July 29, 2009
"At the University of North Carolina, there are many different types of people: frat boys and flamboyant gays, football players and math geniuses, evangelical Christians and newly converted Buddhists; but it is safe to assume that all of us agree about what's most important: hating Duke."In this student essay about the community that is the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, sophomore Emily Banks spells it out. It doesn't matter who you are or where you're from or what you believe, as long as you hate dook. It's a feeling, an experience, a sense of community: the Carolina family.
And no, it's really not all about hating dook. That just comes with the territory. But I do have to say that having been a part of many university communities, the UNC family really is a family, with its own community and values and sense of belonging. Even as a yankee-Californian-grad-student-transplant, I have no qualms feeling an equal member of the Tar-Heel-born, Tar-Heel-bred set. And sure as hell, when I die, I'm planning on being a Tar Heel dead.
I can empathize with Emily. I came from a school with no sports and a bunch of nerds too (Caltech, you know?) and entered this bizarro world with green trees and flowers and HUMIDITY and gods on the basketball courts. I mean, have you ever seen the Dean Smith Center (click for the picture)? If you didn't know what you were looking at you would think it was one of those Megachurches. No kidding. It didn't take long for Carolina to embrace me with both arms. Probably the second best desicion of my life was to go to UNC. The place and the people changed me in ways I am only now beginning to understand. And like Emily, it's a place I love with my whole heart. Something I never thought I'd find anywhere but here.
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, Lali.June 30, 2009
It took me three days to figure out that there was another side to the tape. That was not the only naive mistake that I made; I mistook the metal/normal switch on the Walkman for a genre-specific equaliser, but later I discovered that it was in fact used to switch between two different types of cassette.Yeah, and the cell phones were the size of bricks and had batteries like the one in your mom's car.
Can you believe this kid? Or his parents for that matter? You mean to tell me that his mom and dad have never showed him a cassette tape?
Later, he whines about having to listen to the tape all the way through because there "is no shuffle,"and breaking the cassette"
Its a function that, on the face of it, the Walkman lacks. But I managed to create an impromptu shuffle feature simply by holding down "rewind" and releasing it randomly - effective, if a little laboured.HONESTLY!I told my dad about my clever idea. His words of warning brought home the difference between the portable music players of today, which don't have moving parts, and the mechanical playback of old. In his words, "Walkmans eat tapes". So my clumsy clicking could have ended up ruining my favourite tape, leaving me music-less for the rest of the day
The ignorance of this kid is breathtaking. He's 13, meaning he was born in 1995 or 1996, depending on when his birthday is. My 1995 car came with a tape deck in the top model stereo. You could not GET a CD player in that car, and yet this kid acts as if the cassette is some kind of dinosaur.
And they gave HIM a platform? If all 13-year-olds are like this, I am frankly scared.
Get a life, kid, and pull your selfish head out of your own ass and pay attention to the whole world around you. Not just your easy little toys.
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February 04, 2009
I'm on the track of one, a bigger more dangerous critter than I've ever hunted before: the Obama-Pelosi Porkosaurus.Click over and read the rest. Uncle Ted has some interesting ideas about stalking the beast and starving it to death.The Porkosaurus is plenty dangerous by itself. It subsidizes unemployment by increasing unemployment benefits. And, as the man said, when you subsidize something you get more of it. It doesn't spend anything -- not one thin dime -- on the one thing that economists say is guaranteed to stimulate the economy, defense spending. And its whole purpose is to feed Fedzilla and make it grow even bigger, swallowing our economy whole.
If you've never read Ted before, you're in for a treat.
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January 27, 2009
But every once in a while it also gives me hope....
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January 21, 2009
I'm not a big fan of Jon Stewart, and I often think he's just plain unfunny. But when he nails it, he nails it. This made me laugh. A lot.
Thanks to my afternoon Therapy Pool pals (Hi Stan!) for telling me to find the clip!
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October 27, 2008
Some idiot with bad taste and a worse sense of humor hangs a Sarah Palin doll from a noose and you don't respond? Dare I even suggest that you think it's funny because she's running against your Obamessiah?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but about 10 years ago you all were so mad about a BEAR in a noose that you forced USC to abandon a decades old student tradition of hanging bruins (the UCLA mascot) from tiny nooses. LITTLE TINY TEDDY BEARS. In UCLA shirts. You said it was racist. You said that it was reminiscent of the lynching of black men by the KKK. You said you were offended. So we stopped hanging TEDDY BEARS.
