Quick Roundup 6

Posted in advance.

More on the Dembocrats

Myrhaf makes a few more good points about that bumper sticker I blogged the day before yesterday.

Fascinating Column about Google

I stopped by Oakes's yesterday to find that Toiler had recommended, in the comments, this fascinating article by Robert X. Cringely on where Google might be heading.

Play to your strengths. That's the key to success in any industry. This is the week I promised to explain where I think Google is headed, and playing to the company's strengths is key if they are going to do what I think, which is effectively take over the Internet. Oh they won't steal it or strong-arm us. They'll seduce us into giving it to them. And I am not at all sure that's a bad thing.

I used to read this guy regularly, but got out of the habit. I'm glad Toiler mentioned him.

That Italian Loon Revisited

Nick Provenzo comments on the Italian who has filed a lawsuit in Italy over whether Christ actually existed.

What's wrong with this case? Cascioli is attacking the right to hold a private view. If it's permissible for a government to rule on religion on the basis of "Abuse of Popular Belief," then it's permissible for a government to rule on politics, ethics, or any other realm it desires. Did marketing sway you to buy that car on the promise that it would increase your feeling of prestige or personal satisfaction? Abuse of Popular Belief. Did Atlas Shrugged sway you away from religion and toward Objectivism? Abuse of Popular Belief.

There is a reason government must stay out of the realm of ideas, and that is that no man may presume to think for another. Men like Cascioli are only acting against the dawn of a future age of reason, by undercutting the very intellectual freedom that would make such an age possible.

Excellent point. I had thought about how this lawsuit resembled much else the liberals do, what with their attempts to regulate everything by government decree, and their apparent desire to decide everything by court. But I hadn't quite made that connection, and it's a crucial one. Thank you, Nick!

And that's what I like so much about the blogosphere. Many eyes trained on the same story will wring every last drop of truth that can be had out of it. The more bloggers, the better.

Awards Day at Cox and Forkum!

Cox and Forkum is a double nominee in the 2005 Jewish and Israeli Blog Awards: Best Jewish Humor Blog and Best Overall. Drop by that link to learn more, and to learn how to vote for them.

Cox and Forkum have also, for the fourth year running, illustrated the Robert Fisk Idiotarian of the Year Award for Little Green Footballs. Stop by and find out who it is. (Hint: She was jealous of Hurricane Katrina.)

Fans of Benjamin Franklin, take note.

Via Arts and Letters Daily, here's a good article on Franklin's work on electricity and lightning from Physics Today. The article ends with this.

In June 1776, the celebrated economist and former comptroller-general of France, Anne-Robert Jacques Turgot, composed a prophetic epigram in Latin that captures Franklin's legacy in a single sentence: "Eripuit caelo fulmen, sceptrumque tyrannis" ("He snatched lightning from the sky and the scepter from tyrants")

-- CAV