We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
Instead of picking apart mistakes by Trump, let's focus on the damage the Democrats have done. It's legion. In the guise of economic "fairness," they gave us the worst economic recovery since World War II. They simply ground to a standstill our economic engine, causing massive unemployment and a job market that gives no hope to Americans for the future. They ruined our alliances and fed our enemies under a horrifyingly stupid, feckless president and secretary of state. They laid the groundwork for ISIS to become a power and were virtually useless in dealing with that organization. They destroyed our borders under the idea that it is racist to have them, flooding us with illegal aliens who don't care a whit about American values of the past, and they steal from our kindness. They were on the way to destroying health care, paving the way for massive government control of doctors, insurance companies, and yes, us as patients. The evidence is in: Obamacare was a failure. They lied to get it passed, they lied to keep it, and they are lying about how good it is now. Thankfully, most people understand they now have a pig in the poke that costs a ton, and they can't use it. They corrupted our bureaucracies in Washington, destroying the faith the American citizens had in their government.
They did a lot more damage than this short list, but the point is that they ruined everything they touched.
People babble on about how “Trump will never do anything about illegals” and “He’ll never repeal Obamacare.” Yeah, put your money on Trump failing – I did, and the guy I wrote checks to lost. News Flash: Donald Trump is not only going dance with the ones who brung him but afterwards he is going to take them to his limo to make out. This guy is interested in trying to please the people who elected him, not the urban swells who write for or read the NYT or WaPo – he knows they will never stop loathing him even if he somehow simultaneously cures cancer, brings world peace, and convinces Coldplay to disband.
No, he’s going to do what he said he will do – and I expect that when we hear the name of his Supreme Court nominee (Please, for many reasons, make it Judge Willet!) every conservative in America is going to seek a cigarette and a cuddle.
Good essay. Trump is no Conservative. I see him as a moderate pragmatist and probably an old-style Liberal at heart. I still can not understand why progressives and lefties hate him so much. He seems to love America and Americans, and he is entertaining. And character flaws are de rigeur for politicians because normal people avoid that game.
I received a link this morning to an article which suggests readers should more or less 'be afraid' of a certain group of technology companies. Over the course of time, many firms have acted in an amoral or immoral fashion. These tech firms have all probably also behaved poorly at various points. But the value they provide is significant. Fearing them is not sensible. There is good reason to not fear them. History indicates they are likely to all be undone or greatly diminished at some point in time. For most of the 1980s, the 'company' I was supposed to fear was the entire nation of Japan. For most of the 2000s, it's been China. Funny how Japan has been in a 20 year funk while China is just now dropping like a stone (apparently, Bitcoin prices are soaring over there - a sure sign of instability).
I consider articles like the above link to be a form of fake news, because it's an emotional appeal based on faulty logic. Articles of this nature appear every 10 years or so about various companies. Aside from China and Japan, I've read articles like this about GM, GE, Exxon, IBM, Cisco, Oracle, Bank of America, Citibank, AT&T, Coca-Cola, ITT, and a host of other large firms who, in total, represented large and innovative firms at various points in time. They were firms which happened to benefit from temporary blips in demand and consumer behavior. Point is, almost all are still fairly large firms, but their dominance has diminished, our fear subsiding as our interests and spending patterns change.
In every case, consumer behaviors shifted, innovation moved in different directions, or smaller more competitive firms caught up with these firms. But in almost every case, the dominant positions they claimed were lost. I see the same thing happening with Alphabet, Facebook, Amazon, Apple and Microsoft at some point. In fact, Microsoft is no longer the dominant company it once was - it, too, was part of the group mentioned above back in the 90's as a potentially dangerous 'monopoly'. I guess being downgraded from 'monopoly' status is just as frightening as being part of a group of large firms which all compete with each other?
The idea that there is something new and different happening with these tech firms is misguided. Railroads dominated the economic scene for many decades in the 1800s, then oil companies, then car manufacturers. Each one was demonized in similar fashion. Tech offers greater opportunity than any of these firms did, as well as great potential for abuse. But you take the good with the bad, and the good usually outweighs the bad in an overwhelming fashion. I'll take my chances with these firms as opposed to any government oversight and regulation, thank you. Their fear and dislike of each other will keep them on a far more even keel than any pinhead politician.
