EVER USE ONE OF THESE 8 LOGICAL FALLACIES ABOUT THE BIBLE? Actually, Dr. Norman Geisler identified 16 of these beauties, but HillFaith can only deal with eight of them at once. In fairness to Bible skeptics, of whom there are more than a few among the Instapunditeer ranks, logical fallacies are not exactly unknown among Bible defenders, either. All of us, yours truly included, can use periodic maintenance returns to Logic 101.
Archive for 2022
March 4, 2022
WELL, OF COURSE THEY DO: Putin’s Plutocrat Pals Have a Friend in New York City Hall.
AND SPEAKING OF MEME GIRL: Hugh Hewitt opens up the Washington Pest, excuse me, Washington Post and concludes “it ain’t journalism.”
DISPATCHES FROM THE BLUE ZONES: Carjackings in cities like NYC, Philadelphia jump over 200% – often with kids behind the wheel, officials say.
LIKE MORAL VICTORIES AND ACTUAL VICTORIES, MORAL DEFEATS ARE LESS IMPORTANT THAN ACTUAL DEFEATS. Russia has suffered a crushing moral defeat. And Russians know it.
I am surprised to see the amount of open protest against Putin, though. “Others are pursuing subtler forms of protest in the hope they won’t result in immediate arrest. Some are covering Moscow’s walls with the simple, straightforward call: “No to war.” (The messages are scrubbed away by officials, only to reappear overnight.)”
Sounds like some stickers I’ve seen.
MESSAGE: THEY CARE. Biden and Democrats’ ‘Let Them Eat Cake’ Moment in Face of Exploding Gas Prices.
MARINE CORPS LAUNCHES NEW LITTORAL REGIMENTS. “In our war games the Chinese player finds it very difficult to track down these platoons.” Well, if it comes to that, let’s hope it’s not just that way in our war games.
LIAR, LIAR, PANTS ON FIRE BIDEN: Listening to the guy requires two skills – sorting out incoherency and, especially, identifying lies. Issues & Insights says it’s time to kill once and for all Biden’s repeated lie that he rescued an economy in crisis and everything is all better now, there, there.
IF ‘MEME GIRL’ IS THE FUTURE OF JOURNALISM: Then count me out.
WELL, MAYBE, BUT COVIDIOCY HAS DISCREDITED MEDICAL RESEARCH: The secret to stopping Alzheimer’s is in your gut, not brain, experts say.
And socialism is societal Alzheimers.
OF COURSE IT HAS. THERE WAS NO MYSTERY: Has the mystery of Stonehenge finally been solved?
Area I grew up in, which, incidentally, also has a lot of megalithic circles, every spring we started to ready the fields by adding the new crop of rocks that surfaced over the winter onto the rambling stone walls. I always figured one year had exceptionally large boulders for a crop, and some local boys got drunk and said “Hold my small beer and watch this.”
OR, YOU KNOW, PARENTS EN MASSE COULD TELL THE NEA TO GO JUMP IN A LAKE: NYC Students Under Five Will Still Have to Wear a Mask in School.
Homeschool, unschool, form neighborhood schools. But most of all get out of the city. It’s dead, and the corpse is starting to stink.
NO. THE MONEY BEING USED AGAINST THEM IS THE MONEY NOT GOING TO DEVELOP NATIONAL SOURCES OF OIL: Ukrainian Climate Scientist: “The money that’s invested in fossil fuels, they’re using against us”.
Or for that matter not used to build new nuclear plants. “Climate scientist” is the new term for “brain impaired” I swear.
The fact that the Russians have funded green parties abroad doesn’t help this equation.
WORTH READING: Ukrainian masterstroke of psych warfare; selected background reading; a few observations.
Interesting times. Once more, I must remind whichever of you mad lads (and ladies) created a time machine, and went back in time stomping on butterflies that he/she is not in fact a genius. And I want to have a talk with him/her, prontito. I have a chancla*, and I’m not afraid to use it. Be told.
*Yes, the Portuguese have the same thing, only chancla is chinelo. Which apparently no one can translate in the US.
THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH: The “NATO is at fault” argument is absurd: what does Russia want?
It wasn’t when Russia wore USSR clothes, and it will never be. Russian paranoia and aggression knows no limits.
LET’S GO BRANDON! Iran Deal: Reward Terrorists And Bypass Congress.
GOOD. NOW DEFANG THESE EMERGENCY POWERS. EVERYWHERE: Senate Votes To End National COVID Emergency.
I WAS BITTEN BY POLITICS WHEN I WAS VERY YOUNG: Politics.
It left me with a tendency to write blogs and also howl at the full moon.
March 3, 2022
WELL: $1 million bounty on Putin offered by Russian businessman: The Russian entrepreneur said the Russian president came to power by “blowing up apartment buildings in Russia.” Well, that does seem to be the case.
