Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Racist! (Updated)

You gotta see this!

Pajamas TV/Sonja Schmidt: "What's it Take to Be a Racist?"

Sept. 29, 2009
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Democrats' shrieks of "racist!" this week reached psychotic levels. Let's not sum up who made up the chorus, but former antisemetic President Jimmy Carter was the temporary apotheosis.

Charges of racism have very little to do with reality and serve the purpose of what in another era was 'fascist'. It's a stopper and a slightly more grown-up version of a temper tantrum.

The big winner in this offensive is, yes ... racism.

Big Hollywood: "Real Racism: Lessons in ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’", by Andrea Shea King

My name is Bob Ewell. We’re all Bob Ewells if you check with the Left and their media mouthpieces.

Who is Bob Ewell? Well, if you’ve ever watched the movie To Kill a Mockingbird, you’d know that Ewell is the racist character who destroyed the life of an innocent man.

To Kill A Mockingbird is a classic American film, based on Harper Lee’s novel of life in 1936 Alabama and racial injustice that resided there.

The importance of this movie is that the cries of racism today, most recently by former president Jimmy Carter — which are not true — damage and set back the real cases of racism.

This movie shows us real racism, which thankfully, we don’t see much of today. (...)

The contrast is glaring between this made up political racism and the real deal — the real Bob Ewells of the world. Like Television.com offers it for free online. (...) >>>

Here's the theme by Elmer Bernstein, which is exquisite!

IMdB page.

Slide show.

Wiki.

And for heaven's sake! Stop the racist! rage!!!

Another update (Oct. 15, 2009)

Red State: "The Totally Real And Not Fake Stupid Quotes Shenaniganza!", by Caleb Howe

That’s what the MSM had to say in comments about Rush Limbaugh’s recent bid to purchase the St. Louis Rams. According to some guy I overheard at the mall, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs suggested that Limbaugh owning the Rams “is exactly the same as slavery, but fatter.” And then there’s what Helen Thomas probably said, “Rush to what window? With a ram? Where’s my sweater?”

So in honor of the controversy, I’ve compiled a top ten list of some completely ridiculous but totally true and not fake quotes of famous people who are not (or so they claim) Rush Limbaugh. These are, like, so the true. For really real. Really. No … really.

THE TOTALLY REAL AND NOT FAKE QUOTES SHENANIGANZA TOP TEN (...) >>>

Sunday, September 27, 2009

A Cosmic Splash

Saturday, September 26, 2009

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Book Review: How to Live and Survive Among the Left (Updated)

I'm reposting this because I just found a very spirited and entertaining interview that City Journal's Contributing Editor, Stefan Kanfer had with the author. It can be viewed on C-Span's Book TV After Words. Enjoy!

City Journal: "I Can’t Believe I’m Sitting Next to A Republican"

A Survival Guide For Conservatives Marooned Among the Angry Smug and Terminally Self Righteous, by Harry Stein
With biting wit and amusing personal anecdotes, Harry Stein’s “I Can’t Believe I’m Sitting Next to a Republican” chronicles the everyday travails and triumphs of the plucky conservatives marooned in the liberal bastions that loathe them, from Manhattan to Hollywood, to all the noxious places in between.

Surrounded by the insufferably smug and self righteous – from the angry old lady with the anti-war sign affixed to her walker to the random jerk at a dinner party quoting George Soros – these intrepid souls live in a hostile world; knowing that anytime a neighbor chances to learn their views on affirmative action, big government, feminism, the environment, abortion, multi-culturalism, sex education, the reliability of The New York Times, the scariness of evangelicals or (fill in the blank), his/her face will register stunned surprise and deep confusion. Or worse. (...) >>>

Watch Harry Stein here in an interview on PJTV.

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

How the Dutch Became Water Architects

NRC: "1953 flood survivors see much wrong with the film version", by Kester Freriks

People who lived through the 1953 North Sea flood were given a special viewing Sunday of The Storm, the first feature-length movie to be made about the disaster. They saw much that was at odds with reality.

A scene from The Storm; the movie was filmed on location in the Netherlands and Belgium.

Many survivors of the 1953 North Sea flood in Zeeland province had no wish to see the premiere of The Storm, director Ben Sombogaart's movie version of the biggest natural disaster in Dutch history. "I didn't want to go through all that again," said one women who was a rescue worker in 1953. "But when I heard that it was movie and not a documentary with real news footage, I decided to go anyway."

On the night of 31 January – 1 February 1953 many dykes in the south of the Netherlands failed to resist the combination of spring tide and a northwesterly storm. The resulting floods put large parts of the provinces South-Holland, Zeeland and North-Brabant under water, killing 1,835 people and forcing the evacuation of 70,000 more. The storm also affected England, Belgium, Denmark and France, and left another 700 people dead there. (...)



