Jefferson Starship.........................Miracles
Saturday, March 9, 2013
Opening paragraphs.....................
Just across the George Washington Bridge from Manhattan lies Bergen County, New Jersey, composed of towns such as Fort Lee, Englewood, Palisades Park, and Edgewater, to name a few. Today Fort lee, whose splendid location stretches along the Palisades Cliffs, is a mass of high-rises, a spillover from Manhattan, but the Hudson River and the Palisades Cliffs are still as beautiful as I remember them when I was a kid. In the 1950s there wasn't a high-rise to be seen. The towns were more like villages, old-fashioned and unchanged for decades.
-Ken Perenyi, Caveat Emptor: The Secret Life of an American Art Forger
-Ken Perenyi, Caveat Emptor: The Secret Life of an American Art Forger
Alvin Lee.......................
..........the singer, songwriter, guitarist for Ten Years After died this week. Wiki here. Obit here. His I'd Love to Change the World is one great song, although with some interesting lyrics (full lyrics here).
Every time I hear these lines, I can't help but ask......"then what?"
Tax the rich, feed the poor
Till there are no rich no more
Every time I hear these lines, I can't help but ask......"then what?"
Tax the rich, feed the poor
Till there are no rich no more
Friday, March 8, 2013
Isaiah Berlin........................
Cherry-picking some quotes from a very quotable man:
Injustice, poverty, slavery, ignorance — these may be cured by reform or revolution. But men do not live only by fighting evils. They live by positive goals, individual and collective, a vast variety of them, seldom predictable, at times incompatible.
But to manipulate men, to propel them towards goals which you — the social reformer — see, but they may not, is to deny their human essence, to treat them as objects without wills of their own, and therefore to degrade them.
Freedom for the wolves has often meant death to the sheep.
All forms of tampering with human beings, getting at them, shaping them against their will to your own pattern, all thought control and conditioning is, therefore, a denial of that in men which makes them men and their values ultimate.
There exists a great chasm between those, on one side, who relate everything to a single central vision ... and, on the other side, those who pursue many ends, often unrelated and even contradictory ... The first kind of intellectual and artistic personality belongs to the hedgehogs, the second to the foxes.
Philosophers are adults who persist in asking childish questions.
Everything is what it is: liberty is liberty, not equality or fairness or justice or culture, or human happiness or a quiet conscience.
The first people totalitarians destroy or silence are men of ideas and free minds.
Those who have ever valued liberty for its own sake believed that to be free to choose, and not to be chosen for, is an inalienable ingredient in what makes human beings human.
Injustice, poverty, slavery, ignorance — these may be cured by reform or revolution. But men do not live only by fighting evils. They live by positive goals, individual and collective, a vast variety of them, seldom predictable, at times incompatible.
But to manipulate men, to propel them towards goals which you — the social reformer — see, but they may not, is to deny their human essence, to treat them as objects without wills of their own, and therefore to degrade them.
Freedom for the wolves has often meant death to the sheep.
All forms of tampering with human beings, getting at them, shaping them against their will to your own pattern, all thought control and conditioning is, therefore, a denial of that in men which makes them men and their values ultimate.
There exists a great chasm between those, on one side, who relate everything to a single central vision ... and, on the other side, those who pursue many ends, often unrelated and even contradictory ... The first kind of intellectual and artistic personality belongs to the hedgehogs, the second to the foxes.
Philosophers are adults who persist in asking childish questions.
Everything is what it is: liberty is liberty, not equality or fairness or justice or culture, or human happiness or a quiet conscience.
The first people totalitarians destroy or silence are men of ideas and free minds.
Those who have ever valued liberty for its own sake believed that to be free to choose, and not to be chosen for, is an inalienable ingredient in what makes human beings human.
Good skipper, brave and sure........
On this day in 1921...............Alan Hale, Jr. was born.
First season introduction to Gilligan's Island is here.
Damn that "embedding disabled" thing.
First season introduction to Gilligan's Island is here.
Damn that "embedding disabled" thing.
Stop...........................
Anger and joy,
happiness and sorrow,
anxiety and hope,
laziness and willfulness,
enthusiasm and insolence -
like music arising from emptiness
or mushrooms sprouting in the dark -
they spring before us, night and day.
We do not know from where they come.
Stop thinking about it!
How can we ever understand it in one day?
