Tuesday, April 17, 2007
Each in his own tongue
Very early in this blog, I questioned whether it was better to have a common stock of knowledge, as we had 50 years ago, or to have lots of alternate sources and varieties of knowledge available. At that time I concluded, though not firmly, that the modern condition is better because there is less room for propaganda.
I've changed my mind. I was starting to write on this point a week ago, from a different viewpoint and for other reasons that I'll return to later.
But today's events make the point more critical.
[Later addendum: the "event" was the Virginia Tech massacre.]
We need a common stock of culture.
Specifically we need a commonly respectable set of cultural elements, for two reciprocal reasons.
Example.
This poem was written in 1910 by an English professor at KU, and became nationally popular for a while. Its topic rings Polistra's soul, which is how I happened to locate it through Google's new and immensely valuable Books service, but the topic isn't what I'm discussing right now.
Think about it.
A poem. A nice poem. A lovely poem. A deep poem.
A poem with rhyme and rhythm.
An understandable poem.
Nationally popular.
Written by a professor of English Literature at a major university.
Nationally popular.
Nothing in this poem about bitches, hos, or Glocks, nothing about Transgressive Constructs or Endangered Elephants.
In 1910, professors and poets and artists and composers were respected because they offered something of value, something that ordinary people could recognize and enjoy. And in return, ordinary people had a common connection with fairly serious matters; when someone mentioned Ravel or Edison or Dickens, he could count on his listeners understanding the reference if not the deeper aspects of the subject.
Just after that, the Dada movement and Marxists gradually took over the 'formal' production of culture.
By 1940 the movement hadn't yet influenced most people. Modern artists were popular with the academic critics, but they were also the target of radio comedians; classical music was still commonly heard and used as material by Big Bands; newspapers still published daily poems, often by local poets.
By 1965 when I was in high school, the respect was still there, though running on vapors, but the products were already beneath contempt.
The takeover was dramatically and suddenly completed in 1969. At least symbolically, landing on the moon was the climax and endpoint of respect for learning.
Madame Mao's cultural revolution flipped the world upside down.
Now we still have 'formal' arts, but the products are at best incomprehensible and arcane, at worst obscene and deadly.
Maybe, just maybe, we'd see fewer Final Solutions to resentment and bullying if we had more respect for youngsters who try to think and create, whether in the arts or literature or science ... But we won't reach that point unless arts and literature and science become worthy of respect and worthy of common understanding.
= = = = =
Addendum:
To be clear, I'm not simply saying we need less crap in the arts and sciences. That would be a pointless recommendation. I'm talking about a cross between Gresham's and Parkinson's Law: Shit expands to fill the mental space when no gold is available. We need more gold, available, accessible, and socially approved.
In 1940, a boy with poetic or playwrightish tendencies could pick up a newspaper or turn on the radio and encounter new works, written with decency and depth. He would develop his skills by trying to copy this work, and he could envision making a career from decent writing.
In 2007, a similar boy can turn on the TV and see demonic shit. He will develop his skills and imagine his career by trying to copy this work.
Admittedly the old stuff is still available in libraries and now (blessedly) through Google Books, but it's a fact of life that young folks don't like antique stuff. They need fresh-looking material to observe and copy.
Laws and litigation are part of the modern problem. If our budding poet copies a style and publishes his work on the Web, he's likely to receive a Cease & Desist letter from Walt Disney or some other corporate content holder.
In the sciences:
In 1940, an electrically or mechanically minded boy could take apart a radio or a car; all parts were visible, adjustable and replaceable. In 2007, cars and radios are non-adjustable. No user-serviceable parts. Nothing to learn. Granted, you can still wire up 800-decibel speakers or replace your wheels with flashy '20s' to impress the hos, but it's not the same. Experimentation that leads to learning is no longer available.
Our 1940 boy with a chemical or biological flair could mix things over a Bunsen burner in his basement, or slosh around in the creek and capture odd creatures. In 2007, the budding chemist would be knocked down by a Hazmat team in spacesuits, who would proceed to evacuate the entire neighborhood permanently. The apprentice biologist would be jailed for violating the Endangered Species Act.
And what if our chemist somehow avoids the hazmat team and develops a simple compound that promises to cure cancer? Nobody will notice or fund his work, even if he's a fully credentialed professor in a medical school.
Yes, the Canadian Cancer Cure, which I've been covering here for a while, fits nicely. Stem-cell research fits the model as well. Our 'formal' and professional classes are so deeply immersed in outright fraud (global warming) and love of death (global warming again, embryonic cells) that they can't be bothered with simple and effective solutions to real problems.
Young people see this, and shape their thoughts and career plans accordingly. When golden material - decent, deep, informed by faith and rigorous thought - is visible and available, they will try to emulate the gold. When demonic shit is the only visible and marketable career path, they will pursue demonic shit. ¶ 8:46 PM
Very early in this blog, I questioned whether it was better to have a common stock of knowledge, as we had 50 years ago, or to have lots of alternate sources and varieties of knowledge available. At that time I concluded, though not firmly, that the modern condition is better because there is less room for propaganda.
I've changed my mind. I was starting to write on this point a week ago, from a different viewpoint and for other reasons that I'll return to later.
But today's events make the point more critical.
[Later addendum: the "event" was the Virginia Tech massacre.]
We need a common stock of culture.
Specifically we need a commonly respectable set of cultural elements, for two reciprocal reasons.
Example.
This poem was written in 1910 by an English professor at KU, and became nationally popular for a while. Its topic rings Polistra's soul, which is how I happened to locate it through Google's new and immensely valuable Books service, but the topic isn't what I'm discussing right now.
Think about it.
A poem. A nice poem. A lovely poem. A deep poem.
A poem with rhyme and rhythm.
An understandable poem.
Nationally popular.
Written by a professor of English Literature at a major university.
Nationally popular.
Nothing in this poem about bitches, hos, or Glocks, nothing about Transgressive Constructs or Endangered Elephants.
In 1910, professors and poets and artists and composers were respected because they offered something of value, something that ordinary people could recognize and enjoy. And in return, ordinary people had a common connection with fairly serious matters; when someone mentioned Ravel or Edison or Dickens, he could count on his listeners understanding the reference if not the deeper aspects of the subject.
Just after that, the Dada movement and Marxists gradually took over the 'formal' production of culture.
By 1940 the movement hadn't yet influenced most people. Modern artists were popular with the academic critics, but they were also the target of radio comedians; classical music was still commonly heard and used as material by Big Bands; newspapers still published daily poems, often by local poets.
By 1965 when I was in high school, the respect was still there, though running on vapors, but the products were already beneath contempt.
The takeover was dramatically and suddenly completed in 1969. At least symbolically, landing on the moon was the climax and endpoint of respect for learning.
Madame Mao's cultural revolution flipped the world upside down.
Now we still have 'formal' arts, but the products are at best incomprehensible and arcane, at worst obscene and deadly.
Maybe, just maybe, we'd see fewer Final Solutions to resentment and bullying if we had more respect for youngsters who try to think and create, whether in the arts or literature or science ... But we won't reach that point unless arts and literature and science become worthy of respect and worthy of common understanding.
= = = = =
Addendum:
To be clear, I'm not simply saying we need less crap in the arts and sciences. That would be a pointless recommendation. I'm talking about a cross between Gresham's and Parkinson's Law: Shit expands to fill the mental space when no gold is available. We need more gold, available, accessible, and socially approved.
In 1940, a boy with poetic or playwrightish tendencies could pick up a newspaper or turn on the radio and encounter new works, written with decency and depth. He would develop his skills by trying to copy this work, and he could envision making a career from decent writing.
In 2007, a similar boy can turn on the TV and see demonic shit. He will develop his skills and imagine his career by trying to copy this work.
Admittedly the old stuff is still available in libraries and now (blessedly) through Google Books, but it's a fact of life that young folks don't like antique stuff. They need fresh-looking material to observe and copy.
Laws and litigation are part of the modern problem. If our budding poet copies a style and publishes his work on the Web, he's likely to receive a Cease & Desist letter from Walt Disney or some other corporate content holder.
In the sciences:
In 1940, an electrically or mechanically minded boy could take apart a radio or a car; all parts were visible, adjustable and replaceable. In 2007, cars and radios are non-adjustable. No user-serviceable parts. Nothing to learn. Granted, you can still wire up 800-decibel speakers or replace your wheels with flashy '20s' to impress the hos, but it's not the same. Experimentation that leads to learning is no longer available.
Our 1940 boy with a chemical or biological flair could mix things over a Bunsen burner in his basement, or slosh around in the creek and capture odd creatures. In 2007, the budding chemist would be knocked down by a Hazmat team in spacesuits, who would proceed to evacuate the entire neighborhood permanently. The apprentice biologist would be jailed for violating the Endangered Species Act.
And what if our chemist somehow avoids the hazmat team and develops a simple compound that promises to cure cancer? Nobody will notice or fund his work, even if he's a fully credentialed professor in a medical school.
Yes, the Canadian Cancer Cure, which I've been covering here for a while, fits nicely. Stem-cell research fits the model as well. Our 'formal' and professional classes are so deeply immersed in outright fraud (global warming) and love of death (global warming again, embryonic cells) that they can't be bothered with simple and effective solutions to real problems.
Young people see this, and shape their thoughts and career plans accordingly. When golden material - decent, deep, informed by faith and rigorous thought - is visible and available, they will try to emulate the gold. When demonic shit is the only visible and marketable career path, they will pursue demonic shit. ¶ 8:46 PM
Saturday, April 14, 2007
Global warming causes extinction? Not exactly.
I've always been fascinated by the Ediacaran fauna, a set of fossils from a nearly alien set of animals that flourished before the current set started to evolve. Some of them are now known to be ancestors of present arthropods and mollusks but others, with five eyes and weird appendages, have left no descendants.
I hadn't kept up with developments in that realm ... now it turns out the Ediacaran period was even stranger than previously thought. New fossil finds since 2003 indicate a geologically brief period before the Ediacara, perhaps 15 million years long, in which the sea was densely and richly populated by large critters that don't fit anywhere in our basic distinctions between animal, fungi, and plant. They seem to have been fixed seafloor dwellers, but (here's the strangest part) they weren't built from cells. Their structure appears to be fully fractal; at all scales from near-atomic to "breadbox size", they are branched, feathery, ferny.
What caused this sudden explosion of new types and species, in an ocean that had been exclusively claimed by one-celled bacteria and algae?
It was the end of an ice age, with melting glaciers.
"Peterson argues further that the primeval ocean would have been bursting with dissolved organic matter freed up by melting glaciers. ... their fractal, modular design allowed them to evolve quickly and grow large quickly, to take advantage of this sudden burst of plenty."
This is from an article [subscription only] in the latest New Scientist mag; needless to say, the same issue is also crammed with the usual Gaia-worshipping panic over melting glaciers causing extinction of species. (I'll give the mag credit for occasionally featuring articles that contradict The One True Goddess; it's too bad they don't actually listen to the other side, though.) ¶ 7:21 PM
I hadn't kept up with developments in that realm ... now it turns out the Ediacaran period was even stranger than previously thought. New fossil finds since 2003 indicate a geologically brief period before the Ediacara, perhaps 15 million years long, in which the sea was densely and richly populated by large critters that don't fit anywhere in our basic distinctions between animal, fungi, and plant. They seem to have been fixed seafloor dwellers, but (here's the strangest part) they weren't built from cells. Their structure appears to be fully fractal; at all scales from near-atomic to "breadbox size", they are branched, feathery, ferny.
What caused this sudden explosion of new types and species, in an ocean that had been exclusively claimed by one-celled bacteria and algae?
It was the end of an ice age, with melting glaciers.
"Peterson argues further that the primeval ocean would have been bursting with dissolved organic matter freed up by melting glaciers. ... their fractal, modular design allowed them to evolve quickly and grow large quickly, to take advantage of this sudden burst of plenty."
This is from an article [subscription only] in the latest New Scientist mag; needless to say, the same issue is also crammed with the usual Gaia-worshipping panic over melting glaciers causing extinction of species. (I'll give the mag credit for occasionally featuring articles that contradict The One True Goddess; it's too bad they don't actually listen to the other side, though.) ¶ 7:21 PM
Thursday, April 12, 2007
Duke
Just tossing in, for the record, a couple of comments on recent Big Stories.
The Duke mess has finally come to a highly satisfying conclusion. It was obvious to me from the very start that the accusation was false, as it was to anyone who has been on the wrong side of the law, or in fact to anyone who has lived a less-than-sheltered life.
Indeed it's amazing and refreshing to hear the NC Attorney General state openly that the 3 men are INNOCENT. I'm genuinely and thoroughly surprised. Lawyers usually stick together, and usually refuse to distinguish between "technically not guilty" and "factually innocent". We have fallen into a pit of stupidity wherein "we must always wait for the jury to decide" and "we must always respect the decision of the jury." Cooper pulled us out of that pit, and for the first time in recent memory acknowledged that TRUTH DOES EXIST, regardless of what the Trial Process finds.
Bravo, AG Cooper! Will you be running for President? Or will one of the candidates declare a willingness to hire Cooper as US AG if elected?
One thing that hasn't been said: Obviously Crystal knew with fair certainty that she could get Criminal Nifong to go along with her false accusation. I doubt that she knew Criminal Nifong; probably didn't even know his name. But she knew - from long experience with our court system - that her accusation would not be filtered or tested, and that she could destroy those boys and protect her pimp without any hindrance.
She would have been perfectly correct under normal circumstances.
This measures the depth and totality of the corruption in our court system. Thanks to Comrades McKinnon and Friedan, any insane female can do anything she wants to any innocent male, and the court system will take her false case all the way to its horrible conclusion with no interference from such trivia as facts, law or truth.
We finally have a large and well-publicized exception to Crystal's assumption. Let's hope the exception begins to spread, so that non-wealthy victims of false accusers can also have a chance.
= = = = =
The Imus mess is hardly worth commenting, but again one thing that hasn't been said. Emperors Jackson and Sharpton are not elected officials. What is the source of their universal power? Simple. They are gang leaders. They can start a riot. So: by bowing down to Gang Leaders Jackson and Sharpton, the broadcasters are behaviorally stating that blacks are violent and undomesticated. If any public figure dared to make this statement openly and verbally, he would be defenestrated ten times faster than Imus, and quite possibly killed. Nevertheless, by acting on the implied threat, broadcasters are saying that gangs are the only meaningful segment of the black population. Does this help the non-violent and domesticated blacks? Not 'ardly, guvnor. They are the primary victims of the gangs, after all. ¶ 2:43 PM
The Duke mess has finally come to a highly satisfying conclusion. It was obvious to me from the very start that the accusation was false, as it was to anyone who has been on the wrong side of the law, or in fact to anyone who has lived a less-than-sheltered life.
Indeed it's amazing and refreshing to hear the NC Attorney General state openly that the 3 men are INNOCENT. I'm genuinely and thoroughly surprised. Lawyers usually stick together, and usually refuse to distinguish between "technically not guilty" and "factually innocent". We have fallen into a pit of stupidity wherein "we must always wait for the jury to decide" and "we must always respect the decision of the jury." Cooper pulled us out of that pit, and for the first time in recent memory acknowledged that TRUTH DOES EXIST, regardless of what the Trial Process finds.
Bravo, AG Cooper! Will you be running for President? Or will one of the candidates declare a willingness to hire Cooper as US AG if elected?
One thing that hasn't been said: Obviously Crystal knew with fair certainty that she could get Criminal Nifong to go along with her false accusation. I doubt that she knew Criminal Nifong; probably didn't even know his name. But she knew - from long experience with our court system - that her accusation would not be filtered or tested, and that she could destroy those boys and protect her pimp without any hindrance.
She would have been perfectly correct under normal circumstances.
This measures the depth and totality of the corruption in our court system. Thanks to Comrades McKinnon and Friedan, any insane female can do anything she wants to any innocent male, and the court system will take her false case all the way to its horrible conclusion with no interference from such trivia as facts, law or truth.
We finally have a large and well-publicized exception to Crystal's assumption. Let's hope the exception begins to spread, so that non-wealthy victims of false accusers can also have a chance.
= = = = =
The Imus mess is hardly worth commenting, but again one thing that hasn't been said. Emperors Jackson and Sharpton are not elected officials. What is the source of their universal power? Simple. They are gang leaders. They can start a riot. So: by bowing down to Gang Leaders Jackson and Sharpton, the broadcasters are behaviorally stating that blacks are violent and undomesticated. If any public figure dared to make this statement openly and verbally, he would be defenestrated ten times faster than Imus, and quite possibly killed. Nevertheless, by acting on the implied threat, broadcasters are saying that gangs are the only meaningful segment of the black population. Does this help the non-violent and domesticated blacks? Not 'ardly, guvnor. They are the primary victims of the gangs, after all. ¶ 2:43 PM
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
Brownback on stem cells
Sen. Brownback is speaking right now on the Senate floor, making a point I've hit here before: Nearly all of the productive research on adult stem-cells is happening outside the US. Is this because of Federal limitations? No, because there are NO limitations at all on adult stem cells.
He quoted a researcher in Brazil, who has produced a promising cure for juvenile diabetes using the patient's own marrow cells, as saying that American researchers WERE NOT INTERESTED. Part of the problem was our ridiculous "ethical" requirements. The Brazilian diabetes research was done on adolescents because that's the best time to catch and fix the developing immune system; but the "ethicists" insist that research should only be done on adults. Essentially "bioethicists" are just another branch of the pro-abort machine. Their "answers" to "moral dilemmas" always seem to come out the same as Hitler's answers.
Another reason is undoubtedly the fear of litigation, which is nearly nonexistent in places like Thailand, Brazil and China.
Our problem is not lack of federal funding for a specific bit of the discipline which has not yet produced results. Our problem, here as in most areas of education, research, medicine, business, and life in general, is that America has been destroyed by lawyers.
He quoted a researcher in Brazil, who has produced a promising cure for juvenile diabetes using the patient's own marrow cells, as saying that American researchers WERE NOT INTERESTED. Part of the problem was our ridiculous "ethical" requirements. The Brazilian diabetes research was done on adolescents because that's the best time to catch and fix the developing immune system; but the "ethicists" insist that research should only be done on adults. Essentially "bioethicists" are just another branch of the pro-abort machine. Their "answers" to "moral dilemmas" always seem to come out the same as Hitler's answers.
