Saturday, May 26. 2012
 "Four years ago this Memorial Day I was home on leave from my Iraq deployment. I was still recovering from my jet lag but overjoyed to see my wife and kids after many months away..."
Tom Manion: Why They Serve—'If Not Me, Then Who?' After more than a decade of war, remarkable men and women are still stepping forward.
How the Wild West REALLY looked: Gorgeous sepia-tinted pictures show the landscape as it was charted for the very first time
"Deciders" and "reviewers"
From Carpe, Bastiat on plunder:
"Legal plunder can be committed in an infinite number of ways. Thus we have an infinite number of plans for organizing it: tariffs, protection, benefits, subsidies, encouragements, progressive taxation, public schools, guaranteed jobs, guaranteed profits, minimum wages, a right to relief, a right to the tools of labor, free credit, and so on, and so on. All these plans as a whole—with their common aim of legal plunder—constitute socialism.
But how is this legal plunder to be identified? Quite simply. See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them, and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime."
(Black) Gold Rush America
The Empire of Feeling Is Pacifist
“We feel sympathetic for Bill (Clinton) and I hope this doesn’t hurt his reelection or whatever he’s trying to run for,” she said.
Malanga: Redistricting Wars - The hidden story of the 2012 elections
Barone: Life in a cocoon dulls political responses
UNREAL!… Dem Tom Barrett Blasts GOP’s War on Women Then Turns Stage Over to Gangsta Rapper for “Bitches Who Ride Me” Song
Morning Jay: Appalachia and the Dems' Identity Crisis
Bad news: Obama campaign starting to think they might lose
Noonan: Mitt Romney's Moment - The GOP nominee explains why he thinks America is at an 'inflection point.'
President Obama Won’t Be Returning His Donations From Bain Capital
Obama Co-Chair Is Venture Capital Vampire
Uncovered Ad Shows Obama Appeared At 1996 Event Hosted By Socialist Group In Chicago…
WaPo says Obama’s massive primary fail is “racism”
It Mitt Romney had been a stoner, would it make him cool?
Romney: Obama (and Biden) Never Worked a Day In the Private Sector; Obama Just Doesn't Understand The Basics of Capitalism or a Free Economy
Apartheid: The Big Lie
How Academics Concocted a New 'Middle Class':
...imagine if a presidential candidate in 2012 announced that his anti-poverty program entailed teaching the poor old-fashioned morality, a passion for work, self-reliance, restraining one's consumption, and saving for future purchases versus credit-card debt. That is, traditional (pre-1960s) middle-class values. He would be vilified, accused of imposing "white" values, and clobbered by a rival who instead promised instant cheap college loans as the instant pathway to the American Dream (see here).
It gets worse. Conflating outward appearance with underlying traits is typical of poorly educated Third World nations and, sad to say, America is increasingly drifting in that direction. In these societies, possessing a fancy paper saying "diploma" becomes irrefutable proof of being "educated." "Education" may also be acquired by dressing as an educated person--glasses, a three-piece suit, a briefcase, a fountain pen and similar theatrical props. Translated into current American society, one becomes "middle class" by owning a college diploma even if the acquired learning is less than what was once gained in high school and acquiring the degree required a small army of helpers.
Pension Bankruptcy in Tiny U.S. Territory Is a Warning of What May Lie Ahead
Illinois: Officials spiked their own pensions
Senate Dems offer no gender pay equality
Friday, May 25. 2012
For those of you who, like I, enjoy “world music” it is saddening that a major venue in San Diego which largely targets children is sponsoring pro-Palestinian propaganda from a virulent anti-Israel, anti-US group operating under the misleading name Middle East Children’s Alliance. The WorldBeat Cultural Center sits on San Diego City property in Balboa Park and is funded by some prestigious foundations and corporate sponsors. This misuse of their funds, and reputations, deserves direct protests.
The Oakland Museum of Children’s Art had dropped this exhibit in October 2011, a Board member explaining:
[T]he museum canceled the show “because we lacked a formal policy for sensitive content and because were not confident that we had the resources to deal with the numerous concerns we received regarding the exhibit.”
Rabbi James Brandt, CEO of the Jewish Community Federation of the Greater East Bay, was more direct in a joint statement with East Bay’s Jewish Community Relations Council and the Anti-Defamation League:
“A biased, one-sided perspective filled with depictions of violence has no place in a community-based museum dedicated to serving young children, including 3-, 4- and 5-year-olds,” the statement read….
