I don't look back. So here's a look forward from the precipitous cliffs of the two biggest buzz words of 2008: "Change" [1,360,000,000 Google Hits] and "Hope" [Running far behind at only 617,000,000 Google Hits].
Continued...
neo-neocon on Anticipation: waiting for Obama
Journalist Chris Smith is impatient for Obama to take office. He’s sick of that long countdown to Bush’s final day as President, even though the numbers have now become so small, and the clear and brilliant light can be viewed at the end of that long dark tunnel. In this, Smith probably has a lot of company.It's probably not necessary to point out that this sort of thinking the idea that Obama will magically soothe us, heal us, kiss our foreheads and make it all better -is part of a dangerous trend originally noted when Obama first became a candidate. I wrote "thinking" in the previous sentence, but it's really more of a feeling that Obama will fix it. Or, if he can't fix it, at least he'll talk about it in a way that doesn't involve abominations such as 'nucular.' And even if he doesn't talk about it right, we'll all experience such a sense of relief about his mere presence that maybe that will be enough. Because feeling good is a major part of what this is all about.
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Lincoln Bible
Life (or at least Obama) loves to imitate The West Wing. Now: Obama will take the oath with Bible used by Lincoln
Then: THE WEST WING "INAUGURATION PART I" BARTLET: I kept changing my mind all week on which bible I wanted to use, and then I finally settled on the George Washington Bible but we ran into a problem with the New York Freemasons, which we don't have time to get into.
I like the idea of using the Lincoln bible for a whole host of symbolic reasons. I just hope the Buck-and-West-Wing stops there. [Who are you kidding? Not me.]
Sippican Cottage tells you why in The Greater Fool Theory Of Housing Excerpt:
There's Postmodern evil afoot here. Everything is boiled down to a pastiche, and you put all these disconnected totems into a blender and put the mixed up parts on a concrete rectangle. It's making us all crazy in a very subtle but profound way.
There has been a concerted effort to dismantle all standards of right and wrong and beauty and truth. If ever truthiness was put into sticks and bricks, this house is it. When you rebel against standard things, sooner or later you run out of ways to be original, and all that is left is to do the exact opposite of good. It's the only permutation of new that's left to you after a while. The American house is becoming that prefect distillation of bad ideas. Everything exactly at cross-purposes with its stated purpose.More....
Wretchard at his best. In an off-hand comment to his post, Belmont Club » The strike on Hamas Richard Fernandez sees what others prefer not to see:
Maybe the root of this conflict isn't "land," "statehood," or even religion. Maybe its about preserving fighting and terrorism as a way of life; as a business. Palestine is an alibi for anything, but mostly it is the justification for a mode of employment, a whole series of professions, a whole raft of contractors, a self-sustaining funding network that could not exist without continuous and never-ending war. This monster has already consumed the Palestinians; stolen their future, made a mockery of their hopes.
But sometimes I wonder if the West is any better off. How much "aid", how many diplomatic jobs, how many tenured positions in universities, how many "activist's" careers, how much research and development, weapons manufacturing, military training programs -- how many jobs depend on keeping this abomination going.
This is too much of a good thing for everyone except the ordinary Israeli and Arab for the music to stop. Sometimes I wonder whether it is any more feasible to finish this war than it is to stop illegal immigration. Maybe nobody really wants either a fence or victory to happen. That would be too simple. One thing seems certain: whatever the UN or the diplomats propose isnât going to make a dime's worth of difference. One can't read the drivel coming from the UN without wondering whether they are joking, mad or moronic. And no, Obama's not going to fix it. We are in the real world equivalent of Groundhog Day. What worries me is the suspicion that some people want us to stay there.
There is something worse than war. It is war without end masquerading as a "peace process".
YouTube - Greatest Film Ending Ever
I refer to a brittle weakness in our economy, courtesy of the same smartaleck caste of MBAs who brought us derivatives and hyper-leveraged finance. A frailty that could, potentially, turn some short-term crisis into full-scale disaster -- and all because of a good theory that窶冱 been taken way too far.
Here's what the commercial jet pilots (the good ones) were doing while you were bitching in the terminal.
Flight Level 390: Ice World, Part One...
Position: Underneath the Electric Jet, KJFK (Kennedy)...This from Dave @ Flight 390: America from the Flight Deck, the best blog by a professional airline pilot on the net. If it is not in your bookmarks, it should be.
Outside Air Temperature: None
Windspeed and direction: 290 degrees at 28 gusting to 42 knots
Precip: Blowing snowI am underneath Fi-Fi's belly with flashlight in right hand; left hand in pocket of leather flying jacket. It is surrealistic out here tonight. It reminds me of a movie scene in Alien, where Dallas, Kane, and Lambert descended the Nostromo's crew elevator down to the surface of LV-426. Back to planet Earth, it is unbelievably cold, with howling winds from the northwest. My face is burning, soon to be numb. The snow is stinging my eyes as I try to keep them open, following my flashlight beam, searching for the hydraulic leak, missing piece of aluminum, or shredded tire. Whatever is wrong, if there is anything wrong, this would be the time to overlook it... Got to be careful, even if it freezes my face. Oh well, the pain will go away in a few more seconds.
for Justine
Throughout the night, the cold drew close,
And wrapped our home in shrouds of frost.
Within, four candles lent us light,
Returning to us what was lost.
Around us, all our village slept.
Our children safe, their breathing slow.
Four candles gleamed beside the tree,
Their flames burned long, burned low.
Then all fell silent round my house.
The snow shown blue, the shadows, slate.
You could almost hear the planet turn.
I stood bereft beside my gate.
Behind me, those I loved slept warm,
Protected by God's endless grace.
Below me lay the village streets,
Clad in shadow's chill embrace.
The darkness waned, the morning loomed,
Within my house the fire grew bright.
But still I walked on fragile snow,
And prayed for greater light.