-Chuang Tzu, as excerpted from Solala Towler's
Tales From The Tao: The Wisdom of the Taoist Masters
happiness and sorrow,
anxiety and hope,
laziness and willfulness,
enthusiasm and insolence -
like music arising from emptiness
or mushrooms sprouting in the dark -
they spring before us, night and day.
We do not know from where they come.
Stop thinking about it!
How can we ever understand it in one day?
-Chuang Tzu, as excerpted from Solala Towler's
Tales From The Tao: The Wisdom of the Taoist Masters
Opening paragraphs...............
On that last, cold day of December in the dying year we count as 406, the river Rhine froze solid, providing the natural bridge that hundreds of thousands of hungry men, women, and children had been waiting for. They were the barbari - to the Romans and undistinguished, matted mass of Others, not terrifying, just troublemakers, annoyances, things one would rather not have to deal with - non-Romans. To themselves they were, presumably, something more, but as the illiterate leave few records, we can only surmise their opinion of themselves.
-Thomas Cahill, How The Irish Saved Civilization: The Untold Story of Ireland's Heroic Role from the Fall of Rome to the Rise of Medieval Europe
-Thomas Cahill, How The Irish Saved Civilization: The Untold Story of Ireland's Heroic Role from the Fall of Rome to the Rise of Medieval Europe
Sadness....................
"Agriculture is booming; but farming is long dead. The land grows food as never before, but no longer families."
-Victor Davis Hanson, as excerpted from this essay
-Victor Davis Hanson, as excerpted from this essay
Thursday, March 7, 2013
Magical.............................
“We are all dreaming of some magical rose garden over the horizon instead of enjoying the roses blooming outside our windows today”
-Dale Carnegie
Keep..........................
“Be wiser than other people if you can; but do not tell them so.”
-Dale Carnegie
Process...........................
“If you are not in the process of becoming the person you want to be, you are automatically engaged in becoming the person you don't want to be. ”
-Dale Carnegie
Judge..............................
“Even god doesn't propose to judge a man till his last days, why should you and I?”
-Dale Carnegie
via
Quality.....................
“You can conquer almost any fear if you will only make up your mind to do so. For remember, fear doesn't exist anywhere except in the mind.”
-Dale Carnegie
image via
Dare.............................
“The man who goes farthest is generally the one who is willing to do and dare. The sure-thing boat never gets far from shore.”
-Dale Carnegie
image of Apollo 13
Do something.......................
“If you can't sleep, then get up and do something instead of lying there and worrying. It's the worry that gets you, not the loss of sleep.”
-Dale Carnegie
image via
Bristling.......................
“When dealing with people, let us remember we are not dealing with creatures of logic. We are dealing with creatures of emotion, creatures bristling with prejudices and motivated by pride and vanity.”
-Dale Carnegie
image via
Wednesday, March 6, 2013
tenacem........................
Iustum et tenacem propositi virum
non civium ardor prava iubentium,
non vultus instantis tyranni
mente quatit solida.
"The man who is tenacious of purpose in a rightful cause is not shaken from his firm resolve by the frenzy of his fellow citizens clamoring for what is wrong, or by the tyrant's threatening countenance."
-Horace
non civium ardor prava iubentium,
non vultus instantis tyranni
mente quatit solida.
"The man who is tenacious of purpose in a rightful cause is not shaken from his firm resolve by the frenzy of his fellow citizens clamoring for what is wrong, or by the tyrant's threatening countenance."
-Horace
Keep reminding me.....................
"Our main business is not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand."
-Thomas Carlyle
image via
Fifty years ago....................
The Jaynetts..............................Sally, Go 'Round The Roses
Opening paragraphs.........................
The shots that fired the bullets that entered Pumpkin's head were heard by no less than eight people. Three instinctively closed their windows, checked their locked doors, and withdrew to the safety, or at least the seclusion, of their small apartments. Two others, each with experience in such matters, ran from the vicinity as fast if not faster than the gunman himself. Another, the neighborhood recycling fanatic, was digging through some garbage in search of aluminum cans when he heard the sharp sounds of the daily skirmish, very nearby. He jumped behind a pile of cardboard boxes until the shelling stopped, then eased into the alley where he saw what was left of Pumpkin.
-John Grisham, The King of Torts
-John Grisham, The King of Torts
Hard...............................
Nil sine magno
vita labore dedit mortalibus.
