| Everyone who listens to classical music knows the richness of it. But it is hard to introduce people to. Here's my formula: 1. Do not do so in a concert setting. All that does is tell them that people can write ridiculously obscure stuff in concert notes and that classical music is expensive. 2. Use a parodist to convince them that they really know how good music should go first. Whether it's Allen Sherman's brilliant work for the Boston Pops or it is Peter Schickle's presentation of "PDQ Bach", music done badly is laughable, and points out that they ALREADY KNOW BETTER how it should have gone. 3. Then introduce the really popular classical music: the chase scenes from the William Tell Overture come to mind (not the beginning piccolo foolishness), along with many of the other pieces in this collection. Serve beer. Encourage comment. The parodists are really good at getting things going (and "Variations on How Dry I Am" by Sherman is priceless). | |
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| It only encourages them to continue. And continuing in this vein can get people killed.I recognize that they want to make money and sell newspapers. I'm just not sure that causing crime is a good way to do that. | |
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| There's been some bewailing of the fact that few debates in the blogosphere are civil, and Patterico has decided to do something about it. The link spells out the rules and history: the debate is here, and will be updated.I'm mightily impressed. These are certainly better rules than most debaters get. | |
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|  This is the key to the success of a man who mainly votes "present" and who does not work on major legislation: the appearance of experience without actually accomplishing anything. Inspired by this brillant post in AJ Strata's journal. | |
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| That was the question in the email. Good question. The answer, for those in LA and are interested in local public affairs, is Patterico, which covers many of those moments one of the local papers screw up on (the LA Times, like many papers, hasn't figured out that "news analysis" and withholding information are not the competitive strengths of the news business). He does some original reporting, a lot of fact checking, and is a good, well-written commenter. | |
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| For those who occasionally point out that China is determined to expand its influence, and hungry for influence far beyond its current state: China is not the threat you think it is. Check out The Powerless Dragon for a short summary of why: He offers a fine rehearsal of various problems China faces and/or is causing: it copies Western products rather than innovating; it then mass produces goods by paying exploitative wages; the quality of the goods is horrendous and often deadly; it lacks the natural resources to sustain the sort of growth it would require to become a developed nation; it pollutes at nearly suicidal levels, like Eastern Europe used to; it's running out of water as well as oil and metals and has built shoddy dams that imperil its own people; it has internal ethnic tensions, worker unrest, population imbalances that make a welfare system untenable; it exploits African and other workers abroad as it seeks to extract the raw materials it needs back home, making it the ugliest sort of imperialist power; the Communist Party has to ruthlessly repress free speech, the press, the Internet, religion, etc.; and so on and so forth. And this list is from someone who believes in the Chinese military threat. I am not convinced: the USSR, too, was bellicose beyond its capacity, counting on its ability to cow others into acting well toward it. | |
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| It's interesting to me how thoroughly the prime divider ethos is built into society, and what bizarre forms it takes once it is out of its natural habitat. Check out, for example, the venti snooty latte that Micky Kaus came across, or the political spouse entitlement (no, it's not about Hillary), or, finally and most hilariously, the idea of "making ends meet" on a salary north of $400,000/year. "We're entitled to not have to worry about that stuff, to have it all taken care of by retainers, dammit." | |
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| OK, I use Google a lot. It's a shortcut that enables me to do stuff without having to remember everything about where I found things before. And now, someone has come up with a shortcut to the shortcut: the Goosh (GOOgleSHell). Hit "h" for a list of google related shell commands, and feel free to set up shell scripts to handle them. Quite a tool. | |
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| OK, Obama has resigned from Trinity Church. Not, given what we've been seeing, before time. Scott Ott has posted the correct response:Dear Sen. Obama,
Now that you are back on the market, so to speak, having abandoned your church home of two decades to allow your friends to "worship in peace", I'd like to invite you to consider my church. Let me tell you a little bit about it.
Senator, in my church we love and worship Jesus. We believe the Bible is the word of God. Our preachers faithfully proclaim the gospel of salvation by grace alone, through faith alone in Jesus Christ alone. Our people live out their faith in a variety of ways, from feeding the poor, to providing medical care in rural Africa and elsewhere, to taking the good news of Jesus to Tanzania, France, England and several dozen other places around the world.
Sen. Obama, if you love Jesus, and enjoy the fellowship of others who share your faith in Christ, then you and Michelle and the girls might feel at home here.Read the rest. Consider inviting someone else to your church. | |
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| Ben Stein's "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" is a successful documentary describing the fear of debate among those who support the random-mutation "Darwinist" model of evolution over the "restricted mutation" models proposed under the rubric of "Intelligent Design". Successful in that it presents a problem (no debate allowed on fundamental principles), proposes a solution (open debate), and does so entertainingly. Few documentaries reach this audience, or have such a successful box office. One point, however: while the Nazis, and the eugenics crowd were indeed inspired by Darwin and met with no check under their understanding of "survival of the fittest", there is, in fact, a biological basis for preserving genetic diversity. Any study of "survival of the fittest" assumes something: it assumes the current climate and resources available to the population. Should those change, it is important to be able to adapt to the new conditions: and the more your genotype ties you to the prior conditions, the more difficult that adaptation will be. Earth is changeable. We shouldn't assume otherwise. Therefore, Eugenics has a check coming from a little common sense and a little biology. | |
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| MoveOn doesn't have billionaire donors—it's just all of us, chipping in together.Yeah, right. Check out Wikipedia:Soros gave $3 million to the Center for American Progress, committed $5 million to MoveOn,... I know, old news. But if you're not going to be straight with us, don't bother with the emails. | |
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| Yesterday I read someone saying "McCain has been lying about Hamas endorsing Obama." You guys should know better. McCain has a rep for saying what he believes, even if it's unpleasant to hear, or if he doesn't have the policy support he thinks he does. This, however, was a fact. Here's the interview. Listen for yourself. | |
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| Just passed on from Chris Ellemenopi:
The mother in the supermarket clearly had a bad case of parental burnout. Her toddler would not sit down in the grocery cart, and finally she snapped. "If you fall and break your leg," she scolded her, "don't come running to me."
The sad part? Every parent I know started the discussion by talking about kids in the supermarket: and the best ones talked about THEIR OWN kids. | |
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