NO BANG FOR THE BUCK
I reiterate that I think Bjorn Lomborg's argument that crises need to be prioritized is one of the best arguments against stopping global warming. You can grant the premise just for argument's sake but still insist that we shouldn't spend a dollar to get a nickel's worth of good.
Imagine for a moment that the fantasists win the day and that at the
climate conference in Copenhagen in December every nation commits to
reductions even larger than Japan's, designed to keep temperature
increases under 2 degrees Celsius. The result will be a global price
tag of $40 trillion in 2100, to avoid expected climate damage costing
just $1.1 trillion, according to climate economist Richard Tol, a
contributor to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change whose cost
findings were commissioned by the Copenhagen Consensus Center and are
to be published by Cambridge University Press next year.
Unfortunately, no government program has ever been held to the bang-for-your-buck test.
But surely this has to be persuasive, right? How could it not be? I find it persuasive in every instance. Take health care: I don't care if they can promise that everyone will have total coverage and no one will ever be sick again. Our nation simply doesn't have the money now to cover 30 million new people. Even if it were a government program I could get behind like...um...hmm...giving every law-abiding household a handgun and lessons on how to use it, we just are too far in debt to be adding new programs to the list, no matter what they are.
And certainly we have too much debt to spend $40 to get a dollar of benefit.
I JUST WANT TO STAY HOME
On the plane on the way home, I horrifiedly figured out that by the time my baby is born, she will have already been in 18 different states.
I wonder if someone has tried to have a fifty-state baby.
Posted by: Amritas at September 29, 2009 01:26 PM (+nV09)
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I noticed you missed The People's Republic of New Jersey. Probably a wise choice, because if you are in the state for more than thirty-seconds, you'll be taxed for something or other. :-)
Posted by: Jim - PRS at October 02, 2009 03:11 AM (HZ0p9)
I GOT THE COOKIE
SpouseBUZZ Live is going well, as usual. It was nice to see each other, and we're all very relieved that we didn't have to deliver WifeUnit's baby. She was supposed to come this weekend and instead decided to stay home and deliver a preemie. Holy cow. I wonder who is bigger, the baby or his ewok?
I also got a very touching gift this weekend. FbL attended the event to represent Soldiers' Angels, and she brought me a blogging inside joke gift, one that first puzzled me but then sunk in.
TRANSCONTINENTAL
I'm leaving this morning for SpouseBUZZ Live Camp Pendleton. Will be in the gulch this weekend and thus out of the loop. Which is good, because I could use a break from the UN and ACORN.
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CALMLY HAPPY
Last year, Army Blogger Wife mailed me her home doppler machine. I was so excited to use it, but unfortunately I just kept using it on dead babies. So this time around, I left it in the drawer and just relied on the weekly ultrasounds.
Last night I was lying in bed, trying to will the baby to kick where I could feel it. I am so anxious for that stage. I am looking forward to having the companionship, to there being someone else besides the dog whose presence is felt in my house. And while I was lying there thinking about her, I suddenly remembered the doppler.
I found her easily, and grinned. And then called my parents entirely too late at night so they could both listen.
I'm still mildly wary of the whole thing. When friends get excited and squeal "You're having a baby!", I sometimes feel a stab of fear. Like we all need to rein it in and be calmly happy instead of cartwheels happy.
But I calmly happily listened to baby's heartbeat last night.
I'm not sure how far along you are, but I understand that different people feel kicks at different times during pregnancy. I always thought they'd feel like actual "kicks", but I remember thinking that they felt more like little air bubbles - like the ones in an aquarium might feel if inside your belly! Another trick I remember was to drink a few oz of orange juice and lie still on the floor or bed. The sugar rush will get the baby moving.
I've never posted before, but do enjoy reading. Enjoy the rest of your pregnancy!
Posted by: Maria at September 22, 2009 12:21 PM (mKRWK)
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Totally (calmly) excited for you! I thought that was an entirely soothing device for the time before (and even after) you get to the kick counting stage. A peace of mind. And the oj (or pine orange banana) is really magic when it comes to getting the baby to act like you have Stevie Wonder's Musiquarium ablastin' in your uterus.
Posted by: wifeunit at September 22, 2009 04:06 PM (4B1kO)
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I am calmly extremely happy for you. I will be cartwheel happy when baby is here.
Posted by: Mare at September 23, 2009 07:29 AM (HUa8I)
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Totally calm, totally happy for you. Think serene....
Posted by: tibby at September 23, 2009 10:07 AM (S/Fac)
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I'm glad it's working out for you. I know it put my mind to ease a LOT during my pregnancy with Junior and Abs.
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Any day now you should start to feel her kick. And that was my favorite part of being pregnant - that little secret of sorts between my baby and me. No one else (until the later stages when I looked like something out of the movie 'Alien') was in on the secret unless I allowed it. And it was incredibly reassuring for me as I bled both times I was pregnant and was somewhat wary (not to the extent you are) as well.
You look wonderful by the way!
Posted by: HomefrontSix at September 26, 2009 06:15 PM (BZ+pH)
MY AFGHANISTAN SIGHS
I don't like thinking about Afghanistan. I don't like reading about it, I don't like stressing about it. One of my friends said she was worried all weekend that I hadn't heard from my husband because she had read about some local soldiers being killed. I didn't even know it had happened. I have busied myself with domestic issues and ostriched myself to the war. And since my husband cannot tell me what he does and cannot talk about his life, it's easy to forget that he's not just away at summer camp.
But now with discussions of whether Obama will send additional troops, I have been forced to think about it a little. But reading and thinking about it just ruffles me more. Like this:
Hence nation-building would be impossible even if we knew how, and even
if Afghanistan were not the second-worst place to try: The Brookings
Institution ranks Somalia as the only nation with a weaker state.
Notwithstanding al-Qaeda’s departure, the idea now seems to be that we
should substantially escalate our military involvement in Afghanistan
to replicate the experiment that supposedly worked so well in Iraq.
