NY Times spins the story
The New York Times has an editorial about the Frogs' military intervention in the Ivory Coast. They stress the peacekeeping role, and French efforts to bring the parties together. They opine, with a straight face that the French have been "forced into direct involvement". They say that the French will need help and support from the US and other allies. They don't mention that this "involvement" is completely unilateral. No UN or even OAU resolutions authorize or justify this intervention into what even the Times admits is a "civil war". They also conveniently forget to mention, as I reported here back on January 6, that French troops had killed thirty Ivorians. Thirty! Can you think of any situation where, if, the US sent troops into a third-world country with NO UN resolution and NO allied support and killed THIRTY locals, the Times would fail to mention those facts? Hell, the story would be on the front page for weeks and demonstrators would be besieging the Pentagon. But of course the Ivorians are Africans and the French have a "special relationship", called being the former overlord. And the dead were "rebels", kind of like the Palestiniandians. Of course, the US doesn't have any "former colonies" with handy puppet governments we can terrorize. We even withdrew our military presence from the Philippines, the only place that ever resembled an American "colony", when requested. And the French have such good food and wine and such excellent relations with the "Islamic community", they couldn't possibly be colonialist oppressors. Could they?
Friday, January 17, 2003
Recycling IS Garbage!
Alan Caruba has hit the nail right on the head about recycling, one of my pet peeves. It has been clear for a long time that recycling is a fraud and a net loss for everyone except those liberal con men working in the recycling promotion industry. It's the quintessential neo-Puritan guilt trip.
You dirty man! You can't just throw that dirty stuff in the garbage! Clean it, fold it, sort it, put far more time and energy into it than it's worth and only then will you make up for having produced that filthy stuff, you ignorant pervert!
How anyone with a smidgeon of intelligence can think that it makes any economic sense to have two - in some cities three - big trucks with unionized drivers come around to everyone's house to pick up bottles and little bits of string and cloth and old paper is utterly beyond me. How can the cost of producing the trucks, not to mention fueling them and paying the drivers EVER be recovered; especially when there is no unsubsidized - i.e., free - market for anything recycled with the possible exception of aluminum cans? And even though you can make money by saving your aluminum cans and turning them in every year or so, I guarantee you the city does not clear a profit even on them. And Caruba mentions that in most cities recycled goods end up in the same landfill or incinerators as all the other garbage, so the recycling trucks are a dead loss, even with the partial federal and state subsidies that make recycling programs seem like a good idea. Hey, it's not our money, it's the government's! Intelligent, eh? But it's not about intelligence. It's about power and shame and self-loathing liberals. Caruba goes on to hook up with the bias of the news media, which are and have been for thirty years willing co-conspirators in the recycling deception. Recycling is not attacked often or strongly enough. It strengthens the hand of government and social engineers and taxes the heck out of the average guy for no reason. It needs to go.
Alan Caruba has hit the nail right on the head about recycling, one of my pet peeves. It has been clear for a long time that recycling is a fraud and a net loss for everyone except those liberal con men working in the recycling promotion industry. It's the quintessential neo-Puritan guilt trip.
You dirty man! You can't just throw that dirty stuff in the garbage! Clean it, fold it, sort it, put far more time and energy into it than it's worth and only then will you make up for having produced that filthy stuff, you ignorant pervert!
How anyone with a smidgeon of intelligence can think that it makes any economic sense to have two - in some cities three - big trucks with unionized drivers come around to everyone's house to pick up bottles and little bits of string and cloth and old paper is utterly beyond me. How can the cost of producing the trucks, not to mention fueling them and paying the drivers EVER be recovered; especially when there is no unsubsidized - i.e., free - market for anything recycled with the possible exception of aluminum cans? And even though you can make money by saving your aluminum cans and turning them in every year or so, I guarantee you the city does not clear a profit even on them. And Caruba mentions that in most cities recycled goods end up in the same landfill or incinerators as all the other garbage, so the recycling trucks are a dead loss, even with the partial federal and state subsidies that make recycling programs seem like a good idea. Hey, it's not our money, it's the government's! Intelligent, eh? But it's not about intelligence. It's about power and shame and self-loathing liberals. Caruba goes on to hook up with the bias of the news media, which are and have been for thirty years willing co-conspirators in the recycling deception. Recycling is not attacked often or strongly enough. It strengthens the hand of government and social engineers and taxes the heck out of the average guy for no reason. It needs to go.
