Favorite poster from NR's "The Corner"

and naturally Posner is wrong for advocating "government intervention"

I like EconTalk and I like Russ but the Posner episode was unbearable. Posner comes across as senile and Roberts annoyingly prefaced a number of his rebuttals with, “Since Milton is no longer with us and therefore unable to defend himself …”

Really.

When did Russ become the spokesman for Friedman’s corpse? This is comparable to Joe Stiglitz using Keynes in the same manner (except Stiglitz has a Nobel and a University Professorship at Columbia).

In Praise of Stigmas [John J. Miller]

Today's NYT says that food-stamp usage grows by about 20,000 people per day:

MARTINSVILLE, Ohio — With food stamp use at record highs and climbing every month, a program once scorned as a failed welfare scheme now helps feed one in eight Americans and one in four children. ... While the numbers have soared during the recession, the path was cleared in better times when the Bush administration led a campaign to erase the program’s stigma, calling food stamps “nutritional aid” instead of welfare, and made it easier to apply.

Seems like there ought to be a stigma attached to the use of welfare. A little bit of shame can go a long way toward encouraging people to find jobs. The federal government may think it's doing people a favor by providing them with access to food, but it's doing them a disservice if it also robs them of the motivation necessary to break free from dependency.

Reagan was right: welfare recipients use their checks to buy vodka and Parcheesi.

i now want to do grave physical harm to John J Miller

or make him repeat those sentiments in person at a food shelf or unemployment office

everyone who criticizes welfare queens should be required to spend 1 week working at an unemployment office and 1 month on unemployment benefits

Kathryn Lopez underappreciated singing sensations include: william shatner, don johnson, jack wagner, and bruce willis (I'm only half serious. Maybe.)
23 minutes ago · Comment · Like

The Wall Street Journal story on the Swiss minaret vote had a great quote in it, from a Jamal-on-the-street interview in Turkey (the source of most Muslims in Switzerland):

Cavid Aksin, an Istanbul metalworker, was angered that the referendum coincided with the end of one of the most important religious feasts in the Muslim calendar. "I think Turkey should have a referendum on whether to close down its churches," he said.

You mean churches like Hagia Sophia? Or the Armenian Church of the Holy Cross? Or the Halki Seminary? After 1,400 years of closing down churches, the gall is unbelievable.

I would call her square but...

xp

does whoever wrote that last post (I take it some at the Corner) know that the Hagia Sophia has been a mosque since the conquest of Constantinople?

Hagia Sophia was converted into a mosque in 1453. It was converted into a museum and the Christian iconography restored in 1935.

the gall

er I guess maybe they do; sorry, just misread

The Wall Street Journal story on the Swiss minaret vote had a great quote in it, from a Jamal-on-the-street interview in Turkey (the source of most Muslims in Switzerland):

Cavid Aksin, an Istanbul metalworker, was angered that the referendum coincided with the end of one of the most important religious feasts in the Muslim calendar. "I think Turkey should have a referendum on whether to close down its churches," he said.

You mean churches like Hagia Sophia? Or the Armenian Church of the Holy Cross? Or the Halki Seminary? After 1,400 years of closing down churches, the gall is unbelievable.

― caek, Tuesday, December 1, 2009 8:42 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i dont understand the sentiment behind this AT ALL not even in a "ok maybe if i was born with an extra chromosome" way

i think they probably do, euler. it's just that to them it's unfinished business.

yeah I get it now; it's still stupid but as stupid as I thought

er not as stupid

it's not as ignorant as you thought, but i think it's more stupid

can you guys help me break it down:

1) switzerland bans minarets, this is ok (?)

2) turkish metalworker asked for opinion, responds that turkey should ban churches (this is a pretty lol response imo)

3) turkey has in the past converted churches to mosques

4) because of this it is insensitive of the turkish metalworker to respond to an act of democratic racism via a simple equivalency thought experiment

I think the writer really just means (4), and gives (1)-(3) to make it look like there's an argument.

(3) is especially dumb, since "Turkey" as we know it has only existed since the end of WWI (and even that's arguable).

Jamal-on-the-street

Really, FFS.

jamal?

Y'know, 'Jamal'. One of them furrin names that those people use
http://www.filmbug.com/images/people/329929.jpg

don't know if this has been posted anywhere else on ILX, but here goes nothing:

shame on a teabagger who tried to run game on a teabagger (my apologies to the spirit of ODB)

the money quote:

What about a special case — the worst word in American English, as some of us see it, namely the N-word? When I was growing up, in Ann Arbor, Mich., there was a little debate: Should school officials try to prevent black students from using the N-word? I don’t believe the issue was ever settled. And this brings up the question of whether “teabagger” could be kind of a conservative N-word: to be used in the family, but radioactive outside the family.

grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

No, THIS is the money quote:

I have no doubt you are sexually hip

this is not the corner, but it is corner-esque

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2009/12/obama-national-christmas-tree-xmas-tree.html

It's Andrew Malcolm -- our own little taste of Cornerism out here.

