Screwball Southpaw-in-Chief Shakes Off Top Catcher in Afghan Series

Related Link » Obama seeking options on forces
“President Obama has asked the Pentagon's top generals to provide him with more options for troop levels in Afghanistan, two U.S. officials said late Friday, with one adding that some of the alternatives would allow Obama to send fewer new troops than the roughly 40,000 requested by his top commander.”
— ‘By Anne E. Kornblut and Greg Jaffe, Washington Post, October 31, 2009’

In baseball, the pitcher on the mound is in charge of initiating the play. His batterymate, the catcher, is his commander on the field, in that the catcher suggests, by signaling, what pitch should be thrown to the opponent at bat. In so doing, both pitcher and catcher know what the batter doesn't (because the batter is facing the pitcher when the catcher signals the pitch). Moreover, the middle infielders (and possibly the center fielder, if he has really good eyesight) are also aware of what is about to be delivered to the batter, so they can better prepare for any hit ball.

In general, the catcher is best qualified to direct the pitching tactics. Unlike the pitcher, the catcher is one of the position players (the eight defensive players on the field not including the pitcher) who normally play every game. The catcher is in the best position to gauge the batter's individual talent, having observed, up close, most opposing batters in action.

The fly ball in the ointment, so to speak, is that the pitcher, unlike the position players on the team, has a greater personal stake in the games he pitches, because he is the only player to whom the team's wins and losses are attributed personally (for the games in which he is the pitcher of record). And a pitcher's won/lost record is his livelihood, much like the position players' individual batting statistics are theirs. It is not uncommon, therefore, for the pitcher to shake off his catcher's signals until he gets one he is most comfortable with at that moment, despite the frequently better knowledge the catcher has of specific at-bat situations.

And so it happens that a pitcher, who may be a screwball specialist, for example, will shake off his catcher's signals for a fastball or a changeup, in order to pitch his specialty in a dangerous situation, and in so doing delivers a walk-off home run.

"Cy Young" Obama


UPDATE [November 1, 2009, 9:31 AM]:

Related Link » LIZ CHENEY ON THE SALUTE
“I think that clearly it is very important for a commander-in-chief whenever he can, in whatever way possible, to pay tribute to our fallen soldiers, our fallen military, folks, but I think, you know, what President Bush used to do was to do it without cameras, and I don't understand sort of showing up with the White House press pool with photographers and asking family members if he can take pictures.” [emphasis added]
— ‘Liz Cheney, responding to question by John Gibson at Fox News radio, Oct. 29, 2009.’
h/t STORMBRINGER
Poser-in-Chief

Post #986 Screwball Southpaw-in-Chief Shakes Off Top Catcher in Afghan Series

Vidi. Vici. Veni.

Related Link » Obama 'Most Powerful Writer Since Julius Caesar,' Says NEA Chief
“Rocco Landesman, chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, declared in a speech to art philanthropists in Brooklyn last week that President Obama is the world's most powerful writer since the days of Caesar.”
— ‘By Joseph Abrams, October 28, 2009 (FOXNews.com)’

Related Link » Obama Like Me? Roman, Please
Iowahawk Special Guest Commentary: Gaius Julius Caesar
“Yo mortal, how you livin'? It's your old pal JC, a/k/a Juicy Julius, a/k/a Flavius Flav. What's it been -- two, three millenniums? Yeah, longtimes. After that Forum dagger driveby by that punkass bitch Brutus and his crew, The Juice has been keepin' his shit on the downlow. [...] Anyhow, every since we got wifi at the Pantheon, I've been spending a lot more time online checkin' out the dillyo back in the mortal 'hood. That when I read about this choad praetor Rocco Landesman, saying that your new imperator Obamacus is "the most powerful writer since Julius Caesar." At first I was LMFAO because, let's face it, the Juice didn't waste his prime warrior time word processing a bunch of papyrus scrolls. Word cuz, where I come from that kind of bullshit is for light-in-the-sandals scribefags like Livy and Plutarch. So I guess it was like hearing "Obama is the greatest chariot mechanic since Julius Erving." But then I think about it, and I'm like, WTF? Obama's palace asslick is comparing him to me? Srsly? [...] Shit, I dunno, maybe I'm being too hard on Obamacus. The big problem is that the punk don't know how to pick a posse. Look at his Senators. Jupiter H. Cripes, I thought that crazyass Caligula was straightup psycho for appointing his horse to the Senate, but that thing had more brains than half these muthaf[*]ckers. Combined. And then there's his consuls and praetors. F[*]ck, if the Juice had that collections of douchebags the Roman Empire would have never made it past the Seven Hills Galleria Mall. Yo, Obamacus, the Juice was a rookie dictator himself once, and the Juice knows how it is. Every punk ruler-for-life wanna be the next Xerxes or Nero or Scarface. But you're never gonna get emperor game till y'all start learning to handle your candle. Know what I'm sayin'? I know you be thinkin' you're some kind of stone cold Claudius, layin' down some phat oratory at the Forum and plowing your enemies' fields under with salt. But you still a teleprompter punk, and you gotta know what you don't know.”
— ‘Iowahawk’

“Vidi. Vici. Veni.” [I saw. I conquered. I came.]
— BigJulie, The Original Czar; The Original Roman Polanski;
Original Master of All the Snatch He Saw (but NOT rape-raped)

h/t Theo

Post #985 Vidi. Vici. Veni.

And now for something off the beaten path ...

Related Link » Woman swallows 78 items of cutlery
“A woman obsessed with swallowing spoons and forks was forced to have an operation after she ate an entire canteen of cutlery. [...] Medics also revealed it was not the first time that she had been treated for eating the cutlery. [...] Doctors said there have reportedly been other cases as well of people being treated for the urge to eat unsuitable objects – but none that appear to have consumed quite as much cutlery in a single session. They confirmed that the woman had only ever eaten forks and spoons – but never knives. They were unable to explain why.”
— ‘Telegraph.co.uk’

See, I was right all along! When I had warned my young children that it was dangerous to swallow knives the way the circus professionals did, my admonitions were met with ridicule and general hilarity. Here we have definitive proof that even someone who thinks nothing of eating 78 spoons and forks understands the danger of eating just one knife.

