If you smell what Barack is cookin'

Test notes

For whatever reason, my class on modern Europe is bogged down in America like General Burgoyne at Saratoga. Test is Monday, so I figured I'd share my notes*. As you might have guessed, items in bold are expected to be on the test:

Modern Europe – Test 4

Pontiac’s Rebellion - Indian rebellion in the Great Lakes region and Ohio following the British victory in the French and Indian War. A loose coalition of tribes burned English forts and attacked soldiers and settlers. The British created the Proclamation Line (1763) down the tops of the Appalachians as a solution. This border was supposed to keep British settlers from squatting on Indian land west of the mountains. The decision proved very unpopular with the colonists, who had designs on continental expansion.

Sugar Act (1764) – an update of the 1733 Sugar and Molasses Act, this act actually halved the tax Americans were supposed to pay on imported sugar and molasses. The downside was that the act came with a whole slew of inspectors to ensure that colonists actually paid the tax. The decision proved very unpopular with the colonists, who had been evading the old tax as a matter of course.

Quartering Act (1764) – Following the French and Indian War, the British decided that since they could not keep a standing army in England, they would keep it in America and charge it to the colonies it was ‘protecting.’ The decision proved very unpopular with the colonists, who did not understand why troops that were allegedly protecting them from the Indians west of the Appalachians spent so much time in Boston.

Stamp Act (1765) – In order to pay off the war debt from the French and Indian War, the British decided that every document used in the colonies, from licenses to playing cards, needed to be affixed with a ‘stamp,’ which had to be purchased in silver. The decision proved very unpopular with the colonists, who assembled the Stamp Act Congress (1766), which decided that a boycott of British goods was in order. When British merchants complained to Parliament that they were being bankrupted, Parliament repealed the Act. But they passed a Declaratory Act declaring that even though they were not taxing Americans at the moment, they reserved that right. The Americans found them very taxing.

Townshend Duties (1767) – True to their declaration, Parliament, led by Who guitarist Pete Townshend, added tariffs on tea, glass, tea, lead, tea, painter’s colors, and tea. The decision proved very unpopular with the colonists, who held another boycott, after which Parliament repealed all the duties except the one on tea.

Boston Massacre (1770) – a rowdy crowd of Bostonians decided it would be a lot of fun to throw snowballs at British soldiers who were protecting them from Indians near Boston Harbor. The decision proved very unpopular with the soldiers, who fired into the crowd, killing 5 and wounding 6 more. The soldiers were acquitted of murder, but the colonists used the event to whip up anti-British sentiment.

Boston Tea Party (1773) – The British East India Company got into some financial hot water and the English government allowed them to bring boatloads of tea to the colonies to try to recoup some losses. Except that the colonists were not in any mood to pay the tea tax and considered the government’s move a scheme to get them to accept taxation without representation. So in Boston, Indians threw the tea into the harbor. The decision proved very unpopular with the Parliament, which passed a series of laws they called the Coercive Acts but which the colonists called the Intolerable Acts. Boston Harbor was closed, the Massachusetts government was taken over by England, troops were quartered in unoccupied buildings in Boston, and a big chunk of land claimed by Massachusetts was given to Quebec. Massachusetts was supposed to pay for the tea, after which the acts would be lifted. Instead, the laws tended to unify the colonies, which Britain had been trying without success to accomplish since the French and Indian War.

Lexington and Concord (1775) – the British sent soldiers from Boston to the Massachusetts towns of Lexington and Concord to confiscate guns and ammunition being stockpiled by the colonists. The Shot Heard ‘Round the World was fired (by whom is unknown**) and the Brits were chased back to Boston. The Continental Congress began to build an army and navy, placed George Washington in charge of the army, and asked France for help. This is the same France from the French and Indian War, by the way.

Hessians – The war was less than popular in Britain, so in order to provide sufficient troops, England contracted with the German state of Hesse to provide mercenaries. The decision proved very unpopular with the colonists, etc.

