I remember seeing this maybe half a year ago when I was perusing the wikipedia article on Atlas Shrugged in search of Whittaker Chamber's famous review of Ayn Rand's iconic novel. (I tend to disagree with Mr. Chambers on the fascist overtones in Atlas Shrugged considering it advocates laissez-faire capitalism and attacks large government. In case you don't know, fascists hate laissez-faire capitalism and love large government, but that discussion is for another day) A recent entry in the "Media Blog" at National Review Online (which I would have missed had Rachel Lucas not noticed it) has reminded me of it. Apparently, talks have been underway for years about a film adaptation of Atlas Shrugged starring Angelina Jolie as Dagny Taggart and - according to some reports - Brad Pitt as John Galt. Anyone who has read Atlas Shrugged knows that it strongly advocates a free market which is unfettered by any government interference and refers to those who advocate a welfare state as "looters". This is why I'm puzzled as to why Jolie and Pitt would sign onto the film.
Now I've always known Brad Pitt was a liberal, environmental wackjob, so I can't imagine how he has come to admire Ayn Rand. He famously supported John Kerry in 2004. If he can't stomach George W. Bush, There is no way in hell he can agree with anything John Galt believes aside from his atheism. As for Jolie, maybe she's attracted to Dagny Taggart's character because there are some feministic qualities about her, but Rand portrays other female characters in a bad light, Lily Rearden for example. And given all Jolie's advocacy for the plight of the third world, I find it hard to believe she admires a book in which one of the "good guys" so to speak is a pirate who destroys aid shipments to impoverished countries around the world.
My biggest fear in all of this is that Jolie and Pitt have no idea who Rand was or what Atlas Shrugged advocates. They probably see it as just a chance to have a wild sex scene on film together. I've never minded Jolie much, in fact I go out of my way to avoid the tabloid obsession, and her father, John Voigt is somewhat of a conservative. However, if they tone down the free market, anti government tone of the book so as to not offend Jolie and Pitt's sensibilities, I will never forgive them. Despite being godless and at times reading like a romance novel, Atlas Shrugged is one of my favorite books. If they at all alter Francisco d'Anconia's brilliant monologue on money, I may just become a hermit and live out in the Ozarks, maybe gaining a wacky name from the locals, like "fraggle-toothed Jakey". Bottom line, I'll lose it.
If you're going to do it, do it right.
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Monday, August 11, 2008
Camera Man "Unobjectively" Saves Marine's Life
I'm not sure how I missed this, but Fox News camera man Chris Jackson pulled a marine out of a burning Humvee that had been struck by an IED in Afghanistan. Could anyone see a CNN or BBC camera man pull a marine out of a burning vehicle? Just saying.
Humanity Can't Survive Any More Guardian Columns
Apparently we're all going to die, at least according to global warmist Oliver Tickell. The only thing that puzzles me is whether the global warmists see that as a good thing, or a bad thing. After all, humans are evil, consuming, capitalists who repeatedly rape Mother Earth, right? Anyway, here are some snippets from comrade Tickell's hysterical piece in today's Guardian.
"We need to get prepared for four degrees of global warming, Bob Watson told the Guardian last week. At first sight this looks like wise counsel from the climate science adviser to Defra. But the idea that we could adapt to a 4C rise is absurd and dangerous. Global Warming on this scale would be a catastrophe that would mean, in the immortal words that Chief Seattle probably never spoke, "the end of living and the beginning of survival" for humankind. Or perhaps the beginning of our extinction."
Hmm, well that seems very well thought out and reasoned. A 4C rise in the global temperature would indeed change the face of the earth, and humankind may have to radically adapt, if we can at all (I always like to bet on humanity). But is there any evidence that this is absolutely going to happen? There are many possibilities that would be disastrous to humanity, but we don't feel the need to destroy our economic prosperity without evidence. A bloodthirsty race of ant men with a taste for human infants could suddenly burst up from the Earth in central Asia and destroy most of the human race. Fortunately, geologists have yet to find evidence of giant ant tunnel labyrinths beneath Asia, but it could happen! We need to take action now! The human race can't survive in influx of 10 trillion murderous ant men! We'd be talking extinction!
Tickell goes on:
"To see how far this process could go, look 55.5m years to the Palaeocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, when a global temperature increase of 6C coincided with the release of about 5,000 gigatonnes of carbon into the atmosphere, both as CO2 and as methane from bogs and seabed sediments. Lush subtropical forests grew in polar regions, and sea levels rose to 100m higher than today. It appears that an initial warming pulse triggered other warming processes. Many scientists warn that this historical event may be analogous to the present: the warming caused by human emissions could propel us towards a similar hothouse Earth."
