The 2005 Annual Meeting of the American Society for Eighteenth Century Studies is going to be held at a resort in Las Vegas. How strange. I thought only those rowdy MD's had meetings in Vegas.
Posted at 1:18 PM
So Alan Keyes might be our candidate for the U.S. Senate. He has a very, very, very, very distant Chicago connection:
Q: Along the way, greatest influences among your teachers?I think it would be great if he were the candidate (besides the fact that the other option would not only surely lose the seat, but would help Bush lose the state), and the one bit of advice I'd give him is to take a cue from Hillary and flatter the home team. "How 'bout dem Bearss?"
A: I think that, without any doubt, the greatest influence among my teachers was Allan Bloom, who was a professor at Cornell when I started there, went to the University of Toronto. I think ended his life and career at the University of Chicago, was well known as the author of a book called The Closing of the American Mind, which enjoyed some popularity a few years ago. Without doubt, Allan Bloom was, in terms of my academic and intellectual formation, the most important teacher I had.Q: Can you explain why?
A: I think because, in a way that ended up, really, capturing my both interest and serious thought, he understood the moral foundations of politics--at least the importance of those moral foundations. And instead of approaching a political life and the questions that we are involved with in politics and morality, as is often popular these days, as if it is all somehow a consequence of material relationships, he took seriously what had been the view of societies and eras before our own, which saw a self-subsistent basis for moral things, and therefore for political life, and which took that seriously, going all the way back to ancient times with Plato and Aristotle and others. And I just felt, and still deeply believe, that there is more truth in that than in those approaches that try to reduce human things to some kind of sum of the material forces that operate upon us as material beings.
From an interview on C-Span's "Road to the White House"
Posted at 11:53 AM
Michelle Malkin's new book In Defense of Internment: The Case for "Racial Profiling" in World War II and the War on Terror comes out soon... Ball-sy. I'll have to give it a try.
Posted at 9:33 AM
Every summer I get back from school my parents bug me to clean my room. This summer, I've actually decided to do it. Currently, I have a stack of assorted papers, magazines, and booklets about 3 feet high, and I've only gone through about 45% of my room. By the time I'm done, I'm sure the stack will be as tall as an Asian grandmother.
But anyways, one of the most painful parts of cleaning my room is finding all the assorted liberal/Communist reading materials from my dark, dark past (old issues of the Worker's World... yikes). Unfortunately I haven't found any of the reading materials from my days as a punchy atheist (like those issues of James Dobson's newsletter that I er, defaced).
The last gem I stumbled upon was from some liberal cribnotes from the internet on how to debate evil racist conservatives. I'm not sure exactly where it's from, but the title is "Taking Back the Airwaves." This should be fun:
Principle: Explain what's positive about your position and what's negative about the conservative position.Fair enough! The author was kind enough to give a real life example of how to do this. Observe:
Example: Find a conservative at a cocktail party or barbecue. Debate the issue of abortion. No matter what you do, don't defend a woman's right to choose, instead attack the conservative's position as unpatriotic, pro-rapist, and immoral.Flip-flop, flip-flop... How many things are wrong with that picture?
Well, I hope that was amusing to you too. Carry on.
Posted at 12:28 AM
So much intelligence has never been used to seek to make us stupid. One is tempted to walk on all fours after reading your book. However, as it is more than sixty years since I lost the habit I feel that it is unfortunately impossible for me to resume it, and I leave this natural posture to those who are worthier of it than you and I.--Voltaire to Rousseau in a letter on The Discourse on Inequality from August 30, 1775
Posted at 12:04 PM
Mr. Gorbachev, although I personally oppose the Berlin Wall, I see no reason for you to tear it down. --Susanna Dokupil: Might Have Been John Kerry
Posted at 11:15 PM
Buh, forget the Democratic National Convention. The launch of CHEFSAKAI.COM is more important! And this reminds me that I've been sitting on a post entitled "Iron Chef Libertarian" for over a month. Oops.
Posted at 11:55 AM
Mike posted this hilarious conversation on courting. I've never really taken the time to figure out exactly what courting is, but I suppose I can just follow the very instructive link mentioned in the conversation.
...
MRoesch01: I love the defense of courting that you're certain you'll marry the person
MRoesch01: Isn't that bad?
MacMichael, Brian: oh yeah
MRoesch01: Won't that scare away girls?
MRoesch01: "Hi, wanna court?"
...
Posted at 3:52 PM
Josh Muravchik weighs in on the Philippine capitulation...
The government of the Philippines has yielded to the blackmail of Islamist terrorists. In exchange for the life of one hostage, it has agreed to hasten the withdrawal of the small contingent of peacekeepers it had sent to Iraq.No doubt Philippines President Gloria Arroyo believes that not only has she literally saved the head of her countryman, Angelo de la Cruz, but that she also saved her nation from a passel of further woes in the Middle Eastern briar patch. "With over 1million OFWs [overseas Filipino workers] in the Middle East," she explained, "my Government has a deep national interest in their wellbeing."
This calculation brings to mind Winston Churchill's comment on the appeasement of Hitler at Munich in 1938. British Prime minister Neville Chamberlain's government, he said, had faced a choice between war and shame: "They chose shame; they'll get war too." By his willingness to purchase peace at any price, Chamberlain had only made more certain the very war he wished to forestall and on terms more disadvantageous to his country.
The Philippines may in time learn that it has done much the same, especially if other nations follow the ignoble example that it and its former imperial master, Spain, have set in Iraq...
Posted at 2:51 PM
