Saturday, March 29, 2008

A lot of cheese...

Some interesting Social Security blogging form Megan McArdle

Maybe Hollywood isn't ready for America?

Yet Another Antiwar Movie, Yet Another Flop
Right. It’s “a function of the marketplace not being ready.” Have they ever considered the possibility that the marketplace doesn’t want Hollywood’s tedious left-wing anti-American self-hating bias shoved down its throat?

The Belmont Club

And so it begins:
"One of the enduring lessons of history is that the worm, tormented long enough, always turns."

Now here's a surprise...

U.N.'s Ban condemns Dutch film as anti-Islamic

We're from the government and...

Sound Familiar?

So once again, several parties in a particular sector of the economy made some dumb decisions. And once again, instead of letting the people who made those bad decisions be punished by market forces, the federal government is figuring out how to bail them out, thus conditioning the public to the idea that risky ventures in America’s mixed economy really aren’t that risky at all. The government will always be along to pick you up, dust you off, pat your butt, and send you on your way.

Instead, the government’s proposed “solution” is–surprise!–more government, more power, and more regulation. Hey, maybe the mortgage meltdown will give us another legislative gem like Sarbanes-Oxley!

It's like a Vonnegut story...

Asking a Judge to Save the World, and Maybe a Whole Lot More

We are just here to get the spare parts to Titan, anyways....

Friday, March 28, 2008

Level playing field - I think not....

EU Springs into Action, Condemns 'Fitna'
Following the release of Geert Wilders’ film Fitna, the European Union is quick to reassure the Islamic world that the whole idea of “free speech” is probably overrated: EU condemns Dutch anti-Islam film.

Interesting theory....

The Democrats' 1968 Chicago convention marked the end of FDR-style liberalism...

Read it all....

If some of them would just shut-up...

Women are People Too:
"Sometime after its beginnings in the organized suffrage movement, the American women’s movement lost its way. Somewhere along the path to Roe v. Wade, The Vagina Monologues, and Hillary Rodham Clinton, the hierarchy of values inverted: The anatomy of the person serving the cause became more important than the cause itself.

But the good news is that a natural correction is occurring. The successes and failures of women in the political arena provide evidence that “everything old is new again.” Today’s women in politics are more like the suffragists of the early 1900s than the activists of the 1970s. They are closer to Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Alice Paul than to Betty Friedan, Gloria Steinem, and Jane Fonda."

Puhleeeeese......

THE AL GORE JUGGERNAUT is picking up speed.

Let me do my part to insult Islam...

Thursday, March 27, 2008

I just contributed my share

Study sees Microsoft brand in sharp decline

Great idea, really

McCain Has ‘Hidden Agenda’ To ‘Kill The United Nations’
Wretchard posts on the Wilders film.....
Everyone deserves the freedom to offend.

Reminds me of "The Lord of War"

Makes perfect sense...Heh

Breathless Speculation
With Michael Bloomberg introducing Barack Obama at Obama's "major speech" on modernizing financial market regulation, has the time come to replace pointless speculation about a Bloomberg presidential bid with pointless speculation about a Bloomberg vice presidential bid? I say: Yes. What better way to balance a ticket headed by a lanky black guy from Hawaii/Chicago than by adding a short Jewish guy from Boston/New York? It sounds ideal to me. Plus if Haim Saban and friends follow through on their threat to cut off the flow of big checks if Hillary Clinton doesn't get her way, Bloomberg bucks could make up the difference easily.
Hey, skinny bitch!

The little mistakes that changed the world

March 27, 1933: Just One Word ... Plastics

1933: Two British research chemists miss an important detail ... and make polyethylene.

Reginald Gibson and Eric Fawcett worked at Imperial Chemical Industries' research laboratory at Winnington in County Durham. Their equipment was faulty when they attempted to react ethylene and benzaldehyde under high pressure. They produced a waxy lump of what the British call polythene.

