Saturn In Retrograde

2007-09-27T22:05:00.000-05:00

Atheism vs. Objectivism (Richard) "Earnest, what do you mean by your use of the concept 'God?' Are you talking about a literal conceptualizing consciousness with a will and "super powers," or are you talking about the 'moral dimension of reality,' i.e., the 'vertical axis of existence,' as some of the Eastern religions attempt to frame it?" (end quote) God is rational and a maximally

2007-05-17T13:22:00.000-05:00

The Falwell Paradox Jerry Falwell was supposedly a bad man because he expressed "hate" and "intolerance." But his critics have expressed more hate and intolerance in response to his death than he ever did in his entire life. No doubt they think they're justified in spewing vitriol towards a man they regard as supremely evil, but their doing so belies the notion that they represent the tolerant

2007-05-14T20:51:00.000-05:00

Dial E for Endarkenment With all the touhoubou about Christopher Hitchens's new book, (I've read the advanced reader's copy, it is even more purile than Dawkins or Harris, and that is saying something), I thought that I would repost a Usenet reply to an article that Billy Beck linked back in 1999 that deals with part of Hitchens's intellectual pathologies: REASON *

2005-10-23T11:38:00.000-05:00

I oppose the Miers nomination To answer NZ Bear's query, I oppose the Miers nomination, not because I have any insane delusions about an "originalist" Associate Justice saving us from ROE V. WADE or KELO or any other statist abomination the court has thrown up, but because it is a symbol of the embrace of foul, mediocre lowering of standards which typifies the "Endarkenment" we are now going

2005-10-20T14:57:00.000-05:00

The Elitism of Achievement vs. the Elitism of Association The thing that really disturbs me about the Miers nomination is the willful embrace of know-nothing populism by her defenders like Hugh Hewitt. In calling her detractors "elitist," they conflate the "elitism" of achievement, which is good, with the really negative connotation of the term, which refers to the -elitism- of association, cf.

2005-10-05T23:08:00.000-05:00

Let Slip the Hounds of Love: Kate Bush Returns If you're a Kate Bush fan, you can hear a sample of "King of the Mountain," the first release from her upcoming double album, Aerial. The entire song is available digitally on iTunes, Walmart, Napster, et al. I nabbed it from iTunes as soon as I saw it. It doesn't have the immediate hook of "Rubberband Girl" or "Experiment IV," but instead sounds

2005-10-03T20:41:00.000-05:00

An Unsurprising and Disgusting Choice Hugh Hewitt maunders on about Bush's nomination of Harriet Miers for the Supreme Court and wonders why "the base" is so upset by it. "The base" is upset because they've been busting their humps defending Bush from the charge that he's a crony-loving corporate shill only to have the Bush Baby reward them by sticking his finger down his throat and projectile

2005-10-02T00:56:00.000-05:00

Missing the point Recently, I had the following quotations from Galt's Speech brought to my attention: "What are the evils man acquired when he felll from a state they consider perfection? Their myth declares that he ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge--he acquired a mind and became a rational being. It was the knowledge of good and evil--he became a moral being. He was sentenced

2005-09-21T01:39:00.000-05:00

Welcome Pandas and Cats! Welcome to readers of Pandagon and The Conservative Cat. Ernie and I aren't prolific posters, but there's still plenty o' stuff to read. Enjoy the show, folks.

2005-09-13T00:47:00.000-05:00

Hitler's Pants: a Mini-Confirmation Hearing Senator: It's a known, indisputable fact that in World War II Hitler wore pants. I can't help but notice that you're wearing pants. What does that say about you as a candidate for Chief Justice? And may I remind you not to interrupt me while you're trying to answer my question. Judge Roberts: But ... Senator: You're being evasive Judge Roberts.

2005-09-09T19:38:00.000-05:00

The "Science Marches on in My Name" Fallacy Ernie and I aren't particularly fond of NRO writer John Derbyshire. He's supposed to be a conservative, but he's really a right-wing Social Darwinist who takes a majoritarian stance towards issues such as abortion and embryonic stem cell research. Of course, this label wouldn't bother him in the least, and my aim here is not to attack his views; it's

2005-09-09T15:06:00.000-05:00

Bush Hates Black People: A Mini-Dialogue and/or Mini-Tragedy X: Bush doesn't like black people. Y: Really? Then why have our last two Secretaries of States been black? X: Those aren't real black people. They're just Bush's stooges. Y: So? Even if they are just "Bush's Stooges," that doesn't mean that they're not black. X: No, but they're not the right kind of black people. Y: That's what

