ELSEWHERE

Why do I not feel bothered by this news? "At least 345 pilgrims were killed yesterday when one of the holiest rituals of haj in Saudi Arabia turned to tragedy. White-robed believers rushing to stone the Devil in a symbolic ceremony were caught up in a stampede and crushed. Many who escaped death were seriously hurt, with 289 people reported injured".

There is an interesting article by Bernard Chapin here about the unrealistically high expectations of a partner that single women in their 30s and over tend to have. The article mirrors to an extent observations that I too have made. The unrealism of many women in that age range is certainly puzzling. I remember once overhearing a discussion between two waitresses when one of the waitresses said: "Oh! I'm waiting for my millionaire". Since the lady concerned was fat and sloppy, with short bleached hair and a brassy manner, I can only hope she was joking. I cannot imagine a millionaire who would not be able to find a better option than her. One is tempted to say that it is only the foolishly picky women who are still single by age 30 but the unrealism is also no doubt to a substantial extent due to the constantly preached feminist myths that deny all the basic truths about males and females. I am aware that what both I and Chapin say would be dismissed by feminists as sour grapes but I gather that Bernard is happily married and as someone who twice married ladies in their 40s, I think that I too am rather proof against such ad hominem criticisms.

There is a good historical roundup here that asks us not to judge France by her current despicable political class. There is much truth in what he says but I think he overlooks the extent to which contempt for France is largely a reflection of the feverish French hatred of America and "the Anglo-Saxons" generally. There is also a more personal article here that speaks kindly of the French.

As a legally-qualified academic, Keith Burgess Jackson is taking a particular interest in the nomination of Alito to SCOTUS. Today he "deconstructs" the specious opposition of the NYT to the nomination.

There is an excellent and comprehensive memoir of the heroic life of Ariel Sharon here. In this time of great trial for him and for Israel, it is good to remind ourselves of the Herculean efforts Israel has had to make just to exist.

There is a new book out called Righteous Gentiles: How Pius XII and the Catholic Church Saved Half a Million Jews from the Nazis. That should give the church-haters heartburn! They always accuse Pius of being a Nazi collaborator. There is part of an interview with the author here.

There is another roundup of the latest news on race and IQ by Chris Brand just up here.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here. On Social Security see Dick McDonald and for purely Australian news see Australian Politics (mirrored here).

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Practically all policies advocated by the Left create poverty. Leftists get the government to waste vast slabs of the country's labour-force on bureaucracy and paperwork and so load the burden of providing most useful goods and services onto fewer and fewer people. So fewer useful goods and services are produced to go around. That is no accident. The Left love the poor. The Left need the poor so that they can feel good by patronizing and "helping" them. So they do their best to create as many poor people as possible.

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" (Nationalsozialistisch)

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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Brookes News Update

US economy, productivity and the Bush boom: Commentators are dangerously wrong about US productivity and the boom bust cycle
Islamic Clerics sanction child sex and Bahraini women's rights activist expresses outrage: Is it conceivable for a grown man to have sex with an infant girl? And you people tell me that the Islamic Sharia authorizes this
Jack Murtha betrayed America - and for what?: Democrats are playing politics with the lives of US citizens and in the most hateful way anyone has ever seen our Congress
Defending capitalism against socialist lunacy: Many socialists still peddle the absurd myth that unemployment and 'excess capacity' are created by the need for capitalists to invest to make profits rather than create jobs or meet 'social needs'
The dangerous myth of price stability: There is almost complete unanimity among economists that the most important role of the central bank is to attain price level stability. This is a dangerous fallacy
Mexicans Hire Bush Advisor to Stop US Border, Illegal Immigration Reforms: Mexican President Vincente Fox has bought the services of a Republican strategist to help stop the public outcry over rampant illegal immigration
The coming day of the blog: Political blogs are going to end up more on the activism side because bloggers care about issues.

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ELSEWHERE

Sharon stuns doctors: "Israeli leader Ariel Sharon had appeared aware of his younger son at his bedside, his chief surgeon said. He also expressed astonishment at Mr Sharon's powers of recovery after a serious stroke. The 77-year-old Prime Minister, whose fate is crucial to Israel and the wider Middle East, remains in intensive care but doctors said they had been able to all but stop the drugs that had been keeping him in an artificial coma. His chief surgeon, Felix Umansky, told AFP it could take months to assess the full extent of the damage Mr Sharon has suffered. But his progress so far had defied all expectations, Mr Umansky said, amid suggestions by some of the Prime Minister's allies that he could even lead his new Kadima party at a March general election".

Support for Sharon's party soars: "Voters have swarmed towards the fledgling political party of Israeli leader Ariel Sharon, which is now set to win more seats in the new parliament than before its founder was stricken. A fresh opinion poll shows the new party, which Mr Sharon dubbed Kadima in mid-November, would pick up 44 seats in the Knesset if national elections - scheduled for March 28 - were held now. Before the veteran Prime Minister suffered his massive stroke eight days ago, Kadima had not polled higher than 40 seats, which was still enough to give it commanding majority".

Dutch must send troops: US: "Washington's former administrator in Iraq Paul Bremer has warned the Dutch they could face economic penalties in the US if they fail to send troops to Afghanistan. NATO has also turned up the heat on the Dutch, while the fate of a 200-strong provincial reconstruction team Australia wants to send to Afghanistan hangs in the balance because it is relying on the Dutch to provide security. "I assume from time to time decisions must be taken by the US Government and Congress which affect Dutch economic interests," Mr Bremer, a former ambassador to The Netherlands, told Dutch newspaper De Volksrant. "It is not difficult to imagine that decisions will be made that are not in the best interests of The Netherlands".

Another nail in the coffin for GM. Irresponsible management eventually hurts: "Honda Motor Corp. swept the top honors at the Detroit auto show on Sunday as its all-new Civic and first-ever pickup, the Ridgeline, were voted car and truck of the year by a panel of automotive writers. The result marked another setback for Ford Motor Co. and General Motors Corp., which have been losing market share to Japanese competitors in their home market and have pledged to mount a comeback in the passenger car market".

Curing Poverty or Using Poverty? ""China is lifting a million people a month out of poverty." It is just one statement in an interesting new book titled "The Undercover Economist" by Tim Harford. But it has huge implications. I haven't checked out the statistics but they sound reasonable. If so, this is something worth everyone's attention. People on the political left make a lot of noise about poverty and advocate all sorts of programs and policies to reduce it but they show incredibly little interest in how poverty has actually been reduced, whether in China or anywhere else. You can bet the rent money that the left will show little or no interest in how Chinese by the millions are rising out of poverty every year. The left showed far more interest in China back when it was run by Mao in far left fashion -- and when millions of Chinese were starving.... Since wealth is the only thing that can cure poverty, you might think that the left would be as obsessed with the creation of wealth as they are with the redistribution of wealth. But you would be wrong."

NYPD Gets 'Islamic-Culture Training': "Police in New York are getting "Islamic-culture training" to prepare them for dealing with Muslims in the city, home to 16 percent of the nation's Muslims. About 100 members of the NYPD's hostage negotiating team spent a day at a local college learning about mosques, prayer rituals, holidays and other facets of Islamic life. The instruction was designed to give negotiators tips on dealing with any hostage situation involving Muslim perpetrators, according to the New York Post. Points of Muslim etiquette covered in the training include: Don't step on prayer rugs, never display the soles of your feet; Shake a woman's hand only if she offers it, and: Remember that dogs are not allowed in most Muslim homes

America's founders did not intend for there to be a separation of God and state, as shown by the fact that all 50 states acknowledge God in their state constitutions . An actual list of quotations from each constitution is here. Somewhere along the way, the Federal Courts and the Supreme Court have misinterpreted the US Constitution. How could fifty States be wrong? One is faced with the prospect that maybe, just maybe, the ACLU and the out-of-control federal courts are wrong!

