Archive for 2011

ROGER SIMON: Gingrich staff quits: Is the Republican nomination Perry’s to lose? “Many originally reported that seven Gingrich staffers resigned, but PJMedia has knowledge from a close source that the number was actually twelve — a mass exodus indeed and hugely embarrassing to the former speaker. . . . Now it seems almost certain events have conspired to convince Rick Perry to run. And if he does, the Texas governor will be a formidable candidate.”

LEARNING TO LIVE without Google. “I decided to put my own dependence on Google to the test. The plan was simple—to the best of my ability, I would sever my relationship with Google. I vowed to stop doing business with Google by no longer providing it information. Could I go Google-free without losing my digital quality of life? . . . In general, quitting Google was easier than I thought. One of the biggest lessons for me was that Google’s not the best at everything.”

FOOD: Wet spring cuts corn crop, prices to stay high. “U.S. food prices are expected to stay high through 2012 because a wet spring will likely cut the size of this fall’s corn harvest. The United States will have a surplus of just 695 million bushels of corn next year, less than the 900 million estimated last month.”

I DIDN’T KNOW WE EVEN HAD East Tennessee Oilmen, but apparently they make enough money to buy a sweet, sweet mansion. “Villa Collina overlooks the Tennessee River and boasts indoor and outdoor pools, a tri-level library, a 1,900-square-foot wine grotto and cantina, 11 full bathrooms, five half-baths, and eight bedroom suites. It also includes a sauna room, a hot tub, a dance floor complete with arcade-style games, and a workout room.”

UPDATE: Come to think of it, I remember blogging en passant about a big East Tennessee oil strike a while back. Drill, baby, drill!

THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR JOHN MCCAIN, AMERICA WOULD BE BANKRUPTED BY EVER-EXPANDING WARS: AND THEY WERE RIGHT! Pentagon sees Libya military costs soar.

By the way, you can see the whole collection of these “they told me if I voted” posts here.

TEST-DRIVING THE Nissan Leaf Nismo RC. “With its trick carbon fiber bodywork and three-door layout, the Leaf Nismo RC certainly looks sinister, but its stripped-straight-from-the-road-going-Leaf powertrain isn’t the type of electric drivetrain needed to rip ’round a track with authority.”

LONG LIVE HIGH SCHOOL ENGLISH TEACHERS: “The thing about this photo is that the dumbest element isn’t the misspelling.”

WAR AGAINST PHOTOGRAPHY UPDATE: Miami Police Shoot Man to Death, Attempt to Steal/Destroy All Video Evidence of Shooting Man to Death. I’ve mentioned this before, but it’s worth mentioning again.

And I should also plug Morgan Manning’s law review article on photographers’ rights again, too. Can we get some federal civil rights legislation, with attorney’s fees and statutory damages?

UPDATE: Though the Reason headline says Miami, following the linked stories indicates that it’s Miami Beach.

ZOMBIE: How A Teachers’ Rally Made Me Anti-Education. “I’ve always considered myself an ardent advocate for education. But a recent rally staged by teachers and students in favor of school funding forced me to reluctantly acknowledge an awful truth: We have to destroy education in order to save it. Let me explain how I came to this miserable conclusion.”

Plus this: “As you can see in the many photos illustrating this essay, their demands for more money were accompanied by many ancillary leftist slogans like ‘Tax the Rich!’ and ‘Workers’ Power!’ and ‘Cutting Education Is Class War’ and so on. So this wasn’t just about requesting more funding for education: The content of the rally itself revealed that increasing school funding is just a component of a larger leftist agenda — school funding is being used as a lever to penalize the rich, increase power for unions, and so forth. . . . And the clincher: At both rallies, teachers brought entire classes of their students (this was held on a Friday, a school day, remember) to join in this overtly leftist behavior.”