"A Socialist is only a Communist without a gun."
Rodger, the Real King of France (as quoted by)
--Dolly
Saturday September 6, 2008...
Attention: Family ::.
MEMBERS and Kipling fans. Go and read the stories linked from here and tell me if Dawgie's Dad doesn't remind you even a little of Uncle Cliff.
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Saturday September 6, 2008...
Overheard ::.
THE PATCH FACTORY: "...the idiot who originate the Energy Star logo program and beat him about his addlepated head and skinny, hunched shoulders. 'Hel-LO! It's a labor saving device, not an energy saving device!'"
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Saturday September 6, 2008...
Just So's You Know ::.
WHAT OBAMA'S BEEN soundbitten as saying Friday about global warming -- it's a major problem, the seas and atmosphere are warming, that warming will be a detriment to agrigculture, will cause an increase in insect-born diseases, an increase in hurricanes and violent weather... all of it -- is dead wrong. 180. Degrees. Out. Of. Phase. That sound you hear like 3-inch masking tape coming off the roll is reality snapping back into phase after Obama's reality distortion field shuts off.
As to whether he's a self-deluding fool or hoping you are, deponent sayeth not.
Oh, yes you do! Mmblmfff!
Dolly, stifle.
Mmff mmm nnnn!
Promise?
::hot-as-the-hinges-of-Hades glare of hatred::
Promise?
::truculent nod::
OK! ::removes hand from Dolly's mouth::
You motherf...
Ah-ah-aah! You promised!
Grumble mutter mumble. Rizzins-razzns honk!
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Previously on BabyTrollBlog...
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Friday September 5, 2008...
What Kind of Economic ::.
IDIOCY DOES IT TAKE in times of 95+% employment, for a political party to hang its hat on the notion that the President can, should, or must concern himself with "getting people back to work."
More apposite would be the question, "Where are we going to get more workers?"
Baby, if you ain't workin', you ain't tryin'.
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Friday September 5, 2008...
Fruit of the Poisoned ::.
TREE: the eugenics movement, a.k.a. progressivism -- the seriously hubristic notion that mankind is capable of apprehending the myriad factors which determine evolutionary viability, let alone fitness or superiority.
All lain out in all its -- bleah! -- glory for your delectation.
And your point is...?
There is a straight line from the eugenicists to today's soi-disant (scorn quotes) "progressives."
Oh, they'll deny it -- all horrorstruck with holy water, garlic, and crucifixes to ward off the evil eye. And then turn around and exhibit exactly the same hubris on other or similar subjects.
Read and be enlightened.
Hat tip: Vanderleun.
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Friday September 5, 2008...
Even When I Disagree ::.
WITH HER Peggy Noonan has one of the most lovely and distinctive writing voices in modern American journalism. That she used to be a speech writer for Ronaldus Magnus explains a lot about his voice in turn. And, I'm sure, his influence on her.
One of the things I admire most about her writing is her knack of encapsulating the sense of a thing.
Let me say of myself and almost everyone I know in the press, all the chattering classes and political strategists and inside dopesters of the Amtrak Acela Line: We live in a bubble and have around us bubble people. We are Bubbleheads. ...
And again we know this, we know this is our limit, our lack.
But we also forget it.
And when you forget you're a Bubblehead you get in trouble, you misjudge things. For one thing, you assume evangelical Christians will be appalled and left agitated by the circumstances of Mrs. Palin's daughter. But modern American evangelicals are among the last people who'd judge her harshly. It is the left that is about to go crazy with Puritan judgments; it is the right that is about to show what mellow looks like. Religious conservatives know something's wrong with us, that man's a mess. They are not left dazed by the latest applications of this fact. "This just in -- there's a lot of sinning going on out there" is not a headline they'd understand to be news.
So the media's going to wait for the Christian right to rise up and condemn Mrs. Palin, and they're not going to do it because it's not their way, and in any case her problems are their problems. Christians lived through the second half of the 20th century, and the first years of the 21st. They weren't immune from the culture, they just eventually broke from it, or came to hold themselves in some ways apart from it. I think the media will explain the lack of condemnation as "Republican loyalty" and "talking points." But that's not what it will be.
But even she, I think, misses a point: the fact that most religious folk realize is that true sin consists of doing harm to another human being. When a young couple, life-bonded in their own hearts, (and, one assumes, in the eyes of God), if not yet in the eyes of church and family, engages in touch-loving and even conceives a child, this is not sin. It might be jumping the gun a little, but it does no one any real harm. It does however, fulfill God's purpose.
We don't arrange marriages anymore. We don't dower daughters off. Women aren't property. The reasons a patriarchical society might have for trying to sell the notion of premarital sex -- per se -- being the kind of sin that harms another person have fallen away. The reasons for concern have to do with caution and prudence (hardly hallmarks of adolescence), not hellfire and damnation.
Of course, leftists never did get that.
It's the substance of the thing, see, not the form. But for the anti-religious Left, form is all they can see. They've been so blinded by style for so long that they don't get the substance. And thus they fail when they try -- as one imagines Lucifer might do -- to manipulate the forms of religion to their own faithless ends.
And now, as Breda points out, we learn that young Levi has a tattoo -- the name Bristol on his ring finger -- right where a wedding band would -- will, one day, no doubt -- cover it. A picture is here. Hardly a sign of slight commitment.