What I find difficult to swallow, however, is that this woman was forced to have an operation. It seems abundantly clear to me that she will continue to crave other people's cutlery, assuming that the surgeons will confiscate the entire canteen of forks and spoons they retrieve from her abdomen. After all, she is known to be a habitual consumer of cutlery; what makes these people think she is going on a cutlery diet?

I don't know first hand, mind you, but I would venture to suppose that once a cutlery eater, always a cutlery eater. Wouldn't it make more sense to leave the cutlery where it was? Surely an empty stomach will soon get those hunger juices flowing, and then ... hang on to your forks and spoons.

And then what? Are we then going to have to eat our cereal with a knife? I think not! First of all, it is unseemly to eat cereal with a knife (not to mention inconvenient). Second, what happens on a plane, then? You know they can't let you have knives on a plane. How the heck are we going to deal with the whole security issue? But I digress ...

Post #984 And now for something off the beaten path ...

§ I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word

{Song #36 « Song #37 » Song #38}

§ ≡ One of an ongoing series of posts in which I pick, in my not-so-humble opinion, the best songs of the second millennium. Feel free to offer constructive dissenting opinions; preferably set to music.

{link » Just say sorry}

“It's better, obviously, if the president didn't intend the disparagement than if he did. But his remark was disparaging whatever he intended and that is why the apology is necessary. So it should be that he regrets what he said and apologizes for it, without more ado. That makes it clear the White House understands there was an insult in the remark, irrespective of the president's state of mind in uttering it.”
 — Norman Geras

I have posted here on several occasions about the general erosion of personal accountability in our society. The concept that one is responsible for the transgressions one didn't intend is so completely foreign to our collective psyche, it is not surprising our American-Idol-in-Chief is oblivious to it. "Mistakes" are not what they used to be, and "sorry seems to be the hardest word".

Song #3 is Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word sung by Elton John.



Post #678 § I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word

Useful > Useless > Vile

Related Link » Rep. Pete Stark: ambition vs. a big mouth
“‘McChrystal is one of the best killers in the world, as he proved in Iraq, but I don't think he knows squat about diplomacy,’ Stark says of the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Army Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal. ‘I mean, if he didn't have a gun, he'd be useless.’”
— ‘By Faye Fiore, October 26, 2009 (LA Times)’

"Useless"! Indeed. In which case Gen. McChrystal would be the equal of the current Commander-in-Chief, and the superior of the pricks at the microphone, in the picture below.

Rep. Pete Stark, right, would succeed Rep. Charles B. Rangel, at the microphone, if the House Ways and Means Committee goes by seniority (and if Rangel is forced out in an ethics investigation). (SCOTT J. FERRELL / CONGRESSIONAL QUARTERLY / January 22, 2009)

Post #982 Useful > Useless > Vile

Because He Is Right

Related Link » Dismantling America
“Barack Obama has not only said that he is out to "change the United States of America," the people he has been associated with for years [people like Jeremiah Wright and Bill Ayers] have expressed in words and deeds their hostility to the values, the principles and the people of this country. [...] Among the people appointed as czars by President Obama have been people who have praised enemy dictators like Mao, who have seen the public schools as places to promote sexual practices contrary to the values of most Americans, to a captive audience of children. Those who say that the Obama administration should have investigated those people more thoroughly before appointing them are missing the point completely. Why should we assume that Barack Obama didn't know what such people were like, when he has been associating with precisely these kinds of people for decades before he reached the White House? [...] Nothing so epitomizes President Obama's own contempt for American values and traditions like trying to ram two bills through Congress in his first year — each bill more than a thousand pages long — too fast for either of them to be read, much less discussed. [...] Whether enough people will wake up in time to keep America from being dismantled, piece by piece, is another question — and the biggest question for this generation.” [emphasis added]
— ‘by Thomas Sowell, October 27, 2009 (Townhall.com)’

“Thomas Sowell is an American economist, social commentator, and author of dozens of books. He often writes from an economically laissez-faire perspective. He is currently a senior fellow of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. In 1990, he won the Francis Boyer Award, presented by the American Enterprise Institute. In 2002 he was awarded the National Humanities Medal for prolific scholarship melding history, economics, and political science. In 2003, he was awarded the Bradley Prize for intellectual achievement. Sowell was born in North Carolina to an African-American family.”
— ‘From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia’

I agree with Thomas Sowell — not because he is an eminent scholar; not because he has written dozens of books (a couple of which I have read); not because he is a multiple-award-winning intellect in multiple academic disciplines; not even because he is an African-American, and thereby shields me from false accusations of racially motivated criticism of President Obama's agenda.

I agree with Thomas Sowell because he is right.

Post #981 Because He Is Right

§ Two Strikes You're Out: The "You Are NOT God" Rule

{Rule #3 « Rule #4 » Rule #5}

§ ≡ One of an ongoing series of posts in which I promulgate, in my not-so-humble opinion, sensible rules for a society gone mad. Feel free to offer constructive dissenting opinions. But be advised: if your opinions aren't sensible, it's two strikes for you, and you're out of the gene pool.

If I only had some charisma I could rule this world-gone-mad at least as well as any community organizer. Quite possibly better. At least my legal system would be transparent, simple, and swift: if you are a stupid f*ck and do something that doesn't make any sense, your first offense earns you a reasonable penalty that fits your transgression. Your second offense earns you a one-way ticket out of the gene pool. No exceptions.

“I saw what they were bringing home; poetry and shit ...”
— From Dangerous Minds

Rule #4: The "You Are NOT God" Rule

Related Link » Pilots Say They Were Distracted
“The pilots of Northwest Flight 188 on Sunday told federal investigators that they lost track of time and location -- but never went to sleep -- when they failed last week to respond to air-traffic controllers for more than an hour, according to people familiar with the crew's statements. [...] Over the weekend, Mr. Cole, the first officer, told reporters that neither he nor the captain, Timothy Cheney of Gig Harbor, Wash., nodded off or had any type of argument. "It was not a serious event, from a safety issue" standpoint, the Associated Press quoted Mr. Cole as saying.” [emphasis added]
— ‘By ANDY PASZTOR (WSJ)’

Oh yeah? I'll be the judge of what constitutes a "serious event", you stupid f*ck! If you are cruising at 37,000 feet with 149 people aboard, and you "didn't respond to frantic calls from controllers -- and text messages from the airline's own dispatchers -- for more than 75 minutes[!!!]", that, mofo, is a serious event.

