Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.

I’m utterly fascinated by Inquirer writer Chris Satullo’s apologia to feminists — for the crime of not supporting Hillary Clinton: Bless me, for I have sinned, and it has been a while since my last confession. This, apparently, is my sin: I have failed to support Hillary Clinton in the fashion to which her most…

I’ve been reading Maureen Dowd for years, and I generally find myself irritated by her. But when she’s good, she’s good, and in her latest column, she’s at her best. (Have to admit, I savored every word.) While it’s obvious she favors Obama, she nonetheless doesn’t spare him. Nor (to my delight) does she spare…

I have no idea who Patrick O’Hara is, and I don’t especially care. Certainly not enough to Google him and find out whether he’s really the lifelong Republican he says he is. So for the purpose of this post, I’ll accept what he says in an op ed in today’s Inquirer on faith: Last week…

Gettysburg dead Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord: He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored; He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword: His truth is marching on. (Chorus) Glory, glory, hallelujah! Glory, glory, hallelujah! Glory, glory, hallelujah! His truth…

HT Sweetness and Light

NSFW

Eric at Classical Values is looking at a question that has vexed him for quite some time. Is A responsible for what B says? Actually the post in question is a little more convoluted than that, but the convolution – necessary for his point – is not what I want to talk about. I’m not…

I’ve said it in a number of posts, and I hate to be a broken record, but once again, it is illogical and unfair to hold A responsible for something said by B. In yet another classic example, Glenn Greenwald takes this error a step further, this time attempting to hold Glenn Reynolds responsible for…

James Carville thinks that Bill Richardson’s endorsement of Barack Obama is an act of betrayal of the worst order: The reaction of some of Mr. Clinton’s allies suggests that might have been a wise decision. “An act of betrayal,” said James Carville, an adviser to Mrs. Clinton and a friend of Mr. Clinton. “Mr. Richardson’s…

Over at Just One Minute I spotted this exchange between some commenters. Obama’s connections to Jeremiah Wright, William Ayers, Tony Rezko, and Nadhmi Auchi pose some serious questions about his judgement. Unless he gives the go ahead to Michigan and Florida to hold new primaries,and of course he won’t do that, he will be our…

Global Warming is not what it used to be. It appears that despite a continuing rise in CO2 global temperatures for the last 10 years have been falling. If you count just since 2002 temperatures have been stagnant. The ABC mentioned is the Australian Broadcasting Company. Last Monday – on ABC Radio National, of all…

Change. We all talk about it. Well, I decided to do something about it. So I’ve been digging up change in my back yard with a metal detector. I don’t expect to find anything valuable, but the post about “asparamancy” got me to thinking. If asparagus can be used for divination purposes, why not change?…

No really. Salvador Dal&iacute wrote a film script for the Marx Brothers of that name in 1937: The “Surrealist woman” is lying in the middle of a great bed, sixty feet long, with the rest of the guests seated around each side. Along the bed, as decorations, are a group of dwarfs caught by Harpo.…

When it comes to customer satisfaction the rule of thumb is that every satisfied customer will influence five others and every dissatisfied customer will influence ten. You had better keep your customers happy. So how has Mr. Happy, the glorious Barry O, been doing with his customers? Not well. Not well at all. I’m going…

According to a growing body of experts, being online can be an addiction: If you’re a blogger, you could soon find yourself labeled with the newest mental disorder: Internet Addiction Disorder. IAD has actually been proposed for inclusion as a psychiatric diagnosis in the next issue of Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-V).…

A gay blogger in Oklahoma argues that his state (which my subliminally Freudian fingers keep unconsciously misspelling as “Oklahomo”) is not hell, despite the fact that a state legislator is determined to stop the homos from, from, teaching or spreading their, their lifestyle. Or something. Here’s the video. Says the blogger: As I get older…

In a recent Human Events piece — “The Softer Side of SWAT,” Brett Winterble complains about a plan to admit more females onto SWAT teams on the theory that male SWAT members “under-emphasize negotiating skills, patience, empathy and flexibility while over-emphasizing physical prowess and tactical acumen.” …isn’t the whole point of a SWAT team to…

I have been a critic of NAFTA from the very beginning. — Hillary Clinton, February 26, 2008 Anyone remember Barack Obama’s NAFTAGATE? Hillary’s Texas and Ohio victories were made possible in no small part because she hammered away at Barack Obama for being secretly in favor of NAFTA, or at least, not as opposed to…

Ever wondered why so many teachers and bureaucrats oppose home schooling despite the fact that home-schooled children score far better in standardized tests? Education may have a lot less to do with it than you think. In his analysis of the recent California decision to outlaw homeschooling, Vin Suprynowicz may have identified the chief reason…

In a recent interview, Mike Huckabee noted the left’s double standard in analyzing religious sermons: It’s interesting to me that there are some people on the left that are having to be very uncomfortable with what Louis Wright said, when they all were all over a Jerry Falwell or anyone on the right who said…