[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrOZllbNarw?rel=0]
I found this interesting in the current context.
But, but the right people are in charge!!
Category: Uncategorized
Once Upon a Time…
…a newspaper journalist was on his way to cover a story when a tire on his car blew out. He pulled to the shoulder and looked to discover that the passenger-side rear tire was shredded. So, he popped the trunk and started working on changing it – he was running late. As he was jacking the car up, he noticed that his car was just a few feet from a very tall, very sturdy fence, and the fence had a sign on it warning not to pick up hitchhikers because inside the fence was a facility for the violently insane.
He spun the lugnuts off the bad wheel and placed them carefully into the hubcap he’d put on the ground nearby, but as he was pulling the bad wheel off, he heard a cough behind him. Startled, he dropped the blown tire and it fell onto the hubcap, throwing the lugnuts into the air. When they came down, four of the five rolled directly into a nearby storm drain.
Looking behind him, he saw that a man in a suit and tie was standing just inside the fence, watching. His hair was perfectly groomed, and he was freshly shaved. He didn’t look insane.
“Well, hell,” the reporter said, “I’m running late, and now I only have one lug nut to put the spare on with.”
“Simple,” responded the man behind the fence, “take one lug nut off of each of the other three wheels. That’ll give you four lug nuts per wheel, and that’s enough to get you where you need to go until you can get replacements for the ones you lost.”
A little stunned, the reporter replied, “That’s great! I’d have never thought of that! Are you a doctor?”
“No,” the man replied, “I’m one of the patients.”
“But, how could someone as intelligent as you be in there?” the reporter asked.
“I’m insane. I’m not stupid.”
—
So we’ve had another rampage shooting, this time in California – land of the Roberti-Roos assault-weapon ban, no “gun show loophole,” “bullet buttons,” magazine capacity restrictions, etc., etc., etc.
And another known nutcase still managed to get his hands on an AR-15 and a bunch of standard capacity magazines, plus a black-powder revolver with a cartridge conversion cylinder.
But one more law will prevent this from happening again!
Which is both insane AND stupid.
Quote of the Day – Jerry Pournelle Edition
Sort of a twofer:
I do not say that democracy has been more pernicious on the whole, and in the long run, than monarchy or aristocracy. Democracy has never been and never can be so durable as aristocracy or monarchy; but while it lasts, it is more bloody than either. … Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide. It is in vain to say that democracy is less vain, less proud, less selfish, less ambitious, or less avaricious than aristocracy or monarchy. It is not true, in fact, and nowhere appears in history. Those passions are the same in all men, under all forms of simple government, and when unchecked, produce the same effects of fraud, violence, and cruelty. When clear prospects are opened before vanity, pride, avarice, or ambition, for their easy gratification, it is hard for the most considerate philosophers and the most conscientious moralists to resist the temptation. Individuals have conquered themselves. Nations and large bodies of men, never.
John Adams, letter to John Taylor (15 April 1814).The remedy, of course, was to form a Republic, and for over two hundred years the Republic endured. Now it is to be converted into a democracy, and the result is predictable and predicted. There are many good studies of what happens when a democracy commits suicide. If it is fortunate it gets a Claudius Caesar, but more often it must first endure a Caligula so that Claudius seems a blessed relief. And after Claudius as likely as not comes Nero. But I digress. For the moment we do not yet have Marius.
Take My Money! Entertain Me!
OK, I’ve just finished Larry Correia‘s latest, Warbound: Book III of the Grimnoir Chronicles eARC (Electronic Advanced Reader Copy).
This is not my normal cuppa tea. I’m not a particular fan of… well, I was going to say “fantasy,” but that brings up images of orcs and elves and stuff, and The Grimnoir Chronicles does not fit into that genre. It’s literally unlike anything I’ve ever read, but it does have magic! Let me see if I can find Tam’s description of the earlier two books in the series… Here it is:
See, Larry writes stories about people. People with complex drives and goals and motives, who don’t always categorize easily into ‘heroes’ and ‘villains’. People you care about. The fact that they’re people that run around on top of a zeppelin shooting teleporting ninjas with shotguns is just a bonus.
It’s a genre-defying storyline, and probably one of the more original I’ve read in a long time. It’s got the magic thing, sure, but it’s also well-researched alternate history, with a sort of superhero flavor… Imagine a prose version of The Watchmen, but with fedoras and Tommy guns, and a supporting cast that runs from Buckminster Fuller to Black Jack Pershing. And the thing with shooting the teleporting ninjas on the dirigible with shotguns, which will make you realize that, no matter how highbrow your tastes, sometimes you need to just shut up and eat your awesome.
