Obama's speech to kids is nearly 10x as long as the Gettysburg Address (which was given to adults).

The kids will need to sit still for 2540 televised words.

Hello everyone – how’s everybody doing today? I’m here with students at Wakefield High School in Arlington, Virginia. And we’ve got students tuning in from all across America, kindergarten through twelfth grade.

Can any speech be good for such wide range of ages? 2540 words should take at least 15 minutes to deliver. Who gives a 15 minute speech to kindergartners?

I’m glad you all could join us today.

Students tuning in? Glad you could join us? It's not voluntary.

I know that for many of you, today is the first day of school. And for those of you in kindergarten, or starting middle or high school, it’s your first day in a new school, so it’s understandable if you’re a little nervous. I imagine there are some seniors out there who are feeling pretty good right now, with just one more year to go. And no matter what grade you’re in, some of you are probably wishing it were still summer, and you could’ve stayed in bed just a little longer this morning.

I know that feeling. When I was young, my family lived in Indonesia for a few years, and my mother didn’t have the money to send me where all the American kids went to school. So she decided to teach me extra lessons herself, Monday through Friday – at 4:30 in the morning.

Now I wasn’t too happy about getting up that early. A lot of times, I’d fall asleep right there at the kitchen table. But whenever I’d complain, my mother would just give me one of those looks and say, "This is no picnic for me either, buster."

"This is no picnic for me either, buster" is a long-time laugh line for Obama, but it's not exactly comprehensible to kids. Do kindergartners and first graders understand what a foreign country is? Do elementary school students recognize the word "Indonesia"? Will students understand why going to school with people other than Americans is so bad? (Isn't it prejudiced to think that? a bright child might wonder.)

And what sort of mother wakes a kid up before dawn to teach him lessons? (Some parents say "I'll teach you a lesson" as a prelude to punishment.) Frankly, I don't even understand why the mother picked pre-dawn for lesson time. It seems a bit abusive. And I don't see what so funny when the abusers says "This hurts me too." Is a mother calling her child "buster" funny to little kids, or does it seem sad or scary?

So I know some of you are still adjusting to being back at school. But I’m here today because I have something important to discuss with you...

It's not a discussion. He's on television.

Okay, I've got to stop. I'm not going to reprint the whole thing. It's way too long. I'll summarize. As it goes on, he develops the theme of students taking responsibility for their own education, including and especially when they don't have responsible adults in their life watching over them.

Where you are right now doesn’t have to determine where you’ll end up. No one’s written your destiny for you. Here in America, you write your own destiny. You make your own future.

That’s what young people like you are doing every day, all across America....

Now, that's very nice free market capitalism — not that Obama's policies reflect this spirit.

I know that sometimes, you get the sense from TV that you can be rich and successful without any hard work -- that your ticket to success is through rapping or basketball or being a reality TV star, when chances are, you’re not going to be any of those things.

So can you "write your own destiny" and "make your own future" or not? It's confusing.

But the truth is, being successful is hard. You won’t love every subject you study. You won’t click with every teacher. Not every homework assignment will seem completely relevant to your life right this minute. And you won’t necessarily succeed at everything the first time you try.

That’s OK. Some of the most successful people in the world are the ones who’ve had the most failures. JK Rowling’s first Harry Potter book was rejected twelve times before it was finally published. Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team, and he lost hundreds of games and missed thousands of shots during his career. But he once said, "I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed."

But I thought we weren't supposed to think we could make it at basketball! That's downright perplexing. And why is rapping an inappropriate goal but being a fiction writer is admirable? Isn't rap a more easily reachable occupation?

... [Y]ou’ve got to do your part... So I expect you to get serious this year. I expect you to put your best effort into everything you do. I expect great things from each of you. So don’t let us down – don’t let your family or your country or yourself down. Make us all proud. I know you can do it.

"I expect"... I have no idea if expressions of expectation motivate children. Personally, I don't react well to a political leader telling me he expects something from me, but I'm not a kid.

Thank you, God bless you, and God bless America.

He ends with a double "God." I guess it's okay when Obama invokes the deity in school, but some kids might wonder why God's blessing comes at the end. After all, they were just told to take personal responsibility for themselves. And as for "God bless America," why is it even relevant? This wasn't a patriotic speech. The message to kids in other countries — including Indonesia — would be the same. Maybe some older kids will get it that it's just the conventional ending for a presidential speech, but if you're not familiar with the convention, and you're just trying to understand this speech, it's comes from nowhere.

"What passage in the Koran says women can’t wear pants? This is not nice."

Asks Lubna Hussein, who faced whipping in Sudan, but now will only be fined for breaking the law. The law in Sudan is Muslim law. Hussein says: "I am Muslim; I understand Muslim law."

The law in contention here is Article 152 of Sudan’s penal code. Concisely stated, the law says that up to 40 lashes and a fine should be assessed anyone “who commits an indecent act which violates public morality or wears indecent clothing.”

But what exactly is indecent clothing? ... Mrs. Hussein has argued that Article 152 is intentionally vague, in part to punish women.

Oh, no! It's time to pay attention to Michael Moore again.

Gateway Pundit is all over the insane hypocrisy of his Capitalism-is-evil movie. He passes on this info on Moore's lavish life style:

For reference, Torch Lake is among the two or three most desirable places to live in Northern Michigan. Normally Moore says that Traverse City is his adopted hometown, or lies and says that he lives in Bellaire, like he has some kind of log cabin in the woods.
Nope, his home is an expensive house on 150 ft of lake frontage.

Owner Name(s):MOORE MICHAEL & GLYNN KATHLEEN
Property Address:
*** * **** ***** **** **
CENTRAL LAKE, MI 49622

Property Information
Current Taxable Value:$390,976
School District:Bellaire

Current Assessment:$647,200
Current Homestead:100%
Current Property Class:40 - Residential

Last Year's Assessment:$647,200
Last Year's Homestead:100%
Last Year's Property Class:40 - Residential
Lake Frontage:Torch Lake
Waterfront Footage:150.48 ft. "17

So he lives on a lake in Michigan in a place with a taxable value $390,976? I don't get it. How is that by any stretch of the imagination rich? For that to be all a successful movie director claims for himself? It's downright humble.

