• Check out the latest content on the the forum
• George Monbiot: Lord Keynes really did propose the International Monetary Fund | Comment is free | The Guardian (tip to pedantsareus)

  Poor old Lord Keynes. The world's press has spent the past week blackening his name. Not intentionally: most of the dunderheads reporting the G20 summit that took place over the weekend really do believe that he proposed and founded the International Monetary Fund. It's one of those stories that passes unchecked from one journalist to another. The truth is more interesting. At the UN's Bretton Woods conference in 1944, John Maynard Keynes put forward a much better idea. After it was thrown out, Geoffrey Crowther - then the editor of the Economist magazine - warned that "Lord Keynes was right ... the world will bitterly regret the fact that his arguments were rejected." But the world does not regret it, for almost everyone - the Economist included - has forgotten what he proposed.

• Dallas - Unfair Park - It's Science: Ninety-Nine Percent of Texas Science Professors Surveyed Don't Believe in Intelligent Design
• Guardian: Hillary To Accept State - TalkLeft: The Politics Of Crime
• Uproar Over Federal Drilling Leases Next To Parks | CommonDreams.org

  The view of Delicate Arch natural bridge - an unspoiled landmark so iconic it's on Utah's license plates - could one day include a drilling platform under a proposal that environmentalists call a Bush administration "fire sale" for the oil and gas industry.

• Oh Noz!! I spammed my frenz!! — Listics

  A treat for Opera fans.

• Critics rebel against Charles, the man who would be king - and still air his own views | UK news | The Guardian

  At the risk of offending my British friends; really the Prince has knowledge to share. He seems to me to be nothing more than a clown with strong opinions, none of them particularly well informed. He is a product of inbreeding run amok.

• Dispatches from the Culture Wars: The Perfect Christmas Symbol

Posted by Norm at 11:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

• George Monbiot: Lord Keynes really did propose the International Monetary Fund | Comment is free | The Guardian (tip to pedantsareus)

  Poor old Lord Keynes. The world's press has spent the past week blackening his name. Not intentionally: most of the dunderheads reporting the G20 summit that took place over the weekend really do believe that he proposed and founded the International Monetary Fund. It's one of those stories that passes unchecked from one journalist to another.

  The truth is more interesting. At the UN's Bretton Woods conference in 1944, John Maynard Keynes put forward a much better idea. After it was thrown out, Geoffrey Crowther - then the editor of the Economist magazine - warned that "Lord Keynes was right ... the world will bitterly regret the fact that his arguments were rejected." But the world does not regret it, for almost everyone - the Economist included - has forgotten what he proposed.



• Dallas - Unfair Park - It's Science: Ninety-Nine Percent of Texas Science Professors Surveyed Don't Believe in Intelligent Design


• Guardian: Hillary To Accept State - TalkLeft: The Politics Of Crime


• Uproar Over Federal Drilling Leases Next To Parks | CommonDreams.org

  The view of Delicate Arch natural bridge - an unspoiled landmark so iconic it's on Utah's license plates - could one day include a drilling platform under a proposal that environmentalists call a Bush administration "fire sale" for the oil and gas industry.



• Oh Noz!! I spammed my frenz!! — Listics

  A treat for Opera fans.



• Critics rebel against Charles, the man who would be king - and still air his own views | UK news | The Guardian

  At the risk of offending my British friends; really the Prince has knowledge to share. He seems to me to be nothing more than a clown with strong opinions, none of them particularly well informed. He is a product of inbreeding run amok.

• Dispatches from the Culture Wars: The Perfect Christmas Symbol

Posted by Norm at 8:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Posted by Norm at 8:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Posted by Norm at 8:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

• Bill Ayers talks back | Salon News (video)

  Proving yet again that there are indeed second and even third acts in American lives, Bill Ayers had transformed himself over a quarter of a century from an on-the-run-from-the-law member of the Weather Underground to a Distinguished Professor of Education at the University of Illinois at Chicago. But because of a single event -- a 1995 coffee that he and his wife gave for fledgling state Senate candidate Barack Obama -- Ayers again found himself in the cross hairs of history.



• Darwin art strikes wrong note | Science | The Observer

  It is the ultimate, infallible tribute to a Briton: placing their portrait on a banknote alongside images of their life and work. But now a leading UK biologist has announced that pictures on the £10 note, which commemorates the achievements of Charles Darwin, are 'little better than fiction'.



