ELSEWHERE

PETA doesn't care about evidence. They KNOW! "Somebody pass the butter. A recent Norwegian study reports that lobsters and crabs don't have the capacity to feel pain. And the animal rights nuts at People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals ... must be steaming. Animal rights wackos have a long history of pursuing 'lobster liberation.' PETA's own website offers helpful 'tips' on liberating lobsters from restaurants and supermarkets. ... The Guardian helps explain why lobsters and crabs can't feel pain, pointing out that they have only 100,000 neurons, whereas many vertebrates have upwards of 100 billion. Meanwhile, continuing its long tradition of ignoring inconvenient facts, PETA turns to supposed scientific evidence from the Coalition to End Animal Suffering and Exploitation to 'prove' that lobsters feel pain anyway."

Fighting fire with bureaucracy: "Firefighting is a dangerous occupation. Firefighters face an occupational fatality rate two to four times the rate of average Americans. In an attempt to mitigate the risks faced by firefighters, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration requires the use of protective equipment such as self-contained breathing devices and fire retardant clothing, and there the troubles begin. To achieve OSHA compliance, firefighters must carry the 30 pound breathing device and another 30 pounds of protective clothing for the duration of interior firefighting activities. Those 60 pounds increase the excessive physical stress a firefighter experiences and likely contribute to the leading killer of firefighters, cardiac arrest."

Competition undermines tobacco/government alliance: "Big tobacco was supposed to come under harsh punishment for decades of deception when it acceded to a tort settlement seven years ago. Philip Morris, R.J.Reynolds, Lorillard and Brown & Williamson agreed to pay 46 states $206 billion over 25 years. This was their punishment for burying evidence of cigarettes' health risks. But the much-maligned tobacco giants have subtly and shrewdly turned their penance into a windfall. Using that tort settlement, the big brands have hampered tiny cut-rate rivals and raised prices with near impunity. Since the case was settled, the big four have nearly doubled wholesale cigarette prices from a national average of $1.25 a pack (not counting excise taxes) in 1998 to $2.10 now. And they have a potent partner in this scheme: state governments, which have become addicted to tort-settlement payments, now running at $6 billion a year. A key feature of the Big Tobacco-and-state-government cartel: rules that levy tort-settlement costs on upstart cigarette companies, companies that were not even in existence when the tort was being committed. The 1998 scheme came under legal attack almost from the start. While the cartel has fought off most of these challenges, it has just taken a palpable hit. A federal court in New York tossed out a key antidiscounter rule, and the entire settlement could yet crumble. This is due to the doggedness of one Jeffrey Uvezian, who sells cheapie cigs under such brands as Cobra, Boston and Tough Guy, through his company, International Tobacco Partners".

Arlene Peck: "Not that they would notice, but illiteracy in the Arab world is at an all-time high and rising rapidly, with the out-of-control rise in population. It is possible when you're allowed four wives and have an average of ten children with each. Since they keep their women pregnant, barefoot and out of schools, over half of them are not even able to read or write. At the pace they're going in the Arab world now, it will take roughly 30 years to wipe out basic literacy".

On SOCIALIZED MEDICINE I have just put up a story that will make you pray that you never have to rely on socialized medicine. And there is a pretty amazing power-grab reported on LEFTISTS AS ELITISTS.

My latest posting on MarxWords notes what a sponger Marx was. My latest posting on "A scripture blog" looks at Matthew 25:41 and "The eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels ..."

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE and LEFTISTS AS ELITISTS. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here

**************************

That power only, not principles, is what matters to Leftists is perfectly shown by the 2004 Kerry campaign. They put up a man whose policies seemed to be 99% the same as George Bush's even though the Left have previously disagreed violently with those policies. "Whatever it takes" is their rule.

Leftists are phonies. For most of them all that they want is to sound good. They don't care about doing good. That's why they do so much harm. They don't really care what the results of their policies are as long as they are seen as having good intentions.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist"

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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TUESDAY ROUNDUP

Once again I pick out what I think are my best posts for the week:

On Dissecting Leftism I demolish an anti-American rant by N.Y. journalist Tony Judt.

On Political Correctness Watch I note that racial segregation is now correct again in Canadian schools.

On Greenie Watch I note the latest craze for diaper recycling and show how stupid it is.

On A scripture blog I note that the Church of England has now become the Church of the Environment.

On Socialized Medicine I note evidence that half of America's spending on health care is wasted

On Education Watch I put up a big lot of personal reports about home schooling.

On Gun Watch I note that concealed carry is now regarded as a proven policy in Texas

On MarxWords I note that Engels believed Germans to be a superior race

On Leftists as Elitists I note that the Democrats are now billionaire-oriented rather than people-oriented.

On Majority Rights I note the decline of civility in London.

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ELSEWHERE

Brookes News says Australia has its own Eason Jordan making scurrilous accusations against American troops.

There is a disgusting report here of a Leftist university professor showing a pornographic film to devout Mormon students and mocking them generally -- all in the name of teaching them how to write good English!

Trying to grok has a good example of why there is such high unemployment in Germany

Oppressive Leftist law defied: "About 50,000 people are to defy the ban on hunting which comes into force this week by taking part in choreographed trail hunts at the weekend using foxes that were killed earlier....Although all those taking part will ostensibly be setting off on legal trail hunts, with packs of hounds chasing the scent of a dead fox that has been dragged across the countryside... Mr Worsley warned that there was a higher risk of bad practice than ever before because the new sport would no longer be regulated by the Masters of Foxhounds Association. "The red book is out the window now," he said....With such large numbers of people engaged in the hunts, the expectation is that the police will find it difficult in the extreme to identify the perpetrators of any law-breaking that does take place....However, in its guidance to assistant chief constables, the Association of Chief Police Officers makes clear that the priority is to protect people, not animals."

Amusing conflict of obsessions: "The director of a German zoo has defended her campaign to mate a group of homosexual male penguins with females, arguing that it is the only way to preserve a dying breed from extinction. Heike Kück said that she had been inundated with criticism by the gay lobby after making public her plan. "We're simply trying to help save a threatened species," she said of the Humboldt penguin"

What a brilliant way of discouraging Muslim immigration! "The photograph of Muslim teenagers playing by an advertising hoarding emblazoned with a Nazi swastika and National Front logo could be straight out of a documentary on inner city decay. It is, in fact, just one of a series of grim portrayals being used by the British Council to promote the nation's image overseas. Other photographs in the exhibition include a picture of a smashed-up telephone box and the fenced-off entrance to the Channel tunnel. The council, which is now led by the former Labour Party leader, Neil Kinnock, and which spends tens of million pounds a year on promoting Britain's cultural and artistic achievements, has included the photographs in an exhibition that it claims depict the reality of life in Britain's Muslim community.... Some of the photographs in the exhibition, which is called Common Ground, are accompanied by text depicting British Muslims as the victims of racial hatred and economic oppression".

