text:
Q: The Mike Lombardi stamp, if you will, from having a background with him, what do you see him trying to institute there?
BB: I think they have a lot of young players and a lot of talented players. I see them improving. I see those guys getting better on a weekly basis. They've had a lot of young guys step in and get an opportunity to play and play competitively and then get better. They've been active on the waiver wire in the lower part of their roster, with some of their role players. I see those guys and I see a talented group of players that the roster has improved through the course of the year. Not all of them have played – like their offensive line, they play the same five guys every week, there are never any changes in there. But they've added some younger players on their offensive line for depth and I'm sure that those guys will end up being competitive players, same thing at the tight end position. They're obviously in it for the long haul. I think we saw that last spring with some of their movement around the draft and the trade this year early in the season – [Trent] Richardson – and things like that. I see a lot of improvement in the team and the quality of the team. The team is certainly well coached and they're playing hard and they're improving and they're playing well. I think that's a credit to all the people that are involved in that.
Q: What are your thoughts on Mike specifically as a personnel evaluator?
BB: Good, I think [he's] excellent.
Q: What makes him good?
BB: He's thorough, he's smart, he's thorough, he understands football. He understands not just personnel but schemes and how certain players fit into certain schemes better than others because of the responsibilities in those schemes; the type of plays or the type of system that coaches run, different coaches run. There are obviously a lot of different coaches in this league, different coaches in college, so that affects the performance of the players – some good, some bad, depending on how they fit into that particular system. I think he has a very good understanding of that, which is important for personnel people to understand, just like it is for coaches to understand personnel. Mike is a hard working guy that won't leave a stone unturned. He'll find players, the Tony Joneses of the world, the Wally Williams of the world, the guys like that that played very well for us at Cleveland that nobody ever heard of that came out of nowhere that were good football players. He has a way of finding those guys.
Q: What are you seeing from Josh Gordon? He's had some big games statistically recently.
BB: He's played good all year. You see the same things all year. The plays he's made the last couple weeks are the same plays he's made all year. He's a great player. He can attack all three levels of the defense. He can run through them, he can take the short plays, catch-and-run plays, crossing patterns, look patterns, plays like that, quick three-step drops and break tackles. He's very good on the intermediate routes, the in-cuts, the crossing routes, comebacks, stop-routes, things like that that attack the middle levels of the defense. He's a complete player that can run fast, catch, big target and make a lot of yards on his own after the catch with his speed, size and running ability.
Q: Did you take a good, long look at him when he was available?
BB: Yeah, coming out of Baylor? Sure.
Q: Was he a tough projection at all? Some people thought he was raw.
BB: Well, he didn't have a real productive year there. But I think when you talk to the Baylor people, there have been several receivers drafted out of Baylor. Obviously they had a good quarterback down there when he was there too. I don't think there's any question about his talent. He just didn't have all the production to go with it.
Q: Can you talk about the asset that
BB: Well, you know, James has a role on the team and he's done a good job of executing his role, whether it's been offensively or in the kicking game or even as it relates to the scout team in practice and things like that, helping the defense get ready. As far as what he's been called on to do offensively and in the kicking game, he knows what his job is, he works hard to do it well, as well as he possibly can. It's actually expanded a little bit. I don't think he's ever going to be out there for every play offensively, that's not his role, but when we do have him out there or when we have him out there in the kicking game, he works hard at what he's asked to do and he's been a good contributor for the team. He's smart, he's tough, he works hard, he's a very dependable guy and there's an awful lot to be said for that.
Q: How much is that fullback position similar to tight end in that helps dictate certain matchups as you're going through in-game adjustments and stuff like that?
BB: Yeah, it can definitely be a part of that, yeah. Again, the more productive you can be in any group, the more it forces the defense to react to that grouping. Whatever your production is, whether it's regular or two tight ends or three receivers, whatever that grouping happens to be, if it's productive then it forces the defense to react to it. If they don't like the matchup that they would normally play against that group so to speak, it might force them to do something else or may be something you can take advantage of. Good production in any group puts pressure on your opponents, no question about it.
Q: Did James Develin show you anything that you hadn't seen, in terms of the things he did this past Sunday – catching the ball over the middle, the run at the goal line?
BB: I think in the preseason games, he was effective in short-yardage. I think he has good hands – for a guy who played linebacker in college, he catches the ball pretty well. I don't think that's ever really been an issue.
Q: Does it make it harder when it's Wednesday and you don't know who the opposing starting quarterback is going to be?
Q: Did you spend much time looking at the film of Brian Hoyer to get a feel of that offense?
BB: Looking at the overall composite of the season, you see him in there for the two or three games that he played. It's no different than seeing Travis Benjamin or even [Trent] Richardson when he was there. I'm saying, you see those guys as they came up over the course of the film but obviously we're not focused on them because they're not playing but you can't help but notice them. You can't help but notice Hoyer, you can't help but notice Benjamin, Richardson, guys like that, Oniel Cousins when he was in there the first four games. You see the guys that are in there but obviously our preparation has moved past them because they won't be playing, well Cousins could be, but I'm saying the other guys.
Q: How does Norv Turner react to the different personnel that he's had at quarterback?
BB: Well, he's done it through his whole career. Really, I think his offense has core fundamentals that he sticks by, whether it was at Dallas, Washington, Oakland, San Diego, Miami, Cleveland, you name it. There are core principles in offense, core plays, things that he's very good at, that complement each other, that you know he's going to do. I can't imagine he's going to go in there this week and put in a new offense. I find that hard to believe. He'll obviously make in-game adjustments for us, like he does every week for a new opponent. But the core fundamentals of his offense have, I think, stayed the same from back when he was with Jimmy [Johnson] in Dallas. We have to be ready for that. Obviously the specific personnel changes but I think you see [Josh] Gordon do a lot of things that you saw Vincent Jackson do in San Diego. I think you see [Jordan] Cameron do a lot of things that you saw [Antonio] Gates do in San Diego. There's certainly carryover between his system and players in Cleveland, relative to other players that he's had in his system at similar positions.
Q: During the TV broadcasts, we see you taking notes. What kind of things are you writing down?
BB: Things that I want to remember. To put together with plays, when they come off the field, on a particular play, what the call was, maybe what a problem was, match up with the picture, talk about it with the players. So, we go to play 42, here's what happened instead of trying to remember, 'Was it this play? Was it that play?' So I make a note of it.
BB: I don't think you can replace preseason without preseason. We're only in pads one day a week, less than that now. I don't think, for Rob, Rob's preseason was the time prior to when he played, those practice weeks, whatever it was, however many it was, from the start of the season. We [got] asked about every day, what his status was, whether he practicing, whether he was playing, what he was doing and all that [laughter]. That was his training camp. That's all it was. But that isn't training camp now. I don't think we can mistake that for training camp. But that's what it was.
Q: Now that he's had more than four games, which would have been a preseason, and we've seen his time rise up, is it safe to say he's at the point he would have been at Week 1 if he'd had that time?
BB: I don't know. I mean, maybe. It's approximate. But, he's at Week 1. Everybody else is at Week [14]. I'm just saying, you can't replace the time that you've missed. You just can't replace it, it's gone. You make the best of what you have and do the best you can with it. But all those practices in training camp, that's what training camp is for, is to train the players and train your team, not only to do their job but to work with each other and get the timing, the execution and the consistency and the fundamentals that you need over the course of the season. When you're out here trying to get ready for a team like Cleveland who has a bunch of different defenses, a bunch of different offensive sets, a bunch of different plays, a bunch of different things in the kicking game, it's hard to take the same time and dedicate it to fundamental techniques that you do in training camp when you're installing your plays with your fundamentals that you're going to use on those plays and you can go out there and practice them and then run the play and come back the next day and correct it and practice them again and run the play. We're not in that mode now. We're just not. We can do a part of it in a few drills or maybe something after practice, but it's nowhere close to what training camp is. It's impossible. If you did that, then I don't think you'd be able to prepare your team for the different things they'd have to deal with in the game. The more you prepare for the game, the less time you spend on fundamentals. You hope that you have a good base that you were able to create in training camp and the early part of the season, September particularly, where you have a good base on those fundamentals and techniques and they'll carry you most o the way through. That's been my experience in 39 years in the National Football League. But that's the battle you fight. You have that one period of time, very brief window in your bye week, when you can go back and try to hone in on those a little bit more to try to improve them or correct a few things that have started to slip a little bit but that's a very short window. Once that closes, we're back into where we are now, which is one padded practice every other week, which that's what that is and getting ready for games. But when you get ready for a game now, it's a lot different than getting ready for a game in Week 3 or Week 4 because you have 12 weeks of the volume of what they do. They've been in two-minute situations and goal line and short-yardage and third down and all that and they've expanded their packages, just like you've expanded yours. Now the multiples become exponential in terms of what you can do, what they can do, what they've shown, all the stuff you have to cover. You know they have it in, you know they've run it, you can't ignore it so you have to prepare for it and they have to prepare for all your stuff. I'm just saying, it takes a lot of time.
Q: What's your thought on Rob Gronkowski's impact? Obviously he's one of the best players in the league at his position.
BB: No argument there. I think he's a good player.
Q: How does he open up more things for you in your offense?
