You’ll note that I’ve avoided the immigration debate. That’s partly because I’m divided on the issue, but I’m on several mailing lists with people who are rabid about it, and well, enough is enough.

First, yes, I have a serious problem with the fact that illegals are consciously breaking the law. This does not, in my opinion, speak well of their character, or the likelihood that this demonstrates a lack of respect for the law, the nation, and its citizens. Second, yes, I also realize that the current status quo presents a serious security problem.

Having said that, let’s move on to what I see, repeatedly, from these economically-illiterate folks.

Remember the controversy over the crescent-shaped Flight 93 Memorial, which I visited a little while back?

The redesign is out, and the crescent is gone.

I’m still less concerned about the crescent shape, which would only be discernable from the air, than I am all the lefty gushy-gooey “healing” nonsense. It’s a war memorial, dedicated to heroes. “Healing” isn’t appropriate.

The official site is here.

Hat tip to LGF.

You won’t see this on CNN — or, for that matter, those paleocon pro-protectionist (and economically illiterate) websites.

The economy is booming – 3.8% in the last quarter. Additionally:

• House purchases are at an all-time high
• Gas prices are falling through the floor
• Consumer confidence index is through the ceiling

And I echo Larry Kudlow: Why aren’t Bush and the adminstration banging this home, given that most Americans seem to be under the mistaken impression that we’re in a recession, and aren’t happy with the way Bush is handling the economy?

So how surprised would you be if I told you a whole bunch of Democrats who squeal about the Republican “culture of corruption” have shady connections to Jack Abramoff? Not possible, you say? Silly reader!

Hat tip to GOP Bloggers.

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Something Wyatt Earp said on his blog set this off. Not, mind, that this is something I just realized — I just haven’t said anything about it here yet.

Perspective.

The first time I was in the Bay Area (yes, as in SF, Oakland, you know, that Bay Area) I had just been in Chicago — and while in Chicago, I rode the El (for those of you who’ve never been there, that’s the Elevated train). When I got to the Bay Area, there were letters to the editors of all the papers every day about how “filthy” BART was (BART is the Bay Area equivalent of Chicago’s El).

I laughed every time I saw one of those letters. Come on, BART was spotless. These people were bitching about a few chewing gum wrappers on the floor — and badly needed to take a trip on the El to find out what a filthy public transportation system is like (the El is still pretty nasty, though not as bad as it was then).

No perspective.

Then, we moved here in August, and what do they complain about? The roads. Okay, give me a break. Sure, there are lots of roads that aren’t finished (one almost in my backyard, as a matter of fact), but I can’t get over the great condition of the roads here. Guys, in Indiana, you have to swerve almost continuously to miss the potholes. Even the Interstates in Indiana suck; if you have your eyes closed you can tell the minute you cross the state line, and I’m not making that up. 322/220 and I-99 are like driving on glass. The roads here are like those in Tennessee or Alabama.

No perspective.

Okay, I will admit that some of the roads here set off my fear of heights and I end up at the bottom of the mountain with a sweat-soaked steering wheel and my hands so cramped I have to pull over (seriously). But that’s not really a road issue — it’s the terrain here in the central part of the state.

I know you’re not going to stop bitching about the roads, but know that every time you do, I’m laughing at you.

Check out my article about this on Blue State Conservatives. And despite the fact that the “Republican Mainstreet” has taken the Soros contribution off their site, Kokonut Pundits has documented the digital trail.

And read the detailed acccount from Michelle Malkin, who broke the story and is taking heat from the Soros RINOs for it.

If you think what passes for academic courses is hooey, then you haven’t read any academic journals lately.

In his latest colum, Mike Adams reviews — okay, hacks apart — a sterling example of what passes for “academic research” these days, “Animals, Women and Weapons: Blurred Sexual Boundaries in the Discourse of Sport Hunting,” by Linda Kalof.

No, he didn’t make it up. In fact, if you have a masochistic streak, you can read the whole thing here, published in (wait, I have to stop snickering) Society & Animals: Journal of Human-Animal Studies (Vol 12, Num 3, 2004).

I love Mike Adams, and read every column he writes. But he’s humorous (though always with a serious undertone), and I’m afraid I’m not, at least not here, not now. I’ve seen too much of this nonsense to laugh and shake my head.