An email about feminists getting it back to front: "I have always regarded feminism as perverse because it seems to be more about disempowerment than empowerment of women. The whole "fish without a bicycle" line about how much a woman needs a man overlooks the fact that the control some women are able to influence over some men is a very considerable form of power: the capability of getting more done than one could do on one's own."

Most readers of this blog will know that my online book about Leftism is available here or here. In 1974, however, I also had a book published, called Conservatism as Heresy. About half of it I wrote myself and the other half consisted of chapers contributed by various other authors. I got all my own chapters from it online about a year ago but I have been very slack about the other chapters. I have however had a bit of a burst of energy lately and put a few of them up. You can see the result here or here. There is a chapter here (or here) that is particularly good for showing that Leftist hypocrisy and anti-Americanism was alive and well during the Vietnam era.

My latest posting on MarxWords notes that Marx believed in a "Jewish" look. My latest posting on "A scripture blog" looks at Matthew 13:37-43 and the "wailing and gnashing of teeth".

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE and LEFTISTS AS ELITISTS. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here

**************************

That power only, not principles, is what matters to Leftists is perfectly shown by the 2004 Kerry campaign. They put up a man whose policies seemed to be 99% the same as George Bush's even though the Left have previously disagreed violently with those policies. "Whatever it takes" is their rule.

Leftists are phonies. For most of them all that they want is to sound good. They don't care about doing good. That's why they do so much harm. They don't really care what the results of their policies are as long as they are seen as having good intentions.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist"

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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SOME ECONOMICS

There is a big article here spelling out how conservative policies are much better for the poor than Leftist policies are.

Enter the protectionist dragon: "America's rapidly expanding trade with China is awakening a dragon -- the dragon of protectionism. As trade has grown between the two giant economies, so too have trade tensions. Legislation sponsored by Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) would impose a draconian 27.5 percent tariff on imports from China?s because of its allegedly unfair exchange rate. Meanwhile, a recent study sponsored by a federal commission claims that trade with China destroyed 1.5 million jobs in the United States from 1989 through 2003. The study, performed by the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute, did not actually count real people who lost their jobs, but instead applied a simplistic formula based on the shaky assumption that exports create jobs and imports destroy jobs. As usual, reality is more complicated -- and more positive -- than the critics of trade portray."

A free market in workplace regulations: "In a free economy, under what conditions may employees be hired and fired? And should discrimination be tolerated in the workplace? The answer to these questions depends upon who is the source of the discrimination. From a free market perspective, the only factor that matters is whether or not the government is involved in the discrimination. If the government is the entity that forces a company to hire or fire somebody based on whatever criteria it sets forth as official policy, then that is an imposition, a violation of the rights of private property holders, an infraction against the freedom of association."

A new way to make it harder for women to get jobs: "The union that pioneered extra time off work for women suffering painful periods yesterday argued it was time menstrual leave became common in Australian workplaces. The National Tertiary Education Union was the first to negotiate an extra 12 paid days off a year for women at four universities. Eight years later the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union has lodged a log of claims with car manufacturer Toyota including menstrual leave".

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ELSEWHERE

A priceless statement from the UNLV about the Hoppe affair: ""The purpose of keeping these proceedings confidential is to protect both the complainant and the faculty member involved," Grey said. "It is unfair for the news media and others who may have read incomplete accounts of this situation to judge the university's intentions and values."" [Let me get this straight: They say that it is unfair for the media to comment because the media don't have the full facts. But the reason they don't have the full facts is because the UNLV is keeping the full facts secret. Sounds a lot like Catch 22 to me! Or a claim that UNLV has a right to prevent discussion of anything they do not want discussed]

Valentines banned: "Saudi Arabia's morality police are on the scent of illicit red roses as part of a clampdown on would-be St Valentine's lovers in the strict Muslim kingdom. The Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, Saudi Arabia's powerful religious vigilantes, have banned shops from selling any red flowers in the run-up to February 14". [I wonder when our Leftist nutjobs will get around to attacking it? There is a SAINT involved, after all! Can't have that! And it's probably "patriarchal" or something too]

There is a useful summary here of a book by a German that gives you the figures to show that the USA is miles ahread of Europe in almost any economic category -- including greater fairness -- contrary to the distortions pushed by Tony Judt. The American poverty level is higher than many average incomes in Europe.

Peg Kaplan has a link to a sustained example of Leftist hate-speech that displays yet again the chronic projection that the Left needs to sustain itself. It portrays Republicans as all being super-rich and uncaring -- quite ignoring the fact that super-rich Americans (like John Kerry and George Soros) are far more likely to be Democrats than Republicans and that donations to charity are far more likely to come from Republicans than Democrats. And the idea that all the Southern "rednecks" who voted for GWB are rich is quite hilarious. And portraying Christians as uncaring despite all their charitable works is just off the planet. Where is the Leftist equivalent of the Salvation Army, for instance? Reality is so pesky to Leftists that it is no wonder they say there is no such thing.

Funny how Leftists used to say IQ is meaningless: "The California Supreme Court cleared the way Thursday for dozens of condemned prisoners to escape their death sentences on the grounds they are mentally retarded, defining the disability more flexibly than prosecutors had wanted. Prosecutors, who fear a flood of petitions from death-row inmates, wanted the court to define retardation using a specific IQ level. They suggested 70 on a scale on which the average is 100. The court declined". [Odd how the Left are not all up in arms about this "meaningless" decision! It shows again how nonexistent their "principles" are]

The recent death of Arthur Miller has spurred a few eulogies of him. This eulogy says that he "wrestled with big moral and political questions in America". Since you are not likely to hear it from the MSM, it might be worth reminding readers that he was a proven Soviet dupe.

Michelle Malkin has some background on the now fortunately ousted CNN "News" head Eason Jordan. His history of frantic anti-Americanism is a long one.

White flight in England now: "White and ethnic minority communities are becoming increasingly separated by growing levels of population movement and immigration, a report says today. More white families are moving from London to the regions while many immigrants arrive in the capital from overseas, the think-tank Migrationwatch says. The change in 10 years has been "extraordinarily rapid'', with 606,000 more people moving out of London than arrived from elsewhere in the country. In the same period, a net 726,000 immigrants arrived in the capital.... Migrationwatch says the changes, even for a city as diverse and as vibrant as London, are "unprecedented''. It says: "Migration within the UK is mainly from areas of high ethnic minority population to those with predominantly white populations. "The effect is a rapid increase in the ethnic minority composition of some boroughs, resulting from an outflow of the white population and an inflow of African and Asian international migrants.

There is a good summary here of how the blogosphere helped Bush win the 2004 election.

