News and Notes: 12-4-05

Since I missed my customary Sunday roundup last week, this week's version will contain some slightly old news.

Blog Roundups

Milblogging focused recently on submarine bloggers (HT: Bubblehead).

Vigilis posted a roundup called "Curious Bits You May Have Missed" over at Molten Eagle.

Gus Van Horn and fellow submariner blogs Ultraquiet No More and Hundreds of Fathoms were nominated by Alex Nunez for the 2005 Weblog Awards in the (November 14) TTLB Ecosystem Rank 3500-5000 category. Thanks, Alex!

Myrhaf has posted a roundup on John McCain at his self-titled blog.

Happy Blogiversary -- er Blogbirthday!

One of my favorite blogs, Riding Sun, is now one year old. Its author, the Gaijin Biker, has also updated his blog template, as has the Complimenting Commenter.

Blogroll Changes (and Bleg #1)

Unless I am mistaken, the free version of Blogrolling allows me only fifty blogs. (Bleg #1: If you know, off the top of your head, that I am wrong, go ahead and leave a comment to that effect. It'll save me the trouble of checking on that later.) This week, I've added four to the 'roll and have reached that number exactly. I don't plan to limit myself to only fifty links, but I haven't decided yet exactly how I will change the blogroll -- if I don't go the easy route and just fork over some cash.

In any case, with the four new additions and one change, I have five changes to the blogroll I would like to point out. I'll go in alphabetical order by blog name....

(1) I have added Eric Scheie's excellent blog, Classical Values, to my blogroll. Judging by the fact that I see him listed in blogrolls all over the place and that he's been linked twice (that I know of) by the Blogfather himself, I probably don't need to introduce him to most of my readers, but ....

For those who haven't stopped by there yet, I highly recommend his blog. He's good and he's prolific. In fact, I could very safely say, "Just go over and start scrolling," but I would be remiss not to point out a couple of posts I read today that I found quite thought-provoking. Here, Scheie discusses the relative merits of knives versus guns for home defense ... as well as the insurance risks. And here, he brings up some really good points about the CIA with respect to the Plame scandal.

I would also like to thank him again for this post, which is the nicest write-up my blog has ever had, and for all the extra traffic!

(2) The blog of the Resident (snicker) Egoist has changed names and locations again, this time for good. Fellow fans of Existence Is Identity will find him blogging at i, Egoist from now on.

(3) Objectivism Online regular and occasional Gus Van Horn commenter Jennifer Snow recently started her own blog, Literatrix. I recently included one of her posts in this roundup. Friday, she explained why her blog will be devoid of advertisements for the foreseeable future. I have so far avoided ads myself for aesthetic reasons and because I've noticed that many ads include scripts that can make page-loading a penance. I'm not completely against the idea, but I'm never quite happy with the way banners, icons, etc. look on my blog when I do play around with them.

(4) Myrhaf has started his own blog, which, in the fashion of all great Objectivist political bloggers, he names after himself. It's new, but promising. In addition to the McCain roundup I mentioned above, I would recommend this link on psychologizing the left, which Diana Hsieh also thought worthwhile.

The left's certainty that it is morally right combines with its irrationalism to give it a distinctly emotional style that falls all too easily into ad hominem attacks. This is the root cause of its hysterical, irrational attacks on President Bush. It's not neuroses, it's philosophy.

This is an excellent point which I missed earlier. (Not that considering the phenomenon from a psychological angle is entirely without merit....)

(5) Samantha Burns becomes the first Canadian (that I know of) on my blogroll. Her The Crazy Rants of Samantha Burns is in the running for "Best Humour Blog" and "Best Personal Blog" in the Canadian Blog Awards. Bloggers who value their anonymity might also value this link.

Hobnobbin'

Willy Shake over at Unconsidered Trifles reports on the recent appearances of Michelle Malkin and John McCain at radio talk show host Michael Smerconish's Book Club.

Two Good Laughs

Reader, good friend, and occasional comment bomber Adrian Hester sent me pointers to a couple of hilarious comic strips.

Blog Changes (And Bleg #2)

Long ago, I was asked why I'm still using Blogger. (And the fact that my answer seems to have disappeared has me asking myself the same question yet again now....) The answer boiled down to "It's what I know and I haven't the time to learn anything else."

Thanks to The General, I have a chance to at least begin to address the former problem by playing around with WordPress here. (As of this writing, my email account is down for maintenance, so I won't get to play around with it just yet. In fact, the new blog probably doesn't even exist yet. I would imagine that some sort of verification email will have to be sent in.) I'm still working on fixing the latter problem, and it's not clear I'll get to for awhile longer yet.

Why I'm seriously thinking about making a switch in blogging software now (as opposed to then) also boils down a little bit to the way my personality works: I wasn't yet irritated enough with Blogger to want to dump it. Lately, though, several things have accumulated that I'd like to do here, but can't do easily with Blogger. So I'm thinking about WordPress and, if I make that change, I might as well get my own domain name while I'm at it. If I do that, I may change the name of the blog.

So here's Bleg #2. (And I'm not even completely sure I'm asking this the right way.) I'm under the distinct impression that web hosting and the purchase of a domain name are separate issues, although I'm sure some companies will handle both things for you. Does anyone out there have any recommendations (or horror stories) to share? I am particularly interested in two things. (1) I know someone who has had a domain name sold out from under her. Obviously, I'd like to avoid that. (2) I've heard of people getting noticed by high traffic bloggers only to see their web sites become inaccessible or who end up getting socked with a big bill for the resulting bandwidth as a result. I'd like to avoid both of these problems, too.

I'd appreciate any advice on this, even if it's only to say, "Gus, you need a clue. Go here to get it!" (Provided there's a helpful hyperlink somewhere in that sentence!)

I'm not in a huge hurry to do this, but it's beginning to look like a move I'll inevitably have to make.

Find of the Month

Chap (via Bubblehead) links to an English research paper on submarine slang. See the table in the back and go to town! But be forewarned: This is a lexicon that has evolved over decades from the conversations of men who have been confined together for weeks (or even months) at a time, and entirely apart from the civilizing influence of women. Translation: There will be vulgarity.

I'll excerpt one entry.

Silent Service Submarine Service. In WWII it was a publicity agent's glamorous name for the submarine service and was scorned by submariners. After a senator, congressman, or some official was given a tour on one of the new improved Fleet boats, he made a comment about the new improvements to WWII subs. One was the new hull design that increased diving depth to >400ft. Up to his point the Germans and Japanese had set their depth charges for no more than 300ft because they knew subs didn't go any deeper. "It's true a reporter heard this and printed an article touting the safety of submarines because they went deeper than the enemy depth charges. Soon after this article was printed, the US suffered considerable submarine losses. It was traced back to this article and after that point submariners refused to say anything about their ships. Even the hull numbers were blackened out so observers couldn't ID which subs were coming or going from port. I believe further verification of this can be found in Jane's Fighting Ships. This error in judgment is also what coined the war phrase 'Loose lip sink ships.'"

Axiomatic is out!

The third issue of Axiomatic is out.

-- CAV

Updates

Today: Added submarine slang links, Axiomatic announcement, and hypertext anchors.