Wednesday, April 30, 2008
So near, so far
The populist talker Michael Savage, who often runs along the same path as Polistra, has taken the same path today but veered off at just the wrong point.
In discussing Rev Wright's view of black/white learning methods, Savage understands the difference in rhythm and the difference between concrete-first and abstract-first learning, but he then says "There's only one way to learn astronomy or trigonometry. You just have to sit down with the textbook."
This simply isn't true, and it's NOT a matter of black/white, nor is it a matter of progressive vs conservative.
All good teachers through the millenia have known that there are several ways to learn. Some kids learn best by starting with the concrete, some by starting with the abstract, some by example, some by story-telling. All good teachers have also known that learning requires work, that the only way to solidify your skills is to spend lots and lots of time practicing. All good teachers have also known that some type of objective evaluation is needed at the end of the process.
These basic facts are not controversial, or shouldn't be.
My father, who was pure Teacher from stem to stern, taught me these things early in life, and applied them when possible in his occupation. He didn't think of himself as Progressive; he was old-fashioned.
The controversy and problem arises because American "Progressive Education" insisted on using only the concrete, and ALSO insisted that evaluation is a bad idea because it damages "self-esteem".
In blind reaction to the latter error, American "Conservative Education" insisted on using only the abstract reading method (Just the Basics, Ma'am), conflating method with evaluation.
Because public schools are rigid and bureaucratic institutions, they have to choose only one way of learning. There just isn't the time or resources to handle each kid differently, and discrimination laws further limit the range of operation. A teacher who tries to treat the concrete kids differently will end up dividing mainly, though far from exclusively, along racial lines.
The solution is simple: Vouchers. We've seen that inner-city schools run by gutsy and independent principals have been able to match teaching styles with learning styles, with excellent results because they don't skip the practice and evaluation steps.
As in most areas of life, if you decentralize, if you avoid one-size-must-fit-all requirements, everything works just fine. ¶ 4:54 PM
In discussing Rev Wright's view of black/white learning methods, Savage understands the difference in rhythm and the difference between concrete-first and abstract-first learning, but he then says "There's only one way to learn astronomy or trigonometry. You just have to sit down with the textbook."
This simply isn't true, and it's NOT a matter of black/white, nor is it a matter of progressive vs conservative.
All good teachers through the millenia have known that there are several ways to learn. Some kids learn best by starting with the concrete, some by starting with the abstract, some by example, some by story-telling. All good teachers have also known that learning requires work, that the only way to solidify your skills is to spend lots and lots of time practicing. All good teachers have also known that some type of objective evaluation is needed at the end of the process.
These basic facts are not controversial, or shouldn't be.
My father, who was pure Teacher from stem to stern, taught me these things early in life, and applied them when possible in his occupation. He didn't think of himself as Progressive; he was old-fashioned.
The controversy and problem arises because American "Progressive Education" insisted on using only the concrete, and ALSO insisted that evaluation is a bad idea because it damages "self-esteem".
In blind reaction to the latter error, American "Conservative Education" insisted on using only the abstract reading method (Just the Basics, Ma'am), conflating method with evaluation.
Because public schools are rigid and bureaucratic institutions, they have to choose only one way of learning. There just isn't the time or resources to handle each kid differently, and discrimination laws further limit the range of operation. A teacher who tries to treat the concrete kids differently will end up dividing mainly, though far from exclusively, along racial lines.
The solution is simple: Vouchers. We've seen that inner-city schools run by gutsy and independent principals have been able to match teaching styles with learning styles, with excellent results because they don't skip the practice and evaluation steps.
As in most areas of life, if you decentralize, if you avoid one-size-must-fit-all requirements, everything works just fine. ¶ 4:54 PM
If it's over there, we can describe it.
One of Polistra's main themes is our absolute unwillingness to label things accurately, and our seeming inability to find distinct words for distinct things.
But there's one very large exception to this problem.
When describing American politicians, we can't seem to go beyond Republican and Democrat, despite the complete merging and crossover of those names. And, as is well known, the label is only used when it makes a Republican look bad. Our media will never describe an American politician as a Marxist, a Huey Long Populist, an Agrarian or a Wilsonian; nobody bothers to invent or apply new labels like a 'Lantos Hawk' or a 'Closet Craig', which could be useful if we used labels at all.
Yet we use a full range of accurate and descriptive terms for foreign politicians and parties. Same with political and economic systems, degrees of corruption, and the need for specific solutions to specific problems. All of these remain floaty, gauzy and vague for American situations, all are listed concisely for foreign situations.
In today's Rose Garden press conf, Bush illustrated this contrast perfectly within two answers to one reporter. April Ryan of 'Urban Radio' asked two questions: "When will you finally use the word recession?" and "What can you tell us about the situation in Zimbabwe?" In response to the first, Bush hemmed and hawed, finally mumbling something like "You can call it anything you want." In response to the second, he gave [by his low standards] a remarkably crisp and accurate description of Robert Mugabe and his opponents, with full attention to the brutality and corruption of Mugabe.
It's always like this with our politicians, experts and media. When the subject concerns this benighted and borderless blob of Terra Incognita that sprawls somewhere between Mexico and Canada, we get a vague wave of the hand, or a Delphic utterance that must be interpreted by finding the omissions and variations from the standard code book. When the subject is anywhere else we get precise nomenclature, meaningful information and commonsense assessments.
Well, why is this bad?
The whole point of having newspapers, radio, and TV is to provide useful feedback to the people and to the leaders. And I mean feedback in the strict engineering sense: a signal that tells us the distance between the current situation and the desired or proper situation. When politicians and media hand us nonsensical and empty crap, the people will latch onto paranoid conspiracies which satisfy the hunger for solid mental nutrition.
You won't tell me what's happening? That's fine, I can learn better from Rev Wright. Or Rev Robertson. Or Imam Zawahiri. Not to say that those three are equivalent, but each will serve up a spicy full-course meal of "knowledge", some of which is genuinely and observably more accurate than the establishment swill. That's why it's bad. ¶ 12:21 AM
But there's one very large exception to this problem.
When describing American politicians, we can't seem to go beyond Republican and Democrat, despite the complete merging and crossover of those names. And, as is well known, the label is only used when it makes a Republican look bad. Our media will never describe an American politician as a Marxist, a Huey Long Populist, an Agrarian or a Wilsonian; nobody bothers to invent or apply new labels like a 'Lantos Hawk' or a 'Closet Craig', which could be useful if we used labels at all.
Yet we use a full range of accurate and descriptive terms for foreign politicians and parties. Same with political and economic systems, degrees of corruption, and the need for specific solutions to specific problems. All of these remain floaty, gauzy and vague for American situations, all are listed concisely for foreign situations.
In today's Rose Garden press conf, Bush illustrated this contrast perfectly within two answers to one reporter. April Ryan of 'Urban Radio' asked two questions: "When will you finally use the word recession?" and "What can you tell us about the situation in Zimbabwe?" In response to the first, Bush hemmed and hawed, finally mumbling something like "You can call it anything you want." In response to the second, he gave [by his low standards] a remarkably crisp and accurate description of Robert Mugabe and his opponents, with full attention to the brutality and corruption of Mugabe.
It's always like this with our politicians, experts and media. When the subject concerns this benighted and borderless blob of Terra Incognita that sprawls somewhere between Mexico and Canada, we get a vague wave of the hand, or a Delphic utterance that must be interpreted by finding the omissions and variations from the standard code book. When the subject is anywhere else we get precise nomenclature, meaningful information and commonsense assessments.
Well, why is this bad?