More deliberately misleading NYT reporting: The Rev. Lusk affair

There's a slightly encouraging post here about libertarianism in France.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here. On Social Security see Dick McDonald and for purely Australian news see Australian Politics (mirrored here).

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Practically all policies advocated by the Left create poverty. Leftists get the government to waste vast slabs of the country's labour-force on bureaucracy and paperwork and so load the burden of providing most useful goods and services onto fewer and fewer people. So fewer useful goods and services are produced to go around. That is no accident. The Left love the poor. The Left need the poor so that they can feel good by patronizing and "helping" them. So they do their best to create as many poor people as possible.

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" (Nationalsozialistisch)

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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North Carolina madness

From Nathan Tabor

A lot of changes have been taking place in North Carolina over the past few years. Did anyone happen to notice that the illegal immigration population in North Carolina jumped 43% in 2004? That's almost double what it was just one year ago. We now have the eighth largest population of undocumented immigrants in the United States. That's right, over 300,000 illegal immigrants now reside in North Carolina. Is it because of our temperate climate? Our beautiful scenery? Not likely.

Illegal immigrants are flocking to our beloved state because we are handing out driver's licenses with the ease of movie tickets or grocery coupons. We don't seem to ask for any kind of real identification when applying for a license. We don't ask for a social security number, and we do not require any kind of proof that the person applying is a citizen. Therefore, it is an easy task for an illegal immigrant to obtain fake documents here in North Carolina, and many are moving here to do just that.

What does a driver's license do for an illegal immigrant? At best, it legitimizes their status to prospective employers, to law enforcement, and to any other institution that uses a driver's license as universal identification. They can now present a very real license, and few would ever know it was not legal. It enables them to keep their illegal status hidden effectively from the rest of the world, for a much longer period of time. At worst, it provides a deadly terrorist with a key to access dangerous areas by obtaining employment in and around those areas. We saw this last April, when 27 illegal immigrants were arrested while working as airplane mechanics at the Piedmont Triad International Airport at Greensboro. All had been issued driver's licenses. All were repairing planes. Is someone not making a connection here?

The good news is that this problem is easily solved. Anyone applying for a Driver's license in North Carolina must be made to provide a social security number and two other forms of identification. There is absolutely no reason not to.

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ELSEWHERE

Another Leftist antisemite: "Prominent Jewish rights group, the Simon Wiesenthal Center, accused Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez on Wednesday of using what it said were anti-Semitic remarks and demanded an apology. In a televised Christmas Eve speech, Chavez, a left-winger, said that 'minorities, descendants of those who crucified Christ... have grabbed all the wealth of the world for themselves.'"

Fascism, Islamism and anti-Semitism: "Too many critics of U.S. foreign policy betray a profoundly naive view of human nature: They ignore the ability of propaganda to nullify reason, pervert conscience, and inflame our blackest impulses. People who believe such slurs are psychologically and spiritually prepared to believe almost anything -- and, eventually, to act on those beliefs. 'Nonsense in the intellect,' warned C.S. Lewis, 'draws evil after it.' The nonsense of anti-Semitism is the elephant in the Arab living room. At the moment, the elephant is thrashing about most conspicuously in Iran, but he's at home in much of the Muslim world. 'Over the last half-century, anti-Semitism has been the essential theology of the Arab world,' writes historian Paul Johnson, author of A History of the Jews. 'The Arabs have wasted trillions in oil royalties on weapons of war and propaganda ... In their flight from reason, they have failed to modernize or civilize their societies, to introduce democracy, or to consolidate the rule of law.'"

PETA: Cruel and unusual : "On January 9, two employees of the group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) will appear in court to answer felony charges of animal cruelty. Far from being an isolated incident or an illustration of PETA's hypocrisy, their crimes offer a chilling insight into the beliefs that motivate the group's strategy of animal rights advocay. What the trial reveals may well be just the tip of the iceberg."

A post here on Michael Schermer's generalization that: "Where goods cross frontiers, armies won't. Restated: where economic borders are porous between two nations, political borders become impervious to armies".

Cartoon war in Denmark "Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen is shocked at the way in which some Muslims are misrepresenting Denmark in the Islamic world. “I am speechless that those people, whom we have given the right to live in Denmark and where they freely have chosen to stay, are now touring Arab countries and inciting antipathy towards Denmark and the Danish people,” Rasmussen told journalists yesterday. Rasmussen was responding to the recent visits by certain imams, Muslim intellectuals and representatives of Danish Muslim organizations who toured a number of Muslim countries to “explain” the Danish cartoon affair to local political and religious leaders and media. The affair started last September when the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten published 12 cartoons of Muhammad. Meanwhile, after last week’s rejection of their complaint by the public prosecutor, Danish Muslim organisations have announced that they will take the newspaper to the European Court of Human Rights over the controversial publication. Islam forbids the depiction of the Muslim prophet. Carsten Juste, the editor of Jyllands-Posten repeated late last week that the daily will not apologise for publishing the cartoons: “We will not apologise, because we live in Denmark under Danish law, and we have freedom of speech in this country. If we apologised, we would betray the generations who have fought for this right, and the moderate Muslims who are democratically minded.”"

Sir Humphrey has an interesting excerpt in which the claim is made that the Pope sees Islam as fundamentally unreformable and incapable of change in a more humane direction.

Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) Kills. The W. Va. miners could have walked out: "It is perhaps the most heartbreaking question raised by a heartbreaking accident: Did 12 miners die deep inside the Sago Mine because instead of trying to walk to safety after an explosion, they went by the book and waited for help that took too long to arrive? They apparently had enough oxygen in their respirators to last an hour or more and no wall of debris blocked their escape, mine company officials said. They could not have known it, but less than 2,000 feet away was breathable air.

If you want to feel ill, the election manifesto of the Canadian Liberal party is here. NOBODY is as sanctimonious as the Canadian Liberals. (HT to the Shotgun blog)

I have just put up here an article that draws together some information about the social class origins of German Nazis and Italian Fascists in the pre-WW2 period. Marxists say that Fascism was "bourgeois" but modern scholarship shows that Nazism and Fascism were what they claimed to be: National rather than class-based.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here. On Social Security see Dick McDonald and for purely Australian news see Australian Politics (mirrored here).

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Practically all policies advocated by the Left create poverty. Leftists get the government to waste vast slabs of the country's labour-force on bureaucracy and paperwork and so load the burden of providing most useful goods and services onto fewer and fewer people. So fewer useful goods and services are produced to go around. That is no accident. The Left love the poor. The Left need the poor so that they can feel good by patronizing and "helping" them. So they do their best to create as many poor people as possible.

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" (Nationalsozialistisch)

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

Free trade benefits all: "Trade liberalization talks in Hong Kong ended with a deal to further liberalize access for poor countries' exports to rich countries' markets. Urged on by the misguided nongovernmental organizations, poor countries wasted an excellent opportunity to enhance their own prosperity by opening their markets to foreign competition, however. Therefore, benefits of trade liberalization for many poor countries, especially those in Africa, are likely to be severely limited. So it is worthwhile to again restate the case for free trade and to back it with evidence countries open to trade tend to be more prosperous than protectionist countries."

