In Chapter II of Through the Looking-Glass by Lewis Carroll Alice is talking with the Red Queen: ‘It’s a great huge game of chess that’s being played—all over the world—if this IS the world at all, you know. Oh, what fun it is! How I WISH I was one of them! I wouldn’t mind being [...]
Archive for February 2010
The Red Queen
February 22, 2010Obama needs to turn his back on the Congress and begin to lead the country
February 19, 2010Barack Obama was sworn in as this country’s 44th president on January 20, 2009. What happened on that day was something that I hadn’t believed possible, at least in my lifetime, that a “Black” would be living in the White House. Even if he never did anything else as president this in itself, I thought, [...]
The Evidence as to Man’s Place in Nature by Thomas Henry Huxley
February 17, 2010I take (borrow) the following from this interesting web site that I only today encountered: “Spiritual Insights Quotations and the Faith vs Reason Debate”. The Evidence as to Man’s Place in Nature by Thomas Henry Huxley, published in 1863, was the first book explicitly devoted to the topic of human evolution, and discussed much of [...]
Is this what we’re now confronting, both in Europe and the United States?
February 17, 2010From The Wall Street Journal’s Review and Outlook today: “The central contradiction in modern liberal politics is that Otto von Bismarck’s entitlement state* for cradle to grave financial security is no longer affordable. The model has reached the limit of its ability to tax private income and still allow enough economic growth to finance its [...]
Just the facts, ma’am
February 14, 2010In his Times piece yesterday, February 13, Charles Blow points out that the President’s language (the President’s thinking?) has not changed much between press conferences, that of 2/9/2009 (his first) and that of just one year later, 2/9/2010 (his last). On February 9, one year ago, the President said: “I am the eternal optimist. I [...]
Would that I had come earlier to the United States!
February 3, 2010Columbia University’s Pierre-André Chiappori, as cited by Guy Sorman in the City Journal, says: “Academic life in the U.S. is determined by competition at all levels, he adds. ‘It’s often said that American universities recruit only the best among the Europeans. I would say instead that we become better because we are immersed in permanent [...]
The Old and the Young
February 2, 2010The old, we’re told, will remain young by caring for the young, by caring about the young. Show me a real old man or woman, someone who looks and acts old, and I’ll show you someone who is probably no longer close to children. Children are not only ours and the country’s future, but in [...]
More on the Schools from Today’s News
February 1, 2010Three comments from today’s news concerning the performance, or failure to perform, of our public schools, two from the Times, and one from Time Magazine. First Ross Douthat, in an op ed piece. He cites the sociologist, Kristin Luker who in her history of the sex education debate concluded that, “… it is surprisingly difficult [...]