Another reason is undoubtedly the fear of litigation, which is nearly nonexistent in places like Thailand, Brazil and China.
Our problem is not lack of federal funding for a specific bit of the discipline which has not yet produced results. Our problem, here as in most areas of education, research, medicine, business, and life in general, is that America has been destroyed by lawyers.
Labels: Ethics
¶ 3:30 PM
Sunday, April 08, 2007
Madame Polisztra hears from her godfather
Madame Polisztra was surprised to find a Morse message waiting on her crystal ball this morning. It was from Charles Darwin, her dear Godfather.........
= = = = =
MP: Good morning, good Doctor! I'm humbled and honored to find your face here, along with ... another face.
CD: Good morning indeed, young lady. Many people in your era are taking my name in vain, using my words to support their exact opposite. Herr Marx, who is not up here, is the proper author of egalitarianism. I appreciate those few among you who take my ideas seriously and truly.
The other face is my beloved pet tortoise, Harriet, who joined me up here just a year ago. I believe she is trying to upstage me in your glass; only appropriate since she has carried survival to an heroic extreme!
MP: Can I assume, sir, that you have something specific to offer?
CD: Yes. In any aspect of life, the job of each individual, each family, each tribe, each nation, is to take its own side. Each nation must do its best to preserve its own form of culture and civilization, neither more nor less. Any individual, tribe, or nation that plunders others should be destroyed; any who fails to defend its own side deserves to die.
MP: Yes, go on.
CD: In a fight, the job of the defender is to stop the attacker. Kill it if necessary, but in doing so he is likely to lose his own life. A cheaper method is infinitely preferable. If you can deter the attacker by an impressive display of raised fur and feathers, or an impressive roaring sound, or a pose that sends him squealing toward the horizon, or an impressive display of rockets, forts and soldiers, this is vastly preferable to losing your own fur and feathers, your own soldiers, or your own existence.
MP: Well sir, how about our situation in Iraq? Or Mesopotamia, as you would know it?
CD: Yes, I have been watching Mesopotamia from on high. Your government, if it may be so described, is using up energy for no purpose at all, while paying no attention to the side of survival that Harriet so perfectly symbolizes. Your railways, dams, levees, fortifications and civil water supplies are decaying and even being sold off and abandoned. Your so-called government is destroying and losing those facilities, thus saving the enemy's labor. This is simply insane, if I may be allowed to say so.
MP: I'll certainly allow you to say that. But what about Mesopotamia?
CD: When a war is fought without conscription, you may assume that the people doing the fighting are innately the more belligerent element of the population. This is true of your volunteer Army, and equally true of the informal fighters for the various, ah, denominations, shall we say, of Mohammedans.
MP: So in other words, our enemy is currently using up its own best fighters. When they are used up, the remainder of the population will be genetically and intrinsically more peaceful.
CD: Precisely so.
I would suggest three steps:
1. You should thank the Lord Jehovah that his enemy has decided to destroy its own fighters.
2. You should stand back and allow it to happen, and apply yourselves to restoring your shell of defense.
3. And if possible, covertly supply all sides with an abundant cornucopia of free weapons and ammunition so they may destroy themselves more efficiently.
Now Harriet wishes to have a walk through the Elysian Fields, so I must reluctantly depart.
MP: I have listened carefully, sir, and will attempt to pass along the message. Thank you, good sir.
= = = = =
Technical note: It appears that Madame Polisztra has acquired a lazy eye from the excitement of meeting Darwin. I know how to fix the problem, but it's not worth reworking the animation!
¶ 10:23 PM
= = = = =
MP: Good morning, good Doctor! I'm humbled and honored to find your face here, along with ... another face.
CD: Good morning indeed, young lady. Many people in your era are taking my name in vain, using my words to support their exact opposite. Herr Marx, who is not up here, is the proper author of egalitarianism. I appreciate those few among you who take my ideas seriously and truly.
The other face is my beloved pet tortoise, Harriet, who joined me up here just a year ago. I believe she is trying to upstage me in your glass; only appropriate since she has carried survival to an heroic extreme!
MP: Can I assume, sir, that you have something specific to offer?
CD: Yes. In any aspect of life, the job of each individual, each family, each tribe, each nation, is to take its own side. Each nation must do its best to preserve its own form of culture and civilization, neither more nor less. Any individual, tribe, or nation that plunders others should be destroyed; any who fails to defend its own side deserves to die.
MP: Yes, go on.
CD: In a fight, the job of the defender is to stop the attacker. Kill it if necessary, but in doing so he is likely to lose his own life. A cheaper method is infinitely preferable. If you can deter the attacker by an impressive display of raised fur and feathers, or an impressive roaring sound, or a pose that sends him squealing toward the horizon, or an impressive display of rockets, forts and soldiers, this is vastly preferable to losing your own fur and feathers, your own soldiers, or your own existence.
MP: Well sir, how about our situation in Iraq? Or Mesopotamia, as you would know it?
CD: Yes, I have been watching Mesopotamia from on high. Your government, if it may be so described, is using up energy for no purpose at all, while paying no attention to the side of survival that Harriet so perfectly symbolizes. Your railways, dams, levees, fortifications and civil water supplies are decaying and even being sold off and abandoned. Your so-called government is destroying and losing those facilities, thus saving the enemy's labor. This is simply insane, if I may be allowed to say so.
MP: I'll certainly allow you to say that. But what about Mesopotamia?
CD: When a war is fought without conscription, you may assume that the people doing the fighting are innately the more belligerent element of the population. This is true of your volunteer Army, and equally true of the informal fighters for the various, ah, denominations, shall we say, of Mohammedans.
MP: So in other words, our enemy is currently using up its own best fighters. When they are used up, the remainder of the population will be genetically and intrinsically more peaceful.
CD: Precisely so.
I would suggest three steps:
1. You should thank the Lord Jehovah that his enemy has decided to destroy its own fighters.
2. You should stand back and allow it to happen, and apply yourselves to restoring your shell of defense.
3. And if possible, covertly supply all sides with an abundant cornucopia of free weapons and ammunition so they may destroy themselves more efficiently.
Now Harriet wishes to have a walk through the Elysian Fields, so I must reluctantly depart.
MP: I have listened carefully, sir, and will attempt to pass along the message. Thank you, good sir.
= = = = =
Technical note: It appears that Madame Polisztra has acquired a lazy eye from the excitement of meeting Darwin. I know how to fix the problem, but it's not worth reworking the animation!
¶ 10:23 PM
Intended
Polistra's Sixth Law of Human Nature: Ignore verbiage about goals and preferences. Assume that the situation - or action - that people actually achieve is what they really want.
There are a couple of limits to this law. It can't be fairly applied to youngsters who are still experimenting with goals, and it can't be applied when legal or cultural restraints prevent changes. But when discussing a moderately intelligent adult with few chains, it's absolutely valid and solves a lot of apparent mysteries.
Applied to personal situations: Why does she stay in that awful marriage? Because, despite her complaints, she likes it more than the alternatives. Why does he keep that awful job? Because, despite his bitching and moaning, he enjoys it. It doesn't matter if I would hate it or you would hate it. People are different.
An excellent political example in the news just now. George W. Vichy supported Teddy Kennedy's open-borders approach to immigration as long as Congress was under the "control" of the R brand. Now that Congress is under the control of the D brand, GWV is taking a more restrictive approach.
Mystery? Stupid? Unfortunate that partisan bickering is getting in the way of good policy? Nope. Just apply the Sixth Law. Ignore his talk, and look at his results. By supporting the D side when R was "in control" and supporting the R side when D is in control, you are guaranteed to achieve nothing. No new laws.
So we know what GWV wants, in this as in all else: He wants nothing. Nothing at all. He has more power than anyone else in the world, and he carefully insures that his power achieves nothing except wasting astronomical piles of taxpayer money.
Why? At this level I genuinely find a mystery.
I suppose the answer might be found if we could determine where most of the wasted money goes. China? Saudi? Ray Nagin? Some anonymous blackmailer? Don't know, probably never find out.
= = = = =
The Sixth Law emphatically applies to leftist policies and causes.
There are no Unintended Consequences.
Lenin knew exactly what he was doing, and his apostles like Frances Fox Piven, Saul Alinsky and the delightfully deceased Comrade Betty Fried[m]an, all knew exactly what they were doing. Is it unfortunate that school integration, "intended" to achieve equal achievement for all races, actually produced more segregation and less assimilation for blacks? Nope. Maximum inequality and maximum chaos were the goal. Is it accidental and unfortunate that the ADA, "intended" to give more opportunity to disabled people, actually led to less employment for disabled people? Nope, that's the goal. More dependency, more resentment between groups, more reliance on an all-powerful state, more income for lawyers. ¶ 1:33 PM
There are a couple of limits to this law. It can't be fairly applied to youngsters who are still experimenting with goals, and it can't be applied when legal or cultural restraints prevent changes. But when discussing a moderately intelligent adult with few chains, it's absolutely valid and solves a lot of apparent mysteries.
Applied to personal situations: Why does she stay in that awful marriage? Because, despite her complaints, she likes it more than the alternatives. Why does he keep that awful job? Because, despite his bitching and moaning, he enjoys it. It doesn't matter if I would hate it or you would hate it. People are different.
An excellent political example in the news just now. George W. Vichy supported Teddy Kennedy's open-borders approach to immigration as long as Congress was under the "control" of the R brand. Now that Congress is under the control of the D brand, GWV is taking a more restrictive approach.
Mystery? Stupid? Unfortunate that partisan bickering is getting in the way of good policy? Nope. Just apply the Sixth Law. Ignore his talk, and look at his results. By supporting the D side when R was "in control" and supporting the R side when D is in control, you are guaranteed to achieve nothing. No new laws.
So we know what GWV wants, in this as in all else: He wants nothing. Nothing at all. He has more power than anyone else in the world, and he carefully insures that his power achieves nothing except wasting astronomical piles of taxpayer money.
Why? At this level I genuinely find a mystery.
I suppose the answer might be found if we could determine where most of the wasted money goes. China? Saudi? Ray Nagin? Some anonymous blackmailer? Don't know, probably never find out.
= = = = =
The Sixth Law emphatically applies to leftist policies and causes.
There are no Unintended Consequences.
Lenin knew exactly what he was doing, and his apostles like Frances Fox Piven, Saul Alinsky and the delightfully deceased Comrade Betty Fried[m]an, all knew exactly what they were doing. Is it unfortunate that school integration, "intended" to achieve equal achievement for all races, actually produced more segregation and less assimilation for blacks? Nope. Maximum inequality and maximum chaos were the goal. Is it accidental and unfortunate that the ADA, "intended" to give more opportunity to disabled people, actually led to less employment for disabled people? Nope, that's the goal. More dependency, more resentment between groups, more reliance on an all-powerful state, more income for lawyers. ¶ 1:33 PM
Thursday, April 05, 2007
Hey Rosie!
Rosie the Vampire Bat and its fellow 'Truthers' are fond of saying that fire won't melt steel, which somehow explains why the World Trade Center couldn't have been brought down by jet planes.
Polistra decided to 'speak' in Rosie's own 'language' for this picture.
Ever hear of a blacksmith? Ever hear of a cutting torch? Or more comprehensible to Rosie, ever use steel wool in a hash pipe?
Granted, you won't melt an I-beam with a burning newspaper, but a flame with superior fuel and plenty of oxygen can melt steel without any trouble at all. ¶ 3:39 PM
Rosie the Vampire Bat and its fellow 'Truthers' are fond of saying that fire won't melt steel, which somehow explains why the World Trade Center couldn't have been brought down by jet planes.
Polistra decided to 'speak' in Rosie's own 'language' for this picture.
Ever hear of a blacksmith? Ever hear of a cutting torch? Or more comprehensible to Rosie, ever use steel wool in a hash pipe?
Granted, you won't melt an I-beam with a burning newspaper, but a flame with superior fuel and plenty of oxygen can melt steel without any trouble at all. ¶ 3:39 PM
Wednesday, April 04, 2007
Race to the lace
Polistra's Fifth Law of Human Nature:
You can't expect to see the right thing done for the right reason. Be happy to get the right thing, even when it's done for awful reasons.
= = = = =
Today's R-brand talking point is the attempt by some D-brand Congresscritters to avoid using the terms "Global War On Terror" and "Long War". The R-brand talking points vendors are, as usual, squawking about Orwell and Euphemisms.
Stop.
Think about this for a minute.
"Global War On Terror" is already a delicate Victorian lace-and-perfume euphemism, which avoids all honest and bellicose description.
A correct term for this war, if we were actually fighting it, would be "Crusade Against Mohammed" or maybe "New Crusade".
It was the army of Mohammed that started this war, just as they have done every century since 700 AD. So it's historically accurate, and thus helpful, to use an understandable term for the counter-offensive.
"Long War" is not exactly a euphemism, but it's even more dangerous. As I've said a dozen times here, Long = Losing. Not just because of our short attention span, but because a long war leads us to be comfortable with a certain level of damage. More to the point with this particular enemy, a Long War gives the enemy plenty of time to multiply and subvert, and gives us plenty of time to adjust to Sharia. If we get it over with quickly, by vaporizing as many "holy" places as possible and killing as many Arabs as possible, we will then force the enemy to do the adjusting.
This is as it should be.
We are right. They are wrong.
We are civilized. They are primitive.
If we mean to defend civilization, our job is to create as much chaos as possible within the camp of the savages, so that they must either take on the mantle of civilization or die entirely.
All of this has been true for 500 years. We saw it and described it clearly in 1944; we used the word Crusader to describe our men, and we unflinchingly named the savagery of the Krauts and Nips. We won that war, and the Krauts and Nips are peaceful people now because we won it.
So I'd rather see the euphemisms go away, even for the wrong reasons, because eliminating false distinctions is necessary. Without the euphemisms, we stand a better chance of finding the path toward victory. With the euphemisms, we will continue this insane and suicidal fake "debate" between fast surrender (the D side) and slow painful surrender (the R side.) ¶ 6:46 PM
You can't expect to see the right thing done for the right reason. Be happy to get the right thing, even when it's done for awful reasons.
= = = = =
Today's R-brand talking point is the attempt by some D-brand Congresscritters to avoid using the terms "Global War On Terror" and "Long War". The R-brand talking points vendors are, as usual, squawking about Orwell and Euphemisms.
Stop.
Think about this for a minute.
"Global War On Terror" is already a delicate Victorian lace-and-perfume euphemism, which avoids all honest and bellicose description.
A correct term for this war, if we were actually fighting it, would be "Crusade Against Mohammed" or maybe "New Crusade".
It was the army of Mohammed that started this war, just as they have done every century since 700 AD. So it's historically accurate, and thus helpful, to use an understandable term for the counter-offensive.
"Long War" is not exactly a euphemism, but it's even more dangerous. As I've said a dozen times here, Long = Losing. Not just because of our short attention span, but because a long war leads us to be comfortable with a certain level of damage. More to the point with this particular enemy, a Long War gives the enemy plenty of time to multiply and subvert, and gives us plenty of time to adjust to Sharia. If we get it over with quickly, by vaporizing as many "holy" places as possible and killing as many Arabs as possible, we will then force the enemy to do the adjusting.
This is as it should be.
We are right. They are wrong.
We are civilized. They are primitive.
If we mean to defend civilization, our job is to create as much chaos as possible within the camp of the savages, so that they must either take on the mantle of civilization or die entirely.
All of this has been true for 500 years. We saw it and described it clearly in 1944; we used the word Crusader to describe our men, and we unflinchingly named the savagery of the Krauts and Nips. We won that war, and the Krauts and Nips are peaceful people now because we won it.
So I'd rather see the euphemisms go away, even for the wrong reasons, because eliminating false distinctions is necessary. Without the euphemisms, we stand a better chance of finding the path toward victory. With the euphemisms, we will continue this insane and suicidal fake "debate" between fast surrender (the D side) and slow painful surrender (the R side.) ¶ 6:46 PM
Tuesday, April 03, 2007
One good thing.
Amid all the unmitigated shit in our media and culture, one very good thing happened today: Persian resistance fighter Ghazal Omid talked Glenn Beck into featuring a daily segment on what's happening inside Iran. She will supply the material if he will run it.
Encouraging resistance movements is an important part of running a war. Since the large organization which describes itself for some mysterious reason as "The U.S. Government" is not performing any of the normal and necessary tasks involved in running a war, it's good to see private efforts in this direction.
= = = = =
In WW2 we devoted tremendous effort to supporting and praising the resistance forces in France, Italy, and smaller countries. Prime-time dramas were centered on the Free French, and the news on D-Day talked about Charles de Gaulle as much as Churchill. We never discussed the resistance within Germany, probably because there wasn't any. Germans loved Hitler.
This leads me to a heterodox conclusion.
Unlike Beck, I don't think Iran is the Germany of this war. Iran under the Ayatollahs is more like France under Petain. Iran has been occupied by a basically foreign and Arab style of Mohammedanism since 1979. As in France, some of the elites and many of the peasants have gone along with the occupation. The peasants like it because they are mainly Arabs; the elites (such as Ahmedi-Nezhad) like it because it brings them to a level of power they wouldn't have reached under the Shah's regime.
And as in France, the best people hate the occupation. Many of them escaped to Europe and America before the revolution solidified its control, but most are stuck in Iran, either fatalistic or unwilling to risk the death of remaining family members by leaving now.
Where's the Berlin of this war? That's a bit more complicated, because Arabia doesn't have a distinct national center. Riyadh doesn't correspond to Berlin. Nevertheless, the Arabian Peninsula (including Saudi, Yemen, Oman, etc) is where Osama came from, and it's where the 9/11 attackers came from.
So why haven't we attacked Arabia? That's always been the hard question.
Yes, I know there's a strategic reason to keep the main oil supplier happy. But the Axis-occupied territories were also suppliers of of many important materials including rubber and oil, and we managed to work through those limitations long enough to defeat the Axis FAST. (If FDR had decided to run a Rumsfeldian Long Twilight Struggle, we would have been obliged to compromise then just as we are now.)