The whole point of having newspapers, radio, and TV is to provide useful feedback to the people and to the leaders. And I mean feedback in the strict engineering sense: a signal that tells us the distance between the current situation and the desired or proper situation. When politicians and media hand us nonsensical and empty crap, the people will latch onto paranoid conspiracies which satisfy the hunger for solid mental nutrition.
You won't tell me what's happening? That's fine, I can learn better from Rev Wright. Or Rev Robertson. Or Imam Zawahiri. Not to say that those three are equivalent, but each will serve up a spicy full-course meal of "knowledge", some of which is genuinely and observably more accurate than the establishment swill. That's why it's bad. ¶ 12:21 AM
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Grrrrrr
Bush chided Congress today for doing nothing to open ANWR for oil.
I've said this a dozen times, but it needs to be said again.
Bush can open ANWR by executive order any time he wants.
Proof: Clinton closed national wildlife areas to oil exploration, by executive order.
If a president can close a wildlife area, a president can open a wildlife area.
Bush has not done what he CAN do. This proves he really doesn't give a happy horseshit about energy independence. He only wants to "have the issue" for campaign purposes.
= = = = =
Later: Double Grrrrrrrrrr.
Listening to Saturday morning discussion on Fox (I should know better, but needed some distracting noise) ... The talking pointheads were "discussing" energy independence, and one of them actually mentioned the closing of Utah land in the '90s, then proceeded to blame the Democrats in Congress for failing to open more land for drilling. AGAIN: THE UTAH LAND IN THE '90S WAS CLOSED BY BILL CLINTON'S EXECUTIVE ORDER, NOT BY CONGRESS. IF YOU WERE NOT HOPELESSLY LOCKED INTO TALKING POINTS, THIS FACT WOULD TELL YOU THAT SULTAN BUSH CAN OPEN ANY FEDERAL LAND ANY TIME HE WANTS. ¶ 4:04 PM
I've said this a dozen times, but it needs to be said again.
Bush can open ANWR by executive order any time he wants.
Proof: Clinton closed national wildlife areas to oil exploration, by executive order.
If a president can close a wildlife area, a president can open a wildlife area.
Bush has not done what he CAN do. This proves he really doesn't give a happy horseshit about energy independence. He only wants to "have the issue" for campaign purposes.
= = = = =
Later: Double Grrrrrrrrrr.
Listening to Saturday morning discussion on Fox (I should know better, but needed some distracting noise) ... The talking pointheads were "discussing" energy independence, and one of them actually mentioned the closing of Utah land in the '90s, then proceeded to blame the Democrats in Congress for failing to open more land for drilling. AGAIN: THE UTAH LAND IN THE '90S WAS CLOSED BY BILL CLINTON'S EXECUTIVE ORDER, NOT BY CONGRESS. IF YOU WERE NOT HOPELESSLY LOCKED INTO TALKING POINTS, THIS FACT WOULD TELL YOU THAT SULTAN BUSH CAN OPEN ANY FEDERAL LAND ANY TIME HE WANTS. ¶ 4:04 PM
More two-ended spectra
Wading into murky waters here...
Polistra is puzzled by Obama's sudden and harsh decision to disconnect from Rev Wright. Why just now? The last two major speeches by the Rev are the most positive things we've heard from him. The NAACP speech was a wondrous piece of teaching and preaching, and essentially true. The Press Club speech contained some demonstrable falsehoods, but was still generally positive in tone, unlike the sound-bites we've been hearing for weeks. Oddly, the NAACP speech seems to have been the last straw for Barack. Why?
Start with the spectrum of loyalty. Like morality, it seems to be two-ended. Some people are strongly loyal to a community. American blacks tend toward this end of the spectrum. Some are strongly disloyal to a community. The American elites tend toward this end of the spectrum, and American Communists are at the far tail.
(Note in case of confusion: they didn't learn disloyalty as a result of following Marx. They followed Marx because that was the maximum way of expressing their innate disloyalty to their community of origin.)
Obama comes from a peculiar mix of genes. His father came from Kenya, far from the Western African tribes who were enslaved by Arabs and sold to Englishmen. His mother comes from a long line of American Communists. So his loyalty DNA is half African (but not the strongly communitarian West African) and half Commie. Barack has tried hard to learn the ways of community, but it's still learned, not natural. Most of his life experience and 'peer pressure' has been from the academic elites.
So he's picked up the words of Wright's black preaching style, but not the music. Loyalty to community is not natural for Obama, and when push comes to shove, the maternal Commie side comes through. And what was the shove? Not the "God damns America" stuff, because that stuff is just fine with the Commies. No, the last straw was Wright's lively, scholarly and accurate disquisition on different brains, because American academic and media elites, left and right, agree strongly and violently on exactly one thing: All humans are indistinguishable and identical, and genetic differences between sexes and races do not exist. When Wright opposed this Prime Directive, Obama had to disconnect. ¶ 1:16 PM
Polistra is puzzled by Obama's sudden and harsh decision to disconnect from Rev Wright. Why just now? The last two major speeches by the Rev are the most positive things we've heard from him. The NAACP speech was a wondrous piece of teaching and preaching, and essentially true. The Press Club speech contained some demonstrable falsehoods, but was still generally positive in tone, unlike the sound-bites we've been hearing for weeks. Oddly, the NAACP speech seems to have been the last straw for Barack. Why?
Start with the spectrum of loyalty. Like morality, it seems to be two-ended. Some people are strongly loyal to a community. American blacks tend toward this end of the spectrum. Some are strongly disloyal to a community. The American elites tend toward this end of the spectrum, and American Communists are at the far tail.
(Note in case of confusion: they didn't learn disloyalty as a result of following Marx. They followed Marx because that was the maximum way of expressing their innate disloyalty to their community of origin.)
Obama comes from a peculiar mix of genes. His father came from Kenya, far from the Western African tribes who were enslaved by Arabs and sold to Englishmen. His mother comes from a long line of American Communists. So his loyalty DNA is half African (but not the strongly communitarian West African) and half Commie. Barack has tried hard to learn the ways of community, but it's still learned, not natural. Most of his life experience and 'peer pressure' has been from the academic elites.
So he's picked up the words of Wright's black preaching style, but not the music. Loyalty to community is not natural for Obama, and when push comes to shove, the maternal Commie side comes through. And what was the shove? Not the "God damns America" stuff, because that stuff is just fine with the Commies. No, the last straw was Wright's lively, scholarly and accurate disquisition on different brains, because American academic and media elites, left and right, agree strongly and violently on exactly one thing: All humans are indistinguishable and identical, and genetic differences between sexes and races do not exist. When Wright opposed this Prime Directive, Obama had to disconnect. ¶ 1:16 PM
Monday, April 28, 2008
Same old error
The elites, both left and right, continue to make the same obvious and elementary logical error.
They're showing it off right now in the context of Wright's "God damns America" statement; they did the same thing when Falwell and Robertson made similar claims about the heavenly cause of 9/11. (Though I'm pretty sure Wright's list of American sins is not identical to Falwell's list!) And the elites continue to commit the same stupid error in discussing Intelligent Design.
If you're going to speak in secular, scientific and logical terms, you simply CANNOT say that a Reverend is wrong when he claims America is damned for one reason or another. You CANNOT say that Intelligent Design is impossible.
When you say that ID is impossible, you're stating with certainty that an untestable proposition is false. If the proposition is outside the realm of science, you are not allowed to say "It's false", nor can you say "It's true". You are only allowed to say "It's untestable at the moment."*
When you say that Wright or Falwell is WRONG, you are saying (1) that God exists and (2) that YOU are uniquely blessed with perfect knowledge of God's motives and actions. By making those claims, you are getting into exactly the same room as the Revs.
