Category Archives: history

youth at risk

Tom the Dancing Bug: Why Johnny Joins the Taliban. Link relayed by an Awaiter who commented, “it’s pathetic that anyone even has to point this out.” Funny, tho. Many years later: Newer link.

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Rumpelheimer v. Haddock

Which side of the road do they drive on? With lots of history, theory and anecdotes.

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neat trick

William Sulik seems to say that we ought to act not on our own mores but on those of our more enlightened descendants. Neat trick if you can manage it: like predicting an innovation.

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Mr Lincoln’s war

What made 1861 such a hot topic in the blogs of late? Douglas Turnbull wrote: So yes, there may be a Constitutional case for a state’s right to secede from the Union, but the Southern states did not secede just … Continue reading

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there’s always been a lottery

Office lottery in ancient Athens. In short, the lottery – and the great Iron Age pachinko machine that was its finest expression and most powerful tool – made the first democracy what it was. Together, the system and its technology … Continue reading

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you have three last chances

Several blogs today have mentioned a certain former president of Megaserbia Jugoslavija; and that reminded me of Private Eye’s log of the twenty-two last chances in 1991-99.

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Abraham the Afghan

Victor Davis Hanson, in an otherwise splendid defense of Americanism and the melting pot, says: Mr. Karzai needs something like the U.S. Constitution and an Abraham Lincoln a lot more than he needs $15 billion. Would this be the same … Continue reading

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