Nelson Ascher posted a translation of a Brazilian poem and disappeared for three months. He’s re-surfaced with this reaction to the attack on London:
“If I happened to have just arrived from outer space and found myself in the middle of a war, I’d check which side of it was the British one and would join it. Why? First, because that’s the side that wins and, more importantly, that’s usually the right side to be.”
A Fistful of Euros has a post on Hungary’s two deficits—budget and current accounts—that you should find interesting.
Billmon thinks it’s time for Dean to go. Only if you’re more interested in winning than in theater.
Smash reads about the recent arrests of two terrorism suspects in Lodi, California and urges his fellow-citizens to clarity. I think I might say “focus”.
It’s a two-fer at Winds of Change today. First, check out Egyptian Tarek Heggy’s post on some of the areas that could use improvement in the Arab/Islamic world. Then blogfather Joe Katzman urges the arming of the Zimbabweans (and presumably the Darfurians as well) to allow them to prevent their own democide. I can’t say I agree with him here. I suspect that arming the Zimbabweans would turn the “slo’mo genocide” into a fast motion genocide. It’s not just the guns. It’s the men with the guns—trained and mentally prepared. Sometimes there is no substitute for intervention.
Jeff Medcalf of Caerdroia is unhappy about our present kreitocracy and has proposed a constitutional amendment to correct the situation. As I pointed out in the comments such an amendment would have no force whatsoever: the Supreme Court justices would merely interpret their way around it.
Has anybody heard anything about the transaction tax that Brad Plumer is writing about here?
Well, I see that the Bull Moose doesn’t think much of Howard Dean’s recent shenanigans.
Ed Morrissey of Captain’s Quarters has an interesting post on flawed intelligence on China’s military capabilities. It sounds to me like there’s plenty of blame to go around but why should we be surprised when the CIA, who systematically misread Soviet capabilities over a period of nearly 50 years, should misread Chinese capabilities?
CSR Asia gives us a revealing look at the details behind the extraordinarily high Chinese savings rate. As of this morning one yuan was about 12 cents American. So that’s less than $20 per month for food, $4 a month for rent, etc.
Noah Millman of Gideon’s Blog is back with a post on New York politics. The short form: Bloomberg, yes; Pataki, no.
Stepping Stone has the Top Ten Moments from the School Year now ended.
Check out the comments to this post on Balloon Juice. The blogger, John Cole, writes what amounts to a manifesto (longer than the post itself actually). John, it doesn’t sound like you’re a Republican anymore (at least not in this Republican Party). Sounds like you’re a centrist. Welcome to the club.
Glen Wishard of Canis Iratus is a recovering Amnesty International member.
Lexington Green of Chicago Boyz responds, correctly in my view, to the notion that 2006 will be for the Democrats what 1994 was to the Republicans.
Callimachus of Done With Mirrors has a fascinating group of words and their sources in his Carnival of the Etymologies, a regular Thursday feature over there.
What in the world is going on at the Tennessee state capitol? Bill Hobbs reports on a breaking story. More at Michael Silence’s place. And from Donald Sensing. UPDATE: Memphis blogger Mike Hollihan has the complete lowdown. Apparently, seven have been indicted for corruption including three Tennessee legislators.
Always the first to report, The Llama Butchers have the “Top Ten Guantanamo Prisoner Allegations”.
Michelle Malkin notes that the AP is reporting the charges have been dropped against Lt. Pantano, who was accused of murdering two suspected insurgents in Iraq. The milbloggers don’t seem to have picked this up yet or I’d find some reaction there. The only question now is who called “Cover-up” first.
Ezra Klein has found a health savings account that he actually likes. I don’t honestly believe that such measures will serve to reduce health care costs (or even slow their growth) for reasons I’ve mentioned before but I’d like to see a lot more of these plans implemented so we know for sure.
Athena of Terrorism Unveiled has a new report that Zarqawi has been seriously wounded.
Nearly everybody is posting about the Newsweek/Koran desecration debacle. I’ll try to keep it down to a low roar. Here’s what’s caught my eye this morning:
The merry band at ¡No Pasarán! has a post that notes the infeasibility of flushing the Koran down a toilet complete with technical drawings. This whole issue has convinced me that poverty is, indeed, the cause of terrorism in the Middle East—intellectual poverty. Something needs to be done about it now.