BB: I don't think he opens up anything. I think that when the matchups are favorable and Tom [Brady] sees that, that's where he'll throw the ball. When it's not, I hope he doesn't throw it to him and we throw it to someone else where we have a better matchup. Look, the more things they have to defend defensively, the harder it is for any defense, we all know that. If you can run the ball, if you have multiple options in the passing game at multiple levels, then that makes it harder to defend and everybody benefits form that. It might be one guy one week, might be another guy another week. Again, I think there's a perception out there that in the game plan it's, 'Well, we're going to throw the ball to this guy on this play and we're going to throw the ball to that guy on that play.' It just doesn't work that way. I don't think any passing game, unless you want to throw a screen pass or something like that. You have four or five guys out in the pattern and depending on what the coverage is and how the matchups go, there are certain guys you want to throw to and there are certain guys you don't want to throw to based on what they're doing. You might hope that you get a certain matchup and if you get it, great. But if you don't get it, you don't want to tell the quarterback to throw the ball to two or three guys standing there, just because that's a guy you want to throw the ball to. I think that's ridiculous. We would never do that. I don't know if other teams do that, but that's not something we want to do.
Q: Personally, do you still have an affinity toward the Browns?
BB: I was there for five years. It was five important years in my life, for myself, my family and all that. Obviously we've all moved on and I have a job to do here. That's where my loyalty is, to Robert [Kraft] and the Patriots organization and this football team. [It's] no different than how I feel, honestly, about the Colts or the Lions or the Broncos. I feel differently about the Jets, I wouldn't put them in that category [laughter] but you know. It's good experiences with all those teams and I learned from them and grew as a coach and as a person and as a family. It was for a different time in a different place. This is where we are now; try to make the most out of this one.


text:
Democracy Now! (9 am), for September 10, 2008 - 9:00am
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Haiti Struggles with Humanitarian Disaster in Aftermath of Deadly Storms; Following Disparaging Comments at RNC, Community Organizers Respond to Republican Attacks on Their Profession; Gareth Porter: Bush Admin Ignored Warnings Against Pakistani Air Strikes; As US Announces Withdrawal of 8,000 Troops from Iraq, Leaked US-Iraqi Draft Agreement Envisions Indefinite Occupation.
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* US Occupation of Afghanistan to Increase Following Iraq Troop Cuts
* 2 Afghan Civilians Killed in Errant US Bombing
* Ike Leaves Behind Devastation in Haiti, Cuba
* Ex-Klansman Freed in 1964 Murder Case
* Noose Left in Office of Black Student President at Va. School
* Rep. McDermott Backs Bush Impeachment
* Franken Wins Democratic Primary for Minn. Senate Seat
* Florida Court Rules Gay Adoption Ban Unconstitutional
* Lawsuits Planned over DNC, RNC Protest Crackdowns
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subset: commoncrawl


text:
Chris doesn't want to disappoint Rihanna and he's telling his friends that he plans to visit his girl on her 'Diamonds' World Tour very soon. Keep reading for all the exclusive details!
Just like Rihanna visited Chris Brown on his Carpe Diem tour last year, Breezy wants to return the favor and be with Rihanna while she's kicking butt on her "Diamonds" World Tour, HollywoodLife.com is EXCLUSIVELY reporting.
"Rihanna wants him to come chill with her," a source close to both Rihanna, 25, and Chris, 23, shares with HollywoodLife.com. "Ain't nothing but women around her and she need [Chris] around her to make it all complete. So sometime soon he might pop up there to be with her.
"He ain't going to disappoint her though, he gone make it happen and visit her soon."
Chris Brown And Rihanna Talk And Text Non-Stop
Despite being anxious to see one another in person, our source tells us the two have been talking non-stop ever since Rihanna took off on her tour earlier this month.
"They talk on the regular, you feel me. The don't go a day with out talking and it seem like they don't go an hour without texting back and forth and sending each other pics of themselves.
"They're in they own world but it's mad love though. They want each other like all the time."
And it appears that they will be in each others arms real, real soon.
Rihanna Feels Better After Canceling Two Shows
Rihanna's feeling much better these days after battling the flu and laryngitis, causing the singer to cancel two concerts: one in Boston on Mar. 10 and the other in Baltimore on Mar. 12
The singer regrouped, however, delivering a stellar performance on Mar. 14 in front of a sold out Philadelphia crowd!
Hopefully Rihanna will keep up that intense energy and kill it again in her next show in Hartford, Ct. on Mar. 15.
Sound off HollywoodLifers. Do you think Chris is grown up and will give Rihanna the respect she deserves?
WATCH: Rihanna & Chris Brown Mocked On Law & Order SVU
– Eric Ray
More Chris Brown and Rihanna news:
- Rihanna Cancels Boston Concert: Singer Contracts Laryngitis
- Rihanna & Chris Brown: Texting Every Hour While She's On Tour
- Rihanna's Laryngitis: How Chris Brown Made Her Feel Better
View Comment
Posted at 7:28 AM on March 23, 2013
Posted at 6:25 PM on March 19, 2013
@Stephanie I never told for you that I have a popular office. You don't Know nothing about me. And not will. I'll never discuss professional matters with people as ignorant as you BABE!!!
#RIHANNA NAVY = MORE OF THE 60 MILLION FANS, SO people like you, ever will be insignificant for we!
Posted at 3:57 PM on March 19, 2013
Posted at 7:57 PM on March 18, 2013
Posted at 7:04 PM on March 18, 2013
Posted at 6:36 PM on March 18, 2013
why do you always gotta repeat your posts twice DUH!
Is your post underneath, supposed to be throwing shades at me,oh my bad as i fail to see your joke
*sshole…. lol
@Bvire AKA Anbarb
how many times have i gotta tell you,that your juvenile attempts of a post up on here, hold no intrest with me, so therefore i cannot understand why your constantly on this blog website tryna get my attention.looooooooooooooooooool
Posted at 6:00 PM on March 18, 2013
Posted at 5:54 PM on March 18, 2013
Posted at 6:39 PM on March 18, 2013
Posted at 5:18 PM on March 18, 2013
Posted at 3:18 PM on March 18, 2013
Posted at 1:43 PM on March 18, 2013
kiki = low self-esteem
Posted at 3:02 PM on March 18, 2013
Posted at 3:16 PM on March 18, 2013
@kiki = low self-esteem
Do you have my name on speed dial or something,jezz as soon as i post a fake user id poster is straight up on my clit.
Keep on Hating as i'm loving it.As Damn You Rihoe stans up on here are as insecure about me just as much as Rihoe is insecure about Kae looooooooooool
PS: thanks for taking the time out to name your user id name after me.buddha belly saggy tits (dont think so sweety) you wanna hurry up and get yourself of to spec savers, as look to my pic's that saying bytch where youyr pic's at..
Layla, I know she wish she was you? are you talking about The Dragon Lady KIKI oh! heck! yeh! I also I also calls her the Shady-Lady! the way she thinks is Gross! their two of them Brain crazy Stephanie- No-Brains!!! Layla!! kiki has three diffenent looks on these Blogs! She really must look Notroshish! scary, her and Stephanie! Ha!
Posted at 5:59 PM on March 18, 2013
Posted at 12:25 PM on March 18, 2013
@Kiki has nothing to do with your life?! This girl is disgusting. All day and all night distilling evil and want to judge someone?! Oh Girl, let's go, get a life for you! Jealous is a bad thing…It's not possible… exist someone so jealous and mad because other peoples are happy?! S.M.H
Rih Rih and Breezy: Just Shine Bright…LIKE A DIAMONDS IN THE SKY!!!!
Posted at 11:03 AM on March 18, 2013
Posted at 9:06 AM on March 18, 2013
has nothing to do with your life?! This girl is disgusting. All day and all night distilling evil and want to judge someone?! Oh Girl, let's go get a life for you! Jealous is a bad thing…It' not possible exist someone so jealous and mad because other peoples are happy. S.M.H
Posted at 7:39 PM on March 17, 2013


text:
Who did President Obama refer to when he declared, "and it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations." He referred to the losers of the world. The guys in "these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest [where] the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them".
The tone of loser-lives is very much unlike that of the winners of the world. The clingers believe in the ashes of their fathers and the temples of their gods. But the people who live in Malibu; who spend $80,000 in a single afternoon's shopping, party on yachts and meet with President Obama are beyond that. They take a broader view of things and are cosmopolitans, citizens of the world. I am of course referring to people like "Equatorial Guinea's minister of agriculture and forestry, Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue", Teodorin to his friends.
Never heard of him? You may not know him, but he knows President Obama.
Teodorin is the chosen successfor to Brig. Gen. Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, his father. Mbasogo seized power after overthrowing, then killing his uncle in a 1979 coup. The annointed one now lives the life of a playboy in Malibu, where his neighbors include Britney Spears, Mel Gibson, and Kelsey Grammer. He doesn't go to Mr. Sam's place. Instead, Dolce and Gabanna arrange for private showings at which he has been known to spend $80,000 in an afternoon for his girlfriends, who have included rapper Eve, Tamala Jones and Playmate Lindsey Evans.
Unlike the losers who save carefully to pay for their credit card debts, people like Teodorin can finance their lives by deficit spending. Although he got a US company to pay for schooling at Pepperdine (from which he dropped out, leaving the company with a $50,000 bill), Teodorin nevertheless owns seven Ferraris, five Bentleys, four Rolls-Royces, two Lamborghinis, two Mercedes-Benzes, two Porsches, two Maybachs, and an Aston Martin, which he somehow affords on his $5,000 a month official salary. He has since tired of those jalopies and now favors a blue Bugatti Veyron.
