…from an Iranian president at Yale.
Ronald Reagan was castigated by the bien pensant for calling the evil empire what it was. When the Iranian people attempted to cast off their brutal and tyrannical government, Barack Obama acted as though it was inconveniencing his futile diplomatic efforts.
…is education. Actually I disagree. I’d say that, in terms of advancing the “progressive” agenda, it has been a massive success.
[Update a few minutes]
The president’s hypocritical lip service on school choice, and the reason for it:
Perhaps the president is feeling pressure to adopt reform language because of the attention being paid to the new documentary Waiting for Superman, which charges education unions with the poor state of American education. But the plight of the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program falls squarely with certain members of Congress and the Obama administration, which has continually acquiesced to union demands.
These unions are, by a long shot, the largest contributors to members of Congress. The two major education unions, the National Education Association (NEA) and the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), make 95 percent of their political contributions to Democrats. And with a budget of more than $355 million, the NEA spends more on campaign contributions than ExxonMobil, Microsoft, Walmart, and the AFL-CIO combined.
I think this is criminal, at least morally.
An interesting interview with Claire Berlinski (the second of five running this week).
The Pueblo apparently weren’t as peaceful as the multi-cultis want us to believe. One of the many annoying things about political correctness is its whitewashing of the brutality of many aboriginal American cultures, and false history of their supposed environmental sensitivity.
Michael Lotus is optimistic:
My prediction is that we are in for a rough ride, but a happy outcome. The country is making a course correction, reinventing itself. No one else can do this like Americans can, once they decide it has to be done. We are carrying out a once-in-a-century creative destruction of our whole politico-economic structure, and we are going to leave the rest of the world gasping in amazement. These are exciting times, and we are lucky to be here for them.
Hope he’s right.
Thoughts from Megan McArdle, on philosophical straw men.
Moe Lane apologizes to the KGB and the Mafia:
Recently, I compared Alan Grayson to an ex-KGB agent who was now engaged in a second career as a Mafia pimp. I don’t know what I was thinking: the KGB tried not to hire babbling fools, and neither does the Mafia.
Yes, it really was uncalled for. On the other hand, no apology necessary for this question: is Alan Grayson the most loathesome member of Congress? Could be, though the competition is pretty stiff. Hopefully not for long, though.
[Mid-afternoon update]
Wow. How bad is Grayson? So bad that even MSNBC says that he’s gone too far.
As I’ve been pointing out for months, space policy is one of the few areas in which the Obama administration isn’t socialist by inclination.
But not me, and today is the hottest day of the year in Redondo Beach. It’s eighty degrees on the lower floor of the house, and much warmer upstairs (it’s apparently 109 downtown LA). I know that eighty doesn’t seem that bad, but one of the reasons we like living here is that this kind of heat is rare, which also means that we have no air conditioning here. It may be hot sleeping tonight (last night it never went below seventy outside). There’s supposed to be one more day of this, then a cool down on Wednesday, when things go back to normal. It’s ironic that the hottest days of the year in LA didn’t come until fall. I blame George Bush.
[Update later afternoon]
Wow. According to Accuweather, it is currently 95 in Redondo (not clear where they take that reading) with a day high of 105, then cooling down to 63 (a forty-point plunge) overnight. That’s how dry it is here, with an off-shore wind. This is the first time I can ever recall triple digits at the beach. The record is 106 (back in 1964) and the normal for this time of year is 76.
He’s reduced the violent crime rate:
…all violent crime rates dropped in 2009, murder rates by 7.4 percent, robbery rates by 9 percent: His election caused gun sales to skyrocket, and crime rates to plummet.
Not to mention that poverty is up as well, and we all know that it’s a prime cause of crime (not to mention terrorism). Errrr…wait. Gee, that’s two “progressive” myths about crime shattered.