Penalty for first offense: Suspension of pilot's license for 6 months and forfeiture of pay for period of suspension.

Penalty for second offense, or whining about the first: A one-way ticket out of the gene pool. No exceptions.

h/t Theo

Post #980 § Two Strikes You're Out: The "You Are NOT God" Rule

Me, Myself, and I

 

Post #979 Me, Myself, and I

Social Interactions, Theory of Grammar, and Geometry of Debate

Related Link » The Third Culture, Chapter 9, Roger Schank, "Information Is Surprises"
“There was a rather acrimonious debate between [Roger Schank] and [Noam] Chomsky's followers in the 1970s. But a lot of that energy may have been wasted, because they were talking past each other. [...] This was unfortunate. Much of the debate between Chomsky and Schank is another case of the blind men and the elephant. They're asking different questions, so the answers they come up with aren't really contradictory. Chomsky, in my opinion, is right in saying that there's an autonomous mental organ for grammar and that a child can acquire grammar only if the basic design of the grammar of the world's languages is in some sense built in. Roger is right in that actual use of language, in conversation or understanding, involves a lot more than grammar — such as knowledge of how people interact with one another in typical situations — and that therefore to tell the whole story about how conversation works, you can't simply have a theory of grammar but you must embed it in a theory of knowledge about the world and social interactions.” [emphasis added]
— ‘Steven Pinker, commenting on Schank's and Chomsky's acrimonious debates’

Related Link » You talkin' to me? To debate or not to debate, that is the question
“There are basically two kinds of debates, having distinct objectives: resolution or victory. And these two distinct types are orthogonal. Orthogonality, and its opposite parallelism, are geometric concepts; nevertheless, they can provide graphical insight for understanding some non-mathematical situations. In the issue under discussion, if we represent these two types of debate by a pair of normalized vectors then resolution would be perpendicular to victory, because these goals are completely at odds with one another, in the sense that neither participant can derive any value from a debate in which they have different objectives. The mathematical expression for such a condition is: the cross product of orthogonal unit vectors is another unit vector orthogonal to both original vectors (graphically demonstrating that the originals are completely at odds to one another), and their dot product is zero (demonstrating that the measure of their efficiency is nil). On the other hand, if both participants have the same objectives (either both victory or both resolution), the analogous mathematical situation is a pair of parallel unit vectors. Here we have a cross product of zero (the participants' objectives are not at odds but, rather, in complete harmony), and the dot product is magnitude one (the debate will be 100% efficient, since each participant will derive the maximum value for their efforts, either resolution for both, or the thrill of confrontational competition for both).”
— ‘TheBigHenry’

Steven Pinker seems inclined to believe that the Schank-Chomsky debate was wasted energy, but I think such a conclusion may be debatable. It all depends on what the objectives of both Schank and Chomsky were in their debate.

My sense is that their mutual animosity was such that mere victory was insufficient; they both wanted to demolish the other's position. In which case both of them derived the maximum value from their flame war — the thrill of confrontational debate was win-win.

Post #978 Social Interactions, Theory of Grammar, and Geometry of Debate

The Black — The Proud — The Unhyphenated

Related Link » Lloyd Marcus, Proud Black Conservative
“(Black) Unhyphenated American, Download @ iTunes Touring w/ http://TeaPartyExpress.com & http://AmericanLibertyTour.com http://bit.ly/2CxWa. Feel free to post everywhere, let's take this viral!”
— ‘Lloyd Marcus, Proud Black Conservative’

Twenty Ten by Lloyd Marcus


Post #977 The Black — The Proud — The Unhyphenated

Sex, Brains, and Expressive Jeans

Related Link » Brain Sex Differences In Gene Expression Start Early">
“More than a third of Y-chromosomal genes appear to be involved in sex-based human brain differentiation. Some of the genetic activity in question is evident in the adult brain, while other of it only appears at earlier stages of brain development. It is yet unknown whether the differences in genetic expression among female and male brains have any functional significance.”
— ‘By Randall Parker at 2009 October 24 11:52 PM’

I'm no cognitive scientist but I do know something about male brains and expressive jeans, most of which I learned during the period of hormonal explosion known as "high school". It's all a bit hazy at this point of my life (having recently attended my 50-year high school reunion), but I do recall some pretty significant functional differences in jean expressions between the genders.

For one thing, the female of the species, especially when wearing tight jeans while going commando, expresses a visual cue, with particular effect on Wednesday, which in America is known as "hump" day, that has a strong (and rapid) effect on the male brains, which by puberty have descended to the nether regions, having some visual jean expression of their own.

Furthermore, ..., er, ..., I forgot what I was going to say ..., (senior moment), ...

Post #976 Sex, Brains, and Expressive Jeans

60 Years and Counting ...

Related Link » Remembrance in Spacetime: Liberty
“It was United Nations Day in America: October 24, 1949. But it might as well have been the Fourth of July. For the immigrant survivors, it was, as we continued to celebrate it annually, our Day of Liberty.”
— TheYoungHeinrich

 

Post #975 60 Years and Counting ...

Charles Martel Hammers the Thugs

“Charles Krauthammer (born March 13, 1950) is an American Pulitzer Prize-winning syndicated columnist and political commentator. His weekly column appears in the The Washington Post and is syndicated in more than 200 newspapers and media outlets. He is a contributing editor to the Weekly Standard and The New Republic. He is a Fox News contributor, a regular panelist on Fox’s evening news program Special Report with Bret Baier and a weekly panelist on Inside Washington.”
— From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Related Link » Fox wars: The 'post-partisan' president makes an enemies list
“Defend Fox from whom? Fox's flagship 6 o'clock evening news out of Washington (hosted by Bret Baier, formerly by Brit Hume) is, to my mind, the best hour of news on television. (Definitive evidence: My mother watches it even on the odd night when I'm not on.) Defend Fox from the likes of Anita Dunn? She's been attacked for extolling Mao's political philosophy in a speech at a high school graduation. But the critics miss the surpassing stupidity of her larger point: She was invoking Mao as support and authority for her impassioned plea for individuality and trusting one's own choices. Mao as champion of individuality? Mao, the greatest imposer of mass uniformity in modern history, creator of a slave society of a near-billion worker bees wearing Mao suits and waving the Little Red Book? The White House communications director cannot be trusted to address high schoolers without uttering inanities. She and her cohorts are now to instruct the country on truth and objectivity?” [emphasis added]
— Charles Krauthammer, October 23, 2009 (The Washington Post)

Truth? Objectivity? Facts? These thugs wouldn't know a fact if it fact them in the ass.

