earwax

I was reading Christopher Hitchens lastest piece up on Slate and wondering what the proper response to evil in the world is. Hitchens believes that in some situations the most Humane response is "what the fuck." The article is about Tsutomu Yamaguchi who recenlty died but was a survivor of both the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings. Hitchens contrasts the response of a religious person who might describe Yamaguchi as being protected with the hands of God with a response of just uttering WTF. Now I don't want to sell religion short here because it does seem that there are plenty of confused Psalms and Lamentations in the Hebrew bible that closely resemble the sentiment of WTF. Even while this is true they suppose God must come and rescue them from their current situation to defend them from their oppressors or whatever the case may be. All this to ask what is a person's rational response to evil in the world. Is it sometimes just too incomprehensible that we can't explain it and are reduced to uttering WTF?

http://www.recombinantrecords.net/docs/200...s-to-Death.html Found this link interesting.

Anyone up here in Fort Mcmurray?

I just finished the biography by Anne Heller. She talks about the Johnny Carson interview as if she had watched it herself. I wonder where she saw it.

I am currently listening to the audiobook of the Anne C Heller book 'Ayn Rand and the World She Made.' I was actually more interested in the book by Burns. I saw her on John Stewart where I thought she did quite well. Unfortunately its not on audiobook so I may actually have to read it. Anyone else reading this one right now?

Somehow the argument for not paying other peoples healthcare bills ends up to the point where I say taxes should be voluntary. Not very many people like to entertain that all of governments income should be from voluntary giving.

I find it hard to debate people about the merits of free marker healthcare. While the Canadian and UK systems are easy to argue against, the German system is a bit harder. A lot of the problem seems that it is not as well known. From what I have looked at so far it does seem to have a funding problem. They still spend about 6 percent less then we do on healthcare with better results. I usually make a moral argument for free market healthcare but without real world examples it's hard to put up an ideal against real world systems like in Germany? Any suggestions? http://theragblog.blogspot.com/2009/08/ber...th-care-in.html

I am wondering whether atwoods two dystopian novels are worth picking up and if you recommend one more than the other.

An interesting take on trying to keep your marriage from failing. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/02/fashion/...wanted=1&em

The fountainhead was on display at a Chapters/Indigo I went to. It was on display with several other books with a sign that said something like "books you should read before you turn 17." Could have been 18. I don't know.

Thanks for the recommends. Yes it should be in Fiction. I don't know if I can move the thread or what.

Warning: this article may not be worth your time. http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?articl...over_inequality

I have a 2 and half year old I read to every night. Currently we enjoy Where the Wild Things Are, Curious George, Margaret Wise Brown and Eric Carle books. I recently discovered Oliver Jeffers children's books which we like very much. Anyone else have any good recommends for me?

Hmmm, I never liked Blink. I read a couple of critical reviews that destroyed his methodology in that book. Although I don't know where the links are. I was going through the top 15 NHL players for week 20 on ESPN.com and his theory didn't seem to gel to much with those players. It seems like July was a good month to be born then. There was even a December in there. http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/playerranking

Yeah, sorry about that you are correct of course. On a side note, he does seem to say that Chris Langon had lots of abilities because of his intellect that did not require 10000 hours of practice. Like being able to play Jimi Hendrix guitar licks at young age or even speak at six months or read at, what was it, three years?