Sunday Morning Book Thread 09-20-2015: Subsistence Level [OregonMuse]

Tavik Frantisek Simon, "Paris Bookstore" (1904)

(graphic stolen from rdbrewer's photobucket album)

Good morning to all of you morons and moronettes and bartenders everywhere and all the ships at sea. Welcome to AoSHQ's stately, prestigious, internationally acclaimed and high-class Sunday Morning Book Thread. The Sunday Morning Book Thread is the only AoSHQ thread that is so hoity-toity, pants are required. Or kilts. Also, assless chaps don't count. Serious you guys. Kilts are OK, though. But not tutus. Unless you're a girl.

For one who reads, there is no limit to the number of lives that may be lived, for fiction, biography, and history offer an inexhaustible number of lives in many parts of the world, in all periods of time.
-Louis L'Amour

MULTIPLE TRIGGER WARNINGS this week for extolling the virtues of technological advancement and mental health, and not really being all that impressed with Chelsea Clinton.

"No Fair, Mom, He Hit Me Back!"

You know you've arrived when your book gets trashed by a celebrity. In one of Maet's overnight threads of a few days ago, he mentioned that Mark Steyn's book "A Disgrace to the Profession" had been reviewed on Amazon by one "P Erlich", and it went like this:

It is sad that with humanity facing catastrophic climate disruption as part of an existential threat that there are still people willing to attack Mike Mann, one of the real heroes of climate science, outrageous lies. But one must admire the well-funded denier campaign, carried forward by the likes of Rupert Murdoch and his "False News" network, for the campaign's persistence in the face of massive evidence, its success in confusing much of the public, and creating a propioganda (sic) triumph equivalent to that of creationism in keeping Medieval nonsense embedded in the brains of many Americans. Unhappily the "triumph" may prove doom for many of our descendents. Mike Mann is admired by all real climate scientists, even those who may have same disagreements with him (there is no certainty in science, unlike in the world of denial propogandists (sic)) -- and I know many of the leading players and follow the field closely. The best one can say of this silly collection of comments from hacks and has-beens, mixed with quotes-out-of-context, is that it is NOT a disgrace to the profession of its perpetrators, nor to their pimps.

Yes, "P Ehrlich" is Paul "Population Bomb" Ehrlich, the Undisputed Heavyweight Champion of Junk Science himself, who apparently does not like Steyn's book. Oh dear. I'm sure Steyn is lying awake nights, sobbing into his bedsheets over this. And it's amazing to me how much Ehrlich's review is just standard-issue progtard boilerplate insults. Hacks and has-beens, march of science, medievalism, blah, blah, blah. There's not an ounce of creativity anywhere in it. It's like signs held up at a left-wing protest. Ehrlich is not so much reviewing a book as he is chanting slogans. All that's missing is a giant, papier mâché Mark Steyn puppet head.

Steyn wrote his book "A Disgrace to the Profession" (subtitled "The world's scientists -in their own words- on Michael E. Mann, his hockey stick, and their damage to science) because Mann had sued him previously over some sort of "defamation" nonsense when Steyn agreed with Rand Simberg, who referred to prof. Mann, who is employed by Penn State as "the Jerry Sandusky of climate science", and Mann got offended. When things like this happens, the left expects you to fold up and make a grovelling apology, but Steyn, who does not operate out of the GOPe playbook, is countersuing, whereupon Mann has disappeared into the tall grass.

And what is the solution to global warming that "P Ehrlich'" proposes? Why, the same one that he proposed to defuse the "population bomb", of course: MOAR SOCIALISM! As one Amazon reviewer notes:

His solution was de-industrialization, capital de-accumulation, lowering of productivity and hence lowering of real wages. A back to nature lifestyle of 'dawn to dusk' subsistence poverty.

I would have a better opinion of Ehrlich if he gave up his cushy job at Stanford and took up subsistence level farming, which he apparently wants for everyone else. You know, think globally, act locally, and all that.

There Will Be War, Volume Ten Is Coming

...and all of you authors, aspiring authors, wannabe authors, has-been authors, and Methodists are invited to submit material for it. So says the editor of the TWBW science fiction series, Jerry Pournelle:

Accepting submissions for a new volume of the There Will Be War series. Send with cover note to submission@therewillbewar.net. Stories should preferably be 20,000 words or less. Poetry encouraged, but see the previous series; it needs to make sense. Hard science fiction mainly; urban fantasy with a military theme possibly acceptable, but mostly we want hard, realistic stories. They need not be action adventure; good command decision stories encouraged. Space opera always considered. Again see the previous nine volumes.

More at the link. This reminds me of when Deep Purple lost their lead vocalist Ian Gillam in 1972 and ran an ad in the British music magazine Melody Maker announcing open auditions for a replacement. Of course they got a ton of audition tapes, some good, many bad, and some of them laughably so. The sheer novelty of it was refreshing. Nobody expected a big name band like Deep Purple to pull a stunt like that.

I'll bet Dr. Pournelle is going to get the same sort of response, i.e. an avalanche of submissions, most of them crappy, but some real gems buried in the poo pile. I wonder if he's willing to pay someone to help him sift through all of the material?

Blackmore and the boys eventually picked David Coverdale out of the heap to be the new Deep Purple vocalist.

I actually remember hearing about Purple's open auditions while they were going on.

Get off my lawn.

Thanks to Anna Puma for tipping me about this.

Even Liberal MSM Tools Are Trashing Chelsea Clinton's New Book

First of all, did any of you morons even know that the privately educated, married-to-a-Goldman-Sachs-hedge-fund-trader-daughter-of-two-of-the-most-powerful-and-influential-people-in-America Chelsea Clinton has written a book? For kids? I'll bet you didn't. I hadn't either, until a short time ago. But she wrote a kid's book. It's Your World: Get Informed, Get Inspired & Get Going! The blurb says:

In a book that tackles the biggest challenges facing us today, Chelsea Clinton combines facts, charts, photographs and stories to give readers a deep understanding of the world around them—and how anyone can make a difference.

However, the Washington Post is not so enthusiastic:

The former first daughter’s book is not just long, it is also dense, with at least 51 charts, maps and graphs, including one illustrating the global elimination of the Guinea worm and another titled “Common Types of Cancer in the U.S., 2015.” Despite the peppy title (and that exclamation mark!), Clinton’s first book (surely there will be more, given her parents’ prodigious bibliographies) is packed with data, tiny black-and-white pictures and dire warnings.

Think of it as the literary version of a sad trombone.

But even in a review that basically says the book is duller than ditchwater, the reviewer (Emily Heil) can't help gushing over the author and her parents. Like in the above quote where she refers to Bill and Hillary Clinton's "prodigious bibliographies". Which immediately raises the question, is she high? The word "prodigious" means "remarkably or impressively great in extent, size, or degree", and what exactly have the Clintons written to earn this description? Hillary! has written two books, one of which is a fluffy autobiography, and Bill has written but one (his own fluffy autobiography). This is "prodigious"?

And then Ms. Heil says this:

No one has ever accused the multiple-degreed daughter of former president Bill Clinton and current Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton of being a lightweight

Really? Maybe she should get out more. That's something I've heard many times about Miss Clinton. Considering that her only accomplishments in her life thus far, other than writing this book, have been (a) being born into one of most privileged families in America, (b) graduating from an Ivy League college, and (c) being employed at puff jobs where she probably only got hired for her name, I would think that that pretty much confirms her 'lightweight' status.

But, apparently, not for Ms. Heil.

Sometimes I envy the Clintons. It must be nice to do whatever you want, and have the confidence that a compliant, supine media has your back, and that they will ignore your mistakes, excuse your failures, and trumpet every accomplishment, however meager, as praiseworthy.

God Save The Queen

Unfortunately, by the time you read this, the $1.99 BookBub deal on this book will have ended and the price will have gone back up to whatever it was before. But I have to tell you about Shooting Victoria: Madness, Mayhem, and the Rebirth of the British Monarchy because it sounds quite interesting:

During Queen Victoria's 64 years on the British throne, no fewer than eight attempts were made on her life. Murphy follows each would-be assassin and the repercussions of their actions, illuminating daily life in Victorian England, the development of the monarchy under Queen Victoria, and the evolution of the attacks in light of changing social issues and technology.

Am I the only person who did not know that Victoria survived not one, not two, but eight assassination attempts? To give you a taste, you can read descriptions of a couple of her would-be killers in the Amazon blurb I quoted from. And you'll learn a new word, "dynamitard". Yeah, that's right, some Irish guys plotted to blow up Queen Victoria during the Golden Jubilee celebration in a modern-style, publicity-seeking terrorist attack.

They ought to do a movie about all of these failed attempts. Heck, they could make her an action hero with a bunch of narrow escapes. It wouldn't be all that far-fetched.

Books By Morons

Lurking moron TS Millheim e-mailed me this week to tell me that he has just published his first novel, Night Breaks Into Day. Here is what he says about it:

“Night Breaks Into Day” is the story of Becky Silverberg, a blogger for a celebrity style guru, who meets a charming multi-billionaire business leader and gets far more than just a career-making story.

When Silverberg has a chance encounter with Darrell Beals at an airport bar, she thinks she’s landed a groundbreaking interview that will catapult her into journalism’s elite ranks. Instead, she learns a dark secret that puts her career, her husband and her life in peril.

Trigger warnings for snarky female narration, a mysterious man, and "kinetic" sequences, which I assume would include things such as car chases, weapons discharges and stuff getting blowed up.

Oh, and spirituality. There's some of that in here, too, so best hide your kids.

Night Breaks Into Day by TS Millheim is available on Kindle for $4.99.

___________

Long-time moron commenter (and author) Christopher Taylor's new novel, Life Unworthy, first mentioned on the book thread a couple of weeks ago, will be released tomorrow, Monday, Sept. 21st.

What I'm Reading

The Rape of the Mind by Joost Meerloo, mentioned by various morons here. lately The good news is that a pdf of this book is readily available. I started reading it a couple of days ago and not only is the subject matter interesting (Dutch psychologist studied the 'brainwashing' techniques used by totalitarian regimes such as the USSR, China, North Korea and Nazi Germany), but it's a very conservative book. Not explicity, but in all of its underlying assumptions. For example, commenting on the incessant barrrage of media saturating our culture, he says:

The modern means of mass communication bring the entire world daily into each man's home; the techniques of propaganda and salesmanship have been refined and systematized; there is scarcely any hiding place from the constant visual and verbal assault on the mind. The pressures of daily life impel more and more people to seek an easy escape from responsibility and maturity. Indeed, it is difficult to withstand these pressures; to many the offer of a political panacea is very tempting, to others the offer of escape through alcohol, drugs, or other artificial pleasures is irresistible.

This is very refreshing. Nowadays, if I read a book by a European psychologist, I'd expect to be treated to a lecture on the evils of colonialism, how gender is a social construct, and perhaps something about boycotting Israel.

Free men in a free society must learn not only to recognize this stealthy attack on mental integrity and fight it, but must learn also what there is in side man's mind that makes him vulnerable to this attack, what it is that makes him, in many cases, actually long for a way out of the responsibilities that republican democracy and maturity place on him.

Good: free men, free society, maturity and republican democracy. Bad: avoiding responsibility and not fighting attacks on mental health. If Mssr. Meerloo were still alive, I'd subscribe to his newsletter.

And surprisingly enough, I actually found RotM listed as a book of interest on a progressive site.

According to his wiki page, Merloo wrote other books, but I think RotM is the only one still in print.

___________

So that's all for this week. As always, book thread tips, suggestions, bribes, rumors, threats, and insults may be sent to OregonMuse, Proprietor, AoSHQ Book Thread, at the book thread e-mail address: aoshqbookthread, followed by the 'at' sign, and then 'G' mail, and then dot cee oh emm.

What have you all been reading this week? Hopefully something good, because, as you all know, life is too short to be reading lousy books.

Posted by: Open Blogger at 08:55 AM

Comments

(Jump to bottom of comments)

1 Reading the Rain Wilds Chronicles. The odd thing about this 4 book series is that it cost twice as much to buy the 4 volume set in one e-book than it does to buy all 4 separately.

Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 08:54 AM (t2KH5)

2 Um, isn't Erlichs solution the very definition of medievalism?

Posted by: Auntie Doodles at September 20, 2015 08:55 AM (teYv/)

3 ebook pricing is insane

Posted by: Jean at September 20, 2015 08:59 AM (ztOda)

4 Of course I had to go to Amazon to give Paul Erlich's review a thumbs down, but a lot of people beat me to it.

Posted by: Big Al at September 20, 2015 08:59 AM (3MNCs)

5 Goof morning all you literary and literal Morons. At sea or just sloshing about.

Take my advice, avoid GoFundMe like the plague if you want to fund raise. The brilliant minds that infest that business disaster yesterday emailed me to say they had reviewed my case again and reinstating my campaign. The link provided, did it point to the original campaign that got me in trouble? No, but to the campaign I created Friday night.

https://www.gofundme.com/8k4zdgw9

I am honestly unsure if I have been dealing with the illegitimate offspring of Kafka or Orwell. But I am looking into alternate sites.

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 08:59 AM (jjDwK)

6 Climate Change, otherwise known as globull warming. Even after the head of the UN agency that started this scan admitted that it is a fraud designed to move money from rich nations to poor ones scammers like Obama keep pushing it.

Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 09:01 AM (t2KH5)

7 The Moon is A Harsh Mistress. Last time I read it was over 30 years ago. Mike Mike Mike!

Posted by: freaked at September 20, 2015 09:01 AM (BO/km)

8 'there is no certainty in science,"

I thought it was settled.

Posted by: Jean at September 20, 2015 09:02 AM (ztOda)

9 I'm reading the A.N. Wilson biography of Queen Victoria, I believe that was recommended here. It's quite good and has helped me understand how WWI happened. It got me interested in the rise of nations as well.

Posted by: Auntie Doodles at September 20, 2015 09:02 AM (teYv/)

10 His solution was de-industrialization, capital de-accumulation, lowering
of productivity and hence lowering of real wages. A back to nature
lifestyle of 'dawn to dusk' subsistence poverty.

Erlich's very prescription was the disaster he was warning of.

Posted by: Reggie at September 20, 2015 09:02 AM (oVJmc)

11 race isn't going well for Lewis, thanking last weeks link to Gutenberg.org. Only 1/2 through a Napoleonic war non fiction.

Posted by: skip at September 20, 2015 09:03 AM (7L6zt)

12 Eerlich is a funny guy.

Not like a good standup comedy funny.

But in a "Too stupid to survive locked by himself in a fully stocked but abandoned Super Wal-Mart for ten days" funny.

And I don't read books.
I read the comments at AoSHQ.

Better then a book.
More pictures.

Posted by: Village Idiot's Apprentice at September 20, 2015 09:03 AM (VPLuQ)

13 Even after the head of the UN agency that started this scan admitted that it is a fraud designed to move money from rich nations to poor ones scammers like Obama keep pushing it.

That makes it even more likely that Obama will double down.

Posted by: Jean at September 20, 2015 09:04 AM (ztOda)

14 I also picked up Nick Offerman's audiobook, Gumption, from the library. I was hoping for Ron Swanson, and it starts out that way, but then.....oy, full on lib. I couldn't finish it. Disappointing.

Posted by: Auntie Doodles at September 20, 2015 09:04 AM (teYv/)

15 That's something I've heard many times about Miss Clinton. Considering
that her only accomplishments in her life thus far, other than writing
this book, have been (a) being born into one of most privileged families
in America, (b) graduating from an Ivy League college, and (c) being
employed at puff jobs where she probably only got hired for her name, I
would think that that pretty much confirms her lightweight status.

I posted a link this morning where they discussed Hilary's accomplishments. They were all bad.

Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 09:06 AM (t2KH5)

16 Even after the head of the UN agency that started this scan admitted
that it is a fraud designed to move money from rich nations to poor ones
scammers like Obama keep pushing it.

Don't forget moving money from everyone's pocket into the pockets of right-thinking cronies (like Tom Steyer and many, many others).

Posted by: Pappy O'Daniel at September 20, 2015 09:06 AM (oVJmc)

17
Population Bomb.

The very same people who claim that population growth is unsustainable are the very same people who cut off water to the growers in California.

The very same people who claim we can not feed the huge number of people already on the planet are the very same people who are disrupting agriculture. It's the same tactic used in Somalia and the Sudan. Control the food supply, control the population.

Posted by: Lawrence Nifflebringer at September 20, 2015 09:07 AM (9AA7n)

18 chelsea released her book too late, if HRCs run was still inevitable - people would be buying her book in 1000 unit lots.

Posted by: Jean at September 20, 2015 09:07 AM (ztOda)

19 "No one has ever accused the multiple-degreed daughter of former president Bill Clinton and current Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton of being a lightweight"

This is the 21st century version of "I don't know anyone who voted for Nixon."

Posted by: SGT Ted at September 20, 2015 09:08 AM (Iv1Ix)

20 Morning all

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 09:08 AM (DUoqb)

21 7
The Moon is A Harsh Mistress. Last time I read it was over 30 years ago. Mike Mike Mike!

Posted by: freaked at September 20, 2015 09:01 AM (BO/km)

One of the best SF masterpieces ever written.

Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 09:10 AM (t2KH5)

22 I finished two more of the Liturgical Mystery series, leaving three more to go. By this time I know the approach Schweizer takes but the humor hasn't faded a bit. And I have yet to solve any of the mysteries. (That might say something about me.) I hope he is working on more of the series or I'll run out of them.

I've mentioned this before. Check out the author's website. It is filled with real laughs.

Posted by: JTB at September 20, 2015 09:10 AM (FvdPb)

23 The History of the British Monarchy is replete with civil war over who would be the next Monarch.

Say what you want about a democratic republic but at least we don't go to war over who will be the next president. At least, not yet.

Brainwashing.
I went off on a haphazard search on mass psychology and thought control and quickly discovered that most conservatives are repulsed by the idea. The political left, however, is enthralled with the idea of controlling the masses with words. The left makes a science out of propaganda, and they speak of it in the mumbo jumbo jargon of code words that only the aficionado can decipher.