I keep returning to the same basic question. Is that large organization in DC totally incompetent, totally unaware of every single lesson of history and common sense, totally naive about every single aspect of human nature, war and politics, or is the defect more serious? ¶ 7:54 PM
Encouraging resistance movements is an important part of running a war. Since the large organization which describes itself for some mysterious reason as "The U.S. Government" is not performing any of the normal and necessary tasks involved in running a war, it's good to see private efforts in this direction.
= = = = =
In WW2 we devoted tremendous effort to supporting and praising the resistance forces in France, Italy, and smaller countries. Prime-time dramas were centered on the Free French, and the news on D-Day talked about Charles de Gaulle as much as Churchill. We never discussed the resistance within Germany, probably because there wasn't any. Germans loved Hitler.
This leads me to a heterodox conclusion.
Unlike Beck, I don't think Iran is the Germany of this war. Iran under the Ayatollahs is more like France under Petain. Iran has been occupied by a basically foreign and Arab style of Mohammedanism since 1979. As in France, some of the elites and many of the peasants have gone along with the occupation. The peasants like it because they are mainly Arabs; the elites (such as Ahmedi-Nezhad) like it because it brings them to a level of power they wouldn't have reached under the Shah's regime.
And as in France, the best people hate the occupation. Many of them escaped to Europe and America before the revolution solidified its control, but most are stuck in Iran, either fatalistic or unwilling to risk the death of remaining family members by leaving now.
Where's the Berlin of this war? That's a bit more complicated, because Arabia doesn't have a distinct national center. Riyadh doesn't correspond to Berlin. Nevertheless, the Arabian Peninsula (including Saudi, Yemen, Oman, etc) is where Osama came from, and it's where the 9/11 attackers came from.
So why haven't we attacked Arabia? That's always been the hard question.
Yes, I know there's a strategic reason to keep the main oil supplier happy. But the Axis-occupied territories were also suppliers of of many important materials including rubber and oil, and we managed to work through those limitations long enough to defeat the Axis FAST. (If FDR had decided to run a Rumsfeldian Long Twilight Struggle, we would have been obliged to compromise then just as we are now.)
I keep returning to the same basic question. Is that large organization in DC totally incompetent, totally unaware of every single lesson of history and common sense, totally naive about every single aspect of human nature, war and politics, or is the defect more serious? ¶ 7:54 PM
Confrontation?
So we have "what is being privately described as a major constitutional confrontation" between the D's and the R's.
No we don't.
We don't have a confrontation.
We don't even have two sides.
The D "side" wants to pull troops out of Iraq in the summer of 2008.
The R "side" wants to keep troops in Iraq until the summer of 2008.
Those are not two sides.
Those are merely two very slightly different phrasings of the same sentence with the same meaning. Any English teacher or editor would consider them to be equivalent phrasings, one a little more active in flavor, the other a little more passive.
If I said "I want you home from work at 5:30", and you said "No, I want to stay at work until 5:30", would we have an actual disagreement? Even the most dysfunctional family couldn't run this up into a satisfying fight. ¶ 3:28 PM
No we don't.
We don't have a confrontation.
We don't even have two sides.
The D "side" wants to pull troops out of Iraq in the summer of 2008.
The R "side" wants to keep troops in Iraq until the summer of 2008.
Those are not two sides.
Those are merely two very slightly different phrasings of the same sentence with the same meaning. Any English teacher or editor would consider them to be equivalent phrasings, one a little more active in flavor, the other a little more passive.
If I said "I want you home from work at 5:30", and you said "No, I want to stay at work until 5:30", would we have an actual disagreement? Even the most dysfunctional family couldn't run this up into a satisfying fight. ¶ 3:28 PM
Newt and Malthus
Newt is doing something truly interesting. While the other candidates are busy ginning up millions so they can bash each other over the head for two years, Newt is simply organizing a new party.
He's doing it within the Republican structure, thus avoiding the McCain-Feingold obstacles to a named third party, but it's still a party. His main goal is to run lots of like-minded folks for state, local and federal offices, and then use their power to influence the government.
This is exactly what a party does. 1. Gain a majority. 2. Use it.
Since the Republican club isn't a party by this definition - it gained a majority and the Presidency, and then allowed the Kennedys and Clintons to continue running the country as usual - it's a good 'vacant shell' to build a new organization on. As the informal leader of this new party, Newt will have more genuine power than any Republican president. And if the process of building the organization leads to a groundswell of support, he could become the candidate as well. However: I suspect he understands that no Republican will be allowed to win against Hillary, so it's more important at this time to construct a genuine opposition party.
= = = = =
Newt's platform is correct on the basics. Focus on rebuilding civilization, bring bureaucracy forward into at least the 20th century if not the 21st, put a leash on lawyers. I don't think he goes far enough on the latter; he's ready to dissolve the 9th Circuit but not the entire Federal court system.
I've got a contrarian thought on the middle point. Maybe we'd do better to bring bureaucracy backward and away from technocracy. It would do a better job of serving the poor and elderly with a more human approach, and just might be more efficient in the ways that really matter.
An example, derived from listening to old radio shows.... In the '40s the Post Office delivered twice a day and took care of finding addresses without any Zip Codes at all. You could send a letter to "March of Dimes, c/o Postmaster", and the local post office would know where to put it. Now we have to put 9-digit Zip Codes on letters; if I were to send a letter to my next-door neighbor, it would have to go to Seattle for sorting and return to Spokane. This is high-tech but it is NOT EFFICIENT. My home-town paper sometimes takes 18 days to reach me from Oklahoma, which is literally horse-and-buggy speed.
The overall point is this: Much of the technocracy was planned on the basis of ever-increasing population. Malthusian theories, implanted by the Left, led government to get ready for exponential increases. We haven't had exponential increases. America now has twice as many people as in 1940, not six times as many.
When our population starts to decrease, as many Euro countries are already seeing, we'll be stuck with a lot of systems planned for a non-existent future. Technology can help, but perhaps government can find a different niche, a more personalized way of doing things.
Another helpful backward move that requires considerable government action, though not strictly a gov't matter: Rejuvenate the railroads. We have allowed them to decline dangerously. Trains are hugely superior to trucks in energy usage, especially because trains can be switched to electric power. Even in America many railroads are already electrified, and the standard diesel locomotive would be easy to convert. There's no way to electrify long-distance trucks.
Rails are somewhat more secure than highways; though nothing is purely terrorist-proof, tracks have limited access by definition, and you can't steer a bomb-carrying train into a destination that isn't on the tracks. Also, building more trains - and building more nuclear reactors to power them - would be an excellent use for the dozens of automobile plants and thousands of workers now abandoned by Ford and GM. A competent wartime government would have started this process on 9/12/2001. ¶ 9:59 AM
He's doing it within the Republican structure, thus avoiding the McCain-Feingold obstacles to a named third party, but it's still a party. His main goal is to run lots of like-minded folks for state, local and federal offices, and then use their power to influence the government.
This is exactly what a party does. 1. Gain a majority. 2. Use it.
Since the Republican club isn't a party by this definition - it gained a majority and the Presidency, and then allowed the Kennedys and Clintons to continue running the country as usual - it's a good 'vacant shell' to build a new organization on. As the informal leader of this new party, Newt will have more genuine power than any Republican president. And if the process of building the organization leads to a groundswell of support, he could become the candidate as well. However: I suspect he understands that no Republican will be allowed to win against Hillary, so it's more important at this time to construct a genuine opposition party.
= = = = =
Newt's platform is correct on the basics. Focus on rebuilding civilization, bring bureaucracy forward into at least the 20th century if not the 21st, put a leash on lawyers. I don't think he goes far enough on the latter; he's ready to dissolve the 9th Circuit but not the entire Federal court system.
I've got a contrarian thought on the middle point. Maybe we'd do better to bring bureaucracy backward and away from technocracy. It would do a better job of serving the poor and elderly with a more human approach, and just might be more efficient in the ways that really matter.
An example, derived from listening to old radio shows.... In the '40s the Post Office delivered twice a day and took care of finding addresses without any Zip Codes at all. You could send a letter to "March of Dimes, c/o Postmaster", and the local post office would know where to put it. Now we have to put 9-digit Zip Codes on letters; if I were to send a letter to my next-door neighbor, it would have to go to Seattle for sorting and return to Spokane. This is high-tech but it is NOT EFFICIENT. My home-town paper sometimes takes 18 days to reach me from Oklahoma, which is literally horse-and-buggy speed.
The overall point is this: Much of the technocracy was planned on the basis of ever-increasing population. Malthusian theories, implanted by the Left, led government to get ready for exponential increases. We haven't had exponential increases. America now has twice as many people as in 1940, not six times as many.
When our population starts to decrease, as many Euro countries are already seeing, we'll be stuck with a lot of systems planned for a non-existent future. Technology can help, but perhaps government can find a different niche, a more personalized way of doing things.
Another helpful backward move that requires considerable government action, though not strictly a gov't matter: Rejuvenate the railroads. We have allowed them to decline dangerously. Trains are hugely superior to trucks in energy usage, especially because trains can be switched to electric power. Even in America many railroads are already electrified, and the standard diesel locomotive would be easy to convert. There's no way to electrify long-distance trucks.
Rails are somewhat more secure than highways; though nothing is purely terrorist-proof, tracks have limited access by definition, and you can't steer a bomb-carrying train into a destination that isn't on the tracks. Also, building more trains - and building more nuclear reactors to power them - would be an excellent use for the dozens of automobile plants and thousands of workers now abandoned by Ford and GM. A competent wartime government would have started this process on 9/12/2001. ¶ 9:59 AM
Sunday, April 01, 2007
Chinese poison in dog food?
Speaking on behalf of Kansas, Polistra wonders what the hell is going on. Reports say that the poisoned wheat gluten in pet food came FROM CHINA.
Kansas, Washington, and many other states produce all the wheat we can use in America and plenty more besides. So why in the hell is the pet food company importing wheat gluten FROM CHINA???????
This isn't just a matter of globalization and tariffs.
We know that China is our enemy. We know that China sends thousands of spies into academic and industrial situations. We know that China is responsible for most of our computer viruses. China has been buying our raw materials and selling us screwed-up shitty appliances and computers in return. China has been running a campaign, just short of war, to destabilize America for twenty years now. Why shouldn't they toss in a little poison for our pets as well?
If our trade policy allows China to underprice Kansas, Washington and Iowa on WHEAT, for Christ's sake, something is grotesquely wrong with our trade policy. Not surprising, of course. George W. Vichy serves the interests of China and Mexico perfectly. Where do we get a government that serves the interests of the United States? ¶ 9:27 PM
Speaking on behalf of Kansas, Polistra wonders what the hell is going on. Reports say that the poisoned wheat gluten in pet food came FROM CHINA.
Kansas, Washington, and many other states produce all the wheat we can use in America and plenty more besides. So why in the hell is the pet food company importing wheat gluten FROM CHINA???????
This isn't just a matter of globalization and tariffs.
We know that China is our enemy. We know that China sends thousands of spies into academic and industrial situations. We know that China is responsible for most of our computer viruses. China has been buying our raw materials and selling us screwed-up shitty appliances and computers in return. China has been running a campaign, just short of war, to destabilize America for twenty years now. Why shouldn't they toss in a little poison for our pets as well?
If our trade policy allows China to underprice Kansas, Washington and Iowa on WHEAT, for Christ's sake, something is grotesquely wrong with our trade policy. Not surprising, of course. George W. Vichy serves the interests of China and Mexico perfectly. Where do we get a government that serves the interests of the United States? ¶ 9:27 PM
Saturday, March 31, 2007
You'd think we'd learn, part II
Even during the big news day, CBS carried some of its regular entertainment features, but many of them were shaped specifically by the news. One such feature was "Kate Smith Speaks", a short noontime segment. As far as I can tell, this program hasn't been preserved in a regular way by the old-time-radio folks, so this 3-minute segment is the only one we have.
Here's Kate at her best.
I was prompted to include this after hearing some discussion about today's best-known large female entertainer, the one who hangs upside-down like a vampire bat. Compare Kate's passionate prayer for the success of our Crusaders with the filthy pro-enemy propaganda of the vampire bat, if you can stand the desecration. ¶ 4:12 PM
Even during the big news day, CBS carried some of its regular entertainment features, but many of them were shaped specifically by the news. One such feature was "Kate Smith Speaks", a short noontime segment. As far as I can tell, this program hasn't been preserved in a regular way by the old-time-radio folks, so this 3-minute segment is the only one we have.
Here's Kate at her best.
I was prompted to include this after hearing some discussion about today's best-known large female entertainer, the one who hangs upside-down like a vampire bat. Compare Kate's passionate prayer for the success of our Crusaders with the filthy pro-enemy propaganda of the vampire bat, if you can stand the desecration. ¶ 4:12 PM
You'd think we'd learn.......
In between working on a rather dull spreadsheet assignment, I've been listening to a full broadcast day of CBS from D-Day, 6/6/44.
Not many surprises in the raw news; I've read enough about Operation Overlord to know the basics.
In terms of presentation, all the Big Names like Murrow, Collingwood and Hottelet were taking part in the broadcast, and I found them unimpressive. Lost without their scripts, and poor at basic diction.
The real star of the day was a lesser light, Bob Trout. Caught off guard on a late shift, he took masterful control and invented a whole new way of doing news. He wandered around the building with a remote microphone, talking as he walked, reading the news from whichever teletype machine seemed to have the latest flash, explaining the news-gathering process to the listener, pulling the events together, and finding editors and writers to give on-the-spot analysis. He remained serious and competent but informal; never sounded stilted or harsh. Trout laid the stylistic groundwork for today's cable news, though I suspect he'd be ashamed to hear today's results. Any of those old newshawks would be totally puzzled by a "news broadcast" that covers custody disputes mis-described as abductions, sex with teachers, sex with children, sex with celebrities, and a tiny handful of non-sex stories which are obviously and plainly false. They would recognize this as a fantastically low-quality tabloid newspaper or 'scandal sheet'; maybe even a crude high-school parody of a tabloid.
What surprised me in this CBS day was the high quality of commentary and analysis. They had three main analysts and two 'embedded generals' on the air; all were vastly superior to anyone on TV today, and Quentin Reynolds was the best.
At one point Reynolds compared FDR's approach in WW2 with Wilson's approach in WW1. Crucial difference: Wilson paid more attention to politics and diplomacy than to fighting, and failed to replace generals who couldn't handle a real war. Roosevelt focused strictly on winning the war, and "took care to explain every aspect of the war to the people." This was, of course, before WW2 was won; as of D-Day it was unclear how soon we'd take down Germany, and we hadn't even started to push into Japan. Even so, the distinction was already clear to Reynolds. If you want to win a war, you have to get the citizens on your side and you have to get rid of incompetent managers. The distinction is even more clear now that we know how WW2 came out, and how quickly it was done. Despite all that, George W. Vichy has intentionally taken a 100% Wilsonian path. He focuses on politics and diplomacy, refuses to replace bad generals and Secretaries of Defense, and refuses to explain the war to the people in any way that makes sense. At this point, after nearly 6 years of Wilsonian failure, we really have to ask: is this simple incompetence or is it something worse?
I've posted this 3-minute segment of Quentin Reynolds because it's crisply relevant to today's fight. We know that today's Arabs, fighting under the banner of Allah, are direct descendants of WW2's Germans under the banner of National Socialism. Hitler's chief representative to Arabs was Saddam Hussein's uncle and Yasser Arafat's main mentor. A sort of devilish apostolic succession. But I was still surprised by the historical 'connectivity' of several items in this piece. Listen for yourself and see if you can spot them.
= = = = =
Edit for accuracy: From the Wiki biography of Bob Trout, he did invent the 'peripatetic newscast', but he first used it at the Anschluss in 1938. By D-Day it was already his trademark but not brand new. ¶ 3:18 PM
In between working on a rather dull spreadsheet assignment, I've been listening to a full broadcast day of CBS from D-Day, 6/6/44.
Not many surprises in the raw news; I've read enough about Operation Overlord to know the basics.
In terms of presentation, all the Big Names like Murrow, Collingwood and Hottelet were taking part in the broadcast, and I found them unimpressive. Lost without their scripts, and poor at basic diction.
The real star of the day was a lesser light, Bob Trout. Caught off guard on a late shift, he took masterful control and invented a whole new way of doing news. He wandered around the building with a remote microphone, talking as he walked, reading the news from whichever teletype machine seemed to have the latest flash, explaining the news-gathering process to the listener, pulling the events together, and finding editors and writers to give on-the-spot analysis. He remained serious and competent but informal; never sounded stilted or harsh. Trout laid the stylistic groundwork for today's cable news, though I suspect he'd be ashamed to hear today's results. Any of those old newshawks would be totally puzzled by a "news broadcast" that covers custody disputes mis-described as abductions, sex with teachers, sex with children, sex with celebrities, and a tiny handful of non-sex stories which are obviously and plainly false. They would recognize this as a fantastically low-quality tabloid newspaper or 'scandal sheet'; maybe even a crude high-school parody of a tabloid.
What surprised me in this CBS day was the high quality of commentary and analysis. They had three main analysts and two 'embedded generals' on the air; all were vastly superior to anyone on TV today, and Quentin Reynolds was the best.
At one point Reynolds compared FDR's approach in WW2 with Wilson's approach in WW1. Crucial difference: Wilson paid more attention to politics and diplomacy than to fighting, and failed to replace generals who couldn't handle a real war. Roosevelt focused strictly on winning the war, and "took care to explain every aspect of the war to the people." This was, of course, before WW2 was won; as of D-Day it was unclear how soon we'd take down Germany, and we hadn't even started to push into Japan. Even so, the distinction was already clear to Reynolds. If you want to win a war, you have to get the citizens on your side and you have to get rid of incompetent managers. The distinction is even more clear now that we know how WW2 came out, and how quickly it was done. Despite all that, George W. Vichy has intentionally taken a 100% Wilsonian path. He focuses on politics and diplomacy, refuses to replace bad generals and Secretaries of Defense, and refuses to explain the war to the people in any way that makes sense. At this point, after nearly 6 years of Wilsonian failure, we really have to ask: is this simple incompetence or is it something worse?
