Monthly Archives: October 2013

Rand Paul for President

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The American economy, indeed its entire network of social relations, is in the bin and getting worse by the day. Between uncontrolled debt and deficits, a quantitative easing which in effect means flooding the market with money, the nationalisation of the health care industry, and the debate over the closing of the Federal Government, the US will soon be about as free market as Russia. Convergence theory seems to be coming about not quite as expected but history is filled with surprises. But maybe there’s hope (why not live in hope, after all?). It’s early, of course, but Ron Paul is ahead for the Republican nomination for President.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) narrowly leads the pack of potential GOP contenders in 2016, according to a new poll.

If the GOP presidential primary were held today, 17 percent of GOP voters would elect Paul, according to a new Quinnipiac Poll released Wednesday. He leads among Tea Party Republicans as well with 22 percent.

The next presidential election is not till 2016, Obama will remain president till then no matter what and the offer of free health care and etc is pretty attractive to the sorts of people the Democrats count on for their presidential majority. But the reason it matters is because Rand Paul can become an early focus of Republican discontent. There is no official leader of the opposition in the US but he will fill that role more and more as time goes by if he gets the kind of support he is starting to generate. Here he steps in to bring reason to the closing of the American government:

Sen. Rand Paul on Tuesday said he would support a short-term funding measure ‘to keep the government open while we negotiate.’

‘I think what we could do is pass a very short term, maybe not six weeks, but what about one week, so we could negotiate over a week,’ the Kentucky Republican told CNN’s ‘New Day.’ ‘I think a continuing bill to keep the government open while we negotiate is a good idea. I do agree that negotiating with the government closed probably to [Democrats] appears like strong-arm tactics.’

If he continues like this he will be a hard man to ignore and the more he becomes a lightening rod for opposition to Obama, the more focus he will get. Early days but I am hopeful in what is really a hopeless cause.

How Babe Ruth hit 60 home runs

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This is such a fantastic story about that month of September 1927 in which Babe Ruth from nowhere came to hit 60 home runs in a single season. It’s titled Babe Ruth’s Summer of Records and written by Bill Bryson who makes everything come alive. Just one section as a sampler but read it all:

Pitching carefully (as you might expect), Hopkins worked the count to 3 and 2, then tried to sneak a slow curve past Ruth. It was an outstanding pitch. ‘It was so slow,’ Hopkins recalled for Sports Illustrated seventy years later at the age of ninety-four, ‘that Ruth started to swing and then hesitated, hitched on it and brought the bat back. And then he swung, breaking his wrists as he came through it. What a great eye he had! He hit it at the right second—put everything behind it. I can still hear the crack of the bat. I can still see the swing.’ It was Ruth’s 59th home run, tying a record that less than a month before had seemed hopelessly out of reach.

The ball floated over the head of the right fielder, thirty-seven-year-old Sam Rice, who is largely forgotten now but was one of the great players of his day and also one of the most mysterious, for he had come to major league baseball seemingly from out of nowhere.

Fifteen years earlier, Rice had been a promising youngster in his first season in professional baseball with a minor league team in Galesburg, Illinois. While he was away for the summer, his wife moved with their two small children onto his parents’ farm near Donovan, Indiana. In late April, a tornado struck near Donovan, killing seventy-five people. Among the victims were Rice’s wife, children, mother, and two sisters. Rice’s father, himself seriously injured, was found wandering in shock with one of the dead children in his arms; he died nine days later in the hospital. So, at a stroke, Rice lost his entire family. Dazed with grief, Rice drifted around America working at odd jobs. Eventually he enlisted in the navy. While playing for a navy team his remarkable talents became apparent. Clark Griffith, owner of the Washington Senators, somehow heard of this, invited him for a trial, and was impressed enough to sign him. Rice joined the Senators and in his thirties became one of the finest players in baseball. No one anywhere knew of his personal tragedy.

I just love baseball stories which are different from the stories associated with any other sport. But the greatest book of them all is The Glory of their Times which I read young, either showing that from the very start I had an interest in ancient times or perhaps even bringing me to my interest in them.

Australia in the news

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This was picked up at Lucianne.com.

IMMIGRATION Minister Scott Morrison has issued a stern warning to refugees escaping the Syrian crisis – if they try to come to Australia by boat they will not be welcome.

Mr Morrison this morning said there would be “no sympathy” given to boat people, regardless of their country of origin.

His comments come in the wake of the latest boat tragedy in which at least 31 people, mostly children, drowned off the coast of Indonesia with many more still missing.

News Corp Australia this morning revealed among the dead were a group of Lebanese refugees lured to Australia on fake Syrian passports.

The families from an impoverished area of Lebanon were promised a safe “ship” to Australia via the fake identification.

Mr Morrison said the boat disaster was a tragedy but that the Australian government would not refrain from its hard line approach.

“People who are going to try and use the Syrian conflict, which is a dreadful and horrible tragedy that is unfolding before us there, as some sort of cover to come to Australia for economic migration – we are just not going to cop it,” he told 2GB Sydney radio host Ray Hadley.

“Australia is going to do its bit in terms of what is going on in Syria and there are meetings going on in Europe at the moment about how we are going to support the UNHCR and we are going to be providing places under our humanitarian program for those who are genuine refugees in Syria.

This is the message going out and none too soon. We are closing our borders which was a possibility open to any government if they were of a mind to do it. And then this, with picture, was found on The Drudge Report:

julia gillard from drudge

Gillard reveals her ‘murderous rage’ at sexist attacks…

She should only know the experience even I have felt putting things up on The Drum. Her own party couldn’t take any more of her with the lying and incompetence. All the votes that were picked up by Kevin or those that flowed to the Coalition must originally have been Labor voters. It is these people, these former supporters of the ALP, who are the misogynists she is talking about. The rest of us didn’t vote for Kevin either.

She must have had a particularly sheltered political life up until becoming Prime Minister if the kind of criticism she found as PM wasn’t what she was prepared for. I who find Margaret Thatcher and Sarah Palin as two of the greatest political leaders of my time will not be accused of misogyny in finding what Gillard stood for and did well against my principles. Politics is an equal opportunity pursuit with the rules the same for everyone. She was not on the receiving end of less than anyone else but she also did not receive the slightest bit more.

And then finally there was “5 Ways Feral Cats Do More Good Than Harm for Wildlife“. Also spotted on overseas, at Instapundit in this case, but this is what it’s about:

An Australian study shows feral cats help some endangered animals survive. I say: “Well, duh!”

Makes you proud.