2005-09-07T18:41:00.000-05:00

Anne Rice: Interview with an Idiotarian Anne Rice gets testy with America: Why did America ask a city cherished by millions and excoriated by some, but ignored by no one, to fight for its own life for so long? That's my question. I don't remember asking New Orleans to do this, but it's possible that I did and then forgot. I'll ask Ernie if he did. He probably did, knowing what a bad man he

2005-09-03T00:23:00.000-05:00

Jabbar Gibson vs. Kanye West It is hard for me to stomach what is going on in this country. A lionized punk who has become wealthy beyond the dreams of avarice in this country can't help but vomit all over it in support of murdering Morlocks at a venue designed to help victims of the Katrina tragedy. Meanwhile, a stand-up MAN like Jabbar Gibson gets threatened with jail (!) for having the

2005-08-28T16:23:00.000-05:00

Phone Etiquette, is it so hard? If there is one thing that REALLY ticks me off, it's unsolicited phone calls. I've always hated phones, and the only reason I have one now is to get online. What really chaps me are the people who call and stubbornly insist on asking me who I am without providing Clue One as to who -they- are. I just had someone dial me up and blather on, "Is this Ernest Brown?,

2005-08-27T13:16:00.000-05:00

Was Darwin a rank idiot?, or more ID idiotarianism Glenn Reynolds approvingly links to an Edward J. Larson op-ed in the L.A. Times. Here's the money-quote: Intelligent design, despite its proponents' claims to the contrary, isn't modern science. It's part of that rebellion against it. Scientists look for natural explanations for natural phenomena. Their best explanations, if they survive

2005-08-18T21:51:00.000-05:00

Yo Dawgs: It's Just "Diddy" Now I've often been worried that the "P" in "P. Diddy" gets in between P. Diddy and his fans. Thankfully, I don't have to worry about that anymore: Hip-hop impresario and fashion designer Sean "P. Diddy" Combs wants to make it easier for fans to shower him with adoration--so he's dropping the "P." from his stage name. Word up. Combs, 35, has said he wanted to "

2005-08-14T13:09:00.000-05:00

Benighted Hypocrisy of the Left The disgusting Cindy Sheehan spectacle that Bill references below only highlights the gross hypocrisy of the Left. They claim than the Right are "hypocrites" for not caring about her political position on the war since she is a mother, thus projecting onto their opponents the mindless undifferentiated emotionalism that the "Left" engages in in pursuit of its own

2005-08-11T17:55:00.000-05:00

Dowd on Cindy Sheehan's Moral Authority Maureen Dowd writes: Selectively humane, Mr. Bush justified his Iraq war by stressing the 9/11 losses. He emphasized the humanity of the Iraqis who desire freedom when his W.M.D. rationale vaporized. Note the loaded phrases "his Iraq war" and "his W.M.D. rationale." Is Dowd completely unaware that Saddam was universally thought to be a threat? That the

2005-07-04T05:45:00.000-05:00

Brian Williams Redux Brian Williams complains that his critics have missed the point: Today, apparently, on some radio talk shows and blogs, my friends in the media have accused me of labeling George Washington a terrorist. They apparently missed my point: That the BRITISH CROWN might have viewed American revolutionaries that way. It's quite true that Williams never called Washington a

2005-07-01T09:32:00.000-05:00

The One Man's Terrorist Argument MSNBC's Brian Williams, in response to the story that Iran's new president might be one of the 1979 hostage takers, offers an iteration of the "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter" cliche: . . . several of us raised the point (I'll leave it to others to decide germaneness) that several U.S. presidents were at minimum revolutionaries, and

2005-05-13T08:13:00.000-05:00

Cal Thomas gets "pod-snatched" Dear Cal Thomas, Has a liberal pod infiltrated your mind and made some sort of weird lefty substitution? Blogs DO have a corrective mechanism, other blogs, i.e. good, old-fashioned skepticism at work. You've been complaining for years about the vile, unchecked bigotry of the MSMer's against Christians, and rightly so. Where were the "corrective mechanisms"

2005-05-13T01:50:00.000-05:00

Puffs of Huff As far as I can tell, The Huffington Post is a blog for several hundred million celebrities, journalists, politicians, and other unsavory characters to offer opinions that rival the wit and rigor found in high school essays and letters to the editor. It also seems to lean a bit to the left, probably because the aforementioned unsavory characters tend to lean to the left. But now

2005-04-26T08:26:00.000-05:00

Hollywood's First Star listens to the ants scream in FLORENCE LAWRENCE, THE BIOGRAPH GIRL My Epinions article on the life and fate of Hollywood's first movie star is now up for your reading pleasure.