Life grants nothing to us mortals without hard work.
-Horace
cartoon via
Tuesday, March 5, 2013
Opening paragraphs.................
Now at last the slowly-gathered, long-pent-up fury of the storm broke upon us. Four or five millions of men met each other in the first shock of the most merciless of all the wars of which record has been kept. Within a week the front in France, behind which we had been accustomed to dwell through the hard years of the former war and the opening phase of this, was to be irretrievably broken. Within three weeks the long-famed French Army was to collapse in rout and ruin, and our only British Army to be hurled into the sea with all its equipment lost. Within six weeks we were to find ourselves alone, almost disarmed, with triumphant Germany and Italy at our throats, with the whole of Europe open to Hitler's power, and Japan glowering on the other side of the globe. It was amid these facts and looming prospects that I entered upon my duties as Prime Minister and Minister of Defense and addressed myself to the first task of forming a Government of all parties to conduct His Majesty's business at home and abroad by whatever means might be best suited to the national interest.
Winston S. Churchill, The Second World War Volume II: Their Finest Hour
Winston S. Churchill, The Second World War Volume II: Their Finest Hour
This day in history...................
Fifty years ago today, country music star Patsy Cline was killed in a small plane crash. A sad day.
This day in history.....................
On this day in 1963, the Hula-Hoop, a hip-swiveling toy that became a huge fad across America when it was first marketed by Wham-O in 1958, is patented by the company's co-founder, Arthur "Spud" Melin. An estimated 25 million Hula-Hoops were sold in its first four months of production alone.
source
source
Wake-up call.................
Arthur C. Brooks suggests the Republican party needs to get its act together. It matters. Full WSJ essay here. Excerpt here:
"Meanwhile, the record of free enterprise in improving the lives of the poor both here and abroad is spectacular. According to Columbia University economist Xavier Sala-i-Martin, the percentage of people in the world living on a dollar a day or less—a traditional poverty measure—has fallen by 80% since 1970. This is the greatest antipoverty achievement in world history. That achievement is not the result of philanthropy or foreign aid. It occurred because billions of souls have been able to pull themselves out of poverty thanks to global free trade, property rights, the rule of law and entrepreneurship.
"The left talks a big game about helping the bottom half, but its policies are gradually ruining the economy, which will have catastrophic results once the safety net is no longer affordable. Labyrinthine regulations, punitive taxation and wage distortions destroy the ability to create private-sector jobs. Opportunities for Americans on the bottom to better their station in life are being erased."
Monday, March 4, 2013
Fifty years ago................
The Kingsmen..................Louie Louie
The Kingsmen..................Louie Louie
The 45 RPM version sounds better to these ears. Gospel truth on the controversy over the song and its lyrics can be found here.
The Kingsmen..................Louie Louie
The 45 RPM version sounds better to these ears. Gospel truth on the controversy over the song and its lyrics can be found here.
Fifty years ago..........................
In 1963, Mutual of Omaha launched Wild Kingdom. Marlin Perkins enlightened a generation, or two, about animals and the natural world. Couldn't find Episode 1 of Season 1, but here is Episode 5 of Season 1. Marlin is looking youngish.
Fifty years ago.........................
From the Wikipedia entry on Nelson Glueck: Although he
worked to develop a historical understanding of biblical
events, Dr. Glueck always maintained that his faith was not
based on a literal interpretation of the bible. To do that, he
once said, would be to "confuse fact with faith, history with
holiness, science with religion."
Fifty years ago...........................
The Beatles..........................Please Please Me
(All you purists out there are saying, "hey wait, that video is from 1964." I know. The song was first released in the UK on January 11, 1963. I just prefer this YouTube clip.)
(All you purists out there are saying, "hey wait, that video is from 1964." I know. The song was first released in the UK on January 11, 1963. I just prefer this YouTube clip.)
Fifty years ago........................
In 1963 Richard P. Feynman, a professor of Physics at CalTech, published Six Easy Pieces: Essentials of Physics Explained by Its Most Brilliant Teacher. Here is his opening paragraph:
This two-year course in physics is presented from the point of view that you, the reader, are going to be a physicist. This is not necessarily the case of course, but that is what every professor in every subject assumes! If you are going to be a physicist, you will have a lot to study: two hundred years of the most rapidly developing field of knowledge that there is. So much knowledge, in fact, that you might think that you cannot learn all of it in four years, and truly you cannot; you will have to go to graduate school too!