Posted by: Lawrence Nifflebringer at September 20, 2015 09:15 AM (9AA7n)

24 They ought to do a movie about all of these failed attempts. Heck, they could make her an action hero with a bunch of narrow escapes. It wouldn't be all that far-fetched.

^^^^^

They did an episode of Doctor Who in the Tennant era called Tooth and Claw (Good lord, I'm a nerd) that uses the assasination attempts as a premise. It was creepy and fun.

Posted by: Mandy P., lurking lurker who lurks at September 20, 2015 09:16 AM (KkVB6)

25 Been reading bits and pieces of Destroyers: Foxes at Sea by Edwin P, Hoyt and Passage at Arms by Glen Cook this week.

The first one will probably inspire a bit of my story submission to Jerry Pournelle. Talk about a brass ring quest.

Second story for examples of building tension. But probably not imagery. Very hard to come up with vivid images such as - "The night hangs overhead like a sadist's boot..." But who knows, might craft a few gems.

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 09:18 AM (jjDwK)

26 I liked the Moon Is A Harsh Mistress when it first came out and it was very popular among those of a 'revolutionary' mindset. (Hey, it was the 60s.)

I always had fondness for another Heinlein from that same period: Glory Road. It wasn't as popular as MIAHM but it was an enjoyable read that stays with you.

Posted by: JTB at September 20, 2015 09:18 AM (FvdPb)

27 OT

This just happened-

Formula 1 race in Singapore place under caution because some guy was just walking down the street course track.

No morons you don't get extra points for taking out pedestrians.

NBCsports network

Posted by: weirdflunkyonatablet at September 20, 2015 09:19 AM (fEE67)

28 Mandy P, if you turn to BBC America right now will get to see a Tom Baker episode of Doctor Who. The episode Steven Moffat riffed on for the season premier last night.

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 09:21 AM (jjDwK)

29 After reading several reviews and recommendations here, I read The Time It Never Rained by Elmer Kelton. It is a great novel about the west Texas drought in the early 1950's. Great conservative/libertarian values and ideas are prominently featured throughout the story.

Thank you to all of you for introducing an author new to me. I'm looking forward to reading more of Kelton's works.

Posted by: Zoltan at September 20, 2015 09:21 AM (THsLo)

30 This is used art. Rdbrewer used it for an open thread already.

I hope we get a discount on this thread.

Posted by: Bandersnatch, Opus/Bill the Cat 2016 at September 20, 2015 09:22 AM (1xUj/)

31 28 Mandy P, if you turn to BBC America right now will get to see a Tom Baker episode of Doctor Who. The episode Steven Moffat riffed on for the season premier last night.
Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 09:21 AM (jjDwK)

Thanks for the head's up, but I'm actually already there! I've been enjoying the heck out of the marathon they've been running for the past week.

Posted by: Mandy P., lurking lurker who lurks at September 20, 2015 09:22 AM (KkVB6)

32 The political left, however, is enthralled with the
idea of controlling the masses with words. The left makes a science out
of propaganda, and they speak of it in the mumbo jumbo jargon of code
words that only the aficionado can decipher.

Posted by: Lawrence Nifflebringer at September 20, 2015 09:15 AM (9AA7n)

And since they own all the MFM they do it too. That is the only way a 3rd rate grifter like Obama could get elected.

Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 09:24 AM (t2KH5)

33 OM, Thanks for the painting at the start of the post. I've seen it before and it is always appealing. Imagine being able to peruse some fine books and magazines in comfort after coming out of a chill drizzle in Paris. How civilized! Of course, the damn place is probably full of pretentious Frenchies. Sic semper cum Frogs, alas.

Posted by: JTB at September 20, 2015 09:24 AM (FvdPb)

34 Mandy P, I have been watching episodes during this marathon and well proving again why I walked away. Very little fun, muddy writing, and Moffat and writers being pretentious twits. For example Listen or the season premier last night.

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 09:26 AM (jjDwK)

35 Back to Erlich... didn't China do that in the cultural revolution? That turned out well. I thought Russia did that too... hey, he sounds like a full on commie or sumthin'.

Posted by: Auntie Doodles at September 20, 2015 09:26 AM (teYv/)

36 Finished Secret warriors : the spies, scientists, and code breakers of World War I
by Taylor Downing.

Most I had heard before, but the chapter on medical advances , including mental health and plastic surgery was interesting.

The chapter on government control of propaganda was a revelation. We have had 100 years of self-promotion and population influence by government. This explains a lot.

Currently reading The fall of the Roman Empire : a new history of Rome and the Barbarians by Peter Heather.

Very interesting. I may not agree with his conclusions, but he has great context. I want to find out what happens to the 5% of the population that was the elite, which ran the Empire for their own benefit.

Heather notes that spin doctors was operational in the Roman governments back in the day.
Plus ca change plus c'est la meme chose.

On Deck: The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements by Eric Hoffer and Golden Isis by our own Anna Puma. That book has not arrived from Amazon, but soon, soon. the trackers say CA to KS, arriving Wednesday.

Posted by: NaCly Dog at September 20, 2015 09:27 AM (u82oZ)

37 Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 09:26 AM (jjDwK)

They've been very hit and miss since Tennant left, IMO. I endured through the Matt Smith doctor, but I hated Amy and Rory and a lot of their mythology was just dumb. I'm digging the new guy, but yeah there are not as many great episodes as there were.

Posted by: Mandy P., lurking lurker who lurks at September 20, 2015 09:30 AM (KkVB6)

38 In a just world Paul Erlich would be working on a collective farm.

Posted by: deepred at September 20, 2015 09:31 AM (xv5cf)

39 On book four of Jim Butcher's Furies series. The humor definitely kicked in at book two, which is good since there's a lot of violence. The main character has been in a Roman style military the last couple of books and, as far as I can tell, Butcher seems to get that mostly right. As a civilian though I can't be sure and it's possible the books would annoy the military 'Rons and 'Ettes.I'm curious about other's opinions if anyone else has read them.

The main thing I *don't* like about the series is that whenever one of the main group of characters who are moral is forced to injure/kill someone in self defense, or the defense of others, there's a page worth of angst and them feeling sick. This may be to add contrast to the "dead inside" amoral and immoral characters, but it gets old. Speaking without actual experience, if I *were* to kill someone who was attacking me or my family I intend to spend no such time moping. Now, I could be wrong about my response, but if someone forces me into a position requiring violence I consider the consequences to be of their own choosing.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at September 20, 2015 09:31 AM (GDulk)

40 OM, everybody, once you are done with Rape of the Mind, you can also look at The Vampire Economy by Gunter Reiman (1939)
It is on the von Mises Institute website. It is in PDF and Epub

"Here is a study of the actual workings of business under national
socialism. Written in 1939, Reimann discusses the effects of heavy
regulation, inflation, price controls, trade interference, national
economic planning, and attacks on private property, and what
consequences they had for human rights and economic development."

https://mises.org/library/vampire-economy

Posted by: Kindltot at September 20, 2015 09:32 AM (3pRHP)

41 "32 - And would be only reason Hillary, Bernie, or Joe would get elected

Posted by: skip at September 20, 2015 09:33 AM (7L6zt)

42 30 This is used art. Rdbrewer used it for an open thread already.

I hope we get a discount on this thread.
Posted by: Bandersnatch, Opus/Bill the Cat 2016 at September 20, 2015 09:22 AM (1xUj/)

Fair enough, I'll give everyone 50% off on ampersands on the book thread today.

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 09:33 AM (HuXg7)

43 Speaking of propaganda,
I sent in a short story to Asimov's SF Magazine. It was rejected within 24 hours.

I'm guessing they didn't like my nuking of Washington, and the guns.

We need a conservative publisher who will permit conservative thought embedded in entertainment in the exact same way that liberal thought is embedded in current mass media, and as a counter to it.

Pick any conservative principle, and write about it. You won't get it past the publishers. Self publish and it will be buried with bad reviews.

So the question must be asked, is there a market for conservative themed entertainment? I really don't know.

Posted by: Lawrence Nifflebringer at September 20, 2015 09:33 AM (9AA7n)

44

My girlfriend was raped by a group of mimes.

They did unspeakable things to her.

Posted by: Soothsayer, now with a low profile tip and ergonomical handle at September 20, 2015 09:34 AM (Db4mp)

45 Cuban President Raul Castro welcomed Pope Francis in a long speech at the airport. In his speech, Castro said the communist government has founded an equitable society with social justice in Cuba and he praised the popes critiques of the global economic system that has globalized capital and turned money into its idol.

Way to go popie, giving that communist bastard a platform to pontificate...so to speak

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 09:34 AM (DUoqb)

46 Erlich was a pathetic joke, although popular, in the 1960s. His BS alarmist approach appealed to a lot of pseudo-hippies who thought mankind was the source of all evil. My opinion of him has only gone down since then. It's a wonder he has the gall to do anything in public, let alone speak or write. In the just world of a Shakespeare play, his pretentious character would be mocked and gibed until he ran away, ruined, in Act V.

Posted by: JTB at September 20, 2015 09:36 AM (FvdPb)

47 David morrell's latest in his Victorian series focuses on that era,

Posted by: admiral marcus at September 20, 2015 09:36 AM (0u/CC)

48 Yes, "P Erlich" is Paul "Population Bomb" Erlich, the Undisputed Heavyweight Champion of Junk Science himself, who apparently does not like Steyn's book. Oh dear. I'm sure Steyn is lying awake nights, sobbing into his bedsheets over this. And it's amazing to me how much Erlich's review is just standard-issue progtard boilerplate insults. Hacks and has-beens, march of science, medievalism, blah, blah, blah. There's not an ounce of creativity anywhere in it. It's like signs held up at a left-wing protest. Erlich is not so much reviewing a book as he is chanting slogans. All that's missing is a giant, papier m�ch� Mark Steyn puppet head.

that right there is some wonderful writing

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 09:36 AM (zOTsN)

49 45 Cuban President Raul Castro welcomed Pope Francis in a long speech at the airport. In his speech, Castro said the communist government has founded an equitable society with social justice in Cuba
Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 09:34 AM (DUoqb)

This is true. Pretty much everybody in Cuba is equally poor and hungry.

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 09:38 AM (HuXg7)

50 I think success has very thoroughly spoiled Moffat. So instead of trying to write engaging stories to compensate for no budget, we get sparkly lights plastering over the gaping cracks in the story or the George Lucas school of story telling.

Lawrence, you might want to peruse Liberty Island for a 'conservative' outlook.
https://www.libertyislandmag.com/

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 09:39 AM (jjDwK)

51 re: Chelsea Clinton

**types long screed about what a worthless POS dilettante, erstwhile Pediatric Cardiologist wannabe, privileged, dim-witted, out-of-touch, imbecilic, snobby, pig-faced, child-scaring, Debbie-Wasserman-lookalike, no-good, brainless pile of dog doo she is.**

**deletes**

'Cause my mom always taught me 'if you can't say something nice about someone don't say anything' and I respect my dear departed mother.

Posted by: Seamus Muldoon at September 20, 2015 09:39 AM (NeFrd)

52 Woo hoo! Steyn got Paul Erlich upset. Heard a funny bit by a comedian yesterday (Arg Barker?) where he proposed that maybe, just maybe global warming was caused by the sun --- kinda like how "when you burn toast, you don't blame the bread, do you?".

I love that Steyn has monetized the research he's doing to defend himself in court.

Posted by: Lizzy at September 20, 2015 09:39 AM (NOIQH)

53 According to the visiting MKs, the Jordan king bluntly told them: al-Aksa Mosque is a place for Muslim prayer with no division nor partnership.

Moderate ha?

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 09:39 AM (DUoqb)

54 I'm still reading "Shogun" as my bedtime book. I'm reading "The Africans" by David Lamb, a reporter. It was published in 1982 so it's not current at all, but it is definitely interesting and I am finding it educational. I am especially reading "What Happens At Mass" by Fr. Jeremy Driscoll, OSB, which explains Catholic mass in great detail although it's not a big book at all - entirely suitable for a purse.

I'm teaching an RCIA class on the Eucharist in December. Book suggestions happily accepted, please.

Posted by: Tonestaple at September 20, 2015 09:40 AM (dCTrv)

55 Jason houghs alt earth spy thriller , zero world is pretty good , it's not a light time though.

Posted by: admiral marcus at September 20, 2015 09:41 AM (0u/CC)

56 NaCly Dog, wow. Thank you for buying my book. And I do honestly enjoy it. And not use it as a door stop.

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 09:42 AM (jjDwK)

57 You can also buy Chelsea's book in audio read by her own sweet self.

Posted by: The Great White Snark at September 20, 2015 09:43 AM (Nwg0u)

58 The young people today have been so brainwashed by the left that they will be the ones to carry out Erhlich's plan. They believe that socialism is the solution to all that is ailing the world. It's frightening, but that is what happens when one surrenders a sphere of influence and doesn't pay attention to what is going on.

We gave the left control of our schools, so the ensuing socialist prison-planet that we will all be living on is really our own fault.

Posted by: Mistress Overdone at September 20, 2015 09:44 AM (2S9xy)

59 *pauses*

Someone stop me. I am taking Doctor Who far too seriously.

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 09:44 AM (jjDwK)

60

the attemts on Queen Victorias life are fascinating

you will find this hard to believe I know, but it seems the vast majority if not all of them were mentally ill men who were animated by the news of the day

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 09:45 AM (zOTsN)

61 Paul Erlich can feel free to begin reducing the population starting with himself.

Posted by: Insomniac at September 20, 2015 09:45 AM (FGIR8)

62 Ehrlich wants us all on the paleodiet.

Posted by: The Great White Snark at September 20, 2015 09:45 AM (Nwg0u)

63 admiral marcus, are you deliberately adding that giant block of empty text to each of your comments, or is that your word processor doing that?

Because it looks ugly and I'm hereby exercising my right as Lord High Executioner and Grand Poobah of the book thread to delete the blank space.

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 09:46 AM (HuXg7)

64 Amity Shlae's The Forgotten Man really brought home to me how the entire point of all those government funded art programs was progressive propaganda (with some cheap shots at FED's political opponents thrown in for good measure). I'd known about the murals in public places but not about the plays, photos, etc.

Also, I hadn't realized how fascist FDR was. His second inaugural address used different words than Mussolini but the "Everything within the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State" was pretty clearly there.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at September 20, 2015 09:46 AM (GDulk)

65
about the spawns book

doesnt it sound like Chelsea wanted to do a wonky book for grownups? and her editors took one look at what she produced and said, "Urm, eh, mmmm, lets market this to kids. They are less critical"

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 09:46 AM (zOTsN)

66 There was a Sherlock Holmes pastiche that featured an assassination attempt on Queen Victoria, which was foiled by Dr. Moriarty, who instead of being a Napoleon of Crime, referred to himself as a "consulting criminal mastermind"
The assassination was to be done by Whitworth torpedo from a hijacked submersible during a regatta, and includes wild hansom cab crashes, letter bombs, Sherlock Holmes, kidnapping attempts, night-time murders, and an escape from a Turkish prison.
Oh, and death from an exploding music box, masterminded by a rogue splinter group of the Okhrana.

The Infernal Device by Michael Kurland.

(Kurland is a horrible morally superior lefty of the new-wave of Sci-fi, but he was a great writer in the 60's and 70's as long as he kept away from politics and stayed on themes about freedom and interacting with bureaucracy. He stopped writing Science fiction and went to writing mysteries for some reason)

Posted by: Kindltot at September 20, 2015 09:47 AM (3pRHP)

67 63 admiral marcus, are you deliberately adding that giant block of empty text to each of your comments, or is that your word processor doing that?

Because it looks ugly and I'm hereby exercising my right as Lord High Executioner and Grand Poobah of the book thread to delete the blank space.
Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 09:46 AM (HuXg7)

Many happy returns.

Posted by: Bob's House of Flannel Shirts and Wallet Chains at September 20, 2015 09:50 AM (yxw0r)

68

Anna I am sorry for your Go Fund Me Woes

I am sure you have seen Clock Boy is having no problem with his Go Fund Me

so you cant have the name Isis in the title of a book but you can support a bomb hoaxer

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 09:50 AM (zOTsN)

69 I have a request: where can I get library-style 12-in-one
magazine holders? Somebody here must have an idea.

Posted by: Beelzabubba at September 20, 2015 09:50 AM (XMfyA)

70 "The Rape of the Mind" looks good - just downloaded the.pdf. What I try to do with my son, who is a current events junkie, and constantly ask him "Wy do you think this is considered news? Why is CNN is covering X while Fox is covering Y?"
We love our weekday morning news show because the people on it are silly and fun, but man, there's a lot of mindless fluff used to fill in fort the gaps left by what none of the news stations want to cover.

Posted by: Lizzy at September 20, 2015 09:51 AM (NOIQH)

71 Posted by: Kindltot at September 20, 2015 09:47 AM (3pRHP)

Wow, sounds like Disney totally stole that plot for The Great Mouse Detective.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at September 20, 2015 09:52 AM (GDulk)

72 The latter. Android seems to do that.

Posted by: admiral marcus at September 20, 2015 09:52 AM (0u/CC)

73 Last week Elisabeth G. said she would be using Sir Gawain and the Green Knight in her class. I was inspired to do a side by side by side comparison of three of the more popular translations: Tolkien, Marie Borroff, and W. S. Merwin. They are all similar but there are differences that might appeal to different readers. Tolkien uses older style modern English, words that are still legitimate but seldom used now. His is the oldest translation. Merwin's is closer to modern conversational language which makes for an easier read but is somewhat jarring dealing with a poem over 600 years old. Sort of not fitting. Borroff's was part way between the two men. It was a fun comparison and something I haven't done in a long time.

A point of amusement: as I was reading and getting into the cadence and alliteration, it seemed to me that the meter was very close to Dr. Seuss, as I remember it from reading to my niece. Since she is now married with her own kids, my memory might be a tad off. It still made me laugh. Further investigation is called for.

Posted by: JTB at September 20, 2015 09:53 AM (FvdPb)

74 >>...doesnt it sound like Chelsea wanted to do a wonky book for grownups? and her editors took one look at what she produced and said, "Urm, eh, mmmm, lets market this to kids. They are less critical."

