*checks the calendar to make sure it's not April 1*
OK, here's the press release. The transplant recipient's name is MANNING. No, really.
Showing posts with label Massachusetts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Massachusetts. Show all posts
Monday, May 16, 2016
Wednesday, June 11, 2014
Wednesday, November 27, 2013
Sunday, September 15, 2013
Molasses Morasses
I knew this headline from Honolulu reminded me of something. A similar sticky mess happened in Boston in 1919. Yuck!
Thursday, April 04, 2013
Thursday, November 22, 2012
Forgotten History: A Lesson From Plymouth Plantation
On this Thanksgiving, here's a bit of relevant (if now forgotten) colonial history. More here from Professor Paul Rahe, an expert in the history of republics.
Friday, November 02, 2012
Awesome: Best Political Campaign Ad All Year
Outstanding! I would totally vote for this guy based on the charming sense of humor he displays in this ad. Kudos, sir. He certainly knew how to stand out from the crowd.
Oh! Turns out he's a Republican from Massachusetts. Here is his website.
Oh! Turns out he's a Republican from Massachusetts. Here is his website.
Sunday, September 23, 2012
Nerd News: The Geeky Glory of MIT
A British paper attempts to understand MIT. I personally love how there is a code of etiquette for pranks and practical jokes. Seriously, nobody does practical jokes like MIT students. Oh, as for the nerdy geeky glory, you can get some of that online free.
Friday, May 18, 2012
Monday, May 07, 2012
Nerd News: Hahvahd and MIT to Offer Free Online Classes
It's a $60 million initiative to offer free online courses to anyone who wants them.
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
Forgotten History: The Titanic and Harvard's Widener Library
Did you know that Hahvahd's famous library is a consequence of the Titanic disaster?
Friday, January 20, 2012
Friday, August 05, 2011
Nerd News: the Tale of Deb Caldieri
This is a blistering example of why edu-crats and school administrators have such a bad name.
Monday, July 04, 2011
Thursday, February 03, 2011
Thursday, November 04, 2010
Nerd News: High School Student Suspended For Being Awesomely Awesome
The kid deserves a prize, not a suspension! (Link via Tigerhawk.) Edu-crats are humorless killjoys if nothing else. As for the 17-year-old knight on horseback? Well done, Mr. Depaolis. Well done, indeed.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Downward Facing Doofus: Yoga Poses and Parking Ticket Silliness
From La Parisienne comes this loopy news story from Cambridge, Mass. (Well, I'm not surprised at any lunacy coming from the town that harbors Hahvahd ... but that's another tale.) I can only repeat and endorse the lovely Parisienne's comment: "You can't make this stuff up."
I don't know about you, but if I got a parking ticket, I'd sigh and go about my business. If I got a parking ticket with yoga poses printed on it, I would fly into a frothing rage on the spot because that's adding insult to injury. In fact, I'm starting to feel a bit rage-y just thinking about it. I've only ever seen one positive occurrence of someone enforcing parking rules, and I post it after the fold, as a thank-you to La Parisienne.
I don't know about you, but if I got a parking ticket, I'd sigh and go about my business. If I got a parking ticket with yoga poses printed on it, I would fly into a frothing rage on the spot because that's adding insult to injury. In fact, I'm starting to feel a bit rage-y just thinking about it. I've only ever seen one positive occurrence of someone enforcing parking rules, and I post it after the fold, as a thank-you to La Parisienne.
Saturday, January 23, 2010
It's Independents' Day in American Politics (Plus a Rant)
One thing seems clear in current American politics: you alienate independents to your peril. First the GOP did it, and now the Dems are busy apparently trying to alienate independents as quickly as possible. See the political turnarounds in Virginia, New Jersey, and now Massachusetts with Scott Brown. (See this too.)
After all, what do independents seem to want most? Limited government and the protection of individual rights. PREACH IT! Related to this are the ongoing tea party protests and the frustration of the middle class. We do NOT like an ever-increasing tax-sucking intrusive federal juggernaut run by a "let-zem-eat-unpopular-policy" lot of mealy-mouthed, sticky-fingered, statist corruptocrats and ideologues bent on reducing every productive citizen to indentured tax servitude.
Oh, and here's some free MM advice to the unbelievably feckless and ineffective leadership of the RNC and GOP. Pay attention, people! Stop banging on about social agendas. We don't like the left pushing social agendas, so what makes you think we'll like the right doing it too? Get down to brass tacks here: Limited government. Lower taxes. Less government intrusion. More individual freedom. No nanny government. Stop penalizing the productive in order to bail out the failed and failing. Or, to put it most simply, I'll vote for the people who promise to first (a) LEAVE ME (AND MY WALLET) ALONE, and (b) prevent others from messing with my Constitutionally-protected rights and liberties. (And, yes, for me, this encompasses going after terrorists.)