On most days, this one included, I'm happy with my B.A. in History, thank you.
This two-year course in physics is presented from the point of view that you, the reader, are going to be a physicist. This is not necessarily the case of course, but that is what every professor in every subject assumes! If you are going to be a physicist, you will have a lot to study: two hundred years of the most rapidly developing field of knowledge that there is. So much knowledge, in fact, that you might think that you cannot learn all of it in four years, and truly you cannot; you will have to go to graduate school too!
On most days, this one included, I'm happy with my B.A. in History, thank you.
Sunday, March 3, 2013
What we did last night...................
#10 in your program......................#1 in our hearts.
The Newark Catholic girls basketball team won their District
in the state tourney. Regionals are next week. Stay tuned.
Most of the really smart bloggers I follow are not.....
.....fans of powerpoint slide shows. However, sometimes............
Walter Russell Mead points to this report by Donghoon Lee on the growth of student debt. The slide deck has about twenty slides in it. Worth a quick peek.
While there is much concern about the explosive growth of the debt taken on in the pursuit of higher education, I found this slide interesting:
40% of student loans are $10,000 or less. Almost 70% of student loan balances are less than $25,000.
Just as an observation: If a debt of less than $25,000 is a crushing burden for recently graduated college students, the big problem lies with the absence of economic value of their degree, not with the debt. Just saying.
Walter Russell Mead points to this report by Donghoon Lee on the growth of student debt. The slide deck has about twenty slides in it. Worth a quick peek.
While there is much concern about the explosive growth of the debt taken on in the pursuit of higher education, I found this slide interesting:
40% of student loans are $10,000 or less. Almost 70% of student loan balances are less than $25,000.
Just as an observation: If a debt of less than $25,000 is a crushing burden for recently graduated college students, the big problem lies with the absence of economic value of their degree, not with the debt. Just saying.
Opening paragraphs.......................
Sam Zemurray saw his first banana in 1893. In the lore, this is presented as a moment of clarity, wherein the future is revealed. In some versions, the original banana is presented as a platonic ideal, and archetype circling the young man's head. It is seen from a great distance, then very close, each freckle magnified. As it was his first banana, I imagine it situated on a velvet pillow, in a display alongside of Adam's rib and Robert Johnson's guitar. There is much variation in the telling of this story, meaning each expert has written his or her own history; meaning the story has gone from reportage to mythology; meaning Sam the Banana Man is Paul Bunyan and the first banana is Babe the Blue Ox. In some versions, Sam sees the banana in the gutter in Selma, Alabama, where it's fallen from a pushcart; in some, he sees it in the window of a grocery and is smitten. He rushes inside, grabs the owner by the lapel, and makes him tell everything he knows. In some, he sees it amid a pile of bananas on the deck of a ship plying the Alabama River on a lazy summer day.
-Rich Cohen, The Fish That Ate the Whale: The Life and Times of America's Banana King
-Rich Cohen, The Fish That Ate the Whale: The Life and Times of America's Banana King
Fifty years ago..........................
The Rolling Stones........................I Wanna Be Your Man
The not-so-Simple Village Undertaker........
....plays a clip of what he calls "possibly the greatest defensive football play ever caught on video." It is a pretty good play. But...........for my money, the greatest defensive football play ever caught on video happened in the 2002 Fiesta Bowl. Miami versus The Ohio State University for the National Championship. The 'Canes were heavily favored. The Buckeyes won and it was the greatest collegiate defensive football play that made it all possible. The scene is early in the third quarter. Bucks have a 14-7 lead and are on Miami's six yard line, driving in for the score. Craig Krenzel, off of a play action fake to Clarett, throws a short pass into the end zone that is intercepted by Miami's Sean Taylor. Taylor takes off running with the ball. 5 - 10 -15 - 20 yard line. Uh-oh. Maurice Clarett, OSU's freshman tailback, who had stayed in the backfield on the play to block for Krenzel, chases Taylor down from behind at about the 25 yard line and steals the ball right out of Taylor's arms. Buckeyes ball. Four plays later OSU kicks a field goal for a 17-7 lead. Film clip about Clarett's freshman season is below. The greatest defensive play ever happens about the 4:09 mark. Enjoy - or argue for your "greatest defensive" play:
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