I did not lampoon the new federal recommendation from the Department of Energy saying that you should set your thermostat to 78 degrees in the summer, even though recommendations have a disturbing way of metastasizing into actual laws, particularly under Democrat presidents.
The Energy Star partisans at that agency also say that you should jack the temperature up to 82 degrees when you sleep, for the sake of -- what else? -- energy savings.
Talk radio legend Rush Limbaugh was among the people who did lampoon the new guidelines (on his show yesterday), and that made me happy. Whether this is a "perfect example of socialist government" I couldn't say, but I concur with Mr. Limbaugh's scorn for the idea that having a ceiling fan blowing on your face at night mitigates the discomfort of trying to sleep at 82 or 85 degrees.
While I do sometimes take an almost canine joy in having the wind blowing in my face, it's not ceiling fans that bring that joy. My air conditioning has been out of commission since early in May, and won't likely be replaced before next spring. Repair is not a viable option, given the age of the system and the Federal regulations outlawing R22 refrigerant by 2020. I make do with ceiling and floor fans, not to mention air conditioned public places.
With that as context, let me add that indoor temperatures in mid-Eighties and low Nineties don't make me feel virtuous; they just make me feel hot.
Wednesday, August 21, 2019
Friday, August 2, 2019
The new politics
Conrad Black offers an acerbic but spot-on analysis in the pixels of American Greatness:
"Andrew Weissman and the other fanatical partisans who conducted the so-called Mueller investigation and wrote the report of it, sent an infirm figurehead forward to defend their dirty work under withering examination before the House Judiciary and Intelligence committees last week. They knew from the beginning, as the Strzok-Page texts confirm, that “there was no there there” on the bunk about Trump-Russian collusion, but spun the farce of the Mueller investigation out for two years trying to provoke Trump into an action that could be called obstruction of justice, and sold through the wall-to-wall Democratic chorus in the national media as a “high crime or misdemeanor” such as “treason or bribery” which the Constitution requires two-thirds of the Senate to be convinced of beyond a reasonable doubt to remove a president.
Obviously, as Trump did not take the bait, there was no chance of that, so the best they could do was to invent the preposterous notion that failure to “exonerate” the president of obstruction meant that the House of Representatives should pursue it through impeachment. It is such cynical nonsense they can’t get even the Democratic majority of the House to vote for an impeachment resolution, and are trying to substitute continued investigation in what is taintingly called an “impeachment inquiry,” to try to smear Trump enough to cost him reelection."
"Andrew Weissman and the other fanatical partisans who conducted the so-called Mueller investigation and wrote the report of it, sent an infirm figurehead forward to defend their dirty work under withering examination before the House Judiciary and Intelligence committees last week. They knew from the beginning, as the Strzok-Page texts confirm, that “there was no there there” on the bunk about Trump-Russian collusion, but spun the farce of the Mueller investigation out for two years trying to provoke Trump into an action that could be called obstruction of justice, and sold through the wall-to-wall Democratic chorus in the national media as a “high crime or misdemeanor” such as “treason or bribery” which the Constitution requires two-thirds of the Senate to be convinced of beyond a reasonable doubt to remove a president.
Obviously, as Trump did not take the bait, there was no chance of that, so the best they could do was to invent the preposterous notion that failure to “exonerate” the president of obstruction meant that the House of Representatives should pursue it through impeachment. It is such cynical nonsense they can’t get even the Democratic majority of the House to vote for an impeachment resolution, and are trying to substitute continued investigation in what is taintingly called an “impeachment inquiry,” to try to smear Trump enough to cost him reelection."
Wednesday, July 24, 2019
Crossed the Rainbow Bridge yesterday
Filing this under an "allies" tag because every dog is an ally for the people in its life.
Wednesday, July 3, 2019
Not easy being Green
The gimlet-eyed David Warren observes how often "organic" and "green" labeling serves vested interests at the expense of the little guys:
"You have to be a big, faceless, industrial operation to afford the official “organic” labels that sucker big city consumers into paying double for essentially the same goods. That the whole system is massively corrupt, can almost go without saying. It was designed to be."
