From meteorologist Joe Bastardi. Here.
Here’s a handy guide from the firearms experts at Rolling Stone: The 5 Most Dangerous Guns in America We read: Contrary to what those who defend the right to own high-powered assault rifles believe, not all guns are created equal. Due to a combination of availability, portability and criminal usage the following five types of […]
The comics used to be escapist entertainment. If you’re trying to find a place to escape the mind-bludgeoning drumbeat of cultural Marxism, though, these days you’d better look somewhere else. Not only is Archie Andrews about to martyr himself in the name of homophilia and hoplophobia (a pacifist, anti-cis-heteropatriarchal twofer!), but now we learn that […]
Sorry, no post tonight. Too humid.
From Watts Up With That: Antarctica continues to defy the global warming script, with a report from Meteo France, that June this year was the coldest Antarctic June ever recorded, at the French Antarctic Dumont d’Urville Station. According to the press release, during June this year, the average temperature was -22.4c (-8.3F), 6.6c (11.9F) lower […]
DARPA apparently has a .50-caliber sniper round, called EXACTO, that can adjust its trajectory in-flight to stay on target. I wonder how it works.
It’s hard to believe that all the Ramones are now dead, but there it is: Tommy Ramone, the last man standing, died yesterday of cancer.
Our old e-pal, the estimable Deogolwulf, appears to have caught the Marxist philosopher Slavoj Žižek in a spot of plagiarism. Žižek is something of a “rock star” in certain Continental circles, and so the affair has attracted some attention — so much so that Newsweek has now run an article about it all. That the […]
Chicago has been a bloody place lately. Over the Fourth of July weekend, there were 82 shootings, 16 of which were lethal. The reflex of the Left, as always, is to call for more (and in keeping with the relentless impulse of both the Left and of democracies generally, more centralized) government control. Here’s the […]
With the mood among our rulers and their media apparatus becoming increasingly intolerant of what they call climate-change “deniers”, here’s a gratifyingly defiant post from the U.K. Spectator. (That such a viewpoint as reasonable as this should now seem “defiant” is a depressing sign of how far things have come.)
It’s been jam-packed week or so: a family getaway with both our kids (a rarity these days, now that both are grown and our daughter lives in Guangzhou), and plenty to do today upon getting back to New York. (Apologies to those of you who’ve emailed me over the past few days…) Solitude has been […]
Following on our previous post, here’s a link I ought to have included: Jeremy Bentham on the Declaration of Independence.
Happy July Fourth, everybody! Although we generally celebrate Independence Day with carefree and bibulous abandon, it’s important to remember that this is a solemn occasion, and a day to honor America’s timeless founding principles. So it’s good to see that some Independence Day rituals still embody this ennobling tradition. Foremost among these, of course, is […]
There’s another important court ruling on the way, one that focuses on a serious weakness in the language of the Affordable Care Act. Learn more here. .
The UK is now importing sperm. I am not making this up. (HT: Kevin Kim.)
Here’s a tart essay on the Obama administration’s stance toward Israel, from Noah Pollak.
I haven’t said much lately about current political events — not because there isn’t plenty to comment on (the situation at our Mexican border being, perhaps, foremost at the moment), but because it’s all just so fatiguing. This in itself is worth commenting on, because I’m sure I’m not alone in feeling this way; it […]
From Julius Evola, Men Among the Ruins, p 149-50: The main thing that emerges in ancient forms is that unity in them did not possess a merely political character, but rather a spiritual and quite often religious one, the political domain apparently being shaped and upheld by an idea or a general view that was […]
I’m still working long hours, and haven’t been able to keep up with the growing backlog of interesting things to comment on. In particular, there have been a slew of Supreme Court decisions I’d like to dissect a bit (today’s unanimous ruling rejecting the President’s egregious “recess” appointments was particularly gratifying, but I still want […]
I’m working late tonight, so here are two items to keep you from going away empty-handed: a little item about map projections (sent our way by the indefatigable JK), and, to keep you up wondering about things, some very interesting reading about Benghazi, Syria, and ISIL. (As for the second item, caveat lector: I make […]
The latest in Victor Davis Hanson’s chronicles of a moribund civilization. Here.
This entry is part 15 of 15 in the series
Free WillMy friends Kevin Kim and Bill Keezer have been discussing a recent post of Bill’s, in which he argues that the Universe is “undetermined and constrained”. Bill’s post is here, and Kevin’s response, which raises some important objections but stops short, I think, of fully “grasping the nettle”, is here. Bill’s essay begins: For over […]
A lot of people are complaining about how poorly governed we are these days, but even the self-identifying “conservatives” I speak to are taken aback when I suggest that the problem might not be the administration currently in power (as destructive as it may be), but the natural evolution of democracy itself. We are so […]
If you prefer reality to Cathedral orthodoxy, you’re evil, and will someday roast in Hell. Meanwhile, you should be reading the Unz Review.
