No, this place is not dead. Well, almost. It's on life-support. I plan to be back soon.
Sunday, February 29, 2004
So Aristide is fleeing Haiti. Is anyone else embarrassed that we put this guy in power?
Saturday, February 28, 2004
Here you go. If that is, you were looking for a site documenting Kerry's antiwar activities.
Some people get it.
For some of the industry’s moguls to deny him employment because they don’t like what he said, or because he made a controversial film, would send a creepy message to the public: that a liberal is someone who will defend to the death your right to agree with him.
There's more of this. It's nice to see someone in the major media realize the hypocrisy on display in regards to The Passion.
For some of the industry’s moguls to deny him employment because they don’t like what he said, or because he made a controversial film, would send a creepy message to the public: that a liberal is someone who will defend to the death your right to agree with him.
There's more of this. It's nice to see someone in the major media realize the hypocrisy on display in regards to The Passion.
Friday, February 27, 2004
Thursday, February 26, 2004
In other news, the local news has reported that the Sheriff of St. Louis County is refusing to issue permits for the time being. Somebody please pink slip this poor fascist.
Whoa. Sgt. Stryker reminds us why we shouldn't vote for Kerry.
This might be good news. New leads in the fight against AIDS.
Wednesday, February 25, 2004
Well, I haven't posted in a little while. A lot's going on in the world. We're still winning the War on Terror. John Kerry has pretty much solidified his position as the Democratic Presidential candidate. More is the pity for them. And Gay Marriage has become front and center in the cultural battle.
I just posted this on a forum I read, and I think it states my case about as well as can be done. So pardon me if I quote myself:
I myself am not a friend of the Gay Marriage movement. But then I'm not an enemy either. I have two problems with what is happening right now.
1) Marriage has been around a hell of a lot longer than our society. Government did not create it; it accommodates it. It is the height of hubris to believe that we can change what has stood for thousands of years.
That being said, if gay marriage were to be implemented by democratic processes: i.e. by a change of opinion in the majority of the citizens in this country, and enacted into law by the legislatures of the various states, I would not stand in the way.
Gay marriage advocates aren't doing that. They know they don't have the votes to win right now, so they're making an end run in the courts rather than fighting for the hearts and minds of the people. I can't abide that.
2) I believe that the main reason this is happening now is because Gay Marriage advocates know that the people most likely to oppose them are distracted. We are AT WAR! This is not the time to be clamoring for social change. Let's save Western Civilization, and then worry about rebuilding it.
I just posted this on a forum I read, and I think it states my case about as well as can be done. So pardon me if I quote myself:
I myself am not a friend of the Gay Marriage movement. But then I'm not an enemy either. I have two problems with what is happening right now.
1) Marriage has been around a hell of a lot longer than our society. Government did not create it; it accommodates it. It is the height of hubris to believe that we can change what has stood for thousands of years.
That being said, if gay marriage were to be implemented by democratic processes: i.e. by a change of opinion in the majority of the citizens in this country, and enacted into law by the legislatures of the various states, I would not stand in the way.
Gay marriage advocates aren't doing that. They know they don't have the votes to win right now, so they're making an end run in the courts rather than fighting for the hearts and minds of the people. I can't abide that.
2) I believe that the main reason this is happening now is because Gay Marriage advocates know that the people most likely to oppose them are distracted. We are AT WAR! This is not the time to be clamoring for social change. Let's save Western Civilization, and then worry about rebuilding it.
Thursday, February 19, 2004
This is just weird. Brown skinheads, polite bigots. What are you gonna do?
Jed Babbin over at NRO has some very interesting info regarding Dubya's National Guard service. Example: Bush volunteered for service in Vietnam and was turned down
Thank God for Instapundit. On a daily basis I find something completely indispensible. And today is not exception. Michael J. Totten rounds up info on the scandal in Britain right now. If you haven't heard of it, several of Britains more prominent left wing government types are revealed to be on the baathist payroll. Hey, and I thought you hated us for free!
So check it out.
So check it out.
Monday, February 16, 2004
You've probably seen it already, but we are winning.
"That when dying and bleeding, beset by the flower of terrorism, with pistol to set against automatic rifle and grenade, the Iraqi police did not ask for help from 82nd Airborne. They asked for ammunition."
"That when dying and bleeding, beset by the flower of terrorism, with pistol to set against automatic rifle and grenade, the Iraqi police did not ask for help from 82nd Airborne. They asked for ammunition."
Slate wonders how the sexual revolution has changed.
Friday, February 13, 2004
This is probably something that should be left in the Better Left Unsaid pile. But it's been a year and we're still arguing over whether we should have gone to war with Iraq.
I think it's time we reversed the question. We should have been asking "Why shouldn't we go to war with Iraq". WMD's aside, Saddam Hussein tops my list of people who will be infinitely improved by death.
I think we can come up with a rule. "If an invasion will kill less people than the current government in place will kill in a similar amount of time, we should go to war."
I think it's time we reversed the question. We should have been asking "Why shouldn't we go to war with Iraq". WMD's aside, Saddam Hussein tops my list of people who will be infinitely improved by death.