It’s the age of Obama, so our commanders are talking not about combat
but about a stimulus package to fight the “culture of poverty.†As
military officials described it to the New York Times,
“the overriding goal of American and NATO forces would not be so much
to kill Taliban insurgents as to make ordinary Afghans feel secure, and
thus isolate the insurgents. That means using force less and focusing
on economic development and good governance.†This is consistent with
the delusional belief that terrorism is caused by poverty, corruption,
resentment, Guantanamo Bay, enhanced interrogation tactics, Israel — in
short, anything other than an ideology rooted in Islamic scripture. But
before we all laugh George Will out of the room, we might remember that
the Taliban was not our reason for invading. We would not have gone to
war to save Afghanistan from the Taliban — which is to say, to save
Afghanistan from itself.
Fred Barnes said last night that it's telling that McChrystal, who is at heart a counter-terrorism guy, is requesting additional troops for counter-insurgency. I hope he knows what he's doing. I hope he gets it right.
Posted by: Erin at September 22, 2009 09:34 AM (pK1qw)
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Me too. My son is over there. I avoid the news, I avoid the blogs, I try not to know. Because there really isn't anything productive that I can do. So I make him peanut butter fudge and don't think.
Posted by: tibby at September 22, 2009 09:45 AM (S/Fac)
CONSTITUTION DAY FAIL
My government class in high school was a joke. We just memorized and regurgitated how many representatives there are and how old they have to be to run, and then we watched Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and hoped that somehow we would all learn how this marvelous American experiment works. FAIL. Completely.
I was just reading an article about how a Muslim girl is suing Abercrombie and Fitch because they discriminated against her for wearing a headscarf. In the comments section, a different Muslim girl is arguing that everyone has the Constitutional right to work wherever they want. She said a size 20 woman has the right to be a runway model. Quote: "That's the right of an American citizen per our grand Constitution."
Does anyone even read the Constitution anymore? Apparently everyone's high school government class was as bad as mine.
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Well, I think everyone should have the right to be an airline pilot, especially those who are too dumb to pass either the practical or written test. And I think those who share the attitudes in the thread you mention should be restricted to flying with such pilots.
Posted by: david foster at September 19, 2009 08:17 AM (uWlpq)
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Same for brain surgeons. One for those of us who require education and certification, another for those who think everyone has a right to be whatever they want to be.
Posted by: chuck at September 19, 2009 01:49 PM (bMH2g)
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I do believe that I would be an astronaut. No,I have no background or training,thanks. Don't need it apparently.
My Civics class was taught by a Mr McKinney. Who was the varsity boys basketball coach. In Indiana,it is a big deal.
Mr McKinney would give us a worksheet on Monday and that same worksheet was the test on Friday. We had the class time to find the information to answer the quiz cum test questions.
It was a joke. I was angry that McKinney spent the whole time diagramming plays on the blackboard.
Some of us did our own version of the class in the back of the room because (IMAGINE!) we were interested.
We formed our own kitchen cabinet and studied the depts in it. Got into some interesting debates as well.
We were told to pipe down. Ruining his concentration,don't you know.
McKinney did go on to another school after aa few years and won the state championship. So glad that he reached his goals in life. Snort.
Posted by: MaryIndiana at September 20, 2009 01:47 AM (09ovY)
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Heck, I'd be happy if our elected representatives had the barest inkling of what is in the Constitution and what this country was founded on.
Sigh.
Posted by: MargeinMI at September 20, 2009 08:02 AM (gXnOq)
"I have a right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness, but there is no guarantee of equal results"
One of Glenn Beck's 9 principles of his 9/12 project.
Posted by: tim at September 21, 2009 11:22 AM (nno0f)
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You got to watch "Mr. Smith goes to Washington?" I didn't get to watch that...in fact, I don't remember who my Gov teacher was...who was yours? Everything I ever needed to know about Gov I learned from Mr. DeFabbio via history classes...but hey, you got to watch a movie ;-)
Posted by: Matt at September 21, 2009 08:29 PM (wNBv7)
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Matt -- We also got to watch 12 Angry Men to learn about the judicial system. Sigh. I had Mr. Moore, who was a new teacher, straight out of college. He was kind of a douchebag.
Posted by: Sarah at September 22, 2009 07:17 AM (2Hw+P)
I want to use all elements of American
power to keep us safe, and prosperous, and free. Instead of alienating
ourselves from the world, I want America - once again - to lead.
As President, I will pursue a
tough, smart and principled national security strategy - one that
recognizes that we have interests not just in Baghdad, but in Kandahar
and Karachi, in Tokyo and London, in Beijing and Berlin.
An editorial in Hospodarske Novine, a respected pro-business Czech
newspaper, said: "an ally we rely on has betrayed us, and exchanged us
for its own, better relations with Russia, of which we are rightly
afraid."
So we elected Obama to end the era of unilateralism, to mend fences with alienated allies and make the world love and respect us again.
Except for the Eastern bloc, who backed George Bush. They can get bent.
[Polish Prime Minister] Tusk did not sound pleased with Obama's announcement, telling Polish radio on Thursday,
"It was an autonomous decision taken by President Barack Obama" that did not involve the Polish government.
The Neville Chamberlain comparison is one that many people are using these days, but it's really unfair--to Chamberlain, that is.
Although Chamberlain pursued a very unwise policy of appeasement, he also hedged this policy by supporting the buildup of Britain's defenses...including production of the Spitfire & Hurricane fighters and the deployment of the world's first radar-based air defense network.
Had Chamberlain fully shared Obama's attitudes on defense, these systems never would have made it out of the design offices, and Britain would probably have lost the war.
Posted by: david foster at September 19, 2009 08:14 AM (uWlpq)
EFFECTIVE OUTCOMES
I am feeling less unsettled lately...
After the huge march on Washington last weekend, and the defunding of ACORN this week, I am feeling more like We the People can pressure the government to represent us.
Here are a few things that regular old Americans have achieved since I wrote that I was unsettled:
For an explanation of the list, in case you're not familiar with all of them, listen here.
I am feeling more optimistic.
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I'm surprised because I tend to think that there isn't that much of a difference between Us and Them. I generally can't tell from someone's behavior which side they're on.
It'd be interesting to see if red state parks are cleaner than blue state ones.
The comparison of the Washington Mall photos isn't quite fair because the inauguratiOn photo was taken in winter. The lack of green makes the Mall look worse. Still, the point remains. I'd expect a protest fueled by negative feelings* to leave more rubbish than a celebratory inauguration, yet the reverse happened!
