Peter Ferrara has an article in Forbes drawing climate-science lessons from the disgraceful career of Trofim Denisovich Lysenko. Not caring that much for the tone of the article, and especially of the comments, I'm not going to quote from it. Instead I'll summarize Lysenkoism as I understand it. I find it interesting that the public discourse on the "science" of climate change is now so debased that Lysenkoism is being trumpeted as a cautionary tale both by warmists and by skeptics.
Lysenko was a Ukrainian agronomist who discovered as a young man in 1927 that he could improve the sprouting qualities of winter wheat by exposing them to unusual cold and moisture. He then concluded, on the basis of no apparent (or perhaps falsified) evidence, that the improved qualities of the wheat seed would breed true, such that future generations of seeds would sprout more successfully even without the cold/wet treatment. This attempt to overturn the principles of modern genetics in favor of the inheritance of acquired characteristics (a throwback to Lamarck) went on to enjoy an enthusiastic, confused, and scandalous vogue in the Soviet Union for several decades. In 1938 Lysenko was named president of the Academy of Agricultural Sciences, from which position he wielded enormous power in Soviet science. The Soviet Union showered him with accolades, including seven Orders of Lenin and the title of "Hero of Socialist labor.”
Despite his deep confusion about the underlying mechanisms of genetics, Lysenko continued to implement genuinely helpful agricultural innovations that mitigated, to some degree, the disastrous famines caused by communist policy. Lysenko's alignment with his leadership's political goals then bled over in the illogical but common human way to his evidence-free assertions about genetics. So important were his anti-famine successes, combined with his politically correct background as a member of the peasant class untainted by bourgeois education, and his ability to motivate peasants to return to farming in the wake of collectivist confiscation of their farmlands, that Lysenkoism became official Soviet policy under Stalin. Lacking actual evidence for his eccentric theories, and facing new pressure when his later theories did not pan out (such as the requirement to till the fields to a depth of five feet), Lysenko succumbed to the temptation to use political power to silence his enemies. Andrei Sakharov charged him with having the arrest and death of "many genuine scientists" on his hands. Under his influence, for instance, the founder of the Academy of Agricultural Sciences was sent to his death in the gulag.
About a decade after the conclusion of Stalin's reign of terror in 1953, there was a movement toward the restoration of the scientific method in the Soviet Union and a purging of pseudo-science inspired by political fashion.
Truth over theory: it will always lead to better science and generally to better public policy. My own view, in addition, is that it makes for better people and happier relations among them. When I see beliefs that can't be maintained in the population except through lies, self-delusion, and force, I see beliefs that belong on the ash-heap of history. As C.S. Lewis describes the techniques employed by unscrupulous tempters: "You see the little rift? 'Believe this, not because it is true, but for some other reason.'"
Memorial Day
My brothers at BLACKFIVE have many excellent posts to commemorate the holiday. Keep scrolling.
To many of you as to me, it is an important day. All the best to you.
Take this, in memory of one of the ones honored today: the poet Joyce Kilmer, killed in the first World War while he was acting as a scout for the American Expeditionary Force. It is about one of those whom he thought worthy of defense.
To many of you as to me, it is an important day. All the best to you.
Take this, in memory of one of the ones honored today: the poet Joyce Kilmer, killed in the first World War while he was acting as a scout for the American Expeditionary Force. It is about one of those whom he thought worthy of defense.
As Winds That Blow Against A Star
(For Aline)
Now by what whim of wanton chance
Do radiant eyes know sombre days?
And feet that shod in light should dance
Walk weary and laborious ways?
But rays from Heaven, white and whole,
May penetrate the gloom of earth;
And tears but nourish, in your soul,
The glory of celestial mirth.
The darts of toil and sorrow, sent
Against your peaceful beauty, are
As foolish and as impotent
As winds that blow against a star.
Steyn on the Mundane
Having killed Drummer Rigby, they were killing time: It took 20 minutes for the somnolent British constabulary to show up. And so television viewers were treated to the spectacle of a young man, speaking in the vowels of south London, chatting calmly with his “fellow Britons” about his geopolitical grievances and apologizing to the ladies present for any discomfort his beheading of Drummer Rigby might have caused them, all while drenched in blood and still wielding his cleaver.The world is changing that way.
If you’re thinking of getting steamed over all that, don’t. Simon Jenkins, the former editor of the Times of London, cautioned against “mass hysteria” over “mundane acts of violence....”
Being jumped by barbarians with machetes is certainly “mundane” in Somalia and Sudan, but it’s the sort of thing that would once have been considered somewhat unusual on a sunny afternoon in south London — at least as unusual as, say, blowing up eight-year-old boys at the Boston Marathon.
A Policeman's Lot Is Such A Happy One
In a story titled "Parking Tickets Issued on Wrecks While Stockholm Burns," the Swedish press looks on in wonder at what their nation has become.
H/t: Dad29.
UPDATE: The police are finally roused to action!
[W]hile the Stockholm riots keep spreading and intensifying, Swedish police have adopted a tactic of non-interference. ”Our ambition is really to do as little as possible,” Stockholm Chief of Police Mats Löfving explained to the Swedish newspaper Expressen on Tuesday.But...
”We go to the crime scenes, but when we get there we stand and wait,” elaborated Lars Byström, the media relations officer of the Stockholm Police Department. ”If we see a burning car, we let it burn if there is no risk of the fire spreading to other cars or buildings nearby. By doing so we minimize the risk of having rocks thrown at us.”
Swedish parking laws, however, continue to be rigidly enforced despite the increasingly chaotic situation. Early Wednesday, while documenting the destruction after a night of rioting in the Stockholm suburb of Alby, a reporter from Fria Tider observed a parking enforcement officer writing a ticket for a burnt-out Ford.It's as if the whole country of Sweden has become a university.
When questioned, the officer explained that the ticket was issued because the vehicle lacked a tag showing its time of arrival. The fact that the vehicle had been effectively destroyed – its windshield smashed and the interior heavily damaged by fire – was irrelevant according to the meter maid, who asked Fria Tider’s photographer to destroy the photos he had taken.
