Sunday, June 19. 2011
Grids vs. no grids, at Old Urbanist:
Interestingly, NYC's Broadway was an old Lenape Indian trail into the Bronx and Westchester, later extended by the Dutch to run up to the Dutch settlement of Albany (the current Rte. 9).
We now call the North River the Hudson River. The road along the wall is Wall St. That canal, now filled in, is Broad St. Another Dutch canal further uptown, long filled in, is now Canal St.
More fun old Manhattan maps here.
Referring to real Black Bears, not financial bears - in what year was the last bear on Manhattan killed?
And roughly when, the last wolf?
Father's Day dinner last night with the in-laws at the Red Hat restaurant in the charming riverfront village of Irvington, NY (pop 6000). Was the town named after Washington Irving? Yes. Re-named after its distinguished resident. In fact, the hamlet of Sleepy Hollow is just north of there.
Now mainly a bedroom town, it once housed the Lord and Burnham Co. which built greenhouses and conservatories, including those of the NY Botanical Gardens. In fact, Red Hat is housed in the back of one of the old Lord and Burnham buildings. (Mrs. BD knows Irvington as the location of the home office and shop of Eileen Fisher.)
Here's some Irvington real estate for sale. Surprisingly reasonable, given the location.
If you look south from the water's edge, you can see Manhattan 20 miles in the distance. My pic, looking north up the Hudson, has the Tappan Zee bridge. Gal in the foreground looks like Botticelli's niece - angelic, but with a sadness.
Saturday, June 18. 2011
 My rather good post about our visit to Norcia showed a road sign to Cascia. We did not visit Cascia, but friendly folks at our Abbazia hotel later informed us that St. Rita is the saint of hopeless causes.
I thought to myself, Hmmm. Maybe a saint for Maggie's Farm, if her soul is willing.
Now back to farm work, then we're going for special celeb dinner with my Dad-in-law. Tomorrow, lunch with my own Dad and the entire family, while in-laws go to celebrate their cousin's retirement after 27 years as a beloved parish priest in Pennsylvania.
Friday, June 17. 2011
It is pronounced nor' - cha.
Norcia is the pork capital of Italy - pig, and the cinghiale which live in the surrounding hills and mountains. Sausages, salamis, proscuitto, and all other preserved meats. In the world of supermarkets, we forget how important tasty preserved meats were in the old days.
The food in Norcia is so famous that buses bring Romans up for the day for lunch and food shopping. From what I saw, they surely sleep on the way back to Roma because these Italians are serious about food, wine, - and food volume. Vocal volume, also. (As our Chinese waitress in Bavegna noted, Italians don't talk - they shout. Really, not always.)
Beside meat, they have a specialty in the incredible wild (and wildly expensive) local Black Truffle - tartufo negro, the "diamond of the kitchen" - and Pecorino cheese too - one of the best hard cheeses in the world, made from sheep milk.
Americans tend not to enjoy eating the wild boar very much, but in Italy they do wonders with it. We need to learn from the Italians, since we have such a problem with them. (However, it is illegal to market wild game in the US.)
I enjoyed visiting this village in the mountains, in the Valnerina, very much. It's not a tourist town, it's more like a market town but some savvy tourists stop by to get the local flavor - and to eat some fine flavors.
The real reason we went there was because of Mrs. BD's link to the monks of Norcia, but there turned out to be many reasons to go there.
Italian courtship on church steps. After seeing this pic, Mrs. BD (half Italian) wondered what these gals would turn into over time, after they get the stereotypically easily-led Italian guys off the church steps and up to the altar.
Shops show off their photos of their cinghiale hunters, on the walls. Head shots, in both senses of the term:
More fun Norcia pics and comments below the fold -
Continue reading "Food, fun, and Vespers in Norcia: Pig City"
Thursday, June 16. 2011
 At Chronicle.
I believe that, if you haven't gotten what you need to become an effective and self-motivated learner in high school, you never will. School is spoon-feeding, but real education is picking up the spoon yourself.