2005-04-22T01:53:00.000-05:00

VRWC's Cover Blown Darn! A professor at Berkeley has gotten wise to right-wing mind control: ... the word fetus has been demonized, even though it is a technical, scientific term. The right is so successfully framing this issue that a term representing a political agenda is becoming the "neutral" or "objective" word that journalists are supposed to use in their stories. The right has been on

2005-04-22T00:52:00.000-05:00

Billy Beck vs. P Some quick, desultory comments: Sometimes speculative examples are helpful in philosophy, and they do actual work towards knowing something about the world. Analytic philosophy has its merits but can go over the top and become mind-numbingly trivial or silly. The same is true of continental philosophy. P's main problem, one by no means shared by all professional philosophers,

2005-04-20T13:32:00.000-05:00

A Kind of Tragic Billy Beck questions "P," a philosopher: I have questions for you. Why is it that people in your line of work insist on using terms like “rational agents” when the plain fact is that you’re talking about human beings? Why don’t you guys speak plain English? I’m serious. I’m not being facetious about this. "P" responds: There could be rational agents who are not human

2005-04-16T22:32:00.000-05:00

Dial "C" for "Compromise" The whole "compromise" debate going on recently (summarized ably here) reminded me of the real compromise that put Hitler into power: Schleicher, the mastermind behind many intrigues around the president, had always hoped to reduce Nazi influence by letting the Nazis share government responsibility. The enormous burden of political responsibility, Schleicher and

2005-04-16T22:21:00.000-05:00

Have we lost Bill to Lady Philosophy? Bill Ramey just might devote more of his blogging time to this site. Pop on over and give his posts a "look-see."

2005-04-08T09:17:00.000-05:00

A Sadly-Needed History Lesson "Let’s face it ... with the do-nothings in charge, we’d still be a colony of Great Britian." (this is a more polite reiteration of what I wrote in comments at QandO) I never thought that I would have to give Bruce McQuain AMERICAN HISTORY LESSONS... Did the Founding Fathers VOTE King George out of office, Bruce? No, they took up arms AGAINST the government

2005-03-20T17:48:00.000-06:00

"Is the b---h dead?" For the record, if I was left totally paralyzed or dependent on machines with no way to communicate with the outside world, I would not like to live on. However, I'd very much hope that if there were any doubts about the cause of my condition, that those around me would have an autopsy and bury me respectfully, not toss me into an incinerator and destroy any forensic

2005-03-17T12:54:00.000-06:00

Sappy Mirthday to Me! The city's supply of corned beef and cabbage is at risk now that this St. Pat's baby is on the loose!

2005-03-15T17:39:00.000-06:00

Colby Cosh Blasts Pro-Lifers Ernie and I like Colby Cosh’s writing, but I came across this angry blast in his archives: Any of you pro-lifers out there feeling uneasy about your "It's not as though fetal tissue grafts are really medically promising" arguments yet? Just thought I'd ask--I know that, considering your crowd relies so heavily on "moral intuition", your memory doesn't seem to

2005-03-04T01:09:00.000-06:00

Dean on Abortion, Take Two Remember when Howard Dean said that abortion was about right-wing politicians telling women what to do? Apparently, it’s ok for Democrats to be pro-life : "I want to reach out to people who are worried about values," Dean said. "We are going to embrace pro-life Democrats because pro-life Democrats care about kids after they're born, not just before they're born." I

2005-03-03T21:53:00.000-06:00

Peter Keating takes over the WTC project, or the print horse-whipping of the month I usually don't read the NEW YORK REVIEW OF BOOKS, but a headline caught my eye at the bookstore and I checked it out online here at home. Martin Filler's review of 4 new books about the design competition for the WTC Memorial is a scathing indictment of government fiddling with the process. Here's what he has to

2005-03-01T02:51:00.000-06:00

Howard Dean on Abortion and Tolerance Howard Dean explains what the abortion debate is all about: "The issue is not abortion," Dean told the closed-door fund-raiser. "The issue is whether women can make up their own mind instead of some right-wing pastor, some right-wing politician telling them what to do." In a nutshell, that’s what’s wrong with the mainstream pro-choice position: it turns

2005-02-28T21:24:00.000-06:00

A guide to the future Carnival of Crime in America These wiseacres (found at Billy Beck's blog) have stolen an idea that I've had rolling around in my mind for years, a Cross-Country Carnival of Crime in which the stupidest laws in America get broken. I wish them a lot of luck.