I am hopelessly unhip. Michelle Catalano points to a “Which Star Wars character are you?” quiz on an absolutely remarkable site, LiquidGeneration, which everybody but me must know about already. Incredible. Oh, and I’m Qui-Gon Jinn (and Dr. Strange among Marvel superheroes) which didn’t surprise me a bit.
Beautiful Atrocities has a post on rampaging divas. The research alone has me stunned. If I could devote that much energy to a post on China, I’d have a doctoral dissertation.
Dean is in high dudgeon which he does as well as anybody in the blogosphere. The targets of his ire: journalists who define human rights abuses down generally and Newsweek specifically.
There’s been quite some little sabre rattling about China lately both from left and right. I’m with Tom Barnett on this one: China may be a threat, but I don’t think it’s that kind of threat.
Downsize D. C. has an excellent suggestion: make the Congress actually read the laws they pass. Hat tip: M. Simon of Power and Control. Of course, if they actually read the bills they’re voting on they couldn’t pass as many. Hmmm. All the better.
Dustbury celebrates the invention of the parking meter.
A 40-inch LCD screen for $400? That’s what Motorola is saying. They’re ready to deliver the technology now. Hat tip: EconoPundit.
What do the Saami of Scandinavia (Lapps is considered derogatory) and the Berbers of North Africa have in common? They may be related for one thing. Details from Gene Expression.
M. Simon (a nuclear engineer) of Power and Control has a very interesting post
on Japan as a nuclear power.
If you haven’t already seen it don’t miss Bernard Lewis’s article on the history of freedom in the Middle East
in Foreign Affairs
(hat tip: A Daily Briefing on Iran).
Bloggledygook’s
message to Garrison Keillor: shoemaker stick to thy last.
There’s quite a heated discussion going on over at Dean Esmay’s place about circumcision.
Beautiful Atrocities has an interesting post about the prospect of and reaction to another adaptation of the Daphne Du Maurier story on which Hitchcock’s The Birds was based.
Bull Moose recommends that “the donkey should soar like a hawk”. I agree. The problem is that the progressive wing of the party has the whip hand and they don’t have a solution that passes the laugh test.
Becker and Posner of The Becker-Posner Blog are discussing the increased use of nuclear power in the United States. Interestingly, the economist is trying to be a lawyer and the lawyer is trying to be an economist. And, also interestingly, they disagree. Posner’s post begins:
If externalities are excluded, but fossil-fuel prices are assumed to remain high, nuclear generation of electricity is only marginally economical.
But if externalities were excluded, we’d be using nothing but coal for power generation much as China is. Fortunately, we do not exclude externalities. Have you seen a picture of Shanghai lately?
The Anchoress is back from vacation and posting again but a bit under the weather.
Callimachus of Done With Mirrors has posted the first in a series on Woodrow Wilson and Wilsonian policies.
Michelle Catalano of a small victory posts about the blogging ennui that many bloggers have reported. She believes that the blogosphere has sold its birthright for a pot of message.
Marc Schulman of American Future has posted the next installment of his series on the EU and the Arabs. Be sure and read the comments.
Afghan Warrior marks a milestone in the history of the new, free Afghan nation: the graduation of the 33rd Battalian of the Afghan National Army.
Val Prieto of Babalu Blog has a letter from Dr. Hilda Molina that you probably should read.
David Yeagley of Bad Eagle notes the passing of a Comanche warrior: his mother. May perpetual light shine upon her (hat tip: Abode of Amritas).
Swing State Project notes that Joe Lieberman is having problems in his home state with the Democratic Party powers-that-be. As I suggested earlier the purge of the DLC and Clintonites in general, Lieberman in particular, continues. How this correlates to Hillary in 2008 beats the hell out of me. (hat tip: The Daily Kos)
Joe Gandelman of The Moderate Voice posts on the forum he chaired, bloggers Left and Right, and partisanship. Well, yes, highly partisan blogs are partisan, all right. And the most influential blogs are the red-meat blogs. More people like cotton candy than broccoli, too. There are lots and lots of bloggers who think critically and evaluate the issues carefully avoiding knee-jerk partisan responses. Joe Gandelman, for example.