Even without the stars of David identifying the soldiers [which IDF soldiers do not wear], Brandt maintained, the violent images were “inappropriate for this age group.” As for the Jewish star, he said, “for children in our region… their immediate association is not with the State of Israel, but [with] their classmates who have Jewish stars on their T-shirts from our Jewish camps and after-school programs.”
The exhibit is by the anti-Israel, anti-US Middle East Children’s Alliance (MECA). The drawings were done under the supervision of “therapists” hired by MECA. Some art experts doubt the drawings were even done by children, or they were touched up by adults. MECA is the funder of the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), which sends young protestors to Israel to oppose its security fencing made necessary by Palestinian cross-border terror attacks and participated in the May 2010 flotilla from Turkey to Gaza. MECA also raised funds for George Galloway’s “Viva Palestine” convoy. MECA’s Executive Director wrote “I think the Jewish State is racist to the core.” MECA states its goal: “We educate North Americans about children in the region and the brutal impact of US foreign policy on their lives.”
As with other drawings by Gaza children, the viewpoint is one of victimization and hatred as inculcated by all the official Hamas propaganda aimed at Gazan children. For example, a Gaza TV show for children tells them to slaughter all Jews, and another uses a rabbit to say he “will finish off the Jews and eat them, Allah willing." Another encourages children of the glory of death for Allah in attacking Jews. And another Hamas childrens program: “Khaibar, Khaibar, oh Jews!" in reference to Muhammad's battle against Jews in the year 629.
Here’s a sample of the exhibit at the San Diego World Beat Cultural Center :
Continue reading "Palestinian Propagandizing Of American Children"
 Obama orgasmatron photo via Moonbattery
Mechanical Matchmaking: The Science of Love in the 1920s
Via Insty: What about the boy? A father's pledge to his disabled son
From Park Slope, Parody Menus With Pretentious Sounding Offerings Handed Out at The Great GoogaMooga
Men Urged to Skip Routine Prostate Screening
The Richest Woman in the World: How Gina Rinehart Earns her Billions
Women Are Heroes: A Global Portrait of Strength in Hardship by French Guerrilla Artist-Activist JR
On the greatest chocolate-chip cookie in the known universe, with recipe....
Heart attack more likely during sex with mistress
The pythons of Florida
VDH: The Power of Cool - From Barack Obama to Mark Zuckerberg, cool buys exemption.
Palin family produces Nazi Aryan
Chimps' personalities are like people's, study says
Bald Eagles Fall to Green Energy
Interest in Lindsay Lohan classified as mental illness
Plastic Bag Ban Will Put Los Angeles In Landfill - Proposal would provide no environmental benefits and deepen city’s economic depression.
Breaking Poll: Walker Up 8 in WI, 50-42
Magazines as court jesters:
There are house-style differences between the New Yorker, which still features its trademark cartoons, and Vanity Fair and Esquire, and Time and Newsweek, but they are all basically the same. The same essays repeating the same views for the same audience; all of them fighting for that small slice of urban yuppie audience which DVR's Mad Men, has Michael Chabon novels on the shelf that it hasn't read yet and is forty percent gay.
The real 1 percent is right there. That small elitist fragment of America which writes books for itself, makes TV shows for itself and writes outraged articles for itself about a tiny 1 percent elite that runs everything. It has its own books, its own TV shows, its own music, its own stores, its own stations, its own brands and now it has most of the magazines to itself. It's a claustrophobic village raising its own inner child with inane repetitions of its narrow-minded views.
Another Record!… Obama Now Owns the 30 Worst Months of Employment in Past 25 Years
Soon we will finally see how, or whether, Briffa manipulated his tree ring data
Chinese Communists No Longer Put Much Stock in Communism - China has gone from Mao to 'money worship.'
George Will: Elizabeth Warren and liberalism, twisting the ‘social contract’
China’s Population Crash
Thursday, May 24. 2012
If you don’t think that a little ‘ol blogger like me can take on and win against a trillion-dollar industry’s corporate welfare scheme and its political allies, then read on. I won through careful research and persistence. Then I lost once the allies of the giants of the tourism industry came to power in 2008. But, this tale displays that individual bloggers can have major impacts on legislation, now more than ever as the alternative media has grown and the 2012 elections may turn the tide in Washington.