Tuesday, January 14, 2003
Palestiniandians
Just happened to think. When in the 1800s Indians were attacking white settlers throughout the West, we took care of the problem. We negotiated with them when we could, killed them when they committed acts of terrorism and removed them from land we wanted. We saw that the West would not be properly developed until the terrorism waged by the Indians was brought to an end. So we ended it, at great cost. Now the descendants of the warlike tribes, who, by the way, number more than the likely population when Columbus landed on Watling's Isle, are trying to whine their way into a victory they could not win on the battlefield. But our victory sufficed to create the greatest and most prosperous nation in the history of the world.
Israel is trying to safeguard themselves from the same sort of terrorism we experienced from the Indians. Maybe the solution should be the same. If they negotiate in good faith, let them coexist. But the minute they try terrorism, kill or expel them. Luckily for us, Sitting Bull and Geronimo didn't have the EU and the UN to whine to.
Just happened to think. When in the 1800s Indians were attacking white settlers throughout the West, we took care of the problem. We negotiated with them when we could, killed them when they committed acts of terrorism and removed them from land we wanted. We saw that the West would not be properly developed until the terrorism waged by the Indians was brought to an end. So we ended it, at great cost. Now the descendants of the warlike tribes, who, by the way, number more than the likely population when Columbus landed on Watling's Isle, are trying to whine their way into a victory they could not win on the battlefield. But our victory sufficed to create the greatest and most prosperous nation in the history of the world.
Israel is trying to safeguard themselves from the same sort of terrorism we experienced from the Indians. Maybe the solution should be the same. If they negotiate in good faith, let them coexist. But the minute they try terrorism, kill or expel them. Luckily for us, Sitting Bull and Geronimo didn't have the EU and the UN to whine to.
Bobbie killed
A British policeman has been killed in a raid on terror suspects. Doubtless those Religion of Peace do-gooders are at it again. LeMonde has the story. The Times of London has a blurb on it, but no one over here seems to have picked up on it yet. Maybe the murdered man's family can take some solace in the possibility that his death may change some minds in Europe about the necessity for fighting terror. Oh, yes, the French also found a bomb in the basilica at Sacre Coeur, one of the most visited sites in Paris, and one of my favorites. Maybe when the tourist business starts to decline, the French will have a sudden conversion to the WAT. Can't scare away all those rich Americans, however disgusting the French elite may consider them to be.
A British policeman has been killed in a raid on terror suspects. Doubtless those Religion of Peace do-gooders are at it again. LeMonde has the story. The Times of London has a blurb on it, but no one over here seems to have picked up on it yet. Maybe the murdered man's family can take some solace in the possibility that his death may change some minds in Europe about the necessity for fighting terror. Oh, yes, the French also found a bomb in the basilica at Sacre Coeur, one of the most visited sites in Paris, and one of my favorites. Maybe when the tourist business starts to decline, the French will have a sudden conversion to the WAT. Can't scare away all those rich Americans, however disgusting the French elite may consider them to be.
Death in Illinois
The idiot outgoing governor of Illinois has commuted the sentences of everyone on Death Row. Isn't this kind of like George Washington freeing all his slaves right after he died? Well, geez, you don't expect him to cut his own tobacco and wash his own dishes when he's still alive, do you? And Ryan wouldn't want any murderers escaping from jail while he was still living in Illinois. But now that he's gone, who cares? And he gets to look like a good guy to the liberals. I commented on this matter over on LittleTiny Lies:
Nobody has mentioned the fact that prisoners on death row did not get there via plea bargains. The most obviously guilty go for a plea bargain right away in order to avoid the death penalty. Now sometimes the prosecutor will not bargain because he figures he has a strong case and can convict and get the death penalty. But sometimes he is wrong and it would have been better for society to take a bargain for life in prison without parole. No case is 100% stupid-jury proof. So some very bad guys go free. But sometimes the convicted are, if not innocent, not as guilty as one might think. They get bad advice not to go for a plea bargain and wind up on death row, when more obviously and provably guilty offenders get life sentences. So there are many inconsistencies in the system. In general, though, we provide so many opportunities for review that I would be very surprised if ANY truly innocent murderers are executed. Remember the Gary Gilmore flap? He admitted his guilt and wanted to die and they STILL wouldn't execute him without all sorts of hand wringing. Just like in the old days out West when they hung horse thieves because they had no secure jails, the main reason to kill murderers is so they will not kill again. Commutations and pardons are extremely dangerous when you are dealing with human monsters.