The carps and cavils on sale these days at the Left's Idea Store seem rather worn and threadbare. Faded, obsolete, inadequate to the task. Just like the whole of their political program.
One thing you can say for them: at least they're consistent.
Consistently wrong.
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Friday September 5, 2008...
Pushback on Palin ::.
SEEMS TO BE THAT she was too rough handling Obama -- the word the Forehead is reported to have used is "sarcastic." Probably never heard the word "snarky." Heh.
Look that one up in your Funk and Wagnall's and there'll be pic of a certain other pistol-packin' redhead.
Um... Yes.
Funny -- funny "ha-ha," not funny "odd" -- how the Left can dish it out, but can't take it on behalf of the Obamamessiah.
Oh but doncha unnerstan' -- there's a dif'rence between evil, bitter, vicious, and vituperative lies designed to personally smear your opponent like a bug and sharp-tongued humor meant to illustrate the truth of your opponent's positions. They could probably deal with getting back the same they dished out. But this slice-with-a-smile stuff is hard to take.
I suppose. I also find it amusing that the Obama campaign now finds itself in the position of defending the honorable -- ::coughcough:: -- profession of "community activist" with a straight face.
OK. What am I missing, here?
Do you know what the fig leaf of the term "community activist" or "community organizer" covers?
Er... no. I guess not. I kinda assume it's something like a private-sector volunteer social worker.
Hardly. A so-called "community activist" is better known to people with historical perspective that goes back before -- say -- 1970 as a rabblerouser. A trouble maker. An agitprop. They engage in a great deal of persiflage designed to persuade their "clients" that they (the organizers) are selflessly working to better the clients' lives. But little they do actually serves to improve those lives. Instead, what all the effort accomplishes is to build a political power base for the activist.
Most activists come in one of two stripes -- they are religious zealots or they are marxist fronts.
Religious zealot...? Doesn't sound like you.
There's a big difference between Mother Theresa and Michael Pfleger.
Uh...? Oh. I get it. I think.
And you can see why the one is worthy of support, respect, and admiration, while the other is a despicable little beastie, bedevilling the lives of people he should be serving, but instead labors in a mighty frenzy to his own aggrandisement?
Yeah. Sure. Just never quite thought of it that way before.
Most people don't. Just as it is not at all uncommon to find political dastards wrapping themselves in the flag, there are true devils who hide behind a collar or under a wimple.
Wimple?
You'd look cute in one. Nuns used to wear them. They don't so much any more -- especially not the politically active ones.
But I degrease.
Obama's early resume entry as a community organizer -- which, before Palin called bullshit on him, was one of his major claims of qualification for office -- is the kind of sinecure that leftists carve out for themselves when they can't -- or won't -- get a real job. They used to be called patronage jobs, before the political spoils system purportedly went out of style (but really had to go underground). You can judge the value of the service by the condition of the community being --scorn quotes -- "organized."
Such an organizer is in reality an ankle-biting yappy mutt with pretensions to sheepdoghood, making a lot of noise, annoying people to no good end, and drawing rather attention to himself than to any real problems or viable solutions. The Democrat party and the Left are replete with them. They are funded by taxpayer money -- either in the form of grants or bureaucratic budgets. You can always spot one by the name of his organization. They always have these euphemistic neo-Marxist officialese names like Community Outreach Family Council that say nothing and cover a multitude of sins.
Individually, they accomplish little. Collectively, their ultimate aim is the socialization of America. They mean to bring every aspect of life -- from family life and parental discipline to the commercial relationships between buyer and seller to when where and how any person may worship or express his beliefs -- to bring these under the influence and control of the state. Of bureaucrats. Unelected, "professional" civil service workers, whose job it will be to manage your life. They are the camel's nose of socialism under the tent of unwary freedom.
They demand close watching, as they have this tendency, once entrenched, to corrupt everything they touch. ACORN, for example, gives every appearance of rendering American elections moot for their corruption. Already Chicago is most cynical about the validity of the voter rolls -- and has been for time out of mind. There are places in this country where all you can trust about a ballot box coming out of them is that it will be stuffed with Democrat ballots.
That's your community "organizer." And pace la Palin, they are responsible for a great deal -- just nothing defined in anything any reasonable person would recognize as law.
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Friday September 5, 2008...
Purpleflower Bush ::.
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Thursday September 4, 2008...
Mr. Newt and the NBC ::.
REPORTER DRONE. Finally! Someone in the glare of the media spotlight calls them on their mendacity. Somebody insists that they report the facts, instead of the "He said, she said" with no context, slanted to cast their guy in the best possibly light.
If you want to opine, write editorials. No problem. But if you're reporting the news, please do try to get the facts right.
::snortle:: Yeah. Right.
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Thursday September 4, 2008...
Love the Chin Pulling ::.
OVER THE YOUNG LADY Palin's putative exposure to the media. Such as Rush's sound-biting of Mark "Maxi" Shields. They seem to think the young woman is to be ashamed of her condition.
It's such a terrible thing (to the Left) for a young girl to be pregnant before she gets married. As though it never happens, and that it has on this occasion should disqualify Mother Palin from her run at the Vice-Presidency.