As a child I'd lived in dreams of stars,
Of peace on Earth --life's golden seal--
And this night seemed, of all our nights,
The one when all such dreams were real.
Tonight I know this is not so.
The world is not as we would wish,
But as we make it, day by day,
And this the mystery and the gift.
The candles whisper of His gift.
The stars reflect them high above.
The gift is given to us again,
That we remember how to love.
-- Mill Hill Drive, Southport, Connecticut, 1990
In principio erat Verbum et Verbum erat apud Deum et Deus erat Verbum.
Continued...
Memphis, Tenn., Aug. 16. I could be in the driver's seat.
Tag? I'm it? Okay, I'll play.
The Anchoress prays unto the Lord, as she will, Lord, how dull I am!, because self-abnegation is a way of life! (Hair shirt? Check. Scourge? Check. Communion Wine? Make it a double.) And then she passes on this virus to me.
“It’s simple. Just list all the jobs you’ve had in your life, in order. Don’t bust your brain: no durations or details are necessary, and feel free to omit anything that you feel might tend to incriminate you. I’m just curious. And when you’re done, tag another five bloggers you’re curious about.”
Fine. I'll do it, but only because the Anchoress is Sister Mary Nunsense in my book and I don't want my knuckles slapped with her ruler.
My jobs, in order, were:
Continued...
.... in more dire need of a bright red ball gag than any gay man in history?
I mean, given all the talented, intelligent, stylish, and attractive gay men in America, is this walking spawn of Gumby and Elmer Fudd really the best gays can do in terms of a "spokesman?" Can't some gay American be found with enough clout to tell Frank to "put a ball gag in it?" I mean, someone other than Keith Olbermann?
Continued...Every time I think I have seen just how deeply the pinheads of Seattle can suck, they yet suck more deeply.
Seattle refuses to use salt; roads "snow packed" by design | Seattle Times Newspaper
The icy streets are the result of Seattle's refusal to use salt, an effective ice-buster used by the state Department of Transportation and cities accustomed to dealing with heavy winter snows. "If we were using salt, you'd see patches of bare road because salt is very effective," Alex Wiggins, chief of staff for the Seattle Department of Transportation, said. "We decided not to utilize salt because it's not a healthy addition to Puget Sound."We note for the enlightenment of Mr. Wiggins, aka "Putz," that Puget Sound is 1) vast, and 2) composed entirely of salt water.
Upon receiving this, my correspondent replied: "Unbelievable. Well, at least something is finally uniting the country."
The World From Above: The Beauty Of Aerial Photography @ Smashing Magazine
- Bush Economic Downturn Engulfs Entire Universe: Dark Energy Found Stifling Growth In Universe
... and Squeeze Until They Say "Yes, Massa."
Continued...
Sung by the Gloucester Cathedral Choir. Lyrics by Christina Rossetti:
A Substantial Stocking Stuffer: Nokia's "2 Rights in 1." Just the thing for those among your friends and family who like to shoot their mouths off.
VIA: Strategy Page
A direct descendant from this stealthy weapon:
The Burning of the Bull: An Emblem for the Year of Our Lord, 2008 -- A bull sarcophagus in which a member of the Ubud royal family was cremated burns during the funeral ceremony Tuesday July 15, 2008 in Ubud, Bali, Indonesia. - 2008 in photographs @ The Big Picture
- Against Assisted Suicide: "What manner of sentient being seeks to facilitate its own demise, only to perpetuate the illusion that they control their own lives?"
Physician-assisted suicide is not at all about “death with dignity”, but rather about actively enlisting the culture in support of radical individual autonomy. Not only must we exert full control over the time and manner of our death — which we have always been able to do, by simply killing ourselves — but we demand that society support, honor, and praise this decision, without the faintest whiff of criticism or condemnation. It is not sufficient that we be able to kill ourselves. Rather, it is necessary that we actively kill those societal sensibilities and strictures which condemn such a choice as morally misguided and potentially destructive to our human dignity and our social fabric. - The Doctor Is In [This entire essay is a powerful argument against our secular society of perpetual indulgence which I commend to all.]
- The 40-Year Scam Continues: Climate science has come to this: We are now being told, in effect, to ignore the data and believe the hypothesis. - American Thinker: Climate Crisis = Logic Crisis
Continued...
Just the thing for trimming the tree. And disposing of it afterwards. Ornamentgranate - Deko-Objekte - DaWanda
A bull sarcophagus in which a member of the Ubud royal family was cremated burns during the funeral ceremony Tuesday July 15, 2008 in Ubud, Bali, Indonesia. - 2008 in photographs (part 2 of 3) @ The Big Picture
- Your tax dollars not working: Another reason to loathe the EPA -- EPA Goes Man-Hunting VIA JunkScience: "The list’s creation seems a furtherance of the Greens’ larger campaign to plant the idea within the public’s mind that all environmental “transgressions” fall along a criminal continuum."
- Beautiful and moving: Laundry and Life: A Solstice Meditation @ The Task at Hand "When I was a child, helping to hang summer laundry was all taste and smell and sound - the rough woody dryness of clothespins in my mouth, the sweetness of clover crushed by bare feet, freshening breezes snapping towels to warn of building afternoon storms."
Continued...
Drill. Here. Drill. Now. Legalize. Marijuana.
Who says there's no good news about Bernie Madoff?
"Madoff, single-handedly, has done more harm to the Progressive cause than almost anyone yet realizes. And, that's because The JEHT Foundation, one of the leading providers of grants for all things Progressive, has just abruptly announced they're shutting their doors at the end of January as a result of having come to the realization that they've lost virtually all their money because it was all under Madoff's management." -- Daily Kos: State of the Nation [VIA The Belmont Club's They Got Took, which notes: "'Activists' have a curious relationship with money. They don’t make it, but they need to spend it. They need what they loathe. What can I tell you?"]Less money=Less Mischief. Unless the O-Admin launches a bailout for Progressive Charities. Wait for it.
