As all right-thinking people know, Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was a right-wing atrocity against gays, hatched in the pernicious seventy-two degree corners of the doubleplusungood and evilwickedbadnaughty Pentagon, fought against nearly to the death by progressives …
That’s not remotely what happened. Rather, the Uniform Code of Military Justice, as enacted by Congress, has long deemed Sodomy, which covered more than just homosexual conduct, as a criminal offense potentially carrying severe penalties. Moreover, the procedure for entering into service demanded that prospective recruits deny or admit to homosexual leanings, in writing, which admissions would usually bar the man or woman from service. Of course, back when the shame of being publicly homosexual was very great, people who wanted to join the armed forces simply lied about it and then, as a general rule, hid it while in service.
Liberal Democratic President Bill Clinton, acting in his capacity as Commander in Chief of the armed forces, simply ordered that prospective recruits were not to be asked if they were gay or had homosexual leanings, and were not to volunteer the information. That, young Millennial, is where DADT came from; it came from a liberal, liberally motivated, and pandering to his liberal base.
Did you know that? No? Well, then; ask yourself, WHY didn’t you know?
What the loss of history does to you, dear Millennial, is that it robs you of the ability to reason your way to cause and effect. Never mind the crappy to the point of idiotic decisions and programs this might lead you to support, consider what it does to you as a person. What, after all, is the effect of shielding people from contrary opinions by designating and maintaining, under color of law or regulation, “safe spaces” for this or that minority? Does it make them stronger? Better able to deal with a harsh world? Does it change that objective world to something less harsh? No and no and no; it does none of that. Do you gain grit in a safe space? Ha. Do you learn endurance in a safe space? Oh, please.
Tom Kratman, “It’s Up to You, Millennials. Deflect or Be Doomed”, Milo, 2017-12-06.
January 11, 2020
QotD: “Don’t ask, don’t tell”
January 10, 2020
QotD: Deciding what is “newsworthy”
The idiosyncracies of historical remembrance of battle do not hinge alone on the presence of a Socrates or Teddy Roosevelt in the ranks. Sometimes there are wild cards of culture and politics as well. In this case and at this time, the fact that Israelis fit the stereotype of affluent and proud Westerners abroad while the Palestinians were constructed as impoverished and oppressed colonial subjects brought to the equation the sympathies of influential Americans and Europeans in the media, universities, and government — the prominent and sometimes worrisome elites who determined to send their reporters, scholars, and diplomats to Jenin rather than to Islamabad or Grozny.
Victor Davis Hanson, Ripples of Battle, 2004.
January 9, 2020
QotD: National music
James Lileks, Screedblog, 2005-07-08.
January 8, 2020
QotD: Diversity in academia
“America’s one-party state”, The Economist, 2004-12-02.
January 7, 2020
QotD: The cult of Le Corbusier
A dangerous cult may be defined as a kind of false religion, adoption of a system of belief based on mere assertions with no factual foundations, or as excessive, almost idolatrous, admiration for a person, persons, an idea, or even a fad. The adulation accorded to Le Corbusier, accorded almost the status of a deity in architectural circles, is just one example. It has certain characteristics which may be summarized as follows: it is destructive; it isolates its believers; it claims superior knowledge and morality; it demands subservience, conformity, and obedience; it is adept at brainwashing; it imposes its own assertions as dogma, and will not countenance any dissent; it is self-referential; and it invents its own arcane language, incomprehensible to outsiders.
Anyone who thinks this is an exaggeration has not read much Le Corbusier. (His writing is as bad as his architecture, and bears out precisely what Curl says.) Nor is it difficult to find in the architectural press examples of cultish writing that is impenetrable and arcane, devoid of denotation but with plenty of connotation. Here, for example, is Owen Hatherley, writing about an exhibition of Le Corbusier’s work at London’s Barbican Centre (itself a fine example of architectural barbarism). According to Hatherley, Le Corbusier was:
the architect who transformed buildings for communal life from mere filing cabinets into structures of raw, practically sexual physicality, then forced these bulging, anthropomorphic forms into rigid, disciplined grids. This might be the work of the “Swiss psychotic” at his fiercest, but the exhibition’s setting, the Barbican — with its bristly concrete columns and bullhorn profiles, its walkways and units — proves that even its derivatives can become places rich with perversity and intrigue, without a pissed-in lift [elevator] or a loitering youth in sight. … [T]hese collisions of collectivity and carnality have no obvious successors today.
Theodore Dalrymple, “Crimes in Concrete”, First Things, 2019-06.
January 6, 2020
QotD: Faith
[…]What’s the difference between God and a sock monkey? There is a sock monkey.
Penn Jillette, Sock (quoted in Reason December 2004).
January 5, 2020
QotD: Voting for President
The Editors, “Who’s Getting Your Vote?”, Reason, 2004-11.
January 4, 2020
QotD: “Starchitects”
One is the idea that an architect aspiring to greatness must also aspire to novelty. It is this imperative to “innovate” that underpins the diagrammatic design concepts of the Deconstuctivists. There is of course nothing wrong with innovation per se; it is the knee-jerk compulsion to innovate, or “reinterpret” — as a kind of moral imperative — that is the mid-20th-century aesthetic legacy. To be fair to the profession, I would come to the defense of much innovative public and commercial architecture, most of it by architects that the public has never heard of. Tragically though, these unpretentious and unsung essays in steel, glass, and masonry have been eclipsed in the public imagination by the “starchitect” bling that is currently turning the centers of our great cities into a collection of (in James Stevens Curl’s memorable phrase) “California-style roadside attractions”.