UPDATE: A friend writes: “It starts. Oligarchs and Lukoil, but I repeat myself. Hate to be melodramatic, but it kind feels like, Putin dangling from a lamppost, or we all burn. Has there ever been a simpler answer to the wretched rubik’s cube of human events? Kill the fucker, and we all go back to … whatever normal was at last check.”
Well, I guess it would be fair: Volodymyr Zelensky survives three assassination attempts in days.
President Zelensky has survived at least three assassination attempts in the past week, The Times has learnt.
Two different outfits have been sent to kill the Ukrainian president — mercenaries of the Kremlin-backed Wagner group and Chechen special forces. Both have been thwarted by anti-war elements within Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB).
Wagner mercenaries in Kyiv have sustained losses during their attempts and are said to have been alarmed by how accurately the Ukrainians had anticipated their moves. A source close to the group said it was “eerie” how well briefed Zelensky’s security team appeared to be.
If the FSB is stabbing Putin in the back figuratively, there’s a good chance it may happen literally. Assuming, of course, that these reports are true. But even if they’re not, Putin will be forced to take them seriously. Even if they’re false, they may simply be a few days early.
UPDATE (From Ed): Lindsey Graham is eager to egg on the Russians, for better or (more likely) worse: ‘Take this guy out:’ Sen. Lindsey Graham tweets about Putin, ongoing Russia-Ukraine crisis.
(Updated and bumped.)
I’M SORRY, BUT “PIRATES” IS AN OFFENSIVE AND HURTFUL TERM. WE PREFER “PRIVATEERS.” Calling all pirates: This US lawmaker wants you to seize Russian vessels. “On Monday, Rep. Lance Gooden, R-Texas, introduced to Congress a bill which, if passed, would authorize the president of the United States to issue letters of marque and reprisal to seize Russian property.”
Traditionally, you could issue letters of marque and reprisal without an official state of war existing, which describes the present situation — though some asset seizures aimed at non-state entities are looking perilously like wartime measures.
GOOD ADVICE: Beware wishful thinking when it comes to the Ukraine crisis. It’s pretty clear that things haven’t gone as Putin planned, but that doesn’t mean they’ll wind up going well. And even if they go badly for Putin, which seems likely, that is no guarantee that they’ll go well for Ukraine, or the rest of the world, either.
Related: Why Americans are unlikely to support a war in Ukraine.
OPEN THREAD: Dig Your Own Hole.
OUT ON A LIMB: Vladimir Putin, Tyrant.
The rational actor theory isn’t always wrong. But it has been contradicted repeatedly by leaders who are willing to risk everything for the prospect of honor and victory, not regarding these ambitions as “vainglorious” delusions but rather as the stuff of historical greatness. The last century witnessed the rise of history’s most tyrannical aggressors, including Stalin, Hitler, Mao, and Khomeini. In every case, rationalist-oriented Western policymakers thought that the economic self-interest of tyrants would deter them from all-out war. When Britain and France offered to give Hitler the Sudetenland, they believed this offer would slake his hunger for all of Czechoslovakia and give the Czechs a reprieve. Instead, it encouraged him to further aggression. Similarly, hopes for peaceful coexistence and detente with the Soviet Union were shattered by Brezhnev’s invasion of Afghanistan. As it turned out, the Soviet Union being an economic basket case was not as important to its leadership as restoring revolutionary elan through foreign conquest, as had been done when the Red Army rolled over Eastern Europe after World War II.
The same is true of Putin today. It’s not that he doesn’t want prosperity for Russia. His early popularity was based on stabilizing the ruble. But the economy must rightfully take a distant second place to restoring Russia’s national pride and dignity after what he views as the “catastrophe” of the Soviet empire’s humiliating defeat in the Cold War. Our foreign policy experts too often forget that dictators like Putin don’t have to worry about public opinion and economic performance the same way that democratically elected leaders do. Rulers for life, they can put these to one side for prolonged periods of time in service of the greater goal of national honor.
Although Putin’s ambition is to restore Russian control over its former Warsaw Pact captive states, he in no way wishes to restore the Soviet regime itself. Russian history has long been riven by a cultural conflict between those who look to Europe, the West, and the Enlightenment as the path that Russia should follow and those who are loyal to Slavic nationalism, which is deeply religious and not interested in economic prosperity. In literature, this divide was typified by the different outlooks of Turgenev and Dostoyevsky, which Tolstoy crystallized as the difference between St. Petersburg and Moscow. During the era of anti-Soviet dissidence, this split was typified by Sakharov and Solzhenitsyn. Putin is in the Slavophile camp. A devotee of Berdyaev, a Slavophile critic of Marxism-Leninism, Putin believes that Soviet communism was an import of European rationalism that poisoned the authentic Russian soul, which has nourished the country’s national and artistic greatness.
And as a result of Putin’s goal of recovering Russia’s former captive states, Putin and his inner circle have “really got that bunker siege mentality — fortress Russia.”