Unless you are a foreign tourist entering the US, paying $14 to enter, you probably haven’t heard of Brand USA. Today, the Washington Free Beacon describes “The Cronyism Board” of this public-private partnership to promote tourism to the US: “It is governed by an 11-member board. John Connor, director of the Office of White House Liaison at the United States Department of Commerce, appointed the board members….All of the board members Connor has appointed have donated to Democrats and Democratic organizations almost exclusively, if they have donated at all.”
Briefly, the impetus for Brand USA came from the giants of US corporations, immensely profitable already from tourism. Rather than use their own deep pockets to promote tourism, they sought additional taxpayer and tourist funding for their advertising.
In 2007, I caught on to the scheme...
Continue reading "Kesler Fought Corporate Welfare, Won, Then Lost To Obama"
In Finland, this guy is considered a radical. In the US, he would be considered a Democrat:
The United States symbolises the worst ideologies in the world: growth and freedom… Any dictatorship would be better than modern democracy. There cannot be so incompetent a dictator that he would show more stupidity than a majority of the people. The best dictatorship would be one where lots of heads would roll and where government would prevent any economic growth… A fundamental, devastating error is to set up a political system based on desire. Society and life have been organised on the basis of what an individual wants, not on what is good for him or her… Our only hope lies in strong central government and uncompromising control of the individual citizen.
Yes, human desires sure do complicate the lives of those whose main human desire is power.
 Modern dog breeds genetically disconnected from ancient ancestors
Amusing: 5 Signs Your Child Is a Psychopath, According To The NYT
News you (ladies) can use: 80% of women are wearing the wrong bra size, resulting in discomfort, floppiness, and sub-optimal appearance. Maggie recomments the Nordstrom bra-fitters.
10 Tips on Writing from David Ogilvy
Thinking about the future, Robin Hanson:
The common pattern: project forward a current trend to an extreme, while assuming other things don’t change much, and then recommend an action which might make sense if this extreme change were to happen all at once soon.
How often do scientists fake results?
Actually, the Obama spending binge really did happen
How the Recovery Went Wrong - Of the 11 recoveries in the last 60 years, this one is at or near the bottom in job growth and every other economic indicator.
Who Really Owns the Oil Companies?
With Recall Vote Days Away – New Study Shows Walker’s Reform Saved Wisconsin $1 Billion
Their Rules, Not Ours: Time to Vet Private Lives of Journalists?
Who is Valerie Jarrett?
Walter Williams: Should black people tolerate this?
Prager: Leftism Is A Religion With Its Own Unbending Dogma
Text of Václav Klaus Heartland Institute Conference Speech
Hearing Witness: PPACA Is Scaring Capital Away from Health Services
Putting the 'Insurance' Back in Health Insurance
Nicaragua and the Religious Left: Look Back in Wonder
Wednesday, May 23. 2012
The federal Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) mandates that all hospitals, including Jewish or Moslem, must serve pork instead of beef. Pork is lower in fat and calories, thus better for health, and less expensive than beef, thus better for healthcare spending. HHS opines that only synagogues and mosques may continue to ban pork from their menus.
Can you hear the uproar? Jews and Muslims are required to break their basic dietary laws, rooted in many centuries, to obey a federal mandate. Every civil libertarian and all faiths would protest.
Yet, except for the support of Orthodox Jews, who actually have less stringent prohibitions than Catholics, and the Southern Baptist Convention, most groups which otherwise defend individual and group liberties are silent in backing Catholics in challenging the ObamaCare mandate to provide contraception and abortion by their non-church charities.
Jonathan Tobin lays it out:
One needn’t oppose the president’s re-election or endorse the Vatican’s stance on contraception in order to understand that a ruling against the church would grant the government nearly unlimited power to restrict religious freedom. In the weeks and months ahead as this issue continues to be debated, it is vital that more faith groups rally around the church and make it clear to the administration and the courts that when it comes to protecting First Amendment rights, the church does not stand alone.
You might speak with your pastor or rabbi and ask them not to be silent when Catholics' constitutional right is abridged. Silence is not moral.
(Note Added: There is no such HHS mandate to serve pork, at least yet. It is plausible because of the extent and nature of other ObamaCare intrusions into personal choice and beliefs.)
