Biographical history, as taught in our
public schools, is still largely a history of boneheads: ridiculous
kings and queens, paranoid political leaders, compulsive voyagers,
ignorant generals, the flotsam and jetsam of historical currents. The
men who radically altered history, the great creative scientists and
mathematicians, are seldom mentioned if at all. -Martin Gardner,
mathematician and writer (1914-2010)
Loudon County, north of Washington D.C., is the fastest-growing county in America. It was formerly farm country but now is home to government dependent firms and businesses. Fauquier County is an agricultural community in the beautiful Piedmont mountain region about an hour west of Washington. Under the guise of business zoning authority, Fauquier wants to regulate and fine farm residents on grounds of holding unauthorized pumpkin carvings, birthday parties for little girls, and Boy Scout jamborees.
So the heat precedes the dragon.
Golden oldie:
Before astronomers realized solar eclipses were caused by the moon, the Chinese thought an enormous dragon swallowed the sun, and they made as much noise as possible to scare the dragon away.
“Like Hillary Clinton, I too have traveled hundreds and thousands of miles around the globe, but unlike her, I’ve actually accomplished something,” Carly Fiorina said. “You see, Mrs. Clinton, flying is not an accomplishment. It is an activity.”
Who is....Anita Loos?
Another
myth that generates a lot of poverty and suffering is that the economic
development of the poor countries is, for fundamental economic or
extra-institutional reasons, extremely difficult, and requires special
promotion, planning, and effort. It is sometimes even argued that a
tough dictator or totalitarian repression is required to force the
sacrifices needed to bring about economic development. As I see it, in
these days it takes an enormous amount of stupid policies or bad or
unstable institutions to prevent economic development.
Unfortunately, growth-retarding regimes, policies, and institutions are
the rule rather than the exception….(Mancur Olson, 1982, The Rise and Decline of Nations)
Angelina
Jolie briefed the council as special envoy for the U.N. on refugee
issues on Friday morning at UN headquarters in New York. When asked
about Jolie's planned briefing, Syria's U.N. Ambassador Bashar Ja'afari
responded: 'She is beautiful'.
William
S. Porter was a drug store clerk, cowboy, fugitive, bank teller,
cartoonist who went to jail for five years (commuted to three) for
embezzlement. Porter had published several stories prior to his prison
term, but the fourteen written behind bars represented a new style and
quality. He became the successful writer, "O. Henry." He wrote about 300
stories in all, many drawn from his wandering about New York, the city
he called "Baghdad-on-the-Subway."
Ancient
mathematicians tried to compute pi by inscribing polygons with
more and more sides to more closely approach the area of a circle.
Archimedes used a 96-sided polygon. Chinese mathematician Liu Hui
inscribed a 192-sided polygon and then a 3,072-sided polygon to
calculate pi to 3.14159. Tsu Ch’ung and his son inscribed polygons
with as many as 24,576 sides to calculate pi (the result had only
an 8-millionth of 1% difference from the now accepted value of pi).
If Brian Williams can not be a news
anchor because of mendacity and embellishment, is a candidate for high
office with the same behavior similarly unqualified? Or are news anchor
requirements of a higher standard?
Former
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke has begun blogging at the
Brookings Institution. He wrote that legislators said that, with the
falling interest rates, he was “throwing seniors under the bus.” He
reassures us that he “was concerned about those seniors as well.” This
is a classic modern American political approach: Bernanke does not
defend the low interest rates that the accusation references, he defends
his motives. Similarly, Mrs. Clinton does not refute
the accusations of her financial impropriety, she simply puts those
accusations in the context of political motivation.
Maria Montessori is well known because of the early childhood educational system she developed and the many schools that bear her name. But equally impressive is the fact that she was the first woman in Italy to earn a medical degree.