A flat-out winner for tax reform: "The report issued last month by President Bush's Advisory Panel on Federal Tax Reform landed in no-man's land. The right was disappointed that its proposals were so timid, and the left was critical because the report highlighted the damaging impact of high tax rates on work, saving and investment. Perhaps the panel could have won more hearts and minds if it had examined the real-world experience with tax reform. The flat-tax revolution in Eastern Europe is particularly compelling. Nine nations from the old Soviet bloc have adopted the flat tax -- which taxes income at one rate -- and others are poised to. In an ironic twist, these countries are rejecting the class-warfare politics of yesteryear and building tax systems specifically designed to attract investment, fuel economic growth and treat all citizens fairly."

Minimum wage ACORN roots: "According to a Dec. 25 report in the Boston Globe, the Democratic Party is joining forces with the activist group ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) to place initiatives on state ballots this fall to raise the minimum wage. The idea is to energize the poor to vote for Democratic candidates as well as the initiative. ACORN's involvement in this campaign is amusing because a few years ago the group sued the state of California in order to be exempted from its minimum wage requirement, which was higher than the federal government's. In its appellate brief, ACORN acknowledged that the more it had to pay each worker, the fewer such workers it would be able to hire. Of course, the same thing is true for businesses as well, something minimum wage advocates refuse to admit."

CEOs should mind their own business: "President Coolidge once said the business of America is business. He might have added that the business of business is to pursue profits, for lately some corporate leaders seem to have lost sight of that basic precept. Instead, they have embraced corporate social responsibility (CSR), the political doctrine du jour of the leftist ninnies who seek to further socials goals that they have decided are virtuous. The activist-inspired CSR movement represents the convergence of two seemingly discordant political doctrines: - corporate socialization and the privatization of regulation."

American Marxist economist Harry Magdoff died recently. Was he a Soviet agent?. Good riddance to bad rubbish either way. From his biography, it was clearly emotion, not reason that drove him.

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ELSEWHERE

Dogmatic atheist: "Controversial scientist and evolutionist Richard Dawkins, dubbed "Darwin's Rottweiler," calls religion a "virus" and faith-based education "child abuse" in a two-part series he wrote and appears in that begins airing on the UK's Channel 4, beginning tomorrow evening." [Since the vast majority of the human race is religious, this galoot thinks most people are mentally diseased child abusers. That's the sort of respect for other people that you are always getting from the Left. It does help us to see why they cheerfully wipe people out by the millions when they get unrestricted power -- e.g. Stalin, Mao etc]

Elitist Europe: As authoritarian as ever: "A few years back, after a prolonged immersion in American Protestant fundamentalism (I was writing a book), I moved from the U.S. to Western Europe, ready to bask in an open, secular, liberal culture. Instead I discovered that European social democracy, too, was a kind of fundamentalism, rigid and doctrinaire, yielding what Swedish writer Johan Norberg calls "one-idea states"-nations where an echo chamber of insular elites calls the shots, where monochrome media daily reiterate statist mantras and shut out contrarian views, and where teachers and professors systematically misrepresent the U.S. (millions of Europeans believe that free public schools, unemployment insurance, and pensions are unknown in America). The more I saw of the European elites' chronic distrust of the public, and the public's habitual deference to those elites, the fonder I grew of the nasty, ridiculous rough-and-tumble of American democracy, in which every voice is heard"

Chatting up the TSA: "Next time you go to the airport be sure to put on a happy face, even if you've been informed that your flight has been delayed by an hour and that you'll miss all your connections. You'll need this cheerful facade to make it through the TSA airport security checkpoint. As if being asked to strip off shoes, coats, belts and other clothing before going through a metal detector and getting your personal belongings x-rayed is not enough, the TSA will begin psychoanalyzing air travelers in 40 major airports next year. TSA screeners, who are not even fully trained law enforcement personnel, let alone professional psychologists, will perform behavior analysis screening on all passengers."

Marxist Mexico's busybody president: "The president of Marxist Mexico, Vincente Fox, is a real busybody when it comes to sticking his nose into the affairs of the United States. He has more crust than a loaf of bread. Early in December, 2005, it was announced that a federal judge had lifted the final barrier stopping the United States from completion of a fence along much of its border with Mexico. Fox has been more than critical of the fence plan ever since he heard about it. His problem seems to be that it will keep all the illegals on his side of the border, where most of them belong anyway, instead of letting them sneak across into our Southwestern states so they can get all the free welfare goodies on this side. He called the new fence a violation of 'human and labor rights.' Whose human and labor rights -- why those of the illegal immigrants of course. So if illegals are not allowed to enter this country illegally we are now violating their human rights! To listen to Fox's political posturing you would think that Mexico, almost single-handedly built the United States."

KBJ on a fallacious appeal to authority: "Law professors are expert in law. They are not moral experts. Nobody is a moral expert. So what are we to make of this—a letter signed by several hundred law professors? They say they oppose Judge Samuel Alito's appointment to the United States Supreme Court. But why? Is it because he's incompetent? Is it because his knowledge of the law is inadequate? Is it because he lacks the requisite analytical, argumentative, or critical skills? The answer comes at the end of the letter (before the names): These law professors don't like his values. They think he will make the country "less equal and less free." That these people are experts in law (I give them the benefit of the doubt) has nothing to do with whether anyone should share their values. What a disgraceful document! These law professors are trying to parlay their legal expertise into moral influence. They are trying to fool people into inferring moral authority from legal authority. They are suborning fallacy.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here. On Social Security see Dick McDonald and for purely Australian news see Australian Politics (mirrored here).

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Practically all policies advocated by the Left create poverty. Leftists get the government to waste vast slabs of the country's labour-force on bureaucracy and paperwork and so load the burden of providing most useful goods and services onto fewer and fewer people. So fewer useful goods and services are produced to go around. That is no accident. The Left love the poor. The Left need the poor so that they can feel good by patronizing and "helping" them. So they do their best to create as many poor people as possible.

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" (Nationalsozialistisch)

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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"STEREOTYPE THREAT"

I commented fairly acerbically in April 2004 on the latest gambit among psychologists for explaining away low average black IQ and educational attainment. It is the "stereotype threat" theory. The theory seems to have a number of incarnations but at its wackiest, it says that blacks do poorly because they are afraid of letting down their race! Nonsense as gross as that hardly needs comment but let me simply ask: If such fears exist at all, why do they not make the student try harder and thus do better?

A somewhat more reasonable theory is that blacks "drop their bundle": They know that they are on average unlikely to do well so don't really try to do well. All the studies that I have heard of over the years tend to show, however, that blacks have unusually HIGH motivation in the testing situation -- so that theory need not detain us.

In that situation, psychologists have had to devise ever more dubious experiments to support their ideas. The latest appears to be a study reported here of which we read: "In their spring study of 81 students at Boca Ciega High School in Gulfport, Brett Jones and Tom Kellow investigated "stereotype threat," a phenomenon in which students worry their failure might confirm a negative belief about their race'.

They found that giving a test under "threatening" conditions -- where students were told that the result would predict their later educational success -- produced much lower scores among blacks than when the test was given with a more reassuring introduction. Under the more reassuring condition, scores of blacks and whites were about the same. The authors concluded that the findings supported their theory.

