It's Not Our Fault: I Told You So

Check out this website.

From Down Under

This is from a blogsite worth checking out: 

Matt quotes Ayn Rand:

“When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion–when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing–when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favours and approvals–when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don’t protect you against them, but protect them against you–when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice–you may know that your society is doomed.”

I don't know why we don't pay attention to more news from Australia.

House Rule #1

From the Electric City Weblog

One of the better, if not the best blogs in Montana comes from Great Falls. It always seems to be at the top of the list, perhaps because they have more than one contributor and they seem to stimulate each other, in a normal way of course. Gregg Smith is a frequent blogger, almost always with some stuff worth your while to read.

Yesterday he called our attention to an article by Mark Steyn from his blog. Isn't it odd that visitors from abroad often see more clearly what is going on around us older Americans than we do ourselves?

Irony: too little or too much

John Kerry, who served in
Vietnam 

Psychologists first diagnosed Hypo-ironia in 1967. Before then, society often cast out the irony-challenged, referring to them by such derogatory names as "sourpuss" and "stick in the mud." It afflicts five percent of the population, but has been known to disproportionately affect members of the National Organization of Women. Past sufferers of hypo-ironia include Alan Keyes, Tom Tancredo, John Kerry, Jackson Browne, and Noam Chomsky. And others lower down on the pay grade scale.


I'm not sure where this paragraph came from. I found it as a draft article deep in my list of old blogs. I would guess there is another irony disorder, which I think I suffer from, in other words, seeing or hearing irony where it was not meant at all, a sort of Hyper-ironia.

To Our Friends Professing the Religion of Peace

Monday a week or so ago, the Gazette published an Associated Press article lamenting that many ordinary Muslims, calling themselves ordinary Americans, apparently do not have the confidence of the rest of us. Perhaps they don't realize that most of us common Americans do not share their tolerance of blowing up each other and we infidels as a way of evangelizing.

And then today, the following Saturday, everyone's favorite Rocky professor reviewed all the misunderstandings that us ordinary non-Muslims have about the "religion of peace." I wonder if she has her columns on Islam vetted by someone who reads Arabic? Or is there a Gazette editor who makes sure that only the politically correct terms and definitions appear in the paper?

More On Free Speech

This is getting to be worrying. Juan Williams, a fairly balanced commentator on NPR and Fox News, has been given the pink slip for saying what was on his mind about Muslims in their traditional garb on airplanes. Check this out here, and here and here. By the way, the last link is from a blog called ShrinkWrapped and not surprisingly has a psychiatric slant, often helpful when dealing with media that may demonstrate aspects of mental illness. And here too. Wow, this looks like a big story. It might even make the MSM.

Vegans are not from Vegas

Check out the story at the end of this web entry:

Freedom of Speech

Not surprisingly, a letter to the editor of this morning's Wall Street Journal (Saturday, 16 Oct 2010) reminded me of a couple of other articles I have read recently concerning freedom of speech. A couple of days ago, 11 October to be exact, there was an article by Ayaan Hirsi Ali on the back page of the op-ed section—In Holland, Free Speech on Trial—and an editorial on a related matter which mentioned our own lame Senator Max. I hate it when the WSJ mentions Max because I know it will be embarrassing for him and for his lowly constituents. First of all, the more important of the two concerned the trial of Geert Wilders in the Netherlands for using "hate speech" in public. Apparently our Muslim friends have more freedom to speak their minds than the rest of us. The connection with the editorial was the inquiry initiated by Senator Max regarding identification of donors to some political activist group, an obvious though lame attempt to chill the giving of donations, i.e. a variation on free speech.

I always thought that our friends on the Left were big free speech fans, granting it to a fair number of unsavory activities, but now I'm not so sure. Or is free speech only given freely to their friends and allies? Yesterday, while having lunch at Perkin's Restaurant on 27th St, I was reading a David Crisp editorial in his "free and independent" Billings Outpost. The only worrying thing in the article, which is mainly a thoughtful consideration of why conservative thought is so evident on talk radio, was the whiney paragraphs lamenting the fact that the First Amendment is a big hurdle in the Left's approach to chilling the Right's voice, which they of course call "fairness." I wonder, is there any room for seeking truth in this argument? We didn't allow the Communist Party in this country because they were interested in the overthrow of our government and had no allegiance to seeking truth. Can we afford to allow our friends on the left to selectively enforce the First Amendment?

One of the Benefits of Being Bilingual

This is a sidebar from an article in the Wall Street Journal, the only national newspaper worth reading these days. The original article is worth reading. 12 October 2010. It looks like the anatomic appearance of the brain is similar in both mono- and bi-lingual people, but the latter are better able to deal with this handicap as seen in the large chart above. Another minor point to be noted is that it takes an extra year to recognize that you are having a problem if you are mono-lingual; that, or you are just more stubborn.

A long time ago I was convinced that it would be good for my kids to know another language. I wasn't sure why. I guessed that maybe stretching some neurons in childhood might be good for the long term. The jury is still out on that but those of us who are not looking forward eagerly to the wonders of assisted living and beyond might think about studying another language. Rosetta Stone, here we come.