Like debt, Teodorin's attitude toward pollution is far more enlightened than those of the Bible and gun-clingers. He may wind up benefiting from carbon credits. Redd-monitor reports that "The rather incongruous slide I'm showing here is of a Bugatti Veyron motor car. There are 35 of them in existence. They cost one million euros each. Three of them are owned by a guy called Teodoro Obiang, the Minister of Forests of Equatorial Guinea."
To the UNFCCC, the forests are really just neat receptacles of carbon, easily identified from a satellite. But on the ground they are storehouses of some of the richest biodiversity on earth and they provide homes and livelihoods to literally billions of people. And forests have been ravaged over the last few decades by one of the most corrupt industries on this planet. That, in collaboration with some of the most corrupt, inept or simply vulnerable governments have depleted an incredible resource with most of the wealth ending up in bank accounts in Singapore, Switzerland, the US and Europe.
You could define the Third World as a place whose leaders like living in the First World. Well might Teodorin prefer Malibu, California to Malabo, Equatorial Guinea, in whose picturesque surroundings only one in three live past the age of 40. Although it isn't clear what he's accomplished for his "people", Teodorin certainly knows how to live. Foreign Policy even has a photo-essay detailing the life of the Playboy of the Eastern World, where he is shown rubbing elbows with Barack Obama.
It's no accident that the "bitter clinger" speech was given at a super-exclusive fundraiser in San Francisco. There "they" could look down on "them". From a certain point of view the world is a much more tolerant place today. "Society" doesn't care if you're a Muslim, or a Christian; if you're black or white; it doesn't even care if you can read or write. All it cares about is green. What it cares about is whether you have got the money.
Money covers a multitude of sins. The Telegraph asks how it was possible for Britain's 'great and good' to pander to the likes of Muammar Khadaffi? How could they countenance someone who armed the IRA, which went on to kill nearly 2,000 people; probably bombed Pan Am Flight 103; supplied weapons to Robert Mugabe and is probably now ordering air strikes, using Mirage F1s, on his own population. How? How? The answer is Khadaffi had money. He's not a bitter clinger.
Lee Smith notes the President's "deafening silence on Libya". Smith asks why "after almost a week of escalating violent reprisals against protestors and soldiers who have joined the anti-regime forces, Libya's Muammar Qaddafi and his sons have yet to quell the uprisings—and the White House has yet to take a public stand. Last night, Secretary Clinton released a statement, and pathetic as it was, it's more than the president has offered—a president who has spent considerable energy burnishing his image for the Muslim and Arab public."
That is probably because nobody wants to upset the apple-cart. And even now the suppliers to Libya's jefe maximo are wondering how long the gravy train will last — and whether they can do business with whoever comes afterward. It was a wise man who said that "foreign aid is the process whereby poor people in rich countries subsidize rich people in poor countries."
The only people who don't belong in this game are the poor saps in Equatorial Guinea, the average Abdul in Libya or the "bitter clinger" in America. At a level down, they are the poor dopes who don't want to pay public employees who earn twice what they get, with money they don't have. That makes them bitter clingers who don't got no style. This is a world made for the Masters of the Universe and Michael Jacksons of Mad Mayhem.
Reuters reports him as saying, "Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, speaking on Tuesday in a defiant but rambling speech, said he would call the people to 'cleanse Libya house by house' unless protesters on the streets surrendered." He'll keep the music playing, by any means necessary.
76 Comments, 76 Threads
1. wws
The Land of Opportunity
This morning I realized that a strange and rare opportunity is suddenly presenting itself in North Africa. Quaddafi supposedly only has 5,000 military forces left personally loyal to him, with about 45,000 total military in Libya whose loyalties are up for grabs. And yet Libya sits on incredible wealth.
A single man with just a few loyal military units could easily take control of that country right now, if he were clever enough to play up to the protestors – not hard to do. The Europeans would hand him all the resources he asked for, just to guarantee the security of the oil pipeline. (which they desperately need)
But it doesn't end there – Egypt is just as chaotic, except that the Egyptian military is much bigger and more unified. This suggests where the original power base for such a move would start, but Egypt has a military stocked with bureaucrats who are mainly interested in fattening their personal bank accounts. That's why no one at the top currently can command the kind of loyalty that a true leader would, and why no clear successor to Mubarak has yet emerged.
History suggests that such a man will soon arise.
Imagine a man who could energize the Egyptian public, who are massively poor and have no jobs, by promising them the wealth of Libya's oil – which is just sitting there, ripe for the taking. (fyi: Egypt population about 83 million, Libya population about 6 million)
And it could even be bigger than that – Tunisia is also in chaos, and Algeria for years has been called a "hand grenade in mid-flight". And what of the riots in Bahrain, and the deep worries in the financial capitals that the Saudis could be next? Situations like this only come up about once every other generation, if that often. These are the kinds of times that bring about a Napoleon or an Alexander… or worse.I have never in my life seen all the pieces on the board align like they are aligned right now. Right now *All* of North Africa – maybe even all of the Middle East! – is laid out defenseless and disorganized. It's like a bright, shining apple just waiting to be devoured. The US won't interfere, overcommitted already. Europe won't interfere, too terrified to do anything. China is too far away. Russia is out of the power projection business. All the barriers and players that once would have prevented such a move are suddenly and amazingly… gone. The path is open and clear. The times only need One Man to seize the Opportunity that lies beckoning.
I wonder who out there is watching these events, and thinking the same thoughts I am.
I suspect we'll find out.
February 22, 2011 - 2:39 pm Link to this Comment -
3. westerncanadian
Style, thy true name is corruption. The phrase 'to grease his palm (i.e. bribe)' refers to the practice of corrupt medieval clergy rubbing grease on their palm before taking bribes of gold coins. They would claim that they never touched the money because of the layer of grease which intervened between their skin and the golden coins. According to this corrupted logic, they never took a bribe.
Why bother to go to all the trouble of getting elected if you can't use the position to get rich? Why endure all the hassle of being a gatekeeper if you can't charge admission? Only truly stylish people understand these things. Only dumb-ass hicks don't do them because they can't grasp the nuances of style.
February 22, 2011 - 3:07 pm Link to this Comment -
4. Dr. Mabuse
My daughter was reading 'The Picture of Dorian Gray' for a college class, and I found myself trying to explain to her what Oscar Wilde meant by "society" in the last decade of the 19th century. How vitally important it was to the people who were "in" (including Wilde himself) – how unlivable life would be to fall from that rare atmosphere of money, lineage, and chic cleverness. And yet how entirely it was obliterated less than 20 years later by WWI. The world of the "winners" you describe, so airy and cosmopolitan, floating above us losers on a thermal current of credit, is ready to collapse in the same way. As a wise priest I knew once said "Jesus never said, 'Blessed are the winners.'"
February 22, 2011 - 3:14 pm Link to this Comment -
5. Don Rodrigo
Wow, my salary is higher than Bongo Baboon's by a comfortable margin!
Where's my Bugatti?
February 22, 2011 - 3:23 pm Link to this Comment -
6. Josh
wretchard, this is the one you submit for this year's pulitzer.
February 22, 2011 - 3:23 pm Link to this Comment -
They are not "citizens of the world," they are persons of the world, citizens of the United States of America. Too bad they aren't taught that in their high-falutin' schools.
This is what we get for electing a beta male.
February 22, 2011 - 3:27 pm Link to this Comment -
"they cling to guns or religion"
Obama (as with much else) got this one wrong.
It's actually guns AND religion.
People cling to guns because they might need them. ("better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.")
People cling to religion so they can pray there won't be a need for the guns.
February 22, 2011 - 3:45 pm Link to this Comment -
9. Thrasymachus
I'm cheering for Qaddafi right now. Live like a gangster, die like a gangster. At least he's consistent.
February 22, 2011 - 3:59 pm Link to this Comment -
10. zhombre
@ 6. Josh
Pulitzers, like Nobel prizes or Grammys or Oscars, have become mostly shit.
February 22, 2011 - 4:24 pm Link to this Comment -
11. eaglesdontflock
The old birds of a feather. Obama's friends turn my stomach. Obviously, it's genetic protection: http://tinyurl.com/4dgm6cr
February 22, 2011 - 4:31 pm Link to this Comment -
12. wildiris
@ 1. wws
Wasn't North Africa in a similar state of political disarray in the mid-seventh century when the Muslim armies first swarmed out of Arabia? I believe this was the reason that those Islamic armies were able to conquer so much territory so quickly, so that within a century they had made it all the way to France.
February 22, 2011 - 4:33 pm Link to this Comment -
I think it was the President of Indonesia who said a few years ago that the forests of his country were vital resources to stop Global Warming and if he did not see some money pretty quick they were going to light them up or cut them down.
So now we have yet another Dr. Strangelove moment. The Doomsday Device does not consist of a buried bomb big enough to sterilize the planet but a bunch of crooks who will bash and trash the resources they control 'Or else."
"Nice little planet ya got here, Mr. Obama. Would be a shame if somethin' was to happen to it. Oh! Excuse me! You're from Chicago , right? Well, you know the scam then. Just consider it protection money."
February 22, 2011 - 4:36 pm Link to this Comment -
14. wretchard
One of the biggest threats to forests in the Third World is the lack of property rights and an aversion to using market forces to protect them. In the Philippines, for example, you couldn't grow trees. If you grew trees (in identically aged stands) then you couldn't cut them down because that would be "commercializing" forestry. You could however, engage in an "allowable cut", which would be like authorizing an "allowable cut" on a wheat crop.
