Thursday, May 31, 2012

Althouse: Live-blogging the Scott Walker/Tom Barrett Wisconsin recall debate.

Althouse: Live-blogging the Scott Walker/Tom Barrett Wisconsin recall debate.: ""Barrett is agitated about all the Scott Walker commercials that are 'ripping my face off'" and adds "That is totally insensitive to those in the news lately truly ripping and chewing off faces.""

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Harvard Law School’s Bogus Journey Into Blog Blacklisting | Harvard Law School Is Bogus

Harvard Law School’s Bogus Journey Into Blog Blacklisting | Harvard Law School Is Bogus: "We have launched this new blog in hopes that others with an interest in preserving free speech on the internet will join in our effort to hold Harvard Law School accountable for its bogus censorship of our blog, and specifically to call on it to withdraw its baseless DMCA objection, and authorize WordPress to reinstate our blog, so that we may continue to use that as a platform for future criticism of various aspects of Harvard Law School without interference from Harvard Law School."

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When Romney Fights Back, Politico Declares The Day 'Nasty'

When Romney Fights Back, Politico Declares The Day 'Nasty': "Barack Obama’s top strategist David Axelrod giddily trespassed on Mitt Romney’s backyard here on Thursday to hammer the newly anointed GOP nominee for his shortcomings as governor of Massachusetts governor.
Then Romney, a continent away — but occupying a similar head-space — got good and even, personally visiting Solyndra, the defunct California solar panel manufacturer that has become a conservative poster child for misguided federal spending. ..."

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Today Romney was shrewd and brilliant. Here's hoping for many more similar days.

Young Americans Who Live With Parents Enjoy It, Polls Say | Moneyland | TIME.com

Young Americans Who Live With Parents Enjoy It, Polls Say | Moneyland | TIME.com: "Just how much of a bummer is it to be well past the age of adulthood and still living under your parent’s roof? As this living arrangement grows increasingly common, the perception is that it’s not so bad after all. In fact, living with mom and dad can be pretty sweet. "

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I feel really sad that I missed this opportunity!

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

FOX NEWS - High Court Okays Double Jeopardy - YouTube

FOX NEWS - High Court Okays Double Jeopardy - YouTube:



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Napalitano's characterization of this case is totally wrong. The jury was in the midst of deliberations when the foreman indicated that the jury had voted to acquit on capital murder and first-degree murder. The judge sent them back for further deliberations--which could have lead to a reversal of the jury's preliminary determination on those two counts. After further deliberations the jury still could not agree, so a mistrial was declared. Arkansas law does not allow a partial verdict, so there was no verdict, only a mistrial.

E.J. Dionne’s self-refuting shot at Mitt Romney | Power Line

E.J. Dionne’s self-refuting shot at Mitt Romney | Power Line: "To secure his standing as the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, Mitt Romney has disowned every sliver of moderation in his record. He’s moved to the right on tax cuts and twisted himself into a pretzel over the health-care plan he championed in Massachusetts — because conservatives are no longer allowed to acknowledge that government can improve citizens’ lives.

Dionne’s second sentence refutes his first. If Romney had “disowned every sliver of moderation in his record” he would not have “twisted himself into a pretzel” over Romneycare – his most notorious piece of moderation. Instead, he would simply have disowned it."

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Politics - Robert Wright - Are All Fallen American Soldiers Heroes? - The Atlantic

Politics - Robert Wright - Are All Fallen American Soldiers Heroes? - The Atlantic: "I guess you could argue that for someone to choose to go to war is inherently courageous and hence heroic. But not all Americans who die in wars chose to go. During the Vietnam War--when my family bought that Webster's dictionary (while living on an army base, actually)--many soldiers were drafted. And during the Iraq War, some who died had joined the National Guard--not the Army, Navy, Air Force, or Marines--at a time when few people joining the National Guard imagined winding up in an actual war. Once the war started and they were ordered to Iraq, they were legally compelled to go."