The American people are sick unto death of liberals. They are sick of a lousy economy; they are sick of Hillary Clinton’s grating voice. They are sick of worrying whether a careless word will get them hauled up before the lame feminists in HR. They are sick of being called racists sexists homophobes. And they are sick of their adult kids living in the basement.
But never mind about all that. The real reason for the crisis of 2016 is that liberalism and globalism have been tried and found wanting. The truth is that the nation state is still the best -- although flawed -- way of conjuring up that abstract notion we call human community, and ordinary people feel it in their bones.
For 1 million, you do not get much. Supply and demand. You are not paying for the lousy living square footage, you are paying to be here. Like an ocean liner, you do not just get your little rooms. You get the whole enchilada just out your door.It's not for the faint of heart though. Gosh, I love living here but I am saving for a country getaway in northwestern CT or Ulster County. I need my own shooting range, at least, and that is not allowed in Central Park unless you are a crim.
We mostly post about resistance exercises and calisthenic exercises. Resistance exercises and calisthenics offer plenty of good cardio-pulmonary challenge in themselves, but some almost pure cardio exercise should be part of the fitness mix. The Conditioning or Fitness Triad is what I call it: a total of 2 hrs mostly weights, 1 hr of heavy+lighter calisthenics, 1+ hr of pure cardio.
A few comments about cardio (eg rowing, running, swimming, fast-walk treadmill, stair machine, jump rope, elliptical, bike): These exercises do not build strength. Cardio exercise does nothing to prevent osteoporosis or to strengthen bone. They do help build cardiac power and muscle endurance. These exercises do not help with weight loss in any meaningful way, but keeping your body moving with exertion every day is a good idea, and you can't lift heavy weights every day. We strongly advise against running as a cardio exercise because of joint damage. Sprinting outdoors or indoors is fine, but long runs outdoors are physically destructive (even if mentally beneficial) and offer little fitness benefit.
20-25 minutes of pure cardio, twice or at most 3X/wk, is all anybody needs as the cardio component of a fitness program. It doesn't take much time because it's intensity, not duration, that matters. If you have more time on a given day, spend another 1/2 hr on high-rep weights or calisthenics instead of wasting it on more pure cardio.
There are caveats, however. To be effective, cardio has to be HIIT - High Intensity Interval cardio - approx 1-2 minute sprints alternating with one minute sub-sprints to catch your breath. If you can talk or read during cardio, you are wasting your time. A sprint means around 80% of your max heart rate (unless, like me, you are on BP meds that limit your heart rate in which case you just push it to your max which for me is 120). To get that rate up and maximize the stress, use the max resistance (on a treadmill, for example, an incline of 10 or more) and/or your max sprint speeds and put your heart into it. Otherwise, it's fairly useless unless you are over 80 years old or infirm.
Distance runners (I used to be one) and distance swimmers (I used to swim a mile daily) are not accomplishing very much. It feels good, though.
The other Cardio caveat concerns variety. Continuous repetition of the same cardio exercise increases your efficiency with it and thus diminishes its cardio effectiveness, so we need to vary the cardio exercises to keep the stress up. Mix it up, even within one session. Less boring, too. I always add a few minutes of jump rope at the end - singles, running man, and one-footed, to make sure I finish with nothing left in the tank. Jumping is tough and you will see mostly guys doing it - few if any bouncing gals.
An example of a typical cardio day for me would be 5 minutes elliptical warm-up intervals, set above 10, then a one-minute straight-arm plank, then 15 minutes treadmill fast-walk intervals at a 10% incline, then a minute elbow plank, then 5 minutes jump rope. If I have more free time to fill, I'll do some sets of heavy ball throws, light-weight squats, high-rep curls and press-downs.
An Oregon couple has been told they must destroy a 2-acre pond
on their land — the property’s most attractive feature — because the
government said so.
The question remains, however, why any nation would want to throw out its sovereignty to institutions that are fundamentally unaccountable, that provide no mechanism for reversing direction, and whose only "solution" to problems involves arrogating to itself ever more authoritarian, rather than democratically legitimate, power.
“[Because of an imminent ICE AGE] .. even more dramatic results are possible, however; for instance, a sudden outward slumping in the Antarctic ice cap, induced by added weight, could generate a tidal wave of proportions unprecedented in recorded history.” -John Holdren, 1971
Read through all of the news accounts and commentary about the Berlin attack and no where do you see any questions about whether it was wise to import a million barbarians...The Pax Americana allowed the West to remain in a state of perpetual adolescence.
