the sky is still falling

Mark Steyn (again, and edited):

But what to worry about? Iranian nukes? Nah, that's just some racket cooked up by the Christian fundamentalist Bush and his Zionist buddies to give Halliburton a pretext to take over the Persian carpet industry. Worrying about nukes is so '80s. Back then it was just crazies like Reagan and Thatcher who had nukes, so you can understand why everyone was terrified. But now Kim Jong-Il and the ayatollahs have them, so we're all sophisticated and relaxed about it, like the French hearing that their president's acquired a couple more mistresses.

So what should we worry about? How about - stop me if you've heard this one before - "climate change"?

Every time I think the climate-change cult is about to peak, some "expert" ratchets up the insanity. I see that "scientists" are now proposing "to help wildlife relocate to places where they are not currently found" in order to help them avoid "climate change" before it happens. That's bound to work out well, isn't it? Most animals can figure out this stuff for themselves: I dined yesterday evening with a bear that's taken a yen to my bird-feeder and installs herself on my porch every day around supper time. And, if the animals aren't smart enough to cope, isn't that - what's the word again? - evolution? You know, the thing all the rational-type people are supposed to believe in...

and if those don't scare you enough, how about velociraptors?

theft by government

Mark Steyn:

"If you're a Yemeni jihadist whose lawyer is now Assistant Deputy Associate Deputy Assistant Attorney-General, you're entitled to the full protection of the U.S. Constitution. The rest of us have to take our chances."

read why

civility

it's a challenge for me too:

The last eight years were characterized by a viciousness that may have been unprecedented in most of our lifetimes, and though Republicans have, I honestly believe, treated President Obama with much greater respect than Democrats treated President Bush, it remains the case that with the advent of blogs, cable TV, and talk radio civility seems to have become an anachronism.

Some people... think that it's only those who suffer most from the kind of eye-gouging that occurs daily in the blogosphere and on the airwaves who call for civility. Civility, in this view, is the plea of those who hold to what Nietzsche called slave morality, the attempt by the weak to mitigate the harshness of their masters by foisting a moral system on them that would constrain their will to power. In other words, pleas for civility are the recourse of society's losers who don't want the strong to be all the time beating them up, but who are otherwise powerless to prevent it.

I think, though, that the opposite is true. Civility is a mark of strength. Calmness and courtesy are indicators of confidence in one's positions. Lies, insults, and rudeness are red flags hoisted by people who subliminally recognize that their arguments are inherently weak. The flimsiness of a point of view can often be measured by the level of shrillness and meanness with which it's presented. If one's ideas are compelling then he has nothing to fear by extending courtesy and respect to the other side...

Nevertheless, speaking just of conservatives, it's counter-productive of them to dress themselves in such uncomely rhetorical robes because it closes off any chance that their ideas, which are usually superior to those of the left, will get a hearing among the great mass of people who see themselves as neither conservative nor liberal, but who could potentially be swayed by compelling arguments humorously and irenically presented...

Nor can the left plead rhetorical chastity. Left-wing blogs are often stomach-turning in their vileness, and I can scarcely watch Chris Matthews on MSNBC who is, in my opinion, one of the rudest people on cable TV. And when it comes to sheer meanness Matthews' colleague Keith Olbermann is all that Dreher accuses Mark Levin of being, and worse.

It's hard to treat people with respect and dignity, of course, when they refuse the same courtesy to others, and it's easy to succumb to the temptation to call one's opponents names when they behave in ways that make the name appropriate. It's not always wrong, after all, to call a stupid idea stupid or to call a despicable human being despicable. Sometimes, when stakes are high and the battle hot some rhetoric and behavior are warranted which would not be otherwise, but incendiary language should be used sparingly and judiciously, never gratuitously.

as always, there's plenty more good reading at viewpoint.

now i get it

you know those little letters in parentheses next to a politician's name? apparently liberals misunderstand them to mean:

(R) - "right to criticize"
(I) - "i don't know"
(L) - "looney"
(D) - "don't dare criticize" or "defend despite the facts"

barrage

how can we swat all these bugs?

expired card

sorry jesse, we don't accept race cards any more.

stormtroopers

also sprach mark steyn:

For all that they're demonized as the ruthless shock troops of the Right, social conservatives have been extremely ineffective in advancing their causes politically. By contrast, the gay marriage thing is a campaign that ought to be taught in military staff colleges.

recovery

a t-shirt definitely not safe for my workplace

cain't we all jes' git along?

New post at News Through The Mirror

what's good for the moose is good for the squanderer

VDH puts the news through the mirror with President Palin’s First 100 Days:

And what’s this $50 mil for her inauguration gala? Since when do you fly in your favorite pizza-maker from across the country on our dime? Or send the presidential 747 for a spin over the Big Apple for a third-of-a-million-dollar joyride?...

Then she gives the Brits some unwatchable DVDs as a booby prize — as if she idled the old Yukon and ran into Target’s sale aisle. Did Sarah send Bristol into Wal-Mart back in Anchorage for that ‘engraved’ iPod for the queen? And what’s this don’t-bow-to-the-queen stuff, but curtsy for a Saudi sheik? Maybe that explains why she brags to Stephanopoulos about her ‘Muslim faith.’...

via snadrs

solomon's judgement it ain't

When both sides pretend to care so much, I wonder if either really do:

Judge rules family can't refuse chemo for boy

A Minnesota judge ruled Friday that a 13-year-old cancer patient must be evaluated by a doctor to determine if the boy would benefit from restarting chemotherapy over his parents' objections.