2005-02-27T23:01:00.000-06:00

Iowahawk strikes again An excerpt from a very unusual Scooby-Doo episode, with a certain unexpected guest celebrity: "Hanna and Barbera liked my story on hormone doping at the '72 Laff-a-Lympics and proposed that I cover a Harlem Globetrotters game at a haunted Aztec pyramid in Mexico. They called me to their offices in Burbank. "Jesus Christ, you're killing us here, Duke," Hanna complained

2005-02-21T18:13:00.000-06:00

"The Simplest Thing in The World," or Pragmatics come from Principles This is an excellent time to clear up a misunderstanding I had with Billy Beck in an old discussion on Q and O. In the course of attacking a purely pragmatic/utilitarian defense of Wal-Mart's right to pull out of one of its Canadian stores, I wrote: "I contend that "Homo Economus" doesn't exist. We are not ants in an

2005-02-21T08:04:00.000-06:00

An Absolutely Unsurprising Event Hunter S. Thompson killed himself yesterday. CONTINUED: Lileks shows why he gets paid to write and I don't: HST killed himself. He never would have “turned his life around” – that’s a hard thing to try when the room’s been spinning for 40 years. Depression? Wouldn’t be surprising. A bad verdict from the doc? Wouldn’t be surprising. A great writer in his

2005-02-17T20:53:00.000-06:00

Wild Things When I was a kid, our neighborhood had a patch of wild growth just behind the houses across the street. It served as a little area where snakes and bushes, and even some garbage, flourished and as a piquant reminder of what is gained and lost by building a city. I was reminded of that when I came across the Forgotten NY website. It's an interesting peek into the strange and

2005-02-16T19:24:00.000-06:00

Tears for Some, Silence for Others Ferdinand T. Cat wryly comments on The Progressive Blog Alliance HQ’s entry, “Why we denounce George Bush.” The PBA HQ writes: We watched from our televisions with tears in our eyes and screams in our hearts as innocent people died by the thousands. The Cat points out how selective these tears are because they didn’t seem to flow when Clinton bombed Serbia.

2005-02-15T21:26:00.000-06:00

Forgotten Classics of Blogdom, Part 1 Jay Random from Shiny Happy Gulag takes a Betamax trip down Memory Lane to uncover the roots of Canadian Anti-Americanism in Waking Up from the National Dream: A Curtain-Raiser.

2005-02-14T22:15:00.000-06:00

More Book Evilness I suppose that working for a bookstore has always been my dream job. In addition to the employee discount and other promotions, I get an early crack at the free books and consignment/bargain titles as well. For a bookaholic like me, it's quite a challenge, especially since you can figure that the store gets a good chunk of the salary it pays me back in sales. So, whenever I

2005-02-13T17:38:00.000-06:00

Gaiman and Spelling and Sontag, oh my! At this site, I managed to find an essay that sums up the lasting intellectual worth of the late Susan Sontag. The Stasis of Class: Surrealism and Sontagist camp Ludwig Long Department of Ontology, Cambridge University 1. Stone and semanticist narrative "Narrativity is unattainable," says Foucault; however, according to Buxton[1] , it is not so much

2005-02-11T10:31:00.000-06:00

"Lay off that nostalgia, cousin, it's a killer"-S.J. Perelman Iowahawk takes a rancid trip down memory lane to expose the genesis of Ward Churchill's dementia. As usual in such cases, it involves network television. Highly recommended.

2005-02-09T21:44:00.000-06:00

Boots smashing in human faces forever, thanks to Georgie Porgie George Soros voids forth a disgusting stream of offal in the guise of "political commentary." President George W. Bush's second inaugural address set forth an ambitious vision of the role of the United States in advancing the cause of freedom worldwide, fueling worldwide speculation over the course of American foreign

2005-02-09T09:55:00.000-06:00

Haunted Mailboxes "...but my friend (and, not incidentally, tender of my abibliophobia)" Billy Beck is about to get an extra dose of bibliomania, including the audio version of the best darn baseball book EVER. I'm just mean, cruel and evil that way.