The test of whether someone has deserved a higher education is afterwards: Do they continue with scholarly or self-educational pursuits, or do they rest on their paper laurels? Most people could learn to do their jobs through apprenticeships if a job is what they are after, and save the college cost. Most jobs are not rocket science, but most jobs expect ongoing learning of some sort, on one's own.
I also believe that all education is self-education, and that a degree is an expensive piece of paper. See "I got my education at the New York Public Library," (which wonderful library, a source of learning for immigrants and scholars alike, had its 100th Aniversary last month).
We easily forget that almost none of the remarkable achievers and contributors in human history ever had higher education, or more than elementary formal education, and that that continues to be true up through the present.
America's "education system" is SNAFU, and "college education" is a racket designed to support Big Beer.
Norcia is the birthplace of St. Benedict, born 480. I'll post some of my pics of the town of Norcia, the pork capital of Italy, later. First just a plug for the Monks of Norcia, who Mrs. BD supports.
This group of young Benedictines, many of whom are Americans, were looking for a monastic home. The Vatican responded that the monastery attached to the Church of St. Benedict in Norcia was available. How could they not accept that offer?
They say of themselves:
We pray the full monastic Office as laid out in the Rule (my link). We observe the monastic fast and we have retained the patrimony of Gregorian chant. In addition, the Holy See has entrusted us with the special apostolate of celebrating the Eucharist in both forms (in utroque usu), that is, the Ordinary Form and the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite. We do all kinds of work (manual, clerical and intellectual) including some limited apostolic work. Monastic formation in Norcia focuses heavily on the interior life: conversion, self-knowledge, the rooting out of vices and the acquiring of virtues – all this to create the necessary conditions for contemplative prayer.
We are a young international community, eager to love and serve Our Lord Jesus Christ with all our heart.
We chatted with a couple of them, and Mrs. BD attended their Vespers service in the crypt of the church. I might have joined her, but I don't really get the Roman Catholic routine and feel more like a lurker or a sight-seer instead of a participant when I, as a Protestant, attend, so I don't always feel that it's right.
Wednesday, June 15. 2011
 Four Myths about the Crusades. A quote:
The verdict seems unanimous. From presidential speeches to role-playing games, the crusades are depicted as a deplorably violent episode in which thuggish Westerners trundled off, unprovoked, to murder and pillage peace-loving, sophisticated Muslims, laying down patterns of outrageous oppression that would be repeated throughout subsequent history. In many corners of the Western world today, this view is too commonplace and apparently obvious even to be challenged.
But unanimity is not a guarantee of accuracy. What everyone “knows” about the crusades may not, in fact, be true. From the many popular notions about the crusades, let us pick four and see if they bear close examination.
Afternoon in Bevagna - a regular town sort of like Rumford, Maine. Love the way the bars put their picnic tables on the street to annoy the drivers. Neighborhood social life is on the streets, which I think is a wonderful thing.
If you are a stranger in a non-tourist town, they watch you a little to make sure you aren't up to no good. It's their town, and they feel protective.
Lots of pics below the fold -
Continue reading "More Umbria: Bevagna, Spello, and Assisi (with lots of good food) - not all on the same day!"
From Malanga's The 'Anti-Christie' Agenda Driving Connecticut:
Connecticut finished 47th among states in net jobs created by existing businesses over a 15 year period, according to the National Establishment Times Series database, which tracks job dynamics from 1993 through 2008. On jobs generated by new businesses over the same time, the state ranked 46th, according to NETS. In fact, it's misleading even to use the term ‘job dynamics' in discussing Connecticut. The state has fewer private sector jobs today than it had in 1990.
Malloy and his fellow Democrats now in charge seem to believe that the state's only problem was that it just wasn't doing enough taxing and spending and borrowing.