R. J. Rummel of Democratic Peace contrasts the American and French revolutions as being a liberal revolution on the one hand and a radical revolution on the other. In the past I’ve characterized the difference as one of emphasis: Liberté in the case of the American Revolution, Egalité in the case of the French. Fraternité remains to be heard from. It seems to me that a critical difference was that the American Revolution wanted to restore an (idealized) old order whereas the French sought to completely overthrow the old order. The effects of those differences persist to the present day.
That’s the lot.
UPDATE: Robert Tagorda of Outside the Beltway continues his outstanding series of profiles of prospective papal candidates with this profile of Cardinal Godfried Danneels of Belgium.
Across the Bay critiques the Juan Cole history of Lebanon I linked to a while ago.
Austin Bay comments on Iran and the oil weapon. Wretchard puts in his two cents.
Becker and Posner comment on the interrelationship between economic and political freedom.
Brad DeLong comments on Alan Greenspan in a thoughtful, balanced post.
Steve Antler, the Econopundit, has a very interesting post about “moon-lighters”—people holding more than one job. I’ve been thinking a lot about this since I met two people both of whom were working two full-time jobs. I actually think there’re a lot more of them. Nearly every firefighter I know, for example, has a part-time (or full-time) job in addition to his regular job. Does anyone know how this counts in the unemployment statistics?
A tale of two Marshalls from Matthew Yglesias. Could the problem that Yglesias identifies be that there is no commonality of principle, merely common support for particular policies?
Across the Bay continues excellent of the unfolding situation in Lebanon.
The Abode of Amritas has a somewhat rambling post that starts off with Noam Chomsky’s linguistic theories and ends up speculating about moderate Muslims. A good bit:
When Rightists hope (and pray) for ‘moderate Islam’, I think they really want a Muslim version of homeopathic Christianity. Being less devout makes them more Muslim than the fundamentalist fanatic. What would Muhammad say?
Ammar of Amarji, a Syrian blogger blogging from Damascus, tells us that in Syria freedom remains a distant dream.
There’s another wonderful post from Marcus Cicero over on Winds of Change. This one’s about the opportunities afforded by Lebanon’s tentative moves towards freedom:
Lebanon’s growing democracy movement offers the Western left the opportunity to become relevant in the War on Terror — a war that might be more accurately described as a War on Tyranny. Tyranny endures when free people do nothing to stop it; and it prospers when they cut deals with tyrants.
Joseph Braude of Cordoba has an excellent post on how Arab newspapers covered the Iraq election.
Coyote Blog has a good how-to (and why-to) on hosting Carnivals. My own two cents is that hosting carnivals is not particularly effective at attracting long term traffic. Like bulk mail if you get a 1% response you’re ahead of the game. But I find hosting carnivals worth doing for its own sake. And that’s the best reason to do anything, isn’t it?
Christie Keith of Dogged Blog posts about her bad dog, Colleen.
Don Herzog has the third installment of his critique of originalism in constitutional law on Left2Right.
Iconic Midwest reports that the last of the Jesuit priests involved in the real-life exorcism upon which William Peter Blatty’s book The Exorcist and the movie derived from it in turn was based has died.
Is an Al Qaeda attack imminent? Check out this chilling post from The Word Unheard.
Gerard Vanderleun of American Digest tells us of The Laws of the Blogger (with apologies to Rudyard Kipling).
Beldar has a lengthy commentary on Eason Jordan and
Hugh Hewitt’s Blog.
We really do need to remember the bombing of Dresden, which took place 60 years ago tomorrow. Crooked Timber posts.
Here are what I think are two sides of the same story: Nelson Ascher of EuroPundits
on Europe and the Left
and an article from metrotimes on why
America must lose the war (hat tip: Econopundit).
Tom Maguire of Just One Minute
has an excellent post on the Jeff Gannon story.
hilzoy of Obsidian Wings is posting on St. Joseph of Cupertino. Really.
pennywit has an interesting post on talking people out of terrorism. This looks to me like a good example of what Armed Liberal has called the war against bad philosophy. I wonder if there’s not a sort of Gresham’s Law involved: does bad philosophy drive out good philosophy?
Professor Bainbridge notes that there may be a new, feature-length Wallace and Gromit film in the offing. Hurray! He goes on to whine about Golden Retrievers never having won at Westminster. I should point out that Samoyeds, the most beautiful of natural dog breeds, have never won, either.