The idiot outgoing governor of Illinois has commuted the sentences of everyone on Death Row. Isn't this kind of like George Washington freeing all his slaves right after he died? Well, geez, you don't expect him to cut his own tobacco and wash his own dishes when he's still alive, do you? And Ryan wouldn't want any murderers escaping from jail while he was still living in Illinois. But now that he's gone, who cares? And he gets to look like a good guy to the liberals. I commented on this matter over on LittleTiny Lies:
Nobody has mentioned the fact that prisoners on death row did not get there via plea bargains. The most obviously guilty go for a plea bargain right away in order to avoid the death penalty. Now sometimes the prosecutor will not bargain because he figures he has a strong case and can convict and get the death penalty. But sometimes he is wrong and it would have been better for society to take a bargain for life in prison without parole. No case is 100% stupid-jury proof. So some very bad guys go free. But sometimes the convicted are, if not innocent, not as guilty as one might think. They get bad advice not to go for a plea bargain and wind up on death row, when more obviously and provably guilty offenders get life sentences. So there are many inconsistencies in the system. In general, though, we provide so many opportunities for review that I would be very surprised if ANY truly innocent murderers are executed. Remember the Gary Gilmore flap? He admitted his guilt and wanted to die and they STILL wouldn't execute him without all sorts of hand wringing. Just like in the old days out West when they hung horse thieves because they had no secure jails, the main reason to kill murderers is so they will not kill again. Commutations and pardons are extremely dangerous when you are dealing with human monsters.
Monday, January 13, 2003
Those Krazy Krauts
My German is worse than my French, but I understand what this magazine cover is trying to say. I also know that "Spiegel" in German means "mirror". I just have to wonder whether any of the dummkopfs who put that slogan and image on a major magazine cover have looked in a spiegel lately. Probably not. Too painful.
The Aussies have their own morons to be apologetic about. Here's a new one. Watch out, Margo Kingston! What rathole do these idiots crawl out from?
Update - Splendid, Bunyip, Splendid!
The inimitable Bunyip has nailed the Rat Holding. And, astonishingly, he turns out to be a Socialist! A member of the Australian Labor Party's Socialist Left Faction. Who'da thunk it? And guess what he is? A lawyer! And guess what he was arguing in favor of in the article Bunyip links to? Unlimited personal injury recoveries! John Edwards, you've been cloned in Oz!
My German is worse than my French, but I understand what this magazine cover is trying to say. I also know that "Spiegel" in German means "mirror". I just have to wonder whether any of the dummkopfs who put that slogan and image on a major magazine cover have looked in a spiegel lately. Probably not. Too painful.
The Aussies have their own morons to be apologetic about. Here's a new one. Watch out, Margo Kingston! What rathole do these idiots crawl out from?
Update - Splendid, Bunyip, Splendid!
The inimitable Bunyip has nailed the Rat Holding. And, astonishingly, he turns out to be a Socialist! A member of the Australian Labor Party's Socialist Left Faction. Who'da thunk it? And guess what he is? A lawyer! And guess what he was arguing in favor of in the article Bunyip links to? Unlimited personal injury recoveries! John Edwards, you've been cloned in Oz!
Ice in St.Petersburg!