Worse still, you're claiming to know the mind of God without any resort to Scripture. The Revs can and do point to passages in the Old Testament to justify correlating our sins with God's judgment. Even though this still doesn't belong in pure logic, it is at least a logical and syllogistic progression from basic belief in scripture to a specific conclusion. (The Bible says that these sins will lead to damnation; I believe the Bible is true; these sins are occurring now; therefore I believe these sins have caused our damnation.)
When you say "I don't think God could do that", or when you say "the God that I know wouldn't do that", you're only using your own FEELINGS to justify a statement about the mind and motives of God. This is not only doubly illogical, it's narcissistic.
= = = = =
* I say "at the moment" because over the centuries some questions of cosmology or human perception, once thought to be permanently metaphysical, have turned out to be mundanely physical. ¶ 12:21 PM
They're showing it off right now in the context of Wright's "God damns America" statement; they did the same thing when Falwell and Robertson made similar claims about the heavenly cause of 9/11. (Though I'm pretty sure Wright's list of American sins is not identical to Falwell's list!) And the elites continue to commit the same stupid error in discussing Intelligent Design.
If you're going to speak in secular, scientific and logical terms, you simply CANNOT say that a Reverend is wrong when he claims America is damned for one reason or another. You CANNOT say that Intelligent Design is impossible.
When you say that ID is impossible, you're stating with certainty that an untestable proposition is false. If the proposition is outside the realm of science, you are not allowed to say "It's false", nor can you say "It's true". You are only allowed to say "It's untestable at the moment."*
When you say that Wright or Falwell is WRONG, you are saying (1) that God exists and (2) that YOU are uniquely blessed with perfect knowledge of God's motives and actions. By making those claims, you are getting into exactly the same room as the Revs.
Worse still, you're claiming to know the mind of God without any resort to Scripture. The Revs can and do point to passages in the Old Testament to justify correlating our sins with God's judgment. Even though this still doesn't belong in pure logic, it is at least a logical and syllogistic progression from basic belief in scripture to a specific conclusion. (The Bible says that these sins will lead to damnation; I believe the Bible is true; these sins are occurring now; therefore I believe these sins have caused our damnation.)
When you say "I don't think God could do that", or when you say "the God that I know wouldn't do that", you're only using your own FEELINGS to justify a statement about the mind and motives of God. This is not only doubly illogical, it's narcissistic.
= = = = =
* I say "at the moment" because over the centuries some questions of cosmology or human perception, once thought to be permanently metaphysical, have turned out to be mundanely physical. ¶ 12:21 PM
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Wright is right.
Listening to Rev. Wright's NAACP speech on CNN.
This guy is good.
His basic point: Different is not deficient.
When he talked about his white teacher in the newly integrated school who was shocked by the black kids standing on her desk, he struck a deep note in my memory.
I had the same experience when I started teaching electronics at DeVry. The class had about ten black students in the front row. I was bothered by their constant repetition of parts of my lecture. One of them came up after class and explained the process of Call and Response: the students were learning by repeating the last word of the sentence. After that, I began to swing with the rhythm (to the severely limited extent that a purely white nerd can swing) ... and found not only the black students were happier, but I was happier and gave better lectures. I became more attuned to intuition and subjectivity, less aligned with enumeration and formalism. (Admittedly, Call and Response sounds a bit odd when the Response is "Microfarads!" rather than "Praise Jesus!", but it's the same principle.)
The brand-R talking point heads will instinctively smash against this theme, and they will be suicidally wrong. By insisting that all brains are identical, they will be following Marx into counterfactual egalitarianism, continuing to build a Procrustean country that serves only a small segment of its population.
Charles Murray was wrong, not because he stated that blacks and whites have different types of intelligence. That's the statement that got him ostracized.
Nope, that part was perfectly accurate. Murray was wrong when he said that linear and numerical intelligence is the only kind that matters, the only kind that can contribute to our economy. I've discussed this before in the context of employment.
In fact the Murray connection between academic minds and national success is wrong in two ways. First, because reliance on a purely hi-tech economy excludes many people from success and a decent life; Second, because we're finding that a hi-tech economy is not even the best way for American whites to compete. Koreans and Japs have better numerical brains than Caucasians, so they will end up beating us in that department no matter how hard we try.
So.
The Big Question is:
Why do we have a country?
Do we have a country to serve an abstract principle? To advance numerical thinking? In that case Murray would be right; we should then exterminate the wrong kind of thinkers.
Or do we have a country to serve and advance its people? In that case Murray is wrong; we should then find ways to use all types of thinking productively. We should find (or rather RE-discover) ways for intuitive and subjective minds to serve the country and to earn a decent living.
= = = = =
Clarification: Wright is undoubtedly wrong about many things, but everything he said in this one speech is on the mark.
A semi-relevant aside: For a cute and concrete illustration of learning by grabbing the word, and for some serious swinging, examine Marie Bryant.
¶ 10:57 PM
This guy is good.
His basic point: Different is not deficient.
When he talked about his white teacher in the newly integrated school who was shocked by the black kids standing on her desk, he struck a deep note in my memory.
I had the same experience when I started teaching electronics at DeVry. The class had about ten black students in the front row. I was bothered by their constant repetition of parts of my lecture. One of them came up after class and explained the process of Call and Response: the students were learning by repeating the last word of the sentence. After that, I began to swing with the rhythm (to the severely limited extent that a purely white nerd can swing) ... and found not only the black students were happier, but I was happier and gave better lectures. I became more attuned to intuition and subjectivity, less aligned with enumeration and formalism. (Admittedly, Call and Response sounds a bit odd when the Response is "Microfarads!" rather than "Praise Jesus!", but it's the same principle.)
The brand-R talking point heads will instinctively smash against this theme, and they will be suicidally wrong. By insisting that all brains are identical, they will be following Marx into counterfactual egalitarianism, continuing to build a Procrustean country that serves only a small segment of its population.
Charles Murray was wrong, not because he stated that blacks and whites have different types of intelligence. That's the statement that got him ostracized.
Nope, that part was perfectly accurate. Murray was wrong when he said that linear and numerical intelligence is the only kind that matters, the only kind that can contribute to our economy. I've discussed this before in the context of employment.
In fact the Murray connection between academic minds and national success is wrong in two ways. First, because reliance on a purely hi-tech economy excludes many people from success and a decent life; Second, because we're finding that a hi-tech economy is not even the best way for American whites to compete. Koreans and Japs have better numerical brains than Caucasians, so they will end up beating us in that department no matter how hard we try.
So.
The Big Question is:
Why do we have a country?
Do we have a country to serve an abstract principle? To advance numerical thinking? In that case Murray would be right; we should then exterminate the wrong kind of thinkers.
Or do we have a country to serve and advance its people? In that case Murray is wrong; we should then find ways to use all types of thinking productively. We should find (or rather RE-discover) ways for intuitive and subjective minds to serve the country and to earn a decent living.
= = = = =
Clarification: Wright is undoubtedly wrong about many things, but everything he said in this one speech is on the mark.
A semi-relevant aside: For a cute and concrete illustration of learning by grabbing the word, and for some serious swinging, examine Marie Bryant.
¶ 10:57 PM
Replay
While looking for something else, I noticed this entry from three years ago (5/20/05) which I'd forgotten about. Reprinting it here:
I'm not sure why I was using the doctor metaphor with Dean; there must have been some forgotten reference in the news. Leaving that aside, it's obvious that Doc had both the diagnosis and the prescription exactly right. If you look at the results of the '06 elections, you can see how it happened.