Heh, yes!

And how much you want to bet that she had all sorts of Clinton Foundation staffer doing the research, making the pretty graphs, finding the photos, etc.?

Posted by: Lizzy at September 20, 2015 09:54 AM (NOIQH)

75 I've been reading Joseph Kanon's The Good German. It's not great but held my attention until the end. Stephen Soderbergh made a movie of it a few years ago which sucked. The novel is anti-Nazi and anti-Soviet but Soderbergh turned it into anti-American. He switched around who is Jewish and who is not, a pretty big detail in Nazi Germany and changed around who lives and who dies. The same German is the good German but for entirely different reasons.

Eh, what you goona do? Commies gonna commie.

Posted by: The Great White Snark at September 20, 2015 09:54 AM (Nwg0u)

76 Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 08:59 AM (jjDwK)

According to the sidebar there's a new confounding site for conservatives. No idea what it's like though.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at September 20, 2015 09:55 AM (GDulk)

77 Argh! I saw that AutoCucumber had messed that up just as I posted. Crowdfunding. a crowdfunding site.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at September 20, 2015 09:58 AM (GDulk)

78 she was prolly supposed to be writing a book for young adult voters, that is supposed to be her thing

but demoted to the kiddie section

hahahaha

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 09:59 AM (zOTsN)

79 Polliwogette, the comparison to The Great Mouse Detective made me smile. I will look into that side-bar link, thanks.

Every time I watch Sherlock Hound by Miyazaki, I think that perhaps he created Steampunk.
https://youtu.be/11jnarZgU2Q

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 10:00 AM (HiC8z)

80 >>I have a request: where can I get library-style 12-in-one magazine holders? Somebody here must have an idea.
Posted by: Beelzabubba

Like this?

http://tinyurl.com/ooq9dva

Posted by: Aviator at September 20, 2015 10:01 AM (c7vUv)

81 69 ... Do a search on the library store dot com. They should have a bunch of magazine holders.

Posted by: JTB at September 20, 2015 10:02 AM (FvdPb)

82 There is some chatter on twitter about @mkhammer (Mary Katherine Ham) and somebody named Brewer being killed in a bike racer.

Is that her husband?

Posted by: Albie Damned at September 20, 2015 10:02 AM (HzqYP)

83 looks like Mary Katherine Ham's husband was killed in an accident during a charity bicyle ride

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:02 AM (zOTsN)

84 Hmm, I shall have to go get Rape of the Mind - material for discussions on blog-threads.

The book about attempted assassinations of Queen Victoria sounds absolutely fascinating. It might not be a new notion, but she would make a marvelous alt-history steam-punk crime-fighting heroine, wouldn't she?

Ugh, Paul Ehrlich ... the biggest junk-science mass-frightener of all time. I shall have to go over to Amazon and thumbs-down his review as well. Just for old time's sake.

Alas, I am only re-reading some of my reference history books this week, as I am trying to finish the last half-chapter of the current WIP and to clear away a huge project for the Tiny Publishing Bidness...

Posted by: Sgt. Mom at September 20, 2015 10:05 AM (95iDF)

85 >>looks like Mary Katherine Ham's husband was killed in an accident during a charity bicyle ride

Yikes, that's awful.

Posted by: Lizzy at September 20, 2015 10:05 AM (NOIQH)

86 any link to the MKH story?

Posted by: AltonJackson at September 20, 2015 10:06 AM (irT2h)

87 Oregon Muse Person, I must say your takedown of the book Erlich's Amazon review of Steyn's book is brilliant. The whole time I was thinking, damn, I wish I was that perceptive. Originally I imagined a little old lady wrote the review, one shivering scared for all she's learned from her trusted Democrat sources that she lives by, alone with her parakeet in her dank dark NYC supported apartment she daren't move from for loss of support. And I was right.

Posted by: bour3 at September 20, 2015 10:07 AM (5x3+2)

88 WaPo and twitter. He was the IT guy for the White House

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:07 AM (zOTsN)

89 That is the only way a 3rd rate grifter like Obama could get elected.

Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 09:24

*ahem*

Posted by: Your IRS and DOJ at September 20, 2015 10:07 AM (QP2lF)

90 name is Jacob Brewer

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:08 AM (zOTsN)

91 That Shooting Victoria book is an interesting read. Incredible how much they know about the assailants. Where they lived, worked, what their friends and family said about them, etc.

Posted by: Dang at September 20, 2015 10:08 AM (2oWD2)

92 86
any link to the MKH story?

Posted by: AltonJackson at September 20, 2015 10:06 AM (irT2h)

http://tinyurl.com/p97zfzd

Posted by: Albie Damned at September 20, 2015 10:08 AM (HzqYP)

93 I did have one silly indulgence this week. (Just one, Mrs. JTB said?) I came across a copy of The Hobbit translated to Latin. Since I want to learn at least a basic level of Latin, this seemed appropriate. I knew Winnie The Pooh had been so translated long ago but The Hobbit came as a surprise.

Posted by: JTB at September 20, 2015 10:08 AM (FvdPb)

94 MKH, that bastion of independent punditry on the Salem Radio Network, was married to an IT guy for the White House?

Posted by: Kindltot at September 20, 2015 10:10 AM (3pRHP)

95 Dave Burge just tweeted this link in re MKH:

http://tinyurl.com/p97zfzd

Posted by: AltonJackson at September 20, 2015 10:10 AM (irT2h)

96 I've just finished reading _A Visionary Madness_ by Mike Jay, about the Georgian-era madman James Tilly Matthews, who believed he was being persecuted by a gang using an "Air-Loom" in an underground base to warp his mind. Yep, classic schizophrenic -- except that apparently he really was involved in some back-channel negotiations between England and Revolutionary France, and showed considerable talent as an architect. (While imprisoned in Bedlam he entered the design competition for the new Bedlam and came in fourth.)

The author goes a little too far in trying to be fair to Matthews; reading between the lines it's pretty obvious he was the kind of unstable self-aggrandizing person who is often drawn to espionage and political activism, then his admittedly awful experiences during the Terror basically broke his brain.

Posted by: Trimegistus at September 20, 2015 10:12 AM (BJN55)

97 thx, Albie

Posted by: AltonJackson at September 20, 2015 10:12 AM (irT2h)

98 Okay, Chelsea Clinton, you want to be a Pediatric Cardiologist? So imagine this.

You get a call from the hospital, interrupting your morning cup of coffee and your Argentinian free-range yoghurt. There is a one-day-old baby who is grunting when he breathes and whose skin color looks a little bit off. His oxygen saturation percentage is 89% (normal 90-100). Can you come in and evaluate the baby? You get to the hospital and the baby is lying in an open crib, breathing 60 times a minute. At the end of every breath he vocalizes a faint grunt, "Unh, unh, unh, unh..." Can you do anything other than feel sorry for yourself?

You listen to the heart with a stethoscope and hear a faint murmur and a gallop rhythm of the heart. You call for the ultrasound technician to bring the machine to the bedside. Putting your hand on the transducer you begin taking pictures of the baby's heart, every little nuance, the chambers, the valves, the blood flow. The left ventricle is barely one-fifth the size of the right ventricle. The aortic valve is tiny, only 2 mm, and the valve flaps don't move at all. The only way the baby can get oxygen to his blood stream is through the ductus arteriosus, which is trying to close as it does in all babies within the first two days of life. Your ultrasound shows the ductus is almost completely closed, choking off the vital supply of oxygen-carrying blood to the baby's vital organs. If you don't act now this baby will be dead in less than 24 hours. Can you do what needs to be done?

Now, in the middle of dealing with this, you need to go talk to the parents of this baby. You have to hear the painful cry of the mother, nay the howls of anguish as you tell her that the baby may die and that if he does survive he will likely be on heart medicine every single day of his life, and that in order to survive to age 6 he will need a minimum of three major heart surgeries after which he will still only have one functioning ventricle. You now have to absorb all of this family's pain and anger and fear. Is your soul strong enough the absorb all of that? Or would you rather brush the baby's life under the carpet like so many harvested body parts, because that's easier than caring?

All of this while your family is spending the day alone without you.

And that was just yesterday for me.

Do you really want to do this? Or would you rather go home to your multimillion dollar loft apartment in the ritzy part of Manhattan and surround yourself with adoring sycophants at cocktail parties and be featured on the cover of style magazines while the editors snicker behind your back?

Either way, I hate everything you and your parents stand for. And I wish you would just go away and never show your face in public again. You despicable little twit!

Posted by: Seamus Muldoon at September 20, 2015 10:13 AM (NeFrd)

99 You can see Matthews as the model for every modern self-appointed activist worried about chemtrails or Project HAARP or whatever. But somehow having the machine be made of wood and brass and powered by a windmill makes it cooler.

Posted by: Trimegistus at September 20, 2015 10:14 AM (BJN55)

100 Just finished Merloo's book this week. Very enlightening. My takeaways are: 1) Maturity and individuality are traits that protect you from mind control while education level makes you more susceptible. 2) Jokes and humor are effective counter attacks. And 3) Opinion Cascades are real and can be orchestrated.

Regarding 1) Iam reminded of the Chestertonian observation that bad people manifest in types (what we may call pathologies) but saints are endless in variety. I think Merloo's "maturity" easily maps onto traditional definitions of "good" as applied to personal behavior and disposition.

3) Is why I will never trust a poll again. It is clear the same people who make them are also in the business of "pushing" society one way or the other. People can be manipulated or coerced into expressing an opinion but that also means they are not deeply or personally invested in these ideas.

Posted by: Ty Angur at September 20, 2015 10:14 AM (rFXtC)

101 Re: Mark Steyn's lawsuit/counter suit, does anyone know the status of that litigation? the last I heard, Steyn was being criticized b/c he was acting as his own attorney.

Posted by: Brave Sir Robin at September 20, 2015 10:15 AM (5buP8)

102 Someone stop me. I am taking Doctor Who far too seriously.

I got into it via No. 2 Son. Being obsessive and a teenager with infinite time he watched all the original series as well.

For a while I thought I really like Doctor Who. It turns out that I really like David Tenant. I can skip the rest.

Posted by: Bandersnatch, Opus/Bill the Cat 2016 at September 20, 2015 10:15 AM (1xUj/)

103 Are you shiting me, Thunder? She has a baby...

Posted by: Bruce With a Wang! at September 20, 2015 10:15 AM (iQIUe)

104 *bows in appreciation for Muldoon*

Posted by: Infidel at September 20, 2015 10:16 AM (ad6KV)

105 Her husband was some sort of environmental consultant.

Posted by: Bruce With a Wang! at September 20, 2015 10:16 AM (iQIUe)

106 Posted by: Seamus Muldoon at September 20, 2015 10:13 AM (NeFrd)

Awesome rant. What did the pampered little princess say to prompt this?

Posted by: Albie Damned at September 20, 2015 10:17 AM (HzqYP)

107 Whoa, Seamus just clubbed Chelsea like she was a seal...

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 10:17 AM (HiC8z)

108 Posted by: Seamus Muldoon at September 20, 2015 10:13 AM (NeFrd)

Translation- F U Chelsea and the coattails you rode in on!

Well done SM!

Posted by: weirdflunkyonatablet at September 20, 2015 10:17 AM (fEE67)

109 #98. I am not worthy.

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 10:18 AM (HuXg7)

110 Whoa, Seamus just clubbed Chelsea like she was a seal...
Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 10:17 AM (HiC8z)

108 Posted by: Seamus Muldoon at September 20, 2015 10:13 AM (NeFrd)

Translation- F U Chelsea and the coattails you rode in on!

Well done SM!
Posted by: weirdflunkyonatablet at September 20, 2015 10:17 AM (fEE67)

Ditto

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 10:18 AM (DUoqb)

111 Not kidding, MKHams husband was killed in a bike accident during a charity rode race. He lost control of his bike on a downhill turn and veered into an on coming car. He was the Sr IT guy for the White House. Real goodlooking, science nerd by his twitter feed. Do they haveone child or two? Very sad, he was very young

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:19 AM (zOTsN)

112 I hate chelsea more than that ugly thing carter spawned

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 10:19 AM (DUoqb)

113 Re: Independent Latin study. I/we used this home-schooling my/our son. Earlier edition (5), though, and this one is supposedly almost too large to be convenient. So.

http://www.amazon.com/Wheelocks-Latin-7th-Edition-Series/dp/0061997226

Posted by: Mickey and Sylvia at September 20, 2015 10:20 AM (QP2lF)

114 It's pretty obvious Chelsea has never developed any people skills.

I suspect young Chelsea is a lot like young Hillary, maybe without the killer rage.

Posted by: Pappy O'Daniel at September 20, 2015 10:20 AM (oVJmc)

115 83
looks like Mary Katherine Ham's husband was killed in an accident during a charity bicyle ride

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:02 AM (zOTsN)

That's awful.

Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 10:20 AM (t2KH5)

116 Posted by: Seamus Muldoon at September 20, 2015 10:13 AM (NeFrd)

As someone who has had a little one whose life was in a very precarious life and death situation...THANK YOU by proxy

I too owe a huge debt of gratitude for my own cardiac surgeon

Posted by: Albie Damned at September 20, 2015 10:20 AM (HzqYP)

117 Posted by: Seamus Muldoon at September 20, 2015 10:13 AM (NeFrd)

Prayers for you, the baby, and the family Seamus.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at September 20, 2015 10:20 AM (GDulk)

118 101 Re: Mark Steyn's lawsuit/counter suit, does anyone know the status of that litigation? the last I heard, Steyn was being criticized b/c he was acting as his own attorney.
Posted by: Brave Sir Robin at September 20, 2015 10:15 AM (5buP

It's difficult to find up-to-date information about this on Steyn's site, but I think what's happening is that Mann is repeatedly filing motions to delay, delay, delay.

And I did not know that Steyn was representing himself as his own legal counsel. That's... interesting.

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 10:21 AM (HuXg7)

119

...Muldoon... bless you for what you do

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:21 AM (zOTsN)

120 >>Whoa, Seamus just clubbed Chelsea like she was a seal...

So did the doctor when I was born. He thought a weasel got in the delivery room.

Posted by: Chelsea at September 20, 2015 10:22 AM (c7vUv)

121 "But in a 'Too stupid to survive locked by himself in a fully stocked but abandoned Super Wal-Mart for ten days' funny. "

This was the exact premise of James Gould Cozzens's 1934 novel "Castaway" where the sole character is, in fact, too stupid to survive locked by himself in a fully stocked but abandoned department store.

Posted by: Kodos the Executioner at September 20, 2015 10:22 AM (WtWBY)

122 And I apologize for derailing the book thread, Oregon Muse. I am just a little fed up with it all. Gonna step away.

Posted by: Seamus Muldoon at September 20, 2015 10:22 AM (NeFrd)

123 That wasn't a weasel, it was a webb.

Posted by: Infidel at September 20, 2015 10:22 AM (ad6KV)

124 God bless you, Muldoon!

Posted by: Lizzy at September 20, 2015 10:23 AM (NOIQH)

125 Just finished Vox Day's "SWJs Always Lie: Taking Down the Thought Police". Very funny and informative screed on SF/gamer/tech culture being hijacked by leftists infiltrating HR and management positions and establishing behavioral straitjackets in the name of "fairness". If under attack, Vox learned that one must proceed from the assumption that you are alone, your coworkers and friends are sympathetic but may not support you, and you will probably lose -- so punch back twice as hard. He is adamant that they cannot be reasoned with and must be shunned, de-fanged, or fired. It really is a battle between the traditional foundation of Truth, Liberty, and Justice versus the soft totalitarianism of Equality, Diversity, and Tolerance.

Interesting tidbit I learned is that numbers on SF are way down; lots of SF readers aren't buying the newer titles but are retreating to the classics of science fiction (so it's not just me!), but of course these books aren't eligible for the awards, so they go to the SWJs.

Posted by: All Hail Eris, Scourge of the Atlantic Seaboard at September 20, 2015 10:23 AM (jR7Wy)

126 OT but this will be a thing

Ben Carson told Chuck Todd on Meet The Press that a Muslim should not be POTUS

duck and cover

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:24 AM (zOTsN)

127 Bicycles have no place on a roadway where there are cars and trucks.

The riders of bicycles on the roadway where there are cars and trucks demand that the drivers of cars and trucks not kill the bicycle riders. The rights of the bicyclist are superior to the rights of the motorist. Then the bicyclist does the one thing that gets him killed and it's the fault of the automobile because bicyclists have rights.

Darwin wins eventually, if you buy enough tickets to the lottery.

I can't be here. Trouble follows.

Posted by: Lawrence Nifflebringer at September 20, 2015 10:25 AM (9AA7n)

128 86
any link to the MKH story?

Posted by: AltonJackson at September 20, 2015 10:06 AM (irT2h)

Nothing on Fox or Townhall. I did a Bing search and got no hits so must be just breaking.

Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 10:25 AM (t2KH5)

129 from MKHam

We lost our Jake yesterday, and I lost part of my heart and the father of my sweet babies. I don't have to tell most of you how wonderful he was. It was self-evident. His life was his testimony, and it was powerful and tender and fierce, with an ever-present twinkle in the eye. I will miss him forever, even more than I can know right now. No arms can be her father's, but my daughter is surrounded by her very favorite people and all the hugs she could imagine. This will change us, but with prayer and love and the strength that is their companion, we can hope our heartache is not in vain-- that it will change us and the world in beautiful ways, just as he did. If that sounds too optimistic at this time, it's because it is. But there was no thought too optimistic for Jake, so take it and run with it. I will strive and pray not to feel I was cheated of many years with him, but cherish the gift of the years I had. In a life where nothing is guaranteed, Jake made the absolute, ever-lovin' most of his time with all of us. This is a family picture we took a couple weeks ago. It was taken because Jake, as always, was ready with a camera and his immense talent. All four members of our little, growing family are in it. I can never be without him because these babies are half him. They are made of some of the strongest, kindest stuff God had to offer this world. Please pray that he can see us and we'll all make him proud. God, I love him. Psalm 34:18, Philippians 1:3

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:26 AM (zOTsN)

130 Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:24 AM (zOTsN)

The media will certainly try to make it a big thing, that's for sure

Posted by: Albie Damned at September 20, 2015 10:26 AM (HzqYP)

131 >>That wasn't a weasel, it was a webb.