Anita Loos started writing scenarios for D. W. Griffith while she was in her teens, and eventually worked on over sixty films, but her most enduring creation is her 1925 novel, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. The play, musical or film versions may be better-known, but the book was an immediate hit and soon translated into over a dozen languages. The Times Literary Supplement thought it "a masterpiece of comic literature," James Joyce chuckled over it, and Edith Wharton thought it "the great American novel" -- over another, nearly ignored 1925 novel, The Great Gatsby. Loos and Fitzgerald were about the same age, and came to represent the light and dark sides of flapper culture. Her famous heroine, Lorelei Lee, is purportedly based on Peggy Hopkins Joyce (Gold Digger: The Outrageous Life and Times of Peggy Hopkins Joyce, Constance Rosenblum, 2000), and the book was partly inspired by Loos's relationship to H. L. Mencken.
It is interesting that, following the recent scandals, the Catholic Church has stopped accepting homosexuals as priests while that same policy is being reversed by the Boy Scouts.
“It only took North Korea 12 years to get a nuclear weapon from the time we reached the Agreed Framework in 1994 to the time they tested their first weapon in 2006.”– Sen. Tom Cotton
The flap over the baker
who would not make a cake for a gay couple who are marrying is a real
problem. It is actually a small question--the baker is not withholding a
precious or irreplaceable service. The difficulty seems to be the
curious distinction the government draws. Certainly they would not sue a
Jewish or Muslim caterer who declined to serve pork for religious
reasons. There is a righteousness involved that is aimed at the offender. The florist who refused under a similar circumstance was a close
friend of the couple and the couple respected his decision and just went
elsewhere but the feds made it a legal problem when they heard of it.
The United States Air Force's X-37B space plane will launch on its fourth mystery mission next month.
The unmanned X-37B space plane, which looks like a miniature version of NASA's now-retired space
shuttle orbiter, is scheduled to blast off atop a United Launch Alliance
Atlas V rocket from Florida's Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on May
20.
"As the Russians
gradually assumed control of Uranium One in three separate transactions
from 2009 to 2013, Canadian records show, a flow of cash made its way to
the Clinton Foundation. Uranium One’s chairman used his family
foundation to make four donations totaling $2.35 million. Those
contributions were not publicly disclosed by the Clintons, despite an
agreement Mrs. Clinton had struck with the Obama White House to publicly
identify all donors. Other people with ties to the company made
donations as well.
And shortly after the Russians announced their intention to acquire a majority stake in Uranium One, Mr. Clinton received $500,000 for a Moscow speech from a Russian investment bank with links to the Kremlin that was promoting Uranium One stock.
Whether the donations played any role in the approval of the uranium deal is unknown. But the episode underscores the special ethical challenges presented by the Clinton Foundation, headed by a former president who relied heavily on foreign cash to accumulate $250 million in assets even as his wife helped steer American foreign policy as secretary of state, presiding over decisions with the potential to benefit the foundation’s donors."
And shortly after the Russians announced their intention to acquire a majority stake in Uranium One, Mr. Clinton received $500,000 for a Moscow speech from a Russian investment bank with links to the Kremlin that was promoting Uranium One stock.
Whether the donations played any role in the approval of the uranium deal is unknown. But the episode underscores the special ethical challenges presented by the Clinton Foundation, headed by a former president who relied heavily on foreign cash to accumulate $250 million in assets even as his wife helped steer American foreign policy as secretary of state, presiding over decisions with the potential to benefit the foundation’s donors."
From the New York Times article: Cash Flowed to Clinton Foundation as Russians Pressed for Control of Uranium Company
Competition is valuable only because, and so far as, its results are unpredictable and on the whole different from those which anyone has, or could have, deliberately aimed at. (Hayek)
When the Austrians went to war with France in April 1792, their command decided not to buy new horses, as the expected war would be so brief that they would not be needed. The war lasted a generation.
An Iranian defector, the former diplomat Mohammad Reza Heydari and others report that North Korea has collaborated with Iran on the design of nuclear weapons including warhead design techniques.
AAAAaaaaaaannnnnddddddd.......a graph of Stocks vs Earnings Expectations:
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