I've posted this 3-minute segment of Quentin Reynolds because it's crisply relevant to today's fight. We know that today's Arabs, fighting under the banner of Allah, are direct descendants of WW2's Germans under the banner of National Socialism. Hitler's chief representative to Arabs was Saddam Hussein's uncle and Yasser Arafat's main mentor. A sort of devilish apostolic succession. But I was still surprised by the historical 'connectivity' of several items in this piece. Listen for yourself and see if you can spot them.
= = = = =
Edit for accuracy: From the Wiki biography of Bob Trout, he did invent the 'peripatetic newscast', but he first used it at the Anschluss in 1938. By D-Day it was already his trademark but not brand new. ¶ 3:18 PM
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
ERA redux
Apparently the lesbian leninists are bringing back the good old Equal Rights Amendment.
If American men had any sense at all, they would be enthusiastically supporting the ERA this time around.
Since 1970, Comrade MacKinnon and Comrade Friedan have succeeded in shaping our courts and regulations to favor females in every single circumstance where the distinction is possible. Sexual harassment "laws", "date-rape" "laws", child-support enforcement, affirmative action in colleges, and the overall workings of public schools, all give females superior treatment under the "law".
Having the ERA in the Constitution would give males a substantial ground for lawsuits in each of these areas. It wouldn't make any real difference, because all the black-robed saboteurs are hyper-orthodox Leninists who never pay attention to any part of the Constitution anyway ..... but it would at least make an interesting public display of reality. ¶ 9:06 AM
If American men had any sense at all, they would be enthusiastically supporting the ERA this time around.
Since 1970, Comrade MacKinnon and Comrade Friedan have succeeded in shaping our courts and regulations to favor females in every single circumstance where the distinction is possible. Sexual harassment "laws", "date-rape" "laws", child-support enforcement, affirmative action in colleges, and the overall workings of public schools, all give females superior treatment under the "law".
Having the ERA in the Constitution would give males a substantial ground for lawsuits in each of these areas. It wouldn't make any real difference, because all the black-robed saboteurs are hyper-orthodox Leninists who never pay attention to any part of the Constitution anyway ..... but it would at least make an interesting public display of reality. ¶ 9:06 AM
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Canadian cancer cure update
The University of Alberta has revised its website to make it easier to keep up with the latest developments, and easier to contribute.
Dr. Michelakis needs about 1.5 million dollars to complete a series of clinical tests.
So far donations have reached about $100,000.
What's wrong with this picture? Other than everything?
In other news, some Hollywood dickhead has just crashed his 1.5 million dollar sports car.
Hmm. If I had $1.5 mil, I could buy a Ferrari and crash it, or I could cure cancer.
Let's see ... crash car or cure cancer ... crash car or cure cancer ... crash car or cure cancer ... Okay, we'll do the car.
That wasn't hard, was it? ¶ 11:47 PM
Dr. Michelakis needs about 1.5 million dollars to complete a series of clinical tests.
So far donations have reached about $100,000.
What's wrong with this picture? Other than everything?
In other news, some Hollywood dickhead has just crashed his 1.5 million dollar sports car.
Hmm. If I had $1.5 mil, I could buy a Ferrari and crash it, or I could cure cancer.
Let's see ... crash car or cure cancer ... crash car or cure cancer ... crash car or cure cancer ... Okay, we'll do the car.
That wasn't hard, was it? ¶ 11:47 PM
Thursday, March 22, 2007
Brownb[r]ack's big idea
Right now Sen. Brownback is speaking in the Senate, discussing his idea of a BRAC-style commission for civilian spending. It's an excellent idea. The Base Realignment and Closure Commission has worked well as a procedure by taking the responsibility for cuts out of the hands and out of the voting records of Congressmen.
Before BRAC, it was impossible to close any bases because each representative stoutly defended everything in his district and traded favors with others to keep everything running. With BRAC, the decisions are made by others and each rep is distanced from the responsibility of closing a local job-source. Communities still put tremendous effort into lobbying for their bases, and this lobbying is more like true representation than anything ever done by Congress. The commission tries to measure genuine community support when making its decisions. When Congress makes a decision, community support is drowned out by irrelevant concerns like personal seniority and power. An old power-broker like Byrd or Kennedy was able to keep every base in his state running, even when the locals didn't want or need them.
I emphasize as a procedure because, as I've said many times in many ways, closing military bases is simply an atrocious, stupid, and self-destructive practice no matter how you organize it legislatively.
Two main reasons:
1. The concept of Efficiency simply cannot be applied to defense. The best defense is an infinitely inefficient one. If you spend huge amounts of money on fortifications, walls, tanks, bombs, and soldiers, and you constantly show that all those objects are ready to rumble at a moment's notice, prospective enemies will look elsewhere. The spending will thus be totally useless and totally inefficient by a commercial-style accounting, because no attack will ever occur, and the equipment and soldiers will never be used. This is the ideal arrangement.
When we follow Rumsfeld's bean-counting industrial model, maintaining just enough equipment and soldiers for current needs, we will be unprepared and enemies will accurately view us as unprepared. The few soldiers will then have to fight like hell with inadequate equipment. (Sound familiar?)
2. Because America is now thoroughly settled and urbanized, and mainly because of EPA rules and NIMBY effects, losing a military base is totally irreversible. There is simply no way we can rebuild any of these huge and specialized facilities under current restrictions. Even if the purpose of some facility seems obsolete at the moment, it's still worth keeping as a storehouse of NIMBY-proof square miles and buildings.
= = = = =
However! Even though the BRAC method is bad for military facilities, it would be grand when applied to civilian facilities and programs. In the civilian parts of government, Efficiency is definitely meaningful, because each program or agency is meant to accomplish a positive goal; and none of the civilian facilities are unique or irreplaceable. Any old office building will do.
So Brownback's proposal is excellent, but I'd be inclined to advocate it from a different angle. I wouldn't say that BRAC is a success and should be extended to civilian programs; I'd say that the BRAC method needs to be moved over to civilian programs! ¶ 6:17 PM
Before BRAC, it was impossible to close any bases because each representative stoutly defended everything in his district and traded favors with others to keep everything running. With BRAC, the decisions are made by others and each rep is distanced from the responsibility of closing a local job-source. Communities still put tremendous effort into lobbying for their bases, and this lobbying is more like true representation than anything ever done by Congress. The commission tries to measure genuine community support when making its decisions. When Congress makes a decision, community support is drowned out by irrelevant concerns like personal seniority and power. An old power-broker like Byrd or Kennedy was able to keep every base in his state running, even when the locals didn't want or need them.
I emphasize as a procedure because, as I've said many times in many ways, closing military bases is simply an atrocious, stupid, and self-destructive practice no matter how you organize it legislatively.
Two main reasons:
1. The concept of Efficiency simply cannot be applied to defense. The best defense is an infinitely inefficient one. If you spend huge amounts of money on fortifications, walls, tanks, bombs, and soldiers, and you constantly show that all those objects are ready to rumble at a moment's notice, prospective enemies will look elsewhere. The spending will thus be totally useless and totally inefficient by a commercial-style accounting, because no attack will ever occur, and the equipment and soldiers will never be used. This is the ideal arrangement.
When we follow Rumsfeld's bean-counting industrial model, maintaining just enough equipment and soldiers for current needs, we will be unprepared and enemies will accurately view us as unprepared. The few soldiers will then have to fight like hell with inadequate equipment. (Sound familiar?)
2. Because America is now thoroughly settled and urbanized, and mainly because of EPA rules and NIMBY effects, losing a military base is totally irreversible. There is simply no way we can rebuild any of these huge and specialized facilities under current restrictions. Even if the purpose of some facility seems obsolete at the moment, it's still worth keeping as a storehouse of NIMBY-proof square miles and buildings.
= = = = =
However! Even though the BRAC method is bad for military facilities, it would be grand when applied to civilian facilities and programs. In the civilian parts of government, Efficiency is definitely meaningful, because each program or agency is meant to accomplish a positive goal; and none of the civilian facilities are unique or irreplaceable. Any old office building will do.
So Brownback's proposal is excellent, but I'd be inclined to advocate it from a different angle. I wouldn't say that BRAC is a success and should be extended to civilian programs; I'd say that the BRAC method needs to be moved over to civilian programs! ¶ 6:17 PM
Sunday, March 18, 2007
Settled.
Polistra has been wanting to support Sam Brownback for a while.
The deal is sealed now.
[Unless and until Newt gets serious, that is. Newt is unquestionably the best of the available politicians, but he's still not clear about his intention to run.]
Brownback's recent defense of Gen. Peter Pace for speaking his mind is the threshold point, the snap that turned on the light.
Geography certainly plays a part in this. Polistra, like most Kaw Valley natives, has a Vermontish streak of rock-ribbed reticence, left over from those early Abolitionists who settled the area.
"Say what needs to be said, and then hush."
Brownback seems to have the same quality. When something needs to be said, he doesn't worry about the taboos of the time, and doesn't care if he sounds grumpy about a subject that deserves grumpiness.
He also carries the spirit of those Abolitionists quite directly and effectively into the modern era, in places like North Korea and Africa where plain old-fashioned slavery is still thriving.
He comes off well in comparison to Romney, whose response to Pace's clarity is a typical modern wet blanket: "In a governmental setting, the right way to go is to show more of an outpouring of tolerance."
No, Mitt, no. In wartime we can't afford an outpouring of tolerance. We can't afford mushiness and softness of mind and soul. We didn't win WW2 by outpouring tolerance. We won WW2 by outpouring rock-hard certainty along with the bombs and bullets.
We need a house built of stone. ¶ 3:06 PM
Polistra has been wanting to support Sam Brownback for a while.
The deal is sealed now.
[Unless and until Newt gets serious, that is. Newt is unquestionably the best of the available politicians, but he's still not clear about his intention to run.]
Brownback's recent defense of Gen. Peter Pace for speaking his mind is the threshold point, the snap that turned on the light.
Geography certainly plays a part in this. Polistra, like most Kaw Valley natives, has a Vermontish streak of rock-ribbed reticence, left over from those early Abolitionists who settled the area.
"Say what needs to be said, and then hush."
Brownback seems to have the same quality. When something needs to be said, he doesn't worry about the taboos of the time, and doesn't care if he sounds grumpy about a subject that deserves grumpiness.
He also carries the spirit of those Abolitionists quite directly and effectively into the modern era, in places like North Korea and Africa where plain old-fashioned slavery is still thriving.
He comes off well in comparison to Romney, whose response to Pace's clarity is a typical modern wet blanket: "In a governmental setting, the right way to go is to show more of an outpouring of tolerance."
No, Mitt, no. In wartime we can't afford an outpouring of tolerance. We can't afford mushiness and softness of mind and soul. We didn't win WW2 by outpouring tolerance. We won WW2 by outpouring rock-hard certainty along with the bombs and bullets.
We need a house built of stone. ¶ 3:06 PM
Friday, March 16, 2007
Yet again...
Listening to Saboteur Plame lying to Congress. Same old thing.... The D side is certain of its treasonous values, and the R "side" is weakly and barely defensive. An R congressman is questioning Saboteur Plame, and the best he can do is to try and show that her "career path" was not hurt too badly by Novak's column.
If we had a competent wartime government ... no. If we had a government, Mr. and Mrs. Glamorous Saboteur would already have been tried and imprisoned, preferably hanged, for their vicious sabotage and treason.
We wouldn't have to be asking how badly her "career path" was damaged, for fuck's sake. ¶ 7:57 AM
If we had a competent wartime government ... no. If we had a government, Mr. and Mrs. Glamorous Saboteur would already have been tried and imprisoned, preferably hanged, for their vicious sabotage and treason.
We wouldn't have to be asking how badly her "career path" was damaged, for fuck's sake. ¶ 7:57 AM
Thursday, March 15, 2007
Non-binding
Professor Polistra has run the experiments and checked the theories.
Her conclusion:
A non-binding resolution is the perfect response to a non-binding war.
If we were fighting a binding war, a war aimed at defeating our enemies forever and killing their blood fetish forever, we'd already be done.
The internal discontent that allows the D politicians to play these games wouldn't exist. The anti-American protesters would be marginalized because most Americans would feel the infinite relief of total victory. The major anti-American leaders and politicians would be in jail for sedition or hanged for treason.
That's how Roosevelt and Churchill fought. Destroy the enemy, silence the traitors. A binding war, with no loopholes or escape clauses. Their enemy has remained dead for 60 years, though its mindset has pollinated today's Arab fascists. ¶ 9:23 PM
Professor Polistra has run the experiments and checked the theories.
Her conclusion:
A non-binding resolution is the perfect response to a non-binding war.
If we were fighting a binding war, a war aimed at defeating our enemies forever and killing their blood fetish forever, we'd already be done.
The internal discontent that allows the D politicians to play these games wouldn't exist. The anti-American protesters would be marginalized because most Americans would feel the infinite relief of total victory. The major anti-American leaders and politicians would be in jail for sedition or hanged for treason.
That's how Roosevelt and Churchill fought. Destroy the enemy, silence the traitors. A binding war, with no loopholes or escape clauses. Their enemy has remained dead for 60 years, though its mindset has pollinated today's Arab fascists. ¶ 9:23 PM
Partisan???????????????????
Folks constantly complain about the "partisan bickering" and "lack of bipartisanship" in Congress.
Okay, let's look at the two "sides" on Iraq. The R "side" wants to Support Our President and keep the current pointless slaughter going until the fall of 2008.
The D "side" wants to Speak Truth To Power and begin a drawdown which will keep the current pointless slaughter going until the fall of 2008.
So. We don't have "partisan bickering" at all. We have total harmony, utter concordance, and 100% agreement to put off all decisions until after the next election.
Yes indeed. All options are on the table ... except for any action that could potentially lead to victory. Victory is unthinkable and unspeakable. ¶ 9:26 AM
Okay, let's look at the two "sides" on Iraq. The R "side" wants to Support Our President and keep the current pointless slaughter going until the fall of 2008.
The D "side" wants to Speak Truth To Power and begin a drawdown which will keep the current pointless slaughter going until the fall of 2008.
So. We don't have "partisan bickering" at all. We have total harmony, utter concordance, and 100% agreement to put off all decisions until after the next election.
Yes indeed. All options are on the table ... except for any action that could potentially lead to victory. Victory is unthinkable and unspeakable. ¶ 9:26 AM
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Credit where credit is due
While the alleged, so-called, and let me italicize, underline and bold-face the word so-called, """"""""government"""""""" in DC continues to grind along with the tiresome repetitive screeching and clashing of stale stupidity, craven cowardice, and grade-A prime treason, state governments are functioning quite well.
The Washington state senate has just passed a wonderfully simple solution to a rather nasty problem.
The Problem: Scrap metal is so valuable that thieves are ripping wires out of houses, guard rails and conveyor systems out of running factories, and street signs out of the ground.
The Solution: A thief must ultimately take the copper or aluminum to a recycling center, which is a legitimate operation. So the state will now require those recycling centers to pay for scrap metal by check, sent through the mail to a physical address.
This will make it possible to trace the thieves, and it will also strongly discourage the thieves. Fake address? Nope, that won't work. The check would either go undelivered, or reach the wrong party.
Smart and simple.
Bravo, Wash legislature! ¶ 3:04 PM
The Washington state senate has just passed a wonderfully simple solution to a rather nasty problem.
The Problem: Scrap metal is so valuable that thieves are ripping wires out of houses, guard rails and conveyor systems out of running factories, and street signs out of the ground.
The Solution: A thief must ultimately take the copper or aluminum to a recycling center, which is a legitimate operation. So the state will now require those recycling centers to pay for scrap metal by check, sent through the mail to a physical address.
This will make it possible to trace the thieves, and it will also strongly discourage the thieves. Fake address? Nope, that won't work. The check would either go undelivered, or reach the wrong party.
Smart and simple.
Bravo, Wash legislature! ¶ 3:04 PM
When will they ever learn?
Rush is hitting hard this morning on the Republican habit of being always on defense. Good points.
These things haven't changed a bit in 30 years.
Here is a 4-minute news segment from the spring of 1974. It's worth hearing for the sound bites from politicians. As always, the Dems are certain of their goals and values, attacking hard from solid ground; as always, the Repubs are shaky and defensive, never pointing out hypocrisy or falsehoods, just whining about unfairness.
I've been listening to a series of these newscasts from '74, and the entire picture is remarkably similar. Later in the week, Israel was attacking Lebanon, and the Israeli government was about to collapse because hard-liners accused the prime minister of fumbling the last war. Teddy Kennedy was in Moscow holding a town meeting with Russian "students". And on and on, same now as then.
There is one notable difference, though: the lead story every day in the '74 week was about a strike in some sector of American industry. Unions were riding tall at that time; now they are a minor player, and lawyers have taken over the role of counterbalancing capitalism. Unions and lawyers are both obnoxious, but looking back now, I think we were somewhat better off with unions. Corrupt and incorrigible, at least they occasionally represented the real interests of the workers. Lawyers represent only their own unvarnished greed.
= = = = =
For non-listeners, here are the high points of the sound segment:
Republican politicians supporting campaign finance reform.
Nixon is negotiating with the Russians.
Dems are pushing to impeach Nixon, R politicians are responding defensively and weakly: Minority leader John Rhodes says "No other president has been so charged. This is unfair." Waaaaahh!
Dems are calling for overhaul of the Veterans Administration, charging that the VA is a "dumping ground for Nixon campaigners." Dem Teague of Texas says "I have never seen morale at a lower point. This is a direct result of political manipulations by Nixon."
Wilbur Mills was asked by reporters when Nixon would quit. Mills said essentially, "as soon as possible." (Supposedly Mills was the one who actually talked Nixon into quitting later on.)
Lowell Weicker (RINO of Connecticut) charges that Nixon used IRS data to protect friends like John Wayne and Billy Graham from audits.
Woodward and Bernstein reveal one of their sources, but keep Deep Throat a secret.
= = = = =
Some of the same men are still in the picture; all of the charges, responses, and phrases are being repeated today, and even the subjects are the same.