Lovely state, insane politics. Economically, it could be another Texas if it wanted to be. From an income standpoint, it's the richest state in the US (but that mostly comes from the comfortable NYC suburb of Fairfield County). Instead, it keeps trying to kill the geese that lay the golden eggs to buy votes in its forlorn dying cities from which industry has fled.
That's a long-term death spiral, just like the one New Jersey was in.
Tuesday, June 14. 2011
"I'm working as hard as I can to get my life and my cash to run out at the same time. If I can just die after lunch Tuesday, everything will be perfect." - Doug Sanders, professional golfer
"All the fat guys watch me and say to their wives 'See, there's a fat guy doing okay. Bring me another beer.'" -- Mickey Lolich, Detroit Tigers pitcher
"Last year we couldn't win at home and we were losing on the road. My failure as a coach was that I couldn't think of anyplace else to play." -- Harry Neale, professional hockey coach
"When it's third and ten, you can take the milk drinkers; I'll take the whiskey drinkers every time." -- Max McGee, Green Bay Packers receiver
"I found out that it's not good to talk about my troubles. Eighty percent of the people who hear them don't care and the other twenty percent are glad you're having trouble." -- Tommy LaSorda, LA Dodgers manager
"My knees look like they lost a knife fight with a midget." -- E. J. Holub, Kansas City Chiefs linebacker regarding his 12 knee operations
"My theory is that if you buy an ice-cream cone and make it hit your mouth, you can learn to play. If you stick it on your forehead, your chances aren't as good." -- Vic Braden, tennis instructor
"Blind people come to the ballpark just to listen to him pitch." -- Reggie Jackson commenting on Tom Seaver
"When they operated, I told them to put in a Koufax fastball. They did - but it was Mrs. Koufax's." -- Tommy John NY Yankees recalling his 1974 arm surgery
"I don't know. I only played there for nine years." -- Walt Garrison, Dallas Cowboys fullback when asked if Tom Landry ever smiles
"We were tipping off our plays. Whenever we broke from the huddle, three backs were laughing and one was pale as a ghost." -- John Breen, Houston Oilers
"The film looks suspiciously like the game itself." -- Bum Phillips, New Orleans Saints after viewing a lop-sided loss to the Atlanta Falcons
"When I'm on the road, my greatest ambition is to get a standing boo." -- Al Hrabosky, major league relief pitcher
"The only difference between me and General Custer is that I have to watch the films on Sunday." -- Rick Venturi, Northwestern football coach
"I have discovered, in twenty years of moving around the ball park, that the knowledge of the game is usually in inverse proportion to the price of the seats." -- Bill Veeck, Chicago White Sox owner
"Because if it didn't work out, I didn't want to blow the whole day." -- Paul Horning, Green Bay Packers running back on why his marriage ceremony was before noon.
"I have a lifetime contract. That means I can't be fired during the third quarter if we're ahead and moving the ball." -- Lou Holtz, Arkansas football coach
"I won't know until my barber tells me on Monday." -- Knute Rockne, when asked why Notre Dame had lost a game
"I tell him 'Attaway to hit, George.'" -- Jim Frey, KC Royals manager when asked what advice he gives George Brett on hitting
"I learned a long time ago that "minor surgery" is when they do the operation on someone else, not you." -- Bill Walton, Portland Trial Blazers
"Our biggest concern this season will be diaper rash." -- George MacIntyre, Vanderbilt football coach surveying the team roster that included 26 freshmen and 25 sophomores.
 The Mediterranean Bay Laurel (Laurus nobilis), known in Italy as alloro or lauro, is a common flavoring for Mediterranean meats and fish (also used to decorate the heads of victors). It's sometimes called True Bay, True Laurel, or Sweet Bay. Most Italians have one growing near their house, for cooking (and for hedges). It's used mostly fresh, sometimes slightly dried or dried, and is evergreen.
It is not related at all to the California Bay (Umbullularia californica), which is the common supermarket or farmer's market "Bay Leaf" in the US.
