On Holder's comments...Here we go. I have a feeling like all of this is going to start reading like an episode of West Wing. The sight of our attorney general with a racial agenda spewing out of his pores means that justice is no longer blind. Now, in the form of Holder with infallible knowledge from 'the one', "justice" can see the scales and tip them to their liking.
However, I will agree with Holder in as much as race does still need to be talked about. I just wish one of those conversations would be a sit down with Heather MacDonald.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Well I don't know honey, It just doesn't look like a hybrid
James Taranto's piece today is a must read, some highlights.
"The desire for distinction is not simply a problem for democracy, however, but a problem of democracy. People who have social ambitions, but not necessarily political ones, will find it gratifying to regard themselves and be regarded by others as among Wilson's "instructed few," and appalling to be lumped together with the uninstructed many. "Let me smile with the wise, and feed with the rich," said Samuel Johnson. In our age of widespread affluence, when people can be dangerously well-fed without being rich, the desire to be numbered among the wise when smiles are shared becomes especially urgent. As Leon Wieseltier wrote about the controversial New Yorker cover depicting Michelle and Barack Obama as violent radicals, "The image was the creation of people for whom there is almost nothing more mortifying than not being in on the joke. That is the bridge and tunnel of the soul."
"The Toyota Prius is a testament to its driver's virtue, not a mark of his prosperity. Its distinctive homeliness has made it a hit, at a time when Honda has cancelled production of the hybrid version of the Accord: it turned out nobody wanted to buy a hybrid that was indistinguishable from an iceberg-melting V-6."
"The only status advantage to be gained by liking Disney World and Nascar comes from liking them ironically, conveying that you're in on the joke. As the author Tad Friend has argued, this desperate business of showing the world you have the aesthetically correct vantage point on popular culture "is rare among those who genuinely respect high art," since they find the alternatives to what they care about uninteresting, but also unthreatening."
"The desire for distinction is not simply a problem for democracy, however, but a problem of democracy. People who have social ambitions, but not necessarily political ones, will find it gratifying to regard themselves and be regarded by others as among Wilson's "instructed few," and appalling to be lumped together with the uninstructed many. "Let me smile with the wise, and feed with the rich," said Samuel Johnson. In our age of widespread affluence, when people can be dangerously well-fed without being rich, the desire to be numbered among the wise when smiles are shared becomes especially urgent. As Leon Wieseltier wrote about the controversial New Yorker cover depicting Michelle and Barack Obama as violent radicals, "The image was the creation of people for whom there is almost nothing more mortifying than not being in on the joke. That is the bridge and tunnel of the soul."
"The Toyota Prius is a testament to its driver's virtue, not a mark of his prosperity. Its distinctive homeliness has made it a hit, at a time when Honda has cancelled production of the hybrid version of the Accord: it turned out nobody wanted to buy a hybrid that was indistinguishable from an iceberg-melting V-6."
"The only status advantage to be gained by liking Disney World and Nascar comes from liking them ironically, conveying that you're in on the joke. As the author Tad Friend has argued, this desperate business of showing the world you have the aesthetically correct vantage point on popular culture "is rare among those who genuinely respect high art," since they find the alternatives to what they care about uninteresting, but also unthreatening."
Monday, February 16, 2009
The New American Landscape
Steven Stoll in Hapers looks forward to "the specter of a no-growth world".
""There is nothing intrinsic in the system that says it cannot exist happily in a stationary state.”
A stationary state. The term comes from John Stuart Mill, who argued, in 1848, that “the increase of wealth is not boundless.” Economists should know, said Mill, that “at the end of what they term the progressive state lies the stationary state, that all progress in wealth is but a postponement of this.”"
This is a more logical take on enviromentalism, one without sea kitten mentalities so to speak. Mckibben's Deep Economy sounds like a prominent step towards more autonomous communities, not unlike the Preservation Institute it appears.