We deserve to be angry...

IRAQ WAR VETERANS -- "TOO CONTROVERSIAL." Ward Churchill: Educational!

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

A cartel I can get excited about

Comcast, Sprint, Google May Fund WiMax
"Comcast Corp., Time Warner Cable Inc., Bright House Networks, Google Inc., Intel Corp., Sprint Nextel Corp. and Clearwire Corp. are considering investing a total of $3 billion to $4 billion in the joint venture, said the person, who asked not to be named because the person was not authorized to discuss the talks."

So Clarke was very close to being right

Ingredients for life found on strange Saturn moon

And I remember "Guadalcanal Diary"

Richard Widmark, Actor, Dies at 93

Some good words from a very intelligent person

Are you talking to me?

The only thing I can offer, at this point, is the hope that we can figure out how not to do it again. This being what I've tried to do by outlining how I went wrong.

This is, as I have tried to say in other posts, valuable information--information that opponents of the war are losing as they insist that the thing was obvious. Given that the defense and diplomacy staff of several administrations, a large number of IR scholars, and enormous swathes of the think tank world got it wrong, the one thing it clearly wasn't is obvious.

Read it all... and then stop being so self-righteous.

More here from Megan. Read it!!!!!

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Tampa prosecutors plan to go ahead with charges against a 93-year-old man who offered a prostitute $20 for . . . well, I suppose it could have been sex. I think the guy deserves a commendation for his ambition.

The more I read her, the more I like

Failure is the key to success:
"That, in my opinion, is the secret strength of the American economy. We don't try to plan anything. We just see what works, and get rid of what doesn't. We make it easy to try, and hard to keep going once you've failed. Once people have failed, we make it easy to try again--even after our 'draconian' 2005 reform, our bankruptcy policy remains the most generous in the world towards both individuals and corporations. But we do not keep moribund industries limping along in the hopes that things will change."

That is because the Israelis are human....

An unlikely refuge:
"Even though we're Muslim, the Islamic world has done nothing to protect us", said Yassin, a refugee whose tortured flight from Darfur finally brought him to Israel three years ago. He was one of the first Darfurians to make it into Israel across the border from Egypt, and has dedicated his life to helping hundreds of his fellow countrymen who have made the same perilous journey.

"But the unresolved issue of the Palestinian right of return is not something Yassin wished to be drawn on. As far as he's concerned, Israel has provided for his people in a way that no Arab country would - and for that he's eternally grateful. And in terms of Israel's image in the eyes of the refugees as well as the outside world, accepting the unwanted Darfurians was both an astute and an admirable move to make."

Read all 7 reasons... and then wonder

Why Do Palestinians Get Much More Attention than Tibetans?:
"The world is unfair, unjust and morally twisted. And rarely more so than in its support for the Palestinians -- no matter how many innocents they target for murder and no matter how much Nazi-like anti-Semitism permeates their media -- and its neglect of the cruelly treated, humane Tibetans."

Wow...

An Open Letter to Senator Obama:
"That is the teaching opportunity I hoped you would evoke: not explaining Wright’s outrage to me, but explaining his outrageousness to him. That’s how we’ll reach the postracial era: by no longer justifying ourselves with what was, instead speaking to what now exists. Not deny the past, but recognize that’s what it is: past.

You say you are devoted to Reverend Wright because he brought you to Christ. I can only imagine how powerful a relationship that forges. But, my imperfect understanding of the Christian Faith tells me you can do him an equally magnificent service: You can help bring him back to Christ. Show him redemption and salvation lie not in the satisfaction of doing little dances in a pulpit while you slander good and decent people. Teach him that great leadership and Christian love abjures the very filth – and I pick that word deliberately – that he spews on an apparently regular basis. After all, Senator, you know our government did not invent the HIV virus to kill African-Americans. You know, Senator, this is not the United States of KKK America. You know the truth of 9/11. At least you should. Both you and Michelle have benefited mightily from the new spirit that has come to America in the last two generations. I thought you were part of that. I thought"
Please, please, please read the whole thing!!!