Image via Never Yet Melted. Grammatically correct, but the message is wrong. Good grammar does not compensate for an erroneous message. (Fact check: Spanish actually has a future subjunctive, but not English. Go figger.)
The reason (I surmise) that so many people claim to be spiritual rather than religious is that being spiritual imposes no discipline upon them, at least none that they do not choose themselves. Being religious, on the other hand, implies an obligation to observe rules and rituals that may interfere awkwardly with daily life. Being spiritual-but-not-religious gives you that warm, inner feeling, a bit like whiskey on a cold day, and reassures you that there is more to life—or, at least, to your life—than meets the eye, without actually having to interrupt the flux of everyday existence. It is the gratification of religion without the inconvenience of religion. Unfortunately, like many highly diluted solutions, it has no taste.
Hedge fund manager Ray Dalio quantified just how much private sector experience Trump's picks have: a cumulative 83 years in the private sector vs. 55 years in either government or military (mostly military). By contrast, Obama's first Cabinet had achieved a cumulative of five years in the private sector vs. 122 years in the government or military (mostly government) before joining his incoming administration. Trump's Cabinet is tilted more toward the private sector than any administration in history, and Dalio predicts this may inject into the economy the "animal spirits" that spurred so much growth in the 1980s.
News outlets such as the New York Times and NBC have no more credibility than most websites or the National Enquirer. Is it any surprise that we are witnessing the funeral for traditional journalism as we once knew it?
This election didn’t merely expose the failure of six months of campaigning by the Democratic Party. This election exposed the failure of SIX DECADES of leftist propaganda to have any cumulative effect at all.
... low levels of legal immigration are probably a good thing. The people willing to go through all the steps it takes to migrate legally are going to be people who scrupulously observe the law. They are not coming here just to screw it all up for everyone including themselves. Recent legal immigrants tend to be hyper-patriotic for that reason. They take nothing for granted because they had to earn their citizenship. Their presence is a healthy reminder that citizenship has value.
Tomorrow, the days begin to lengthen but I have to say that I don't really mind the short days. Getting out early in the cold and dark at 330 or 4 is pleasant to me. I take the dog out if he's willing, I listen for owls, I identify constellations and O'Ryan watches me with a cautious eye, I hear little critters scampering in the leaf litter.I have a hot coffee and a cold Coke to get ready for the gym which is open at 4:45. Carpe diem.
How many MORE atrocities before our leaders stop lying to us and admit that, thanks to their immigration policies, being mowed down while doing your Christmas shopping is simply the new normal?
“It would be very difficult for us to learn that a human being committed this deed who came to Germany to ask for refuge and asylum,” the German chancellor said in a live statement.
"Would be"? You know she is praying that Lutherans did it.
The Wisconsin governor has asked Trump to restore the balance of federal and state power. Here’s why all states should rally to his call...Democrats who fear the exercise of unbridled power by a Republican president have as much reason to want state governments kept free from federal control as Republicans do for not wanting a repeat of Obama’s constitutional abuses. We can disagree about policy issues, but we should agree on the basic meaning of our Constitution.
Boudreaux: 
Lightning activity around the globe, 
An Ancient City 
Another myth demolished, finally: 
Image via 
We mostly post about resistance exercises and calisthenic exercises. Resistance exercises and calisthenics offer plenty of good cardio-pulmonary challenge in themselves, but some almost pure cardio exercise should be part of the fitness mix. The Conditioning or Fitness Triad is what I call it: a total of 2 hrs mostly weights, 1 hr of heavy+lighter calisthenics, 1+ hr of pure cardio.
Mead's Yule Blog: 
Image via 
Here's the Real Reason 
Manhattan Project-sized effort is
Tomorrow, the days begin to lengthen but I have to say that I don't really mind the short days. Getting out early in the cold and dark at 330 or 4 is pleasant to me. I take the dog out if he's willing, I listen for owls, I identify constellations and O'Ryan watches me with a cautious eye, I hear little critters scampering in the leaf litter.I have a hot coffee and a cold Coke to get ready for the gym which is open at 4:45. Carpe diem.