This was my biggest problem in grad school: reading tripe like this, and being expected to discuss it seriously. How can you take a “study” seriously that calls reading magazines and picking out a word, oh, like “target” and declaring it to be a “sexual reference,” and that turns around and calls that process “empirical evidence”?

The first time I inadvertently started a maelstrom in a grad class was when we read that feminist classic that started it all, Robin Lakoff’s Language and Women’s Place. Now if you’re not familiar with this, er, not so scholarly work, it’s basically a long essay, and started the “feminist scholarship formula” we see today: Pick out a few words and use lots of gooey-gushy hot-button words like “power” and “patriarchy” around them, declare them “oppressive” in some way, and then call the whole thing empirical research.

So what did I do to start this firestorm in that particular seminar? I asked a simple question.

“Where is the evidence for her conclusions?”

Before you jump to any conclusions, the faculty I had for my graduate work were all extremely fair, and I’ve gotten to know them all quite well personally since. Yes, I started a lot of hot discussions, but that’s why they liked me — even if they didn’t agree. So if you thought this was going in that direction, you’re wrong.

The answer to my question, of course, is that there is no evidence of any kind. Feminist scholarship doesn’t require evidence — just a lot of “interpretation” (which means unsubstantiated personal opinion), and the phrase, “empirical evidence” thrown in just for good measure.

“Feminist scholarship” (and yes, those are sneer quotes) is anti-empirical.

What I find really depressing, however, is not that these idiots do this sort of thing and call it research. What gets under my skin is that peer-reviewed academic journals publish this equine excrement. Given that these journals are peer-reviewed, and universities are full of UACJOBs like this, that is hardly surprising. The problem, however, is that “academic” carries weight in the general public, weight it doesn’t deserve.

Okay, now I have to go take a shower.

Hastert has lost points with me lately, due to the massive overspending in Congress, but he gains them back for proclaiming the tree a Christmas Tree, instead of a “Holiday” Tree, as has been the custom since the (surprise) Clinton regime.

I realize expecting some minimal rationality from liberal multiculturalists is stretching it, but would somebody please explain to me how calling it a Christmas Tree is “insensitive”? How neurotic do you have to be to be offended, or have your widdle feewings hurt — I mean, what kind of sad loser are you, if you object to it being called exactly what it is: a Christmas Tree?

No doubt the leftists and liberaltarians will be up in arms about this. I’m surprised I haven’t seen anything about the ACLU filing suit.

Hat tip to Gunn Nutt.

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Catholicism has a long history of left-wing politics among the laity. In the 70s and 80s, “liberation theologists” tried to institutionalize Marxism, but Pope John Paul II effectively nixed that plan. And North and South American bishops have historically been at the forefront of this left-wing push.

As a result, every community large enough to support two Roman Catholic churches has one left-wing parish, and one conservative parish. I live right across from the left-wing parish here (which I call St. Josef Stalin), but I drive across town to attend the conservative parish.

Louisville (Kentucky) surely has more Catholic parishes per capita than any other community in the nation. One of these is St. James on Bardstown Road.

St. James is a Byzantine (architecture) church, which looks conservative from the outside. Ah, but go inside, into the dome and look up. The Lidless Eye of Sauron gazes back down at you from the center. We attended Mass there in the early 80s, and the during the Intercessions, the nun prayed that we would give our private property to the State, and for the victory of the Sandanistas. She also strummed the guitar and led the congregation in a rousing chorus of We Shall Overcome (but then, Marxist politics and excessive Vatican II guitar masses go together).

Usually, Marxism isn’t quite so unsubtly expressed. It is much more common to hear “For world peace and social justice, we pray to the Lord,” which of course means the same thing. But John Paul II knew all about Marxism, and was quite firm about purging it from the Church.

Contrast this with St. Louis Bertrand, a south Louisville parish (not far from Churchill Downs) run by Dominicans, or St. Martin of Tours. Instead of leftie politics, both parishes offer daily Novenas for Life (that would refer to abortion, by the way). St. Louis Bertrand is home to the Louisville Blue Army; St Martin of Tours offers Mass in Latin.

The conservative parish here sponsors a weekly Novena across the street from the local Planned Parenthood (to those of you who are protestants, a Novena is not a protest; a Novena is a prayer cycle). St. Josef Stalin across the street from our house does not participate (as a parish, though I’m sure there are parishoners who do — even many left-wing Catholics are pro-life).