I get your point, though. Hanging people is not a joke. It's MURDER. And that's never funny.
And now, these people have NOT A BEAR, but a life-size mannequin of a woman, dressed as Sarah Palin, hanging from a noose in their yard and you say not one word. Why?
I'll bet my house that if it was Barry Obama swinging from the yardarm you'd have had 3 press conferences already, and called the police out to arrest these homeowners for a hate crime. Perhaps for racial intimidation.
And yet you say nothing about this. I'm offended by it, and I'm clearly not black. Not as a conservative, or because I am a woman, but because I think it's disgusting. Hanging a bear, or a skeleton, or something clearly not representing a particular person is one thing, demonstrating by your Halloween display that you wish someone a painful death is quite another.
And I still want to hear your outrage. If you all could muster that kind of vitriol for a few teddy bears, I bet you can come out and preach it about this Sarah Palin mannequin.
I'll be sure to be there to support you when you do.
Regards,
CTG
h/t Flap
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I agree with you on this post, what is wrong with people? I have no answers, only further questions. It makes me sick. September 22, 2008
It has become increasingly clear to me that the Democrats are scared shitless of Sarah Palin. The sheer amount of vitriol being flung around (BTW, anyone know what vitriol REALLY is?) combined with the increasing hysteria about the fact that they can find any dirt that seems to stick is becoming increasingly laughable. Memo to the MSM: when hardcore BDS suffering Liberals begin to feel that the all-out, anti-Sarah barrage is TOO much, it's time to back off. And on a related note, so what if Sarah won't sit don for yet another hit-piece interview? Who said she had to let you piss in her sandbox? Or that she had to play your game? Especially when the rules change more frequently than Calvinball and the only thing that stays the same is that Sarah loses...
ESPN makes me happy. Not sure why, but there's really something comforting about being able to turn on something on the TV that sounds like the news, but won't make me scream and throw things at the TV. I need the "audio/visual wallpaper" when I'm working. Usually I have FoxNews or the local news on, but I just am so tired of knowing more about the story being reported than the editor or reporter who write and read the news scripts.
Anyone else think Kenley's dress on Project Runway last Wednesday looked like something Betty would wear on Ugly Betty? Yeah, me too.
Fake sudafed is for shit. It works about 1/10 as well as the real stuff, and they don't make the formulation that works for me with the real stuff any more. AARRGH. So I suffer. Benedryl ain't cutting it either, and I am sneezing every 5 minutes. Not to mention waking up every 45 minutes and sleeping badly in between...
Just waiting to see if shit rains down on my head about coming home early. I met all my responsibilities for the day, I taught my class and picked up HW and went to my meeting, where I also sat far away from everyone so I wouldn't give them germs.
I still have a hell of a lot of work to do, and a million small personal things to get taken care of. But I think it's nappy nap time.
Two quick links before I go:
1. Check out the investigative journalism done by the fine folks at My Pet Jawa regarding anti-Palin "viral" videos
2.wRitErsbLock went to see the Sarah Palin rally at the Villages, FL this weekend, check out her pictures.
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September 20, 2008
EPA Shuts Down Local Ghost-Entrapment BusinessRead the rest, and be sure you put down your drink before you read the last paragraph!NEW YORK --Citing unsafe practices and potential toxic contamination, the Environmental Protection Agency shut down a small ghost- entrapment operation in downtown Manhattan today, and had four of the business' spectral-containment specialists arrested in the process.
According to EPA agent Walter Peck, employees of the company ”located in an old fire station in the Tribeca neighborhood of New York” had repeatedly refused to grant him access to their storage facility, which posed a health hazard to the surrounding community.
"The facility in question unlawfully used public utilities for the purpose of non-sanctioned waste-handling, and was in direct violation of the Environmental Protection Act," Peck said. "Additionally, this company possessed several unlicensed portable nuclear accelerators that were frequently discharged within mere feet of civilians."
Some who witnessed the arrests felt that Peck had launched a personal crusade against the business, possibly due to a previous verbal altercation with one of the ghost-removal professionals, former parapsychology research professor Dr. Peter Venkman.
"It definitely seemed as though Agent Peck had an ax to grind," said Consolidated Edison technician Brian Holmes, who was ordered by Peck to turn off the containment system located in the basement of the company's headquarters. "I had never seen anything even resembling that type of equipment before. I was extremely hesitant to shut it down, but I didn't want to lose my job."
