Above all, our citizens were betrayed by the sense of security that had been cultivated for decades -- that they need not worry, that when the time came, the state would come to the rescue. Even as we discovered repeatedly that this was an illusion -- that the state was either incompetent or cruel or indifferent -- we maintained the hope that some kind god would protect us. Now we fear everything: that neither our health system, nor our pensions, nor our deposits are safe. The old social contract does not apply. On the issue of pensions alone, we see that those who paid dutifully all their lives are those who are suffering the greatest losses.So much for the politics of compassion.
Sunday, January 08, 2012
What The End Of The Progressive Dream Looks Like
(Some of) The Greeks are starting to get it. In a commentary looking forward into 2012 at ekathimerini.com, is this paragraph.
Saturday, January 07, 2012
Link Of The Day
Go visit Tim. No, really, go. His work is consistently beautiful and educational.
We'll still be here when you get back.
We'll still be here when you get back.
I Saw A Grasshopper. We're All Doomed.
A few days ago, I posted this bit about being subconsciously worried about our mild winter because of the pervasive fear of Global Warming Climate Change that fills our culture. I think the point got a bit muddled as I used the nuclear war terror of the 80s as a comparison, so I'm taking another run at it.
What if it was insects instead of weather? What if the news and movies and schools and zoos were filled with stories of chemical-resistant bugs or uncontrolled bug population growth or scientists finding ever-larger insects? Properly massaged, I have no doubt we could find data to "prove" all of that.
I have no idea what theGlobal Warming Climate Change data actually says*. I don't know anything about the equations or methodology or experimental processes or even if they have any possible way of isolating individual factors out of the hopelessly complicated, impossibly huge system that is Earth's weather. All I know is that lots of people tell me I'm supposed to be deeply afraid of it and so, despite my skepticism and my understanding of how science funding is doled out, I am. When the weather is warm, I wonder about Global Warming Climate Change.
If they'd been telling me horror stories about insects for the last 10 years, I'd be terrified every time I saw something like this.
Might as well take up serious drinking. We're totally screwed.
* - Neither do some of the key scientists. They lost it all.
What if it was insects instead of weather? What if the news and movies and schools and zoos were filled with stories of chemical-resistant bugs or uncontrolled bug population growth or scientists finding ever-larger insects? Properly massaged, I have no doubt we could find data to "prove" all of that.
I have no idea what the
If they'd been telling me horror stories about insects for the last 10 years, I'd be terrified every time I saw something like this.
* - Neither do some of the key scientists. They lost it all.
500,000
We hit 500,000 visits yesterday here at The Scratching Post.
I don't blog for links or hits any more, I just want to share whatever I think will be provocative or interesting or make you smile and then learn from your deep, collective wisdom.
Thanks for stopping by.
I don't blog for links or hits any more, I just want to share whatever I think will be provocative or interesting or make you smile and then learn from your deep, collective wisdom.
Thanks for stopping by.
Friday, January 06, 2012
Sunset Cliffs At Sunset
Sometimes you get lucky and you have your big camera in the car at just the right time. I left the original pretty large. It's worth clicking on the image.
Cheesecloth
I bought cheesecloth from Amazon earlier this week after looking for it at lots of local grocery stores. With Amazon Prime, it was shipped to me in 2 days for free.
Why didn't I just go to Amazon in the first place?
Why didn't I just go to Amazon in the first place?
Thursday, January 05, 2012
Unbelievable.
A Favorite Holmes Clip
... in honor of the new Sherlock Holmes movie which features cannons, handguns, chase scenes and, for all I know, Holmes covered in tattoos and shooting his 9mm gangsta style after engaging in a threesome. Instead, I offer you this wonderful bit of Jeremy Brett as Holmes.
The Weather Is Mild. We're All Doomed.
Back in 1986, at the height of Ronald Reagan's crazy nuclear cowboy foreign policy against the totally reasonable and pacifist Soviet Union, I was living in a studio apartment in La Jolla, in the path of the flightline at Miramar Naval Air Station. For years, the popular culture had been infused with the terror of nuclear war. Any day now, that crazy Reagan was going to press The Button and kill us all.
