Diogenes Better Hurry

An honest lib admits that of course Elena Kagan ought to recuse herself from the Supreme Court deliberations on Obama Care next summer.  There will be no similar outbreaks of contact with reality from the left next spring.

However!  A Kagan recusal may yet happen!  Courtwatcher Orin Kerr predicted last summer that there were six to eight votes for the ObamaCare mandate.  If his vote-counting is correct I can imagine (based on nothing but speculation) a scenario in which Chief Justice Roberts privately suggests to Ms. Kagan that she should recuse herself for the sake of the Court's public image, and also assures her that her recusal won't affect the outcome.

Which means that from here in the cheap seats, if we see a Kagan recusal it means that the ObamaCare decision is already in the bag for Obama.

Comments

[Ranger]

if we see a Kagan recusal it means that the ObamaCare decision is already in the bag for Obama.

Or the opposite might be true as well. There may be 5 to 6 votes against in the bag, so her recusal wouldn't matter anyways.

Lots of law profs couldn't see an individual right to own a gun in the Constitution either, and that was a 7-2 decision no one saw coming IIRC.

[Greg Q]

Orin Kerr is on drugs on this one. His analysis has been so consistently pathetic that is now my "least likely to read" at Volokh

[Clarice]

Roberts wouldn't do that. I do understand that there is a preliminary, non-binding discussion, that takes place early on--in part it's how they decide who will be writing the opinion(s). It's possible that Kagan would smell the coffee and decide to recuse herself, but I consider it unlikely. BTW I thin the "evidence" put forth to date to suggest she oughta is very thin gruel. I I were a friend of Tribe's I , too, might have written that I considered the final vote amazing. It was entirely unpredictable.

[Clarice]

*thinK* the evidence*

*IF I were a friend*

[Danube of Thought]

I agree with both TM and Ranger--if Roberts counts noses and sees that it's a done deal in either direction regardless of her vote, it would be in the Court's interest for her to recuse.

I remember Prof. Paul Freund suggesting that the Brown v. Board of education Court was not really unanimous, but when the would-be dissenters saw the writing on the wall they concluded that it was in the national interest that the nation see it as unanimous.

[NK]

TomM-- sorry, but you're waaay off on this one. The S Ct does not work that way, never has, and certainly does not under Justice Roberts.

[Ignatz]

I'm with NK.
I have no experience at the state supreme or SCOTUS level but not even state appellate courts act that way, in my experience.
Other than rock, paper, scissors to decide cases, can't imagine anything that would undercut court credibility much more.

[Thomas Collins]

While the attention on the mandate is understandable, keep in mind that SCOTUS has also taken for review the Medicaid provisions of ObamaCare. The ObamaCare provisions forcing states to expand their Medicaid programs as a precondition to receive federal matching funds are of equal importance to the mandate. See LUN for an article explaining what is at stake.

[NK]

ThomasC-- the Medicaid provisions are a fiscal disaster as they massively expanded the financial cesspool known as Medicaid and put taxpayers on the hook for it. But, there is little constitutional controversey about that one. Alas.

[MarkO]

TM, can you send me some of whatever you are taking? Thanks in advance and peace, dude.

[rse]

One of my morning emails was about all the school based clinics being funded already by the Obamacare legislation. These would not be limited to students and the use for students explicitly mentions bullying. Have I told you the number 1 solution for a school climate that makes bullying less likely according to the frameworks is promoting social justice?

The idea of using the schools as a base to meet all the needs of the community is a long time prog goal. There are also aspirations to organize the parents a la SEIU while they are at it. Sore throat? Immunizations? Just stop by the helpful school. It's there to provide for your needs. The particular poignant story was a school in Portland that would no longer be trying to run a clinic out of a closet.

[Thomas Collins]

NK, I am inclined to agree with you about the lack of constitutional controversy. But I thought there was no Circuit conflict on that issue, so I was intrigued by the fact that SCOTUS is hearing arguments on it.

By the way, am I wrong in thinking that there is no Circuit conflict on the Medicaid provisions?

[Jane]

John Fund guaranteed that Obamacare will fail.