Battle of Bunker Hill (1775) – Actually held on Breed’s Hill, it was a very costly victory for the British who, in an attempt to take some American cannon that could fire on the troops in Boston, came up with the bright idea of charging uphill straight at them. The Americans retreated over the hill, leaving it safely in the hands of those British who were left.

Battle of Saratoga (1777) – The French wanted the states to prove themselves before they would join the war effort. This proof arrived when British general Burgoyne surrendered a British Army that was surrounded in New York. Due to bad orders, the armies he was expecting to meet never arrived. Instead, about a squillion Americans with guns arrived.

Battle of Yorktown (1781) – British General Lord Cornwallis surrendered to the combined American/ French army when trapped in port by the French fleet. This is the same France from the French and Indian War, by the way. The peace treaty is called the Treaty of Paris (1783), partially because it was signed in Paris and partly because it was signed in 1783, but mostly because there are many, many treaties of Paris, like the Treaty of Paris (1763), which ended the French and Indian War.

* It's easier than blogging.
** Schoolhouse Rock blames the British. I blame George Bush.

If not today, when?

Cry me a river

CNN Money has a handy little slide show of the 'meanest' budget cuts, those heart-rending, horrible Republican spending decisions that reduced this year's budget deficit by about 3%.  The funny thing is, there's nary a cut to be found.  For example, cut number 1, Community Health Centers:

Under the budget deal agreed to by Congress Thursday, the centers would see their funding slashed by $600 million for the remainder of 2011.
[But] under the sweeping health care legislation passed last year, the centers will actually see a $400 million increase in funding

How about Land mine removal? Well,

It's not clear if the $14 million in cuts will come out of the land mine program's budget. 

So maybe there's a cut there, maybe not. But how about food stamps?  Obviously we can't have people starving in the streets. Well,

A Senate Democrat staffer on the Appropriations Committee said the reduction is a result of fewer people needing the program.

So it's a 'mean' cut to reduce spending when people don't need it, I guess. But what about heat for the poor?

The fund's main budget of $4.5 billion was unchanged from last year's level.

What was actually cut was 'contingency funds' that had not been spent and were unlikely to be spent, since the poor will not need a lot of heat this summer.

And on it goes, illustrating the utter unseriousness of the budget 'debate' in Washington. Next on the Kabuki, the Republicans make some noises about demanding that the Democrats consider the possibility of maybe making some more budget cuts before voting to increase our national debt by a trillion dollars or two.

Weimar, 1923

Well, that's that.

At long last:

(CNN) – The White House released President Obama's original birth certificate Wednesday.

And no, I do not think there's even the slightest possibility that it's a fake.

And good riddance

To mass voter registrations:

Topeka — Voting rights advocates say that Kansas’ new law that requires a photo ID to cast a ballot is bad enough, but what’s worse is its requirement that states to register to vote a person must prove U.S. citizenship.

“That part is actually far more troubling,” said Ernestine Krehbiel, president of the League of Women Voters of Kansas.

The days of voter registration drives at picnics, nursing homes, grocery stores, county fairs and the Kansas State Fair, may be near an end, she said.

Count me as one of those people who does not see the result of an election as the sum of the voters' wisdom, but as the average: I do not believe the process is improved in the abstract by adding more voters. I actually believe it is eroded by adding voters who are not plugged in to the process. And by 'not plugged in' I mean, "will not undertake a modest effort to make one's self eligible to vote."

Voting rights activists* make the claim that forcing people to prove that they are the person with the right before they exercise it will cause certain people not to vote**. For these people, getting a state-issued ID or ordering a copy of their birth certificate is an insurmountable burden, a demand on their citizenship that is too onerous. These people, it is claimed, will simply not vote.

Fine by me. If the vote is not worth any more than that to you, the rest of us have no obligation to suffer the results of you exercising it.

* also known as 'placemen' or in the vernacular, barnacles. These are what all organizations are eventually filled with. It doesn't matter if it's a church denomination, a union, a civil rights organization, or even a company. If the group's ostensible purpose is met (e.g. Voting Rights Act) the rot occurs that much faster.