At one point in my life, Church history and theology were two of my major interests. I read the Church fathers, and more recent theologians. Though I no longer do, the Church still fascinates me. How can such polarization exist in such a monolithic ecclesiastical organization — or more to the point, how can this polarization exist when the Vatican unambiguously favors one side over the other?

For one thing, the Church avoids entanglements in national politics, unless those politics involve questions of morality (I’m thinking here of the movement to excommunicate Catholic politicians who advocate abortion). For another, the Vatican tends to handle American bishops with kid gloves, partially because they understand that the anti-Catholic fervor in the United States exhibited as late as the 60s (during Kennedy’s campaign) could easily rear its head again. With matters of faith and theology, the Church wields a heavy hand; other matters the Church avoids. Even when the Church issues statements about foreign policy, it does not do so in a way that obligates Catholics to fall in line.

Most of all, however, is apostasy. For the most part, Catholics lapse rather than convert. I believe in One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church resonates within the soul of every Catholic. St. Josef Stalin will waver up to a point — but clergy will not defy the Vatican. To do so is to separate oneself from the Church.

However much I may enjoy sneering at the leftie Kumbayah Mass parishes, I think that ultimately, the fact that they can exist is good for the Church in America. Although they may differ on non-essentials, they provide a home for Catholics who hold leftist beliefs — and since the business of the Church is saving souls, not the violent overthrow of capitalist governments, they should have a home in the Church. Only when the Vatican says, “We stand here,” and the parishoners say, “No, we stand here,” has the line been crossed.

« Close it

During World War II, Hollywood cranked out movies, some of them among the great classics: The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Battle of the Bulge, Mrs. Miniver, The Sands of Iwo Jima, The Dirty Dozen, Tora! Tora! Tora!. Had television been the industry it is today, TV shows would likewise have turned out show after show, all with the same pro-American patriotic theme. Even cartoons, then shown in movie theaters, were strongly patriotic.

This Hollywood patriotism was not limited to the period during the war. In 1951, The African Queen was released — a love story whose underlying theme was that supporting your nation in time of war was the right and moral thing to do.

Today, with a few exceptions, the closest thing we have to a patriotic film is the “conflicted soldier” theme, as seen in the currently playing Jarhead. Far more common are the anti-patriotic shows (Boston Legal a few weeks ago, Kingdom of Heaven), and the fear of identifying the enemy. Without a Trace last week featured a home-grown terrorist (though we can and should give kudos to the writers of 24 for having the courage to stand up to PC pressure groups and identify Muslim terrorists).

We have gone from “supporting your nation in time of war is the right and moral thing to do” to “opposing your nation in time of war is the right and moral thing to do.” Hollywood has gone from being the core of support for the United States to the core of sedition.

Who wants to try to tell me this has nothing to do with their steeply falling profit margins?

Look at the films over the last few years that have pulled in huge profits: The Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and Harry Potter, all movies about one old-fashioned, common theme: good versus evil. The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe will open December 9, and I’m betting it will be the biggest success of the Christmas season.

What’s the problem here? Those producers are businessmen. How is it they can’t see the obvious, that we’re sick of anti-US, anti-capitalist, anti-patriot trash?

Because it’s not obvious to them. They live in a bubble of left-wing ideologues, and are incapable of breaking out. So the news that Bruce Willis is producing a movie based on Michael Yon’s coverage of Deuce Four in Iraq, a movie in which American soldiers are portrayed as heroes, is welcome news indeed.

And it will be a big hit.

H/T to Michelle Malkin.

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We went to see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire yesterday. Note that although I’ve seen all of the Harry Potter movies, this is the first I’ve seen in the theater, and I have never read one of the books. My evaulation of the movie is just that, since I have no knowledge of the book to which I can compare the movie.

Spoilers below.

One thing about teaching in computer clusters is that there’s almost always something useful — or at least interesting — to be found in the printer. Students print things out, then leave them, and sometimes, you find something and say, “That’s a great idea! I could adapt that for my classes!”

Then other times, you find something that either makes you laugh. Or cry.

One day, I found a syllabus from an education seminar. I think I’ve fixed all the typos (I scanned it). If not, apologies for any I missed.

