Monday, February 09, 2004

Crowned

Roderick T. Long has an interesting post up titled Aristocracy for Everybody.  He quotes George Woodcock, Ernest Lesigne and Anne Rice through the mouth of the vampire Lestat and mentions Oscar Wilde and Benjamin Tucker.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/09 at 06:50 AM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Twisted

I am continually amazed at how individuals twist sayings, statistics and what not to suit their fancy.  In particular, my amazement stems from the fact that these twists are typically constructed to support fallacious arguments and ideologies, that, in most instances, require a body of laws and threats of cudgels to be enforced.

David Yeagley, in a post titled One in Christ?, A Re-take on Missions, which takes a look at interracial marriage, does some twisting of his own while thumping the Good Book as the authority on the subject being considered.

While reading the piece, I did find two short paragraphs, which almost qualify as non sequitur, and follow.

Indeed, this liberal Christianity is theoretically more potent than Communism, and has contributed to the very dissolution of culture and nationalism which Communism seeks to achieve.

But both liberal Christianity and Communism run against human nature.  Not that human nature is the standard of right and wrong.  As Rose (Hepburn) tells Charlie (Bogart), on the African Queen,  “Nature, Mr. Allnut, is what we were put in this world to rise above.”  Yet, this objective philosophy pertains to the individual.  To make a political policy of it smacks of religious tyranny and oppression, such as Europe saw in the Dark Ages, and the Islamic world has seen since the day of its appearance.

The above two paragraphs are not twisted and, in my experience, correctly state the kinship between both Communisim and Christianity which are, at the end of the day, two of the most pernicious ideologies afflicting mankind.

Update:  A cautionary word of the day - bibliolater.  Though the number 2 definition could be applied to myself, the excessiveness of the 1st leaves me cold.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/09 at 06:25 AM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Sunday, February 08, 2004

Peddle This

Kerry hates it, Dean hates it, Bush hates it, Edwards hates it, what does this mean?  It means aboslutely nothing because it is spewing out of the mouths of politicians.  What do they supposedly hate?  Influence peddling.

Go read Aaron Haspel’s post at God of the Machine for the complete analysis of this particular nugacious soundbite dripping like honey from the lips of supposedly presidential political aspirants as they lure the ignorant to their hives of imprisonment.  I’m going to take a walk in the woods.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/08 at 03:42 PM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

“This is not the way science is done, it is the way products are sold.”

Shonk is right.  Read Aliens Cause Global Warming, a speech given by Michael Crichton.

Question everything.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/08 at 03:28 PM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

The Most Bassackwards Proposal I Have Ever Laid Eyes On

The proposal.

In its fiscal 2005 budget, the Bush administration proposes to encourage Americans to save more by creating two private savings accounts. These new entitlements may be worthwhile, but they are also expensive. Congress should not approve them unless the president also agrees to Social Security reform.

Yep, that’ll work.  Steal everyone’s money and then make them think, actually feel in this case, that you’re starting a savings account for them.  WTF!, over.

Via Billy Beck, and make sure you read what he has to say.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/08 at 03:07 PM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

A Four Shooter Cell Phone

Donald Sensing has a video available on his server which demonstates a four shot cell phone.  I kid you not.

Via Samizdata.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/08 at 02:57 PM
(2) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Not Even Weathermen Are Wrong This Often

But far from this being an unusual case, Ms McCloskey and Mr Ziliak found that 70% of the papers published during the 1980s in the American Economic Review (AER), one of the most respected journals of the dismal science, failed to distinguish between “economic” and “statistical” significance. They relied too much on numbers, and too little on economic reasoning.

From an article in The Economist titled Signifying nothing?

Via Mises Economics Blog.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/08 at 02:43 PM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

“Why The Income Tax is Bad”

In 1956, U.S. News and World Report interviewed recently retired Internal Revenue chief T. Coleman Andrews.  The title to this post is the title to the piece.  Though Andrews would not come right out for abolishing the taxes, whether by use of a lottery or voluntary contributions, his critique was still pointed.  Here’s the link to the interview, which is lengthy.  Below are a few excerpts.

Q Mr. Andrews, is it feasible to do away with the income tax?  Are there other ways to get income into the Federal Treasury besides taxing the individual?

A Of course there are.  To say otherwise would be to say that we have lost the imagination and ingenuity that have made us leaders among the nations of the earth in so many other fields of human endeavor.  Moreover, it would be to resign ourselves to slavery.  For absolutism in one form or another is the inevitable end of “steeply graduated” taxes on income and inheritances, and absolutism in any form is slavery…” “...we’ll continue to penalize outstanding ability and success until the will to achieve has been destroyed throughout the nation and we’ve all been reduced to the aimless status of an indifferent conglomerate of bone, tissue and blood.

Q Shouldn’t everybody have the same income?  President Franklin Roosevelt said nobody should have more than $25,000-

A You know I don’t subscribe to such socialistic demagoguery as that.  I say everybody should have what he can make honestly, with a minimum of taxes…

The following is in regards to the inheritance tax.

Q Maybe that’s a good thing; they can scratch to get ahead-

A I don’t agree.  The best incentive for those who haven’t started scratching is the example of those who did and who achieved success by doing so.

The entire interview is worth reading.

The rebuttal by then professional jobholder Rep. (R) Daniel A. Reed.