Ed Morrisey ably sums up the intimidation campaign by a convicted murderer, Brett Kimberlin, against several bloggers. As Michelle Malkin writes: “This is a convoluted, ongoing nightmare that combines abuse of the court system, workplace intimidation, serial invasions of privacy, perjury, and harassment of family members.” Read it all.
A highly notable issue, aside from that the legacy media has failed to take up the matter, is that the funding for this campaign comes from some of the most-darling of liberal-left foundations (see this list, and some more background on Kimberlin's trail of BS), using the Tides Foundation as their beard. The Tides Foundation acts as a secret conduit to leftist causes for donors, that include George Soros and Teresa Hines-Kerry as well as numerous other liberal foundations but also benefits from grants from the US government. See here.
Morrisey and Malkin and many other bloggers call for a free speech blogburst, of which this post is part. There is more at stake than the first amendment right to factually expose a campaign of intimidation against bloggers who have exposed Brett Kimberlin and his backers. There is the need to further expose the network of leftist donors and by example require greater transparency and accountability to their whole range of activities.
How to Find Your Purpose and Do What You Love
College Grads Earn Less Than A Decade Ago
Supply and demand at work
Transgender Five-Year-Old?
MoDo doesn't understand Catholicism
HHS doesn’t speak for me, or many women
Mary Ann Glendon: Why the Bishops Are Suing the U.S. Government - The main goal of the contraception mandate is not to protect women's health. It is a move to conscript religious organizations into a political agenda.
Washington Post Asks The Important Question: In a Way, Isn't Romney Sort of Responsible for a Massacre By Mormons 160 Years Ago?
Obama's Bain mutiny
Swinging at Bain, Obama Ignores What Private Equity Is
Democrats and Bain Capital: Hypocrisy exposed
As I understand it, venture capital and private equity are the EMS of the business world
Furious Chris Matthews Explodes: Cory Booker 'Betrayed' and 'Sabotaged' Obama
Obama’s dangerous words about profits and free enterprise
Dr. Orwell Will See You Now - Don’t be fooled by their health care Newspeak.
Michele: A 2012 campaign must-read: The conservative survival guide to Mitt Romney
Lazear: 2013 Tax Increases Are to be Feared, Not Spending Cuts
Watching the Democratic Party Collapse in Dixie
Obama challenged in Arkansas primary
GAFFNEY: Bad timing for LOST - Another foreign policy battle in the presidential election
The Danger of Article 82 and Obama’s Latest Treaty
White House officials shaped pending bin Laden movie
North American Energy Inventory
ZUBRIN: China’s population-control holocaust - The bloody history of ‘Limits to Growth’
Smithsonian's Vietnamese exhibit recalls plight of 'boat people'
Re Europe:
"Today, firms with more than 15 workers cannot get rid of employees even in a downturn without risking legal proceedings that can last years," reports The Economist magazine, referring to Italy's overregulated economy. "If a judge then decides the company has acted unfairly, it can be forced to rehire the worker and pay him his lost earnings
Tuesday, May 22. 2012
Cool blog we found: Brain Pickings. Sample: Joan Didion on Self-Respect
Mutations in autism
A new study in the journal Social Psychology and Personality Science finds that organic food eaters are . . . jerks.
Is it rape, or pushiness?
Mead: NY Met: The End of The Season
We love the Grand Tier too. An annual treat for us.
A new cut of steak
Selling kidneys
If you exercise enough, can you live forever?
How to prevent the poor of the world from getting Vit A
Humans, per groups like the WWF, are undesirable parasites. In effect, the WWF would prefer the scourge of humanity to be wiped clean from the planet.
We're white, we're male, and we suck
The Worst Union in America - How the California Teachers Association betrayed the schools and crippled the state
How would Tom Barrett have erased the $3.6 billion budget deficit in Wisconsin?
New York Times' Tom Friedman Bombs on ‘Jeopardy!’
The president had dinner with nine presidential historians...
Meet Desmond Hatchett — the fulfillment of the Welfare State
Douthat: A Little Bit Indian
Europe is driving full-tilt, foot on the pedal, into a brick wall
Racism must be a problem because government must have power.
The Left’s Threat to Delegitimate the Supreme Court if it Invalidates the ACA:
Once health insurance can be mandated, Congress will inevitably find that other products or services are equally essential to national well-being. Future Courts will either have to find all such purchase mandates to be legal, in which case there is no limiting principle, or they will have to pick and choose, which means an endless exercise in policy-making.