Thank you. I have higher standards than a webb.

Posted by: The Weasel at September 20, 2015 10:26 AM (c7vUv)

132 is she pregnant?!

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:26 AM (zOTsN)

133 So, having run out of all the artwork in the world, the blog is reduced to stealing from the blog. Art re-runs already!

♠

Read the early morning thread in the time it took comments here to go from low forties to high nineties. I think the temperature did the same.

♣

Ehrlich praising Mann is like Rather praising Brian Williams. OMuse wrote, "amazing to me how much Ehrlich's review is just standard-issue progtard boilerplate insults" - that's basically what I was thinking as I read him. Just vacuous ad hominem. Nothing was more revealing of the projection inherent in this kind of thinking than this: "there is no certainty in science, unlike in the world of denial propogandists" - exactly backwards.

"His solution was de-industrialization, capital de-accumulation, lowering of productivity and hence lowering of real wages...." Take that to its (I won't say logical) conclusion and where does it lead? I'll tell you. My son followed some links provided by a Bernie commie, and ended up at the Human Extinction site. It's self-hatred, really.

Probably Daddy issues.

* Quit typing and post this dang thang already! *

Posted by: mindful webworker - such a card at September 20, 2015 10:26 AM (O7kBk)

134 I suspect young Chelsea is a lot like young Hillary, maybe without the killer rage.
Posted by: Pappy O'Daniel at September 20, 2015 10:20 AM (oVJmc)

I have read articles about chelsea and she apparently is ever bit the nasty fuck her mother is

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 10:27 AM (DUoqb)

135 Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:26 AM (zOTsN)

Wow. That's strength

Posted by: Albie Damned at September 20, 2015 10:27 AM (HzqYP)

136 Interesting tidbit I learned is that numbers on SF are way down; lots of SF readers aren't buying the newer titles but are retreating to the classics of science fiction (so it's not just me!)
Posted by: All Hail Eris, Scourge of the Atlantic Seaboard at September 20, 2015 10:23 AM (jR7Wy)

More proof that SJWs corrupt everything they touch. Nobody wants to read their crap.

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 10:27 AM (HuXg7)

137 Oh my. MKHam is pregnant

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:28 AM (zOTsN)

138 Good morning all

Posted by: chemjeff at September 20, 2015 10:29 AM (R4FFC)

139 Oh my. MKHam is pregnant
Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:28 AM (zOTsN)

Who?

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 10:29 AM (DUoqb)

140 All Hail Eris, is this anywhere near your wardrobe?

http://www.ufunk.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/selection-du-weekend-158-41.jpg

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 10:29 AM (HiC8z)

141 More proof that SJWs corrupt everything they touch. Nobody wants to read their crap.

The SJW model is find something that is popular, elbow your way in, spew your message until everyone leaves, then move on to the next thing.

People are too damn polite to them.

Posted by: Bevel Lemelisk at September 20, 2015 10:31 AM (6J38E)

142 Mary Katherine Ham. Her husband died yesterday. She has about a 3 year old and she is pregnant

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:31 AM (zOTsN)

143 Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 10:27 AM (DUoqb)

The entitlement runs deep in Chelsea.

But I do not think that she is as smart as her mother. Not that Hillary is particularly bright, but that her spawn is particularly stupid.

Posted by: CharlieBrown'sDildo at September 20, 2015 10:31 AM (Zu3d9)

144 MisHum,
I answered you in last thread. I'm using iPhone & can't read all comments.

Posted by: Carol at September 20, 2015 10:31 AM (INbOC)

145 I'm teaching an RCIA class on the Eucharist in December. Book suggestions happily accepted, please.

Posted by: Tonestaple at September 20, 2015 09:40 AM (dCTrv)

*de-lurks*

Check out "Jesus and the Jewish Roots of the Eucharist" by Brant Pitre. Elizabeth "The Anchoress" Scalia recommended this book to anyone who would listen to her, including religious. It's that good.

Posted by: Paul L Carter at September 20, 2015 10:32 AM (NvfGi)

146 Really sorry to hear about MKH's husband, take your life in your hands riding bikes on the road. Recently read of someone else riding for cancer getting killed.

Listened to Warbound (Grim Noir #3) by Larry Correia, colorful and exciting conclusion to the series. Ends well so he would need to cough up some new characters if he wants to continue in this universe. The reader Bronson Pinchot does an amazing job with the voices.

Read Ghost Story by Peter Straub, terrific horror story of supernatural forces haunting a small town, has good characters and well written. Not on e-book and my paperback was missing the last page

. One more reason I prefer Kindle.

Read Jet (Jet #1) by Russell Blake, story of a retired hot chick Mossad assassin who is found by her enemies and fights back. Pretty good story, may continue the series.

Posted by: waelse1 at September 20, 2015 10:32 AM (Sgt1j)

147 Guess should re-post what Larry Correia said about writing and getting paid. I think AllenG shared this link previously.
http://preview.tinyurl.com/nusycpz

And I need to get back to my own writing. And if you have a few dollars to spare for an indie writer - https://www.gofundme.com/8k4zdgw9

Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 10:33 AM (HiC8z)

148 Israel to Bring 20,000 Chinese Workers to Lower House Prices

Finance Ministry says Chinese builders work 50% faster than others; PM announces move as gov't seeks to tackle rising living costs.

Not sure how to feel about this, but on the bright side, it does screw all the arab laborers from the west bank.. GOOD

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 10:33 AM (DUoqb)

149 Mary Katherine Ham. Her husband died yesterday. She has about a 3 year old and she is pregnant
Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:31 AM (zOTsN)

Ah ok, I saw some comments but was not putting 1 and 2 together. Gee that's terrible.

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 10:34 AM (DUoqb)

150 I submitted a short story to the Catholic publisher Tuscany Press. It was intended to be a horror sci-fi tale about the triumph of (Satanic) secularism over religion after the nuking of the Vatican and Mecca.

Needless to say it did not go over well. Not enough dappled colors and "God always wins" I suppose.

The point being you can not always blame publishers' politics. Sometimes they know their readership and what sells.

I looked at Asimov's website and knew not to send them anything. Their writing standards reference Christianity as a "mythology" for crying out loud.

Posted by: Ty Angur at September 20, 2015 10:34 AM (HuaVW)

151 Ehrlich was certainly not alone, nor the leading light of The Movement.

A couple of Important Books I was compelled to read as a fresh-person (but college was lazier then, and I didn't have to read them the summer before) were Theodore Roszak's "The Making of A Counter-Culture" and Charles Reich's "The Greening of America." Honors 112 Composition students in 1970 were given nothing but radical polemicists.

The good news was, you learned to recognize their literary and reasoning "style." Which made you sick of it sooner. And, jokes happened. More than one of us had been around old midwest humor enough to know that "Greening" someone was having them on, making a joke of them. And within a quarter (yes, we had trimesters then), everybody at The Coffee Cup diner was "a member of the counter culture."

The nascent new establishment being fundamentally confused, one was then moved on to honors quarters in "The Twentieth Century Crisis in Values," which meant well (meaning, of course, meant Ill) but unwittingly exposed us'ns, will-he, nill-he, to actual thinkers, kinda, like Colin Wilson and Nietzsche, who don't pin down as well, and could lead on to Anything, as they have for so many.

After all these years, I still have never been able to figure out what the damn big deal was with Hermann Hesse. Lord knows, I tried.

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 10:35 AM (xq1UY)

152 Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:19 AM (zOTsN)

Oh man, that's horrible.

Posted by: Paul L Carter at September 20, 2015 10:36 AM (NvfGi)

153 Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend.

Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read.

-Groucho Marx

Posted by: BackwardsBoy at September 20, 2015 10:37 AM (LUgeY)

154 I have known Dr Pournelle for decades, and he was my favorite author from when I was a teenager. I have an opening battle from a novel in progress and an idea for a stand alone story I'd love to submit, and I'm instead frantically trying to finish getting my teaching license. They do these things on purpose, it's got to be a conspiracy to make these things happen at the same time.

Maybe he'll do it again, or will keep the submissions open long enough for me to get to it.

Posted by: Graves at September 20, 2015 10:40 AM (3MEXB)

155 113 ... Thanks. I just got the Wheelock 7th edition as well as the Great Courses Latin 101 DVD. Haven't started either yet, probably after the garden is done for the season. I'm looking forward to this as I haven't tried to learn a language since the early 70s. It should be 'interesting'. And I might finally have to learn, and understand, grammar instead of relying on familiar usage.

Posted by: JTB at September 20, 2015 10:41 AM (FvdPb)

156 >>>Steyn wrote his book "A Disgrace to the Profession" (subtitled "The world's scientists -in their own words- on Michael E. Mann, his hockey stick, and their damage to science) because Mann had sued him previously over some sort of "defamation" nonsense when Steyn agreed with Rand Simberg

Slight quibble -- that lawsuit is unresolved. Mann is suing Steyn in federal court (in DC -- Steyn lives in NH) for something like $14 million. And he keeps dragging it out. Classic lawfare. He doesnt' expect to win, he just expects to outlast Steyn before Steyn runs out of money for defense attorneys.

National Review Online, of course, has long since stopped supporting Steyn in any way so Steyn's on his own here. But part of his defense against defamation was to get statements from scientists around the world saying that the hockey stick IS fraudulent, thus the book.

Posted by: mynewhandle at September 20, 2015 10:42 AM (AkOaV)

157 149 Mary Katherine Ham. Her husband died yesterday. She has about a 3 year old and she is pregnant
Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:31 AM (zOTsN)

Ah ok, I saw some comments but was not putting 1 and 2 together. Gee that's terrible.
Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 10:34 AM (DUoqb)

holy shit, wow. that's awful.

Posted by: mynewhandle at September 20, 2015 10:43 AM (AkOaV)

158
Did Chelsea even take an upper level science course? I bet not. But pediatric cardiologist sounded so cool to her.

Posted by: Bruce With a Wang! at September 20, 2015 10:44 AM (iQIUe)

159 How old is Paul Ehrlich now? We were reading "The Population Bomb" back when I was in high school in the 70's ( Oh, yes get off my lawn!!)

I am reading, "A Way Through The Wilderness" by Rob Renfroe. Subtitled: Growing In faith when life is hard. I m thinking of offering a study on it at the church I serve.

I posted an excerpt of it yesterday.

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at September 20, 2015 10:44 AM (1+XCd)

160 Churchill's body guard who was with him for decades wrote a book and there is also a documentary. Lots of attempts.

Posted by: Bruce With a Wang! at September 20, 2015 10:45 AM (iQIUe)

161 While thrones across Europe toppled, the Queen's would-be assassins contributed greatly to the preservation of the monarchy and to the stability that it enjoys today. After all, as Victoria herself noted, "It is worth being shot at - to see how much one is loved."

lol... Said the woman whose shooters missed. I suspect Archduke Franz Ferdinand would not be so sanguine.

Posted by: Anon Y. Mous at September 20, 2015 10:45 AM (IN7k+)

162 140 All Hail Eris, is this anywhere near your wardrobe?

http://www.ufunk.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/selection-du-weekend-158-41.jpg
Posted by: Anna Puma at September 20, 2015 10:29 AM (HiC8z)
---
Not even in the same solar system!

Posted by: All Hail Eris, Scourge of the Atlantic Seaboard at September 20, 2015 10:46 AM (jR7Wy)

163 Posted by: Seamus Muldoon at September 20, 2015 10:13 AM (NeFrd)

Wow.

Posted by: @votermom at September 20, 2015 10:46 AM (cbfNE)

164 I can't wait to dive into The Rape of the Mind. Thanks for the link, OM.

Dear Papa was a hypnotist for a while and I still have some of his how-to booklets around here somewhere. I was told that once, while he had a subject under hypnosis, he told him he was going to burn him with a cigarette (but the subject would not be harmed, which is strange but, hey, hypnosis.), but he used a pencil eraser instead.

Said subject produced a blister as though he had been burned.

Interesting...

Posted by: BackwardsBoy at September 20, 2015 10:46 AM (LUgeY)

165 What is the website for Liturgical Mysteries?

Posted by: Seems Legit at September 20, 2015 10:46 AM (Xa4vS)

166 My understanding of the Steyn thing is all about the countersuit. Mann didn't see that coming. Steyn is doing everything he can go get Mann under oath and access to Mann's research.

That's why Mann is doing the delay game. Mann can not allow himself to be deposed or let his data see the light of day.

Of course I could have made all that up and I should be shunned by polite society and prolly banned again by the nearest smart military blog.

Posted by: weirdflunkyonatablet at September 20, 2015 10:47 AM (fEE67)

167 good thing for you you arent in polite society with the horde

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 10:48 AM (zOTsN)

168 After all these years, I still have never been able to figure out what the damn big deal was with Hermann Hesse. Lord knows, I tried.

--

Heh. You were supposed to impy that you had read him so as to sound deep.

Posted by: @votermom at September 20, 2015 10:48 AM (cbfNE)

169 This is true. Pretty much everybody in Cuba is equally poor and hungry.

Except for the aristocracy that goes by the name of Communist Party, whose collective member the Pope just sucked. And now he's going to come up here and lecture us about homosexual marriage.

Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain at September 20, 2015 10:50 AM (EpTck)

170 165
What is the website for Liturgical Mysteries?

Posted by: Seems Legit at September 20, 2015 10:46 AM (Xa4vS)

http://www.sjmpbooks.com/

Posted by: redclay at September 20, 2015 10:51 AM (n5+7R)

171 Very powerful, Dr. "Muldoon" God bless you in your work..

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at September 20, 2015 10:51 AM (1+XCd)

172 JTB, quite a few linguistic psychologists have driven themselves mad with theories of how anyone might have learned Latin in the real world through familiar usage.

My personal opinion is that it leads to Italian, Old French, and Spanish.

Funny thing, the Romans generally thought their language rather limiting, and didn't write much in it. "Educated" Romans learned Greek, which brings up the same question. A language with twenty discrete words for a spear flying through the air: unless you do a lot of spear throwing, how the hell would you pick that all up?

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 10:51 AM (xq1UY)

173 What is the website for Liturgical Mysteries?
Posted by: Seems Legit at September 20, 2015 10:46 AM (Xa4vS)

http://www.sjmpbooks.com/

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 10:52 AM (HuXg7)

174 Posted by: mynewhandle at September 20, 2015 10:42 AM (AkOaV)

Does that mean that buying the book helps finance Steyn's defense? If so, I guess I'll buy it even though I hadn't planned to.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at September 20, 2015 10:52 AM (GDulk)

175 165 ... Schweizer's website is sjmp books dot com if you get rid of the spaces. The writing is wonderfully funny but the music pieces are funnier. It's worth the time.

Posted by: JTB at September 20, 2015 10:53 AM (FvdPb)

176 My post# 159

This is a couple of page excerpt of "Walking Through the Wilderness" which I posted yesterday. I thought it was very powerful.

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at September 20, 2015 10:53 AM (1+XCd)

177 Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at September 20, 2015 10:52 AM (GDulk)

Polli, on his site he mentions that anything you buy is used/needed to help his defense.

He also mentions that he does in fact have lawyers helping him.

Posted by: weirdflunkyonatablet at September 20, 2015 10:55 AM (fEE67)

178 I would be more appreciative of OpenNloggers political and economic opinions if he were in fact showing just a bit of success in the private sector

Posted by: Ehrlich at September 20, 2015 10:55 AM (IFmCm)

179 Does that mean that buying the book helps finance Steyn's defense?

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at September 20, 2015 10:52 AM (GDulk)

Yes.

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 10:55 AM (HuXg7)

180 RE: 136
OM,
I checked out of modern SF years ago. I'm working my way back through the Childe Cycle. Currently reading 'Soldier, Ask Not.'

Next up is 'Children of the Lens' by Doc Smith.

The next non-fiction is 'Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy' on the recommendation of my brother.

Quoting my brother, "Bonhoeffer was a theologian (Pastor and academic) in Germany during Hitler's reign. The author here does a pretty exhaustive biography and I'm finding it to be enlightening. I've often wondered what happened to the Christians in Germany...not in what was done to them, but why they did "nothing". What I'm learning is new to me...the bond between Church and state...really the bond between Lutheranism and Germany's national identity...makes what would seem to be straightforward so much more complex."

Posted by: Long Running Fool at September 20, 2015 10:55 AM (/A5gb)

181 A couple of Important Books I was compelled to read as a fresh-person

--

By the way, I find it so annoying when a reviewer calls a new book "important."
Only time can judge that.

Posted by: @votermom at September 20, 2015 10:55 AM (cbfNE)

182 Posted by: weirdflunkyonatablet at September 20, 2015 10:47 AM (fEE67)

I mean he may have filed a countersuit, but this book and everything else was his defense against defamation.

Because the best defense against defamation is to say, "well, I wasn't lying. It's the truth. The hockey stick is a fraud." and yes, he's trying to use discovery to get access to Manns paperwork.

But I don't think Mann ever planned on letting this go to trial, he hoped Steyn would settle. Steyn is saying no, I want my day in court.

Posted by: mynewhandle at September 20, 2015 10:55 AM (AkOaV)

183 @168 How true. I just mentioned the other day, at one time every black-clad espresso waitress had a copy of Velikovsky's "Worlds in Collision" under her arm. Nobody read it. You had to be seen with it. Jules Feiffer World.

Other than Steppenwolf, Hesse was like that. I mean, did anybody WBAGNFARB "The Glass Bead Game"? (pace, Kansas fans).

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 10:56 AM (xq1UY)

184 After all these years, I still have never been able to figure out what the damn big deal was with Hermann Hesse. Lord knows, I tried.

Oh god. A girlfriend gave me "Klingsor's Last Summer". It's clear that we're following the protagonist to his death but he was so annoying I wished he'd died in the Spring.

Then No. 1 Son read "Steppenwolf" and loved it, because college students' brains are made of tree bark and thin mud. He wanted me to read it, but I pulled my snob thing on him and said I'd only be second guessing the translation unless I could read it in German. Then we were in the basement of the Yale bookstore looking for German books and he reminded me to get it.