Global warming proceeds on its merry way to the next ice age. "Several dozen ships - fifty or more - were stuck in the ice outside St.Petersburg," reports LeMonde. As with most things in Russia most of the time, the port-master calls the situation "complicated but not catastrophic"! It's taking ice-breakers a week or more to get ships in and out of the harbor. Wait a minute. St.Petersburg used to be Leningrad, right? The only ice-free port with ocean access the Soviet Union had west of Vladivostok, right? And it's blocked with ice and people are still talking about global warming? The ice has not been so bad, apparently, since 1941. Let's see, that's 62 years of merry "greenhouse gas" production and our best efforts can't even keep the Bay of Finland from freezing over. We'd better crank out a lot more SUV's if we don't want to freeze to death!
Global warming proceeds on its merry way to the next ice age. "Several dozen ships - fifty or more - were stuck in the ice outside St.Petersburg," reports LeMonde. As with most things in Russia most of the time, the port-master calls the situation "complicated but not catastrophic"! It's taking ice-breakers a week or more to get ships in and out of the harbor. Wait a minute. St.Petersburg used to be Leningrad, right? The only ice-free port with ocean access the Soviet Union had west of Vladivostok, right? And it's blocked with ice and people are still talking about global warming? The ice has not been so bad, apparently, since 1941. Let's see, that's 62 years of merry "greenhouse gas" production and our best efforts can't even keep the Bay of Finland from freezing over. We'd better crank out a lot more SUV's if we don't want to freeze to death!
Sunday, January 12, 2003
Norks' nukes
Well, do the North Koreans have any nukes or not? Everyone around the blogosphere seems to assume they do have one or two. And this story from Fox News reports that the "US" (who? the Pentagon? The State Department? The White House? They don't say) thinks the Norks have one or two nukes. But I haven't seen anything definite. And the Norks, in their usual psychotic - or is it schizoid? - but definitely pathological way say in one place that they have no nukes and anyone who says they do is the spawn of Satan, but then they threaten any attackers with being met by a "sea of fire". OK. So how are they going to do the "Sea of Fire" thing without nukes? Really angry phosphorescent jellyfish?
Well, do the North Koreans have any nukes or not? Everyone around the blogosphere seems to assume they do have one or two. And this story from Fox News reports that the "US" (who? the Pentagon? The State Department? The White House? They don't say) thinks the Norks have one or two nukes. But I haven't seen anything definite. And the Norks, in their usual psychotic - or is it schizoid? - but definitely pathological way say in one place that they have no nukes and anyone who says they do is the spawn of Satan, but then they threaten any attackers with being met by a "sea of fire". OK. So how are they going to do the "Sea of Fire" thing without nukes? Really angry phosphorescent jellyfish?
Friday, January 10, 2003
Love that global warming!
Reports keep coming in of colder than usual weather from Europe to the Siberian north. Apparently you can walk from Finland to Sweden over the Gulf of Bothnia. Next we'll be skating on the Thames, as Pepys reported, in "hard, frosty weather". (The Thames skating post is not up yet) Don't the whines of the global warming fanatics remind you of those doomsayers who always say the stock market will go down, or the gold bugs who say a crisis is right around the corner that will boost the price of gold through the stratosphere? And whatever happened to the "The ozone hole is growing, we'll all get skin cancer" dorks? At least Cassandra was right! The problem with hoping that bad things will happen is that, even if you're right, things will, by definition, be bad.
Reports keep coming in of colder than usual weather from Europe to the Siberian north. Apparently you can walk from Finland to Sweden over the Gulf of Bothnia. Next we'll be skating on the Thames, as Pepys reported, in "hard, frosty weather". (The Thames skating post is not up yet) Don't the whines of the global warming fanatics remind you of those doomsayers who always say the stock market will go down, or the gold bugs who say a crisis is right around the corner that will boost the price of gold through the stratosphere? And whatever happened to the "The ozone hole is growing, we'll all get skin cancer" dorks? At least Cassandra was right! The problem with hoping that bad things will happen is that, even if you're right, things will, by definition, be bad.
He lies
Does anyone actually believe this idiot? Are there even any Democrats, former Carter/Clinton diplomats or Nobel prize electors who really believe that North Korea is not going to do everything they can to produce nuclear weapons? And sell them to anyone who can pay? Maybe I'm just an incurable optimist, but I can't imagine anyone so naive and stupid could be competent enough to breathe regularly.