The flavor/fragrance profiles are quite different, as these commenters note. In my view, each is good but definitely different. To my American taste, the Med True Bay has a foreign, kerosene-like flavor which takes a little - but not much - getting used to.
Here's how Italians use Laurus nobilis. The excellent Tuscan steaks are always cooked with it, and grilled meats in general.
As I have twice before (here in June 2010 and here in September 2010), I asked my friend Gerald Robbins, the Turkish-speaking expert and a Senior Fellow at Philadelphia’s Foreign Policy Research Institute, to comment on this past weekend’s parliamentary elections in Turkey.
In brief recap of prior posts:
Turkey’s AKP political party and its leader Prime Minister Recep Erdogan have held parliamentary power since 2002. Their program has been a combination of several elements: successfully encouraging economic development in the interior which has also benefited the usual coastal economic centers, and pursuing a gradual turning from the secularist path set almost a century ago for modern Turkey by Kemal Attarturk. AKP’s Turkey turned to a more Islamist focus aligned with Ottoman-like pretensions of influence throughout the Middle East. Turkey’s former closeness with the West via NATO membership has become an empty promise, as shown in its refusal to allow Western forces to enter Iraq via its territory in 2003 and subsequent footsy with radical states in the Middle East and support for anti-Israel propaganda and actions. Facing strongly entrenched business, secular and military interests, like a frog in slowly warming water, these interests have had their power sapped (coopted in the case of many traditional business interests, whose social-democratic/statist linkages make them particularly susceptible to AKP blandishments and programs).
Now, for Robbins latest:
Continue reading "Turkey and the Frog"
Monday, June 13. 2011
Honest discussions or debates have one purpose: to illuminate a subject with facts and theories which relate facts to eachother, and perhaps to persuade. Dishonest debates or arguments are really just fights with words, and of interest only to litigators and politicians.
Fallacious arguments of the false assumption type are used in both: in the former by accident or out of ignorance, and in the latter as a tactical trick (eg "If the glove don't fit, you must acquit.").
When questions are posed in that manner, they are known as loaded questions. They are "loaded" with an effort to seek your acquiescence to an unspoken assumption. (The classic is "When did you stop beating your wife?") The correct response to questions with hidden assumptions is to point that out, and to challenge the hidden assumption. Otherwise, you will fall into a trap.
When engaging on an issue, always examine the other guy's assumptions first, because a topic can go nowhere with fallacious assumptions, and there can be no constructive discussion if you do not accept the other guy's premise. In that case, you must address the premise first, backing up before you can move forward.
Here are some simple examples of fallacious assumptions. Usually, in arguments, the assumptions are unstated, "assumed." It's better to state them first just as one lists one's "givens" in geometry proofs. Sometimes, just addressing the assumptions clears everything up.
John at Powerline: You Can Prove Anything If You Make the Right Assumptions. Certainly true, if one is engaging in dishonest or tendentious debate.
(I am aware that I am not discussing the huge and important topic of unconscious assumptions, but that is more about psychology than logical debate.)
Sunday, June 12. 2011
We wanted our trip to be as much off the beaten path as feasible, and to try to soak up Italy instead of tourist Italy (which I term Disney Italy - been there, done that). After using our delightful tenuta outside Todi as our base for a few days, we headed up over the hills and through the vineyards towards Bevagna in the Valle Umbra because Mrs. BD knew, during her planning, that I wanted some time based in a little old, non-touristy town to walk around in.
On the way there, we stopped by the hilltop walled village Montefalco, where we did the most shopping on our entire trip: She could not resist the famous tessuto artistico - the textiles of Umbria - tablecloths and linens - and I could not resist their heavy Umbrian olive oils and wines. Sagrantino di Montefalco, in particular:
Montefalco is know almost exclusively for its obscure and powerful wine, know as Sagrantino. Sagrantino is a dark bruiting red wine made from the indigenous Sangratino grape that is grown only around Montefalco. For centuries it was produced as a passito, a fortified dessert wine, but today Sagrantino reaches its pinnacle as a earthy and dry table wine.