Although it has been more than fifty years, the disaster is still very much alive in the southwestern Netherlands. Now that there is talk of returning a piece of reclaimed land, the Hedwige polder, to the sea - to compensate for the environmental damage from dredging the shipping lane to the port of Antwerp - history, cinema and political reality seem to have come together. (...) >>>

Here's the real thing breaking news in 1953:



- Slideshow of the film
- Slideshow of the disaster
- Flood Museum
- site of "Deltaworks", the infrastructure of levees, dams and dikes
- wiki "Deltaworks"

Monday, September 14, 2009

The Unsung Hero Who Fed the World


Open Market: "The Man Who Fed the World", by Greg Conko

He may have saved a billion people from starvation, but, if you asked a random sample of reasonably well educated Americans who Norman Borlaug was, they’d probably answer, “Norman who?”

I’ll tell you Norman who. His biographer, Leon Hesser, called him the Man Who Fed the World. Science reporter Gregg Easterbrook called him the Forgotten Benefactor of Humanity. I’ve called him a Modern Prometheus. And comedians Penn and Teller said (well, mostly Penn said) that he was the greatest human being who ever lived.

Norman Borlaug was an American agricultural scientist and plant breeder whose work sparked what is now known as the Green Revolution. He was recognized with countless scientific and humanitarian awards, including, in 1970, the Nobel Peace Prize. Quite tragically, he died of cancer yesterday, at the age of 95.

Borlaug was born on a small farm in Cresco, Iowa in 1914 and developed an interest in applying science and technology to agriculture during the Depression-era dustbowl that desiccated the Great Plains in the first half of the 1930s. He went off to study forestry and plant pathology — and compete on the wrestling team — at the University of Minnesota in 1933. He eventually would complete a Master’s and Ph.D. at the U of M, after brief stints with the U.S. Forest Service that periodically interrupted his studies. After completing his Ph.D. in 1942, Borlaug worked for two years at DuPont, contributing scientific research for the war effort. (...) 

Read it all >>> 

Related:

The Washington Times: "EDITORIAL: The humanitarian the greens hated - Enabling life isn't on the environmentalist agenda"

Norman Borlaug valued humanity and had confidence in the capabilities and aspirations of human beings. He applied his intellect and energy in ways that allowed millions of people to live longer, better lives. He truly was a great humanitarian, in every sense of the word. No wonder the environmentalists hate him so (...) >>>

Saturday, September 12, 2009

"A New America", the Movie

The United States economy reached a meltdown point in September 2008. A Republican President and Democratic Congress passed a massive bill to bail out banks. Many Americans were shocked that the wealthiest country in the world could be in so much financial trouble overnight. This financial crisis occurred at a point when many Americans were already looking for change in their government and an election provided the opportunity.

Then Candidate Barack Obama promised to turn the page and take America in a new direction. A majority of voters were receptive to this message. Congressional leaders pledged to work with their new President to help his vision become reality.

Americans made a similar choice in 1932, when the economy was in a serious downturn. Franklin Delano Roosevelt promised a New Deal for America, a series of government programs to turn the economy around. FDR is credited by many historians for having spared the United States from drifting towards the totalitarianism that swept through Europe and other parts of the world at that time.

Barack Obama began his term in office in an atmosphere of heady optimism, in the wake of Abraham Lincoln. Many pointed to the Presidents agenda as the New New Deal and Barack Obama himself promised fundamental change.

And one cold January day, we embarked on the path to a new America...



- A New America Movie official website
- A New America Movie on Facebook
- A New America Movie on YouTube

Related:

On Politeia: "Which New America, Which New World"

"A New America", the Movie (II)

Friday, September 11, 2009

9/11: "The Falling Man"

Today on The Lighthouse the 9/11 special "The Falling Man", powerfully introduced on Pajamas TV's Trifecta in ""Never Forget" Means Never Forgetting".

Saturday, September 05, 2009

Thursday, September 03, 2009

Morbid Obama Syndrome & the World of Art

Commentary Magazine: "The Art of Obama Worship", by Michael J. Lewis

Of all the images hurled forth by the last presidential election, none will live longer than Shepard Fairey’s poster of a red, white, and blue Barack Obama, gazing significantly into the distance, resting atop the single word Hope. It had already been embossed into the national consciousness as the definitive image of Obama even before it was acquired by the National Portrait Gallery and appeared as the cover of Time’s “Person of the Year” issue. His poignant mien seemed to encapsulate all his personality and promise, an expression that was at once solemn, pensive, yearning, and ever so slightly sorrowful. With good reason the critic Peter Schjeldahl termed it “the most efficacious American political illustration since ‘Uncle Sam Wants You.’”

Campaign posters are discarded like yesterday’s newspaper the morning after an election, but not in the case of Obama. If anything, the demand for posters bearing his image has only grown. A recent New York Times front-page story highlighted the trend of amateur artists’ trying their hand at painting the new president. In one three-month period, 787 Obama paintings were auctioned on eBay, showing the new president in every possible pose, and a few impossible ones: standing commandingly before the White House, cradling a basketball and wearing a Washington Wizards uniform, gamely wrestling a bear on Wall Street, even flying naked on the back of a unicorn. (...) >>>

Read it all >>>