It is difficult to know where to start in commenting on such nonsense. Quite aside from the total disregard for sampling that is characteristic of most psychological research, Occam's razor has been completely ignored. If the findings show anything, they simply show that blacks handle stress less well. There is no need to bring "stereotypes" into the explanation. But the gaping oddity in the findings is that blacks and whites did in one condition do about equally well on the test. That is totally contrary to all prior findings where some attempt at sampling was used and suggests that the whole setup was severely contrived in some way and that the results therefore tell us nothing at all. To put it as politely as I can, there was at least a very strong "Rosenthal" (experimenter expectation) effect at work.

I am not the first to find the "theory" risible. Steve Sailer also dissects it and there is an even more savage takedown at Gene Expression. Charles Murray is probably the most succinct of us all, however. Of the original study in the field, he says: "Claude Steele and Joshua Aronson, demonstrated experimentally that test performance by academically talented blacks was worse when a test was called an IQ test than when it was innocuously described as a research tool. Press reports erroneously interpreted this as meaning that stereotype threat explained away the black-white difference. In reality, Messrs. Steele and Aronson showed only that it increases the usual black-white difference; if one eliminates stereotype threat, the usual difference remains". See also here and here.

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ELSEWHERE

Jeff Jacoby on Abramoff: "The worst is that Abramoff is a Jew. Not only a Jew, but an Orthodox Jew -- someone who claims to be committed to strictly observing Jewish law and faithfully adhering to the Torah's ethical standards. But instead of upholding those ethical standards Abramoff trampled on them, and a "religious" Jew who behaves so corruptly disgraces not only himself but all religious Jews. He brings his faith into contempt. He is guilty of what Jewish tradition calls, with disgust, *chillul ha-Shem* -- a desecration of God's name. For me -- also an observant Jew -- that is the worst thing of all. Honesty in financial dealings is not optional in Judaism; it is mandatory. The Talmud teaches that when a person is brought to judgment in the world-to-come, the first question the heavenly tribunal puts to him is: "Did you conduct your business affairs in good faith?" A Jew who takes the values of his religion seriously must be scrupulous in his transactions with others"

Most Senate Dems Took Abramoff Cash: "Nearly ninety percent of Senate Democrats took money linked to disgraced "Republican" lobbyist Jack Abramoff, according to a list compiled by the Republican National Committee. Though reporters continue to insist that the Abramoff imbroglio is "a Republican scandal," 2008 Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton took more than $12,000 in tainted cash. Compared to the party's 2004 standard bearer, however, she's a piker. John Kerry raked in nearly $100,000 in Abramoff-linked donations. In fact, 40 of the party's 45 U.S. senators made the Jack Abramoff dishonor roll"

Media Critic Donald Rumsfeld: "Defense Secretary's Rumsfeld's speech on Iraq, in which he strongly criticized the conduct of the U.S. media, deserves to be read in its entirety. Unfortunately, the Secretary expressed the false hope that the media might be persuaded to come around to responsible journalism. He said, "it's important also for the media to hold itself to account." Well, don't count on it, Mr. Secretary. Remember how Newsweek had published that phony Koran-in-the-toilet story. Rumsfeld mentioned it, saying, "Not too long ago, there was a false and terribly damaging story about a Koran that was supposedly flushed down a toilet in Guantanamo, and in the riots that followed in several countries, some people were killed." Yet nobody was fired or even reprimanded by Newsweek over that false story. So much for accountability from the media."

MN: GOP blogger served with libel lawsuit: "A dispute between a self-described 'Republican operative' and a former Democratic campaign organizer widely quoted in Minnesota media has turned into a libel lawsuit that could help set legal standards for Internet blogs. The suit pits Blois Olson, a Democratic public relations executive who is a frequent guest on Twin Cities Public Television's 'Almanac' show, against Michael Brodkorb, a former Minnesota Republican Party employee who operates a political blog -- or Web journal -- called minnesotademocratsexposed.com. Olson's lawsuit, which was served to Brodkorb on Tuesday but has not yet been filed in court, seeks damages of more than $50,000 and a court order forcing Brodkorb to remove from the blog a Dec. 28 posting about Olson and his St. Paul-based public relations company. In the Dec. 28 item, Brodkorb suggested that Olson had publicly criticized former FBI agent Coleen Rowley's campaign for Congress because Rowley's campaign staff last summer refused to hire Olson's firm, New School Communications. Olson insists the item was a fabrication; Brodkorb says he's confident it was true."

Keith Burgess Jackson has just done a big fisking of the latest NYT attack on Supreme Court nominee Alito.

Tom Heard updates us on the latest antics of Communist-loving Harry Belafonte. GWB is "the greatest terrorist in the world" etc.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here. On Social Security see Dick McDonald and for purely Australian news see Australian Politics (mirrored here).

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Practically all policies advocated by the Left create poverty. Leftists get the government to waste vast slabs of the country's labour-force on bureaucracy and paperwork and so load the burden of providing most useful goods and services onto fewer and fewer people. So fewer useful goods and services are produced to go around. That is no accident. The Left love the poor. The Left need the poor so that they can feel good by patronizing and "helping" them. So they do their best to create as many poor people as possible.

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" (Nationalsozialistisch)

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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A POWERFUL ARTICLE FROM A FORMER THATCHER MINISTER

Just a few excerpts from an article by Lord Tebbit about Britain's new Tory leader

There is no doubt Mr Cameron is a remarkable political animal. From back office, through the back benches to leadership in half a decade is unusual. From proud authorship of a Conservative 2005 manifesto widely criticised for narrow dogmatism, to its condemnation and utter rejection is hardly less so. Nor could Mr Cameron's uplifting effect on the party's poll ratings be anything but amazing. Unfortunately razzle-dazzle success and exciting policy statements only whet the public appetite for more non-stop political pyrotechnics than any man can deliver. Mr Cameron is now in danger of such an outstanding public relations success dissolving into tetchy doubts about his political orientation. Is he really "New Labour Lite", a Tory wolf in Lib-Dem sheep's clothing, or for that matter a Lib-Dem sheep leading a pack of Tory wolves?...

Quite why Mr Cameron believes that voters who flocked to Mrs Thatcher's dark blue flag defected to Blair's pale pink or Kennedy's muddy yellow banners I do not understand. Nor can I see that if they did, they would now flock back to a pale blue and pink flag emblazoned "Thatcher Was Rubbish". In any case, for all the talk about Tory voters switching to Labour in 1997, the figures show that if it did happen, the numbers were tiny. What happened was that Labour voters turned out, as did Lib-Dems voting tactically to get the Tories out, and 4.5 million Tory voters stayed at home unable to stomach John Major's ERM disaster.

Nor should Tories be ashamed of Mr Cameron's concern with world poverty, but throwing money at corrupt dictators because they have ruined their economies will help neither poor Africans nor poor British. The trouble is that we have other problems here at home. With selection on ability (but not ability to pay) and vouchers ruled out, how will we improve our schools? If the Treasury alone can finance hospitals, how can they be run for patients and not for the Treasury?... How would Cameron deal with multiculturalism, which threatens social stability? Would he encourage marriage and stable families? Could he free us from our masters in Brussels? Like the voters, I wait for Mr Cameron to show as much interest in all this as the chocolate oranges in WH Smith. His answers will decide the election.

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Constant attacks on Wal-Mart hurt the poor in yet another way: "Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., the nation's largest food retailer, said Thursday it will no longer donate nearly-expired or expired food to local groups feeding the hungry. Instead, that food will be thrown away, a move several Sacramento charities consider wasteful. Olan James, a Wal-Mart spokesman, said the policy, which applies to all 1,224 Wal-Marts, 1,929 Supercenters and 558 Sam's Clubs, is an attempt to protect the corporation from liability in case someone who eats the donated food gets sick."