My latest posting on MarxWords notes more mockery of Jews. My latest posting on "A scripture blog" has more on both Hell and the environment.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE and LEFTISTS AS ELITISTS. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here

**************************

That power only, not principles, is what matters to Leftists is perfectly shown by the 2004 Kerry campaign. They put up a man whose policies seemed to be 99% the same as George Bush's even though the Left have previously disagreed violently with those policies. "Whatever it takes" is their rule.

Leftists are phonies. For most of them all that they want is to sound good. They don't care about doing good. That's why they do so much harm. They don't really care what the results of their policies are as long as they are seen as having good intentions.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist"

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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AMERICA'S HOPELESSLY BIASED "EDUCATION" SYSTEM

College Far-Leftist propagandizing finally coming under pressure: "A Hamilton College program director has resigned after igniting a furor by inviting to the campus a controversial professor who compared Sept. 11 victims to Nazis. Nancy Rabinowitz said she was resigning "under duress" as director of the Kirkland Project for the Study of Gender, Society and Culture. She will continue to teach comparative literature.... Her departure comes on the heels of a Feb. 3 speaking invitation extended to University of Colorado Professor Ward Churchill, whose essay written shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks compared the World Trade Center victims to "little Eichmanns," a reference to Adolf Eichmann who ensured the smooth running of the Nazi system. Rabinowitz also drew fire in November when the program she headed offered a temporary teaching position to 1960s radical Susan Rosenberg.... Churchill was forced to resign as a department chairman at Colorado in the recent aftermath of his essay's revelation. In the piece, Churchill also suggested many of those killed in the World Trade Center attacks deserved their fate, and spoke of the "gallant sacrifices" of the "combat teams" that struck America."

Lying Leftist professor Ward Churchill is down but not out. He still has his job if not his former seniority. I think his university should have sacked him for lying in his job application to them but that has not happened so far. His job is presently "under review". More on his rather unbelievable record of lying, terrorist-support and America-hatred here and here and here. He is one very sick puppy.

Results of a Leftist education: "While authoritarian states in much of the world are routinely jailing journalists and others for expressing their views, a substantial proportion of U.S. high school students believes the government should censor the American press and that the free speech protections of the Bill of Rights First Amendment go 'too far.' These are among the findings of a two-year $1 million study of 100,000 high school students, nearly 8,000 teachers, and more than 500 administrators and principals, carried out in more than 500 high schools by the University of Connecticut. The study, entitled, 'The Future of the First Amendment,' was commissioned by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. Hodding Carter III, president of the Foundation, said, 'These results are not only disturbing -- they are dangerous. Ignorance about the basics of this free society is a danger to our nation's future.'"

A good example here of the far-Leftist trash that is a REQUIRED course at San Francisco State university.

Free speech only for Leftists: "In the Summers affair, free speech and academic freedom barely came up, except among a few conservative commentators and one or two academics who were already known for their political incorrectness. Instead, Summers was a pinata to be bashed for material rewards and to send the message that some subjects are simply taboo even among serious scholars, no matter what the evidence, in closed-door, off-the-record meetings. Meanwhile, Ward Churchill, whose scholarship is a joke, whose evidence is tendentious at best, and who called the victims of 9/11 the moral equivalent of a man who sent babies to the gas chambers, is a hero of free speech."

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ELSEWHERE

My comments yesterday about Tony Judt I posted both here and on Majority Rights. Unlike most of his posters, the blog-owner at Majority Rights has a good sense of humour so he put up a response to my post on Judt that gave me a good laugh: "Euro-coffeeists like Judt are Nazis. Coffeeism is morally reprehensible and personally limiting. It has no place in a decent, progressive society where all the coffees of the world are equally celebrated. Fortunately, coffeeism is a social construct, like everything else. Ergo, we liberals can insist that Mr Judt frees himself from it and sees the native American coffee for the coffee it really is".

Leftist lying never stops. Germany is going to ban rallies by the allegedly "Right-wing" NPD. Yet the NPD is an anti-capitalist, pro-Green party! Read some of an interview with their party chairman here if you doubt it. The NPD undoubtedly have a soft spot for Hitler but seeing he had similar policies to theirs, that is hardly surprising.

Michelle Malkin has a wrap up of "Easongate", the latest triumph of the blogosphere over the lying mainstream media. There's an announcement of Eason Jordan's resignation from CNN here that tries its best to sanitize what he said. My most recent comment on him is here. I am glad to have been a small part of the "pajama" brigade.

A small step forward: "The Senate approved a measure Thursday to help shield businesses from major class action lawsuits like the ones that have been brought against tobacco companies, giving President Bush the first legislative victory of his second term. Under the legislation, long sought by big business, large multistate class action lawsuits could no longer be heard in small state courts. Such courts have handed out multimillion-dollar verdicts. Instead, the cases would be heard by federal judges, who have not proven as open to those type of lawsuits. The Senate passed the bill 72-26. It now goes to the House."

More global warming: "Greg Hunt, MP, Parliamentary Secretary with ministerial responsibility for the Australian Bureau of Meteorology, said today that Victoria's weather records would need a new chapter following unprecedented weather in the past 24 hours. "Victoria has experienced extreme weather during the past 24 hours, with all-time rainfall records tumbling, very cold temperatures for this time of the year, and very strong winds," Mr Hunt said."

Some Hollywood types can see reality: "Actress Jane Seymour waived a small US flag and cheered after she and about 9,000 other immigrants became US citizens during a naturalisation ceremony in Los Angeles today. The British-born actress who once lived in a mansion near Bath and is best known for her TV series Dr Quinn, Medicine Woman, said she has been in the United States since 1976. "I've realised that I've been living here longer than in my home country. America has given me unbelievable opportunities," she said. "I realised that with the US elections I wanted to vote and I couldn't. I felt the time had come to participate more fully."

My latest posting on MarxWords notes that Engels claimed that Germans were a superior race. Yes, that was Engels, not Hitler. My latest posting on "A scripture blog" is about Ludwig von Mises and his views on the churches.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE and LEFTISTS AS ELITISTS. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here

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That power only, not principles, is what matters to Leftists is perfectly shown by the 2004 Kerry campaign. They put up a man whose policies seemed to be 99% the same as George Bush's even though the Left have previously disagreed violently with those policies. "Whatever it takes" is their rule.

Leftists are phonies. For most of them all that they want is to sound good. They don't care about doing good. That's why they do so much harm. They don't really care what the results of their policies are as long as they are seen as having good intentions.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist"

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

********************************

TONY JUDT: POOR MAN'S CHOMSKY

There's an article in the N.Y. Review of Books by Tony Judt that is just typical of Leftist distortions and anti-Americanism. And is it supercilious and arrogant! In his opening paragraph Judt baldly assserts that American coffee is "largely without flavor". How do you answer such asinine condescension? What poor stupid people he obviously thinks Americans are. I guess it is at least fair warning of the low quality of the reasoning that follows. Fisking the article is a job for an economic statistician and I am sure that such a fisking will happen so I was going to leave it at that but I cannot resist just a few interim remarks pointing out where some of the distortions lie:

One of his most unforgivable assertions is that America has a high infant mortality. That was the subject of much discussion fairly recently so he really has no excuse for trotting that deception out. America has a high infant mortality rate mainly because America tries hard to save even very premature babies. And many of those attempts fail, of course. So naturally America has more infant deaths than countries that do not try to save such babies and do not count them as babies at all.