Maybe that's why they're so wedded to abortion. I mean, if this is worse than abortion, it must be pretty horrible, eh?
My understanding of the situation is that the woman and her intended have been planning to marry all along. And, in the words of someone close to the young man, "This is just a bonus." A blessed life.
So why should the media pecksniffs be so "concerned" that this shrinking violet (No doubt, her mother's daughter -- as in, "You know the difference between a hockey mom and a pitbull?") should even care what they think or say about her? Or that their -- scorn quotes -- "caring attentions" should not instead enrage her and set her (even more) firmly against them?
The rationalization of the sociopath -- "Look what you made me do!"
Class-sehh.
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Thursday September 4, 2008...
Idiots Unbound ::.
OR MAYBE Idiots Out-of-bounds.
Or maybe Idiots Inbound.
Eh?
INCOMING!
Oh. ::chuckle::
An idiot on Beldar's commented:
And if McCain had taken the time to investigate Palin himself, we wouldn't have to be doing it now in the public media.
You. Forking. Numbskull! McCain did vet Palin. He checked and considered those factors relevant to the office. The rest is none of your facesti business!
And all the chin-pulling and wittering about your "doubts" and "concerns" say more about your lackwittedness than anything else.
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Thursday September 4, 2008...
A Genius for the Obvious ::.
I AVOID POSTING on a lot of topics, because it seems to me that my take on them is the obvious one.
However, a lot of discussion I hear and read on some subjects leads me to believe that I am mistaken. Not in my take on the subjects -- heaven forfend -- but in my assumption of the obviousness of my take.
Of course, as Our Curmudgeon never tires of reminding me, the word "obvious" comes from the Graeco-Roman root meaning "My contact!" So, maybe... Whatever.
So I'm starting a new occasional and aperiodic feature, Genius for the Obvious.
Today's take: Health Care Financing.
Socialists and other left-leaning idiots like to talk about how universal health care is a Federal priority. Perhaps Priority One.
They lie. (Or they are fooling themselves. The outcome is the same in either case.)
Health care is universal. One may argue as to the levels of quality, but every person on the planet has available to them some measure of resources for the care of their health. In America -- by law -- a certain minimum standard of care is available to all, without regard to ability to pay.
This being the case, what is the Left on about?
Simple: they want universal third-party payer health -- scorn quotes -- "insurance." Preferably, Federal third-party, etc.
Take it as a given that the statistics bruited about to prove that this is needful or desirable are mendacious. Tendentiously so. Or don't. You are free to do your own research. But I assure you: you can trust me on this; they are.
Let us instead examine the economics in brief. You pay X dollars for your health care in a year. The value of X varies all over the patch, but is somewhere between $5 and $10 thousand. (According to this Wikipedia article, the per-capita expenditure on health care is $7,439.00.)
I don't pay that. My employer, the incorporated city of East College of the Americas, Ohio, does.
And that line-item appears where on a balance sheet?
Um... employee insurance?
I'm sure. It's tax-deductible. But it's charged against?
Um... personnel costs?
Specifically...?
::squeak:: Me?
Bingo! Whether it comes out of your pocket, or is justified by your value to the organization, in some way, you are paying for it. And that that fact needs to be concealed from you by legislative legerdemain should be instructive.
Now. How much of that $7,400 goes to doctors and other health professionals, and how much goes to insurance carriers?
Oh, hell! My insurance costs about $3600
Roughly half.
But they get discounts I couldn't get as an individual, so it's a wash.
Really? You think there's no cost to the so-called "insurance?"
Well, no.
In fact, insurance premiums are going up faster than the actual costs of services, in most cases, aren't they?
So what do you do?
Why do you need insurance at all?
To cover health care costs?
If your health care providers didn't have to maintain infrastructure and incur costs to service insurance company paperwork requirements, what do you expect would happen to the price of their services?
I'm clueless.
My family physician guessed he could cut his price for an office visit by two-thirds.
WTF!!1!
Indeed.
So, if you take a conservative estimate and say health care prices -- prices, not costs -- could be reduced by half in a single stroke, would you find that acceptable?
By eliminating insurance?
By eliminating the bias in the tax code toward third-party payers. Make the costs of insurance transparent to consumers. Tie the policy to the individual -- or the family -- and not to the employer.
Wouldn't that make the insurance more expensive?
For the same coverage, yes. But what do you think would happen?
Um... people would opt for less coverage, and pay more out-of-pocket?
Which is still tax-deductible if you itemize, right?
Right.
So it's revenue-neutral to the government.
Why's that important?
It's not. But the Left think it is, so we throw them a bone.
But what else do you think would happen?
People would price shop where they could.
Like, for example, you do now with your prescriptions.
I do?
Don't you get your scripts filled at Sam's or Wal-Mart? Because the total price is lower than your co-pay with your insurance card?
Of course! It only makes sense... Oh!
And what do you think would happen then?
The overall cost of health care would go down?
Right.
But wouldn't there be a... a... thing in the insurance sector?
And this would be a bad thing because...?
OK, so recap: whatsyerpoint?
Simple: eliminate the distorting bias in the tax code toward third-party payers. Allow individuals to deduct insurance premiums on their income taxes. Expand HSAs. Market forces will quickly exert downward pressure on health-care prices. More operations on the scale and style of the "minute clinic" will appear. The poor will have easier access to better, more-easily-afforded health care. Problem solved.