The little bastard.

Anyway, the first chapter or two of Steppenwolf is exactly as annoying as Klingsor for exactly the same reasons.

The one thing I will give Hesse is that the aforementioned girlfriend also gave me a poster of him with the phrase "Damit das Moegliche entsteht muss immer wieder das Unmoegliche versucht werden".

In order to achieve the possible you must continuously strive for the impossible.

That's kinda nice. Otherwise, bleah.

Posted by: Bandersnatch, Opus/Bill the Cat 2016 at September 20, 2015 10:56 AM (1xUj/)

185 Does that mean that buying the book helps finance Steyn's defense? If so, I guess I'll buy it even though I hadn't planned to.
Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at September 20, 2015 10:52 AM (GDulk)

Yes, that's what he says. You can buy the book on his online store (and get it autographed!) or discounted at amazon.

Or buy gift certificates to the steyn store and not cash them in. Which sounds kind of like money laundering or something, but I dont know.

Posted by: mynewhandle at September 20, 2015 10:56 AM (AkOaV)

186 Do'h. Forget the link for the wilderness study

http://tinyurl.com/oj9alac

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at September 20, 2015 10:57 AM (1+XCd)

187 Aviator,
Sorry, no, i should have been more detailed.
I'm looking for a big notebook, but instead of 3 rings in the
middle, I want 12 strings, so I can store 1 year of magazines in
one notebook. I know libraries used to use these things,
umpteen years ago, but i cannot figure out the search terms
that will reveal them now.

Posted by: Beelzabubba at September 20, 2015 10:58 AM (XMfyA)

188 The nitwit's name is 'Ehrlich.' Not 'Erlich,' or 'Eerlich,' or 'Erhlich,' all of which I've seen here. You undercut your own words by not getting the spelling right, like people ranting against 'athiests.'

Posted by: RNB at September 20, 2015 10:59 AM (1/fQ0)

189 Posted by: mynewhandle at September 20, 2015 10:55 AM (AkOaV)

Agreed. You're arguing your point with a simpleton that agrees with you. You have obviously stated the point better than me. I defer to your description of the matter.

Posted by: weirdflunkyonatablet at September 20, 2015 10:59 AM (fEE67)

190 Posted by: Long Running Fool at September 20, 2015 10:55 AM (/A5gb)

I read the Metaxas biography of Boenhoeffer several times. I also was involved with a video study of it. I think grammie Winger (?) and Mike Hammer have read it as well. Very worthwhile.

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at September 20, 2015 11:00 AM (1+XCd)

191 oh dear, that is terrible about MKHam's husband

Posted by: chemjeff at September 20, 2015 11:00 AM (R4FFC)

192 The recent reading I've been doing of Medieval and Renaissance literature has led me to Erasmus, with whom I am unfamiliar. (Give me the better part of a millennium and, by gum, I'll catch up.)

Can anyone suggest a good translation of his writing? I will probably start with "In Praise of Folly". Thanks for any suggestions.

Posted by: JTB at September 20, 2015 11:01 AM (FvdPb)

193 178 I would be more appreciative of OpenNloggers political and economic opinions if he were in fact showing just a bit of success in the private sector
Posted by: Ehrlich at September 20, 2015 10:55 AM (IFmCm)

Oh, I'm fabulously wealthy, thanx to book thread graft and kickbacks. Maybe not as rich as Mr. Moo Moo, but I'm doing OK.

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 11:01 AM (HuXg7)

194 @188 New around here? You get over it. Hint? "Morons."

Yep, bothers me every single day. Bet I'm athier than you are.

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 11:02 AM (xq1UY)

195 Oh, I'm fabulously wealthy, thanx to book thread graft and kickbacks. Maybe not as rich as Mr. Moo Moo, but I'm doing OK.
Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 11:01 AM (HuXg7)

Shhhhhhh, OM, don't admit to the kickbacks.

They're not kickbacks, they're self-appointed commissions.

Posted by: mynewhandle at September 20, 2015 11:03 AM (AkOaV)

196 Im sorry but I get the hordes full quota of misspellings all to myself. No one is angrier than I

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 11:03 AM (zOTsN)

197 Posted by: RNB at September 20, 2015 10:59 AM (1/fQ0)

Frankly, I don't care how he spells his name FWIW.

Posted by: mynewhandle at September 20, 2015 11:03 AM (AkOaV)

198 ...there is scarcely any hiding place from the constant visual and verbal assault on the mind...

As I sit here in the quiet of the morning, no connections to broadcast media save the radio which is usually off, I realize, wow, I really am assaulted constantly, because, I stay tuned to AoS!

I should confine myself to Will S's Sunny Side blog! And maybe Engrish.com. Well, and, the book thread here, of course.

Seriously, when this old hermit goes out in The World, I'm reminded, and re-astounded, that people put up with the constant assault of the LaughingStock Media. But then, some people even start the day turning on the TV at home and it stays on all day. Brainwashing you bet! The effect is like being on speed - deep, reflective thinking not encouraged.

Even having a bunch of games on at a sports themed place is mind-boggling (mostly by how little actual sports action there is).

When I see a TV ad for a restaurant, while I'm sitting in a restaurant, I always say,* "Oh! _____'s! That's where we should have gone!" (*But not too loudly.)

It's like people leaving their doors open for every mosquito, vagrant, salesman, and imam to just walk right in and set up shop.

Lock your doors!

/rambling rant

Posted by: mindful webworker - too long; didn't write at September 20, 2015 11:04 AM (O7kBk)

199 Posted by: RNB at September 20, 2015 10:59 AM (1/fQ0)

Why, professor Ehrlich. is that you?
.
Sorry; I am in the royalty of people who make typos. If I'm going to be strung up for every typo I make (Don't know if I did-not checking) I would have been on the gallows a hell of a long time. :^) And no, if people know about his books and arguments and can refute them jt doesn't undercut their arguments if they get his name spelled his name wrong. It just means they spelled his name wrong.

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at September 20, 2015 11:04 AM (1+XCd)

200 188 The nitwit's name is 'Ehrlich.' Not 'Erlich,' or 'Eerlich,' or 'Erhlich,' all of which I've seen here. You undercut your own words by not getting the spelling right, like people ranting against 'athiests.'
Posted by: RNB at September 20, 2015 10:59 AM (1/fQ0)

Argh. Thank you, I've made corrections.

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 11:05 AM (HuXg7)

201 Posted by: Beelzabubba at September 20, 2015 10:58 AM (XMfyA)

http://tinyurl.com/pg2jjox

"magazine storage binders"

Posted by: CharlieBrown'sDildo at September 20, 2015 11:05 AM (Zu3d9)

202 Thanks, redclay.

Posted by: Seems Legit at September 20, 2015 11:06 AM (Xa4vS)

203 Another good book I've been reading is _Chief of Station, Congo_ by Larry Devlin, about his years as CIA station chief in Kinshasa. This was back when the CIA was actually allowed to do stuff and even liberals thought fighting communism was a good idea.

Devlin's account is very different from what you're likely to read in most histories of the period.

Posted by: Trimegistus at September 20, 2015 11:06 AM (BJN55)

204 Feenelong Spok is right!
--Gabby Johnson

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 11:07 AM (xq1UY)

205 Posted by: CharlieBrown'sDildo at September 20, 2015 11:05 AM (Zu3d9)

Binders full of magazines?

Posted by: weirdflunkyonatablet at September 20, 2015 11:08 AM (fEE67)

206 Hey; I got his name right. You'll have to string me up three minutes from now when I make another typo. :^)

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at September 20, 2015 11:08 AM (1+XCd)

207 Feenelong Spok is right!

Spunds like some type of tea-You oolong, feeelong.

I'm sort of warming up to "FelonSpoke" myself.

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at September 20, 2015 11:09 AM (1+XCd)

208 Aviator and JTB, thank you.

Posted by: Beelzabubba at September 20, 2015 11:11 AM (XMfyA)

209 Putting a semi-colon in one's signature causes the cookie to be mis-set. The Email address field comes back blanked, while the Name field loses everything after the semi-colon, but appends some email code.

Pixy blogware - reliable technology.™

Posted by: mindful webworker - trixy pixy at September 20, 2015 11:11 AM (O7kBk)

210 Pick any conservative principle, and write about it. You won't get it past the publishers. Self publish and it will be buried with bad reviews.

So the question must be asked, is there a market for conservative themed entertainment? I really don't know.

Posted by: Lawrence Nifflebringer at September 20, 2015 09:33 AM (9AA7n)

The problem with Indie, as I see it now, is access. Like all things, there is so much available to read, and the average person does not have time to sort the gold out of the dross. Magazines like Astounding had two major uses to the reader and writer, it provided a known standard for what it published, and it gave a place for writers to practice while earning money - a short story can be dashed off in a week or two, but it is hard to do that for a novel - a large work is a lot of work and is hard to let go if it doesn't work.
Now, of course, the system is rigged in favor of some political themes and against others. Only one area of thought is being given the opportunity to learn and earn in the big-time and readers don't get a choice in the matter.

Sarah Hoyt, among others, talks a lot about gatekeepers and how new technologies can allow us to evade them. This works in part with Smashword and Create Space, but again, it is hard to figure out what is good and what is not so good. The question remains, how do you figure out what is good before you read it? Do you have to spend that much to find out if it works? Do I want to spend $.99 on a work that might not be worth even that?

I was thinking on how to do a create space magazine- wouldn't that be fantastic? The problem is always getting stories and advertisers to commit, but a trade sized pamphlet, like Make Magazine, and even if you match Analog's year subscription price of $40, and put out bi-monthly, you are looking at $7.00 per issue, which is comparable for a mass market paperback.

Of course, why do paper if you can do it electronically now? Kindle and pads and readers can now take magazines, my sister gets a knitting and beading magazine monthly on her tablet, in full color, without having to find a store that carries it - and that is the other issue with paper, distribution.
Now, I wouldn't take just any magazine, I see a lot of the stuff as filler to make it look worthwhile to spend that money on a glossy cover. I admit I am really ~~cheap~~ price sensitive.

I was also looking at how Trackfone and the other prepaid providers do their billing.
So this is my second proposal:

You have a bunch of indie writers who want to sell shorts, novellas and serialized books.
You provide a forum for them to publish electronically with a standard price per word/story payment for the story.
The writers do their own editing, and their own blurbs for encouraging readers to read them.
You provide a website where the stories can be bought: But to access you have to buy a subscription ($40 a subscription) to access and buy stories.

This is the clever part: This week's new stories include, say, three werewolf stories, a space opera, 15 pages of an on-going serialization, and a discussion of space elevators.
You, the reader, look at the blurbs and you choose the elevator, the serialization you are reading, and you recognize one of the werewolf stories because you have read that author so you pick up that one too.
You only pay for those stories.

The next thing is, you still have a credit against your subscription, so you look and see that the Space Opera writer has been pumping out connected stories and has had good sales per the "about the author" hyperbox, so you try him out on spec becauase $.25 or $.50 or so is a decent risk.
If you like him, you go and buy his older stuff later.
You had a small risk to try something new, and they author did not have to write a 400 page goat-gagger to get attention.

Even better, the authors have feedback on sales. The series on cis-gendered vampire bunnies with rayguns written in the hypothetical 5th person point of view with no adjectives is not selling? Try it again.
The best prize in this case is what has been called the Benjamin prize. The author is recognized for writing ability by being paid.

The publishing site is going to make its money on a percentage of sales, and advertising. And if the reader just does not like the site, can't stand the stories and wants to end the subscription, well, make the terms to be, "if you do not like your subscription after [x number of months] we will refund any unused credit minus a processing fee" which would be the site's standard rake-off on sales anyways.

I don't know anyone with enough knowledge to do this, or computer savvy to run it, or contacts to pull it off. If you do it let me know because I would buy a subscription.

Posted by: Kindltot at September 20, 2015 11:13 AM (3pRHP)

211 Aye haidt id wen pibil dunned czech thayer spalling.

Posted by: Trimegistus at September 20, 2015 11:14 AM (BJN55)

212 "magazine storage binders"
Posted by: CharlieBrown'sDildo at September 20, 2015 11:05 AM (Zu3d9)

Wow. Didn't think they'd be that spendy.

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 11:14 AM (HuXg7)

213 was looking at The Inheritors by Wm. Golding, but the ebook link was broken, oddly enough.

Apparently it was the inspiration for Trick of the Tail by Genesis...

Posted by: Bigby's Knuckle Sandwich at September 20, 2015 11:15 AM (Cq0oW)

214 The Jake Brewer / Mary Katharine Ham tragedy is the top story at Hot Air.

http://tinyurl.com/qzas4b8

Posted by: Anon Y. Mous at September 20, 2015 11:16 AM (IN7k+)

215 so Hilliry sed on Face the Nashun that "She is a reel persin!" The gif is going round the inter web and its reel skeery

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 11:16 AM (zOTsN)

216 OregonMuse: Argh. Thank you, I've made corrections.

In all fairness could you fix mine, too, since I cut'n'pasted from your post?

Posted by: mindful webworker - eror ffree at September 20, 2015 11:18 AM (O7kBk)

217 Pixy blogware - reliable technology.

Posted by: mindful webworker - trixy pixy at September 20, 2015 11:11 AM (O7kBk

Rivals clock boy

Posted by: RWC - Team BOHICA at September 20, 2015 11:18 AM (9jeGC)

218 Posted by: Anon Y. Mous at September 20, 2015 11:16 AM (IN7k+)

The poor family. What a sad thing.

Posted by: Bevel Lemelisk at September 20, 2015 11:19 AM (6J38E)

219 In all fairness could you fix mine, too, since I cut'n'pasted from your post?
Posted by: mindful webworker - eror ffree at September 20, 2015 11:18 AM (O7kBk)

Done.

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 11:21 AM (HuXg7)

220 kindltot
could possibly offer Lulu style print on demand for stories selected out. a kind of create your own custom magazine.

Posted by: Bigby's Knuckle Sandwich at September 20, 2015 11:22 AM (Cq0oW)

221 Only because Sports Car Graphic had gone away, I subscribed to Road and Track all through the seventies and well into the eighties. And I bought those binders with clamps in them. They came with little gold-leaf inserts for putting the year on the spine, and they cost more than the magazines. My fault for being a carguy in a couple of the saddest decades ever, but hey, LJK Setright was in there.

Esteemed ex-GF's mother was divorced from a bookshop owner. A hobby that bibliophiles used to have, and don't appear to have anymore, was making fitted pasteboard boxes for treasured volumes, and making the outside of them as nice as possible with leftovers from upholstery and wallpaper. They also made boxes for "volumes" of magazines. People used to keep things a lot more, I've noticed. But then, they had less and it all cost more, so, there. Things stayed important longer.

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 11:23 AM (xq1UY)

222 26, JTB, Glory Road is one of my favorite Heinlein books.

Posted by: Tonestaple at September 20, 2015 11:23 AM (dCTrv)

223 Re Chelsea-- Does she know that there are a few small requisites standing in the way, such as 4 years of medical school, and 6-8 years of training after that? As a point of consolation, she would stand a much better chance of getting into medical school than any white or Asian guy.

Posted by: Edmund Burke's Shade at September 20, 2015 11:25 AM (cmBvC)

224
I am reading "Mohammed & Charlemange Revisited: A History of Controversy".

Stunning read, and most appropriate in these here times.

3 Stars, Joe Bob says check it out.

Posted by: GBruno at September 20, 2015 11:26 AM (u49WF)

225 So, does this Muldoon fellow have a newsletter? Because that was epic.

Posted by: PabloD at September 20, 2015 11:26 AM (3RNW8)

226 You got that right, mindful, the only way to keep a clear head these days is to consume as little media as possible, and be careful with what little gets through. From that perspective, it would almost be funny how much bs people swallow, if it weren't having such serious consequences.

Oh, and thanks for the semicolon tip - that was happening to me once but I never took the time to figure it out, just found that removing the additional text in my nic made it go away. I thought I had exceeded the allowable length, actually.

Posted by: sock_rat_eez at September 20, 2015 11:26 AM (S0bOl)

227 You provide a website where the stories can be bought: But to access you have to buy a subscription ($40 a subscription) to access and buy stories.

--

You would buy a membership for the privilege of buying stories?

Posted by: @votermom at September 20, 2015 11:27 AM (cbfNE)

228
So sorry.... "Mohammed & Charlemange Revisited: A History of Controversy" BY Emmet Scott.

I hate when that happens.

Posted by: GBruno at September 20, 2015 11:28 AM (u49WF)

229 222
26, JTB, Glory Road is one of my favorite Heinlein books.

Posted by: Tonestaple at September 20, 2015 11:23 AM (dCTrv)

It was the first book I downloaded when I got my Kendal.

Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 11:30 AM (t2KH5)

230 "I would have a better opinion of Ehrlich if he gave up his cushy job at
Stanford and took up subsistence level farming, which he apparently
wants for everyone else. You know, think globally, act locally, and all
that."

Across the Bay from where Ehrlich sits with his cushy job at his elite university, there's a lefty econ professor with a cushy job over at another elite university, Cal Berkeley. Feller named Brad DeLong.

I used to stick my nose in to DeLong's blog now and again to savor the authentic stench of liberal sanctity. Never more so than when he got on the subject of housing.

DeLong is a big backer of using "smart development" policy in places like the Bay Area, to force people by government fiat to live in high-density high-rise urban termite mounds. Because Sprawl is Bad, and government should prevent Bad things like the stand-alone single-family suburban homes with yards which constitute Sprawl.

DeLong would post paeans of praise to these sorts of schemes, and then would sometimes only a short time later post snippets of his own home life and how wonderful it was living where he was. In a stand-alone single-family suburban home with a yard, in the hoity-toity hills above Berkeley, enjoying views of the Bay.

If it weren't for double standards, liberals would have no standards at all.

Posted by: torquewrench at September 20, 2015 11:30 AM (noWW6)

231 ..." Hacks and has-beens, march of science, medievalism, blah, blah, blah. There's not an ounce of creativity anywhere in it. It's like signs held up at a left-wing protest. Ehrlich is not so much reviewing a book as he is chanting slogans."

