About Me

Name:Far_view
Loading...

Create Your Own Blog Find Other Townhall Blogs

Comments

Blog Roll

Russian aggression in Georgia: why no protests against it?

Posted by Far_view on Friday, August 22, 2008 5:44:58 AM
I'm in Iceland this week and on my walk from my hotel to the conference venue I can walk by the Russian embassy here in Reykjavik. When I walked by it the other day I was wondering, "why are there no protestors here?" OK, it was 7:30 in the morning so that might have been one reason, but seriously, I doubt if there ever were any protestors. When the U.S. went in to Iraq there were HUGE protests in Europe. We didn't commit any atrocities, we took out a tyrant. They should have been applauding us. The Russians go into a sovereign country and, literally in many instances, rape and pillage the populace and there is hardly a peep. What's up with that????

By the way, Victor Davis Hanson has a good opinion piece on the Russia/Georgia situation.
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (1) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Icelandic attitudes towards the U.S.

Posted by Far_view on Friday, August 22, 2008 5:18:08 AM
I am in Iceland this week for a geologic conference. I was out on a mid-week, mid-conference field trip to Thingvellir- a geologic rift zone and the assembly location for early Icelandic parliaments. Our guide for the day, one of the geology professors from the U. of Iceland was talking a bit about the history of Iceland and talked about how Iceland was “occupied” by the English during WW2 and then “occupied” by the Americans during the Cold War. Geez, is that what those guys really think? That they were occupied? The Brits were here to defend them from the Nazis in WW2 and we were here to defend them from the Soviets during the Cold War- that’s not an “occupation”. I don't know, maybe its just a language issue. On the tour bus, I was sitting next to a woman from Britain and I mentioned this to her and she thought it was kind of hosed up as well. She said that she had been on a tour earlier in the week where one of the Icelanders had said something similar. Hmmm...
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

National Geographic: a tool for the liberal left

Posted by Far_view on Sunday, August 17, 2008 7:28:44 AM
My parents got me a subscription to National Geographic when I was, I think, 11 and I received it non-stop until a few years ago. At that time, one, I just didn't have the time to read it that much and, two, when I did read it I thought it just espoused radical environmental positions. I recently resubscribed on a low cost subscription, but was really disappointed when I tried reading an article in the August 2008 issue about ancient Persia. It was pretty unbelievable. The author was like a PR agent for the Iranian theocracy. She talked about the "grand experiment" of the Iran being ruled by mullahs. Can you believe it? I wonder how "grand" she thinks it is when girls are stoned to death for having a relationship with a boy that isn't arranged by their parents. The article of course went on to talk about "hysteria" in the U.S. over Iranian nukes. I don't think I'll be resubscribing to National Geographic anytime soon.
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

the Obama salute: Sieg Heil!!!

Posted by Far_view on Friday, August 08, 2008 9:47:51 AM
You have got to be kidding me!!! I just heard on Laura Ingraham's radio show that Obama supporters now have their own salute for their annointed one. Here's a link that shows it. That salute cracks me up. Back in middle school and high school we'd give a salute like that... hold the hands together in front of the crotch to symbolize sticking out my you-know-what. Come to think of it, if Obama is elected, he'll be doing that to the country!
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (1) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Liberals who think (nay... know!) they are smarter than Conservatives

Posted by Far_view on Saturday, August 02, 2008 5:06:15 PM
Great column here, apparently a book excerpt, on how Liberals are so eager to believe that they are smarter than Conservatives. A good excerpt from the excerpt...

"The arrogance of some liberals in this regard is astonishing. You don’t even have to be highly educated yourself to complain about how uneducated conservatives are. Michael Moore, college dropout, travels all over Europe talking about how “idiotic and uneducated” conservatives are. He also said: “Once you settle for a Ronald Reagan, then it’s easy to settle for a George Bush, and once you settle for a George Bush, then it’s real easy to settle for Bush II. You know, this should be evolution, instead it’s devolution. What’s next?”