The forests were managed as the Commons. Why? Because they were the "national patrimony" — not to be alienated, even to tribal communities which had lived in them since the dawn of human settlement. Thus, nobody owned the forests but the state. And they were exploited according to a regime called "logging concessions", which meant that politicians were allowed to "selectively log" — which in reality meant they basically totaled everything, not having any incentive to protect property which was never going to be theirs, but simply handed to the next politician to succeed them in office.
This wonderful state of affairs accords very much with the socialist view of the world. They don't realize that the only way to manage land is to get somebody to own it. In their view ownership is "exploitation". The reverse is true. Non-ownership means the Tragedy of the Commons.
In my experience the natural resource management theories of the Third World are dominated by a toxic combination of leftist NGOs, development financiers and corrupt Third World officials, all of whom pretend to care, though none of them give a hoot. They are as big a bunch of grifters as it is possible to find.
I think many of the same cast of characters have since moved on to the Global Warming racket. And together they are going to wind up starving the world, wiping out what is left of the forests and making a big pile of money. Someone once asked me what the best form of aid was for the Third World. We were at the time sitting near a giant bureaucratic complex devoted to mismanaging the forest. I replied without hesitation, "an Arc Light right down along this whole street."
That's what they should have done to Khadaffi long ago and the world would have been far the better for it.
February 22, 2011 - 4:51 pm Link to this Comment -
15. Storm-Rider
W: "Who did President Obama refer to when he declared, 'and it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion…' He referred to the losers of the world… The only people who don't belong in this game are the poor saps in Equatorial Guinea, the average Abdul in Libya or the "bitter clinger" in America. At a level down, they are the poor dopes who don't want to pay public employees who earn twice what they get, with money they don't have. That makes them bitter clingers who don't got no style. This is a world made for the Masters of the Universe…"
"The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others… We are different from all the oligarchies of the past in that we know what we're doing… Power is not a means, it is an end… The object of power is power… Always there will be the intoxication of power… We are the Priests of Power… Power is power over human beings, over the body; but above all over the mind… The real power; the power we have to fight for night and day is not power over things but over men. How does one man assert his power over another… by making him suffer… Power is in inflicting pain and humiliation… You will be hollow. We shall squeeze you empty and then we shall fill you with ourselves." George Orwell – 1984
February 22, 2011 - 4:54 pm Link to this Comment -
16. toadold
14. Wretchard:
Ayup, you see the same process on a number of American Indian reservations. The land on a number of the reservations belongs to the tribe as a whole and no individual owns any land. The effect has been that who ever the tribal leaders are run the place and take their slice of any thing comming in. Money from the land use or from the US government goes through thier hands first. Most businesses don't want to set up on reservations because of the uncertain rules on taxation, who the rent goes to, low levels of education and etc. So you end up with a few doing OK and the rest living in poverty.February 22, 2011 - 5:04 pm Link to this Comment -
17. Josh
sr @ 15: Do you remember (have you seen) the star trek : next generation episode where Captain Picard is tortured by the Kardashians … um, Cardassians? They want him to say that three lights are four. He resists, and is rescued just before breaking, and admits that he was just about to break, not to tell them what they wanted to hear, but because he REALLY SAW what they wanted him to see. A terrific scene – in what was a very uneven series.
February 22, 2011 - 5:20 pm Link to this Comment -
18. wretchard
David Ignatius has a wonderful anecdote about Khadaffi's "style". A bodyguard preceded the Brother Leader into the room brandishing an automatic, barefoot and with a bristling beard. Then Ignatius saw Khadaffi:
Then came Gaddafi. He marched straight toward me, stopped about a foot from my face and stared at me with bulging, bloodshot eyes. Then he shouted something in Arabic to his aides and bolted from the room, never to return. Sorry, no interview, his terrified aides told us. … Honestly, I thought at the time that Gaddafi was high on drugs. …
Dressed up in his coats and caps and band-leader braided uniforms, Gaddafi always looks to me as if he's playing himself in the movies.
I think the word Ignatius is looking for is "homicidal maniac". The only cure for Khadaffi's headache is a chair planted with considerable force on his noggin. And the only fashion appropriate to the Brother Leader is a strait-jacket in prison stripes.
But the really scary thing is that there is more where he came from. And the real genius of the Founding Fathers was their realization that government ought never to get so big, permanent or powerful as to prevent a regular change in personalities that govern a country.
The real virtue of democracy is that is not aristocracy. The "bitter clinger" — the average man — are all that stand between society and those who would save it.
February 22, 2011 - 5:21 pm Link to this Comment -
19. Josh
w @ 18: And the real genius of the Founding Fathers was their realization that government ought never to get so big, permanent or powerful as to prevent a regular change in personalities that govern a country.
including George Washington, who had the grace to step down after two terms.
I don't recall classic Greek democracy including term limits!
February 22, 2011 - 5:28 pm Link to this Comment -
20. blert
OT — but timely —
LAHORE – Raymond Allen Davis, who killed two Pakistanis last month in the provincial capital, is second-in-comm-and to Jonathan Banks, the former station chief of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in Islamabad, The Nation has learnt.
Well-placed sources said that the highly-trained operative of the CIA was the second important man of the CIA in Pakistan after ex-station chief Jonathan Banks who left Pakistan after his cover was blown. Banks left Islamabad when Karim Khan, a resident of North Waziristan, submitted an application at the Secretariat Police Station, Islamabad for a FIR against the CIA station chief for the killing of Karim's brother and son in one of the drone attacks directed by the CIA boss in Pakistan. The sources said that Davis could be called the deputy station chief of the CIA in Pakistan, or the acting station chief.It looks as if the ISI was fingering our guys for the opfor.
It also looks like the duo was trying to engineer a snatch.
One can surmise that the US/ CIA has tried to hide our agents from both the opfor in the field and the ISI in Islamabad.
Shades of Chapman!
And in other news:
Colonel Imam is gunned down by paranoid Hakeemullah Mehsud — the ultimate in loose cannons.
Warning — explicit execution vidi.
Since Col Imam was the original field worker organizing the Talibs his cycle is complete.
February 22, 2011 - 5:38 pm Link to this Comment -
21. blert
Early America had the good grace to elect son-less Presidents in the early going.
It was all that George could do to get the boys from calling him "Your Majesty." Washington introduced the title Mr. President to stop that.
IIRC Polk introduced "Hail to the Chief" — or rather his wife did. He was so quiet and short that assemblies didn't know when President Polk had entered without some fanfare.
February 22, 2011 - 5:42 pm Link to this Comment -
22. PA Cat
wretchard #18: Ignatius doesn't mention Kaddafi's unique entourage of "stylish" female bodyguards:
Here's a Russian video of Muammar's recent visit to Kiev: even if you can't understand the voiceover, the video speaks for itself:
Kaddafi's robe and chapeau look like hand-me-downs from FLOTUS.
February 22, 2011 - 5:45 pm Link to this Comment -
A few years back there was a soccer match in Libya between two teams, one of which basically belonged to one of his sons and the other team to the other one. There was some disagreement about some of the officiating and they elected to settle it in true sportsmanlike fashion: by means of a gun battle between the opposing groups of bodyguards. Then the spectators decided it was high time to express their true measure of devotion to the regime by attacking both groups of bodyguards, who responded with more gunfire.
And the latest uprising against Kaddafy Duck came as huge surprise? In the words of one captured German general after WWII in reference to the Allies failure to use chemical weapons: "Your intelligence people are asses!"
February 22, 2011 - 5:52 pm Link to this Comment -
24. wretchard
What was their beef with Colonel Imam? Or did they shoot him on general principles?
February 22, 2011 - 5:56 pm Link to this Comment -
25. westerncanadian
W@#14, toadold@#16 : Agreed. Not much foreign aid trickles down to Joe Poverty-stricken. For the Indians, if Joe Band-member is in the wrong clan (totem) then he's screwed. In the developed world replace 'allowable cut' with 'variable rate of harvest' and you can start to have a sensible conversation about forest management.
February 22, 2011 - 5:59 pm Link to this Comment -
26. stoicheion
It looks like the ISI is working to shut down drone attacks. The Air force could but they won't. So the ISI is doing it thru the back door.
