Legal humor here “You’re in luck! We’ve been looking for a white boy!” “Congratulations! It’s ‘Zeke Week’!” And if you play bridge and pinochle, well, you can practically write your own ticket.” “Let’s get you out of those bib overalls and into a dry martini.” “I know you have a million questions. Fortunately, we have…
Author: Alan Vanneman
Al McLean and Jaleel Shaw—“Bemsha Swing”
Al McLean, Tenor Saxophone; Jaleel Shaw, Alto Saxophone; Bryn Roberts, Piano; Jason Davis, Bass. Posted by Randy Cole
“The Conservative Mind” turns sixty! (Sound of one hand clapping)
Actually, the sound of no hands clapping. From the perspective sheer scholarly effort, Russell Kirk’s 500-page tome, surveying Anglo-American conservative thought from Edmund Burke to T. S. Eliot, is an impressive work, examining dozens of both illustrious and obscure thinkers and arranging them in a coherent historical framework that shows considerable learning as well.1 So…
Paul Ryan, an evidence-based analysis
“He has actually proposed three — total, three — bills that have become law in his entire career dating back to 1999,” said David T. Canon, chairman of the political science department at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. One named a post office in Wisconsin, a second changed taxes on arrows used by deer hunters,…
Maureen Dowd, making Hillary look not entirely awful
Famed NYT hitchick Maureen Dowd ever so accurately pegs Bill and Hillary Clinton as America’s modern-day Tom and Daisy Buchanan (read the whole hit here), but then piles on FBI Director James Comey’s pile-on, to wit: “Instead of Clinton’s assurances that the server in the basement in Chappaqua had never been breached, Comey said it…
Renee Rosnes Trio plus 1—“Bright Mississippi”
Renee Rosnes, piano, Ira Coleman, bass, Billy Drummond, drums, George Young, tenor saxophone take on Monk’s rewrite of “Sweet Georgia Brown”. Posted by paris0820
Pseudo New Yorker
Legal humor here. “Oh, yeah, it’s a veritable hula hoop of holiness. Definitely.” “What can I say? The Big Guy likes me.” “Yeah, I was heading down 66, maybe 3 o’clock in the morning, and I see this guy with his thumb out, so I say ‘what the hey’, right? So I pull over and…
Ronald Radosh, writing history and then forgetting it
Way back in 1983, Ronald Radosh and Joyce Milton published a monument of Cold War scholarship, The Rosenberg File, arguing that while Julius Rosenberg was a very active and successful spy for the Soviet Union, whose conviction though not execution for espionage was well merited, the arrest, indictment, trial, conviction, sentencing, and ultimate execution of…
Jonathan Rauch Redux
Jonathan Rauch has a new article up at the Atlantic that is basically a rehash an updating of his free book Political Realism: How Hacks, Machines, Big Money, and Back-Room Deals Can Strengthen American Democracy. The article is getting praise from people like Robert Samuelson.1 Last fall, I devoted three posts to refuting Jon’s little…
David Brooks on the Road to Character
You’ve always wanted David Brooks’ classic Road to Character in a dee-lux, golden, signed edition, haven’t you? Sure you have! Go ahead! Admit it! It feels good, doesn’t it? This shining, gold on gold on gold edition of Dave’s masterpiece, a full six inches wide by nine inches high, will take pride of place in…