harmonicminer

Here are the top ten reasons why I am beyond delighted that Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize

(thanks Blog and Mablog and Melody)

10. Because this means that the Vatican must have verified that reports of the president floating around the top of the Washington monument were reports of a genuine miracle, and were not a deceitful trick by the devil.

9. Because the prize was funded and named after the inventor of dynamite, and it has ever been the destiny of this prize to be wreathed in ironies, the same way a smoking tank is after it runs over one of Nobel’s inventions. So this just continues a long and honored legacy.

8. Because there is no apparent reason for the prize, this must mean that the committee is inviting all of us to assign our own meanings to it — and so I would submit that Obama got it for continuing the Bush policies of rendition, roving wiretaps, indefinite detention of accused terrorists, urging continuation of the Patriot Act, and so forth.

7. Because the prize did not go to David Letterman, it shows that the Nobel committee does in fact have its limits. But on the down side, it also shows they are willing to go right up to those limits.

6. Because it means that intelligent liberals won’t know which way to look for at least a couple months.

5. Because this shows that our secular civilization’s great awards now have about the same value as the Montessori preschool participant ribbons in a block-stacking contest.

4. Because this is yet further testimony to the deep affinity that necessarily exists between awards and their recipients, kind of like rich little old ladies and their poodles. In this case that affinity is the shared characteristic of being as hollow and as shiny as one of those over-sized vases at Pottery Barn.

3. Because this is a boon to American conservatism almost as great as if Obama won People’s Sexiest Man Alive award. This morning, as the news spread across red state America, that noise you heard was howls of delight, happy applause, bloggers typing, cheerful sharing, and gladsome whoops.

2. Because American narcissism is never fulfilled until Euro-weenies join in the applause, which means we might be almost done now.

1. Because soft tyranny can always be effectively fought with the horse laugh. And soft tyrannies never understand this. And on they go, as solemn as a judge. You know, provoking us.

So it’s official:  the Nobel prize committee has decided it’s time to practice affirmative action, and award the Peace Prize to someone who hasn’t done anything yet, but might…  maybe.

Here’s the list of former Nobel Laureates.

Generally, it seems to me that in order to get a Nobel Peace Prize, you must either do something good, or do something bad, or do something very loudly, even if it is neither good nor bad.  As far as I can tell, President Obama is being awarded the Peace Prize for the signal achievement of not being George W. Bush.  It’s a new category…  a prize awarded for not being someone else.

He’s in good company…  Jimmy Carter, Al Gore, Yasser Arafat, Mikhail Gorbachev…  great luminaries all, full of grace and truth.  Or maybe just gin and vermouth.  All those cocktail parties are hard work.

I wonder if any scientist has ever gotten a Nobel Prize for hoping and wanting to do some new science.

It is the ultimate paean to hope and change…  with emphasis on the hope, since it’s obvious the Leftist agenda behind the Nobel committee has not changed.

Mammoth black holes push universe to its doom

THE mammoth black holes at the centre of most galaxies may be pushing the universe closer to its final fade-out. And it is all down to the raging disorder within those dark powerhouses.

Disorder is measured by a quantity called entropy, something which has been on the rise ever since the big bang. Chas Egan and Charles Lineweaver of the Australian National University in Canberra used the latest astrophysical data to calculate the total entropy of everything in the universe, from gas to gravitons. It turns out that supermassive black holes are by far the biggest contributors to the universe’s entropy. Entropy reflects the number of possible arrangements of matter and energy in an object. The number of different configurations of matter a black hole could contain is staggering because its internal state is completely mysterious.

There is a certain parallel with the current US government, which promises to be such a black hole for money that the entire economic future of the nation is going down another hole… down the drain, down a rabbit hole, pick your metaphor, ladies and gents.

It’s very clear that “the number of possible arrangements” of money and power in a federal bureaucracy is essentially infinite. 

“Raging disorder within those dark powerhouses” indeed.  Who knew that the Hubble telescope was pointed at the Federal Reserve?

Is the ‘U.S. furious over Israeli incitement against Obama’?

The U.S. administration is furious over Israeli incitement against President Barack Obama, Democratic congressmen close to Obama told an Israeli source who returned from a visit to Washington this week.

The congressmen even hinted that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been personally involved.