Professor Bruce Fleming, a self-professed liberal, explains this liberal attitude perfectly. “All of us are ignorant of many things. It’s just that the liberal here thinks he knows what the conservative is ignorant of.”

I especially liked the comparisons the author, Peter Schweizer, made between Bush and his presidential campaign opponents Al Gore and John Kerry. Both were reputed to be smarter than Bush, but Bush actually outperformed each of them in school.
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Is Nancy Pelosi saving the planet or destroying it?

Posted by Far_view on Friday, August 01, 2008 11:20:12 AM
Charles Krauthammer has a good column here where he deconstructs Nancy Pelosi's ridiculous statement that she isn't allowing a vote on off-shore oil drilling because she is "trying to save the planet". For just a flavor of the column, here Krauthammer discusses the negative impact of biofuels (which the Democrats do seem to like) vis-a-vis the alternative of drilling in ANWR:

"Here in the U.S., one out of every three ears of corn is stuffed into a gas tank (by way of ethanol), causing not just food shortages abroad and high prices at home, but intensive increases in farming with all of the attendant environmental problems (soil erosion, insecticide pollution, water consumption, etc.).

This to prevent drilling on an area in the Arctic one-sixth the size of Dulles Airport that leaves untouched a refuge one-third the size of Britain."

It really is obscene that Pelosi won't allow a vote on domestic oil production, but I guess her political power is more important to her than easing the pain at the pump for consumers.
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Good & evil vs. chance & chaos in "Dark Knight"

Posted by Far_view on Thursday, July 31, 2008 11:14:29 AM
Good column here by a Catholic priest, Father De Souza, on the philosophical underpinnings of the struggle between Batman and the Joker in "Dark Knight". I liked that he quoted some of the dialog from the movie which I liked at the time, but couldn't have quoted verbatim. The line from Harvey Dent/Two Face was really powerful in the movie:

"You thought we could be decent men in an indecent world," summarizes the hero-turned-villain Two-Face. "But you were wrong; the world is cruel, and the only morality in a cruel world is chance."

As Father De Souza points out:

"If reality has no order to it, if there is only chaos and chance producing what we experience, then against what criterion of reality will good and evil be measured? Everything retreats into relativism and meaninglessness."

Something to thing about!
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Batman the "Dark Knight" as a parable for the War on Islamic Terror

Posted by Far_view on Friday, July 25, 2008 12:30:17 PM
Great, great, great opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal by Hollywood screenwriter Andrew Klavan outlining how the storyline in the new Batman movie, "Dark Knight" is a parable for the war on Islamic Terror. Some key bits from the piece:

" Like W (G.W. Bush), Batman is vilified and despised for confronting terrorists in the only terms they understand. Like W, Batman sometimes has to push the boundaries of civil rights to deal with an emergency, certain that he will re-establish those boundaries when the emergency is past.

And like W, Batman understands that there is no moral equivalence between a free society -- in which people sometimes make the wrong choices -- and a criminal sect bent on destruction. The former must be cherished even in its moments of folly; the latter must be hounded to the gates of Hell."


and another:

"When heroes arise who take those difficult duties on themselves, it is tempting for the rest of us to turn our backs on them, to vilify them in order to protect our own appearance of righteousness. We prosecute and execrate the violent soldier or the cruel interrogator in order to parade ourselves as paragons of the peaceful values they preserve. As Gary Oldman's Commissioner Gordon says of the hated and hunted Batman, "He has to run away -- because we have to chase him."

Klavan also goes into some detail about why the Left leaning movies such as "In the Valley of Elah" and "Rendition" have tanked at the box office and movies with a conservative message such as "Dark Knight" and "300" have done so well.

Wow... what a great opinion piece.
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

The Moon orbiting the Earth... viewed from the outside!

