Month: February 2004

Glenn Reynolds has written a column about Kerry and the Jane Fonda problem. Many bloggers will be posting and posting and posting. I really don’t want to write about this at all, for a variety of reasons. But what the hell; it’s a big issue, whether I like it or not. Yet another election is…

As part of what I see as my ongoing duty to report the latest in belt-tightening news; here is a TRUE story involving airport security and private morality: ATHENS (AFP) – When a 40-year old British woman set off a metal detector alarm at Athens airport, bemused security staff found that it was caused by…

This week’s Bonfire of the Vanities is hosted by Josh Cohen. A sci-fi nerdy type, Josh has a pretty good post of his own about his latest Trek incarnation, and I enjoyed his treatment of “What to Say When a Girl Wants to Put Something in Your Butt.” (You learn the strangest things in the…

Nature is shocking! At least, according to the New York Times, nature shocks people when the subject is natural homosexuality. So goes this discussion of homosexual behavior in a pair of penguins named Roy and Silo: Roy and Silo are hardly unusual. Milou and Squawk, two young males, are also beginning to exhibit courtship behavior,…

The “war against terrorism” has turned into a seemingly hopeless dispute over whether Bush lied. Whether there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq is being presented as the grand national question. If no WMD, then “Bush lied,” the war is illegitimate, and Americans died for absolutely no reason at all. Bush’s interview with Tim…

A Labradoodle pup (named “Cookie”) showed up in my yard on a very cold day. Cookie refused to leave, and this was what she looked like, shivering in the cold: Somewhat irresistible. So I let Puff out for a closer look: While this was going on, I noticed that Molly the Jack Russell Terrorist was…

Now that the Black Metal movement has been analogized to Richard Perle and David Frum (see this for more “depth”), I think a little common sense is in order. (Link via Glenn Reynolds.) The Norwegian Black Metal movement is now over ten years old. A number of its original proponents are either dead or in…

Another thought about Balkanization and the division between communitarianism and libertarianism. What about war? What about religion? Neither fits neatly into the communitarian or the libertarian scheme of things…. And what worries me most of all is that war and religion are increasingly becoming synonymous. (In that regard at least, “Balkanization” is no overstatement.)

A comment from Randall Parker to my earlier post (inspired by his discussion of marriage drugs) has encouraged me to explore further the issue of entanglement between marriage and state. The history of marriage (and divorce) in the United States seems hopelessly intertwined with earlier religious law, and its later enforcement by secular authority: Before…

I am always sorry to see a blog die, but John Jenkins now says he is bored, and has retitled his blog “ALL GONE NOW.” Reason? “I’m bored.” I’ll miss you John, so I won’t say rest in peace! Perhaps your restlessness and boredom will cause you to change your mind, and perhaps you can…

Well, just because it’s late Friday doesn’t mean that I forgot it was Online Test Day at Classical Values. My mood fits this first test — “What Type of Lunatic are You?” — beautifully. Complete loony tune! And I like the classic look too! ‘Complete Psycho’ PLEASE VOTE!!! What Type of Lunatic are You? brought…

I am being persecuted again! That mean Hesiod guy keeps calling me a pseudo-libertarian, and now, a phony! What’s more, he says I keep whining about it — and pathetically at that! And, lame phony that I am, all I can do now is whine about it some more. I am not particularly hung up…

Just found an incredibly cool video link of a cellphone gun in action. (Link to Gizmodo via Glenn Reynolds.) Looks like it holds four rounds, .25 caliber automatic. I can just see it now….. Guy goes to doctor with two .25 caliber gunshot wounds in his head. (Yeah, you could still theoretically be walking and…

Hey, first it was mice producing monkey sperm, and now, thanks to Justin Case, I find that scientists have engineered mice that produce fish oil — and we could too: Genetic engineering has turned mice into a source of healthy omega-3 fat and could let humans produce it themselves. Investigating a novel way to increase…

After discussing recent evidence of brain changes during the “falling in love” syndrome (for example, “men tended to show more activity in two regions in the brain: ….visual…. and ….. penile….”), Randall Parker proposes a high tech solution to the nation’s marriage woes: We need drugs that will keep people happily married. The cost of…

Long day into night with no posts. My heat quit last night and I nearly shivered to death and didn’t sleep much. Finally got repair people here, which set me back half a day, and an evening engagement kept me out until late. I am proud to state that I have a new nickname —…

Dr. Helen Smith (wife of Glenn Reynolds, and forensic psychologist specializing in treating violent kids) highlighted a detail of the Appalachian Law School shooting case which I somehow missed (perhaps because it didn’t appear in my local newspaper): …[A]t the Appalachian Law School in 2002, a student by the name of Peter Odighizuwa murdered three…

Censorship in Philadelphia? In the name of “brotherly love?” A local cheese steak business is being squashed in the name of political correctness, because it is named “Chink’s.” (Apparently that was the nickname of the establishment’s Jewish founder.) Is “Chink” hate speech? This local writer thinks so, and he claims that a mere word like…

People just won’t stop trying to frighten, intimidate, and control others by means of labels. (A complaint of mine from the first days of this blog.) Are we in a great national label war? Glenn Reynolds links to Eugene Volokh’s mordant reference to a new blogger, who, among other things, attempts to “smear” (I guess…

Roger L. Simon recently shed some new light (for me, anyway) on the Bush-as-Hitler smear. Citing a dreadful piece which compares the Bush administration to Hitler’s Nazi regime (which I’ll also refrain from linking directly), Roger makes it clear that these ostensible attacks on Bush are more insidious than what they appear to be. They…