Charles Krauthammer spanks these thugs for their stupidity and their loutishness.

Charles "the Hammer" Martel at the Battle of Tours

Charles de Steuben's Bataille de Poitiers en Octobre 732

UPDATE (2009-10-24, 11:59 AM): A mention by Theo Spark in one of his posts, News ... 'Charles Martel Hammers the Thugs', has attracted the average daily number of visitors to my blog, in just the past hour! Tanks for the mammaries, Theo.

Post #974 Charles Martel Hammers the Thugs

§ I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: If I Loved You

{Song #35 « Song #36 » Song #37}

§ ≡ One of an ongoing series of posts in which I pick, in my not-so-humble opinion, the best songs of the second millennium. Feel free to offer constructive dissenting opinions; preferably set to music.

Song #36 is If I Loved You from the musical Carousel by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II. My favorite rendition of this most beautiful love duet is from the film version of "Carousel", sung by the stars Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones.

I had become infatuated (as a 13-year-old boy) with Ms. Jones in her 1955 film debut "Oklahoma!" (also starring MacRae), and my love for her blossomed a year later when she starred in Carousel. My love was unrequited, though I sang this duet with her many times (in my dreams).

Carousel (1956) If I Loved You Duet
h/t Anjaxo
This clip belongs to Fox and Rodgers&Hammerstein. All rights reserved.

Post #973 § I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: If I Loved You

Indecency by Proxy

“Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made.”
— Otto von Bismarck

“Have you no sense of decency sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?”
— Special Counsel for the Army Joseph N. Welch

“For the first time in my adult life I am proud of my country.”
— Michelle Obama

“For the first time in my adult life I am ashamed of my President and those Americans who adore him.”
— TheBigHenry

The American sense of decency is in decline. For the first time in my adult life I note a distinct relegation of it to the realm of antiquated customs. Even worse, common decency has become something to be shunned as totally uncool. And, I blame the current Administration for placing its stamp of approval on thuggery as the new social norm.

Having surrounded himself with loutish, sneering, and impudent advisors, the President proceeds to impose his indecency by proxy, as he struts and frets his hour upon the world stage to the everlasting shame of many countrymen, who continue to cling to their uncool sense of decency.

It is a sad and shameful tale, which, hopefully, will signify nothing of permanence, god and the American electorate willing.

Post #972 Indecency by Proxy

§ Two Strikes You're Out: The "Gore Your Own Ox" Rule

{Rule #2 « Rule #3 » Rule #4}

§ ≡ One of an ongoing series of posts in which I promulgate, in my not-so-humble opinion, sensible rules for a society gone mad. Feel free to offer constructive dissenting opinions. But be advised: if your opinions aren't sensible, it's two strikes for you, and you're out of the gene pool.

If I only had some charisma I could rule this world-gone-mad at least as well as any community organizer. Quite possibly better. At least my legal system would be transparent, simple, and swift: if you are a stupid f*ck and do something that doesn't make any sense, your first offense earns you a reasonable penalty that fits your transgression. Your second offense earns you a one-way ticket out of the gene pool. No exceptions.

“I saw what they were bringing home; poetry and shit ...”
— From Dangerous Minds

Rule #3: The "Gore Your Own Ox" Rule

This eponymous rule honors Al Gore, who managed to bamboozle (to the tune of 100 megabucks) not only Holyshitwood and the general population, which is not that hard, but also the hermaphroditic Norwegian slugs, who seldom get f*cked by anyone but themselves. Clearly, Gore's talents reside in the bamboozling domain, but when he ventures into pontificating about computer-based simulation he enters the domain of personal expertise known as "jack shit".

Anyway, there are many others who violate this rule routinely. The other day, Neil Cavuto, whose money expertise I generally pay attention to, ventured to opine that NASA's recent mission to find water on the moon was a waste of money. Finding water on the moon, however, is an important key to future space exploration. So Neil, that's strike one for you.

Penalty for first offense: A stern warning about the dangers of assuming that expertise in any domain of knowledge automatically qualifies you for polymath status.

Penalty for second offense, or whining about the first: A one-way ticket out of the gene pool. No exceptions.

Post #971 § Two Strikes You're Out: The "Gore Your Own Ox" Rule

§ Two Strikes You're Out: The "Debit-card" Rule

{Rule #1 « Rule #2 » Rule #3}

§ ≡ One of an ongoing series of posts in which I promulgate, in my not-so-humble opinion, sensible rules for a society gone mad. Feel free to offer constructive dissenting opinions. But be advised: if your opinions aren't sensible, it's two strikes for you, and you're out of the gene pool.

If I only had some charisma I could rule this world-gone-mad at least as well as any community organizer. Quite possibly better. At least my legal system would be transparent, simple, and swift: if you are a stupid f*ck and do something that doesn't make any sense, your first offense earns you a reasonable penalty that fits your transgression. Your second offense earns you a one-way ticket out of the gene pool. No exceptions.

“I saw what they were bringing home; poetry and shit ...”
— From Dangerous Minds

Rule #2: The "Debit-card" Rule

So you traded in your credit card for a debit card. Whoop-ti-do! You think this entitles you to bounce checks with impunity? Maybe in The Obama's world it does. But here on planet earth, we still don't get free lunch or free credit. You charge something with your spiffy debit card but your not-so-spiffy checking account can't cover it, your handy credit company will charge you whatever the f*ck they feel like charging you, provided such penalties are specified in the agreement you signed when you got your debit card.

Oh, you neglected to read your credit agreement before you signed it? Tough shit for you. Read the next one before you sign.

You say you can't read? Tough shit for you. Don't sign any agreements before you learn to read.

It's not fair? Don't make me laugh. Life is not a bowl of cherries that have been pitted by your Mom. Get a grip.