This is what our future teachers are, uh, learning in the university. I didn’t reproduce it all because I didn’t want to accidentally make anyone ill or anything.

Alexander Wolfe commented on Savages:

One gets the sense that you’re more offended by children and soldiers being lumped together in the article then you were by children being killed. Are you on the lookout more for the evils of religious terrorism, or the evils of liberal bias in the media?

I’m offended by their being lumped together because children were deliberately targeted and murdered, and for nothing more than to further a media agenda. The two are not mutually exclusive, though I admit that it’s hard to decide which is more despicable: the deliberate murder of children, or downplaying the murder of children just to push a leftwing interpretation.

However, there’s more:

Iraq seizes booby-trapped toys
24/11/2005 17:13 - (SA)

Baghdad - The Iraqi army said on Thursday it had seized a number of booby-trapped children’s dolls, accusing insurgents of using the explosive-filled toys to target children.

The dolls were found in a car, each one containing a grenade or other explosive, said an army statement.

The government said that two men driving the car had been arrested in the western Baghdad district of Abu Ghraib.

“This is the same type of doll as that handed out on several occasions by US soldiers to children,” said government spokesperson Leith Kubba.

It was not immediately clear when the find was made or the suspects arrested.

That’s it. No further details, and certainly none of the solicited commentary a story about, oh, the evils of American soldiers would definitely have gotten. And to date, not a peep from the cowards in the Senate who are so concerned about the “rights” of these child-murdering terrorists.

Sign me furious and disgusted.

See the scathing commentary at the Anti-Idiotarian Rott.

One of the many problems with education is the educators. And this cuts across all spectra. Some of the worst excuses for teachers I’ve seen had PhDs. But when you get education school types, well, that’s manslaughter waiting to happen.

Let me explain. There I was, trying to get a lot of work done in as little time as possible, minding my own business at my desk, when in walks not one, not two, but three moonbat teachers.

I briefly considered ignoring them, but I’d tried that before and it’s not effective. So I turned toward them.

“Yes?” I said, and I might add, in quite a polite helpful tone of voice, with a smile on my face.

They just looked at me. I waited. They kept looking at me.

As I read Warren Community College President Austin’s public statement regarding Daly, all I can do is shake my head:

 [We will] rededicate ourselves to a review of our current policies and procedures to make certain that we continue to foster an open and collegial learning environment at our institution. I personally pledge to see that tolerance training is included in our next faculty and staff in-service, and to consider a broad range of student input in its development.

“Tolerance training.” Wait, I have to stop laughing and get my kleenex … there, that’s better. So the answer to the problem of faculty entitlement to intimidate students is what? Why yes! More liberal groupthink!

But liberals are like that. When faced with evidence (you know, as in from the real world) that large, centralized government (or whatever) doesn’t work, they always respond by wanting more. Witness FEMA and Katrina, the best recent example of the inefficiency of centralized federal government bureaucracies — the liberals want more.

Likewise, thirty years of nothing but radical liberal groupthink at universities result in this sort of repugnant and irresponsible behavior, and their answer is yet more groupthink.

So I wonder if they’ll have Clara come do her interpretive dancing for them?

I wonder how the terrorist fan club (Cindy Sheehan, Mike Al-Moor, Justin Raimondo, Lew Rockwell, all those America-hating nutjobs at dummocraticunderground.com and moron.org) feels about this:

BAGHDAD, Nov. 24 — A suicide attacker steered a car packed with explosives toward U.S. soldiers giving away toys to children outside a hospital in central Iraq on Thursday, killing at least 31 people. Almost all of the victims were women and children, police said.

What’s really annoying — no, infuriating — about the article itself, however, is that despite the fact that the above is the first paragraph, and despite the fact that the headline is, “Bomber Bloodies U.S. Toy Giveaway,” the story goes on to discuss soldiers who were bombed, lumping them all together as if targeting children who were getting toys is no different from targeting soldiers.

This is so heinous it should have gotten its own story. Of course, that would have outraged readers, which is precisly why it did not.

After all, that would be a “value judgment.”

Hat tip to Ex-Donkey Blog.

Linked to Blue State Conservatives

Since I don’t really care that much about traffic, I’ve stayed out of this, but there are a couple of points that haven’t yet been made — and some that have, but should be emphasized.