Also, Richard Florida in The Atlantic looks at "How the crash will reshape America"
"The solution begins with the removal of homeownership from its long-privileged place at the center of the U.S. economy. Substantial incentives for homeownership (from tax breaks to artificially low mortgage-interest rates) distort demand, encouraging people to buy bigger houses than they otherwise would. That means less spending on medical technology, or software, or alternative energy—the sectors and products that could drive U.S. growth and exports in the coming years. Artificial demand for bigger houses also skews residential patterns, leading to excessive low-density suburban growth. The measures that prop up this demand should be eliminated.
If anything, our government policies should encourage renting, not buying. Homeownership occupies a central place in the American Dream primarily because decades of policy have put it there. A recent study by Grace Wong, an economist at the Wharton School of Business, shows that, controlling for income and demographics, homeowners are no happier than renters, nor do they report lower levels of stress or higher levels of self-esteem."
Now why would this aspect be left out of every conversation of the housing bubble seen on MSM television? Do they just not do their research? Are they in the tank? Or maybe it's just that they don't think the people who watch their stations are capable of understanding it? Whatever the reason, there is no excuse.
Given the fact the market did not cause the housing bubble...For about five years now I've wondered where do we go from here. It seemed like we had hit a wall, but I always conceded that I just wasn't smart enough or creative enough to see all of the posibilities for growth. So, idk, do we have to keep growing? Or is that just a Marxist ideology, as far as I know he is the only one to say it. Did any of the "classical economists" ever say things must continue to grow?
""There is nothing intrinsic in the system that says it cannot exist happily in a stationary state.”
A stationary state. The term comes from John Stuart Mill, who argued, in 1848, that “the increase of wealth is not boundless.” Economists should know, said Mill, that “at the end of what they term the progressive state lies the stationary state, that all progress in wealth is but a postponement of this.”"
This is a more logical take on enviromentalism, one without sea kitten mentalities so to speak. Mckibben's Deep Economy sounds like a prominent step towards more autonomous communities, not unlike the Preservation Institute it appears.
Also, Richard Florida in The Atlantic looks at "How the crash will reshape America"
"The solution begins with the removal of homeownership from its long-privileged place at the center of the U.S. economy. Substantial incentives for homeownership (from tax breaks to artificially low mortgage-interest rates) distort demand, encouraging people to buy bigger houses than they otherwise would. That means less spending on medical technology, or software, or alternative energy—the sectors and products that could drive U.S. growth and exports in the coming years. Artificial demand for bigger houses also skews residential patterns, leading to excessive low-density suburban growth. The measures that prop up this demand should be eliminated.
If anything, our government policies should encourage renting, not buying. Homeownership occupies a central place in the American Dream primarily because decades of policy have put it there. A recent study by Grace Wong, an economist at the Wharton School of Business, shows that, controlling for income and demographics, homeowners are no happier than renters, nor do they report lower levels of stress or higher levels of self-esteem."
Now why would this aspect be left out of every conversation of the housing bubble seen on MSM television? Do they just not do their research? Are they in the tank? Or maybe it's just that they don't think the people who watch their stations are capable of understanding it? Whatever the reason, there is no excuse.
Given the fact the market did not cause the housing bubble...For about five years now I've wondered where do we go from here. It seemed like we had hit a wall, but I always conceded that I just wasn't smart enough or creative enough to see all of the posibilities for growth. So, idk, do we have to keep growing? Or is that just a Marxist ideology, as far as I know he is the only one to say it. Did any of the "classical economists" ever say things must continue to grow?
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Beau, Barney, & The Great Bear
What's Portland like this time of year...Oh.
How could I have never asked the question. Seriously had no clue.
Is Russia going to be a problem?
And now to work on my chops...Hackery, Sorry Mr. Taranto
Congress still flips too soon, just can't avoid grilling tough bankers
"Wall Steet bankers nervous in face of tough congressional grilling" - Guardian.uk
Served with a side of greens and a lemon wedge
"Bank CEO's Grilled On TARP" - Business Week
Fecicious puts forth ultimatum
"Sirius, your days look numbered" - Fortune
Proof, Trigg can't be Todd's child
"Behind the Palin Pull Out" - The Atlantic
After talks fall through with nightcrawler
"Caterpillar offers retirement to 2,000 employees" - Bloomberg
News of the Tautological
" Rains present flooding threat" - The Comercial News, Danville, IL
How could I have never asked the question. Seriously had no clue.