2005-02-07T13:03:00.000-06:00

Peter Greenaway meditates on birds and immortality in THE FALLS (Revised Review) My review of Peter Greenaway's first feature film, THE FALLS, has been re-edited and reposted for your reading pleasure over at the Epinions.com site. Here's an excerpt: Before he gained world-wide fame as the creator of THE DRAUGHTSMAN'S CONTRACT and THE COOK, THE THIEF, HIS WIFE AND HER LOVER,

2005-02-04T11:29:00.000-06:00

Bio-Comprachicos, Incorporated Alyssa Ford, Utne.com, writes: Biopolitics, a term coined by Trinity College professor James Hughes, places pro-technology transhumanists on one pole and people who are suspicious of technology on the other. ...and shoots herself in the foot with the lead sentence. I am no more "suspicious of technology" in this context than I am "suspicious" of fire

2005-02-03T22:37:00.000-06:00

A Valediction Permitting Criticism I see, via Billy Beck, that Rand's birth centenary has come and gone. Professor Bainbridge has validated every faith that Beck has in him via the following post: Personally, I don't get it (or, more precisely, her). I found Fountainhead unbearably obtuse and Atlas Shrugged unreadable. As for Objectivism and Objectivists, they have always struck me

2004-11-17T13:01:00.000-06:00

Turkeys Pardoned, Peta Unhappy, Democrats Suspicious Bush pardoned two turkeys today, and the turkeys will go to a farm. PETA's response: That drew an objection from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, which said the turkeys would live in more humane conditions at an animal sanctuary. The turkeys Bush pardoned last year died within three months after their "pardons," a

2004-11-16T01:05:00.000-06:00

Rall's Rage Against Red State Biscuits One of the stranger things in Ted Rall's zing at Middle America is his claim that liberals eat better. Rall's reasoning is that liberals migrate to larger cities, and such cities generally have good food. It's no doubt true that large cities have a wide variety of good food, but that's hardly due to liberalism. Large cities attract immigrants, and

2004-11-16T01:03:00.000-06:00

Intellectual Snobbery or Misology: A False Dilemma There's an interesting discussion at Rational Explications. One of RE's bloggers responded to Jane Smiley's nasty article by making a distinction between people who make their living in the realm of talk (e.g. writers and teachers) and those who make their living in the realm of things (e.g. businessmen and engineers). The problem is that he

2004-11-09T03:40:00.000-06:00

The Unimposing Kinsley Michael Kinsley suggests that the problem with Red Staters is that they want to impose their values on other people, whereas liberal Blue Staters do not want to impose their values on anyone: But at least my values — as deplorable as I'm sure they are — don't involve any direct imposition on you. We don't want to force you to have an abortion or to marry someone of

2004-11-03T03:27:00.000-06:00

Hawking on Iraq Stephen Hawking offers his view of the war: "The war was based on two lies," said Hawking. "The first was we were in danger of weapons of mass destruction and the second was that Iraq was somehow to blame for Sept. 11. If Bush lied, then he (a) made false claims and (b) knew those claims to be false. So if Hawking is right, then all of the following propositions are true

2004-11-03T01:49:00.000-06:00

You Just Think Women Are Treated Badly in the Islamic World Here's TurkishPress's take on murdered filmaker Theo van Gogh: Van Gogh was widely known for his criticism of Islam and recently caused uproar with a short film linking domestic abuse with the perceived subservient position of women in the Islamic faith. Perceived subservience.

2004-11-01T18:13:00.000-06:00

Bill meant "Platonic dialogue" literally Here's the definition: http://www.wordiq.com/definition/Dialogue The arguments below are real, but the characters and setting are fictional (barely so, they really are here, we just don't waste our time talking to them, since Bill and I know about their imperviousness to reason). He was using "platonic dialogue" literally, and not as a

2004-10-27T11:51:00.000-05:00

Bush is Hitler: A Platonic Dialogue [Note: Some have thought that the following is an actual dialogue. It is not. The dialogue is a Platonic one, i.e., it is a fictive narrative in which I tackle real arguments. It is explicitly modeled on the first book of Plato's Republic. Despite its fictive nature, the positions are real and reflect what I have heard around campus.] I was on foot

2004-10-26T01:17:00.000-05:00

Bill Maher and the False Barbarians Some thoughts on the transcript of Bill Maher’s interview with the CBC. [Maher] is a frequent guest on Larry King on CNN because of his no-holds-barred, politically incorrect style … There isn’t anything politically incorrect about Bill Maher. Calling the American people stupid while lauding Europeans as deep thinkers is de rigueur for liberal

2004-09-12T17:18:00.000-05:00

The Champions of "Media Democracy" yearn for Oligarchy Well, it comes as no surprise to anyone watching the antics of the left in regard to the Swift Boat vets and the Rather phony "memo" that the bleating-hearts of the left who made moo-cow noises for years about the evils of corporate media dominance would besharny themselves to a high degree of stench over the fact that the "wrong" people

2004-08-06T01:41:00.000-05:00

All We Are Saying Is, Give Creative Tasks a Chance Why do terrorists blow stuff up, and what might we do to stop them? The answers to these tough questions have been discovered by an expert on terrorism at our very own alma mater, the University of Missouri at Columbia. First, why do they blow stuff up: “People struggle to defend their beliefs to protect themselves from anxiety over

2004-08-05T23:45:00.000-05:00

iBook and Safari Test I've gone over to the Mac side, so this post is just to see if I can use Safari and my Apple iBook to post messages.