I’ve read all of the Monster Hunter series and his joint effort with Mike Kupari, Dead Six.
At this point I will read anything that man writes, including his grocery lists.
Larry announced recently that his writing has allowed him to quit his normal dayjob as an accountant to concentrate full time on writing.
Faster, Larry. Take my money! Entertain me!!
Bordering on Tyranny, Piers?
OK, here we go again with Piers “I hate the Second Amendment” Morgan a few weeks ago:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKO8A285Rr0?rel=0]
And here he is just a day or so ago (sorry about the ad – can’t strip it out):
Even Glenn Greenwald is outraged! Or is he just trying to sell more dish soap?
So I ask again: Merely bordering on tyranny?
Bill Whittle – Happiness
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIPp_MdsIUQ?rel=0]
If I Recall Correctly, 2008 was an Election Year
So, in January, 2008 MTV (!) ran the following two ads as part of its THINK.MTV.COM campaign. (PDF) But this wasn’t political speech by a corporation or anything, right?
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CtbVsbr67E?rel=0]
I wonder how they’re feeling about these clips now?
Oh, and yes, Godwin has been invoked!
…And Now We’re Down to Three
When it gets down to it — talking trade balances here — once we’ve brain-drained all our technology into other countries, once things have evened out, they’re making cars in Bolivia and microwave ovens in Tadzhikistan and selling them here — once our edge in natural resources has been made irrelevant by giant Hong Kong ships and dirigibles that can ship North Dakota all the way to New Zealand for a nickel — once the Invisible Hand has taken away all those historical inequities and smeared them out into a broad global layer of what a Pakistani brickmaker would consider to be prosperity — y’know what? There’s only four things we do better than anyone else:
music
movies
microcode (software)
high-speed pizza delivery— Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash
Well, we can scratch “high-speed pizza delivery” off the list:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=on4DRTUvst0?rel=0]
Yeah, it’s Domino’s, but it’s in the UK, not Silicon Valley.
Quote of the Day – New York Times Edition
When you’ve lost the editorial board of the NYT, you’re in deep, deep guano:
…the Obama administration issued the same platitude it has offered every time President Obama has been caught overreaching in the use of his powers: Terrorists are a real menace and you should just trust us to deal with them because we have internal mechanisms (that we are not going to tell you about) to make sure we do not violate your rights.
Those reassurances have never been persuasive — whether on secret warrants to scoop up a news agency’s phone records or secret orders to kill an American suspected of terrorism — especially coming from a president who once promised transparency and accountability.
The administration has now lost all credibility on this issue. Mr. Obama is proving the truism that the executive branch will use any power it is given and very likely abuse it.
Hey, NYT editorial board, here’s a clue: It’s not just the executive branch, and it’s not just “this issue.”
But hey! Nice start!
Oh, and “overreach”? There’s that term again.
UPDATE: Aaaaand the NYT felt it necessary to soften the tone, apparently:
The New York Times edited its damning editorial condemning the Obama administration for collecting phone call data from Americans to make it less stinging shortly after the editorial was published online Thursday afternoon.
The editorial originally declared that the Obama “administration has lost all credibility” as a result of the recently revealed news that the National Security Agency and the Federal Bureau of Investigation have been secretly collecting call data from American users of Verizon under the authority of the Patriot Act.
But hours later the stinging sentence had been modified to read the Obama “administration has now lost all credibility on this issue.” [Emphasis added]
IOW: They got it right the first time. And no, they did not note that the piece had been altered.
Full disclosure: I’ve edited this piece twice now.
Clayton Cramer Wrote a Book About This
A family’s mentally ill son buys a gun with the intent to perpetrate a massacre. Prior to this, he’d planned on doing it with a knife.
http://cnettv.cnet.com/av/video/cbsnews/atlantis2/cbsnews_player_embed.swf
Note that they can’t get their son institutionalized, even though it’s apparent that he’s dangerous. Clayton Cramer in his book My Brother Ron: A Personal and Social History of the Deinstitutionalization of the Mentally Ill discusses the changes in America’s mental health system that has led to dangerously violent people wandering around free until they finally do something that will get them incarcerated.
Kudos to the parents. By age 21 I would imagine the daily grind of dealing with a mentally ill son would have worn most people out.