“Takeru Kobayashi has defended his title in the Nathan’s Famous Fourth of July world hot-dog eating contest, but not without some controversy. “The slightly built Kobayashi, who set a world record with 50 hot dogs eaten in 12 minutes a year ago, did himself a half-dog better this year with 50

Sorry for the light posting today. Not only was I hungover from all the, uh, burgers and dogs, but the site had a few glitches that needed correcting. During the fix, some of the Movable Type functions were disabled. Comments are back up. Seem to have lost the trackback links, though. Win some, lose some, I guess. On the plus side, all future posts will be automatically ping enabled. So

So today is the one year anniversary of my kicking the tobacco habit (American Spirits, yellow). Yup — kicked its ass. Hard. Did it cold turkey, too. None of that patch nonsense. To mark the occasion, I link to these two Reason pieces: Jacob Sullum’s “Van Dough,” and Joel Miller’s “Cigarette Stash.” What do these stories have to do with quitting smoking? Not a damn thing, so far as I

“Scientists have kept the secret to strong bones bottled up for years. Now, a new study has raised the bar on the list of nutrients that could have benefits. “Television station WCVB [Boston] reported that the good news is pouring out — beer builds bones.” A new study shows beer is rich in the mineral silicon. Researchers said that learning which parts of our diet have high concentrations of silicon

Michelle Malkin shines a bit of light on several Congressional bills she believes pander “to the illegal alien lobby for ethnic votes while paying lip-service to patriotism.” Notes Malkin: Last week, members of Congress leapt to the defense of the words ‘under God.’ They shouted the phrase on Capitol Hill and in front of every available camera. But what about the two little words in the Pledge of Allegiance that

Ted Williams — one of baseball’s greatest hitters (maybe its greatest) — died today. He was 83.

Well, the wife and I are off to our annual holiday barbecue, hosted by some friends whose house is way out in the breezy ‘burbs of Highland’s Ranch. I’ll doubtless drink too much. And of course eat too freely from the spread of mayo-glutted “salads” (I’ll never understand how macaroni salad got its name) — but at least I’ll be gorging myself while colorful sparks go popping and streaming overhead…

Brendan O’Neill thinks I pick on him* unfairly in this post, where I react to his mini-disquisition on postmodern morality with a (very) few choice words. Writes O’Neill: Have you ever noticed how some webloggers revert to childish insults and slang talk when taking up people they disagree with? Protein Wisdom, a weblog that looks like it is run by some form of ex-hippy, disagreed with my piece on the

Liberal Lebonese-American gushpuppet and White House correspondent Helen Thomas writes: […] lawmakers are worried that Bush will play the ‘patriot card’ in the November elections to attack dissenters and opponents. The Democratic leaders have already rolled over. They have given him a blank check by passing the USA Patriot Act, which permits outrageous invasions of privacy, and by seconding Bush’s foreign policy with a weak ‘me too.’ Whatever happened to

Happy 226th, ya’ big goofy lug of a country, you! Now go on! Go have some fun! You’ve earned it…! (Just do me a favor and don’t stay out too late, y’hear? You know how much I worry.)