"It was Orville’s turn. At 10:34 on the windy morning of December 17, he piloted Flyer for a distance of 120 feet in 12 seconds." -- Humankind Takes Flight: The Wright Brothers at Kitty Hawk, 105 Years Ago Today
Bill Dyszel shoots and scores with the scathing Morbid Major Magazine Song As a book and magazine writer, editor, and agent for over 30 years I can attest to the fact that there's nothing but the adamantine truth in this song.
Continued...
Click to enlarge
Let's review:
Victory? Check.
U.S. Debt? Check.
Inflation? Check.
Labor? Check.
China? Check.
Europe? Check.
Farm Prices? Check.
Russia? Check.
Congress No Good? Check.
Housing? Check.
Price Controls? Check.
Cost of Living? Check.
Budget? Check.
Job Seekers? Check.
Socialized Medicine? Check.
Deserving Democrats? Check and double-check.
As seen by Pulitzer Prize winning editorial cartoonist Jay Norwood "Ding" Darling on November 16, 1948. Browse Ding's other work HERE
In what can be considered the final death blow to counterculture, a prominent rolling paper company that caters to the unskilled smoker who doesn't care about thick paper and too much glue, has filed a trademark infringement lawsuit against an obscure apparel company for this obvious Obama t-shirt parody. They're claiming the brand will be exposed to "to criticism and scorn," since some might make an association between pot smoking, Bambu, and the President-elect.Who could possibly be into smoking, dope, message t-shirts and supporting Obama at the same time?
UPDATE: Special nostalgic look back at the Campaign That Was. Ah, those were the days, my friend. We thought they'd never end.
"Barack Obama: There Will Be Bamboozling"
1,000 Pictures of New York City .
The archives he retains will, invariably, be merely personal -- clippings from the local papers, a box of business cards, filched matchbooks, a sheaf of menus, random pay stubs, a well-thumbed Rolodex, and a few albums filled with pictures of friends and acquaintances remembered with varying degrees of accuracy. And his snapshots.
They will be snapshots of his personal celebrations; the birthdays, anniversaries, shared summer houses, days in the park and nights on the town. He'll be in some of them. Friends will proliferate in others. And the city will persist, implied, either in the background or intruding in the middle distance; like the air, unnoticed until absent. When you leave her, this is what you will carry away. It will fit in a medium-sized cardboard box. We've all packed this box. Mine was labeled, "New York."
Like the lies of false and faithless love, your memory of the city will fade long before the snapshots in the box. True, they fade slowly -- pushed into the mist by other days and other scenes -- but fade they do. And so you will find yourself pretending, long after she has gone to seed and faded into the smoke of the world, that you still know what she looks like, and how you felt, when you lived with her through all those bright days and white nights.
Continued...
Fewless numbering, more better grammer please. [VIA: Art and Installations from Money | WebUrbanist]
Donald Sensing @ Sense of Events shoots and scores with Hitler hates cussing.
Make sure you have captions turned on by clicking the small up-arrow in the far lower right of the Youtube box and clicking on "CC." And wait for the penultimate line, it kills.
From the Governor's Gazette, Dated November 12 (VIA Blago-Gate Timeline (@ Verum Serum)
- Light Reading for the Lightworker: It's About the Money!: How You Can Get Out of Debt, Build Wealth, and Achieve Your Financial Dreams: Jesse Rev Jackson, Jesse Jr Jackson: Books
"Living in capitalism without understanding the role of money is like a fish that doesn't know how to navigate water," they write. "In our modern economy, capital is the equivalent of water to fields. With it comes the possibility of growth, without it little can survive." [VIA: The indispensible Brutally Honest.]
"I did not have interpersonal relations with that man, Governor Blagojevich." - Bloodthirsty Liberal
The story that put the lie to the No-O & Blogo Meeting was discovered yesterday. Once discovered it promptly disappeared down the memory hole at News : KHQA. Seeing that it had vanished I searched for it in Google Cache and, sure enough, there it was. For about an hour and then cached page vanished as well. A second story from the same source confirming the meeting also met the same fate.
But, fearing something like the erasure of the cached page, I made a screen shot. Here it is:
Continued...At least he didn't emulate Jimmy Carter by saying, "I'll never lie to you." Indeed, this whole administration is shaping up to be a paraphrase of Mary McCarthy's “Every word he says is a lie, including and and the.” Still they'll look to find a reason to believe.
- Fantasyland Bill Comes Due:
Americans spent the 1990s in a fantasy world, where technological change supposedly would transform the human condition, taking as their intellectual guide science-fiction writers like William Gibson. There was nothing wrong with the market mechanism as such; what went haywire was the childish imaginings of the American public.
Underlying the crisis is the Western world's repudiation of life, through a hedonism that puts consumption or "self-realization" ahead of child-rearing. The developed world is shifting from a demographic profile in which the very young (children four years and under) outnumbered the elderly (65 and older), to a profile with 10 times as many retirees as children aged four or younger. Economics simply never has had to confront a situation in which the next generation simply failed turn up. - Spengler @ Asia Times Online
- On Gay Out Day, gays need to expand protest locations: "Get your ass down to those "other" parts of town where you don`t brunch – and give those blacks and Mexicans a piece of your mind. And when you`re done with that – confront the Muslims, who cling to a religion that`s not only against you marrying – but living too!" -The Daily Gut
- Liberal Bigots United: A Commonplace Blog: Why the university is dominated by the Left
The more interesting question is why the Left dominates the social sciences and humanities. To answer that question might produce the reason there are so few conservatives in the academy. (Could it possbily be that the Leftists in charge of hiring decisions won’t hire them?)
Do ya think?
Continued...