Democrats Turn on Obama's Bain Attack Ad
‘Relief Rolls As Modern Reservations’
Is mentioning Rev. Wright racist?
As best I can tell, Rev. Wright is a racist
Obama allows your children to go swimming for one more summer
VDH: Winning Battles, Losing Wars
Ten Thousand Commandments 2012 - An Annual Snapshot of the Federal Regulatory State
Does Jeremiah Wright have a place in this campaign?
Caseless ammo could cut 25 lbs. from gear
Cronkite and the Roots of Media Bias:
A key element to this fairy tale is the idea that the journalistic icons of the time, like CBS’s Walter Cronkite, were Olympian figures who would never stoop to play favorites or inject ideology into the news.
But this view is totally false.
MSM: Obama’s Faith Is Off The Table, Romney’s Isn’t
The Treblinka Gold Rush - After World War II, Polish peasants hunted for jewels and gold amid the human remains at former Nazi death camps
Monday, May 21. 2012
Paul Mirengoff’s lawyerly skills rebut Karl Rove’s campaign skills on whether Rev. Wright should be raised as an issue in the 2012 presidential campaign. The difference is between inside-Beltway and what turns on (or off) the jurors, voters.
Karl Rove considers President Obama’s twenty-year attachment to his radical minister as old hat, largely because failed presidential contender John McCain declined to raise it in 2008, and because the Obama administration’s record is so bad in itself that it should be enough to defeat him in 2012.
Paul Mirengoff, however, says that “presidential elections aren’t just about issues; they are about the person in whom we are entrusting our highest office.” Mirengoff then goes into how campaigns actually occur:
The second argument for shying away from Wright is that raising the issue will backfire, as pro-Obama forces accuse Romney of personal attacks and racism. But Romney need not, and should not, make the attacks; nor should the major PACs that back him. If the issue is raised –- after testing it with focus groups — it should be raised by lesser groups, as was the case with ads attacking John Kerry over his military service….It’s not racist to be disturbed by the fact that Obama chose a rabidly anti-American, who happens to be Black, as his spirtual [sic] leader. And, of course, Obama’s associations with white radicals can be invoked as part of the same line of attack.
In 2004, defenders of Kerry insinuated that Karl Rove was involved in the Swiftboat Veterans for Truth campaign to show that Kerry’s narrative of Vietnam heroism was false. Their only “proof” was that some of the same people supported President Bush and the Swiftees or that anti-Kerry Swiftees lacked enough documented evidence in Navy records.
That would be a problem for a Wright-Obama campaign in 2012, except that Kerry’s critics were the witnesses to his overblown attempted image whereas Obama’s own words and actions are the witness to his radical past. Further, Obama’s radical past is directly in line with his radical presidential policies and actions.
Were it only Rev. Wright that might be downplayed as but one indiscretion, albeit a twenty-year one. But, throughout Obama’s life his self-proclaimed formative mentors were cut of the same radical cloth, and in his administration he has appointed others of this ilk.
During the 2004 campaign I was interviewed by a star New York Times reporter, pro-Kerry, about the Swiftee campaign. I was fairly quoted, and continued an email correspondence with the reporter. After Bush narrowly won, this was our last email exchange:
Note to Todd Purdum, New York Times: If not for the anti-Kerry Vietnam veterans, shifting many thousands of votes, the election may well have been lost by Bush.
Reply from Purdum: Hard to argue with your analysis.
Mirengoff wins the dispute.
Nonetheless, I and others opposed to President Obama’s re-election must be responsibly concerned that some others opposed to his re-election may exceed the facts of his radical nature, and – of course – will be the ones given most prominence by the pro-Obama legacy media. That is unavoidable. But, regardless, the core truth will resonate with many who otherwise would be unaware of the facts of Obama's proudly radical past and how it shows in his present. It will be another strike against Obama that, again, may determine the margin in 2012.
Sunday, May 20. 2012
I think he likes me. I copied it below the fold.
Now back to my honey-do list. Sheesh.
Continue reading "Got a friendly email from President Obama today"
 Food Rules! Tyler Cowen’s useful new book helps ordinary diners find the good stuff.