Though its incarcerated employees were unavailable for comment, the company released a statement denying any wrongdoing. The statement also repudiated claims that those associated with the spectral-entrapment operation were afraid of any individual ghost, and went on to say that the act of capturing said ghosts simply made them "feel good."
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November 08, 2007
Seems poor li'l Brit Brit just can't make it to the drug lab on time. You'd think that since she has cars and drivers a plenty this would actually be an EASIER task for her than it would be for the rest of us who need to drive ourselves or rely on a crappy car or **horrors** take the bus to get where we need to go.
Her justification? That she has a Number One album to promote (sorry Brit, but you're actually #2. Ever heard of the Eagles?) and she's too busy to make time for the drug lab in less than 6 hours. SIX.
The judge rebuffed this claim, saying, "I have to get here at 7:30 a.m. to read (court) papers," implying that getting out of bed to go to the lab is not an unreasonable demand from the court.
Britney's lawyer responded, "But you're not a pop star with a number one album."
No, idiot, he's a JUDGE. Well, technically a court commissioner, but still. He's the judge in charge of whether or not she ever gets to see her kids. I suppose that means your client should act accordingly, huh?
I never thought I'd ever say it, but I'm starting to hope those two little boys take after their Dad in the brains department.
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October 09, 2007
Rep. Henry Waxman has asked his investigative staff to begin compiling reports on Limbaugh, and fellow radio hosts Sean Hannity and Mark Levin based on transcripts from their shows, and to call in Federal Communications Commission chairman Kevin Martin to discuss the so-called "Fairness Doctrine".Now that's creepy."Limbaugh isn't the only one who needs to be made uncomfortable about what he says on the radio," says a House leadership source. "We don't have as big a megaphone as these guys, but this all political, and we'll do what we can to gain the advantage. If we can take them off their game for a while, it will help our folks out there on the campaign trail."
But not surprising.
Let me sum this up for you, in case you don't understand just what's at stake here: The Fairness Doctrine was a policy implemented by the FCC in the earliest days of TV and radio, when small media markets were dominated by a handful of stations, or in many cases, just one station. And, as is often the case when you have a media monopoly, FCC regulators were concerned that all views wouldn't be broadcast fairly and some candidates for office might lose out because of a lack of coverage.
Fast forward to 1987. It was the end of the Reagan era, and the rise of mass communications in the US. In 1987 the FCC overturned the Fairness Doctrine because the market had grown so much that there was enough market pressure to allow for opposing viewpoints to be presented, not to mention an increased expectation of such presentation from the media-consuming public. With so many opportunities for coverage and so much media to keep track of, enforcement of the Fairness Doctrine became obsolete and the policy was ended.
In the two decades since, the US has seen an exponential increase in the amount of political speech broadcast through the media. Commercials, debates, opinion and news shows, radio talk shows, etc. have all increased the public's awareness of political issues and political thought. Admittedly, much of this increase has been on the conservative side of the fence. However, the financial disaster formerly known as "Air America" clearly highlights that this is likely due to purely market forces; that Americans want to hear conservative political thought in the media more than they want to hear liberals.
You can come up for your own explanation for that one. I'm sure it's not hard to think of a dozen reasons why, but left-leaning media (other than, it can be argued, mainstream "news") is simply not commercially viable in this country.
Faced with the fact that they can't compete in the open marketplace, what do the liberals do? As usual, they try to level the playing field... to their advantage. If the market won't admit "liberal" political thought, then it's time to simply break down the doors to the market. With the Fairness Doctrine bulldozer.
While it might seem, naively, that the more speech accessible to the masses, the better; in reality this is nothing more than censorship. Reinstating the Fairness Doctrine limits the amount of political speech that can be presented for either side to an amount that can be feasibly presented by the media in consideration of their need (under the FD) to present opposing viewpoints. Is that what we want? Sound bites and snippets? Well, if that's all you're getting anyway, and your opposition has a three-hour talk show, you might just say yes, and damn the consequences.
Let's look at this economically, too: the consumer prefers conservative media (e.g. Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, etc.), and we know this because these ventures are commercially viable. By limiting the supply of the preferred goods, and forcing the consumer to take some non-preferred goods (Liberal media) instead, the re-institution of the Fairness Doctrine forces the consumer's choice. Sounds a lot like Communism to me...
