Maggie's Farm

h/t, Theo -

A new, better invisibility cloak

Conservatives live in different moral universes. It's true.

The ballerina and the Narwhals

Krauthammer begins:

I think it hasn't been the most important 100 days. I think it has been the most revealing 100 days in our lifetime. After all, this man when he was elected was one of the great mysteries of American politics. He was the most unknown, untested, untried, and really un-figured-out man ever to ascend to the office.

Via Ace:

Dennis Miller: We're Living In Odd Times When Miss California Gets Tougher Questions Than the President

BBC: Basra progress "staggering"

Precautionary principle gone wild: The flu. Related from Lewis in Am Thinker, who begins:

The Mexican swine flu pandemic? Oh, that's soooo yesterday. Global Warming? All those confident "scientific" predictions are falling apart around the world, even as greedy politicians still try to squeeze the last little drops of power and money out of them. Human flesh-eating bacteria? SARS? Ozone holes? Mad Cow? The Curse of the Killer Tomatoes? Water torture? CO2? Bee Colony Collapse? It never ends. As long as scare stories sell, as long as millions of indoctrinated suckers fall for them they will never end. They've got you on a rat-running wheel, running scared every day, like rats scrambling to get away from electrical shocks that never actually come. 

Is the bipolar child a purely American phenomenon?

Solzhenitsyn on free medical care

From Insty:

DOES G.M. NOW STAND FOR Gettelfinger Motors? Actually, I like the idea of the unions owning the car companies — or I would, if they then had to stand on their own instead of getting still more bailout cash. I’m afraid we’re in for a decade of politically propped-up zombie carmakers, a sort of American Leyland.

UPDATE: Mickey Kaus is taking a positive view: “Let the UAW, as new owner of GM, pay the price for the overgrown work rules of its locals. Let the UAW demand above-market raises from itself. Let the UAW try to raise money from new lenders after the previous round of lenders has been royally screwed (thanks, in part, to the UAW). And then let the UAW try to sell the cars that result.” So long as friendly politicians don’t protect them from the consequences of their actions with other people’s money.

My first thought about our Theo photo this morning is that it looked like the Adirondacks. Wasn't that your first thought too?

No race bake sale at Bucknell. We support freedom of baking.

Was this a real Hobbitt?

Update me: Am I not allowed to say "pig" any more?

Advice for ladies in the workplace

Can gummint and a union run a car company?

Dick Morris says Obama will damage himself

"It is devolutional." Surber

"You're a Professor, really?"

The vast Obama-media conspiracy. A masterful job of seducing the press. Still, O is the second most reviled Pres in 40 years

Sir Michael:

"The Government has taken tax up to 50 per cent, and if it goes to 51 I will be back in America," he said at the weekend. "We've got 3.5 million layabouts on benefits, and I'm 76, getting up at 6am to go to work to keep them. Let's get everybody back to work so we can save a couple of billion and cut tax, not keep sticking it up."

What does the future hold for First Things?

Free Enterprise's 100 day death march. Key quote:

EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson told NPR’s Michelle Norris yesterday: “The President has said, and I couldn’t agree more, that what this country needs is a one single national road map that tells automakers who are trying to become solvent again what kind of car it is they need to be designing and building for the American people.” Norris then asked: “Is that the role of Government though? That doesn’t sound like free enterprise.” Jackson responded: “Well it is free enterprise in a way.”

Blakeman at Politico:

The Dems were able to get by defection something they may have never have gotten at the Ballot Box, a closure needed, debated ending 60 votes. The Dems will come to regret taking Arlen in. He knows how important his votes are to them. If you think dealing with Somalia Pirates is bad, try working with Blackbeard Spector. There is not much the GOP can do if the Dems have 60 votes. They need to stay united in opposition and work like hell for mid-term gains. Obama will put the pedal to the metal and steam roll as much legislation through as is possible while he enjoys his "dictatorship".

Related, the O says he is remaking America. Good grief.

Related, at Reason:

...he will reveal himself to be that least inspiring of all political characters: a leader beholden first and foremost to special interests and ultra-conventional voting blocs. This at a time when the electorate is becoming increasingly unaffiliated with either the Democrats or Republicans, conservatives or liberals.

That's his griz. I'd rather see her bare. Story here. 

Quoted in a piece at Villainous:

In the 1970s, it took $46,870 to add a year to the life expectancy of 65-year-olds. By the 1990s, it cost $145,000.

Does gummint support for R&D do any good?

Quoted at Ace:

Isn't it fabulous how Obama has reconciled with our enemies and put fear into the hearts of Americans? Does any image illustrate so neatly the wrongheadedness of the Obama administration than Americans scrambling in terror from Air Force One?