First, a lot of people are making a couple of assumptions here that are unwarranted: that open trackbacks generate links to lower quality writing, and carnivals generate links to higher quality writing. I’m sorry, but I fail to see how anyone could make these assumptions. Where do these ideas come from? These assumptions are as irrational and bizarre as anything you’d find on dummocraticunderground, and even more bizarre is that people seem to be buying into them.

Second, a number of people talk about “cheating” or “breaking the rules.” Sorry, but since there are no rules on TTLB about open trackbacks, nobody is doing either. Nor do I see how links generated by open trackbacks can be called “artificial stats,” since there’s nothing “artificial” about them, and they are in every way indistinguishable from links generated from blog carnivals or blogrolls.

Third — and this is one of those points that has been made but should be emphasized — this whole thing reeks of the Dan Rather MSM mindset. Given that the assumptions are without merit (see above) until proven otherwise (and I’d love to see somebody try), this really is about nothing more than yet more media elitism. Nothing I’ve seen in support of this decision is anything other than that. Examples? “Let them get traffic the way I did!” one of the most common, which translates into, “I was too damned stupid to figure this out myself, it’s not fair!”

Sorry, but given the invalidity of the assumptions behind this decision, I react to it the same way as I do the OSM hype: with a well-deserved derisive sneer and shake of the head.

Now, if you don’t mind, I’ll go back to my blog — and I’ll provide open trackbacks for those who need exposure. NZ and the rest of the “blogosphere quality control guardians” are free to implement whatever devices they see fit to keep the riff-raff out.

Linked to: Stop the ACLU, Blue State Conservatives, Conservative Cat, Don Surber, Pajamas Media/Stuck on Stupid Blog

First, we got up to snow. Yes, snow. (Pictures here.) Nothing heavy, but there have been flurries off and on all day, and trust me, it’s too cold for any of it to melt off.

We don’t really know anybody here, certainly not well enough to do Thanksgiving with them, so we headed to a Thanksgiving buffet. It was actually very good, though the turkey was dry.

I was traumatized. No persimmon pudding!

How can you have Thanksgiving without persimmon pudding! Whoever heard of such a thing!

Not that I was surprised. The stores here have those boring, flavorless Japanese persimmons. I asked the produce dept managers at several stores if they ever carried American persimmons, and they’d never heard of American persimmons.

Oh, the horror!

The American persimmon (diospyros virginiana) is perhaps the world’s hardiest fruit tree, with very hard wood, and small deep orange fruits (persimmons), which are astringent until ripe and falling off the tree. Unlike the Japanese persimmon, the American persimmon is essentially jelly — you certainly can’t slice them. You put them in a food mill and pulp them, then use the pulp in the premiere desert, persimmon pudding, or any of thousands of different recipes (persimmon breads, cookies, you name it). The American persimmon is an intensely flavored fruit, unlike the inferior Japanese cousin, and truly is, as the Greeks named it, the food of the gods.

Problem is, nobody outside Indiana seems to know about them.

The only place I found on the web where you can order pulp is Dillman Farms, which ironically is about three miles from where we lived until we moved here.

When you get your persimmon pulp, here’s what you do with it (and you eat it with LOTS of whipped cream):

Persimmon Pudding

2 c. sugar
2 c. persimmon pulp
3 eggs, beaten
2 c. flour
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. baking soda
1 1/4 c. buttermilk
1/4 c. (1/2 stick) unsalted butter

1. Mix sugar and pulp. Add beaten eggs.
2. Mix flour and cinnamon.
3. Add soda to buttermilk, and stir until foaming stops.
4. Add flour mixture and buttermilk to persimmon pulp.
5. Melt butter in pan in which you will pour batter. Pour
   excess melted butter into batter, then all into prepared
   pan. Bake 1 hour at 300 to 325 F. 

This is not cake. It should fall on its own. If it doesn't,
drop the pan a couple of times when it comes out of the oven.
Cool. Serve with whipped cream. LOTS of whipped cream.