"The past is prologue"
An Obama aide, speaking on the condition of anonymity, took back David Axelrod's remark last month that Barack Obama and Rod Blagojevich had spoken recently. "What the president-elect said today is correct, David Axelrod misspoke," the aide said. -Ben Smith - Politico.com
These are early days. The Obama Administration will not start for another six weeks, and it is already building scenery for an opera worthy of "All the King's Men." We do know the end of the first act: Obama takes the oath of office, and the orchestra frantically signals trouble ahead. - Untouchable - What's News Tonight by John BatchelorContinued...
At length corruption, like a general flood,
Did deluge all; and avarice creeping on,
Spread, like a low-born mist, and hid the sun.
Statesmen and patriots plied alike the stocks,
Peeress and butler shared alike the box;
And judges jobbed, and bishops bit the town,
And mighty dukes packed cards for half-a-crown:
Britain was sunk in lucre’s sordid charms.—Pope.
"The state of matters all over the country was so alarming, that George I. shortened his intended stay in Hanover, and returned in all haste to England. He arrived on the 11th of November, and parliament was summoned to meet on the 8th of December. In the mean time, public meetings were held in every considerable town of the empire, at which petitions were adopted, praying the vengeance of the legislature upon the South-Sea directors, who, by their fraudulent practices, had brought the nation to the brink of ruin.
"Nobody seemed to imagine that the nation itself was as culpable as the South-Sea company. Nobody blamed the credulity and avarice of the people,—the degrading lust of gain, which had swallowed up every nobler quality in the national character, or the infatuation which had made the multitude run their heads with such frantic eagerness into the net held out for them by scheming projectors. These things were never mentioned. The people were a simple, honest, hard-working people, ruined by a gang of robbers, who were to be hanged, drawn, and quartered without mercy." -- From Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, Volume I, by Charles Mackay, 1852
Six thousand years ago, a mother and two children died at the same time and were buried here holding hands. Someone obviously cared a great deal, as the scientist found that flowers were placed above and below the bodies. It is not yet known how they died. - Green Sahara - The Big Picture - Boston.com
- "When a ghost shows up, you don't ignore him because you don't like the clothes he's wearing." Sippican Cottage: Delmer's A Haunt, Still
- Ze Varmink up ub der Globe:Ecomyths explains it all to you:
Warming is evidence of global warming. Cooling does not mean that global warming is not happening, just that it hasn't yet...but it might, still..and then the theory will be right again...except if its not, and then it will be because something has temporarily interfered with the theory working, like cooling, but that doesn't mean the cooling has replaced the warming -- its just hiding it, for now. We know this because the models tell us. Can't be anything else happening like the sun, the oceans or any of that stuff. Why? Well, because that's why.
- Who says there's no good news? Your daily digest of newspaper extinction news
Continued...
You do not want to watch this. Move along. Nothing to see here....
Continued...I've known a few suicides, but none of them ever seemed to require "assistance" once their minds were made up. One or two tries, maybe. But sooner or later, they got it done. Perhaps "Suicide Assistants" can be a new career path for some of those 2.5 million folks Obama wants to find jobs for.
Being left-handed makes this move a natural:
The Step-Through Move
To execute this move do the following:
Come to a one-count stop.
Fake a jump shot.
If you want to go to the left, take a quick step to the side of the defender with your right foot. Protect the ball as you go toward the hoop....You might even get a power lay-up by faking to the middle, then executing a quick drop step with the baseline foot, then, power it up. - How to teach and coach one-on-one basketball moves
Gun’s N’ Girls "SPF-30? Check. Towel? Check. Sunglasses? Check? M-16? Check. Everything a girl needs for a day in the sun at Camp Victory, Baghdad." [VIA: Stop The ACLU + Morgan ]
- Who says there's no good news?
"Lawyers and financial advisers have reported a 50 per cent increase in the number of divorce inquiries since the financial markets collapsed in September.... Like a frog, the Toxic Wife needs to hop safely on to another lily pad, and a rich one, before leaving her husband. She won't stand on her own two feet. And finding a job is quite beneath her.... As the joke doing the rounds among City men goes: 'This credit crunch is worse than a divorce. I've lost half my net worth and I still have a wife.'" -- Recession: When the money goes, so does the toxic wife - Telegraph
- Doing the jobs illegal aliens won't do: Picking apples with a robot "Two teams of researchers at CMU are developing automated farming robotic systems to help apple and orange growers."
Continued...
Fishermen's Terminal - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Centered around a memorial for over 500 local fisherman who were lost at sea
The Walrus Blogs » A Conversation with Lynda Barry » Four-Colour Words
I just thought, âI still want to make this book that Iâve been wanting to make since Sasquatch dropped me,â so I thought, âJust make it. Just start.â And again I had that idea about doing this book about writing, but the idea of writing about writing, doing a book that was about writing with writing in it, was something that was so different than my class. I wanted to give some kind of visual equivalent to the class that I teach, so I just started messing around and making collagesâand actually there are many, many more than are in this book. And while I would work I would just hear these little things, like, âWhat would be different if there were no monster stories? Anything?â And thatâs all Iâd have to have and then I could start messing around.
This track is From a TV show called 'Quest' shown on CBC TV, Canada, Feb 1, 1964
I saw a newborn baby with wild wolves all around it
I saw a highway of diamonds with nobody on it,
I saw a black branch with blood that kept drippin',
I saw a room full of men with their hammers a-bleedin',
I saw a white ladder all covered with water,
I saw ten thousand talkers whose tongues were all broken,
I saw guns and sharp swords in the hands of young children...
- The Economics of Too Big to Fail by Bruce Kesler @ Maggie's Farm
The answer that comes from our politicians, who see their pet programs and their contributors as too big to be allowed to fail, is to increase our debts through formerly unimaginable greater deficit spending, piling multitudes of new debt upon the existing. That is a prescription for delay, at best, of a far worse reckoning.