Why should the Left like this?
Oh, they won't. But the debate should reveal their true motive -- the expansion of their own power -- to their political detriment. This will exert market pressures on them to reform or go out of business.
A win-win-win.
Exactly.
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Thursday September 4, 2008...
Playset Inundated ::.
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Wednesday September 3, 2008...
All The Hoo-Raw ::.
OVER THE WEEKEND about how the GOP base is energized by the Palin pick, and the utterly brilliant performances la Palin has delivered, reminds me of something that happened in my patch of business back in the '80s.
You might recall.
There was this tour. A new-media darling had taken a different tack from the "normal" dinosaur corporate record company path-to-fame and garnered a fanatical following by gigging at -- gasp! -- shopping malls! What. A. Maverick!
And she went on tour and got a record out and blew doors.
And then she was headlining major venues -- like a national act or something.
And -- this was while Like a Virgin was still in the record stores as current product -- was accorded the one-name treatment.
Her name was Tiffany.
Her opening act -- for the first half of the tour -- was a boy band. The New Kids on the Block.
For the second half of the tour, she was opening for them.
Just giving the people what they wanted.
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Wednesday September 3, 2008...
If You Think Palin's ::.
EXPERIENCE AS mayor of a small town is dispositively and significantly inadequate, you keep on running her down for it.
But I would advise you first to find that map from the last Presidential election -- the one that shows the red/blue map of the country by counties.
All that red.
Small towns.
Go right ahead. Shoot yourself in the foot.
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Wednesday September 3, 2008...
When the Negative Types ::.
ARGUE THAT SARAH Palin has no foreign policy experience -- considering her tenure as governor of a state with all international borders -- I think what they really mean is that she hasn't any experience with the Federal Department of State.
Which -- I'm sorry -- I can't see as being a detriment. After all, look at how the Stockholm Syndrome overtook Condi Rice. And how fast it did.
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Wednesday September 3, 2008...
All the Skidmarks ::.
IN THE SEAT OF the BVDs of American Politics...
Those would be the Kos Kidz?
The very ones.
...have decided it's good politics -- in the sense of persuading people to your point of view -- to attack a pregnant, unmaried, teenaged young woman.
Uh-huh.
Fortunately, things -- and people -- are tougher in Alaska.
Compare and contrast:
Barry -- and his cohort -- believe that for a young woman to become pregnant outside of an ideal situation is a tragedy. In BHO's words, the girl is being "Punished with a baby."
So the solution would be to run to the nearest Planned Parenthood clinic and terminate the innocent life.
The Palins report being rocked back at first by the news. Yes, it's less-than-ideal. But you don't -- if you're an adult human being, and not some public-dole suckling pig -- wail and moan about circumstances you can bear. Instead, you deal.
And that appears that is what the family is doing. The young lady will marry the baby's father -- as should be -- and no doubt there will be all measure of appropriate support from family, friends, and community, tempered with the expectation that the happy couple will make every attempt to stand on their own two -- well, four -- feet.
When conservatives speak of "choice," this is the kind they mean. Not the choice to murder your child because his advent is inconvenient, but the choice, taken with the decision to engage in sex, to accept the outcome of the activity with equanimity. To step up and take responsibility, come what may.
As opposed to seeking a license to kill off the inconvenient blastoma.
I think you mean blastula.
You go right on ahead thinking that.
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Wednesday September 3, 2008...
You Know What ::.
SCARES ME ABOUT Sarah Palin? Sooner or later, she's going to do the Cincinnatus thing.
Pray to God there'll be another leader like her in the wings, ready to take the stage when that happens.
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Wednesday September 3, 2008...
Light, Shadow, Mass, Color, Texture ::.
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Tuesday September 2, 2008...
Didn't Get As Much Done ::.
MONDAY AS I'D HOPED but that always happens. I'd hoped to at least get some sanding done, but -- except for the part about using a belt sander as a shaping tool -- not so much. In fact, I didn't even get to set sawtooth to the plywood.
I started with the maple and that's as far as I got.
Sunday, I glued up a three-fours maple board to some scants of 7/16" birch plywood. This is meant to raise the top of the maple board level with the birch ply in the counter-top. This particular board is to serve as a false window sill at the back of the cabinet.
When upon calculating all the necessary dimensions of these cabinets, I realized that the height of the things would bring them 2" above the windowsill, I knew I had to make some arrangement to allow access to the window sash itself, so it could be opened and closed. This board is that arrangement. It's cut away across the width of the window, and the edge will be chamfered to soften the corner, thus allowing that needed space for a person to get his hands in there. Toni's not entirely pleased with the arrangment, but I left it too late to check -- work done last weekend gives impetus to her objection and the remedy of that is just too complicated to contemplate.
The making of this board took a good deal more time than I meant it to. First I had to make a template of MDF, no mean feat in and of itself, considering the nonexistence of my shop in which to do such things. But I pulled it off. Then I made what could have been a horrible mistake in cutting the rough cut with the sabre saw, which was magnified when I followed the wrong course using the piloted cutoff bit in the router to fair the edge.