Does anyone actually believe this idiot? Are there even any Democrats, former Carter/Clinton diplomats or Nobel prize electors who really believe that North Korea is not going to do everything they can to produce nuclear weapons? And sell them to anyone who can pay? Maybe I'm just an incurable optimist, but I can't imagine anyone so naive and stupid could be competent enough to breathe regularly.
Double Dumbass
Some academic idiot is accusing the government of overfeeding the poor. !! !! Yes, you heard me right. The Food Nazis care so much about the poor that they are criticizing the Food Stamp program for letting the eligible unfortunates and losers and parasites - that should cover everyone - buy any food they want and making them get fat. Just imagine. Those stupid poor can buy potato chips instead of celery, soda pop instead of Evian water, Twinkies instead of carrot cake! The Horror!! They don't mention there are already severe restrictions on what can be bought with food stamps. No alcohol - even though recent studies have shown that a drink a day can reduce the incidence of heart attack. No prepared food, although many food stamp recipients have minimal or no facilities to cook food and are WAY too dumb to watch Julia Child on Public TV and learn how to cook properly. WIC, a supplemental program for mothers with young children, has the most incredibly Byzantine set of restrictions on exactly what can be bought with WIC checks. Many's the time I've rolled my eyes and drummed my fingers while a young unfortunate or whatever mother in front of me has her WIC selections examined by the cashier to make sure nothing but eggs, orange juice, milk and the PROPER cereals are paid for by the WIC check. It can take hours. Well, OK, minutes anyway. Now the FN's want me to wait even longer so everything being bought with food stamps is scrutinized to make sure it meets some PC standards that are both irrational and obsolete. Next thing you know they'll be demanding the poor eat only organic foods, at three times the cost, no nasty oppressive masculine meat and only the best imported olive oil. Just because they're poor, why should they have to have less money to spend on food? And if they're stigmatized by the delay letting everyone know they're using food stamps, well, why don't we just make everyone use food stamps? Then we could control exactly what everyone ate. Wouldn't that just be the best thing? Morons.
Some academic idiot is accusing the government of overfeeding the poor. !! !! Yes, you heard me right. The Food Nazis care so much about the poor that they are criticizing the Food Stamp program for letting the eligible unfortunates and losers and parasites - that should cover everyone - buy any food they want and making them get fat. Just imagine. Those stupid poor can buy potato chips instead of celery, soda pop instead of Evian water, Twinkies instead of carrot cake! The Horror!! They don't mention there are already severe restrictions on what can be bought with food stamps. No alcohol - even though recent studies have shown that a drink a day can reduce the incidence of heart attack. No prepared food, although many food stamp recipients have minimal or no facilities to cook food and are WAY too dumb to watch Julia Child on Public TV and learn how to cook properly. WIC, a supplemental program for mothers with young children, has the most incredibly Byzantine set of restrictions on exactly what can be bought with WIC checks. Many's the time I've rolled my eyes and drummed my fingers while a young unfortunate or whatever mother in front of me has her WIC selections examined by the cashier to make sure nothing but eggs, orange juice, milk and the PROPER cereals are paid for by the WIC check. It can take hours. Well, OK, minutes anyway. Now the FN's want me to wait even longer so everything being bought with food stamps is scrutinized to make sure it meets some PC standards that are both irrational and obsolete. Next thing you know they'll be demanding the poor eat only organic foods, at three times the cost, no nasty oppressive masculine meat and only the best imported olive oil. Just because they're poor, why should they have to have less money to spend on food? And if they're stigmatized by the delay letting everyone know they're using food stamps, well, why don't we just make everyone use food stamps? Then we could control exactly what everyone ate. Wouldn't that just be the best thing? Morons.