Penalty for first offense: A hefty fine for being an irresponsible f*ck.

Penalty for second offense, or whining about the first: A one-way ticket out of the gene pool. No exceptions.

Post #970 § Two Strikes You're Out: The "Debit-card" Rule

§ Two Strikes You're Out: The "Tripod" Rule

{T•of•C « Rule #1 » Rule #2}

§ ≡ One of an ongoing series of posts in which I promulgate, in my not-so-humble opinion, sensible rules for a society gone mad. Feel free to offer constructive dissenting opinions. But be advised: if your opinions aren't sensible, it's two strikes for you, and you're out of the gene pool.

If I only had some charisma I could rule this world-gone-mad at least as well as any community organizer. Quite possibly better. At least my legal system would be transparent, simple, and swift: if you are a stupid f*ck and do something that doesn't make any sense, your first offense earns you a reasonable penalty that fits your transgression. Your second offense earns you a one-way ticket out of the gene pool. No exceptions.

“I saw what they were bringing home; poetry and shit ...”
— From Dangerous Minds

Rule #1: The "Tripod" Rule

Any 2 points that are not coincident define a straight line. A third point that does not lie on the line defined by the first two points, defines a triangle, whose vertices are the 3 points so defined. A triangle defines a plane.

So what? Well, this is not only elementary plane geometry, but it also happens to be my obligatory rule for restaurant ownership. If you must own a restaurant you had better make sure every table in your restaurant is supported by a tripod. If you must ask "Why?" you immediately incur your first strike (see penalty, below).

Back in the day when everyone smoked and there were no "non-smoking" sections, everyone had packs of matches in their pockets, and the most useful application for said packs of matches was to adjust the levels of the table legs in restaurants so your table wouldn't wobble when your annoying kids put their elbows on it and thereby caused your wine to spill from its glass. Virtually nobody, except yours truly, seemed to understand that a tripod provides perfect stability no matter how misshapen the restaurant floor happens to be (and we all know they are all misshapen).

Penalty for first offense: A passing grade in remedial plane geometry.

Penalty for second offense, or whining about the first: A one-way ticket out of the gene pool. No exceptions.

Post #969 § Two Strikes You're Out: The "Tripod" Rule

§ Two Strikes You're Out: Sensible Rules for a Society Gone Mad

{Rule #7 « T•of•C » Rule #1}

§ ≡ One of an ongoing series of posts in which I promulgate, in my not-so-humble opinion, sensible rules for a society gone mad. Feel free to offer constructive dissenting opinions. But be advised: if your opinions aren't sensible, it's two strikes for you, and you're out of the gene pool.

If I only had some charisma I could rule this world-gone-mad at least as well as any community organizer. Quite possibly better. At least my legal system would be transparent, simple, and swift: if you are a stupid f*ck and do something that doesn't make any sense, your first offense earns you a reasonable penalty that fits your transgression. Your second offense earns you a one-way ticket out of the gene pool. No exceptions.

“I saw what they were bringing home; poetry and shit ...”
— From Dangerous Minds

TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. The "Tripod" Rule
2. The "Debit-card" Rule
3. The "Gore Your Own Ox" Rule
4. The "You Are NOT God" Rule
5. The "Footsteps" Rule
6. The "Winter Savings" Rule
7. The "Dodd" Rule

Post #968 § Two Strikes You're Out: Sensible Rules for a Society Gone Mad

Of Slugs and Men

Related Link » Steve Jones: Chapter 5, "Why Is There So Much Genetic Diversity?" in The Third Culture
Steve Jones is a biologist; professor of genetics at the Galton Laboratory of University College London; author of The Language of the Genes: Biology, History, and the Evolutionary Future (1993); coeditor (with Robert Martin and David Pilbeam) of The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Human Evolution (1992).

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“I also have a vicarious interest in sex. After all, it's just a machine for generating diversity — differences between parents and offspring. Nobody really knows why sexual reproduction is there. About the only way to study it is to look at those few creatures who've given it up. Most slugs are hermaphrodites, but nearly all are relatively decorous about it; boy-girl meets girl-boy and nature takes its course. Some, though, have taken the easy way out. They fertilize themselves, effectively abandoning sex altogether. Their genes show that these species are essentially a mass of identical twins, with no diversity at all. We don't yet know why they do this: the only real pattern is that it pays to give up sex in the cold — in Norway, as compared with Spain, for example.
[...]
Because I do a lot of writing and broadcasting, I'm better known as a geneticist by the general public than I am by other geneticists. Although I write a lot about it, I've never done any serious work of my own in human genetics, so I'm a spectator of the subject rather than a participant. I'm grateful to my colleagues for being slightly less cynical about that than they have the right to be. I think they see that there's a role for the reporter in science. However, I can console myself with the thought that I'm one of the top six snail geneticists in the world, out of a field of perhaps half a dozen.” [emphasis added]
— Steve Jones in The Third Culture

In light of The Obama's "humbled" acceptance, it seems appropriate for the Nobel Committee to evolve recognition for sincere humility.

Although hermaphroditic slugs of Norway (who are content to continue f*cking themselves) are not likely to concur, nevertheless, I would nominate a Steve Jones, for example, as a worthy candidate for a Nobel Humility Prize, if it were made available.

h/t Theo

Post #967 Of Slugs and Men

Read it and weep. Read it. Read!

Related Link » Critical thinking? You need knowledge
“But we have ignored what matters most. We have neglected to teach them that one cannot think critically without quite a lot of knowledge to think about. Thinking critically involves comparing and contrasting and synthesizing what one has learned. And a great deal of knowledge is necessary before one can begin to reflect on its meaning and look for alternative explanations. Proponents of 21st-Century Skills might wish it was otherwise, but we do not restart the world anew with each generation. We stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before us. What matters most in the use of our brains is our capacity to make generalizations, to see beyond our own immediate experience. The intelligent person, the one who truly is a practitioner of critical thinking, has the capacity to understand the lessons of history, to grasp the inner logic of science and mathematics, and to realize the meaning of philosophical debates by studying them.” [emphasis added]
— By Diane Ravitch, September 15, 2009 (The Boston Globe)

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“Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.”
— Thomas Edison

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“There are no shortcuts to expertise. The only known exceptions were Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Rain Man, and Barry Bonds.”
— TheBigHenry

There are no shortcuts to critical thinking despite the eternal quest for one, especially in our society, along with related quests for get-rich-quick schemes particularly favored by some Americans, most of whom I daresay end up in jail or at least greatly disappointed. That does not obviate a rightful place in our society for craftsmanship, and many other specialized skill sets, all of which, nevertheless, still require much more apprenticeship and related investments of time, effort, and frequently money than some modern proponents of specialization would have you believe.

