Department of Defensiveness
W attacked the Jihadis. O attacks... well, just about everybody except Jihadis.
Fector
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And no Taepodong-2 Missiles to Deliver Them
The Conquerors
by Phyllis McGinley
It seems vainglorious and proud
Of Atom-man to boast aloud
His prowess homicidal
When one remembers how for years,
With their rude stones and humble spears,
Our sires, at wiping out their peers,
Were almost never idle.
Despite his under-fissioned art
The Hittite made a splendid start
Toward smiting lesser nations;
While Tamerlane, it's widely known,
Without a bomb to call his own
Destroyed whole populations.
Nor did the ancient Persian need
Uranium to kill his Mede,
The Viking earl, his foeman.
The Greeks got excellent results
With swords and engined catapults.
A chariot served the Roman.
Mere cannon garnered quite a yield
On Waterloo's tempestuous field.
At Hastings and at Flodden
Stout countrymen, with just a bow
And arrow, laid their thousands low.
And Gettysburg was sodden.
Though doubtless now our shrewd machines
Can blow the world to smithereens
More tidily and so on,
Let's give our ancestors their due.
Their ways were coarse, their weapons few.
But ah! how wondrously they slew
With what they had to go on.
When the Cheering Stopped
"While we are followers of Jefferson, there is one principle of Jefferson's
which no longer can obtain in the practical politics of America. You know
that it was Jefferson who said that the best government is that which does
as little as possible... But that time is passed. America is not now and
cannot in the future be a place of unrestricted individual enterprise..."
—Woodrow Wilson, quoted in Liberal Fascism, Jonah Goldberg, p92.
"If you are not a progressive, you better look out."
—Woodrow Wilson, quoted in Liberal Fascism, Jonah Goldberg, p104.
When the Cheering Stopped was (and I guess it still is) a history by Gene Smith about the final years of Woodrow Wilson after his popularity plummeted.
I admit this PhotoShop conflation of Obama and Woodrow Wilson is a bit of a slur on President Wilson. Woodrow, at least, had some executive experience -- if only as president of Princeton and as governor (for two years) of New Jersey -- where Obama has none. Also, Mr. Wilson managed to hang on to his popularity with the public for a respectable amount of time. It took seven years and a World War for him to become despised. Obama is losing all that whumped-up good will much more quickly.
Surprising side-by-side documentary footage by a $169 Flip Mino vs. $3500 Canon XH-A1
Wow, Kirk Mastin taped a Flip video camera to a $3,500 Canon XH-A1 + pro mic, and filmed a mini-short with both of them filming identical footage. He then runs through it one after another, and you can barely tell the difference. The main difference actually is the sound quality, and even that isn't significant at all.
This is apparently the video blog entry that caused the NYTimes to pick up the Flip camera. Anyway, Kirk Mastin, your blog rocks.
And also I just finally ordered a Flip Mino HD myself. I'm absolutely inspired by the storytelling possibilities.
Leapin' Lizards!!
♪ ♪ ♬
Who's that little chatterbox
The one with pretty auburn locks?
Cute little she,
It's Little Orphan Bammie.
♬ ♪
—From Ovaltine to Oval Office