Protein begins:

Obama is running the banking, housing and automobile industry out of the White House (along with letting Rahm play with the US Census) so why not be in charge of Science, too?

The politicization of GM. Quite discouraging and distressing, but that's what happens when you mix politics with real life. Everything becomes politicized and part of the spoils system.

Fair and balanced rules cable

Carville: Dems will rule for 40 years

The end of Capitalism? McArdle.

But not the end of Capitalism for Al Gore. He got rich quick.

Another Big Rug: A floral carpet in Brussels. Thanks, reader.

Fisheries: "it is at least something that, after 25 years, the EU is recognising that one of its longest established policies has failed. It has yet to understand, however, the reason for that failure."

Woopsy. A mistake, viewed in retropect. The consequences of letting Lehman fail. This was new territory for everyone, but the fallout of this error were ginormous. Related: The amazing story of Paulson, The B of A, and Merrill.

Ben Stein on the honorable business of selling. h/t, Tiger

Masochist play makes $ for Pakistan. What's ouroboros? All sex play is good, in our view. At Maggie's, leather and whips are my fave, but sometimes we're in the mood for French maid outfits on the chicks, and maybe a little light bondage.

Deification of the planet. I thought culture had evolved past that. Why worship a rock spinning in space? There are millions of 'em. But OK, it's our rock. Our Pet Rock?

Krugman now admits that Laffer was right

Record declines in the newspaper biz. Except the WSJ. Seems odd to me. Everybody enjoys the papers, even if they also enjoy getting mad at them. How else would you know who starred in the high school basketball game against Pittsfield High?

The O talks to his teleprompter. Imagine if Bush...

From Lucianne:

100 days: Obama dumps Bush's
world view, but now what?

Quantity vs. Quality

Pelosi plays defence on "torture"

Newspaper circulation crumbles (h/t, Insty)

Should you look out for "people who keep to themselves"?

Stereotyping: It's natural. I stereotype everybody: a-holes until proven otherwise.

From the mouths of babes

$ rules too onerous for unions. It's payoff time. Related, The strategery of the unions: Kaus

Latin leaders declare war on Capitalism. And freedom, too.

Anarchy at UNC. Mike Adams

The social challenge of speaking honestly about race

Apparently some people do not want to know what an assault rifle is. But our readers know an assault rifle is one with a full-auto setting.

Cannot do it without the teleprompter. Man, that is lame.

Save the Humans! Reason

In cold blood. The Talibanz are taking over Pakiland.

The O tries to steal their prime time - for the 4th time. They have a biz to run.

Upper photo: My nooner date today, thanks to friend Theo who shares his girlfriends. Lower photo via Never Yet Melted

Some animals are more responsible than other animals.

The 10 worst things to say on the job

The O less popular than Bush after 100 days. Whatever that means. The press and the moonbats seem to still get a tingle.

Ford runs from the gummint "We're here to help you." Smart. The F 150 is still good.

Latest spin: Polar ice increasing because of global warming.

The secret plan to turn Soc Sec into a welfare program. I think it always should have been.

Would somebody please give Henrietta Hughes a job?

Al Gore: Keep Lord Monckton away from me. As Drudge juxtaposes them:

Gore pleads for unity on climate, despite divide...

Dems Refuse to Allow Skeptic to Testify...

That's "unity" for ya. Related: Dingell says cap and trade is just a giant tax

An extreme Lefty moves into the Pentagon. She'll be popular, no doubt, with the old soldiers.

But the kids never heard the word "lesbian" til you taught it to them in Kindergarten. Don't you want curious kids? Lesbian pron is fun to watch, isn't it?

Dem sleazebag du jour: Rattner

What's with the President's wanderlust?

...to hear this president run down America, you would think it was a failed state until he was transformed from junior senator of Illinois to president of the United States. He has surpassed Jimmy Carter's precedent of being the first ex-president to criticize while on foreign soil a sitting president. President Obama has become the first sitting American president to criticize America while on foreign soil, and he does it with the practiced zeal of a person who has been feeding on anti-American myths for years.

Krauthammer: The Grand Strategy. A quote:

Taken as a whole, Obama's social democratic agenda is breathtaking. And the rollout has thus far been brilliant. It follows Kaus' advice to "give pandering a chance" and adheres to the Democratic tradition of being the party that gives things away, while leaving the green-eyeshade stinginess to those heartless Republicans.

It will work for a while, but there is no escaping rationing. In the end, the spinach must be served.

"LOL OMG Talibanz!" Soldiers return home to fight the war on jerks. It makes me want to enlist today.