Remember air-raid drills under your desk?

In an Era of School Shootings, a New Drill

No kidding

Megan McArdle at least admits her mistakes:
"One of my commenters asks what I got wrong on the Iraq war. I've posted on this before, but I suppose it's worth saying again what I've learned from the experience."
Very much worth reading...

We think alike...

Radley Balko: Artificial Standards

Earlier this month, a bullying, cartel-like professional group met in New Orleans for its annual conference. One of the top items on the agenda was to discus new lobbying strategies to scare off the lowly folks who attempt to enter this particular profession without first paying the proper deference and dues to the industry's old guard. I'm speaking of course of the American Society of Interior Designers (ASID).

I'm not kidding.

We wanted one VERY badly....


March 25, 1954: RCA TVs Get the Color for Money:
"1954: RCA begins production of its first color-TV set for consumers, the CT-100. It's destined to become a costly classic."

Silly me - I thought that was what they get paid to do....

They’re Lying:
"Isn’t it time we did away with the position of White House Press Secretary?

We’ve reached the point now where the person who occupies this position is intentionally kept in the dark about anything remotely important, so they can honestly say they “don’t know” when asked by the press about anything at all controversial. If it’s something about which they should at least know something about the administration’s policy, they can merely say they “aren’t allowed” to discuss it. The WHPS may be the most uninformed senior member of any presidential administration."

It's a good thing someone is paying attention....

BBC Creates News ... Real reporting is ...SO YESTERDAY:
"Exhibiting a thoroughness worthy of Orwell's Ministry of Truth, the BBC has been busy erasing all traces of the corporation's blatantly dishonest reporting of President Bush's speech on the fifth anniversary of the Iraq invasion."

Hitchens can be so direct...

Hatred, tribalism, and ignorance are most commonly incubated in church
"You often hear it said, of some political or other opportunist, that he would sell his own grandmother if it would suit his interests. But you seldom, if ever, see this notorious transaction actually being performed, which is why I am slightly surprised that Obama got away with it so easily. (Yet why do I say I am surprised? He still gets away with absolutely everything.)"
Uh, oh... is the "tribalism" word that of a typical white person? There are lots more goodies if you read the whole thing.

Reynolds has it right again...

BUT I THOUGHT THE COMMUNITY DEMANDED IT: D.C. Gun Crackdown Meets Community Resistance. I guess the D.C. government fears it will lose in Heller and wants one last power-trip before it's too late. But if the gun-control had worked, why would they need to be confiscating them now?

Plus, more resistance from "the community" in Boston. When you can't even sell gun control in big urban areas like these, I think it means sentiments have shifted.

Gun control is one of those "less is more" issues that myopic liberals just cannot get their arms (pun intended) around. When the majority of shootings take place in supposed "gun-free zones", they think that if only the zone had been bigger, it never would have happened - just oodles of wishful thinking piled upon naiveté.

Monday, March 24, 2008

As it should be...

Victor Davis Hanson on Wrong on Wright
"Over the past four days, I asked seven or eight random (Asian, Mexican-American, and working-class white) Americans in southern California what they thought of Obama’s candidacy — and framed the question with, “Don’t you think that was a good speech?” The answers, without exception, were essentially: “Forget the speech. I would never vote for Obama after listening to Wright.” In some cases, the reaction was not mild disappointment, but unprintable outrage"
Read the whole thing.....

You mean "She lied" ?

Clinton Misspoke About Bosnia Trip, Campaign Says

"Schmuck" is the appropriate word...

What Is Keith Olbermann?

The left has long sought a commercially viable answer to the conservative movement’s dominance in talk radio. In Keith Olbermann’s ‘Countdown’ they finally seem to have found it. Yeah free market! But as an openly partisan activist, Olbermann must be narrowly confined to his ‘Countdown’ role. If NBC News wants to maintain any journalistic credibility they can not allow Olbermann to hijack their news brand for a full hour for purely partisan purposes like they did March 20.