That means it's time to close down the Embassy in Pakistan and go after the ISI. Let them find out what the meaning of targeted assassination is. We really need to change our approach in Afghanistan. Find a replacement at the top and murder What's his name and all his relatives. Pull out the Army and let the Marines do the job THE WAY THEY WANT. NO ROE's from the 5 sided nut house. Ain't gonna happen but if I'm gonna dream, I'll dream big.February 22, 2011 - 6:01 pm Link to this Comment -
27. Storm-Rider
Josh 17,
When someone wants you to say three lights are four they are demanding a rejection of self-evident truth. When one rejects the validity of self-evident truth one rejects reason its self because reason is simply the ability to comprehend and accept self-evident truth – both scientific and moral. Rejection of reason can be traced back to Plato, and it turns out that such a philosophy when fully worked out plays into the hands of a special elite – the "Priests of Power" as Orwell called them in "1984″ – or the Pigs of Animal Farm. Since their "higher truth" is not self-evident we must look up to our betters to guide us – we must look up to that special elite who are in effect the only people made in the image of God."Plato's metaphysics holds that the universe consists of two opposed dimensions: true reality – a perfect, immutable, supernatural realm, nonmaterial… non-perceivable – and the material world in which we live. The material world, Plato holds, is only an imperfect appearance of true reality… The advocacy of the omnipotent state follows from the above as a matter of course… The program of government domination of the individual is thoroughly worked out. In Plato's "Republic and Laws" one can read the details, which are the first blueprint of the totalitarian ideal… The blueprint includes the view that the state should be ruled by a special elite: the philosophers. Their title to absolute power, Plato explains, is their special wisdom, a wisdom which derives from their insight into true reality… the so-called "Form of the Good"… The Form of the Good cannot be known by the use of reason… It can only be grasped, after years of ascetic preparation, only by an ineffable mystic experience… which is reserved to the philosophical elite… The mass of men, by contrast, are entangled in the personal concerns of this life. They are enslaved to the lower world revealed to them by their senses. They are incapable of achieving mystic contact with a supernatural principle. They are fit only to obey orders… What men perceive is not reality "as it is," but merely reality as it appears… Thus for Kant, as for Plato, the universe consists of two opposed dimensions… true reality, a supersensible realm… and a world of appearances which is not ultimately real, the material world men perceive by means of their physical senses… Reason is impotent to discover anything about reality… Reality, declares Hegel, is inherently contradictory… In Hegel's view… distinctions of any kind… between one man and another, are unreal (opposites are identical, A is non-A)… A few superior beings throughout the ages, he (Hegel) holds – e.g., Alexander, Caesar, Napoleon – have functioned as "agents of the World Spirit." These men have been endowed with a special mission: to advance the evolution of Spirit (carry out the will of God) in their era… Such individuals, Hegel concedes, often leave a trail of corpses in their wake. Nevertheless, they are exempt from moral judgment." Leonard Peikoff, "The Ominous Parallels"
O'Brian to Winston Smith: "You believe that reality is something objective, external, existing in its own right. You also believe that the nature of reality is self-evident… I tell you Winston that reality is not external. Reality exists in the human mind and nowhere else; not in the individual mind, which can make mistakes and in any case soon perishes; only in the mind of the Party, which is collective and immortal. Whatever the Party holds to be truth is truth." George Orwell – 1984
February 22, 2011 - 6:06 pm Link to this Comment -
28. Walt
I had lunch with Teodorin the other day, and he was very charming, very forthcoming. We talked about many things, but mainly about Teodorin.
They say you lead a playboy life
I said with knowing smile
He said he married a rich wife
Who keeps them both in style
He said that many overstate
The number of his cars
I drive a beat-up Ford V-8
And keep my cash in jars
I like it here in Malibu
The women here are white
If you were me you'd like it too
I go out every night
I have drink and have some fun
I cherish every date
But stroke of nine the evening's done
I never get home late
You seem to have a lot of cash
I casually said
Your shopping sprees seem kind of rash
Why don't you save instead
He laughed and waved a limpid hand
Said trees have made me rich
Al Gore and carbon make life grand
While clingers like you bitchFebruary 22, 2011 - 6:10 pm Link to this Comment -
29. Josh
sr @ 27: amen to all, I was just pointing out the profoundly good version of it appearing on ST:TNG.
On the other topic Karl Popper, btw, starts out his social philosophy strongly criticizing those who claim the unlimited authority of vox populi.
February 22, 2011 - 6:27 pm Link to this Comment -
30. blert
Col Imam was accused of colluding with the ISI and CIA and nearly succeeding in eliminating Hakeemullah Mehsud, himself.
Apparently, Hellfire strikes took out HM's immediate associates while he suffered but slightly.
Here and there the Leftist press pushes the line that the drone strikes are hitting nobody important.
This liquidation shows just how close the strikes have come. Mehsud is a MAJOR player.
IIRC, he was behind the assault on Islamabad Army HQ a while back. That's his MO: direct targeting.
February 22, 2011 - 6:28 pm Link to this Comment -
31. blert
Popper is a Royalist — pure and simple. All of his arguments exist to buttress that faith.
He can't adjust to a hyper-dominant royal like Henry VIII — a tyrant under crown.
February 22, 2011 - 6:30 pm Link to this Comment -
32. wretchard
I've given up on trying to fix the world. There's too many con artists out there promising to do that for one. For another, maybe the Bible was right. You can't build a tower to reach the heavens.
What may be possible is to just keep it going. To leave the world no worse than we found it, allowing for advances in technology, knowledge and malice.
It is not our part to master all the tides of the world, but to do what is in us for the succour of those years wherein we are set, uprooting the evil in the fields that we know, so that those who live after may have clean earth to till. What weather they shall have is not ours to rule.
Toward that goal, our aims could be more modest: to contain evil and limit madness so that we obtain for ourselves and our families a space in which to pursue happiness. The main philosophical difference, I think, between the Founding Fathers and Marx, is that the former saw life as something to be protected from human ambition while the latter saw it as something to be perfected by the same ambition.
There is a great deal of wisdom to the words, "leave me alone". Alone to grow my garden, to peer at the stars, to invent things, while at the same time giving just due to the needs of community. But the Sabbath for man, and not man for the Sabbath.
And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.
But it should never have been about the city and its tower, but the inhabitants therein. The tower was nothing; it was they who dwelt therein who were all. Maybe that is what this global collapse is about: a reminder that life is not lived within the vaulting enterprises of public endeavor, but in little homes, in small kindnesses and in the mortal but everlasting spark of human love.
February 22, 2011 - 6:32 pm Link to this Comment -
33. dPercy
@ #6 Josh….just so…this is splendid work.
I believe I qualify for the role of "bitter clinger" I've got guns, read the bible from time to time, and, well, live in Pennsylvania outside the range of the Philly and 'burg democrat machines. I'm Barry O's perfect target. He had been successful in running off most of my customers…but we had a trick for him…we started making "Fracking Blocks"….keeps us alive. Though we do worry that the EPA will find the practice "environmentally unhealthy" I make my bet everyday that they won't.
February 22, 2011 - 6:37 pm Link to this Comment -
34. Storm-Rider
Josh 29,
The cure for Plato, Kant and Hegel is Aristotle, Locke and Jefferson.
"Aristotle is the champion of this world, the champion of nature, as against the supernaturalism of Plato… Reality is comprised, not of Platonic abstractions, but of concrete, individual entities, each with a definite nature, each obeying the laws inherent in its nature. Aristotle's universe is the universe of science… The Renaissance represented a rebirth of the Aristotelian spirit. The results of that spirit are written across the next two centuries, which men describe, properly, as the Age of Reason and the Age of Enlightenment. The results include the rise of modern science, the rise of an individualist political philosophy (the work of John Locke and others); the consequent spread of freedom across the civilized world; and the birth of the freest country in history, the United States of America." Leonard Peikoff, "The Ominous Parallels"
The supernaturalism of Plato means that a small group of "Philosopher Kings" are made in God's image whereas the supernaturalism of Locke and Jefferson (and possibly Aristotle) means that all men (and women) are made in the image of God.
February 22, 2011 - 6:40 pm Link to this Comment -
35. Blast From the Past
Just now I was watching the series of launch failures sequence in "The Right Stuff." Fifty years ago we still knew that in engineering and in the military, and the Mercury program was both, action means entering the unknown. That means cost and time and risk and loss. You do your best and you use your best and you sacrifice your best, and honor them. Now people expect some High School kids making six figures to solve our problems with CGI.
Call me naive but I think that at one time aristocracy meant something. There were real aristocrats. They wore their privileges lightly and they were always aware that they had responsibilities. As Dr Mabuse mentioned above The World War changed that. In 1916 they went over the top and walked into the machine gun fire at the Somme. What we have now are cheap imitations. Obama and the Quangocrats are stars in the CGI cartoon show.
February 22, 2011 - 6:42 pm Link to this Comment -
36. Walter Sobchak
They got a name for the winners in the world
I want a name when I lose
They call Alabama the Crimson Tide
Call me Deacon Blues"Deacon Blues" by Becker & Fagin from AJA (1977)
http://www.steelydan.com/lyraja.htmlFebruary 22, 2011 - 6:52 pm Link to this Comment -
37. Teresita
Emanuel elected mayor with 110% of precincts reporting.
W quoted JRRT: It is not our part to master all the tides of the world, but to do what is in us for the succour of those years wherein we are set, uprooting the evil in the fields that we know, so that those who live after may have clean earth to till. What weather they shall have is not ours to rule.
Master Lao Tzu said:
Center your country in the Tao
and evil will have no power.
Not that it isn't there,
but you'll be able to step out of its way.Give evil nothing to oppose
and it will disappear by itself.February 22, 2011 - 6:57 pm Link to this Comment -
38. allen
Re: losers (that is the topic…Right)
Then, that means the UK…
UK budget airline easyJet apologized Tuesday to Jewish customers after the only food choices served on a flight from Israel were ham melts and bacon baguettes.February 22, 2011 - 7:01 pm Link to this Comment -
39. dPercy
#36 Walt…I always thought Steely Dan was referring to my pseudo-alma mater Wake Forest.
#35 Blast…very poignant reference to the Somme. Future historians (if there are any) will fix the end of the West on August 1914, which was the last time the West believed in wholeheartedly in "the West". There still exists a chance to turn it suicide of the west around. Places like the Belmont Club give me hope…
February 22, 2011 - 7:07 pm Link to this Comment -
40. Storm-Rider
"Give evil nothing to oppose and it will disappear by itself."
Lao Tzu was wrong because evil only disappears when it is confronted and defeated by the power of truth and courage in the hands of free men.