(the judge wrote) Daniel has only a "rudimentary understanding at best of the risks and benefits of chemotherapy... he does not believe he is ill currently. The fact is that he is very ill currently."

(the family's attorney said) "I feel it's a blow to families," he said. "It marginalizes the decisions that parents face every day in regard to their children's medical care. It really affirms the role that big government is better at making our decisions for us."

I seriously think the parents are being incredibly unwise with their child's health, but I would still stand with them against Nanny State & Big Brother.

three out of four bloggers

...have updated us on the interesting days they've had lately:

jungle mom
lileks
local malcontent

my attempt to parody the malcontent's parody would fail miserably, going something like this:

"upon my return from el worko anoche*, i found myself not doing too well. work has not been difficult, but monotonous because of the mind-numbing hypnosis of constantly seeing the world through a 16x9 glowing rectangle, which can inflame my wrist and eyes...

coming home, i microwaved some kibble and fell into fevered dreams. when i awoke, the dreams left, but the fever (and accompanying headache & weakness) didn't..."

* that's tex-mex for "work last night". apologies if it really means something else.

oh i wish

Obama antitrust crackdown to nail DNC, big unions:

"The Democratic National Committee and Big Labor are typical monopolies," said Christine A. Varney, head of the antitrust division at Justice. "The DNC controls at least two out three branches of government, and it recently raided a weaker competitor to steal a U.S. senator and thus to get a filibuster-proof monopoly..."

"The current recession gives dangerous incentive for large and dominating firms to engage in predatory behavior that harms citizens and weakens competition," Varney said. "This collusion for market dominance by the DNC makes Google, Microsoft and even the old Standard Oil look like bit players."

read the rest.

however you spell it

Have a Happy Lag BaOmer!

...the day on which we commemorate the passing of the famous sage Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai (Rashbi). Famous indeed. There isn't a chapter of the Mishna that does not contain a statement made by Rabbi Shimon...

Famous? ok...

Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, who lived in the 2nd century of the Common Era, (uh-oh) was the first to publicly teach the mystical (hmm) dimension of the Torah known as the "Kabbalah," (aha) and is the author of the basic work of Kabbalah, the Zohar. On the day of his passing, Rabbi Shimon instructed his disciples to mark the date as "the day of my joy."

(parentheses mine)

One commentor on Wikipedia asks:

When will we be as careful and joyous in the fulfillment of all the Creator's commandments before we are so extravagant in the observance of human innovations which are contrary to and annexed onto His Torah?

what theory?

I knew he was a madman before the election:

One person described the administration as the most shocking "end justifies the means" group they have ever encountered. Another characterized Obama as "the most dangerous smooth talker on the planet - and I knew Kissinger." Both were voters for Obama in the last election.

One participant in negotiations said that the administration's tactic was to present what one described as a "madman theory of the presidency" in which the President is someone to be feared because he was willing to do anything to get his way...

Tom Lauria disclosed to Judge Gonzalez that some Chrysler creditors had received death threats...

"Let me tell you it’s no fun standing on this side of the fence opposing the President of the United States. In fact, let me just say, people have asked me who I represent. That’s a moving target.

"I can tell you for sure that I represent one less investor today than I represented yesterday. One of my clients was directly threatened by the White House and in essence compelled to withdraw its opposition to the deal under the threat that the full force of the White House Press Corps would destroy its reputation if it continued to fight. That’s how hard it is to stand on this side of the fence."...

"(I)t's the Chicago Way, last year they only had building inspections, garbage collections and the like at their (ahem) disposal, this year they have the entire weight of the Federal Government behind them and if you expect me to believe for one minute that the guys who put Rod Blagojevich in office and supported him there are not playing games with power, I will double over laughing at your naivete."

slowdown

short week before mini vacation weekend. may not be posting til next monday - except this.

p.s. go read these

on governance and lost principles:

We can look at it as a game in which two sides compete for the prize of wielding power and garnering benefits for their team, or we can look at it as a moral calling to do what's in the best interests of the people of the United States.

on arrogance and lost compasses:

In a breathtaking display of self-righteousness and intellectual arrogance, the president told Americans that his personal beliefs are more important than protecting their country, their homes and their families.

and on tea and lost invitations.

he's just not that into news

AP policy: still trying to be the gatekeepers on the information superhighway.

pro-conservative obama?!?

On CNN, Obama said he wanted Souter's replacement to be someone who:

"has a sense of what's happening in the real world and recognizes that one of the roles of the courts is to protect people who don't have a voice."

May we assume that he's referring to Senate Republicans?

Maybe not... ;)

"We need somebody who's got the heart, the empathy, to recognize what it's like to be a young teenage mom," Obama said at a Planned Parenthood conference in 2007. "The empathy to understand what it's like to be poor, or African-American, or gay, or disabled, or old. And that's the criterion by which I'm going to be selecting my judges."

Noticeably absent from the list are the bitter, the religious, and the gun-clinging. Can anyone say "discrimination"?

The article also included this bit of doublespeak:

"Obama will pick someone who supports a woman's right to choose abortion and Roe v. Wade, but denied that that amounted to a litmus test."

Yeah right. Maybe he's using phenolphthalien?