*Yes, I know the protestors were motivated out of love for America. But when one's mad about America turning into Omerica, one might litter without a second thought. Or not!
Posted by: Amritas at September 17, 2009 12:36 PM (+nV09)
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Why should I trust photos posted at American Thinker? (What a misnomer. True thinkers don't have their doubleplus ungOOd thoughts.) Oh, excuuuuse us, Gateway Pundit. The 9/12 photos were probably photoshopped: rubbish was removed and extra people were added. 99.99% of Omericans want Dr. gOvernment.
That 0.01% that bothered to show up probably drove away in Gaia-tormenting SUVs while the millions that came to the enthrOnement came in Priuses (Barack bless 'em) and peOple's transportation. The pictures don't tell the whole story. If a picture is worth a thousand words, there could be nine thousand other words we won't deign to say.
And let's suppose that the peOple really did make a mess. Is that really such a bad thing? Think of all the people employed to clean up that mess! All the jobs created by his ascensiOn! Break a window for Barack!
Posted by: kevin at September 17, 2009 12:48 PM (+nV09)
I'm not sure that a comparison of "red" and "blue" national parks would do it, either.
Blue areas tend to be more urban than red areas; and urban areas tend to be a lot nastier trash wise. I'm not sure how much of that can realistically be laid at the feet of political belief systems, because I think the sheer number of people in one area tends to cause more of the ugliness than the fact that urban areas tend to be blue.
Another factor I think might play into the issue is self identity. I try to keep my house looking nice (or rather, I'm fixing my house up) because I want to be proud of where I live. If you don't have any vested pride in something, why bother to take care of it?
Posted by: airforcewife at September 17, 2009 03:18 PM (9sMSe)
Some conservative blogs have been circulating photos allegedly taken
during the rally. But at least one fact-checking site says the photos
are fakes ...
Politifact, a nonpartisan journalistic fact-checking organization,
checked in on Monday with Pete Piringer, public affairs officer for the
DC Fire and Emergency Department. Piringer “unofficially†estimated
that between 60,000 and 75,000 people had shown up. He added that the
photo circulating conservative sites was almost certainly not from this
year.
The caption for the photo at the top speaks of "photos" being "fakes". Many will not read the actual article which only discusses one fake photo. One commenter noticed this act of legerdemot:
To imply that *all* of the 9/12 photos are fakes based on this one
photo, which I have only seen here, being called out as fake is a
blatant propaganda move. Not journalism.
"It is one of our basic tasks to contrapose our own truth to bourgeois 'truth', and win its recognition.
The transition from bourgeois society to the policy of the proletariat is a very difficult one, all the more so for the bourgeoisie incessantly slandering us through its entire apparatus of propaganda and agitation. It bends every effort to play down an even more important mission of the dictatorship of the proletariat, its educational mission ..."
Teach us mOre, o MSM!
Posted by: kevin at September 18, 2009 10:19 AM (+nV09)
I suggested parks because comparing blue cities with red towns makes no sense for the reasons you stated:
Blue areas tend to be more urban than red areas; and urban areas tend
to be a lot nastier trash wise. I'm not sure how much of that can
realistically be laid at the feet of political belief systems, because
I think the sheer number of people in one area tends to cause more of
the ugliness than the fact that urban areas tend to be blue.
I presume there is no difference in human density among the visitors to blue and red parks. There is, however, a complicating factor I overlooked: visitors to parks can come from other areas. If a park's visitors are overwhelmingly non-local, the condition of the park tells us nothing about local behavior. Moreover, most visitors to a red park could be blue, and vice versa.
In any case, my guess is that there is no difference between blue and red parks in terms of cleanliness. Do parks in, say, California have a bad reputation?
I try to keep my house looking nice (or rather, I'm fixing my house up)
because I want to be proud of where I live. If you don't have any
vested pride in something, why bother to take care of it?
Leftists feel this pride too. Look at how nice the houses of the elite are. But how proud do the tenants of public housing feel? As Rick Moran wrote,
On the other hand, liberals
don't see public property as their concern, but rather that of the
government. When everyone owns the land, no one is responsible for it
in their calculation.
Yet we must all pay for public property. And we must pay more as the public sector grOws.
Posted by: Amritas at September 18, 2009 11:26 AM (+nV09)
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I forgot to mention that you can always trust "a nonpartisan journalistic fact-checking organization".
In nOwOmOwa (from Polish for 'Newspeak'), words like nonpartisan and neutral really mean prOgressive. Which as we all know really means back to the glorious socialism of the past. Now that's progress - in a wOrld where blue means 'Red'.
Ever notice how you hear about the center-left, but never the center-right? How the gOOd guys are always moderates while you are extremists? We control language. We control people's perceptions of reality. Even conservatives often think within the confines of our framework.
... nowadays the left-wing position is actually considered the default ...
I reject so many of these so-called non-partisan positions ...
So in normal discussions with Democrats, I am always operating from a disadvantage, because "conventional wisdom" or "normal people" usually grant these premises. I'm always frustrated because I don't accept the underlying foundation of their arguments, which makes it hard to have a discussion because to them, this is the normal default position ...
I believe that the Republican Party will never be a success if it keeps granting Democrat premises. It can't keep trying to find right-wing solutions to things that many right-wingers don't accept as the default. McCain let Obama frame the debates ...
Nobody I know wanted to vote for Democrat Lite, but that's what we were getting served.
Get ready for a second serving in 2012! victOry is inevitable!
Posted by: kevin at September 18, 2009 11:56 AM (+nV09)
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And we finally found an issue where we disagree 100% with President Obama. Kanye West is a herO for standing up to Europpression. Beyonce's video was better and you all know it. Copy Kanye!
HELP, HELP, I'M BEING OPPRESSED!
I was racially discriminated against today.
I got in a black cashier's line at Walmart. She took the lady in front of me and then switched off her light, saying that I'd have to change lines because she needed to close down for a few minutes. So I hopped over to the line next to hers, behind three other people. The black cashier finished up with the lady she was helping, puttered around for about 30 seconds, found out that she was no longer needed to help clean up another register, and then turned her light back on and motioned for a black lady who was just walking up to the checkout area to get in her line.
Raaaaacist! She helped a black customer instead of telling me to go ahead and get back in her line! She took a black lady who'd just arrived to checkout instead of white me, who'd been waiting for several minutes! I need a Beer Summit!