- Islamic Space Punks: Iran plans to "Launch Animals to Space" but some kids in England have already sent Teddy Bears Into Space VIA Universe Today
Michael Yon has the rest and a full PDF HERE
Michael Yon has the rest and a full PDF of the agreement HERE
THE OLD PINE BOX is pleased to be able to offer a special line of coffins in support of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. Designed by the folks at PETA and built exclusively by THE OLD PINE BOX, these coffins allow you to voice your defense of all creatures even after your own voice is silenced. Every coffin purchased from this selection will result in a net contribution of $75.00 to PETA. - About The Old Pine Box
Via the eversharp copyranter: Peta coffins.
[First published: October, 2003 ]
Sections of "The First Terrorist War"
1. Calling the War By the Right Name.
2. Not Process But Victory Restores Freedom
3. Playing for Time is Playing to Lose
4. The Goal of Radical Islam is Our Destruction
5. The War of Two Religions
6. The Unspoken Role of the Ballistic Missile Submarines
7. Avoiding the Islamic War by Winning the Terrorist War
"[Arabs] were incorrigibly children of the idea, feckless and colour-blind, to whom body and spirit were for ever and inevitably opposed. Their mind was strange and dark, full of depressions and exaltations, lacking in rule, but with more of ardour and more fertile in belief than any other in the world. They were a people of starts, for whom the abstract was the strongest motive, the process of infinite courage and variety, and the end nothing. They were as unstable as water, and like water would perhaps finally prevail." -- T. E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom
1. Calling the War By the Right Name.
In a war, "Know your enemy" is one of the first axioms in formulating a strategy for victory. It is an axiom the United States has ignored for over two seven years. Instead we’ve seen a host of euphemisms and slogans thrown up in the belief that, having had many decades of a life where ugly things are given pretty or neutral names, Americans can no longer "bear very much reality."
In the years between September. 2001 and today, the public has had little asked of it and seen nothing happen on our soil that alarms it. All is quiet on the western front.
Foggy thinking, attractive in politics, means defeat in war. War requires "a mind of winter;" a mind that is precise, cold, and unrelenting. War requires that we call things what they are and cease to skirt issues that make us, "uncomfortable." Vague names create fluffy policies, hamstrung strategies, and wishful thinking. This is where we are drifting.
Continued...(Number between 5 and 50) + of the + (Country / World / Solar System / Galaxy / Universe)'s + (cool- most- best- worst- fun-)est + ( Subject) = Digger attention span.
- ROFL MAO! R U SERIUS? A British doctor volunteering in DR Congo used text message instructions from a colleague to perform a life-saving amputation on a boy.
- "Unfortunately the tourists can still smell the BS from the Congress." Reid: We won't smell the tourists anymore "My staff tells me not to say this, but I'm going to say it anyway," said Reid in his remarks. "In the summer because of the heat and high humidity, you could literally smell the tourists coming into the Capitol. It may be descriptive but it's true."
- Bet on "stupid" and keep them that way: RIGHTWINGSPARKLE does the numbers on How Obama got elected. Moral: "Be informed and watch Fox News."
"I told you I had a pony in here."
Found at Tastes Funny: 1916 | Shorpy Photo Archive
"Arabs could be swung on an idea as on a cord; for the unpledged allegiance of their minds made them obedient servants. None of them would escape the bond till success had come, and with it responsibility and duty and engagements. Then the idea was gone and the work ended--in ruins. Without a creed they could be taken to the four corners of the world (but not to heaven) by being shown the riches of earth and the pleasures of it; but if on the road, led in this fashion, they met the prophet of an idea, who had nowhere to lay his head and who depended for his food on charity or birds, then they would all leave their wealth for his inspiration.
"They were incorrigibly children of the idea, feckless and colour-blind, to whom body and spirit were for ever and inevitably opposed. Their mind was strange and dark, full of depressions and exaltations, lacking in rule, but with more of ardour and more fertile in belief than any other in the world. They were a people of starts, for whom the abstract was the strongest motive, the process of infinite courage and variety, and the end nothing.
"They were as unstable as water, and like water would perhaps finally prevail. Since the dawn of life, in successive waves they had been dashing themselves against the coasts of flesh. Each wave was broken, but, like the sea, wore away ever so little of the granite on which it failed, and some day, ages yet, might roll unchecked over the place where the material world had been, and God would move upon the face of those waters. One such wave (and not the least) I raised and rolled before the breath of an idea, till it reached its crest, and toppled over and fell at Damascus. The wash of that wave, thrown back by the resistance of vested things, will provide the matter of the following wave, when in fullness of time the sea shall be raised once more." - T. E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom
Glitch:
Please help! I took my husband's i-phone and found a raunchy picture of him attached to an e-mail to a woman in his sent e-mail file (a Yahoo account). When I approached him about this (I think that he is cheating on me) he admitted that he took the picture but says that he never sent it to anyone. He claims that he went to the Genius Bar at the local Apple store and they told him that it is an i-phone glitch: that photos sometimes automatically attach themselves to an e-mail address and appear in the sent folder, even though no e-mail was ever sent. Has anyone ever heard of this happening? The future of my marriage depends on this answer! - Apple - Support - Discussions - Pictures automatically attach to e-mail? ...
"You can fool all of the people some of the time; you can fool some of the people all of the time; and that should be enough for most purposes." - From Minims by Tom Weller. [Note: Long ago I was the editor for this wonderful book. Glad to see it has survived being out of print and is still being pointed to today by distinguished pages such as Drawn. ]
- "It is there we must go. Sooner or later, it is there we must go."
We are going about this the wrong way. We treat symptoms rather than disease. We goafter men when we should be going after addresses. Behind every Islamic killer there is a nation. We have long known their names -- Syria, Iran, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan. These dismal places are the factories of terror and blood. Wherever you find hordes of dead Westerners and slaughtered Jews you will find the footprints of one of these regimes. The Return of Scipio
Time: 1964. "I'll let you be in my dreams if I can be in yours."
Power of suggestion wielded by Ars Psychiatrica
Continued...
