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The theme for the best of all country songs
I was looking up the history of my favorite fiddle tune, Bonaparte’s Retreat (I play it in drop D), and came across this little Southern gem. To wit, three men
were taken prisoner by the Guard-no one knows why, but the area had been ravaged by scalawags and bushwackers, and the populace had suffered numerous raids of family farms by Union troops hunting provisions. The village of Waynesville had been burned two months earlier, and the citizenry was beleaguered and anxious. Cantrell writes: “The group traveled toward Cataloochee Valley and Henry Grooms, clutching his fiddle and bow, was asked by his captors to play a tune. Realizing he was performing for his own firing squad Grooms struck up Bonaparte’s Retreat.” When he finished the three men were lined up against an oak tree and shot, the bodies left where they feel. Henry’s wife gathered the bodies and buried them in a single grove in Sutton Cemetery No. 1 in the Mount Sterling community, the plain headstone reading only “Murdered.”
Now I just need to write the song.
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Pithy post on tortue
Tdaxp has an interesting post on the government use of torture here, to wit
My reply back to him mainly concerned, the subtile, which is The inside story of how the interrogators of Task Force 145 cracked Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s inner circle—without resorting to torture—and hunted down al-Qaeda’s man in Iraq. The title’s odd in that it is both boring and inflammatory.
The boredom first. I can imagine an article subtitled The inside story of how programmers at Microsoft Corporation released SQL Server 2008 on time — and without using hash tables.
I’ve always found the specific opposition to torture strange. We’re willing to jail people for the rest of their lives, hold them without trial, and bomb various countries which involves inherent civilian death and maiming. Drawing a line at torture seems odd to say the least. I suppose to some people it is a categorical difference in government action, and not an incremental difference in human suffering.
Now that I think about it, it does make for a good Schelling Point. It is objectionable to differing degree to both sides of the argument, as well as obvious to both. It is also seen as a categorical tactic (though not strategy) by both. Hmmm….
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Tab clearing roundup
- Michael Totten goes to Kurdistan – phenomenal reporting.
- The Yazidi religion of the the Middle East, very strange and interesting.
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Bold new insight
Barack Obama is a lot like Lenny Kravitz. Both have a well defined personal story which makes for an easy story for critics and pundits. They both sound just like vague rehashes of the Kennedy era so they seem familiar to those in the pundit demographic. Both were barely born then, so the talking heads can proclaim them to be “new”. Both are of mixed race ancestry so people can feel good about themselves for saying they like them. Both have problems with “authenticity”.
Where’s my CNN.com column?
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Nature doesn’t like you
Watch this video and ask yourself if you still feel bad about the destruction of the Amazon rain forest. Ouch. It’s not graphic on the visual level, but conceptually I cringed.
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European vs American Talents
From Marginal Revolution
Because European government works better, Europeans demand more of it and get more of it. American liberals look at Europe and see (sometimes) better results per dollar spent. They then conclude that America should be more like Europe, whereas in reality America would end up spending more to get more bad American government.
It’s a very nice argument against moving towards European style nationalized health care, to wit, we would not get the same results as they do. Instead we would probably just magnify existing problems.
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Super Jews are coming! Duck!
Mathew Yglesias links to a Charles Murray article in Commentary about the apparent brainpower edge of the Jewish people. For the most part, Yglesias’ commenters go off on the notion of implied inequality with a few dissents.
To me this is partial proof of evolution. The world has changed to a mostly urban lifestyle, and Jews have been living in cities for much longer than most groups. That would make them more suited to score higher than other groups on what we measure on IQ tests. Jewish culture essentially “chose” the right path to the future.
Throw in non-random mating and the fact that Jewish culture values literacy more than most other cultures and it seems quite reasonable that Jews would score higher on whatever test the psychologists can throw at them.
None of this matters much (yay minimalist view of politics) but it is interesting. I imagine it is as unprovable as are most other evolutionary theories.
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Tdaxp on winners and losers in a war with Iran
Dan Tdaxp has a very good post on the winners and losers of a purely punitive (i.e. we don’t occupy) attack on Iran. It’s well worth reading.
One thin that is not mentioned is that a take-down of Iran would create sizable about of Indian country, it would also be contiguous with the other large patch of Indian country, i.e. Afghanistan. I have no meaningful speculation on what would ensue from that.
Now that I think about it, “Land Ocean” might be a better way to refer to large lawless areas.
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Tuesday round up
- Popular mechanics and 100 mpg cars
- Couple Fights for Baby ‘Metallica’ Name
In Sweden, parents must get the names of their children approved by the tax authority, which is in charge of the population registry and issues personal identification numbers, similar to Social Security numbers in the United States.
- Billy Joe Shaver seems to have shot someone.
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Fair trade energy
Check out this article on Popular Mechanics about using excess CO2 and algae to create biofuels. It’s an elegant solution, using one problem (excess CO2) to solve the other (the need for energy).
If I were Bill Gates, or at least in some position of power in his charity, I would subsidize the creation of these things in the third world. Doing that would create industry in the (mostly) quite hot third world countries where it has never been. Unlike the traditional oil regimes though, this industry would not be easily stolen as capital and expertise could be moved fairly easily.
I’ll have more ruminations on the “Curse of oil” and capital flight eventually.