A brief session with the belt sander and some 50-grit fixed that, but it delayed me to the point I was lucky to get all the other boards cut. Sanding and routing remains to be done on all of the maple, and I still need to rip and cope the birch ply.
Then comes the trick I'm going to have to pull -- eurethaning large boards and keeping the cats from walking on them. That'll be a neat trick, it will.
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Tuesday September 2, 2008...
I Don't Ordinarily ::.
MAKE TOOL RECOMMENDATIONS because I don't feel myself expert enough for them to have any weight. This thing, however, leads me to believe my lack of throw weight is immaterial. It's called the Router Buddy and is available from Parts Express.
It's designed to provide an easy circle jig for speaker cabinet makers. But the easy-setup undermount edge guide coupled with the circle ability -- and the ability to accept standard Porter Cable-style template guide bushings makes it quite possibly the substitute base for a hand-held router. If yours is one of those supported, and you don't already have one, get one.
Mine came Saturday, and when I got to the routing parts of Monday's cutting chores, it saved my bacon. I'm in love with the thing like no other tool accessory.
So there.
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Tuesday September 2, 2008...
Anabelle ::.
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Monday September 1, 2008...
Infrastructure Progress ::.
BUILDING ON THE PROGRESS made last week, I'm taking advantage of the three-day weekend to forge ahead on the countertop of the east wall base cabinets.
When I did the window seat, the 1x2 ribs were a bit more ad hoc. This time, I've formalized the structure.
The standard interval is 6 inches on centers. Where that pattern is broken, the reason as follows.
The board that's pieced around the wire-access hole in the foreground is there to support the bottom of the bookshelf that will stand above. There is support built into the cabinet below it all the way to the floor, and I will continue that all the way up to the cabinets at the ceiling.
I realize I'm probably over-engineering things. It's a function of my ignorance. I have no clue how much weight any particular structure can take, so the simplest thing for me to do is not even try to bridge support for what I perceive as big weight. I think 300-600 pounds of books (plus the shelving itself) counts.
Then... I'm piecing the finished top together. The part in front of the window, which will be fully exposed, will be a single piece 48" long. The right and left ends are shorter pieces cut out of another 48" sheet. (Half-inch birch plywood.) The long lateral piece in front of the window will support the edge of the plywood where it will be framed by 3/4" maple, which in turn will be cutaway to allow access to the window. (The top of the counter is 2¼ above the windowsill.)
To cover my probable clumsiness in edge-joining two pieces of plywood, there will be ¾" bands of maple between the center piece of birch and the end pieces. The front and near end edge of the countertop will be maple. All relevant edges will be chamfered to match the door edges.
Planned for Monday is to cut and shape all the various remaining bits and pieces, dry-fit them, then start sanding and finishing.
With luck, this stage of the project will be finished next weekend and I'll be able to start on the drawers.
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Monday September 1, 2008...
Siamon in the Window ::.
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Saturday August 30, 2008...
LOLs ::.
(LITTLE OLD LADIES, that is), at the McDonald's breakfast club this morning chortling over la Palin's selection for GOP Veep. Allowed as how she's gonna kick Biden's ass in the VP debates. Heh.
Best line so far, I think, is a commenter at Rachel's, who writes, "She's a Heinlein character come to life."
True dat.
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Oh! And my favorite Little Known Sarah Palin Fact:
Sarah Palin will pry your Klondike bar from your cold dead fingers.
OK, there's this:
Sarah Palin doesn’t need a gun to hunt. She has been known to throw a bullet through an adult bull elk.
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Saturday August 30, 2008...
Do the Math, ::.
WOULD YOU? Obama's folk are saying Sarah Palin doesn't have enough experience...
When he started campaigning, Obama had been in the Senate for... 143 days.
Palin has been governor of Alaska (the largest state in the country) for two years. That's over 700 days.
Barry. M'man. Do you really want to get into this pissing match? 'Cause I suspect your isn't long enough to go up against this girl.
This kick-ass American chick.
Still...
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THE DEMOCRAT talking points got out there fast. Or maybe they didn't and that's why they're all echoing the mistaken point of the Obama campaign.
Governor Palin has more experience as an executive (adminstrator, i.e., President analog) than any of the other three candidates.
When Senator Obama first knocked on William Ayers' door to launch his political career, Sarah Palin had already been in elective office five years.
Sure, she was nine years old when Joe Biden first entered the Senate. But then, that seemed to the Obama campaign to be a reasonable excuse...
Ah, the audacity of lies.
It's kinda sad, innit, that the Democrats have to lie to get by. That the truth just won't serve them. Even when it might, they still go for the default lie.
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Saturday August 30, 2008...
Some Thinking Points ::.
HERE Pleasantly not-surprised by McCain's pick of Sarah Palin for veep. That is to say I thought her the best choice of the lot on the table. The also-rans are bruised fruit -- too easy for the Left to run against. Bobby Jindal -- rightly so -- refused to abandon his promise to stay in Luzianna. He'll be around down the road. Tim Pawlenty might have been a fair choice, but Palin has so much going for her, that she would have been hard to pass up.
Seems to me that there's a signal here from McCain. He's been telling us for a long time that he's learned his lesson on those point where he strayed from the libertarian-conservative reservation. He's been talking a good fight on almost every subject but global warming. And we've been saying back, like the whole movement was from Missouri, instead of just Rush, "Show me." Deeds speak louder than words.