ADDED: Yes, I see the $647,200 too. It's also quite modest for a man of Moore's success. It sounds like a relatively nice middle class home.

"Loons should shut up and listen: Obama not out to brainwash schoolkids."

Obviously, you can't really be talking to people you call "loons."

It seems that Mike Lupica is amusing his readers who want the opposition to shut up. (When did "shut up" become a liberal argument?)

Here's the end of Lupica's shut-up-loons column:

Some of this is racial, though Obama's critics would never see themselves as being racist in a million years.

And the sense that criticizing the President is racial, is that racial? I'm guessing Mike Lupica wouldn't see himself as being racist in a million years.

But there is something more going on, not just white versus black but white hats versus black hats, on both sides of politics, both the right and left selling conflict with both hands, trying to give you a Civil War every night on Cable America because that's where the ratings are.

Only it's not civil. And somehow the most gullible people have been convinced that the enemy is anybody who disagrees with them. About anything.

Maybe the ones who fear Obama the most, the ones who hate him the most, should try doing what a lot of schoolchildren will do tomorrow, as this President tries to inspire them:

As a change of pace, maybe they should stop shouting and listen.

Oh, wait! Mike Lupica never wrote the words "shut up and listen." He wrote: "stop shouting and listen."

And he doesn't call anyone "loon" either. But somehow the headline writer read his column and came up with "Loons should shut up and listen."

I guess it's not just "Cable America" that's "trying to give us a Civil War" and "selling conflict with both hands." It's Lupica's newspaper, the Daily News, reading his column that — irony! — calls for civility.

Or did the headline writer pick up Lupica's real message, which was not the "civility" business padding page 2? The real message is: Obama's opponents are crazy/racist/stupid and should not be talking. And if you protest that characterization you're being uncivil.

Now, fold your little hands on your desk and pay attention, children.

"I'm hungry."

Stupid 911 call of the day.

"10 Things I Hate About Health-Care Reform."

By Arthur M. Feldman — "a cardiologist and the administrator of a large practice that includes general internists and specialists" — who agrees with the basic idea that reform is needed:

1. Private insurance companies escape real regulation....

2. We urgently need tort reform, but it's nowhere to be seen....

3. "Prevention" won't magically make costs go down....

4. Reform efforts don't address our critical shortage of health-care workers....

5. We need more primary-care physicians -- but we also need specialists....

6. We have to streamline drug development and shake up the Food and Drug Administration....

7. We can't fund health-care reform by cutting payments to doctors....

8. We can't forget about research....

9. Cutting reimbursements could shut some hospitals down....

10. We need to improve the quality of care....

Obama, the school kids, and paranoia about paranoia.

Timothy Rutten in the L.A. Times:

[Q]uite a number of people ... seem to believe that Obama intends to induct their children into -- well, it's not quite clear what they're afraid of. The Web and talk radio are abuzz with various attempts to organize a boycott of Tuesday's speech....

[There is a] process at work in the healthcare hysteria and, increasingly, elsewhere where the GOP thinks it can shove the Obama administration into a ditch. Republican officials ... are playing a dangerous game with an unhinged segment of public opinion that regards Obama not as an elected official with whom they disagree, but as an illegitimate usurper of the presidency.

That paranoid fantasy is what's really behind the 'birther' movement and the allegations that the president is -- take your pick -- a secret Marxist or a secret Muslim.

Come on! This is absurd. You're stringing one thing after another and claiming it's all part of a big scheme. That itself is paranoid ideation.

It's the kind of fanciful anxiety that produces comments like this, posted on a conservative website this week: "Barack Obama and his left-wing Chicago machine regime are putting into place laws and institutions which will insure that there will never again be free elections in America."

And this is the kind of fanciful anxiety that produces columns like this....

Good lord, somebody posted a comment on a website somewhere and in Rutten's fevered brain it's all: yes, yes, this is exactly the way it is.... this, this is the problem!!!11!!!11!!!

Get a grip, man.

These are the people who are stockpiling ammunition and keeping their children at home next Tuesday.

What people?! The people! The people! You know: THE PEOPLE!!!! The PEOPLE WITH GUNNNNNNSSSSSSSSSS.........

"In a victory for Republicans and the Obama administration’s conservative critics, Van Jones resigned..."

"... as the White House’s environmental jobs 'czar' on Saturday."

That's the first paragraph of the NYT story on the Van Jones resignation — which is also its first story about Jones. The site's "Caucus" blog did take notice of the controversy — and the issue of the NYT's failure to write about it — yesterday:

Keeping up with Jones: Republicans are accusing one of Mr. Obama’s top advisers of being a communist and calling for his resignation....

Mr. Jones was caught on tape using an unprintable word to describe Republicans and allowed his name to be put on a letter requesting an investigation of whether the Bush administration allowed the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks to happen as a pretext for war....

Conservatives are abuzz over the mainstream media’s oversight of the story. According to the Washington Examiner, as of 11:30 a.m. Friday, none of the major news outlets, including The Times, had mentioned the controversy.

Whether the Bush administration allowed the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks to happen as a pretext for war? The petition — read it — "calls for immediate public attention to unanswered questions that suggest that people within the current administration may indeed have deliberately allowed 9/11 to happen, perhaps as a pretext for war." (Boldface added.)

The Caucus toned down what the petition said and did not link to it. There's a big difference between "allowed" — which might mean only the administration was not sufficiently vigilant — and "deliberately allowed" — which accuses the administration of knowing and letting it happen. The petition is asserting that there is reason to think the Bush administration wanted the attacks to occur so it could lead us into war. The innocuous paraphrase in the Caucus prevents us from feeling outraged at the document Jones "allowed his name to be put on." There's that word "allowed" again! How passive and unknowing was he? He signed it! Let's speak English and quit pussyfooting. The Caucus wanted to frame this as a story of bad old Republicans causing trouble.