The source, who met in Washington with administration officials and members of Congress, told Haaretz he was stunned by the level of anger there over attempts to portray Obama to the American public as an enemy of Israel because of his efforts to restart peace talks and freeze settlement construction.
 
“There are people here who are playing with fire by damaging our relationship with the U.S.,” the source said.

Last month’s summit in New York between Obama, Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas also reduced Washington’s expectations of a speedy resumption of final-status talks between Israel and the PA. While U.S. envoy George Mitchell will meet Netanyahu again Friday, the meeting is not expected to resolve the crisis in Israeli-Palestinian relations.

gosh… d’ya think?

I don’t think it’s “the U.S.” that is angry at “Israeli incitement against Obama”…. it’s just Obama who’s angry. Yet more people immune to his charm…  so sad.

It must be hard to know that everyone doesn’t love you, and won’t do what you want just because you want it, without regard to what they think is in their own best interest.

First the IOC doesn’t award the Olympics to Chicago, and now this….  who do those Zionists think they are, anyway?  How DARE they publicly disagree with the man who is single handedly revolutionizing the US role in world politics?

I think the peace process is in pieces.

In the meantime, Iran’s hudna goes on, fooling the gullible in the US government, the UN and NYTimes.

Even climate scientists who AREN’T “climate skeptics” are complaining about politics producing bad science.

when later generations learn about climate science, they will classify the beginning of 21st century as an embarrassing chapter in history of science. They will wonder our time, and use it as a warning of how the core values and criteria of science were allowed little by little to be forgotten as the actual research topic, climate change, turned into a political and social playground.

Read it all at the link… it is a translation from a prominent Finnish scientist.

In a display of absolutely stunning ignorance about how the world works, the way economies work, and the nature of wealth cretion, here is Les Leopold claiming that The Forbes 400 Shows Why Our Nation Is Falling Apart

Collectively, those 400 have $1.57 trillion in wealth. It’s hard to get your mind around a number like that. The way I do it is to imagine that we were still living during the great radical Eisenhower era of the 1950s when marginal income tax rates hit 91 percent. Taxes were high back in the 1950s because people understood that constraining wild extremes of wealth would make our country stronger and prevent another depression. (Well, what did those old fogies know?)

Had we kept those high progressive taxes in place, instead of removing them, especially during the Reagan era, the Forbes 400 might each be worth “only” $100 million instead of $3.9 billion each. So let’s imagine that the rest of their wealth, about $1.53 trillion, were available for the public good.

What does $1.53 trillion buy?

It’s more than enough to insure the uninsured for the next twenty years or more.

It’s more than enough to create a Manhattan Project to solve global warming by developing renewable energy and a green, sustainable manufacturing sector.

And here’s my favorite: It’s more than enough to endow every public college and university in the country so that all of our children could gain access to higher education for free, forever!

Just ignoring all the other stupidity and economic ignorance in these assertions, does Leopold actually believe that if these wealth-creators had been taxed at 1950s rates then that 1.53 trillion would have been spent on any of the things he lists?

The fact is that the government had hugely more money than that over those decades…  and much of the money the government DID have came from these very rich people, in the form of taxes they did pay.  The history says that when taxes were cut, revenue to the government in tax receipts went UP, because people took more risks in investing the capital they had, risks which paid off, on average.  The government had MORE money than it would have had with high tax rates.  And the government chose to spend its money on entitlement programs that helped get statist politicians re-elected, not innovative research that would have floated all boats.  The money went to programs which largely subsidized and incentivized bad behavior, and made people feel like they had a right to it in the bargain.

Leopold seems not to grasp that if that 1.53 trillion was turned into liquid cash to fund his utopian fantasies, then millions of people, who are employed because that money is INVESTED, would be instantly out of work.  These rich folk don’t have their money in a mattress somewhere.  They want to make a profit, so they put it to work.  It’s the capital that makes it possible for any of us to be more than subsistence farmers.  And if that 1.53 trillion had never been in private hands, it’s likely that Leopold would have been typing his idiotic opinions on an equivalent to the 1985 Commodore 64….  which would have been invented just last year, and would cost $5000, and be affordable only to those same rich folk.  Maybe he should review the track record of micro-computer innovation in the Soviet Union.  It should take about 3 seconds to cover the history, which is essentially simple theft of western innovation, because they had none locally.  I wonder how Leopold would feel about typing his drivel on a Mark II Royal typewriter?