= = = = =
The problem with R politicians is that they are not paranoid enough.
By all accounts Nixon had a melancholy and paranoid temperament, but when it came to judging his enemies he was just as naive and optimistic as Bush.
A full-fledged melancholy paranoid operates on the "Nothing to Lose" principle. He understands that his enemies will attack him at 100% intensity no matter what he does, so he goes ahead and does everything necessary, and does it fast, hard, and loud. No clever bank shots, no cutesy coverups. Result: the surviving enemies, IF ANY (preferably none), will back off and stop attacking for a while.
Optimists, like Bush and Nixon, mistakenly and suicidally believe that Communists and their allies, whether in Russia or Iran or the Senate, are nice civilized gentlemen who can be mollified by compromise and negotiation. ¶ 10:09 AM
These things haven't changed a bit in 30 years.
Here is a 4-minute news segment from the spring of 1974. It's worth hearing for the sound bites from politicians. As always, the Dems are certain of their goals and values, attacking hard from solid ground; as always, the Repubs are shaky and defensive, never pointing out hypocrisy or falsehoods, just whining about unfairness.
I've been listening to a series of these newscasts from '74, and the entire picture is remarkably similar. Later in the week, Israel was attacking Lebanon, and the Israeli government was about to collapse because hard-liners accused the prime minister of fumbling the last war. Teddy Kennedy was in Moscow holding a town meeting with Russian "students". And on and on, same now as then.
There is one notable difference, though: the lead story every day in the '74 week was about a strike in some sector of American industry. Unions were riding tall at that time; now they are a minor player, and lawyers have taken over the role of counterbalancing capitalism. Unions and lawyers are both obnoxious, but looking back now, I think we were somewhat better off with unions. Corrupt and incorrigible, at least they occasionally represented the real interests of the workers. Lawyers represent only their own unvarnished greed.
= = = = =
For non-listeners, here are the high points of the sound segment:
Republican politicians supporting campaign finance reform.
Nixon is negotiating with the Russians.
Dems are pushing to impeach Nixon, R politicians are responding defensively and weakly: Minority leader John Rhodes says "No other president has been so charged. This is unfair." Waaaaahh!
Dems are calling for overhaul of the Veterans Administration, charging that the VA is a "dumping ground for Nixon campaigners." Dem Teague of Texas says "I have never seen morale at a lower point. This is a direct result of political manipulations by Nixon."
Wilbur Mills was asked by reporters when Nixon would quit. Mills said essentially, "as soon as possible." (Supposedly Mills was the one who actually talked Nixon into quitting later on.)
Lowell Weicker (RINO of Connecticut) charges that Nixon used IRS data to protect friends like John Wayne and Billy Graham from audits.
Woodward and Bernstein reveal one of their sources, but keep Deep Throat a secret.
= = = = =
Some of the same men are still in the picture; all of the charges, responses, and phrases are being repeated today, and even the subjects are the same.
= = = = =
The problem with R politicians is that they are not paranoid enough.
By all accounts Nixon had a melancholy and paranoid temperament, but when it came to judging his enemies he was just as naive and optimistic as Bush.
A full-fledged melancholy paranoid operates on the "Nothing to Lose" principle. He understands that his enemies will attack him at 100% intensity no matter what he does, so he goes ahead and does everything necessary, and does it fast, hard, and loud. No clever bank shots, no cutesy coverups. Result: the surviving enemies, IF ANY (preferably none), will back off and stop attacking for a while.
Optimists, like Bush and Nixon, mistakenly and suicidally believe that Communists and their allies, whether in Russia or Iran or the Senate, are nice civilized gentlemen who can be mollified by compromise and negotiation. ¶ 10:09 AM
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
The LDS Jerusalem
Haven't been in a blogging mood for a few days ... terrible weather, and some dull but paid work.
Today NRO is discussing the LDS views on New Jerusalem in the context of Mitt Romney's sudden fall from stellar status. Reminds me of a rare and probably obsolete bit of information.
Back in 1962 I was considering radio as a career; I did a sort of student internship at K-State's low-power student practice station, and visited some other stations.
At that time my favorite uncle worked at KMBZ in Kansas City, which was quietly owned by the Mormons but not operated as a religious station. My uncle showed me some of the internal details at KMBZ. He showed me the Conelrad stuff, which I was already familiar with from my K-State practice: the big red button and the scary tapes pre-recorded by Kennedy to give the impression that our flag was still there after Washington had been turned into a glowing crater by Soviet bombs.
My uncle showed me something unexpected as well. Alone among American radio stations, KMBZ had a second emergency setup. This was not designed for nuclear apocalypse; it was for the return of Jesus, which was going to occur in Independence, just east of KC. The whole reason for owning KMBZ, in other words, was to have a station ready to cover the New Jerusalem!
= = = = =
Overall, I'm sad to see Romney losing track of his chief advantage. His absolutely unique quality among modern politicians is a talent for speaking clearly and selling convincingly. He seems to have fallen into the hands of some experienced Bush handlers, who are teaching him how to act like a Bush. I don't blame him for hiring handlers, but if his leadership is so weak that he can't resist their awful advice, he isn't qualified.
= = = = =
Afterthought:
When I write that KMBZ was "not operated as a religious station", I'm guilty of Nowism, applying modern mindsets to an earlier era.
In 1962 there was no such thing as Christian Radio, so "operating as a religious station" wasn't a meaningful choice. The need and the opportunity hadn't yet developed, except possibly in the largest cities like New York. Radio was still operating under the law and culture of public service, in which each station was a quasi-governmental franchise. FCC insisted that stations should serve the needs of their local communities, which included encouraging religion. Stations offered daily sermonettes and choral programs, and networks provided wonderful series like Family Theater.
But 1962, though not obvious at the time, was a point of inflection in this curve. Television had sapped the audience, so networks simply stopped providing radio entertainment in '62. Local stations, unable to replace the quality, started to decline.
Also in '62, the Soviet saboteurs who occupied the Supreme Court began their long war on Christianity with the first decisions banning school prayer. Soon the notion of public service was reversed: it was illegal to mention religion in public.
By the late '70s the FCC had ceased paying much attention to the stagnant backwater of AM radio. As FM and TV, infiltrated from NPR, moved farther and farther to the left, the need for a pro-Christian (or at least not lethally anti-Christian) media became more drastic. Entrepreneurs like Pat Robertson and the Bakkers, and church-based organizations like EWTN and Moody, took advantage of the cheap licenses of abandoned stations and filled the perceived need.
Today nearly every town has at least one explicitly Christian station, and many are commercially successful. ¶ 8:07 PM
Today NRO is discussing the LDS views on New Jerusalem in the context of Mitt Romney's sudden fall from stellar status. Reminds me of a rare and probably obsolete bit of information.
Back in 1962 I was considering radio as a career; I did a sort of student internship at K-State's low-power student practice station, and visited some other stations.
At that time my favorite uncle worked at KMBZ in Kansas City, which was quietly owned by the Mormons but not operated as a religious station. My uncle showed me some of the internal details at KMBZ. He showed me the Conelrad stuff, which I was already familiar with from my K-State practice: the big red button and the scary tapes pre-recorded by Kennedy to give the impression that our flag was still there after Washington had been turned into a glowing crater by Soviet bombs.
My uncle showed me something unexpected as well. Alone among American radio stations, KMBZ had a second emergency setup. This was not designed for nuclear apocalypse; it was for the return of Jesus, which was going to occur in Independence, just east of KC. The whole reason for owning KMBZ, in other words, was to have a station ready to cover the New Jerusalem!
= = = = =
Overall, I'm sad to see Romney losing track of his chief advantage. His absolutely unique quality among modern politicians is a talent for speaking clearly and selling convincingly. He seems to have fallen into the hands of some experienced Bush handlers, who are teaching him how to act like a Bush. I don't blame him for hiring handlers, but if his leadership is so weak that he can't resist their awful advice, he isn't qualified.
= = = = =
Afterthought:
When I write that KMBZ was "not operated as a religious station", I'm guilty of Nowism, applying modern mindsets to an earlier era.
In 1962 there was no such thing as Christian Radio, so "operating as a religious station" wasn't a meaningful choice. The need and the opportunity hadn't yet developed, except possibly in the largest cities like New York. Radio was still operating under the law and culture of public service, in which each station was a quasi-governmental franchise. FCC insisted that stations should serve the needs of their local communities, which included encouraging religion. Stations offered daily sermonettes and choral programs, and networks provided wonderful series like Family Theater.
But 1962, though not obvious at the time, was a point of inflection in this curve. Television had sapped the audience, so networks simply stopped providing radio entertainment in '62. Local stations, unable to replace the quality, started to decline.
Also in '62, the Soviet saboteurs who occupied the Supreme Court began their long war on Christianity with the first decisions banning school prayer. Soon the notion of public service was reversed: it was illegal to mention religion in public.
By the late '70s the FCC had ceased paying much attention to the stagnant backwater of AM radio. As FM and TV, infiltrated from NPR, moved farther and farther to the left, the need for a pro-Christian (or at least not lethally anti-Christian) media became more drastic. Entrepreneurs like Pat Robertson and the Bakkers, and church-based organizations like EWTN and Moody, took advantage of the cheap licenses of abandoned stations and filled the perceived need.
Today nearly every town has at least one explicitly Christian station, and many are commercially successful. ¶ 8:07 PM
Friday, February 16, 2007
Beck: "Money trumps peace."
Glenn Beck did a neat little riff yesterday on "Money trumps peace." It's an important point, and one rarely voiced by conservatives because it sounds too much like a leftist argument. It is, however, a point that Reagan understood deeply.
Here's a deep and long parable on the same subject, produced back in 1954 by Family Theater, famously the source of "The family that prays together stays together."
Family Theater ran on radio from '47 to '56, essentially sponsored by God through the earthly agency of a semi-official group of Catholics. Because God doesn't need to worry about ratings, the show could present a wide variety of stories, from classics to medieval legends to obscure American short stories to fresh and topical pieces, always with a moral point. Nothing in radio or TV since then has matched Family Theater for variety, literary quality and depth.
Monsieur Payen falls into the topical-piece category. It's a story of France's abandonment of Vietnam to the Communists, which was still unraveling at the time when the show was aired. Payen is a French businessman in Haiphong who decides to let money trump everything. He thinks, "Eh bien, Communists are no different from anyone else. They need fabric, and the workers need work. So I'll keep my factory running and make whatever adjustments are needed."
Along the way, Payen sees the consequences of fighting a half-hearted and compromising war against an unyielding ideology.
The author foresees that the same defeat will happen again and again until we realize several important things.
First: if you're in such a war, FIGHT. Seems like an obvious lesson, but not learned by the Americans in Korea in 1954 (who may have been the immediate target of the parable); not learned by Americans in the very same Vietnam twenty years later; still not learned by Americans in Iraq today.
Second: to prevent such a war from happening, be sure you're not giving the enemy an easy handle on the people. Payen is forced to realize that he had treated his workers badly, making the Marxist propaganda about capitalist slavedrivers just a bit too resonant. In modern terms: pick your alliances carefully, not letting money trump everything. If we are seen as aiding the slavedrivers (such as the Saudi government or the Mexican maquilladoras) we are handing the revolutionary enemy a propaganda gift. If we are seen as supporting the slaves, even if only on a moral basis, we subtract one advantage from the enemy.
Third, perhaps the most original point: If there's a risk of being defeated, don't leave the enemy a physical legacy. Payen ends up by burning his fabric mill and escaping with his life. In modern terms: don't build schools, sewage treatment plants and oil pipelines that the enemy can take over. You may do those things after you've completely defeated, eliminated, destroyed, abolished and killed every vestige of the enemy's tribe or ideology. If you do them while the barbarian is still alive, you're only leaving gifts that he will use for his own advantage.
We need to remember one basic difference: Civilized people build things, while barbarians only use and destroy. If we sell or give pipelines, nuclear plants, or even fuel oil, we are simply confusing the picture. The barbarian can then offer the fruits of civilization as if they were his own idea, without gaining any of the qualities of a builder. If we leave the barbarian to his own devices, the people will see the difference clearly, and will be more likely to support a civilized force when it emerges.
Fourth: if you're on the side of civilization, God will be there also. Ask him. [I suspect this wasn't in the original story; probably added by Family Theater. But it turns out to have been uncannily prophetic, since Reagan finally defeated the Commies with the physical, social, and spiritual aid of the Roman Church.]
= = = = =
Later edit: I had the audio of the 'Monsieur Payen' program here, but it appears that the Family Theater outfit (still very active) has done a thorough combing of the web. The clip was deleted from my website, and the entire series is no longer available through the store where I bought it on CD. No point in putting it back up; it will just get deleted again later. Apologies to searchers who were looking for it.
= = = = = ¶ 8:00 AM
Here's a deep and long parable on the same subject, produced back in 1954 by Family Theater, famously the source of "The family that prays together stays together."
Family Theater ran on radio from '47 to '56, essentially sponsored by God through the earthly agency of a semi-official group of Catholics. Because God doesn't need to worry about ratings, the show could present a wide variety of stories, from classics to medieval legends to obscure American short stories to fresh and topical pieces, always with a moral point. Nothing in radio or TV since then has matched Family Theater for variety, literary quality and depth.
Monsieur Payen falls into the topical-piece category. It's a story of France's abandonment of Vietnam to the Communists, which was still unraveling at the time when the show was aired. Payen is a French businessman in Haiphong who decides to let money trump everything. He thinks, "Eh bien, Communists are no different from anyone else. They need fabric, and the workers need work. So I'll keep my factory running and make whatever adjustments are needed."
Along the way, Payen sees the consequences of fighting a half-hearted and compromising war against an unyielding ideology.
The author foresees that the same defeat will happen again and again until we realize several important things.
First: if you're in such a war, FIGHT. Seems like an obvious lesson, but not learned by the Americans in Korea in 1954 (who may have been the immediate target of the parable); not learned by Americans in the very same Vietnam twenty years later; still not learned by Americans in Iraq today.
Second: to prevent such a war from happening, be sure you're not giving the enemy an easy handle on the people. Payen is forced to realize that he had treated his workers badly, making the Marxist propaganda about capitalist slavedrivers just a bit too resonant. In modern terms: pick your alliances carefully, not letting money trump everything. If we are seen as aiding the slavedrivers (such as the Saudi government or the Mexican maquilladoras) we are handing the revolutionary enemy a propaganda gift. If we are seen as supporting the slaves, even if only on a moral basis, we subtract one advantage from the enemy.
Third, perhaps the most original point: If there's a risk of being defeated, don't leave the enemy a physical legacy. Payen ends up by burning his fabric mill and escaping with his life. In modern terms: don't build schools, sewage treatment plants and oil pipelines that the enemy can take over. You may do those things after you've completely defeated, eliminated, destroyed, abolished and killed every vestige of the enemy's tribe or ideology. If you do them while the barbarian is still alive, you're only leaving gifts that he will use for his own advantage.
We need to remember one basic difference: Civilized people build things, while barbarians only use and destroy. If we sell or give pipelines, nuclear plants, or even fuel oil, we are simply confusing the picture. The barbarian can then offer the fruits of civilization as if they were his own idea, without gaining any of the qualities of a builder. If we leave the barbarian to his own devices, the people will see the difference clearly, and will be more likely to support a civilized force when it emerges.
Fourth: if you're on the side of civilization, God will be there also. Ask him. [I suspect this wasn't in the original story; probably added by Family Theater. But it turns out to have been uncannily prophetic, since Reagan finally defeated the Commies with the physical, social, and spiritual aid of the Roman Church.]
= = = = =
Later edit: I had the audio of the 'Monsieur Payen' program here, but it appears that the Family Theater outfit (still very active) has done a thorough combing of the web. The clip was deleted from my website, and the entire series is no longer available through the store where I bought it on CD. No point in putting it back up; it will just get deleted again later. Apologies to searchers who were looking for it.
= = = = = ¶ 8:00 AM
Thursday, February 15, 2007
Souder's excellent speech
Rep. Mark Souder of Indiana gave a wonderfully well-written speech yesterday during the "debate" over the anti-surge resolutions. Souder speaks accurately for all who want our side to work toward victory, not Stay The Course.
I voted to support this war because I believe Iraq presented a direct threat to the United States. Iraq had, was developing, and was attempting to develop weapons of mass destruction. Iraq was, at a minimum, cooperating with the funding and harboring of terrorists committed to our destruction. Saddam Hussein was repeatedly defying UN resolutions, contesting no-fly zones, and blocking WMD inspectors. Our intelligence estimates, never 100 percent accurate in any case, apparently overstated the immediate risk, but the basic facts remain the same. Knowing what we know now, perhaps we could have waited another six to 12 months, which would have given us valuable time to solidify our position in Afghanistan. But the decision to go to war was still the right decision, just possibly premature. I would not have supported this war had the initial selling point been a goal of establishing democracy in Iraq.
....
Certain basic arguments being made by the administration are simply not accurate.
To insist that the war in Iraq is not a civil war – when the entire world and Americans all understand that it is – continues to undermine the credibility of those who make it.
....
We had hoped that the early, smaller-scale civil war could be countered by a strong central government. It is now a large scale civil war eroding the already-limited power of the Iraqi government. It is now absurd to deny it is a civil war.
Making exaggerated statements of progress in Iraq also does not pass a basic credibility test.
While we have made sporadic progress – a school or project here and there – it is apparent to any Member of Congress who visited Iraq a number of years ago and again recently that security had deteriorated.
Baby-boomer Americans especially tend to see everything as Vietnam. A government that denies basic realities has little hope of persuading even its friends. We want our government to tell the truth, pleasant or not.
....
I have repeatedly heard from returning soldiers that, when the gunfire starts, the Iraqis by and large disappear. They only seem dedicated when Shia get to kill Sunnis and vice versa.
By being bogged down as the main security force in Iraq in increasingly hostile cities, we are undermining our long-term potential to fight the War on Terror.
For years we have been utilizing our National Guard and our Reserves as if they were regular military. Many are about to enter their second 12-month-plus tour of duty in combat, something historically many regular military veterans did not do.
