Roger Kimball has shown me the error of my ways. I had fallen into the habit of using “elitist” as an ephithet. Worse, I had no excuse.
The point is that reality is elitist. Failure to acknowledge that might make you feel kinder, gentler, etc., but at the significant cost of living a lie.
I’ll never confuse elitism with arrogance again. (Read the whole article. It’s a gas.)
The fifth and final installment of Peter Robinson’s interview with T.J. Rodgers is here.
T. J. Rodgers discusses the promise and pitfalls of the most popular alternative-energy sources (other than solar). Ethanol? Rodgers says it’s a “total waste.” However, bioengineering and genetic engineering that address the entire corn plant, rather than just the fruit, hold promise. Wind power? Rodgers says it produces high energy volume while remaining cheaper per kilowatt hour than solar. Nuclear? Not only is it cheap and efficient — it’s safe.
Zombie has audio of Obama’s shoe sandwich.
And yes, I know that some of you are thinking of the other end of the horse.
Yesterday I read Michael Yon’s new book. It is vital and timely. Everybody – of any stripe – interested in the war should buy it and read it.
Those of us who have been reading Yon’s dispatches have been ahead of the information curve on Iraq for years. More valuable information was in one of his posts than in a month of the New York Times. He’s always been an independent voice and keen observer. Some of what he saw got him in hack with the military. He saw the impending civil war months before any officials would admit it. But he also called al Qaeda’s loss of Iraq long before – wait. I guess nobody else is close to calling that one yet. Give it a few months.
Much of the book will be familiar to long time Yon readers. The heart pounding action and heart rending atrocities are all there. Now it’s all bound up in a narrative that takes the reader from the near disaster that Iraq was just a few years ago to the near miracle it is now. Yet, for all the progress, victory balances on the edge of a knife blade even today.
Glenn Reynolds suggests buying copies for your local library and your congresscritters. While not convinced that my misrepresentative is reading at a “chapter book” level, maybe she could understand some of the pictures.
Buy the book at the link above and you might get one of the few remaining autographed copies. On Amazon, the book has shot to #75 on the sales rankings. Here’s hoping it goes higher.
I’ve always found it hard to get too excited about them. Maybe this is why.
The Olympics are a vulgar, ruinous hullabaloo the chief functions of which are to facilitate graft on a spectacular scale and to act as a vehicle for the promotion of despotic values. They are, at best, unedifying and, at worst, intolerable.
is tasting some shoe leather.
Some days I look at the field of presidential contenders and conjure Kissinger: “It’s a shame they can’t all lose.”
Update:
Ace of Spades nails it.
Obama To Rural Pennsylvanians: Vote For Me, You Corncob-Smokin’, Banjo-Strokin’ Chicken-Chokin’ Cousin-Pokin’ Inbred Hillbilly Racist Morons.
The funny part is that this is Obama just accidentally being honest. A bad habit he picked up from the little woman?
I kid. I’m a kidder.
Michael Ledeen adds:
In Naples, for centuries, churches had doors with revolving platforms, through which unwanted babies were delivered to the sisters within. There’s a considerable literature on these abandoned children, who were known as “esposti” or “exposed,” and that is the origin of one of the most common Neapolitan names, “esposito.” Now you know.
In Baghdad they’re called “Callahan.” I’m sure Clint Eastwood is smiling.
He also links to a nice letter from an Aussie. Worth reading.
Read all of Michael Yon’s Op-Ed in the WSJ.
It is said that generals always fight the last war. But when David Petraeus came to town it was senators – on both sides of the aisle – who battled over the Iraq war of 2004-2006. That war has little in common with the war we are fighting today.
I may well have spent more time embedded with combat units in Iraq than any other journalist alive. I have seen this war – and our part in it – at its brutal worst. And I say the transformation over the last 14 months is little short of miraculous.