• Carnival of Light: McCartney wants world to hear 'lost' Beatles epic | Music | The Observer

  George Harrison said it was too avant-garde. Now Sir Paul says the time has come to release 1967's 'Carnival of Light'



• The Center-Right Nation Exits Stage Left - washingtonpost.com

  Here's the main thought Republicans are consoling themselves with these days: Notwithstanding President-elect Barack Obama, a nearly filibuster-proof Democratic majority in the Senate and the largest Democratic majority in the House of Representatives since 1993, the United States is still a center-right country. Sure, voters may be angry with Republicans now, but eventually, as the Bush years recede and the GOP modernizes its brand, a basically right-tilting electorate will come back home. Or, in the words of the animated rock band the Gorillaz, "I'm useless, but not for long/The future is comin' on.". . .

  The only problem: It isn't true. Or at least, not anymore. If you'd asked me a year ago whether the United States is really a center-right nation, I would have said yes -- after pausing for a second to contemplate the GOP's big congressional losses in 2006. At the time, Republicans cheered each other up by assuring ourselves that the worst was over: If you were running for Congress and survived 2006, you could hold your seat forever.



• The Wild Wordsmith of Wasilla - Dick Cavett Blog - NYTimes.com

  Electronic devices dislike me. There is never a day when something isn’t ailing. Three out of these five implements — answering machine, fax machine, printer, phone and electric can-opener — all dropped dead on me in the past few days.

  Now something has gone wrong with all three television sets. They will only get Sarah Palin.

  I can play a kind of Alaskan roulette. Any random channel clicked on by the remote brings up that eager face, with its continuing assaults on the English Lang.

Posted by Norm at 8:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Posted by Norm at 2:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (16)

Posted by Norm at 1:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

• Church Preaches The Music Of Beethoven : NPR Music

  Albuquerque, N.M., is no different from any other American city, in terms of its religious life; you've got churches, synagogues, a couple of Unitarian congregations and a mosque. But an abandoned gas station along old Route 66 is the unlikely home for another kind of Sunday-morning service, and it's one that you won't find anywhere else. It's called the Church of Beethoven.

• Respectful Insolence: The Real Estate Downfall video
• Why Do We Panic?: Scientific American
• Skeptic: eSkeptic: Wednesday, October 8th, 2008

  BY DEFINITION, “ALTERNATIVE” MEDICINE CONSISTS OF TREATMENTS THAT HAVE NOT BEEN SCIENTIFICALLY PROVEN and that have not been accepted into mainstream medicine. The question I keep hearing is, “But what about acupuncture? It’s been proven to work, it’s supported by lots of good research, more and more doctors are using it, and insurance companies even pay for it.” It’s time the acupuncture myth was punctured — preferably with an acupuncture needle. Almost everything you’ve heard about acupuncture is wrong.

• The Daily Doubter: Grayling and Hitchens discuss Among the Dead Cities
• Woman out $400K to 'Nigerian scam' con artists | KATU.com - Portland, Oregon | News
• Jesus' General: Voted Yes on Prop 8
• Why Obama should fill his Cabinet with geniuses. - By Jacob Weisberg - Slate Magazine
• The Satirical Political Report - An Offbeat Look at the Hot-Button Issues of the Day » Bush to World Leaders: ‘Tear Down Your MALLS’

Posted by Norm at 9:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Posted by Norm at 12:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (27)

Posted by Norm at 12:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (13)

• BBC NEWS | Science & Environment | Human ancestors born big brained

  A new Homo erectus fossil suggests that females had large, wide pelvises in order to deliver large-brained babies.
  Being born with a larger brain meant our ancestor became independent far more quickly than modern human infants.
  The new finding, published in Science magazine, conflicts with earlier ideas that suggest they had a tall, thin body shape adapted for running.



• Missouri To Keep Electoral Votes, Will Remain White - Opinions You Should Have


• A Cartoon—By Mr. Fish (Harper's Magazine)


• Boston Review — Joseph Levine: History Matters

  I have often been involved in arguments about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that focus on its history. Usually, the defender of current Israeli behavior urges the importance of appreciating all that Israel has been through and why it exists in the first place. I respond by reviewing the dispossession of 1948, terror attacks on Arab villages in the ’50s, Israeli provocations over the DMZ on the Golan Heights in the ’50s and ’60s, and on and on. Eventually and invariably, the defender of Israeli behavior insists that we not be so distracted by the history, that we need to focus on resolving the current conflict, not rehearsing the past. And thus we are struck by a larger question: is the history of Israeli-Palestinian relations important in our attempts to solve the present problem?