H/t: Dad29.
UPDATE: The police are finally roused to action!
Faced by another night of terror at the hands of predominantly immigrant rioters, Swedes grown tired of the police’s inability to put an end to the unrest took to the streets Friday night to defend their neighborhoods.... In the Stockholm suburb of Tumba the police decided to abandon their earlier non-intervention policy as a large group of police officers rounded up and dispersed a group of vigilantes trying to fend off rioters.
The decision to round up vigilantes while, according to Stockholm Chief of Police Mats Löfving, ”doing as little as possible” to stop rioters, met with a wave of protests in various social media and on the Internet.
Who's stopping you?
I'd reveal the source of this (probably unoriginal) joke if I didn't think it would interfere with its enjoyment:
Recently, while I was working in the flower beds in the front yard, my neighbors stopped to chat as they returned home from walking their dog.
During our friendly conversation, I asked their 12 year old daughter what she wanted to be when she grows up. She said she wanted to be President someday.
Both of her parents -- liberal Democrats -- were standing there, so I asked her, "If you were President what would be the first thing you would do?"
She replied, "I'd give food and houses to all the homeless people."
Her parents beamed with pride!
"Wow . . . what a worthy goal!" I said. "But you don't have to wait until you're President to do that!" I told her.
"What do you mean?" she replied.
So I told her, "You can come over to my house and mow the lawn, pull weeds, and trim my hedge, and I'll pay you $50. Then you can go over to the grocery store where the homeless guy hangs out, and you can give him the $50 to use toward food and a new house."
She thought that over for a few seconds, then she looked me straight in the eye and asked, "Why doesn't the homeless guy come over and do the work, and you can just pay him the $50?"
I said, "Welcome to the Republican Party."
Her parents aren't speaking to me.
Guess that ethnicity
"Ah, 'youth,'" as Mark Steyn would say. RT News reports on the fifth straight night of rioting in Stockholm. I got to paragraph 21 before the article identified the "youths" or "youth gangs" or "rampaging teenagers" as "Young Muslims." But at that point, at least, the article got down to basics:
“The problem is not from the Swedish government or from the Swedish people,” the editor in chief of Dispatch International said. “The last 20 years or so, we have seen so many immigrants coming to Sweden that really don’t like Sweden. They do not want to integrate, they do not want to live in [Swedish] society: Working, paying taxes and so on."
* * *
“The people come here now because they know that Sweden will give them money for nothing. They don’t have to work, they don’t have to pay taxes – they can just stay here and get a lot of money. That is really a problem,” added [Swedish journalist Ingrid Carlqvist].
* * *
"It’s always the same problem. There is a massive refusal by Muslim youngsters of the basics of Western society... and they take any excuse whatsoever to show that with violence – that is where the problem is,” [said Gerolf Annemans, the parliamentary leader of a Belgian far-right nationalist political party].In related news, opinion-makers struggle to identify the mysterious motivation of youths who beheaded a British soldier this week while screaming Islamofascist slogans. We're going to put the same team on it that's spent the last few months or years struggling to decipher the impenetrable motives of the Fort Hood shooter and those guys who got so upset by a video in Benghazi.
I Imagine This Worked Out Fine...
“Uh, I don’t have anybody to send out there,” the 911 dispatcher told the woman. “You know, obviously, if he comes inside the residence and assaults you, can you ask him to go away?”Yeah, absolutely. What if he says no?
Rules for Swordsmen
A British soldier was decapitated a few hundred yards from a UK Army base by two men with large knives saying: “We swear by almighty Allah we will never stop fighting you.” The men were shot when police responded 20 minutes later.If I were the British Army, I would reintroduce a sword to the uniform and mandate training in it. There's no reason to lose fights like this except that our side has unilaterally disarmed. US soldiers, all of whom are trained with arms, and many of whom own private firearms and are licensed to carry them off post, found themselves prey for Nidal Hassan because regulations disarmed almost every soldier on base. British soldiers are having their heads hacked off with meat cleavers, because they -- also like people coming off of many US military bases, especially those run by the Air Force -- can't even carry a combat knife, or even a lengthy pocket knife.
"They" want us to be this way, The Belmont Club says. Allahpundit notes that the British Army's actual response is to order soldiers to take off their uniforms:
Hard to imagine a more demoralizing order for a soldier than to tell him to take off the uniform and hide after an enemy’s attack. And the powers that be know it: They’re stressing that the order’s temporary in order to blunt public indignation over their decision.We don't have to lose this fight. There is no reason we ought to be losing it, except that we have a political class -- internationally, here and in Europe -- that has all the wrong principles, and that ought to be stripped of every last power.
The twisted punchline here is that the victim yesterday wasn’t wearing a uniform. The two degenerates who murdered him apparently targeted him because they saw him entering or exiting a barracks. There’s the next move, presumably — evacuate the barracks nationwide until they’re safe. For soldiers.
A Guide To The Pronunciation Of Criticially Important Words
Some of you gentlemen may find this guide very helpful. The rest of you will enjoy the commentary.
Poster child for smaller government
Apparently I'm not the only one wondering how Lois Lerner could possibly still have her IRS job. We might all have reasonably assumed that she couldn't "take five and survive"; after all, no one has a Constitutional right to a cushy federal job.
No doubt the White House would like to ship Ms. Lerner off to a post in Siberia right about now. Unfortunately, any attempt to discipline her will take months if not years to process, and will be the occasion of awkward questions about why she used to be everyone's favorite administrator and now suddenly is being attacked for carrying out what was so obviously a broadly implemented policy approved from the top. That makes Ms. Lerner a high-profile albatross: a top tax collector who got caught, took the Fifth, and kept her job.
It appears the voting public (that tiny sliver that pays attention) is about to get an object lesson in how the federal government behaves just like one of those bloated unionized workforces everyone hates, larded with chair-warmers who can never be fired no matter how dishonest or incompetent. And for this we hock our financial future to Chinese investors? To pay for a government that's several times bigger than it needs to be? A government whose really active workers do too much as it is, even while a big chunk of their colleagues take a free ride, secure from any meaningful discipline or termination?