The change goes far beyond the statistical decline in casualties or incidents of violence. A young Iraqi translator, wounded in battle and fearing death, asked an American commander to bury his heart in America. Iraqi special forces units took to the streets to track down terrorists who killed American soldiers. The U.S. military is the most respected institution in Iraq, and many Iraqi boys dream of becoming American soldiers. Yes, young Iraqi boys know about “GoArmy.com.”
Lost in Translation (keep clicking on the next picture icon).
Seems to me the first part of this trick shot is the trickiest part.
I’d love to hear what a real sax player could do with this. (Watch all the way to the end for a good laugh.)
John Lott approaches Obama’s gun rights trial balloon with a sharpened, historical needle.
Something happens to Democrats on the gun issue when they run for president. For John Kerry during 2004, it was awkwardly posing in brand new hunting gear at a seemingly endless series of hunting photo-ops.
But in what will probably be the most improbable change, the Politico reported on Saturday that Barack Obama was making a big play for gun votes in Pennsylvania. It is not particularly surprising that this change is occurring with the crucial Pennsylvania primary soon approaching.
With about one million of the country’s 12.5 million hunters, Pennsylvania is number one in the nation in the amount of time its citizens spend hunting. With about 600,000 people with permits to carry concealed handguns, Pennsylvania also has more permit holders than any other state.
Others, such as Jim Kessler, vice president for policy with Third Way, a progressive think tank, view Obama as starting to position himself for the general election.
Peter Robinson continues his chat with T. J. Rodgers.
In today’s segment of the Uncommon Knowledge interview with Silicon Valley entrepreneur T. J. Rodgers, I present the global warming policies of Al Gore, John McCain, and Barack Obama, asking T.J. for a critique of each. Obama’s cap-and-trade policy, to offer a brief sample of the conversation, strikes T.J. as—well, as less bad than it might have been.
The first seven are silly, but fun. The last, that he’s hidden his father’s communist ideology, seems right in character.
Mark Steyn isn’t the only one in trouble. Several conservative bloggers are being sued for… Well, you have to read it to believe it.
Britain has lost.
I knew years ago that England had lost its liberty but not noticed. I wonder if they’ll start noticing the sinking ship when the chill waters of Shari’a lap at their ankles.
Maybe.
BlackFive recommended this article from Men’s Health.
So do I.
Subsunk wrote:
This is a great story from Men’s Health about courage, bravery, and how to cultivate it. A plus to the story is it was written during the time Mike Monsoor was in ar Ramadi and was killed serving us in defense of his country. It identifies some of the thinking behind the Anbar Awakening, and highlights what makes a Brave Man, Brave. There is no question Michael Monsoor epitomizes the Character, Courage, and Commitment to his comrades that distinguishes Bravery from the common and cheap political discourse and communication of Cowardice seen from Congress today. Thank God our country produces more Men like Mike than “Congressquitters” like _insert name of your favorite dhimmi here_.
I guess Obama better tell his wife to chill. She spilled the beans on what she, and the rest of the Marxists in the Democrat party, want to do with your pie.
“The truth is, in order to get things like universal health care and a revamped education system, then someone is going to have to give up a piece of their pie so that someone else can have more.”
That kind of honesty can’t sit well at campaign headquarters.
and you may get fired from the Library.
As if you’d want to work for those people anyway.
Peter Robinson continues his talk with T. J. Rodgers.
Does solar power “pay,” in the capitalist sense of the word? Almost. According to T. J. Rodgers, solar power is on the edge of ROI — of generating a worthwhile return on investment. And while there’s a learning curve involved in the process of efficiently capturing solar energy, it is neither steep nor prolonged.
If this report is true, America’s worst ex-president will meet with the leader of a genocidal terror gang.
It would be right in character.
Where can we find more like Bainbridge?
You want to help make society a better place? You want to eliminate poverty? Become a corporate lawyer. Help businesses grow, so that they can create jobs and provide goods and services that make people’s lives better.
A corporate lawyer not only serves the public interest by helping to create new wealth, we also help defend an important social institution from statism.
I wouldn’t count on it, but Samizdata has the email address of the reporter who wrote altered that story on “global warming” – all because an activist told him to.