For a perfect specimen, examine the Montana debates between old silverback brand-R Conrad Burns and young brand-D Jon Tester. Burns lounged around with the attitude of a Roman emperor reclining on his golden throne, waiting for his phalanx of servants to fan him and feed him gold-plated grapes, while Tester looked like a 'squared-away' military man eager to serve the people. On every question, Burns growled "Don't bother me, you lowly slime, I got connections and you ain't." [And I'm really not stretching all that far for the sake of parody!] Tester gave meaningful answers in line with the needs of the people of Montana. Tester won.
And the same thing happened in many House seats. Republicans seemed to joyfully wallow in filth and corruption, offering the people nothing but Zero Zip Nada Taxes, while brand-D candidates seemed to be upright ordinary citizens, offering specific answers to specific questions. The Democrats won. This really shouldn't be surprising, but two years later, I see no indication that brand-R has garnered even the tiniest bit of information from the defeat. Still wallowing, still offering nothing but "tax holidays".
A more recent demonstration of the switch: When Sultan Bush decided to give a contract for Air Force tankers to the Euro company Airbus, it was the Dems from this state who fought to undo the decision and give the contract to Boeing. This is, of course, normal politics, not high-falutin principle.
Nevertheless, it's Osama's girlfriend Patty Murray and Baghdad Jim McDermott who are visibly and genuinely working for the interests of the state AND for strong national defense, while the brand-R representatives from this state have been absent from the fight, absent from normal politics. They have chosen loyalty to Sultan Bush over loyalty to their own state and nation.
I do not comprehend why.
Does Sultan Bush own compromising photographs of all the Rs?
In any case, the wheel has emphatically turned in the opposite direction, and (as I foresaw three years ago) Hillary is pulling hardest.
= = = = =
Later note: I was using the doctor metaphor with Dean because Dean was a doctor before entering politics. For some reason I forgot this. Senior moment. ¶ 8:21 PM
Doctor [Howard] Dean, underneath the public red-meat, is handing out a more subtle message to Democrats. He recently gave an hour-long forum at Wash. State Univ to a hard left audience.
Doc's main theme: Why do lower-income voters ignore their own economic interests to vote Republican? Because their kids are more important than their economic interests, and they feel under attack from a culture that is dangerous to kids. They also feel that Dems are firmly tied to that culture, and Reps are fighting against it. And everybody, not just the poor folks, wants to see integrity in a candidate. Dean said, without precisely saying it, that Kerry lost because he lacked integrity.
Pretty good diagnosis, both on the facts and the feelings. So what's the prescription? Speak softly about abortion, push hard to maintain So'Scurity, strengthen labor unions, emphasize strong national defense, strengthen NEA, push universal health insurance.
It's a plausible mouthful of pills, but I don't see how it even connects to the culture problem.
The audience cheered loudly on most points, and gave him dead silence on 'strong national defense'. Thus the real question is, can today's Dems fill this scrip with a straight face? Can the party of Traitor Durbin, the party of Traitoress Patty bin Murray, and for that matter the party of I-Hate-All-Republicans Dean, turn on a dime and start sounding like Joe Lieberman? Hillary can probably do it, because she began turning her steering wheel in 2000. She will have to stand against the rest of the party on most issues, though.
I'm not sure why I was using the doctor metaphor with Dean; there must have been some forgotten reference in the news. Leaving that aside, it's obvious that Doc had both the diagnosis and the prescription exactly right. If you look at the results of the '06 elections, you can see how it happened.
For a perfect specimen, examine the Montana debates between old silverback brand-R Conrad Burns and young brand-D Jon Tester. Burns lounged around with the attitude of a Roman emperor reclining on his golden throne, waiting for his phalanx of servants to fan him and feed him gold-plated grapes, while Tester looked like a 'squared-away' military man eager to serve the people. On every question, Burns growled "Don't bother me, you lowly slime, I got connections and you ain't." [And I'm really not stretching all that far for the sake of parody!] Tester gave meaningful answers in line with the needs of the people of Montana. Tester won.
And the same thing happened in many House seats. Republicans seemed to joyfully wallow in filth and corruption, offering the people nothing but Zero Zip Nada Taxes, while brand-D candidates seemed to be upright ordinary citizens, offering specific answers to specific questions. The Democrats won. This really shouldn't be surprising, but two years later, I see no indication that brand-R has garnered even the tiniest bit of information from the defeat. Still wallowing, still offering nothing but "tax holidays".
A more recent demonstration of the switch: When Sultan Bush decided to give a contract for Air Force tankers to the Euro company Airbus, it was the Dems from this state who fought to undo the decision and give the contract to Boeing. This is, of course, normal politics, not high-falutin principle.
Nevertheless, it's Osama's girlfriend Patty Murray and Baghdad Jim McDermott who are visibly and genuinely working for the interests of the state AND for strong national defense, while the brand-R representatives from this state have been absent from the fight, absent from normal politics. They have chosen loyalty to Sultan Bush over loyalty to their own state and nation.
I do not comprehend why.
Does Sultan Bush own compromising photographs of all the Rs?
In any case, the wheel has emphatically turned in the opposite direction, and (as I foresaw three years ago) Hillary is pulling hardest.
= = = = =
Later note: I was using the doctor metaphor with Dean because Dean was a doctor before entering politics. For some reason I forgot this. Senior moment. ¶ 8:21 PM
Saturday, April 26, 2008
Tressell's diagnosis
A recent issue of New Science-ist had some articles on the end of civilization, which were just as silly and dangerous as the usual contents of that mag.
A letter in the latest issue, responding to the articles, contains a far more interesting idea. "Inverse differential rewards", first described by Robert Tressell (who I now must read in more detail.)
The concept is simple: make a list of the available occupations and roles in a given society. Rank them two ways: (1) Rank by reward in money and especially in status, since status is what really counts among social mammals. (2) Rank by usefulness, measured by how long we could do without this occupation before we'd have to re-invent it.
I've used the latter measure in discussing the federal government, particularly the judiciary; said several times that if we eliminated them entirely we'd never find any reason to re-invent them. But I hadn't thought of applying this instrument more widely.
The writer's point: in current Euro and American culture, those two lists are inverted. Which occupation would we have to redevelop immediately if it disappeared? Probably trash collectors or plumbers. Which occupation could we survive longest without? Celebrities.
A civilization that wants to endure will aim toward a somewhat more positive correlation between respect and usefulness.
Here is the best web page on Tressell, including a complete downloadable copy of the book.
= = = = =
After reading part of the book: It's a cross between Dickens and Steinbeck, but without the literary talent of either. Basically an instructive fable leading toward some form of socialism. In fact the problems described in the book were adequately solved without full-fledged socialism; labor laws and Social Security did the trick. Still, it's a useful reminder of how bad life can get under raw unregulated Ayn Rand capitalism, and a nice slap-in-the-face for middle class conservatives who imagine that their interests are identical with billionaires. ¶ 7:21 PM
A letter in the latest issue, responding to the articles, contains a far more interesting idea. "Inverse differential rewards", first described by Robert Tressell (who I now must read in more detail.)
The concept is simple: make a list of the available occupations and roles in a given society. Rank them two ways: (1) Rank by reward in money and especially in status, since status is what really counts among social mammals. (2) Rank by usefulness, measured by how long we could do without this occupation before we'd have to re-invent it.
I've used the latter measure in discussing the federal government, particularly the judiciary; said several times that if we eliminated them entirely we'd never find any reason to re-invent them. But I hadn't thought of applying this instrument more widely.
The writer's point: in current Euro and American culture, those two lists are inverted. Which occupation would we have to redevelop immediately if it disappeared? Probably trash collectors or plumbers. Which occupation could we survive longest without? Celebrities.
A civilization that wants to endure will aim toward a somewhat more positive correlation between respect and usefulness.
