“As democracy is perfected, the office of the President represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day, the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last, and the White House will be occupied by a downright fool and a complete narcissistic moron.”--H.L.Mencken in the July 26, 1920 Baltimore Evening Sun
Chris' back is really bothering him.
Good pitching last night. Crucial Pirate error, then another Liriano failure.
Assage arrested disguised as David Letterman! Pam Anderson outraged, uses prison slang. Edward Snowden called his arrest "a dark moment" for freedom. Snowden said that. From Russia. Is a spy's communication protected by freedom of speech? Are we just nuts?
The Barr accusation is getting crazier and crazier responses. The Dems are really upset. These are the same guys who were furious over the Patriot Act and the very FISA that they used to investigate Trump with the Conspiracy Hoax. Now they are digging in to defend FISA's integrity. This might be why:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Conservative/comments/bc6wj9/kim_strassel_barr_brings_accountability_and_fear/
Electric cars will not have success until people stop thinking of them as lawnmowers. But the Tesla Model S vs Porsche Taycan produce 762 and 670 horsepower, respectively. And, of course, there is Battista with 1,900 horsepower.
Protectionism superficially looks to be a mechanism that protects workers. As does socialism. But both are devoted to the status quo, both are created out of the fear of competition. Neither allow for progress because progress inevitably creates change and thus losers. Both put special interests over society.
New fossils "provide sufficient evidence of a new species" that lived on the island of Luzon about 50,000 to 67,000 years ago, according to a new study. That's roughly the same time that some of our ancestors began to leave Africa. A new species!
A young stripper named Danni Ashe read a book on HTML programming during a beach vacation. She launched her own fan site online, Danni’s Hard Drive, in 1995 as a place to put her own promotional pictures. Then Ashe struck on a more lucrative idea— charging for membership, still a new idea at the time. She hired models and posted pictures, audio interviews, and videos, and then charged $15 a month for access—becoming one of the first subscription sites on the internet, besides The Wall Street Journal (which later profiled her in a page-one story about online pornographers, called “Lessons for the Mainstream”). Before long, Ashe was making $2.5 million a year and reportedly using more bandwidth than all of Central America.--From Wired
One organization actively promoting religious environmentalism is called GreenFaith. According to its website, “GreenFaith is an interfaith coalition for the environment that works with… people of all faiths to help them become better environmental stewards.”
There is a movement to prevent Kavanaugh from teaching at George Mason Law School. They never stop.
From Brian (they ARE listening): Amazon.com Inc. employs thousands of people around the world to help improve the Alexa digital assistant powering its line of Echo speakers. The team listens to voice recordings captured in Echo owners’ homes and offices. The recordings are transcribed, annotated and then fed back into the software as part of an effort to eliminate gaps in Alexa’s understanding of human speech and help it better respond to commands. (Bloomberg)
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hell of earth. This very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be “cured” against one’s will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on a level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals.-C.S. Lewis
Former Obama White House counsel Greg Craig was indicted by a federal grand jury in Washington on charges related to work he did for Ukraine. Who are these people? Isn't anybody honest?
The American Civil War began when on this day in 1861 Confederate shore batteries under General P.G.T. Beauregard opened fire on Union-held Fort Sumter in South Carolina’s Charleston Bay.
Alinsky and Formulas to Hurt You
A fascinating change has occurred in the West: Where it used to be that we wanted to protect the rights of minorities from the suffocation of the majority, we now somehow believe in the rule of the minority. Social movements are beginning to look like aristocratic counter-revolutions where a small minority tries to reassert its self-declared right to rule.
American Saul Alinsky is thought be the founder of modern community organizing and wrote one of the most influential books on setting up grass-roots movements: the 1971 book “Rules For Radicals”. Obama used his ideas on his path to the US Presidency, Hilary Clinton wrote her college thesis on his work. He is often referenced but not quoted.