Let me ask you this: Why is it ok to have NO Fairness Doctrine for 20 years while the left consolidates their power base and makes in roads into the MSM, but the SECOND that conservative media shows some strength, it's time to put it back? Why is the playing field level until the other team goes ahead? Why didn't ANY of these things matter until people started to challenge the status quo?
Funny how the First Amendment gets bought and sold by the left like so much cattle, depending on whether they're winning or losing.
h/t FRED who makes his own case for a Free Press.
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September 28, 2007
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July 13, 2007
The NAACP wants Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory to apologize for remarks he made about African American youth after last week's arrests during Fourth of July festivities in uptown.Mayor McCrory's comments, as discussed above, were in regards to many arrests at the city's 4th of July celebration. From the Charlotte Observer:Ken White, president of the Charlotte Branch of the NAACP, on Wednesday called the mayor's comments "insensitive" and said he's concerned they painted "African American youth with a broad swath that cuts deep in many of our communities."
McCrory's comments came July 5 in a letter to the city manager congratulating police on their efforts the night before, when 169 people were arrested in uptown. McCrory also wrote that "too many of our youth, primarily African American, are imitating and/or participating in a gangster type of dress, attitude, behavior and action."
Later Wednesday, McCrory said he won't apologize.
Why not?
"Because my comments were accurate. Period."
The uptown crowd was primarily African American, as were most of those arrested: Of 143 adults arrested, 122 were black. Police later noted that those arrested comprised fewer than 1 percent of the uptown revelers.Mayor McCrory went on to explain both his statements, and why he refuses to apologize:
McCrory ... cited statistics showing more than 60 percent of Charlotte's gang members are African American. And, he said, the victims of gang violence also tend to be black.Kudos for Mayor McCrory for saying the truth, and refusing to back down from it. Too often in this society our leaders back down from a stand because powerful opposition groups (in this case the NAACP) start threatening them."One thing we agree on is that it is a horrible stereotype," McCrory said, "but it's being perpetuated by those who continue to dress like, behave like and act like gang members. It's not productive to our community, our neighborhoods, our schools, or to those individuals who are doing it."
But I must echo LaShawn Barber and ask: When did it become more of a crime in this country to SAY that something is wrong, than to do the wrong thing?
LaShawn goes on:
Too many black “youth” eschew education and decent living, while embracing a lifestyle that glorifies criminal activity, triflingness (yes, there’s such a word), and having illicit and zero-responsibility sex with as many women as possible. The resultant children are sentenced to fatherless homes and instability. That, too, makes me sick to my stomach.It's my hope that more of our leaders, of ALL colors, stand up and ask the tough questions and give the tough answers about what's wrong in our communities, following Pat McCrory's example....
Blacks cannot complain about what white people may or may not be doing to them when they don’t even care about their own children. I’ve lost patience with it, and I advise everybody — no matter what color you are — to stop being afraid of the truth or of black people making demands. Take it from an insider: the bark, as loud and annoying as it is, is much worse than the bite.
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July 10, 2007
Clearly you have learned nothing, either from your master's thesis at Columbia, or about your own children.
But that's not surprising, given that you would publicly insult your own son. Calling him a pawn is pretty low. As if he can't think for himself. I don't know whether that says more about his shallowness, or YOUR inability to mold him into a self-reliant and thoughtful young man if you think so poorly of his ability to make decisions about his life.
You say your life is surrounded by signs and symbols of the military. Perhaps you should take advantage of your unique situation and learn about that which you seem to loathe without understanding.
Oh, and one more thing. You say you are worried about how the experience will affect your son. You worry he will be seriously harmed. But did you ever think that maybe he might be changed for the better? That perhaps the "horrors" he sees over there will spur him on to great things? That he might dedicate himself to removing the suffering of others.
I wish you luck in dealing with your issues, and I thank your son for the choice he made to serve our country.
--CTG
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June 19, 2007
... Especially here in the great Republic of Texas, a smiling, drooling preference for succulent, protein-rich, nutritious backstrap over aromatic mesquite coals is as American and natural and right as Mom, apple pie and the flag. It's beautiful, really.There's more. Check out the rest here. Be sure to note Nuge's views on the Left in this country, and how much their rhetoric sounds like the commies...But a culture war rages against such universal, self-evident truths. It would be laughable if it were not so deranged. Some weirdos actually are on a crusade to outlaw the consumption of flesh.