For the record, this nanny-government idea and the nanny-statists' attempt to infantilize everybody. I don't want or like my own biological parents telling me what to do. Why would I want a government doing that? A government with the power to tax (always the power to destroy) and to compel? I mean, seriously, if my mom nags me to change my behavior or do something that I don't want to do, I can just go away or ignore the directive. If the nanny state nags, it can outlaw things and impose fines and resort to all sorts of nastiness. Why would any intelligent, freedom-loving person assent to such a thing? The only reason I can think of is the temptation to suck forever at the government teat, depend on the Mommy State cradle-to-grave, and refuse to take any responsibility for oneself. Pathetic. Give me spirited, self-reliant rugged individualism any day. Maybe the question boils down to, do you want opportunities or guarantees?
Oh, and to be fair, here's some free advice for the Dems in power in DC. Pay attention! The voter revolts do NOT mean that you should push on even harder with your craptastic policy ideas that every single poll reveals to be wildly unpopular with just about EVERYBODY, left, right, and center! Are you really so far into your own echo chamber that you don't realize that you are utterly out of step with THE COUNTRY? Stop trying to cram stuff down our throats as if we were geese being force-fed to make foie gras. (Then again, maybe that's exactly the point, so eventually they can eat our livers -- I mean, bank accounts.)
Oh, and you might want to dial back the overweening aristocratic arrogance, elitist self-absorption, and open contempt for dissenting citizens or, in the words of one of your DC peeps, "evil-mongers." Your Marie Antoinette is showing. Lucky for you, in this country we don't have the guillotine. We do, however, have something even better. They're called elections, and if I'm not mistaken there are a whole boatload of midterm elections coming this very year. Remember, you are in office to serve the citizens, not the other way around. Pelosi, your "most ethical Congress ever" is now the most despised train wreck of a Congress ever. A wise person learns from his own mistakes. A REALLY wise person learns from someone else's mistakes. Only a total moron learns nothing at all from his own mistakes. Wake up and smell the political mortality. In good Greek-tragic fashion, hubris soon practically begs for nemesis to come and squash it like an cockroach.
Now I could go on lambasting politicians left and right, but I have better things to do! MM is going to procrastinate on her latest nerd paper; she's off to the mall and to Borders (to look at books that have nothing to do with her studies!).
After all, what do independents seem to want most? Limited government and the protection of individual rights. PREACH IT! Related to this are the ongoing tea party protests and the frustration of the middle class. We do NOT like an ever-increasing tax-sucking intrusive federal juggernaut run by a "let-zem-eat-unpopular-policy" lot of mealy-mouthed, sticky-fingered, statist corruptocrats and ideologues bent on reducing every productive citizen to indentured tax servitude.
Oh, and here's some free MM advice to the unbelievably feckless and ineffective leadership of the RNC and GOP. Pay attention, people! Stop banging on about social agendas. We don't like the left pushing social agendas, so what makes you think we'll like the right doing it too? Get down to brass tacks here: Limited government. Lower taxes. Less government intrusion. More individual freedom. No nanny government. Stop penalizing the productive in order to bail out the failed and failing. Or, to put it most simply, I'll vote for the people who promise to first (a) LEAVE ME (AND MY WALLET) ALONE, and (b) prevent others from messing with my Constitutionally-protected rights and liberties. (And, yes, for me, this encompasses going after terrorists.)
For the record, this nanny-government idea and the nanny-statists' attempt to infantilize everybody. I don't want or like my own biological parents telling me what to do. Why would I want a government doing that? A government with the power to tax (always the power to destroy) and to compel? I mean, seriously, if my mom nags me to change my behavior or do something that I don't want to do, I can just go away or ignore the directive. If the nanny state nags, it can outlaw things and impose fines and resort to all sorts of nastiness. Why would any intelligent, freedom-loving person assent to such a thing? The only reason I can think of is the temptation to suck forever at the government teat, depend on the Mommy State cradle-to-grave, and refuse to take any responsibility for oneself. Pathetic. Give me spirited, self-reliant rugged individualism any day. Maybe the question boils down to, do you want opportunities or guarantees?
Oh, and to be fair, here's some free advice for the Dems in power in DC. Pay attention! The voter revolts do NOT mean that you should push on even harder with your craptastic policy ideas that every single poll reveals to be wildly unpopular with just about EVERYBODY, left, right, and center! Are you really so far into your own echo chamber that you don't realize that you are utterly out of step with THE COUNTRY? Stop trying to cram stuff down our throats as if we were geese being force-fed to make foie gras. (Then again, maybe that's exactly the point, so eventually they can eat our livers -- I mean, bank accounts.)
Oh, and you might want to dial back the overweening aristocratic arrogance, elitist self-absorption, and open contempt for dissenting citizens or, in the words of one of your DC peeps, "evil-mongers." Your Marie Antoinette is showing. Lucky for you, in this country we don't have the guillotine. We do, however, have something even better. They're called elections, and if I'm not mistaken there are a whole boatload of midterm elections coming this very year. Remember, you are in office to serve the citizens, not the other way around. Pelosi, your "most ethical Congress ever" is now the most despised train wreck of a Congress ever. A wise person learns from his own mistakes. A REALLY wise person learns from someone else's mistakes. Only a total moron learns nothing at all from his own mistakes. Wake up and smell the political mortality. In good Greek-tragic fashion, hubris soon practically begs for nemesis to come and squash it like an cockroach.