DISCOVERING THE PRESIDENTIAL ORIGIN OF ‘OK’
Olympics, 388 B.C.: Mud, Sex, Hymns…Sports Too - Political rivalries flared and money flowed—but it was more like a rock festival than what we'll see in London
Arriving in Manzanillo
CNN Urges Normal Couples to Emulate Homosexuals’ Promiscuity
How Ignorance Fuels Science and the Evolution of Knowledge
Borat - and the Dictator - and Zionism
The truth is that Facebook is a toy, a dreamworld, a figment of the imagination.
Muslim Voters Change Europe
Belmont: The Son of Paleface
Cities Double Down on CRA Insanity That Caused 2008 Crisis
Roger: Who Is Barack Obama? The Question that Won’t Go Away:
...the noteworthy thing is that it is one more puff in the cloud of unknowing that surrounds the president.
It’s been pretty foggy in those precincts for some time.
Obama as con-man, fraud? Steyn
OK, but it is the policies that do not make any sense to me. Aren't most pols narcissistic frauds?
Why Hugo Chávez hates Jews: New book explores roots of anti-Semitism in Venezuela
Convicted Terrorist Brett Kimberlin and the Left's Political (and Criminal) Intimidation Network
Joe Lieberman: Turn the tide against Bashar al-Assad
I have yet to meet a single critic of our policy in Syria who believes that the situation in Syria is simple.
EU violates Aarhus Convention in ‘20% renewable energy by 2020’ program
Our Very Own Greece
Do not think about Jeremiah Wright
Buddy recommends: Jewish World Review
Malik Ali Brings the Crazy to Irvine Speech
Their Sense of Belonging - A historian vividly reconstructs Eastern Europe as a place of Jewish life rather than of Jewish death.
Deadly Disengagement - When Czech democracy needed defending, America was inattentive. The U.S. point man in Prague spent much of his time in New York.
Obama's 'Less Economy': Americans Facing Less Work, Less Reward
Saturday, May 19. 2012
Vermont bans fracking, but there is no oil or gas in Vermont, nor do they understand what fracking is
Funny, they don't ban fracked fuels from other states
My Son Looks Like a Girl. So What? (h/t Althouse)
Fat, Broke, and Single?
Regulating the Innovation Out of Charter Schools
Media Works To Suppress Obama 'Born in Kenya' Bio
"we rich Westerners are already beyond the practical limits that humans should ever aspire to achieve in terms of health, wealth – and even of education."
Why the Obama Campaign Is Blowing the Election
Ain’t no politics like identity politics ’cause identity politics don’t stop
Diversity training makes things worse (h/t Insty)
Media Pretends Mormonism Will Hurt Romney; Study Says Opposite
Clive Crook: Why I Think Obama Is Losing:
Obama's big problem, I think, is that he is no longer the president he said he would be. Above all, he's stopped trying to be that president.
U.S. Metros Are Ground Zero for Majority-Minority Populations
According to Adecco, nearly a third of parents are helping their kids find work, and nearly one in ten are taking them to job interviews.
Re-linked: Acknowledging The Arrival Of Peak Government
Via NYM:
Treating college as the new high school hasn’t benefited students who waste four years of their lives and pick up staggering debts which make it harder for them to buy homes and start families, but it has benefited the liberal arts infrastructure, which, despite the liberal spin, is just as good at handing out useless degrees with no career path as any for-profit college. And it has benefited the Democratic Party, which rightly sees college campuses as recruitment grounds and liberal-voter-training seminars. ...
Re-linked: Deterring Bullies: The “Karate Kid” Program
Is Regents of the University of California v. Bakke, a 1978 case rejecting academic racial quotas, the smoking gun behind Obama’s Kenyan identity?
The Audacity of Faith
Deficit likely higher than Jerry Brown's estimate
Did Elizabeth Warren Plagiarize Her 'Pow Wow Chow' Recipes?
Linda Chavez on her DNA geneology
Howie Carr: If moccasin were on the other foot...
‘Barack Obama: A Composite Kenyan’
Thursday, May 17. 2012
Toon via Theo
Chasing the Wrong Guys? Blame Your Hormones
Asian sex gang 'were acting within cultural norms'
Deterring Bullies: The “Karate Kid” Program
Are Pit Bulls Inherently Dangerous?