No more is necessary for his audience. This is meat and drink to them. This is why Leftist is always historically doomed -- it is forever static, non-regenerative. It's adherents atrophy or they leave leftism and are reborn.

Posted by: rrpjr at September 20, 2015 11:30 AM (s/yC1)

232 The Camp of the Saints .... Damn !!! written in 1973 by a French guy no less .... outstanding read

Posted by: Qmark at September 20, 2015 11:31 AM (EnIDr)

233 re spelling names right: the corollary is, if you're in face-to-face conversation with someone on some topic, you should be able to PRONOUNCE the names right. "Juynboll" (Dutch) is "Jane-boll", not "Join-boll"; "Crone" (Danish) is "Kro-neh", not "Crone".

What can I say; I am a moron.

And don't get me started on Johann Wilhelm Fuck.

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 11:31 AM (4Olbg)

234 This week reading 'Tuxedo Park : A Wall Street Tycoon and the Secret Palace of Science That Changed the Course of World War II'

A fascinating biography of Alfred Loomis. I picked the book up by chance. It's been a very interesting read.

The great puzzlement for me, is how I had never heard of this fellow before. He was a VERY key player in the development of radar. The book provides a lot of insight into how things got done during the development leading up WWI, and during the war. Radar and The Bomb.

http://preview.tinyurl.com/ph9dwuk

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at September 20, 2015 11:32 AM (9mTYi)

235 @228 The nitwit's name is "Charlemagne." You undercut your words!

However, having studied up on yer late Dark Ages some time ago, I have to admit that "Charle Mange" has something to it.

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 11:32 AM (xq1UY)

236 223 Re Chelsea-- Does she know that there are a few small requisites standing in the way, such as 4 years of medical school, and 6-8 years of training after that? As a point of consolation, she would stand a much better chance of getting into medical school than any white or Asian guy.

She's a Clinton. They'll just buy her the degree and a few cardiologists to actually do the work for her.

Posted by: Bevel Lemelisk at September 20, 2015 11:32 AM (6J38E)

237 Me: fix mine, too
OMuse: Done.

Ha! I was just kidding, y'know. Color me impressed.

Posted by: mindful webworker - impressionable at September 20, 2015 11:33 AM (O7kBk)

238 Plastic magazine shelf binders for about 10-12 magazines are a staple that I get at WalMart/Target for $1-2 each. Son keeps all his old heavy metal magazines and bass player magazines. He's worse with those than an old guy with National Geographics.

Posted by: mustbequantum at September 20, 2015 11:33 AM (MIKMs)

239 "The entitlement runs deep in Chelsea."

Chelsea, at age 33, never having consistently worked a real job in her life, immediately after dropping nearly eleven million bucks to buy a luxury Manhattan penthouse, says to an interviewer that she's "not really motivated by money".

Jaw-dropping.

Posted by: torquewrench at September 20, 2015 11:34 AM (noWW6)

240 Just finished "Devil in the White City" by Erik Larsen. It's the story of the 1893 Chicago World's Fair and a serial killer doctor, H.H. Holmes. Really brings the era to life and amazing early detective work by a Philadelphia detective. Larsen writes in the style of Laura Hillenbrand, author of "Unbroken" and "Seabiscuit".

In the middle of "In the Garden of Beasts" also by Larsen. I really like his writing style. Anyway, it's about a newly appointed ambassador to Germany in 1933. Brought his family with him, including his ditzy daughter that screwed everything in sight, like the head of the Gestapo,NKVD guy and assorted Nazis. How she was a big defender of the new, young, dynamic Germany along with far too many others. The big awakening comes slowly after repeated atrocities. Political maneuvers in US were far too slow and weak to recognize the dangers, partly because of fear of repudiation of German debt, and partly, shamefully, because of anti-Semitism.

Larsen wrote a couple others I'm going to read, his histories read like a novel. There's "Issac's Storm" about the 1900 hurricane that destroyed Galveston, Texas for example.

Posted by: JHW at September 20, 2015 11:35 AM (w+zdY)

241 However, having studied up on yer late Dark Ages some time ago, I have to admit that "Charle Mange" has something to it.

My understanding was that his grandfather, Charles Martel, earned the appellate 'le Magne' after stopping the Moorish conquest of France.

Posted by: Bevel Lemelisk at September 20, 2015 11:36 AM (6J38E)

242
But I don't think Mann ever planned on letting this go to trial, he
hoped Steyn would settle. Steyn is saying no, I want my day in court.

Which proves Mann is an idiot. Steyn recently fought the government of Canada to a standstill. He's obviously not going to roll over.

Posted by: Pappy O'Daniel at September 20, 2015 11:36 AM (oVJmc)

243 @241 Yes. "Magne, " the great. Not "Mange," the eaten one. It's a typo joke.

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 11:38 AM (xq1UY)

244 Jaipur Book Festival Day Two starts here at 10:45 AM. I expect to be dropping some comments here as the day goes along.

Re, Steyn's collection of anti-Mann reviews: the "Wild Swans" author Jung Chang was here last night. She mentioned that the commie fanclub in the US and India tried to trash her bio of Mao. She noted that book titled "Was Mao Really A Monster: The Academic Response to Chang and Halliday" came out collecting a lot of these. Yes, the book actually exists.

Turns out that Jung and Halliday were right and the pro-Mao academics were full of poo. Something tells me that the reverse will turn out the case with Steyn v. Mann: Steyn's collection of reviews against Mann will hold up, and Mann will be proven (has been proven) full of the selfsame substance.

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 11:38 AM (4Olbg)

245 Well, Mrs. Clinton, I see that The Right Wing Hate Machine has now stooped to attacking the reputation of your lovely and talented daughter. Have they no shame!

Posted by: Real Everyday American at September 20, 2015 11:38 AM (EDYaR)

246 You would buy a membership for the privilege of buying stories?

Posted by: @votermom at September 20, 2015 11:27 AM (cbfNE)

No, it would be just like TracFone, ideally you would just prepay your subscription and carry that as a credit until you use it up. Then you buy more.

I think it would be fantastic if I could use some other company's prepaid company, like all land line providers will accept any prepaid long-distance card.
If it could be set up so you could use Virgin or TracPhone cards to pay for your purchases that would be fabulous since they deal with security issues and accounting every minute.

Posted by: Kindltot at September 20, 2015 11:39 AM (3pRHP)

247 Ehrlich. Does anyone believe that he actually read Steyn's book?

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at September 20, 2015 11:39 AM (9mTYi)

248 Charles Martel wasn't called "Magne", he was called the Slicin' Hammer. "Martel" in French.

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 11:40 AM (4Olbg)

249 Btw horde, prayers out to Mary Katherine Ham, her husband apparently was killed in a bike accident.

If you see drudge, apparently Biden is coming in. That makes me elated because that means the uniparty sincerely believes Trump is very likely to win gop nomination. Awesome!!!

Conservative Treehouse called this on the night of the second debate. Very prescient.

Posted by: Prescient11 at September 20, 2015 11:41 AM (S85kT)

250 I'm about halfway through "The Miniaturist," by Jessie Burton. But I'll come back to that in a moment.

Have any of you read anything by Northwestern University professor Gary Saul Morson? He teaches Slavic Literature at NU, and his classes on Dostoyevsky and Tolsoy are so loved that he'll get 500 or 700 students in there (almost none of whom are studying slavic literature), and for good reason. His approach to literature is so refreshing that I'm hoping his ideas are rubbing off a bit on me. (One of my favorites is "Why College Kids Are Avoiding the Study of Literature," found in Commentary magazine. GO READ IT NOW. https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/why-college-kids-are-avoiding-the-study-of-literature/ )

One of the beauties of studying literature is that it allows a voice from another time, another place, to challenge the given assumptions of our own. And one of the dangers of the postmodern university is that it inverts that process, keeping us in a comfortable bubble of our own received opinions, while standing in judgment over--and therefore unable to appreciate the brilliance of--great works of literature of the past. Instead of asking a question like, "I wonder if our hookup culture is really the best idea ever," we think, "Wow, those benighted fools! If only Anna Karenina had been in a society of easy lovin', her life would have been so much easier. Man, those old guys are morons. Will this be on the test?"

So, back to "The Miniaturist." Granted, I haven't finished it, but I'm questioning whether I will. Here we have a circa-1600s Dutch newlywed woman who struggles with the cold, unloving household she has just been married into. Her husband hasn't touched her, and instead has bought her a sort of a dollhouse, a model of the home she is now to be the lady of, where she shall meditate on the type of home she wants to rule over. Husband is a rich merchant who apparently doesn't have time for her. There is a mysterious miniaturist who has some sort of prophetic power, and she makes tiny miniatures for the dollhouse, which foretell tragedies that will happen to the family. Hence, it's in the fantasy section of the online bookstore.

***SPOILER ALERT***

Husband is totally gay. The reason he's been keeping her at a distance is because he's having sex with other men and is totally not into her, except as a friend. So they all live together in sort-of happiness: husband, his shrewish sister, new wife, the servants, the dogs. Much hullaballoo involving the gay loverboy, and eventually husband is found out by another merchant, who is going to turn him in to the Burgermeisters, who will tie weights to the husband's neck and throw him into the canal.

Yeah, I know. Hence Dr. Morson's analysis. This author is part of the overculture that has rejected the Sad Puppies authors during the Hugo contretemps. The only way to write about 1600s Holland is with thoroughly postmodern spectacles, standing in judgment over the nasty anti-gay people who weren't lucky enough to have come of age in Obama's America. Under no circumstances are we to pop the bubble around ourselves, keeping out the horrid, backwards views of, say, anyone else from any place or any time other than right now.

The story itself is not so bad, and I like the intrusion of the weird into the everyday world. But the superimposition of modern sensibilities into 1600s Holland has broken my suspension of disbelief enough that I'm just waiting for Caitlyn Jenner to show up and yell at everyone for mistreating the African servant just because squee's (is that the right pronoun?) cis-black. It's frustrating to see how a modern, popular author is unable--or unwilling--to break the bubble of the overculture's expectations.

Posted by: Smallish Bees at September 20, 2015 11:41 AM (yjhOG)

251 Erlich has a job at Stanford? What's he teach, fiction writing?
Or is he a landscaper or something?

Posted by: tu3031 at September 20, 2015 11:42 AM (EDYaR)

252 Ugh, I think we have a shower leaking thru the pan and/or sealer we have under the shower and it also damaged some wood floors around it. Sometimes it sucks to be a home owner

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 11:42 AM (DUoqb)

253 Steyn's collection of reviews against Mann will hold up, and Mann will be proven (has been proven) full of the selfsame substance.
-------------
*wildly swings imaginary hockey stick at boulder terlit hobo*

Posted by: Mikey Manless at September 20, 2015 11:42 AM (9mTYi)

254 Oh, hey. Charles "The Hammer" Martel only held one title under the old regime, and he used it as his jumping-off point. He was "Maitre d'Hotel," master of the king's house. AFAIK no Martel ever held a higher royal post. Just took 'em.

And this is why it is so hard to get served in a French restaurant.
"Mater-Dee" is the highest post in French royalty.

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 11:43 AM (xq1UY)

255 Ugh, I think we have a shower leaking thru the pan and/or sealer we have under the shower and it also damaged some wood floors around it. Sometimes it sucks to be a home owner
Posted by: Nevergiveup
--------------------

Going through the same thing here. *sigh*

The joys of home ownership.

Posted by: Mikey Manless at September 20, 2015 11:44 AM (9mTYi)

256 MARTHA DODD WAS A COMMIE SLUT!

Posted by: Bruce With a Wang! at September 20, 2015 11:44 AM (iQIUe)

257 Oops. Sheds bull hockey sock.

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at September 20, 2015 11:44 AM (9mTYi)

258 "Radar and The Bomb."

Adding that one to the reading queue now.

Another often unrecognized individual who had a lot to do with radar in the interwar years and the early stages of the war, and who then found himself shifted to the Manhattan Project, was Deak Parsons.

Posted by: torquewrench at September 20, 2015 11:45 AM (noWW6)

259 That Queen Vic book sounds great, if its historical and well written. Certainly great source material.

Chelsea, at age 33, never having consistently worked a real job in her life, immediately after dropping nearly eleven million bucks to buy a luxury Manhattan penthouse, says to an interviewer that she's "not really motivated by money".

She probably does not feel motivated by money at all. She has lived her entire life in comfort, riches, and luxury. She doesn't know what its like to lack any material thing or want. She has no idea what its like to have to strive to achieve things or earn. So yeah; she probably isn't motivated by money; it has no meaning to her.

Posted by: Christopher Taylor at September 20, 2015 11:45 AM (39g3+)

260 "Erlich has a job at Stanford? What's he teach, fiction writing?"

Biology.

Ostensibly.

Posted by: torquewrench at September 20, 2015 11:46 AM (noWW6)

261 >>Aviator,
Sorry, no, i should have been more detailed.
I'm looking for a big notebook, but instead of 3 rings in the
middle, I want 12 strings, so I can store 1 year of magazines in
one notebook. I know libraries used to use these things,
umpteen years ago, but i cannot figure out the search terms
that will reveal them now.
Posted by: Beelzabubba

Search for "Magazine Binders". You will find them. Amazon has them as well.

Posted by: Aviator at September 20, 2015 11:46 AM (c7vUv)

262
Now I may be unkeyboardinated for I type on an iPad and autocucumber does not correct for Proper Names, but I do not think we need to go so far as to call Charlemagne a nit wit.

My apologies kind sir.

Posted by: GBruno at September 20, 2015 11:46 AM (u49WF)

263 Smallish Bees that is interesting. Also a married woman who did not produce children would be financially insecure should her husband die before her which was likely. Not to mention penicillan had not been invented yet so an unfaithful husband was a real health risk, although you say he was not touching her. You are right though, there are things to learn from the past about why these mores were adopted that modern eyes do not see

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 11:47 AM (zOTsN)

264 247 Ehrlich. Does anyone believe that he actually read Steyn's book?

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at September 20, 2015 11:39 AM (9mTYi)

Well, you certainly can't tell from his review. Ehrlich could have written what he wrote in his review whether he had read Steyn's book or not.

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 11:47 AM (HuXg7)

265 The Frogs did know how to remember their Dark Age monarchs though. "Charles the Bald", "Charles the Fat", "Pepin the Short", "Charles the HAMMER".

As for the Merovings, those kings those maitre d's like Hammer and Shorty served? Rois fai neant, the Kings Who Do Nothing.

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 11:48 AM (4Olbg)

266 Posted by: Smallish Bees at September 20, 2015 11:41 AM (yjhOG)

I think liberals are a cult that worships homosexuality. It shows up in everything like Christianity used to show up in literature.

Posted by: Bevel Lemelisk at September 20, 2015 11:48 AM (6J38E)

267 Charlemagne wasn't a nit wit, but there are plenty of Saxons who'd call him a genocidal maniac, had Charlemagne left more alive

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 11:49 AM (4Olbg)

268 The fact that Ehrlich has a job anywhere teaching proves how worthless colleges and universities have become. That's like giving a snake handling preacher a job teaching zoology.

Posted by: Christopher Taylor at September 20, 2015 11:49 AM (39g3+)

269 "Erlich has a job at Stanford? What's he teach, fiction writing?"

From his wiki page:

Ehrlich earned a bachelor's degree in zoology from the University of Pennsylvania in 1953, an M.A. at the University of Kansas in 1955, and a Ph.D. in 1957 at the University of Kansas, supervised by the prominent bee researcher C.D. Michener. During his studies he participated in surveys of insects on the Bering Sea and in the Canadian Arctic, and then with a National Institutes of Health fellowship, investigated the genetics and behavior of parasitic mites. In 1959 he joined the faculty at Stanford University, being promoted to professor of biology in 1966. By training he is an entomologist specializing in Lepidoptera (butterflies); he published a landmark paper about the evolution of plants and insects.[9] He was appointed to the Bing Professorship in 1977.[10][11]

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 11:50 AM (HuXg7)

270 could possibly offer Lulu style print on demand for stories selected out. a kind of create your own custom magazine.
Posted by: Bigby's Knuckle Sandwich at September 20, 2015 11:22 AM (Cq0oW)

Distribution is one issue. I have a continual thought in my head that the Fanzine is dead, but maybe it is time to re-animate it.

(visions of the Chinese restaurant kitchen scene in Dead Heat)

Posted by: Kindltot at September 20, 2015 11:50 AM (3pRHP)

271
torquewrench - Here's a copy, $3.28, FREE SHIPPING

http://preview.tinyurl.com/p4tj8tn

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at September 20, 2015 11:51 AM (9mTYi)

272 Ehrlich started his career studying parasitic mites, and went native

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 11:51 AM (4Olbg)

273 >>Sometimes it sucks to be a home owner
Posted by: Nevergiveup

I working day and night to reduce the number of people that can afford to be so burdened.

Posted by: His Excellency President for Life Field Marshall Doctor Barry at September 20, 2015 11:51 AM (c7vUv)

274 Erlich has a job at Stanford? What's he teach, fiction writing?
Or is he a landscaper or something?

Landscaping requires actual skill.

Posted by: V the K at September 20, 2015 11:52 AM (c/Ipt)

275 190 FenelonSpoke

The Metaxas bio is the one I picked up. It's a pretty rare occasion when my brother recommends a book to me. This one is a result of a conversation that we had a couple of years ago which ended with him telling me I was a little tough on God. It's one of those books that I'll take my time reading.

Posted by: Long Running Fool at September 20, 2015 11:52 AM (/A5gb)

276 That's like giving a snake handling preacher a job teaching zoology.
-------------

Or making Robert Reich Professor of Public Policy.

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at September 20, 2015 11:53 AM (9mTYi)

277 I working day and night to reduce the number of people that can afford to be so burdened.

In addition to the other evils of leftist dictators, they all seem to want to move everyone into big city tenament apartment blocks. Big, hideous, concrete apartments too small for a family.

Posted by: Christopher Taylor at September 20, 2015 11:54 AM (39g3+)

278 Ehrlich started his career studying parasitic mites, and went native
Posted by: boulder
----------------

Possible Thread Winner

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at September 20, 2015 11:54 AM (9mTYi)

279 I wonder if the Clinton-spawn actually wrote "her" book. Sounds like the work of Paul Ehrlich or one of his psychophants.