Maybe Ms. Lerner is doing more public good staying at her post after all. May this debacle drag on right through the 2014 elections.
No doubt the White House would like to ship Ms. Lerner off to a post in Siberia right about now. Unfortunately, any attempt to discipline her will take months if not years to process, and will be the occasion of awkward questions about why she used to be everyone's favorite administrator and now suddenly is being attacked for carrying out what was so obviously a broadly implemented policy approved from the top. That makes Ms. Lerner a high-profile albatross: a top tax collector who got caught, took the Fifth, and kept her job.
It appears the voting public (that tiny sliver that pays attention) is about to get an object lesson in how the federal government behaves just like one of those bloated unionized workforces everyone hates, larded with chair-warmers who can never be fired no matter how dishonest or incompetent. And for this we hock our financial future to Chinese investors? To pay for a government that's several times bigger than it needs to be? A government whose really active workers do too much as it is, even while a big chunk of their colleagues take a free ride, secure from any meaningful discipline or termination?
Maybe Ms. Lerner is doing more public good staying at her post after all. May this debacle drag on right through the 2014 elections.
Two Paths
Down one path for our Republic, we have Supreme Court
rulings and dissenting opinions like these.
In the Child Labor Tax Case, in which the government sought to protect children from excessively long hours in sweatshops, Chief Justice William Howard Taft, writing for the court, rejected the government's broad taxing interpretation and struck the law as unconstitutional. He wrote in part,
Today, we have the following affairs, which to be sure are the actions of the Executive Branch, which has the capacity to act promptly, and not those of the Judicial Branch. Nevertheless, the Executive and the Judiciary form two-thirds of our Federal government (I've elided the behavior of the Congress, of which the ACA and Dodd-Frank are current examples), and such activity is the inevitable result of a Big Government that considers the law to be a convenience to be manipulated rather than a circumscription of governmental power.
Update: to add the opening sentence, which was omitted in my cut-and-paste posting, and to correct my formatting error in the first Taft paragraph quoted above.
In the Child Labor Tax Case, in which the government sought to protect children from excessively long hours in sweatshops, Chief Justice William Howard Taft, writing for the court, rejected the government's broad taxing interpretation and struck the law as unconstitutional. He wrote in part,
a court must be blind not to see that the so-called tax is imposed to stop the employment of children within the age limits prescribed. Its prohibitory and regulatory effect and purpose are palpable. All others can see and understand this. How can we properly shut our minds to it?
He answered his question in this way [emphasis mine]:
It is the high duty and function of this court…to decline to recognize or enforce seeming laws of Congress, dealing with subjects not entrusted to Congress, but left or committed by the supreme law of the land to the control of the States. We cannot avoid the duty even though it require us to refuse to give effect to legislation designed to promote the highest good. The good sought in unconstitutional legislation is an insidious feature because it leads citizens and legislators of good purpose to promote it without thought of the serious breach it will make in the ark of our covenant or the harm which will come from breaking down recognized standards.
The wisdom of Taft's ruling, however painful it must have
been to write, wants no further comment.
A few years later, Justice James Clark McReynolds dissented from the
Supreme Court's ruling in NLRB v. Laughlin Steel Corp, which upheld the constitutionality of the
NLRB, which had the follow-on result of amending from the bench the Commerce
Clause to allow the Federal government to reach inside any of the several
States to…regulate…activities that had been held for the preceding 100+ years
to be wholly intrastate and so beyond the reach of the Feds. McReynolds wrote this:
There is no ground on which reasonably to hold that refusal by a manufacturer, whose raw materials come from states other than that of his factory and whose products are regularly carried to other states, to bargain collectively with employees in his manufacturing plant, directly affects interstate commerce. In such business, there is not one but two distinct movements or streams in interstate transportation. The first brings in raw material and there ends. Then follows manufacture, a separate and local activity. Upon completion of this and not before, the second distinct movement or stream in interstate commerce begins and the products go to other states. Such is the common course for small as well as large industries. It is unreasonable and unprecedented to say the commerce clause confers upon Congress power to govern relations between employers and employees in these local activities.
McReynolds then exposed the implications of the majority's opinion:
We are told that Congress may protect the "stream of commerce" and that one who buys raw material without the state, manufactures it therein, and ships the output to another state is in that stream. Therefore it is said he may be prevented from doing anything which may interfere with its flow.This, too, goes beyond the constitutional limitations heretofore enforced. If a man raises cattle and regularly delivers them to a carrier for interstate shipment, may Congress prescribe the conditions under which he may employ or discharge helpers on the ranch? The products of a mine pass daily into interstate commerce; many things are brought to it from other states. Are the owners and the miners within the power of Congress in respect of the latter's tenure and discharge? May a mill owner be prohibited from closing his factory or discontinuing his business because so to do would stop the flow of products to and from his plant in interstate commerce? May employees in a factory be restrained from quitting work in a body because this will close the factory and thereby stop the flow of commerce? May arson of a factory be made a federal offense whenever this would interfere with such flow? If the business cannot continue with the existing wage scale, may Congress command a reduction? If the ruling of the Court just announced is adhered to, these questions suggest some of the problems certain to arise.And if this theory of a continuous 'stream of commerce' as now defined is correct, will it become the duty of the federal government hereafter to suppress every strike which by possibility it may cause a blockade in that stream?
Imagine the response, for instance, of unions were their wage
demands or strikes held unconstitutional (the latter which, incidentally, must
upend the heart of Clayton Antitrust).
Down another path we have these, in the short and sweet:
Justice Louis Brandeis, in dissenting from the Court in Burnet
v. Coronado Oil & Gas Co,
a case that rejected the application of Federal income and excess profits taxes
to income derived from a particular kind of state-granted mineral lease, wrote,
…in most matters it is more important that the applicable rule of law be settled than that it be settled right. This is commonly true even where the error is a matter of serious concern, provided correction can be had by legislation.