Deceptive Munich: "Ever since World War II, the German city of Munich has been symbolic of a single, solitary political lesson: the folly of 'appeasement.' The 1938 Munich Pact represented the futility of compromising with evil. This was always a bit unfair to poor British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, who had better reasons to sign on to the pact than most people remember. But the moral of the story was a good one, going all the way back to Aesop, who told the fable of the scorpion and the frog, which ends with the frog being shocked that the scorpion would sting him even though the scorpion could do nothing else, for that was its nature. Hitler was a scorpion, and thinking or hoping otherwise wouldn't change that fact. Much of the Cold War was predicated on this lesson, as the World War II generation agreed not to let down its guard ever again. Steven Spielberg would like to rewrite the meaning of Munich. In his film about the response to the massacre of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics, Spielberg seems determined to invest the word with a new meaning: We must not treat scorpions like scorpions."

Media ignore the truth again: "Guilt by association. It is a common tool used to discredit those deemed a threat to the established order. Recently, I've found myself on the receiving end of such a tactic courtesy of a piece by Jonathan Finer and Douglas Struck in the Washington Post. On the day after Christmas, the Washington Post featured an article titled "Bloggers, Money Now Weapons in Information War - U.S. Recruits Advocates to the Front, Pays Iraqi TV Stations for Coverage," of which my recent embed in Iraq was the subject of scrutiny as a military-information operation. It is a fact-challenged article that manages to cast an unfair shadow on my reporting from Iraq. The piece claims that I had retired from the military, when in fact it requires 20 years of service to retire. I served four years on active duty and two years in the National Guard. The authors report that I was credentialed by the American Enterprise Institute, when in fact this is impossible, as a think tank cannot provide media credentials - this must be done by a recognized news organization. I was credentialed by The Weekly Standard and the Canadian talk-radio show The World Tonight. And finally, contrary to the report, I was not in Iraq when the article was published. I had been home for nearly a week. Each of these items could have been easily confirmed by a simple inquiry....."

UK immigration: Sense creeping in? "A large-scale overhaul of the asylum system has begun which will lead to at least a third of all asylum seekers being placed in detention centres for the 'fast-track' processing of their claims for refugee status. The 'new asylum model,' which ministers hope will be implemented by September, also envisages far greater controls over failed asylum seekers facing removal, including the use of electronic tagging, reporting requirements and detention."

No free speech in Muslim Turkey: "After writers and intellectuals, bar owners have become the latest targets of a controversial Turkish law limiting freedom of expression, the daily Hurriyet reported on Friday. The owners of nine Istanbul bars and restaurant have drawn the wrath of the authorities for staging a protest last month over what they called frequent and arbitrary police inspections which they said harmed their business, the mass-selling daily reported. The protesters closed shop for a day, hanging banners denouncing 'arbitrary and unlawful practices and pressure by the police, conducted under the guise of inspections.' Police removed the banners and filed complaints against the bar owners, leading to their indictment under Article 301 for 'openly denigrating the police force,' Hurriyet said."

Big Brother has arrived in the UK: "John Prescott has told tax inspectors to use satellites to snoop on householders' attempts to improve their homes. Images of new conservatories and garages taken from space will be used to hike up council taxes and other property levies, official guidance obtained by The Independent on Sunday reveals. Mr Prescott's department is overseeing the creation of a database containing the details of every house in Britain to help tax inspectors to assess new charges. Even minor improvements, invisible from the road, will be caught by 'spy in the sky' technology that uses a mix of aerial and satellite images taken over time to spot changes."

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here. On Social Security see Dick McDonald and for purely Australian news see Australian Politics (mirrored here).

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Practically all policies advocated by the Left create poverty. Leftists get the government to waste vast slabs of the country's labour-force on bureaucracy and paperwork and so load the burden of providing most useful goods and services onto fewer and fewer people. So fewer useful goods and services are produced to go around. That is no accident. The Left love the poor. The Left need the poor so that they can feel good by patronizing and "helping" them. So they do their best to create as many poor people as possible.

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" (Nationalsozialistisch)

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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ABRAMOFF

I don't even try to follow all the minutiae of American politics so for those like me I thought the following sounded like a rather fun summary of a man very much in the news these days:

"Here are some of the details of the Abramoff story. He made more money as a lobbyist than anyone had ever even imagined making. He bilked two Indian tribes out of $82 million by representing both of them -- as they waged a fight against EACH OTHER. The longer they fought, the more money he made off BOTH OF THEM. He bought off libertarian newspaper columnists. It appears he owned at least one congressman who was willing to do his bidding by using the Congressional Record as a weapon in his private business dealings.

In the course of those dealings, he bought a casino cruise-ship company with a mobbed-up former owner of the Dial-A-Mattress concession in Washington, D.C. Less than a year after that transaction, the original owner of the casino company was shot to death on a Fort Lauderdale street, and three members of the Gambino crime family have now been arrested for the murder. Those three Gambino-ites were put on the company's payroll by the Dial-A-Mattress guy. Meanwhile, in Washington there was Abramoff's partner, the former chief of staff to the House Majority Leader. This guy, Michael Scanlon, had set up a "think tank" at his beach house in Delaware to launder lobbying money -- a think tank run by a bartender and a yoga instructor who might well have been "more than friends" of Scanlon's.

This is like a really bad novel. An Orthodox Jewish lobbyist stealing money from Indian tribes, funneling it through a yoga instructor at the beach, and being a possible accessory to a gangland hit in Florida? And it's all true. It's the best Washington story in years!"

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ACLU moves further Left: "Not satisfied with its ongoing anti-President Bush campaigns (the group took out a full-page Ad in the "we-hate-Bush-all-the-time" NY Times that blasted the president), the ACLU has already come out against any and all probes into who leaked information to the Times' staff , in regards to formerly top-secret national security information. In fact, the ACLU is veritably furious that the Justice Department has the audacity to actually investigate treacherous behaviors. How dare the Justice Department work toward protecting the country? In a press release, ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero stated: "President Bush broke the law and lied to the American people when he unilaterally authorized secret wiretaps of U.S. citizens. But rather than focus on this constitutional crisis, Attorney General Gonzales is cracking down on critics of his friend and boss. Our nation is strengthened, not weakened, by those whistleblowers who are courageous enough to speak out on violations of the law!" In other words, according to the ACLU President Bush has no right to protect the United States (the question of NSA intercepts of terrorist phone calls--regarding legal v illegal--appears to have an equal number of legal scholars on both sides of the debate), but allowing and condoning treason (as long as it also hurts any Republican-president) is "okay" with the ACLU. Besides, Romero told us that leaking national security information is a good thing--as long as it "gets Bush". In fact, any far-Left agenda is acceptable to the ACLU--as long as it promotes its cause toward the destruction of the USA".