Now, back to today's article on the resignation:

Controversy over Mr. Jones’s past comments and affiliations has slowly escalated over several weeks, erupting on Friday with calls for his resignation.

Appointed as a special adviser for “green jobs” by President Obama, Mr. Jones did not go through the traditional vetting process for administration officials who must be confirmed by the Senate. So it was not until recently that some of Mr. Jones’s past actions received broad airing, including his derogatory statements about Republicans in February and his signature on a 2004 letter suggesting that former President George W. Bush might have knowingly allowed the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks to occur in order to use them as a “pre-text to war.”

Not just knowingly, but deliberately. Please quote to the petition. And link to it.

Mr. Jones’s involvement in the 1990s with a group called Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement prompted recent accusations by conservative critics that he associated with Communists. The group, according to a post-mortem written by some of its founders, was an anti-capitalist, antiwar organization committed to achieving “solidarity among all oppressed peoples” with “direct militant action.”

Republican blogs and conservative talk show hosts, notably Glenn Beck of Fox News Channel, seized upon Mr. Jones’s statements and associations.

"Involvement," "statements," "associations" — what did Jones do exactly? The NYT should serve its readers by putting us in a position to think about the trustworthiness of the Obama administration and its selection of "czars." This isn't just another occasion to note that "Republican blogs" and "conservative talk show hosts" attack the administration. It's interesting that the opposition won a "victory," but more important than the endless partisan battles is the question whether we can trust the administration.

Mr. Jones apologized on Wednesday...

“I cannot in good conscience ask my colleagues to expend precious time and energy defending or explaining my past,” Mr. Jones said in a statement announcing his resignation that was released early Sunday morning....

Does that mean the NYT will not go into the matter of what Jones did and said and what the Obama administration knew about it? He's gone now. Go back to looking away, like good little Obamites.

The NYT gives me the last word...

... on Obama, education, and what I dare to call "child abuse."

It's a personal, portable radio!

1. "Dobie Gillis" is my all-time favorite TV show. 2. In 6th grade, I sneaked a transistor radio (with an earplug) into school to listen to during class had it confiscated by the teacher.

"There was actually a WWI propaganda poster that had a pit bull draped by an American flag."

The dog, Romeo, was present at a lovely party last night. Here's the poster referred to:

Convicted of manslaughter and attempted rape, a man who has not yet had sex reassignment surgery wins the right to be transferred to a woman's prison.

This legal right — under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights — was recognized by the High Court of London:

The prisoner is in her 20s and serving a life sentence for manslaughter and attempted rape....

Describing her as “a woman trapped inside a man’s body”, her barrister, Phillipa Kaufman, said the final step to her achieving full womanhood is gender reassignment surgery - but she had been told she cannot have it while in a men’s prison.

Doctors have refused even to consider her for the operation unless she fulfills the “living role requirement” - living as a woman for an extended period; so she has no hope of getting the surgery she so desperately wants unless moved to a women's jail.

The barrister told Judge David Elvin, QC, that, although the woman has now served her minimum jail term, she has been told by the Parole Board that she remains an unnacceptable risk to the public, still has “a great deal of work to do” and is “nowhere near release”.

That, Miss Kaufman argued, was a direct result of her intense frustration at being unable to have gender reassignment surgery...

Regardless of any extra cost involved, the judge said that to block her progress towards full gender reassignment surgery was irrational and would only increase her risk to the public.

Risk to the public? But this person is serving a life sentence!

The transsexual prisoner, referred to in court only as “A”, was convicted of manslaughter and jailed for five years after smothering her boyfriend with a pillow and strangling him with a pair of tights.

5 years have been served for this killing, and the court finds a right of this person to be put with women in order to do "a great deal of work" and win release.

Her life sentence tariff, the minimum period she must serve before being considered for parole, expired in 2007.

So 3 years was enough for murder!

The judge said that her detention in a men’s jail had both scotched her desire to live fully “in role” as a woman - and thus qualify for a full gender reassignment - and had also had a “serious adverse effect” on her ability to take part in work aimed at reducing her risk status and moving towards release.

Just a little lesson in European-style human rights for you this morning. The linked article says nothing about the human rights of the women prisoners who now must live with a very angry person who: 1. attempted rape and still has a penis, and 2. was strong enough to smother a man with a pillow and tights.

***

How long does it take to smother someone to death with a pillow? 2 to 3 minutes, if he doesn't manage to struggle the pillow away for a gulp of air. Try to picture what this person was able to do 5 years ago and think about why 3 years — 1 year for each minute of strongly applied murderous pressure to a struggling human being — is an adequate sentence.

"If I have offended anyone with statements I made in the past, I apologize."

Van Jones is sorry if you were offended.

AND: What if we're still offended?

"Sci-Fi’s Most Beautiful Stars: 1933-2008."

A fine list, with some cool photos, like:

How can Obama keep claiming prime network time...

... with no time given for a response from his opponents?

The networks don't like giving up their ad money, and on top of that, they are being turned into channels of state propaganda. I hope the ratings are terrible, and I'm pretty sure they will be. Why would anyone watch at this point? Even if you love the Prez, why tune in for multiple performances as if he's your favorite pop star?

And what if all the President has to say to the children is a load of innocuous pleasantries?

Grus grus.

Van Jones.

Here's a post where you can talk about White House Green Jobs Czar Van Jones.

"2 of the 3 broadcasts being anchored by women is nothing to sneeze at..."

Well, I'm sneezing because I think it means that the network news isn't important anymore. That's not progress in feminism. It's what is conventionally a symptom of anti-feminism: That women do something signifies that it isn't considered important.

Henry — our James Dean of a commenter — fixes the metaphor written by TIME's Sal Mineo, Joe Klein.

Back here — beginning with a Joe Klein quote in italics —Henry writes:

Indeed, the Republicans have the pedal to the metal--rushing us toward a tragedy far greater than the California health care forum finger-biting...