Photograph by Shevill Mathers @ The Southern Cross Observatory
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Mitt did it all wrong
Instead of wasting his time learning how business works and building a multi-billion-dollar company that really did save or create hundreds of thousands of jobs, Mitt should have lived off his daddy's fortune like Jack Kennedy. Chasing skirts and molesting teenage virgin is a lot more fun than figuring out how to revive an old business. Instead, Mitt Romney gave his inheritance to charity. Who does that anymore? -- ｫ Don Surber
PermaLinkYup, not a teaspoon of testosterone from toenail to topknot
Obama said, before energetically pumping a compressor and shooting the marshmallow gun, invented by 14-year-old Joey Hudy. Obama watched open-mouthed as the candy shot across the room before crashing into the wall near the entrance to the Red Room, an elegant state parlor which stuffed with rare 19th century French furniture.The man who "got" Bin Laden. Yeah, right.
Landlord's Nuts
The person went feral. Back into a state of nature. It's the hunter-gatherer Eden ruined by Western Civilization that we're told we need to go back to that's on display here. She was living off the land. When the land is covered with stripmalls, pizza and Diet Pepsi represents the nuts and berries. --Sippican Cottage: So You Want To Be A Landlord
The Vile Monsters of Planned Parenthood and Their Hostages
And it's known throughout the country as an implacable and aggressive opponent of any meaningful restrictions on deliberate feticide.... Breast-cancer victims are only the latest hostages taken by Planned Parenthood. Unless the organization is finally held to account, they will surely not be the last. --Robert George and Carter Snead: - WSJ.com
A double whammy on the dumb class.
The cognitively inferior need stringently enforced social codes in order to stay on the straight and narrow. So what has happened over the past several decades is that the cream of the crop are leaving the areas where dumb people reside, and the voice of morality has diminished. This is a double whammy on the dumb class. --Folgers ｫ Gucci Little Piggy
Ten West of COFAX
Me- Ok, this is not a stable approach. Let's go around and try it again. He says something that makes me laugh... Now? Me- Yes, now... Go around. -- Flight Level 390:
View from the Land of NO-Money
Total United States currency (paper and electronic entries in reserve accounts) sums to about $2 trillion. The national debt sums to over $14 trillion. If people ever really suspected that the U.S. monetary printing press was broken, there would be the mother of all bank runs. Bond holders would redeem their U.S. debt instead of rolling it over. Savers would hold tightly to any real currency. --Europe's Wile E. Coyote Moment
Not a dry fly in the house
The Choice: A Scion or a Bastard
They will elect either a candidate with a famous father or with no father. The surviving serious contenders—Barack Obama, Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney—all exemplify one of these two categories. For the seventh consecutive election, the winning candidate will be either a privileged prince with an adored, powerful patriarch, or an up-from-nothing scrapper with no relationship with his biological dad. -- Michael Medved: Presidential Fathers and Sons - WSJ.com
Gay Choice? Yet More "Settled Science" That Is Becoming Unsettled
who were very loosely defined as “exclusively or mostly” homosexual. He claimed to find a pattern in a specific region of the X chromosome that such brothers seemed to disproportionately share. This was widely trumpeted in the media as the landmark discovery of a “gay gene.” But Hamer and others failed to subsequently replicate his results. In fact, a 1999 Canadian study contradicted them. Hamer is a gay man who has reportedly stated he hoped his research would help end intolerance toward homosexuals. He also later claimed he’d discovered the “God gene,” so take whatever he says with a grain of DNA. --Homosexuality: What’s Choice Got to Do With it? - Taki's Magazine
Beardski: Just the Thing for the Coming Global Ice Age
Have you ever wondered where your Flying Car is, now that you live in the Age of the Jetson’s, dear reader?
When civilization abandoned institutional Christianity for liberalism, then abandoned Christian notions of decency and individualism for socialism, and then abandoned Christian notions of chivalry and truth for political correctness, and then abandoned Christian notions of the objectivity of truth, beauty and virtue for the roaring abyss of nihilism, civilization lost the engine and motive of its progress. When you stopped calling yourself sons of God and started calling yourself naked apes, you stopped climbing Jacob’s Ladder toward the angels, and slumped instead toward the jungle where Nature red in tooth and claw holds reign. -- Futurism and Shoepiles | John C. Wright's Journal
Where Christian virtues fail
"May I suggest that this is not a rejection of the Tea Party,"
Inside The Ridiculously Complicated Process Of Buying A Super Bowl Ad
And now football, like Madonna, is over...
"Then there's the other Republican Party. "
that can be settled amicably behind closed doors. It is uninterested in bipartisan great compromisers, it seeks fighters who will stand up for its agenda. It is not interested in the progressive voyage to the national future that has been taken up by both parties, what it would like is independence from their reign of policy terror. It would like to roll back the progressive policymaking of both parties. --Sultan Knish a blog by Daniel Greenfield RTWT!