I have musical touring associates who have been fired from their jobs with ex-Beatle Paul McCartney for sneaking a hamburger.
You heard that right. Fired for eating meat by an animal-rights maniac, hard-core vegan bass player.
The entire agenda of the gazillion-dollar-financed joke known as PETA literally is dedicated to outlawing meat.
Neither I, nor any hunter or meat eater on the planet, has any desire whatsoever to influence any vegetarian's choice of diet or to force them to eat meat. We are the friendly, tolerant Americans.
This is but one of many issues that represent the line drawn in the sand between liberals and conservatives.
h/t el Pitbull at Babalu
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May 15, 2007
Dear Mooreon,Friends and Neighbors, if I wasn't 100% behind Fred before, I am now. Not only did he best the Mooreon in HIS OWN MEDIUM, it was a timely, witty, and on-point response.You really shouldn't attempt to play big boy games until you are potty trained and no longer wail for Mommy at the drop of a hat. Oh, and BTW, not that you care, but you can't hide behind Mommy's skirts and question her parenting skills at the same time....
Love and Kisses,
CTG
Can you imagine a President with this kind of response to our enemies? Fred gets it. He totally gets it. For more on this, see Bob Krumm's commentary on Fred and the OODA Loop.
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April 04, 2007
But this story, from Sunday's Raleigh News and Observer, well, it's not hard.
Hispanic DWIs rooted in immigrants' cultureIt was a commonly held assumption among the Orange County sheriff's deputies and other local cops that a hispanic man driving to the ABC (state-owned liquor store) was probably already drunk. And that if you pulled over a hispanic man, chances are he would fail a roadside sobriety test.
When Eliseo Hernandez came to the United States 30 years ago, he thought he drove better after a few beers. Driving drunk had been normal back in Mexico, he said. But Hernandez, 54, learned of its perils firsthand. He quit the practice after falling asleep at the wheel and hitting a tree 18 years ago.Then, last year, a young Hispanic man who authorities say was drunk nearly killed Hernandez's only son, Diego, in a crash on a rural Johnston County road. Eliseo Hernandez's daughter, who was nine months pregnant, lost her unborn child in the accident.
Hernandez has spent the past year following Diego through four hospitals and 14 brain surgeries. Diego only recently began to smile again and might never walk.
Hernandez said he hopes his painful journey will teach his friends and family a lesson. Car accidents are the top killer of Hispanics in North Carolina, and the disproportionate number of alcohol-related arrests and wrecks are an embarrassment to a minority already beleaguered by hard feelings over illegal immigration.
"It makes the Mexicans look bad, very bad," Hernandez said. "The American people say 'Oh, it's just another Hispanic, the same as the others.' "
DWIs are far higher among hispanics than any other culture in NC, and for a while this was seen as racial profiling by police and State Troopers. In CA, many times the DWI hispanic driver is also an illegal alien. Interesting now to see this article owning that DWI/DUI is sometimes part of the culture.
The first step is admitting you have a problem.
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February 21, 2007
Blogger and Walter Reed frequent flyer CPT. Chuck Ziegenfuss has some interesting things to add to the debate:
Look at the charities who help the wounded--whether flying them or their families to hospitals, making Velcro clothes so they can dress themselves, helping to take care of the soldier's kids, getting them a drastically discounted rental vehicle so they can get from hospital to hotel and back, et cetera, et cetera, ad nauseam. Every single gap that a charity had to fill equates to a leadership failure--a failure to recognize the unique needs of the soldiers and their families. Please don't misconstrue this as my dislike of charities, the exact opposite is true, they are lifesavers. But when a wounded soldier has to rely on the sympathy and charity of others to simply live day to day, to meet his most basic needs, then the Army, and the government as a whole, has failed them.As for getting that job done, Chuck's not alone. There are plenty of folks who would be more than happy to pitch in. Myself included.
As a leader in the Army, who has gone through this system, I SHOULDER PART OF THE BLAME FOR NOT TRYING TO FIX THE PROBLEM. I left my brothers behind, and got myself home. After recovery, I moved on to other things, even though the complaints made today are the same as they were 2 years ago. Families are in the dark, medhold is a ridiculous and poor taste joke and apparent cover-your-ass move by the chain of command. I am an officer. I am a leader. By allowing this to happen, and continue to happen, I am at fault for not getting it fixed earlier or fixing it myself.