The proponents of 21st-Century Skills that Ms. Ravitch refers to are enabling the delusional concepts of "get-rich-quick" paths to glory, power, and super-stardom, which in turn lead to the type of "reality show" crap pervading our culture.

And speaking of crap, there is no dearth of it in our government either. This lack of critical thinking on the part of our political "leadership" undoubtedly stems from such delusions that extremely complicated socio-political issues can be addressed with 1000-page legislation slapped together by two-bit political hackery, which no one ends up reading, let alone understanding.

Critical thinking is mandatory for even the most rudimentary chances of hopeful changes toward resolving problems of global proportions. Yet it often seems that our "leaders" rely on the flip of a coin, which is equivalent in most cases to pinning the tail on the donkey, blindfolded.

Post #966 Read it and weep. Read it. Read!

§ I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: I Saw Her Standing There

{Song #34 « Song #35 » Song #36}

§ ≡ One of an ongoing series of posts in which I pick, in my not-so-humble opinion, the best songs of the second millennium. Feel free to offer constructive dissenting opinions; preferably set to music.

Song #35 is I Saw Her Standing There sung by The Beatles:

According to the RIAA certifications, The Beatles have sold more albums in the US than any other artist. They are credited with six Diamond albums, as well as 24 Multi-Platinum albums, 39 Platinum albums and 45 Gold albums. In 2008, Billboard magazine released a list of the all-time top-selling Hot 100 artists to celebrate the chart's fiftieth anniversary, with The Beatles at number one. The Beatles were collectively included in Time magazine's Time 100: The Most Important People of the Century.

Nevertheless, my favorite Beatles song is one that only peaked at #14 on the Billboard Hot 100. Must have had something to do with my having been a young man at the time this song came out, and it being about some 17-year-old girl who looked "way beyond compare" ... In fact, come to think of it, I was (and still am, I guess) exactly the same age as one of the Beatles.

Beatles - I Saw Her Standing There by ghovingh

Post #965 § I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: I Saw Her Standing There

The Wisdom of Salamiman

Related Link » Judgment of Solomon
“After some deliberation, King Solomon calls for a sword to be brought before him. He declares that there is only one fair solution: the live son must be split in two, each woman receiving half of the child. [...] In the end, Solomon, by his wisdom, avoids the destruction of the subject matter of the dispute (the baby). There is no reason to believe that destruction was ever his intent [i.e., he was bluffing].”
— based upon the Biblical passage in 1 Kings 3:16-28

Related Link » A little learning is a dangerous thing
“A little learning is a dangerous thing;
drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring;
there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
and drinking largely sobers us again.”
— Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism

Full Disclosure: I do not pretend to know what our "best" strategy for the war in Afghanistan should be. That doesn't necessarily preclude, however, the possibility that I could have useful insight for the decision making process currently ongoing.

So, as I see this rather complicated scenario, there appear to be two opposing schools of thought. There is the position advocated by the Commanding General McChrystal, which involves a troop surge a la the successful one in Iraq. Then, there is the minimalist view (in terms of troop strength) advocated by the Commanding Jester Biden. Despite the disproportionate military expertise of these opposing views, it is not a given which view is to be favored. It depends almost entirely on the objective of the Decider-in-Chief Obama. There's the rub, so to speak.

All eyes are on the "King Solomon" of this exercise in theatrics, for if The Obama remains true to form, His likely objective is to be compared favorably to the Biblical wise man. Nothing is beyond the reach of a Nobel Lariat, capable of snagging prizes with the flick of a wrist.

Our Hero is a churchgoing Man, so it is likely He is familiar, at least superficially, with the Judgment of Solomon. The key, however, is whether or not He understands that Solomon was bluffing. My guess? It's 50/50. I think The Obama will end up "splitting the baby" like a man slicing salami. His brand of "wisdom" will be to allocate more troops than Biden requires, but not enough to make it possible for McChrystal's plan to succeed. The worst of both worlds, especially for our troops.

h/t Theo

Post #964 The Wisdom of Salamiman

From machines; out of sorts; and turtles all the way!

Related Link » deus ex machina
“Stage device in Greek and Roman drama in which a god appeared in the sky by means of a crane [skyhook] to resolve the plot of a play. See: miracle”
— TheFreeDictionary

Related Link » Stephen Jay Gould: The Pattern of Life's History
“What Darwin discovered, I claim, is that evolution is ultimately an algorithmic process — a blind but amazingly effective sorting process that gradually produces all the wonders of nature. This view is reductionist only in the sense that it says there are no miracles. No skyhooks.” [emphasis added]
— Daniel C. Dennett, commenting on Gould's work

Related Link » Turtles all the way down
“A well-known scientist (some say it was Bertrand Russell) once gave a public lecture on astronomy. He described how the earth orbits around the sun and how the sun, in turn, orbits around the center of a vast collection of stars called our galaxy. At the end of the lecture, a little old lady at the back of the room got up and said: ‘What you have told us is rubbish. The world is really a flat plate supported on the back of a giant tortoise.’ The scientist gave a superior smile before replying, ‘What is the tortoise standing on?’ ‘You're very clever, young man, very clever’, said the old lady. ‘But it's turtles all the way down!’”
— Stephen Hawking, A Brief History of Time

I have recently intuited what I now believe amounts to a generalization of Dennett's claim for "nature", namely that: Darwin's discovery of evolution is "a blind but amazingly effective sorting process that gradually produces all the wonders of nature". In my posts "The Fundamental Dichotomy" and "The Classification of Everything", my fundamental operator is "the classification process" and my fundamental operand is "the evolving universe", whereas Dennett speaks of a "sorting process" operator with "the wonders of nature" as its operand.