"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke
"I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary but slinks out of the race, where that immortal garland is to be run for, not without dust and heat." John Milton
"Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God." Thomas Jefferson
February 22, 2011 - 7:16 pm Link to this Comment -
41. allen
#32 Wretchard said…
maybe the Bible was rightIt is going to be quite a ride.
February 22, 2011 - 7:20 pm Link to this Comment -
42. Walter Sobchak
If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?
o The Gulag Archipelago (1973)
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Aleksandr_SolzhenitsynFebruary 22, 2011 - 7:41 pm Link to this Comment -
43. Teresita
Storm Rider Lao Tzu was wrong because evil only disappears when it is confronted and defeated by the power of truth and courage in the hands of free men.
Let's do a little thought experiment, my friend. Suppose Mitt Romney won the White House on a platform that would outlaw communites of more than 2,500 people anywhere in the United States. From now on, everyone has to live in little Tom Sawyer towns with white picket fences, and all the mega conurbations have to be dismantled.
Now suppose al-Qaeda managed to obtain those dreaded nuclear weapons ala Wretchard's Three Conjectures, or Li'l Kim managed to shrink his alleged nuclear weapons and mount them as intercontinental ballistic rounds. What would they hit? Darmstadt, Indiana? Ridgefield, Washington? Why bother?
Sharia law. Good luck, the boys from the VFW would kick their ass right after their parade down Main Street. Of course, this will require a kind of neo-isolationism, abandoning the role of World Policeman and turning inward. Some real conservatives think this is ideal. This is the vision of heaven on Earth we see in TTC 80:
If a country is governed wisely,
its inhabitants will be content.
They enjoy the labor of their hands
and don't waste time inventing
labor-saving machines.
Since they dearly love their homes,
they aren't interested in travel.
There may be a few wagons and boats,
but these don't go anywhere.
There may be an arsenal of weapons,
but nobody ever uses them.
People enjoy their food,
take pleasure in being with their families,
spend weekends working in their gardens,
delight in the doings of the neighborhood.
And even though the next country is so close
that people can hear its roosters crowing and its dogs barking,
they are content to die of old age
without ever having gone to see it.February 22, 2011 - 7:47 pm Link to this Comment -
44. Walter Sobchak
I've been walking forty miles of bad road
If the Bible is right, the world will explode
I've been trying to get as far away from myself as I can
Some things are too hot to touch
The human mind can only stand so much
You can't win with a losing hand"Things Have Changed" by Bob Dylan (2000)
on The Essential Bob Dylan
http://www.bobdylan.com/songs/things-have-changedFire and Ice by Robert Frost
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.February 22, 2011 - 7:49 pm Link to this Comment -
W…"Leave me alone"….yes please leave me alone. The IRS now requires any US citizen to report any bank account or investment account worth more than $10,000 that is outside of the US to file a form with an income tax statement. The US Federal government is the only western government that requires an expat to report income gained outside of the US and will tax it. Where can one find serenity when their government ( even when they are expatriated) is so intrusive into all aspects of life?
February 22, 2011 - 7:56 pm Link to this Comment -
46. Storm-Rider
Walter Sobchak 42,
Yes everyone has an evil nature within their hearts and minds, but there is also room for the Spirit of God within; there is room for love, goodness and courage in every heart and mind. Everyone at regular points along the way chooses one path or the other – good or evil – and everyone should be willing each day to destroy the evil piece of their own heart. Some people apparently go "all in" one side or the other – Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong, Pol Pot and Fidel Castro come to mind – evil people insidiously and overtly committing evil deeds."Communism has never concealed the fact that it rejects all absolute concepts of morality. It scoffs at any consideration of "good" and "evil" as indisputable categories. Communism considers morality to be relative, to be a class matter. Depending upon circumstances and the political situation, any act, including murder, even the killing of thousands, could be good or could be bad." Alexander Solzhenitsyn
February 22, 2011 - 8:00 pm Link to this Comment -
47. trangbang68
#36 Steely Dan references always get kudos from me.
Here's one for the world today…
No marigolds in the promised land
There's a hole in the ground where they used to grow
Any man left on the Rio Grande
Is the King of the World as far as I know…http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NSVjwbiXRvI&feature=related
#39- Steely Dan is named after a dildo in William Burroughs "Naked Lunch"
February 22, 2011 - 8:12 pm Link to this Comment -
48. Storm-Rider
Teresita 43,
Your "thought experiment" seems to be unrelated to my post regarding the nature of good and evil. For one thing Mitt Romney would not try, nor would he be able, to coerce hundreds of millions of Americans into the social engineering scheme that you envisioned; but I wouldn't put it past the likes of Joseph Stalin, Pol Pot or Mao Zedong.February 22, 2011 - 8:12 pm Link to this Comment -
49. Victor
Demographics are destiny
–Libya is a made up nation of tribes numbering 6 million with the greatest oil reserves in Africa.Egypt is a 8000 year old civilization- 80 million people now in poverty.
The likely outcome is that Egypt will take over eastern and central Libya and Tunisia will take over Tripolitania.
Nobody–particularly Europe— which is faced with a massive invasion of immigrants–will have any problem with that solution.
Turkey is floating this solution and the Arab League has few objections to that scenario.
Morocco and Algeria have no serious objections and this scenario will serve American best interests in terms of security and general energy price.
Gadaffi is a long term amphetamine addict–his performance today–before trotting away in his golf cart–was like a scene from The Downfall.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxPKnSl-Km8&feature=relatedGadaffi has not being running the country for some time–there is a Shakespearean drama going on between his sons–one of whom has a PhD from LSE–this will not end well for the rest of them.
Libya will cease to exist as anything other than a name on old maps very soon
–follow the money
–and the demographicsFebruary 22, 2011 - 8:20 pm Link to this Comment -
50. buddy larsen
This essay is by that guy –a DOJ voting rights lawyer named J. Christian Adams –who challenged the infinitely-bent Eric Holder re those two thugs with clubs outside the polling place. i thought it to be on topic due to the words of Sofie Scholl, words that got her guillotined by the Gestapo at the age of 21.
Active opposition to Hitler inside Germany was a deadly and lonely affair. Yet today, we view these few souls, most of whom would meet gruesome deaths, as plainly right and heroic. Pope Benedict XVI captured this idea of justice revealed over time when he observed: "usually it is the creative minorities that determine the future" — another lesson for today's defenders of liberty.
Between March 1942 and February 1943, the White Rose wrote and secretly produced anti-Nazi leaflets. They copied them on mimeograph machines and literally left them lying all around Munich. They stenciled anti-Hilter messages on the sides of buildings. The Gestapo went wild. Nobody else in Germany was doing anything of the sort.
White Rose leaflet four captures the totalitarian corruption of language as well as a view of Hitler justified by hindsight:
Every word that proceeds from Hitler's mouth is a lie. When he says peace, he means war. And when he names the name of the Almighty in a most blasphemous manner, he means the almighty evil one, that fallen angel, Satan. His mouth is the stinking maw of hell and his might is fundamentally reprobate. To be sure, one must wage the battle against National Socialism using rational means. But whoever still does not believe in the actual existence of demonic powers has not comprehended by far the metaphysical background of this war.
Everywhere and at all times, the demons have waited in darkness for the hour in which mankind is weak; in which he voluntarily abandons the position in the world order that is based on freedom and comes from God; in which he yields to the force of the Evil One, disengaging himself from the powers of a higher order.
end excerpt))
Twenty-one years old –those words came from a 21 year old. Once released, the Evil of which the words spoke came and got her, and killed her.
February 22, 2011 - 8:37 pm Link to this Comment -
51. Mad Fiddler
Dang, Trangbang…
You have ruint forever my placid enjoyment of a fine couple of moozishuns.
William fer-Pete's-sake Burroughs, forsooth!
Why couldn't have been a reference to some Hebrew blacksmith from the book of "Judges" or a Japanese human national treasure swordmaster?
February 22, 2011 - 8:41 pm Link to this Comment -
52. trangbang68
Sorry Fiddler, but truth is what it is. Fagan and Becker were a couple of NYC
hipsters at Bard College near Poughkeepsie in the early 70′s. Burroughs and Kerouac and those of that ilk were the rage . I went to New Paltz State down the road about that time and these beats were icons.February 22, 2011 - 9:01 pm Link to this Comment -
53. allen
#50 buddy larsen
Evil never gets a free ride… But you knew that…
At its best, the human soul reflects the mind of its Creator. Wherever darkness has smothered the land, the light has always struggled to break through the barrier, no matter the cost. The White Rose was plural. There were, indeed, good Germans.
It is fascinating to see that both the Nazis and the White Rose believed the struggle was between the eternal forces of light and darkness, good and evil. The battle was bare knuckled.
"It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to, than I have ever known."
February 22, 2011 - 9:01 pm Link to this Comment -
54. buddy larsen
a/53, for sure we WILL worship something –even if it is Nothing.
"Leave me alone" is "Get thee behind me, Satan" –nothing grand asked of life, only the freedom to choose to look at the world without Medusa or der Furher's face –or associated flying monkey minions such as the bad Allah, or obama and billary clinton –loitering grinning in the path ahead.
February 22, 2011 - 9:58 pm Link to this Comment -
55. Mad Fiddler
Dear Belmont Club,
Events of the last week put me in mind of the article Wretchard had posted on the day I first stumbled into his community. (Pray
It was about the vulnerability of international commerce in the sea lanes off the Horn of Africa… القرن الأفريقي
That was way back in 2005, if memory serves.