And he says that European productivity per worker compares favourably with American productivity. Of course it does. It has to. Europe's legally enforced high minimimum wages ensure that only highly productive people are worth employing. But that leaves around 10% of the European workforce unemployed, compared to around 5% in America. And that extra 5% in Europe produce nothing at all. The only fair comparison would be to compare productivity of the whole workforce, not just the employed part of it. If you did that Europe would really be in the basement!

And he mentions the generous maternity benefits for Swedish mothers. They are generous all right. So generous that few Swedish companies can afford to employ women. So it is only poorly-paid government jobs that most Swedish women can get. And Sweden has a QUARTER of its workforce on welfare of one sort or another, anyway. So that's REAL maternity leave!

What he says about the poor quality of American education, however, is undoubtedly true. He omits to mention, however, that education is the one section of the U.S. economy that his Leftist co-religionists dominate.

But I think his description of the United Nations tells you all you need to know about Mr Judt's desperate blindness. He calls it "the jewel in the crown of international agencies". Words fail me at that point.

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ELSEWHERE

"Gay gene" a myth: "A study to be published in the March 2005 issue of the journal Human Genetics, and available online now, actually undermines the commonly held view that homosexual orientation is determined by genetic factors. The study's lead author Brian Mustanski from University of Illinois at Chicago said in a UIC news release that "There is no one 'gay' gene. Sexual orientation is a complex trait, so it's not surprising that we found several DNA regions involved in its expression." However, a thorough examination of the actual report reveals no statistically significant findings for any of these DNA regions".

Sense from the Saudis! "Labor Minister Dr. Ghazi Al-Gosaibi thinks extremist teachings, not unemployment, are the root causes of terrorism in Saudi Arabia. Gosaibi blamed the spread of terrorism on the "indoctrination that teaches young people they can kill justifiably" and the training some extremists received in terror camps in Afghanistan. "I don't believe that terrorist movement has anything to do with unemployment," the minister told reporters in Riyadh. Unemployment has long been regarded as a major source of frustration in a region possessing one of the world's youngest populations. Many also argue that economic hardships also drive young people from the region toward militancy. As you know Osama Bin Laden is a very rich man and all of his cronies are quite rich," Gosaibi said. "(Venezuelan-born terrorist) Carlos (the Jackal) wasn't exactly a beggar and I am not aware that somebody has been driven to terrorism simply because he could not find a job."

Another Leftist antisemite: "Ken Livingstone was accused last night of having "lost the plot" after an angry confrontation with a Jewish journalist who, he said, was behaving "just like a concentration camp guard". The Mayor clashed with Oliver Finegold, a reporter from the London Evening Standard, on Wednesday night at a party marking the 20th anniversary of Chris Smith becoming the first openly gay MP. His "concentration camp" remark came after being told that the reporter was Jewish, it was claimed..... The Board of Deputies of British Jews said: "We are appalled by this latest outburst by a man whose insensitivity seems to know no bounds."

Given me Irish blood, I've got to note this report: "It was not so long ago, even less than a generation, that Ireland was a threadbare nation, barely relevant in European affairs. Finding a job meant hopping an aircraft out of the country. People counted their pennies, not their commuter miles, and poverty, for many, was a stubborn component of Irish life. But Ireland's jump into the European Union and aggressively pro-business economic policies changed all that. In little more than a decade the so-called Celtic Tiger was transformed from one of the poorest countries in Western Europe to one of the richest in the world. Its gross domestic product per person, not quite 70 per cent of the EU average in 1987, sprung to 136 per cent of the EU average by 2003, while the jobless rate sank to 4 per cent from 17 per cent. In November The Economist cemented Ireland's powerhouse reputation by declaring it the country with the best quality of life in the world."

I often point out (e.g. here) that degree of happiness is a fairly lasting disposition rather than something that is affected by how much money you have and this rather confirms it: "Most people who live with serious disability or illness, such as kidney failure, appear to adapt well and maintain a healthy outlook on life, new research reports. This trend may be surprising to some -- the report also found that people without serious illnesses tended to underestimate the level of happiness in these patients. "We think it is encouraging that for at least some illnesses, life seems to (eventually) go on and that people come to experience good and even normal mood levels," study author Dr. Jason Riis of Princeton University in New Jersey told Reuters Health. "We cannot adapt to anything. But we are generally more resilient than we think," he said. In the Journal of Experimental Psychology, Riis and his colleagues note that this is not the first study to show that people can adjust to good and bad life events. For instance, a nearly 30-year old study found that paraplegics were not that much less happy than lottery winners."

Wicked Thoughts has been putting up a lot of odd and amusing news items lately -- many proving once again that truth is stranger than fiction. The one on Microsoft and the EU really is amazing.

My latest posting on MarxWords notes that Marx talks of "dogs of democrats and liberal riff-raff". My latest posting on "A scripture blog" asks what sort of Hell "gehenna" is.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE and LEFTISTS AS ELITISTS. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here

**************************

That power only, not principles, is what matters to Leftists is perfectly shown by the 2004 Kerry campaign. They put up a man whose policies seemed to be 99% the same as George Bush's even though the Left have previously disagreed violently with those policies. "Whatever it takes" is their rule.

Leftists are phonies. For most of them all that they want is to sound good. They don't care about doing good. That's why they do so much harm. They don't really care what the results of their policies are as long as they are seen as having good intentions.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist"

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

********************************

I would like to add my congratulations to those of the many who will be congratulating His Royal Highness, the Prince of Wales, on his recently-announced forthcoming marriage.




CULTURAL RELATIVISM

Leftists claim that there is no such thing as right and wrong because what is right in one culture may be wrong in another. And to Leftists all cultures are equal, of course. It is true that values do differ to some degree between cultures but there do also appear to be some inborn moral instincts. Blogger Turin pursues that point. Excerpt below:

The claims of cultural relativism rests upon two assumptions. The first assumption is that there no common human nature shared by all human beings. By human nature is meant a substantive constitution of mind and body that is uniform in all humans across racial, ethnic, cultural, and political groupings. If human nature were to exist, some values would arise out of it, as humans operationalized their human nature in living in diverse conditions; and these values would the same for all humans. This notion is denied by the principle of cultural relativism. The concept of human nature lies behind the opposition of the anthropologist, Clyde Kluckhohn, to cultural relativity, as expressed in this quotation:

"Contrary to the statements of ... exponents of extreme cultural relativity, standards and values are not completely relative to the cultures from which they derive. Some values are as much givens in human life as the fact that bodies of certain densities fall under specified conditions. These are founded, in part, upon the fundamental biological similarities of all human beings. They arise also out of the circumstance that human existence is invariably a social existence. No society has ever approved suffering as a a good thing in itself. As a means to an end (purification or self-discipline), yes; as punishment--as a means to the ends of society, yes. But for itself--no. No culture fails to put a negative valuation upon killing, indiscriminate lying, and stealing within the in-group. There are important variations, to be sure, in the conception of the extent of the in-group and in the limits of toleration of lying and stealing under certain conditions. But in the core notion of the desirable and nondesirable is constant across all cultures. Nor need we dispute the universality of the conception that rape or any achievement of sexuality by violent means is disapproved. This is a fact of observation as much as the fact that different materials have different specific gravities."