2004-08-05T23:06:00.000-05:00

We're Coming Back Ernie and I have not updated in quite some time, but I've been itchin' to blog again. Of course, I don't know if anyone still reads Saturn, but if you do, stay tuned.

2004-02-14T13:43:00.000-06:00

A Reply to Professor Brandon's Defense Professor Brandon, Serious and mature discussion of an issue does not involve implying that one's opponents are "stupid," let alone by committing a gross logical fallacy (the distributive fallacy of composition [1]) as you do in your seriously intentioned "joke." The graver fallacy that you're

2003-12-02T23:02:00.000-06:00

"History's greatest monster"-it's not a joke The Pharisee from Plains vents his anti-Semitism openly in the N.Y. Times (registration required) "Mr. Carter, when asked in an interview whether the absence of progress so many years after Camp David was bittersweet for him, replied, "It's not bittersweet, just sweet." But then his frustration over twists in history and missed

2003-11-15T15:37:00.000-06:00

Again, Anime Anima This time she's trapped on the astral plane in deadly combat with the foul soul of Ted Rall

2003-11-15T15:00:00.000-06:00

The Comicsblogger returns The never-ending saga of Anime Anima's revulsion at Chomsky's self-lobotomy continues!

2003-11-03T08:04:00.000-06:00

The Reason for Inexcusable Casualties Fred Kaplan at Slate posted a chilling story Friday which served as a grim prophecy of yesterday's highly avoidable shoot-down. For now, I'll just say that the prejudice against human intelligence gathering (HUMINT) in both the armed forces AND the CIA in favor of signal intelligence (SIGINT) is going to get more people killed.

2003-11-02T19:00:00.000-06:00

Inexcusable Casualties Rantburg has news and commentary on the Chinook shootdown near Fallujah. My giant, economy-sized question is -why- are unescorted, thin-skinned helis like Chinooks flying over the Iraqi "bandit country" during a state of high terror alert? The Army needs to get the brass's heads out of their collective fundaments and start reading the Marine's "Little War" manual

2003-09-14T21:05:00.000-05:00

Sweden puts thumbs down on the Euro, thanks France! The Swedish electorate has voted to reject the Euro, due in no small part to France's EU scofflawry. It's a good blow for freedom against the Kafkaesque hellhole bureaucracy that the Union represents, and one can only hope that it is the first step in destroying that abominable institution.

2003-08-24T21:15:00.000-05:00

The IN LOCO PARENTIS Show In addition to the tragic events of this week, we have seen the disgraceful efforts of so-called world leaders to avoid the consequences of their actions. First, Kofi Annan whined that the U.S. should have forced(!) the U.N. Mission in Iraq to accept stepped-up security, even though their own spokesmen admitted that American forces DID offer to provide

2003-07-22T23:52:00.000-05:00

The Left Fails(?) its Rorschach Test Steven Den Beste's article on the Bush administration's justifications for going to war is comprehensive enough, but the substance behind it can be summarized as Bush & Co. being audacious enough to use the classical counter-insurgency tactic of "inkblotting" on an international scale: Not all U.S. COIN efforts failed outright or succeeded through

2003-06-30T23:17:00.000-05:00

Some Quick Blogs We haven't blogged much lately, so here's some brief items to get us going again: There's been a lot of blogging about Maureen Dowd's article on Clarence Thomas, but the main problem with it is a very basic one: whether or not Thomas benefited from affirmative action has nothing to do with whether or not affirmative action is constitutional. Thomas is under no obligation

2003-06-13T15:48:00.000-05:00

Marsh Arabs return to the ravaged Garden of Eden (via Instapundit) The Chicago Tribune's Paul Salopek reports [registration required] that the Marsh Arabs are cutting the levees and dams that drained the Tigris-Euphates marshes. The problem with this is that uncontrolled flooding of these dry areas could result in salt poisoning of the affected areas. Saddam, so beloved of the Euro-left and

2003-05-31T16:30:00.000-05:00

All Resourced Up and No Place to Go It seems that our Canuckistani friends might be facing another separationist movement (via Freedom News Daily). The Newfies are apparently up in arms about the national government's decision to close the cod fisheries. Well, cry me a tidal pool. Those whacky right-wingers over at Greenpeace point out that government policies of bribing the fishery

