NOVATOWNHALL

Nature and music. First the music -

My wife and I are fortunate in so many ways it is impossible to quantify, but one is our respective cultural inheritances, which are inarguably excellent. Just like I’ve got the great musician, Paul Cebar, who attended my obscure college while I was there, Linda has The Clarks, who attended her equally obscure school while she was there. We make it a point to go see both of them every convenient opportunity.

This week our trek was to Dewey Beach, Delaware to see The Clarks at the Bottle and Cork - which is, incidentally, a really, really good bar: large, open-air, friendly and cheap.

I can’t classify The Clarks because I am not a rock critic and am frankly an old man, but I will just say they are an original rock act (did a cover of Springsteen’s The River on Thursday, but that’s the only cover I’ve seen them do) with an exuberant quality, an outrageously good lead singer, and just a very fun sound …. which explains the fantasticly loyal fan base this Pittsburgh band has throughout the mid-Atlantic region.

To get the sense of their style, go here and watch “Shimmy Low” under the “Video” section.

The Clarks did a kick-ass show opening for Sister Hazel who I never heard of before on account of my boutique (read “old man”) musical repetoire. By far the majority of the audience were there for The Clarks, I can say. Hopefully the Bottle and Cork will have them back as the lead act and give them a little more time in the future. Sister Hazel was quite good, though, rock in a similar vein.

Definitely check out The Clarks if you get the chance. I guarantee you will like them.

Here are the rock and roll photos for my wife’s photo album:

Scott Blasey

Greg Joseph

Dave Minarik

Rob James

ELSEWHERE IN DELAWARE ….

My sleeping habits being what they are, I woke up well before dawn and could not get back to sleep, so I went driving around to check out the fishing scene.

This is sunrise at the Indian River inlet. Note the seagull over the rising sun, Digital Camel dudes. ART, my friends.

Here are the fishermen heading off down the jetty. Wish I was going with them, but that is a trip for another day.

The liberals are screwing up the country and things look very bleek on the horizon.  Things are going black and I thought of the Amish (isn’t this considered natural progression of thought?)  I was looking at the similarities between the two and was astounded.  Let me give you some examples.

The Amish immigrated from Switzeland to Pennsylvania because of intense persecution.

Liberals migrated to the cities for the same reason and to avoid recognition.

The Amish are high on humility and reject pride, arrogance and haughtiness.

Liberals do the same-only backwards!

Amish minimize contact with the outside world to avoid corruption.  Basically work from home.

Liberals work from home and avoid contact with conservatives so that they may make contact with the outside world with the purpose to corrupt.

The Amish shun their own when they do not become members of the church.

Liberals shun their own because they want to and can.

Amish believe in large families and consider themselves accountable to the Lord for the spritual welfare of their children.

Liberals like large families also because it adds to the tax base.  They feel accountable (as well as social services) for the overall welfare of YOUR children.

The Amish minimize the needs and ownership of modern technologies except for emergencies.  This way they are not being held hostage by technologies nor is there the opportunity to “out do” your neighbor.

Liberals are always trying to out do their neighbors and would love to throw us all back into the stone-age.  Except when they consider something as an emergency.  Then they will take action as long as they can blame it on someone else.

Some communities  of Amish allow internet usage if it is for the operation of a business.

One liberal invented the internet while another liberal doesn’t know anything about it.  Sorry John!  All liberals are still trying to figure out how to TAX it!

Amish are into plain dress and use suspenders because they don’t allow belts.

Liberals take everything away so that they live lavishly and you are looking for something to hold your pants up with.

Amish are a small population and usually only marry within the community.  This confined strain allows for disease and malformity because of a lack of greater gene pool.

Liberals are inbred but not for the same reasons. 

The Amish self school within the community and the schooling usually doesn’t go past the 8th grade.  Although their standards are higher and you get a better education, no more is necessary to do the work as is the Amish lifestyle.