As Robert Vincent asserts in a separate essay, doctrinaire environmentalism is, for well-connected practitioners, a means to an end.
"You have to be a big, faceless, industrial operation to afford the official “organic” labels that sucker big city consumers into paying double for essentially the same goods. That the whole system is massively corrupt, can almost go without saying. It was designed to be."
As Robert Vincent asserts in a separate essay, doctrinaire environmentalism is, for well-connected practitioners, a means to an end.
Sunday, June 9, 2019
Creative writing
Movie critic Anthony Lane manages to link Elton John with Godzilla:
"In many respects, Godzilla is hard to distinguish from Elton John. Terrible temper? Check. Professional longevity? Check. Tireless vocal vigor? Check. They even share a fondness for baseball parks as suitable arenas for their skills; “Rocketman” re-creates Elton’s triumphant appearance at Dodger Stadium, in 1975, while “Godzilla: King of the Monsters,” a new addition to the franchise, shows the title character slugging a rival predator at Fenway Park. For years, it’s true, the singer has beaten the beast in the costume stakes, since Godzilla prefers to function au naturel, with his dark-green skin, all wrinkled and ridged, lending him the look of a furious avocado. For the latest film, however, he grows more fashion-conscious, arranging for his dorsal plates to flash bright blue whenever he’s totally stoked. Once Elton John sees this movie, he will have to get himself a set of those."
"In many respects, Godzilla is hard to distinguish from Elton John. Terrible temper? Check. Professional longevity? Check. Tireless vocal vigor? Check. They even share a fondness for baseball parks as suitable arenas for their skills; “Rocketman” re-creates Elton’s triumphant appearance at Dodger Stadium, in 1975, while “Godzilla: King of the Monsters,” a new addition to the franchise, shows the title character slugging a rival predator at Fenway Park. For years, it’s true, the singer has beaten the beast in the costume stakes, since Godzilla prefers to function au naturel, with his dark-green skin, all wrinkled and ridged, lending him the look of a furious avocado. For the latest film, however, he grows more fashion-conscious, arranging for his dorsal plates to flash bright blue whenever he’s totally stoked. Once Elton John sees this movie, he will have to get himself a set of those."
Wednesday, May 29, 2019
That new business model
They used to call tabloid newspapers like the one in the Raleigh metropolitan area "alternative weeklies." I'm not sure what they call them now, but I do have some thoughts about the new business model being touted by the progressive tabloid in my backyard.
Monday, May 13, 2019
Marcus on Shakespeare
David Marcus, writing in The Federalist, sheds some welcome light on William Shakespeare while defending him:
"One question Winkler brings up is worth exploring a bit: How did Shakespeare write women characters so effectively and honestly at a time when this was exceedingly rare? In today's intersectional age, it's easy to see why some would jump to the conclusion that a woman must have written these parts, but there is a simpler explanation. Shakespeare wrote better women characters than his contemporaries because he wrote better characters of every kind than did his contemporaries. Women, kings, soldiers, Jews, Moors, fairies, and a fountain of other characters flowed from his pen, all revealing a new style and substance in English writing.
How did Shakepeare do this? How was he able to create all of these characters with humor and speech so much more naturalistic than came from the other writers of the time? As is usually the case with the Bard, the clues are in the plays themselves."
"One question Winkler brings up is worth exploring a bit: How did Shakespeare write women characters so effectively and honestly at a time when this was exceedingly rare? In today's intersectional age, it's easy to see why some would jump to the conclusion that a woman must have written these parts, but there is a simpler explanation. Shakespeare wrote better women characters than his contemporaries because he wrote better characters of every kind than did his contemporaries. Women, kings, soldiers, Jews, Moors, fairies, and a fountain of other characters flowed from his pen, all revealing a new style and substance in English writing.
How did Shakepeare do this? How was he able to create all of these characters with humor and speech so much more naturalistic than came from the other writers of the time? As is usually the case with the Bard, the clues are in the plays themselves."
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