(A dumb thing to do I know, but nevertheless he did it, in person to me.)

[Clarice]

rse, when I was younger, Milwaukee sued to run well baby clinics on Saturdays out of neighborhood schools. Since everyone was within walking distance of a school and the facilities were already in place it was a great idea. It may have been run by or with help from the then rather larger National Public Health service. My guess is that in the long run it saved the city and local hospitals and the taxpayers a lot of money.

School playgrounds were used after hours and on weekends and in the summer to run free programs for the kids. The poorer the neighborhood the more extensive the programs. At the time they calculated these programs cost less than the cost of replacing broken windows and defaced walls. I worked there in the summers at college and can tall you if anyone tried to deface the school facilities it was promptly reported by neighbors who viewed these places as year round community centers.

And in the summer time, school social workers would make the rounds to check up on kids who had received help during the school year and to see if there were any other troubled families they needed to know about.

I tell you this, because efforts to use schools in this way is not entirely new nor entirely bad.

[Danube of Thought]

I guess the audience is pretty resoundingly booing my musings about Prof. Freund's speculations. I should acknowledge that I have zero experience with appellate courts, so the booing may increase in volume.

[Clarice]

*Milwaukee Used to run**

{Good grief. It's what you get when posting and exercising at the same time, I guess.)

[NK]

ThomasC-- Medicaid = Circuit conflict? that is a very interesting question-- I don't know. I need to go back and read the Cert orders, there were several.

TomM-- are you going to Barrett's Bookstore today to meet Bubba? I asked my wife to bring my copy of the WSJ Editorial Pages: Whitewater I and have him sign my Letter to the Editor published in 1994, "ARKANSAS CORRUPTION: A SPECIAL BRAND, alas she didn't want to be dragged off by Secret Service.

[Threadkiller]

To think Roberts recused himself in the MERS stupid borrowers case, it would seem obvious that Kagen would recuse herself in the stupid patient case.

http://topshortsalelawyer.com/supreme-court-declines-to-review-mers-challenge

Why would Roberts do that anyways? Gun to his head?

[Neo]

But the real burning question this morning is what to do with the 600 million gamers who are virtually violating the Geneva Convention ?

“One possible course of action… could be to encourage governments to adopt laws and regulations to regulate this ever-growing industry.” -- ICRC

Another would be to cut off money to the Red Cross for their meddling, but I can see a compromise …

Have the game report each violation of international law … and then score bonus points for each.

[rse]

I would agree with you clarice if I was merely ascribing nefarious intent or if the push was not also coupled with completely gutting any academic content unless it can be used to push a political point like racism, oppression, or environmental catastrophe which only extragovtal action right now can avert.

When you simultaneously increase dependence and then say this is the outlet you can depend on since you cannot rely on your own knowledge and skills, that's the problem. Plus again it is expressly coupled with other methods that explicitly state they are meant to foster dependence. When I wrote that quote this morning on how to explain to schoolchildren I was thinking about all the principals and admins right now who are living from the proceeds of property taxes and they know nothing that is true. Everything they are pushing hurts children and/or the economy. Same is true of Durban and a big chunk of what the EPA is doing. We are literally spending tens of trillions to hobble our tomorrow at the most fundamental level-the human mind. And trying to see that it becomes reflexive at the subconscious, emotional level.

[sbw]

Reminds me of what I say about editorial columns:

Everyone is welcome to an opinion, but you don't have to know anything to have one.

[lyle]

Everyone is welcome to an opinion, but you don't have to know anything to have one.

cf. Times, New York

[Clarice]

Certainly, rse. When you write what I am sure will be a best seller--a book I am anxious to read-- though you might want to be sure to draw that distinction.

[narciso]

OT, what kind of insanity is this, specially considering the source;

http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/7334835/the-sixth-day-nba-christmas

[rse]

Will do Clarice. Which is why I say theories are made for finding confessions but this is too incendiary not to rely on their own words and put into appropriate context. That has been the time consuming part. To make sure I could see all the way through to what was sought and why.