Dumbass
This UN moron (but I repeat myself) not only has the stupidity to wring his hands about a non-existent disease, but has to throw in a gratuitous slap at the end of the article about the horror of the coming war in Iraq. And he's talking about Africa, where wars are going on all over the landscape. Pigmies are being eaten, for God's sake, in the Congo. Algeria hosts an AlQaeda-linked rebel movement that kills more innocent Muslim civilians in a month than have been killed while being used as human shields by Hamas and Fatah cowards in the West Bank and Gaza for the last ten years. Robert "Crazy-ass" Mugabe in Zimbabwe is dispossessing the only people in the country who know how to grow food and simultaneously rejecting "Genetically modified" food on the advice of his Euroweenie PC friends, who are not - yet - starving to death. Nigeria is stoning women to death for adultery and threatening death to beauty pageant managers. And HE'S UPSET ABOUT THE LIBERATION OF A COUNTRY FROM A BLOODY DICTATOR ARMED WITH POISON GAS AND ANTHRAX!!! Ok, now he's got me upset. Deep breath. Focus. What can be done to destroy, eliminate, bankrupt, reduce to a nullity the United Nations? Any ideas?
This UN moron (but I repeat myself) not only has the stupidity to wring his hands about a non-existent disease, but has to throw in a gratuitous slap at the end of the article about the horror of the coming war in Iraq. And he's talking about Africa, where wars are going on all over the landscape. Pigmies are being eaten, for God's sake, in the Congo. Algeria hosts an AlQaeda-linked rebel movement that kills more innocent Muslim civilians in a month than have been killed while being used as human shields by Hamas and Fatah cowards in the West Bank and Gaza for the last ten years. Robert "Crazy-ass" Mugabe in Zimbabwe is dispossessing the only people in the country who know how to grow food and simultaneously rejecting "Genetically modified" food on the advice of his Euroweenie PC friends, who are not - yet - starving to death. Nigeria is stoning women to death for adultery and threatening death to beauty pageant managers. And HE'S UPSET ABOUT THE LIBERATION OF A COUNTRY FROM A BLOODY DICTATOR ARMED WITH POISON GAS AND ANTHRAX!!! Ok, now he's got me upset. Deep breath. Focus. What can be done to destroy, eliminate, bankrupt, reduce to a nullity the United Nations? Any ideas?
Thanks
Thanks to Inoperable Terran - one of my favorite news-link sites - for a link to my article on the LeMonde editorial. Now let's see if anyone wants to get a comments discussion going. I have such comment-envy when I go to Rachel Lucas and Asymmetrical Information. I wouldn't even mind a troll or two.
Thanks to Inoperable Terran - one of my favorite news-link sites - for a link to my article on the LeMonde editorial. Now let's see if anyone wants to get a comments discussion going. I have such comment-envy when I go to Rachel Lucas and Asymmetrical Information. I wouldn't even mind a troll or two.
Many marriages are like this:
It’s as though you had two people who were hitting themselves over the head, repeatedly, each hitting himself, and neither of them realizing they were doing it. Then all of a sudden one of them realizes what he’s doing and that it hurts and that he can stop if he wants. Now would it make sense for him to turn to the other one and say, “Hey, I’ve got a great idea! If you stop hitting yourself on the head, I’ll stop hitting myself. How about it?”
Does that make sense? What should the man who realizes what he’s doing do? Right! He should STOP HITTING HIMSELF ON THE HEAD! Despite what anyone else is doing.
It’s as though you had two people who were hitting themselves over the head, repeatedly, each hitting himself, and neither of them realizing they were doing it. Then all of a sudden one of them realizes what he’s doing and that it hurts and that he can stop if he wants. Now would it make sense for him to turn to the other one and say, “Hey, I’ve got a great idea! If you stop hitting yourself on the head, I’ll stop hitting myself. How about it?”
Does that make sense? What should the man who realizes what he’s doing do? Right! He should STOP HITTING HIMSELF ON THE HEAD! Despite what anyone else is doing.
Thursday, January 09, 2003
Verbum supra!
Clinton is being mentioned as a possible Chancellor of Oxford (I told you Europe was doomed!) So the dog Latin specialists over there have come up with a celebratory poem.(via the International Sentinel) You really need to read this. I'm not going to try to translate it. You need to. "Togam maculatam" to you!
Clinton is being mentioned as a possible Chancellor of Oxford (I told you Europe was doomed!) So the dog Latin specialists over there have come up with a celebratory poem.(via the International Sentinel) You really need to read this. I'm not going to try to translate it. You need to. "Togam maculatam" to you!
