Author: Dennis

I was just reading Bertrand Bronson’s essay “Johnson Agonistes” which puts Johnson first in contest with the leading men of his youth and then in contest with himself. He emerges as a man of radical spirit yet with a belief in the unquestioned sovereignty of the state, viz. authoritarianism. In respect of this Bronson rightly…

I really need to get an internet connection so I can post these things in a timely manner … I happened to catch a few minutes of NBC’s coverage of the opening ceremonies at Athens and wondered if anyone else laughed along with me as a float clearly representing the geometric period in Greek vase…

I fear I may have killed Julia Child, telepathically. Before you call me mad know that I have twice insisted in the last week that Julia Child was dead, hazily recalling her donation of a house to Smith College some years ago, and assuming that the consequence of her demise. And just last night a…

One of my favorite pastimes is to browse the stacks in the basement of the college library where most books are labelled “STORAGE” and virtually forgotten. I’m ever in the ire of the girls at the check-out counter for bringing them dusty old barcode-less books. One book has jumped out at me a few times…

This was too good not to share in full. The last line had me wondering whether “Turkmenbashi” had not been to Houyhnhnmland. ASHGABAT (Reuters) – Turkmenistan’s authoritarian president, whose recent decrees have included banning gold teeth, has told television presenters to stop wearing make-up because he had difficulty telling the men from the women. “You…

Call me old-fashioned, but what ever happened to personal responsibility? I’ve been wondering why every soda machine on campus disappeared a few months back, and I may have stumbled onto the answer last night flipping past Teen Jeopardy (it’s painful to watch a dumbed-down show dumbed-down more). There was something about fighting obesity and the…

I’d rather not beat the horse of questioned timing as it lay dying (it’s taken us a long way lately and has long deserved a decent burial) but I couldn’t help noticing that within the final five minutes of PBS’s awkardly-titled “Watergate plus 30: Shadow of History” (re-aired last night) there were repeated reminders that…

This morning, after the President announced Porter Goss as his pick for CIA director, NBC titans Matt Lauer and Jim Miklaszewski wondered whether Goss, as a former army intelligence officer, CIA agent, and member of a House intelligence committee, might not be part of “the problem” in America’s intelligence agencies. That’s a fair question. But…

I’ve seen a PDF preview of chapter three from the forthcoming Unfit For Command, and it seems pretty damning. Now, for those who would instantly discount it as lies I humbly offer my friend’s defense of Fahrenheit 9/11: “if it’s not true why isn’t he being sued?” Libel laws aside, let it suffice to say…

Remember how the Kerry–Edwards ticket was going to be the alternative to negative campaigning? Well, here’s something fun that came in the mail: Dear [name withheld], I am rushing this message to you just hours after accepting the Democratic nomination. Our campaign to end the Bush presidency and move America forward is now in its…

On NPR yesterday Allison Keyes spoke with pollster John Zogby whose work has shown that Arabs feel the 9/11 commission missed some important things. The commission hasn’t taken into account, for example, that America should try to promote a more positive image abroad, and that it shouldn’t treat Arabs as only capable of responding to…

We know that Kerry mispronounced a woman’s name as he misled America last night, but did you catch this? This is where I ended up scratching my head: I … I wish, I wish my parents could share this moment. They went to their rest in the last few years. But their example, their inspiration,…

First let me begin by saying that Al Sharpton upstaged John Edwards despite his innumerable innacuracies and anachronisms. Aside from the popular lie about 40 acres and a mule. According to Sharpton, while it is true that Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, there was an unfulfilled commitment to 40 acres and a mule. This is…

The GOP’s 12 minute video chronicling Kerry’s flip-flop on the war issue is now available. One apologist has already tried to soften the blow: “There’s no question that comments here or there, taken out of context and thrown together, are intended by Republicans to try to simplify or dumb down a crucial issue of war…

Where’s the aftermath of the close of last night’s Newshour coverage of the Democratic Convention? There is no link to the transcript, and near as I can tell no one is talking about it. Mark Shields, in gushing over Barack Obama, called him Tiger Woods, a comparison which is valid if one considers his youth,…

Teresa Heinz Kerry, wife of Democratic hopeful John Kerry, has some interesting things to say. I’m not referring to “shove it” (which, incidentally, makes her tough and sexy–a woman who knows when to say ‘enough!‘; it’s also shorthand for “shove it up your ass”, the sort of thing Dick Cheney would be roasted for). I’m…

Eric has recently ranted on a popular pasttime, namely questioning the timing of things. And since that post President Bush’s payroll records, which the Pentagon previously thought had been destroyed, have surfaced. Every news outlet that lets out to my little apartment has been repeating the refrain that some have “questioned the timing” prefacing the…

This is from Reuters: Bigger Breasts for Free: Join the Army Jul 22, 9:15 AM (ET) NEW YORK (Reuters) – The U.S. Army has long lured recruits with the slogan “Be All You Can Be,” but now soldiers and their families can receive plastic surgery, including breast enlargements, on the taxpayers’ dime. The New Yorker…

The U.S. has refused to aid the U.N.’s Population Fund for reasons cited in Eric’s response to an earlier post on the subject: forced sterilization and abortion in China. Coercive population control as a goal of the radical left has crept up too in Justin Case’s excellent essay on Paul Ehrlich, Estimated Prophet. Eric suggested…

I received a chain e-mail this morning from a well-meaning acquaintance who thinks she’s somehow fighting for reproductive rights and other ‘good’ things (‘good’ because somehow connected with the U.N.) by spamming her address book with an ad for Molly Ivins’s latest hootenanny–a rollicking, down-home blend of countrified wit and wisdom from the Smith College…