Your memory makes this all the more tragic. School should be the social elevator that takes everyone who wants beyond the circumstances they were born into. Here it becomes a chain plus providing desired services encourages trust that is not merited in the least.

I got a little delayed in finishing by some new info over last month that bolsters everything already written. Then I had to think through ways to describe it which I have now. Thanks Lord Acton for a similar metaphor to what I had been thinking.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Glurg. Here's what the ICRC actually says about video games:

A few media reported that certain virtual acts performed by characters in video games could amount to serious violations of the law of armed conflict. Is this correct?

No. Serious violations of the laws of war can only be committed in real-life situations, not in video games.

Does the ICRC work with video-game developers to make sure the law of armed conflict features in certain games?

The ICRC has expressed its readiness to engage in a dialogue with the video gaming industry in order to explore the place of humanitarian rules in games. The ICRC welcomes the fact that certain video games on war-related themes already take the law of armed conflict into account.

Shouldn't the ICRC be primarily concerned with real-life warfare?

Absolutely, and real-life armed conflict and its humanitarian consequences are in fact its primary concern.

[Captain Hate]

narc, Stern obviously was envious of all the publicity the league had missed out on, other than how immature both sides were regarding the collective bargaining agreement, and went full retard at the urging of the owners.

[peter]

Best use of a school building ever--(LUN) convert it into a microbrewery/pub!

[Thomas Collins]

The irony is that New Orleans is a small market team. So Stern, at the behest of other small market owners, shafted a small market team. I suspect the NBA would like to find a buyer for the New Orleans franchise as soon as possible. It would have been in the NBA's interest to avoid blocking this trade, because New Orleans' position was improved (they got solid compensation for Chris Paul, and there is no way Chris Paul is going to sign with New Orleans when he becomes a free agent at this season's end), and thus would have been more attractive to a potential buyer.

[Frau Reibekuchen]

Mark Steyn said yesterday, "Energy is freedom." That "fracking" good article at the NYT? Trust useful idiots to believe Obama's EPA and the Gray Slut's weasel words.

"Hydraulic fracturing ("fracking") is the process used by the energy industry to extract immense deposits of oil and natural gas from deep geologic formations that only a few years ago were unreachable. It involves injecting a solution of water and chemicals far underground, typically thousands of feet below groundwater supplies. Fracking was first used in Oklahoma in the 1940s and in the years since has been employed in more than a million oil and gas wells across the nation. There is not a single independently documented instance of groundwater contamination by fracking anywhere in the country, a fact that was confirmed as recently as May by U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson during congressional testimony."

The evil immense deposits of oil and natural gas!
LUN

[Jane]

TC,

I just sent you an email.

[Captain Hate]

TC, I thought NO made out much better in the trade than LA. Yes, having the league own the team is a horrible situation; they'd be better off just terminating the franchise at this point.

[Thomas Collins]

I answered it, Jane, so check your SPAM folder if it's not there.

I agree, CH. I thought it was a great deal for NO. I hope NO can survive, but I too am skeptical about its chances, especially since Stern just nixed a great rebuilding trade.

[Benjamin Franklin]

Damocles better hurry

http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2101344_2101369_2101667,00.html

[Benjamin Franklin]

Doesn't anyone else here still read Time?

Anyone?

PAY ATTENTION TO ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Benjamin Franklin]

"PAY ATTENTION TO ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Say something, Gmax. No one is stopping you.

[boris]

Say something as semantic1eo, or is someone stopping you. Wonder why.

[Ignatz]

IIRC, when Gmax sock puppeted BF he used obviously sock puppety names and made no effort to change his avatar.
Moreover he hasn't to my knowledge posted here today at all under his own tag.
Highly doubtful it's him.

[peter]

I confess I don't get the Diogenes reference.

[lyle]

I confess I don't get the Diogenes reference.

Me, either. But then again I'm just a wingnut, slack-jawed, hayseed with a State school edumacation and a rabid fascination with guns.

[Melinda Romanoff]

Why am I always the one left holding the "racist" ID tag?

Sheesh.