** Democrats and those wheeled out and bussed about by Democrats.

99 problems, but tuition ain't one

So anyway, John Brown Jr., in addition to all the TV stuff, has netted me a history department award for research which I'll receive at the grad student award dinner next week. What's even better, last night he won me a Reverend Kenneth J. Melaragno scholarship. The "Father Ken" scholarship pretty much covers full-time grad tuition*, but I have to use it this fall. That means I'm going to have to decide between taking 9 credit hours - leaving only my thesis and one seminar between me and graduation - or doing the thesis. I'm not opposed to writing the bleeding thing; that's actually the easy part. I've just been unable to really nail down a topic because every idea I've proposed to myself thus far has either seemed too obvious to bother proving or has lacked the requisite documentation to prove it**. I asked my (very cool) advisatrix about that particular conundrum and she just smiled knowingly and noted that such agony is an indispensable part of the thesis process.

Agony it is. I'm just glad I'm not paying for it.

* with the other money I get for being a non-faculty employee, it will cover everything including a gym membership.  
** This yin and yang of research works together in a most excruciating manner.

Must've missed the memo

It's Holy Week and we get this?

Two Roman nails dating back 2,000 years, found in the burial cave of the Jewish high priest who handed Jesus over to the Romans, may be linked to the crucifixion, an Israeli filmmaker has claimed.

The gnarled bits of iron, which measure around three inches (eight centimeters) each, were shown to reporters in Jerusalem on Tuesday at the premier of a television documentary series examining the question of whether they could have been the nails used to crucify Jesus.

I'm as skeptical of relics as the next guy; obviously there is no way of knowing if these are the nails or even if they are of any importance at all.  Frankly, I doubt they are - Caiphas was not such a fan of Jesus that he was liable to be a collector of His memorabilia.

That said, what's interesting about this story is that it comes out at Easter. Easter is traditionally the time of stories claiming the Jesus' tomb has been found*, of Gospels of Judas and Thomas, of wars over Easter Eggs, and of front-page interviews with liberal theologians who claim that Jesus never existed or if He did we know nothing about him and certainly He did nothing so unscientific as rise from the dead**. We almost never get a revelatory story that actually fits with the Easter narrative. I don't know what it means, but it does give me a sense of foreboding.

* such stories always limp away as soon as Easter is over.
** and always presented as if it's some sort of scientific discovery and not simply a philosophical presupposition of naturalism that the guy picked up in college in the 50s.

Three Creeper Moon

We've already established what they are

Now we're just haggling over price:

Geithner said that Republicans have told President Obama they "recognize we have to [raise the debt limit], and we're not going to play around with it."

"There's no alternative, and they recognize that," Geithner said...

But Republicans appearing on the Sunday talk shows demonstrated how tough a fight the White House might be facing just weeks after a near-shutdown of the government spurred by debates over fiscal 2011 spending.

How tough the fight might be? Simple question for those watching Sunday talk shows*: are the Republicans willing to forgo a debt-limit increase, throwing the government into a cost-cutting panic for which spending*** would have to be immediately cut to match revenues?

I wish, but no, they will not do so. They won't even shut down NPR.  And if they will not hold the line on debt, then there is no 'fight' going on in Washington any more than Tables, Ladders, and Chairs is a fight.  It's a full-contact ballet, a chaotic yet choreographed production during which sometimes people get hurt, sometimes blood gets spilled, and always final result is no surprise to those in the know.

The GOP will raise the debt ceiling to avoid short-term pain, just like they did when they controlled the White House and both houses of Congress, when the debt was far lower, and when it would have been much easier to do, and when, had they done it, we would be through the crisis with a much improved outlook. Instead, we're still facing a storm and it's about four times bigger than it was when the Republicans were saying the words Geithner is saying today. John Boehner won't be the only one who cries when it finally arrives.


* of which I am not one. The only thing I watch on TV is pro wrestling, which by coincidence is the realest thing on there**.
** Next to a disappointing Vikings season, obviously. 
*** Not budgets. The distinction makes all the difference.

Diversity

Do we have enough milk cartons?