How does appeasing the Taliban work out?

How are things working out with Chrysler? Note re the possibly pending bankruptcy: union benefits will be protected by the taxpayers.

Also related, Kudlow on TARP

People who think they are good, are less good. They seem to think they get a pass, because they're good.

Review of Horowitz' new book, One Party Classroom, at City Journal

New models for higher ed

60% say govt has too much power and money. Yet many seem to love the O. What's the deal? Related: The Christian Left has tears of joy re O's budget. Tears of joy about a budget?

Does the fact that waterboarding saved LA make a difference to you? Hmm, let me think...

A Federalism Amendment? Count me in.

Dick Morris gets heated up in Obama's Leap to Socialism

...whoever controls the banks controls the credit and, therefore, the economy. That’s called socialism.

From SISU on the tea parties, quoting Steyn:

That’s why these are Tea Parties — because the heart of the matter is the same question posed two-and-a-third centuries ago: Are Americans subjects or citizens? If the latter, then a benign sovereign should not be determining “your interests” and then announcing that he’s giving you a “tax credit” as your pocket money.

As we wrote a couple of years back in another context, "It's naive to believe [citizens] should be content to have physical comforts handed to them on a welfare platter. No man — no creature worth its salt — can bear the shame. Come to think of it, that's exactly what's wrong with the liberal project. Talk about intellectual bankruptcy.

Related, from The Map is not the Terrain at NE Repub:

You can’t believe in or be loyal to, low taxes and small government, but you can believe in freedom because you can imagine what it means to be a slave, and you can be loyal to the principle of personal sovereignty.  And so can a lot of other people who aren’t conservatives.  

Got MILFs? This from Iowa via Blair.

If the NYT dies, would that be a bad thing? (h/t, Small Dead Porcupines)

Disgraced sociopathic prof sues Columbia for $200 mill. Talk about truth and honor.

Liberal icon Izzie Stone was a Soviet agent. h/t, Viking

Is Janet Napolitano a retard? It seems like it. More: How the heck did she get that job?

UK Death Watch: Taxes up, economy down

Obama blaming America first. It might be fashionable in certain quarters, but it's not funny. Related: Why does O smile at dictators?

Cap and trade would cost you $3600/year. And accomplish nothing. Slightly related: Rick Moran thinks about greening the Repubs. We at Maggie's are passionate conservationists, but think that the Greenies are wacko pagans.

From Sowell on medical care:

Insurance is not medical care. Indeed, health care is not the same as medical care. Countries with universal health care do not have more or better medical care.

The bottom line is medical care. But the rhetoric and the talking points are about insurance. Many people who could afford health insurance do not choose to have it because they know that medical care will be available at the nearest emergency room, whether they have insurance or not.

This is especially true for young people, who do not anticipate long-term medical problems and who can always get a broken leg or an allergy attack taken care of at an emergency room -- and spend their money on a more upscale lifestyle.

This may not be a wise decision but it is their decision, and there is no reason why other people should lose the right to make decisions for themselves because some people make questionable decisions.

If you don't think government bureaucrats can make questionable decisions, then you haven't dealt with many government bureaucrats.

It's Earth Day! via Am Thinker:

...it was not just Leftist conspiracy theorists who a few short were years ago accusing the government of lying to us about global cooling.  Even books for schoolchildren like The New Ice Age by Henry Gilford, cautioned thirty years ago that the temperature of the earth had been steadily cooling and that a new ice age was certain. What investigative reporters and schoolbook publishers were insisting during the Carter and Reagan presidencies was being endorsed by some great scientists as well.

Sir Fred Hoyle is one of the leading cosmologists in human history.  No scientist today can claim greater intellectual stature than Hoyle, particularly about our planet in the universe.  In 1981, Hoyle published a book, Ice: How the New Ice Age will Come and How We Can Prevent It, in which this brilliant giant of natural sciences warned of the next ice age.  The consequences, Hoyle warned, would be disastrous.  It would:

"...hopelessly compromise the future...This is why our modern generation must take action to avoid catastrophe, an ultimate catastrophe besides which the problems that concern people, media, and government from day to day are quite trivial."

Hoyle, writing only a decade before the whole global warming jihad became chic science, had studied the climatic trends, the astronomical effects, the impact of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere -- everything, really, that the druids of global warming cite today -- and he had come to exactly the opposite conclusion as today's politically correct science of official global warming. 

There is no doubt that there will be a surge in ice. Question is when. Technically, we remain in an ice age, defined as periods in which there are polar ice caps. During most of earth time, there weren't.