Of course, I suppose it’s unreasonable to expect Huffington Post to give a platform to an economist who actually understands these things.  Will they ever give a regular column to Thomas Sowell?

Only in your dreams.

Below is the first post here from my wife, Mrs. Miner.  It’s about her young student, Jennifer, who recently ran (or just possibly skipped) through the gates of Heaven.

When I walked into Jennifer’s hospital room, I was initially surprised at the number of people present.  The pediatric intensive care unit doesn’t usually allow more than a few visitors at a time. The hospital staff was letting us say goodbye.

Peggy and I hugged.  There are no words for a mother at a time like this.  Then we both turned to Jennifer.  She was unconscious, breathing like my father had breathed during his last twenty four hours.  I noted the display of her vitals, grim confirmation of the obvious.  Family members were present that I had not yet met.  Introductions were made, and I sat down with silent prayers of support for a family in indescribable pain.

Conversations would start and stop.  Grandma softly sang hymns while stroking Jenny’s face.  Big sister Sarah leaned from her chair and partly lay across Jennifer.  (Maybe, if she could just hold tightly enough…)  Jennifer would occasionally open her eyes, look around briefly, then go back to sleep.  I was told that she had roused earlier in the day, alert enough to demand the remote control for the TV.  Hey, Tom and Jerry rocks.

Jennifer was born with a rare genetic disorder which resulted in a host of problems, including legal blindness, skeletal anomalies, learning difficulties and pulmonary hypertension, a fatal disorder of the heart and lungs.   She attended public school for a time, but became too frail to continue.  Our school district contacted me and asked if I would be interested in teaching Jennifer in her home.  After meeting with Jennifer and her mother, I gladly accepted the position.

Jennifer’s house was modest.  She had three sisters still living at home, and they all shared one bedroom.  There was no father.  Peggy, fiercely devoted to her children, seemed undaunted by her many challenges, drawing strength from extended family, church, and her Lord.  Jennifer was surrounded in love by a family that had truly learned to treasure what’s important in this life.

I quickly grew accustomed to her oxygen tank and was even able to avoid stepping on the tubing that accompanied Jennifer everywhere she went.  After a little more time, I nearly stopped seeing them altogether.  Jennifer was just … Jennifer.  Fourteen years old when I met her, she only weighed about sixty pounds, but she had a big attitude.  She was assertive, even stubborn, and her family and I would have it no other way.

Sweet Pea, one of two tiny canine family members, merely tolerated my presence, but she and Jennifer adored one another.  When Jennifer was feeling worse than usual, Sweet Pea would hop into her lap, seeming to comfort both of them.  In turn, Jennifer took excellent care of her dogs, leaping to their defense when I threatened one or both of the creatures with barbecue sauce.

Jennifer and I worked out of a small room Peggy had set up for that purpose.  This room was Jennifer’s domain, and she took great pride in her school work and in keeping her materials organized.  It never ceased to amaze and sometimes shame me that Jennifer accepted her many limitations without complaint. She was determined to find the good in all situations and never missed an opportunity to laugh.  Once, we read through The Three Billy Goats Gruff.  When I asked what the troll had in mind for the goats, Jennifer gleefully replied, “He wants to eat them!”  She licked her lips. Then she giggled.  Oh, that giggle…  It filled the room and made you laugh right along.

Jennifer was generous.  Sometimes I arrived at her home to find a brownie or some other example of her growing culinary skills waiting for me.  When my son had surgery, she sent him a homemade get-well card.  This required Jennifer to hold her face about three inches from the paper while she worked on the greeting.  She certainly wasn’t going to let a small annoyance like legal blindness stop her from encouraging another.

Jennifer’s life was worth living, and she lived it well.  I’ve heard some say she is “resting in peace,” but I see her running for the first time.  Running, running, running… into her Father’s arms.

Jennifer Monique Tinker

January 10, 1994-September 17, 2009

Case Closed

The Democrats are perfectly well aware that millions of Americans will lose the coverage they have under their proposal, whatever form it finally takes. In fact, that’s their objective: in the long run–President Obama has said it may take 10 to 20 years–they intend to force all of us to lose our private health care and be forced into a socialized medicine system.

At the link, a report on a simple amendment that tested the Democrats’ sincerity on letting people keep the coverage they now have, if they like it. You know how it turned out without looking, of course, but it is interesting.