So he picks a running mate, a woman, western governor, pro-gun, pro-life, pro-business, married to the oil business, understands intimately the damage the eco-maniac movement has done and will do to the country -- and how wrong it is on all questions relating to the environment -- a real, liberty-oriented conservative.
And, at the same time, blows the Democrats out of the water on so many fronts. The Democrats have dissed women. It's a Republican woman who will break the highest, hardest glass ceiling in the country. (And I'll bet she'll run for and be elected President at the end of McCain's term(s).) She has more administrative experience than either Democrat candidate. She speaks more truth and with more sense than a million Al Gores -- and most inconveniently for the Left.
It would seem that McCain has reversed Nixon's old dictum by running left in the primaries and right in the general -- and he looks to win.
Let me just say: "Tee." And also, "Hee."
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Friday August 29, 2008...
GagMe ::.
FOX RADIO NEWS passed this turd Thursday morning. The reporterette drew a parallel between Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have A Dream" speech and B. Hussein Obama's nomination as the latter being a realization of the former.
Not so fast, Nancy.
Because contradicting that contention is the the rest of the verse that goes, "...that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."
Because, if you judge Barack Obama on the content of his character, he is in no wise fit to be President of these United States. It is only -- SOLELY -- by the color of his skin that he has even been considered for any office. He is the ultimate, the very apotheosis of affirmative action.
Poor ol' Dr. King is probably spun up to such a rev as to promise a new "alternative" energy source.
You don't maybe think that was the point?
I wouldn't give them that much credit.
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Friday August 29, 2008...
Found On Brigid's ::.
SIDEBAR, the text of this placard inspired me to produce something worth reproducing.
Make free.
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Friday August 29, 2008...
Immenent Ambush ::.
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Thursday August 28, 2008...
Happy Anniversary ::.
TONI AND I used to kid that we couldn't remember exactly the date of our wedding. The ceremony happened on a Friday (the mayor's office, Cincinnati), and the reception on Saturday (Dollar Bill's Saloon, Cincinnati), August of 1982. The joke was we couldn't remember the date. Was it the 26th? The 27th? Or the 28th.
Well, Mom and Baby Sister -- who were there -- have sent greetings, so it must be official. It was the 27th.
Which makes the anniversary yesterday. And you in the dog house.
So perspicatious, you are, Dolly.
So it's been 26 years, which I hear tell is an accomplishment in itself. And we're still friends. Wow!
Happy Anniversary, Wif.
Love, Hub.
I looked it up on a perpetual calendar -- in't the Intarwebz wunnerful? That Friday was the 27th and Saturday the 28th. I'll try to make a note of it. For the next 26 years.
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Thursday August 28, 2008...
Loki Avoiding the Flash ::.
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Wednesday August 27, 2008...
No. They. Should. Not. ::.
INSTY SAYS in concluding this post about lowering the drinking age. (Topic: ::yawn::.)
Somebody should really ask the Presidential candidates about this.
We've got to get past this yearning for a Good King to Save Us All. Doesn't exist, and wishing really, really hard won't make a socialist agitprop from Chicago or the statist loose cannon from the Navy into one.
The lawful drinking age is not a matter for the Federal government. Says so right here on the outside of the box. It's. None. Ofthe. President's. Business.
A caller on the WKRC morning show Tuesday drive time had it dead right. This whole clamoring for the President to be a national Daddy is offensive. The President's job is to administer the government and defend the nation. It's not to be national referee of every petty squabble, it's not to impose your vision of utopia on me or any of your other fellow citizens.
Now, I suspect, based on a lot of news I've been hearing lately that, were a Republican to run on essentially Ronaldus Magnus' program, he or she would win in a 57-state landslide. The mood of the country seems that strongly conservative.
And yet, RINO politicians keep droppin' 'em into the left legs of their boxers.
Er... ::wobbita:: ... Uh, yeah.
Buttcherpoint?
But my point, as the Doll says. Whenever somebody says or does something even marginally brilliant, speaks unusual truth to reactionary power, or just evinces ordinary common sense, a shout goes up to run the poor schlub for President. Every four years, we focus on the election of the Chief Adminstrator as though this personage could -- or should -- have any kind of positive effect on our quotidian lives.
Stop it.
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Wednesday August 27, 2008...
James Carville Famously ::.
COINED THE PHRASE for the '92 Clinton war room, "It's the economy, Stupid."
These days, those who oppose Barack! Obama (Savior of the Universe!) find themselves tarred with the "racist" brush.
The proper rejoinder to the slander being, "It's your policies, Stupid!"
Not to mention your stupid policies.
That's sort of implicit, there, Dolly.
WHAT. EVerrrr.
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Wednesday August 27, 2008...
Kool Ade Drinker ::.
ON HANNITY ON TUESDAY tries to spin William Ayers' terrorist leanings by citing Fact Check dot org.
WTH, I'm on the 'Net, I cruise over there.
Right up there at the top: "Annenberg Political Fact Check."
Yeah. There's a reliable source.
Gabrielle Francesca East (Dolly) | |
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Wednesday August 27, 2008...
Michelle Ma Belle ::.