Anyway, remember, all Jay Nordlinger is saying that it's a no-teabagging establishment. (NSFW, obv.)

I wonder how bad Andrew Malcolm felt about having to spike the "Obama Wages War on Christmas by Leaving Tree Lights Off at Night" column he undoubtedly also wrote.

“‘Teabagging’ is a slang term for the act of a man placing his scrotum in the mouth or on or around the face (including the top of the head) of another person, often in a repeated in-and-out motion as in irrumatio. The practice resembles dipping a tea bag into a cup of tea.” I could quote you more, but you have had enough.

You have had enough!

The first big day for this movement was Tax Day, April 15. And organizers had a gimmick. They asked people to send a tea bag to the Oval Office. One of the exhortations was “Tea Bag the Fools in D.C.” A protester was spotted with a sign saying, “Tea Bag the Liberal Dems Before They Tea Bag You.” So, conservatives started it: started with this terminology. But others ran with it and ran with it.

lol you played yourself, that's why its so great!

has southpark done a teabagger episode b/c they are begging for it

Yesterday morning the local NPR affil had a crazy Texas House rep who said she had been "working on these issues from a libertarian position for years, so you might say I was teabagging before teabagging was cool."

I almost swerved into traffic

"working on these issues from a libertarian position for years, so you might say I was teabagging before teabagging was cool."

ORLY. would like to see her voting record on drug laws, reproductive rights, marriage equality, church/state separation, etc etc...

Santorum in 2012? [Rick Brookhiser]

How many elections do other GOP hopefuls have to lose to be as qualified as Rick Santorum?

The Corner just loves the Santorum.

oh geez, maybe someone should warn them

http://gawker.com/5420810/idiot-inks-boffo-book-deal

The raw material for santorum.jpg is probably enough to keep him from the office of dog catcher.

on a related note, Dan Lacey has been busy:

http://www.faithmouse.com/santorum-family-pancakes.jpg

Missing Dan on ILX. Friend of mine commissioned him to do his portrait avec pancake.

Thursday, December 10, 2009

The Swinger [John J. Miller]

The Hill:

Rep. Joe Baca (D-Calif.) is abandoning his effort to honor golf star Tiger Woods with the Congressional Gold Medal.

Woods remains a contender for the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize.

12/10 06:15 AMShare

o this poor sad woman

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Was It Sponsored by the Tiger Woods Foundation? [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

NYPost reports "Study: Casual Sex Not Emotionally Damaging"

It includes:

[/q]"We were so surprised," said Marla Eisenberg, an assistant professor at the [
University of Minnesota's] School of Public Health.

"The conventional wisdom is that casual sex, 'friends with benefits,' and hooking up is hurtful."[/q]

Professor Eisenberg must not spend a lot of time on the University of Minnesota's campus.

12/10 09:24 AMShare

And K-lo has? How many hours has she spent interviewing college students "hurt" by casual sex?

New study explains what makes church ladies assholes

i figured the answer was going to be 'lack of casual sex'

The World Is Upside Down [Andy McCarthy]
If you're in a graveyard humor kind of mood as the Left rams "reform" down our throats...

I'm sure he daydreams about it all of the time.

The Derb's vital stats:

Through adult life I have been 6 ft. 1 in. and my weight has gradually increased from 170 lb. to 190 lb. I am healthy but not often fit. My IQ is 135. On the currently favored Big Five measures of personality, I score as follows. "Low" indicates scores within the bottom 30 percent for adult American males, "average" the middle 40 percent, "high" the top 30 percent.

Extraversion: Low. I am an introvert, "reserved, and quiet. You enjoy solitude and solitary activities. Your socializing tends to be restricted to a few close friends."

Agreeableness: Low, "indicating less concern with others' needs than with your own. People see you as tough, critical, and uncompromising."

Conscientiousness: Low, "indicating you like to live for the moment and do what feels good now. Your work tends to be careless and disorganized."

Neuroticism: High, "indicating that you are easily upset, even by what most people consider the normal demands of living. People consider you to be sensitive and emotional."

Openness to Experience: Average, "indicating you enjoy tradition but are willing to try new things. Your thinking is neither simple nor complex. To others you appear to be a well-educated person but not an intellectual."

The full test results, with all contributing factors, are here. Hmm. A disagreeable, disorganized, neurotic introvert who is moderately open to new experiences? Sounds right. "One of the Awkward Squad," according to my mother.

Read the whole thing here:
http://johnderbyshire.com/FamilyHistoryJD/People/Self/page.html
or if you want the entire personality readout with all details, here:
http://johnderbyshire.com/FamilyHistoryJD/People/Self/bigfive.html