Liberals act as if they know everything but in reality, an 8th grade education would be a blessing just so that you could have some form of cognisant dialog with the morons!

Amish are nonresistant.  They rarely if ever defend themselves and allow bodily harm and abuse from others.

Liberals are nonresistant and will run away after giving up everything to avoid bodily harm and abuse.

“Contrary to popular belief, some of the Amish vote, and they have been courted by national parties as potentially  swing voters: their pacifism and social conscience cause some of them to be drawn to left-of-center politics, while their generally conservative outlook causes others to favor the right wing”

Liberals are confused also.  They mostly just like to swing!

I found those similarities to be fascinating.  You know and I know that the Amish would never fess up to the liberal sect or order.  The Amish are all about community whereas liberals are all about the collective-like the Borg.  Everyone equal.  No Amish will be reading this as it is something contrary to their beliefs but just to cover my bases I want to apologize for possibly defaming the name of the Amish by associating them to liberals.  I’m on your side, guys.  All you want is to be left alone and the same goes for conservative Americans.  Hey!  Maybe I should do a sequel on the likeness to conservatives!
 

Just damn. (Content warning).

Ah, a quiet Friday. NVTH bloggers all preoccupied with their so called lives, so here we go with the topic that always fascinates, and for good reason.

(Credit to the original).

You know the old adage about how when you’re a kid you think the greatest thing in the world is chocolate, and then you become an adult and discover sex which shows how limited your “world” used to be, but then you discover single-malt scotch and the Zeitgeist of it all suddenly becomes clear?

Well a similar thing happened to me recently when Brian Withnell revealed my puerile infatuation with the AK-47 is just that.

Yes, I have discovered what true manliness is all about:

You need to watch through to the end, around 4:36 in, for the really good part. In terms of home perimeter defense, a handgun is nice, but there is something better out there.

Thank you for the life-lesson, Brian.

For the first time, Asians will be the largest group entering Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Fairfax County, according to the Washington Post.  It’s not just TJ, either.  The article goes on to say that,

The rising concentration of Asian Americans at T.J. mirrors demographic trends in other elite math and science magnet schools. In New York, the selective and specialized Stuyvesant High School, Bronx High School of Science and Brooklyn Technical High School have Asian American majorities, although about 10 percent of the metropolitan population is of Asian descent. In San Francisco, Asian Americans make up more than 60 percent of the students at selective Lowell High School and about a third of the city’s population.

Asians make up less than 10% of the residents in the Washington area, so why are they so overrepresented at the highest end of the educational spectrum?  Are they innately more intelligent?  There is little evidence to support that.  It is possible that selection for intelligence has occurred in China, so the more intelligent have more children, but there is no evidence for that either.  However, there is evidence of a cultural difference:

The success of Asian American students reflects the educational commitment found in many immigrant communities, particularly for second-generation students fluent in English and encouraged by upwardly mobile parents who came to the United States for higher education or professional positions.

Yes, I think culture is more likely to explain the differences in racial disparities in education and achievement.

Too bad, I was rooting for the kid. Alan Webb came in fifth in the 1500 meter finals at the US Olympic Trials. Bernard Lagat won in 3:40, at least 5 seconds slower than Webb’s personal best. It was a slow final, and Webb just was not able to bring on the kick - even though he had more sheer speed talent than any of these guys.

Webb has run a 3:46 mile in the past year - a pace which would have blown away today’s field.

My take is Webb does best in low pressure situations. I predict he will break the world record in the mile at some obscure meet, with no media present, in the not too distant future.

Well, according to E. J. Dionne, Jr., our favorite Black Irishman, Barry H. O’Bama, wants to revamp W’s “Faith-Based Initiative.”  Mr. O’Bama wants to call the office the ”Council for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships.”  Funny he should choose that last word.  You see, the whole problem with W’s Faith-Based Initiative was the ol’ bait-and-switch.  Get the religious charities dependent on federal largess, then force them to hire active homosexuals, adulterers, “alternate lifestylers,” etc.  Then, when Catholic Charities refuses to go hire people who are blatant, unrepentant sinners, the leftists say, “How disgusting — they’re willing to let people go hungry rather than hire a homosexual.”