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Not sure I agree. There are plenty of people who dodged the draft, obtained military deferrals or found ways not to go to war. So just because you are drafted does not mean you are not still choosing to go to war in some sense. And people who join the military--even the national guard!--must contemplate that they may be called upon in time of war. Should they be treated less heroically because they made the decision to go fight in a war long before the conflict was underway?

I agree there are gradients of heroism. But I still think there is something kind of heroic about a cook in the green zone being killed by a stray rocket.

Michael W. McConnell: The Liberal Legal Meltdown Over ObamaCare - WSJ.com

Michael W. McConnell: The Liberal Legal Meltdown Over ObamaCare - WSJ.com: " As the great Chief Justice John Marshall put it, the enumeration of certain powers of Congress "presupposes something not enumerated," and "by this tribunal alone can the decision be made.""

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Tuesday, May 29, 2012

News from The Associated Press

News from The Associated Press: "LONDON (AP) -- A British judge has jailed a woman whose racist tirade toward fellow subway riders went viral on YouTube."

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The lack of of a right to free speech rights in European countries and Canada is so depressing.

EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty

EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty: "If our political digestive system were functioning properly, it would vomit out the energy loan program and the people responsible. There would be daily front-page headlines in the newspapers. Congressional hearings would feature harsh attacks by Democrats as well as Republicans and be carried live by all major news channels. Steven Chu would be as generally reviled as Bernie Madoff. There would be a special prosecutor operating and talk of impeachment."

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Essay about prejudice in academe against Mormons | Inside Higher Ed

Essay about prejudice in academe against Mormons | Inside Higher Ed: "Utah is about 72 percent Mormon, so it's a pretty good representation of Mormonism. Among the 50 states, Utah has the lowest child poverty rate, the lowest teen pregnancy rate, the third-lowest abortion rate, the third-highest high school graduate rate at 94 percent, the highest scores on Advanced Placement exams, fewest births to unwed mothers (also the highest overall birthrate), lowest cancer rate, lowest smoking rate, lowest per capita rate of alcohol use, and, arguably, the most comprehensive and universal state health insurance system in the U.S."

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Essay about prejudice in academe against Mormons | Inside Higher Ed

Essay about prejudice in academe against Mormons | Inside Higher Ed: "I’ve attended numerous scholarly conferences since that lunch where Mormonism has been discussed, and it is amazing to confront snide and disdainful comments and even overt prejudice from intellectually and sophisticated academics. And it seems perfectly acceptable to express this bias. Mormons are abnormal, outside the mainstream; everybody knows that."

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Monday, May 28, 2012

Memo To The NFL: To Reduce Concussions, Ban Football Helmets - Forbes

Memo To The NFL: To Reduce Concussions, Ban Football Helmets - Forbes: " To Reduce Concussions, Ban Football Helmets"

Could be Peltzman found that seatbelts in cars lead to more fatal accidents.

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Althouse

Althouse: "In fact, what bugs me the most about lefties — what motivates me to go after lefties much more than righties on this blog — is they way they set themselves up as the good people and prance and stomp all over the place shaming and blaming the people who won't agree with them. Having lived in Madison for the last quarter century, I am fed up with their domineering bullshit. "

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Obama levels straight shots at Supreme Court and Ryan budget - The Washington Post

Obama levels straight shots at Supreme Court and Ryan budget - The Washington Post: "Now it’s true that after Obama spoke, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney placed some limits on the president’s claim that knocking down the Affordable Care Act would be “an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress.”

Carney explained that Obama was “referring to the fact that it would be unprecedented in the modern era of the Supreme Court, since the New Deal era, for the Supreme Court to overturn legislation” on a “matter of national economic importance.”

And that is precisely the point."

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What about U.S. v. Lopez and Morison case and U.S. v. Morison?

Democrats put John Roberts on trial - The Washington Post

Democrats put John Roberts on trial - The Washington Post: ". Even the president advanced this argument as recently as last month, although the ACA is not, in fact, all that popular."

