New vs. Used

Stewart Kissel wrote:
Well be prepared two years from now for the return
of you know who Somewhere in Texas a village is
looking for him.

Wow! Stuart can read bumper stickers. He must relly bee smart. Hees
gong too halp Jon Cary ged them stoopid army pepple oud of Irak and
intoo a reel kollege like the ons Kerry god into or Gore flunked out
of.

November 5, 2006
Kerryism
by Victor Davis Hanson
National Review Online

Kerry surely must be one of the saddest Democratic liabilities around.
Some afterthoughts about his latest gaffe, which is one of those rare
glimpses into an entire troubled ideology:

(1) How could John Kerry, born into privilege, and then marrying and
divorcing and marrying out of and back into greater inherited wealth,
lecture anyone at a city college about the ingredients for success in
America? If he were to give personal advice about making it, it would
have to be to marry rich women. Nothing he has accomplished as a
senator or candidate reveals either much natural intelligence or
singular education. Today, Democrats must be wondering why they have
embraced an overrated empty suit, and ostracized a real talent like Joe
Lieberman.

(2) How could Kerry possibly claim that he was thinking of the
uneducated in the context of George Bush, who, after all, went to
Harvard and Yale?

(3) Some of the brightest and most educated Americans are not only in
the military, but veterans of Iraq. Two of the best educated minds I
have met - Col. Bill Hix and Lt. Col. Chris Gibson, both Hoover
Security Fellows - were both Iraqi veterans. What is striking about
visiting Iraq is the wealth of talent there, from privates to generals.
Without being gratuitously cruel, the problem of mediocrity is not in
the ranks of the military, but on our university campuses, where
half-educated professors and non-serious students killing time are
ubiquitous. Personally, I'd wager the intelligence of a Marine Corps
private any day over the average D.C. journalist. Every naval officer
I met at the USNA, without exception, seemed brighter than John Kerry,
whose "brilliance", after all, has managed to offend millions of voters
on the eve of a pivotal election. If the Democrats lose, it will be
almost painful to watch the recriminations against Kerry fly.

(4) This is not the first, but third, time he has denigrated soldiers
in the middle of a war-and there is a systematic theme: John Kerry's
assumed superior morality allows him to pass judgment from on high
about supposedly lesser folk who become tools of a suspect military:
thus we go from limb-loppers and Genghis' hordes to terrorists to
dead-beats. The only constant is that the haughtiness is always
delivered in the same sanctimonious, self-righteous, and patronizing
tone.

(5) The mea culpa that Democrats are blaming the war and not the
warriors is laughable after Sens. Durbin, Kennedy, and Kerry have
collectively compared American soldiers to Nazis, Pol Pot's killers,
Stalinists, terrorists, and Baathists.

(6) The problem is that Kerry is not just a senator, but the most
recent presidential candidate of the Democratic Party, and thus in some
sense, especially given the diminution of Howard Dean, the megaphone of
the entire party.

(7) His pathetic clarification, as he blamed everyone from Tony Snow to
Rush Limbaugh, displayed the same Al Gore derangement syndrome, and
thus raises a larger question: what is it about George Bush that seems
to reduce once sober and experienced liberal pros to infantile ranting?

(8) And why is the supposedly lame Bush so careful in speech, and the
self-acclaimed geniuses like a Ted Kennedy, John Kerry, or Howard Dean
serially spouting ever more stupidities? For all the Democrats'
criticism of George Bush, I can't think of a modern President who has
so infrequently put his foot in his public mouth, and, by the same
token, can't think of any opposition that on the eve of elections seems
to have an almost pathological death wish.

The Democrats should use this occasion to have an autopsy of Kerryism,
or this strange new tony liberalism, that has turned noblesse oblige on
its head. It used to be that millionaire FDRs and JFKs felt sympathy
for those of the lower classes and wished to ensure that the hoi polloi
had some shot at the American dream. But today's elite liberals-a
Howard Dean, Al Gore, Ted Kennedy, George Soros, Ted Turner - love
the high life and playact at being leftists simply because they are
already insulated from the effects of their own nostrums that always
come at someone poorer's expense while providing them some sort of
psychological relief from guilt. Poor Harry Truman must be turning over
in his grave - from bourbon, cigars, and poker to wind-surfing and
L.L. Bean costume-of-the-day says it all.