Well, also known for its Umbrian textiles. She bought a yellow tablecloth with some pattern in it or whatever, taking well over 1/2 hour to do so while I explored around. (It is against my religion to enter clothing stores, shoe stores, or textile shops).
This is a pic of a pic on the wall in one of Montefalco's many vino and olio shops.
Lots of pics below the fold -
Continue reading "More Umbria: Onward to Bevagna (with a stop for a fine lunch in Montefalco)"
Friday, June 10. 2011
That's the name of a hotel that we did not stay at. Somebody's old villa. We discovered this gem by accident while stumbling around the countryside outside Montefalco looking for a Sagrantino winery to visit on our way (on the "Strada di Sagrantino") to visit the wonderful town of Spello - also a gem of a place.
A stunning and elegant place in a tiny hamlet outside Montefalco. I love the elegant simplicity of classic Italian design: zero glitz, sedate and serene, good use of subtle colors, formal gardens - the things the Brits loved and learned from, and enthusiastically integrated into their sort-of-crude commercial culture in the 17th and 18th C.
Brits love - and need - Italy for the yeast in their northern European bread, as it were. Same for New England Yankees, I think.
Mrs. BD and I thought it would be perfect for a destination wedding or a second, third, or whatever honeymoon. She walked in and had a chat with the manager, who was happy to show her around, while I stayed outside and took pics of their gardens and smoked a short ceegar. It's in fairly easy driving distance from Assisi, Spello, Spoleto and Montefalco, and what could be better than that?
Look at their website, and make up your own mind about whether you might like to spend a few days there in the Valle Umbra with your honey-pie and a Costco-rented standard transmission Alpha Romeo with talking GPS.
Big swimming pool, too, even though no Italians can swim to save their lives. I do not know why that is. They like to strut around pools and beaches in their tiny clothes, but they can't swim.
From an old buddy of mine in Oregon:
Hi, Doc -
Well, piss. I'm extremely upset about two things:
-- I was wrong
-- You were right
And that's enough to piss off ANYBODY!
I'll say. I cringe at the mere thought.
Like a lot of people, my friend always assumed that because his last name is somewhat unusual, he'd always be able to pick up his "name.com" domain whenever he wanted.
He also thought he'd never actually have a use for it, in the sense that he doesn't have any kids, so it's doubtful he'll be posting pics of his cute grandkids a few years down the road, plus he doesn't have any interest in blogging.
Then he went to some kind of 'crafts school' for a month and is now gearing up to sell online some of the nifty things he's turning out, like lamps and chandeliers. But he doesn't want to commit himself to any one genre in a business sense, like using "JimsCustomLighting.com" for the domain, so what he really wants to do is — you guessed it — use his real name.
And — you guessed it — the domain is gone, gobbled up by the domain harvesters. It just goes to some "This domain is for sale" page. And, in many cases, you don't actually get to buy it from them for a mere $4,999.99, you lease it from them on a yearly basis extending from now until the end of eternity.
And then there's this (names have been changed to protect the innocent):
I just don't get it. Did they pre-register it because of all the James Bellywhumpers out there, knowing one of us would be along any minute? I typed a few variations into the browser about a year ago and they were all available (it went to Bing). Did I tip my hand?
Ya got me. You wouldn't think that Bing (Microsoft) would actually sell its list of searches with the word ".com" in them to some domain harvester, but, on the other hand, it's not illegal to harvest domains, so it probably wouldn't be surprising to find out the domain harvester in this case is owned by Microsoft.
As it is, my friend isn't sure what the hell he's going to do. Probably end up using "JimsCustomDoodads.com".
So if you ever think you might want your own domain name, now's the time. Nor do you have to actually do anything with it, like build a temporary web site to 'hold' it. And most web hosting companies will automatically re-bill you each year so you don't lose it.