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Sunday, May 27, 2012

The Corner - National Review Online

The Corner - National Review Online: "? What an absolutely unblemished life the man must have lived if all they can come up with is that he pulled some unkind pranks in high school and HE’S RICH!! "

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Telemark Journal - Jay Nordlinger - National Review Online

Telemark Journal - Jay Nordlinger - National Review Online: "Habitually, Norwegians make a run for the border — the Swedish border. Why? To shop. Because food is so darn expensive in Norway, owing to the protectionist and other screwy policies of the government. Along the Swedish-Norwegian border, they’ve just built a new mall, for Norwegian shoppers. It is 14 soccer fields long."

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Telemark Journal - Jay Nordlinger - National Review Online

Telemark Journal - Jay Nordlinger - National Review Online: "When Henrik was five months, I think, his father sent me a picture of him reading National Review — or at least looking at it, with admiration, I think."

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David Brooks sours on Obama over anti-Bain ads: Administration, campaign ‘demeaned itself’ | The Daily Caller

David Brooks sours on Obama over anti-Bain ads: Administration, campaign ‘demeaned itself’ | The Daily Caller: "“And, finally, I just think the Obama administration, or the campaign has demeaned itself with a series of falsehoods. They released this ad which had a whole series of falsehoods. The one was that this steel company, GST, was a healthy company until Bain took it over, which the ad suggests — completely untrue.”"

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Media hastily erase articles about Malia Obama’s appearance at One Direction concert | The Daily Caller

Media hastily erase articles about Malia Obama’s appearance at One Direction concert | The Daily Caller: "Within hours, the entire post was scrubbed from the site without explanation, and the post’s URL was hastily changed to direct users to the site’s celebrity section."

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Tuesday, May 22, 2012

EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty

EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty: "The ideologically easiest escape route is to drop (b).  Maybe the health benefits of organic food really do justify a 30-50% price premium.  But nothing high on Google Scholar inspires confidence in this position.  Major literature reviews in 2009, 2003, and 2002 report that (a) there's little solid evidence about the health benefits of organics, and (b) existing evidence reveals little health benefit of organics. 

This is hardly surprising given the emotional, credulous cognitive style of organic consumers.  Can you imagine the typical "all-natural" fan changing his mind in response to peer-reviewed nutritional research?  That's just not how they roll."

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Obama backer and former CNN exec puts dog poop in gay couple’s mailbox | The Daily Caller

Obama backer and former CNN exec puts dog poop in gay couple’s mailbox | The Daily Caller: "Just imagine if anybody even remotely connected with Fox News put dog crap in a gay couple’s mailbox. The Media Matters servers would melt down. MSNBC would call it “Watergate III.” Sandra Fluke would find some way to insert herself into the story. We wouldn’t hear about anything else for at least a week."

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Monday, May 21, 2012

Polanski surprises Cannes with Prada ad - Yahoo! News Canada

Polanski surprises Cannes with Prada ad - Yahoo! News Canada: "The film-maker was arrested on an international warrant over the child sex case in September 2009 when he arrived in Zurich on his way to the city's film festival.
Polanski spent 10 months in Swiss custody before convincing authorities not to honour a US extradition request, and instead to release him."

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Buying Organic Makes You A Jerk, Study Says

Buying Organic Makes You A Jerk, Study Says: " I finally bought a small cake and some strawberries and then at the check stand, the guy was like ‘You didn’t bring your own bag? I need to charge you if you didn’t bring your own bag.’ It was like a ‘Portlandia skit.’ They were so snotty and arrogant.”"

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Buying Organic Makes You A Jerk, Study Says

Buying Organic Makes You A Jerk, Study Says: "People who buy organic food tend to act like jerks, according to a study published on May 15th in the journal of Social Psychological and Personality Science."