But if you want to gaze upon the face of real prescience, just look at this week's declaiming by Mouammar Gaddafi before the news cameras, and then check the representin' by Martin Lawrence's character posing as a Saudi Prince who wishes to purchase a fancy residential hotel in the movie "What's the Worst that Could Happen?"
You will be thunderstruck.
Jeez. Yous guys really know how to talk fancy.
Even when you're pointing out the water squirting from the fresh cracks in the face of the dam towering overhead, the acuteness of your vision and the deftness of your language almost makes me forget I'm about to be smashed to a bloody pudding by the deluge.
Seriously, your keen-eyed analysis of events is mighty reassuring. My brother says it keeps him out of the bomb shelter, and away from the ledge.
Hmmm. I wonder if I could toddle down to the local precinct and swear out a restraining order on this administration? None of the bastards allowed within a hundred yards of anything important, or they all have to wear shocky-collars and we citizens all get to carry battery-powered remotes.
If that doesn't work, maybe I should just turn my self in, like the town drunk in Andy Griffith's "Mayberry RFD."
That inept juggler in the elliptical suite — you know…. the guy who needs help changing his didies when the Somali Pirates commit yet another atrocity — is now abandoned even by the left-est of the left. The cover of Newsweak [sic] depicts him as a big fat LOSER.
Well, ridicule definitely suits him.
Couldn't happen to a more deserving guy.
February 22, 2011 - 10:05 pm Link to this Comment -
56. peterike
Ahh, the great and the good, who tell me I cling too much. One of my favorite descriptions of this crew comes from the James Gould Cozzens novel "By Love Possessed."
A rabble of professional friends of man, social-worker liberals, and practitioners of universal brotherhood — the whole national horde of nuts and queers — will come at a run to hang me by the neck until I learn to love.
February 23, 2011 - 7:05 am Link to this Comment -
57. herb
I heard a newsbabe on Fox say that the only US asset in the Med was a tin can. NO US Carrier in the Med??? Whazzup wid that? Have we sunk that low?
February 23, 2011 - 7:55 am Link to this Comment -
58. always right
Although it isn't clear what he's accomplished for his "people", Teodorin certainly knows how to live.
Please, Wretchard.
Things could have been much worse. He could have chosen to live amongst his own people, and who knows how much worse those poor souls are going to be 'tortured'.
At least Teodorin had the good sense living in a 'lawful' land, like Malibu, CA. One the surface, he is still subject to our laws.
February 23, 2011 - 10:58 am Link to this Comment -
59. blert
The Resident sent the 6th Fleet through the canal – south – to 'pass in review' the mighty garbage scow and tramp steamer.
I would rather expect them to be tasked with suppressing Somali pirates until Clinton's reset button comes unstuck.
February 23, 2011 - 11:26 am Link to this Comment -
60. buddy larsen
Somebody mentioned the Phoenicians, and he got worried about a confrontation in the Med.
February 23, 2011 - 1:47 pm Link to this Comment -
61. blert
It's official, the 6th Fleet was tasked with the piracy of the US yacht.
Following the ROE determined by the CinC USA our Navy was able to intervene after all the civilians were murdered.
The pirates didn't like the 33-year sentence handed out to their co-jihadist — which they learned about via un-jammed radio news. They obviously figured that murdering their hostages carries no further sanction.
With the Zero in the loop — they're right. He's already on record that should he need to choose he'd always take the side of the ummah.
February 23, 2011 - 2:48 pm Link to this Comment -
62. blert
Someone cried out," Scamming speed !"
They should have said, "Rahmming screed!"
Rahm, 'iz the new Pharaoh of denial.
Look for 'im to bury all of the loose-lipped mummies.
I understand from some allusions posted to the Web that there's plenty of stink for Rahm to deep Sphinx.
February 23, 2011 - 4:06 pm Link to this Comment -
63. herb
If we could set up a couple dozen CONEX boxes with .50Cal and willing hands, Ill warrant the pirate problem would be over in 90 days. Sending a CV to chase what are basically bandits is overkill.
We (or the world)may not make to 2012.
February 23, 2011 - 5:46 pm Link to this Comment -
64. buddy larsen
blert, one mayor may not desire to peer amid the valets of the kinks, for they will hire ugly fix, and Horace needed.
If we don't open our Isis, we'll be Styx with the bill. If we refuse to pay, we'll get kicked in the Ba'als and Nefertiti again
February 23, 2011 - 6:32 pm Link to this Comment -
66. marymcl
Storm Rider – Lao Tse wasn't wrong, but neither did he mean what Teresita proposes.
Teresita – Your isolated quote from Tao Te Ching @37 was offered in contrast to Wretchard's quote from Tolkien. To be sure, Lao Tse and Tolkien were different men from different worlds. What both men understood – as many who quote either of them out of context do not – are the paradoxes inherent in both good and evil. (btw I'm not talking about our host in this regard)
In fact Wretchard's quote from LOTR expresses the spirit of Taoism in practice – in other words, doing what is required by the times in which you live. That IMO is what Lao Tse was talking about when he counseled "living in the Tao" – not passive isolation, or ivory-towered denial, or "turning inward", (probably the single greatest misunderstanding of Taoist philosophy in the West) but active engagement with the world as you find it, the world as it is. Just like Gandalf says.
February 23, 2011 - 8:55 pm Link to this Comment -
67. Blast From Grouchos Past
Wouldn't you rather go to her room?February 23, 2011 - 9:32 pm Link to this Comment -
68. ConservativeMutant
A bit of Arthur Hugh Clough seems apropos:
"It's all very well to be handsome and tall,
Which certainly makes you look well at a ball;
It's all very well to be clever and witty,
But if you are poor, why it's only a pity.
So needful it is to have money, heigh-ho!
So needful it is to have money.""There's something undoubtedly in a fine air,
To know how to smile and be able to stare.
High breeding is something, but well-bred or not,
In the end the one question is, what have you got.
So needful it is, etc."Some things don't change, it seems.
February 23, 2011 - 9:32 pm Link to this Comment -
70. buddy larsen
bfgp/67, as harpo would say, "______!"
February 23, 2011 - 9:41 pm Link to this Comment -
71. spindok
The elites do not know, and we must never let them know, how much more fun it is to be one of the losers. I pity them really, how difficult to carry the weight of every polar bear and the nutritional balance of every Gazan on such narrow shoulders. The school just called and Alexis has been caught dealing happy meals behind the girls gym again. To fall from such a height would be unthinkable but the view is nice and the air smells of nothing. Everything is dangerous, harmful and about to collapse.
Down below amidst the crumbling rustbelt ruins there is another life. I live there. We can sleep wherever we want, the houses are near free. The highways are clear of traffic because most of the people have gone. We have freedom because there is not much to lose. We have our faith, and have gained and lost that so many times that it cannot be taken away. We are presumed armed and so no need to use our weapons. A beatup F-150 is not difficult to replace. We love, not like bunnies all soft and fluffy, but like men and women. There is less fear here.
So we dance among the ruins. Obama was wrong. It was not bitterness he sensed. We just wanted him to leave.
I wanna tell you 'bout Texas Radio and the Big Beat
Comes out of the Virginia swamps
Cool and slow with plenty of precision
With a back beat narrow and hard to masterSome call it heavenly in it's brilliance
Others, mean and ruthful of the Western dream
I love the friends I have gathered together on this thin raft
We have constructed pyramids in honor of our escaping
This is the land where the Pharaoh diedFebruary 24, 2011 - 11:21 am Link to this Comment -
72. Storm-Rider
marymcl 66: "Lao Tse wasn't wrong, but neither did he mean what Teresita proposes."
"Why are people starving?
Because the rulers eat up the money in taxes.
Therefore the people are starving.Why are the people rebellious?
Because the rulers interfere too much.
Therefore they are rebellious.Why do people think so little of death?
Because the rulers demand too much of life.
Therefore the people take life lightly." Lao Tzu"Give evil nothing to oppose and it will disappear by itself." Lao Tzu
OK; Lao Tzu was a good guy, but it appears to me that he was wrong about evil.
"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke
"I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary but slinks out of the race, where that immortal garland is to be run for, not without dust and heat." John Milton
"Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God." Thomas Jefferson
February 24, 2011 - 1:47 pm Link to this Comment -
73. buddy larsen
good grief, spindok. literally good grief. that's beautiful. no, more than beautiful, real –literature.
Down below amidst the crumbling rustbelt ruins there is another life. I live there. We can sleep wherever we want, the houses are near free. The highways are clear of traffic because most of the people have gone. We have freedom because there is not much to lose. We have our faith, and have gained and lost that so many times that it cannot be taken away. We are presumed armed and so no need to use our weapons. A beatup F-150 is not difficult to replace. We love, not like bunnies all soft and fluffy, but like men and women.
incandescent, and i wish i'da wrote it.***
(btw i wouldn't clang clang mention it, but as publishable in slick paper it should lose the apostrophe typo in the verse, line one, stanza two)
February 24, 2011 - 2:01 pm Link to this Comment -
75. Cleveland
This space is an oasis for the bitter clingers trying to make sense of this nonsensical time. Thank you Wretchard and all of the other players. Another beautiful thread.
February 24, 2011 - 7:18 pm Link to this Comment -
76. buddy larsen
c/75, me too –
b/74, writers on the storm –yes –yo humble correspondent not included, ah hastens to add –
February 25, 2011 - 3:23 am Link to this Comment
Comments are closed.