Thus, if an injustice is done through erroneous
application of a law, "justice" can only be served by subjecting
everyone to that same injustice. This is
a very Sorelian view of the uses of justice (albeit he was writing about
"truth" in particular). Yet, it should have been apparent to Brandeis
(and I think it was) that "can be had" is not the same as "will
be had." Even so, were the delay before
legislative correction is made a brief one, that injustice still can be spread
far in the interval.
Then there's Thurgood Marshall's arrogant answer
to a clerk's request at a Justice-hosted luncheon for Supreme Court clerks that
Marshall describe his judicial philosophy (it was Marshall's turn to host the
luncheon):
La loi, c'est moi. Louis XIV would have felt right at home in Marshall's...court.You do what you think is right and let the law catch up.
Today, we have the following affairs, which to be sure are the actions of the Executive Branch, which has the capacity to act promptly, and not those of the Judicial Branch. Nevertheless, the Executive and the Judiciary form two-thirds of our Federal government (I've elided the behavior of the Congress, of which the ACA and Dodd-Frank are current examples), and such activity is the inevitable result of a Big Government that considers the law to be a convenience to be manipulated rather than a circumscription of governmental power.
·
The NLRB continuing to operate as though two
Appellate Court (one of which with national jurisdiction) rulings that they have
no quorum do not exist.
·
The failures and cover-up related to the Benghazi
preparation, intra-attack, and post-attack events.
·
The failure and cover-up related to IRS
targeting government-disfavored Americans and groups of Americans.
·
The naked assault on the free press and on individuals
of the press by DoJ.
·
Kathleen Sebelius "encouraging"
companies regulated by her HHS to make "contributions" toward the
funding of Federal insurance exchanges.
It's a long list; these are only a few.
It's clear which path the Progressives have chosen for our
country. We can't fade in the traces now. The struggle is only begun.
Eric Hines
Eric Hines
Update: to add the opening sentence, which was omitted in my cut-and-paste posting, and to correct my formatting error in the first Taft paragraph quoted above.
Apropos of nothing
I just like this song.
Voice Squad is a favorite of mine, but they have the strangest tendency to drift up in pitch between verses. Most people drift down.
These aren't quite the lyrics that Voice Squad uses, but they're close:
As I roved out one fine May morning,
To view the meadows and the flowers gay,
Whom should I spy, but my own true lover
As she sat under yon willow tree?
I took off my hat and I did salute her;
I did salute her most courageously.
But she turned around, and the tears fell from her
Saying, False young man, you have deluded me.
A diamond ring I own I gave to you,
A diamond ring to wear on your right hand.
But the vows you made, love, you went and broke them
And married the lassie that had the land.
If I married the lassie that had the land, my love,
It's that I'll rue 'till the day I die.
When misfortune falls, sure no man may shun it.
I was blindfolded, sure I'll ne'er deny.
And at night when I go to my bed of slumber,
The thoughts of my true love are in my mind.
When I turn around to embrace my darling,
Instead of gold, sure 'tis brass I find.
And I wish the queen would call home her armies
From the West Indies, America and Spain.
And every man from his wedded woman,
In hopes that you and I might meet again.
Voice Squad is a favorite of mine, but they have the strangest tendency to drift up in pitch between verses. Most people drift down.
These aren't quite the lyrics that Voice Squad uses, but they're close:
As I roved out one fine May morning,
To view the meadows and the flowers gay,
Whom should I spy, but my own true lover
As she sat under yon willow tree?
I took off my hat and I did salute her;
I did salute her most courageously.
But she turned around, and the tears fell from her
Saying, False young man, you have deluded me.
A diamond ring I own I gave to you,
A diamond ring to wear on your right hand.
But the vows you made, love, you went and broke them
And married the lassie that had the land.
If I married the lassie that had the land, my love,
It's that I'll rue 'till the day I die.
When misfortune falls, sure no man may shun it.
I was blindfolded, sure I'll ne'er deny.
And at night when I go to my bed of slumber,
The thoughts of my true love are in my mind.
When I turn around to embrace my darling,
Instead of gold, sure 'tis brass I find.
And I wish the queen would call home her armies
From the West Indies, America and Spain.
And every man from his wedded woman,
In hopes that you and I might meet again.
Japan melts down
Financially, that is. Trading has been halted on Japanese government bonds future for the second time this week as prices went into freefall.
Money is a promise. If no one believes the promise, it has no value.
Money is a promise. If no one believes the promise, it has no value.
Eyes on the ball
Good advice from Benjamin Domanech at RealClearPolitics:
[Republicans] must willfully set aside Obama’s presence in the fray, leaving the short term personalized attacks on the table, and go after the much bigger prize. Obama isn’t running for office again. Liberalism is.* * *
When this period of scandal draws to a close, if the idea still survives that a more competent and ethical president would be able to effectively govern a $4 trillion bureaucracy, it will be a sign Republicans have failed. They can succeed by ignoring the tempting bait of making this about the president they despise, and focusing instead on the false philosophy of expansive government which represents the true danger to the American experiment.Yes, his name should be mud for trying to evade responsibility for all of this, whether through willful ignorance or outright lying. But that can wait. By exposing himself as an empty credential-collector, he's made himself irrelevant. The country remains important.
Why is she still drawing a paycheck?
Is there any excuse for failing to fire a high-level administration official who takes the Fifth in testifying before Congress about abuses committed by her own agency and division?
Congress is noodling over whether Lerner waived her Fifth Amendment rights by choosing to start with an exculpatory speech, then refusing to take questions about it. They also offered to negotiate limited or "use" immunity, but she stuck to her refusal to answer. This discredits every boss she has, right to the top.
Congress is noodling over whether Lerner waived her Fifth Amendment rights by choosing to start with an exculpatory speech, then refusing to take questions about it. They also offered to negotiate limited or "use" immunity, but she stuck to her refusal to answer. This discredits every boss she has, right to the top.
A Merciless Wind
Yesterday I was talking with an Egyptian I know, who happens also to be an expert on the French language and culture. Apparently when he was young, the Catholic schools once set up by the French government there were still very active. Education was in both French and Arabic, with the result that he was able to attend a university in France, and then eventually become an academic himself.