Because of this heavy usage, we are starting to short training funds and repair funds for those units. We are finding that employers are getting increasingly nervous about disruptions to their firms. Family objections are becoming more intense. Recruiters are running into increasing resistance.
....
It has been said many times by defenders of this surge that Iraq is the place the enemy has chosen to fight and thus it is the place that we must fight.
That is partly true.
Hezbollah has chosen to fight us on many fronts. Iran is a threat itself, not just by funding terrorism in Iraq. Terrorists attacked in Madrid, London, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and many other places throughout the world. And they continue to try to attack us in the United States.
Iraq is not the only place terrorists have chosen to fight.
....
If we burn up the support of the American people, our military’s ability to recruit, the usage of our Guard and Reserves in Iraq, how do we defend ourselves elsewhere?
....
But we cannot sustain this intense an effort indefinitely. Complete victory over terrorism is unlikely ever to occur. Sometimes you have to reposition and prepare for the broader battle, not exhaust yourself on just one front and then risk defeat in the overall conflict.
I beseech our President, Secretary Gates, Secretary Rice and others never to give up the War on Terror but to understand that, without significant tactical drawdowns in Iraq, our entire counterterrorism and military efforts are threatened. Our nation can ill-afford another decade of defeatism and retreat that seized the United States after Vietnam.
Read the whole thing here. ¶ 8:05 AM
I voted to support this war because I believe Iraq presented a direct threat to the United States. Iraq had, was developing, and was attempting to develop weapons of mass destruction. Iraq was, at a minimum, cooperating with the funding and harboring of terrorists committed to our destruction. Saddam Hussein was repeatedly defying UN resolutions, contesting no-fly zones, and blocking WMD inspectors. Our intelligence estimates, never 100 percent accurate in any case, apparently overstated the immediate risk, but the basic facts remain the same. Knowing what we know now, perhaps we could have waited another six to 12 months, which would have given us valuable time to solidify our position in Afghanistan. But the decision to go to war was still the right decision, just possibly premature. I would not have supported this war had the initial selling point been a goal of establishing democracy in Iraq.
....
Certain basic arguments being made by the administration are simply not accurate.
To insist that the war in Iraq is not a civil war – when the entire world and Americans all understand that it is – continues to undermine the credibility of those who make it.
....
We had hoped that the early, smaller-scale civil war could be countered by a strong central government. It is now a large scale civil war eroding the already-limited power of the Iraqi government. It is now absurd to deny it is a civil war.
Making exaggerated statements of progress in Iraq also does not pass a basic credibility test.
While we have made sporadic progress – a school or project here and there – it is apparent to any Member of Congress who visited Iraq a number of years ago and again recently that security had deteriorated.
Baby-boomer Americans especially tend to see everything as Vietnam. A government that denies basic realities has little hope of persuading even its friends. We want our government to tell the truth, pleasant or not.
....
I have repeatedly heard from returning soldiers that, when the gunfire starts, the Iraqis by and large disappear. They only seem dedicated when Shia get to kill Sunnis and vice versa.
By being bogged down as the main security force in Iraq in increasingly hostile cities, we are undermining our long-term potential to fight the War on Terror.
For years we have been utilizing our National Guard and our Reserves as if they were regular military. Many are about to enter their second 12-month-plus tour of duty in combat, something historically many regular military veterans did not do.
Because of this heavy usage, we are starting to short training funds and repair funds for those units. We are finding that employers are getting increasingly nervous about disruptions to their firms. Family objections are becoming more intense. Recruiters are running into increasing resistance.
....
It has been said many times by defenders of this surge that Iraq is the place the enemy has chosen to fight and thus it is the place that we must fight.
That is partly true.
Hezbollah has chosen to fight us on many fronts. Iran is a threat itself, not just by funding terrorism in Iraq. Terrorists attacked in Madrid, London, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and many other places throughout the world. And they continue to try to attack us in the United States.
Iraq is not the only place terrorists have chosen to fight.
....
If we burn up the support of the American people, our military’s ability to recruit, the usage of our Guard and Reserves in Iraq, how do we defend ourselves elsewhere?
....
But we cannot sustain this intense an effort indefinitely. Complete victory over terrorism is unlikely ever to occur. Sometimes you have to reposition and prepare for the broader battle, not exhaust yourself on just one front and then risk defeat in the overall conflict.
I beseech our President, Secretary Gates, Secretary Rice and others never to give up the War on Terror but to understand that, without significant tactical drawdowns in Iraq, our entire counterterrorism and military efforts are threatened. Our nation can ill-afford another decade of defeatism and retreat that seized the United States after Vietnam.
Read the whole thing here. ¶ 8:05 AM
Vichy at AEI
Listening to G. W. Vichy's "major speech" at AEI this morning. He's still using the same logic, even after it's been shown invalid.
Specifically:
"If we fail over there, the turrists will follow us home."
Think about this for a minute. How will they do this? Several thousand Sunni and Shiite warriors will not be able to infiltrate easily into American life. These guys are not the elite Westernized types that performed 9/11. If they do attack en masse by some method, it means we are not doing the basic job of controlling our ports and borders.
"All people desire to live in peace."
Observe what they do, not what they say. It's perfectly obvious from their behavior that Arabs do not desire to live in peace. Arabs love fighting. They are a warrior culture with no achievements other than death.
"9/11 happened because Afghanistan was a failed state."
Afghanistan was part of the story, but most of the training and planning for 9/11 happened in Germany and in Florida. There are always failed states around the world; Somalia and Sudan are both failed states that serve al-Qaeda well, and we haven't done anything to eliminate them. Eliminating failed states is neither necessary nor sufficient to protect OUR people from Mohammedans and Arabs.
And what does he propose for solutions? More wasted money, more use of our military in places where it won't make any difference. If we can protect the borders of Iraq, we could protect the borders of the United States.
GGGGGRRRRRRRR!!!!!!
Now he's talking about our success in building 4000 miles of roads in the "Young Democracy" of Afghanistan, and the failed attempt to eliminate poppy production there. This is the same administration that REFUSES to build a fence around the "Old Democracy" of the United States, and the same administration that PUNISHES the Old Democracy's border guards when they dare to arrest and shoot Mexican drug dealers.
AAAAAAAAAGGGGHRHRHRHRHRHRHRHRH!!!!!!!!!!
I thought it couldn't get any worse, but it does. Now he's talking about helping Afghanistan to get rid of bad judges. I can hardly even write about this.
What would happen to an American who tried to assist the "Old Democracy" to get rid of bad judges and develop a fair judicial system? The FBI would bomb his house and kill his family, that's what would happen.
¶ 7:21 AM
Specifically:
"If we fail over there, the turrists will follow us home."
Think about this for a minute. How will they do this? Several thousand Sunni and Shiite warriors will not be able to infiltrate easily into American life. These guys are not the elite Westernized types that performed 9/11. If they do attack en masse by some method, it means we are not doing the basic job of controlling our ports and borders.
"All people desire to live in peace."
Observe what they do, not what they say. It's perfectly obvious from their behavior that Arabs do not desire to live in peace. Arabs love fighting. They are a warrior culture with no achievements other than death.
"9/11 happened because Afghanistan was a failed state."
Afghanistan was part of the story, but most of the training and planning for 9/11 happened in Germany and in Florida. There are always failed states around the world; Somalia and Sudan are both failed states that serve al-Qaeda well, and we haven't done anything to eliminate them. Eliminating failed states is neither necessary nor sufficient to protect OUR people from Mohammedans and Arabs.
And what does he propose for solutions? More wasted money, more use of our military in places where it won't make any difference. If we can protect the borders of Iraq, we could protect the borders of the United States.
GGGGGRRRRRRRR!!!!!!
Now he's talking about our success in building 4000 miles of roads in the "Young Democracy" of Afghanistan, and the failed attempt to eliminate poppy production there. This is the same administration that REFUSES to build a fence around the "Old Democracy" of the United States, and the same administration that PUNISHES the Old Democracy's border guards when they dare to arrest and shoot Mexican drug dealers.
AAAAAAAAAGGGGHRHRHRHRHRHRHRHRH!!!!!!!!!!
I thought it couldn't get any worse, but it does. Now he's talking about helping Afghanistan to get rid of bad judges. I can hardly even write about this.
What would happen to an American who tried to assist the "Old Democracy" to get rid of bad judges and develop a fair judicial system? The FBI would bomb his house and kill his family, that's what would happen.
¶ 7:21 AM
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Random note
Fox's relatively new reporter Douglas Kennedy has the most annoying intonation pattern I've ever heard. He seems to have a ferret in his pants, which bites his balls several times in the middle of each sentence.
¶ 7:25 PM
Mall gas ... just a thought
When Spokane's huge Northtown Mall was emptied by a semi-toxic (but not seriously harmful) gas on Sunday, I naturally wondered if it was a 'test' or 'ping'. After hearing about the Salt Lake mall shooting yesterday, and hearing that the shooter was a Mohammedan from Bosnia, I'm wondering even more. What makes my Spidey Sense tingle: many of the tough teens in the Northtown area are Bosnian immigrants. The police seem to have some clues, but they haven't done any identifications yet. We shall see.........
¶ 12:38 PM
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
What's wrong with Romney?
I've already given up on Romney after his squishy waffling on the war a month ago. Since then, it seems that he's trying to be as stupid as possible.
He made his official announcement in the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn.... thus hitting the Trifecta of political stupidity. First and most obvious, Ford is instantly recognizable as anti-Jewish and pacifistic.
Second, Dearborn is a center of Arabs and thus a center of pro-enemy activity, for reasons that have no direct connection to Ford's fascist tendencies.
Third and dumbest, why honor the museum of your father's antiwar and anti-semitic competitor when your father himself is commemorated in a nice museum? The Chrysler Museum in downtown Detroit has a large section on American Motors, since Chrysler swallowed up AMC in 1987.
Dumb, dumber, dumbest. ¶ 9:12 AM
He made his official announcement in the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn.... thus hitting the Trifecta of political stupidity. First and most obvious, Ford is instantly recognizable as anti-Jewish and pacifistic.
Second, Dearborn is a center of Arabs and thus a center of pro-enemy activity, for reasons that have no direct connection to Ford's fascist tendencies.
Third and dumbest, why honor the museum of your father's antiwar and anti-semitic competitor when your father himself is commemorated in a nice museum? The Chrysler Museum in downtown Detroit has a large section on American Motors, since Chrysler swallowed up AMC in 1987.
Dumb, dumber, dumbest. ¶ 9:12 AM
Sunday, February 11, 2007
Odd gas in Spokane
Just noting this for the record.... Around 3:30 PM today, Spokane's Northtown Mall was evacuated because of some kind of gas leak or released gas. Not natural gas; reported to smell "like pepper spray". Several people have been hospitalized, at least for checking. At this point (4:30) the authorities are clearing out a larger area around the mall, and are being "very tight-lipped."
4:50: appears to be all-clear, but still no sense of what it actually was.
5:13: not so all-clear. Some people seem to be "getting worse"; some folks went home, then started having skin irritation and respiratory symptoms, and took themselves to the hospital. May not be pepper spray; one witness claimed to be familiar with pepper spray and said it was something else, tasted "medicinal".
6:29: The chemical doesn't seem to have been anything serious, though about 20 people are still being checked. What is serious is that Northtown was shown to have no effective evacuation procedure. There was apparently no announcement; even after firemen closed off the parking lot and started checking the air, customers and store employees were still allowed to mill around and ask each other what was happening. So if this was a test, a 'ping', the enemy has now detected a huge vulnerability.
= = = = =
A media note. Spokane has three major TV stations: KREM (CBS), KXLY (ABC) and KHQ (NBC). In this event as in the last few weather emergencies, only KREM has done the job that television was meant to do! KREM starts covering an emergency as soon as it's evident, and stays on with wall-to-wall news until it's over. The other two stations basically stick to their consultant-ordered formats, ignoring the emergency and covering the officially denominated "local news" topics, namely breast cancer, breast cancer, breast cancer, breast cancer, and cute puppies.
KREM's newest reporter Othello Richards deserves a special tip o' th' hat for possessing old-fashioned reportorial guts. In this event as in the windstorms, he's been first on the spot and first with the facts.
Needless to say, KREM won't receive any awards for an outstanding job of reporting important news. Broadcasters receive awards only for serving Lenin and destroying America. ¶ 4:36 PM
4:50: appears to be all-clear, but still no sense of what it actually was.
5:13: not so all-clear. Some people seem to be "getting worse"; some folks went home, then started having skin irritation and respiratory symptoms, and took themselves to the hospital. May not be pepper spray; one witness claimed to be familiar with pepper spray and said it was something else, tasted "medicinal".
6:29: The chemical doesn't seem to have been anything serious, though about 20 people are still being checked. What is serious is that Northtown was shown to have no effective evacuation procedure. There was apparently no announcement; even after firemen closed off the parking lot and started checking the air, customers and store employees were still allowed to mill around and ask each other what was happening. So if this was a test, a 'ping', the enemy has now detected a huge vulnerability.
= = = = =
A media note. Spokane has three major TV stations: KREM (CBS), KXLY (ABC) and KHQ (NBC). In this event as in the last few weather emergencies, only KREM has done the job that television was meant to do! KREM starts covering an emergency as soon as it's evident, and stays on with wall-to-wall news until it's over. The other two stations basically stick to their consultant-ordered formats, ignoring the emergency and covering the officially denominated "local news" topics, namely breast cancer, breast cancer, breast cancer, breast cancer, and cute puppies.
KREM's newest reporter Othello Richards deserves a special tip o' th' hat for possessing old-fashioned reportorial guts. In this event as in the windstorms, he's been first on the spot and first with the facts.
Needless to say, KREM won't receive any awards for an outstanding job of reporting important news. Broadcasters receive awards only for serving Lenin and destroying America. ¶ 4:36 PM
Friday, February 09, 2007
The Clinton luck ... again.
The Anna Nicole thing is a classic sad story. Country girl wants fame and fortune, goes to Hollywood, shows her assets, gets fame and fortune. Ends up in the hands of vampires and vultures who keep the fame going regardless of consequences to the actual girl, because the vampires and vultures are making a wonderful living off her troubles.
I'm tempted to say that the old-world method worked better. Leave fame and fortune to the aristocrats, who know how to handle it. They aren't necessarily better people, but their 'family retainers' are more focused on maintaining the family name than grabbing the maximum bucks from momentary fame.
= = = = =
However, one Big Story will tend to occupy the drawkcaB sweN entirely, crowding out what would otherwise have been the big story. In this case, Anna Nicole's death has stomped all over Abu Hussein Obama's official announcement of candidacy! The drawkcaB sweN were undoubtedly planning a whole month of Obamafest, but now they have no choice but to cover a politically irrelevant story.
Hillary lucks out again. If I were an Abu Hussein Obama supporter, I'd feel paranoid right now, just as all the other Clinton opponents have felt paranoid when their cherished and well-timed stories were mysteriously drowned by other irrelevant events. It's not worth the paranoia, though; it's just the Clinton luck as always.
= = = = =
Irrelevant sidenote: The name of Anna Nicole's chief vulture, Howard K. Stern, provides an interesting shibboleth. Anyone over 50 unavoidably says or thinks 'Smith' after 'Howard K.' I find myself doing it, and Fox's John Gibson is having real trouble with it. Gibson has to stop for a full second each time; you can hear him internally swallowing the 'Smith' and forcing 'Stern' out of his mouth, and still he sometimes misses. Indeed a testament to the power and authority of those old newsmen. Looking up Smith, I find that he retired from daily broadcasting 30 years ago and died in 2002. But his name is still an automatic instinct for those of us who grew up along with television.
= = = = =
Polistra disagrees with my cold detached sociological approach. Instead, she simply wants to offer up a prayer for Anna Nicole's soul, aimed at Saint Germaine Cousin, the patron saint of country girls who endure a hard life and die young. Germaine never achieved fame and fortune in life, but her posthumous power among the country folk of France was so intense that the Communists of 1789 found it necessary to desecrate her grave.
¶ 7:47 PM
I'm tempted to say that the old-world method worked better. Leave fame and fortune to the aristocrats, who know how to handle it. They aren't necessarily better people, but their 'family retainers' are more focused on maintaining the family name than grabbing the maximum bucks from momentary fame.
= = = = =
However, one Big Story will tend to occupy the drawkcaB sweN entirely, crowding out what would otherwise have been the big story. In this case, Anna Nicole's death has stomped all over Abu Hussein Obama's official announcement of candidacy! The drawkcaB sweN were undoubtedly planning a whole month of Obamafest, but now they have no choice but to cover a politically irrelevant story.
Hillary lucks out again. If I were an Abu Hussein Obama supporter, I'd feel paranoid right now, just as all the other Clinton opponents have felt paranoid when their cherished and well-timed stories were mysteriously drowned by other irrelevant events. It's not worth the paranoia, though; it's just the Clinton luck as always.
= = = = =
Irrelevant sidenote: The name of Anna Nicole's chief vulture, Howard K. Stern, provides an interesting shibboleth. Anyone over 50 unavoidably says or thinks 'Smith' after 'Howard K.' I find myself doing it, and Fox's John Gibson is having real trouble with it. Gibson has to stop for a full second each time; you can hear him internally swallowing the 'Smith' and forcing 'Stern' out of his mouth, and still he sometimes misses. Indeed a testament to the power and authority of those old newsmen. Looking up Smith, I find that he retired from daily broadcasting 30 years ago and died in 2002. But his name is still an automatic instinct for those of us who grew up along with television.
= = = = =
Polistra disagrees with my cold detached sociological approach. Instead, she simply wants to offer up a prayer for Anna Nicole's soul, aimed at Saint Germaine Cousin, the patron saint of country girls who endure a hard life and die young. Germaine never achieved fame and fortune in life, but her posthumous power among the country folk of France was so intense that the Communists of 1789 found it necessary to desecrate her grave.
¶ 7:47 PM
Thursday, February 08, 2007
Canadian cancer cure: how to donate.
I note that Glenn Beck, the only American NON-drawkcab news source, did a feature today on the Michelakis cancer cure, which I mentioned a couple weeks ago.
