Author: Eric Scheie

I just had an experience which illustrates the folly of thinking that if a quote can’t be found online, it doesn’t exist. Looking an a 1917 road map last week, my eyes were drawn to quote from Rear Admiral W.W. Kimball. Above the picture of Uncle Sam, here’s the quote from W.W. Kimball: “A military…

What do you do when the keys on your keyboard wear out? I have been using a Logitech model EX-110 wireless keyboard for two and a half years, and I have gradually worn off the letters on the more frequently used keys, to wit, the letters A, S, D, H, L, and C. (The carrots…

Reading today that “there’ll be nowhere to run from the new world government” which will use “climate change” as a pretext reminded me of a prediction repeatedly made by William S. Burroughs, as immortalized in 1989 in a marvelous film clip from “Drugstore Cowboy”. Unfortunately, embedding has been disabled, so you’ll have to click on…

Who owns what professors teach? Can knowledge in the sense of knowing what the truth is about a particular subject really said to be someone’s property? Greg Mankiw links a fascinating discussion of the online sale and distribution of notes taken in class: The basic legal question of whether a professor or university has any…

Despite a lot of wishful thinking on the right, it appears that the health care boondoggle will pass this week. Reid and company managed to literally buy off the sole remaining holdout (Nelson) with an abortion compromise measure. John McCain says the Republicans will not be able to stop the bill, although he says Bernie…

As I said earlier, I feel more had by Andrew Sullivan than by Tiger Woods. I don’t like it when people are not who they say they are, and the whole Sullivan Doppelganger thing makes me wince when I think back on the innumerable posts I’ve written over the years either agreeing or disagreeing with…

Is the subject of whether I feel “had” by Tiger Woods even worth a post? I don’t know. For the life of me, I just don’t feel part of a growing chorus of angry “we’s” who do feel — very strongly — they they have been “had.” (Apparently, there is a sense that by betraying…

In general, politics is a depressing topic for me. Maybe it’s because after six and a half years of blogging against socialism and big government only to see more of both, all I can do is repeat myself. A big Ugh! to that. What could be more ineffective than telling my readers what I think…

Not everyone appreciates vintage Grateful Dead. Please feel free to yawn and roll your eyes if you’ve heard this rant before — which you have — and in that regard I admit that this is probably another classic example of what I have called, self-indulgent psychedelic nostalgia, aggravated by a narcissistic, passive-aggressive sense of midlife…

I’ve been marveling over the president’s contention that unless we spend a ton more money, we will soon be bankrupt. I like the way David Harsanyi puts it in his column with the appropriate title of “All the president’s mendacity“: President Barack Obama grimly warned America this week that if his health care plans fail,…

I’ll say it isn’t! I woke up to see a truly marvelous headline staring me in the face. Ethnic groups say ‘white’ isn’t enough on the 2010 census What is apparently going on (at least according to Detroit Free Press staff writer Niraj Warikoo) is that Arab Americans and others fear a “loss” of “benefits”…

The misapplication of the so-called “Precautionary Principle” is one of my pet peeves, because it is selectively invoked. It is routinely applied to the risk of environmental damage but never the risk of economic damage. Rand Simberg takes a close look at the Precautionary Principle, which is problematic at best: Those advocating that we upend…

Yesterday marked the 210th anniversary of George Washington’s death, and Michael McNeil has a fascinating overview of the man and his life. Despite his immense importance, notes McNeil, Washington is more of a mystery now than ever. This year (2009) marks the 210th anniversary of the passing (on earthdate 1799-12-15) of the man who, first…

Reading that Senator Schumer called an airline flight attendant a “bitch” simply because she asked him to turn off his cell phone as federal rules require, a couple of things came to mind. First, we have one of the quintessential champions of massive federal power — a guy whose daily existence consists of figuring out…

It was getting tired. And confusing. Yeah, I get that way myself, but back in June, acting with the very best of intentions, I added the green color at the top of this blog in order to express solidarity with the Iranian protesters. It was intended to be temporary, and while I of course still…

Dead bodies suck. No, really. I feel incredibly sorry for the owners of this land: Some people have skeletons in their closet. Others have ’em buried beneath their house. That’s the life lesson a group of construction workers learned in Fairmount on Saturday, when they unearthed seven old graves. Police spokesman Lt. Frank Vanore said…

In Nevada, brothel owners are contemplating adding male prostitutes to their stables: The owner of a brothel more than two hours’ drive from Las Vegas said she hopes to hire Nevada’s first legal male prostitutes within a month, now that state health officials have approved a method to test men for infectious diseases. The world…

On CNN, there’s been a serious discussion of implementing a worldwide one-child policy, and Jack Cafferty is obviously sympathetic. CNN’s Jack Cafferty all but endorsed a global version of China’s oppressive one-child policy on Friday’s Situation Room. He repeated the argument of Canadian journalist Diane Francis, that population control is the only way to fight…

Probably in the hope of driving a stake through the heart of AGW skeptics in Copenhagen, a self-described Al Gore trainee named Kevin Grandia has created the term “Copendenier.” He must really like it, for he has even authored a Wiki page announcing the term to the world. I’m always fascinated by new words, but…

It’s a complicated read, but “The Smoking Gun At Darwin Zero” by Willis Eschenbach (which Jerry Pournelle calls a must-read) explains in detail why Climategate is about a lot more than the scientific bitch fight that the AGW advocates and their media allies are allies would have people believe. You should read it all, as…