Hyphenated fuzzy thinking
The recent use by women of hyphenated names, their maiden last name and their husband's last name, has always bothered me, for a number of reasons.
The first is that the women who tend to do this are leftover hippie-dippy chicks who, unlike myself, have not managed to shake off the effects of narcissism and resentment at the nature of reality.
The second is that it doesn't make any sense, because it can't be carried on very long. Say if Mrs. Rainbow Smith-Jones (her maiden name was Smith) and Mr. Peacepipe Jones have a daughter, Nebula Smith-Jones, what will her name be if she gets married to the son of Jane Roe (now Roe-Doe) and John Doe? Nebula Smith-Jones-Roe-Doe? You can see this doesn't provide a solution to the non-problem of perpetuating male oppression for very long. Few people are going to want to carry around their entire genealogy on their business cards.
The third problem is that the use of conjoined names was and is a legacy from the aristocratic practice of marrying to unite two families and those rich people could have names as long as they wanted because they had servants. Both names were retained so that the offspring could boast that they belonged to two important families, or at least one important one and one whose patriarch - with a lot of help from the matriarch - had the smarts to marry his daughter off to an important one. Take, for instance, Kathleen Kennedy Townsend (although she at least eschews the hyphen). But in the modern world, the practice ended because people didn't want to be pretentious. And it doesn't help that the arranged marriages commemorated by these compound names were hardly examples of individual choice and feminist freedom. The users of these odious hyphens seem to be totally oblivious to the historical context.
The fourth problem, that I just realized today, is that the use of such a name makes it obvious that you're married. If you're unmarried and your name is Debbie Goodman and everyone knows you're Debbie Goodman and then all of a sudden you're Debbie Goodman-Gates, your patriarch having made a VERY shrewd deal with a scion of the modern nobility, everyone knows you're married. But the whole point of keeping on using "Ms" instead of switching to "Mrs." when you get married is to hide the fact that you did something so bourgeois and dated as getting married and also not to make the single girls feel bad right away. But if you keep your maiden name, all the trouble of hooking your man will have been entirely for naught. I should have known the essential characteristics of feminity would have found a way around PC-ness. My faith in human nature is restored.
The recent use by women of hyphenated names, their maiden last name and their husband's last name, has always bothered me, for a number of reasons.
The first is that the women who tend to do this are leftover hippie-dippy chicks who, unlike myself, have not managed to shake off the effects of narcissism and resentment at the nature of reality.
The second is that it doesn't make any sense, because it can't be carried on very long. Say if Mrs. Rainbow Smith-Jones (her maiden name was Smith) and Mr. Peacepipe Jones have a daughter, Nebula Smith-Jones, what will her name be if she gets married to the son of Jane Roe (now Roe-Doe) and John Doe? Nebula Smith-Jones-Roe-Doe? You can see this doesn't provide a solution to the non-problem of perpetuating male oppression for very long. Few people are going to want to carry around their entire genealogy on their business cards.
The third problem is that the use of conjoined names was and is a legacy from the aristocratic practice of marrying to unite two families and those rich people could have names as long as they wanted because they had servants. Both names were retained so that the offspring could boast that they belonged to two important families, or at least one important one and one whose patriarch - with a lot of help from the matriarch - had the smarts to marry his daughter off to an important one. Take, for instance, Kathleen Kennedy Townsend (although she at least eschews the hyphen). But in the modern world, the practice ended because people didn't want to be pretentious. And it doesn't help that the arranged marriages commemorated by these compound names were hardly examples of individual choice and feminist freedom. The users of these odious hyphens seem to be totally oblivious to the historical context.
The fourth problem, that I just realized today, is that the use of such a name makes it obvious that you're married. If you're unmarried and your name is Debbie Goodman and everyone knows you're Debbie Goodman and then all of a sudden you're Debbie Goodman-Gates, your patriarch having made a VERY shrewd deal with a scion of the modern nobility, everyone knows you're married. But the whole point of keeping on using "Ms" instead of switching to "Mrs." when you get married is to hide the fact that you did something so bourgeois and dated as getting married and also not to make the single girls feel bad right away. But if you keep your maiden name, all the trouble of hooking your man will have been entirely for naught. I should have known the essential characteristics of feminity would have found a way around PC-ness. My faith in human nature is restored.