Other people who share the blame: The soldiers and family members who didn't use normal channels, like the Inspector General, the Chain of Command, or even letters to congressmen to fix the problem. They ran to the press, and embarrassed the Army. The chain of command, and more to the point, the NCO support channel and "chain of concern." Every Sergeant from the newly-minted Corporal to the Command Sergeant Major is tasked with looking out for the health, safety, and welfare of the soldier, and advising the command on the soldier's needs. As a matter of fact the ONLY role of a Command Sergeant Major is to advise the commander on enlisted matters. Clearly, the ignorance of these issues by the chain of command indicated an extreme dereliction of duty on the part of the Non Commissioned Officer (Hey CSM: maybe if you'd spent more time with the soldiers at the Mologne house, Fisher house, and other places the wounded congregate, instead of chasing me another 25 feet up the hill to the designated smoking area; or making sure that there were plenty of signs in the right areas to tell people they couldn't smoke there.)
Maybe you, hospital commander, and all of your high-ranking staff could move your designated parking spots to the other side of post, forcing yourselves to walk up and down the hill to the Mologne house every day, through winter's ice and snow, spring's rain, and summer's heat, just like the men on prosthetic legs and wheelchairs do. (But hey, thanks bunches for the chain link handrail, it sure does come in handy when trying to pull yourself up the hill.
As a company commander, I made time to walk through my billets, and even in combat I made soldier's living conditions a priority. I agree with Dr. Harvey. The command is to blame for this. I will accept the challenge of fixing it, assuming that I receive the commensurate promotion and pay raise. It'll be fixed in 6-12 months--but I need the authority to hire and fire anyone working on Walter Reed, military and civilian, to move people and organizations as I deem necessary, and the authority top bring in other officers and soldiers who I know will get the job done. (not that it'll happen, but hey, I'd take the job in a heartbeat.
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Gardasil is currently only FDA approved for girls and women age 12-26, and is therefore not KNOWN to be effective at the age when the majority of HPV infections occur and HPV-related cancers are diagnosed for ANY woman receiving the vaccine, under current guidelines.Lawmakers looking to force preteen girls to take Gardasil, a new vaccine against a virus that causes cervical cancer, are targeting the wrong age group, cancer data shows.
Middle-school girls inoculated with the breakthrough vaccine will be no older than 18 when they pass Gardasil’s five-year window of proven effectiveness — more than a decade before the typical cancer patient contracts the sexually transmitted human papillomavirus (HPV). emphasis mine --Ed.
This is why I (and MANY medical professionals) am against mandating this vaccine. All of this bandwagon science in the name of "the children" completely jumped the gun on this one. If there is no evidence that the vaccine will even protect these girls from this virus or subsequent cervical cancer at the age when many of them will contract it, then why should we subject our daughters to the potential hazards and side effects of the injections?
Nurse and Cotillion sister Raven has a lot more in her very thoughtful post:
Read the whole thing!Far be it for me to say, but with the known side effects being reported so far, from doctors who have given the shots to young girls, I question itÂ’s worth. Reports of seizures, blindness, episodes of passing out, tremors, memory problems, vision loss-are coming in at an alarming rate. Are these true side effects of the vaccine, or just the bad luck of coincidence for the young ladies? We donÂ’t know, yet. It takes many years of data collection and analysis to come up with an honest, medically sound answer.
One thing we do know: Condoms prevent the spread of ALL forms of HPV. Period. As well as other viral infections and disease. TheyÂ’re much cheaper and donÂ’t cause the serious side effects drugs cause. Why are little girls being mandated to get vaccinations that cause them harm, that do not guarantee freedom from the very disease the vaccine is said to protect against when we could mandate condom use for boys? DonÂ’t answer that because I know itÂ’s a stupid question. But for the love of GAWD peopleÂ…do we see a problem here?
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February 20, 2007
Why you ask? Well, frankly, because he lost a lot of traffic when his site was down while he was dealing with that crazy left-wing whore who threatened his child and wife.
