Listen, My Children...

Holidays

I've got houseguests and I'm going out of town in a few days, so: Merry Christmas, all (or unhappy December 25th, or whatever makes you feel better -- whatever you'd prefer, though, I do hope you're merry then!), and see you next year.

Multi-love

I got your lovin' right here.

Foiled Attempts

Foiled attempts are a hard thing to prove.  Anne McCaffrey had fun with them in her books -- psychics would prevent terrorist attacks by warning about them ahead of time, but then, because the attacks would be foiled and not take place, people eventually started doubting the psychics and saying, in effect, "prove it."  How can you prove it?  By writing it down in an envelope and then having it opened after the attack takes place?  Only if you've got a total disregard for the people killed in the attack.  Same thing with Bush -- they're saying, "sure, sure, you've foiled attacks -- you're just saying that to back your spying up.  Prove it -- what have you foiled?"  But if he did the envelope trick, he'd be in more trouble (and justifiably) for having the knowledge and doing nothing about it. 

Sucks to be president.  Glad I'm not!

The Weblog Awards: Best of the Top 1751 - 2500 Blogs Archive

With any luck,  I won't be less than half of the next-to-last candidate!

A Welcome Response

Here's something else to read today: Dafydd ab Hugh takes on Forbes on blogs.

Mavericks

A commenter over at Clive Davis's place makes a fascinating observation on academia:

I think we are looking at a hyper-conformist subculture.

Within the humanities, any given individuals personal success is wholly dependent on the good opinion of one's professional peers. Its not like in the sciences or business where natural or market forces can prove an iconoclast right. In the humanities, popularity is everything and those that do not conform to current fads face professionally fatal ostracism.

Combine this fear of expulsion with a culture of overweening intellectual and moral arrogance that leads them to believe that no other group has ideas or experiences of any worth whatsoever and you get a subculture of individuals who will not deviate from the herd in the least.

I had never thought of it that way before.  If you disagree with the norm, in the humanities, what options do you have?  It's very hard to be "proven right."   Even selling well doesn't help anything (or Barbara Cartland would have been an Oxford don).  All you can hope for is to win enough supporters for your perspective  that you have, if not a majority, at least some serious weight.

Forgotten Dictators

So, Rice says the rest of the world is ignoring the Saddam Hussein trial.  Why is she surprised?  There are quite a few trials of former dictators that people have stopped paying attention to...

War on Decongestants

Vodkapundit complains about the War on Drugs going after Nyquil. 

To an extent he has a point.  There's a reason prohibition was repealed, and all that.  On the other hand, it does appear to be working -- I don't have the specifics on hand, but they did run a piece on the news a few days ago about how, in the areas where they've cracked down the most, the prevalence of meth labs has gone down over 70 percent.  (That leaves unanswered the question of whether it's worth it, whether it works or not: Red Russia had a low crime rate, in some areas, but most of us would agree it wasn't quite worth it.)

However, he leaves undiscussed the other reason manufacturers were already reducing their use of pseudoephedrine: health liability from normal people.  True, they wouldn't have dropped it nearly so fast (or, depending on the number of lawsuits, at all) without governmental pressure, but there has still been a significant number of cases of people -- such as myself -- who don't realize until after they've taken Sudafed that it does very bad things to their heart.  (Yes, it's similar to that stuff they've removed from many diet pills, in that case due to liability rather than to governmental pressure.)  With more and more brands adding it to their standard mix (why sell plain Robitussin?  let's add pseudoephedrine to it!), it's rather a relief to some of us to find it losing its shelf space! 

Polygamy and the "slope"

The Professor jokes:

Favorite husband? I blame the gay marriage movement for the spread of polygamy!

He can laugh all he wants, but as one who (for no reason but entertainment!) is on the mailing lists of pro-polygamy groups, I can say with certainty that those who think polygamy is a good or at least non-objectionable thing are for the most part thrilled about the progress of the same-sex marriage movement, even though they generally disapprove of homosexual behavior.  They find it rather obvious that it's a "slippery slope" -- but they welcome the slide. 

Not only bigoted scare-mongers see it that way, Professor.

Modern Technology

The things you learn while watching PBS:  Jordanians watch their videos on beta!