Obama is not shy about this: “Obama would keep the religious exemption from federal civil rights laws for congregations but apply them to specific programs sponsored by the congregations that accepted federal money.”  (Emphasis mine.)  And how long would that last?  Only until the charities have swollowed the bait, then the leftists will set the hook, and drop the words “specific programs sponsored by.”  The same applies now to any school accepting federal funds — that’s why VMI was forced to accept women.

One root of the problem, again showing that W is not a conservative, is also pointed out in the article: “Under Bush, [O’Bama] said, ‘you took resources from some programs and gave them to others without clear criteria for why the funds were shifted.’”  Exactly.  What makes bureaucrats in the feral government more qualified to say which charities deserve your money than you are?  Nothing.

Another root is the leftist notion, as stated by Dionne, that “support for religious groups can’t be an excuse for government (sic)backing out of its responsibilities.”  Certainly this is true, but what does he think the government’s responsibilities are?  Caring for the poor and downtrodden is our responsibility, not the feral government’s.  (State constitutions, of course, may be different.)  That is why leftists “give less than conservatives in every way imaginable, including volunteer hours and donated blood,” according to Syracuse University professor Arthur C. Brooks:

The book’s basic findings are that conservatives who practice religion, live in traditional nuclear families and reject the notion that the government should engage in income redistribution are the most generous Americans, by any measure.

Conversely, secular liberals who believe fervently in government entitlement programs give far less to charity. They want everyone’s tax dollars to support charitable causes and are reluctant to write checks to those causes, even when governments don’t provide them with enough money.

That’s socialists for you, generous to your last dime, and they know better than you where it should go.

How about this instead: a 50% tax deduction for charitable contributions.

Right now, the lower your income, the less you get to deduct.  If you are in the 10% tax bracket, and donate $100 to your church, you get $10 off your taxes.  Someone in the 33% bracket gets $33 off his taxes.  (Don’t the leftists say our tax code should be more “fair”?)

So, with a 50% deduction, not part of the standard deduction, everyone would get an equal break for charitable contributions, the feral government would essentially be matching one’s donations dollar-for-dollar, and we, not bureaucrats or congresscritters, would decide which charities to support.

Nothing lasts forever.

Olsson’s Books appears to be in a bad way, suffering the double, or rather triple, whammy of of big-box competitors, online books sales and online music exchanges. They are getting killed by both Amazon and Barnes and Noble, and no one buys CDs at stores anymore.

I moved out of Olsson’s territory in late 1994 when I moved to Reston, never to return further east. But through the early 1980s and until I left, I spent a decent amount of money at the Olsson’s in Old Town Alexandria and a couple locations in DC. Back then, if you wanted a book that was more academic than commercial, Olsson’s was the first place to check.

Living in Reston, I did a huge academic project from 1999-2001, and almost every single one of the dozens of books I procured for research were from either Amazon or Alibris. I don’t think I ever even considered a trip to Olsson’s - even though during college in the early 1980s that was where I bought the lion’s share of books I needed when doing research here at home. Forgot about the bookstore completely: sign of the times.

Next up, the Washington Times: This one truly pains me folks and I hate to be the person saying it. I have copies of this paper in my files from the first year of publication back in the mid 1980s, and I am proud to say I have been a full time subscriber basically since I could afford the simplest amenities of your typical blue-collar existence, which means from about 1995 on. Don’t ask.

I have probably read most copies of the Times, cover to cover, since 1993, and many, many issues in years prior to that (living in Florida most of the 1980s gives me some exemption from missing a few of those issues).