If Klein slowed down his typing he could have worked a little with that image.

As it is, I see a car plunging into a severed finger. Scary!

How about this instead:

Indeed, the Republicans have the pedal to the metal--rushing us toward a tragedy far greater than a crashed car. Someone's going to get their leather jacket caught on the door handle and die. It's me! It's my rhetorical cuff caught on the hyperbolic handle of the cliche car! Aaaagh!

"Dayo [Olopade] explains why Obamacare will fail in 8 seconds flat. The RNC should hire her for their next commercial."

Conn Carroll says, extracting this ultrashort clip:



Listen a few times and let it sink in. Here's the whole context, which begins with Olopade saying that it might have been better to argue for health care reform on a moral rather than an economic ground.



If you take the time to watch all this, you'll see that every time I pressure her about the nature of the moral argument, she shifts over to an economic argument. I point out the shift when it happens 3 times and say that I think the way she keeps going back to economics may well explain why the Democrats chose not to give prominence to the moral argument. In particular, as Conn Carroll's clip shows, the moral argument — when you get right down to it and strip away the verbiage — is hard left ideology.

The Presidency has an aging effect.

(Photo illustrating an article published yesterday in TNR.)

"[T]he number of people who believe that the President has larded the government with communists (!) was astonishing."

Says Joe Klein, who attended a town hall meeting in Nebraska:

One woman said there were four known communists in the government and that she'd researched it on the internet. When I asked her afterwards, she said environmental adviser Van Jones, legal advisor Cass Sunstein (who was last spotted being excoriated by the left for supporting the FISA revisions), someone named Lloyd and she didn't remember the fourth. And wasn't it suspicious that Obama had all these czars working for him--that was a Russkie commie term, wasn't it? When I asked, the woman admitted that, among other things, she occasionally listened to William Bennett's conservative radio show. I pointed out that Bennett had once been the Drug Czar, appointed by Ronald Reagan. Life sure can be complicated sometimes.

Wow. Joe got a lot out of one woman in Nebraska! But remember, what he asserts is "astonishing" is "the number" of people who think there are communists in the government. I certainly agree that the number one is astonishing. You'd think, by now, a lot more would be plunging ahead and using the inflammatory word.

I was later told by a local observer that many of these vomitous, disgraceful notions were the fruit of Glenn Beck's fruitful imagination. "We are living Glenn Beck's fantasy life," said this audience member. The amazing thing remains not only the unwillingness of responsible Republicans--a term that is in danger of becoming an oxymoron--to call bull-- on this, but also the willingness of many prominent Republicans to join in the slinging of garbage.

Astonishing... amazing... poor Joe is continually surprised by ordinary things. What's amazing? Blech... I have to reread: not only the unwillingness of responsible Republicans... to call bullshit on this, but also the willingness of many prominent Republicans to join in the slinging of garbage. So what's amazing — to plow through Klein's verbiage — is that Republicans use and put up with inflammatory rhetoric.

Yawn. I don't really think Klein is astonished and amazed by any of this. He's just doing the old I'm-surprised-at-you routine beloved of kindergarten teachers. I'm sure he'd love conservatives to stop putting their arguments in such stimulating and colorful terms. (Look out! It's a death panel!)

Michelle Cottle reports that there are Republican-sanctioned efforts afoot to have parents not send their children to school on September 8 because the President is scheduled to address the nation's school-children that day and they are afraid that he will fill their little heads with socialist propaganda. That is somewhere well beyond disgraceful.

No, Joe. Because they are disgusted at the melding of partisan political power and education and the prospect of a child made to accept compulsory school in the form of gazing upon the face of our leader. Imagine if Bush had proposed such an exercise for all of the children on the first day of school. Well, Bush would never have proposed such a thing because: 1. He didn't have the fawning approval of the vast majority of teachers, and 2. He never acquired the idea that his countenance and voice could inspire the masses. But if he did you know very well, Joe, that you'd have been disgusted at Bush, not the people who objected to his absurd display.

Could I just say that the intensity of this getting pretty scary...and dangerous?

Could I just say... may I be so bold... timid little me... can I please just say something... I'm scared! It's dangerous!!!1!!111!

We are heading toward a cliff and the usual brakes of civil discourse are not working.

Get a grip, Joe, you timorous mouse of a man. But that's just a joke. I know you're not really concerned about "civil discourse" in the abstract. You're annoyed that the people have started paying attention and are not sitting back in awed reverence like the most confused and cowed first grader watching that nice man on TV. You thought that when the Democrats won — "I won!" — they'd be able to roll up their preferences into 1000-page bundles and there wouldn't be anything people could do about it. But — lo and behold! — they used speech, free speech, they spoke their minds, sometimes harshly and with hot emotion, but they got themselves heard. If you think that is "heading toward a cliff" without "the usual brakes," then I say you don't believe in a free democratic society.

Indeed, the Republicans have the pedal to the metal--rushing us toward a tragedy far greater than the California health care forum finger-biting Karen describes below.

What tragedy? Not passing a sprawling, amorphous, unproven rearrangement of the way health care is paid for? Who is plying overheated, irrational rhetoric? That lady in Nebraska? Glenn Beck? Or Joe Klein?

It's a new Bloggingheads — with me and Dayo Olopade.

Lots of vigorous debate in this one. I'll do some clips later.

Down in the marsh.

Today, we walked in Cherokee Marsh, a city park in Madison. At one point, as we walked along the boardwalk...



... we heard a distinctive cry and saw (what I'm pretty sure were) 3 or 4 sandhill cranes fly across the sky over the marsh. Here's one:

I hope your thighs are big enough...

... to protect your heart.

"[L]adies, ladies, ladies..." — *you* are the whores!

"[S]o many of you have been cool, supportive and loving. But there are those of you out there who just love to judge."

Love to judge Ashley Dupre, the prostitute who did business with Eliot Spitzer.