Why not go over to Amazon.com and buy one of Roger L. Simon’s mystery novels while he’s in the hospital having gall bladder surgery?
The famous theatrical producer, David Belasco, said nearly 100 years ago “if you can’t
put your idea on the back of your business card, you don’t have a clear idea”. I see that
Kevin Drum of Washington Monthly agrees.
There’s dog-blogging from Robin Burk over on Winds of Change.
There’s nothing like waking up to a dog standing over and vomiting on you to get you up in the morning full of vim, vigor, and vitality! There’s nothing wrong with her—she was just telling me she was hungry and wanted to be fed. Here’s what’s caught my eye this morning:
Jane Galt of Asymmetrical Information
has an interesting story of conflicting interests: organized labor, Walmart, local workers, and (one not mentioned)
local consumers.
The Bull Moose urges Democrats
to celebrate the good. I sometimes wonder whether some Democrats haven’t confused fundamental liberal
values with The Prime Directive.
Daniel Drezner’s reaction to a recent Economist
article on Rice’s trip: Europe just isn’t that important anymore.
Dean Esmay reports on the Angel Light
which (if it pans out) is apparently a combination X-ray goggles and death ray. I always thought that Dr. Zarkoff was Russian but apparently he’s Canadian. Blame Canada!
Infidel at Duophony has the best commentary on the revelation that the NPRK has nuclear
weapons that I’ve seen so far. Comments on his site errored out so I’ll make my observation here: the smallest
effective negotiating table in this matter has three sides. No agreement on this that doesn’t have Chinese participation
is worth a damn.
There’s an interesting celebrity death match over at The Wall Street Journal
on the real dog in the manger: health care (hat tip: EconLog).
There’s a new edition of CSI: Medblogs up at CodeBlueBlog.
This time he’s investigating the death of the president of Georgia.
The New Sisyphus didn’t think much of Secretary Rice’s speech in Paris yesterday.
To put it mildly.
Rusty Shackleford at The Jawa Report has
a response from the professor who achieved some notoriety for failing a Kuwaiti student not long ago
and was a recent blog celebre (hat tip: PoliBlog).
UPDATE: Well, I walked into the office of a client who was in a pretty fair state of panic, evaluated the situation, solved the problem (confirming my reputation for omnipotence), did a little self-promotion, and left.
My wife and I have just finished taking down the last of the outside Christmas decorations. It was quite a holiday season and not one I’d gladly repeat. But there’s quite a bit going on in the blogosphere you should know about. Here’s what’s caught my eye this morning:
A remembrance of German heavyweight fighter Max Schmeling, who died this week, from
amba of Ambivablog.
The Diplomad is hanging up his gloves.
He’s done what he set out to do and is now riding off into the sunset. Who was that masked man?
From Boing Boing: Life-size Candyland game staged by Nebraska college students. What is it they teach in college these days?
Brad DeLong concludes
that the CEA is forecasting a stock crash.
David Kaspar of Davids Medienkritik contrasts post-war German and Iraqi democracy.
Nelson Ascher of Europundits
wonders whether the Iraqi terrorists have read Joseph Conrad’s The Secret Agent.
Fafnir of Fafblog has
delivered his State of the Internet address.
TangoMan of Gene Expressions analyzes the BioPolitics of the blogosphere.
Elizabeth Anderson of Left2Right
writes about Social Insurance and Self-Sufficiency.
David Adesnik of Oxblog quotes FDR’s
message to Congress on Social Security from 1935. It’s a plan I can agree with completely but I don’t think
that anyone who wants to abolish the Social Security system in toto can take much heart from. The
problem is not that the contributions from government are too lavish but that individual savings haven’t
met the targets FDR describes. And I’d say that the reasons for that include excessive individual taxation
and stagnant median real incomes.
It seems to me that the kind of abuse referred to in this post from Samizdata
is not much of an argument against home schooling. I think I’ll leave it up to Jeff, my associate
blogger’s, expertise to comment on it.
The Big Picture
reminds us that a falling unemployment rate may be a mixed blessing.
The Curt Jester
has the perfect solution for Catholics who are just too busy to go to confession: e-Fession.
It’s a gray and dreary February-sort of day both here in Chicago and, apparently, in the blogosphere. Here’s what’s caught my eye this morning:
Beldar is back and training his sights on John Kerry again.