Fathers pretend to want internet porn ban
Dartmouth Costs $62,125 a Year
This Is Not Your Grandma's Humane Society
NYC Set on Chasing Last Remaining Industry out of Town
Maher: We Haven’t Had a Better President Since Jimmy Carter
Chris Matthews, Who Repeatedly Urged a Jeopardy Test To Determine Palin's Qualifications, Fails Jeopardy Test
Panic: Obama Campaign Already Coming Off the Rails
Scholars Continue to Reveal Mao's Monstrosities : Asia: Exiled Chinese historians emerge with evidence of cannibalism and up to 80 million deaths under the Communist leader's regime.
As much of the world starves, a UN hunger expert investigates Canada
Second Opinions - Obamacare isn’t the only target of conservative judges.
On Obama, via Lucianne:
'What More Do We Want This Man To Do For Us, Honest To God?' (David Letterman, May 2012)
Via Wilkinson:
...the next time you hear a good story about why the financial recession, or any other economically significant event, was caused by a single collection of bad actors — or how a simple linear narrative “explains” an important event — remember this: Just as we are wired to like a diet rich in fats and sugars, we have an appetite for simple, coherent narratives. Neither habit is good for our long-term health.
Wednesday, May 16. 2012
Teaching Doctors the ‘End of Life Conversation’ - Do dying patients want someone else to make decisions for them?
How Famous Companies Got Their Names (h/t Linkiest)
A Controversy at Post-Catholic Georgetown
Goldman-Bred Neuroscientist Bares Secret of Testosterone Trading
The Essential Authoritarian: “Personal responsibility” is a fetish
Call me irresponsible...
Acknowledging The Arrival Of Peak Government:
Central government -- the Central State -- has been in the expansion mode for so long that the process of contracting government is completely alien to the nation, to those who work for the State, and to those who are dependent on the State. Thus we have little recent historical experience of Peak Government and few if any conceptual guideposts to help us understand this contraction.
Peak Government is not a reflection of government services or the millions of individuals who work in government; it is a reflection of four key systemic forces that drove State expansion are now either declining or reversing...
Obama: You Know That Romney Is A Meanie Who Closed Business, Right? Because He Did UPDATE: Team Romney Gets It
The Romney Campaign Fires Back
Mead: Black studies is not the only academic area that is full of baloney
Belmont: The shape of post-Arab Spring Syria is becoming clearer with the passing months
One Afternoon In a Garage in Reno, Nevada
O'Keefe Strikes Again--in North Carolina
Sowell: Is A Race War Being Censored To Avoid White Backlash?
Palestinians: A different history of displacement and loss
Obama’s glory was inevitable, says Obama
Good grief. That is sick.
Tuesday, May 15. 2012
They were hedging their hedges. Who wouldn't? It's a little complex, but understandable: Irony 101 Or How The Fed Blew Up JPMorgan's 'Hedge' In 22 Tweets.
Businesses lose money every day by making calculated risks. I don't know what the big deal is. All business operates on risks. You win some, lose some. You try to win more than you lose.
 Are jeans suitable male attire?
A high-fat breakfast of bacon and eggs may be the healthiest start to the day, report shows
Plus home fries and white toast, and an (alternate day) side of pancakes or grits 'n gravy
Trash hoarder
Obesity a 'derogatory' word
Ann Romney = Hitler and Stalin
She's a Socialist? Who knew?
Break up the banks - JPMorgan mess is ‘Exhibit A’
OK, but then how do American banks compete with the foreign giants?
Licensing is obviously not for the consumer
Obama's Bain ad: 'Like watching an old friend bleed to death'
Backlash: Obama Campaign Turns Defensive Over Latest Ad Attacking Romney
Still trying to rally the base. Normal people do not like these personal attacks by Chicago thugs.
The Amateur: Barack Obama in the White House
1% Conundrum: How Much Income Inequality Is There, Really?
‘Having Persevered Through Those Days of Horse Drawn Computers . . .’
Key Soros Ally Provides Race-Rhetoric Training Session for House Democrats
President Barack Obama's Complete List of Historic Firsts
Romney's The un-McCain campaign
College Can Help You Do Anything—Even Apply for Foodstamps
Jerry Brown's plea to voters: 'Please increase taxes temporarily'
Right.