[Thomas Collins]

I believe Diogenes was an ancient Greek dude one of whose activities was looking for a truly honest man (that is, one who told the truth as a matter of principle, not one who would make a big deal about telling the truth to gain praise, and then lie when it suited him). But then again, I was rejected from first grade (I really was; I'm not kidding), so what do I know.

[boris]

I would not consider it "honesty" that Segall believes the mandate is consititutional and "Affordable Care" a good thing for America and Kagan should recuse anyway ...

More like preening IMO.

Why was Social Security implemented as a "tax" instead of just mandating retirement savings? Because the "old" constitution would not have permitted it.

If "this" constitution actually allows a mandate to buy health insurance then we need a new constitution.

[Ignatz]

Diogenes supposedly walked about in the daytime with a lamp and when asked why said he was looking for an honest man and was, by implication, not having any luck.
TM believes he may have found one, for the time being anyway.

[Jack is Back! (An Above Average Hoi Polloi)]

I wish she would recuse her eating habits and get rid of her chipmunk looks and Jesus, lady, take off the damn pearls.

[cathyf]

On the subject of video games and the laws of war... As a former professional game developer, I can attest that these games regularly violate the laws of physics. I wouldn't be too worried about gamers understanding about games not being reality -- sure there are always crazies out there, but people pretty much understand that just because Wyle E. Coyote (occupation: genius) walks away from a 1000-foot fall and the subsequent direct hit from the falling anvil, that anything like that would work in real life...

[MaryD]

JiB - LOL! Home run.

[cathyf]

Chipmonk in pearls... What narciso says about the goggles!

[OldTimer]

rse, I've already got at least twenty people on my gift list besides my own copy, when your eagerly anticipated book is published. I'm getting up in years, so hope we don't have to wait too long..

Yeah...I was playing on your heartstrings a little bit there. :)

[jimmyk]

I remember Prof. Paul Freund suggesting that the Brown v. Board of education Court was not really unanimous, but when the would-be dissenters saw the writing on the wall they concluded that it was in the national interest that the nation see it as unanimous.

It would have been a nice touch if the dissenters in Bush v. Gore had done the same. Seems concern about the national interest lays more heavily on one end of the ideological spectrum.

[jimmyk]

I remember Prof. Paul Freund suggesting that the Brown v. Board of education Court was not really unanimous, but when the would-be dissenters saw the writing on the wall they concluded that it was in the national interest that the nation see it as unanimous.

It would have been a nice touch if the dissenters in Bush v. Gore had done the same. Seems concern about the national interest lays more heavily on one end of the ideological spectrum.

[jimmyk]

Sigh, that wasn't worth saying twice, not sure why it happened.

[rse]

jimmy-

Did you catch my comment that the relevant Bush v Gore ruling was 7-2 and the media almost immediately chose to emphasize the remedy split of 5-4 to the more relevant law split of 7-2?

I hurried over to see what was worth saying 3 times in a row.

[jimmyk]

No, where was that, rse? You're right, but all the more reason for the two in the 7-2 to have dropped their dissents.

[Ranger]

Hmmm... Looks like someone has found the real hoarders (via Instapundit):

'Hoarding Assets'?

WASHINGTON -- A few years ago, Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) caused consternation among the nation's wealthiest colleges by scrutinizing their endowments, saying that universities needed to spend more of the tax-exempt funds they were accruing. He also requested a variety of data on tuition prices, financial aid and endowment management...

Now, as endowments have rebounded, Grassley is revisiting the issue. In a press release Thursday on a Treasury Department study on donor-advised funds, he blasted colleges for "hoarding assets at taxpayer expense." (The study did not focus on college endowments, but did note that colleges are frequent users of tax exemption provisions.)

"It’s important to understand whether these tax benefits are fueling the tuition increases by subsidizing high salaries for college leaders and rock-climbing walls and other non-educational amenities to try to attract students," said Grassley, a member of the Senate Finance Committee. He pointed to tax-exempt bonds and charitable contributions, as well as the income-tax exempt endowments, as examples of preferential tax provisions that universities frequently use.

