ELSEWHERE

In their hatred of genetics and IQ, something Leftists cling to is a superficially clever book called The Mismeasure of Man by that smug old Leftist propagandist, Stephen Jay Gould. It is a book that would deceive no-one who knew anything about the field and totally misrepresents those who do but as more and more data on genetics and brain function emerge, the sheer stupidity of the work become more and more obvious. Here is a brief summary of Gould's lies and evasions and what the latest brain findings show. Amusingly, it notes that even Krugman can see that Gould is at best confused. An older and more extensive demolition of Gould is here

Communist antisemitism "On January 13, 1953, just six weeks before Stalin died, an ominous article appeared in Pravda: The ever-vigilant Soviet authorities had "discovered" that several Kremlin doctors, mostly Jews, were in fact killers sent by American intelligence to destroy the nation's leaders. For Soviet Jews, this terse disclosure about the "killers in white gowns" ushered in a period of fear and terror unusual even in a society where arbitrary arrests, denunciations and executions had become routine. During that terrible winter, Jewish children came home from school bruised and beaten. Jews were assaulted on public buses, and patients shunned Jewish doctors"

The NYT is having a justified laugh at Big Government Conservatism. I rather like their point that the only thing conservative about today's GOP is its pro-business orientation, though. To the NYT that is the equivalent of original sin but to me it means that the GOP is working towards the future prosperity of all Americans. It is business that generates the wealth, not government or NYT columnists.

Steve Sailer has an interesting view of Strom Thurmond and says that, contrary to popular belief, miscegenation between American blacks and whites has been relatively unusual throughout history.

Latest PID post: A selection of Ann Coulterisms from over the year.

Jesus wept! Britain may deploy armed sky marshals on some passenger flights. Two years after the 9/11 events and they are still THINKING about it? Israel's El Al have had armed marshalls aboard their flights for years so despite their being No. 1 target, the Arabs leave them strictly alone.

Justice takes strange forms: A man died of a heart attack while stabbing his wife. She survived.

Fun! A Leftist blogger has taken umbrage over my note that the Antarctic ozone hole has not shrunk 12 years after CFCs were banned. He says that I misstate the Greenie claim -- which he gives as "it will take until 2050 for the CFC ban to restore the ozone layer". But if it takes 60 years for a full restoration, shouldn't we see SOME effect after 12 years? Let me make a similar prediction: By the year 2050 a Communist society will have emerged that will make its people prosperous. No sign of it yet but you never know!

I have to laugh a bit at the continuous coverage Yahoo News has been giving to the tragic death of a man taken by a crocodile in Northern Australia. Out of all the deaths in the world, why single out just that one? I guess crocodiles are pretty exciting. A few years ago we had a croc take an American tourist in much the same area and the result was a big upsurge of American tourism to that area!

U.S. authorities are blaming Canada for their mad cow. Why not? Canada blames the USA for everything else!

China Hand has returned to blogging in fine form. Not only is his Xmas letter now up but on his other site he is giving his old friends a hard time. I greatly enjoy his "diatribes" so I am pleased that he has made two of them public. He found my appreciation of the Queen's Xmas message a great cause for mirth.

My latest upload of a previously published article (here or here) is one of the few contributions I have made to the academic literature on IQ. Although I have always taken an interest in IQ research, it is not my specialty. In this case, however, I offered an explanation of the "Flynn Effect" -- the fact that average IQ scores have been rising over the last century.

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