The courts have been so all over the place on police search issues that it’s hard to say what impact this will have. But the Supremes just declared that cops cannot prolong a routine traffic stop even for a minute without legit cause. Inside the strange and wonderful world of micronations. Emphatically NSFW, but funny: company posts a … unique Craigslist ad for engineers. Bet we’ve all wanted to do this at some time or another. Looks like a must-see documentary (though the characterization of Tasers as “rifles” needs some explanation for sure). Gradeschooler challenges school anti-pot propaganda. His activist…
Author: Claire
“‘Safe Spaces’ and the Mote in America’s Eye.” For some time I’ve been mean to university students who feel entitled to a “safe space” — by which they seem to mean a space where they are insulated from ideas they don’t like. I call these young people out for valuing illusory and subjective safety over liberty. I accuse them of accepting that speech is “harmful” without logic or proof. I mock them for not grasping that universities are supposed to be places of open inquiry. I condemn them for not being critical about the difference between nasty speech and nasty…
House, you’re always providing me with lots of surprises dismay consternation cuss words entertainment.
Yesterday I moved left-over construction materials that had leaned against a “naked” corner of the house all winter. Once I got everything shifted away, I got distracted by the corner itself.
Immune-system drug combo “melts” tumors. Yeah, I know there are always reports like this that eventually come to nothing. But this is pretty dramatic. Are you nuts, Mr. Cop??? Officer shoots (at) dog in a crowd. Fortunately misses. Dog just looked as if it was being rambunctiously friendly, too. (Here’s the video if you can’t see it on that page.) If you’re going to have anti-abortion laws, you’re going to have to be prepared not only to prosecute every doctor, nurse, and med-tech for murder, but to investigate every miscarriage as a potential homicide. Some countries do. Results aren’t pretty.…
Where were you on April 19? On April 19, 1993 I was on a long drive toward a client’s headquarters when I heard the Branch Davidians were burning. For some reason I hadn’t taken the siege very seriously to that point (even though I’d taken the earlier Weaver siege as seriously as I’d ever taken anything in my life). Just a bunch of Jim Jonesy cultists, I thought. I figured the FBI would wait them out until Koresh got done with his preposterous “seven seals” manuscript, then peaceably arrest and later release most of them. Cause you know, why would…
The story of the reserve deputy who killed a pinned-down suspect in Tulsa County gets worse and worse. Wonder who this cop is or who he knows that entire chains of officialdom were ordered to falsify records for him? Ohhhh, wait. It says right there in the article … Don’t be nervous now. It probably means you’re a terrorist. In the future your insurance company (ugh) will know when you’re having sex. And of course so will “security” ‘crats in DC. ‘Cause you know we still don’t have enough surveillance. I wonder … why don’t these people ever get that…
“Oh crap! More ammo for the ‘ban body armor’ people.” Something on the lighter side from Y.B. ben Avraham. And exactly who here terrorized and abused those free-range kids? Just another example of why people are fleeing the biggest nanny states. Schadenfreude is so very ignoble. Still, it’s a delightful thing to see some of the greatest supporters of Obamacare getting skewered by it. This is one of those things you might have intuitively perceived but never quite believed: we recall better (especially recall concepts better) when we write notes by hand rather than type on a keyboard. Those “racketeering”…
Been feeling distracted and tired lately. Concerned about money. Not “OMG, how will I keep the lights on?” money issues. More like “How do I juggle all this?” It’s temporary (vehicle repairs, taxes) and I’m not asking anything from anybody. Everything is fine. Just know that right now I feel muzzy-headed, unclear on many of life’s little details, as if I want to crawl back in bed by 9:00 a.m., and for some reason also ravenous for protein. Preferably protein saturated in honey and brown sugar (so it’s a good thing I made beef jerky the other day, yes?)
Anyhow, I don’t have much for you right now, so I thought I’d just share a little email exchange from the weekend. It’s the kind of communication that should make you glad you didn’t opt for a career as a freelance writer.
Background: I wrote a S.W.A.T. magazine article asking, “Do we have a right to rebellion?” The article isn’t online, but basically I was answering that statist eejit Paul Begala’s multi-idiocy remarks from earlier this year. Then some “expert” answered me.
Before I get to the exchange itself, I’ll acknowledge that, yes, I’m well aware that some readers here deny that any such things as rights exist. Consider your point to be noted in advance. We have a right to differ. 🙂 But my position in the article was that we damn well do have a right to rebellion, Mr. Begala to the contrary.
For the rest of you who consider discussions of the nature of rights meaningful, on to the exchange.
As you complete your taxes this week and prepare to keep your sorry arse out of prison do your patriot duty by paying for everything from politicians’ mistresses to drone attacks on wedding parties, you might enjoy this: a Tax-Time Devil’s Dictionary of DC lingo. Cheers.
Ban the trebuchet! (And while you’re at it, tell that writer that 1895 wasn’t “medieval.”) H/T MJR Princeton opts for insensitivity discursive rape hurting people’s itty-bitty widdle feewings free speech and free thought. And does it for the right reasons. Seattle. Cops. Humanity. Hm. We’ll see how this works out I used to know a fair bit about the pre-WWII history of aviation. I could have bored you silly with tales of how Henri Coanda almost invented a jet plane in 1910 and how Jacqueline Cochran won the Bendix Race. But I never knew this. It’s touching that after all…