Europe not only doomed, defeated
OK, I don't have my French dictionary with me, but I managed to struggle through this editorial in LeMonde and they seem to be saying that Europe is "defeated" (defaite). Does this go beyond "doomed"? Probably. They also seem to be assuming that Bush's tax cut plan will lead to bigger deficits, in the range of 4%. So they are also assuming that spending will not be cut. I don't know. Jeb Bush in Florida seems to be dedicated to cutting spending. In his inaugural speech yesterday, which I attended briefly, he actually said that he'd like to see the government buildings that surround the Capitol in what passes for downtown in Tallahassee empty in a few years. I could feel a shiver of fear pass through the gangs of state workers listening. George W. has broken with Ted Kennedy about paying off the teacher's unions. Not a bad idea politically, since they're not going to support Republicans anyway. So maybe we'll get lower taxes AND lower spending and more prosperity and can watch the Europeans raise taxes and ratchet up spending and disappear down the rathole they so richly deserve. Life is good.
OK, I don't have my French dictionary with me, but I managed to struggle through this editorial in LeMonde and they seem to be saying that Europe is "defeated" (defaite). Does this go beyond "doomed"? Probably. They also seem to be assuming that Bush's tax cut plan will lead to bigger deficits, in the range of 4%. So they are also assuming that spending will not be cut. I don't know. Jeb Bush in Florida seems to be dedicated to cutting spending. In his inaugural speech yesterday, which I attended briefly, he actually said that he'd like to see the government buildings that surround the Capitol in what passes for downtown in Tallahassee empty in a few years. I could feel a shiver of fear pass through the gangs of state workers listening. George W. has broken with Ted Kennedy about paying off the teacher's unions. Not a bad idea politically, since they're not going to support Republicans anyway. So maybe we'll get lower taxes AND lower spending and more prosperity and can watch the Europeans raise taxes and ratchet up spending and disappear down the rathole they so richly deserve. Life is good.
Wednesday, January 08, 2003
Tuesday, January 07, 2003
Attaque Generalisee sur le Fromage!
The rebels in the Ivory Coast are threatening to attack French forces on all fronts if the Imperial French Army doesn't stop interfering in the Ivorian Civil War. How can the French be so stupid and bloody-minded? Don't they have enough cheese at home? Maybe we should send some military aircraft and then, when French troops are under fire and calling on us for help, we can change our mind and say that we don't think we should take part in their racist oppressive war. When will the world put a stop to the globalization of the French cheese industry? Don't they realize a lot of people don't even like cheese?
The rebels in the Ivory Coast are threatening to attack French forces on all fronts if the Imperial French Army doesn't stop interfering in the Ivorian Civil War. How can the French be so stupid and bloody-minded? Don't they have enough cheese at home? Maybe we should send some military aircraft and then, when French troops are under fire and calling on us for help, we can change our mind and say that we don't think we should take part in their racist oppressive war. When will the world put a stop to the globalization of the French cheese industry? Don't they realize a lot of people don't even like cheese?
Europe is still doomed
Bloomberg has the latest gloomy statistics from the European economic tailspin. The only problem I can see with this situation is that if France goes defunct I won't be able to get my favorite wines any more. But I suppose the vineyards will be the last resource to be surrendered. With the imposition of Shari'a law in France, though, they'll have to stop producing alcohol. But maybe they'll start smuggling out immense quantities of hashish and heroin like the other Islamic states. Then with their luck we'll come to our senses and decriminalize. Serves them right!
Bloomberg has the latest gloomy statistics from the European economic tailspin. The only problem I can see with this situation is that if France goes defunct I won't be able to get my favorite wines any more. But I suppose the vineyards will be the last resource to be surrendered. With the imposition of Shari'a law in France, though, they'll have to stop producing alcohol. But maybe they'll start smuggling out immense quantities of hashish and heroin like the other Islamic states. Then with their luck we'll come to our senses and decriminalize. Serves them right!
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