Month: June 2003

White Slaver? We Blog; You Decide! As Instapundit makes abundantly clear, every blogger worth his salarium (Latin for “salt” — the salary of classical days) is tearing Bill O’Reilly a new one because of his attacks on the Internet. Instapundit Lileks Volokh Matt Welch, ad infinitum. O’Reilly has taken on the entire blogosphere. As a…

Get the Jews Homos Out of Our Theaters Sewers! Andrew Sullivan is annoyed by Brent Bozell’s amazing discovery that the theater industry is full of (gulp!) homos. This, Bozell claims, makes the theater a “sewer” (presumably from its infestation with the slimy, icky homos — or as the great William S. Burroughs used to say,…

Persian Classical Values — Coming Soon? Don Watkins makes the following very prescient observation: There’s no telling how this particular protest will end, but one thing’s for sure: it’s only a matter of time before Iran’s theocracy tumbles, and when it does, mark my words — the new Iran will mark the beginning of the…

Corrections — Old, New, and Undeleted I received an email from Craig Ceely with the following “Corrections and Updates.” (I should pay more attention to detail, and I am delighted to have another blogger helping me out, so THANK YOU CRAIG!). Craig writes as follows: 1) The Soviet Union 28 years ago thing is for…

The Great Big Penis Debate, Enlarged? Crucify Jello? Hello? I guess like many new ideas, my proposal to crucify spammers is already encountering resistance. I may be on “shaky” ground here, so let me be more specific. “Pinning down a spammer is like trying to nail down Jell-O.” Point well taken. I may have to…

Luck is a Virtue, Not a Superstition I have now been blogging daily for one solid month. I started this blog a year ago but let it lie fallow because I thought we might have finally reached a new era of tolerance. Well, that hope turned out to be a bit premature, and after the…

Altruistic Fish and the Morality of Death I am indebted to two wonderful bloggers, Arthur Silber and Don Watkins, who have forced me to think about altruism in ways I never have before. (Both know more about Objectivism than I do, which I find humbling as well as challenging.) Bearing in mind that I am…

“School” for Solipsism? (Rule One: “Never Write about Yourself!”) Hell hath no fury like a fanatic who feels patronized. If you are dealing with a fanatic or absolutist of any kind, you’d better either agree with what he says or else take the exact opposite position. If you agree with him partially, you’ll really piss…

Some Cures are Worse than the Disease “An entire range of federal regulations is going to be necessary if the Internet is to be kept usable” So says the Weekly Standard. I found this horror thanks to Arthur Silber. No one is more personally opposed to spam than I, a longtime sufferer. Yesterday, I deleted…

By What Objective Standard? This altruism stuff is really cool, because precise definitions are so evasive. One of the best posts I have seen so far on the subject is this post by Don Watkins. What most fascinates me about altruism is that it is so often used as a cover for selfishly evil motivations…

State Education, an Altruistic Oxymoron This article, written by author and blogger Katie Granju, is a very thoughtful defense of school vouchers from a liberal Democratic vantage point. Opinions like this do not conform to the herd mentality, and tend not to be reported in mainstream newspapers, which like to present home-schoolers and those in…

From Ranting to RAVEing ….Our Watered Down Freedom The RAVE Act is more than just another unconstitutional drug law. It is an attack on free speech, on private property, and on freedom of association. I don’t take it as personally as I might have ten years ago, and I will try to explain. Funny how…

How to Survive Religion-Based Government Cuts A sign of the times? Beep beep! Move over John Ashcroft! Latest news on godly government: Highway 666 is gone! Beastly traffic jams will have to move elsewhere. I have mixed feelings, but I guess at least stuff like this won’t be happening on Highway 666 anymore. My source…

Terrorism Sucks — Fundamentally! Arthur Silber links to a New York Times report that the Justice Department is not allowing gay employees to celebrate Gay Pride Day or whatever the hell it was. Religious discrimination? Don’t laugh yet, please. What is religion? Isn’t it a religious belief that God commanded that planes be flown into…

Damn! Another @#&% test! How’d I do? I just got to take a test promising to label me. I must be a glutton for punishment or something. Anyway, here are (gulp) the results: Libertarian – You believe that the main use forgovernment is for some people to lord it overothers at their expense. You maintain…

Update — Sign the Petition Amazing how New York Times related things are coming out of the woodwork. I never imagined that Walter Duranty would finally be recognized for the evil fraud that he was. A group of Ukrainian activists have a place where you can sign the petition. For the most part, American Communists…

Jerry Falwell is not the only character on the right to declare war on the Bush administration. He has been joined by Pat Buchanan, now sounding more like a French anti-Semite as he sneers, “Was it oil? Empire? To make the Middle East safe for Sharon?” I consider myself a libertarian, but such demagogic opportunism…

Do lies become true with age? My last blog about religion and politics and definitions thereof has me all worked up and I feel another rant coming on?.. (Thank you once again,

Define and Conquer I refuse to be a definition victim, which is why I criticize “definitionitis” every chance I get. But that does not make this evil form of black magic stop. Of course, I love it when other people do my homework for me, because I am lazy by nature, and would rather sit…

Hanging by nails? Howard Owens (found through Instapundit) is cool! First of all (and on the serious side) his statements about blogging are as optimistic as I hope they are correct. These are real gems of wisdom: ….if newspapers don’t develop effective blog-related strategies, they’ll lose credibility and market share.?.. ?.What excites me most about…