With the world scheduled to come to end sometime tomorrow, I thought I’d be clear out the Firefox tabs I’ve had open for a while now and end on a clean slate. So, in somewhat random order (think of it as the William Boroughs Cut-Up Method of cut and pasting!), here goes:
- At the Anchoress’s blog, is revisionist punctuation “A Menace to Our Way of Life?” If so, I’d say it’s time to Eat, Shoot & Leave the offending periods and semicolons.
- DaTechGuy spots the left blowing a gasket that Texas conservatives are rewriting the leftwing revisionist textbooks of the past forty years or so. How dare you revise our revisionism — only we’re allowed to control history here in Oceania!
- Speaking of those who view 1984 as a user’s guide to power, Steve Hayward explores the Left’s omnipresent Totalitarian Temptation. Why is it so easy for them to fall in love with Big Brother?
- OK, one more riff on Orwell’s 1984. City Journal breaks down “The Washington Diet,” which for schoolkids will be enforced via two-way telescreens, with automated morning wake-up calls for the more tardy of the Airstrip One Youth League, if need be.
- The Politico on “Obama the Desperate.” Let’s hope we see a lot of these headlines between now and November of 2012.
- David Boaz of the Cato Institute quotes George Will on the self-described anarchists of Europe, “Anti-government mobs composed almost entirely of government employees going berserk about threats to their entitlements!” But other than being officially on the government payroll, anarchy and Big Government has always historically gone together like fist and glove.
- “Governor Cuomo says gay marriage is one of his top three priorities. Mayor Bloomberg says it is his number one priority.” Wow, who knew that building more bike lanes wasn’t Mayor Mike’s number one priority when it comes to the social re-engineering of Manhattan?
- “Prince Charles says Americans eat too much steak.” And they often live in unsightly giant McMansions, too. Though rarely as large as this one, with its enormous carbon footprint. For shame!
- “Same Roger Ebert Who Sees Coded Racism in ‘Food Stamps’ Publishes Excuse for Director’s Pro-Nazi Rant On His Journal.” For once though, Cannes had more sense.
- “In China, some new cities are ghost towns.” Thomas Friedman could not be reached for comment. But ahh, the remarkable efficiency of central planning.
- Investor’s Business Daily asks, “Has anyone stopped to think of what the world would be like if the environmentalists were in charge?” Wait, they’re not?
- “Believing in BBC’s ethos is equivalent to a faith, job tribunal rules.” Well, much of the left is the equivalent of an alternative religion, so that’s not too surprising.
Finally, “TV Ownership Down in America, Nielsen Says.” But James Lileks looks back fondly to when it was a way of life, complete with its own bible. But check out the letters from readers that were printed in the TV Guide from 1968 that Lileks is digitizing. As Lileks notes, “Compare to modern YouTube pages. Of course they got ranting stuff written in crayon on butcher paper, but in those days there were mechanisms in place to suppress those things, not give them a platform to be viewed by millions.”
This one is fun:
My compliments to ABC News. They needed only an hour and a half to tell us what happened at the Republican convention; it took CBS and NBC all evening long. Also, Gore Vidal and William F. Buckley added a great deal of interest and, in most cases, understanding.
Mrs. Cal Heathman, Champaign, Ill.
Gore’s red-lining the Godwin meter and presumably declaring this week’s coming fascist state to America along the way certainly added a great deal of interest as well.
See you later today, tomorrow, and — with a little luck, possibly Sunday as well. But I’m definitely taking my Popeil Pocket Mezuzah everywhere I go on Saturday to avoid being smited, just to be on the safe side.
(Concept via Jimmie Bise.)
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