I've been designing web pages since the web was one month old, have used a lot of web hosting companies over the years, and my pick of the litter these days is BlueHost. Unlimited bandwidth, unlimited storage space, unlimited email boxes, a whole shitload of helper programs, and all for a lousy $6.95 a month.
The direct link is here. If you want to read a bit more about BlueHost and get some ideas on conjuring up an available domain name (like using hyphens), read this, then use the link on the page to get to BlueHost. If the domain's available, GET IT. You're not signing up for a 1-year contract or anything. If you later decide you don't want it, they'll pro-rate it back and refund you the difference with no 'disconnect fee'.
If you're interested in firing up a blog site (elections are coming up!) or web site, please...
Continue reading "YourName.com = going, going, gon-"
Thursday, June 9. 2011
The various academic fields of –ists and –ologists try to decipher why and how individuals and groups do things, and the effective ways to get them to do them better or differently or to do other things.
I’d suggest that the further they get from coercion, material or otherwise, the weaker their prescriptions.
With one exception, that is, persuasion. The field of persuasion is what I focused upon in my doctoral studies of organization and decision making, as offering the most direct and directly measurable avenue to offering improvements that are accepted and acted upon.
Reducing a complex subject, full of tautologies, persuasion is getting someone to do what they want to do. One does that by listening, observing and understanding the person’s wants and offering information with comfort that they find useful which will lead them to rearrange their priorities.
A corollary to that is understanding why individuals choose attitudes and behaviors that are less constructive to their own wants. This article by a leading social psychologist says that we form narratives of ourselves and the world that are often misleading.
Personally, I believe that we all are exposed to roughly equal proportions of good and bad things in our lives, although of differing dimensions, and we each choose which to focus upon. The happier among us tend to focus on the good things more than the bad.
None of this is to contradict deep psychoanalysis, discursive or medicinal, for very serious problems. However, for most of us, the functionally dysfunctional common to humanity, the more direct path is through understanding our and others’ narratives.
The academic –ists and –ologists tend to go well beyond that -- often based on controlled experiments with college students from which they overgeneralize -- into how to influence or control groups of people, adding such magnitudes of mathematical and knowable uncertainties that they blunder about in faith-healing based on catering to whatever their powers that be desire.
Once one gets too far away from eternal verities, from moral lessons that have been, in effect, empirically tested across hundreds and thousands of years by all people and peoples and found to point in the right direction, one enters into the experimentalists that have no more respect for us than rats and no more object than controlling the rats.
They haven’t been too successful, so they increasingly turn to coercion. The resistance of individual constructive independence and relationships eventually wins out, although after great costs along the way.
If one chooses to be conscious and resist ill temptations, to be in control of one’s own narrative, however, the “I” rules and saves oneself and the world from great pain.
We took a drive to Orvieto, with the goal of seeing the renowned Signorelli chapel's 16th C. frescoes - the Chapel of the Madonna di San Brizio inside the 15th C. Duomo.
Pics and verbiage below the fold -
Continue reading "A drive to Orvieto"
 At Pajamas, How a Teachers’ Rally Made Me Anti-Education.
It's a remarkable photo-essay. He says:
Horrors! I was taken aback by my own thoughts. How could I be so cruel? What evil right-wing influence was making me think this way?
I went through a similar transformation years ago. I am heartened to see that some are still capable of real "critical thinking." Perhaps all Liberals are not hopelessly committed Communists. My main take-home from the pics, however, is that these are not well-indoctrinated ideologues - they are just greedy for my money.
There is no end-point to the Leftist's desire for the fruits of my labor. It is always "more."
This has nothing to do with education.
Image from the article.
ED addendum: related: Elites Gone Bad - What America needs is a better class of left-winger.
Another addendum at Powerline: Long Live High School English Teachers. Photo from that piece below:
What's her pension invested in? Not-for-profit windmills? What about your greed, honey?