One night around 2AM, a pair of F-14s took off from Miramar and turned on their afterburners right over my apartment. The whole place shook and I awoke with a start. My very first thought, and I remember it like it was last night, was that the missiles were in the air and the Navy was getting their jets out of town as fast as they could.
We were all doomed. We were going to be incinerated in sheets of atomic fire in a matter of minutes.
It's been a very mild winter so far here in San Diego. The highs have been in the low 70s and the nights have been cool, but not cold. After a decade or so marinating in the fear ofGlobal Warming Climate Change, I can't help it. Every time the weather is unexpectedly warm or cold or wet or dry, my subconscious connects the event with Global Warming Climate Change.
Once again, we're all doomed. The seas will rise, the hurricanes will come and the nation's cornfields in Nebraska will bake until they look like the surface of Mars.
This happened. No, really, it did! Well, the part about chicks with huge hair and everyone wearing monstrous glasses. That happened. So, in a way, all the scaremongering was validated.
One night around 2AM, a pair of F-14s took off from Miramar and turned on their afterburners right over my apartment. The whole place shook and I awoke with a start. My very first thought, and I remember it like it was last night, was that the missiles were in the air and the Navy was getting their jets out of town as fast as they could.
We were all doomed. We were going to be incinerated in sheets of atomic fire in a matter of minutes.
It's been a very mild winter so far here in San Diego. The highs have been in the low 70s and the nights have been cool, but not cold. After a decade or so marinating in the fear of
Once again, we're all doomed. The seas will rise, the hurricanes will come and the nation's cornfields in Nebraska will bake until they look like the surface of Mars.
Wednesday, January 04, 2012
Is It Time To Get Back Into Diamond Offshore?
Here's the news from Libya.
TRIPOLI—Two Libyan militias once allied against Moammar Gadhafi battled for nearly two hours in central Tripoli, leaving four dead and a renewed sense of unease across a capital where the nascent government has struggled to maintain authority.
Iran is rattling sabers again, Iraq without the US is unstable and so on and so forth. Diamond Offshore (DO) makes deepwater drilling rigs and leases them out to clients. Extracting oil off the coasts of Brazil and Norway looks a lot more profitable than trying to get it out of Libya or Iraq.
Diamond Offshore has taken a beating in the last few years, so now might be a good time to get back in.
Tuesday, January 03, 2012
On Missing The Mormon Forest For The Trees
A while back I posted a bit about my thoughts on Mormons. It was an attempt to discuss discoveries of my own bigotry, but it came out too harsh against the Mormons, so I took it down and now I'm taking another run at the topic.
The Old Testament is not a perfect historical document, nor is it tuned to the sensibilities of 2012. In an argument about slavery over at Egnorance, I was confronted with biblical verses about slavery, marriage rights, child abuse and so on. I know of these, but they don't bother me as a Catholic. Further, I don't feel the need to look into why they're not important. I've read plenty of Catholic thinkers and every major question I've ever had has been answered to the point where it all makes sense.
Having found no glaring mistakes, I've assumed that other issues have been similarly well-addressed and have moved on to more interesting things like daisies, photography and soccer. Throwing Old Testament verses in my face doesn't do any more to me than statistical chemistry equations. I can't derive them and I may not even understand them, but I've no doubt that trustworthy people have worked them out and I can get on with life.
This brings me to the Mormons.
If you search the web for Mormon archaeology or Mormon biology contradictions, you quickly come to the conclusion that the Book of Mormon has no historical basis at all. This has hung me up forever. How can otherwise wonderful, rational people believe in this nonsense? Elephants in South America? Please. It's ridiculous. The Mormons have spent tons of money and done lots of excellent archaeology in the New World and have found nothing at all to validate Joseph Smith's claims.
So what?
Just as I don't bother finding out the Church's positions on Old Testament teachings, who's to say they don't simply punt on their stuff as well and just go back to what is relevant to them - behavioral and moral issues. Every Mormon I can think of from my own life has been a wonderful person - moral, hard working and a good friend. If they were Catholic, I'd be pointing to them as exemplars of our faith. My issues with Mormons aren't real, they're theoretical. I need to get over them.
I still think they'd be better off on the side with the cool hats.