Posted by Far_view on Friday, July 25, 2008 9:51:28 AM
There's a neat video, available through this link of a set of time sequence images, put into movie form, that show the Moon orbiting and passing in front of the Earth as taken from the Deep Impact comet probe (it's still going!). Pretty neat!
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

The NY Times sinks to a new low

Posted by Far_view on Tuesday, July 22, 2008 8:38:45 AM
Can there really be anybody with a brain who doesn't believe that that NY Times (along with 90% of the rest of the media) is in the tank for Obama?  I just can't believe the brazenness of the NY Times to not publish John McCain's OpEd piece on Iraq (the NY Post published it here).  I guess it really just depends on where people are getting their news these days.  I think fewer people are getting it from the "mainstream" media, but there still might be enough for their Obama advocacy to make an influence.
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Great take on Obama in Germany

Posted by Far_view on Sunday, July 20, 2008 8:55:20 PM
Rand Simberg in his transterrestrial.com blog has a great take on Obama's upcoming speech in Germany. He wanted to give it at the Brandenburg Gate, but the Germans weren't too happy about that so now he's giving at the Victory Column- a monument to German 19th century military superiority. Simberg has a hilarious line in there: "Too bad Leni Riefenstahl isn't around any more to film the event for him (Obama). Then later, he could reenact his grandfather's liberation of Auschwitz."
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

We need more nukes built ASAP!

Posted by Far_view on Sunday, July 20, 2008 3:49:02 PM
Hugh Hewitt has a brief note here about reports of potential shortages in electricity. As Hugh notes, this could be easily remedied by building more nuclear power plants. It is time to get off the pot and do it!!!
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Can we have a 10 year goal to get one good idea out of Al Gore?

Posted by Far_view on Friday, July 18, 2008 9:02:24 AM
Al Gore had his big speech yesterday with a 10 year challenge for getting America 100 % on carbon-free energy sources.  Yeah... right.  Strangely (OK, not so strangely... the guy is as wacky as The Joker) he didn't include nuclear energy among the "green" energy sources that America should turn to.  Oh, I know why... maybe because it is actually a viable energy source?  There is a good analysis of Gore's speech (an analysis that points out how disconnected with reality Gore is) is right here (not even a right wing web site and the writer claims to be sympathetic to Gore's goals, but he is at least honest enough to point out where Gore has got it wrong).  Al Gore... please get a clue.
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

no jokes about Obama

Posted by Far_view on Tuesday, July 15, 2008 6:34:27 PM
Here is a ridiculous story about how TV comics, principally on the late night talk shows, are not telling many jokes about Obama. The line that really made me shake my head was the following though:

""The thing is, he's not buffoonish in any way," said Mike Barry, who started writing political jokes for Johnny Carson's monologues in the waning days of the Johnson administration and has lambasted every presidential candidate since, most recently for Letterman. "He's not a comical figure," Barry said."

Are you kidding me? The guy is nothing but a buffoon. How about making fun of his pomposity and arrogance? The truth is that the TV comics are writers are 1) all Libs so they don't want to diss their guy, and 2) they're scared to death of doing anything that might even vaguely smell of racism so they won't lay a hand on the guy. Really, really sad.
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive

Obama just can't get it right on Iraq

Posted by Far_view on Monday, July 14, 2008 9:35:26 PM
Great opinion piece here by Peter Wehner in which he deconstructs Obama's July 14 N.Y. Times Op-Ed piece on Iraq along with his other wrong-headed views on the war. Wehner also makes a powerful case that justifies the invasion of Iraq in this paragraph:

"In fact, it is far from clear that Iraq will be judged a strategic blunder at all, let alone the “greatest strategic blunder in the recent history of American foreign policy.” It is now plausible to argue that the Iraq war will lead to a defeat of historic proportions for al Qaeda. It has already triggered a massive Sunni Muslim uprising against al Qaeda, a repudiation of violent jihadism from some of its original architects, and a significant shift within the Muslim world against the brutal tactics of jihadists. Iraq is also, right now, the only authentic democracy in the Arab world. And Saddam Hussein, the most aggressive and destabilizing force in the Middle East for the last several decades, is dead, and his genocidal regime is now but an awful, infamous memory."
Email ItEmail It | Print ItPrint It | CommentsComments (0) | TrackbacksTrackbacks (0) | Flag as offensiveFlag as Offensive
« Previous123456789101112131415Next »