I think we can come up with a rule. "If an invasion will kill less people than the current government in place will kill in a similar amount of time, we should go to war."
Thursday, February 12, 2004
Heh, heh, heh. Looks like Kerry got caught with his pants down. DRUDGE of course got the scoop, since the rest of the media has been frantically hoping that anybody else would let the cat out of the bag.
One wonders if this will sink the Kerry candidacy. It probably shouldn't, but it'll be fun to watch the Democrats chew each other up over this.
One wonders if this will sink the Kerry candidacy. It probably shouldn't, but it'll be fun to watch the Democrats chew each other up over this.
Tuesday, February 10, 2004
Colby Cash reviews Robert Heinleins previously unpublished work For Us the Living.
Reading that piece makes me aware that Cash is a fan. For that my heart is warm to him. It also makes it pretty clear that he has only the barest understanding of what RAH was about. The man links Alexei Panshin for Bog's sake!
He seems somewhat surprised that Heinlein, in his first novel, plays with the idea of "social credit", and wonders how the die-hard libertarian firebrand could have fallen into to such a trap. RAH wasn't a libertarian firebrand at the time. In his early years, Heinlein beleived in the same liberalism that informed the Roosevelt administration, and only drifted right as the Left gave up its' fight to stop Communism.
Heck, For Us the Living wasn't even the only RAH novel to use the idea of 'socreds'. He also used the idea in Beyond this Horizon, admittedly not one of his better works.
I haven't read the book yet, which is unusual considering my professed love for RAH, but I've been sunk nose deep in the Aubrey Maturin books lately, and also, I confess to a wee bit of fear. This is the book that Heinlein absolutely refused to have published. I'm a little afraid it won't measure up to his other works.
Reading that piece makes me aware that Cash is a fan. For that my heart is warm to him. It also makes it pretty clear that he has only the barest understanding of what RAH was about. The man links Alexei Panshin for Bog's sake!
He seems somewhat surprised that Heinlein, in his first novel, plays with the idea of "social credit", and wonders how the die-hard libertarian firebrand could have fallen into to such a trap. RAH wasn't a libertarian firebrand at the time. In his early years, Heinlein beleived in the same liberalism that informed the Roosevelt administration, and only drifted right as the Left gave up its' fight to stop Communism.
Heck, For Us the Living wasn't even the only RAH novel to use the idea of 'socreds'. He also used the idea in Beyond this Horizon, admittedly not one of his better works.
I haven't read the book yet, which is unusual considering my professed love for RAH, but I've been sunk nose deep in the Aubrey Maturin books lately, and also, I confess to a wee bit of fear. This is the book that Heinlein absolutely refused to have published. I'm a little afraid it won't measure up to his other works.
Friday, February 06, 2004
Oh, and I got my very first piece of email from this site. Wahoo! So, thanks for stopping by themoe!
Andrew Sullivan points out some more of the Red/Blue divide. Apparently we're not even reading the same books. I'm reading the Aubrey/Maturin novels myself. I don't know about y'all in New York.
I post this because Andrew Sullivan says he posts all the gay issues on his blog because he's trying to bridge the divide with people who don't talk about these sorts of things. That's fine, but it might help if everytime somebody disagreed with him, he wouldn't call them a bigot.
I post this because Andrew Sullivan says he posts all the gay issues on his blog because he's trying to bridge the divide with people who don't talk about these sorts of things. That's fine, but it might help if everytime somebody disagreed with him, he wouldn't call them a bigot.
Tech Central Station is one of the smartest places on the web. It's run by James Glassman, economist, and among others, they had the smarts to hire Glen Reynolds of Instapundit as a columnist.
Frederick Turner identifies what he says as the new dichotomy in the American polity.
A rift is opening at right angles, so to speak, to the old borders of contestation. The rift, I will argue, is not between left and right but between libertarian and communitarian. Or perhaps we could say that in the intellectual absence of the left, an inherent rift in the right is becoming the new locus of debate, and the remnants of the left are having to choose one side or the other.
Signs of realignment are everywhere. The Republicans are accused of creating Big Government, the Democratic Party of being anti-progressive and reactionary. Bill Gates and George Soros, the great capitalists, come out against inherited wealth. Polls of inner-city voters support school vouchers to send minority children to private schools. Bill Joy, the leading-edge technologist, warns in Luddite tones, oddly resembling the Unabomber's, against the dangers of human enslavement to machines. Bill Clinton the liberal leaves office with his major achievement being the abolition of welfare as we know it, under a cloud of scandal about his having been bribed by big business. Samuel Francis, the religious conservative, opposes the involvement of religion in politics, and conservative religious groups oppose President Bush's faith-based services plan. Black educationalists advocate racially segregated black schools. Some conservatives advocate the liberalization of Chinese society by the spread of capitalism through free trade, while other conservatives want to use anti-capitalist tariff barriers to pressure the Chinese into allowing religious freedom. Liberals are divided in the same way, between those who see capitalism as the cure for Chinese political tyranny, and those who see the denial of capitalist privileges as a moral weapon in the cause of human rights. Chronicles, the conservative journal, attacks big business; Fidel Castro wants access to U.S. capitalist markets. Ted Turner, the liberal entrepreneur, gives the U.N. a billion dollars; Jane Fonda is born again. Susan Faludi, the feminist, writes a book praising butch blue-collar committed Dads, literally patriarchs who take charge of their kids. Martha Stewart makes a billion-dollar business out of traditional housework. All your base, as the cant phrase goes, are belong to us.