Is Russia going to be a problem?
And now to work on my chops...Hackery, Sorry Mr. Taranto
Congress still flips too soon, just can't avoid grilling tough bankers
"Wall Steet bankers nervous in face of tough congressional grilling" - Guardian.uk
Served with a side of greens and a lemon wedge
"Bank CEO's Grilled On TARP" - Business Week
Fecicious puts forth ultimatum
"Sirius, your days look numbered" - Fortune
Proof, Trigg can't be Todd's child
"Behind the Palin Pull Out" - The Atlantic
After talks fall through with nightcrawler
"Caterpillar offers retirement to 2,000 employees" - Bloomberg
News of the Tautological
" Rains present flooding threat" - The Comercial News, Danville, IL
Friday, February 6, 2009
Some Vintage Scroot
I'm not sure how I ever missed this from The Scroot...
Money Shots:
The lush context of each is worth the exploration. Check em out.
Also, you read the latest Scroot out at CJ yet?
Money Shots:
"Most religions stifle our metaphysical questions with myths..."
"Happiness depends upon the approval of people who are no longer living"
The lush context of each is worth the exploration. Check em out.
Also, you read the latest Scroot out at CJ yet?
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Bubbling Up
Forbes points to the next bubble about to burst.
Jay's got the wrong way.
How kind of them to stop rising tuition. God forbid we cut funding for such fine programs as this and this.
A side note on the e-research program. James Bowman points out in Is stupid making us Google,
"as an elementary school principal told Bauerlein, proceed as follows when they are assigned a research project: “go to Google, type keywords, download three relevant sites, cut and paste passages into a new document, add transitions of their own, print it up, and turn it in.”
Jay's got the wrong way.
How kind of them to stop rising tuition. God forbid we cut funding for such fine programs as this and this.
A side note on the e-research program. James Bowman points out in Is stupid making us Google,
"as an elementary school principal told Bauerlein, proceed as follows when they are assigned a research project: “go to Google, type keywords, download three relevant sites, cut and paste passages into a new document, add transitions of their own, print it up, and turn it in.”
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
A Daimond in the Kos
I usually check DailyKos everyday; I prefer anger to anxiety. In any case, I actually found something I somewhat agreed with for the first time ever! King Kos's himself includes a link in a post to the The Preservation Institute. Reading through the site a little bit I see a lot I like. They haven't got all the kinks worked out yet though imho:
Yikes! I can't help but laugh. That's all they have to say on human nature? What to expect from a movement that has systematically ignored it, if not explicitly undermine it for generations.... Anyhow, I see some Howard Kunstler in these ideas that may be my only nexus of agreement with the left.
Wikipedia info here.
Apparently The Congress for a New Urbanism has a website, but I can't get it to load to see what they have to say. Sounds interesting.
I can't decide if it's ironic or appropriate that the left champion this issue considering the socialist Bauhaus-style worldview that inspired the destruction of urban communities in the first place.
[on] Human Nature: Genetic engineering, psyychiatric drugs, and other new technologies threaten to change what it means to be human. We believe these technologies should be banned.
Yikes! I can't help but laugh. That's all they have to say on human nature? What to expect from a movement that has systematically ignored it, if not explicitly undermine it for generations.... Anyhow, I see some Howard Kunstler in these ideas that may be my only nexus of agreement with the left.
Wikipedia info here.
Apparently The Congress for a New Urbanism has a website, but I can't get it to load to see what they have to say. Sounds interesting.
I can't decide if it's ironic or appropriate that the left champion this issue considering the socialist Bauhaus-style worldview that inspired the destruction of urban communities in the first place.
Dollar Bet
A gratuitous prediction that the dollar declines sharply today... But then again I haven't been asleep yet...
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