Glenn said that many folks have been donating to the University of Alberta to help Michelakis continue his research, since our idiotic government and our idiotic drug companies aren't interested. But Glenn didn't mention how to make a contribution, so here we go:
The link below includes a video interview with Michelakis, and a donation link, which I've just used.
Donate here.
Incidentally, the donation process is mainly the expected stuff, but there's a somewhat obscure part where you define the donation's purpose. On the second page, you have to scroll down to the middle and click on the line that says "DCA - Cancer Research Fund". (DCA is, of course, DiChloroAcetate.) ¶ 7:29 PM
Glenn said that many folks have been donating to the University of Alberta to help Michelakis continue his research, since our idiotic government and our idiotic drug companies aren't interested. But Glenn didn't mention how to make a contribution, so here we go:
The link below includes a video interview with Michelakis, and a donation link, which I've just used.
Donate here.
Incidentally, the donation process is mainly the expected stuff, but there's a somewhat obscure part where you define the donation's purpose. On the second page, you have to scroll down to the middle and click on the line that says "DCA - Cancer Research Fund". (DCA is, of course, DiChloroAcetate.) ¶ 7:29 PM
Gaia's Papa
Listening to the great Roger Hedgecock (who really needs to replace Rush permanently!) discussing how Kyoto favors China.
This is, of course, no accident, but even Rush never tells us exactly why. The connection is quite simple. It's one man, Maurice Strong. I got the feeling that Pope Maurice must be coming back into action, and sure enough found some fresh news about him.
Nice article in Canada Free Press and a piece by Claudia Rosett on the Fox News website.
Rosett gives Strong's full story, much of which I hadn't read before. Strong is a birthright Communist; his mother defected to China and is buried there. He worked for the UN for many years, and began the process that led to the Kyoto agreement. He was nominally fired when payments from Saddam's oil-for-food business were revealed, but he has continued working for the interests of China and North Korea through the "University for Peace", a loosely connected UN institution that was basically a shell until Strong took it over in 1999. Unfortunately, the new Secretary General, a South Korean, has close ties to Strong. So any promises of reform by SecGen Ban are now guaranteed to be empty (s'prise, s'prise!) and Strong will continue to be the main power-broker. (I was going to say the main power-broker for the environmental branch of Communism, but I think the sentence is more accurate without the qualifying phrase.) In other words, China and North Korea still own us.
We will not begin to function as an independent nation until we disconnect ourselves entirely from the UN, and from all of its friends and operators. It's that simple.
George W. Vichy, needless to say, is a wholly owned subsidiary of the UN; he shapes all of his policies to serve their interests, not ours. ¶ 10:39 AM
This is, of course, no accident, but even Rush never tells us exactly why. The connection is quite simple. It's one man, Maurice Strong. I got the feeling that Pope Maurice must be coming back into action, and sure enough found some fresh news about him.
Nice article in Canada Free Press and a piece by Claudia Rosett on the Fox News website.
Rosett gives Strong's full story, much of which I hadn't read before. Strong is a birthright Communist; his mother defected to China and is buried there. He worked for the UN for many years, and began the process that led to the Kyoto agreement. He was nominally fired when payments from Saddam's oil-for-food business were revealed, but he has continued working for the interests of China and North Korea through the "University for Peace", a loosely connected UN institution that was basically a shell until Strong took it over in 1999. Unfortunately, the new Secretary General, a South Korean, has close ties to Strong. So any promises of reform by SecGen Ban are now guaranteed to be empty (s'prise, s'prise!) and Strong will continue to be the main power-broker. (I was going to say the main power-broker for the environmental branch of Communism, but I think the sentence is more accurate without the qualifying phrase.) In other words, China and North Korea still own us.
We will not begin to function as an independent nation until we disconnect ourselves entirely from the UN, and from all of its friends and operators. It's that simple.
George W. Vichy, needless to say, is a wholly owned subsidiary of the UN; he shapes all of his policies to serve their interests, not ours. ¶ 10:39 AM
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
Maybe there's hope......
I've been wondering if anyone anywhere is willing to stand up against the Leninists and lawyers. (Well, wondering about this country anyway; the Ethiopians and Australians are doing a fine job of standing firm for Christian civilization.)
Here's a small bit of hope, even though it's not really relevant to the main war.
Several years ago the Catholic hierarchy in Boston decided to close and sell 20 churches, to pay off the witch-hunting lawyers. Nine of those churches rose up in protest; their parishioners started to occupy the churches constantly in a kind of vigil. One of those churches, though officially closed, has been occupied 24/7 since October 2004!
The Leninist media enjoy reporting on sit-ins and protests, as long as the protests are on the Leninist side. This protest, though it beats all known 'civil rights' or 'pro-immigration' protests for sheer stamina, has never been mentioned on the national news.
Bless these folks. They know the difference between the Church and the hierarchy, and they are standing up for the Church.
They have also been pushing a legal case to decide whether the churches belong to the parishioners who donated the land in the first place, or to the Bishop to sell as he pleases. The Mass Supreme Court will take up the case tomorrow, which is why the situation hit the Boston media today. ¶ 7:33 PM
Here's a small bit of hope, even though it's not really relevant to the main war.
Several years ago the Catholic hierarchy in Boston decided to close and sell 20 churches, to pay off the witch-hunting lawyers. Nine of those churches rose up in protest; their parishioners started to occupy the churches constantly in a kind of vigil. One of those churches, though officially closed, has been occupied 24/7 since October 2004!
The Leninist media enjoy reporting on sit-ins and protests, as long as the protests are on the Leninist side. This protest, though it beats all known 'civil rights' or 'pro-immigration' protests for sheer stamina, has never been mentioned on the national news.
Bless these folks. They know the difference between the Church and the hierarchy, and they are standing up for the Church.
They have also been pushing a legal case to decide whether the churches belong to the parishioners who donated the land in the first place, or to the Bishop to sell as he pleases. The Mass Supreme Court will take up the case tomorrow, which is why the situation hit the Boston media today. ¶ 7:33 PM
Lunar-tics
Must admit I was thinking of a snide cartoon about the astronautess in diapers, but when I saw Nowak's face in the courtroom, I just couldn't do it. Her face showed more clearly than any words could say, that she had been in the grip of a hormonal delusion and that the delusional bubble had been well and truly popped.
Happens to all of us, though generally around age 18 instead of age 40.
One broad comment: Any time you set up a tightly-knit caste with specialized training and a code of silence, whether priests, astronauts, spies, or elite paramilitary, you need to keep those folks busy. You need to give them a well-defined and clear mission that holds their attention and excitement. When you see priests diddling the altarboys, or astronauts pursuing delusional love interests with mallets and saws, or spies leaking to newspapers, it's a pretty good sign that the caste has too much time on its hands and not enough clarity of mission.
For NASA, it's obvious that the mission of manned spaceflight has gone stale. There's no scientific purpose and no public excitement in going to the fucking MOON one more time. As I've said a dozen times, weather control would be scientifically interesting, exciting and understandable to the public, and quite possibly the most heroic and life-saving effort by science since vaccination. ¶ 12:44 PM
Happens to all of us, though generally around age 18 instead of age 40.
One broad comment: Any time you set up a tightly-knit caste with specialized training and a code of silence, whether priests, astronauts, spies, or elite paramilitary, you need to keep those folks busy. You need to give them a well-defined and clear mission that holds their attention and excitement. When you see priests diddling the altarboys, or astronauts pursuing delusional love interests with mallets and saws, or spies leaking to newspapers, it's a pretty good sign that the caste has too much time on its hands and not enough clarity of mission.
For NASA, it's obvious that the mission of manned spaceflight has gone stale. There's no scientific purpose and no public excitement in going to the fucking MOON one more time. As I've said a dozen times, weather control would be scientifically interesting, exciting and understandable to the public, and quite possibly the most heroic and life-saving effort by science since vaccination. ¶ 12:44 PM
Tuesday, February 06, 2007
Just for joy
One of my graphics acquaintances made this lovely heart-shaped swing. Polistra had to hang it up and try it out.
Nope, no socio-politico-economico-geographico-religious implications this time. Just a moment of sweetness and light.
¶ 7:42 AM
One of my graphics acquaintances made this lovely heart-shaped swing. Polistra had to hang it up and try it out.
Nope, no socio-politico-economico-geographico-religious implications this time. Just a moment of sweetness and light.
¶ 7:42 AM
Sunday, February 04, 2007
The blind faith of the atheist
There's a long-running dispute over Intelligent Design in the letters column of New Scientist magazine. The latest issue has an especially well-written letter from Peter Brooks on the atheist side, nicely illustrating the pure blind faith of the atheist.
= = = = =
I believe 'good science' will come from the Biologic Institute's efforts to find experimental proof of intelligent design, but not in the way that it intends.
Starting with a premise or hypothesis, one ... attempts to negate the hypothesis, demonstrating that it does not hold true for all cases, or not for any cases.
Starting with a bad premise simply means that it will take longer to come to the realisation that it is a false start; the premise must be refined and the process reiterated. ... Imagine replacing all instances of "I don't know the answer yet" with "God did it", and continuing to labour to uncover the facts. Over time, we will inevitably chip away at the mountain of "God did it" assertions - we have been quietly doing so for centuries - but now we will be able to publicly state that what was once thought to be an act of God is not. Thus we will gather tangible and mounting evidence of the continued erosion of God's claimed ability.
I wonder how many believers will be able to face daily despondency as yet another cherished "God did it" claim perishes before the unstoppable juggernaut of the search for truth.
= = = = =
Part of Brooks's assertion is certainly true. We have been chipping away at the primitive "God did it" claims for a long time.
Beyond that, he goes wrong in several ways.
For 3000 years, very few serious religious thinkers have bought the primitive and concrete idea that God grabs hold of cars, brains, lightning bolts, or planets, and shoves them around with his hands. If Brooks thinks that these claims are still alive in the Christian world, he's simply wrong.
There is an exception to this progress, though. The most modern of all religions does in fact believe in a purely concrete deity, and believes that our physical actions directly offend this deity, and believes that the deity punishes us physically and concretely for our transgressions. I'm talking, of course, about the Earth Goddess Gaia.
[Sidebar, Polistra's Second Law of Human Nature: The total sum of taboos and beliefs remains constant. If one generation drops certain taboos and beliefs, it will invent other taboos and beliefs to fill the gap. The Greatest Generation considered marijuana evil and tobacco normal; Baby Boomers consider tobacco evil and marijuana norml. Each generation feels liberated in its enjoyment of the 'normal' herb, and feels righteously enlightened in its punishment of anyone who dares to use the 'evil' herb. In the big picture, both of these taboos and freedom-feelings look silly. We're only talking about burning herbs, after all.]
Most importantly, Brooks shows that he is thinking like a True Believer, not like a scientist, and also shows that he doesn't even realize it. His discussion of "starting with a bad premise" shows that he is absolutely certain beforehand, a priori, of the total absence of anything that could be described or manifested as a supernatural power. So he is not really proposing a series of experiments; he's just chortling over the believer's stupidity.
The ID people are not starting with the idea that "God did it"; in fact their underlying hypothesis is the other way around. They start from the usual scientific assumption that everything in biology can be explained by purely random mutation and adaptation, and they look for counterexamples. They look for DNA sequences or patterns in nature that cannot be explained without some form of intelligence.
If the ID folks don't find such exceptions, it won't prove the non-existence of a god; it could mean that a god is not especially interested in showing his existence through hard-to-find discrepancies. It could mean that the researchers are looking through the wrong end of the microscope. If the Judeo-Christian god exists as described, he's responsible for the big stuff: the laws of physics and mathematics that make all of biology, including the brains of the ID researchers, function. If he exists as described, he didn't want us to wait for obscure exceptions; he wanted us to know his presence in everything.
And if the ID folks do find such exceptions, it won't convince the science-ists anyway, because the science-ists have blind faith in their own primitive and concrete god. ¶ 9:04 PM
= = = = =
I believe 'good science' will come from the Biologic Institute's efforts to find experimental proof of intelligent design, but not in the way that it intends.
Starting with a premise or hypothesis, one ... attempts to negate the hypothesis, demonstrating that it does not hold true for all cases, or not for any cases.
Starting with a bad premise simply means that it will take longer to come to the realisation that it is a false start; the premise must be refined and the process reiterated. ... Imagine replacing all instances of "I don't know the answer yet" with "God did it", and continuing to labour to uncover the facts. Over time, we will inevitably chip away at the mountain of "God did it" assertions - we have been quietly doing so for centuries - but now we will be able to publicly state that what was once thought to be an act of God is not. Thus we will gather tangible and mounting evidence of the continued erosion of God's claimed ability.
I wonder how many believers will be able to face daily despondency as yet another cherished "God did it" claim perishes before the unstoppable juggernaut of the search for truth.
= = = = =
Part of Brooks's assertion is certainly true. We have been chipping away at the primitive "God did it" claims for a long time.
Beyond that, he goes wrong in several ways.
For 3000 years, very few serious religious thinkers have bought the primitive and concrete idea that God grabs hold of cars, brains, lightning bolts, or planets, and shoves them around with his hands. If Brooks thinks that these claims are still alive in the Christian world, he's simply wrong.
There is an exception to this progress, though. The most modern of all religions does in fact believe in a purely concrete deity, and believes that our physical actions directly offend this deity, and believes that the deity punishes us physically and concretely for our transgressions. I'm talking, of course, about the Earth Goddess Gaia.
[Sidebar, Polistra's Second Law of Human Nature: The total sum of taboos and beliefs remains constant. If one generation drops certain taboos and beliefs, it will invent other taboos and beliefs to fill the gap. The Greatest Generation considered marijuana evil and tobacco normal; Baby Boomers consider tobacco evil and marijuana norml. Each generation feels liberated in its enjoyment of the 'normal' herb, and feels righteously enlightened in its punishment of anyone who dares to use the 'evil' herb. In the big picture, both of these taboos and freedom-feelings look silly. We're only talking about burning herbs, after all.]
Most importantly, Brooks shows that he is thinking like a True Believer, not like a scientist, and also shows that he doesn't even realize it. His discussion of "starting with a bad premise" shows that he is absolutely certain beforehand, a priori, of the total absence of anything that could be described or manifested as a supernatural power. So he is not really proposing a series of experiments; he's just chortling over the believer's stupidity.
The ID people are not starting with the idea that "God did it"; in fact their underlying hypothesis is the other way around. They start from the usual scientific assumption that everything in biology can be explained by purely random mutation and adaptation, and they look for counterexamples. They look for DNA sequences or patterns in nature that cannot be explained without some form of intelligence.
If the ID folks don't find such exceptions, it won't prove the non-existence of a god; it could mean that a god is not especially interested in showing his existence through hard-to-find discrepancies. It could mean that the researchers are looking through the wrong end of the microscope. If the Judeo-Christian god exists as described, he's responsible for the big stuff: the laws of physics and mathematics that make all of biology, including the brains of the ID researchers, function. If he exists as described, he didn't want us to wait for obscure exceptions; he wanted us to know his presence in everything.
And if the ID folks do find such exceptions, it won't convince the science-ists anyway, because the science-ists have blind faith in their own primitive and concrete god. ¶ 9:04 PM
Friday, February 02, 2007
Madame Polisztra sees all.........
Madame Polisztra can spot this one coming without even tuning up her crystal ball for peak performance.
A speech by Hillary today included the flat statement "We can stop global warming."
That's a pretty audacious marker to lay down, and Hillary will get the credit for it when it happens. Why? Because most of the curves indicate that the peak of temperature has already been passed. Temperatures will soon begin to drop noticeably. And Hillary, with the Clinton luck, will be in office when the turnaround begins to show.
It won't matter if she does anything concrete. Since CO2 is the result of warming, not the cause, no change in our emissions will make the slightest difference, and even the folks who claim otherwise have acknowledged that the Kyoto destruction of Western civilization would make only an imperceptible difference in their apocalyptic prophecies.
Anyway, concrete action isn't the point. For the Gaia worshippers, as with most fundamentalist religions, reciting the creed or formula is the main point. And Hillary has recited the creed of the Earth Goddess often, loudly, and convincingly.
Overall, it will be a neat trick, a classic piece of medicine-show magic disguised as science. Tell the unwashed masses that you can control light and darkness; wait for an eclipse; wave your arms and shout "Kyoto! Kyoto! Kyoto!", and then you have the masses eating out of your hand when the sun mysteriously disappears.
The classic trick worked, of course, because the High Priests had access to accurate astronomy, while the dumb masses couldn't read. Same here. The real curves of temperature and solar activity are available, and a few genuine scientists are speaking the truth, but the fools who get their info from TV are subjected to a 24-hour pounding of constant falsehood and fear. They are perfectly conditioned to treat the truth as craziness when they encounter it. ¶ 9:48 PM
Madame Polisztra can spot this one coming without even tuning up her crystal ball for peak performance.
A speech by Hillary today included the flat statement "We can stop global warming."
That's a pretty audacious marker to lay down, and Hillary will get the credit for it when it happens. Why? Because most of the curves indicate that the peak of temperature has already been passed. Temperatures will soon begin to drop noticeably. And Hillary, with the Clinton luck, will be in office when the turnaround begins to show.
It won't matter if she does anything concrete. Since CO2 is the result of warming, not the cause, no change in our emissions will make the slightest difference, and even the folks who claim otherwise have acknowledged that the Kyoto destruction of Western civilization would make only an imperceptible difference in their apocalyptic prophecies.
Anyway, concrete action isn't the point. For the Gaia worshippers, as with most fundamentalist religions, reciting the creed or formula is the main point. And Hillary has recited the creed of the Earth Goddess often, loudly, and convincingly.
Overall, it will be a neat trick, a classic piece of medicine-show magic disguised as science. Tell the unwashed masses that you can control light and darkness; wait for an eclipse; wave your arms and shout "Kyoto! Kyoto! Kyoto!", and then you have the masses eating out of your hand when the sun mysteriously disappears.
The classic trick worked, of course, because the High Priests had access to accurate astronomy, while the dumb masses couldn't read. Same here. The real curves of temperature and solar activity are available, and a few genuine scientists are speaking the truth, but the fools who get their info from TV are subjected to a 24-hour pounding of constant falsehood and fear. They are perfectly conditioned to treat the truth as craziness when they encounter it. ¶ 9:48 PM
Boston again
Mario Loyola at NRO brings up an important question. We shouldn't be asking why Boston police were so quick to detect the fake bombs; we should be asking why the dozen other cities didn't notice anything odd.