According to the UN, 50,000,000 go missing and no one notices :

Fifty million climate refugees by 2010. Today we find a world of asymmetric development, unsustainable natural resource use, and continued rural and urban poverty. There is general agreement about the current global environmental and development crisis. It is also known that the consequences of these global changes have the most devastating impacts on the poorest, who historically have had limited entitlements and opportunities for growth.

If there is general agreement somewhere, it is on the fact that Climate Progressives are consistently wrong in their predictions. Just about every specific prediction they make not only turns out incorrect, but almost wildly so, and they're not even predicting stuff that far away.  The sentence above comes from a 2008 web page based on a 2005 "study." So they were essentially trying to predict 2 years into the future, and 50,000,000 people went missing, because they never existed*.

But the map on the page contains some fine print floating immediately between Hawaii and the Aleutians, and it says, "Climate refugees will mainly come form developing countries, where the effect of climate changes comes on top of poverty and war."  War? Seriously?  Joe Refugee, a poor man from a nation riven by civil war and who flees, is now a climate refugee?

Even when Climate Progressives cheat with the numbers, they can't seem to get anything right. And that's good news for Joe.

(hat tip: BOTW)

UPDATE: 404 - Welcome to the Ministry of Truth. The information you are seeking never existed.

* Or if those refugees did exist, they certainly never refuged because of global warming. They just stayed right where they were, much to the chagrin of people who get paid to write reports about them.

Yalta, 1945

Like bass in a canoe

The flip flops echo across the quiet waters:

House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer has joined President Obama in conceding that he blundered by voting against an increase to the government’s debt ceiling.

“I have voted against the debt limit in the past. That was a mistake,” Hoyer (Md.), the second-ranking House Democrat, said in an unprompted admission to reporters on Tuesday.

His comment came two days after White House adviser David Plouffe said Obama made a mistake by voting against raising the debt ceiling when he was a senator.

Just like the kerfuffle over whether it was The End of the Republic(tm) if the senate filibustered judges*, the kerfuffle over whether Congress ought to raise the debt ceiling just keeps coming back, and it just keeps coming back as an echo: all the arguments pro and con are the same, the only thing that has changed is the parties mouthing the platitudes.  The Democrats all howled and whined to "demand a course correction" (John Kerry) in faux outrage over the ever-increasing national debt all throughout the Bush administration.  Now that it's the Dems' administration and therefore their debt, the GOP is howling and whining in faux outrage over the ever-increasing national debt and demanding "a course correction" (Marco Rubio).  And the Democrats are outraged that the GOP is holding the legislation hostage in exactly the same way they held the same legislation hostage under Bush.

So now the Dems are all coming out and saying they were wrong about all that stuff they said about fiscal responsibility... no, actually, they were wrong about trying to actually do anything about it. Senator Lieberman's** spokesbabe is still saying the right words:

“Sen. Lieberman stands by that vote because he believed the [Bush administration] failed to demonstrate that they were going to take serious steps to reduce the national debt which today threatens our economic future,”

Those brackets are incredibly helpful, as it is makes it easy to replace [Bush administration] with [Obama administration***] and the statement will be just as true.  In order to reduce the debt, one must begin with a budget surplus. Obama promises us trillion dollar deficits as far as the eye can see - no "serious steps" there. Such madness not only threatens our economic future, it is killing our economic present. Therefore, I look forward to Senator Lieberman's principled vote against raising the debt ceiling next month.

* complete with a secret Republican 'nuclear option' that, when revealed, turned out to be nothing more than a change to an arbitrary number in an obscure internal Senate rule. It's like the 'nuclear option' of lowering the speed limit 5 mph in a school zone.
** Who, while technically not a Democrat, is principled enough to qualify.
*** Or [Reagan administration]. I'm going to cut Clinton some slack, because at least he looked that direction briefly.

I wonder if she cleans fish on her desk, too

Hollywood economics

Ashton Kutcher explains the supply/demand curve:

Kutcher told CNN: "We want to create a cultural shift in the way men and women view young people selling themselves for sex."

He added: "Sex trafficking is an elastic trade. If you can raise the price for sex you can actually reduce the demand. As you reduce the demand that raises the price.

