batavicus

"Started lying to themselves?" What about, "They're eating the dogs. They're eating the cats?" He pushed that made-up nuttery pretty hard.

"We are always paid for our suspicion by finding what we suspect." Henry David Thoreau."

An eloquent way to express "confirmation bias." Our contemporary social scientific language is useful but often unlovely.

The music accompanying Doomsday might be the best score ever written for any TV episode ever. It's beautifully composed and uses leitmotiv in an operatic way. Sol Kaplan was a great film music composer.

Dang, George, you can skate well too! And speak French! A regular polymath! Good ad. I'm sending some more $$$.

My sense is you're right, as long as the next midterm and general elections turn out ok...

That happened in the Netherlands. The Dutch fascist leader was Anton Mussert. Post WWII, Anton fell out of favor and those who were already named that went by "Toon" (sounds like "tone"). An older colleague named "Anton-Adolf" by his fascist parents (he was decidedly not fascist!) went by Tony.

"One thing close reading can clarify in the k12 context is reading with appreciation vs reverence."

May I express appreciation sprinkled with reverence for this succinct formulation?

At least the Tulip Craze produced some lovely flowers (if the 17th-century drawings are faithful representations). Bitcoin is, as obseved here, nothing.

Here's what the photo made me think of.

A US senator, cap in hand. How much self-abasement? For how long? Don't GOP senators have a limit?

Stop Meeting Students Where They Are What I learned when I finally started assigning the hard reading again.

In case this escaped your notice. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0... In some encouraging news, I got to watch 12th-grade English class have a deep discussion of "The Remains of the Day." (These days, semi-retired, I teach econ.)

"The American oligarchy has amassed its wealth through parasitism..." Yup. A la the courtiers at the courts of Louis XV and Louis XVI--right before the Revolution.

Indeed. It's a weakness in my view. Just allow edits within a time window, e.g., five minutes and then mark the edited post "edited." WaPo has allowed it for years. Doesn't seem that hard to me.

Ah, my mistake.

Inflation is the rate of increase of prices, not the price levels themselves. Prices (in general) don't drop (particular goods drop in prices, e.g., electronics) A general price drop would be deflation which is scary, e.g., Great Depression. That said, Sen. Kennedy is lying and he knows he's lying.

Typo--you meant Trump took office in 2025, correct?

Didn't see the show. Did the journalist challenge the claim? If s/he did, that would be Jim Dandy. I'm so sick of the journalists nodding "uh-huh" and letting false claims go unchallenged. It leaves me wondering if the journos don't know where to find data or just don't prepare for interviews.

"Susan Collins-y" -- that's the best word coinage I've read in months! Congrats, George!

The existence of ideologically inclined "think tanks" is a perversion of social science. Questions are supposed to be approached neutrally. The idea of "conservative" or "liberal" research is daft. It just a way to generate "alternative facts" when peer review produces inconvenient conclusions.

She forgot "Kenyan, atheist, Muslim, Islamist..."

Farage's out will be that his "not quite fair" was simply British understatement.

Shouldn't the severe drought last year in Atlantic Canada be on the map too?

Wasn't Billy B an April Fool's joke? Not that it matters. Coalie is plenty
dumb.

Hail to the champions!

Goedemorgen!

If it did ok with a NY strip, then it should be ok with a deer backstrap. Thanks for the tip!

Don't forget Bunga Bunga governance.

And northeastern France!

I'm betting WaPo will. Sigh. That used to be such a good paper.

Yes. What's especially amusing is that Thiessen links to the 1951 treaty which essentially gives the US free hand in establishing military installations in and around Greenland.