way the coyotes did - which were never native to the Northeast and which cannot take on a whitetail deer. Story in the Science Times. A Wolf website here.
Yesterday: 
Friday, February 22. 2008
 A friend laid a box of the Ashton coronas on me last week to try, and I burned a few today while bumbling around. Very mild but a tasty flavor.
They are Dominican with a Connecticut shade wrapper. Funny how often those CT-grown wrappers return, eventually, back to New England. Not expensive for the quality. An excellent everyday smoke.
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