Month: June 2005

I’ve been reading about all these Americans who suffer from an unmedicated condition called “Omnipotent Tourist Syndrome (aka “OTS”), who are fond of going to other countries and marveling over stuff like crumbling buildings. (Via InstaPundit.) I’m a morbid person. Really, I am. And at the risk of sounding sympathetic with the PC tourist crowd,…

Is Howard Dean Hillary Nixon Clinton’s Spiro Agnew? Right now he’s getting all the flak (as Dick Polman points out today), and yet, while that’s noisily happening, Hillary is quietly manuevering herself into a position where the presidential nomination is a certainty. Dean’s doing an excellent job as a flaky irritant and a distraction, but…

After thinking over that last post, the manifest unfairness of singling out books for the carnage they’ve wrought began to get to me. After all, even if we grant for the sake of argument that books are dangerous, as I explained, the danger is limited by the number of people who can a) read, and…

“So this is the little lady who started this big war.” — Abraham Lincoln, on meeting Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin. In similar vein, Human Events has listed what it considers the “Ten Most Harmful Books of the 19th and 20th Centuries.” 1. The Communist Manifesto (Marx & Engels) 2. Mein Kampf…

The Bush presidency is the highest stage of Nixonism. So says Sidney Blumenthal. Got that, folks? On occasions too numerous to count, President Bush has been likened to Hitler. Just recently, his foreign policy was compared to the Holocaust by leading Democrat Charles Rangel. But Nixon? My God, as hyperbole goes, that really takes the…

While I have no background in teaching (save a brief stint as a TA as an undergrad), I’m thrilled that one of my posts has been included in the 18th Carnival of Education. It’s hosted by Education Wonk — a libertarian-oriented education blog (I didn’t even know there was such a thing!), and the Carnival…

Not only is feeling not the same thing as thinking, feeling is more powerful than thinking because it is able to defeat thought itself. A perfect example is the struggle I have been having over having to kill my dog, poor suffering old Puff. That’s right; kill. A decidedly more malevolent sounding word than the…

According to this report, the “macho look” is making way for… for…. Well, for something else: PARIS (AFP) – Macho man is an endangered species, with today’s male more likely to opt for a pink flowered shirt and swingers’ clubs than the traditional role as family super-hero, fashion industry insiders say. A study along these…

….newspapers are destined to become like the horse and buggy. They will still be around, but everyone will be driving something faster. So says Kentucky blogger Brian Goettl at the The Conservative Edge. Brian is this week’s host for the 142nd Carnival of the Vanities, and I want to thank Brian for linking my post…

Here’s something that strikes me as a contradiction: disposable digital cameras: CVS Corporation has begun selling a disposable digital camcorder at its chain of pharmacies. Priced at $29.99, the number 2 drugstore chain operator in the US hopes to boost profits in its photo labs with the new product. Pure Digital Technologies of San Francisco…

Possibly in response to the “care package” proposed by Mick Wright, Senator John Kerry has apparently signed his form 180. But not without a snarky comment: ”The call for me to sign a 180 form came from the same partisan operatives who were lying about my record on a daily basis on the Web and…

Speaking of animal rights (and food for bears!), via InstaPundit I see that in Canada, bears are now killing hikers: A grizzly killed a runner near Canmore, Alberta Sunday. Isabelle Dub? was out running a popular woodland trail with two friends when the group chanced upon the bear. Dub? climbed a tree while her two…

Here’s a photo from an animal rights protest meant to “compare eating meat with cannibalism.” Much as I admire such ingenuity, I disagree with the assertion that meat eating is the same as cannibalism. Because I disagree with the premise that eating animals is the same as eating humans, no amount of what purports to…

There’s no question that right now Watergate appears to be a gigantic orgy for the geezers of Watergate, of little if any relevance to the affairs of today. Much as I hesitate to weigh in for or against age as a criterion for determining what is or what is not of historical importance, because of…

Remember the Robin Williams character keeling over in front of the coffee section in “Moscow on the Hudson“? A brand-new Soviet defector to the United States who’d been raised having to stand in long lines to buy a single, shoddy product, he was asked by his hosts to “go buy coffee.” Dutifully, he walked right…

I hate to get serious after that last post (criticized for an excess of “timidity“), but some serious things did happen yesterday. First, my serious thanks to John Hawkins at Right Wing News on making Classical Values Website of the Day. I’m really touched! It didn’t escape my attention that yesterday was a day of…

I’m feeling guilty, folks. A few posts ago I commented on the religious cult to which the Daughter of Deep Throat is said to belong, and I supplied this picture of the Adi Da Samraj, to whom she has joyously devoted herself: Now I realize that by discussing the religion of Watergate right after the…

“If we can’t change people’s behavior and make them think what’s in their best interest, then that’s when government comes along and becomes a bit paternalistic.” So says San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who’s considering legislation which would ban pit bulls. I want to address Newsom’s apparent contention that people who own pit bulls don’t…

I still haven’t seen the latest “Star Wars,” but I’m glad to see that the brilliant Mark Steyn has made it relevant to the pressing political and religious issues of the day: ….”Revenge of the Sith” is a marvel of motivational integrity compared to ”Revenge of the Felt,” the concluding chapter in that other ’70s…

This is by way of being a companion piece to ?Like A Thousand Iron Curtains.? It?s comprised of relevant excerpts from Poul Anderson?s Hugo winning story, ?The Longest Voyage.? If you ever intended to read it for yourself, you should be aware that I?m about to give away the ending. Fair warning? THE SET-UP? If…