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Sunday, May 20, 2012

Obama Drove Drunk, Too
Obama's Agent Required, And Still Requires, Authors To Submit Their Own Bios

Obama Drove Drunk, Too<br>Obama's Agent Required, And Still Requires, Authors To Submit Their Own Bios: "And Still More: The bio was updated, corrected, and republished multiple times. For example, it was updated to include the new title of Obama's book.

And yet "Born in Kenya" remained."

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Obama Drove Drunk, Too
Obama's Agent Required, And Still Requires, Authors To Submit Their Own Bios

Obama Drove Drunk, Too<br>Obama's Agent Required, And Still Requires, Authors To Submit Their Own Bios: "Their unruly maleness will not be contained, as mine finally was, by a sense of sadness at an older man's injured pride. Their anger won't be checked by the intimation of danger that would come upon me whenever I split another boy's lip or raced down a highway with gin clouding my head."

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Robert Nozick Interview

Robert Nozick Interview: "In fact there's some psychological literature that seems to indicate that when people are asked by psychologists what other people in their social circle think of them, and then the psychologists check with these other people about what they actually do think, that the people who have more accurate views of what other people think of them are less happy, less successful in life, cope less well with various things, than the people who have rosier views of what people think of them than is actually the case."

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Althouse: "Mitt and Ann Romney’s marriage is strong because they believe they will live together in an eternal afterlife..."

Althouse: "Mitt and Ann Romney’s marriage is strong because they believe they will live together in an eternal afterlife...": "Writes Jodi Kantor in the NYT, citing "relatives and friends" as the source of information. It's a whole long article about Mitt Romney's Mormon faith.

Fascinating! But what I'd like to know is what Barack and Michelle Obama are picturing for the afterlife. NYT, can you clue me in? Because I feel like there are so many things we never found out about Obama the first time around in 2008. How about now?"

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‘ing Thought Experiments: How Do They Work? | Bleeding Heart Libertarians

‘ing Thought Experiments: How Do They Work? | Bleeding Heart Libertarians: "Many people approach political questions as a war to defend their ideological turf. Others are policy wonks who want to turn everything into a debate about contemporary policies. (How boring.) Some people mean well but don't understand what the words "all things equal" mean. This can prevent them from having honest, interesting, or relevant dialogue. It can prevent them from being able to do philosophy at even an introductory undergraduate level."

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Friday, May 18, 2012

The Conglomerate Blog: Business, Law, Economics & Society

The Conglomerate Blog: Business, Law, Economics & Society: "Guest describes the mission as a "crash course in leadership, self-restraint, languages, and salesmanship." He sees two important features of the mission: being forced to learn a foreign language, which forces one to "think globally and understand foreign countries," and being forced to "practice salesmanship ... selling a product that nobody wants." "

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Witness Told Cops He Saw Trayvon Martin Straddling George Zimmerman And Punching Him "MMA Style" | The Smoking Gun

Witness Told Cops He Saw Trayvon Martin Straddling George Zimmerman And Punching Him "MMA Style" | The Smoking Gun: "A witness told Florida cops that he saw Trayvon Martin straddling George Zimmerman and pummeling the neighborhood watch captain “MMA style” shortly before the unarmed teen was felled by a gunshot to the chest."

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Thursday, May 17, 2012

Subsidized college loans are another bipartisan boondoogle - The Washington Post

Subsidized college loans are another bipartisan boondoogle - The Washington Post: "The Atlantic’s Conor Friedersdorf notes that if Washington is feeling flush enough to spend another $60 billion on education in a decade, it could find more deserving people to subsidize than a privileged minority of college students who are acquiring credentials strongly correlated with higher-than-average future earnings."

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Subsidized college loans are another bipartisan boondoogle - The Washington Post

Subsidized college loans are another bipartisan boondoogle - The Washington Post: "Bipartisanship, the supposed scarcity of which so distresses the high-minded, actually is disastrously prevalent."