©2006 Victor Davis Hanson

Texans....
Proud to be Texans, but don't know why.

"Pete Reinhart" wrote in message
...
I don't care where he moves as long as he doesn't come to Texas.
And the same goes for the rest of you who aren't already here.
Cheers!, Pete


"Brad" wrote in message
ps.com...
That's what I love about this country. A guy passionatley explains what
he feels is wrong with his country, and describes ways in which he
believes it could be changed. And someone else tells him to move to
Iraq.

Just goes to show; the "if you don't like it here, why don't you move
to "insert name here" retort is neither a dem or a rep comeback.

Brad



wrote:
Shawn wrote:
Doug Hoffman wrote:

What concerns me is the continuing decline of technical and
managerial
competence in our country. We, as a country, seem to be complacent
about this. Far too few of our kids are getting technical
educations.
If they do, where shall they work?

What do you expect when every repugnican thinks taxes supporting
education, particularly college education is a sin against god? Ever
talk to a psycho-christian kid (home or private schooled) about
science?
Scary, and this is what our pres. considers a good education.
This country debates the morality of teaching some of the most solid
science on the books; geology, biology, evolution, climatology,
cosmology-off the top of my head, and you think we should continue as
a
technological leader? Don't be so naive. We're coasting at this
point.
Whatever you do, don't blame it on the kids. They're dealing, as
well
as we've equipped them (Ha!), with the world we've made for them.

Shawn

Why don't you try moving? I recommend France, Germany, or how about
Iraq?

Tom

I bought one of the early Honda Civics when they 1st came out. Back then
Hondas were both better and cheaper.

Mike Schumann

"Graeme Cant" gcantinter@tnodedotnet wrote in message
...
GK wrote:
Mike Schumann wrote:
Prices will come down when the chinese start building gliders.

Mike Schumann

- Or companies like Honda.

That won't bring prices down. Honda build better, not cheaper.

GC

Mike Schumann wrote:
I bought one of the early Honda Civics when they 1st came out. Back then
Hondas were both better and cheaper.

The original Honda Civic was horrid.

Honda had merely re-invented the Renault 4, but a decade after Renault
and done it remarkably badly.


--
martin@ | Martin Gregorie
gregorie. | Essex, UK
org |

Bruce T. wrote:
Shawn wrote:
Doug Hoffman wrote:

What concerns me is the continuing decline of technical and managerial
competence in our country. We, as a country, seem to be complacent
about this. Far too few of our kids are getting technical educations.
If they do, where shall they work?

What do you expect when every repugnican thinks taxes supporting
education, particularly college education is a sin against god? Ever
talk to a psycho-christian kid (home or private schooled) about science?
Scary, and this is what our pres. considers a good education.
This country debates the morality of teaching some of the most solid
science on the books; geology, biology, evolution, climatology,
cosmology-off the top of my head, and you think we should continue as a
technological leader? Don't be so naive. We're coasting at this point.
Whatever you do, don't blame it on the kids. They're dealing, as well
as we've equipped them (Ha!), with the world we've made for them.
Shawn