Related: Since fat people are now the cause of global warming, Jules suggests that Al Gore preach more about that.

Bloggers for hire?

In America today, there are almost as many people making their living as bloggers as there are lawyers. Already more Americans are making their primary income from posting their opinions than Americans working as computer programmers or firefighters.

Difficult for me to believe.

Juan Williams:

...over the last week I find myself in a fury.

The cause of my upset is watching the key civil rights issue of this generation — improving big city public school education — get tossed overboard by political gamesmanship. If there is one goal that deserves to be held above day-to-day partisanship and pettiness of ordinary politics it is the effort to end the scandalous poor level of academic achievement and abysmally high drop-out rates for America’s black and Hispanic students.

How well did waterboarding work?

Why trying to control carbon emissions will make no difference at all. But what do facts matter? Power grabs always find excuses for it.

In a time of victory, why is the Left still so angry?

It's been cold, rain and stormy, noisy wind here. "Feels like 34," weatherman said yesterday. We are eager for some global warming - solar, anthropogenic, cow farted, or otherwise.

A new book of Mark Twain's unpublished work. One quote:

Twain describes his dentist: "He was gray and venerable, and humane of aspect; but he had the calm, possessed, surgical look of a man who could endure pain in another person."

Bummer: Online shopping taxes are on the way. Government = Greed.

Dems promise that gummint medical care will deny you treatment. Duh.

Kinky gerontophiliacs? Is it legal?

Piracy: There's been lots of it since the Barbary pirates.

Sin City on the Tigris: Baghdad getting back to normal.

Ban Ki Moon annoyed with Ahmadinejad. Delegates walked out.

The truth behind the Maersk Alabama story.

Spengler outs himself to be...David P. Goldman, of First Things

Miss California (on left) is a gay marriage skeptic. Will Wikinson defends gay marriage on libertarian grounds.

It's about time we added The Other McCain to our blogroll

Cuts of $100 million? A joke. Who is he kidding? (Probably lots of people who can't add.)

What's the state of manufacturing in the US? Not too bad.

I'm with Jules: this is the sort of reporting I want from the NYT

Politics and public pension shakedowns

DHS Threat map (h/t, Moonbattery)

More on the govt's opposition to solar power. But that's fine with me. I think oil is great stuff, and a gift to humankind.

Fred Barnes: Defeat Obamacare. Related: Socialism and cancer

Michelle O and her no-show paycheck. It's the Dem ideal: money for nothin'

Who said this?

"Edicts of nondiscrimination are not enough. Justice demands that every citizen consciously adopts a personal commitment to affirmative action, which will make equal opportunity a reality."

Close the service academies? Jules

Re Elaine Showalter's new book on women authors:

"I believe that women writers no longer need specially constituted juries, softened judgment, unspoken agreements, or suppression of evidence in order to stand alongside the greatest artists in our literary heritage." That, she acknowledges, may not sit well with some literary critics, men and women. The Chronicle Review talked with her about why she thinks the time is right for the kind of broad survey she's undertaken and why it's taken so long to get it.

A blast from the past on Fascism (Parts 1,2, and 3): Volokh

Hate-spewing sanctimony: Garofolo. People use ad hominem when they run out of arguments, but this is ridiculous. Who is this person, anyway?

The O's tax plans running into resistance. Hmmm

More links later tonite - probably.

Good news: people increasingly AGW skeptics. As John says, The public is catching on. Follow the money...

Related: Lefty Court disallows Alaska offshore drilling. Insane.

Alice Waters: Let them eat organic grapes. I cannot stand people like that. Alice needs to check out a Big Mac.

I never heard of "teabagging" before. Maybe I'm innocent. I still don't know what it means.

Justice Stevens renders an opinion on who wrote Shakespeare's stuff. Whoever it was, I will continue to refer to him as Shakespeare.

If you tax the rich at 100%, it's still not enough for the O's budget

Conservative college speakers need bodyguards.

Is waterboarding worse than killing?

The Left and Islam. Why are they friends?

"We Chinese need to be controlled." Why? Because otherwise "we would do what we want." God forbid!

2nd Amendment, Montana-style

Excellent Afghanistan battle report at Villainous

Faculty scared by veterans. I guess gratitude never entered their mind.

Alarmed by Obama, at Am Thinker. A quote:

Obama's most transparent strategy, about which much has been written, is to cement American citizens' economic dependence on the government, and therefore on him.  In order to achieve this, Obama has deepened and prolonged an otherwise fixable economic crisis, creating menacing conditions for social disintegration and chaos. His tax policies and private sector takeovers ensure jobless rates that will rival those of the Depression era, greatly increasing the number of individuals who will look to government for their survival.