The test has certainly provided important information to our Arab enemies, one of whom is in the management team of Iridium Group. They now know which cities are easy targets for electronic-looking bombs. ¶ 10:04 AM
The test has certainly provided important information to our Arab enemies, one of whom is in the management team of Iridium Group. They now know which cities are easy targets for electronic-looking bombs. ¶ 10:04 AM
Thursday, February 01, 2007
Empiricism
I've said these things before, but today they came together in a nice clear way, so I'll write it down before it disappears again in senile fog!
Americans are above all empirical. In industry and in daily life we are devoted to the basic notion of science: we don't accept anything on authority until we see whether it works or not. After we determine that a certain approach works, we keep doing it until somebody shows us an even better way.
Over the last century, American leaders have tried two styles of foreign policy. Each has received a good solid experimental run, and the results are clear. The data is in, and has been analyzed well and truly.
The Wilson style assumes that all humans want the same things, and thus aims to achieve certain moral goals for the world. It was tried in WW1 and the aftermath. It failed. Moral goals led immediately and directly to Hitler.
The Roosevelt style (Teddy & Franklin are the same in this context) makes no assumptions at all; it simply aims to serve the interests of the American people by defeating our enemies, regardless of morality, courtesy, the Golden Rule, or any other shit. It was tried in WWII, and later by Reagan. It worked both times.
Despite such a clear A/B pair of experiments, George W. Vichy is still taking the Wilson approach. Even today, after his OWN experiments have so clearly and predictably failed, he is still on the Wilson path. No mention of victory, just endless process and details and democracy and elections.
Osama loves it when we get bogged down in process, details, Rule of Law, and "long twilight struggles". Osama and his ilk are long-term thinkers. They will always beat us, by subversion and demographics, in a long chronic war. A gradual increase of troops, with the same rules of engagement, makes no difference at all to the enemy. It just gives them more targets, and gives our bureaucrats more chances to punish our soldiers for doing the job of a soldier. Result: more deaths, more discouragement, more wasted billions, more cynicism, more confusion about the goal, less will to win.
Someone needs to ask George the same question that Lynne Cheney asked to Wolf Blitzer:
"Do you really want us to win?" ¶ 4:33 PM
Americans are above all empirical. In industry and in daily life we are devoted to the basic notion of science: we don't accept anything on authority until we see whether it works or not. After we determine that a certain approach works, we keep doing it until somebody shows us an even better way.
Over the last century, American leaders have tried two styles of foreign policy. Each has received a good solid experimental run, and the results are clear. The data is in, and has been analyzed well and truly.
The Wilson style assumes that all humans want the same things, and thus aims to achieve certain moral goals for the world. It was tried in WW1 and the aftermath. It failed. Moral goals led immediately and directly to Hitler.
The Roosevelt style (Teddy & Franklin are the same in this context) makes no assumptions at all; it simply aims to serve the interests of the American people by defeating our enemies, regardless of morality, courtesy, the Golden Rule, or any other shit. It was tried in WWII, and later by Reagan. It worked both times.
Despite such a clear A/B pair of experiments, George W. Vichy is still taking the Wilson approach. Even today, after his OWN experiments have so clearly and predictably failed, he is still on the Wilson path. No mention of victory, just endless process and details and democracy and elections.
Osama loves it when we get bogged down in process, details, Rule of Law, and "long twilight struggles". Osama and his ilk are long-term thinkers. They will always beat us, by subversion and demographics, in a long chronic war. A gradual increase of troops, with the same rules of engagement, makes no difference at all to the enemy. It just gives them more targets, and gives our bureaucrats more chances to punish our soldiers for doing the job of a soldier. Result: more deaths, more discouragement, more wasted billions, more cynicism, more confusion about the goal, less will to win.
Someone needs to ask George the same question that Lynne Cheney asked to Wolf Blitzer:
"Do you really want us to win?" ¶ 4:33 PM
Ghhhllrrraaaarrrrrkkkhhh!
Just after I posted the silly pun below, about confusing the Aqua Teen whatever-it-is with AquaNet, those hippie-ass dickheads who actually performed the terroristic fakery gave a news conference in which they talked only about 1960's and 1970's hairstyles.
I don't often feel shocked or unclean; I'm reasonably comfy with the stranger and sleazier parts of the universe. In this case I feel unclean, just knowing that my mind, though accidentally and through different paths, somehow reached the same subject as these hippie-ass dickheads.
I quickly checked the Site-Meter thing, and to my relief found that nobody had read the blog in the period in question. This is, of course, the normal and default condition; this blog is never actually read by humans. So I really didn't need to worry about the possibility. Still, it's good to know that those hippie-ass dickheads did not actually derive their idea from here! ¶ 3:07 PM
Just after I posted the silly pun below, about confusing the Aqua Teen whatever-it-is with AquaNet, those hippie-ass dickheads who actually performed the terroristic fakery gave a news conference in which they talked only about 1960's and 1970's hairstyles.
I don't often feel shocked or unclean; I'm reasonably comfy with the stranger and sleazier parts of the universe. In this case I feel unclean, just knowing that my mind, though accidentally and through different paths, somehow reached the same subject as these hippie-ass dickheads.
I quickly checked the Site-Meter thing, and to my relief found that nobody had read the blog in the period in question. This is, of course, the normal and default condition; this blog is never actually read by humans. So I really didn't need to worry about the possibility. Still, it's good to know that those hippie-ass dickheads did not actually derive their idea from here! ¶ 3:07 PM
Boston 'bombs'
Nice to see CNN's parent company under the magnifying glass. Needless to say, DOJ (Department of Jesse Jackson) won't do anything serious to the company, because DOJ is just as solidly leftist as CNN. If Rupert Murdoch's company tried the same trick, they'd be in instant and deep doo-doo.
One question that hasn't been asked: What if these fake devices still aren't merely a joke? What if they are an instance of 'guerrilla marketing' AND a diversion and test for Arab terrorists?
Check out the upper management of the Iridium Group, parent company of Interference Incorporated, and see if you can spot any, er, interesting names.
Must admit it ... when I heard the name of the TV program being advertised, "Team something-or-other Aqua something-or-other", the only picture that came to mind was
The AquaNet Team!Getting old, for sure.
¶ 7:50 AM
One question that hasn't been asked: What if these fake devices still aren't merely a joke? What if they are an instance of 'guerrilla marketing' AND a diversion and test for Arab terrorists?
Check out the upper management of the Iridium Group, parent company of Interference Incorporated, and see if you can spot any, er, interesting names.
Must admit it ... when I heard the name of the TV program being advertised, "Team something-or-other Aqua something-or-other", the only picture that came to mind was
The AquaNet Team!Getting old, for sure.
¶ 7:50 AM
Sunday, January 28, 2007
So near, so far
Polistra would really like to support Sam Brownback for President.
Brownback is Polistra's homeboy: grew up in central Kansas, graduated from K-State and KU. He's rock solid on matters of life and death, and understands the religious basis of this war vastly better than other candidates. He also understands the enemy, as witness his recent judgment about the various anti-surge resolutions. Other pro-war candidates are saying that the resolutions will embolden the enemy; Brownback accurately judges that the enemy is already dialed to Maximum Bold, and thus won't be affected by our discussions and debates.
But: He's making an awfully poor start on the campaign. His interview this morning with Chris Wallace on Fox was miserable. He didn't know the basic positions of the other candidates, seemed generally unprepared, and struck a Grand Senatorial Attitude, resembling John Kerry. As in "You dare to ask ME such presumptuous questions?"
Polistra hopes that Brownback's handlers will give him a good workover! We don't need niceness from our Pres, but we do need a sense of respect for questions.
= = = = =
Addendum: Some questions deserve the "How dare you" response. Gotchas, sucker punches, low blows. For example, every single question ever asked by Helen Thomas and David Gregory. But none of Wallace's questions were unfair or inappropriate; all deserved straightforward answers. ¶ 10:13 PM
Brownback is Polistra's homeboy: grew up in central Kansas, graduated from K-State and KU. He's rock solid on matters of life and death, and understands the religious basis of this war vastly better than other candidates. He also understands the enemy, as witness his recent judgment about the various anti-surge resolutions. Other pro-war candidates are saying that the resolutions will embolden the enemy; Brownback accurately judges that the enemy is already dialed to Maximum Bold, and thus won't be affected by our discussions and debates.
But: He's making an awfully poor start on the campaign. His interview this morning with Chris Wallace on Fox was miserable. He didn't know the basic positions of the other candidates, seemed generally unprepared, and struck a Grand Senatorial Attitude, resembling John Kerry. As in "You dare to ask ME such presumptuous questions?"
Polistra hopes that Brownback's handlers will give him a good workover! We don't need niceness from our Pres, but we do need a sense of respect for questions.
= = = = =
Addendum: Some questions deserve the "How dare you" response. Gotchas, sucker punches, low blows. For example, every single question ever asked by Helen Thomas and David Gregory. But none of Wallace's questions were unfair or inappropriate; all deserved straightforward answers. ¶ 10:13 PM
Saturday, January 27, 2007
Time capsule
Ever wonder how FDR handled disloyal Americans? Not just the complainers. Then as now, everyone bitched and grumbled. But then as now, we had some genuine traitors who were actively and concretely supporting the enemy and its ideology.
Here's a 2-minute segment from a March 1942 news broadcast on WBBM, a major Chicago station that is still going strong. The first bit is about Father Coughlin, who had begun as a normal populist, mainly agreeing with FDR's welfare programs, but later veered off into pure Fascism and hatred of Jews. Note that the Post Office was ordered to stop mailing Coughlin's newsletter, and the Department of Justice convened a grand jury to investigate other 'Axis propagandists'.
And here's a Wiki entry on Coughlin, which doesn't mention the event in this broadcast.
The modern equivalent, of course, would be shutting down CNN, which has become our most active and virulent spewer of pure treason. You couldn't use the modern Department of Justice, though, because it is only interested in protecting Mohammedans. You'd never in a million years get DOJ to operate against the enemy.
The rest of the news segment is less dramatic. It's about a Republican National Committee meeting in Chicago, which agreed to support the war effort fully and to turn away from previous isolationist tendencies. Those isolationists (like Charles Lindbergh) had been uncomfortably close to Coughlin's populism, and had been associated with anti-Semitism.
Modern equiv: Think of how the DNC would react if Bush shut down CNN and convened a grand jury to investigate other seditious organizations. I'll bet the Dems would suddenly find all sorts of good reasons to turn away from isolationism, eject Keith Ellison from Congress, and cease supporting Abu Barack Hussein Obama. ¶ 9:40 AM
Here's a 2-minute segment from a March 1942 news broadcast on WBBM, a major Chicago station that is still going strong. The first bit is about Father Coughlin, who had begun as a normal populist, mainly agreeing with FDR's welfare programs, but later veered off into pure Fascism and hatred of Jews. Note that the Post Office was ordered to stop mailing Coughlin's newsletter, and the Department of Justice convened a grand jury to investigate other 'Axis propagandists'.
And here's a Wiki entry on Coughlin, which doesn't mention the event in this broadcast.
The modern equivalent, of course, would be shutting down CNN, which has become our most active and virulent spewer of pure treason. You couldn't use the modern Department of Justice, though, because it is only interested in protecting Mohammedans. You'd never in a million years get DOJ to operate against the enemy.
The rest of the news segment is less dramatic. It's about a Republican National Committee meeting in Chicago, which agreed to support the war effort fully and to turn away from previous isolationist tendencies. Those isolationists (like Charles Lindbergh) had been uncomfortably close to Coughlin's populism, and had been associated with anti-Semitism.
Modern equiv: Think of how the DNC would react if Bush shut down CNN and convened a grand jury to investigate other seditious organizations. I'll bet the Dems would suddenly find all sorts of good reasons to turn away from isolationism, eject Keith Ellison from Congress, and cease supporting Abu Barack Hussein Obama. ¶ 9:40 AM
Friday, January 26, 2007
"GLOBAL WARMING UPS SEA LEVEL!!!"
That's the scary headline on CNN just now. Well, it's true, but it's not news. It's just as fresh and newsworthy as "TRAINS GO FASTER THAN HORSES!"
We've been on a warming trend since about 1840, and the sea level has been rising nice and steady since about 1840. Look at this graph.... can you see anything different about the last few decades, when we've supposedly been desecrating the Earth Goddess with our profane exhalations of CO2? Nope. The last few decades are rising just the same as the first few.
Full story here. ¶ 12:13 AM
We've been on a warming trend since about 1840, and the sea level has been rising nice and steady since about 1840. Look at this graph.... can you see anything different about the last few decades, when we've supposedly been desecrating the Earth Goddess with our profane exhalations of CO2? Nope. The last few decades are rising just the same as the first few.
Full story here. ¶ 12:13 AM
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
Algore
In the Seattle suburb of Federal Way, Algore's propaganda film has stirred up a frustrating controversy. A "science" "teacher" used the film in class, without any coverage of the truth. A parent objected, saying both sides needed to be given. Amazingly, the school board took the side of the parent and stopped the film.
This is a good result, but frustrating because the parent wasn't really objecting to the total falseness of the film; he was a self-described "creationist" who agreed with the lies but only objected to the secular context of the lies. He wanted the same lies to be presented in a religious context!!!!!!!!!!!
"It's not that we don't believe global warming is happening. It says so in Revelations," said Hardison. "We've been expecting it for what, 3,500 years now?"
AAAAACCCCCKKKKK!!!!!
The teacher defended herself: "I thought the use and interpretation of data was thought-provoking."
AAAAAAACCCCKKKKKK again!!!!!! In teaching science, you're not supposed to present "thought-provoking" data. You're supposed to present ACCURATE data. This illustrates the total Leninization of science. Truth is whatever the Party says it is, and Algore is unquestionably an authoritative member of the Politburo.
One Communist parent was quoted as saying: "Make no mistake, the moratorium is prior restraint of free speech."
No, no, no, no, and no. Schools can always choose which books or movies to include in their curriculum. Parents can object to the choice, and schools may accommodate the parents. If you must put this in 1st Amendment terms, it's an act of publishing: choosing which content to distribute. So the school was exercising freedom of the press. This point is often misunderstood by people on both sides. Most situations described as "censorship" are in fact choices made by publishers, and are thus implementations of the 1st Amendment, not violations of the 1st Amendment.
Story here.
= = = = =
Afterthought for clarity: Constitutionally speaking, there's nothing wrong with the school presenting the film, and nothing wrong with pulling the film. Both choices are strictly OK, though it's better for the 'spirit of the system' when a school responds to the parents who pay its taxes. My objection to presenting the film is tied to the proper role of science ... the sacramental status of accuracy, if you will. ¶ 9:36 AM
This is a good result, but frustrating because the parent wasn't really objecting to the total falseness of the film; he was a self-described "creationist" who agreed with the lies but only objected to the secular context of the lies. He wanted the same lies to be presented in a religious context!!!!!!!!!!!
"It's not that we don't believe global warming is happening. It says so in Revelations," said Hardison. "We've been expecting it for what, 3,500 years now?"
AAAAACCCCCKKKKK!!!!!
The teacher defended herself: "I thought the use and interpretation of data was thought-provoking."
AAAAAAACCCCKKKKKK again!!!!!! In teaching science, you're not supposed to present "thought-provoking" data. You're supposed to present ACCURATE data. This illustrates the total Leninization of science. Truth is whatever the Party says it is, and Algore is unquestionably an authoritative member of the Politburo.
One Communist parent was quoted as saying: "Make no mistake, the moratorium is prior restraint of free speech."
No, no, no, no, and no. Schools can always choose which books or movies to include in their curriculum. Parents can object to the choice, and schools may accommodate the parents. If you must put this in 1st Amendment terms, it's an act of publishing: choosing which content to distribute. So the school was exercising freedom of the press. This point is often misunderstood by people on both sides. Most situations described as "censorship" are in fact choices made by publishers, and are thus implementations of the 1st Amendment, not violations of the 1st Amendment.
Story here.
= = = = =
Afterthought for clarity: Constitutionally speaking, there's nothing wrong with the school presenting the film, and nothing wrong with pulling the film. Both choices are strictly OK, though it's better for the 'spirit of the system' when a school responds to the parents who pay its taxes. My objection to presenting the film is tied to the proper role of science ... the sacramental status of accuracy, if you will. ¶ 9:36 AM
Monday, January 22, 2007
As I was saying.....
Just ran into a perfect example of America's failure. A family in Wisconsin is taking their girl to China for stem cell treatment of a rare neurological disorder. Embryonic? Nope, umbilical cord cells.
Brooke will receive six injections of 10 million stem cells over a four-week period at Xiaoshan Hospital in Hangzhou, China.
The treatment uses stem cells from the umbilical cords of healthy Chinese babies rather than the more controversial embryonic stem cells ...
The treatment is not available in the United States, and it is not yet approved for Brooke's condition, Vicki said.
American doctors "want it to be safe, but yet it takes so long (for government approval)," she said. "But for the types of cells she's going to be getting in China-the testing, trials … they're all done. There are hundreds of patients who have been successful already."
Yes sir, ethics. We want it to be safe ... from lawsuits. And we'll kill as many people as necessary to achieve that kind of safety.
Article here.
Brooke will receive six injections of 10 million stem cells over a four-week period at Xiaoshan Hospital in Hangzhou, China.
The treatment uses stem cells from the umbilical cords of healthy Chinese babies rather than the more controversial embryonic stem cells ...
The treatment is not available in the United States, and it is not yet approved for Brooke's condition, Vicki said.
American doctors "want it to be safe, but yet it takes so long (for government approval)," she said. "But for the types of cells she's going to be getting in China-the testing, trials … they're all done. There are hundreds of patients who have been successful already."
Yes sir, ethics. We want it to be safe ... from lawsuits. And we'll kill as many people as necessary to achieve that kind of safety.
Article here.
Labels: Ethics
¶ 9:53 AM