Linked to Stuck on Stupid

Where I grew up, most of the people have names like Uebelhor, Mueller, Schneider, you know, Deutsch names, and protestants are a small minority. “Bathtub Marys” in front yards. What I jokingly call the Blue Army Belt (like the Bible Belt, but very Roman Catholic). The food is heavily German influenced (you have to distinguish between “cold potato salad” and “hot potato salad” so you know whether you’re getting the yellow mayonnaise based stuff or the never-hot-but-room-temp bacon and vinegar based German potato salad). Every refrigerator has a cup or some sort of container where the bacon grease is kept (NEVER thrown away!) If you ate greens, it was with vinegar on them. The ever-present wilted lettuce, lettuce wilted with a mixture of bacon and bacon grease, vinegar and a sprinkling of sugar, poured hot over the lettuce (hence, the wilting). And of course, the ultimately delicious thing you can do to potatoes: German fries.

Given that Pennsylvania has the largest percentage of folks with German ancestry of any state, I expected the same sort of German influence here. Wrong. This is a whole ‘nuther kind of German here, protestant German from the north, not the Bavarians that settled the Ohio River valley. They left far less imprint on the local food — just try finding good kraut in the store here (and good luck). I haven’t seen head cheese here, or blood sausage (both of which when I grew up you made yourself, but then, both my grandmothers killed chickens every Sunday too). Instead of eating brats in the summer here, they eat italian sausage (like New York City).

In the county seat about ten miles down the road, there is a German restaurant — not a bad one, either — but they don’t have kartoffelklösse, “potato glaze” back home (”glaze” because that’s what “klösse” sounds like without the last unstressed vowel), those potato dumplings. The waitress told us they didn’t have them because they never figured out how to make them — which tells me that however good the food might be, they don’t have Germans in the kitchen.

There’s also a fantastic Austrian place here, but Austrian is not the same — similar, yes, but not identical. And they don’t have rotkohl!

In fact, nearly everybody here I’ve met doesn’t like kraut. Huh? That’s like not liking ham and beans, or not liking cornbread. How do you not like kraut?

Because all you’ve had is crap kraut. So let me introduce you to kraut that will make you cry.

Kraut with apples

1 bag or can kraut
1 small onion
1 or 2 apples (winesaps are good)
1/4 lb. bacon
apple cider
salt and pepper

1. RINSE THE KRAUT! Bagged/canned kraut is packed in vinegar
   and it's WAY too sour. And rinse it well. Get every bit
   of the juice off it.
2. Either chop the bacon up and cook it, or cook it in strips
   then drain and crumble it. DO NOT THROW AWAY THE BACON
   GREASE!
3. Peel and slice the apples and onion thinly.
4. Heat the bacon grease and add the apples and onion. Cook
   until soft, then add the kraut. Add a cup of the cider,
   cover and simmer for thirty minutes or so. Check it from
   time to time and add a bit of cider if needed.
5. Uncover, raise the heat, and cook until still moist, but
   the excess cider is gone. Mix in the bacon and serve.

In the 80s, I was a chef. Yup, that’s right, in a number of very good restaurants. And more than anything else, I love to cook. I get all excited at the prospect of spending hours in the kitchen.

Seriously.

I’m a true gourmet. I love good food, no matter what it is. I grew up in a rural area not far north of the Ohio River, where they still have church pitch-ins. My mother and my grandmothers were all exemplary cooks (though with different strengths and weaknesses), and I guess I’m fortunate to have grown up with amazingly good food.

I’m going to document some of my favorites, including things I grew up eating, but are hard to find recipes for. And I’m going to start it off with Chicken ‘n Dumplings.

Before you groan, what I grew up eating is different from every recipe I’ve seen. These are not thick dumplings dropped from a spoon; these are rolled out thin, and cook up light and tender. These are tricky — not hard, but follow all of the directions. So here it is.

Chicken and Dumplings

1 chicken, or chicken parts (but NOT boneless or skinless)
water or chicken broth
1 onion
1 carrot
poultry seasoning
salt and pepper

Dumplings:

1.5 cups flour
1.5 cups chicken stock
poultry seasoning
1 t. each: salt and baking powder

 1.  Cover the chicken, onion and carrot with water (broth
     is better), bring to a boil, then simmer until done
     (how long that is depends partly on whether you use a
     whole chicken, or chicken parts). You'll need about 5
     cups total. Discard onion and carrot.
 2.  Remove chicken and reserve stock. DO NOT DEGREASE (and
     why in the name of God Almighty would you do such a
     hideous thing, anyway?)