What a truckload of patronizing bull.
Ever heard of Genentech, Google, Cisco Systems, Intel, My Space, Apple,
Halliburton, Exxon, You Tube, Corning, Trimble Navigation, the GPS
system, the Tomahawk, Cirrus Design, Global Hawk or the U.S. Army?
Have you ever thought about the technology that goes into an F-22, the
USS George Bush or USS Reagan, either one of which is more powerful
than the military of most countries? A day after the tsunami hit that
dope smoking paradise for European hedonists, the USS Abraham Lincoln
steamed out of Hong Kong and provided fresh water, food and rescue
choppers and saved the lives of a half million muslims, buddhists and
european pot-heads. The United States has more universities per capita
than any other country in the world and it is damn hard to get into the
engineering or science departments of every one of them. Liberals and
Dumocrats have made it simple to get degrees in naval gazing; we sure
need more ethnic studies experts, American Indian wannabes, and snotty
little leftists learning how to throw food at people they and their
esteemed but barely literate liberal arts professors don't like. "Oh,
you got her in the face with that pie, Sean, that should get you an A+
in your comparative political feelings course. That'll teach her to
spout off on that religious crap. Here is your Phi Beta Kappa key and
a job with the government. Be sure to count all those mosquitoes in
that swamp, er wetlands. They're very important, you know. Global
warming is causing their numbers to shrink and you're so highly
educated you'll believe it."
I know several kids who have graduated from religous home studies
courses, one attends Rice, another is at Carnegie Mellon and has been
accepted into Medical School, two more attend Duke and one is at U
Penn, all on academic scholarships in science. Many more attend local
universities. All of them grew up in evangelical Christian families,
they are still religous and they didn't have their time wasted studying
the liberal blather which masquerades as public education. At least not
in high school. And they will become scientists, and they are
Americans, and in the future they will work with Chinese, Indian,
Korean, Pakistani, German, English, French, and other engineers and
scientists in American companies, in America, at companies many of
them will start, because most of the world sucks and America is where
the majority of the worlds educated people want to live.

Yes. The older generations, all of us, should be doing a better job of
guiding the younger generations. I would like to see a national
effort, similar to the "space race" of the 1960's, to stimulate
technical excellence in the education of our youth.

How about requiring universities to increase their capacity for
teaching science courses and eliminate at least half of their liberal
arts faculty to pay for it. How about granting postgraduate
fellowships and money to American students and let foreign students get
funding from their own taxpayers. How about requiring that a certain
percentage of faculty positions must be filled by Americans who speak
American English. Getting a Science Phd. in America is really kind of
dumb, unless you really are a genius, because it puts you in
competition with the worlds smartest people, most of whom are trying to
get Phd. level jobs in America, and most of whom really are smarter
and more dedicated than you because that is their only way of getting
here. How about fostering a culture where we can believe that we
really are the best society on earth because the worlds people seem
desperate to come here and we don't seem all that keen to leave. How
about getting rid of the idiots at Princeton who seem to value giving
scholarship money to Afghan terriorists over American citizens.

Hi Bruce,

I think that you have summarized things very well, I still don't get
why so many people don't see things the way they really are....is it
the ignorance of the masses? Lack of discipline?

wrote:
How about fostering a culture where we can believe that we
really are the best society on earth because the worlds people seem
desperate to come here and we don't seem all that keen to leave. How
about getting rid of the idiots at Princeton who seem to value giving
scholarship money to Afghan terriorists over American citizens.

Hi Bruce,

I think that you have summarized things very well, I still don't get
why so many people don't see things the way they really are....is it
the ignorance of the masses? Lack of discipline?


Where is the West?
By Thomas Sowell
Thursday, November 9, 2006

European nations protesting Saddam Hussein's death sentence, as they
protested against forcing secrets out of captured terrorists, should
tell us all we need to know about the internal degeneration of western
society, where so many confuse squeamishness with morality.

Two generations of being insulated from the reality of the
international jungle, of not having to defend their own survival
because they have been living under the protection of the American
nuclear umbrella, have allowed too many Europeans to grow soft and
indulge themselves in illusions about brutal realities and dangers.

The very means of their salvation have been demonized for decades in
anti-nuclear movements and protesters calling themselves "anti-war."
But there is a huge difference between being anti-war in words and
being anti-war in deeds.

How many times, in its thousands of years of history, has Europe gone
60 years without a major war, as it has since World War II? That peace
has been due to American nuclear weapons, which was all that could
deter the Soviet Union's armies from marching right across Europe to
the Atlantic Ocean.

Having overwhelming military force on your side, and letting your
enemies know that you have the guts to use it, is being genuinely
anti-war. Chamberlain's appeasement brought on World War II and
Reagan's military buildup ended the Cold War.

The famous Roman peace of ancient times did not come from negotiations,
cease-fires, or pretty talk. It came from the Roman Empire's crushing
defeat and annihilation of Carthage, which served as a warning to
anyone else who might have had any bright ideas about messing with
Rome.

Only after the Roman Empire began to lose its own internal cohesion,
patriotism and fighting spirit over the centuries did it begin to
succumb to its external enemies and finally collapse.