Islam is the religion of violence: "Christian women are being abused on the streets of Baghdad by Islamo-fascist thugs for not wearing the hijab. Shop owners--mostly Christians--who sold beer under Saddam without fear are now being shot dead in their own places of business. Four churches were bombed in a single day in Baghdad, priests have been threatened and killed, Christian children are being forced to read the Qur'an and Christian Midnight Mass was cancelled this year because of fears of being bombed..... Islamo-fascism is ubiquitous. Seventeen thousand police officers are currently deployed in Jakarta, Indonesia, to protect Christian churches from those who believe 'Burn, baby, burn' is second only to 'Allahu akbar.' Twenty-nine churches were hit on Christmas Eve five years ago and the Indonesian government didn't want a repeat of that--at least not while applying for assistance at Uncle Sam's Welfare Office. Hundreds of thousands of East Timorese have been murdered by Muslim terrorists over the past decades and, more recently, generic Qur'an-spouting psychopaths beheaded three Christian schoolgirls.... And the sorry tale continues: The Palestinian Authority has driven tens of thousands of Christians out of Jerusalem, the persecution of Coptic Christians continues unabated in Egypt. In Pakistan, Christian children are still being kidnapped and raised as Muslims. From Australia to Zanzibar, thousands of non-Muslim women are being gang-raped by sexist chauvinist pigs inspired by the Qur'an."

American poverty now comes with a color TV, DVD and computer: "In case there was any doubt, a study has confirmed that Americans have a lot of what economists know, technically, as stuff. The computer has surpassed the dishwasher as a standard household appliance. The poorest Americans have posted a sharp rise in access to air conditioning. The richest Americans still own the most cars, but they are choosing to own slightly fewer of them than they used to. These Census findings, released in December, were true even before gifts piled up under trees. These nuggets provide a glimpse of American lifestyles that isn't captured in the raw data of monthly economic reports. At a time of concern about the standard of living for future generations, the study offers hopeful signs of tangible progress, even as the pace of income growth has slowed in recent years.... by almost all measures, the data show rising well-being for all of society. And while the wealth gap may not be narrowing, the rich-poor gap in lifestyles has narrowed substantially since 1992 when measured in many of these tangible items. "In terms of the items people have ... it amazes me the number of people who are at or near the poverty line that have color TVs, cable, washer, dryer, microwave," says Michael Cosgrove, an economist at the University of Dallas in Irving, Texas.... Two-thirds of those in poverty had air conditioners in 1998, up from 50% in 1992. Personal computers have grown increasingly ubiquitous. Where fewer than 20% of homes had them in 1992, nearly 60% did in 2002 (more than own dishwashers). Two-thirds of those in poverty had air conditioners in 1998, up from 50% in 1992. Personal computers have grown increasingly ubiquitous. Where fewer than 20% of homes had them in 1992, nearly 60% did in 2002 (more than own dishwashers).

Our law-abiding ways of doing things make us rich: "Economists are gradually shifting the way we think about the determinants of economic well-being. Traditionally, the focus was on resources. Increasingly, we appear to be moving toward a focus on beliefs. A new study from the World Bank, called Where is the Wealth of Nations? (which I first saw mentioned in Ronald Bailey's article in Reason magazine), is a landmark event in this transformation of economic viewpoint. First, it adds to the growing body of evidence that institutional factors, such as property rights, play a significant role in economic development.... Over the past 50 years, economists have become less materialistic. No, we have not become hippies, rejected consumerism, and discovered spirituality. As social scientists, however, we have noticed that a large share of wealth comes from factors other than basic labor and capital.... The current consensus is that institutions matter. The rule of law is important. Clear property rights are important. On the negative side, protectionism, corruption, and barriers to entrepreneurship are important."

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here. On Social Security see Dick McDonald and for purely Australian news see Australian Politics (mirrored here).

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Practically all policies advocated by the Left create poverty. Leftists get the government to waste vast slabs of the country's labour-force on bureaucracy and paperwork and so load the burden of providing most useful goods and services onto fewer and fewer people. So fewer useful goods and services are produced to go around. That is no accident. The Left love the poor. The Left need the poor so that they can feel good by patronizing and "helping" them. So they do their best to create as many poor people as possible.

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" (Nationalsozialistisch)

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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FROM BROOKES NEWS

US economy and productivity: some truths and fallacies: Two dangerous myths -- one a crude derivation of the other -- appear to be re-emerging as an explanation of the Bush boom. However, the fundamental point is that the ultimate source of rising productivity is investment
Why do dollar rates fluctuate?: When it comes to exchange rates confusion is the order of the day. Regardless of sneering references to speculators, it is not they who are at fault but the central banks
Bracks' Star Chamber commission applies the law selectively against Christians in favour of Muslim
bigots: The cowardly dhimmis who sit on the Equal Opportunity Commission and the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal have basically admitted that they are persecuting two Christian pastors at the behest of a Muslim bigot who incited religious hatred
Times' treason likely in cahoot with Dems: The New York Times must be investigated as to how it illegally obtained classified war-time information and whether it coordinated its activities with members of the Democrat Party
I Spy: Terrorists at Work: Spying gives us valuable knowledge about terrorist planning and activities. We can use that knowledge to save American lives and continue the fight against terrorism
Islamic fundamentalism is the elephant in the room: I am not the only Jew who has intimate knowledge of what happened to our people once before, not that long ago. The threat of Islamic Fundamentalism is on the march
Israel facing leadership crisis: Israel is in need of strong National leadership. She can't afford the continuation of the same self-destructive games any more

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Major Terror Plot Against U.S. Ignored: "The mainstream U.S. media outlets have failed to report a major terrorist plot against the U.S. - because it would tend to support President Bush's use of NSA domestic surveillance, according to media watchdog groups. News of a planned attack masterminded by three Algerians operating out of Italy was widely reported outside the U.S., but went virtually unreported in the American media. Italian authorities recently announced that they had used wiretaps to uncover the conspiracy to conduct a series of major attacks inside the U.S. Italian Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu said the planned attacks would have targeted stadiums, ships and railway stations, and the terrorists' goal, he said, was to exceed the devastation caused by 9/11".


The party of Margaret Thatcher is now led by a blithering idiot: "David Cameron, Conservative leader, on Wednesday launched an outspoken attack on retailers, singling out WH?Smith for offering cut-price chocolate oranges. He accused it of irresponsible marketing that made people fat. His remarks, in a speech on health policy, sparked concern that the Tories had embarked on a campaign against big business to win votes from Labour and the Liberal Democrats. Mr Cameron said the consumer industries could do more to promote healthy lifestyles. "Try to buy a newspaper at the train station and, as you queue to pay, you're surrounded by cut-price offers for giant chocolate bars... As Britain faces an obesity crisis, why does WH Smith promote half-price chocolate oranges at its checkouts instead of real oranges?" he said. The comments caused bemusement at the retailer and embarrassment among senior Tories with City links, one of whom said it was a mistake to target WH Smith in this way. The company denied acting irresponsibly, saying it also sold dried fruit. "I am not quite sure why he picked on us. We offer customers a whole range of products so they have a choice," it said".

The imaginary America of the deaf and blind European Left: This past New Years Day, an editorial from across the Alps caught our attention. It was published in "Der Standard," Austria's self-described "leading quality newspaper": According to columnist Barbara Coudenhove-Kalergi, American journalism has been on the ropes ever since President Bush took office. And because of the President and his scheming corporate pals, American media have come under unparalleled "pressure" to censor themselves, refrain from criticizing the government, ignore topics involving the rest of the world and avoid domestic "social" issues such as single, homeless, oppressed, depressed, drug-addicted mothers." [No criticism of the government in America!!!! What sort of bubble do these pathetic Europeans live in?? Do they even live on the same planet as the rest of us?]