Piltdown Man: Another Case in Which "The Science Is Settled"
those shards of skull were part of a scientific scam that completely fooled leading palaeontologists. For decades they believed they were the remains of a million-year-old apeman, an individual who possessed a large brain but primitive jawbone and teeth. --Piltdown Man: British archaeology's greatest hoax The Observer
"If you were an Iranian subscriber to the Post who works at Iran's "Interests Section" inside the Pakistani embassy in Washington, what would be your considered judgment? "
I think you'd end up saying: "We can't compete with the Krauthammers. They are better than us at putting together words. Therefore we can't guarantee that the ruling class in Washington won't work itself into another frenzy like it did in 2003 and do something stupid. So, we'd better get ourselves a few nukes as a deterrent." --Steve Sailer's iSteve Blog: The Great Game ain't so great anymore
The Summing Up
Citizens of Slab City
soul-searching Gypsy Kids who arrive by train with little more than the ragged clothes on their back, Spaz Kids and their electro-psychedelic outdoor parties, and Scrappers who risk life and limb to collect shrapnel from the gunnery range that flanks the camp, where Navy SEAL teams train year-round (and where rumor has it they prepared for the Osama bin Laden raid). That's to say nothing of the rowdy bikers who pass through, or the meth-addled loners on the outer edges inclined to greet a trespasser with a gunshot. -- Slab City: Living Off the Grid in California's Badlands
Big Wind: For Dummies, Chumps, and Greens
it becomes very difficult to support big wind power on any basis whatsoever. Unless, of course, you are a big developer or investor in government subsidised wind farms. In that case, there are $billions to be made, without the need to provide any useful power to the public, whatsoever. A neat scam, if you can live with yourself. Just ask Warren Buffett. --Al Fin Energy:
"There are new monsters in America, and I am starting to wonder whether I am to be considered among them: "
the never deserving of respect ones, the Vegas junketeers, the Super Bowl jet setters, the tuition stealers, the faux-Christians who do not pay higher taxes, the too much income makers, the tormenters of autistic children, the polluters, the enemies deserving of punishment, the targets to bring a gun against, the faces to get in front of, the limb-loppers, the tonsil pullers, the fat cats, the corporate jet owners, the one-percenters, the stupidly acting, the not paying their fair sharers, the discriminators on the âway you lookâ, the alligator raisers and moat builders, the vote deniers, the clingers, the typical something persons, the hunters of kids at ice cream parlors, the stereotypers and profilers, the cowards, the lazy and soft, the non-spreaders of money, the not my people people, the Tea party racists, the not been perfect and mistake makers, the disengaged and the dictating, the not the time to profiteers, the ones who did not know when to quit making money, and on and on. My God, man, how did Barack Obama & Co. conjure up so many demons? -- Works and Days » Are You "Them"?
Even a Nun Might Say, "Jesus Christ it's cold in Europe!"
And the Sammy Hager Award Goes to McCain for "You Idiots, Get Out of My Way!"
but evidently they’re issuing drivers licenses to people too stupid to understand that rule, who are probably also too stupid to figure out that passing a semi-truck might require use of the accelerator pedal. (Trust me, idiot: It’s down there on the floorboard of your car, probably somewhere on the right side.) If there were any justice in the world, state troopers wouldn’t be laying radar traps for guys doing 82 mph in a 65 mph zone, but would instead be issuing tickets to slow-moving idiots who take more than a few seconds to pass a semi-truck. -- Hate Hoax Busted by Cop’s Dash-Cam (Also: You Idiots, Get Out of My Way!) : The Other McCain
"Spoiler alert! Living in San Francisco with her gay male BFF blogging the existential ennui of being unmarried was my tip-off."
Change is nothing but the status quo
considering how predictable change has become. (Does anyone dispute at this point that, for example, gay marriage will soon be legalized, most likely by the courts?) Political action must address this change, must figure out where it stands relative to that change and act accordingly; if it limits itself to addressing the present, it may end up misdirecting its energy, addressing issues that will soon resolve themselves by pure inertia and ignoring issues for which the direction that inertia will eventually drive them in has not yet been decided. --Anonymous admits its irrelevance
The One-Check Education Bill in the United States
If Newt wasn't steeped in envy, spite, and self-pity he wouldn't have to empty his drool cup so often
"They outspent me five to one to quote destroy Newt Gingrich?" Gingrich said in an interview on CNN's "The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer." "You know, I think that doesn't deserve congratulations. I think that's reprehensible, I think it's dishonest, and I think it's shameful." --Gingrich: Romney didn’t deserve congrats – CNN Political TickerSigh. The person who doesn't deserve congrats for the regularly scheduled destruction of Newt Gingrich is.... Newt Gingrich!
Strange Apparatus
Nerd Valentines
The Dead Cities of Syria
Between the cities of Aleppo and Hama there is a limestone massif and it is here these ancient settlements were built by their once prosperous peoples. The area is about thirty kilometers in width yet is several times longer – extending to almost 140 kilometers in length.... An extensive and fascinating photo essay @ Kuriositas
10-Year-Old Accidentally Creates New Molecule in Science Class
to visualize simple molecules to his fifth-grade class. But Clara put the carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen atoms together in a particular complex way and asked Boehr if she'd made a real molecule. Boehr, to his surprise, wasn't sure. So he photographed the model and sent it over to a chemist friend at Humboldt State University who identified it as a wholly new but also wholly viable chemical. -- | Popular Science
In which Warren Buffet wraps up his national tour of intellectual drooling and presidential fellatio with bunny ears
The ritual ends with a photo shoot. Each student gets to take two pictures with Mr. Buffett. The first one is a serious shot, the second is a funny pose of their choosing.Would the ritual ended with sepaku for the hilariously named "Sage of Omaha."
If he's talking about prayer we know he's lying. On the other hand....
Obama: 'I have fallen on my knees with great regularity' - Investors.com
Record 1.2 Million People Fall Out Of Labor Force In One Month, Labor Force Participation Rate Tumbles To Fresh 30 Year Low
So as the labor force increased from 153.9 million to 154.4 million, the non institutional population increased by 242.3 million meaning, those not in the labor force surged from 86.7 million to 87.9 million. Which means that the civilian labor force tumbled to a fresh 30 year low of 63.7% as the BLS is seriously planning on eliminating nearly half of the available labor pool from the unemployment calculation. -- | ZeroHedge
Caesar Commands the Jews Eat Pork, Quakers Join Army, Amish Get i-Pods, Christians Burn Incense
Kinder, Gentler Embroidery
O’Sullivan’s First Law: Any institution that is not explicitly right wing will become left wing over time.
