Anthrax. Yawn. And what else?

Today has been a blogger's nightmare for me. I have writer's block. The time I spent this weekend on a writing project that grew from this blog and on improving the blog itself have taken their toll on me. Evidently, I need to take regular breaks, as I normally do on Saturdays, from this to stay fresh. Worse still, I've been kept from following the news as closely as normal by obligations at work and elsewhere. So how to get back into the swing of things? Run amok and take copious notes, that's how! These are for my future reference, but I'm sure you'll find them worthwhile, too.

Anthrax Scare (?)

Is it just me, or has there been less of both the anthrax and the scare this time around? On the latter, this could be a sign that we're winning the war, psychologically. Or it could be complacence. Or "warning fatigue." Only the first of these is positive, and it can be endangered by the second two.

A Quick Stroll through the Blogosphere

At Ego, Martin Lindeskog beat me to the punch again! He posted about National Eat an Animal for PETA Day before I did and then he did a link roundup about it! I was thinking about doing the same thing, but this is good in a way. I think his obvious enthusiasm makes his ability to post on that subject far superior to mine! I'm glad he posted the pair of links I'd gathered so far: One is by an accomplished chef who was once a submariner and the other is by an Objectivist butcher!

Is freedom sexy, or are the sexes free to pursue different mating strategies? Both articles make good points that are best taken with a little salt.

At Fresh Bilge, Alan Sullivan sounds quite optimistic about the fact that an increasing proportion of our population invest. I saw the same John Zogby article he refers to somewhere earlier today as well. While its results echo a trend among Hispanics that alarms some Democrats, I'm not so sanguine. What if the Republicans finish forgetting that they're supposed to be the party of small government and the fiscal conservatives get marginalized altogether? Suppose the religious right shifts its allegiance to the party whose views on economics more closely mirror Christian morality? A return of Carterian inflation, taxation, and unemployment will quickly take a toll on that promising demographic. Think of it as a "bloodless genocide". The lack of blood is shown to be an illusion when we consider the maxim "time is money". When we take away the fruits of a man's effort (physical or intellectual), we steal a part of his life.

And speaking of the bastard offspring of the religious right and the nihilistic left, get a load of Michelle Malkin's post on a PC rewrite of the Bible. I'm not religious, but this is ridiculous. It reminds me of a nun my mother called "Sister It" who'd extemporaneously edit biblical passages and hymns when she was called upon to read or sing during Mass when I was a kid. You could say she was "politically correct" before it was "correct".

Glenn Reynolds and Martin Lindeskog differ in their assessments of the Libertarian Party.

A forum for a cop killer? Is this the beginning of a new left-wing fad?

The wife and I are finally getting over the cold I caught two weeks ago and she's suffered through this week. Thinking about it reminded me to dig up this old gem from James Lileks I saw somewhere and wanted to remember.

Everyone’s sick with a cold to varying degrees. Wife is not entirely zombified; Gnat, who had it first, has shaken off the worst and regained her vim. I didn’t get the last one, thanks to Zinc! But I have this one. Mild so far. Thanks to Zinc! But there’s a point at the beginning of a cold where all you can do is sigh, or give a moan of annoyance. If only a cold just put you down on the spot for 6 hours then left you alone. You got the bug, and it announced itself with some obvious manifestation – your skin turned plaid, your hair started to smoke, whatever. You had two, three minutes to find someplace soft, and then you were pasted to the sofa while the cold beat you like a Salvadoran barrio boxer working the kidneys, and then you were fine. If only.

At Klados, Curtis Weeks gives Bush his due. Meanwhile, at RealClear Politics, T. Bevan gives Ted Kennedy his! And at Capitalism Magazine, Harry Binswanger thanks Bush for finally mentioning individual rights in a speech!

At TIADaily, Robert Tracinski notes that things for the Democratic Party are getting even worse. Not too surprising to me!

Cox and Forkum show us that a picture is worth a thousand words when lampooning Bush's sure-footed stand for Taiwanese freedom.

They also show that an ounce of fraud is worth a pound of poultry.

At Jewish World Review, dammit, is an article I saw this morning and thought I might comment on at length. It's too late to do no now, but I'll link to it here for possible future use. Daniel Pipes asks, "Which Priveleges for Islam? In doing so, he demonstrates why the question must be asked in terms of individual rights. (Hint: No, the state should not suppport Islam as much as it supports any other faith. Rather, the state should not support any faith at all.)

And, if I ever create a ficticious character named "Szechuan Ostrich" to make idiot guest posts here, this is where I got the idea. This had been a liberal I had some modicum of respect for.

And finally, since it wouldn't be my blog without either some fisking or some smack talk directed at a good friend ....

At The Transhuman Comedy, Raymund appears to be teaching by example what he means by, "[P]atience is a good thing. Would it better come from being forced to move slowly due to frailty, or from the long perspective that someone who can expect to live another 1000 years may develop?" Well. It's true that I'm not frail yet, but I may not have quite a whole millennium to wait for another post!

-- CAV

Updates

3-17-05: Added a missing link.