94 percent of African-American eighth graders reported to Harris-Britt
that they'd felt discriminated against in the prior three months.
Now, I don't really think it was racial discrimination at Walmart. I think the cashier was kinda boorish and lazy, and that she didn't care who she helped next as long as she was doing her job. When I called her on it, she apologized as if the thought had never crossed her mind to ask me to return to her line. She didn't do it because I was white; she did it because she was unobservant and clueless.
But it got me thinking and I remembered the above statistic from a recent Newsweek article about children's racial attitudes. If almost every single black pre-teen says they're constantly being discriminated against, then it seems to me that, if the tables were turned and a white cashier helped a white customer over a black one, some people out there are interpreting that as racism.
I don't think it's racism. I think it's laziness, or bad manners, or tunnel vision you get from doing the same mundane task all day long. But I don't for one second think she pushed me out of her line because I was white. But do black people think that? It seems some of these pre-teens probably do. How else could they all say they've been discriminated against recently? A few may have truly met with bigotry, but a good number of them must just be interpreting the slightest offenses as racism.
It just got me thinking that, if you try to find slights based on skin color, you will see them. But I'd bet that much of the "discrimination" people feel they're encountering is just a misunderstanding or a breakdown in acceptable social behavior, not racism.
Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.
You can pretty easily substitute laziness for stupidity, I'd say.
Another favorite saying of mine is that when you're holding a hammer all of your problems look like nails. So, if you've been told all of your life that you're a victim, you start looking for proof.
Posted by: Christa at September 15, 2009 01:06 PM (2qSbp)
Reading this post embodied your last point. I wanted to look for a nail after the first sentence. Then I got to the incident, initially thought that it was a nail - that it was racist - and then instantly realized, hey, wait, this could have happened for nonracial reasons.
Most of the cashiers at stores near me are black. I'm not black, and I probably had the same thing happen to me, but I never thought anything of it. I didn't take out my Victimâ„¢ hammer because I wasn't thinking of nails. I'm not white either. But when my interactions with whites go wrong, I almost never see any nails. I can only think of two or three incidents in my entire life that might have been racist. Might.
Those kids need desensitivity training. They need to be told that not everything is a nail. Don't take out that hammer unless you're certain you need it. Otherwise you look paranoid and no one but your fellow 'victims' will take you seriously anymore.
Posted by: Amritas at September 15, 2009 02:17 PM (+nV09)
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As a half black woman speaking, I have experienced this crap from more and more people on a general basis. People are lazy and stupid. Growing up I was not taught that is was alright to cry wolf every time I did not win, get my way, or just wanted something. I had to earn certain things on merit and forgive others because people may just not know, or see. Is that an excuse? No it is not but it is life all around us everyday. If someone goes looking for a frog in the desert then they will find one.
Posted by: Reasa at September 15, 2009 02:47 PM (uKniq)
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Sarah, you can't be discriminated against. You are white.
Racism is a black thing, you can't possibly understand.
Kill Whitey!
Posted by: chuck at September 16, 2009 12:05 AM (bMH2g)
I work as a trainer at Petsmart. Sometimes when we are really busy they make me cashier because I'm not 18 and have a brain. When we open up a new register we take the next person in line. It does not matter what color they are.
I will however cop to the fact that if a customer comes into my store and they are wearing an abaya and I cannot see their face. I will not wait on them unless I am cashiering and then I have to. 99.9% of the women who comes in wearing them, I'd say there are about a half dozen maybe more per day where I work, are black. It has nothing to do with them being another color. It has everything to do with the fact that I find it absolutely offensive that after all the work that has been done by women's rights activitists that an American woman would chose to subjugate herself in this way.
Plus I just find it straight up offensive that American's choose to dress this way while we are war. I guess I'm a bigot. But I don't really care. My favorite was the 16 year old who came in wearing a hajib scarf, the TIGHTEST pair of jean's I have ever seen, and a half shirt with most of her cleavage hanging out.
Time for me to break out my Infidel t-shirt and my Dad's old hat from when he was stationed at Guantanamo Naval Air Station. I'll let you know if I get fired.
Posted by: Mare at September 16, 2009 08:51 AM (HUa8I)
BORLAUG CARRIED A WATERMELON
I'm a few days late, but I was finally prompted to say something because of Patrick Swayze. I don't mean to denigrate him at all; he was a fine actor and probably a fine man. (He was in Red Dawn, for pete's sake, so that automatically makes him OK in my book.) But a couple days ago, Deskmerc was the only one of my Facebook friends to salute the passing of Norman Borlaug. As of last night, dozens of people were saluting Swayze. I think that's exactly backwards, and while everyone is touched that Johnny won't dance again, myself included, we all missed the fact that the greatest man who ever lived passed away this week too.
We are still cavepeople. We feel more for what we can see. We saw Patrick Swayze, not just in a brief clip like one you linked to, but in movies watched by millions. Or a movie in my case. I've only seen him in Red Dawn over 20 years ago and have only the vaguest notion of what he looks like. So I had to look up "carried a watermelon".
How many actors from Shakespeare's time are remembered today? Only those who saw those actors perform remember them, and they are as long dead as the actors. But Swayze's image will live on every time a DVD of his performances plays.
I don't care for the cult of the actor. Movies are stories (or are supposed to be stories). Who makes up those stories? Unseen writers. Yet even directors get more attention. But there would be nothing to act out, nothing to direct, without writers. Yet how many people can name the writers of their favorite movies and TV shows?
Writing is abstract and doesn't impress us the way an actor does. Our reactions to actors are no different from a caveman's reactions to an attractive human. We let our instincts overpower our intellect. This is why people sit through bad movies with charismatic actors (and put up with bad but charismatic leaders).
I must have seen Borlaug's name before. I've definitely read about the Green Revolution before and I even mentioned it to you in a recent email (albeit without Borlaug's name). Nonetheless his name didn't stick in my brain. Unlike Swayze, Borlaug was a name without a face. A string of letters that unraveled and disappeared down the memory hole. I had to look him up this morning after you mentioned him. His achievements are hard to visualize:
Borlaug's discoveries have been estimated to have saved over 245 million lives worldwide.
Penn said "a billion people".