He linked the issue to the Obama administration's new focus on college costs, which has emerged in recent days as a key issue...

For now, he is calling largely for increased transparency. "Additional transparency related to revenues and expenses would give us all a better handle on how tuition is set," he said in the statement.

I hope the Ben-Dana's of the world are prepared for the class war they have been so eagerly asking for.

[Jim Rhoads a/k/a vnjagvet]

I think rse will be all over this.

[Clarice]

Huge charitable foundations in this country are sitting on billions, if not trillions of dollars, and skirting their obligations to spend it down through a variety of accounting tricks.

If Rockefeller and Pew and the like spent their own funds on improving the lives of Americans instead of lobbying Congress and the courts--directly and thru push polls and the buying of academic papers--to do their will with our money , the would be a better world.

Congress keeps refusing to demand faster payouts and better accounting and a truly charitable functioning.

[Sara]

LOL.

New York Times columnist Nick Kristof and colleague Adam Ellick were both tear-gassed and placed in the custody of the Bahraini police on Friday during a protest in the city of Sitra.

[Jim Rhoads a/k/a vnjagvet]

Amen, Clarice. For 20 years, I represented a 501c3, pro bono, on employment matters

Then, seven years ago, I started a legal foundation. Before I did it, I pulled up and reviewed about seventy 440's for regional and national 501c3's to see if the space I was trying to occupy was already taken.

My eyes were opened to the mammoth amounts of money those tax exempt organizations dealt with. Then, I started checking college and university endowments. Holy s***. After that, i significantly reduced my contributions to my several alma maters.

[jimmyk]

An honest question: Why do we care if charities don't spend? Doesn't it seem like some arbitrary government regulation that charities have to spend some percentage of their endowments? I understand Clarice's argument about those that spend on lobbying etc. rather than on genuine charitable causes. And transparent accounting is certainly important. But I don't see the concern about payout rates out of endowments.

[DrJ]

I had the same question, jimmyk.

[Clarice]

As I recall the foundations were allowed to accept tax free contributions and grow their assets without tax consequences because in the depression when the law was created to permit this, it was believed they would supplement then reduced government financed domestic charitable endeavors, jimmyk.

[Clarice]

So, to give an example, Henry Ford transfers tax free millions of dollars to a Foundation which spends only a fraction of it and invests most of it, building up an enormous pot of assets. Where one they financed useful domestic projects, like experimental education programs for children, they soon morphed into financing anti-American international activities like the repulsive Durban conference--they paid for the conference, for the international "indigenous" participants, the anti-American organizers, etc. Why shouldn't this money be returned to the treasury to pay for necessary services?

[Clarice]

If this money were in govt treasuries or corporate accounts there'd be some oversight of it, now there is not. Really none to speak of. The administrators chosen decades away from the founding of these institutions b people clearly holding views antithetical t the founders' have a free hand in how they spend it.

[narciso]

Basically the O'Sullivan rule, operates, Pew
(from the Sun Oil) Ford, Hearst, Rockefeller,
all drifted toward the left,

[Army of Davids]

JMHO....SCOTUS ObamaCare will be more political than many think.

5-4 w/ Kennedy making the call one way or another.

Rove says that it can be repealed w/ 51 Senate seats and the presidency by the way.

I think it was a mistake for Obama to call out the SCOTUS on the Citizens decision in the SOTU speech. Wonder what Kennedy thought of that.

[jimmyk]

Ok, so my spin on this would be: Having to spend the money rather than accumulate it helps to ensure that the money is spent according to the donors' intent. If 10 donors each give $10M to help starving children in Africa, and the charity spends $10M on that (in effect telling each donor it's his money being spent), but invests $90M and 30 years later morphs into an organization that spends money funding abortion clinics, say, then it has effectively ripped off the original donors.

I'd still prefer transparency and good accounting rules to some arbitrary regulation, but I see the plus side of making them spend the money.

[Clarice]

I'd make an exception for Foundations set up to support speciic charitable institutions such as schools or churches but I''d make the others spend down a big hunk 10 percent or so a year of their assets.