It’s bad enough that NBC allows Olbermann to anchor election coverage. Not even Fox News is that bold. Fox keeps its personalities as analysts when covering politics and MSNBC really ought to do the same.

Oh no, we were wrong....

The Weekly Standard
The report on Saddam's terrorist ties released last week by the Joint Forces Command confirms this (not that you would know it from the scant press coverage of the study). The study, citing captured Iraqi documents, indicates that Saddam's regime supported various jihadist groups, including Ayman al-Zawahiri's, and including Kurdish Islamist groups, about whom I have reported. But read the study for yourself; it's actually quite an achievement of translation and analysis.

Classy group....

Palestinian Terrorists Make Deal, Break Deal

Yesterday the media reported that Hamas and Fatah had signed a reconciliation deal in Yemen. That really sounds like a party, doesn’t it?

Today, the deal’s off.

This is how these pathetic thugs convince the “international community” they’re really statesmen in disguise, with pointless maneuvers that mimic “diplomacy” seen through a warped mirror of Islamism and hatred.

Uh, oh...What do we do now?

U.S. States Lead the World in High Corporate Tax Rates

A terrible story

A Boy the Bullies Love to Beat Up, Repeatedly

How do you protect a kid like this? It's not really an isolated incident, it happens all the time; and the results are often the same - this is where school shootings start. Yet schools are more interested in preventing kids from saying nasty things to each other than offering them real protection from physical violence.

Must be a very quick read....

On Speed:

Everyone in college

I don't necessarily agree

The First Casualty:
It’s been said by many that antiwar films are secretly complicit in war because they can’t help showing it off in all its messy glory. Stanley Kubrick’s “Paths of Glory,” a First World War drama from 1957, at Film Forum March 30-31, is an exception.
This was, and is, a great movie. Very "unKubrick-like" in many ways, but it was his first and, in many ways, his most understandable (shall we say "linear"?)

Certainly, it is one of the best examples of the gross injustices that war brings upon us (it is based on a true story). But war is not the aberration that today's writers, directors, etc. would have us believe. It is, fortunately or unfortunately, the most prevalent form of conflict resolution in all of history; and it is an intensification of the human condition.

Life without war is not just or "fair" as today's helicopter parents would like it to be; therefore life in the midst of war is that much more unjust. Somebody please call me when that changes....

From Instapundit...

NETWORK SOLUTIONS SHUTS DOWN A WEBSITE under Islamist pressure. I'm guessing they wouldn't respond to complaints from Baptists quite so readily.

UPDATE: Reader Antoinette Aubert emails: "Baptists don't blow people up for disagreeing with them. Heck Baptists don't even sue you for disagreeing with them. Thus does multi-culturalism make cowards of us all." Or encourage violence and litigation.

Our Little Darlings

Megan McArdle has something to say about modern parents who refuse to vaccinate their children:
Of course, I recognize that people have a right to abide by their conscience, and I would not want public health officials to force children to be vaccinated. I just think that people who are unvaccinated, unless they have a legitimate medical reason for same, should not be allowed to use public roads, public sidewalks, or public services. They have a right not to vaccinate their children. But they do not have a right to risk my health.
It is hard to imagine the level of selfishness that pervades modern-day parenthood. I sit and stare at wildly behaving little runts as their parents sit and do nothing, expecting everyone else to tolerate their children's' behavior because we are not supposed to hurt their "self-esteem". Schools are being ruined by "helicopter parents" who think that teachers are nothing more than overpaid baby-sitters; and, even worse, these kids are turning into self-centered brats who cannot even fill out a college application without Mommy and Daddy helping them out. They all need rescuing - and they are all voting for Obama......