SAYS OF BARRY O, "Instead of going to Wall Street, Barack went to work in the neighborhood." Right out of school.
See. This is the problem with the Left. They think this is a good thing.
Barry. Couldn't get a job doing -- you know -- real stuff. So he got a sinecure making trouble in poor neighborhoods because -- you know -- poor people are too stupid to take care of themselves, so they need some condescending limousine liberal to spread rose petals and palm fronds in their paths.
On the taxpayer's dime.
As I often say, "non-profit" is a dirty word. "Community service" isn't if you get paid for it. A life on the public dole is not noble -- just the opposite -- and not made any more so by cloaking it in professionalist set-dressing and Marxist dialectic.
This is what comes of not standing socialists up against a wall.
Bit over the top, there, Dolly.
Really? Do they extend you and yours the same consideration?
Well... No.
Kyew. Ee. Fuckin'-Dee.
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Wednesday August 27, 2008...
Siamon Flakes Out ::.
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Tuesday August 26, 2008...
Ted Koppel Asked ::.
SEAN HANNITY a most cogent question Monday afternoon. The two were in Hannity's broadcast booth at the Pepsi Center for the Democrat shindig out there in Denver. Teddy asked Sean: "What's going on here?"
Sean had a cute answer, bringing to mind a Busby Berkley water ballet routine. But I have a better one, I think:
NOTHING OF SUBSTANCE
Used to be a convention was to -- you know -- convene the faithful, poll their sentiment, choose a candidate, and rev up the troops for the coming campaign.
Nowadays, they do all of that via telecommute.
And it's typical of the Left in this country that they're so far behind the times, and so hypocritical on their own hot-button issues, that they'll hold the damned goat screw anyway -- all the while protesting how "green" the event is going to be.
Tip fer y'all -- the money's only green on one side.
Failing to mention, of course, that the greenest thing they could do would be to not hold the damned thing at all -- it being pointless and everything -- and just ... phone it in.
You say that like they're not just going through the motions as it is.
Oh, Democrats are famous for that. All the arm-waving and such without accomplishing squat? Oh, yeah. They be past masters at that. It's practically all they're good for.
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Tuesday August 26, 2008...
B. Hussein Obama ::.
RAILS ANGRILY at those who -- he thinks -- question his patriotism: "Don't you DARE question my patriotism or suggest that I am less patriotic than you!"
Poo' bebbeh! Did somebody huht your widdle feewings?
And Squirelly shoots back, "I'm not questioning his patriotism; I'm questioning his judgement!"
All well and good, but, as the Good Baron du Toit observed some time ago, by their actions and stated desires, Democrats -- especially those in elected office -- even more especially those in Federal elected office -- are forsworn of their oaths, engaged in making war (politics being war by passive-aggressive means) on the People, the nation, and the Constitution of the United States, seeking to alter the Constitution by unconstitutional subversions and perversions of the institutions of government and society. They are, in short, traitors -- in fact, if not in law. And a traitor, by definition, cannot be patriotic.
And B. Hussein Obama, by his Marxist public policy prescriptions is also urging on America the shackles of the greatest evil this world has ever known.
So -- pace McCain -- yes, I am questioning Obama's patriotism. More: I point the finger -- J'accuse! -- at Obama and shout it from the rooftops. The man is a bloody traitor.
Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Barry.
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Tuesday August 26, 2008...
Just Like Liberals ::.
MISCRO-SOFT in denial about the facts of the matter and the demands of the market. This will be studied in B-School seminars for decades as the textbook case of why you shouldn't try to move a market -- you don't have the mass, the throw-weight necessary to do it. Not even if you're Microsoft. Or the U.S. federal government.
Remember that when you direct your vote for President and Congress this fall. They can't -- can NOT -- have a positive influence on the market. All they can do is muck it up.
The ["Hello! I'm a Mac."] ads, which have become part of popular culture, have helped boost Leopard sales and may be partly responsible for the widely held perception that Windows Vista is cumbersome and hard to use. Few businesses have upgraded to Vista from Windows XP, citing concerns about Vista's cost, compatibility with older software and intrusive security features.
Gee! So you don't think that the perceptions that Vista is cumbersome, hard to use, intrusive, and welded to DRM and the DMCA have to do with the fact that it actually is cumbersome, hard to use, intrusive, and welded to DRM and the DCMA? Couldja 'splain that?
Why in the world they have abandoned XP is beyond me. But here's my bill of indictment against Vista:
I am a content creator. I do not want or need an operating system that is so thick that it won't let me duplicate DVDs of my own property! Until I hear that Microsoft allows users to disable DRM, I will not ever use Windows Vista -- or its successors.
I'm sure the rest of you have your own reasons.
I'm sure that there is an investment of millions -- even billions -- wasted in developing Vista that needs to be recouped. I just don't see or agree that cutting off a sure seller in favor of a gold-plated turd is the best way to get there.
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Tuesday August 26, 2008...
Rommie ::.
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Monday August 25, 2008...
It's How I Get Things ::.
DONE I obsess. OK, I concentrate. To the point of obsession.
Sometimes it works.
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Monday August 25, 2008...
Glides ::.
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Saturday August 23, 2008...
It's If Joe ::.