Here is the best web page on Tressell, including a complete downloadable copy of the book.
= = = = =
After reading part of the book: It's a cross between Dickens and Steinbeck, but without the literary talent of either. Basically an instructive fable leading toward some form of socialism. In fact the problems described in the book were adequately solved without full-fledged socialism; labor laws and Social Security did the trick. Still, it's a useful reminder of how bad life can get under raw unregulated Ayn Rand capitalism, and a nice slap-in-the-face for middle class conservatives who imagine that their interests are identical with billionaires. ¶ 7:21 PM
Friday, April 25, 2008
Time capsule
Another extract from the incomparable quiz show Information Please.
This three-minute segment, from January 1944, contains within itself EVERYTHING we've lost. In these three minutes you can hear certainty about sexual identity, calm confidence in our SPEEDY AND FINAL victory over the enemy, and a light-hearted non-snobbish discussion and explanation of classical music, linguistics, history, politics and military strategy.
No moral equivalence, no sexual ambiguity, no fucking Hundred-Year-Long Fucking Twilight Struggles, neither euphemism nor vulgarity, no dilution of knowledge.
LISTEN.
These folks were elite but not elitist. They had a tremendous store of knowledge, and happily shared it in a way that an ordinary audience could enjoy, and in a way that would help America defeat its enemies, firm, fast, and final.
Well, one important difference is not mentioned in the clip. The most important thing we owned in 1944 that we have conclusively lost. One word: Industry. We had steel-makers, car-builders, radio-builders, airplane-builders, coal-miners. Equally important, we had car repairmen and radio repairmen, and we had cars and radios that could be repaired. All of these skills, and the design that made the cars and radios repairable, have been lost. We still have a tiny remnant of these men and these industries, but we've found in Iraq that you can't fight a tough and dirty war with delicate disposable unrepairable plastic Chinese crap.
So finally a quiz for us.
Which candidate appears to grasp the need to rebuild industry? Hillary.
Which candidate appears to understand firm, fast and final victory? Hillary. ¶ 9:11 PM
Another extract from the incomparable quiz show Information Please.
This three-minute segment, from January 1944, contains within itself EVERYTHING we've lost. In these three minutes you can hear certainty about sexual identity, calm confidence in our SPEEDY AND FINAL victory over the enemy, and a light-hearted non-snobbish discussion and explanation of classical music, linguistics, history, politics and military strategy.
No moral equivalence, no sexual ambiguity, no fucking Hundred-Year-Long Fucking Twilight Struggles, neither euphemism nor vulgarity, no dilution of knowledge.
LISTEN.
These folks were elite but not elitist. They had a tremendous store of knowledge, and happily shared it in a way that an ordinary audience could enjoy, and in a way that would help America defeat its enemies, firm, fast, and final.
Well, one important difference is not mentioned in the clip. The most important thing we owned in 1944 that we have conclusively lost. One word: Industry. We had steel-makers, car-builders, radio-builders, airplane-builders, coal-miners. Equally important, we had car repairmen and radio repairmen, and we had cars and radios that could be repaired. All of these skills, and the design that made the cars and radios repairable, have been lost. We still have a tiny remnant of these men and these industries, but we've found in Iraq that you can't fight a tough and dirty war with delicate disposable unrepairable plastic Chinese crap.
So finally a quiz for us.
Which candidate appears to grasp the need to rebuild industry? Hillary.
Which candidate appears to understand firm, fast and final victory? Hillary. ¶ 9:11 PM
Language Awards
Since Polistra was vacationing in a better time around Christmas, she missed the annual Language Awards, given for the most repetitive or meaningless new words or phrases. There have been a couple of sudden new entrants in the last month or two, so this seems like a good time to run the ceremony.
= = = = =
"Shaking your head yes" ... instead of the much shorter "nodding".
This makes some sense. You can expect that language will evolve toward parallelism; when two usages seem to be closely related they will converge toward similar forms. Normally the Yes gesture is described by nodding while the No gesture is described by shaking your head No. The force of regularity will try to make both phrases sound similar, and natural laziness would typically push toward the shorter form. In this case there isn't a single verb available for the No action - Shaking by itself won't do the job - so the irresistible impulse toward regularity had to fit the longer phrase to both actions.
Emergent.
Seems to have started in medical circles as a substitute for urgent, though I can't see any difference or advantage. Now spreading to other areas of discourse.
The planet.
You could always spot a Commie by his constant references to the entire world; it's a natural part of leftist thinking to assume all humans are identical, and to apply the same arbitrary rules to all humans. In the '50s, World was the shibboleth. You could safely assume that an organization with World and League in its name was a Soviet front. Now that the prophet of Communism has shifted from Marx to Maurice Strong, his pet word planet is the shibboleth.
It is what it is.
Often used as a way of avoiding forbidden statements in the realm of racial and gender differences.
I nor my associates. (Instead of 'Neither I nor my associates')
Nor without neither has always been possible, but tended to occur only in poetry, where the omission was needed for the meter. I'm not sure why it's spreading now, but it certainly is!
Part of who I am.
Seems to be used often in commercials, as in "Good health is a part of who I am." Well, yes. If you lose health and die, then there ain't gonna be no I at all, let alone any parts of I, or parts of who I am. The phrase simply has no meaning. If you do something often, or enjoy doing something, then it's probably part of your genes and can be discussed separately. Your ontological essence (who I am), if such a thing can even be defined, doesn't have sections or parts. If it did have parts, you could subdivide it and sell shares in your soul. Let's try to apply this to the obvious target audience of the commercial. If she asks "What are the parts of who I am?" she would answer: "I'm a grandmother and a college graduate and a harpist and a cat owner and a Good Health."
Howyadoin.
Obviously this is not a new phrase, but until recently it was mainly a New York thing. Until recently, most conversations outside of Brooklyn began with a wide variety of phrases: Hello, Good morning, Hi, Sapnin Dood, Sup Dog, etc. Now every single conversation begins with a lengthy exchange of unanswered
"Howyadoin." "Howyadoin." "Howyadoin." "Howyadoin."
Squirmish instead of squeamish.
A sudden, and rapidly contagious, new development in March of 08.
Ancestor instead of descendant.
An easy mistake, and I'll confess to making it myself.
Predecessor instead of successor.
Another easy and spreading error.
Viruses with prefixes
In the last few years, viruses have suddenly become prefixed forms. Hanta Virus became Hantavirus, Norwalk Virus became Norovirus. This happened without any explanation that I've heard. I can't find anything via Google to distinguish between the types of virus that go prefixual versus the kind that retain their original first name and surname, if there is a difference. Will the common cold virus become Cocovirus? ---- Oops, it has already become Rhinovirus.
Optics.
This has popped up in the last two months, meaning the "visual impression" or "visible front" of an event or a politician. Suspect it will be a passing fad; doesn't have a good reason for existence. ¶ 6:49 AM
Since Polistra was vacationing in a better time around Christmas, she missed the annual Language Awards, given for the most repetitive or meaningless new words or phrases. There have been a couple of sudden new entrants in the last month or two, so this seems like a good time to run the ceremony.
= = = = =
"Shaking your head yes" ... instead of the much shorter "nodding".
This makes some sense. You can expect that language will evolve toward parallelism; when two usages seem to be closely related they will converge toward similar forms. Normally the Yes gesture is described by nodding while the No gesture is described by shaking your head No. The force of regularity will try to make both phrases sound similar, and natural laziness would typically push toward the shorter form. In this case there isn't a single verb available for the No action - Shaking by itself won't do the job - so the irresistible impulse toward regularity had to fit the longer phrase to both actions.
Emergent.