A complete reprint from The Belmont Club

A time for self-examination ... America s chickens coming home to roost:
"Here is the full-length, uncherry-picked clip of Jeremiah Wright s sermon in response to September 9/11.


How about these people, Reverend Wright? What sort of self-examination would you suggest for those who, by the logic of chickens coming home to roost are no less collateral damage than any which you seek to condemn? Whose capital city in 1945 suffered as many dead as the Nagasaki you so sorely regret?

They are the invisible men and women, like the janitorial cleaner at ABM Industries, confirmed dead, World Trade Center.

Grace Alegre-Cua, 40, Glen Rock, N.J.
Cesar A. Alviar, 60, Bloomfield, N.J.
Marlyn C. Bautista, 46, Iselin, N.J.
Cecile M. Caguicla, 55, Boonton, N.J.
Jayceryll M. de Chavez, 24, Carteret, N.J.

Benilda Pascua Domingo, 37, New York, N.Y.
Ramon Grijalvo, 58
Frederick Kuo, 53, Great Neck, N.Y.
Arnold A. Lim, 28, New York, N.Y.
Manuel L. Lopez, 54, Jersey City, N.J.

Carl Allen Peralta, 37, New York, N.Y.
Rufino Conrado F. Roy Santos, 37, New York, N.Y.
David Marc Sullins, 30, New York, N.Y.
Hilario Soriano Larry Sumaya, 42, New York, N.Y.
Hector Tamayo, 51, New York, NY"

What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of good-byes.
The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.

Sunday, March 23, 2008

Everyone is a genius...

"There's No Reason Why [Iraq] Shouldn't Be A Walkover"

Is time on the United States' side in this battle?

Yeah. I really think time is on our side here. This is a fragile society, a little old one-town country, the size of Nebraska, maybe a little bigger, with the GDP about half the Army budget. So if this is a hard problem, we ought to get ourselves some new generals. I mean there's no reason why this shouldn't be a walkover.

And here we learn that McPeak "publicly opposed the current Iraq campaign from the start". Gee, a retired member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff opposed the war and the Times missed it. But James Fallows of The Atlantic confirms it, as of Nov 2002 anyway.

Don't worry, there is NO threat....

Mukasey 'surprised' by scope of terrorist threats
It's surprising how varied [the threat] is, how many directions it comes from, how geographically spread out it is," he said.

Don't forget mom....

Charles Krauthammer - The Speech: A Brilliant Fraud "White guilt. Obama's purpose in the speech was to put Wright's outrages in context. By context, Obama means history. And by history, he means the history of white racism. Obama says, 'We do not need to recite here the history of racial injustice in this country,' and then he proceeds to do precisely that. What lies at the end of his recital of the long train of white racial assaults from slavery to employment discrimination? Jeremiah Wright, of course."

Grandma Got Run Over By a Campaign Speech

Ah! The bloom is off the rose...

Barack Obama: toxic mentors start to corrode pristine campaign

Wouldn't you rather panic??

Making Sense of a Scared New World
"Let’s start at the beginning. As far as we know to date — and this could well change — we are not in a recession. Unemployment is far below recession levels, as are new claims for unemployment payments. The number of hours worked has barely budged from its highs. In the most recent reporting quarter (the fourth quarter of 2007), there was still positive economic growth, though barely."

Flavor of the month...

The Wisdom of the Ages, for Now Anyway
EARLIER this month, Oprah Winfrey looked into a camera and announced to the world that she was about to do the “most exciting thing I’ve ever done.”
Do people really believe this nonsense? By next month this guy will have been the third in bed with the Spitzers...

Who cares about the basketball?

Michigan Is Still No. 1

The Wolverines played a great game last night, and came away with a well deserved victory in the CCHA tournament against the Redhawks of Miami University. Congrats on a great season; and one more mountain to climb in the Frozen Four ...
Oh The Irony

Just redraw the map...

The UN needs a geography lesson?