But Obama's strategies go far beyond mere economic control.

I know it's a cheap shot which is beneath Maggie's dignity, but that photo (Caption This) from Wizbang isn't a person walking a dog: it's a dog walking a person. I just use the photo to make the point that, in general, it only takes about 3 hours (9 20-minute lessons at 2-3/day) to train a pup to heel (his nose at your left knee), and it will never forget with regular reinforcement of the lesson. Nobody wants to be seen in public with a dog that will not heel because it's a reflection on you, like a kid that throws food. Pinch collar and dog yummies. An untrained dog means you don't really care about the animal, same as an uncivilized kid. In the Obama's defence, that is a darn good-looking PWD (if a bit older than the ideal 6-9 weeks), but any dog can be easily trained. Obedience is what they are bred for. It just takes a few minutes and a little firmness. The training is the real bonding. Train that dog the way you train the Dems in Congress. Sit! Heel! Vote!

Government should bail out dying media. Brilliant! Just like Chavez. Or Pravda. Put 'em on the gummint payroll and they will play nice, like the BBC and the CBC.

Treasury "allows" bank to return TARP funds; bank complains about changing the rules. Duh. Take their money and you're on their plantation.

Does Georgetown hate its Jesuit heritage?

Dem crook du jour: The Car Czar. So many Dem sleazes that it seems normal now. Not news.

From Tiger:

An old pro like Barack Obama has to be more amused by these protests than worried about them. The left is laughing for a reason.

If the right wants to succeed in civil resistance, it needs to study the tactics of the left and adopt the methods that are not incompatible with its own morality.

Related: Thousands protest: the Left sneers

Finally, a war the Left would embrace with enthusiasm

Journalists have journalist arrested. That's the spirit! (h/t Insty)

LaShawn outs herself as a right-wing extremist

Why many with 6-figure incomes do not feel rich

Obama apologizes to innocent asteroids

How the CIA extracted info from Jihadists.

Krauthammer shreds Obama's BS. Amazing to me how the O gets away with it.

NYT: Tea Parties dismissed as group therapy. Dem leaders have a different view: Tea Parties are Neo-Nazi racists and militias. I guess they are referring to people like the Neo-Nazi skinhead neoneo.

And another Dem Rep calls them despicable. Huh? I thought dissent was patriotic...never mind.

And via Driscoll:

Related: “Never before in history have so few been able to accuse so many so often and so pervasively of so much they didn’t say and don’t mean”, Roger L. Simon writes, in his look at “Tea Party Derangement Syndrome.”

Social pathology and structural poverty. A quote:

The biggest question to ask liberals is: Why don't you support those solutions that have worked so well in your own life?

It is hard to avoid the feeling that the Left is endemically racist and classist: That they have simply decided that what works in their own lives will never work to raise poor blacks, Hispanics and whites out of poverty.

If that's not true, I would like to hear from liberals: Why don't you just encourage all the people you feel sorry for to adopt those work and life habits that made your own friends and families successful?

Dick Morris on the anti-success President. A quote:

Obama’s perverse view of fairness threatens to create reverse incentives, militating against growth, jobs, expansion, and upward mobility.

For decades, astute observers of national welfare policy warned of the perversity of the incentives which kept the poor on welfare and discouraged them from taking jobs. Employment meant that their slightly higher income would be more than offset by the loss of other benefits like food stamps, day care, rent supplements, and Medicaid. Work didn’t pay.

Now Obama is applying the same crazy policies to the upper end of the economic spectrum.

Upward mobility is alive and well in the United States, at least until Obama took over. A study conducted in the late 1990s examined the economic fate of those consigned to the bottom 20% of incomes in 1980. The analysis concluded that more than four out of five had left the bottom quintile and one in five was now in the top 20%! It is true that the top quintile is getting richer while the bottom is getting poorer, but the bottom is not the same people. There is, fortunately, a constant churning at the bottom as new immigrants move in and those who used to be on the bottom begin their long, thrilling, upward climb to the American dream.

But Obama does not believe in individual upward mobility. He would penalize it, tax it, regulate it, inveigh against it, and disincentivize it.

Cincinnati photo via Moonbattery:

 Also, the 101 freedoms the Left doesn't want you to have.

Sarkozy: Obama is unoriginal, unsubstantial and overrated.

It must be Spring. Campus moron infants must have their fun. Learning physical chemistry is apparently not on their agenda.

Beware of the geeks. The health and climate experts are usually wrong.