In his introduction Alinsky wrote:
“WHAT FOLLOWS IS for those who want to change the world from what it is to what they believe it should be. The Prince was written by Machiavelli for the Haves on how to hold power. Rules for Radicals is written for the Have-Nots on how to take it away”
The basic philosophy purports to give power to the have-nots. As such, it is rather superficial; a minority in a democracy has more power than any minority in history except for rulers by divine right. What Alinsky wants is not power for the have-nots, he wants power for the out-voted--and often the incoherent. It is a tall order, to "change the world" into "what they believe it should be." Proud words. And such ambition should be taken both with a truckload of salt but some real concern as well. Wild ambition by nature must overturn a lot of obstacles; some of those obstacles are likely of considerable social value. And wild ambition, when frustrated by reality, will not crash to the ground alone.
The book goes on to give lessons on how to take power away from the “haves”. Naturally, it was heavily used by the counter-cultural movement in the 1970s, but has increasingly be used in mainstream political campaigns. Perhaps, the most enduring part of the book is Alinsky’s 13 rules for radicals. Here they are with some of his additional notes that I lifted from Nomura, along with some weird computer lingo I could not get rid of:
Chris' back is really bothering him.
Good pitching last night. Crucial Pirate error, then another Liriano failure.
Assage arrested disguised as David Letterman! Pam Anderson outraged, uses prison slang. Edward Snowden called his arrest "a dark moment" for freedom. Snowden said that. From Russia. Is a spy's communication protected by freedom of speech? Are we just nuts?
The Barr accusation is getting crazier and crazier responses. The Dems are really upset. These are the same guys who were furious over the Patriot Act and the very FISA that they used to investigate Trump with the Conspiracy Hoax. Now they are digging in to defend FISA's integrity. This might be why:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Conservative/comments/bc6wj9/kim_strassel_barr_brings_accountability_and_fear/
Electric cars will not have success until people stop thinking of them as lawnmowers. But the Tesla Model S vs Porsche Taycan produce 762 and 670 horsepower, respectively. And, of course, there is Battista with 1,900 horsepower.
Protectionism superficially looks to be a mechanism that protects workers. As does socialism. But both are devoted to the status quo, both are created out of the fear of competition. Neither allow for progress because progress inevitably creates change and thus losers. Both put special interests over society.
New fossils "provide sufficient evidence of a new species" that lived on the island of Luzon about 50,000 to 67,000 years ago, according to a new study. That's roughly the same time that some of our ancestors began to leave Africa. A new species!
A young stripper named Danni Ashe read a book on HTML programming during a beach vacation. She launched her own fan site online, Danni’s Hard Drive, in 1995 as a place to put her own promotional pictures. Then Ashe struck on a more lucrative idea— charging for membership, still a new idea at the time. She hired models and posted pictures, audio interviews, and videos, and then charged $15 a month for access—becoming one of the first subscription sites on the internet, besides The Wall Street Journal (which later profiled her in a page-one story about online pornographers, called “Lessons for the Mainstream”). Before long, Ashe was making $2.5 million a year and reportedly using more bandwidth than all of Central America.--From Wired
One organization actively promoting religious environmentalism is called GreenFaith. According to its website, “GreenFaith is an interfaith coalition for the environment that works with… people of all faiths to help them become better environmental stewards.”
There is a movement to prevent Kavanaugh from teaching at George Mason Law School. They never stop.
From Brian (they ARE listening): Amazon.com Inc. employs thousands of people around the world to help improve the Alexa digital assistant powering its line of Echo speakers. The team listens to voice recordings captured in Echo owners’ homes and offices. The recordings are transcribed, annotated and then fed back into the software as part of an effort to eliminate gaps in Alexa’s understanding of human speech and help it better respond to commands. (Bloomberg)
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hell of earth. This very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be “cured” against one’s will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on a level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals.-C.S. Lewis
Former Obama White House counsel Greg Craig was indicted by a federal grand jury in Washington on charges related to work he did for Ukraine. Who are these people? Isn't anybody honest?
