Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.

This is an advertisement for a movie coming out just in time for the election season. If you follow the link there is a movie trailer that tells more about the movie. If you would like some words about the movie from the makers, here are some of them: HYPE: The Obama Effect examines the…

The Chicago Annenberg Challenge Ayer/Obama affair (discussed infra) is finally receiving national attention. More here and here. (Via Glenn Reynolds.) While Glenn thinks the files have probably been “vacuumed of any seriously embarrassing matter,” I think it’s an embarrassment that a candidate for national office worked closely for years with an unrepentant terrorist. Let me…

It seems that China can’t keep the Free Tibet folks down. Despite the consequences to them that could be easily anticipated. On Monday, “…five pro-Tibet activists unfurled a banner spelling out “Free Tibet” in English and Chinese in blue LED “throwie” lights in Beijing’s Olympic Park tonight. The five were detained by security personnel after…

In The Ties That Bind I discuss Russian proposals for selling nuclear capable missiles to Syria. And then I learn today that an Obama adviser was recently in Syria at an oil company sponsored conference to discuss what? Dried fruit exports? Maybe. Oil exports? Much more likely. Barack Obama’s Middle East Policy Adviser recently discussed…

You have to wonder what the Russians are thinking. Syria’s official news agency SANA announced Mr. Assad would begin a “working visit” to Moscow on Wednesday at the invitation of Russia’s President Dmitry Medvedev. Ahead of the visit, Mr. Assad told Russia’s Kommersant daily on Wednesday that his country’s defence ties with Moscow, in the…

I’ve stumbled onto a very entertaining and informative site that covers “political ephemera, drug hysteria, vintage sex & health items”, and the latest entry is on the work of a guy called Dick Hafer. This anti-gay tract from 1986 reads like modern satire mocked up to ridicule the attitudes of the past. It’s the sort…

In response to my post Let the Games End, commenter Karl notifies me that a petition to revoke the Winter Olympic Games in Russia in 2014 has been started. If you want a badge for your site this is the place to go. It is the least we can do. Cross Posted at Power and…

Yesterday I wrote a long post about Barack Obama’s long relationship with Bill Ayers. What did not occur to me was that my criticism of Bill Ayers might very well be interpreted as racist. That’s because my criticism of Ayers is necessarily criticism of Obama, and all criticism of Obama is racist: In his color-coded…

Harry Reid says coal and oil are making us sick. He has that right. High oil prices are funding jihadis and the new Russian Military machine. The high price of oil is killing Iraqis and killing Georgians. It is also severely squeezing the poor in America. And here you probably thought the Democrats were the…

Phil Plait, the Bad Astronomer and incoming president of the James Randi Educational Foundation, has a post about Iran’s failed satellite launch, but what interests me more is the text of Ahmadinejad’s desperate prayer (quoted in turn from MSNBC): Ahmadinejad was present at this launch on Saturday, and offered a prayer before liftoff: “In the…

There is talk of denying the Russians the Winter Olympic games in 2014. Pennsylvania’s Democratic Rep. Allyson Y. Schwartz and Republican Bill Shuster , the co-chairs of the House Georgia Caucus, announced they intend to introduce a resolution when Congress returns calling on the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to find a new venue for the…

For about five years America is going to depend on the Russians for access to the Space Station. Suppose because of happenings in Georgia the Russians decline to do their part? “The new challenge we have is that for approximately five years, the plan — which is a very bad plan but is the only…

This is not my first post about the unrepentent terrorist Bill Ayers (to say nothing of his thoroughly evil wife Bernadine Dohrn). I’ve long thought that Obama’s relationship with Ayers is far more serious than his interactions with Jeremiah Wright, but unlike Jeremiah Wright, Obama has yet to denounce or repudiate Ayers. Far from it;…

Read the article at the Wall Street Journal. My friend Tom Ligon is featured as well as Richard Hull. Read the back story on how the article came about at Talk Polywell. You can follow developments in this line of research and McCain’s interest at: Fusion Report 13 June 008. You can also read more…

Commenter Schwimmer at my post Democrats Strike Out had this to say: And so it begins. The party which has controlled the White House for the past 8 years and which has controlled Congress for the past 12 of 14 years is now the party of new ideas. The Democrats are rightfully trying to pursue…

I was commenting at Althouse about Obama’s performance on the stump: Without a script Obama is a doofus. Another commenter popped up with this gem: Really? A doofus? You’ve been watching to many “Leave it to Beaver” reruns. So I responded (I can’t resist a set up). And Obama is still a doofus when he…

(and who isn’t) you may not have read the Bleat in too long a time. Well, here’s one worth reading (though you’ll want to skip down a bit past the candle): Well, let’s see what’s up with the Old Scout this week. Garrison Keillor’s column – America’s most peculiar example of a fine writer willingly…

Barack Obama is doing his best to link John McCain to a vaguely labeled “machinery,” and he just can’t stop talking about a certain “book.” Better worry, because things could get ugly: Things could get ugly in the coming weeks, he warned. “They’ve got a whole machinery that they’re cranking out,” Obama continued. “They’ve got…

Commenter RAH at the Belmont Club (5:26 pm) speculates on how the Green Movement and CO2 hysteria have played into the hands of the Russians. Russian President Medeyev was Gazprom President. In his new position he is buying contracts from other countries. Venezuela sells oil to Russia; Libya just signed a contract with Medeyev and…

American Thinker recounts the latest moves in Congress with respect to drilling for new oil resources. After reporting yesterday on Nancy Pelosi’s desire to develop a comprehensive energy bill instead of an up or down vote on lifting off shore drilling restrictions, the GOP immediately saw through her transparent attempt to make the bill so…