2003-05-23T01:19:00.000-05:00

Bashing Philosophy One of the least exciting things about being a philosophy student is hearing non-philosophers opine about how useless philosophy is. Many is the scientist, engineer, or housewife who with the patronizing air of someone who does real work, by gum avers that he or she doesn't have time to put up with nonsense. I don't answer these critics by earnestly but unconvincingly

2003-05-18T13:23:00.000-05:00

Clarification and Correction Aziz Poonawalla at Unmedia has accused Bill of “lying” because of his mistaken inference about Cantor’s views on the existential reality of actual infinity. While we apologize to all of our readers of good will for this error, I submit that if one mistaken inference debars all further comment about figures or ideas, then the whole blogosphere itself would have to

2003-05-16T21:39:00.000-05:00

Aziz Poonawalla on the Kalam Cosmological Argument Here's another critique of the KCA, from Aziz Poonawalla. Either Ernie or I will respond to the substance of his critique later, but now I want to address being called a liar by him. Poonawalla writes: Troy writes in to demonstrate with examples of Cantor's own writings that the attribution above that Cantor denied the existence of "

2003-05-16T12:44:00.000-05:00

Kurt Vonnegut's Mustache In April, Kurt Vonnegut delivered a lecture for the Mark Twain House. Naturally, of course, he took the opportunity to say nasty things about conservatives. And naturally, he began with a remark about his mustache: First things first: I want it clearly understood that this mustache I’m wearing is my father’s mustache. Thanks for clearing that up. I know

2003-05-14T00:29:00.000-05:00

In Response to Steven Den Beste As I mentioned earlier, Steven Den Beste at USS Clueless fisked my summary of the kalam cosmological argument--and boy was he peeved. Entitled "Abusing Math for God" (sounds like an allusion to Philip Kitcher's Abusing Science: The Case Against Creationism) his scathing blog calls me an idiot and a tyro, labels my argument as "an almost ideal example of a

2003-05-13T00:05:00.000-05:00

I've Been Fisked! Here's a fisking of me by Steven Den Beste at USS Clueless. Not only does he think that I'm an idiot, he thinks that I'm worse than a creation scientist. Wow! That's pretty low on the totem pole of things despised by the scientific cognosceti. I wonder if I even merit a space above astrologers and phrenologists. Being an idiot, I of course will need some time to sort

2003-05-11T22:55:00.000-05:00

Constructive criticism for atheists Steven Den Beste has posted two interesting blog entries on his view of atheism's "provability" at USS Clueless: USS Clueless - Raving Plagiarism and USS Clueless - Belief in atheism Den Beste distinguishes between "proof atheists" and "belief atheists." "Proof" atheists assert that the concept of God can be disproven via logically sound and valid

2003-05-09T12:37:00.000-05:00

Philosophy and Science An NRO Corner reader sent the following to Jonah Goldberg: In philosophy, the idea is to sit in a dark room and understand the universe using reason alone. In science, the idea is to ask "OK, what actually happens" i.e. do an experiment and see what reality says about your ideas. I'll take reality over intellectual consistency any day (although, of course, most

2003-05-08T17:44:00.000-05:00

On X-Men Here's an interesting article on the X-Men arguing that: ... the comic book series on which they're based has abandoned its early idealism in favor of crude racialist appeals. What we've seen in recent years is nothing less than the Sharptonization of the X-Men. Not being an X-Men reader, I don't know if this true, but I do know that the first X-Men movie (I haven't seen

2003-05-07T22:08:00.000-05:00

The Unofficial Story It seems that the story about the missing artifacts has been badly overblown. CNN.com - Thousands of Iraqi artifacts found - May. 7, 2003 I'm certain that the idiotarian mewlers who got their shorts in a bunch over the exaggerated initial reports will be breaking out in joyous hosannas over the news... when the Ice Capades performs for Lucifer in the Ninth Circle

2003-05-06T22:07:00.000-05:00

Home is where the heat is Well, well, well, remember how evil we were to not ratify Kyoto? Here's how those oh so superior and immensely moral Europeans are doing: BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Europe slips on greenhouse targets-via Rantburg Next, we'll talk about the 220+ EU code violations by France... Jonathan Todd, the Commission's spokesman, said the policy of "naming