Via Karen DeCoster.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/08 at 02:05 PM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Saturday, February 07, 2004

A Few Words on W. Somerset Maugham

I just, well actually thirty or so minutes ago, completed reading Maugham’s The Razor’s Edge.  I enjoyed it.  I had never read anything by Maugham until this volume, and the main reason I read this particular tome was because I was aware of his name and happened to come across this book while at the Salvation Army store.  I bought it for a dollar.  Good investment I’d say.  It still had its dust jacket, albeit being ragged, and carried Maugham’s copyright, 1944, along with a disclaimer which stated

“This book has not been condensed.  Its bulk is less because government regulations prohibit use of heavier paper.”

The war you know.

I’ll spare you a full review, except to note that this work examines the mystical, which I acknowledge I have a streak of, but do not allow to give way to reason, which, as Maugham has a character state in this book ”...for its instrument (knowledge’s) is the most precious faculty of man, his reason.”  And to that statement I say Amen.

I now must choose my next read and will post it in the sidebar left tomorrow.  Tonight I dine with a small group whom I shall attempt to stir up by advocating remaining away from all polling places.  I’m certain it will be entertaining.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/07 at 04:32 PM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

A Saturday Afternoon Read

Theodore Dalrymple writing on Stefan Zwieg for the City Journal.

Via Arts & Letters Daily.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/07 at 01:57 PM
(1) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Big Assed Boondoggle

I really shouldn’t be surprised when I read things such as this.  What this is is acronymed “BIG,”  and stands for “Basic Income Guarantee.”  Sounds all soft and fuzzy doesn’t it?  Indeed it does.  And why does it sound soft and fuzzy?  It sounds all soft and fuzzy because BIG is being sold as a this is a oh so good for everyone and equitable idea when it is actually nothing more than a call for forced redistribution of income, or, in straightforward terms, socialism, or, in American parlance, theft.  The fuzziness is attributable to the minds which posit such altruistic evils with the same earnestness of priests and pastors misleading the faithful in the mistaken belief that God wants you to roll over for any two-bit thug who wants your jacket, and your shirt too.  There are even people who discuss implementing this legalized theft, and how it would function.

I’ve got news for you.  Living wasn’t meant to be equal folks and anyone who tells you different is trying to slip a greased finger up your keister while saying you’re going to feel a little pressure, now.

Via Billy Beck.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/07 at 01:10 PM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Sittin on That There Sack of Seeds

I like this headline.  Federal Court Rejects DEA Ban on Hemp Food - Court Tells DEA it Cannot Regulate Naturally-Occurring THC in Hemp Food - Landmark Decision Opens Way for Expansion of Hemp Food Industry.

The DEA seems to always be in need of a good rebuke.

Via Jacob Sullum at Reason’s Hit & Run.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/07 at 08:30 AM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Stop Making Sense

No, no, no.  I’m not thinking about the Talking Heads video, I’m, as Kim du Toit states, “Gobsmacked.”  Why?  Because, as Kim points out, Cook Country Illinois is not going to prosecute a homeowner who “whacked a goblin” who thought he could invade a home that was not his and help himself to various and sundry items the homeowner was the rightful owner of.  Unfortunately, for the goblin, the homeowner was home and owned a pistola.  Why, you may ask, would Cook County even consider prosecuting the homeowner?  Because the homeowner’s pistola FOI card was not current.  But, in a fit of common sense, Cook County officials had this to say.

He purchased a gun legally. It was registered. What he failed to do was keep current (his FOI card), and we chose not to prosecute this memory lapse,” Goebel said.

Prosecution, Goebel said, “would violate the spirit of the law and be a narrow-minded approach.” He said his office decided not to pursue the case after conferring with Wilmette police, who brought the charge.

Hear, hear.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/07 at 08:14 AM
(2) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

“Kludge: a dirty, inelegant solution”

I had never read, or heard, the term which is the title to this post, which, is not necessarily surprising, since I am not a computer programmer and willingly profess my ignorance of technical jargon and computer programming.  Still, I like the term.  I happened across the term in an article titled Things fall apart.  Published in The Economist, the article takes a look at an emerging theory that asks the question “What if the dark energy and dark matter essential to modern explanations of the universe don’t really exist?”

An interesting cosmological question.

Via J. Orliln Grabbe.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/07 at 08:04 AM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Friday, February 06, 2004

Should Efficient Market Theory Be a Hypothesis?

Alex Tabarrok, at Marginal Revolution, has a short post up concerning the game Marketocracy.  Alex’s description of the game.

Marketocracy is a game where investors are given $1 million in virtual money to build a mutual fund, much like fantasy baseball. Currently some 55,000 players manage 65,000 fantasy mutual funds. But at Marketocracy fantasy becomes reality (I ought to be paid for that line) because the sponsoring firm monitors and ranks the performance of all the traders using an algorithm incorporating short and long-term analysis, market sector, risk and so forth. The stock picks of the top 100 portfolios are then used to create a real portfolio of stocks, the M100 (MOFQX). In addition to fame, the players have an incentive to trade carefully because top managers are paid a percentage of the assets in the fund!

Alex had an opportunity to invest in one of these funds, but passed it up, because,

I demurred based on efficient market theory and bought Webvan instead. Ugh.

Lesson:  Question everything and think for yourself.

Posted by John Venlet on 02/06 at 01:06 PM
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Page 11 of 13 pages « First  <  9 10 11 12 13 >