June 2, 2013 — Steven Hayward
A reader tip brings Gary Saul Morson of Northwestern University to the list of candidates for the Power Line 100 Best Professors roster. Morson is the Frances Hooper Professor of the Arts and Humanities and professor of Slavic languages and literature at Northwestern University, where, according to one recent profile, he is considered “a throwback,” because “he believes his most important job is to teach undergraduates. His Introduction to Russian
»
June 1, 2013 — Steven Hayward
About the only thing worth reading in all those “alternative” free weekly papers that line birdcages and clog recycling bins in every crunchy burgh is the “News of the Weird” feature, syndicated by Chuck Shepherd for the last 21 years. Things like this: Dateline Saudi Arabia: (1) A newspaper in the capital city of Riyadh reported in April that three men from the United Arab Emirates were booted out of
»
June 1, 2013 — Steven Hayward
Our friends at the Young America’s Foundation note that there are exactly zero conservatives among the commencement speakers at Ivy League universities this year, though this shouldn’t surprise anyone by this point. I have a theory on this: the Ivy League is still reeling from Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s 1978 Harvard commencement address, “A World Split Apart,” which was a fulsome attack on everything that Harvard stands for. It could well have
»
June 1, 2013 — Steven Hayward
Will Rogers quipped, “Well, Prohibition is better than no liquor at all.” Churchill took a similarly jaunty view of this ridiculous experiment in progressive legislation (which is making a comeback today with people like Nurse Bloomberg). Anyway, a couple of Churchill’s observations on the matter: It is possible that the dry, bracing electrical atmosphere of North America makes the use of alcohol less necessary and more potent than the moist,
»
June 1, 2013 — Steven Hayward
As a follow up to yesterday’s Green Weenie about the feckless downhill ski industry, several Power Line readers have directed me to news stories about how late snow has kept many ski resorts open this year long after their usual closing dates. Aspen Mountain reopened its upper slopes for skiing and snowboarding over Memorial Day weekend, while over in France, a ski resort has reopened following heavy snow this past
»
June 1, 2013 — Steven Hayward
Even a holiday-foreshortened week can’t keep Power Line from gathering up the best images and memes for our weekend collection. Be sure to stay tuned to the very end, where we share the very latest IRS video. You remember the last one where the fine thespians of the IRS spent $60,000 to try out their best Star Trek imitation? This time, they try out their dance moves. Anyway, enjoy! Finally,
»
May 31, 2013 — Steven Hayward
So what’s that old Santayana line about those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it? Can we mix that in with Karl Marx’s line about history repeating itself as farce? Either way, this video juxtaposition of Nixon and Obama, from RevealingPolitics.com, is sure to leave a mark:
»
May 31, 2013 — Steven Hayward
We have commented before about the Sensitivity Police who use electron microscopes to spot the most minuscule trace of racism wherever it can be found, such as this Volkswagen ad, and this ad for the Discovery Card. Here’s the latest entry in the Racism Overreaction Playbook: a Cheerios ad featuring a mixed-race couple (below), which you would think would receive the approval of the Multidiversiculturalites. But apparently it has caused
»
May 31, 2013 — Steven Hayward
Talk about going downhill fast: 100 ski resorts have signed on to a Climate Declaration calling for “action” on climate change. In typical hokum, this declaration suggests that “climate action” represents “one of America’s greatest economic opportunities”–a claim about as credible as a women’s Spandex apparel concession in Saudi Arabia. This deserves a whole case of Green Weenies, along with the buns. My old partner-in-climate-crime Ken Green of the Fraser
»
May 31, 2013 — Steven Hayward
I wrote here the other day about how “diversity” has become a latter-day Stalinist concept, when it doesn’t imply downright hate from the left, just as “multiculturalism” is cover for self-loathing of Western civilization rather than a genuine curiosity about what might be learned from other cultures. (I think it was Allan Bloom who pointed out, for example, how few of the devotees of “multiculturalism” actually bother to learn a
»
May 30, 2013 — Steven Hayward
File this under the ditty “Tie a Yellow [Journalism] Ribbon Round the Old Koch Tree” (hat tip to our erstwhile headline writer RS), as we take in our pals at ReasonTV allowing the protesters against a possible Koch purchase of the LA Times make utter fools of themselves:
»
May 30, 2013 — Steven Hayward
From E & E news (subscription required, so I won’t post the link), a news item that requires no commentary: Emissions Device May Have Cut Power to Ambulance on Way to Hospital A U.S. EPA-mandated device meant to reduce diesel emissions may have shut down an ambulance carrying a suspect who had been shot by police in Washington, D.C. While medics yesterday were transporting the injured man, who was suspected
»
May 30, 2013 — Steven Hayward
Day after day comes more news of the gradual collapse of the climate campaign. Between the embarrassing lack of continued warming and the reckoning with the unsustainably (heh) high cost of renewable energy to displace hydrocarbon energy, you can hear politicians slowly backing away from the whole scene, especially over in Europe. Yesterday, for example, Tim Yeo, one of the leading advocates of climate action in the UK, took a
»
May 30, 2013 — Steven Hayward
More evidence that Britain has decided to embrace its cultural suicide comes from The Telegraph, which reports that the British High Commission pressured Kenyan authorities to release Michael Adebolajo, the murderer of Drummer Lee Rigby in London last week, after Kenyan police had arrested Adebolajo in 2010 when Adebolajo was attempting to make his way to Somalia for terrorist training: A Kenyan lawyer who represented the 28 year-old suspected of
»
May 29, 2013 — Steven Hayward
I forget which Chicago-school economist it was (probably it was Sam Peltzman) who once suggested that the most effective way to cut down on automobile accidents would be to place a sharp, eight-inch knife on the steering wheel of every car. Instead, we got mandates for seat belts and air bags. Peltzman’s research showed that in the early years people with seat belts suffered fewer injuries in accidents, but .
»
May 29, 2013 — Steven Hayward
So Obama thinks the problem of terrorism has receded to pre-9/11 levels and we can call the whole thing off. Won’t be long now before the New York Times re-runs the Larry Johnson article from July 2001, “The Declining Terrorist Threat,” which confidently proclaimed: Americans are bedeviled by fantasies about terrorism. They seem to believe that terrorism is the greatest threat to the United States and that it is becoming
»
May 28, 2013 — Steven Hayward
When you research and assemble a long account of any subject, as I did with my two-volume Age of Reagan project, you make unexpected discoveries along the way. Two in particular stand out: first, that the CIA is mostly a bunch a blundering boobs (more on this some other time perhaps), and second, that Bob Dole is a total heel. That’s why I long ago came refer to him as
»