The American Civil War began when on this day in 1861 Confederate shore batteries under General P.G.T. Beauregard opened fire on Union-held Fort Sumter in South Carolina’s Charleston Bay.
Alinsky and Formulas to Hurt You
A fascinating change has occurred in the West: Where it used to be that we wanted to protect the rights of minorities from the suffocation of the majority, we now somehow believe in the rule of the minority. Social movements are beginning to look like aristocratic counter-revolutions where a small minority tries to reassert its self-declared right to rule.
American Saul Alinsky is thought be the founder of modern community organizing and wrote one of the most influential books on setting up grass-roots movements: the 1971 book “Rules For Radicals”. Obama used his ideas on his path to the US Presidency, Hilary Clinton wrote her college thesis on his work. He is often referenced but not quoted.
In his introduction Alinsky wrote:
“WHAT FOLLOWS IS for those who want to change the world from what it is to what they believe it should be. The Prince was written by Machiavelli for the Haves on how to hold power. Rules for Radicals is written for the Have-Nots on how to take it away”
The basic philosophy purports to give power to the have-nots. As such, it is rather superficial; a minority in a democracy has more power than any minority in history except for rulers by divine right. What Alinsky wants is not power for the have-nots, he wants power for the out-voted--and often the incoherent. It is a tall order, to "change the world" into "what they believe it should be." Proud words. And such ambition should be taken both with a truckload of salt but some real concern as well. Wild ambition by nature must overturn a lot of obstacles; some of those obstacles are likely of considerable social value. And wild ambition, when frustrated by reality, will not crash to the ground alone.
The book goes on to give lessons on how to take power away from the “haves”. Naturally, it was heavily used by the counter-cultural movement in the 1970s, but has increasingly be used in mainstream political campaigns. Perhaps, the most enduring part of the book is Alinsky’s 13 rules for radicals. Here they are with some of his additional notes that I lifted from Nomura, along with some weird computer lingo I could not get rid of:
- Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have. Power is derived from 2 main sources, money and people. Have-Nots must build power from flesh and blood.
- Never go outside the expertise of your people. the result is confusion, fear, and retreat.
- Whenever possible, go outside the expertise of the enemy. Here you want to cause confusion, fear, and retreat.
- Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules. You can kill them with this, for they can no more obey their own rules than the Christian church can live up to Christianity.
- Ridicule is man's most potent weapon. It is almost impossible to counterattack ridicule. Also it infuriates the opposition, who then react to your advantage.
- A good tactic is one your people enjoy. If your people are not having a ball doing it, there is something very wrong with the tactic.
- A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag. Man can sustain militant interest in any issue for only a limited time, after which it becomes a ritualistic commitment, like going to church on Sunday mornings. New issues and crises are always developing, and one's reaction becomes, "Well, my heart bleeds for those people and I'm all for the boycott, but after all there are other important things in life” and there it goes.
- Keep the pressure on. Never let up. [use] different tactics and actions, and utilize all events of the period for your purpose.
- The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself.
- "The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition." It is this unceasing pressure that results in the reactions from the opposition that are essential for the success of the campaign. It should be remembered not only that the action is in the reaction but that action is itself the consequence of reaction and of reaction to the reaction, ad infinitum. The pressure produces the reaction, and constant pressure sustains action.
- If you push a negative hard and deep enough it will break through into its counterside [positive] this is based on the principle that every positive has its negative. We have already seen the conversion of the negative into the positive, in Mahatma Gandhi's development of the tactic of passive resistance.
- The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative. You cannot risk being trapped by the enemy in his sudden agreement with your demand and saying "You're right, we don't know what to do about this issue. Now you tell us."
- Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it. the opposition must be singled out as the target and "frozen." in a complex, interrelated, urban society, it becomes increasingly difficult to single out who is to blame for any particular evil. There is a constant…passing of the buck. Obviously there is no point to tactics unless one has a target upon which to center the attacks. If an organization permits responsibility to be diffused and distributed in a number of areas, attack becomes impossible.
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