A scholar of that sort naturally thinks of the current revolutionary changes in Egypt in the light of the French Revolution. At least the current revolutionaries have something they consider sacred, which provides a stability not found in France. There the desire was to overturn every heritage, to sweep away every sacred or traditional thing.
He told a story of a man who came to Paris in 1793. The guard demanded he introduce himself.
Je suis le monsieur le Marquis de Saint-Janvier.
The guard said this was impossible, as there was no such thing as a "monsieur" anymore -- the word means literally 'my lord,' and the revolution had eliminated the class of gentlemen. Everyone is now a 'citoyen.' So, what is your name?
Je suis le Marquis de Saint-Janvier.
Impossible! There are no longer marquis. The revolution has eliminated nobility. Who are you?
Je suis a citoyen de Saint-Janvier.
Impossible! The revolution has eliminated religion. There are no longer saints. Who are you?
Je suis Janvier.
As it turns out, that too was impossible, because the revolution had eliminated the months of the year.
Sometimes it seems like our current society is bent on the same thing, except in slow motion so everyone has a chance to get used to it.
A scholar of that sort naturally thinks of the current revolutionary changes in Egypt in the light of the French Revolution. At least the current revolutionaries have something they consider sacred, which provides a stability not found in France. There the desire was to overturn every heritage, to sweep away every sacred or traditional thing.
He told a story of a man who came to Paris in 1793. The guard demanded he introduce himself.
Je suis le monsieur le Marquis de Saint-Janvier.
The guard said this was impossible, as there was no such thing as a "monsieur" anymore -- the word means literally 'my lord,' and the revolution had eliminated the class of gentlemen. Everyone is now a 'citoyen.' So, what is your name?
Je suis le Marquis de Saint-Janvier.
Impossible! There are no longer marquis. The revolution has eliminated nobility. Who are you?
Je suis a citoyen de Saint-Janvier.
Impossible! The revolution has eliminated religion. There are no longer saints. Who are you?
Je suis Janvier.
As it turns out, that too was impossible, because the revolution had eliminated the months of the year.
Sometimes it seems like our current society is bent on the same thing, except in slow motion so everyone has a chance to get used to it.
Blowing whistles
HotAir claims there is new Benghazi testimony about to break:
Stevens’ mission in Benghazi, they will say, was to buy back Stinger missiles from al-Qaeda groups issued to them by the State Department, not by the CIA. Such a mission would usually be a CIA effort, but the intelligence agency had opposed the idea because of the high risk involved in arming “insurgents” with powerful weapons that endanger civilian aircraft.
Hillary Clinton still wanted to proceed because, in part, as one of the diplomats said, she wanted “to overthrow Gaddafi on the cheap.”Meanwhile, Jim Geraghty reports on a looming "Pinnochio" shortage in his piece entitled "Washington Post Forced to Begin Using Its Strategic Pinnochio Reserve," but sadly, the NRO site appears to be down for the moment. Meanwhile, as a commenter I read yesterday noted, Disney is considering cracking down on copyright infringement in the widespread use of that meme, prompting the Washington Post to look around for another example of a lying puppet; he suggested "Jay Carney."
Nice small business.
Wouldn't want to see anything happen to it.
This story raises the usual question: deliberate coordination of attack on a political enemy, or just a government so large and intrusive that this kind of interference and hostile scrutiny is the norm?
This story raises the usual question: deliberate coordination of attack on a political enemy, or just a government so large and intrusive that this kind of interference and hostile scrutiny is the norm?
The High Feast of Pentecost
“The king stablished all his knights, and gave them that were of lands not rich, he gave them lands, and charged them never to do outrageousity nor murder, and always to flee treason; also, by no mean to be cruel, but to give mercy unto him that asketh mercy, upon pain of forfeiture of their worship and lordship of King Arthur for evermore; and always to do ladies, damosels, and gentlewomen succor upon pain of death. Also, that no man take no battles in a wrongful quarrel for no law, ne for no world’s goods. Unto this were all the knights sworn of the Table Round, both old and young. And every year were they sworn at the high feast of Pentecost.”
-Sir Thomas Malory
When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.
-Acts of the Apostles
Then anon they heard cracking and crying of thunder, that them thought the place should all to drive. In the midst of this blast entered a sunbeam more clearer by seven times than ever they saw day, and all they were alighted of the grace of the Holy Ghost. Then began every knight to behold other, and either saw other, by their seeming, fairer than ever they saw afore.... Then there entered into the hall the Holy Greal covered with white samite, but there was none might see it, nor who bare it.... And then the king yielded thankings to God, of His good grace that he had sent them. Certes, said the king, we ought to thank our Lord Jesu greatly for that he hath shewed us this day, at the reverence of this high feast of Pentecost.It was on Pentecost that the Holy Grail went about in the world, leading the knights out from Camelot to their destruction in quest of God's truth. It was on Pentecost that the apostles, likewise keeping together in safety and company, were set afire to go out into the world to quest.
-Sir Thomas Malory
Of the knights who went on that quest few returned again to Camelot. For a long time I thought that was a warning against seeking too much after a perfection that was not meant for human kind.
But of the apostles, almost all were martyred: all but John.
Reply to Keats
Ah, a day of gentle South wind
In August, when the mercury,
heat-hardened as an artery
of bacon, readily sends
a comforting wake to each our friends;
Where they drink and sing old songs,
Each one a scoundrel, a waste
of morals, such that in haste
we made them brothers of drinking long
necked beer, when we were wrong
and young, as once we were
before the heat made us suffer.
I dashed that off purely to amuse the companions at Brandywine Books, but some of you might enjoy it too.
In August, when the mercury,
heat-hardened as an artery
of bacon, readily sends
a comforting wake to each our friends;
Where they drink and sing old songs,
Each one a scoundrel, a waste
of morals, such that in haste
we made them brothers of drinking long
necked beer, when we were wrong
and young, as once we were
before the heat made us suffer.
I dashed that off purely to amuse the companions at Brandywine Books, but some of you might enjoy it too.
Cassandra Was Right!
