It occurs to me while reviewing the endless electronic reflection on the VT incident that the gun control crowd and their sympathizers don't offer any rational, realistic arguments against allowing students to carry on campus. I have yet to see one person actually volunteer a concrete reason why it should be disallowed. What we get instead are appeals to emotion based on perceived feelings of vulnerability.
From an otherwise decent article by Lila Rajiva:
However much we may support the second amendment, do we really want students packing heat in their book bags, as filled with alcohol, drugs and partying as most campuses are today?
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my wife's craft clique, the Richmond Craft Mafia, is having their annual show this weekend. Apparently, I will be DJing - although I sincerely doubt they want me to break out my turntable and jungle vinyls. I'll probably just make a playlist on my iPod.
There's also a feature in Brick Weekly about the group coming up, for which they did a photo shoot on Tuesday. Tasha is, of course, holding the teapot up front. Don't they look hep in their black clothes and grungy urban background?
If you haven't seen the Trailer Park Boys movie, do yourself a huge fucking favor. It's based on a Canadian TV series that is probably one of the top 3 funniest shows ever. Here's a clip:
Apologies for that shitty Sheryl Crow track, by the way... they usually have pretty good music on the show, like Rush and rappers from Moncton and stuff...
My best friend celebrates his 28th today. Also, check out his fly new pad! I helped haul all that cool shit in there, by the way.
Quasibill has a great idea for a left libertarian public response to the coming implosion of the sub-prime mortgage market:
Instead of robbing the taxpayers to line the coffers of the state-connected bankers, why don't we propose an amendment to the bankruptcy law: Any loan owed to an entity that engaged in fractional reserve banking while generating the loan is discharged *completely* upon application to the bankruptcy court.
To me, it's a win-win. The homeowner gets to keep their house. The seller who sold the house has already been paid. The loss falls squarely on those who created this disaster through their alliance with the state - fractional reserve bankers. Other lenders, who actually used real savings to fund their loans, won't be touched.
While there's zero chance of this plan ever going over in this political climate, a campaign that placed the blame for people losing their homes directly on the corporate-state complex could be popular and different enough to gain attention. And it has the added benefit of distinguishing our consistent libertarian position from that of the vulgar libertarians.
complete content feed for this blog using Yahoo! Pipes, and I have really good things to say about it. The interface is very pretty, snappy, and intutitive. There's lots of modules into which you can pipe content, such as content analyzers, regular expression parsers, string and math functions, geocoding, etc. I'd really like to come up with some ideas on mixing data sources to create some really useful or cool feeds. If you have any ideas, let me know - or check it out yourself!
Here's the story. Just talked to my brother, who is finishing up his engineering PhD in one of the buildings where people were indiscriminately shot. He's fine, thank God, and is now adamant about acquiring a concealed carry license.
I, for one, am buying a gun extremely soon. I'm not saying it's everybody's responsibility to carry firearms. But I just feel like if the madmen are going to learn how to operate these devices, I probably should. And for Christ's sake, I do not want to wait for the cops to show up if my life is in danger.
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Written on Monday, April 16, 2007
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In the near past I discovered what came to be a favorite source of left-leaning commentary and analysis, The Republic of East Vancouver, a small community paper published by one Kevin Potvin (you may remember him as the author of In Defence of Conspiracy Theories). Potvin had been running as a Green Party candidate for the Canadian legislature until a media controversy arose around an article he wrote about his reactions to 9/11 entitled "A Revolting Confession". I became aware of the original article because of a recent reflection Potvin compiled in his attempt to understand the whole ordeal.
His version of the story sounds exactly like what I'd expect from the mainstream media. Any time somebody speaks a truth that doesn't immediately conform to the preordained taxonomy of political positions, the media simply lies and distorts their position. It's not so much that they want to be mean, I think; rather, if they allow people to transcend the ideological taxonomy through which they excel at projecting the news, they risk their position in society as news experts. Competition in weltanschauungen is not appreciated.
The establishment thrives on inculcating a particular, uniform world view in the public. Even mainstream dichotomies (such as liberalism vs. conservatism) rest upon and take place within a common historical and ideological mythology. Treading outside the matrix in public carries not only the danger of being ignored, but also the risk of being refashioned into whatever role the media narrative requires. The stakes are just too high for the establishment.
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Since the Patrick Henry Supper Club meeting, I've been thinking about a lot of the questions I've received on what left libertarianism is. I can't answer for anybody but myself, but I figure this is as good a place as any to try.
First, I should address the term "left", since many find it grating and statist. My use of the term rests on its original usage since the French revolutionary era, stemming from the seating arrangements of the French legislature. Those who supported the ancien régime - the status quo, the establishment, the ruling class - sat on the right side of the assembly. Those who opposed the old guard (for whatever reason) seated themselves on the Left. Of course, opposing the establishment is not an endeavor unique to the Left, strictly speaking; nevertheless, it has been the Left that throughout history has consistently worked against authority. The Left has not always been libertarian, but the farther left one goes, the freer one gets, until you end up on the so-called "infantile Left" that was far too anarchic for somebody like Lenin. The central theme of leftism, at its heart, has been resistance to the status quo. That is the sense in which I'm a leftist (and the sense in which somebody like Stalin or Clinton could hardly qualify when compared to other thinkers and activists on the Left).
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In an IM conversation with my co-worker (who's 5 feet away from me, I know, I know) I said:
- "If we have to use force, it is because we are America. We are the indispensable nation. We stand tall and we see further into the future." -- Madeleine Albright
- roflmao
- (well, not really)
- on the internet, nobody knows you're not ROFLMAO
It was the head gasket (why didn't they check that first?). So $500 in labor fixing things that aren't broke and not fixing the problem - mechanics are way too much like IT professionals. They should at least give me a break on the price since they didn't fix it (and take some of their new parts back that do me no good).
Ryan provides the heads-up on the upcoming Ruby Hoedown in Raleigh this summer:
It's official, the 2007 Ruby Hoedown is in full swing now. The venue and dates are set and we've already made our call for proposals. Now starts the heavy lifting -- heavy lifting best shared amongst the community. If you're the philanthropic type, or even if you're not, we'd love for you to volunteer to review the proposals we'll be getting for the conference. Besides contributing to a worthy cause, members of the program committee will get free registration to the event as well.So, if you're interested in helping us review the many worthy proposals that will begin filtering in shortly, drop me a line at proposals [at] rubyhoedown.com. Thanks in advance!
For those of you (like me) not going to Portland this year, this should provide some networking and learning opportunities we'd otherwise miss. I highly recommend it for newbies, and consider getting involved if you know what you're doing in Ruby.
Sorry, I know I went from blogging five times in one day to not blogging once in five days. I haven't been too happy lately, and Saturday I spent all day helping Matt move to his new crib.
So on Wednesday I left my phone at the office and went home to hang out with Jim until Tasha got home. We had purchased some premium steaks to grill, but Jim had to leave before I could start. Tasha was in class and usually got home no later than 9:30 PM, so I started cooking around quarter after and finished up around 10.
When Tasha still wasn't home, I got worried that she couldn't contact me (we don't have a phone for the house) so I drove back to work. When I got to work, I called Tasha and (of course) she had arrived home just in time to miss me. And on the way home, my car overheated! It had had a VERY slow leak for some time that I had always managed to control, but now the engine was hot for real. So I pulled over and called Tasha, and she came out. I called a tow truck but I got home as soon as the car cooled down.
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