• Neurologist recounts the time he was conned - Boing Boing



• A positive aspect of the Bush legacy - Glenn Greenwald - Salon.com


• Essay - Enough With the Sweet Talk - NYTimes.com



• Joho the Blog » A joke from the inbox

  One sunny day in 2009 an old man approaches the White House from across Pennsylvania Avenue where he’s been sitting on a park bench. He speaks to the U.S. Marine standing guard: “I would like to go in and meet with President Bush.” The Marine looks at the man: “Sir, Mr. Bush no longer is president, and no longer resides here.” The old man says, “Okay,” and walks away. . .



• Fallacy Files Weblog Archive: Check it Out

  This is experimental confirmation of a type of anecdotal fallacy, that is, the tendency of people to think that events which receive media attention are more common―or, in this case, more dangerous―than they are.

Posted by Norm at 10:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

• 
  
  Daily Show
  

  Bill O'Reilly Part 1
  

  Bill O'Reilly Part 2



• DIRECT eNewsletter for Democrats

  “With all trends running against them, Republicans' only hope is to reinvent themselves as pragmatists. That, or nominate Sarah Palin and go out in a blaze of glory.” -- Gary Kamiya 11.10.08



• Cluster Bomb 'Soon To Be Thing of The Past' | CommonDreams.org

  This is very good news



• The Campaign Trail: The Fall: Reporting & Essays: The New Yorker
  
  
  
  


• Fairfield woman: Priest kicked me out of Mass because of Obama signs - San Jose Mercury News (tip to Scott)

  A Fairfield woman whose car was adorned with celebratory signs for President-elect Barack Obama says she is furious that a priest singled her out during Mass Sunday morning and ordered her to leave.



• First images captured of alien solar system - space - 13 November 2008 - New Scientist


• International Con Man Barack Obama Leaves U.S. With $85 Million In Campaign Fundraising | The Onion - America's Finest News Source


• By The Fault » Blog Archive » Just How Many Acts of Contritions for a Vote for Obama?


• Hillary Clinton emerges as State dept candidate | Reuters


• New Statesman - Books of the year 2008

Posted by Norm at 8:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

Posted by Norm at 8:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

And the winner is: Rooksarii

The book is Just How Stupid Are We?: Facing the Truth About the American Voter by Rick Shenkman

I'll take all requests for the book left in the comments during the next 24 hours or so, and then use a random number generator to determine the winner. I'll then ship the book at my expense to the winner. The offer is limited to residents of the U.S. and Canada. My apologies to my good friends in other countries but the cost of shipments to other destinations is simply too high.

A note to the winners in the last giveaway, your books are on the way. I sent them media mail so they should arrive in 4-10 days.

Posted by Norm at 11:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (30)

There is new content at the Forum check it out. If you don't see anything of interest, start a topic of your own.

• Editorial - A Case of Religious Discrimination - NYTimes.com

  Displays of the Ten Commandments have long been a lightning rod in constitutional law, and so they are again today. The Supreme Court is hearing arguments in a challenge to a city’s decision to allow the Ten Commandments to be placed in a public park, while refusing to allow a different religion’s display. The court should rule that that city’s decision violates the First Amendment prohibition on the establishment of religion.



• Op-Ed Columnist - Obama and the War on Brains - NYTimes.com

  Barack Obama’s election is a milestone in more than his pigmentation. The second most remarkable thing about his election is that American voters have just picked a president who is an open, out-of-the-closet, practicing intellectual.



• Adios, Conservative Kooks | The Journal of Doubt

  The conservative movement that has dominated American politics and government for the last thirty years has been toppled by an angry electorate hungry for change. Let us dance happily about conservatism’s demise and begin immediately to undo all the damage it has inflicted on our country and the world, but let’s also examine why it has failed and why it is being rejected so completely across the country.



• A Heart Machine for a Corpse


• Barack Obama's victory didn't magically eliminate America's problems and enemies. - By Christopher Hitchens - Slate Magazine

  Yes, yes, yes. I, too, took pleasure in standing in line and in exchanging pleasantries and greetings with the amazingly courteous staff at my polling station and the many citizens of my delightfully diverse Washington neighborhood. I, too, am still wearing my lapel sticker, with the jaunty words "I Voted." And I found it pretty easy to cast a vote that told the Republican Party, for which I recommended a vote last time, not to try any of this shit again.



• A New Dawn - WSJ.com

  As Barack Obama shifts from a waking dream to the real world, he faces the near-virtual reality of climate change. He has to move decisively, Ian McEwan writes.

• Close Reading: Victory Speech: The Talk of the Town: The New Yorker

  A theatre critic once memorably complained of a bad play that it had not been a good night out for the English language. Among other triumphs, last Tuesday night was a very good night for the English language.



• The philosopher and the wolf - Telegraph



• Marc Chagall's Russian dolls - Telegraph

Posted by Norm at 10:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)