Let me say this - most girls, to varying degrees of course, want to be pampered and have nice shoes, designer handbags and gorgeous clothes. I know many women who target guys with money and use them to get these things. They toy with them, flirt, go on dates, have sex and then drop hints about that new dress at the store down the street or being short on rent money – and the guys deliver it. This is a dishonest relationship. I see this all over New York City. Some women aren’t as vindictive, but still dive into relationships with wealthy guys who they don’t love or even find attractive, but they stay in it because they have a nice home, a car and spending money – they would rather stay in an unfulfilling or loveless relationship than lose that security. This, too, is a dishonest relationship.

You, ladies, you are whores too.

I see this type all over the suburbs of New Jersey with the housewives who are strung out on mood stabilizers or the couples who put all their attention on their children so they don’t have to deal with their own issues. What about going to those sugar daddy websites? Is that legal? Should it be? Is what I did any more dishonest? Get real and get over yourself.

Yeah, get over yourselves, ladies. Judge me? I judge you!

You’d be shocked at some of the messes I’ve gotten myself into....and, more importantly, how I got out of them. I have so much more to say, and I will – but it’s time for Yoga class! Om Shanti!

Om Shanti!

"The 65-year-old was apparently aggressive and hit the other man, who then retaliated by biting off his attacker's pinky..."

Health care required, as a health care reform opponent gets his finger bitten off — apparently and amazingly by someone so compassionate as to support health care for all.

ADDED: The bitten man tells his story:



He admits to landing 2 punches, the second of which landed in the biter's mouth, leading to the bite, and he says he doesn't want to sue — he's "not a litigious guy."

If Justice Stevens retires, won't Obama need to appoint a Protestant?

I know people have trouble looking at the issue of religious diversity on the Supreme Court. I raised this question when Justice Souter stepped down, and Obama's nomination put a 6th Catholic on the Court.

Here I am on a May, 4, 2009 Bloggingheads with Emily Bazelon, raising the question question of religious diveristy in the wake of the Souter retirement. (This recorded on May, 4, 2009 , before Obama had nominated Sotormayor.)



Now, Justice Stevens is the only Justice who was raised in the Protestant tradition. The other 2 Justices are Jewish. I anticipate that there will be little discussion of this, but I find it hard to believe that Obama will not see the lack of diversity as a problem and choose a Protestant.

Getting pseudonymous commenters to diavlog — with a "masking effect" — and a draft of a Bloggingheads comments policy.

Here's Bob Wright demonstrating the effect Bloggingheads is proposing to conceal identities — and make people look more interesting? — when pseudonymous commenters are turned into video personalities:



In the second part of that clip, Bob introduces the subject of a comments policy for his site, where, as he says, there've been "flame wars" lately. The main thing I've noticed is how much hate is thrown at me anytime I appear — often by people who load up the beginning of the thread with assertions that they will not watch the video because of me. Anyway, here's the draft of the comments policy they are proposing. I note Rule #2: "No rude comments aimed at diavloggers."

Like most superficially simple rules, this one is easier to state than to enforce fairly—one man’s verbal abuse is another man’s fair and accurate characterization. Here are some examples of what we’d label name-calling: moron, idiot, asshat, wingnut, moonbat, troll—and, absent very good evidence: racist. (To be clear: We don't proscribe the use of such words, only their use as epithets against other commenters, either directly or by implication.)

... In particular, avoid derogatory or demeaning remarks about physical appearance and speaking style. Don’t forget that many diavloggers read the comments section.

Don’t forget that many diavloggers read the comments section. LOL. Wasn't that the point of the rudeness?

Should schoolchildren be made to listen to a President's speech and analyze it?

Vodkapundit thinks it's so terrible that he thinks parents should keep their kids out of school.

Allahpundit responds:

If this turns out to be some hamfisted attempt by The One to pitch his agenda to kids — which would be politically insane given the outcry it would cause... — there’ll be ample time for outrageous outrage later. For all the media fainting spells over Obama’s oratory, you can count on one hand the number of truly memorable lines he’s uttered; I doubt he’s going to come up with such a corker next week that kids will be planning their lives around it.

We haven't heard the speech yet, so we can only react to the idea of the President speaking to schoolchildren. I'd say: Let the kids hear it and the teachers teach it — here's the official teaching guide — and then respond. Nothing's going to be so damaging that parents need to preemptively hold their kids out of school. And that would itself be a matter of adults pushing a political message down kids throats.

Ideally, children should learn to understand political speeches and think for themselves about what they mean. I remember as a schoolchild being assigned various political speeches to read and understand. These were historical speeches — by Washington, Lincoln, etc. — but they were by Presidents, Presidents who had a political agenda. These assignments can be especially useful educational experiences, equipping children to live in the world — where politicians will try to influence them and lead them along. Teach them how to see what is being done and why.

I know many of you will say that the teachers are all such big liberals and Obama sycophants that no critical thinking will be taught. But let's see! I love reading things and applying my critical thinking to the text. I do it as a lawprof reading the stuff judges present as legal analysis, and I'd love to do it as a blogger reading about what the President said and how the teachers dealt with it.

Please, send your kids to school and get a full report on what happened. Encourage your kids to observe and report accurately, and then tell us all about it. The teachers could do anywhere from a brilliant to an abysmal job with the assignment. This is a great opportunity — whatever happens. If the teachers handle it well, the children learn valuable skills. If they handle it badly, that will be the basis of a lesson we can teach them.

"How to Win in Afghanistan We tried the 'offshore' strategy before. The result was 9/11."

Max Boot boots George Will.

In the Queen Anne Tavern...

... I hope you emerge.



(Photo 2 by Meade.)

Top 10 Worst Bible Passages.