Those peace-loving Muslims and the ineffectual French again: "A gang of more than 20 youths -- thought to be North African immigrants -- terrorized hundreds of train passengers in a rampage of violence, robbery and sexual assault on New Year's Day ... The gang of between 20 and 30 youths boarded the train, heading from Nice on the French Riviera to Lyon, in eastern France, early on Jan. 1, as it carried 600 passengers home from New Year's Eve partying overnight. Once inside, they went wild, forcing passengers to hand over mobile phones and wallets, and slashing seats and breaking windows. A 20-year-old woman cornered by several of the marauders was sexually molested. "It was a real scene of pillage on the train," said the regional state prosecutor, Dominique Luigi, adding that the passengers were in a state of "panic." Train staff alerted police, and the train pulled into a station to wait. The three officers who initially turned up later were joined by reinforcements. A waitress in a bar near the station said two young women from the train had come inside in tears. "They told me there had been groping. They talked about sexual assaults. They were really traumatized," she said. The train resumed its journey with the heavy police presence on board but, just before Marseille, the youths pulled the emergency stop and many escaped." [No Pasaran has more details]

If you ever doubted that Leftists lack any principles, this profile of super-popular Leftist blogger Moulitsas should set all doubts at rest. He sounds a lot like other Greeks I have known.

I have put up here another installment of my correspondence about Australian/American differences in "authenticity".

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here. On Social Security see Dick McDonald and for purely Australian news see Australian Politics (mirrored here).

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Practically all policies advocated by the Left create poverty. Leftists get the government to waste vast slabs of the country's labour-force on bureaucracy and paperwork and so load the burden of providing most useful goods and services onto fewer and fewer people. So fewer useful goods and services are produced to go around. That is no accident. The Left love the poor. The Left need the poor so that they can feel good by patronizing and "helping" them. So they do their best to create as many poor people as possible.

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" (Nationalsozialistisch)

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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FOLLOW-UP TO YESTERDAY'S "AUTHENTICITY" POST

I of course knew that the impressions I set down yesterday were rather provocative and therefore thought a long time about posting them. Because they had a potential to offend well-justified American feelings of patriotism, I was careful to point out that my generalizations were only that -- ones to which there were plenty of exceptions. A definite omission in what I posted however was that I should have said that I had in mind big-city Americans. Most of my time in the USA was spent in (horrors!) Los Angeles, San Francisco and NYC. I should have added that my experience of small-town America was of thoroughly warm-hearted and genuine people. Unfortunately, however, in most ways it is the big cities that set the tone and have most influence. Only one of the emails I received about the post was condemnatory and it was very ad hominem so I will not reproduce it. Below are however four other emails I received:

1). "Having lived in NYC for 15 some years before returning to New Zealand, I'd have to say you're not wrong. However, I did find upstate NY (rural) people to be far more authentic - as were pretty much all the Southeners I happened upon. On the flip side, I didn't come across many "she'll be right" Americans - most are pretty competitive and believe "good is not as good as better"".

2). "Just read your grafs about phony Americans. I have only met a few Aussies, and I must say they did seem very genuine. I'm not sure where in America you have traveled, but it sounds like you may have been in an urban areas, perhaps in the Northeast, or (shudder) Southern California. Next time, try rural Texas, New Mexico, Kansas, Oklahoma, Nebraska, Colorado, anywhere in the deep South, or anywhere rural or "small town" in nature. Some call these areas "fly over country." Perhaps a better impression will emerge. Or perhaps you have visited such places and come away with the same poor impressions. I'm not sure what to think about that, as I find most rural and small town Americans to be noticeably deficient in worrying over their image."

3). I didn't think this post was pointless at all. Your comments about one of the characteristics of Australians and Americans is straight to the heart of the difference between our countries. I wanted to go to go Australia on R&R while I was in Viet-Nam and didn't get to go. I was finally able to make it almost twenty years later. I finished my assignment on the island of Guam and was going back to the States to retire from the military. Before I came back I took thirty days leave and most of my savings and went to Australia. I saw as much of the county as I could in the time I had but it's the people that made my visit such a memorable experience. I've traveled across most the United States during my military career and I agree with what you say: Americans in general are more concerned with the impression they create. I didn't see that concern at all in the Australians I met in the pubs of Sydney, Melbourne and Adlelaide and played cards with on the train going to Alice Springs. An expression you sometimes hear in the U.S. is "get real"; there would be no use for that expression in Australia.

4). "I have just read your article regarding the problem with Americans having difficulty defining who they are and spending too much time presenting some image of the moment. There is a degree of truth in that statement, but I believe there is a degree of truth in that statement in any society that permits their members to be who they want to be. The real problem isn't their not knowing who they are. The problem is not knowing who they should be.

I had the pleasure of meeting some Aussie sailors in the late 60's when my ship ported in Singapore. I will agree wholeheartedly that Aussies have few inhibitions and are truly genuine. Most of them would rather fight and drink than do almost anything else. I say this with affection as I thoroughly enjoyed the experience.

The real problem we Americans have is a lack of interest in history and the lessons it teaches because we rely on television entirely too much. I think you will find there is more depth in Americans than you realize when the going gets tough. At home as well as abroad, we also have the tendency to want to be liked entirely too much. As a result we adapt to the circumstances and adopt ideas that may be detrimental to us too easily. Americans are an easygoing lot. That is why we hate wars so much. Wars interfere with a good time. Extreme adversity will however, bring out what is best in American society, which has been the most generous society the world has ever known.

It is true we have a judgmental mentality in America, although that judgmental attitude is tempered with a degree of acceptance that would be totally unacceptable in most places of the world. What you say is true, puritanical restraints create hypocrisy, but as nationally syndicated columnist William Raspberry once noted, "There is something to be said for hypocrisy". What? It acts as a restraint since those at are being hypocritical recognize they are doing something wrong. Where as today, we have few hypocrites and few restraints. Neither is good, but you can't be a hypocrite unless you have values".

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Another historical insight into the Leftist mind: Opposite a car park that I sometimes use on those rare occasions when I go to the bank, there is a graffito up which says, "Stop GHOGM". Now what in the blue blazes is "CHOGM"? -- you might ask. It stands for "Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting" -- with the Commonwealth concerned being the British Commonwealth. It is purely a talk-shop with no powers whatsover, though its members do seem to hope (usually in vain) that their resolutions will have some moral force towards lessening human rights abuses. So what could be more innocuous and worthy? Yet to the Left it should be "stopped". Why? There is no rational reason. It is just that the Left like disrupting the normal activities of other people. That is it, pure and simple. There is no other rhyme or reason to it. Trying to please or placate the Left is pointless. They will always find SOMETHING to condemn, no matter how brainless the condemnation may be.

The bureaucratized British: "In his book, Lions, Donkeys and Dinosaurs, Page deconstructs many of the most cherished beliefs of the men and women who run our military. Most spend their careers defending the indefensible, Page says, largely because it is the only way to keep their jobs and inflation-proof pensions. The number of officers is way out of proportion to the number of service units that actually need commanders. "The army's two combat divisions - one of which is at least partly fictional - might call for 10 or 15 brigadiers, two or three major-generals and a single lieutenant-general to run them," Page said. "Maybe we should also have some extra generals - say two or three times this number. What we actually have is more than 10 times as many." There are 180 brigadiers and 60 generals. And, as Page points out, the military hierarchy is even more distorted in the Royal Navy, where there are 41 admirals with only 40 major warships or submarines to look after. The RAF has 40 air marshals for 36 squadrons. Little has improved since C Northcote Parkinson of "Parkinson's law" fame first identified the problem 50 years ago".