We can't see those billion lives being saved. There aren't cameras running to record his process of discovery. And watching people farm and eat isn't exciting, whereas a guy saving a single life on camera is exciting ... and understandable. Most of us don't process big numbers. We can easily envision saving one life, or the lives of everyone on a bus. We've seen such acts dramatized. But a billion lives? We cannot see that many people. It's physically impossible.
So in short, here's the cruel irony: we're hard-wired to admire the small and concrete but neglect the great and abstract. Man can do amazing things, but other men may not care - even though they may depend on the hidden and virtuous for their very lives!
Virtue is its own reward. Do what's right, even if you'll never be recognized. Be like Borlaug.
Posted by: Amritas at September 15, 2009 11:27 AM (+nV09)
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Take a look at this (well, maybe you shouldn't): "The feted agronomist may have saved a billion from starvation, but..." How can anyone write "but" after "may have saved a billion from starvation"?
Posted by: David Boxenhorn at September 16, 2009 01:01 AM (/+KQb)
IT'S ALL ABOUT HIM
At PowerLine: "Obama seems increasingly unable to resist the kind of specious
arguments a fairly bright first year law student might make in a crunch." Oy.
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A PRESENT FOR A NERD BABY
I can finally post a photo of a recent baby gift. WifeUnit's husband is a Star Wars nut, and I have decided that I really get a kick out of making baby presents that are geared towards the dads. So when I learned they were having another baby, I went searching teh internets for a good pattern.
I'm a novice crocheter, but Lucy's pattern wasn't too hard to follow. I just had a hard time with the face fur: I made two heads and a couple different faces until I got the one I liked.
And I showed that hat to the multitude in my house and there was much excitement.
Posted by: airforcewife at September 14, 2009 07:48 PM (CDkfD)
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That totally rocks! I'm still knitting on my loom. I made one bootie. Can't make the other one because I can't remember how I did the first one. Until I get smart, I'll have to live vicariously through you
Posted by: Susan at September 14, 2009 08:10 PM (EU2Wl)
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Oh Ma Lord, I LOVE it! That has got to be one of the most awesome things I've ever seen!
Posted by: sharona at September 14, 2009 08:25 PM (BeRta)
Posted by: Miss Ladybug at September 14, 2009 11:17 PM (paOhf)
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I truly love that I got to see the look on Mark's face when he opened it. Even if having a mystery package sitting around the house waiting for him to get home was HARD.
I'll have to see if the seller will add one more child size to my mom's order for last year's Christmas present. The three boys with matching hats would be pretty awesome in a supremely dorky way.
I am so bad, I will confess, that the first thing that popped in my Star Wars challenged mind was Sand People. And not Ewoks. I'm not even sure if Star Wars has Sand People or what.
And I'll just say thank you again. I think presents for Dads and babies is pretty awesome as far as ideas go.
Posted by: wifeunit at September 15, 2009 06:42 AM (4B1kO)
A CROSSROADS OF SORTS
While I feel that the majority of infertility blogging is behind me, and since I don't plan to blog about my kid once she's here, I feel trapped between moving on and keeping you notified of my progress. Many of you have been with me from the beginning, from the day I wrote my post asking for advice for someone who is thinking of getting pregnant. You have helped me through hard times and rallied behind little John Elway baby this time around. I remain amazed at how many fans my baby has, all because I opened up and tried to be honest about the infertility bane. I tried to tell it like it was, in hopes that I could process it and that maybe someone out there would feel a little less alone in her journey. I am so grateful that you have kept reading my nonsense along the way and encouraged me to keep sharing the good and the ugly. My baby is already more celebrated and loved by complete strangers than I ever dreamed possible.
So I hate to leave you hanging. I will update from time to time on my progress.
I am 15 weeks along. Yesterday I had an appointment with a fantastic nurse practitioner. She spent an hour with me, longer than all the time I spent with my fertility doctor combined over the past year. She answered all my questions and repeated that I am in charge of my pregnancy and they will do anything they can to give me knowledge and help me along. I got a great vibe off of her and hope that I continue to work with people like her.
She listened to baby's heartbeat, and right in the middle of it was a big THUD. Baby kicked the ultrasound wand. I couldn't feel it, but we both heard it and laughed.
I am doing well. I have a tummy and look newly pregnant. My mind over matter decision seems to have worked: the day I announced I would no longer be morning sick, I started eating again. I have gained back the weight I lost in the first trimester and have just hit the hungry phase over the past few days. Yesterday, out of the blue, I wanted Ruffles and onion dip. I may come to regret the fact that I no longer eat only fruit and water...
The nurse practitioner also told me to avoid unpleasantness as much as I can. She said that with my
history of loss and a deployed husband, I will be prone to anxiety. So,
she said, the best thing to do is to have as much fun as possible. Eat
fun things, do fun activities, and try to make this the
hap-hap-happiest six months of my life. Sounds good to me. I plan to
play skee-ball soon.
1
Awesome! I love that last paragraph, and I'm sending tons of fun and happy thoughts your way.
Posted by: FbL at September 12, 2009 08:42 AM (HyNTm)
2
Sounds like an excellent plan, except that if I were in your position, I think I'd opt for something other than onion dip ;-)
Posted by: Miss Ladybug at September 12, 2009 09:40 AM (paOhf)
3
Onion dip sounds delish right about now. I'm glad you'll keep updating, otherwise curiosity would get the best of me and I would resort to flooding your inbox with emails (oh wait, I've already done that)
Posted by: dutchgirl at September 12, 2009 11:45 AM (hLAkQ)
She spent an hour with me, longer than all the time I spent with my fertility doctor combined over the past year.
Finally you get the attention you deserve! The 'quality' of care you got from your doctor never ceases to appall me. I imagine him as a heartless, vile version of the doctor I saw last year who ran his clinic like a drive-thru - nice guy, but obviously in a hurry.
In the idiocratic world that's coming, drive-thru medicine will be the norm. You'll yell your problem into a speaker. "I, like, don't feel so good or something!" Then some teenager at the window will hand you a bag of random drugs. For more 'care', you can stand in line inside McDoctor's.
Wishing you much hap-hap-happiness ...
Posted by: Amritas at September 12, 2009 11:51 AM (h9KHg)
I would like to help you have some fun the weekend after next when we are going back to Cali, Cali, Cali (oops, sorry! couldn't resist!).