I strikes me as fitting and quite elegant that such an algorithmic "operator{operand}" description neatly summarizes Darwin's evolution of nature within Einstein's expanding universe, viz.

classification{universe(sorting{nature})}

Post #963 From machines; out of sorts; and turtles all the way!

And the Sheep Will Beg for More

Related Link » Why are Jews Liberals? written by Norman Podhoretz

From: Review Quotes

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“Norman Podhoretz has written a characteristically vigorous and well-informed book about one of the most interesting and persistent questions in American politics. He gets right to the heart of the matter, and provides a convincing explanation of why American Jews tend to vote against their own interests, and those of Israel.”
— Paul Johnson, author of A History of the Jews and Modern Times

I have recently finished this book, but I must admit I still don't get it.

My parents were Holocaust survivors, and technically, so am I, albeit I was too young to have any memories of events prior to 1945. The great grandfather I was named after, all my grandparents, all except two of my uncles (my father's two older brothers), all my aunts, all my cousins (those born before 1945), and millions of other Jews were exterminated by the most rabid Jew-haters until recent times. I can not for the life of me understand how any American Jew can support a political ideology that aligns itself with today's Jew-haters and all those who would support and appease them.

Podhoretz posits that this bizarre advocacy is some sort of religious fanaticism stemming from the days when traditional liberalism (predating by many decades the contorted and perverted cult of today's leftist brand) was kind enough to extend to Jewish Americans a token of the right to pursue happiness, which the Constitution had already granted to all Americans.

Maybe so. But one would have to accept a number of premises for that to make sense, at least to me. For example, one would have to believe that a people, who managed to survive, by their wits alone, millennia of organized persecution, would not be able to distinguish between an advocacy that offered them a place at the table, from one that offers them a place under a bus.

I don't claim to understand, nor am I able to conjure an excuse for 76% of American Jews voting for Obama, a monolithic support only exceeded by the 92% support he drew from African Americans. But even more baffling for me is the tenacity of such Jewish support, after Obama's despicable (but not unforeseen; at least not by all) abandonment of Israel to Iran's zeal for its "eradication from the map". What sort of self-hatred can account for such willful abnegation of the obvious?

Today's leftists who call themselves liberals are a perversion of nomenclature. They are part of the larger global movement marching to the old tune known as "The Big Lie" — repeat something emphatically and often enough and you can make gold out of horseshit. And the sheep will beg for more.
h/t Theo
Post #962 And the Sheep Will Beg for More

Galactic Dancing with the Stars

Related Link » Decline Is a Choice
“There are things to be done. Resist retreat as a matter of strategy and principle. And provide the means to continue our dominant role in the world by keeping our economic house in order. And finally, we can follow the advice of Demosthenes when asked what was to be done about the decline of Athens. His reply? ‘I will give what I believe is the fairest and truest answer: Don't do what you are doing now.’”
— ‘by Charles Krauthammer, The New Liberalism and the end of American ascendancy, 10/19/2009, Volume 015, Issue 05’

Related Link » "Biology Is Just a Dance"
“The ‘new’ biology is biology in the form of an exact science of complex systems concerned with dynamics and emergent order. Then everything in biology changes. Instead of the metaphors of conflict, competition, selfish genes, climbing peaks in fitness landscapes, what you get is evolution as a dance. It has no goal. As Stephen Jay Gould says, it has no purpose, no progress, no sense of direction. It's a dance through morphospace, the space of the forms of organisms. Will biology join up with physics, take on its flavor, have this notion of rules, organization, regularity, order? The new movement is transforming biology from a historical science, which is what it is at the moment, the objective of Darwinism being to reconstruct the history of life on Earth. Well, that's not the style of physics. Physics is about laws, the principles of organization of matter. We're doing the same thing in biology; we're looking for the principles of organization, the dynamics of the living process.”
— ‘by Brian Goodwin, The Third Culture, Chapter 4’

As go physics and biology so go, eventually, sociology and politics. It must be so because sociology and politics are bereft of hereditary memory, which is prerequisite to a semi-monotonic trending toward improvement in socio-political conditions.

The recording of history was a great leap forward toward a possible "historical" track of improving socio-political conditions. But recording of history is insufficient; it must be learned to do any good. So Einstein's "infinite threshold of human stupidity" is the gigantic fly in the ointment. Thus, George Santayana's great insight remains steadfast:

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

And, therefore, despite the best efforts of the best and the brightest individuals in all disciplines of human endeavor, we will continue our galactic dance with the stars as in the astrological days of old, because, inevitably, we must bow to the lowest common denominator of ignorance that masquerades as prize-awarding and prize-winning ineptitude.

Post #961 Galactic Dancing with the Stars

The Classification of Everything

Related Link » The Fundamental Dichotomy
“[T]he fundamental dichotomy is dimensionality itself. Everything in the universe, including everything that can be conceived, either has an implicit dimensionality or it doesn't. If it has dimensionality it can, in principle, be measured; if it doesn't, it can not be measured (not even in principle). The reason that dimensionality is more fundamental than even a bit of information is precisely because bits can only describe measurable concepts, concepts that are in some fundamental sense quantifiable (and ultimately digitized).”
— TheBigHenry, October 1, 2009

Related Link » "A Package of Information"
“Evolutionary biologists have failed to realize that they work with two more or less incommensurable domains: that of information and that of matter. I address this problem in my 1992 book, Natural Selection: Domains, Levels, and Challenges. These two domains will never be brought together in any kind of the sense usually implied by the term "reductionism." You can speak of galaxies and particles of dust in the same terms, because they both have mass and charge and length and width. You can't do that with information and matter. Information doesn't have mass or charge or length in millimeters. Likewise, matter doesn't have bytes. You can't measure so much gold in so many bytes. It doesn't have redundancy, or fidelity, or any of the other descriptors we apply to information. This dearth of shared descriptors makes matter and information two separate domains of existence, which have to be discussed separately, in their own terms.”
— George C. Williams, The Third Culture - Chapter 1

“It depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is.”
— President Bill Clinton

The fundamental meaning of everything is classification.

And the fundamental classification of everything is defined by the fundamental dichotomy, namely dimensionality.

"Everything" includes "classification", which latter may be thought of as the fundamental process. So that existence, which in the broadest sense includes fantasy, may be thought of as the classification of everything (including the process of classification itself).

