Category: Uncategorized

Not really old history just forgotten according to history Professor David Kaiser. How did he get people on his side? He did it by promising jobs to the jobless, money to the money-less, and rewards for the military-industrial complex. He did it by indoctrinating the children, advocating gun control, health care for all, better wages,…

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…

It looks like health care “reform” will pass. Nick Gillespie asks: How Many Americans Will Choose to be Uninsured Even if Insurance is Mandatory? This problem is MUCH worse than it seems at first glance. Since there’s no PEC (pre-existing condition) denial anymore, you aren’t buying insurance, you’re buying the right to exchange your medical…

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…

Riveting Rousseauian warporn, set in a gorgeous hi-def Azerothian CGI landscape, ironically itself a dazzling gem of the technological civilization it decries.

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…

It looks like Al Gore is not the only one involved in making big money on CO2 trading. The Head of The IPCC, Dr Rajendra Pachauri, is in on it as well. Although Dr Pachauri is often presented as a scientist (he was even once described by the BBC as “the world’s top climate scientist”),…

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 have been sitting on this story for a couple of days – waiting for verification. I now have some. Watts Up With That says that the CRU (of ClimateGate fame) cherry picked Russian data. And you probably couldn’t guess this in a million years, but they left out the data from the coldest stations.…

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,…

That I think is one of the most eloquent points ever made against the alternative energy craze as it is currently being manifested. We know what the world looks like now. How will it look if we have to get 100% of our energy from natural sources with technology that is available now? Or even…

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”…

Among the many wonderful links from the 2009 IEC conference, we learn the boys at the University of Sydney have made their own small Polywell device: Cute little guy. Congrats to proud parents Matthew Carr and Dr. Joe Khachan, who got the wee tyke up to 1T magnet strength and 250KV drive depth. Also of…

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…