We can see the inequality inherent in the system in Marine Corps regulations on umbrellas:
If it's winter and your hands are cold, are female Marines permitted to put their hands in their pockets 'at their option'? If not, why the discrepancy in the pursuit of female comfort? After all, the new primary mission of the US military could reasonably be defined as ensuring the psychological comfort of female servicemembers. Why not their physical comfort as well?
H/t: Althouse, who is also having a ton of fun mocking this story.
Per Marine Corps uniform regulations, the men are not allowed to carry or use umbrellas while in uniform. Female Marines can carry “an all-black, plain standard, or collapsible umbrella at their option during inclement weather” but not with combat uniforms.At their option? What kind of nonsense is this? As is well known, everything in the military is either forbidden or required. My favorite example of this was at the military-controlled portion of Baghdad airport, where there was a signpost near the entrance. On the way in, the sign directed, 'Absolutely no headgear shall be worn past this point. Stow all covers.' On the way out, it said, 'Headgear mandatory past this point.'
If it's winter and your hands are cold, are female Marines permitted to put their hands in their pockets 'at their option'? If not, why the discrepancy in the pursuit of female comfort? After all, the new primary mission of the US military could reasonably be defined as ensuring the psychological comfort of female servicemembers. Why not their physical comfort as well?
H/t: Althouse, who is also having a ton of fun mocking this story.
Did Any Of You Still Need Convincing That The ACA Was A Terrible Idea?
Funny thing about this recent IRS scandal: the guy taking the fall wasn't really in charge while the problem was at its height. No, the person in charge was a woman, and she now has a new job. That job is overseeing Obamacare implementation.
UPDATE: Yes, it could.
The Internal Revenue Service official in charge of the tax-exempt organizations at the time when the unit targeted tea party groups now runs the IRS office responsible for the health care legislation.That's perfect. Really, it couldn't be better.
Sarah Hall Ingram served as commissioner of the office responsible for tax-exempt organizations between 2009 and 2012. But Ingram has since left that part of the IRS and is now the director of the IRS’ Affordable Care Act office, the IRS confirmed to ABC News today.
Her successor, Joseph Grant, is taking the fall for misdeeds at the scandal-plagued unit between 2010 and 2012.
UPDATE: Yes, it could.
André Maurois on Confession
It is perhaps surprising to find a most insightful a comment on the sacrament of confession composed by a Jew. Nevertheless, André Maurois, in his novel The Silence of Colonel Bramble, has an extraordinary scene that does it justice. It is as fine an exploration of the difference between human morals and divine grace as I have seen.
The setup: a man has committed a terrible murder, and the weight of it is heavy on his soul until he is very close to suicide. The Anglican Church, to which he belongs, has recently begun to offer confession in an attempt to regain something of its roots. At first, few Anglicans were interested in confessing their sins, though the church pushed the offer strongly. The man who bears the sin is drawn, though, and eventually works up his courage to ask the vicar to hear his confession.
The setup: a man has committed a terrible murder, and the weight of it is heavy on his soul until he is very close to suicide. The Anglican Church, to which he belongs, has recently begun to offer confession in an attempt to regain something of its roots. At first, few Anglicans were interested in confessing their sins, though the church pushed the offer strongly. The man who bears the sin is drawn, though, and eventually works up his courage to ask the vicar to hear his confession.
The vicar was a very well brought up
young man, and had been at Eton and Oxford.
Enchanted with this rare piece of luck, he
said eagerly, 'Most certainly, open your heart
to me; you can talk to me as if I were your
father!' The other began : 'I have killed a
man.' The vicar sprang to his feet. 'And
you come here to tell me that? Horrible mur-
derer! I am not sure that it is not my duty
as a citizen to take you to the nearest police
station. In any case it is my duty as a gen-
tleman not to keep you a moment longer un-
der my roof.'
And the man went away. A few miles
farther on he saw a Roman Catholic church.
A last hope made him enter, and he knelt
down behind some old women who were wait-
ing by the confessional. When his turn came
he could just distinguish the priest praying in
the shadows, his head in his hands. 'Father,'
he said, 'I am not a Catholic, but I should
like to confess to you.' 'I am listening, my
son.' 'Father, I have committed murder.'
He awaited the effect of this terrible rev-
elation. In the austere silence of the church
the voice of the priest said simply, 'How many
times, my son?'
The black hole of pigment
The Gaboon viper has impressive camouflage:
But even more impressive is the black-black-blackness of its black spots, which achieve a velvety light absorption though very tiny hairy structures. Great electron-microscope pics at the link.
On the other end of the spectrum, the Pollia fruit puts itself right out there, using reflection and iridescence to make the most of the available light:
Lots of birds and insects know this trick, but for some reason it's rare in plants.
H/t Rocket Science.
But even more impressive is the black-black-blackness of its black spots, which achieve a velvety light absorption though very tiny hairy structures. Great electron-microscope pics at the link.
On the other end of the spectrum, the Pollia fruit puts itself right out there, using reflection and iridescence to make the most of the available light:
Lots of birds and insects know this trick, but for some reason it's rare in plants.
H/t Rocket Science.
The State Is For The Weak
Literally, the weak. Physically strong men tend to have right-wing views, and physically weak men tend to support more government intervention in daily life, because for the most part people are self-interested. To the strong, the state is chiefly a burden.
For the weak, the state is a much better proposition. It may give you money. While it restricts your freedom in some ways, it also provides some freedom to you by restricting the freedom of others who might run over you. It imposes some costs, but also provides some benefits. The more you don't think you can take care of yourself, the more you are likely to be inclined to want someone empowered to protect you and provide for you.
As a teenager I was inclined to Anarchism. I thought, at that time, that the world would be a better place if people were forced to overcome their weaknesses and stand or fall on their own. This would promote the kind of natural virtue, I thought then, that comes where Darwinian forces are allowed to play out.
Over time I've come to see that position is wrong, in several ways. For one thing strength is not earned, it is a gift from God. While you can make yourself stronger, or neglect to develop the strength you could possess, ultimately you are bound by limits that you did not create, and if you find yourself on the higher side of this divide, you did not earn your place there. It was given. Such gifts are given for a purpose, and the purpose of the strong is to defend and uphold the weak.