How did mankind increase the global temperature 6C 55.5 million years ago? The Earth doesn't warm and cool naturally. Humans are responsible. And surely humans could have stopped the Earth from warming 6C, we have that kind of power. We can control weather and climate. We don't have to wait for Al Gore's dream of falling into a vat of toxic waste and gaining Captain Planet-esque powers to come true. Tickell's got a plan to stop the warming this time, unlike those selfish humans of 55.5 million years ago:
"The answer? Scrap national allocations and place a single global cap on greenhouse gas emissions, applied "upstream" – for instance, at the oil refinery, coal-washing station and cement factory. Sell permits up to that cap in a global auction, and use the proceeds to finance solutions to climate change – accelerating the use of renewable energy, raising energy efficiency, protecting forests, promoting climate-friendly farming, and researching geoengineering technologies. And commit hundreds of billions of dollars per year to finance adaptation to climate change, especially in poor countries."
Interestingly, Mr. Tickell doesn't say who will enforce this "global cap on greenhouse gas emissions". How are we going to keep sovereign nations in line? Maybe we could make them a little less sovereign? I think I see where Mr. Tickell is going here. Let's have the UN regulate global emissions like you know they're dying to do. We'll give them sweeping new powers to fight global capitalism and move one step closer to a socialist one world government. Hooray! I'm sure in a hundred years, when we're all serfs on a UN commune, there will be no bitter feelings when the next ice age hits.
"We need to get prepared for four degrees of global warming, Bob Watson told the Guardian last week. At first sight this looks like wise counsel from the climate science adviser to Defra. But the idea that we could adapt to a 4C rise is absurd and dangerous. Global Warming on this scale would be a catastrophe that would mean, in the immortal words that Chief Seattle probably never spoke, "the end of living and the beginning of survival" for humankind. Or perhaps the beginning of our extinction."
Hmm, well that seems very well thought out and reasoned. A 4C rise in the global temperature would indeed change the face of the earth, and humankind may have to radically adapt, if we can at all (I always like to bet on humanity). But is there any evidence that this is absolutely going to happen? There are many possibilities that would be disastrous to humanity, but we don't feel the need to destroy our economic prosperity without evidence. A bloodthirsty race of ant men with a taste for human infants could suddenly burst up from the Earth in central Asia and destroy most of the human race. Fortunately, geologists have yet to find evidence of giant ant tunnel labyrinths beneath Asia, but it could happen! We need to take action now! The human race can't survive in influx of 10 trillion murderous ant men! We'd be talking extinction!
Tickell goes on:
"To see how far this process could go, look 55.5m years to the Palaeocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, when a global temperature increase of 6C coincided with the release of about 5,000 gigatonnes of carbon into the atmosphere, both as CO2 and as methane from bogs and seabed sediments. Lush subtropical forests grew in polar regions, and sea levels rose to 100m higher than today. It appears that an initial warming pulse triggered other warming processes. Many scientists warn that this historical event may be analogous to the present: the warming caused by human emissions could propel us towards a similar hothouse Earth."
How did mankind increase the global temperature 6C 55.5 million years ago? The Earth doesn't warm and cool naturally. Humans are responsible. And surely humans could have stopped the Earth from warming 6C, we have that kind of power. We can control weather and climate. We don't have to wait for Al Gore's dream of falling into a vat of toxic waste and gaining Captain Planet-esque powers to come true. Tickell's got a plan to stop the warming this time, unlike those selfish humans of 55.5 million years ago:
"The answer? Scrap national allocations and place a single global cap on greenhouse gas emissions, applied "upstream" – for instance, at the oil refinery, coal-washing station and cement factory. Sell permits up to that cap in a global auction, and use the proceeds to finance solutions to climate change – accelerating the use of renewable energy, raising energy efficiency, protecting forests, promoting climate-friendly farming, and researching geoengineering technologies. And commit hundreds of billions of dollars per year to finance adaptation to climate change, especially in poor countries."
Interestingly, Mr. Tickell doesn't say who will enforce this "global cap on greenhouse gas emissions". How are we going to keep sovereign nations in line? Maybe we could make them a little less sovereign? I think I see where Mr. Tickell is going here. Let's have the UN regulate global emissions like you know they're dying to do. We'll give them sweeping new powers to fight global capitalism and move one step closer to a socialist one world government. Hooray! I'm sure in a hundred years, when we're all serfs on a UN commune, there will be no bitter feelings when the next ice age hits.
Thursday, August 7, 2008
America's Daughters Look Disgusted
In an update to the "Proof that there is a God" file, Nancy Pelosi has sold 2,737 copies of her new book "Plastic Smile: Diary of a Wackjob"- er, I mean "Know Your Power: A Message To America's Daughters". Had I a daughter, I believe the last person I'd want sending her messages would be Nancy Pelosi, who despite becoming the first female Speaker of the House, managed to set the woman's rights movement back about a decade by bringing her 6 grandchildren up to the Speaker's podium while the House was in session. Thus she justified the fears of any man who believes that women aren't serious enough to govern the most powerful country on Earth.