That seems to be where western civilization is heading today.

Internal cohesion? Not only does much of today's generation in western
societies have a "do your own thing" attitude, defying rules and
flouting authority are glorified and Balkanization through
"multiculturalism" has become dogma.

Patriotism? Not only is patriotism disdained, the very basis for pride
in one's country and culture is systematically undermined in our
educational institutions at all levels.

The achievements of western civilization are buried in histories that
portray every human sin found here as if they were peculiarities of the
west.

The classic example is slavery, which existed all over the world for
thousands of years and yet is incessantly depicted as if it was a
peculiarity of Europeans enslaving Africans. Barbary pirates alone
brought twice as many enslaved Europeans to North Africa as there were
Africans brought in bondage to the United States and the American
colonies from which it was formed.

How many schools and colleges are going to teach that, going against
political correctness and undermining white guilt?

How many people have any inkling that it was precisely western
civilization which eventually turned against slavery and began stamping
it out when non-western societies still saw nothing wrong with it?

How can a generation be expected to fight for the survival of a culture
or a civilization that has been trashed in its own institutions, taught
to tolerate even the intolerance of other cultures brought into its own
midst, and conditioned to regard any instinct to fight for its own
survival as being a "cowboy"?

Western nations that show any signs of standing up for
self-preservation are rare exceptions. The United States and Israel are
the only western nations which have no choice but to rely on
self-defense -- and both are demonized, not only by our enemies but
also by many in other western nations.

Australia recently told its Muslim population that, if they want to
live under Islamic law, then they should leave Australia. That makes
three western nations that have not yet completely succumbed to the
corrosive and suicidal trends of our times.

If and when we all succumb, will the epitaph of western civilization
say that we had the power to annihilate our enemies but were so
paralyzed by confusion that we ended up being annihilated ourselves?


Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institute and author of
Basic Economics: A Citizen's Guide to the Economy.

Bruce T. wrote:
What a truckload of patronizing bull.

How refined, you are obviously home schooled.

Ever heard of Genentech, Google, Cisco Systems, Intel, My Space, Apple,
Halliburton, Exxon, You Tube, Corning, Trimble Navigation, the GPS
system, the Tomahawk, Cirrus Design, Global Hawk or the U.S. Army?

US Army??What do they have to do with free
enterprise?Halliburton??About all they are famous for is gouging the US
taxpayer (Through the US Army of course).

Have you ever thought about the technology that goes into an F-22, the
USS George Bush or USS Reagan, either one of which is more powerful
than the military of most countries? A day after the tsunami hit that
dope smoking paradise for European hedonists, the USS Abraham Lincoln
steamed out of Hong Kong and provided fresh water, food and rescue
choppers and saved the lives of a half million muslims, buddhists and
european pot-heads.

Where were these teckno hotshots after Katrina you knuklehead?

The United States has more universities per capita
than any other country in the world and it is damn hard to get into the
engineering or science departments of every one of them. Liberals and
Dumocrats have made it simple to get degrees in naval gazing; we sure
need more ethnic studies experts, American Indian wannabes, and snotty
little leftists learning how to throw food at people they and their
esteemed but barely literate liberal arts professors don't like. "Oh,
you got her in the face with that pie, Sean, that should get you an A+
in your comparative political feelings course. That'll teach her to
spout off on that religious crap.

Dude, you have been watching too much Bill Orielly.

I know several kids who have graduated from religous home studies
courses, one attends Rice, another is at Carnegie Mellon and has been
accepted into Medical School, two more attend Duke and one is at U
Penn, all on academic scholarships in science. Many more attend local
universities. All of them grew up in evangelical Christian families,
they are still religous and they didn't have their time wasted studying
the liberal blather which masquerades as public education.

And no doubt these kids were filled with hatred and intolerance, just
like you.

How about requiring universities to increase their capacity for
teaching science courses and eliminate at least half of their liberal
arts faculty to pay for it.

Good idea! This way we can train more weapons engineers and start more
civil wars in places like Iraq.