The lying Castro: "The longest-ruling despot in the world is Fidel Castro, who seized power in Cuba 47 years ago this week. Like most dictators, Castro is a brazen liar, especially about his own regime. This, for example, is what he told an international conference in Havana in April 2001: "There have never been death squads in our country, nor a single missing person, nor a single political assassination, nor a single victim of torture. . . . You may travel around the country, ask the people, look for a single piece of evidence, try to find a single case where the Revolutionary government has ordered or tolerated such an action. And if you find them, then I will never speak in public again." ,,, Castro's mocking challenge -- "try to find a single case" -- is not going unanswered. The Cuba Archive project (www.CubaArchive.org) is working to document the cost, in human life, of more than five decades of Cuban dictatorship... It is heartbreaking work.... So far the archive has catalogued the deaths of 9,240 victims of the Castro regime"

I have just put up a new recipe on my recipe blog. (Mirror site here). It is a convenient recipe for that yummy Hungarian creation -- Liptauer Cheese spread. Great for parties and canapes.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here. On Social Security see Dick McDonald and for purely Australian news see Australian Politics (mirrored here).

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Practically all policies advocated by the Left create poverty. Leftists get the government to waste vast slabs of the country's labour-force on bureaucracy and paperwork and so load the burden of providing most useful goods and services onto fewer and fewer people. So fewer useful goods and services are produced to go around. That is no accident. The Left love the poor. The Left need the poor so that they can feel good by patronizing and "helping" them. So they do their best to create as many poor people as possible.

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" (Nationalsozialistisch)

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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ON BEING AUTHENTIC

This is probably a pretty pointless post but I just want to say a little about one of the differences I have noticed between U.S. and Australian society. In Australia, it is almost a national religion to be authentic. To be "fair dinkum" is expected and to "bung on an act" is regarded as very low indeed. In standard English that means that to be respected, Australians have to be genuine, sincere, honest, natural and unpretentious. I myself share those values and I hope I exemplify them.

In the USA, however, there seems to be little of that attitude. From my observations on my various trips to the USA, honesty seems to run a distant second to making a good impression. It seems to me that most Americans don't really know who they are at all. They are constantly aware of their "image" and often wonder how they can improve it but "being themselves" is almost a meaningless expression to them. Obviously not all Americans are like that and readers of this blog who write to me seem generally to be a pretty individualistic lot who know where they stand and are not afraid to express it. But, on the whole, I see American society to be a very largely phony society. I think the average American is a good-hearted person but the pressures under which they operate militate against frankness and openness.

So what are those pressures? I think a lot of it goes back to America's puritan origins. Puritanism is against nature so where puritanism prevails hypocrisy is a quite inevitable outcome. And while America is no longer puritan in the original sense of that word, it still retains the judgmentalism of one-another that the original puritans had. These days puritanism is more likely to manifest itself in the form of recycling your garbage than in keeping the Sabbath but the need to claim virtue is still there.

So in the end I feel rather sad about the pressures under which Americans operate but I think it should be encouraging that there is a much more relaxed and natural society on the other side of the globe. Being authentic is possible and works well.


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ELSEWHERE

I have just put up here a rather sad email from a disabled American veteran who had the temerity to challenge illegal behavior on the part of the U.S. Postal "Service". They cut off his mail, of course. That's the behaviour you have to expect from an arrogant, legally protected monopoly.

A reader writes: "Marin County, North of San Francisco, is a liberal bastion. It is also the location of the Russian and Napa rivers, two streams that just went over their banks causing millions of dollars damage. One decimated city, Sebastopol, probably wishes it had declared itself a flood free city instead of a nuclear-free city. I wonder if I should ask the cities up there to contribute to the Wild and Scenic Rivers cause.

The usual Leftist love of violence: "A Labour Party campaign manager went on trial today accused of trying to throttle a young Tory activist on the eve of the General Election. David Harding, a Labour Party worker, is accused of punching and grabbing the throat of Robert Benham, 25, a parliamentary assistant to Andrew Rosindell, the Conservative MP for Romford in Essex, on May 4 last year. Harding, 48, of Hornchurch in Essex, denies common assault. He also denies using abusive words or behaviour during the alleged incident.

More Muslim thuggery: "They weren't your average thugs. Dressed in bow ties and dark suits, the group of nearly a dozen men entered a corner store and smashed bottles of liquor, wine and beer with metal pipes, shattering refrigerator cases and leaving behind a terrified clerk along with piles of broken glass. No one was held up. Nothing was stolen. The vandals just wanted to leave a message: Stop selling booze to fellow Muslims. In urban America, friction between poor residents and the immigrant merchants who sell cigarettes, bread and alcoholic beverages from neighborhood markets is nothing new. But the recent attack at San Pablo Liquor has injected religion into the old debate over whether a glut of such stores contributes to violent crime, vagrancy and other social ills. Followed by an identical attack at another West Oakland store the same evening, the episode highlighted tensions -- and different interpretations of doctrine -- between black Muslims hoping to reclaim troubled parts of the city and Middle Eastern shop owners, many of them also of Muslim faith".

A good rant: "A former friend of mine has called me a "zombie nutcase." Why? Because I refused to waste an hour of my irreplaceable time to watch a video which purports to be: "A one hour analysis of 9/11 and how it is more likely than not that the government was actually behind the attacks." What purpose would this video serve? It would, if believed, terminally discredit the Bush administration and the War on Terror. Who would benefit from the terminal discrediting of the Bush administration and the War on Terror? Certainly not the Libertarians, and the Perot faction is for all practical purposes dead as Lenin. Who could possibly replace President Bush and the Republicans as the ruling party in the United States? The Democrats, of course. The problem with this is that the Democrats are a bunch of traitors, thieves, and murderers who don't care how high the pile of human bodies is as long as they are firmly seated on top, and thus are objectively unfit to hold any form of public office. And if this wasn't bad enough, as a former Army combat rifleman who refuses to be an mindlessly obedient drone in the socialist collective I would be looked upon by the Democrats as some form of vermin".

Who would have predicted it? "The city of Houston is appealing for emergency funding to help to fight a huge crime wave following the arrival of refugees from hurricane-hit New Orleans. The murder rate in the Texan city leapt by 24 per cent last year, with the toll for November and December up by 70 per cent on the same period in 2004. There were 324 murders in Houston in 2005, compared with 263 in 2004. Of the 2005 tally, 51 occurred in November and December - up 21 on the same period of 2004. The police department has not monitored precisely how many can be attributed to those evacuated after Hurricane Katrina, but says that at least 12 homicides in the past four months have involved evacuees either as victims or perpetrators. While stressing that they cannot lay all the blame at the door of hurricane evacuees, the police chief and the mayor suggest that the influx of as many as 150,000 extra people has been a contributory factor. The issue is highly sensitive as the majority of the hurricane's victims were drawn from New Orleans's black underclass."

One of my regular Dutch correspondents was moved to comment on my reference yesterday to this stupid Dutch site. He says that such stupidity is all too typical in the Netherlands today and offers some interesting comments on the Netherlands generally. I have posted his email here

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here. On Social Security see Dick McDonald and for purely Australian news see Australian Politics (mirrored here).

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Practically all policies advocated by the Left create poverty. Leftists get the government to waste vast slabs of the country's labour-force on bureaucracy and paperwork and so load the burden of providing most useful goods and services onto fewer and fewer people. So fewer useful goods and services are produced to go around. That is no accident. The Left love the poor. The Left need the poor so that they can feel good by patronizing and "helping" them. So they do their best to create as many poor people as possible.

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" (Nationalsozialistisch)

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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