A joke I had to pass on...

Bill Clinton is getting $12 million for his memoirs, and Hillary got $8 million for hers. That’s $20 million for two people who, throughout eight years of investigation, testified repeatedly that they couldn’t remember anything. Via Jay Nordlinger.

Kids say their parents are a bunch of annoying Hippies.

Well, not Exactly. But they are a lot more conservative than their parents. This really doesn't surprise me at all. The young have seen tha impending failure of Social Security, They have seen the reality of Abortion in their younger Sibling's Ultrasound pictures, they weren't raised in the post-vietnam anti-american slogan chanting days. I don't see much of a reason why they would be as liberal as their parents. And considering that 9/11 came when this survey was mostly completed, I'd be willing to bet that the results underestimate how conservative they will be over time. 9/11 jerked a lot of people rightward, in the classic "A Conservative is a Liberal that has been mugged" manner. For those coming up with this as a huge experience in their formative years, it will probably be more pronounced than it would be for adults.

Obligatory link

With a blog called Trojan Horseshoes, I absolutely have to link to this one.

Iraq Makes Peace Offering to U.S. and U.N. (2002-09-22) -- The Republic of Iraq, in a move designed the placate talk of war, plans to give a multi-million dollar work of art to the people of the United States of America and to the world. Senator Tom Daschle and U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, will receive the gift on behalf of the U.S. and the U.N. in a special ceremony attended by hundreds of foreign dignitaries and the entire U.S. Congress in October in Washington D.C.. The exquisite work, crafted by Iraq's best artisans, is said to be a larger-than-life stylized sculpture of a horse. "I've seen pictures," said Mr. Annan, "and it's quite spectacular. It's about six stories tall, and will actually be transported on wheels into the city." Senator Daschle's spokesman said, "This helps to assure us that Iraq is not a threat to us, nor anyone else. The Senator can't wait to see that gigantic horse statue wheeled right up to the front of the Capitol building." To give some idea of the scale of the sculpture, Daschle's aide said the abdomen of the horse, if it were hollow, could seat about 450 men, with luggage.

Carnival of the Vanities

Silflay Hraka has started a series of posts called Carnival of the Vanities. In short, bloggers select one of their favorite posts from the last week, and send them in. Bigwig compiles a list of all the submissions (I don't believe there is any selection or editing on his part, but I could be mistaken). Anyway, his first collection is here. There are some good ones in there. Unfortunately, there are some really bad ones in there as well. I had hesitated on commenting on this before, because I didn't want to shoot it down before it got off the ground. The problem really boils down to Sturgeon's Law. "Ninety Percent of everything is crap." And yes, that includes Blog posts. Even the Blog posts self-selected by their authors as really good ones, you are going to have a crappiness percentage way too high to count as any sort of "best of blogdom" collection. The current Blog system where at least two people have to like the post for it to be linked is probably not the best system. But it's a far better system than only needing the Author to like it to have it linked all over. Update: Just so I don't sound overly full of myself, let me clarify one point. 90% of what I write is probably crap as well, even some of the stuff I think is extremely good. I just as bad of a writer and bad at impartially judging my own work as anyone else.

Can you imagine how much press this would get...

...If Bush had done it? Strange, how so many in the media seem to censor themselves when it comes to criticizing a member of the left.