I've often quoted this line from Ivanhoe:
When the weak become this strong, you can strive against them without disgrace. Only, that is, insofar as they are strong. It would be cruel to strive against weak individuals, but as a faction they are powerful and interested. Defending the right means restraining the state they so desperately want, but only to its due and proper bounds.
Alas! But it is a flawed and fallen world. Perhaps in the next world we will need no government, and no law, beyond that truth and beauty that flow from the divine.
For the weak, the state is a much better proposition. It may give you money. While it restricts your freedom in some ways, it also provides some freedom to you by restricting the freedom of others who might run over you. It imposes some costs, but also provides some benefits. The more you don't think you can take care of yourself, the more you are likely to be inclined to want someone empowered to protect you and provide for you.
As a teenager I was inclined to Anarchism. I thought, at that time, that the world would be a better place if people were forced to overcome their weaknesses and stand or fall on their own. This would promote the kind of natural virtue, I thought then, that comes where Darwinian forces are allowed to play out.
Over time I've come to see that position is wrong, in several ways. For one thing strength is not earned, it is a gift from God. While you can make yourself stronger, or neglect to develop the strength you could possess, ultimately you are bound by limits that you did not create, and if you find yourself on the higher side of this divide, you did not earn your place there. It was given. Such gifts are given for a purpose, and the purpose of the strong is to defend and uphold the weak.
I've often quoted this line from Ivanhoe:
``Deny it not, Sir Knight---you are he who decidedWe have come to a pass, though, wherein the forms of government have given a power to the weak that is greater than that which they find in themselves; in other words, the weak are no longer as weak as they think that they are. Just as the strong man must not reason only from his strength, the weak man must not reason only from his sense of weakness, whether physical or financial or moral. It is no more right for the weak acting together to enslave the strong than it would be right for the strong to oppress the weak, or to deny them the basic protections of a state that are required by justice.
the victory to the advantage of the English
against the strangers on the second day of the
tournament at Ashby.''
``And what follows if you guess truly, good
yeoman?'' replied the knight.
``I should in that case hold you,'' replied the
yeoman, ``a friend to the weaker party.''
``Such is the duty of a true knight at least,'' replied
the Black Champion; ``and I would not willingly
that there were reason to think otherwise of
me.''
When the weak become this strong, you can strive against them without disgrace. Only, that is, insofar as they are strong. It would be cruel to strive against weak individuals, but as a faction they are powerful and interested. Defending the right means restraining the state they so desperately want, but only to its due and proper bounds.
Alas! But it is a flawed and fallen world. Perhaps in the next world we will need no government, and no law, beyond that truth and beauty that flow from the divine.
Who can keep them straight?
Guy Benson at HotAir asks: "But why did Lois Lerner secretly monitor Susan Rice’s talking points for two months before trying to coerce a 'donation'?"
Now you're talking my language
I visited FireDogLake out of curiosity to see whether they would acknowledge the Gosnell story (no, of course not), and was amused to see they're talking like Tea Partiers in the wake of the DOJ AP wiretap scandal. They're passionately discussing limited government and traditional Constitutional values. One of them quoted this passage from Justice Brandeis in the 1928 Olmstead case:
The makers of our Constitution … sought to protect Americans in their beliefs, their thoughts, their emotions and their sensations. They conferred, as against the Government, the right to be let alone—the most comprehensive of rights, and the right most valued by civilized men.
Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government’s purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding.
If the Government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy … to declare that the Government may commit crimes in order to secure the conviction of a private criminal—would bring terrible retribution.”
Justice Louis Brandeis,
dissenting in
Olmstead v. United States,
277 U.S. 438,
June 4, 1928
dissenting in
Olmstead v. United States,
277 U.S. 438,
June 4, 1928
Bad week for anti-conspiracy theorists
Also from a Hoyt commenter: what the week feels like in some corners.
Getting up off the floor (minor version)
One of Ms. Hoyt's readers recounted this story about a man who, in his small way, stood up for reasonable principles at his office (see Robin Munn reply at May 14 1:13pm).
Now, AofS guy and Che guy worked in the same division, with Che guy on a different team, one that happened to have poor results. The company reassigned Che guy's team leader and replaced him with AofS guy, with explicit directions to let go anyone he thought necessary to improve the poor team results. Did he immediately fire Che guy? No, he said he wanted to give him a fair shake and judge by the numbers, not the personalities. His attitude so impressed other team members, including Che guy's running buddies, that one of them upped her game and improved her performance. Che guy, on the other hand, improved nothing and in fact quit before he could be fired, crowing that he'd now get unemployment benefits. (Actually, by quitting he forfeited them.) AosS guy then called the remaining team together to announce that the numbers were now so improved that no one else faced a layoff. Meanwhile, AofS guy became good friends with the bodyguard and even better friends with the bodyguard's highly eligible older sister.
As the commenter notes:
The day after Andrew Breitbart died, this guy saw a coworker (of the 20-something hipster-liberal variety) wearing a Che T-shirt. Normally, he said, he would have brushed it off, but after losing Andrew and seeing all the “Breitbart is here” and “Be Breitbart” slogans that were popping up, he decided to say something. The Che T-shirt guy didn’t take it kindly, and got a few of his hipster-liberal buddies to complain to HR, and an anonymous email (which later proved to have been from a liberal-leaning HR person) got distributed widely among the Ace of Spades commenter (hereafter called AoS guy)’s group—WAY more widely than company policy said it should have. AoS guy immediately stopped driving his nice car to work and started driving his junky car, which proved to be wise because a few days later, someone slashed his tires in the parking lot. He reported this fact to HR (to someone he was pretty sure was NOT the person who sent out the anonymous email).The upshot, described in more detail at Hoyt's site, is that more sensible people in this financial company got wind of the situation and were unhappy with the first HR person's flagrant violation of company policy re the privacy of HR disputes—enough so to fire him. Management also assigned AofS guy a young bodyguard to take him to and from his parking spot. Presently the bodyguard witnessed some guys trying to spraypaint a message on the car, broke the vandal group up, and received minor injuries. Fortunately, he also took down the escaping car's license plate, which proved to have an indirect connection to Che guy, though not enough to get him fired.