Now I could go on lambasting politicians left and right, but I have better things to do! MM is going to procrastinate on her latest nerd paper; she's off to the mall and to Borders (to look at books that have nothing to do with her studies!).
Jon Stewart 1, Olbermann 0
The hilarious Jon Stewart takes some potshots at MSNBC's reliably ridiculous pseudo-journalist Keith Olbermann, whose utterly insane rants about new Massachusetts senator Scott Brown deserve the withering contempt of any thinking, serious, civil grown-up who lives in reality.
Kudos to Jon for making contempt so funny. The frothing, unhinged far Left seems to be now busy alienating non-frothing liberals. To which I say, we here on the center-right libertarian/independent/conservative side of things have been saying this for a long time now -- those far Left folks are crazy. Oh, and MSNBC is a media cesspool where objectivity goes to die a grisly death.
Kudos to Jon for making contempt so funny. The frothing, unhinged far Left seems to be now busy alienating non-frothing liberals. To which I say, we here on the center-right libertarian/independent/conservative side of things have been saying this for a long time now -- those far Left folks are crazy. Oh, and MSNBC is a media cesspool where objectivity goes to die a grisly death.
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| Special Comment - Keith Olbermann's Name-Calling | ||||
| ||||
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
We've Done the Impossible, and That Makes Us Mighty: I Got Some Real HopeChange For Ya!
Oh, yeah!
Now THAT's some Hope and Change for you! And in the bluest of the blue states, Massachusetts. Unbelievable. Unbelievably awesome, that is. East Coast residents can attest to the blue in the state. And yet Scott Brown is the new senator. This election result could well mark a sea change. There will be other elections in 2010, and I am pretty sure that the Congressional Pelosicrats are feeling their political mortality right now. (And will Dems start fleeing poisonously unpopular ObamaCare like rats from a sinking ship?)
So to riff on the old ad, "What Can Brown Do For You?" Keep building a vibrant center-right-independent coalition to push back against the overweening and increasingly heavy-handed bunch of entrenched statists in DC who feel no obligation to the citizenry.
Now to quote my beloved "Firefly" -- "We've done the impossible, and that makes us mighty."
I'm going to bed happy in the knowledge we all can indeed do something about the political mess that Washington has got us into (i.e., say No). I confess too to being wickedly amused that leftists all over are frothing with rage and that tomorrow some of my more rabidly partisan nerdy campus dwellers will be glum, gloomy, and predicting the end of days because a Republican (! ... or, really, someone closer to the grass-roots tea parties and not so much tied to the ossified RNC) is now liberal icon Ted Kennedy's successor, freely and officially elected by the people of that state. Ain't democracy grand? Well, all politics are local, but this election has some major ramifications well beyond Massachusetts. (Now to quote the delightful Jane Lynch in "Glee," "Your resentment is ... delicious.")
Congratulations, Senator Brown, as you go to the people's seat.
And it all seems poetically fitting too, doesn't it, that it all happened in Massachusetts, in Boston, so steeped with the history of the American Revolution, from the original Tea Party to "the shot heard 'round the world."
PS: Here is Brown's very nicely done victory speech. Do read. I think you all know me well enough by now to know which parts of it made my heart flutter (or would have, if I actually possessed a heart)!
Now THAT's some Hope and Change for you! And in the bluest of the blue states, Massachusetts. Unbelievable. Unbelievably awesome, that is. East Coast residents can attest to the blue in the state. And yet Scott Brown is the new senator. This election result could well mark a sea change. There will be other elections in 2010, and I am pretty sure that the Congressional Pelosicrats are feeling their political mortality right now. (And will Dems start fleeing poisonously unpopular ObamaCare like rats from a sinking ship?)
So to riff on the old ad, "What Can Brown Do For You?" Keep building a vibrant center-right-independent coalition to push back against the overweening and increasingly heavy-handed bunch of entrenched statists in DC who feel no obligation to the citizenry.
Now to quote my beloved "Firefly" -- "We've done the impossible, and that makes us mighty."
I'm going to bed happy in the knowledge we all can indeed do something about the political mess that Washington has got us into (i.e., say No). I confess too to being wickedly amused that leftists all over are frothing with rage and that tomorrow some of my more rabidly partisan nerdy campus dwellers will be glum, gloomy, and predicting the end of days because a Republican (! ... or, really, someone closer to the grass-roots tea parties and not so much tied to the ossified RNC) is now liberal icon Ted Kennedy's successor, freely and officially elected by the people of that state. Ain't democracy grand? Well, all politics are local, but this election has some major ramifications well beyond Massachusetts. (Now to quote the delightful Jane Lynch in "Glee," "Your resentment is ... delicious.")
Congratulations, Senator Brown, as you go to the people's seat.
And it all seems poetically fitting too, doesn't it, that it all happened in Massachusetts, in Boston, so steeped with the history of the American Revolution, from the original Tea Party to "the shot heard 'round the world."
PS: Here is Brown's very nicely done victory speech. Do read. I think you all know me well enough by now to know which parts of it made my heart flutter (or would have, if I actually possessed a heart)!
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