Posted by: Alberta Oil Peon at September 20, 2015 11:54 AM (7MWCL)

280 GBruno, look upthread @188 for the Miss Spelling alert "to which I alluded."

NGU, this is sacrilege, since I cannot cite an ancient plumbing volume for reference, but here's a Helpful Household Hint. Check the caulking around the tub overflow and diverter handle, and around the tub rim just beneath the spigot. In two instances I have found old caulk letting a truly shocking amount of water into the framing behind the tub surround, and fixed it in a minute for a couple of dollars. After, of course, tearing out a wall or ceiling in a blind panic, to find it.

Come to think of it, this may be in "Mister Blandings Builds His Dream House."

With apologies for besmirching Book Thread, we return to original programming.

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 11:54 AM (xq1UY)

281 In addition to the other evils of leftist dictators, they all seem to want to move everyone into big city tenament apartment blocks. Big, hideous, concrete apartments too small for a family.
Posted by: Christopher
-----------------------

The East German Gambit.

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at September 20, 2015 11:54 AM (9mTYi)

282 or make a guy with a degree in Creative Writing your most important national security advisor (Ben Rhodes)

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 11:55 AM (zOTsN)

283 267 Charlemagne wasn't a nit wit, but there are plenty of Saxons who'd call him a genocidal maniac, had Charlemagne left more alive
Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 11:49 AM (4Olbg)

Relevant:

http://tinyurl.com/orelxdr

Posted by: Bevel Lemelisk at September 20, 2015 11:55 AM (6J38E)

284 It never ceases to amaze me that these true believers will be thrown into commie hell hole prison cells and still are red to the core. You see this alot with westerners who went to China and participated in the revolution and stayed.

There was also the case of Noel and Herta Field who were brahmins and of course commies. He was a spy and working for some US agency in Swiz. He fled to Hungary when he thought the US was on to him where he and his wife were arrested as US spies. His brother had contacts in Poland and went to see if they could help get him out and he was arrested as a spy. Their adopted daughter approached the east germans and she was arrested and sentenced to death but it was commuted to being sent to the gulags after Stalin kicked the bucket. Still, they remained commie to the core...

Posted by: Bruce With a Wang! at September 20, 2015 11:57 AM (iQIUe)

285 Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 11:54 AM (xq1UY)

Thanks. I have a friend/Patient who is our plumber and i will start with him and the Insurance Company. My Brother in law is a contractor in FL, but he will tell me how to phrase things for the Insurance Company. Sigh. We will see. It is what it is

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 11:57 AM (DUoqb)

286 If Charlemagne hadn't wiped the Saxons nearly out, they'd have done it to him. They were sort of an all-or-nothing band of folks.

Posted by: Christopher Taylor at September 20, 2015 11:57 AM (39g3+)

287 Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 11:54 AM (xq1UY)

Anyway it is a shower shower, not a tub.

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 11:58 AM (DUoqb)

288 Prayer request:

My wife's Uncle, and Grand Parents lost their homes in the Tassajara fire yesterday.

California just can't get a break. The Middletown CA fire has already claimed the elementary school my kids attended, and the only house left on the block where we used to live, is the one we used to own.

Posted by: Sticky Wicket at September 20, 2015 11:58 AM (0IhFx)

289 286 If Charlemagne hadn't wiped the Saxons nearly out, they'd have done it to him. They were sort of an all-or-nothing band of folks.

The original Britons were more or less wiped out by Saxons, weren't they?

Posted by: Bevel Lemelisk at September 20, 2015 11:59 AM (6J38E)

290 In a just world Paul Erlich would be working on a collective farm.

Posted by: deepred at September 20, 2015 09:31 AM (xv5cf)

Indeed. On the manure pile, as a constituent thereof.

Posted by: Alberta Oil Peon at September 20, 2015 12:00 PM (7MWCL)

291 Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has approved tougher rules of engagement for security forces grappling with the latest surge of Palestinian terror, ready for the security cabinets endorsement Sunday, Sept. 20.
First cleared with the State Attorney Yehuda Weinstein was the use of the Ruger rifle by Jerusalem police.
This weapon fires light 0.22 (5.59mm) bullets packed with a small amount of explosive which can cause injury within a 100m radius. It was used against Palestinian terrorists during their Second Intifada in 2000 2007.
Under the amended rules, police officers and soldiers may use the Ruger for live fire in life threatening circumstances, such as the throwing of rocks and fire bombs which have plagued East Jerusalem in recent months.
This rule goes into force in all parts of Israel, since one of the primary inciters of the unrest on Temple Mount is the Northern Wing of the Israeli Muslim Movement, which represents Israeli Arab Muslim extremists.

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 12:00 PM (DUoqb)

292 Fiorinas biggest donor used to be the CEO of Univision

he gave alot of money to McCain too when he ran

she has no intention of closing the border

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 12:00 PM (zOTsN)

293

Stikcey Wicket prayers for your family and the people imperiled by the fires in CA

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 12:01 PM (zOTsN)

294
I truly understand the arrival of the Grammer Police. The spelling police, not so much. Most of us immediately see the error of ways upon hitting the Post button.

Focusing on spelling in this forum, detract from the exchange of knowledge.

And did you notice how deftly I avoided the use of the word Nazi?

Posted by: GBruno at September 20, 2015 12:02 PM (u49WF)

295 "You took this from a Frisian?"
--Charlton Heston in The War Lord

The seasonal wars against non-Christian Saxon and associated tribes went on for centuries after Charlemagne's death, and right through the Crusades. The Knight in Chaucer was home from those. One of my old profs called that frontier, which moved over time from just across the river from Aachen to much closer to Finland, "Europe's Wild West."

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 12:02 PM (xq1UY)

296 Thanks. I have a friend/Patient who is our plumber
and i will start with him and the Insurance Company. My Brother in law
is a contractor in FL, but he will tell me how to phrase things for the
Insurance Company. Sigh. We will see. It is what it is

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 11:57 AM (DUoqb)

The standard homeowner policy does not normally pay for water damage. You have to have a separate rider.

Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 12:02 PM (t2KH5)

297 In addition to the other evils of leftist dictators, they all seem to
want to move everyone into big city tenament apartment blocks. Big,
hideous, concrete apartments too small for a family.

The totalitarian impulse to herd the population into vertical cattle pens is universal on the left:

http://tinyurl.com/kaskr7a

Posted by: V the K at September 20, 2015 12:02 PM (c/Ipt)

298 Bevel, it does seem that way, since there are so few Welsh / Cornish loanwords in Old English. The Celtic-origin words we did get, like "cavalier" and "camisole", came in from the Norman French and the Continental aristocracy that traveled along.

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 12:02 PM (4Olbg)

299 The original Britons were more or less wiped out by Saxons, weren't they?

Just about yeah. Each conquering group obliterate the previous one and took over - the left likes to stop going back at a certain point and blame only the most politically convenient one, but the history of man has been a succession of bloody murder and genocides with very few exceptions.

Then along came a religion that said to do otherwise.

Posted by: Christopher Taylor at September 20, 2015 12:02 PM (39g3+)

300

- s -

Posted by: GBruno at September 20, 2015 12:03 PM (u49WF)

301 188 The nitwit's name is 'Ehrlich.' Not 'Erlich,' or 'Eerlich,' or 'Erhlich,' all of which I've seen here. You undercut your own words by not getting the spelling right, like people ranting against 'athiests.'

Posted by: RNB at September 20, 2015 10:59 AM (1/fQ0)

Due to the potential risk of misspelling Ehrlich's name in future correspondence, I shall henceforth refer to him as "that alarmist douchebag who wrote 'The Population Bomb'."

Posted by: antisocial justice beatnik at September 20, 2015 12:03 PM (EHU9F)

302 The totalitarian impulse to herd the population into vertical cattle pens is universal on the left:

Easier to monitor, control, and dictate culture and education if people are centralized and put in boxes. Those rural folks, they keep teaching the old ways. And they are self reliant and hard to track down.

Posted by: Christopher Taylor at September 20, 2015 12:04 PM (39g3+)

303 I think we should call him Professor Dickweed

Posted by: ThunderB at September 20, 2015 12:04 PM (zOTsN)

304 It's suppose to rain on Tues in SoCal. Doubt it will help much but who knows...

Posted by: Bruce With a Wang! at September 20, 2015 12:04 PM (iQIUe)

305 The standard homeowner policy does not normally pay for water damage. You have to have a separate rider.
Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 12:02 PM (t2KH5)

We will see.

Posted by: Nevergiveup at September 20, 2015 12:04 PM (DUoqb)

306 If you see drudge, apparently Biden is coming in.
That makes me elated because that means the uniparty sincerely believes
Trump is very likely to win gop nomination. Awesome!!!

Conservative Treehouse called this on the night of the second debate. Very prescient.

Posted by: Prescient11 at September 20, 2015 11:41 AM (S85kT)

Yahoo has a headline story by one of its "writers", 'Can Biden run for president with a broken heart'. It's is Vox level stupid. Yahoo needs to go out of existence ASAP

Posted by: TheQuietMan at September 20, 2015 12:04 PM (DiZBp)

307 Its weird to me that Yahoo even still exists. But then, AOL is still around and a lot of older people, farmers, etc use it for their internet service.

Posted by: Christopher Taylor at September 20, 2015 12:06 PM (39g3+)

308 Easier to monitor, control, and dictate culture and education if people
are centralized and put in boxes. Those rural folks, they keep teaching
the old ways. And they are self reliant and hard to track down.

Also, entire populations at the mercy of public transport unions, sanitation worker unions, public education unions, utility workers unions...

Posted by: V the K at September 20, 2015 12:06 PM (c/Ipt)

309 We're all going to Die of Irony! Professor Dickweed The Alarmist Douchebag is an actual expert, with correct credentials, on mites and honeybees. And is he writing on how to end Colony Collapse Disorder, which cripples traditional agriculture of the Nice and Natural variety, a field where he might conceivably do some good?

No, a thousand times No, in thunder. He's emoting about old issues.

Little dweeb couldn't carry Norm Borlaug's jock strap.

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 12:08 PM (xq1UY)

310 Bruce - Related. Can there be anyone more archetypical of the silver spoon commie than Martha Dodd?

Even the Soviets who used her were contemptuous.
Teaser:
"The Soviets viewed her as a valuable but uncertain asset. One assessment was: "A gifted, clever and educated woman, she requires constant control over her behavior."[24] Another assessment was that "She considers herself a Communist and claims to accept the party's program. In reality [she] is a typical representative of American bohemia, a sexually decayed woman ready to sleep with any handsome man."

http://preview.tinyurl.com/orpugfx

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at September 20, 2015 12:10 PM (9mTYi)

311 Here is what the standard homeowner policy covers with respect to water damage. You may be in fact covered depending on how the pipe broke.

https://www.allstate.com/tools-and-resources/home-insurance/water-damage.aspx

Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 12:10 PM (t2KH5)

312 nood

Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 12:11 PM (t2KH5)

313 "This weapon fires light 0.22 (5.59mm) bullets packed with a small amount
of explosive which can cause injury within a 100m radius."

A twenty-two caliber explosive bullet with a hundred-meter damage radius?

Journalism!

Posted by: torquewrench at September 20, 2015 12:12 PM (noWW6)

314 But then, AOL is still around and a lot of older people, farmers, etc use it for their internet service.
Posted by: Christopher Taylor
-------------------

I have a friend who's email is with Prodigy.
I am slightly surprised every time that I see it.

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at September 20, 2015 12:12 PM (9mTYi)

315 "This weapon fires light 0.22 (5.59mm) bullets packed with a small amount
of explosive which can cause injury within a 100m radius."
--------------

So, they've packed a nuke in a .22?
Fascinating.

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at September 20, 2015 12:14 PM (9mTYi)

316 The nitwit's name is 'Ehrlich.' Not 'Erlich,' or 'Eerlich,' or 'Erhlich,' all of which I've seen here. You undercut your own words by not getting the spelling right, like people ranting against 'athiests.'
-----------------

Can we just move on to Bowie Burgdoll?

Posted by: Mike Hammer, etc., etc. at September 20, 2015 12:16 PM (9mTYi)

317 I'm also trying to read "As You Wish," by Cary Elwes, his story about "The Princess Bride." Sorry to say, Elwes is just an awful writer, so I'm having trouble getting to the fun stuff about how the actors and writers got along, that kind of thing. I've been told it's a must-read for lovers of "The Princess Bride," so I guess I'll have to grit my teeth.

Posted by: Smallish Bees at September 20, 2015 12:17 PM (yjhOG)

318 It's essential to write often in Latin if you wish to translate it fluidly. Resist the temptation to attempt its aquisition only by decoding it sentence by sentence. Recite your grammatical paradigms using mental tricks to keep them vivid (Some of the fun is composing your own methods). Contemplate vocabulary throughout every day and twice on Sundays. And keep in mind the stylistic flourishes in English that stray from convention, e.g. pairing subject with predicate, often come from Latin inspiration.

Posted by: derit at September 20, 2015 12:17 PM (jT+gh)

319 Vic,
I read the first three books of the "Rainwilds" series many years ago. I did enjoy them. I have the forth but haven't read it yet. It's been so long I'd have to re-read the wholes series. Right now I'm too busy for that. I can barely read the blog post during the week. My schedule should easy up after I get everyone vetted and trained.

Posted by: lindafell de spair at September 20, 2015 12:19 PM (xVgrA)

320 I shouldn't be astonished that anyone takes seriously �rleacche (is that the proper spelling? I wouldn't want to undercut my own argument). If an academic's prophecies are so completely wrong, should we still be forced to read anything he writes on any topic whatsoever, much less the one he so disastrously misunderstood?

Posted by: Smallish Bees at September 20, 2015 12:21 PM (yjhOG)

321 Posted by: Smallish Bees at September 20, 2015 12:17 PM (yjhOG)
==============

His dad and an interesting and tragic life.

Posted by: Bruce With a Wang! at September 20, 2015 12:21 PM (iQIUe)

322 Drat, my U-umlaut didn't survive Pixy.

Posted by: Smallish Bees at September 20, 2015 12:22 PM (yjhOG)

323 Considering the silly uproar over the wires and clock in a case, I think it is time to find my copy of 'Rocket Boys.' (Later renamed 'October Sky') Can you imagine those kids being allowed to experiment today? Looking at the case full of wires, I would have reported it to have it checked out, but politics is more important I guess.

My local elementary school had to stop their rocketry program because of the political situation.

Posted by: mustbequantum at September 20, 2015 12:23 PM (MIKMs)

324 When the M-16 was new, there was a lot of talk about exploding bullets.
".22" doesn't always mean what you think, in rimfire. The .223 uses a .22 bullet.

I think we signed a treaty, or something.

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 12:26 PM (xq1UY)

325 We have a used books store in our neighborhood, a tiny storefront that's just packed with books: you'd love it. I popped in there yesterday and picked up a copy of Thurber's "My Life and Hard Times". I'd forgotten how good it is. The scene in which the Get-Ready Man interrupts a performance of "King Lear" is laugh-out-loud funny.

IMHO, Thurber is best when read aloud: half the pleasure of his prose is in its cadence.

Posted by: Brown Line at September 20, 2015 12:26 PM (a5bF3)

326 Posted by: Beelzabubba at September 20, 2015 09:50 AM

CBD had a link above re: your request. Here's another option.

Thelibrarystore dot com

http://tinyurl.com/mag-holder

Posted by: olddog in mo at September 20, 2015 12:26 PM (oKpFs)

327 On 'Rape of the Mind,'

Why are you surprised to find it on a progressive site?

You read it as a cautionary tail; they view it as an instruction manual.

Posted by: Robert at September 20, 2015 12:26 PM (TPDZq)

328 323 Considering the silly uproar over the wires and clock in a case, I think it is time to find my copy of 'Rocket Boys.

That's a great book.

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 12:31 PM (HuXg7)

329 327 On 'Rape of the Mind,'

Why are you surprised to find it on a progressive site?

You read it as a cautionary tail; they view it as an instruction manual.

Posted by: Robert at September 20, 2015 12:26 PM (TPDZq)

Hmmm... good point.

Posted by: OregonMuse at September 20, 2015 12:32 PM (HuXg7)

330 Bevel, ThunderB:

It's not that I hate all stories involving the theme of a homosexual in danger, because it is and was a real thing. It's just that the approach the author is taking is so dreary and predictable. "Oh, it's THIS story. Ah, well, then."

I'm also up to my eyeballs in "Brothers Karamazov" at the moment. Yes, it's unfair to compare anybody to Dostoyevsky. But dang, D. really took the time to explore the psychology leading to the development of other people's ideas! He didn't make the mistake of making the atheists just cartoonish villains, and so on. And he sure didn't set up an easy-to-manipulate story that challenged no one and nothing.

Posted by: Smallish Bees at September 20, 2015 12:32 PM (yjhOG)

331 Hornady makes a .223 bullet they label as "super explosive" however it is not really explosive. It is just highly frangible and is designed to fragment on impact. It is intended for small varmint shooting.

The loading manuals say not to load it up to velocities above 3000 fps.

http://bit.ly/1OIAaKT

Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 12:33 PM (t2KH5)

332 302 The totalitarian impulse to herd the population into vertical cattle pens is universal on the left:

Easier to monitor, control, and dictate culture and education if people are centralized and put in boxes. Those rural folks, they keep teaching the old ways. And they are self reliant and hard to track down.
Posted by: Christopher Taylor at September 20, 2015 12:04 PM (39g3+)
---
And don't forget mass transit! All people should have their residences located on the main arteries of public transportation, because cars are evil.

I work in a building that was deliberately placed far away from the blast radii of yesteryore (it has since been engulfed by suburbia) and many millennials and silver ponytails are upset the building is not accessible by Metro and bus lines. They should move it!

Please note that employment was not compulsory.

Posted by: All Hail Eris, Scourge of the Atlantic Seaboard at September 20, 2015 12:33 PM (jR7Wy)

333 Smallish Bees: Drat, my U-umlaut didn't survive Pixy.

It's just hiding.