Now, AofS guy and Che guy worked in the same division, with Che guy on a different team, one that happened to have poor results. The company reassigned Che guy's team leader and replaced him with AofS guy, with explicit directions to let go anyone he thought necessary to improve the poor team results. Did he immediately fire Che guy? No, he said he wanted to give him a fair shake and judge by the numbers, not the personalities. His attitude so impressed other team members, including Che guy's running buddies, that one of them upped her game and improved her performance. Che guy, on the other hand, improved nothing and in fact quit before he could be fired, crowing that he'd now get unemployment benefits. (Actually, by quitting he forfeited them.) AosS guy then called the remaining team together to announce that the numbers were now so improved that no one else faced a layoff. Meanwhile, AofS guy became good friends with the bodyguard and even better friends with the bodyguard's highly eligible older sister.
As the commenter notes:
So go ahead and stand up for your beliefs — you never know WHAT might happen.
Hearing voices
Biggest difference? One of them had enough class to resign.
When there is evidence of scandalous or bizarre behavior on the part of a political figure, and no reasonable explanation is revealed within 24 to 48 hours, then the truth is probably as bad as everyone suspects.
Nobody withholds exculpatory information. Nobody who's been accused of something wrong waits for "just the right moment" to unveil information that proves the charge baseless. Political figures never choose to deliberately let themselves twist in the wind. It's not the instinctive psychological reaction to being falsely accused, it's not what any public communications professional would recommend, and to use one of our president's favorite justifications, it's just common sense.As someone else said recently,
Unfortunately, you've grown up hearing voices that incessantly warn of government as nothing more than some separate, sinister entity that's at the root of all our problems. Some of these same voices also do their best to gum up the works. They'll warn that tyranny always lurking just around the corner. You should reject these voices.I should reject something, that's for sure.
The eighth deadly sin
Sarah Hoyt urges us to "Get up off the Floor":
And right now you’re going “It’s all done, we’re done, we—”
Get up off the floor. First, if you’re a believer, despair is a sin. And if you’re not a believer, despair is spitting on the graves of all the men and women who fought in much worse conditions than you face. The ghosts of Tiananmen Square rise up against you. The men who in the Gulags carried a hope of freedom accuse you. The victims of communism point fingers at you. The millions of dead at the hands of marching statism would like to remind you that to give up is to die. And that’s when you should give up. Not a second earlier.
The government loans me my children
Here's a proposal so wrong-headed in so many ways I hardly know how to begin. Kristin Wartman's NYT Op-ed observes that:
Something Must Be Done, and as usual, it takes the form of totally misunderstanding what salaries are for, as in "money that one person (or group) gives to another for performing a service that the first person (or group) values enough to pay money for it." Here, it obviously wouldn't help much for the husband or the children to pay the wife a salary for putting a fresh, healthy dinner on the table and then washing the dishes. Evidently it doesn't count that the husband deposits his salary into the household account and pays the bills. What to do? Somehow I knew it would involve tax subsidies, tax penalties, and the phrase "sugary foods," and Wartman did not disappoint:
One thing I don't understand is why the tax subsidy would be limited to families with young children. Don't older children deserve to avoid obesity, illness, incivility, and immorality? What about middle-aged people who don't have parents any more?
The home-cooked family meal is often lauded as the solution for problems ranging from obesity to deteriorating health to a decline in civility and morals.Well! That certainly identifies the high stakes. What to do? We're way too busy to cook, even those of us who stay home. And it's expensive to buy fresh food! We need affordability and convenience, but without sacrificing good looks, health, civility, or morals. Fantasy economics comes to the rescue. Remember in the early days of feminism the proposals for housewives to earn salaries? Acknowledging that "[i]t’s nearly impossible for a single parent or even two parents working full time to cook every meal from scratch, planning it beforehand and cleaning it up afterward," Wartman notes that families "of means" just hire outsiders to take care of these problems. But then what happens to the obese, unhealthy, uncivil, and immoral children of the paid housekeepers?
Something Must Be Done, and as usual, it takes the form of totally misunderstanding what salaries are for, as in "money that one person (or group) gives to another for performing a service that the first person (or group) values enough to pay money for it." Here, it obviously wouldn't help much for the husband or the children to pay the wife a salary for putting a fresh, healthy dinner on the table and then washing the dishes. Evidently it doesn't count that the husband deposits his salary into the household account and pays the bills. What to do? Somehow I knew it would involve tax subsidies, tax penalties, and the phrase "sugary foods," and Wartman did not disappoint:
Stay-at-home parents should qualify for a new government program while they are raising young children—one that provides money for good food, as well as education on cooking, meal planning and shopping—so that one parent in a two-parent household, or a single parent, can afford to be home with the children and provide wholesome, healthy meals. These payments could be financed by taxing harmful foods, like sugary beverages, highly caloric, processed snack foods and nutritionally poor options at fast food and other restaurants. Directly linking a tax on harmful food products to a program that benefits health would provide a clear rebuttal to critics of these taxes. Business owners who argue that such taxes will hurt their bottom lines would, in fact, benefit from new demand for healthy food options and from customers with money to spend on such foods.Progressives are so cute when they try to talk about market principles. See, it makes sense for the taxpayers to pay mom's salary, because business owners benefit when families demand healthy food options at the store! Also, we need "workplace policies that incentivize health, like 'health days' that employees could use for health-promoting activities: shopping for food, cooking, or tending a community garden." I guess there's not much a family should supply for itself by deciding that it's important and paying for it with money the family brings in by doing valuable work for outsiders. If it needs to be done at all, the taxpayers should fund it. Probably best if the government mandates it, too, just to be sure, because you can never be sure that most parents will take care of their children out of love, duty, or simple self-interest.
One thing I don't understand is why the tax subsidy would be limited to families with young children. Don't older children deserve to avoid obesity, illness, incivility, and immorality? What about middle-aged people who don't have parents any more?
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