"[That means] you can, ultimately, put it out of business, and the way to do that is by attacking the demand because the supply is endless."

So if reducing the demand raises the price, I guess that explains why even though fewer people go to movies, the price keeps going up.

A food pyramid for the rest of us

Priorities

Harry has them:

Washington (CNN) -- Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, said Friday morning that the abortion issue is the lone remaining stumbling block for negotiators trying to reach a budget agreement that would prevent a government shutdown.

Assuming that the Democrats are the ones who are for them*, it is enlightening that the Democrats are admittedly willing (even threatening) to impose upon the nation all the horrible things a government shutdown entails**, in order to preserve that particular spending.

* Or at least for giving your money to pay for them.
** Mostly over-dramatic speeches and news coverage of the shutdown of national parks and the delay of some tax refunds. I actually saw a 'Countdown to Shutdown' last night, complete with an animated countdown clock, which provided me with a stark reminder of why I no longer watch TV news. 

A speech not to be missed*

James Dean comes to campus:

How do heterosexuals claim identity and privilege in a post-closeted condition? If hard homophobic practices which operate by means of exclusion and disrespecting nonheterosexualites are less tenable, how do straight individuals negotiate sexual difference? In this talk, Dr. James Dean argues that a post-closeted dynamic is refashioning the culture of heterosexual masculinities. Specifically, many heterosexual American men are projecting and securing a heterosexual masculinity without resorting to hard homophobic practices. While homophobic and antihomophobic practices are central to the negotiation of heterosexual masculinities, a post-closeted dynamic signals a trend towards soft homophobic practices, which avoid garnering public disapproval that code one as intolerant, mean-spirited, or even hateful.

If I'm reading this correctly, Dr. Dean is arguing that heterosexual masculinity exists widely as a reaction to homosexuality.  I wonder if he would be offended to learn that homosexuality is utterly irrelevant to how the average man** views himself and his place in the world.

* except for the 'not' part, obviously.
** by which is meant, "one who lives outside both academia and Hollywood."

We won't get fooled again

Or maybe it should be, "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss."

Have at you!

The New Republican budget 'tis but a scratch:

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan will warn at AEI today that the country is at a “tipping point” in its debt crisis that threatens to “curtail free enterprise” and lead to a “gradual moral-political decline as dependency and passivity weaken the nation’s character.” ...

Ryan will address four main aspects of “The Path to Prosperity” agenda: streamlining government to make it “more efficient, effective and responsible”; welfare reform to “build upon the success” of the bipartisan efforts during the 1990s; focusing on entitlement reform to save Medicare and require the president to submit a plan “for restoring balance” to Social Security; and tax reform that “starts not by asking what is the ‘right mix’ of tax increases and spending cuts to balance the budget, but by asking what is the purpose of government, and then raising only as much revenue as the government needs to fund the things it is supposed to be doing.”

Even though he uses the word 'incredulous' incorrectly, Mish does a fine job of illustrating why the proposed budget will not meet its lofty goals, even should it be enacted, which it won't.  So there's no point in piling on that. Rather, I'm going to pile on Ryan's statement that 'dependency and passivity weaken the nation's character.'  Of course they do. Even FDR said as much, calling welfare 'a subtle destroyer of the human spirit,' and 'a narcotic,' even while hooking the nation and then upping the dosage.

The problem is not that Ryan recognizes the obvious. The problem is that his budget does not do anything about it. There is certainly no shortage of addictive, narcotic welfare programs in the Federal government. The biggest is Medicare, which Ryan wants to 'save.' The second is SocSec*, to which Ryan wants to 'restore balance.' News flash: people** are no less passive or dependent on government largesse just because a program is run efficiently or is 'balanced.' If the government is interested in the preserving the human spirit by reducing dependence on government, then it needs to work on eliminating entitlements, not making them run better. A budget that ignores (or worse, saves) the three or four*** largest expenditures, all of which are largely 'welfare' and much larger than what people think of when they say welfare, does not change anything. It is a tale told by a committee of idiots.