The other cancer is the idea that building design has sociological, psychological, and macro-economic dimensions that the architect — simply by virtue of being an architect — is competent to judge. What really matters to your average architecture student is drawing — which is fine, and just as it should be, until the vain idea emerges that their drawings represent some kind of implicit vision for mankind. At my school, any student’s design presentation had to include a verbal rationale — often post hoc and invariably half-baked — of how the form, massing, and materials of the design are expressive of such imponderables as the supposed psychological “needs” and “aspirations” of the users and the wider “community” that the building is to serve. The students were simply reciting the bogus language of their tutors — in which buildings might be said to be “fun,” “thought provoking,” “democratic,” “inclusive” and other such nonsense.
Graham Cunningham, “Why Architectural Elites Love Ugly Buildings”, The American Conservative, 2019-11-01.
January 3, 2020
QotD: Against The Grain
Against The Grain should be read as a prequel to Scott’s most famous work, Seeing Like A State. SLaS argued that much of what we think of as “progress” towards a more orderly world – like Prussian scientific forestry, or planned cities with wide streets – didn’t make anyone better off or grow the economy. It was “progress” only from a state’s-eye perspective of wanting everything to be legible to top-down control and taxation. He particularly criticizes the High Modernists, Le Corbusier-style architects who replaced flourishing organic cities with grandiose but sterile rectangular grids.
Against the Grain extends the analysis from the 19th century all the way back to the dawn of civilization. If, as Samuel Johnson claimed, “The Devil was the first Whig”, Against the Grain argues that wheat was the first High Modernist.
Scott Alexander, “Book Review: Against The Grain“, Slate Star Codex, 2019-10-15.
January 2, 2020
QotD: Anime
Friend A: “Anime by itself isn’t supposed to be cringy. There’s lots of good anime out there.”
Friend B: “Intentional or not, that’s the effect on me.”
Friend A: “Well, what anime have you watched?”
Friend B: “Let’s see… Pantyflash Crisis, Fanservice High School, and Animal-Eared Preteens, I believe.”
I laughed so hard I nearly lost continence.
Tamara Keel, “Overheard Online…”, View From The Porch, 2019-10-16.
January 1, 2020
QotD: “Bin End” sales
Richard Best, The Frugal Oenophile Newsletter, 2005-07-13.
December 30, 2019
QotD: Microbrew beer
Risk-taking microbreweries these days are known to replace or supplement hops with such oddities as heather, bog myrtle, ginseng, and hemp. As hops are related (by marriage) to cannabis — that other great medicinal herb — we shouldn’t be surprised to encounter hemp beer, and indeed you can usually find it on tap in Toronto at C’est What down on Front Street. It’s not bad either, once you get it lit, which is the hard part.
Nicholas Pashley, Notes on a Beermat: Drinking and Why It’s Necessary, 2001.
December 29, 2019
QotD: Senate confirmation hearings
Senator: “I have here a report from www.gruesomeliesaboutpublicfigures.com that says you like to puree puppies in a blender and drink them as a breakfast smoothie. Why do you do that, Mr. Smith?”
Mr. Smith: “I don’t drink pureed puppies for breakfast.”
Senator: “So you’ve stopped pureeing puppies for breakfast. Was that because you were afraid that it would become public and derail your nefarious secret plan to devastate the U.S. economy from your perch at the Department of Agriculture? Or did you just get tired of puppy blood?”
It’s entertaining viewing, but not really all that informative. And it has little impact when the nomination comes to a vote, which tends to break down on party lines. Mostly, it’s just a way for senators to get themselves on the teevee.
Megan McArdle, “Prescription Drug Imports Are Banned for a Reason”, Bloomberg View, 2017-12-01.
December 28, 2019
QotD: The “missing” mass of the universe
For something to exist, it has to have a position in time and space.
And this explains why nine-tenths of the mass of the universe is unaccounted for.
Nine-tenths of the universe is the knowledge of the position and direction of everything in the other tenth. Every atom has its biography, every star its file, every chemical exchange its equivalent of the inspector with a clipboard. It is unaccounted for because it is doing the accounting for the rest of it, and you cannot see the back of your own head.*
Nine-tenths of the universe, in fact, is the paperwork.
* Except in very small universes.
Terry Pratchett, Thief of Time, 2001.
December 27, 2019
QotD: The perils of tax reform
This is why deductions rarely go away, no matter how stupid and detrimental to the fiscal and economic health of the republic. For example, virtually every wonk in Washington, from radical libertarian to fervent socialist, can agree upon at least one thing: the tax deductibility of employer-sponsored health insurance is a terrible idea. On the one hand, it costs the government a packet of money every year, money that has to be raised by higher taxes on someone else. On the other hand, it encourages employers to load as much compensation as possible into the health benefit package, which distorts our economy and contributes to ballooning costs. There is nothing nice to be said about this particular tax deduction, except that it undoubtedly seemed like a good idea during World War II.
And yet, when it comes time to, say, pass a major health-care reform, or reform the tax code, do our nation’s legislators start with the obvious, and get rid of this egregiously stupid deduction? I regret that there is no way to convey my hollow, despairing laugh in pixel form. Of course they don’t touch it. The very egregiousness of its immense costs, the massive distortions it has induced in American consumption patterns, mean that getting rid of it would be far too disruptive.
Megan McArdle, “Republicans Turned the Tax Code Into a Weapon”, Bloomberg View, 2017-11-03.
