Stanley Kurtz has a nice column on the liberal misperception of conservatism, which ends with these observations and anecdotes: The belief in conservative bigotry is more than a misunderstanding. It is liberalism’s indispensable drug — the opium of the elites. Are there some bigoted conservatives? Sure. But conservative bias can’t hold a candle to the thunderous bigotry of the Left toward conservatives. From the shameful attempts to portray Judge Pickering

Crimson Crusadertrade; Glenn Kinen informs me that this ridiculous boycott-of-Israel business is barely registering on Harvard’s ideological Richter Scale — that the media coverage being given this “academic” travesty is disproportionate to its actual, real-world importance (much like Bill O’Reilly’s career, come to think of it). Still, I just can’t seem to let it go, it’s so firmly lodged in my craw. So here’s more info on that dim bulb

So. I just watched Nancy Kanwisher, an MIT professor of brain and cognitive science (gulp!), and Sam Halabi, a Harvard law student, being interviewed about their support for this colossally asinine MIT-Harvard divestiture petition by FOXNews’ Neil Cavuto. The essence of the position being championed by these two jargon-slinging, pseudo-informed buffoons (once you cut through all the obligatory tripe about “root causes,” “occupation,” and “humiliation,” blah blah blah) is this:

So. I just watched Nancy Kanwisher, an MIT professor of brain and cognitive science (gulp!), and Sam Halabi, a Harvard law student, being interviewed about their support for this colossally asinine MIT-Harvard divestiture petition by FOXNews’ Neil Cavuto. The essence of the position being championed by these two jargon-slinging, pseudo-informed buffoons (once you cut through all the obligatory tripe about “root causes,” “occupation,” and “humiliation,” blah blah blah) is this:

The National Review’s Rob Dreher joins Reason’s Charles Paul Freund (“Fortuyn’s Folly“) and the blogosphere’s erudite Doc Weevil (“The Limits of Tolerance”) in examining the media machinations that turned openly Gay ex-socialist educator Pim Fortuyn into a “far-right” extremist bigot: “Extreme? Pim Fortuyn was not who they say he was“: […] what accounted for Fortuyn’s ‘extreme right’ reputation was not his tax or agricultural policies, but his views on immigration

I like Spinsanity. On occasion, though, the Spinsanity crew can get a little too over-eager. And it shows. Yesterday, for instance, Ben Fritz attempted to deconstruct the

Sorry for the dearth of posts today, everybody; I’ve been wearied by the barrage of pro-Palestinian garbage on the news shows (“you see? The Israeli military incursion cannot and will not stop the suicide bombings! Occupation must end, yada yada yada!”) — and besides, my host has been acting quite bitchy. But this got me quite exercised. Yessir. Once again, I find myself embarrassed to be associated with “academic” thinking…

Speaking of oil and conservation… “Still fretting about our dependence on imported oil? The profligate use of gas-sucking behemoths clogging our roads as endlessly decried by the nannies at the New York Times and other media magnificos?” Well, then Tech Central’s Brock Yates points you toward the new generation of diesel engines as one possible solution to your energy concerns: The modern diesel now powers over half of the passenger

Writing in The Weekly Standard, Irwin Stelzer argues that “the key to a sound energy policy is a strong military.” From “Oil’s Well That Ends Well“: American soldiers marched off to World War II singing ‘We did it before, and we can do it again.’ That tune may become appropriate once more should any hostile group make a grab for power in Saudi Arabia. Our energy policy for the foreseeable

I just got through making this point in response to visitor Jack Warburton’s comments on my Chris Patten entry, but Jay Nordlinger makes it far more forcefully in his most recent “Impromptus” column (using The New York Times’ Thomas Friedman as his exemplar): A couple of brief words on the Middle East. It