Seems to have started in medical circles as a substitute for urgent, though I can't see any difference or advantage. Now spreading to other areas of discourse.
The planet.
You could always spot a Commie by his constant references to the entire world; it's a natural part of leftist thinking to assume all humans are identical, and to apply the same arbitrary rules to all humans. In the '50s, World was the shibboleth. You could safely assume that an organization with World and League in its name was a Soviet front. Now that the prophet of Communism has shifted from Marx to Maurice Strong, his pet word planet is the shibboleth.
It is what it is.
Often used as a way of avoiding forbidden statements in the realm of racial and gender differences.
I nor my associates. (Instead of 'Neither I nor my associates')
Nor without neither has always been possible, but tended to occur only in poetry, where the omission was needed for the meter. I'm not sure why it's spreading now, but it certainly is!
Part of who I am.
Seems to be used often in commercials, as in "Good health is a part of who I am." Well, yes. If you lose health and die, then there ain't gonna be no I at all, let alone any parts of I, or parts of who I am. The phrase simply has no meaning. If you do something often, or enjoy doing something, then it's probably part of your genes and can be discussed separately. Your ontological essence (who I am), if such a thing can even be defined, doesn't have sections or parts. If it did have parts, you could subdivide it and sell shares in your soul. Let's try to apply this to the obvious target audience of the commercial. If she asks "What are the parts of who I am?" she would answer: "I'm a grandmother and a college graduate and a harpist and a cat owner and a Good Health."
Howyadoin.
Obviously this is not a new phrase, but until recently it was mainly a New York thing. Until recently, most conversations outside of Brooklyn began with a wide variety of phrases: Hello, Good morning, Hi, Sapnin Dood, Sup Dog, etc. Now every single conversation begins with a lengthy exchange of unanswered
"Howyadoin." "Howyadoin." "Howyadoin." "Howyadoin."
Squirmish instead of squeamish.
A sudden, and rapidly contagious, new development in March of 08.
Ancestor instead of descendant.
An easy mistake, and I'll confess to making it myself.
Predecessor instead of successor.
Another easy and spreading error.
Viruses with prefixes
In the last few years, viruses have suddenly become prefixed forms. Hanta Virus became Hantavirus, Norwalk Virus became Norovirus. This happened without any explanation that I've heard. I can't find anything via Google to distinguish between the types of virus that go prefixual versus the kind that retain their original first name and surname, if there is a difference. Will the common cold virus become Cocovirus? ---- Oops, it has already become Rhinovirus.
Optics.
This has popped up in the last two months, meaning the "visual impression" or "visible front" of an event or a politician. Suspect it will be a passing fad; doesn't have a good reason for existence. ¶ 6:49 AM
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Sailer gets it right ... but not all of it.
Steve Sailer at Vdare hits the Waco 2 nail on the head in terms of plain facts. Polygamy is unquestionably a bad idea in modern civilization, and it's good for authorities to discourage it. Most of the polygamous cults and families engage in welfare fraud, and polygamy always leads to inbreeding (check out the unibrows on the compound wives for evidence!) and large numbers of leftover useless males.
But those facts don't justify a witch-hunt. The real goal of this particular witch-hunt, as with all pogroms, has nothing to do with discouraging bad forms of mating, and everything to do with megalomaniacal prosecutors.
If Texas really wanted to discourage polygamous practices, welfare fraud, and 'children having children', it could do all of those things much more effectively, cheaply and quietly by looking closely at its welfare and WIC clients. Permanent poverty, especially in black ghettos, always involves a tribal form of polygamy, with the alpha male living off the state checks of his harem.
Prosecutors will never work in that direction because they know that the Civil Rights Establishment will destroy them. When prosecutors tear into a weird semi-Christian cult, they know that the entire political and media culture will cheer. It's an easy choice.
The big problem, aside from the utter corruption of the court system, is that America used to be the last refuge, the place where strangely dressed religious groups were welcomed, and where their contributions were encouraged and used. Kansas became the breadbasket of the world because we welcomed Mennonites, who escaped from witch-hunting prosecution in Russia and Germany. America became the leader in physics and space exploration because we welcomed Jewish scientists, who escaped from pogroms in Russia and Germany.
And now we are the homeland of the pogrom.
Now that we've "come for" the polygamists with no resistance from any meaningful source, it will be vastly easier to "come for" other odd and self-contained groups. Their productivity or intelligence won't matter. ¶ 3:05 PM
But those facts don't justify a witch-hunt. The real goal of this particular witch-hunt, as with all pogroms, has nothing to do with discouraging bad forms of mating, and everything to do with megalomaniacal prosecutors.
If Texas really wanted to discourage polygamous practices, welfare fraud, and 'children having children', it could do all of those things much more effectively, cheaply and quietly by looking closely at its welfare and WIC clients. Permanent poverty, especially in black ghettos, always involves a tribal form of polygamy, with the alpha male living off the state checks of his harem.
Prosecutors will never work in that direction because they know that the Civil Rights Establishment will destroy them. When prosecutors tear into a weird semi-Christian cult, they know that the entire political and media culture will cheer. It's an easy choice.
The big problem, aside from the utter corruption of the court system, is that America used to be the last refuge, the place where strangely dressed religious groups were welcomed, and where their contributions were encouraged and used. Kansas became the breadbasket of the world because we welcomed Mennonites, who escaped from witch-hunting prosecution in Russia and Germany. America became the leader in physics and space exploration because we welcomed Jewish scientists, who escaped from pogroms in Russia and Germany.
And now we are the homeland of the pogrom.
Now that we've "come for" the polygamists with no resistance from any meaningful source, it will be vastly easier to "come for" other odd and self-contained groups. Their productivity or intelligence won't matter. ¶ 3:05 PM
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Saddled up
Got one of these little spreadsheet assignments going, so likely to be fairly occupied for a week or so........
= = = = =
10 hours later: Well, that didn't take as long as I thought. The stack looked like a few days of work, but the part I needed to handle was small.
Feel slightly frustrated, which is stupid. Should be glad to get two weeks of pay for 12 hours of work. Mostly should be glad to get back to more interesting types of creative work! ¶ 10:05 PM
Got one of these little spreadsheet assignments going, so likely to be fairly occupied for a week or so........
= = = = =
10 hours later: Well, that didn't take as long as I thought. The stack looked like a few days of work, but the part I needed to handle was small.
Feel slightly frustrated, which is stupid. Should be glad to get two weeks of pay for 12 hours of work. Mostly should be glad to get back to more interesting types of creative work! ¶ 10:05 PM
Smoke & mirrors
Most of the ads on radio in this area are for mortgage companies, breathlessly exhorting new customers to take advantage of the artificially low interest rates set by the Fed. I've been wondering how such companies expect to make any profit in the long run, because despite the fradulent "core inflation" numbers, real inflation is several points above the price-controlled mortgage rate. A fixed 5% mortgage when inflation is 10% is a good deal for the customer but a guaranteed loss for the lender. I've guessed that the companies are really counting on a quick repo or some other fancy trick, some kind of smoke and mirrors involving 'securitization'.
Turns out that the smoke and mirrors may be quite literal. A Seattle mortgage company has been loaning to customers with fake documents, and then making its money from a cut of the marijuana-growing operations that the customers establish in their low-interest houses.
Full story here. ¶ 5:47 PM
Turns out that the smoke and mirrors may be quite literal. A Seattle mortgage company has been loaning to customers with fake documents, and then making its money from a cut of the marijuana-growing operations that the customers establish in their low-interest houses.
According to court documents, Scitek Garden Supply was connected to grows of more than 14,500 plants, and more than $1.1 million in cash was laundered through the business.
