paralepsis

Here's what: No matter what they say, the Bush administration will always, always , ALWAYS use any authority Congress gives them. Chris Dodd should have known better : In the mortgage rescue bill, the Treasury Department was given authority to buy major stakes in the two mortgage giants — if it had to. But Paulson, until recently, predicted that the government would not need to get federal money involved in propping up Fannie and Freddie. Just the ability to do so, he suggested, would be enough to calm the market. "We certainly accepted him at his word that this was going to be all that was necessary," Dodd said, adding that the administration has now "used that authority aggressively." Dodd said that he would be more wary of Paulson's words in the future. "Fool me once, your fault; fool me twice, my fault." [emphasis added] Uh huh. Now, I don't necessarily oppose the Fannie/Freddie thing. Unlike the Iraq war, something along these lines was ...

Sent today: So Charlie Gibson has scored the first interview with Palin after the GOP convention. Congratulations! But I wonder why they chose Gibson. Today on Fox News, a McCain spokesman said he will only release Palin to the media when he's convinced they will be "deferential" to her. If you are at all deferential, you should be ashamed of yourselves. Charlie Gibson's pre-convention interview with John McCain was a softball suck-up interview of the first order: a shameful piece of puffery. I imagine they've chosen Gibson to interview Palin because they expect the same kid-glove treatment. But the American people want some answers. So my suggestion is this: spare us the domestic soap-opera distractions. Don't ask anything about Bristol's pregnancy. Don't ask about the First Dude's snowmobile. Don't ask about Trig's Down syndrome. Don't ask about Track's deployment. Instead, how about this? Ask about issues. A...

I'm just a heartbeat away from the presumptive nominee.

for the folks at MyDD Barack Obama did not raise your gas prices. Barack Obama did not ship your job to Mexico. Barack Obama did not write your sermons. Barack Obama did not deny your habeas corpus. Barack Obama did not cast your primary vote and Barack Obama did not dismiss your primary vote. Barack Obama did not raise your interest rates. Barack Obama did not send that letter you wouldn't open for days because you knew what was in it but thought it might go away if you waited long enough only it didn't. Barack Obama did not foreclose on your house. Barack Obama did not protect your perverted priest. Barack Obama did not deny your claim. Barack Obama did not key your car. Barack Obama did not call you sweetie, probably, and if he did, he meant it to be nice. Barack Obama did not beat up your kid. Barack Obama did not deny your choice. Barack Obama did not steal your lunch money. Barack Obama did not cause the Sichuan earthquake or Cyclone Na...

Why are the evil Darwinists so much more popular than me?

As a short counter to the recent exercise in triviality, how about I encourage us all to do something of consequence? Namely, help free Sami Al-Arian , an actual political prisoner in America, currently held in Howard County, Maryland. I first heard of Al-Arian because I briefly encountered his son Abdullah, who was a student at Duke when I taught there. Back in 2002, Abdullah Al-Arian was smeared in the Duke Chronicle as "the son of a widely suspected terrorist," and I was among those who wrote outraged letters in response. Sami Al-Arian's story is complicated, but the recent history is this: he was arrested in 2003 along with three other men but the government's case against him was poor; according to Wikipedia , "Of fifty-one charges against the four men, not one resulted in a conviction." He pled guilty to a single charge but is still in prison in violation of the government's agreement. He's been on hunger strike since March 3, 2008, and h...

Added: Wow, this post got long. It's like kairosfocus gives everything he touches a proximate case of his own logorrhea. Warning: do not read this post. It is by definition without consequence, as it's about a character what goes by the name kairosfocus , whose blog, though astonishingly voluminous, is even less important than mine . Although his own blog is but a filibuster in an empty room, kairosfocus also spends a lot of time posting on other (mainly Christian) blogs. As Jon Rowe puts it , he's in the habit of writing "book-length ponderous posts" in strident defense of his strange views. kairosfocus typically doesn't really win an argument. He simply wears his opponent out. In the process, he inevitably accuses them of some combination of the following: "selective hyperskepticism" ad hominem red herrings strawmen These accusations are often couched as painful observations and noted with a characteristic "sadly." But there...

I must have recorded this some years ago. Found it on microcassette and transcribed. One day a flying lizard was going in a fierce place called Fierce Desert , and it heard something very very fierce. What are you doing with that? I’m just — OK, done. And then it woke up a sleeping lizard. The sleeping lizard was grunting. And — can you record that again? I’m recording, I’m recording now. Keep going. And then, the fierce lizard just ate it like it eats a snake. Snake chomped up by the hungry lizard. And then it tried to eat it. And then he killed it! Is that the end of the story? No it isn’t! OK . Cause there’s a crocodile! Right . And it kept eating until its mouth was full. Of snake. [eating sounds] Then what? Then, the crocodile came. And it tried to — bited itself — and it bited with the slimy lizard — and then it killed it. [killing sounds] It kept eating until t...

On NPR's Weekend Edition this morning, Scott Simon delivers a commentary about the recent exposure of gang-banger "memoir" Love and Consequences by Margaret Jones (actually Margaret Seltzer). Simon observes that "the book is a fraud, but Ms. Seltzer came within hours of of being on NPR." Wrong . In fact, Jones/Seltzer did make it onto NPR's syndicated show "On Point," and the show followed with an hour-long, hand-wringing examination of how they got punked in the first place. But that minor error is nothing compared to what happens next. Simon quotes Seltzer making up some bullshit about her life and observes (my transcript of the online audio): Now if some Brooklyn or London novelist had written a story set among drug gangs and uttered those words, people might have dismissed them as pretentious nonsense. Put those sentences into a so-called memoir, people call it "gritty and real," or "raw, tender, and tough-minded,...

My brother lives in Singapore, where I spent a lovely Christmas. We're twins, so we look alike (except that he's in shape, so I look like my brother in a funhouse mirror). He's been learning Chinese and singing Chinese songs in Singapore karaoke bars. Here is is singing an acoustic version of the pop song Xiao Wei : Also, if you don't know it, tune in to Radio Otherfunk . Their Darwin Day episode was my first contact, but I've been catching up on previous broadcasts since I heard it. Fantastic stuff: worth the time.