Month: December 2003

The Washington Times? (No, the New York Times in drag!) Why would the New York Times be helping to fuel or exploit a divisive cultural debate over same sex marriage? Daniel Drezner’s analysis makes me suspect that they are. (Via Jeff Jarvis.) Unlike Social Security or Medicare, this public opinion divide is in all likelihood…

The stories about the various ghosts allegedly haunting Henry VIII’s Hampton Court Palace simply will not go away. I’ve read many of these stories — both of the ghosts and of their “debunking” (of course there is said to be more than one ghost) and I guess in the “spirit” of Christmas, the ghost is…

It’s time to play “retro future” with the wayback machine: anyone with a Web site and a server, a satellite transponder and about $100 million can have — in a matter of months — much of what the political parties have taken generations to build. I found the above via Jeff Jarvis, who says that…

Has Glenn Reynolds a proprietary interest in the words “heh” and “indeed”? This is not an idle question brought on by having too much time on my hands. In fact, my very blogfather himself wants to know whether I had anything to do with this new blog. My answer to him was that I didn’t…

Once in a great while, something comes along which really makes me think. This piece certainly did. (Via InstaPundit.) The problem is, I am supposed to be doing my Christmas cards. I have less than two hours to get to the damned post office before it closes, or else it will be too late! I…

It’s tough trying to make sense out of today’s test results, but it’s Online Testing Day at Classical Values, so the choice is not mine. First, from Ghost of a flea, I found a test which is really getting around — “What Muppet are you?” The Flea was Sam the Eagle, and I am Kermit…

A hoax. A @*%&! hoax. And that hoax generated this report by Glenn Reynolds, who never asserted it was true, specifically cautioning that it was big news “if it pans out.” It turns out that it didn’t. Because my additional observations on that post got me an Instalanche, I stand squarely in the chain of…

A recent plethora of blogging activity (plus, I suppose, the capture of Saddam Hussein) is pushing Iran into the spotlight of the blogosphere. Iran is Persia, of course, and more than perhaps any country, Persia looks both East and West. This has been the case since antiquity. I have discussed Persian history before in this…

Human Rights Watch accuses the U.S. of “political show trial” tactics in allowing the Iraqi government to try Saddam Hussein: [T]he Iraqi Governing Council, taking its lead from Washington, last week established a tribunal that is to be dominated by Iraqi jurists. Despite the superficial appeal of allowing Iraqis to try their own persecutors, this…

Here’s another ominous trend — more prohibition of instrumentalities of crime (rather than enforcing laws against the crime itself) because of an uproar over the nature of the instrument: Many local governments in the United States are moving to restrict the use of cell phone cameras even as the quality of the camera pictures steadily…

Here’s a politically correct essay which nonetheless manages to raise some issues worthy of discussion. The author is a self-described heterosexual who questions the privileges which have been bestowed on her because of her sexual preference. The privilege she complains of having is akin to belonging to a sort of inside club — a club…

No blogging all day, and almost no blogging tonight! I said “almost” because I just fixed what I have called my “IMPOSSIBLE problems with Verizon’s sucky-ass, on-again/off-again DSL”. It always tends to occur in the rain, and this week, in addition to DSL failure, on Monday the phone became unusable because of a loud hum…

The biggest division in American society — and the widest cultural gulf — is between those who believe in serfdom, and those who believe in freedom. Those who believe in serfdom are inclined to think that the world is divided into masters and slaves, and that if you don’t want to be a slave, you’d…

Hey, I don’t mean to whine about gays in the military or anything…. But Strom Thurmond was personally as well as politically opposed to homosexuals for his entire career, and believed that not only should they not be allowed to serve in the military, but that they shouldn’t be given security clearances. Here’s something I…

While Howard Dean might have missed his moment of opportunity, according to William Safire, Saddam Hussein can’t wait for his: I think Saddam is still Saddam ? a meretricious, malevolent megalomaniac. He knows he is going to die, either by death sentence or in jail at the hands of a rape victim’s family. Why did…

Looks like Howard Dean missed out on an opportunity for the Sister Souljah moment which had been predicted. (Via Instapundit.) Maybe Dean’s not as smart as I thought. (Or, maybe he’s as reckless as Karl Rove thought….)

Latest idea? Frighten Americans and embolden Jihadis by distributing snuff films like the one showing Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl having his head cut off. I don’t know the extent to which this has been independently verified, but this site discusses the idea (and links to a rather sickening video): The newest tactical plan…

What kind of city would — in the middle of a war — no longer welcome its traditional annual (since 1981) precision flying performance by the legendary Blue Angels? San Francisco, unfortunately. As a 30 year resident of Berkeley (although I’m currently bicoastal), and former city official there, I’m familiar with the type of thinking…

Forget, for a moment, things like plastic turkeys and rubber chickens. Tim Blair offers a map showing the exact locations of the Coalition of the Puss Pissy. (Link via InstaPundit.) I hate to sound paranoid but that map (especially the MoveOn version) bears a striking resemblance to the T-mobile cell phone coverage map! Surely, this…

With understandable skepticism, my blogfather Jeff discusses this report from Debka that Saddam Hussein was being held prisoner by Iraqis seeking to claim the reward money: Saddam was seized, possibly with the connivance of his own men, and held in that hole in Adwar for three weeks or more, which would have accounted for his…