The Englishman says this guy in photo needs Courage to "give him enough confidence to tell the woman the dress was not flattering":

Mourning Michigan. Dr. Clouthier

Very sensitive: Georgetown hides Jesus at Obama's request. But I thought Georgetown...never mind. Jesus is old hat: Mohammed is cool, dude, and he was big into underage chicks. Can you dig it?

Want Cadillac health care?

You can have Cadillac health care. You want lots of doctors, no waiting lists and coverage for virtually all your medical and psychological needs? Sure. But there's a price to pay. I know, you're already pinching pennies because your nest eggs have been decimated and you're wondering how you're going to put the kids through college. Still, if you want unlimited health care, hand over half your paycheque to the government.

Photo below from Michelle's Tea party update:

One more dangerous right-wing fanatic, and another reason to attend your local tea parties, via Ace:

Tea Parties all over. Martini Parties too, but in private I suppose. Photo from Ann Arbor. Map of today's Parties: Lots of 'em.

Also, Why you should go to one. LAT: Tea Parties are insane. Tea parties are about future taxes: Q&O.

Each one is identically different: Sipp.

Pirates talking tough. AAARRRGhhh. It's the most trivial of our international problems. Related: More support for the pirates. Let's all collect bottles of Bacardi for the poor fellows.

Social class in America:

For readers who somehow missed this snide, martini-dry American classic, do have your assistant Tessa run out and get it immediately (Upper), or at least be sure to worriedly skim this magazine summary over a low-fat bagel (Middle), because Fussell’s bibelot-rich tropes still resonate.

When Viktor met Olga.

More Lefty thugs preventing free speech at UNC. Aren't different points of view interesting?

The unbearable lightness of Paul Krugman

If you are a single guy, and paid your taxes today honestly (or at least filed your extension), your reward, besides feeling patriotic and honest, is the young lassie below the fold courtesy of Obama and Timmy Geithner. She's waiting at home for ya.

Legal scam or real problem? Chinese wallboard

Is there a freedom not to buy medical insurance? Why does that question even need to be asked?

Animal nutritionists at the National Zoo

A "quick" bankruptcy for GM? Megan

Nuclear disarmament: a bad idea in many ways.

A generation of selfish, self-centered liars. Perfect for the Brave New World.

Yes, the Dems killed it, but

What’s a bunch of African-American kids, versus the teachers’ union? Especially in this administration?

Related at Ace who says Obama hates black people.

Goldman beats expectations. Clever dudes down there. From what I heard, they hedged their AIG debt with AIG shorts.

Speaking of Goldman, Wilkinson considers whether there is something nasty about wanting to make lots of money. Of course there isn't: everybody is free to pursue their own (legal) aspirations. The contemptuous assumption that "all the rich are crooks" is as foolish as "all poor are honest." People without functional morals are well-distributed everywhere.

News flash: Economics is an art, not a science

Pirate photo via Theo. Rick Moran offers another side to the Somalia piracy story. Of course, lousy fishing conditions do not justify piracy. These pirates are just thugs with a heretofore easy gig.

Shades of Larry Summers: Disney uses science to attract boy viewers

We posted previously that Western Civilization is not consistent with Brown University's values. Jules attempts to comprehend what is consistent with Harvard's values. It's confusing to say the least. He quotes young Kristol 3rd:

Harvard today happily pays for future bankers to take accounting courses at MIT, but refuses to pay for aspiring military officers who take ROTC courses. Since 1994, anonymous donors have generously picked up the tab, providing hundreds of thousands of dollars per year for Harvard’s ROTC students.

Bravo to our Navy, our SEALs, and to Captain Phillips.

NY taxes now #1.

Mr. Silver says of the coming tax hikes: "We've done it before. There hasn't been a catastrophe." Oh, really? According to Census Bureau data, over the past decade 1.97 million New Yorkers left the state for greener pastures -- the biggest exodus of any state. New York City has lost more than 75,000 jobs since last August, and many industrial areas upstate are as rundown as Detroit. The American Legislative Exchange Council recently said New York had the worst economic outlook of all 50 states, including Michigan. And that analysis was done before these $4 billion in new taxes. How does Mr. Silver define "catastrophe"?

I think he could more accurately say that it hasn't been a catastrophe for the politicians.

Move along. Nothing to be learned here.

A history of the computer mouse. h/t, Thompson

Turns out that all of that about the evil Bush power grabs was insincere electioneering. Gee, who knew?