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ELSEWHERE

Aha! We now have an independent report of what CNN Chief Eason Jordan said at Davos. He DID make a scurrilous accusation against American troops but immediately started to backpedal when what he said came under scrutiny. Should anyone trust a "news" organization headed by such a sleaze? I think that question answers itself.

It has always been a common Leftist tactic to take some single thing out of context and draw amazing conclusions from it that ignore all the other facts relevant to the matter. And The Guardian really does us proud with this example of such totally dishonest and deceptive argument -- written by Neil Clark, who is said to be "a writer and broadcaster specialising in east European affairs". I am sure he is just that, regrettably. Tim Worstall goes to the trouble of demolishing the sorry tripe concerned.

Offensive peacenik feels the heat: "Some Sacramento residents are reacting with outrage over a homeowner's controversial war protest in Land Park. When they saw the American soldier display, they decided to do something about it.... What got people so upset? A fake U.S. soldier in uniform hung by the neck with a noose, with a sign on it that says "your tax dollars at work." .... This young man, who would not identify himself, was just walking down the street when he decided he had seen enough. He climbed onto the house and tore down part of the display..... Another man was riding his motorcycle when he decided to stop and do something about the rest of the display, the soldier's hanging pants. So he took them down, and grabbed the torso and took off."

A small but welcome step towards immigration control: "Hoping to keep drivers licenses out of the hands of terrorists, the House voted Thursday to make states verify that applicants are U.S. citizens or legal immigrants. Republicans pushed the measure through on a 261-161 vote despite protests from governors and state motor vehicle departments that it would be too costly and would require them to take on the role of immigration officers. The bill also would make it easier for judges to deport immigrants seeking political asylum if they think they might be terrorists."

They got the America-hating bitch: "veteran civil rights lawyer was convicted Thursday of crossing the line by smuggling messages of violence from one of her jailed clients - a radical Egyptian sheik - to his terrorist disciples on the outside. The jury deliberated 13 days over the past month before convicting Lynne Stewart, 65, a firebrand, left-wing activist known for representing radicals and revolutionaries in her 30 years on the New York legal scene.

Leftists: Masters of empty rhetoric: "The Virginia Senate yesterday approved a constitutional amendment that defines traditional marriage as the union of a man and a woman. The Senate voted 30-10 to pass the amendment after an emotional 30-minute debate during which several Democrats likened the measure to the Holocaust" [normal marriage = mass-murder?]

Corrupt Russia (so what else is new?) "Russia's political class has amassed as much wealth as power under President Vladimir Putin, according to a new 'rich list' published yesterday. In revelations which will outrage many pensioners, who have recently campaigned against welfare cuts, Finance magazine reported that three regional presidents, 20 MPs, 11 senators, a regional governor and a deputy regional governor were among the country's 468 wealthiest individuals."

There is an amazing document by a psychologist here that "examines 155 scholarly investigations: 126 empirical studies and 29 reviews and/or analyses, which demonstrate that women are as physically aggressive, or more aggressive, than men in their relationships with their spouses or male partners. The aggregate sample size in the reviewed studies exceeds 116,000". So much for the automatic "blame the man" one hears.

My latest posting on MarxWords notes again Marx's contempt for democracy. My latest posting on "A scripture blog" looks at the NT conception of "hades".

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE and LEFTISTS AS ELITISTS. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here

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That power only, not principles, is what matters to Leftists is perfectly shown by the 2004 Kerry campaign. They put up a man whose policies seemed to be 99% the same as George Bush's even though the Left have previously disagreed violently with those policies. "Whatever it takes" is their rule.

Leftists are phonies. For most of them all that they want is to sound good. They don't care about doing good. That's why they do so much harm. They don't really care what the results of their policies are as long as they are seen as having good intentions.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist"

Comments? Email me or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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FROM BROOKES NEWS

The American economy: is the current account deficit a problem? America's current account deficits are really symptoms of dangerous economic undercurrents that will have to be confronted - the question is when
Great Depression: defending capitalism against anti-market myths, part II What really happened during the Great Depression?
Mr Brown's magical unemployment figures What the coming UK election tells us about Labour's record on jobs and taxes
Women of Iraq - rend your veils and begin Your shoe smacking! It was the night before the election in the land of Iraq, but all through the eastern seaboard bars Democratic Senator Edward Kennedy could be heard roaring, "President Bush your Iraq policies are a catastrophic failure"

Details here

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ELSEWHERE

There is a huge new study of DNA just come out of the Stanford School of Medicine which showed that genetics is almost a perfect predictor of self-described race. See here. In other words whether you are black, white, Asian or Hispanic can clearly be seen in your genes. It certainly knocks on the head the Leftist idea that race is a "social construct". And it's not the first DNA study to identify normal racial categories in the genes. There was a 2002 Yale University study that found the same thing. See here. So realism about race is not an ideology. It is just scientific truth. Anybody who ever thought all races were the same was always battling against the evidence though. It is race-equality that is the ideology.

Hate-filled Leftist professor Ward Churchill is living proof that Leftists mean it when they say there is no such thing as truth. There is certainly no such thing as truth in what he writes. Full details of his blatant lies about American history here

Fabulous: An arrogant bureaucrat being sued for manslaughter: "A council architect was responsible for causing Britain’s biggest outbreak of legionnaires’ disease which killed seven and infected 172 others, Preston Crown Court was told yesterday. Gillian Beckingham, 47, a middle-ranking executive for Barrow-in-Furness council, cancelled a maintenance contract governing the air-conditioning system of Forum 28, the town’s main arts centre.

Frogs rediscover work: "Much of France was due to bid farewell to its guaranteed short working week last night with parliament set to pass an unpopular labour reform bill that is feeding discontent with the Government of Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin. Mr Raffarin insisted yesterday that big protest marches at the weekend would not divert his drive to undo the compulsory maximum 35-hour week, the measure that was the prime legacy of the previous socialist government. The new legislation will allow people to work up to 48 hours a week if they and their employers agree."