" It’s mind-boggling unless you understand that California has the worst business climate in the country and its revenue projections turned out to be wildly over-optimistic. "
California High-Speed Rail: Highest Burn Rate Ever
Turning Water Vapor Into Pollution
The carbon footprint of spilt milk
Vietnam, Laos Veterans Receive National Recognition
The UN: Awarding the Useless
Senior Homeland Security staffers have no law enforcement experience
MANDEL: Perverse Palestinian pride - Losing an unwise war, refugees wear their predicament as a badge of honor
Now about Obama's Teenage Years!
From Front Porch's President Obama vs. Walker Percy (and Another Jefferson Lecturer):
Until we manage to uncouple higher education from the job market, we are going to persist in misunderstanding education’s true end. It may well be that in the past—i.e., in a debt-based economy incapable of imagining how top-heavy things eventually fall over—a college degree has been a stepping stone to the middle class, but those days are over. An economy that can’t help a college graduate retire an enormous debt is not going to look upon a college degree as a stepping stone to the middle class. Colleges, obviously, will continue to look thus upon the degree (how they will wield the mighty frame of education, how build, unbuild, contrive to save tuition costs), but this is just one more thing among many about which they will be wrong.
And although it is true that we shouldn’t make higher education a luxury, it is truer still that we shouldn’t make it a commodity. When it once again becomes difficult, it will be neither a luxury nor a commodity. Making it so “every American should be able to afford it” is no different from making it so every American can do it, which is the same thing as rendering it meaningless.
Monday, May 14. 2012
 In retrospect, it was an insanely stupid idea to begin with.
Hindsight is always 20/20.
The original concept was noble in its intent; a new fighter jet that would satisfy the needs of the Air Force, Navy and Marines. Better to develop one all-purpose fighter than have each branch go through the trouble and expense of manufacturing their own, right? And if one branch had a specific requirement, like the Navy needing stronger landing gear because of the stress put on the aircraft by carrier landings, then that could be taken care of after the fact.
Then they screwed the whole idea with the moronic notion that the newest, fastest, most brilliant state-of-the-art fighter in the world also had to serve as a helicopter.
Yes, you read that right.
For the first half of the story, watch this engaging Nova documentary on the battle between Boeing and Lockheed Martin over who would claim the prize. Both teams ran into serious delays, both teams overcame enormous hurdles, and both teams put together a truly awesome plane.
Both teams also deserve the Dunce of the Decade award for even considering such a preposterous notion that the fastest fighter jet in the world also had to serve as a friggin' chopper. If they had put their collective foot down and simply told the brass back in Washington "This is the stupidest idea we've ever heard of", maybe it would have dawned on someone that trying to make the fastest fighter jet in the world hover was the very definition of oxymoronic.
For your viewing pleasure: Battle of the X-Planes
Continue reading "The F-35 Debacle"
Sunday, May 13. 2012
Few politicians have had the cojones to push back against the government unions who seem to believe that they own the government.
Walker did. Government unions nationwide are pouring so much money into his recall election that Obama's team is complaining that there isn't enough left for him.
The election is on June 5.
Send Gov. Scott Walker a few bucks. I did.
 Fighter plane from World War II found
The art of Arthur Szyk
Distracted Drivers Think of Themselves as Good Drivers, Research Suggests
For Mother's Day, Julia is married to the State
A Generation Hobbled by the Soaring Cost of College
A study that studied a study that studied why there are so many studies
How Black Studies Avoids Studying Blacks
Romney Tells Liberty Students to Honor Family Commitments
Sweden's Reputation As A Welfare State Is In Trouble
Around world, Obama's presidency a disappointment
The Incivil War of Climate Change Heats Up
The Proper Role of Government in One Chart
Armageddon in Wisconsin
A Speech I Would Like to Hear from a Politician...Any Politician!
Via Eratosthenes:
During the last week, we have seen the president support three political positions: gay marriage, a raise in the minimum wage, and a cut in the interest rate on loans to college students. These issues have one thing in common: The president’s supporters claim that those who oppose gay marriage, oppose a high minimum wage, and oppose the lowering of interest rates on college student loans must really hate gays, hate the poor, and oppose education. If you don’t favor President Obama’s programs, you hate the groups targeted by the programs. Thus, we have no serious debate on the merits of either side of these issues, and that is unhealthy.
Review of "best book on health care"
Scott Walker Is No More Anti-Union than FDR - The recall battle against Walker speaks volumes about the misguided priorities of modern-day progressives
The "It's On" Video is Now Off
Traitor!: Left Launches Hate Campaign Against Romney
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