ELSEWHERE

I drink very little alcohol these days so it was for the first time in years that I had a couple of glasses of German white wine with my dinner last night. It took me ages to find someone in Brisbane who sold German wine. Even so, it cost me only $10 for the bottle (about $6.50 in U.S. dollars). I think it is one of the everyday miracles of capitalism that I can buy a Rheinhessen Qualitaetswein half a world away from where it was made for such a small sum. It rather perplexes me, though, that German wine has such a patchy following around the world. Maybe its uniformly high quality makes it boring. French wine is mostly rubbish by Australian or German standards but I suppose the challenge of finding a good one makes it interesting. Australian winemakers wouldn't dream of making such a nasty product as French vin ordinaire. Even a $5 ($3.50 U.S.) bottle of Australian red is pretty good.

The French elites hate Hollywood but the French people love it -- so the elites want to "protect" the French people from it. That hardly shows much faith in their own culture. Protecting the French from Hollywood's politics might make some sense, though.

Wow! We have here a complete summary of French philosophy from a French philosopher: ""Despite his clarity, Seneca still must be taken seriously as a philosopher." Note: "Despite his clarity". I said a few days ago (on 8th) that French philosophy aims to obfuscate, not clarify. No wonder Leftists like French philosophy: Clarity of thought would be fatal to them.

Even The Guardian admits that not everyone hates Guantanamo Bay. Some ex-prisoners liked it. They say that the food in the camp was delicious, the teaching was excellent, and the warders were kind: "Americans are good people, they were always friendly, I don't have anything against them," he said. "If my father didn't need me, I would want to live in America." "

Middle-aged Madness is a good blog. He has a great list of the things that Kerry and the Democrats believe -- and I like his "we found Nemo" graphic too.

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The Left have always wanted more spent on welfare and made "Fascism" a swear-word. President Bush deposed a brutal Fascist dictator and sponsored a big expansion of welfare. But instead of being admired by the Left, he is hated with a passion. What does that tell you about the Left? It tells you that they have no principles at all: That everything they have ever claimed to stand for is fake.

Three more examples of Leftist dishonesty: They blame the 9/11 attacks on "poverty" in the Islamic world. Yet most of the attackers were Saudis and Saudi Arabia is one of the world's richest countries! They also say that they oppose racism yet support "affirmative action" -- which judges people by the colour of their skin! They say that they care about "the poor" but how often do you hear them calling for the one thing that would bring about a worldwide economic boom in poor countries -- the USA and the EU abandoning their agricultural protectionism? Leftists obviously care more about conservative farmers than they do about the poor!

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