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Jane Wright - 09/02/2011
I'm a late starter with this super dance. It doesn't matter that it's been around for a long time, it's great and the class got on well with it last week. We will see what tonight brings, hope the results are just as good.
vicki - 15/02/2005
when i was taught this dance i fell in luv with it straight away. it is my favourite dance ever! the music is brill aswell!
vicki - 15/02/2005
when i was taught this dance i fell in luv with it straight away. it is my favourite dance ever! the music is brill aswell!
Peter - 20/07/2003
This dance is lasting on my list of favorites. Nice sequence of steps and music whilst didn't like it a first grew on me.
karen D - 20/07/2003
it still fills the dancefloor, its stayer!!!!
Carly - 26/06/2003
I love this dance! I first saw it performed at the class i go to ages ago and thought, i have to learn this. It always tires you out which i find a good thing. Luv Carly xxx
Charlotte - 15/05/2003
fab dance!! every time i hear the music, i get up on the floor and dance! it allways cheers me up.
Becky - 26/04/2003
What can I say. A huge success, cool music, fun. The dance can fit to other music as well. Brill.
cris - 20/04/2003
gr8 dance, it took me a bit to learn, but once i had it, it was fantastic!!
jade doull - 11/04/2003
I love this dance every time i hear the music i get up & do it!
Tiffany - 07/04/2003
What a great dance! Love it so much, don't think I will ever tire of it!
Pat Laming - 17/03/2003
Has anyone tried this dance to cheeseburger, it goes brilliantly to it
Holly Trigger - 19/02/2003
This has been out 4 ages its good to see it still being played as it is a very good dance. xox
karen - 17/02/2003
we taught this when it first came out, and still the classes love it we hope it will stay around for a while yet, this will onle happen if the djs keep playing it!!!
Yvette Corbett - 31/01/2003
I dance with Apache Rebels in Perth WA and we just love this dance. You just cant help getting up to do it and its a real feel good number.
Christine - 25/01/2003
Just have to say, that i have just learned this dance but itis really really fun and i love to dance to it.....so go on and keep dancing xxxx
Betina Sommerset - 08/01/2003
Great dance with a lot of challenge. Also great to Love you too much by Brady Seals.
longtallsally - 11/05/2002
what a brilliant dance routine,it is a fun dance routine to learn
Adam Tilbrook, SIX-24 LDC Tuddenham suffolk, PHIL AND MARGARET - 25/04/2002
also another great dance, i noticed maggie galagher hasnt been about 4 a while, maybe daniel and hayley are the next maggie!! i hope they throw a few more dances like this one, i love the music, only thing is it gets my knees after about 4 mins, i know you say faid after 4 mins but we just keep going. thankyou margaret spearman for teaching us this dance. WE LOVE YOU ALSO!!!!!!!
Levi J. Hubbard - 21/04/2002
I just attended a workshop today at my favorite club (Cotton Eyed Joe's) and this dance was taught, It's a great dance the steps fit very well with the beat of the music, This is my no 1 fav dance now this dance deserves more than 5 stars
amcualay - 16/04/2002
well what can i say....superb dance and i love the music, if you haven't learned this dance go and find the script and start learning because it's brilliant!
angie mackenzie - 15/04/2002
this is one of the best dances around, and the music is pretty cool too! we need more dances like this one.
Marie Sheard - 17/02/2002
This dance has to be one of the best, particularly for putting individual style into it, it's absolutely brilliant. Thankyou to Michael & Jennifer of Navajo (Doncaster)for teaching us the dance. We've been doing it now for quite a while but its still a real favourite.
Sue Johnstone - 04/02/2002
This is the best most exciting dance that's come along in a long time. We've been dancing it quite a while now at my classes and discos and we still all rush onto the floor when the music starts. Well Done Sue 'Scootnboogie Line Dance, Oxford www.linedanceoxford.co.uk
rachael burgis - 02/02/2002
i think that this is a really good dance and every time i know its on it always makes me get up and dance!(thanx 4 a gr8 dance.)
Sue - 13/01/2002
My class love this dance. We do it to track 1 (3mins 30sec) not track 4 (5mins 36)as suggested by the choreographer. Much better music - good solid beat and tune - dance fits well.


text:
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The large island kitchen with high-end professional chef's kitchen appliances, living room with wood burning fireplace and dinning area are perfectly situated in a great room setting.
Property is located across the street from Lancaster Estate Vineyard, 10 minute walk to Verite Winery. The property has also a private access to Maacama Creek. 10 miles drive to Healdsburg town, 14 miles to Calistoga.
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CNS Story:
RELIGIONS-CONGRESS Jan-7-2013 (530 words) With photos and with graphic to come. xxxn
Catholics still largest Congress denomination; 10 percent Jesuit grads
By Patricia Zapor
Catholic News Service
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The 113th Congress includes some slight shifts in religious makeup over the previous session, with a few more Catholics, the first Buddhist in the Senate and the first Hindu to serve in either chamber.
It's a historic high for the number of Catholics in Congress, with 163, although that's just two more seats than the previous high point, when there were 161 Catholics in the 111th Congress of 2009-10.
That's an increase of seven seats over the 156 Catholics had in the 112th Congress.
Since at least the 1960s, Catholics have been the single largest denomination in Congress. Although when Protestant denominations are counted together, they still constitute the largest number of members, at 56 percent.
Another analysis finds that alumni of Jesuit colleges and universities account for nearly 10 percent of all members of Congress.
According to data compiled by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, Catholics now make up slightly below 31 percent of Congress, while they account for about 22 percent of the U.S. population.
The new Congress, which opened Jan. 3, includes 136 Catholics in the House of Representatives, 75 of whom are Democrats and 61 of whom are Republicans. The 27 Catholic senators are comprised of 18 Democrats and nine Republicans.
Pew counted 31 freshman members of Congress as Catholics, about 37 percent of the class.
The next largest denomination in Congress is Baptists, with 9 percent of freshmen and 15 percent of incumbents. Overall, Baptists account for 14 percent of the 113th Congress, with 73 total seats, up from 68 seats in the previous session.
Fifty-eight members of Congress listed their affiliation as "other" or "unspecified," the same number as in the 112th Congress, but only one, newly elected Rep. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., described herself as "unaffiliated."
The Pew data notes that Catholics, Protestants and Jews are disproportionately represented in Congress in comparison to their percentage of the overall adult population. But even with fewer than five members in Congress, Buddhists, Muslims, Hindus and Orthodox are represented in about equal proportion to their number in the country. The same goes for Mormons, who have 15 members in Congress, just under 3 percent, and represent about 2 percent of the U.S. population.
Data compiled by the Association of Jesuit Colleges and Universities counted nearly 10 percent of Congress as having attended Jesuit higher education institutions. That includes 11 senators and 41 members of the House, who collectively attended 14 different Jesuit schools.
Georgetown University has the most alumni in Congress, with 21, followed by Boston College with seven and Fordham University with five, the College of the Holy Cross with four and Creighton University with three, the association reported. Loyola University Chicago, St. Peter's University and University of Detroit Mercy each has two alumni in Congress. Loyola University Maryland, Marquette University, St. Joseph's University, Santa Clara University, Wheeling Jesuit University and Xavier University each has one.
Nine Jesuit alumni were elected in 2012, including Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, who is the first Buddhist elected to the Senate (she served as a member of the House since 2007); and Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., a Baptist, who both hold advanced degrees from Georgetown.
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Her life would appear to say otherwise. Blair, for decades known as one of Washington's leading socialites and icons of style, has always been a peacock among the wrens, a shade too sophisticated for the nation's capital — couture shows in Paris, summers in the South of France and, most recently, mingling with biotech pioneers. She seems to have had an endlessly charmed life.
But no one would describe her that way after the last year. Last May, she and her husband, former Ambassador William McCormick Blair Jr., lost their only child, William McCormick Blair 3rd, 41, to suicide. "The moments of grief are rather unpredictable," Blair says, her reed-thin figure looking frailer than usual. "Different things can suddenly generate overwhelming sadness."
Her son, who had owned a fashionable dog-walking business in Georgetown, suffered from bipolar disorder. He had attempted suicide with an overdose of sedatives a few weeks earlier in California, and succeeded in killing himself en route home to D.C. His body was discovered on a terrace at Chicago's Le Meridien Hotel, where he had jumped out of a window.
Then, in October, the planned sale of the Blairs' $7.25 million, Thirties Georgian mansion, decorated by Billy Baldwin, fell through and their plans to relocate to New York City's River House Condominium were put on hold. The Blairs had planned to relocate after 37 years as one of the capital's most elegant globe-trotting couples because of the retirement of their longtime household help and a need to simplify their lives.
"To have all these horrible things come crashing down on her, it's unspeakable," says her good friend Catherine Graham, daughter-in-law of the late Washington Post publisher Katharine Graham.
Blair insists she is doing fine, and that she and her husband are still moving to New York as soon as they have settled the issue of their house. In the meantime, the D.C. doyenne is keeping more than busy, planning the details of her new home in New York and continuing her work of the past two decades as a biotech entrepreneur. Blair credits her unlikely career with helping her deal with her son's death. "Going back to work was very important," she says. "I went to a meeting at the National Institutes of Health and saw that I could stay all day and function. It's a terrific distraction. Very few people know it, but I work seven days a week."


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Suburban Sweets: Peach and Berries Pie
My friends and I often say that food tastes better when someone else makes it. It tastes best, I think, when someone else makes it specifically for you. A couple of years ago, a friend brought a homemade peach pie on a visit to my home. It wasn't expected, so… Read More →