Wednesday, June 8. 2011
The original argument against the Bill of Rights as an amendment to the Constitution in the US was that it would make it appear that those were the only rights of the people and of the states.
"Enumerated powers" do not enumerate the rights of the people, but delimit the powers of the state (all Maggie's readers know that). Randy Barnett discusses. A quote:
...before there was any Bill of Rights, defenders of the Constitution claimed that the enumeration of power in Article I would protect the liberties of the people, making a bill of rights unnecessary.
The people opposing the Bill of Rights amendments had a good point.
Tuesday, June 7. 2011
That is literally the old Via Flaminia as it passes through the Roman town of Carsulae. We drove out there from our tenudo to look around. This via was an ancient trading road between the Tyrrhenian and the Adriatic, but was much improved by Roman engineers when they invaded Umbria around 250 BC.
Carsulae is an unusual Roman site because most Roman towns have been subject to later building on the old Roman foundations, but nobody ever built a town on top of Carsulae (in part, because it's not on a defensible hill).
The place started as a Roman military camp, and just grew into a town with an amphitheater, a local Senate, etc. by the time of Augustus. Most of the Roman town, and its surrounding Roman vacation villas, are yet to be excavated.
Continue reading "More Umbria: Come on, show me something really old"
 While preserving my usual skepticsm about what "studies say...", it does make sense that humans would need a good dose of full- body sunlight daily.
Recent studies say 40 mins/day (without sun block), or 20 minutes per side or until done to taste.
With unblocked sunlight over enough of your body, your skin produces the right sorts of Vit D that you need for full health, vigor, and maybe even cancer prevention. Roofers get enough but, in my experience, roofers often tend to destroy themselves with crystal meth and/or alcohol. It's a roofer thing.
The alternative is to do the research yourself and try to figure out what kind and what amounts of Vit D a person ought to take as pills. As I have posted here in the past, Vit D is the only vitamin I take on the advice of all of my doc friends. However, I also take my shirt off whenever I can.
Happiness is a state of undress: why it’s time to stop worrying and love the bikini ...
Dietary Supplement Fact Sheet: Vitamin D
(Men, middle-aged and above, also probably need a baby aspirin and Vitamin L - Lipitor, but don't take medical advice off the internet. Including mine.)
 I don't think you can attribute all of the prosperity of Medieval Europe to the Medieval Warm Period, but surely some of it.
At Maggie's, we retain a healthy skepticism about AGW just as we do about most or all scientific theories - and especially those driven by political or economic agendas.
What we mostly hear from the Climate Change propagandists are the terrifying effects of some planetary warming. We never hear about the benefits.
I took a minute to google "advantages+global warming" and "benefits+global warming," and found tons of links. A few samples of them:
Special Report: Global Warming Benefits May Exceed Risks
The Bright Side of Global Warming
Global Warming Health Benefits
By coincidence, I see that SDA had the idea of googling "climate porn."
Monday, June 6. 2011
From a commenter at Mead's The Death of the American Dream II:
In an otherwise excellent essay, a distinction that Mead fails to grasp is the difference between what I will call a “breadwinner” business and a service business.
A breadwinner business is a business activity that brings money into a community. It can be manufacturing, agriculture, mining, banking or even government (e.g. Washington D.C., which hauls in cash from every state). When the breadwinner business closes down (the mine plays out or the factory closes), you have a ghost town. Service businesses can provide jobs only in communities that have a thriving breadwinner business.
Small businesses in general are service businesses that are completely dependent on the health of breadwinner businesses.
American prosperity completely depends on the health of our breadwinner businesses, and policymakers should be focusing solely on policies that will help those businesses succeed. This is not an issue of big business vs. small business; it is an issue of winning in a severe competition in a hyper-competitive global marketplace.
It's an interesting distinction, but I am not sure how well it holds up. In the failing old towns that I have seen, the main breadwinner (ie importer of $) is via government in all of its redistributive efforts, such as Social Security, Medicare, welfare, government jobs, government job programs, etc.
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