The screwing began with Dennis the Peasant and it hasn't stopped. Steve lays it out:
I'm only guessing, but the logical assumption is that the principals are going to get paid no matter what, while the investors and member bloggers who don't prosper in spite of joining PJM get the shaft. You know how this works. You saw The Producers, didn't you?Shady underhanded crap. As I've said before. And you know, crap floats. You can keep flushing it all you want, it just pops up somewhere else.Michelle Malkin improved her traffic somewhat, no thanks to PJM, so she gets no pay cut. Instapundit's traffic stayed flat in spite of the dullest, laziest, most unnecessary and useless blogging in the top half of the ecosystem, so he gets no pay cut. PJM failed to drive traffic to Jeff, and for one reason or another he didn't generate it on his own, so Jeff takes a beating. Meanwhile, I'm sure he's grateful for all those print opportunities they rounded up for him. I know Raj and Rerun were busy, busy, busy every day, knocking on doors and handing out business cards, securing those MSM ins we heard so much about back before respectable folks like Larry Kudlow bailed out.
The investors get milked, the castle in the sky fails to materialize, Raj and Rerun feather their nests, and a top-notch writer has his valuable time wasted. Is that an incorrect assessment? If Pajamas Media were as transparent as the workings of a Cheney energy-policy session, maybe we would know. It's a good guess, though.
Jeff was distracted, because a vicious lunatic whore threatened his family and had to be dealt with, and maybe that hurt his traffic. But would that have mattered, had PJM been anything but a house of cards? Where is the synergy we used to hear about? Obviously, the PJs didn't pull their own weight, and now they care more about money than they do about Jeff taking time off to protect his wife and son.
It'll be a real fucking shame if Goldstein quits because PJM drops his paycheck.
Posted by: caltechgirl at
10:39 PM
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February 05, 2007
Here's the summation for those of you who zombied at the very idea of such a long passage:What would happen if tomorrow we were told that, after all, the Earth is flat? It would probably be the most important piece of news in the media and would generate a lot of debate. So why is it that when scientists who have studied the Global Warming phenomenon for years say that humans are not the cause nobody listens? Why does no one acknowledge that the Emperor has no clothes on?
Believe it or not, Global Warming is not due to human contribution of Carbon Dioxide (CO2). This in fact is the greatest deception in the history of science. We are wasting time, energy and trillions of dollars while creating unnecessary fear and consternation over an issue with no scientific justification. For example, Environment Canada brags about spending $3.7 billion in the last five years dealing with climate change almost all on propaganda trying to defend an indefensible scientific position while at the same time closing weather stations and failing to meet legislated pollution targets.
No sensible person seeks conflict, especially with governments, but if we don't pursue the truth, we are lost as individuals and as a society. That is why I insist on saying that there is no evidence that we are, or could ever cause global climate change. And, recently, Yuri A. Izrael, Vice President of the United Nations sponsored Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) confirmed this statement. So how has the world come to believe that something is wrong?
Maybe for the same reason we believed, 30 years ago, that global cooling was the biggest threat: a matter of faith. "It is a cold fact: the Global Cooling presents humankind with the most important social, political, and adaptive challenge we have had to deal with for ten thousand years. Your stake in the decisions we make concerning it is of ultimate importance; the survival of ourselves, our children, our species," wrote Lowell Ponte in 1976.
I was as opposed to the threats of impending doom global cooling engendered as I am to the threats made about Global Warming. Let me stress I am not denying the phenomenon has occurred. The world has warmed since 1680, the nadir of a cool period called the Little Ice Age (LIA) that has generally continued to the present. These climate changes are well within natural variability and explained quite easily by changes in the sun. But there is nothing unusual going on.
Since I obtained my doctorate in climatology from the University of London, Queen Mary College, England my career has spanned two climate cycles. Temperatures declined from 1940 to 1980 and in the early 1970's global cooling became the consensus. This proves that consensus is not a scientific fact. By the 1990's temperatures appeared to have reversed and Global Warming became the consensus. It appears I'll witness another cycle before retiring, as the major mechanisms and the global temperature trends now indicate a cooling.
-- It is UNBELIEVABLY PREMATURE to state that people are the main cause of Global Warming. PERIOD.
-- Thirty years ago many of the same scientists raising a ruckus today were DEAD SURE we were headed for a man-made ice age FROM THE SAME CAUSES (greenhouse gasses, etc.)
--Consensus is different from fact: 95% of 4 year olds believe in Santa, but this doesn't make him REAL, does it? So why should we believe something just because a majority of pinheads with PhDs do?
And yes, for the record I too have a PhD. So what? But I'm not a pinhead. Doesn't make me a sheep, either.
Please read all of Dr. Bell's article (yes, there is more. A lot more.), It is a fascinating look at how popular politics colors even the most rigorous of disciplines.
h/t Q and O via RWV
Posted by: caltechgirl at
12:19 PM
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