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EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty

EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty: "Why then do people support the interventions they do, while apathetically ignoring countless other forms of human suffering and degradation?  For the most part, people support the interventions they have because they have them.  It's not about the severity or treatability of the problems.  It's about conforming to our secular religion.  Our society says that poverty among American seniors would be a terrible problem.  So we have massive social programs to prevent it.  How do we know this "disaster" is especially pressing in a world so full of suffering?  We don't.  We don't even try to do a fair accounting.  Instead, we make stuff up, and shame anyone who subsequently furrows his brow.  Simple as that."

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6 Times Obama Promised To Cut The Deficit

6 Times Obama Promised To Cut The Deficit: "6. Obama in 2010: We will cut the deficit in half by the end of my first term in office."

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Wednesday, May 16, 2012

JustOneMinute: Zimmerman Case - Keeping Hate Alive At The Times

JustOneMinute: Zimmerman Case - Keeping Hate Alive At The Times: "Stand Your Ground is not in play when the victim is lying on the ground. New York is a 'duty to retreat' state, but no one (with the possible exception of Chuck Norris) has a duty to execute a blinding Ninja back-flip and roll while the assailant is on their chest."

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First Read - Romney presses Obama on debt with aid of prop clock

First Read - Romney presses Obama on debt with aid of prop clock: ""Gosh, when we put that clock up, we made that clock back in the New Hampshire primary days and it began with 14 back then. Now its fifteen, six eighty five, it'll be sixteen coming soon. It is not at all what he promised," Romney said. "This presidency has been a disappointment, and the people who have been hurt by this disappointment are the American people.""

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I really, really like this strategy.

Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Is Obama another Edwards? | The Daily Caller

Is Obama another Edwards? | The Daily Caller: "Maybe I’m missing something, but if Obama’s pal Dr. Eric Whitaker did offer Rev. Wright $150,000 to stay silent for the duration of the campaign, as charged by Ed Klein, how exactly is that different from John Edwards’ pal Fred Baron giving Rielle Hunter money to stay out of the limelight for the duration of the campaign?"

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Shock Poll: Romney now leads among women | Washington Examiner

Shock Poll: Romney now leads among women | Washington Examiner: "And here’s a surprise: Despite the media hyping the so-called war on women, no major outlet today noticed Romney’s new lead with women voters."

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Sunday, May 13, 2012

BBC News | Clinton Scandal | Scandalous scoop breaks online

BBC News | Clinton Scandal | Scandalous scoop breaks online: "Last summer, while Newsweek was debating whether to publish another charge of sexual misconduct by Clinton, Mr Drudge, who heard it from a source inside Newsweek, ran the story.

But the rogue reporter - who says he is on a mission to divorce the Washington press from its 'too-cosy' relationship with its sources - is far from perfect."

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Keep Rockin - WSJ.com

Keep Rockin - WSJ.com: "The John Edwards case illustrates the point. News organizations not only ignored the story of his affair but promoted the phony narrative that he was a white knight standing beside his cancer-stricken wife."

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Keep Rockin - WSJ.com

Keep Rockin - WSJ.com: "Rutten acknowledged that "too many newsrooms, including that of The Times," were derelict in ignoring the Edwards story."

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Patterico's Pontifications » L.A. Times Censors Bloggers on Edwards

Patterico's Pontifications » L.A. Times Censors Bloggers on Edwards: "L.A. Times bloggers have been told not to blog about the National Enquirer story on John Edwards and Rielle Hunter."

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Baiting Garett Jones, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty

Baiting Garett Jones, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty: " I would hope that one could undertake research on the role of IQ in economic development without being presumed to have racist intent."

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Mhhhhhwaaahahahahah!

Obama team tried to 'bribe' Jeremiah Wright to keep quiet: book - NYPOST.com

Obama team tried to 'bribe' Jeremiah Wright to keep quiet: book - NYPOST.com: "“Barack said, ‘I’m sorry you don’t see it the way I do. Do you know what your problem is?’ And I said, ‘No, what’s my problem?’ And he said, ‘You have to tell the truth.’ I said, ‘That’s a good problem to have. That’s a good problem for all preachers to have. That’s why I could never be a politician.’"

