If you want to become very, very depressed…
…read this article, and then start reading the comments section.
Continue reading →Category Archives: History
FDR: fireside demagoguery—“saving the Court from itself”
[NOTE: Last night I wrote a draft of a post on how Barack Obama’s latest remarks on SCOTUS precedent are an attempt to emulate Franklin Roosevelt in the 30s. I was going to polish it up and submit it to … Continue reading →
New evidence that the Medieval Warm Period was world-wide
Interesting. Now let’s see how this gets integrated into the narrative: A team of scientists led by geochemist Zunli Lu from Syracuse University in New York state, has found that contrary to the ”˜consensus’, the ”˜Medieval Warm Period’ approximately 500 … Continue reading →
The good life, the long life
In yesterday’s thread about eating beef, commenter “SteveH” asks: Where does this obsession with quanity of life come from? I could understand it if we lost years on the average lifespan over the past 100 years. But we’ve gained tremendously. … Continue reading →
Turnout and the primaries
I’m one of those people who takes voting very seriously, so much so that I think I’ve voted in every general election and midterm as well. The only ones I’ve ever skipped are the off-years with just the very local … Continue reading →
Here we go…
…with more of this horse manure. I refer you back to this for an explanation, and a tribute to Tsongas.
Continue reading →If you were wondering about Dole’s motivation…
…in writing that anti-Gingrich letter that all the fuss was about yesterday, TNR’s Timothy Noah offers further background on some possible reasons behind Dole’s anger (in addition to what I’d already suggested here). An excerpt summarizing the gist of it: … Continue reading →
The history of “women and children first”
I’ve got an article up today at PJ with some background on the old (actually, not all that old) “women and children first” rule in maritime disasters. Please click on the link and read the article first, and then come … Continue reading →
Amazon reminder: there’s still time!
[NOTE: Bumped up from yesterday.] There’s still plenty of time left to order from Amazon via the handy neo-neocon widgets on the right sidebar. I’m a big procrastinator, so I know. And there’s even time to sign up for 2 … Continue reading →
The decline of the duel
I’m reading—slowly, slowly—Steven Pinker’s long but fascinating The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined. Don’t laugh at the title because it seems absurd. Pinker presents a strong case to defend his thesis (although so far I’m only … Continue reading →
Serfs v slaves
I’ve been slowly reading Paul Johnson’s The Birth of the Modern: World Society 1815-1830. Don’t let the dry dull title or its length put you off; it’s wide-ranging and has something of interest (and something I didn’t previously know) on … Continue reading →
You think the postal service is bad now?
You should have seen it around 1815: To send a letter from the United States to Britain, you addressed it by domestic U.S. Mail to a shipping house on the coast, enclosing money to cover ocean travel and inland postage … Continue reading →