Apr
24
2009

URLs du Jour

2009-04-24

  • You can, and probably should, read Charles Krauthammer's column today in which he purports to figure out the grand vision behind all the Barackrobatics. Or you can read Tom Smith's short summary at the Right Coast. For example:
    We can either use markets to ration care, giving subsidies to the poor if we reckon that's kind, or use the government. That means, some bureaucrat who probably hates life himself will decide according to some byzantine, opaque and deeply arbitrary set of crypto- pseudo- rules whether or not you get your chemo, your hip replacement, your eye surgery, your bypass. If you don't get it, you'll die sooner. But look at the bright side. You'll want to.
    But until then…

  • Cathy Young at Reason describes the recent shoutdown of a conservative speaker at UMass-Amherst. The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) has more, including a victory (at least for now) against efforts to censor a conservative campus newspaper.

    Maybe UMass should dump the Minuteman mascot, and change it to something else.

  • Speaking of which, I love Jackie Chan, but I guess he's not a candidate for a Chinese version of Patrick Henry:
    "I'm not sure if it's good to have freedom or not," [Chan] told an audience at a regional economic forum in southern China Saturday. "If you're too free, you're like the way Hong Kong is now. It's very chaotic. Taiwan is also chaotic." He continued: "I'm gradually beginning to feel that we Chinese need to be controlled. If we're not being controlled, we'll just do what we want."
    Or maybe he was being sarcastic. Yeah, that's probably it.

  • Not that I'm anxious or anything, but the new Star Trek movie is a mere 14 days away. Perhaps I'll wear this tasteful red shirt to the theater.

  • Joe Cocker @ Woodstock, with subtitles and helpful illustrations. If you don't laugh out loud, you are not easily amused. (Via Viking Pundit.)