2003-05-03T13:58:00.000-05:00

A Plaster Saint of Peace? Those who are critical of ANSWER and the rest of the leadership of the (objectively anti-)"peace" movement often hold up Gandhi and MLK as being moral exemplars against the moral turpitude and outrageous vomit n' fecal antics of our current "warnicks." King's personal flaws notwithstanding, MLK was generally consistent in his desire for peaceful solutions and felt

2003-04-30T20:50:00.000-05:00

Rose Falcon: The Un-Britney Recently I bought my first pop/rock album (or should I say CD?) in over a decade--to be sure, a dull event in times of either war or peace; but it has prompted me to make my first record (or should I say CD?) recommendation in two decades, when I wrote reviews for my high school newspaper. The CD in question is Rose Falcon, the self-titled debut of an 18-year old

2003-04-30T20:49:00.000-05:00

On Pens Long have I quested for the perfect stationery--the perfect pen, the perfect pencil, the perfect paper. And Long have I gazed upon pens and pencils and notebooks in Wal-Mart, Target, Office Depot, and Dairy Queen (OK, I was really gazing at hot fudge brownie sundaes, but you get the idea). And many is the time I thought that my quest had ended, but alas, I was merely fooled by the

2003-04-20T11:32:00.000-05:00

Just another 'maudit juif' as far as ChIraq & De Vilepig are concerned The last surviving commader of the Warsaw Uprising shares his thoughts about the conflict in Iraq: Marek Edelman speaks out on the war

2003-04-19T01:24:00.000-05:00

Return of the Comics-Blogger Anime Anima fisks the Chomper but good in the latest installment of Ernie's Situationist Comics. Chomsky Strikes Again

2003-04-16T02:18:00.000-05:00

New Blog Link We've added a link to Paul at Smell the Blog. He's got nude pictures of the Justice League! Well, no he doesn't. But somebody recently found his site by Google searching on the words "justice league naked." (I think it was Ernie trying to get a peek at Hawk Girl.) Some highlights of Smell the Blog: Justice League joins Alliance to Stop Iraq Iraqi Foreign Minister

2003-04-16T02:17:00.000-05:00

Protests in Los Angeles I don't know why, but I watched some of C-SPAN's coverage of the LA protests. Some highlights: A sign in the audience read: "Bush: Anti-Christ in the Making." So let's tally up what our peace activist friends have discovered about our president so far: he's a rogue cowboy; he's dumber than a ten-gallon hat; he's in league with Big Oil; he's Hitler; he's a

2003-04-12T12:42:00.000-05:00

A base canard and libel refuted Over at Pave France, the British need more parking, they have linked to a NewsMax article that compares Chirac & Co. to the Three Stooges. As I point out in my comment there, that is a true insult to the Stooges, who, after all, were among the first to parody Hitler and believed in fighting Fascists when the chips were down, cf. THEY STOOGE TO CONGA. (not

2003-04-06T12:40:00.000-05:00

Dang! One of the perils of procrastination is that you become discouraged when other writers make a statement better than you feel that you can do, before you do it. The Wild Monk has usurped me on a precise point that I've been intending to make for some time. Go over right now and read it! The Cold War is Not Over: Europe and the Post-Modern Left

2003-04-05T22:41:00.000-06:00

Peter Arnett Reports In This just in from Peter Arnett, the Always Objective JournalistTM, special to Al Jazeera, the Network of Truth in the Face of the Great SatanTM: The Unilateral Coalition of Evil, after having been all but defeated by valiant Iraqi forces, has stooped to the ultimate in biological warfare. F-18 Hornets flew over Baghdad today and disgorged massive swarms of giant

2003-03-29T22:04:00.000-06:00

A Gateway Writer Responds One of Chris Krause's colleagues at the Gateway, a newspaper at the University of Alberta, responded to my critique of Krause's article, "America: It’s Far Too Easy to Ridicule You." I'll admit that his article was extreme, this response was just as ridiculous. Except that I didn't wish for a "huge loss of life," make hateful generalizations about Canadians,

2003-03-28T22:22:00.000-06:00

Stating the Obvious The really interesting thing about Dominique de Villepin's paean to Napoleon's disastrous Hundred Days Campaign lies in his historical blindness to Napoleon's diplomatic incompetence, which is troubling in a putative Foreign Minister of a European "power." Amazon.fr : Les Cent-Jours ou l'esprit de sacrifice For all of de Villepin's idiotic veneration of "glory," he

2003-03-28T00:17:00.000-06:00

The Shanghai Gesture Well, I certainly didn't expect to see sense out of this quarter, but this commentary is about as short and sweet a summary of the realities of America's position as you will find anywhere: Gulf of misunderstanding Tip o' the pen to Iron Fist at LGF