Whatcha say, sister? Want to sit by each other blogging questions and answers to each other like we did in Vegas? Or, sit waiting for 4 hours for dinner like we did in Virginia only to realize I ate your Mom's food? Maybe we can stuff goodie bags for a bit and then go the the computer center at the hotel and confirm our flights home? We are a laugh a MINUTE, I'm tellin' ya!
Seriously, though, I'm looking forward to seeing you again!
Posted by: Guard Wife at September 12, 2009 05:26 PM (EvsXa)
Even though you call me after your appointments, please continue to write about your pregnancy. It's fun reading about what happens at your visits ( and sometimes sad), but I still want to read. I would imagine the people interested in hearing from you outweigh those very, very, few who don't care to hear about your pregnancy, which I always wonder if people don't like to hear your opinions on politics, military info, pregnancies, etc., why do they even visit your site? Your mama
Posted by: Sarah at September 13, 2009 01:12 AM (0DENp)
I am coming out of lurkdom just to let you know how much I'd like to hear about your baby. I've been reading your blog for sometime and have been praying for this to be......so, if you can, please keep us in the loop.
Enjoy the onion dip...I may have some right now as a kindred spirit (you don't have to ask me twice)
Posted by: Trudy at September 13, 2009 08:12 AM (OAPSQ)
9
Can we set up a betting pool for the next strange food craving?
Posted by: deskmerc at September 13, 2009 12:43 PM (3rYlD)
and please please please tell us what you name her! As a long time reader I feel like I have a vested interested and would be really sad if only ever knew your baby as "Daisy" or some other pseudonym. I'm just saying...
Lots of luck!
Posted by: Gina at September 14, 2009 03:38 PM (2mX2s)
Hurray for happiness! I seriously am so thrilled for you that it's practically like my own baby! I keep looking for cute outfits that I can send her when she's born. I'm waiting to find that "perfect" one! Yay for 15 weeks and hurray for a good nurse prac!
Posted by: Stacy at September 14, 2009 04:39 PM (JKqIL)
13
Terrific news. Hope you have lots of fun in the next few months, watch funny movies, eat lots of "not so good for you" stuff. Chips and onion dip is a good start.
Posted by: Pamela at September 14, 2009 10:58 PM (Egn5l)
WHY IS THERE STILL A HOLE?
Like Glenn Beck, my anger has been more focused lately on my own government than on the enemy. Even with my husband in Afghanistan, I have spent the majority of my time fretting over the 10th Amendment.
I thought this was worth watching and thinking about yesterday...
Posted by: Sarah at
09:13 AM
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Post contains 53 words, total size 1 kb.
I am reminded of Nelson Ascher's post again today.
The problem is that I do not want to waste a milligram of my
anger on all the idiots who have been getting ready to show us how
idiotic they are. We're at a point where to be too angry at, say,
Chomsky and the BBC, Old Europe and ANSWER, second and third rate
entertainers and academics is to give them a kind of victory. They
deserve disdain. Anger needs to remain concentrated like light in a
laser beam, we must direct it toward its rightful target: Islamofascism
first and foremost. If we spend too much time getting mad at those who
are but idiots we run the risk of forgetting, even if only for a
second, that it is the Muslim/Arab religious fanatics who are the
ENEMY. In a way, that's the idiots' main weapon: to attract a wrath
that could be more usefully directed to the really dangerous enemies.
Whenever we're not thinking about the Jihadists we are losing some very
precious time. And anger."
1
I don't think this is a time for you to be angry. Your focus is in the right place: your pregnancy. And you have not forgotten 9/11. Otherwise you wouldn't have posted this.
Your focus will be on your daughter for many years to come. This doesn't necessarily mean you've shut off Nelson's laser beam. On the contrary, you're training a member of the next generation of laser riflemen. Even if your daughter never becomes a gun enthusiast, she must be armed with the greatest weapons of the West: its ideas.
She must be loyal to the ideas that our government has betrayed (emphasis mine):
The State Department’s new “democratic†constitutions
for Afghanistan and Iraq are a disgrace: establishing Islam as the
state religion and elevating sharia as fundamental law. That is not
exporting our values; it is appeasing Islamism. It is putting on
display our lack of will to fight for our principles, which only
emboldens our enemies.
Can you imagine if the Axis got new constitutions like the Afghan and Iraqi constitutions after World War II? What happened to the America that won that war?
Recall, for example, the spectacle of the
Christian prosecuted for apostasy a couple of years back by the
post-Taliban, U.S.-backed Afghan government. He had to be whisked out
of the country because it’s not safe for an ex-Muslim religious convert
in the new Afghanistan. It’s not safe for non-Muslims, period.
Several years ago, she converted from Islam to Christianity ... After her father threatened to kill her for apostasy, a
crime under Islamic Sharia law, Rifqa hitchhiked to the bus station and
fled to Florida [from Ohio].
The 9/11 attacks were extensively planned, over long
periods of time, in, among other places, Berlin, Madrid, San Diego,
Florida, Oklahoma, and Connecticut. Clearly, thriving democracy in
those places provided no security.
A country that sacrifices for its enemies (emphasis mine):
And what we had our hands full with in Iraq and Afghanistan was
nation-building. Quite apart from the inherent futility of trying to
democratize fundamentalist Muslim countries, our efforts in those two
places were doomed if we failed to address Iran’s promotion of
terrorism and its intolerable nuclear threat. What has happened to Iraq
has happened because we lacked the will to deal with Iran. We left
unaccomplished the mission that was vital to our national interests
while laboring exhaustively to create Islamic democracies that are
either hostile or useless to us.
A country that imports sharia, the antithesis of your ideas, into places like Ohio. Ohio!
None of that is primarily the fault of - as Nelson put it - "Chomsky and the BBC, Old Europe and ANSWER, second and third rate
entertainers and academics". I'm not mad at them. I laugh at them. I even laugh at the first-rate entertainers and academics who venture out of their fields to support the latest Leftist fashion. They're just a sideshow, a distraction. Let's focus on our real external and internal enemies.
We can’t stop Muslim countries from being Islamist. That
is their choice. It should be no concern of ours who rules them as long
as they do not threaten American interests. When they inevitably do
threaten us, or allow their territories to be launch pads for
terrorists, we should smash them. But the price of defending our nation
cannot be spending years — at a cost of precious lives and hundreds of
billions of dollars — in a vain attempt to give people who despise us a
way of life they don’t want.