Stupid Europeans again: "On January 28 the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative announced that the U.S. government will raise tariffs on European yogurt, cheese, fruit, vegetables, and spices in retaliation for increased European Union tariffs on American brown rice... Thus the higher EU tariffs on American rice will harm not only the narrow segment of rice producers as perhaps intended by the EU Commission, but also innumerable European consumers of rice, European producers in other markets, and European workers"

From a review of Ann Coulter's book: "The most interesting and probably most valuable part of Treason is Coulter's analysis of the immediate postwar era. She says the problem was not that the Democrats were given insufficient proof of communist spies in their administration but that "they didn't give a damn". Soviet spies in the government most certainly were not, as the liberal-left continued to maintain, a figment of right-wing imaginations.... McCarthy's allegations that some 57 persons in government were communist spies or security risks in every instance proved to be entirely accurate.... In her final chapter, Coulter poses and answers the question: why do liberals hate America? She points out that the liberal-left, much of the media and of academia continue to support savages as against civilisation and to support intrinsic evil. She concludes that "the fundamental difference between liberals and conservatives is conservatives believe man was created in God's image while liberals believe they are God - liberals believe they can murder the unborn because they are gods".

Does Islamophobia exist? "The trouble with the idea is that it confuses hatred of, and discrimination against, Muslims on the one hand with criticism of Islam on the other. The charge of "Islamophobia" is all too often used not to highlight racism but to silence critics of Islam, or even Muslims fighting for reform of their communities. In reality, discrimination against Muslims is not as great as is often claimed. When making a film on Islamophobia for Channel 4, I discovered a huge gap between perception and reality"

Smokers, shareholders escape taxation-through-litigation: "The Competitive Enterprise Institute applauds today's court ruling against the federal government's tobacco racketeering suit. 'The federal government's lawsuit to squeeze $280 billion out of the tobacco industry was nothing more than an effort to milk a politically disfavored industry,' said Sam Kazman, general counsel for the Competitive Enterprise Institute. 'Tobacco may be addictive, but tobacco money is even more addictive,' Kazman observed."

Lopsided moralizing: "The outrage at Lt. Gen. Mattis's comment is outright paradoxical, as well. On the one hand it suggests that there are no morally bad people at all and thus no joy may be experienced when one has helped rid the world of some of the worst such people, especially in the face of their relentless violent onslaught. On the other hand the outrage suggests that the likes of Lt. Gen. Mattis are evil people, deserving of scolding and rebuff. Well, you cannot have it both ways. Either there are evil folks and some so evil as to deserve killing under certain circumstances, or there are none, in which case those who have fun killing others simply need to be cured-they too aren't doing anything morally wrong".

Carnival of the Vanities is up again with a big range of reading

My latest posting on MarxWords notes how Marx wanted to hear bad news. My latest posting on "A scripture blog" asks: "Is there a Hell?

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE and LEFTISTS AS ELITISTS. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here

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That power only, not principles, is what matters to Leftists is perfectly shown by the 2004 Kerry campaign. They put up a man whose policies seemed to be 99% the same as George Bush's even though the Left have previously disagreed violently with those policies. "Whatever it takes" is their rule.

Leftists are phonies. For most of them all that they want is to sound good. They don't care about doing good. That's why they do so much harm. They don't really care what the results of their policies are as long as they are seen as having good intentions.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist"

Comments? Email me or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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AMERICA GOING FASCIST?

Americans have a "Hunger for dictatorship"? Spare us!

Historically, American conservatism has always been isolationist. Isolationism is the translation into international politics of the basic conservative deal, "You leave me alone and I'll leave you alone". And that's why it has in the past always been Leftists or "Progressives" who have got American into foreign wars. So it is no surprise that America's interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq have always had opponents on the Right as well as on the Left. Old habits die hard and the fact that war was decisively declared on America by a new and dangerous foe on 9/11/2001 has not found its way into some thick old heads. And Patrick Buchanan and his American Conservative magazine have been the principal advocates of an isolationism that is in reality simply no longer possible. The Islamic fruitcakes are NOT going to leave America alone if America keeps letting them do what they like.

So it is no surprise that The American Conservative has now joined the Left in a cry that America is "going Fascist" under GWB. The article is however written by co-editor Scott McConnell rather than by Buchanan. Buchanan knows his history far too well to write such historically naive stuff. And a knowledge of what Fascism actually was is important if the accusation of "fascism" is to be taken as being more than just the routine and mindless swear-word that it has become among Leftists. And McConnell does make some claim to historical sophistication in his article. He quotes Fritz Stern, a retired professor of history at Columbia. Here is the nub of what McConnell says about Stern's views:

Stern had emigrated from Germany as a child in 1938 and spent a career exploring how what may have been Europe’s most civilized country could have turned to barbarism. Central to his work was the notion that the readiness to abandon democracy has deep cultural roots in German soil and that many Europeans, not only Germans, yearned for the safeties and certainties of something like fascism well before the emergence of fascist parties. One could not come away from his classes without a sense of the fragility of democratic systems, a deep gratitude for their success in the Anglo-American world, and a wary belief that even here human nature and political circumstance could bring something else to the fore.

This account of Fascism in terms of national character is however a very tired old one and is one that probably owes more to Stern's (understandable) antipathy to Germany than anything more profound. The great weakness of the account is its mismatch to Italy. To argue that Germans longed for order and stability is at least plausible for such a phlegmatic and orderly people but Italians are fundamentally an anarchic, fractious and volatile lot. Insofar as there are national characteristics, Italians and Germans are just about as opposite as you can get. (Ask almost any Italian if you doubt it). Yet both nations went heavily for Fascism, with Italy leading the way. So to attribute Fascism to a particular national character is just mindless.

The plain fact of the matter is that the appeal of Fascism was just a slightly different mix of politics as usual. Fascism appealed to and claimed to represent the workers with its socialistic promises and it kept everyone else onside with the second string to its bow -- strident nationalism. There is nothing mysterious and unique about Fascism or its appeal. Socialism and nationalism appeal to lots of people to this day. The Fascists were just clever enough to combine big dollops of both.

So where does that leave the claim that America is "going Fascist"? Given the criticism (if not hatred) of America that is taught in most American schools and which also pours out daily from most of America's mass media, America is about as opposite to a Fascist state as you could imagine. Any Fascist state worth its salt would have knocked all that on the head years ago. In a Fascist State you would be hearing nothing but patriotic and nationalist propaganda in your media and in your schools. So America lacks even the first precondition for "going Fascist". Despite big efforts, George Bush cannot even get American schools to teach phonics, let alone nationalism.

There are other idiocies in the article but what's the point....?

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ELSEWHERE

The poor old Leftists. They haven't got a clue. In Sawicky's abuse-filled attack on Intapundit, he tries to say that mainstream Leftists are really decent guys not at all like the fruitcakes we are always hearing about on the American Left. But to prove his point he says that Michael Moore and Chomsky are geat men and ends his own post by saying that if he had had his way Saddam would still be in power! If that's the moderate Left, they all have a bit missing. Scott Campbell comments more extensively on Sawicky than I think he deserves.