And I still read it cover to cover most days, which is good, because the recent redesign is so completely nonsensical that if I wanted to try to read it topically I’d be lost. The new organizational schema seems to have been designed by social psychologists or accountants, and I am betting on the latter.

Where you used to have the front section for “News” and editorials, like every other paper, then a local “Metropolitan” section which usually had “Business” tacked on, then “Sports” and then “Lifestyles/Arts/Food” (with the occasional weekend additions of “Show” and “Auto” and “Real Estate”), you now have an incomprehensible mish-mash. The front section is some national news, some international news, some local news, and some political news. The “World” section is more international news and also editorials. Then there is “Plugged In” which might be more political news, or business, or something else.

So if you want to find a particular story which not obviously front page material, you need to read the entire thing because it could be anywhere. I read the entire thing so that is ok with me, but it is a bad sign.

The other bad sign is a whole slew of the content is from AP and Reuters. This means you get the same liberal-ideology crap you get from every mainstream news outlet. You still get the excellent top level reporting from the Times’ key reporters, but much of the second-tier news is right off the wires.

The WashTimes has never had the resources of the Post, so none of the Times’ reader community would reasonably hold it to the same level of comprehensiveness. It is short on NASCAR, short on track and field, short on culture. But the Times has long been the key local paper for objective coverage of real news. Now that they are having to scale back on that, I think the end may be near. Jerry Seper is still worth the price of the subscription for me, but I think many readers upon reading AP’s take on the issues of the day will wonder why they need the Times when they can get that everywhere else.

I also think many readers upon reviewing the new Web site will wonder why the three layers of navigation bars across the top, which in my view is about two too many.

It’s tough times for newspapers, sad to see this once-excellent one on a downward spiral.

This is truly a first. Our congress is less popular than used car salesmen, dog catchers and arch villains that tie beautiful damsels to the train tracks. People prefer bad breath to congress. OK, maybe not bad breath, but the following does tell an incredible story …

HMO’s are more popular than congress. You know those guys who in the movies leave grandma on a gurney outside the hospital to die? Yeah, those guys are more popular than our elected officials. According to Henniger at the Wall Street Journal

At the bottom of the heap, displacing HMOs as our worst institution, one finds the second branch of government, our Congress, at 12%. The Gallup folks noted it is “the worst rating Gallup has measured for any institution in the 35-year history of this question.” Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, come on down! You’ve made history.

Congress has become a bad joke. With 74% of the American people wanting us to drill for oil domestically, what does Nancy Pelosi say in response to $4 a gallon gas?

It’s an energy policy “literally written by the oil industry - give away more public resources,” declared House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California.

OK Nancy darling, who is going to drill for the stuff OTHER than oil companies? Do you want to start a government program to do this, nationalizing the oil industry perhaps? Some Democrats have called for this from the floor of the house. Is that where you are going?

There is nothing a Democrat hates worse than an American company being able to make money while helping the American public with a crisis. When there is a crisis, money must be lost and the government has to do the helping, unless it is a Republican president in office, then of course nothing can go right. Speaking of presidents, Bush, our buffoon in chief, is more than TWICE as popular than congress. This is remarkable as the president has managed to alienate just about everyone in the country except … well … hmmm. It is remarkable! At 12% the odds are that many of the mothers of those in congress think they are doing a lousy job.

Some of the other groups that score worse than the president are Unions and the Mainstream Media. Considering that congress, Unions, and MSM are the big three of the modern left, is it possible that mood of the country reflects a desire for a truly conservative alternative? I wonder how well the likes of MoveOn.org would score?

The people at the top of the heap are the military, despite it’s involvement in Iraq and the MSM policy of only bad news from Iraq is fit to print, or, report. Then comes small business, the police and organized religion. All the above are conservative entities. Considering the publics current distaste for Republicans it is becoming clear that the party is no longer associated by the public at large with conservative principles. It appears that the country is seeking a conservative response to the socialistic instincts of the modern Democrat party.

It is obvious they are not seeing this response in the modern Republican party.