It is a fresh reminder that the left fully absorbed and adapted the Brezhnev Doctrine: once they capture an institution, they aren't giving it up. How dare a private foundation stop coughing up the dough. It explains why "diversity" means conformity to liberal views in newsrooms, college faculties, and Hollywood studios. It's why the left reacts with howls of outrage every time you propose reducing taxpayer funding for NPR and PBS, even as the left disingenuously argues that NPR and PBS receive only a "tiny" amount of tax subsidy. It should also remind us how the left will fight every battle to shrink government like it was Verdun. Which suggests one obvious conclusion if you're an incoming Romney Administration: go big. Go after everything at once. -- | Power Line
DIANA WEST: An Interesting, In-Depth Interview
Diana West, discusses her weekly online column syndicated in over 100 newspapers nationwide. She writes about cultural and political issues from a self-described conservative viewpoint. She talks about some themes in her columns, including the spread of Islamic law throughout formerly non-Islamic areas of the western world and her opposition to the war in Afghanistan.
"Every day we see people championing the pathetic in journalistic essays:"
No one champions the simple strivers, those who take care of themselves and in the process alleviate society of one more charity case, and along the way create wealth via 'gains from trade' implicit in market transactions. A simple prosperous mensch who does not hypocritically claim he primarily works for others is off the radar, implicitly insulting to any intellectual making considerably less than him. The kind of change Murray is talking about will not happen until productive, successful people again feel pride in their distinguishing learned characteristics, including the willingness to shame people who do not have them. -- Falkenblog: Charles Murray Reiterates Willpower
Poor Mitt Romney
I would suspect he has actually done more for the poor than anyone else in the presidential sweepstakes, by virtue of the tithes he has paid to his church and the whopping taxes he has actually paid. While we might carp and squeal about his tax rates, the actual amount of cabbage he has forked over in his career to the federal government must cover a sizable acreage indeed, and we assume that even given the spectacular ineptitude of that same government in distributing assistance to the needy without leakages of Mississippi dimensions into various private spillways and sluice gates, a fair amount of Mitt's earnings must have found its way into the pockets of the deserving. -- | The Daily Cannibal
Commenters Can Be Really Mean
2:00 PM: Golf with Plouffe
5:00 PM: Dinner with the wookie
6:00 PM: Sneak a cigarette
6:15 PM: Watch Oprah on Tivo
8:00 PM: Smoke a joint and have sex with a male campaign staffer
8:05 PM: Done with sex
8:10 PM: Watch the wookie scarf down everything in the White House refrigerator
9:00 PM: Hold the wookie's head as she "purges" her snack
9:30 PM: Watch Ray Maddow fantasize about sex with him
10:00 PM: Pass out
This is the ghetto way of life.
The ones I do are 1) really big-ass black guys with hardcore street cred, 320 pounds and a lot off tattoo chatter on their arm, 2) Mexican psycho dudes with tattoos on their face. See the commonality? Once you etch shit in your face you are telling the world that you have ceased belonging. This is a clear signal of danger. Animals use subtle aromatic spear to ward off predators. Man now uses skin ink. Heavy skin ink. -- Men in East L.A. that scare me ｫ An Unmarried Man
"Fiat, fiat, fiat": Catholics need to declare the president as anathema
Wherefore in the name of God the All-powerful, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, of Blessed Peter, Prince of the Apostles, and of all the saints, in virtue of the power which has been given us of binding and loosing in Heaven and on earth, we deprive Barack Hussain Obama himself and all his accomplices and all his abettors of the Communion of the Body and Blood of Our Lord, we separate him from the society of all Christians, we exclude him from the bosom of our Holy Mother the Church in Heaven and on earth, we declare him excommunicated and anathematized and we judge him condemned to eternal fire with Satan and his angels and all the reprobate, so long as he will not burst the fetters of the demon, do penance and satisfy the Church; we deliver him to Satan to mortify his body, that his soul may be saved on the day of judgment.That would pretty much work for me. What about the Catholics among us?
GRAPH #20
"The news. I don’t watch it and I don’t read it."
has exactly the opposite effect. At best, it only helps us think we know things. Doubtful knowledge. Or doubtable knowledge. Which is a hell of a lot worse because that makes us want to hurry up and make a whole bunch of other people think they know it, too. --How Dead Do I Have to Be? « The Dipso Chronicles
YUMM!: 64 year-old tub of lard still 'fit for consumption'
"There is of course a slight lack of smell and taste," sniffed Frerk Feldhusen,
from the office of agriculture, food safety and fisheries in the eastern state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. However, "all in all, given its level of freshness and its material composition, the product is assessed as satisfactory," Feldhusen said, adding it would stand up to today's definition of being fit for the dinner table. --PhotoBlog -
And then he said, with a straight face, "An Economy Built to Last."
He's going to take ownership of the American economy. Not the real one, but the one he's just made up, "the economy built to last." It won't last long, but long enough. You'd think the best and the brightest would be beyond Mr. Obama's crude populist pitch. You of course would be wrong.... A speech that flopped among Washington's policy sophisticates is soaring out in the country. Republicans had better figure out why. --Henninger: Obama's Maddening, Winning Speech - WSJ.com
Lest We Forget What Day It Is
- Change and Hope for 2009
- Wednesday, December 31 (Updated)
- Coming Soon: The "Kiss It And Make It Better" President
- And now a public service announcement
- Tuesday, December 30 (Updated)
- Let's Hope the Whole Thing Won't Be Reruns of "The West Wing"
- Everything That's Wrong With Us is in This House
- Monday, December 29 (Updated)
- David Warren's selection for "Man of the Year 2008" is: Sarah Palin. Mine Too.
- Wretchard on Mid-East Inc.
- The Reckoning
- In Advance of the Obama Landing Israel Decides to Settle All Family Business
- The 12 Days Of Global Warming
- Friday, December 26
- Quite Simply the Greatest Commercial Ever Made
- Got Home for Christmas by Air? You've Got No Complaints.
- Thursday, Christmas
- Hanukkah Candles on Christmas Eve
- Wednesday, December 24