HEARD IT ON THE RADIO, read it on some blogs. At 3:00AM, the Obama campaign announced that the pick for Vice President is to be Joe Biden. Savor the light weight of that -- 3:00AM on a Saturday, announced via a text message. How much more unserious is it possible to get? What more evidence do you need that the modern Democrat party is dominated by dorm-room bullshit artists?
And I should make it clear, here, that I have less than no respect for Joe Biden.
Aside from the negatives the press will pounce on -- the plagiarism, the fact that he's from a small state with -- what? -- a half an electoral vote?, that he's a perennial also-ran and how many times can you be a loser in a national contest before you become a laughingstock? -- I think he has the worst possible combination for a man in power: he's smug, arrogant, and stupid.
Not ignorant, mind you, he's probably quite well-briefed on any number of subjects (a mile wide and a millimeter deep). No, it's that his words and deeds fail to comport with reality or good sense. He is deeply stupid. A political idiot, in love with the sound of his own voice.
When I say that the Left has been 180 degrees out of phase with reality or the right choice on every single question of public policy virtually since Rousseau fell out of his tree and knotted up his noble savage loincloth, it's men such as Joe Biden to whom I am referring. (Al Gore is another.)
Essentially, John McCain just won the election. All that remains is for the electorate to start to realize it.
One hopes that, with the expanded exposure Biden will garner on the campaign trail, that realization will come early and easy.
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Friday August 22, 2008...
Fought the Good Fight ::.
WITH THE WASHER, which amounted to taking it apart, cleaning various parts, and reassembling it. Nothing wrong I could see, and a low-load test (water only) seemed to indicate it would work. But you never know. For now, I feel like I won.
Hope so. I wanted to get some laundry done this weekend.
I'll keep you posted.
Meantime, I've been without my laptop for about a month. Its display just ... stopped working. Figure out what it was and found somebody local to fix it. Dell was giving me a ration of go-away. I really don't like that, because it means I may have to find a new hardware vendor, and there doesn't seem to be much choice out there. Sigh.
They're picking it up from me at work tomorrow and promise to have it back to me within a week -- at a lower price than Dell would charge me just to look at it.
I can honestly admit to being excited about it. It'll almost be like getting a new 'puter.
I hope.
I'll keep you posted.
You do that.
Update: Lappy is off to the repair shop. Fingers crossed. And the washing machine works. Ran a load yesterday. Oh frabjous day!
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Friday August 22, 2008...
Loki and the Cat Dancer ::.
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Thursday August 21, 2008...
There Must Be a Corollary ::.
TO MURPHY'S LAW that goes something like, Any part you save will be thrown out just long enough prior to need that you won't remember whether you did.
I can picture that damned coupling sitting in any one of a half-dozen places, but it ain't there. </dennishopper>
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Thursday August 21, 2008...
I Don't Know Why ::.
ANY OF THIS comes as any surprise to anyone but the worst suckling piglets and the willfully blind.
Biofuels -- not so much.
It is possible -- desirable, even -- to draw a general truth from these and myriad other lessons: Government is not the answer. Government is not the solution. Government is the problem, The trick is to get to the minimum necessary -- the MINIMUM (take a breath) NESS EH SARY -- government. Not the minimum acceptable. Not the compromise between good and ill -- how good is a slight ill? Not "half-a-loaf." The. Minimum. Necessary.
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Thursday August 21, 2008...
I Always Snerkle ::.
IN THOSE ODD moments when it hits me that the same crowd who do the dozens on creationists (Hey! Here's a notion: prove that creation and evolution are mutually exclusive -- Bishop Ussher notwithstanding.), have so much trouble with the notion that they might be witnessing evolution in action.
Or that people or societies might -- oh, I dunno -- evolve all their ownsomes with nary a trace of government coercion as motive.
There is that as well.
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Thursday August 21, 2008...
Wall ::.
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Wednesday August 20, 2008...
Well, THERE's ::.
YOUR PROJECTION!
When anyone who is not a Democrat or a liberal succeeds at anything ... a liberal will tell you it is because they cheated.--a reader at Boortz
And why is that? Anyone? Dolly?
Because cheating is all liberals know. So they project their own mental Rorschacht blots on everyone else and assume ever'body cheatin'.
Bingo!
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Wednesday August 20, 2008...
If It's Joe ::.
BIDEN IT'S over. I mean, Obama's already shown he's a lightweight. If he picks the Stupidest Man in the Senate -- Joe Biden -- it'll be Dumb and Dumber running on the Left, and Squirrelly couldn't ask for weaker opponents.
I wouldn't be so sure about that, Alger.
How so, Dolly?
Well, the Democrats have demonstrated pretty handily that they're incompetent, wrong-headed, and -- frankly -- not too bright. Over-educated nincompoops. Been that way since Jefferson and Jackson first went their separate ways.
So?
So, if competence, real intelligence, and common sense mattered to Democrat voters, they'd -- to paraphrase St. Ann -- be Republicans.
Touché. Point: Dolly.
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Wednesday August 20, 2008...
A Site Worth Keeping ::.
AN EYE on: America in the World.
I'm not sure this would go over as anything but poor, poor, pitiful me whingeing if it were to come from an American, so that it comes from a Brit strikes just the right tone, I think.
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IS 