Perhaps you will disagree:

1. "I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man. She must be quiet." (1 Timothy 2:12)
2. "Go, now, attack Amalek, and deal with him and all that he has under the ban. Do not spare him, but kill men and women, children and infants, oxen and sheep, camels and asses." (1 Samuel 15:3)
3. "You shall not let a sorceress live." (Exodus 22:18)
4. "Happy those who seize your children and smash them against a rock." (Psalm 137:9)
5. "When the men would not listen to his host, the husband seized his concubine and thrust her outside to them. They had relations with her and abused her all night until the following dawn, when they let her go. Then at daybreak the woman came and collapsed at the entrance of the house in which her husband was a guest, where she lay until the morning. When her husband rose that day and opened the door of the house to start out again on his journey, there lay the woman, his concubine, at the entrance of the house with her hands on the threshold. He said to her, 'Come, let us go'; but there was no answer. So the man placed her on an ass and started out again for home." (Judges 19:25-28)
6. "And the males likewise gave up natural relations with females and burned with lust for one another. Males did shameful things with males and thus received in their own persons the due penalty for their perversity." (Romans 1:27)
7. "Jephthah made a vow to the Lord. 'If you deliver the Ammonites into my power,' he said, 'whoever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites shall belong to the Lord. I shall offer him up as a holocaust.' ... When Jephthah returned to his house in Mizpah, it was his daughter who came forth, playing the tambourines and dancing. She was an only child: he had neither son nor daughter besides her. When he saw her, he rent his garments and said, 'Alas, daughter, you have struck me down and brought calamity upon me. For I have made a vow to the Lord and I cannot retract'." (Judges 11:30-1, 34-5)
8. "Then God said: 'Take your son Isaac, your only one, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah. There you shall offer him up as a holocaust on a height that I will point out to you'."(Genesis 22:2)
9. "Wives should be subordinate to their husbands as to the Lord." (Ephesians 5:22)
10. "Slaves, be subject to your masters with all reverence, not only to those who are good and equitable but also to those who are perverse." (1 Peter 2:18)

Corn sponge.

For all you corn fans.

You know who you are.

"Practice coughing and sneezing into your sleeve."

Advice from "A Guide for UW–Madison Students: What You Can Do About the Flu." (PDF.)

Sleeve-sneezing... learn it before you have sneeze. And quit touching your face.

May I offer a piece of advice that is not in the flier? Don't touch doorknobs. Outside of my own house, I never touch doorknobs. How is that accomplished? Well, again, your sleeve can come in handy — but not part you use for sleeve-sneezing. You can also use gloves, a paper towel (when leaving a bathroom where you've washed your hands), or wait for someone else to open the door (when they are pushing out and you need to go in).

"American Men Look to Restore Dominance."

Front page teaser in the NYT. It caught my eye, but the article turned out to be about tennis.

A new Supreme Court appointment for Obama?

Justice Stevens has only hired one clerk for next year, a sign that he may retire at the end of the term that begins next month.

"Charles Gibson leaving 'World News.'"

Oh, blah. Who cares? I didn't even know there was something called — so boringly — "World News." Charles Gibson (Charlie Gibson)? I'd have to click my tag — see below — to ascertain whether I dislike the guy. Was he mean to Sarah? I don't remember.

Haven't watched network news since the 80s. Or was it the 70s?

"Like two tragic Playboy bunnies who're going through some kind of tiresome art school phase where they lounge around the mansion reading Anais Nin...

"... and smoking cloves and talking about how their work as centerfolds is really just a post-modern reclamation of the male gaze and telling Hef not to be such a phallocentrist perv. But now that I'm old, I feel like, a) screw The Girls Next Door, THAT's the reality show I want to watch, and b) eh, the rabbit ears are kind of cute...."

Look sharp.

(The grey crowned crane.)

Why Andrew Sullivan shouldn't be talking about whether Sarah Palin is "nutty enough."

So that prince of a man Levi Johnston is luxuriating in Vanity, saying:

Sarah told me she had a great idea: we would keep it a secret—nobody would know that Bristol was pregnant. She told me that once Bristol had the baby she and Todd would adopt him. That way, she said, Bristol and I didn’t have to worry about anything. Sarah kept mentioning this plan. She was nagging—she wouldn’t give up. She would say, “So, are you gonna let me adopt him?” We both kept telling her we were definitely not going to let her adopt the baby. I think Sarah wanted to make Bristol look good, and she didn’t want people to know that her 17-year-old daughter was going to have a kid.

Springing into a posture of triumph, Andrew Sullivan is all:

So, according to Levi, Governor Palin was very, very interested in avoiding embarrassment for her daughter - and a political problem - by passing off someone else's child as her own and adopting him. This kid's name was Tripp. But this exercise is called "proof of principle." If anyone believed that Palin wasn't nutty enough to try to pass off her own daughter's baby as her own, they need to reassess.

First, there are 2 babies — Trig and Tripp — born too close together for both to have been Bristol's. But Sullivan says it's a "proof of principle" exercise. (Is that common parlance? Maybe in England. WikiAnswers says: "A proof of principle experiment is one designed to see if the idea is workable. Usually little if any data is collected.") So the point is: If we are to believe Johnston — a humongous "if" — then Palin is the sort of person who would adopt a baby — Tripp, in that case — then she might have also adopted Trig.

But let's examine this:

First, Johnston didn't say that Sarah would pass the baby off as her own, only that she would adopt it. Whose baby is Trig supposed to be? Who else in the world would Palin have wanted to protect by taking on a new baby? The motive would have to be entirely different, such as thinking she'd look good having a Down Syndrome baby. So the principle is a different one.

Second, is it nutty for a grandmother to take over the role of raising a child born to a too-young mother? Let Andrew Sullivan step up and answer a clear yes to that if that's what he thinks. Do you realize how many women he is tainting with an accusation of insanity? Many, many women — including Barack Obama's grandmother — have done that over the ages. No one with any sensitivity to the condition of women in society should say that it's crazy for a grandmother to step in. It is a good and gracious thing that many good women have done, and emphatically not crazy.

Third, if you want to talk crazy, how crazy is it to want so badly to paint Sarah Palin as crazy? She is your political opponent, Andrew, and you don't think she's good enough for high office. It's not so dramatic. It's utterly banal. Ironically, Palin draws energy from your overheated hatred. Have you heard she's about to make $100 million?