Now Mr. Ryan wants to ask this esteemed committee  - the committee that designed the current government - to decide what the purpose of government is, and what its limitations are and ought to be. But it's a silly question, which all but ignores the fact that it has already bee answered: the purposes and responsibilities of this government are laid out in the Constitution. The fact that Mr. Ryan and his committee are asking themselves the question instead means that they are ignorant of the answer or they do not like it****.  That's all well and good, as most voters don't like it, either: they like narcotics and won't go do a doctor who threatens to cut off their prescription.

The sad fact is that the moral-political decline that he's trying to avoid with his non-budget has already occurred. Playing around the edges of the budget while pretending that it's meaningful reform is either cynical, cruel, or an illustration of just how far that decline has gone.

* One could argue that neither is 'welfare' proper, as people 'paid into' them.  However, most people will draw far more from SocSec than they ever paid in - that makes the overage welfare. But it is the fact that people no longer save for retirement and instead rely on SocSec and Medicare that makes them harbingers of decline.
** and companies.  It would be incorrect to presume that it is only individuals who become addicted to government largesse. Corporations are just as bad, and since they have the resources to write their own prescriptions, so to speak, they are likely even worse.
*** Including defense.  A budget that does not reduce our defense spending to twice that of our nearest opponent - in other words, by  about 60% - is not a serious budget. But it will not be cut because too many companies are addicted to defense spending.
**** It is most likely the latter, to be fair. But the fact that he's not arguing for constitutional limits means that the only limits are those which can gain a majority in the Congress. In other words, by asking the question, he is presuming the very 'unlimited government,' that his budget allegedly saves us from.

Hidden talents

So anyway, we're having a talent show this week at work.  Seriously. It's not a singing and dancing show, but more a demonstration of hidden (or not so hidden) stuff we know how to do and want to share. For example, my neighbor Kris is an awesome photographer, so she's going to have a table with some of her pics on display - stuff that's good enough that it's been in a couple of art shows.  I got weaseled into showing all the codebreaker stuff* off, so now I've got to try to design a display table that is probably going to be right next to hers.

It's going to be ugly. Let's just say that designing aesthetically pleasing displays** is not one of my talents.

UPDATE: It worked out ok. I was right next to a guy who had a cake on his table.  Just a cake.  I mean, yeah, it was a nice cake, but it still saved my presentation by its very solitude on the table.  Then I ate it.

* I tried to get the director to allow me to demonstrate how to pick various padlocks, but she was surprisingly not very keen on that.  I still think it's far more useful than deciphering old correspondence.
** I thought it would be interesting if someone's talent was designing really good-looking display tables. That way the table would be in the display which would be the table in the display on display. Yo, dawg, I herd you like tables...

Not even once

Friday randomness

Test today on the War of Spanish Succession*, so I'll make it quick:

Adoption is finally final. The girls were great in court and got their picture taken with the judge once it was all over.  One funny note: their social worker asked TK on his last** visit if she knew what adoption meant.  She was appalled, "You don't know?  It means you get your ears pierced."  So TK and Molly now have their ears pierced.

Minecraft has a new update out today. So there goes this weekend. Other than the 75 saplings I've got to plant that are sitting in a box on my front porch. And the dinner/presentation on (get this) African Culture on Saturday***.

Shrinkflation continues apace. One change I would suggest to the NYT article: consumers are not beginning to encounter shrinking food packages, it's been going on for years. Maybe the Times just noticed it.

Fed weaselry continues apace.  One change I would suggest to the Bloomberg article: rather than the caricature of the Fed is that it was shoveling money to big New York banks and a bunch of foreigners, I would suggest that it is a perfectly accurate description of what it has done since its inception. Maybe Bloomberg just noticed it.

Newt Gingrich explains his habit of porking staffers: "There's no question at times of my life, partially driven by how passionately I felt about this country, that I worked far too hard and things happened in my life that were not appropriate." See? When he was cheating on his wives, he was thinking about you the whole time!

* One of the more laughably useless wars in history. 
** Thankfully, it is his very last.
*** Rogue's Pitt Pal is from Nigeria. I can't wait to tell her that her friends in the African Student Association don't know what they are talking about by referring to so many diverse cultures under one collective name.