Dumplings:

 1.  When stock is room temperature, mix flour, salt, baking
     powder, and poultry seasoning (I like LOTS).
 2.  Add stock: These are not noodles. You want the dough
     sticky, about the consistency of spaetzle dough. If that
     doesn't mean anything to you, you want it thicker than
     cake batter, but it shouldn't "hold together" into a
     dry ball. When you lift the spoon, it should pull some
     of the dough with it.
 3.  Flour your counter generously, and turn the dough out
     onto the counter. Flour the top of the dough generously
     and let it sit for fifteen minutes or so. Now, using
     almost no pressure at all, roll it with a pin (it's very
     soft, and requires no pressure) until it's about 1/8
     of an inch thick. Again, let it rest for about thirty
     minutes, then cut it into squares.
 4.  Add poultry seasoning to stock, and bring to a boil.
     Now, lower the heat until the stock is simmering, but
     not boiling (the dumplings really are tender, and will
     fall apart if they are boiled rapidly).
 5.  Add dumplings 5 or six at a time, and GENTLY separate
     them with a spoon and push them down into the stock
     before you add more. This prevents them from sticking
     to each other (as does the fat in the stock). The flour
     on the dumplings will thicken the stock as it cooks, so
     you don't want to shake it off. Repeat this process till
     all the dumplings have been added, then cover and simmer
     for 30 minutes. Simmer. Don't boil. Very gently break
     them up two or three times, but IF YOU STIR THEM THEY
     WILL DISENTEGRATE!

Serve with the chicken pieces, or remove the chicken from
the bones and chop then add when the dumplings are done.

Well, we woke up to this (front and back shots):

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to all! Signing off.

I’ll login tomorrow to set up a trackback post, but I’m not promising anything else.

Right here.

You surely know by now that John Daly resigned (you know, that part-time faculty member who emailed a Freshman to tell her that he’d do everything he could to see that conservatives didn’t dare show their faces on campus).

I thought I’d head over to Inside Higher Ed to see what was being said about it (very little, by the way). While there, I saw an intriguing headline: David Horowitz’s Next Campaign. I decided to read the story.

If you’re not familiar with it, Inside Higher Ed is a (relatively) fair news site. Relatively fair. But those who write the stories just can’t help letting their biases show sometimes.

In reference to the case of William Bradford, Inside Higher Ed said the following (emphases mine):

The case of William C. Bradford isn’t quite what it seems, but it has riled up plenty of people in Indiana.

 [ . . . ]

Among his unconventional views is backing the U.S. invasion of Iraq.

(If you’re unfamiliar with Bradford, here is Inside Higher Ed’s rather simplistic story; for a far more complete picture, go here, and read all the articles there.)

Back to the point, which is how utterly out of touch with the real world academics are. First, the author of this story never defends his assertion that, “The case of William C. Bradford isn’t quite what it seems” — in fact, he doesn’t even try. He never returns to that — he just starts it off with his personal opinion, which he never backs up. But he shows how utterly oblivious to reality in the rest of the quotation.

Unconventional views? Invasion of Iraq?

In Wonderland, perhaps.

Have you ever known anybody who had some Mysterious Nameless Source of Information? You know, somebody who would say something nutty, and claim that there had been some study done that proved it — but couldn’t tell you who did the study or how to find it?

I’ve known lots of these people. I seem to attract them, for some reason — like I attract people who mistakenly think they can cook. But you’re wondering why I’m thinking of these people.

I found this story on Reuters SA, and I thought I’d share it:

Until I remove this post. Link to this post.

Trackback URI:
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Tuesday trackbacks are here.

Who said the following?

 [ … ] holds the American government responsible for the suffering of the Iraqi people and all the crimes and assassinations now being committed in Iraq

A Democrat? Cindy Sheehan? Chris Matthews?

Why no, it was Iran’s Supreme Leader, the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

So one more time with feeling: I don’t question their patriotism; they have none.

Read the whole thing.

Hat tip to Gay Patriot.

Teflon at Molten Thought has had it with the Dems:

You are no patriot if you wish to see America defeated.

You are no patriot if you hope for America’s humiliation.

You are no patriot if you work for America’s weakening.

You are no patriot if you undermine America’s war effort.

You are no patriot if you call for America’s surrender.

This week, Congressional Democrats confirmed that they