The Old Testament is not a perfect historical document, nor is it tuned to the sensibilities of 2012. In an argument about slavery over at Egnorance, I was confronted with biblical verses about slavery, marriage rights, child abuse and so on. I know of these, but they don't bother me as a Catholic. Further, I don't feel the need to look into why they're not important. I've read plenty of Catholic thinkers and every major question I've ever had has been answered to the point where it all makes sense.
Having found no glaring mistakes, I've assumed that other issues have been similarly well-addressed and have moved on to more interesting things like daisies, photography and soccer. Throwing Old Testament verses in my face doesn't do any more to me than statistical chemistry equations. I can't derive them and I may not even understand them, but I've no doubt that trustworthy people have worked them out and I can get on with life.
This brings me to the Mormons.
If you search the web for Mormon archaeology or Mormon biology contradictions, you quickly come to the conclusion that the Book of Mormon has no historical basis at all. This has hung me up forever. How can otherwise wonderful, rational people believe in this nonsense? Elephants in South America? Please. It's ridiculous. The Mormons have spent tons of money and done lots of excellent archaeology in the New World and have found nothing at all to validate Joseph Smith's claims.
So what?
Just as I don't bother finding out the Church's positions on Old Testament teachings, who's to say they don't simply punt on their stuff as well and just go back to what is relevant to them - behavioral and moral issues. Every Mormon I can think of from my own life has been a wonderful person - moral, hard working and a good friend. If they were Catholic, I'd be pointing to them as exemplars of our faith. My issues with Mormons aren't real, they're theoretical. I need to get over them.
Preserving Herbs
Here in the Catican Compound, we have two very nice raised beds where we grow herbs and vegetables. We've got a couple of herbs that are not only huge, but rarely used. It's time to harvest and preserve them to free up the space for more interesting things.
I spent some time noodling around the Interweb Tubes and came up with this video.
While I don't like the microwave idea, I love the freezing idea. I would think that freezing them would work perfectly. The expansion of the water would wreck the cell walls of the plant material, but since all you're really after are the aromatic oils, I can't see how those would be broken down by freezing at all. In fact, breaking the cell walls would probably help to release the oils once the herb was thawed and cooking.
I spent some time noodling around the Interweb Tubes and came up with this video.
While I don't like the microwave idea, I love the freezing idea. I would think that freezing them would work perfectly. The expansion of the water would wreck the cell walls of the plant material, but since all you're really after are the aromatic oils, I can't see how those would be broken down by freezing at all. In fact, breaking the cell walls would probably help to release the oils once the herb was thawed and cooking.
Monday, January 02, 2012
From The Dome Of The Cat-thedral
Keynesians Unclear On The Concept, Gold Medal Finalist
The NYT, always a trusty source of bloggable idiocy, has come up with another howler of an article. Voluntary austerity, they claim, is killing Europe.
No one will lend to them.
But wait, there's more! Delving deep into the minor leagues, the NYT visits the Graduate Institute of Geneva to talk to "an economics professor." (How do they even find these places?)
I love these articles; they're so totally disconnected from reality. They show how far the progressive education system has gone in removing the mental connections between earning and having in the culture. What's happening in Europe is simple mathematics - compound interest tables at work. It's nothing more than that and it's a total mystery to the NYT.
More! Print more!
Despite criticism from many economists, though, most European governments are sticking to austerity plans, rejecting the Keynesian approach of economic stimulus favored by Washington after the financial crisis in 2008, in a bid to show investors they are serious about fiscal discipline.Err, not really. It's not voluntary at all. They're not thumping their financial chests and flexing their fiscal biceps to try to impress the girls on the beach, they've run out of people to tap. In one syllable words, here's what's happening.
No one will lend to them.
But wait, there's more! Delving deep into the minor leagues, the NYT visits the Graduate Institute of Geneva to talk to "an economics professor." (How do they even find these places?)
“Every government in Europe with the exception of Germany is bending over backwards to prove to the market that they won’t hesitate to do what it takes,” said Charles Wyplosz, a professor of economics at the Graduate Institute of Geneva. “We’re going straight into a wall with this kind of policy. It’s sheer madness.”Umm, it's not madness, they're just out of options, save for going Full Zimbabwe on the problem.