Let's think about this for a second. How many real, radical, man hating, feminists are there in America? A million? Half a million? One Hundred Thousand? Ten Thousand? Certainly more than 2,737. They don't even want to touch this crap. With the approval rating of Congress mired in the teens, its clear that even liberal democrats aren't happy with Speaker Pelosi. This all ties back into the current furor over Barry Obama. Black voters need to understand something, you want the first black President to be competent. When Barry is elected and the 2nd term of the Carter administration begins, many people's stereotypes about blacks will be confirmed in their minds, just as Nancy Pelosi has made women look like imbeciles. You don't want a President who says there are 57 States, or - as I fear most about a black President - thinks all "typical white" people are inherently racist.
On one hand, if Obama is elected, we'll get this whole "will there ever be a black President" thing out of the bloody way. On the other hand, if Obama is elected, the next black President may be a long time coming.
Let's think about this for a second. How many real, radical, man hating, feminists are there in America? A million? Half a million? One Hundred Thousand? Ten Thousand? Certainly more than 2,737. They don't even want to touch this crap. With the approval rating of Congress mired in the teens, its clear that even liberal democrats aren't happy with Speaker Pelosi. This all ties back into the current furor over Barry Obama. Black voters need to understand something, you want the first black President to be competent. When Barry is elected and the 2nd term of the Carter administration begins, many people's stereotypes about blacks will be confirmed in their minds, just as Nancy Pelosi has made women look like imbeciles. You don't want a President who says there are 57 States, or - as I fear most about a black President - thinks all "typical white" people are inherently racist.
On one hand, if Obama is elected, we'll get this whole "will there ever be a black President" thing out of the bloody way. On the other hand, if Obama is elected, the next black President may be a long time coming.
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
If You Say You're Not A Racist. . . You May Be A Racist
From National Review Online:
1.If you think Obama's the most liberal member of the senate you...may be a racist.
2.If you object to Obama raising your payroll, capital gains and estate taxes you...may be a racist.
3.If you'd prefer a president have at least some foreign policy experience you...may be a racist.
4. If you're in favor of drilling for oil and building nuclear power plants you...may be a racist.
5. If you think "Vero Possemus" is Latin for "Massive Ego" you... may be a racist.
6. If you wonder why Obama was hanging around William Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn you...may be a racist.
7. If your pastor is nothing like Rev. Wright or Father Pfleger you... may be a racist.
8.If you don't want the majority of justices on the Supreme Court to be like Stephen Breyer you...may be a racist.
9. If you're not impressed with Obama's 100% NARAL rating you...may be a racist.
10. If you're not sure whether Obama opposed or supported FISA reauthorization you...may be a racist.
11. If you don't think America is a "downright mean" country you...may be a racist.
12. If you think Obama should've visited wounded troops at Ramstein and Landstuhl you...may be a racist.
13. If you think the surge is working and that's a good thing you...may be a racist.
14. If you oppose racial preferences in employment, school admissions and contracting you...may be a racist.
15. If you think "we are the change we've been waiting for" is a line from a Monty Python skit you...may be a racist.
16. If you prefer that a president have a smidgen of executive experience you...may be a racist.
17. If you're appalled that Obama voted against treating infants born after an abortion attempt the same medically as other infants born alive you...may be a racist.
18. If you were proud of your country even before Obama's candidacy you...may be a racist.
20. If you don't think American troops are just "air raiding villages" you...may be a racist.
21. If your grandmother isn't a "typical white person" you...may be a racist.
22. If you don't think rural, working class people are bitter and "cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them" you...may be a racist.
23. If you're not sure invading Pakistan is a particularly good idea—what with their nuclear weapons and all— you...may be a racist.
24. If you don't want the president to meet without precondition with the leaders of state sponsors of terror you...may be a racist.
25. If you don't care how Hollywood or the European elite think you should vote you...may be a racist.
Monday, August 4, 2008
House GOP: Not Geldings After All
Finally, someone in the GOP is pounding Pelosi and the Democrats over the ban on drilling. I was beginning to question their intelligence and genitalia.
This Isn't Dirty Harry's San Francisco
Over in San Francisco, Mayor and Stalinist Gavin Newsom has proposed fining people $1000 if residents don't properly sort their trash for recycling. Seriously. Is their anyone who still can't see the fascism inherent in the green movement? San Francisco has sunk far deeper into liberalism than the rest of the country has, but this is the direction the greenies and politicians like Obama and Pelosi want to take us in. I don't think a lot of Americans realize this. I have always refused to set foot in that God forsaken place, but maybe now I'll visit just to dump trash.
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