[RichatUF]

This is interesting:

For Falcone, the notification from the SEC that it may file civil fraud charges against him —officially called a Wells Notice — marks the latest setback at the top of the hedge fund empire.

Harbinger now manages less than $4 billion and roughly half of the money is tied up in its investment in LightSquared LP, the upstart wireless telecom on which Falcone has bet the ranch. LightSquared is running low on cash and its outstanding debt trades at a steep discount as its fortunes have floundered due to a number of technical issues.

Seems he is no longer Friend of Obama...

[jimmyk]

Another entry in the long list of "If Bush had done this....": "I just wanted to see what it was like getting [through White House Security]," Obama said.

Potus shook hands all around. Talked football, said he was Chicago Bears fan. Wanted to know how entry worked. Went through metal detector. Set it off. Guard told him he'd probably left cellphone in pocket.

Remember when Bush was ridiculed for his trip to the supermarket and his comments about the scanner?

[Clarice]

That was dadddy Bush, Jimmy but your point is well taken.

[narciso]

You know I didn't really want to be right about this;

http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2011/12/09/knowledge-beats-wishes-again/#comments

[Ignatz]

If you7 want to get rid of left wing foundations get rid of the inheritance tax, which coincidentally is, I suspect, the largest reason lefties like the inheritance tax, not because it's fair or reduces massive estates for the idle rich.
Most of the clowns fighting hardest to keep the inheritance tax are the idle wastrels lolling about the marble hallways of their great grand daddy's foundation.

[Ignatz]

you7?
Stupid, fat fingers.

[Neo]

Nobel-Winning IPCC Chair Rajendra Pachauri Urges Obama to "Listen to Science" on Global Warming

Pachauri continued, "Actually, to be honest, nobody over here [at COP 17] is paying any attention to science."

[jimmyk]

That was dadddy Bush, Jimmy

Ack, I'm getting old.

[SWarren]

Mark Levin was discussing this in the second hour of his show tonight.
Internal DOJ emails show Kagan was not truthful in her answers during her confirmation hearing. Former Appeals Court Judge McConnell says she should recuse.

~snip~
Internal DOJ emails show Kagan was not truthful in her answers during her confirmation hearing. Former Appeals Court Judge McConnell says she should recuse.

In a statement to CNSNews.com, Mark Levin asked “where is the evidence” that Kagan was in fact “walled off” from health-care matters when she was solicitor general.
“I served in the Justice Department, including as chief of staff to Attorney General Edwin Meese,” Levin told CNSNews.com. “It simply is not credible to argue that Kagan, as the top litigator at Justice and for the nation, would not have been informed about and commented on the legal strategies involving the most important constitutional and policy issue not only in the Obama administration, but in several decades of American history.
“If she had been ‘walled off’ from the matter, where is the evidence for that?” said Levin. “Who was the gatekeeper? In fact, the emails demonstrate that her subordinates were ensuring that she was kept informed about events and potential legal issues, including Landmark's draft complaint, which was prepared to challenge the Slaughter rule and then-Speaker Pelosi's attempt (albeit abandoned) to bypass the Constitution's law-making requirements. At a minimum, it does not appear that Kagan was forthright during her confirmation testimony about the extent to which she was kept apprised of Obamacare.”

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2011/12/obamacare_and_the_supreme_court_should_elena_kagan_recuse_herself_.single.html

[jimmyk]

Oh, and the other thing about the Bush scanner story, of course, was that it was false.

[SWarren]

Oops, this was the link I meant to post:

http://cnsnews.com/news/article/internal-doj-email-kagan-was-brought-loop-mark-levin-s-obamacare-complaint

[History will impeach the whole damn lot.]

Well, if she lied during confirmation, she should be impeached.
================

[daddy]

Just in from a fun midnight walk with the big dog. Chilly, but the full moon is out, and with the light reflecting off the beautiful snow that is covering the road and trees it made the whole scene gorgeous.

The clear sky got me thinking of Astronomy stuff, so coming in I clicked on a favorite Space photo site, and came up with an unexpected Diogenes coincidence.