I love these articles; they're so totally disconnected from reality. They show how far the progressive education system has gone in removing the mental connections between earning and having in the culture. What's happening in Europe is simple mathematics - compound interest tables at work. It's nothing more than that and it's a total mystery to the NYT.
Sunday, January 01, 2012
Hoppin John Tonight
... from Terry Thompson's excellent cookbook.
Because you gots to have your black-eyed peas on New Years Day!
Once The Money Is Out Of Politics
... we'll enjoy the fruits of a total dictatorship, assuming we can figure out what "getting the money out of politics" even means.
Our Monks of Miscellaneous Musings posted a George Will - Robert Reich clip from some debate show. Robert Reich brought up the claim that "we need to get the money out of politics" and blatted on about income inequality. On the latter point, George Will whiffed badly, but more about that later.
Getting the money out of politics assumes that money is somehow corrupting what the government does, that there is some best solution to whatever set of problems we're trying to drown with three-and-a-half trillion dollar bills. If we got the money out of politics, then our political leaders would make wise decisions that were best for all of us.
Sort of like Mussolini did. There wasn't much money in politics in fascist Italy.
But the best set of decisions depends on what you're trying to achieve. Over in Greece, they've pretty much done the things that Robert Reich has been suggesting for years and they're now starting to throw their poor and elderly out into the street. So much for finding wise political leaders who can make your decisions for you, eh Robert?
If we could just get the money out of politics, then Deep Thinkers like Alan Blinder could come up with more ideas like Cash for Clunkers.
And what does "getting the money out" even mean? The government contracts out to private companies for much of its work. If there's a customer out there with $3.5T to spend it's utterly childish to think that marketing dollars aren't going to gush forth in pursuit of that prospect. (You can solve this problem by nationalizing all industries so that everyone is inside the government and no one outside. See also: Union, Soviet.)
The only way to get the money out of politics is to get the money out of the government. Given the track record of geniuses like Alan Blinder and Robert Reich, that's probably a good idea for lots of other reasons, too.
Finally, a bit of George Will's response to income inequality. George took the collective position and made points about government being the cause of problems and blah blah blah. This really ought to stop. Income and wealth don't simply happen to you. You're not plankton floating around with the tides. Income and wealth are markers of behavior. Next time a Robert Reich launches into an income inequality tirade, someone ought to bring up the behaviors that lead to poverty and ask Robert just how successful we've been at dealing with those through politics.
Our Monks of Miscellaneous Musings posted a George Will - Robert Reich clip from some debate show. Robert Reich brought up the claim that "we need to get the money out of politics" and blatted on about income inequality. On the latter point, George Will whiffed badly, but more about that later.
Getting the money out of politics assumes that money is somehow corrupting what the government does, that there is some best solution to whatever set of problems we're trying to drown with three-and-a-half trillion dollar bills. If we got the money out of politics, then our political leaders would make wise decisions that were best for all of us.
But the best set of decisions depends on what you're trying to achieve. Over in Greece, they've pretty much done the things that Robert Reich has been suggesting for years and they're now starting to throw their poor and elderly out into the street. So much for finding wise political leaders who can make your decisions for you, eh Robert?
And what does "getting the money out" even mean? The government contracts out to private companies for much of its work. If there's a customer out there with $3.5T to spend it's utterly childish to think that marketing dollars aren't going to gush forth in pursuit of that prospect. (You can solve this problem by nationalizing all industries so that everyone is inside the government and no one outside. See also: Union, Soviet.)
The only way to get the money out of politics is to get the money out of the government. Given the track record of geniuses like Alan Blinder and Robert Reich, that's probably a good idea for lots of other reasons, too.
Finally, a bit of George Will's response to income inequality. George took the collective position and made points about government being the cause of problems and blah blah blah. This really ought to stop. Income and wealth don't simply happen to you. You're not plankton floating around with the tides. Income and wealth are markers of behavior. Next time a Robert Reich launches into an income inequality tirade, someone ought to bring up the behaviors that lead to poverty and ask Robert just how successful we've been at dealing with those through politics.
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