Daniel Hannen MEP on the Brit NHS:

Imagine that, in 1945, we had created a National Food Service. Suppose that, in the name of "fairness" and "need and not ability to pay", sustenance had been rationed by the state. Conjecture that every citizen had been allocated one butcher, one baker, one café and so on. We all know where that would have led: to bureaucracy, to duplication, to surpluses in one field and scarcity in another, to racketeering, to hunger. No one, not even Prescott, is suggesting that we socialise food distribution - even though food is at least as basic human need as healthcare. As those Americans of whom you seem so contemptuous might put it, John, go figure.

 Chris Dodd's "Banking for Change" does seem like an unfortunate choice of campaign motto

More on China's excess of males

The NYT, Obama, and the UN Human Rights Council

The Blago case: Biz as usual?

The AP is sword-rattling towards the internet. I agree with the article that the relationship is symbiotic.

The Left hopes the New America will no longer be exporting democracy. I understand Realpolitik, but it hardly seems like something to be enthused about.

What is it about Europe and free speech?

Proposed: the right to sue the Fed gov for the weather

It's Holy Saturday - another day to mourn and to reflect on the cross - and to anticipate Easter. We all encounter our personal Good Fridays - the seeming death of God to us in our own foolish lives, and the feeling of abandonment by God. Through prayer, constant prayer, we can humble and diminish our precious selves and reestablish the link by making space for Him to return to us and to talk to us. Think I am crazy? Try it. Our self-love and self-pity leave little room for Him in our hearts.

But here are some unholy links:

Who are the Socialists in America? Whatever happened to love of freedom? When did a decadent yearning for dependency take over?

Health care reform and free markets. Q&O

Piracy. Why there are no armed men on freighters in that area is a mystery to me.

Western Civilization inconsistent with Brown's values. Which are what????

Global sea ice far above normal now. Explain that. Related: NASA now says it's not CO2 - it's aerosols. So much for "settled science."

The elephant in the room: Obama vs. USA. A quote from Phila Enquirer:

What is indisputable is that Koh calls himself a "transnationalist." He believes U.S. courts "must look beyond national interest to the mutual interests of all nations in a smoothly functioning international legal regime. ..." He thinks the courts have "a central role to play in domesticating international law into U.S. law" and should "use their interpretive powers to promote the development of a global legal system."

Koh's "transnationalism" stands in contrast to good, old-fashioned notions of national sovereignty, in which our Constitution is the highest law of the land. In the traditional view, controversial matters, whatever they may be, are subject to democratic debate here. They should be resolved by the American people and their representatives, not "internationalized." What Holland or Belgium or Kenya or any other nation or coalition of nations thinks has no bearing on our exercise of executive, legislative, or judicial power.

Koh disagrees. He would decide such matters based on the views of other countries or transnational organizations - or, rather, those entities' elites.

Shades of Oceania.

Obama's arrogance: neoneo. I think he thinks he's smarter than he is.

What is the carbon footprint of green pizza? It reminds me of how Elvis used to send his plane from Memphis to LA to pick up  his favorite PB&J sandwiches.

The Left is "monitoring" the Tea Parties

Obama is reaching out to the moderate pirate community

Hey Dems - keep your hands off Teddy Roosevelt

I wondered this too: if universities receive federal funds, why doesn't the gov try to run them too?

O makes a case for unilateral disarmament. Bret Stephens:

It's also worth considering just what a new round of arms control is meant to accomplish. In his speech, Mr. Obama painted it as a matter of setting an example to the wider world.

But as the journalist Walter Lippmann observed in 1943, the disarmament movement of the interwar years only proved "tragically successful in disarming the nations that believed in disarmament." Mr. Obama himself noted that "some countries will break the rules" of nuclear nonproliferation, adding that "That's why we need a structure in place that ensures when any nation does, they will face consequences."

Sure. Like the UN? Related: The Department of No Defence

Poor Joe Biden. He really seems to be a compulsive liar and self-aggrandizer. Maybe it's a good match. Related: Rush Limbaugh's meeting with Obama!

Different visions. David Limbaugh via Intell Cons:

The liberals see they now have a chance to actualize their vision for an America remade in their image and radically at odds with the vision of this nation's Founders. It doesn't matter that there couldn't be a worse time in our history for implementing their reckless policies. They know they may not get another chance in their lifetimes to work such mischief. Even though it will break the federal bank, us, our children and our grandchildren, it's all going to be OK because they will finally have achieved their statist vision for America.

Yep, they think they are smarter and wiser than the average rubes like us.