I clicked on Astronomy Picture of The Day and today's photo was this colorful shot of backlit slices from a meteorite thought to be from the asteroid Vesta.

The write up beneath the photo says the space rock is made up of "Howardite, Eucrite, and Diogenite".

Never having heard of Diogenite I click on Wiki and find:

"Diogenites originates from deep within the crust of the asteroid 4 Vesta, and as such are part of the HED meteorite group. There are about 40 distinct members known."

Then this: "Diogenites are named for Diogenes of Apollonia, an ancient Greek philosopher who was the first to suggest an outer space origin for meteorites."

That led me to this site which tells us that in @450 BC Diogenes of Apollonia explained "Along with the visible heavenly bodies revolve invisible stones, which for that very reason are nameless; but they often fall and are extinguished on the earth like the stone star which fell down flaming at AEGOSPOTAMI." Cool.

"Unfortunately" continues the author of this write-up, "the contemporary of Diogenes and Anaxagoras, none other than Aristotle, believed otherwise: that the heavens were perfect. It would be impossible for rocks to have fallen from the sky. This mistaken belief was generally propagated through the early 19th century...Even the otherwise exceptionally learned US President Thomas Jefferson, probably recalling Aristotle said, "I would more easily believe that two Yankee professors would lie than that stones would fall from heaven." with reference to the WESTON fall in Connecticut, USA, on December 14, 1807."

Well if Jefferson had a hard time believing that Yankee Professors would lie, then I guess he didn't share the opinions of TM's Diogenes, Diogenes of Sinope. (Nor of most of the JOMer's here for that matter) Anyhow, that later Diogenes is the cranky old cynic with the lantern and the orange barrel looking for an honest man, who had his sunbathing session famously interrupted by Alexander The Great.

From Plutarch:

"Soon afterwards, representatives of the Greeks assembled at Corinth and named Alexander to lead them in a war against Persia. While Alexander was at Corinth, politicians and philosophers came to congratulate him, but he noticed that the famous philosopher Diogenes, who lived there in Corinth, did not come.

So Alexander went to visit Diogenes at his home and found him lying down, sun-bathing. Diogenes raised himself up a little when he heard the crowd approaching, and Alexander asked the philosopher very courteously if there was any favor a king could do for him. Diogenes only said: "Yes, please take your shadow off me." Alexander's companions, on the way back, were making fun of the simple-minded old man, but Alexander told them: "Laugh if you must, but if I were not Alexander I would choose to be Diogenes."

So what this all means is that Aristotle is the culprit that trashed Diogenes' Meteorite theory, and Aristotle's star pupil, Alexander The Great, is the guy that trashed Diogenes' suntan session, so it's fitting that here's the culprit that trashed Aristotle's 'perfect heavens.'

[pagar]

"Well, if she lied during confirmation, she should be impeached."

My guess is that anyone in the Obama regime is going to lie. Why do Republicans keep voting to confirm them?

[pagar]

"all drifted toward the left,"

Does anyone know of a foundation created by a leftist that has drifted right.

I believe we have let the William Ayers/Communist Party Anti American bunch take control of most of the big money piles in America. Just look at the funding provided to leftist groups by the US government, the foundations and the college endowments. What's left?

[Cecil Turner]

Nobel-Winning IPCC Chair Rajendra Pachauri Urges Obama to "Listen to Science" on Global Warming

Let's see . . . a "climate scientist" whose prime credential is a "peace" prize complaining that nobody is talking about science at the meeting in Africa. [Africa? Does that make any sense if the goal is emissions reduction? Maybe not . . . but it makes a lot of sense if the goal is squeezing money out of western countries.]

I don't know if defunding the UN is necessarily wise, but defunding certain parts of it is long overdue.

[pagar]

"defunding certain parts of it is long overdue"

IMO, if they just moved the whole thing to Africa it would cut down on the rush to travel to the UN.

[Cecil Turner]

One of my first thoughts was hosting it was counterproductive. But in the case of an actual security council meeting on something important (the only reason I can see for the organization to continue), being centrally located helps. OTOH, publicly evicting them would be very soul-satisfying.