The "Seinfeld" reunion.

It's the story line of this season's "Curb Your Enthusiasm."

“Doing it with Larry and on his show just seemed like the only possible way it would be fun….We would never do the type of thing that these shows usually do. That wouldn’t be our style. But something like this — that was sillier and a little more offbeat — felt like it might be right for us.”

Now, let's distinguish between wishing someone was dead and...

Jim Lindgren is struck by Michelle Goldberg's passion. It's hateful and casual, as she expresses the exquisite difference between the way lefties wanted Cheney dead and some righties — purportedly — actually want to kill Obama.

Hmm. Did anyone really threaten to kill Obama? It's a federal crime, and isn't it vigorously investigated? If people are doing this, why are we not seeing arrests?

Anyway, comparative hatred is a strange game, isn't it? Let's be rational and analytical, mm'kay?

"[W]e believe that journalists have a responsibility to shine light in dark places, to give voice to those who are too often silenced and ignored."

"One of us, Euna [Lee], is a devout Christian whose faith infused her interest in the story. The other, Laura [Ling], has reported on the exploitation of women around the world for years. We wanted to raise awareness about the harsh reality facing these North Korean defectors who, because of their illegal status in China, live in terror of being sent back to their homeland.... We didn't spend more than a minute on North Korean soil before turning back, but it is a minute we deeply regret...."

"We are all mutants."

Science says.

"Burglar doesn't flush, leaves his DNA ."

Front page teaser of the day, over on CNN. Video, with ad. If the homeowner had flushed — the instinctive reaction — the burglar would not have been caught

After taking Woodstock.

We saw them on the way in, and now:



Thanks, Chip Ahoy.

Taking in "Taking Woodstock" — at Sundance, in Madison, tonight.

No, we weren't. We were just eating sushi at a sidewalk table across from the theater, and these ladies — who were very enthusiastic about seeing the movie — asked us to take their picture. This isn't the picture M. took. That's in their camera. This is the picture I took after M. made the request:



(And they said yes to taking the picture and putting it up on line.)

Whooping cranes.

Video made today at the International Crane Foundation in Baraboo, Wisconsin. Here's some info about the whooping crane.

Why not send people to Mars and just leave them there?

Lawrence M. Krauss, director of the Origins Initiative at Arizona State University and author of "The Physics of 'Star Trek'" makes this suggestion in an op-ed in today's NYT:

Much of the cost of a voyage to Mars will be spent on coming home again. If the fuel for the return is carried on the ship, this greatly increases the mass of the ship, which in turn requires even more fuel...

[I]f the radiation problems cannot be adequately resolved then the longevity of astronauts signing up for a Mars round trip would be severely compromised in any case. As cruel as it may sound, the astronauts would probably best use their remaining time living and working on Mars rather than dying at home.

If it sounds unrealistic to suggest that astronauts would be willing to leave home never to return alive, then consider the results of several informal surveys I and several colleagues have conducted recently. One of my peers in Arizona recently accompanied a group of scientists and engineers from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory on a geological field trip. During the day, he asked how many would be willing to go on a one-way mission into space. Every member of the group raised his hand....

We might want to restrict the voyage to older astronauts, whose longevity is limited in any case. Here again, I have found a significant fraction of scientists older than 65 who would be willing to live out their remaining years on the red planet or elsewhere....

I agree. And I note that I floated the same idea on this blog 4 years ago:

But I must say, when I saw the headline about a 90-year-old "Explorer of Mars," an idea that occurred to me was having a one-way mission, sending some quite old persons to Mars, with no way to bring them back. I was assuming he'd be in favor of sending a man to Mars and imagined him saying I'm 90, send me! I'm going to die pretty soon anyway. I'd like to have a shot at making it to Mars. And you can just leave me there!

Would it be wrong to have a mission like that? Why is it that young people take the most risks with their lives? Shouldn't the oldest people take the most daring risks, since they've lived the greater part of their lives and therefore risk less of it?

***

By the way, the NYT published an offensively ageist illustration with its op-ed.

"I can't tell if you're doing that ironically."

"What's with the stupid pose, Cat?"

Obama approval down to 45%.

!

"Zambia's president evicts 'peeing monkeys' from State House."

Front page teaser for "Zambia's peeing monkeys evicted."

There were 200 monkeys in the state house, and presumably they were peeing all the time. But one peed on the president during a news conference. That's it for the state house monkeys.

ADDED: There are not enough animals running around in American press conferences. Maybe it would help those townhalls and tea parties: more monkeys.

What college major leads to the lowest scores on the LSAT?

Oops. It's criminal justice. Second worst — the irony continues: pre-law. 

I think this has less to do with whether the major prepares you for the exam than with the raw talent of the people who choose various majors. That's why physics/math comes in first. My theory, anyway. The best advice for those who want to go on to law school is to study something you're very interested in and good at. It will help you get a good GPA, which counts about as much as the LSAT in admissions. It will make college intrinsically rewarding. (Try to make whatever you do intrinsically rewarding.*) And it will give you an opportunity to find out more about your own preferences which you will need to have when you get out of law school and find a path within law. It will also give you the ability to be drawn away from the idea going to law school, which is certainly not a bad thing. 

 _____________ 

*To think more deeply about what it means to do what is intrinsically rewarding, read Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's book, "Flow." At page 49 of the 1991 Harper Perennial edition, he describes the 8 components of flow:

First, the experience usually occurs when we confront tasks we have a chance of completing. Second, we must be able to concentrate on what we are doing. Third and fourth, the concentration is usually possible because the task undertaken has clear goals and immediate feedback. Fifth, one acts with a deep but effortless involvement that removes from awareness the worries and frustrations of everyday life. Sixth, enjoyable experiences allow people to exercise a sense of control over their actions. Seventh, concern for the self disappears, yet paradoxically the sense of self emerges stronger after the flow experience is over. Finally, the sense of the duration of time is altered; hours pass by in minutes, and minutes can stretch out to seem like hours. The combination of all these elements causes a sense of deep enjoyment that is so rewarding people feel that expending a great deal of energy is worthwhile simply to be able to feel it.