From Vanderleun's Deer in the headlights:

Of course, much of the current government's institutionalized death wish, and the culture of cowardice that both precedes and envelops it, is carefully camouflaged, hidden from the sight of the less-than-persuaded centrists, independents, and other Americans who might not be ready to follow the Democrats across the Styx and down into the hell of collectivism "done right, this time, trust us." The love of death-in-life in political philosophies must always be hidden. If it were not the American collectivist party would wither to its small and wizened core. After all one must, even while taking the country down the path to defeat and ruin, pretend that one has only the very best core American values at heart. It keeps the marks and the rubes from wising up, waking up, or blinking in the glare of the headlights.

Let's tax 'em at 80%. Just for the heck of it. They'll keep on working hard...won't they?

Is amnesty designed to be a distraction from the Big One - the budget?

One of the scariest things in America is prosecutorial power. Am Thinker discusses.

17 Socialists in the House? At the very least, it seems to me. Plus one in the White House.

From David Warren on Thomas Sowell (and MLK):

I love Sowell, because he can "do" desolation without wandering into despair. Reciprocally, he can do hope -- the real thing, not the rhetorical posture. A black man, from a fatherless home, raised by an aunt whom he thought was his mother, in rural then urban conditions that would excuse any man for failure, he saw through his circumstances. He dragged himself up, through a machine shop, through the Marines, eventually to great eminence in the academic world, at a time before he could trade on his race. And he continued rising, with the help of honest friends, and by ignoring vilifications.

Getting dates: What's your FICO score?

College admissions officers emote. What a horrible job they have: all those snot-nosed kids putting their egos on the line.

Powerline gets rough on Harold Koh: Curtailing our representative democracy. Yes, this is a serious issue.

Related, from Dick Morris: The repeal of the Declaration of Independence. Not funny.

Utter economic ignorance in the NYT. Does the Left think money is manna from heaven? Somebody has to make it, you know.

A good reason for the gummint to encourage smoking. Plus, they get the tobacco taxes. Smoking is patriotic.

A good story about charter schools: We don't want your money

Taxes heading up for the middle class. Duh. No free lunch.

Guess what? If you spend $50 billion on construction, you do get a little bit of construction. Not a lot, but some.

We are now bailing out life insurance companies. Did you know that?

Paglia on Obama's painful missteps. I would not have made all of those gaffes, nor would have Paglia.

For the ignorant press, this counts as "evidence" nowadays. Unbelievably stupid.

Transgender laws headed for New England. Whoopee! We're almost all transgenders up here, ya know. We like those of the opposite sex, if that is what it means.

76% vote to live off the other 24%. Hey, who wouldn't? Unless you happen to have some dignity and pride...

 Let's not offend...Britain? WHT? Do these people know anything?

"It's like Miley Cyrus Does Europe." I don't know who Miley Cyrus is, but Jules does.

The 2010 Census as a welfare project

Tony Blankley begins:

Of all President Barack Obama's transformative domestic policy proposals, none is more far-reaching and less transparent than health care.

President's science advisor: Let's cool the earth. Not up here, please. We had snow today, and we are burning oil like crazy in NYC to keep the furnaces blasting.

Image on right via Surber. Related, at Volokh:

Good to hear that American free speech tradition isn't "too deeply unsettling to world order." But wait -- check out the footnote following this paragraph:

See generally Louis Henkin, Gerald L. Neuman, Diane F. Orentlicher & David W. Leebron, Human Rights 564 (1999). Admittedly, in a globalizing world, our exceptional free speech tradition can cause problems abroad, as, for example, may occur when hate speech is disseminated over the Internet. In my view, however, our Supreme Court can moderate these conflicts by applying more consistently the transnationalist approach to judicial interpretation discussed infra Part III.C.

And what is this "transnationalist approach" that can help "moderate these conflicts" caused by American constitutional protection for "hate speech ... disseminated over the Internet"?

Read it. I say "Good grief."

A vote for sanity: Climate change bill sidetracked

Harvard student takes on Barney Frank

Black Caucus praises Castro. Nice role model. Everybody wants to emigrate to Cuba, don't they? The Gulf of Mexico is packed with Mexicans and Liberals trying to get to the peoples' paradise.

Obama's anti-nuke speech. Dino

Why "quality" medical care is dangerous

Are American housing policies rational? Prof B says no, and I agree. The American Dream isn't home ownership - it's freedom. I am a flat-taxer and opposed on principle to the mortgage interest deduction.

O's foreign apologies: What did you expect? Still, Rick says:

Yes, it discomfits me that Obama seemed eager to disrespect his own country in front of those who, at times, have been equally arrogant, equally dismissive, and certainly more derisive when George Bush was president. But in perilous times, it is best to keep your friends close. And despite a few gaffes (”Austrian” language? Are you fricking kidding me?), Obama’s trip was helpful to our interests and will hopefully pay big dividends in the future.

This is entertaining: