Good morning.

1. Art and disability.
2. Gaming rent control.
3. Five years.
4. Bulbs.
5. Politics and history and the bear.
6. No pull back from Mr Obama. Surprised, not?
7. Heh.
8. A Confessor.
9. Bears of small brain?
10. Mr Obama and the panthers.
11. The “war as plunder/defence” argument neatly skewered.
12. Muslims in Indonesia.

When a small group led by a charismatic leader does something outrageous in this country to the average American this means little. This sort of thing happens all the time … bringing out examples is likely an exercise best left to the reader. A question that arises is why then does so much of the Islamic world rise up in anger when, say, a wacky pastor in South Florida burns a few books? The reason is in part a reflection of our different political cultures. 

In those countries which are rising up in anger, no such act would transpire without the express order and approval of a governmental (or organized anti-governmental organization, i.e., an insurgency). They are upset that this guy is going this because to them it means that Mr Obama and the US government has decided this is the right thing to do. Or at the very best, if he is doing it, then he has their explicit stamp of approval. It doesn’t matter that he says he thinks it is bad or that any number of us do the same. That is irrelevant because he is being allowed to do it means that their approval and sponsorship is a given. That they protest against his action but allow it is just a demonstration base deception. 

Those places in the world do not have freedom of speech and have never lived in such places or really (as is likely) considered the consequences of a society which defends such. Perhaps part of the problem is that our COIN apparatus (unlike as what pointed as “optimal” in the Petraeus manual) is almost exclusively military … which does in fact control its message and people in a way which our civilian life is not. This might be a big benefit of moving those COIN operations which are pointed as better done by non-military units to be done by actual non-military units. Perhaps the surge would have been best accompanied by 75k civilians in their unruly mess … so that part of the world might come to learn what freedom of speech looks like up close and personal. 

Good morning.

1. Contra fideism. 
2. On the President’s “go after Bay-ner” strategy.
3. Two posts on war, part one and part two.
4. On becoming a monk.
5. Greed.
6. A tax increase plugged by a conservative.
7. Obamacare in action, two notes here and here.
8. On state secrets.
9. Go ahead and burn those Bibles, but the Quran … not so much, eh?
10. Ah, for those days when cookie meant cookie.

From the rust belt, this statement was made (and apparently affirms at some level … of sophistry):

Justin and I both accepted a crucial premise that neither one of us bothered to support: that “marriage” should be a legal institution for any arrangement of people.

Well, there you go, jump that shark along with the Fonz. What might be some of the consequences of that notion:

• Kiss the inheritance tax goodbye, after all just “marry” your beneficiaries for spouses don’t pay that tax. 
• That will really help the power relationship between pimp and his flock now that he can “marry” them and really control their lives with legal machinery at his beck and call. 
• I’d bet a clever lawyer might combine marriage and employment in ways that might be serve as a good union-buster. 
• Or on the flip side, unions could “close shop” to only those in the family and get new ways to enhance their power.
• For the controlling parent, “marry” your kids to enhance your hold on their life after age 18. 

When you try to make a blanket statement that marriage should be allowed for any random arrangement of people you need to step back and consider the sorts of things which marriage allows, merging of finances, relaxation of privacy between members, and a the option for a shared corporate presence for the state. There’s going to be lots of ramifications when you decide any group can don that cloak. 

In the early years after the framers finished the Constitution, they were quite taken aback and surprised that Mr Burr formed a electoral machine in New York and almost grabbed the Presidency. They hadn’t “figured” on the consequences of their laws. Likewise it pretty clear that a decision that the legal status of marriage assigned to “any arbitrary group” of people is going to be similarly used by people lacking the preconceptions-as-constraints under which your discussion labored. 

Good morning.

1. Housing.
2. The pencil.
3. A list of books.
4. Ice and that mythical industrial age 7k years ago.
5. Germany and economic recovery.
6. Remember that Discovery gunman nut? He was on the fringe of this current.
7. My somewhat snarky comment aside, apparently nobody noticed that locations in which large amounts of raw materials get processed from the earth do not become vibrant and heavily populated.
8. “Can’t afford tax cuts for the rich” alas, the tax codes put most small business owners in the “rich” category. 
9. On a prayer widely used.
10. Health care and organ farming.
11. Quran burning, here and here and here. For myself, talk of book burning reminds me of this The Master and Margarita.
12. Defending Chesterton.
13. Duh.
14. And … our the stimulus that the Democrats hath wrought. The leeches did well.

Good morning.

1. A painting.
2. When you’re a generous billionaire that anti-Semitism isn’t noticed as much.
3. Poverty and a photo-essay. 
4. 9/11 and Muslim sensibility.
5. And Park51 politics and financial shenanigans.
6. Multi-tasking at its worst.
7. The tightrope which the left will make sure no politician can every walk.
8. Grist for the public education mill. It was recently remarked that all public education needs is to improve the student teacher ratio. This contradicts that and as well, I’ll note that at the meet-and-greet at my daughter’s High School last week the list of administrators to teachers was 4 pages to 8. For every two teachers there was one administrator … it seems to me that ratio needs to be worked on too if costs are to be contained. 
9. And a teachers wish list.
10. On faith and science.