Read the whole thing, it's pretty good. I've long made the case that all the really interesting arguments in America, are going on entirely in the Right. The Left has pretty much given up leading entirely. They're like that senile old relative that everybody listens to patiently and then promptly ignores.
The Libertarian/Conservative divide is where the real fun is.
Frederick Turner identifies what he says as the new dichotomy in the American polity.
A rift is opening at right angles, so to speak, to the old borders of contestation. The rift, I will argue, is not between left and right but between libertarian and communitarian. Or perhaps we could say that in the intellectual absence of the left, an inherent rift in the right is becoming the new locus of debate, and the remnants of the left are having to choose one side or the other.
Signs of realignment are everywhere. The Republicans are accused of creating Big Government, the Democratic Party of being anti-progressive and reactionary. Bill Gates and George Soros, the great capitalists, come out against inherited wealth. Polls of inner-city voters support school vouchers to send minority children to private schools. Bill Joy, the leading-edge technologist, warns in Luddite tones, oddly resembling the Unabomber's, against the dangers of human enslavement to machines. Bill Clinton the liberal leaves office with his major achievement being the abolition of welfare as we know it, under a cloud of scandal about his having been bribed by big business. Samuel Francis, the religious conservative, opposes the involvement of religion in politics, and conservative religious groups oppose President Bush's faith-based services plan. Black educationalists advocate racially segregated black schools. Some conservatives advocate the liberalization of Chinese society by the spread of capitalism through free trade, while other conservatives want to use anti-capitalist tariff barriers to pressure the Chinese into allowing religious freedom. Liberals are divided in the same way, between those who see capitalism as the cure for Chinese political tyranny, and those who see the denial of capitalist privileges as a moral weapon in the cause of human rights. Chronicles, the conservative journal, attacks big business; Fidel Castro wants access to U.S. capitalist markets. Ted Turner, the liberal entrepreneur, gives the U.N. a billion dollars; Jane Fonda is born again. Susan Faludi, the feminist, writes a book praising butch blue-collar committed Dads, literally patriarchs who take charge of their kids. Martha Stewart makes a billion-dollar business out of traditional housework. All your base, as the cant phrase goes, are belong to us.
Read the whole thing, it's pretty good. I've long made the case that all the really interesting arguments in America, are going on entirely in the Right. The Left has pretty much given up leading entirely. They're like that senile old relative that everybody listens to patiently and then promptly ignores.
The Libertarian/Conservative divide is where the real fun is.
Thursday, February 05, 2004
Of course, none of this is a result of socialized medicine. Never!
Well, another damned dreary day with too much snow to make driving safe, and not enough to keep me off the roads entirely. Winter is pretty and all, but it's prettier when I'm watching it on TV and not when I actually have to get out in the mess.
As I was driving in to work, Rush Limbaugh was playing clips of George Tenet's testimony before the Senate. For I believe the first time, I warmed to the man. He refused to be rolled. He refused to pass the buck, and he forthrightly stated some of the problems that have plagued the intelligence community both before and after September 11. Including how the number of recruits dwindled in the mid-nineties and funding cuts and rules tied the hands of our intelligence agents.
And he flat-out denied that the US was anywhere close to saying there were no WMDs in Iraq.
I'm not going to quote it right now. I need to find a transcript first, and I plan to. It was good stuff.
And go read Lileks (www.lileks.com). He gives Patrick Stewart the what in hell for.
As I was driving in to work, Rush Limbaugh was playing clips of George Tenet's testimony before the Senate. For I believe the first time, I warmed to the man. He refused to be rolled. He refused to pass the buck, and he forthrightly stated some of the problems that have plagued the intelligence community both before and after September 11. Including how the number of recruits dwindled in the mid-nineties and funding cuts and rules tied the hands of our intelligence agents.
And he flat-out denied that the US was anywhere close to saying there were no WMDs in Iraq.
I'm not going to quote it right now. I need to find a transcript first, and I plan to. It was good stuff.
And go read Lileks (www.lileks.com). He gives Patrick Stewart the what in hell for.
If you're reading this, send me an e-mail. It'd be cool to see if anybody has noticed me. salamandyr@hotmail.com
Wednesday, February 04, 2004
This stuff keeps happening.
Now we've found a seven pound block of cyanide salt in Baghdad. And the guy who it belonged to is a top man in Al Quaeda. And people still think we weren't justified in going to war with them.
Now we've found a seven pound block of cyanide salt in Baghdad. And the guy who it belonged to is a top man in Al Quaeda. And people still think we weren't justified in going to war with them.
Andrew Sullivan provided a nice link to a primer on Bush's National Guard performance.