How about fostering a culture where we can believe that we
really are the best society on earth because the worlds people seem
desperate to come here and we don't seem all that keen to leave. How
about getting rid of the idiots at Princeton who seem to value giving
scholarship money to Afghan terriorists over American citizens.

Yea, nothing like that good old White Christian supremacy!Dude, you are
a self righteous ding dong.You are on the wrong Google list.Try the
religous nazi zelot list for your next post.

American voters obviously don't agree with you, Bruce,
thankfully.

Bruce T. wrote:
Where is the West?
By Thomas Sowell
Thursday, November 9, 2006

European nations protesting Saddam Hussein's death sentence, as they
protested against forcing secrets out of captured terrorists, should
tell us all we need to know about the internal degeneration of western
society, where so many confuse squeamishness with morality.

Two generations of being insulated from the reality of the
international jungle, of not having to defend their own survival
because they have been living under the protection of the American
nuclear umbrella, have allowed too many Europeans to grow soft and
indulge themselves in illusions about brutal realities and dangers.

The very means of their salvation have been demonized for decades in
anti-nuclear movements and protesters calling themselves "anti-war."
But there is a huge difference between being anti-war in words and
being anti-war in deeds.

How many times, in its thousands of years of history, has Europe gone
60 years without a major war, as it has since World War II? That peace
has been due to American nuclear weapons, which was all that could
deter the Soviet Union's armies from marching right across Europe to
the Atlantic Ocean.

Having overwhelming military force on your side, and letting your
enemies know that you have the guts to use it, is being genuinely
anti-war. Chamberlain's appeasement brought on World War II and
Reagan's military buildup ended the Cold War.

The famous Roman peace of ancient times did not come from negotiations,
cease-fires, or pretty talk. It came from the Roman Empire's crushing
defeat and annihilation of Carthage, which served as a warning to
anyone else who might have had any bright ideas about messing with
Rome.

Only after the Roman Empire began to lose its own internal cohesion,
patriotism and fighting spirit over the centuries did it begin to
succumb to its external enemies and finally collapse.

That seems to be where western civilization is heading today.

Internal cohesion? Not only does much of today's generation in western
societies have a "do your own thing" attitude, defying rules and
flouting authority are glorified and Balkanization through
"multiculturalism" has become dogma.

Patriotism? Not only is patriotism disdained, the very basis for pride
in one's country and culture is systematically undermined in our
educational institutions at all levels.

The achievements of western civilization are buried in histories that
portray every human sin found here as if they were peculiarities of the
west.

The classic example is slavery, which existed all over the world for
thousands of years and yet is incessantly depicted as if it was a
peculiarity of Europeans enslaving Africans. Barbary pirates alone
brought twice as many enslaved Europeans to North Africa as there were
Africans brought in bondage to the United States and the American
colonies from which it was formed.

How many schools and colleges are going to teach that, going against
political correctness and undermining white guilt?

How many people have any inkling that it was precisely western
civilization which eventually turned against slavery and began stamping
it out when non-western societies still saw nothing wrong with it?

How can a generation be expected to fight for the survival of a culture
or a civilization that has been trashed in its own institutions, taught
to tolerate even the intolerance of other cultures brought into its own
midst, and conditioned to regard any instinct to fight for its own
survival as being a "cowboy"?

Western nations that show any signs of standing up for
self-preservation are rare exceptions. The United States and Israel are
the only western nations which have no choice but to rely on
self-defense -- and both are demonized, not only by our enemies but
also by many in other western nations.

Australia recently told its Muslim population that, if they want to
live under Islamic law, then they should leave Australia. That makes
three western nations that have not yet completely succumbed to the
corrosive and suicidal trends of our times.

If and when we all succumb, will the epitaph of western civilization
say that we had the power to annihilate our enemies but were so
paralyzed by confusion that we ended up being annihilated ourselves?


Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institute and author of
Basic Economics: A Citizen's Guide to the Economy.

Bruce,
Lets see now, Sowell is an Economics professor and he is doing a paper
on political science?Anyone with half a brain can see that the guy has
embelished certain truths while ignoring other truths.Anyone who would
take this at face value would have to be an ignorant white slippery
slope christian zelot.Oh, wait a minute, you are.Nevermind.