Greenhouse & Garden Supply and its owner are alleged to have provided equipment, advice and trash disposal service to those setting up indoor marijuana grows.
Jet City Mortgage of Kent, as well as the home of the company owners, were also searched in connection with possible mortgage fraud related to the homes where marijuana grows have been discovered. Nineteen homes where grow operations were discovered were purchased through the business.
Full story here. ¶ 5:47 PM
Polistra's Earth Day Hint
Use Compact Fluorescent Bulbs in all your light fixtures.
Depending on your life expectancy, Compact Fluorescent Bulbs will save as much as 70 years on your electric bills!!!!
But wait!!!!! There's more!!!!! After you start using Compact Fluorescent Bulbs, you won't have to pay any bills at all!!!! None at all!!!!!
Under the EXpenseless EXistence Plan, you will never have to write another tiresome check for anything, never have to negotiate with those tiresome creditors!
Join the EXpenseless EXistence plan today, and EXperience the EXultation of being an EX-person!!!!!!!
= = = = =
Kidding aside, folks, this is the real purpose of CF. Polistra's Sixth Law: All consequences of leftist plans are intended. ¶ 12:23 PM
Use Compact Fluorescent Bulbs in all your light fixtures.
Depending on your life expectancy, Compact Fluorescent Bulbs will save as much as 70 years on your electric bills!!!!
But wait!!!!! There's more!!!!! After you start using Compact Fluorescent Bulbs, you won't have to pay any bills at all!!!! None at all!!!!!
Under the EXpenseless EXistence Plan, you will never have to write another tiresome check for anything, never have to negotiate with those tiresome creditors!
Join the EXpenseless EXistence plan today, and EXperience the EXultation of being an EX-person!!!!!!!
= = = = =
Kidding aside, folks, this is the real purpose of CF. Polistra's Sixth Law: All consequences of leftist plans are intended. ¶ 12:23 PM
Mot juste
Polistra had a bad day yesterday, but it was partly redeemed by Hillary's strong victory in Penna.
Chris Mathews described the Pennsylvania Edition of Hillary exactly: She's sounding more like Marci Kaptur than Barbara Boxer. Wish I'd come up with that comparison!
Polistra observed last year that Kaptur was the nearest thing to Rohrabacher, and Rohrabacher is the best of all politicians in DC. Kaptur, often in dual harness with Rohr, has been pushing hard against all aspects of internationalism, all attempts to sell our factories and technology to Mexico and China. And Hillary is picking up the same line, with remarkable fidelity.
The most interesting part of Hillary's victory last night has nothing to do with gender and race: the interesting part is that she won by supporting national sovereignty, a position hitherto shoved aside as "sick perverted nativist wacko" by the national parties. If she ends up as the D candidate, and if she carries at least some Kaptur flavor into the national election, we may have a genuine choice for the first time in 30 years. McCain will promise to continue the Bush policy: rip out America's heart, guts and soul and generously donate them to our enemies with no return favors expected. Hillary will promise to serve America occasionally.
= = = = =
Later fussy correction: Kaptur was working with Duncan Hunter, not with Rohrabacher. Doesn't make any difference to the main point, but wanted to get it right. ¶ 4:36 AM
Chris Mathews described the Pennsylvania Edition of Hillary exactly: She's sounding more like Marci Kaptur than Barbara Boxer. Wish I'd come up with that comparison!
Polistra observed last year that Kaptur was the nearest thing to Rohrabacher, and Rohrabacher is the best of all politicians in DC. Kaptur, often in dual harness with Rohr, has been pushing hard against all aspects of internationalism, all attempts to sell our factories and technology to Mexico and China. And Hillary is picking up the same line, with remarkable fidelity.
The most interesting part of Hillary's victory last night has nothing to do with gender and race: the interesting part is that she won by supporting national sovereignty, a position hitherto shoved aside as "sick perverted nativist wacko" by the national parties. If she ends up as the D candidate, and if she carries at least some Kaptur flavor into the national election, we may have a genuine choice for the first time in 30 years. McCain will promise to continue the Bush policy: rip out America's heart, guts and soul and generously donate them to our enemies with no return favors expected. Hillary will promise to serve America occasionally.
= = = = =
Later fussy correction: Kaptur was working with Duncan Hunter, not with Rohrabacher. Doesn't make any difference to the main point, but wanted to get it right. ¶ 4:36 AM
Monday, April 21, 2008
This is astonishing. Maybe too late? 2
Hillary continues to astonish me. Tonight in an MSNBC interview with Idiot Olbermann, who was trying to ask her all the usual idiotic questions about words and campaigning, Hillary managed to get out a serious and well-constructed position statement on Persia. What's more, the statement runs along the same lines that Polistra was suggesting, but Hillary's version is more practical.
The important concept: Arming the good guys works better than trying to disarm everyone, whether you're talking about college campuses or the Middle East.
Nobody is 100% irrational. Even suicidal maniacs avoid a futile suicide; nobody has ever shot up the West Point campus, nobody has ever shot up a police academy. Suicidal maniacs want to view their evil handiwork before dying.
Mutual Assured Destruction worked well for 50 years. So let's rebuild it, instead of trying to eliminate all weapons, which is impossible anyway.
Polistra suggested allowing Persia's neighbors to go nuclear, in order to set up a balance that would keep Persia in line.
Hillary's idea is more practical: We should make it absolutely clear and explicit (none of this weasely crap about All Options On The Table) that we will destroy Persia if it makes the slightest real move against Israel, and we should set up a NATO-like agreement with Persia's neighbors, so that we will promise to destroy Persia if it threatens any of them.
Again: Damn, Hillary, why didn't you talk this way from the start? ¶ 9:05 PM
The important concept: Arming the good guys works better than trying to disarm everyone, whether you're talking about college campuses or the Middle East.
Nobody is 100% irrational. Even suicidal maniacs avoid a futile suicide; nobody has ever shot up the West Point campus, nobody has ever shot up a police academy. Suicidal maniacs want to view their evil handiwork before dying.
Mutual Assured Destruction worked well for 50 years. So let's rebuild it, instead of trying to eliminate all weapons, which is impossible anyway.
Polistra suggested allowing Persia's neighbors to go nuclear, in order to set up a balance that would keep Persia in line.
Hillary's idea is more practical: We should make it absolutely clear and explicit (none of this weasely crap about All Options On The Table) that we will destroy Persia if it makes the slightest real move against Israel, and we should set up a NATO-like agreement with Persia's neighbors, so that we will promise to destroy Persia if it threatens any of them.
Again: Damn, Hillary, why didn't you talk this way from the start? ¶ 9:05 PM
Sunday, April 20, 2008
Last survivor
Pleasant story about the last surviving Canadian veteran of WW1. He's been living here in Spokane for quite a while. In response to the inevitable question, he attributes his longevity to his second wife, married 30 years ago. He is 107 years old but looks 70, so maybe he's right; maybe his wife is so magically wonderful that she stopped his clock at 70.
At first I thought Comrade McCain's campaign would do well to publicize this guy, as evidence that 72-year-old vets can have a considerable number of miles left on the odometer. On second thought, maybe it's not so wise; viewers might semi-consciously think the other way around. As in "This guy is 107; McCain looks about the same age." ¶ 2:44 PM
At first I thought Comrade McCain's campaign would do well to publicize this guy, as evidence that 72-year-old vets can have a considerable number of miles left on the odometer. On second thought, maybe it's not so wise; viewers might semi-consciously think the other way around. As in "This guy is 107; McCain looks about the same age." ¶ 2:44 PM
Saturday, April 19, 2008
They don't make 'em .... 2
Sort of parallel to this entry with its picture of 1947 college girls, but mainly inspired by the clock.