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Obama team tried to 'bribe' Jeremiah Wright to keep quiet: book - NYPOST.com

Obama team tried to 'bribe' Jeremiah Wright to keep quiet: book - NYPOST.com: "“And one of the first things Barack said was, ‘I really wish you wouldn’t do any more public speaking until after the November election.’ He knew I had some speaking engagements lined up, and he said, ‘I wish you wouldn’t speak. It’s gonna hurt the campaign if you do that.’"

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Saturday, May 12, 2012

What $1.2 Trillion Can Buy - NYTimes.com

What $1.2 Trillion Can Buy - NYTimes.com: " Linda Bilmes, at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, and Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel laureate and former Clinton administration adviser, put a total price tag of more than $2 trillion on the war. They include a number of indirect costs, like the economic stimulus that the war funds would have provided if they had been spent in this country."

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I don't get this. Stiglitz is the guy that says digging holes to fill them in again is stimulus. So why isn't all the spending on the Iraq also stimulus?

Sunday, May 6, 2012

Mark Steyn: Fauxcahontas and the melting pot | great, warren, elizabeth - Opinion - The Orange County Register

Mark Steyn: Fauxcahontas and the melting pot | great, warren, elizabeth - Opinion - The Orange County Register: "Martin Luther King dreamed of a day when men would be judged not on the color of their skin but on the content of their great-great-great-grandmother's wedding license application. "

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Mark Steyn: Fauxcahontas and the melting pot | great, warren, elizabeth - Opinion - The Orange County Register

Mark Steyn: Fauxcahontas and the melting pot | great, warren, elizabeth - Opinion - The Orange County Register: "But being yourself is never going to be enough in the new composite America. Last week, in an election campaign ad, Barack revealed his latest composite girlfriend – "Julia." She's worse than the old New York girlfriend. She can't even be herself. In fact, she can't be anything without massive assistance from Barack every step of the way, from his "Head Start" program at age 3 through to his Social Security benefits at the age of 67. Everything good in her life she owes to him. When she writes her memoir, it will be thanks to a subvention from the Federal Publishing Assistance Program for Chronically Dependent Women but you'll love it: Sweet Dreams From My Sugar Daddy."

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Saturday, May 5, 2012

Taking a scythe to the Bill of Rights - The Washington Post

Taking a scythe to the Bill of Rights - The Washington Post: "Controversies can be wonderfully clarified when people follow the logic of illogical premises to perverse conclusions. For example, two academics recently wrote in the British Journal of Medical Ethics that “after-birth abortions” — killing newborn babies — are matters of moral indifference because newborns, like fetuses, “do not have the same moral status as actual persons” and “the fact that both are potential persons is morally irrelevant.”"

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Will: The Attack on Kids With Down Syndrome - Newsweek George F. Will - MSNBC.com

Will: The Attack on Kids With Down Syndrome - Newsweek George F. Will - MSNBC.com: "Jon experiences life's three elemental enjoyments—loving, being loved and ESPN. For Jon, as for most normal American males,Compose the rest of life is details."

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Friday, May 4, 2012

Althouse: The NYT accuses American voters of opposing Obama because he's black.

Althouse: The NYT accuses American voters of opposing Obama because he's black.: "While Mr. Obama will always be known to the history books as the country’s first black president, his mixed-race heritage has only rarely surfaced in visible and explicit ways amid the tumult of a deep recession, two wars and shifting political currents."

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It really irritates me how people continually forget that Clinton was actually the first black president.

Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Republicans have bad brains? – USATODAY.com

Republicans have bad brains? – USATODAY.com: "If you say that about homosexuals, you are tolerant and realistic. If you say it about blacks, you are racist (unless you're black yourself). If you say it about women, you may or may not be sexist, depending on who is manning (er, womanning) the feminist battle stations. If you say it about men, you just might be a writer for Esquire. But if you say it about conservatives, you're a scientist."

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So much truth in one paragraph.