From our reader Bill Keezer comes a link to a piquant item by Richard Fernandez on the crumbling Obama presidency. There’s so much blood in the water now that even some of Mr. Obama’s most stalwart allies are swimming away as fast as they can, lest they be devoured too. It’s even getting to the […]
Here’s a little clip from a public appearance by Hillary Clinton today. It’s only a couple of minutes long, but is, let’s just say, densely packed. As the clip begins, Ms. Clinton is asked by an androgynous, hoplophobic sycophant whether she thinks that banning “assault weapons” and “high-capacity magazines” would exert a downward pressure on […]
I’m a little woozy tonight after some periodontal surgery earlier today, so for now, just a few links that have been gathering dust in the bin: — On topic: Comfortably Numb. — On legacies and dynasties. — The wages of sin. — The Walter Duranty prize: to David Kirkpatrick, for his Benghazi whitewash in the […]
The weather being clement here in Brooklyn today (it won’t be for long; see here and here and here and here) I went out for a constitutional in Prospect Park. I found myself walking behind a police officer. I was so struck by her appearance that I snapped a photo (forgive the poor quality; it […]
Here’s a shot of the sky above Brooklyn a few minutes ago, from my stoop.
Well! It appears the IRS has “lost” two years’ worth of Lois Lerner’s emails. Golly, what an unlucky coincidence. Especially considering that the NSA has copies of every email every American citizen has ever written, backed up redundantly in hardened underground bunkers scattered across all fifty states. Allahpundit just remarked: This is the Platonic Form […]
Here’s what Bryce LaLiberte just called “the lamest hit-piece on neoreaction yet (and that’s saying something)”. It really is pretty bad. There isn’t even any discussion of what NRx is; just a lot of huffing and puffing about fascism by a frightened socialist. See for yourself. My favorite parts: putting the word “culture” in scare-quotes, […]
A young man named Evan Todd, who is a survivor and eyewitness of the Columbine massacre, has written an open letter to the President urging him to reconsider his support of Federal gun-rights infringements. You can read it here. One quibble: arguing against universal background checks, Mr. Todd asks “is a universal background check system […]
In case you haven’t noticed, everything’s going to hell. I can’t say that I’m surprised: in a comment a while back, for example, I wrote that the administration of “this awful man — this grotesque incompetent, this subversive fraud, this preening and malevolent narcissist, this despiser of American tradition and implacable enemy of everything the […]
There aren’t many public figures on the Left who irritate me the way the writer Chris Hedges always has. (Tim Wise is another.) Pallid, sneering, humorless, self-righteous, and full of that grotesque collectivist piety that has done more damage in the modern world than any other force of man or nature, the very sight of […]
I have to say, this is pretty titillating. It’s also the first I’m hearing about this sort of thing as a realistic possibility, and I wonder how seriously to take it. (The article says this rig can get to Alpha Centauri and back in a month. I assume that’s ship’s time, and so we’d still […]
Not content with Mosul, now it appears that ISIL has seized Tikrit, too. Iraq is disintegrating. Update: Not sure what to make of this…
Things are finally getting back to normal around here, and I apologize to all for the long absence. (I realize that my not writing anything here for a week doesn’t exactly deprive anyone of oxygen, but I do know that many people stop by here regularly — my thanks to all of you as always! […]
In this engaging post, science-fiction writer John C. Wright responds, with brio and in fine style, to accusations of political heterodoxy and tainted allegiances.
There are a great many things I’d like to be commenting on just now, but I’m working very long hours this week and have no time for anything else. Thanks very much as always for checking in. Back soon I hope.
Say what you will about Barack Obama, the man is consistent: everything he does seems reliably to act against the interests of the United States, its people, and its economic and social well-being; against the intention of the Framers that we shall live under a government of limited, enumerated powers, in which the three branches […]
I haven’t written about martial arts in a while, but coming across a silly little article in Popular Mechanics prompts me to do so today. The article begins with some fawning hyperbole: Forget all those broken boards and crumbled concrete slabs. No feat of martial arts is more impressive than Bruce Lee’s famous strike, the […]
Google’s just revealed its workplace demographics. The breakdown for tech workers: 60% white, 34% Asian, 2% Hispanic, 1% black. Pass the popcorn. Addendum, 5/29: I neglected to add above that the breakdown by sex is: women 17%, men 83%. Nobody should be surprised by any of this. To get through the multilevel Google tech interview, […]
Our reader Henry has sent us a link to the latest crop of “Random Thoughts” from Thomas Sowell. Some excerpts: Some people act as if the answer to every problem is to put more money and power in the hands of politicians. * Republicans in Congress seem to be drawn toward the immigration issue like […]
Here’s George Will outlining the sort of presidential candidate he’s hoping for next time round. I have to say, I think that if someone actually presented himself to the voters as Mr. Will proposes, he’d win by a landslide. At the very least, he’d certainly get my vote.
Well! Good news from across the Big Ditch, as the “bunch of fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists” known as UKIP did very well indeed in yesterday’s elections. Here’s a happy reaction from UK blogger ‘Anna Racoon’, in which she writes: So peace finally reigns in the old ‘Muppet show’ studio ‘D’ at Elstree, from where […]
Writing at The Intercept, Glenn Greenwald reports on an item from the collection of classified material leaked by Edward Snowden: a report on the ways that “Western intelligence agencies are attempting to manipulate and control online discourse with extreme tactics of deception and reputation-destruction”. I can’t say that any of it should come as a […]
Here’s something really beautiful: photographs of subtropical fungi by Australian photographer Steve Axford.