If you've been watching TV at all in recent months, you remember Miss South Carolina's strongly stupid performance on a quiz question about education. "We the USA Americans have to help the Eye-Raq and the South Africa" and so on.
This clip (about 4 minutes) is from a 1947 radio special in which a quiz-show host asks questions about American history and geography, and a subset of the 1947 Miss America contestants try to answer. The host was obnoxious and boorish just like modern quiz hosts, but the girls were non-modern. Not necessarily smarter, but more civilized, more adept at using their feminine talents. Note how they hold their own against the obnoxious host without ever insulting him or descending into virago territory. (The only modern public example of this old-fashioned style is Peggy Noonan.)
I'm mainly enchanted by the voices. It's not just the pitch ... some modern women have equally low fundamental frequencies ... but there's a real difference in the shaping of mouth and throat. I've noticed this for a while, both in actresses and in ordinary women as heard in quiz or man-in-the-street shows. The 1930-1940 voice is centered at the back of the tongue, with an open pharynx and relatively pursed lips, perhaps more like a Turkish or Slavic mouth-set. Modern women tend more toward a tense and high tongue with flat lips, centering the voice just behind the teeth as in German or Chinese.
The old style is easy on the ears. The new style is grating and whiny.
The old voices remind me of this gently humming Westclox, or a low-revving '47 Dodge with Fluid Drive. The new ones remind me of a modem, or the cat-in-heat transmission noise of a Honda. ¶ 9:05 PM
If you've been watching TV at all in recent months, you remember Miss South Carolina's strongly stupid performance on a quiz question about education. "We the USA Americans have to help the Eye-Raq and the South Africa" and so on.
This clip (about 4 minutes) is from a 1947 radio special in which a quiz-show host asks questions about American history and geography, and a subset of the 1947 Miss America contestants try to answer. The host was obnoxious and boorish just like modern quiz hosts, but the girls were non-modern. Not necessarily smarter, but more civilized, more adept at using their feminine talents. Note how they hold their own against the obnoxious host without ever insulting him or descending into virago territory. (The only modern public example of this old-fashioned style is Peggy Noonan.)
I'm mainly enchanted by the voices. It's not just the pitch ... some modern women have equally low fundamental frequencies ... but there's a real difference in the shaping of mouth and throat. I've noticed this for a while, both in actresses and in ordinary women as heard in quiz or man-in-the-street shows. The 1930-1940 voice is centered at the back of the tongue, with an open pharynx and relatively pursed lips, perhaps more like a Turkish or Slavic mouth-set. Modern women tend more toward a tense and high tongue with flat lips, centering the voice just behind the teeth as in German or Chinese.
The old style is easy on the ears. The new style is grating and whiny.
The old voices remind me of this gently humming Westclox, or a low-revving '47 Dodge with Fluid Drive. The new ones remind me of a modem, or the cat-in-heat transmission noise of a Honda. ¶ 9:05 PM
Quick notes
Quick notes from the brief campaign speeches aired on CNN.
Hillary:
1. Eliminate tax benefits for outsourcing.
2. Eliminate tax benefits for hedge-fund managers etc
3. Renegotiate NAFTA.
4. Reward work. "People must feel that their work is leading somewhere"
5. Re-emphasize manufacturing. (YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYY!)
6. Manhattan project for 'clean energy'
Obama:
1. Let's talk about substance instead of words.
2. Change
3. Hope
4. Let's talk about substance instead of words.
5. Change
6. Hope
McCain:
1. Zero zip nada taxes.
2. Zero zip nada taxes.
3. Zero zip nada taxes.
4. Zero zip nada taxes.
5. Zero zip nada taxes.
6. Zero zip nada taxes.
The most dramatic difference:
Hillary is the only one who defines specific problems and offers specific solutions.
And I agree with the importance of the problems and the general direction of the solutions. (I disagree strongly with her on education, but that's secondary at this point in history.)
Obama isn't saying anything that you could agree or disagree with. In other words, while he's advocating a new form of politics, he's practicing the oldest kind of empty-rhetoric politics.
McCain is speaking directly to Warren Buffett and Britney Spears. Fine for them, I suppose, but lethal for the rest of us. ¶ 1:36 PM
Hillary:
1. Eliminate tax benefits for outsourcing.
2. Eliminate tax benefits for hedge-fund managers etc
3. Renegotiate NAFTA.
4. Reward work. "People must feel that their work is leading somewhere"
5. Re-emphasize manufacturing. (YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYY!)
6. Manhattan project for 'clean energy'
Obama:
1. Let's talk about substance instead of words.
2. Change
3. Hope
4. Let's talk about substance instead of words.
5. Change
6. Hope
McCain:
1. Zero zip nada taxes.
2. Zero zip nada taxes.
3. Zero zip nada taxes.
4. Zero zip nada taxes.
5. Zero zip nada taxes.
6. Zero zip nada taxes.
The most dramatic difference:
Hillary is the only one who defines specific problems and offers specific solutions.
And I agree with the importance of the problems and the general direction of the solutions. (I disagree strongly with her on education, but that's secondary at this point in history.)
Obama isn't saying anything that you could agree or disagree with. In other words, while he's advocating a new form of politics, he's practicing the oldest kind of empty-rhetoric politics.
McCain is speaking directly to Warren Buffett and Britney Spears. Fine for them, I suppose, but lethal for the rest of us. ¶ 1:36 PM
Self-Explanatory Sentence XII
Via NRO: the Nobel prize winner Elie Wiesel was interviewed about Benedict's visit. He was asked "What can B16 say and do to repair the growing rifts between the Vatican, the clergy, and the laity in America?"
Answer: "He could tell the Vatican to abandon efforts to confer sainthood on Pope Pius XII."
In the first place, the answer has nothing at all to do with the question; Pius XII is not a front-burner question for American Catholics, and slowing or speeding his canonization has precisely zero connection with "growing rifts". It's obviously an obsession for Wiesel, though.
Second, we have another of these Self-Explanatory Sentences. When you read Nobel prize winner, you know instantly and completely that we're talking about an orthodox Stalinist who will spout nothing more than orthodox Stalinism. Wiesel doesn't disappoint.
If he were truly speaking on behalf of Jews, he would advocate a faster canonization for Pius XII.
Polistra has discussed this question before.
Quite simply, Hitler "came for" the Catholics before he "came for" the Jews, and Pius XII was highly active in protecting both. His activity was not secret; it was well-known in America at the time. After the war, Stalin changed history specifically to create "growing rifts between the Vatican, the clergy and the laity in America". So it's completely predictable that Stalinist Wiesel continues to push the Stalinist line. ¶ 10:15 AM
Answer: "He could tell the Vatican to abandon efforts to confer sainthood on Pope Pius XII."
In the first place, the answer has nothing at all to do with the question; Pius XII is not a front-burner question for American Catholics, and slowing or speeding his canonization has precisely zero connection with "growing rifts". It's obviously an obsession for Wiesel, though.
Second, we have another of these Self-Explanatory Sentences. When you read Nobel prize winner, you know instantly and completely that we're talking about an orthodox Stalinist who will spout nothing more than orthodox Stalinism. Wiesel doesn't disappoint.
If he were truly speaking on behalf of Jews, he would advocate a faster canonization for Pius XII.
Polistra has discussed this question before.
Quite simply, Hitler "came for" the Catholics before he "came for" the Jews, and Pius XII was highly active in protecting both. His activity was not secret; it was well-known in America at the time. After the war, Stalin changed history specifically to create "growing rifts between the Vatican, the clergy and the laity in America". So it's completely predictable that Stalinist Wiesel continues to push the Stalinist line. ¶ 10:15 AM