What a dilemma for the Left! "During America's commemoration of Black History Month, some pro-life activists are charging that legalized abortion has led to a "black genocide" of more than 14 million unborn African-American babies. They condemn, in particular, the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, whose president Gloria Feldt announced last week that she's resigning. "For every five African-American women who get pregnant, three have an abortion," Clenard Childress Jr., director of the Northeast Chapter of the Life Education And Resource Network, told the Cybercast News Service. "This is a horrific injustice to women, and it's decimating our communities.""

More good news from Iraq: "With a hero who gave his life for the elections, a revived national anthem blaring from car stereos and a greater willingness to help police, the public mood appears to be moving more clearly against the insurgency in Iraq, political and security officials said. In the week since national elections, police officers and Iraqi National Guardsmen said they have received more tips from the public, resulting in more arrests and greater effectiveness in their efforts to weaken the violent insurgency rocking the country".

There is a most interesting site here showing what real patriots were the Hollywood stars of yesteryear. Most of them were WW2 veterans. A great contrast with the utter lack of experience among the empty vessels of today.

One of the more laughable claims of the MSM is that they do fact-checking whereas bloggers do not. "Powerline" has recently given two powerful examples of just who it is that does the fact-checking. See here and here. If something suits MSM biases, it immediately needs no fact-checking, apparently.

My latest posting on MarxWords notes how Marx admitted to being deliberately ambiguous in what he said. My latest posting on "A scripture blog" says Jesus was a conservative insofar as he was political at all.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE and LEFTISTS AS ELITISTS. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here

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That power only, not principles, is what matters to Leftists is perfectly shown by the 2004 Kerry campaign. They put up a man whose policies seemed to be 99% the same as George Bush's even though the Left have previously disagreed violently with those policies. "Whatever it takes" is their rule.

Leftists are phonies. For most of them all that they want is to sound good. They don't care about doing good. That's why they do so much harm. They don't really care what the results of their policies are as long as they are seen as having good intentions.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist"

Comments? Email me or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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TUESDAY ROUNDUP

Once again I pick out what I think are my best posts for the week:

On Dissecting Leftism I point out that what the racist "Far Right" believe today is virtually the same as what Leftists once believed.

On Political Correctness Watch I note evidence against the Leftist claim that self-esteem is all-important for mental health

On Greenie Watch I note that Greenies are the new imperialists

On Education Watch I note academic double standards. Freedom of speech is only for Leftists.

On Socialized Medicine I note that huge savings in health care costs can come from improved efficiencies

On Gun Watch I note the idiocy of ballistic fingerprinting

On Leftists as Elitists I point out what an elitist Michael Moore is

On A scripture blog I ask was Jesus a Leftist?

On MarxWords I note that Marx referred to one of his "friends" as a "Jewish Nigger"

On Majority Rights I point out that the founder of modern conservatism was a Jew

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ELSEWHERE

V.D. Hanson has a good takedown on the crazy California Leftie Senator Boxer: "The senator once went after erstwhile rival Bruce Herschensohn, Senator Packwood, and Clarence Thomas for their purported sexual insensitivities-but urged forgiveness for President Clinton's more egregiously inappropriate conduct, whose preemptive bombing of Milosevic she supported despite the absence of either Senate or UN approval... Then Boxer proclaimed of the professed reason to go to war: "It was WMD period.". Boxer's statement was simply not true. Read the joint congressional declaration that was approved on October 11, 2002 by Senator Boxer's colleagues".

Greenie gets it right for once: "African leaders agreed bold plans at the weekend to preserve the world's second biggest rainforest area but Kenya's Nobel prize-winning environmentalist told them they would need to root out corruption to succeed. At a conference in Brazzaville, central African heads of state signed a treaty pledging to protect the forests of the Congo Basin from massive poaching and illegal or irresponsible logging which threaten the flora and fauna of the region".

This article shows what a crock the "mentally retarded" defence is. It mentions a murderer saved from executuion because of his low IQ. But his IQ has now risen substantially. IQ does not change much so the earlier low scores were just malingering.

How pesky for the Dems. Their great hero, FDR, seems to have wanted private savings accounts for Social Security purposes too: "Second, old-age benefits, including compulsory and voluntary annuities"

Protestor motivations: "Protesters shout about the tragedy of death in war, to be sure. But according to their own Godless worldviews, their reasons for opposing war are without foundation. Why would death or suffering be wrong or worth opposing if, according to atheism or materialistic science, it's been happening as a natural part of the bloody evolutionary process for millions of years?... D.C. Mayor Anthony Williams, no friend of the Bush administration, nevertheless was quoted in the Washington Post as saying in so many words that these people make him very angry because they're "so selfish that they can't give him this one day." Often, when the police swarm in after things get especially rowdy, protesters will shout in exact unison the common canard, "These are our streets!" while they struggle mightily in the officers' clutches, perhaps attempting to reach into their pockets and present their deeds for the property. No, they're not your streets. They belong to all of us. Didn't your parents ever teach you to share? Rooted in that selfishness is an extreme closed-mindedness as well. They're convinced their opposition to war is just, but refuse to acknowledge that others feel the same way about defending their beliefs - and defending their nation from those who would do it harm".

The FCC backslides on unbundling: "The FCC has been one of the most rogue agencies in recent memory. Charged with writing regulations to carry out the will of Congress in the Telecom Act of 1996, the agency has been rebuked by the D.C. District Court no fewer then three times for writing regulations that flew directly in the face of the act's deregulatory intentions.... Finally this year, the commission seemed to get religion. In the last months of 2004, the commission made the correct decision on voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), determining states could not regulate this transforming new technology.... In December, the FCC announced the results of its fourth attempt at network-sharing rules. Until recently, the assumption was that, chastened by the courts and driven by the free-market convictions of Chairman Michael Powell, the commission would do the right thing and quickly phase out line-sharing and unbundling regulations. But the FCC has backslid. Oddly, although the commission acknowledges the damage done by unbundling regulations, it can't resist leaving them in place for another year on mass-market lines and indefinitely on high-capacity lines used by businesses... It is unbelievable that almost a decade after the 1996 act, the FCC still has not carried it out."

My latest posting on MarxWords notes some more ferocious antisemitic abuse from Engels. My latest posting on "A scripture blog" looks at texts which tend to show Jesus as a Leftist.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE and LEFTISTS AS ELITISTS. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here

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That power only, not principles, is what matters to Leftists is perfectly shown by the 2004 Kerry campaign. They put up a man whose policies seemed to be 99% the same as George Bush's even though the Left have previously disagreed violently with those policies. "Whatever it takes" is their rule.