The question for me is, what do we do about the latter, about our enemies within? Can we simply keep voting them out of office? Instead of worrying about freedom for Islamists abroad, we should worry about the future of freedom here. As McCarthy suggested,
The surge we need is at home: to roll back Islamism’s
infiltration of our schools, our financial system, our law, and our
government. In addition to not being universal, the “values of the
human spirit†are not immortal. If we don’t defend them in the West,
they will die.
But there are more threats than terrorism. Recently we have seen a homegrown surge against socialism in the form of tea parties - of Rightist protests against Dr. gOvernment. Our citizen-troops may win this battle. But can they keep winning? Or will they - we - eventually be outnumbered by those who vote for 'free' handouts? Will we have to retreat to our gulch?
PS: Nelson, wherever you are, I miss you.
Posted by: Amritas at September 11, 2009 10:20 AM (+nV09)
2
I think my anger is spread thin because I'm just so tired. TIRED. Tired of the constant deployments and TDYS, tired of fighting at home and keeping up the face for those deployed to keep their morale up, tired of the constant attacks and name-calling, tired of seeming to take two steps back for every step forward, and tired because it seems like we're still on the brink in so many places.
I'm not ready to give up, I'm just tired. I need a rest, and there doesn't seem to be one in sight. I'm still angry, and I think that's why I refuse to give up, but it's hard to focus that anger when you're overwhelmed.
On the other hand, I've also ever been one to to smack myself about whining when seeing someone else's situation. How can I complain about being tired when I think about what Britain went through in WWII? My children and I don't have to retreat into the metro stations to avoid bombing raids every night. We can eat whatever we want - my grandmother had shortages.
How can I complain about being tired when there were members of my husband's family who went through Stalingrad? My fatigue is NOTHING compared to that.
I'm lucky, and I have no right to slow down. But sometimes I do. And that's why my anger is spread thin. But days like today are what cause me to regroup and regather and remember what we're fighting for.
I'm tired, but I have not forgotten.
Posted by: airforcewife at September 11, 2009 11:37 AM (CDkfD)
I REMAIN SHOCKED TOO
Jonah Goldberg says, "I have no idea why I still have the capacity to be shocked by such things." Thomas Friedman Is a Liberal Fascist
1
Translation: Thomas Friedman is a good guy! A true friend of the people ... the People's Republic of China:
One-party autocracy certainly has its drawbacks. But when it is led by
a reasonably enlightened group of people, as China is today, it can
also have great advantages. That one party can just impose the
politically difficult but critically important policies needed to move
a society forward in the 21st century. It is not an accident that China
is committed to [blah blah blah ... lotsa good green stuff] ...
Say ä½ å¥½ ni hao (hello) to our new role model! If we Great Leaders weren't unselfishly dedicated to saving you from capitalism, we'd let the PRC's "reasonably enlightened group of people" rule you. Our cities, true-blue zones like New York City, will be the next Beijing, Shanghai, and Shenzhen, and the rest of America can be "impoverished" like the rest of the PRC. And under "The Firm Hand of the Benign Strongman", the number of patents filed by Omericans will be reduced by 99.7%. (90,000 American patents were filed in the US in 2002, but only 297 PRC patents were filed in the US in 2003.) Innovation requires freedom. Great Leaders don't require innovation. They just need lots of followers. So let's add 300 million more. Annex America. Learn æ™®é€šè¯ Putonghua, I mean Mandarin, the exciting è¯è¨€ yuyan (language) of the future that nearly half of the PRC's population aren't fluent in! Welcome to Friedman's flat 世界 shijie (world) where all will be equally poor except for an elite of smart people like us!
Posted by: kevin at September 09, 2009 02:57 PM (+nV09)
A coal mine accident early on Tuesday killed 13 people and 66 others were missing in central China's Henan Province, the Xinhua news agency reported, citing the state work safety watchdog.
China's mines are the deadliest in the world, due to lax safety standards and a rush to feed demand from a robust economy. More than 3,000 people died in coal mine accidents in 2008 alone.
**
Part of China's problem with mine safety is due to the fact that they're at an earlier stage of economic development than we are. Part of it, though, is that China's government doesn't have to be excessively concerned with casualties among those Obama likes to call "working families."
I wonder whether Friedman would prefer to be a coal miner in China or in the United States.
Posted by: david foster at September 09, 2009 07:20 PM (uWlpq)
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There is neither happiness nor misery in the world; there is only the comparison of one state with another, nothing more. He who has felt the deepest grief is best able to experience supreme happiness. We must have felt what it is to die, Morrel, that we may appreciate the enjoyments of living. --The Count of Monte Cristo--
While our troops go out to defend our country, it is incumbent upon us to make the country worth defending. --Deskmerc--
Contrary to what you've just seen, war is neither glamorous nor fun. There are no winners, only losers. There are no good wars, with the following exceptions: The American Revolution, WWII, and the Star Wars Trilogy. --Bart Simpson--
If you want to be a peacemaker, you've gotta learn to kick ass. --Sheriff of East Houston, Superman II--
Going to war without France is like going deer hunting without an accordion. You just leave a lot of useless noisy baggage behind. --Jed Babbin--
Dante once said that the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in a period of moral crisis maintain their neutrality. --President John F. Kennedy--
War is a bloody, killing business. You've got to spill their blood, or they will spill yours. --General Patton--
We've gotta keep our heads until this peace craze blows over. --Full Metal Jacket--
Those who threaten us and kill innocents around the world do not need to be treated more sensitively. They need to be destroyed. --Dick Cheney--
The Flag has to come first if freedom is to survive. --Col Steven Arrington--
The purpose of diplomacy isn't to make us feel good about Eurocentric diplomatic skills, and having countries from the axis of chocolate tie our shoelaces together does nothing to advance our infantry. --Sir George--
I just don't care about the criticism I receive every day, because I know the cause I defend is right. --Oriol--
It's days like this when we're reminded that freedom isn't free. --Chaplain Jacob--
Bumper stickers aren't going to accomplish some of the missions this country is going to face. --David Smith--
The success of multilateralism is measured not merely by following a process, but by achieving results. --President Bush--
Live and act within the limit of your knowledge and keep expanding it to the limit of your life.
