More displays of brilliance from the current administration:



Discussing security along the U.S. border on Canada's CBC News on Monday, Napolitano said, "To the extent that terrorists have come into our country or suspected or known terrorists have entered our country across a border, it's been across the Canadian border. There are real issues there."

When asked whether she was talking about the 9/11 terrorists, Napolitano said: "Not just those, but others as well."

Great. Not only has the government started requiring passports for travel between the US and Canada (yeah, that's a real boon for the economies of border states like mine), they are now intending to treat the Canadian border as if it were as much of a problem as the Mexican border. Guess I won't bother trying to visit Stratford this year after all.

When will 2012 be here? And by that time, how much of a mess will there be to clean up?

Why haven't I seen this before?

Italicized books are re-reads.

Read in January

(omitted)
Master and Commander – Patrick O’Brian
The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass (Assigned)
The Six Questions of Socrates – Christopher Phillips

Read in February

1) Patrick O’Brian, Post Captain
2) Robert A. Maguire, Red Virgin Soil: Russian Literature in the 1920s
3) Frances Hodgson Burnett, A Little Princess
4) Patrick O’Brian, H.M.S. Surprise
5) Martin L. Gross, The Conspiracy of Ignorance: The Failure of America’s Public Schools
6) A.B. Yehoshua, Mr. Mani - There are several "Mr. Manis" that are profiled in this novel, covering the life of the family spanning over the a century. I found his approach to telling the stories interesting as well.
7) Octavia E. Butler, Kindred - I would not have read this book if I weren't already familiar with the author. I tend to be nervous about books that use devices such as time travel that often seem gimmicky to me. As it is, I don't think it's her at her best.

8) Patrick O’Brian, The Mauritius Command
9) Patrick O’Brian, Desolation Island
10) Hadley Arkes, Natural Rights and the Right to Choose
11) Joel Salatin, You can Farm
12) Annie Dillard, Encounters with Chinese Writers

16/100 read for the year.

http://www.kxmc.com/News/336718.asp

( lots of videos )

( Read more... )

Unfortunately I couldn't find any more of these.

Back from hiatus.

"Rebecca" by Daphne du Maurier is one of the best books I've read all year. I find myself writing an essay about it. I don't think I'll post it, though, since it could be useful in some academic context in the future.

As radical as I think people tried to characterize the Warren Court, it wasn't that radical. It didn't break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution, at least as it has been interpreted -- and Warren Court interpreted it in the same way, that generally the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. It says what the states can't do to you, says what the federal government can't do to you. But it doesn't say what the federal government or the state government must do on your behalf. And that hasn't shifted, and one of the tragedies of the civil rights movement was because the civil rights movement became so court-focused, uh, I think that there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalitions of power through which you bring about redistributive change. And, uh, in some ways we still suffer from that.

The president of the United States, upon taking office, takes an oath to uphold the Constitution. I have strong doubts that someone who criticizes the Constitution and wishes it were something else than it is, is going to be faithful to that oath. I think this pushes me over the edge into voting for McCain.

Voting fraud by Obama supporters

Can't wait for this whole thing to be over. Still don't know how I'm going to vote in most races, but I need to decide soon.

Or I may forget the whole thing and just vote on a handful of local proposals.

I really want to know what PETA member came up with this. If you didn't think they were off their rocker before, you will now.

Pshaw. I can tell people that my favorite pieces include the Carmen overture and Dvorak's New World Symphony. No need to pretend.

you_tube_links

I wonder if some of the negative reactions to Indiana Jones 4 have to do with the fact that the movies have a strong fantasy/wish fulfillment component. It's often harder to transfer that to someone who's noticeably aging, after all. He's grayer. He's less of a playboy. He has setbacks including getting sacked.

Apparently this man is unfamiliar with the concept of a Potemkin village.

"Darling Colette" is only funny the first time you hear it. It should never have been made standard.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/13/theater/13forb.html?hp

Disappointing.

Random thought: What would Disney's Mulan have been like with Stephen Schwartz as lyricist?

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I need to get better at scheduling my time. I have a light class load, but still things seem to hectic for me. I also need to work on getting another job. Maybe I can try temp work again.

What?

There's a reason Palin and her family are not seen as a "burden to the system. That would be the fact that they're not on the "system".