Leftists are phonies. For most of them all that they want is to sound good. They don't care about doing good. That's why they do so much harm. They don't really care what the results of their policies are as long as they are seen as having good intentions.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist"

Comments? Email me or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

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THE VALIDITY OF THE IMPLICIT ASSOCIATION TEST

There are two articles here and here that summarize some research by Indian psychologist Mazharin Banaji on a "covert" measure of racism called the Implicit Associations Test (IAT). A common finding from use of the test is that all sorts of people are quicker to pair "good" words with whites and "bad" words with blacks. The most surprising thing about the test is that many people who are conspicuously anti-racist show the same quickness to associate good with white.

Finding "covert" measures of anything -- and racism in particular -- has long been a "holy grail" for psychologists and there have been some conspicuous failures in the quest. So is the IAT the holy grail? Sadly, No. The first thing a psychometrician asks about any test of anything is: Is it valid? -- meaning, does it measure what it purports to measure? But there is another question logically prior to that: What does it purport to measure? And the answer in this case seems to be straightforward: It purports to ascertain whether a person has prejudiced, negative or antagonistic attitudes towards various minorities. That being so, the test is obviously NOT valid. It is not valid on what psychologists call a "criterion groups" examination. And it is precisely the feature of interest in the IAT that lots of people who are by any criterion either non-racist or actively anti-racist get high scores on racism according to the test. So the IAT does NOT pick out non-racist or anti-racist people accurately.

So does the test measure anything? Anybody who is familiar with the stereotyping literature will find that easily answered. There have now been many decades of research into stereotyping and the findings about it are roughly the opposite of what is popularly believed. There are two literature surveys here and here which document that. The important point for our present purposes is that stereotypes have long been found to have a "kernel of truth", as Allport put it. Far from being rigid or fixed, they are highly responsive to modification through fresh information. They are our first and most immediate response to any new situation -- but to be useful, they also have to be continually modified as information about the situation comes in -- and they are.

So what the IAT findings show is that the experience white people have of blacks is generally negative. Whites know from experience or observation that blacks in general are (for instance) more dangerous to them. Given the enormously disproportionate incidence of violent crime among blacks, it would be a sad day indeed if no-one had noticed that. So what the IAT measures is EXPECTATIONS of blacks, not ATTITUDES to blacks. It shows what we see as most probable about blacks but tells us nothing about any more complex attitudes we may have towards blacks. So the IAT simply records our experience of reality without telling us anything about how we interpret that reality.

That view of the IAT also explains why even many blacks associate badness with blacks. Blacks are of course the most frequent victims of black crime (for instance). Since it is very common for whites to shun blacks in various ways (no eye contact etc.) however, many blacks will still have most positive associations with their own kind. And the IAT shows that too.

There is an academic review article here (PDF) which also fairly effectively undermines the claims of the IAT as a measure of racially biased attitudes. See also here for comments on another study using the IAT.

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ELSEWHERE

Amusing. Liberal Avenger noted my demonstration of his hypocrisy of two days ago but was completely unable to defend his stance. All he could manage was some ad hominem abuse. He said I must be "lonely". How typically Leftist! Abuse in lieu of rational argument. The emails I get from Leftists are dominated by abuse too. See LEFTISTS AS ELITISTS for the latest example.

Nepalling BBC ethics: "British Broadcasting Corporation's coverage of the recent developments in Nepal raises questions about ethics.... The anchor mentioned its Nepal stringer, Netra KC, by name. He also mentioned the fact that since telephone lines were disconnected in Nepal, KC was nipping across the border into India and making calls from there. Soon after that, there were unconfirmed reports that Netra KC had either gone into hiding or was missing. Today, an official intimation came from the International Federation of Journalists who issued a statement saying the president and general secretary of the Federation of Nepalese Journalists had been arrested. It further added that BBC representative Netra KC had also "disappeared" after being called to the army barracks in Nepalgunj. "The IFJ is calling for the international community to support our courageous Nepalese colleagues," the statement said. But if the report about KC is true, it raises questions about the BBC's ethics in disclosing the name and mode of operation of its representative in a country where emergency has been imposed and press freedom curtailed.

Farm sanity good for U.S., good for Oz: "Australian farmers could reap big dividends from the Bush administration's "monumental" decision to slash US farm subsidies in an effort to reduce Washington's budget deficit, Trade Minister Mark Vaile predicted last night. Deep cuts in US farm and commodity programs were expected in the new Bush administration budget, limiting subsidies to individual farmers that can run up to $US2 million ($2.588 million) a year to just $US250,000 in some cases. Mr Vaile last night hailed the proposal as a significant breakthrough for Australian farmers, but warned it would face strong resistance from the US farm lobby. "This is a very positive signal that the Bush administration is going to bite the bullet and go ahead with a reduction of farm subsidies," he told The Australian".

The pathetic Dutch: "In the Netherlands the national flag is now banned on most schools. If a student wears the national flag of his own country he will be suspended or expelled from school. The reason for this is that this provokes the immigrants (the muslims) and therefore it is considered discrimination if you wear your country's flag in your own country. Even people who have an bumpersticker whit the flag on their car are harassed and called a facist by the Muslims. Most schools also ban certain clothing like the Lonsdale brand and combat boots with white or red laces. This is also concidered a sign of racism. There are of course no restrictions for the immigrants on clothing."

This article by Mathias Dapfner, Chief of the huge German publisher, Axel Springer, shows that some Germans do get it. It is titled: "Europe, thy name is cowardice". Excerpt: "Appeasement generates a mentality that allows Europe to ignore nearly 500,000 victims of Saddam's torture and murder machinery and, motivated by the self-righteousness of the peace-movement, has the gall to issue bad grades to George Bush. Even as it is uncovered that the loudest critics of the American action in Iraq made illicit billions, no, TENS of billions, in the corrupt U.N. Oil-for-Food program. And now we are faced with a particularly grotesque form of appeasement... How is Germany reacting to the escalating violence by Islamic fundamentalists in Holland and elsewhere? By suggesting that we really should have a "Muslim Holiday" in Germany.....These days, Europe reminds me of an old woman who, with shaking hands, frantically hides her last pieces of jewelry when she notices a robber breaking into a neighbor's house"

My latest posting on MarxWords notes that Marx was paranoid about both Jews and Jesuits. My latest posting on "A scripture blog" looks at arguments that Jesus was conservative.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE and LEFTISTS AS ELITISTS. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here

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That power only, not principles, is what matters to Leftists is perfectly shown by the 2004 Kerry campaign. They put up a man whose policies seemed to be 99% the same as George Bush's even though the Left have previously disagreed violently with those policies. "Whatever it takes" is their rule.

Leftists are phonies. For most of them all that they want is to sound good. They don't care about doing good. That's why they do so much harm. They don't really care what the results of their policies are as long as they are seen as having good intentions.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist"

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