SOME RECENT GOOD EMAILS FROM READERS

"When my younger sister died at 59, and when I was diagnosed with prostate cancer, I had new cause to curse junk science. If the money spent "proving" that more substances "cause" cancer had gone, instead, to treatment research, we would probably have a combination of earlier diagnostics and medication that would relegate cancer to being just bothersome. And I curse Carl Sagan because he went to the Dark Side of the scientific lie for a good cause. Atmospheric scientists twisted by the "Nuclear Winter" theories of the Cold War got the alarmist habit and so easily went into the new ice-age and global warming scenarios to shake loose grant money."

"As an architectural project manager, I face the silliness of committees and regulators daily. It is a silliness which goes beyond misguided good intentions. It stifles progress, costs clients inordinately, and quite frequently scares them out of building the housing and other facilities that people need and want to make their lives better. No tax-credit, warm-fuzzy, or "affordable housing incentive" could ever make up for the meddling by these people who have no care about, or personal stake in, what the people standing in front of them say they need. After all, what sort of incentive is a tax-credit other than a little *less* extortion?"

In response to my post about low Leftist IQ: "Just look to Hollywood to see Low IQ leftists. It doesn't take much in the way of brains to read a script created by someone else (the real brains in Hollywood are the producers and writers, not the actors). For example - many don't believe Sean Penn should get an Academy Award for playing himself; likewise for Jack Nicholson."

A bit of interesting gossip about the authors of David's Medienkritik: "David Kaspar is the German half of the dynamic duo and enlisted American Ray D. to help him with translation. Ray has Lived in Nuremberg for five years. When he moved there he didn't pay much attention to politics, but the distortions and public pandering of the press drove him mad with anger. He reads and watches the media to write about it, but often finds that he can't because it's SO bad that it makes him physically ill".

**********************************

ELSEWHERE

"Liberal" psychology: "Liberalism isn't a political ideology; it's a psychology - the psychology of self-satisfaction to be precise. A liberal (or a leftist; I use the terms interchangeably), is a person who only cares about politics to the extent that doing so makes him or her feel good, or avoid feeling bad, due both to external and internal factors. Their motivations can include things like a desire to feel intelligent, moral, noble, or unique, as well as a desire for peer acceptance or reverence, and aversion to being ostracized, among many other things. Now, before I go any further, I have to draw a distinction between liberals and the people who agree with them. Liberals, the people I'm referring to throughout, are the activists and ideologues; the people who truly believe in their leftist ideas and who fight for them.... Liberalism isn't a political ideology. The only common bond that truly holds liberal ideas together is their straight-forward simplicity (pass a law, raise taxes, hand out money, talk it out, etc), which is solely a consequence of the fact that liberals are completely uninterested in real solutions to real problems. It is the political activism itself that interests them, in that it makes them feel good about themselves...."

LOL: Kerry boasted that he and Edwards had better hair so I guess this comment from Dick McDonald about Mrs Kerry is fair: Dick says that her "hair looks as if it was styled by Mixmaster"

"Australians were addicted to welfare and political parties were too scared of voters to ask the junkies to quit, an academic said today. Professor Peter Saunders, from the right wing Centre for Independent Studies, has painted a scathing picture of government welfare policies over recent decades in his new book, Australia's Welfare Habit, being launched in Sydney today. Prof Saunders said Australia's welfare dependency had increased by 500 per cent in four decades. Forty years ago three per cent of working age Australians lived off welfare. Now the figure is 16 per cent".

Sowell: "Santa Monica, California, has decreed a fine of $2,500 a day for not cutting your hedges! .... Santa Monica has long been called "the People's Republic of Santa Monica" for all the far left laws and rhetoric it generates. Like other governments called "people's republic," the last thing they care about is people. The ideology, or even whims, of those in power routinely take away other people's right to live their own lives as they see fit. Santa Monica is not unique. Wherever you get enough far left people in power, you can find a similar willingness to force everyone into collectivist conformity at all costs. Too often these selfish ego trips of the left are called idealism, and issues are discussed in terms of the wonderful goals they proclaim -- "social justice," "open space" or "saving" this or that -- rather than in terms of what is actually being done and the costs entailed on others"

"Asylum seekers". Another reason why "refugees" just don't come to Australia any more: "A stateless Palestinian-born man refused political asylum in Australia could continue be held in immigration detention indefinitely, the High Court ruled today. Similarly, an Iraqi national refused an Australian protection visa could continue to be held in a detention centre because there was no reasonable prospect that he could be returned to his preferred destination, Syria. By a 4-3 majority, the High Court ruled that unsuccessful asylum seekers who could not be removed to another country, despite their wish to leave Australia, could continue to be held in immigration detention indefinitely. Both cases involved asylum seekers rejected for Australian protection visas who asked to be returned to the Middle East."

Arafat learnt from Adolf: "Since the onset of Oslo, ten years ago, the PA has established a campaign of vilification against us as part of the effort to delegitimize our presence. All of this is reinforced by a direct connection to Nazi anti-Semitism. Yasser Arafat learned at the feet of his uncle and mentor, the former Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, who consorted with the Nazis; Mein Kampf is sold in PA stores today. The PA is the first entity since Nazi Germany to advocate the killing of people simply because they are Jews. Listen to their incitement, especially from their pulpits, and you can hear it -- Allah is pleased when Jews are killed".

Walter Williams: "During the first Reagan administration, I participated in a number of press conferences on either a book or article I'd written or as a panelist in a discussion of White House public policy. On occasion, when the question-and-answer session began, I'd tell the press, 'You can treat me like a white person. Ask hard, penetrating questions.' The remark often brought uncomfortable laughter, but I was dead serious. If there is one general characteristic of white liberals, it's their condescending and demeaning attitude toward blacks."

For more postings, see GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH and GUN WATCH. Mirror sites here, here and here

********************************

Leftists acclaim "diversity" yet say "All men are equal". Figure that one out.

Perhaps the original example of Leftist "projection": Marx condemned conventional religion as the "opium of the masses". Why? Because he had an opiate to peddle.

Why can those who claim to understand the dangers of meddling with a complex ecosystem like the natural environment, not understand that government interference with a complex system like the economy is perilous too?

The conflict between conservatives and Leftists is not usually a conflict between realists and idealists. Mostly it is a conflict between realists and people who will say anything to win applause

Comments? Email me here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.

********************************