Wretchard of Belmont Club makes an excellent point and it’s not one I’ve heard before:
The strategic center of gravity of the American thrust into the Middle East was not Iraq the geographical entity, as so many have I believe, mistakenly put it, but the Iraqis. The war aim was access to an alliance with an unlimited pool of Arabic speakers, not a puddle of oil in the ground. The return of Iraqi security and intelligence forces will be a nightmare for regional dictators in the short term; but the advent of even a quasi-democratic Iraqi state will, without exaggeration, be their death-knell.
A trip by Jeff Simmermom of And I Am Not Lying, For Real to an Iraqi Out-of-Country polling place that turned out a little differently than he had thought. Must read (hat tip: Isaac Schrödinger).
So this morning I was hit by a ton of trackback spam and Ann Elisabeth has the explanation (hat tip: Jim Treacher).
Brad DeLong gives the highlights of a Social Security reform plan I’m completely
in favor of (not surprising since I’ve been saying nearly all of these things for 30 years).
Tigerhawk has the latest installment of his Carnival of the Commies (the best of the Left).
The indispensable Dan Darling has some of the best commentary on the Iraqi election that you’ll find
in the blogosphere over on Winds of Change.
If you’re looking for an opponent of the Bush Administration who strikes precisely the right tone in his reaction to the Iraqi election, you need go no farther than Bull Moose. This is especially worthy of consideration:
However, in light of this weekend’s success, intellectual honesty compels progressives to acknowledge two difficult propositions. First, despite his myriad mistakes, President Bush deserves credit for pressing forward with the elections. Second, despite his enormous contributions to progressivism for which we are all indebted, Senator Kennedy committed a severe error by suggesting a withdrawal of our troops on the eve of the elections.
Last week, the Senator stated, “The U.S. military presence has become part of the problem, not part of the solution.” No, our troops are for the time being the only defense against Iraq falling into the abyss. That was the wrong message at the wrong time.
Crooked Timber has the feature you’ve been looking for: Ask a 19th Century Whaling Expert. Questions anyone?
As usual, the best round-up on the Iraqi election is from Joe Gandelman of The Moderate Voice.
When the Geneva Food Crimes Tribunal meets, Beautiful Atrocities’s No-Bake Meatloaf is certain to be indicted.
A dialogue with Socrates (although not precisely a Socratic dialogue) about Bush’s inauguration
speech with guest appearances by William F. Buckley and John F. Kennedy from Glen Wishard of Canis Iratus.
It’s a busy day in the blogosphere. Apparently more people than I thought have some time on their hands this morning. Here’s what’s caught my eye:
Beautiful Atrocities lists the blogola received by right-leaning bloggers
for their endorsements of Bush. As if.
Different River has a great post on Medicare. Forget Social Security reform, folks.
This is the big dog.
Steve Antler of Econopundit directs us to a history of Social Security
that should be required reading if we’re going to have an intelligent discussion of this issue.
Has Sistani endorsed a slate of candidates in the upcoming Iraqi elections? Juan Cole of Informed Comment is skeptical.
At last! Golden Globe fashion blogging from Little Miss Attila.
I haven’t seen nearly as much of this as I expected to.
Matsu of media girl reads the Tarot for the Democratic Party. Really.
And it’s interesting. Remember her predictions. I’ll bet they’re as good as anybody else’s. Or better.
Medpundit comments on her experience with and attitude towards the automation
of medical record keeping.
Who (or more accurately what) dunnit at shrinkette. Read the comments
for the solution.
That’s the lot.
UPDATE: It didn’t take long. Remember what I said about Tigerhawk’sCarnival of the Commies yesterday? The Poor Man has responded with what he calls Wingnut Butter.
Just when you thought that the set of all possible Carnivals was complete…Carnival of the Doodles
is now up at Ambivablog. It’s still accepting entries so if you’ve always been looking
for a venue for your doodles now’s your golden opportunity. It seems a bit estrogen-intensive
at this point so male doodlers—submit your work.
Different River has a great post on birth control, pregnancy, and experts.
The Daily Demarche speculates on what would have happened if we had never invaded Iraq.
Without additional comment I suggest you examine this post which demonstrates how the United States caused the Sumatran tsunami. You be the judge. (Hat tip: Tigerhawk)