Previously, I found that setting the page encoding (in Opera browser) to Western Windows-1252 showed the intended characters instead of black diamonds.

Today's test shows that Western US ASCII also works to show the characters.

But the blog rejects comments posted at either of those settings. Seems to demand UTF-8 for posting.

You can do umlauts & stuff and have them show up only with &-#-number-; codes.

Pixy Blogware - reliable technology™

Posted by: mindful webworker - blog scientist at September 20, 2015 12:35 PM (O7kBk)

334 Brown Line:

You're in Chicago? I used to take the Brown Line all the time to my apartment. Now I live in the 'burbs.

And I've never read Thurber. Where do I start?

Posted by: Smallish Bees at September 20, 2015 12:35 PM (yjhOG)

335 My local elementary school had to stop their rocketry program because of the political situation.
Posted by: mustbequantum at September 20, 2015 12:23 PM (MIKMs)
---
But how will kids learn to launch hamsters into the stratosphere?

On a more serious note, are private rocketry clubs now the only available venue? Won't they also be under scrutiny?

Posted by: All Hail Eris, Scourge of the Atlantic Seaboard at September 20, 2015 12:38 PM (jR7Wy)

336 mindful: Yeah, that smacks of effort, which I'm not about to do this morning.

Woke up with a nasty headache this morning, and so wasn't able to get to church, so I'm sitting here staring at a computer instead of listening to my pastor, and I'm fooling around with umlauts? I wonder at my priorities.

Posted by: Smallish Bees at September 20, 2015 12:38 PM (yjhOG)

337 The proggies see the modern 'rape of the mind' to be committed by Teh CORPORATIONS. That's why they're hosting it there. When proggies do it they are simply educating people to become informed members of our democracy.

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 12:40 PM (4Olbg)

338 Esteemed ex-GF's mother was divorced from a bookshop owner. A hobby that bibliophiles used to have, and don't appear to have anymore, was making fitted pasteboard boxes for treasured volumes, and making the outside of them as nice as possible with leftovers from upholstery and wallpaper. They also made boxes for "volumes" of magazines. People used to keep things a lot more, I've noticed. But then, they had less and it all cost more, so, there. Things stayed important longer.

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 11:23 AM (xq1UY)

Indeed. Storage of magazines becomes quite a problem, because they are, when owned in quantity, bulky. And not a little heavy. You need substantial shelves.

Incidentally, I am pretty sure you and I are "acquainted" on another Forum which is linked to the provider of a magazine which makes up quite a large chunk of the aforementioned bulk at my place.

Posted by: Alberta Oil Peon at September 20, 2015 12:43 PM (7MWCL)

339 Smallish Bees: fooling around with umlauts? I wonder at my priorities.

#ÜmlautLivesMatter!

Posted by: mindful webworker - blog scientist at September 20, 2015 12:44 PM (O7kBk)

340 98
I have no words other than "God bless you".

Posted by: Tuna at September 20, 2015 12:50 PM (JSovD)

341 My niece is a freshman in college and has drunk the climate change kool-aid. I wish I could send her Mark Steyn's book but she would only throw it in the trash.

Posted by: microcosme at September 20, 2015 12:50 PM (8QCtS)

342 Test

Posted by: lindafell de spair at September 20, 2015 01:01 PM (xVgrA)

343 As always, thanks for the awesome book thread!

Ok - I'll probably read the Queen Victoria Book. After binge watching the Tudors, I've just finished "The Six Wives of Henry the VIII" by Alison Weir and am nearly done with "Elizabeth I" by Anne Somerset. Found both very interesting and full of details that give a picture of 16th century life.

Otherwise am starting some negotiating books "Difficult Conversations" by Douglas Stone and "Getting to Yes" by Fisher and Ury.

Because I looked at my work schedule this week and I'm going to be having some 'difficult conversations' where it is not a foregone conclusion that I will 'get to yes.'

Posted by: Jade Sea at September 20, 2015 01:03 PM (28qnN)

344 Even though many laughed at Ehrlich, many thought it was "responsible" to have two kids at most (zpg). "We" fell for it to some degree, trying to be good people I guess. So westerners aren't replacing themselves ... even Russia has this problem. The rest of the world has too many kids, I guess so if they lose a couple kids to war or famine, they still have five or ten more to carry on.

"We" need to get back to big families, more local control, building communities, etc. But the central planner have other ideas for the traditional hard working American. They can always import a slave class to replace us, that won't have our legacy and heritage issues.

I'll be dead before the radical changes happen probably, but I hope the younger generation wises up fast. What are the odds? Of course a nuke in some harbor would change everything fast.

Posted by: Illiniwek at September 20, 2015 01:17 PM (I6695)

345 @338 Yes, my Turning Wheels outweigh my actual, turning, wheels.
And I won't be parting with a one of them, of course.

Posted by: Stringer Davis at September 20, 2015 01:17 PM (xq1UY)

346 This past week I finished "Kushiel's Chosen" and "Valiant Masters: Shadowman"

Kushiel's Chosen is a worthy sequel to Kushiel's Dart.

Valiant Masters: Shadowman was my first taste of the classic Shadowman comics of the 90s. They were great! I love this character! Sadly it looks like they got rid of everything interesting about the character when they rebooted him in 2013.

Now I'm reading "Fear City" by F. Paul Wilson and listening to the audiobook of "The Forgotten Man" by Amity Shlaes

Posted by: BornLib at September 20, 2015 01:36 PM (zpNwC)

347 Ugh, I had bad eggs for breakfast today and now I'm not feeling well. I hope the people here don't think I'm hungover.

Anyway first talk (10:45-11:30) was about the art of translation. Mostly north Indian because Jaipur.

Indians seem tolerant of Western translations of their work; they figure that the art of poetry is itself a translation of the numinous, so if a foreign poet does a good job then s/he is kind of like a Hindu too. Contrast with Islam which does NOT allow that a foreign translator is like the Prophet.

Sometimes there are problems in cultural translation. Puns don't work in direct translation; English doesn't have a concept of dharma; Indian languages don't have a medical / legal concept of child sexual abuse (they do have vulgar terms for that though; this reminds me of the Greeks).

Also if there's a story about a new birth of a boy, the Indians will distribute sweets in celebration. So a translator will either have to add the sentence "yay it's a boy" or else put in a footnote.

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 01:40 PM (4Olbg)

348 Thank you so much for the generous shout-out, OregonMuse! I appreciate it. The book thread at AoSHQ is always great. Please keep showing love to the written word.

PS: I like the word "kinetic" because 'splodey things topped off with a heaping helping of destruction all happening at a breakneck pace' doesn't really work on a book blurb.

Posted by: TS Millheim at September 20, 2015 01:41 PM (vROHw)

349 My niece is a freshman in college and has drunk the
climate change kool-aid. I wish I could send her Mark Steyn's book but
she would only throw it in the trash.

Posted by: microcosme at September 20, 2015 12:50 PM (8QCtS)

Take it to a book binder and have it rebound with the author's name of
Paul Erhlick or Abby Hoffman.

Change the cover page too.

Posted by: Kindltot at September 20, 2015 01:41 PM (3pRHP)

350 43 Speaking of propaganda,
I sent in a short story to Asimov's SF Magazine. It was rejected within 24 hours.

I'm guessing they didn't like my nuking of Washington, and the guns.

We need a conservative publisher who will permit conservative thought embedded in entertainment in the exact same way that liberal thought is embedded in current mass media, and as a counter to it.

Posted by: Lawrence Nifflebringer at September 20, 2015 09:33 AM (9AA7n)

You want Liberty Island
https://www.libertyislandmag.com/

Or for longer work: Castalia House.
http://www.castaliahouse.com/

Posted by: BornLib at September 20, 2015 01:50 PM (zpNwC)

351 A second for Meerloo's Rape of the Mind. Excellent, if depressing. Compliments the Gulag Archipelago very well.

Reading the free "look inside" portion of Chelsea's book, it's clearly not a children's book, though it was clearly presented by someone with the mind of a child. Not an "innocent and naive child-like" mind, but a spoiled, sheltered, privilaged mind that doesn't have the faintest idea of history or the realpolitik of how the world and its economy actually function. It's part autobiography, part bad (as in "incompetent") soviet propaganda, part cloying humble-brag. How anyone outside the beltway echo-chamber can give it 5 stars, or think it's a children's book, is beyond me.

Posted by: Rolf at September 20, 2015 02:07 PM (n+40i)

352 second session - "Matters of Faith". highpoint here is Catlos who wrote the book "Infidel Kings and Unholy Warriors" about the Crusades.

He says that when he was in syria people asked him "what religion are you". Saying "I'm an atheist" was a faux-pas. When he said "I'm a Christian" then people at least knew how to approach him. In the mediaeval Near East, and places in the Near East where Christians still survive (like Syria), "religion" is an identity, not a set of philosophical propositions; and nobody wants even to know what you think about whether God exists etc.

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 02:42 PM (4Olbg)

353 Thanks for the helpful suggestions.

Posted by: Beelzabubba at September 20, 2015 02:56 PM (XMfyA)

354 Almost finished with "Disgrace." Fcuk Michael Mann and his shitastic science.

Also, Mark Steyn is a one ballsy dude.

Posted by: Gem at September 20, 2015 03:12 PM (c+gwp)

355 240
Just finished "Devil in the White City" by Erik Larsen. It's the story
of the 1893 Chicago World's Fair and a serial killer doctor, H.H.
Holmes. Really brings the era to life and amazing early detective work
by a Philadelphia detective. Larsen writes in the style of Laura
Hillenbrand, author of "Unbroken" and "Seabiscuit".

In the middle
of "In the Garden of Beasts" also by Larsen. I really like his writing
style. Anyway, it's about a newly appointed ambassador to Germany in
1933. Brought his family with him, including his ditzy daughter that
screwed everything in sight, like the head of the Gestapo,NKVD guy and
assorted Nazis. How she was a big defender of the new, young, dynamic
Germany along with far too many others. The big awakening comes slowly
after repeated atrocities. Political maneuvers in US were far too slow
and weak to recognize the dangers, partly because of fear of repudiation
of German debt, and partly, shamefully, because of anti-Semitism.

Larsen
wrote a couple others I'm going to read, his histories read like a
novel. There's "Issac's Storm" about the 1900 hurricane that destroyed
Galveston, Texas for example.

JHW-
Larsen is one of my favorite authors- Devil in the White City was the first book I read of his and that propelled me into many others. Just finished Dead Wake about the Lusitania and it was "keep me up at night when I need to go to sleep to function at work" good.

Posted by: Charlotte at September 20, 2015 03:26 PM (5etLx)

356 third session: Jerusalem.

An audience member wanted to blame America's military-industrial complex for not wanting peace. Some called it a conspiracy theory; audience members yelled out REALITY THEORY.

I think the previous conference in this particular room was a Chomskyite confab and we got the lazy fatasses who didn't want to move to another room.

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 03:29 PM (4Olbg)

357 One interesting point, from Catlos again, is that through much of Jerusalem's history no-one cared about it. It became a place that factions wanted to own. It was a prestige-prize.

ISIS doesn't make a big deal of Jerusalem, because they can't reach it - there's no prestige in starting a fight you will lose.

The people killed in the Crusades were collateral damage from European politicians. Pope Urban's famous Claremont speech wasn't recorded at the time; it was "recorded" after the Crusaders had already taken Jerusalem, and retroactively needed the Papal blessing for what they just did - or, at least a well-thought-out blessing. (Maybe Urban had originally just said the equivalent of, 'good luck with that'.)

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 03:33 PM (4Olbg)

358 The crusades were primarily an excuse for a few European kings to loot and pillage. One even had to take time out to go after Greece, which was a Christian country.

Posted by: Vic-we have no party at September 20, 2015 04:13 PM (t2KH5)

359 146
Listened to Warbound (Grim Noir #3) by Larry Correia, colorful and exciting conclusion to the series. Ends well so he would need to cough up some new characters if he wants to continue in this universe. The reader Bronson Pinchot does an amazing job with the voices.

Posted by: waelse1 at September 20, 2015 10:32 AM (Sgt1j)

Actually there is more Grimnoir material. Check out "Murder on the Orient Elite" on audible.com and "Tokyo Raider" in the anthology "The Baen Big Book of Monsters".

Posted by: BornLib at September 20, 2015 05:05 PM (zpNwC)

360 I would have a better opinion of Ehrlich if he gave up his cushy job at Stanford and took up subsistence level farming, which he apparently wants for everyone else. You know, think globally, act locally, and all that.

Always remember, whatever the elites say should be done is something to be imposed not on them, but on the little people.

Posted by: Blacque Jacques Shellacque at September 20, 2015 05:55 PM (wgrxk)

361 Appetite's back, which is good; managed not to barf during the previous panels. Stepped out for lunch to avoid the weak panels 3:15-4:00. unfortunately caught the end of the last one which was all about the warmongering Repugs. Urge to barf back...

Jung 'Wild Swans' Chang was at the 2:15 panel, talking about her new book on Empress Cixi. Cixi's only real claim to the throne was the accident of her being the mum to the only viable Emperor.

And I say "viable" VERY loosely - this Emperor, as soon as he discovered how to work his dick, promptly used it on every female or male prostitute he could find. Then he died and Cixi found a new three year old to play regent for, her nephew. This one didn't want to sneak out of the Forbidden Palace, at least... he was a wimp who didn't want to leave the library.

Cixi's second-highest priority was to keep China strong enough to fend off the Europeans. Her FIRST-highest priority was to fend off the Japanese. She mostly didn't succeed but a lot of that was because, at certain periods, the Emperor was old enough to make his own (stupid) decisions. Like putting the royal tutor in charge of fighting the Japs. The Japs of course whooped his ass and that led to Europeans swarming in to carve up China, and THAT led to the Boxer debacle.

In 1908, Cixi - just before she died - had Useless Emperor #2 poisoned.

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 06:09 PM (4Olbg)

362 Test.

Posted by: Smallish Bees at September 20, 2015 06:14 PM (yjhOG)

363 Montefiore is back delivering a talk on his 2000ish book on Catherine II and Prince Potemkin. the Russkies liked his book so much they let him use their archive, to write the book on Stalin...

Catherine was a German princess. She was married to useless Peter III. She was asleep in her villa, planning a coup against him because he was planning to divorce her. (She was already cucking him, with Orlov.) But the conspiracy was about to be exposed. So, Orlov &c said: either the rope or the crown. She chose crown. She met Potemkin on the way there.

There are 3000 love-letters between Potemkin and Catherine once *they* became lovers. Both were brilliant statesmen. The love-letters have a lot of political Q&A between the two; they were basically 'co-czars'.

Potemkin annexed the Crimea and founded Sevastopol. He sold Crimea to Catherine (in a love-letter) as being the place where Vlad of Kiev had been baptised. Interestingly Putin, when *he* took Crimea, had sold this very place to the Russian people as "our Temple Mount".

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 06:45 PM (4Olbg)

364 on the way there - on the way to the palace, which she got to before Peter III could get there.

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 06:46 PM (4Olbg)

365 Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 06:09 PM (4Olbg)

I have that in my "hold" queue for Overdrive. It sounds like it'll be a really interesting look at a person and time I know nothing about.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at September 20, 2015 06:49 PM (GDulk)

366 apparently all those stories about Cathy being born a male, boinking a horse etc came out of Pitt's prime-ministership in the UK, in league with the British newspapers at the time

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 06:57 PM (4Olbg)

367 250
Have any of you read anything by Northwestern University professor Gary Saul Morson? He teaches Slavic Literature at NU, and his classes on Dostoyevsky and Tolsoy are so loved that he'll get 500 or 700 students in there (almost none of whom are studying slavic literature), and for good reason. His approach to literature is so refreshing that I'm hoping his ideas are rubbing off a bit on me. (One of my favorites is "Why College Kids Are Avoiding the Study of Literature," found in Commentary magazine. GO READ IT NOW. https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/why-college-kids-are-avoiding-the-study-of-literature/ )

One of the beauties of studying literature is that it allows a voice from another time, another place, to challenge the given assumptions of our own. And one of the dangers of the postmodern university is that it inverts that process, keeping us in a comfortable bubble of our own received opinions, while standing in judgment over--and therefore unable to appreciate the brilliance of--great works of literature of the past. Instead of asking a question like, "I wonder if our hookup culture is really the best idea ever," we think, "Wow, those benighted fools! If only Anna Karenina had been in a society of easy lovin', her life would have been so much easier. Man, those old guys are morons. Will this be on the test?"
Posted by: Smallish Bees at September 20, 2015 11:41 AM (yjhOG)

Thank you for that article. It was so good I printed off a copy.

Posted by: BornLib at September 20, 2015 07:24 PM (zpNwC)

368 So looking at the Paul Ehrlich review on Steyn's book, I notice that it doesn't have the "verified purchase" notice listed. Now, I suppose that Ehrlich may have purchased the book at a local brick and mortar store, but quite frankly, I don't feel like giving him the benefit of the doubt.

Posted by: Chris Christie at September 20, 2015 08:27 PM (6n332)

369 last talk was William Dalrymple discussing his "Return of a King", which is how the East India Company invaded Afghanistan. But they weren't making money there so they pulled out most of the troops to fight the Opium War, which *was* profitable. Meanwhile the troops in Afghanistan decided not to pay off the local warlords who were keeping the passes open.

This... did not go well for the Brits in Afghanistan.

Posted by: boulder terlit hobo at September 20, 2015 09:06 PM (4Olbg)

370 250 because squee's (is that the right pronoun?) cis-black

Doubtless from the Latin: squee, squis squi, squem sque with plural sques, squium, squibus, sques, squibus.

Posted by: Anachronda at September 21, 2015 12:24 AM (o78gS)

371 I didn't read Chelsea's book in full. I just listened to the audio, which was AWFUL! Chelsea's nasal voice, and upper-class badly inflected manner made that truly painful.

Did you know, for example, that infectious diseases are worse for kids? And that if we don't deal with climate change, it will be awful? Such are the flatly inflected, bland statements in the book. Could she be more banal and uninteresting?

Posted by: LindaF at September 21, 2015 10:38 AM (Id4/4)

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