Well, this weekend the clever routines at Amazon suggested an interesting book, on which I bit and a problem of sorts arose. This book, in electronic form, was priced at that-which-must-be-obeyed level, that is to say $1. It was a “trilogy” of short books, fiction, in a genre I enjoy. Enjoy in the “guilty pleasure” sense of the title of this little essay. 

So. Do you like space opera? If so, check out the series by Mr Randolph Lalond (here’s a start in paper First Light Chronicles Omnibus or eInk First Light Chronicles Omnibus.

Thoroughly enjoyable. I’m into the continuation series … as time permits. The continuation books are a little more expensive in the eInk version … but only by a little. 

Good morning. I hope everyone had a nice Labor Day weekend.

1. A new legal blog, a sample here.
2. Worse than heroin? Hmmm, that’s an odd point of view to say the least.
3. A word, oikophobia.
4. More on the Beck gathering, here and here.
5. That strikes me as less a problem of gender and more about manners.
6. On the values gap.
7. Freedom of speech and a martyr.
8. Church and dress.
9. A reply to Mr Krugman’s reading of WWII as stimulus. 
10. Our government right now in a nutshell.
11. One part of the financial picture.
12. And an argument against expanding government influence in, say, healthcare or well just about anything.

Good morning.

1. A book reviewed.
2. VAT considered. The bigger problem with VAT is that the Congress critters considering VAT aren’t thinking of it as a replacement but an addition.
3. A book list.
4. Clunkers. A bad idea then, worse in retrospect.
5. Oil in them thar hills.
6. What airline I wonder?
7. Beslan.
8. Lies, damn lies, and statistics.
9. Weather is not climate. Climate is not climate. 
10. The Administration and yet-another-broken-promise.
11. Another look at unemployment numbers. 
12. Prayer as image.
13. The Discovery nut as right winger meme.
14. Statistics and schools. 

Good morning. Well, I’m a little rushed this morning … shorter list than usual … work intrudes on life.

1. Satan and cinema.
2. Another view of the POTUS speech. I think the right was not his intended audience. I’m not sure who was.
3. Thoughts on marriage, mostly from the left. I’d offer that if you’re considering marriage and want to pretend to live the self-examined life, this resource is indispensable (Wing to Wing, Oar to Oar).
4. Ahhhhh. 
5. Occupied territory.
6. Why is this even a question? 
7. Thought and sin.
8. Liberal caricature.
9. Comments of note.
10. Of rest and restlessness.
11. Noetic processes.

Good morning.

1. Son of a great man.
2. On the POTUS address.
3. Verse.
4. Huh, the average male has a GPS these days.
5. France and the Roma.
6. Hmm, in a search for a less substantial less vapid political post … this might be in the list. My wife lists here occupation on our 10-40 as “domestic goddess.” 
7. Male midlife crisis … a temporary one.
8. Mr Assange.
9. About those free riders.
10. I think that assessment is right, although I doubt my own ability to judge the motives of liberal/progressives.

Don’t aim for the straw man, go for the flesh and blood one aiming a lance at you. Read the rest of this entry

Good morning.

1. Of Beck and Obama.
2. A man shot and consequence.
3. Two Gulf disasters, two Presidents, and a cricket race.
4. One post which clearly shows Mr Krugman and his ilk are non-serious about economy and politics.
5. And lo and behold, he shows the origins of his fantasy.
6. A big bubble?
7. The continuation of the lying to Congress charge … one wonders how actual real-live you-can-tell-they’re-lying-because-their-lips-are-moving Congress-critters make such charges with straight faces.
8. Appeasement.
9. A challenge.
10. Just get on your bike and ride, dude.
11. Shotgun tracts.
12. Contra smut.

I have not offered any opinion of mine own on the proposed Mosque site. I think a lot of odd things have been said about it, not the least of which was the GOP reaction to his expressing the mainstream conservative opinion on the matter, that they do in fact posses a Constitutional right to build but that it is a very bad idea. One has to remember an idea you support, when spoken by one on the other side of the aisle, remains a good idea (and recall that even a broken clock is right twice a day). Another silly thing touted is that this building is “two whole blocks away” and nowhere near the ‘Ground Zero’ location. The reason that notion is silly is that the Park51/Cordoba people have chosen this location is its proximity to the former World Trade site. It seems to me that the those who protest that this is too far away miss a crucial point. Neither the sponsors nor the objectors see that is correct. Doubtless one can point at countless other ideas fronted on this topic which are incoherent or silly. Read the rest of this entry

Good morning.

1. Some with Nixie tubes. 
2. The VP and those pesky details.
3. Going up?
4. Setting aside the (excessive) sarcasm, I think the question of how to treat differently talented kids in school to optimize goals is a valid question. And “making things equal” is not necessarily the best answer.
5. Stupid liberal tricks … now bullets.
6. That’s what we need more, bigger deficits.
7. Extreme airport.
8. Friendship.
9. Mr Obama goes on the offensive against misinformation, with hyperbole and misinformation.
10. Great photo anyhow.
11. Reading on the Mosque. 
12. 2-d time.
13. Iraq.
14. A photo.
15. Norman and virtue.