Blight bulbs, part 2.

Henry says:

I've inadvertently stockpiled 7 compact fluorescents. That's two boxes minus one bulb.

I thought I would swap them in the basement fixtures as the old incandescents burned out. It took a year or so, but as soon as I screwed in the first one I realized my mistake.

At first I was sure I had purchased the wrong wattage. The turd-shaped bulb worked up a feeble bruise-colored flicker and paused, as if exhausted.

In a few minutes, though, as I went about my work, it came to life, casting violet shadows across the room from its forsaken corner. I walked over and stood under it. It didn't so much make light as well-defined edges. It was like walking into the afterimage of a instamatic flashbulb. Except that it's permanent.

Since the damn things last forever, I figure ten years from now I will use that corner of the basement to interview my daughter's boyfriends.

"So I ate that mushroom, fly and all GULP just like that without even chewing. I could feel the fly buzzing all the way down. Mmmmm, fly."

"Then I ☽ met a mysterious ☍ man on ♌ the road, ☻ dressed in 〄 black and ☠ walking a ☢☡♽ white dog. ⚡ He seemed truly ethereal, but I know what I saw. No 〒 really, ✴ I'm ✣ seramous 〠check ❦ out ☥ the picture.✺"



Chip Ahoy ate that mushroom....

"A Health Care for America Now (HCAN) organizer is caught on tape outside the meeting instructing supporters on how to shout down opponents..."

From Gateway Pundit:



Via Instapundit, who says: "Remember, what they accuse their opponents of is usually what they’re planning themselves..."

"Rather than rejoicing in a loving wife, a daughter not yet 2, a job I enjoyed — in being, simply, 41..."

"... I created felonies out of matters not worth a summons. Traffic jams. Work conflicts. No Vienna Fingers in the cupboard. Felonies all. Cancer, as is often said, tends to focus the mind.... Sickened by the mere smell of food, I suddenly saw the wonder in the most common foods: an egg, a hard-boiled egg. Imprisoned and essentially chained to an IV pole, I would stare out my hospital room window at the people below, and feel a rush of the purest envy for their routine pursuits. Imagining the summer night air blowing cool through sweat-dampened shirts, I’d think how good a $3 ice cream would taste right about now, or a $5 beer, and how nice it would be to watch a baseball game of no consequence."

"So Mr. Fish, how about teaching some comp classes yourself?"

Stanley Fish kicks that critic's ass.

"If you've ever wanted to explore the world of Wal-Mart but don't live near one, this site is for you."

"Everyone at these stores seems to be topless, pantsless, toothless or all of the above."

HuffPo sniffs (in a piece about various websites HuffPo readers might want to stoop to read).

Coffee is food...

... if they need it to be food to force you to stop smoking.

Political pants.

I thought this...



... was pretty funny... as I searched around the TwistedTwee site after reading about the outrage caused by — can it be? — nipple tassel T-shirts for toddlers...



I searched all over TwistedTwee for the nipple tassel shirts so I could figure out if they really were for kids or were some kind of satire, but I just couldn't find it. Looking, I saw a lot of genuinely amusing things, like this and this...



... and this. Some of that is in bad-ish taste, perhaps intended more as a joke gift than really to be worn by a child.

Should I be more upset?

Can Eliot Spitzer make a comeback?

"Two sources said Spitzer had thought about a gamut of different electoral choices in his months of political exile. But one ally insisted he's realized he can't do anything, at least not next year, saying, 'There are people around him who want to see him [in office], and he sees himself there, too. He loves to be in the limelight. But he knows it can't happen.'"

Oh, why not? Does anyone care anymore?

"WaPo Style Writer Declares Kennedy Old-Money Style Only Cool on Liberals."

The Weekly Standard rags on Robin Givhan.

Camping with llamas.

"A guide and four llamas would ferry us to and from our campsite, leaving us with two of the llamas to carry our packs on day hikes. Mark Pommier, our llama guide, showed us the saddles, lead lines and panniers, and the picket line for securing the llamas in camp. We practiced snapping buckles and tightening cinches. Mr. Pommier also gave us some insight into the llama psychology. Although they are fuzzy and adorable, batting their Tammy Faye eyelashes, they tend to be aloof — 'more like cats than dogs,' he said. But they’re hard-working and dependable, and would be easygoing companions on the trail."

I've never gone camping, and the idea of walking and camping has always been ruined by the thought of carrying heavy stuff. Getting an animal to carry everything seems like a great solution, but, of course, you have to relate to the animals and take good care of them. Are they really completely adorable? Hmmm....

The travel writer, Helen Olsson, went with her husband and 3 little kids into the San Jan Mountains near Silverton, Colorado, exactly where we were last month.

Bears tend to avoid campsites with llamas. When threatening wildlife approaches, llamas sound a piercing alarm cry.

And the mountain lions? When we saw a mountain lion around those parts, it had been eyeing some cattle. It might have liked llama.

And here's another thing:

Redwood Llamas... offers full-service pack trips that include guide, tents, llamas and meals for $4,000 for four people, four days, or $1,000 a person per day.

$1,000 a person per day? That's 4x what we spent in beautiful luxury at the Ritz-Carleton in Bachelor Gulch — with all the Colorado hiking and scenery during the day and dinner at Spago every night and room-service breakfast on a private balcony every morning.

Less costly is the drop-camp option: The guide leads you in and out; you bring gear and food. A three-day trip in July cost $1,075.

So, you get the equivalent of the hotel only — no food — for $358 a night. That's pretty close to the room rate in the summer at the Ritz-Carleton. And here's where we stayed in Silverton, at the Wyman Hotel, where we paid $183 per night for a very charming room that looked out over the street that is a national landmark.

So llamas are a luxury, a big luxury, even as you are roughing it. You've got to want to do it just as much as you'd like to stay at the Ritz. Your choice.