The expanding universe, which includes us as elements of itself, is the "autobiography" of knowledge, a work in progress titled, "The Classification of Everything". It begins thus:

The Classification of Everything

Dimensionality
The Big Bang
Dimensionality = 0	Dimensionality > 0
	Matter/(Information Structure)
Mind	Dimensionality = 1	Dimensionality > 1
	Information	Mass/Energy
		Mass = 0	Mass > 0

Post #960 The Classification of Everything

HHS Class of 1959 Reunion

You might have noticed my new (at the time of this posting) "Blog Title Background Pic", which happens to be the 50th one I have used over the years (to date). It was taken at my 50th-year Reunion for my Hicksville High School Class of 1959, at the Holiday Inn (near Islip Macarthur Airport) on Long Island, New York, October 3, 2009.

Using as a clue my October-1949 photo from my U.S. Immigration "Green Card", can you extrapolate exactly 60 years to find me in the Reunion photo?

Post #(1)959 HHS Class of 1959 Reunion

Infinite Human Stupidity

Related Link » Random Thoughts
“Oliver Wendell Holmes said, "Think things, not words." In words, many see a need for "social justice" to override "the dictates of the market." In reality, what is called "the market" consists of human beings making their own choices at their own cost. What is called "social justice" is government imposition of the notions of third parties, who pay no price for being wrong.”
— by Thomas Sowell, October 07, 2009 (Townhall.com)

Related Link » Antisemitism in the Arab world
“Antisemitism in the Arab world refers to discrimination against Jews. While Arabs are also a Semitic people, the modern meaning of the English term "antisemitism" refers exclusively to discrimination against Jews.” [emphasis added]
— From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Let's cut the crap once and for all, shall we? When an Arab or an Arab sympathizer resorts to the old canard, "I can't be an anti-Semite because Arabs are Semites themselves" he or she is not being clever or original, as he or she usually thinks he or she is; he or she is a Jew-hater cloaked in false semantics. An anti-Semite is a Jew-hater, not a hater of all Semites or anyone speaking a Semitic language.

Word coinage is not an exact science. And it is a gigantic waste of time and energy to engage in debates about semantics masquerading as issues. Nevertheless, such debates, arguments, and physical battles ("sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never harm me") are ubiquitous. Why? Well, because of what Big Al famously observed:

“Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the the universe.”

Post #958 Infinite Human Stupidity

§ I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: Rock Around The Clock

{Song #33 « Song #34 » Song #35}

§ ≡ One of an ongoing series of posts in which I pick, in my not-so-humble opinion, the best songs of the second millennium. Feel free to offer constructive dissenting opinions; preferably set to music.

Song #34 is Rock Around the Clock sung by Bill Haley & His Comets.

Although it was not the first rock and roll record, Haley's recording became an anthem for rebellious Fifties youth and is widely considered to be the song that, more than any other, brought rock and roll into mainstream culture in the United States and around the world.

Having just returned from my 50th Hicksville High School (NY) Reunion, and since my high school's sports teams were nicknamed "The Comets", it is appropriate that I now pick this iconic song of 1950s American youth.

Bill Haley & His Comets - Rock Around The Clock by SamFisher037

Post #957 § I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: Rock Around The Clock

The Fundamental Dichotomy

Everything, without exception, can be categorized. That in itself is not a startling statement — unless there exists a fundamental dichotomy! This is abundantly clear if you think about it for a moment or two. For, without further ado, if there was not a fundamental dichotomy, then clearly, the fundamental top level classification (or top level taxonomy) would be: everything that exists or can be conceived of in the universe; and that, of course, is a degenerate classification, where "degenerate" is, in this context, a technical term meaning "being mathematically simpler (as by having a factor or constant equal to zero) than the typical case".

At this point, many people would be inclined to jump up and exclaim, with some indignation, "Of course, TheBigHenry, everyone knows that the fundamental quantifiable entity is information, which is the fundamental unit of entropy, which in turn is at the heart of one of the fundamental universal laws of nature, namely the Second Law of Thermodynamics. And, as anyone knows, anyone who is even remotely familiar with how computers acquire, process, and store information, the fundamental unit of information is a bit. And, every bit of information is binary — its value is either a zero (0) or a one (1). The rest is mathematics.

But, that is not the dichotomy I have in mind. There are quite a few others that spring to mind: male/female; up/down; left/right; positive/negative; animal/vegetable/mineral (which, of course, is not a dichotomy but a trichotomy). None of the foregoing is more fundamental than the binary bit of information. But, what I have in mind is something that is more fundamental.

I submit that the fundamental dichotomy is dimensionality itself. Everything in the universe, including everything that can be conceived, either has an implicit dimensionality or it doesn't. If it has dimensionality it can, in principle, be measured; if it doesn't, it can not be measured (not even in principle). The reason that dimensionality is more fundamental than even a bit of information is precisely because bits can only describe measurable concepts, concepts that are in some fundamental sense quantifiable (and ultimately digitized). For example, just to invoke one of the most common concepts that virtually everyone is aware of, except, perhaps, those who are completely catatonic, is consciousness. To my knowledge, no one has yet been able to explain it or define it satisfactorily, which in the most basic sense that I can imagine constitutes our inability to quantify it. Consciousness has no dimensionality. Nor, to my knowledge, does love, pornography, hope, and charity, just to name a few other concepts that many people can't define, but everyone, to quote a famous Supreme Court Justice (whose name, at the moment, escapes me), "knows what it is when they see/experience it".

Why does any of this matter? It matters very much for the following reason (and many others too): anything that has dimensionality can be quantified and, therefore, can be marketed (i.e., the market can, in principle, serve as a passive system of allocation for it); anything that does not have implicit dimensionality can not be allocated by a market allocation system. Therein lies the source of our world's contentiousness, and in particular, our society's penchant for litigation and political protest. The issues that invariably lead to controversy between individuals as well as between collective ideologies are those that are not quantifiable. Hence, they are not in principle amenable to market solutions.

What we need is not an alternative to market solutions, which work just fine for quantifiable concepts. We need an alternative solution for disputes that involve non-dimensional issues, other than the old standby — war.

Post #956 The Fundamental Dichotomy