--John Galt--
First, go buy a six pack and swig it all down. Then, watch Ace Ventura. And after that, buy a Hard Rock Cafe shirt and come talk to me. You really need to lighten up, man.
--Sminklemeyer--
You've got to kill people, and when you've killed enough they stop fighting --General Curtis Lemay--
If we wish to be free, if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending, if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained -- we must fight! --Patrick Henry--
America has never been united by blood or birth or soil. We are bound by ideals that move us beyond our backgrounds, lift us above our interests and teach us what it means to be citizens. Every child must be taught these principles. Every citizen must uphold them. And every immigrant, by embracing these ideals, makes our country more, not less, American. --President George W. Bush--
are usually just cheerleading sessions, full of sound and fury and signifying nothing but a soothing reduction in blood pressure brought about by the narcotic high of being agreed with. --Bill Whittle
War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.
--John Stuart Mill--
We are determined that before the sun sets on this terrible struggle, our flag will be recognized throughout the world as a symbol of freedom on the one hand and of overwhelming force on the other. --General George Marshall--
We can continue to try and clean up the gutters all over the world and spend all of our resources looking at just the dirty spots and trying to make them clean. Or we can lift our eyes up and look into the skies and move forward in an evolutionary way.
--Buzz Aldrin--
America is the greatest, freest and most decent society in existence. It is an oasis of goodness in a desert of cynicism and barbarism. This country, once an experiment unique in the world, is now the last best hope for the world.
--Dinesh D'Souza--
Recent anti-Israel protests remind us again of our era's peculiar alliance: the most violent, intolerant, militantly religious movement in modern times has the peace movement on its side. --James Lileks--
As a wise man once said: we will pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.
Unless the price is too high, the burden too great, the hardship too hard, the friend acts disproportionately, and the foe fights back. In which case, we need a timetable.
--James Lileks--
I am not willing to kill a man so that he will agree with my faith, but I am prepared to kill a man so that he cannot force my compatriots to submit to his.
--Froggy--
You can say what you want about President Bush; but the truth is that he can take a punch. The man has taken a swift kick in the crotch for breakfast every day for 6 years and he keeps getting up with a smile in his heart and a sense of swift determination to see the job through to the best of his abilties.
--Varifrank--
In a perfect world, We'd live in peace and love and harmony with each oither and the world, but then, in a perfect world, Yoko would have taken the bullet.
--SarahBellum--
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free. --Ronald Reagan--
America is rather like life. You can usually find in it what you look for. It will probably be interesting, and it is sure to be large. --E.M. Forster--
Do not fear the enemy, for your enemy can only take your life. It is far better that you fear the media, for they will steal your HONOR. That awful power, the public opinion of a nation, is created in America by a horde of ignorant, self-complacent simpletons who failed at ditching and shoemaking and fetched up in journalism on their way to the poorhouse. --Mark Twain--
The Enlightenment was followed by the French Revolution and the Napoleonic wars, which touched every European state, sparked vicious guerrilla conflicts across the Continent and killed millions. Then, things really turned ugly after the invention of soccer. --Iowahawk--
Every time I meet an Iraqi Army Soldier or Policeman that I haven't met before, I shake his hand and thank him for his service. Many times I am thanked for being here and helping his country. I always tell them that free people help each other and that those that truly value freedom help those seeking it no matter the cost. --Jack Army--
Right, left - the terms are useless nowadays anyway. There are statists, and there are individualists. There are pessimists, and optimists. There are people who look backwards and trust in the West, and those who look forward and trust in The World. Those are the continuums that seem to matter the most right now. --Lileks--
The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.
--Winston Churchill--
A man or a nation is not placed upon this earth to do merely what is pleasant and what is profitable. It is often called upon to carry out what is both unpleasant and unprofitable, but if it is obviously right it is mere shirking not to undertake it. --Arthur Conan Doyle--
A man who has nothing which he cares about more than he does about his personal safety is a miserable creature who has no chance of being free, unless made and kept so by the existing of better men than himself. --John Stuart Mill--
After the attacks on September 11, 2001, most of the sheep, that is, most citizens in America said, "Thank God I wasn't on one of those planes." The sheepdogs, the warriors, said, "Dear God, I wish I could have been on one of those planes. Maybe I could have made a difference." --Dave Grossman--
At heart I’m a cowboy; my attitude is if they’re not going to stand up and fight for what they believe in then they can go pound sand. --Bill Whittle--
A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship. --Alexander Tyler--
By that time a village half-wit could see what generations of professors had pretended not to notice. --Atlas Shrugged--
I kept asking Clarence why our world seemed to be collapsing and everything seemed so shitty. And he'd say, "That's the way it goes, but don't forget, it goes the other way too." --Alabama Worley--
So Bush is history, and we have a new president who promises to heal the planet, and yet the jihadists don’t seem to have got the Obama message that there are no enemies, just friends we haven’t yet held talks without preconditions with.
--Mark Steyn--
"I had started alone in this journey called life, people started
gathering up on the way, and the caravan got bigger everyday." --Urdu couplet
The book and the sword are the two things that control the world. We either gonna control them through knowledge and influence their minds, or we gonna bring the sword and take their heads off. --RZA--
It's a daily game of public Frogger, hopping frantically to avoid being crushed under the weight of your own narcissism, banality, and plain old stupidity. --Mary Katharine Ham--
There are more instances of the abridgment of freedoms
of the people by gradual and silent encroachment of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations. --James Madison--
It is in the heat of emotion that good people must remember to stand on principle. --Larry Elder--
Please show this to the president and ask him to remember the wishes of the forgotten man, that is, the one who dared to vote against him. We expect to be tramped on but we do wish the stepping would be a little less hard. --from a letter to Eleanor Roosevelt--
The world economy depends every day on some engineer, farmer, architect, radiator shop owner, truck driver or plumber getting up at 5AM, going to work, toiling hard, and producing real wealth so that an array of bureaucrats, regulators, and redistributors can manage the proper allotment of much of the natural largess produced. --VDH--
Parents are often so busy with the physical rearing of children that they miss the glory of parenthood, just as the grandeur of the trees is lost when raking leaves. --Marcelene Cox--
