Round-Up 12-28

Santa Baby... Defund ObamaCare.

It's a sign the tingle has gone - Chris Matthews: Why Doesn't Obama Just Release The Birth Certificate?

The *true* John Conyers scandal.

President Obama under pressure to deliver on climate AND YET there's this... The Abiding Faith Of Warm-ongers

EPA's Endangerment Rule Threatens States' Sovereignty

The Cancun Climate Con

Ethanol: No End in Sight

The EPA and the Alarmist Narrative

Teen Birthrates and the Media

Pigford Investigation Resources Careful, cleaning out this fraud pigsty is gonna get messy.

Ya think? GAO Sees Problems in Government’s Financial Management

The String-Pullers in Internet Regulation

White House attempts to quiet revived talk of 'death panels'

Consumer Confidence Shows Surprise Drop in December

Has Government Grown Since the Recession Started?

Whistleblower Protection Act

Using Regulation Against The Will Of The People

Dispelling the VAT. I would only agree to a VAT in America if it was as public as the current sales tax is AND we completely eliminated both corporate taxes and income/estate taxes. Period. Otherwise, VAT is nothing but a scam.

Boston Taxpayers Pay $8.4 Million for Teachers' Union Softball, Legal Defense

Changes to data collected on unemployment duration

Shell's Plan to Drill for Oil in the Beaufort Sea This Summer

How Much Debt Did the 111th Congress Leave Us?

Investigating Obama's Eating Habits

Early Word: Obamacare High-Risk Pools Unpopular, Expensive

Poll: Opposition to Individual Mandate at All-Time High

Political End Runs

Fleeced: The upper 1% earned 19.6% of total income before tax, and paid 41% of the individual federal income tax. "No other major country is so dependent on so few taxpayers"

EPA to Regulate Greenhouse Gases

The States' 'Day of Reckoning'

European anarchists grow more violent, coordinated

I am the YouTube airline pilot

The Government Can't

Global warming goes gaga



Fuel Vs. Food: Ethanol Helps Boost Meat Prices

Still Out Sick

Merry Freakin' Christmas to me!

Now they are giving me antibiotics normally prescribed for pneumonic horses.

I promise I'll get back to ya'll.

Out Sick

I've had a couple of "sick days" here but hope to be back up and blogging soon.

No Labels, No Dance Skills

Awesomely awful!


From - New nonpartisan “No Labels” group has its own “anthem” by Akon for some reason

Random Round-Up 12-13

President Obama Job Approval

From our friend Boris who is a wolf in sheepdog's clothing - Snooty Europhiles should be forced to crawl in penitence. The 'blimpish Little Englanders’ who opposed monetary union were right all along

New WikiLeaks Document Dump Targets Liberal Media – Part 1

To revive the economy, pull back the red tape

Government Unions vs. Taxpayers The moral case for unions—protecting working families from exploitation—does not apply to public employment.

“Cultural Defenses” and Incest

I blame Reid for a lot of things - Blame Reid, Not Republicans, for ‘Obstructionism’

Kicking the Medicare can -- again

Swindle of the year

The Hawkeye Handouts The tax bill is becoming a favor festival, starting with ethanol.

Good! Dems could miss last chance to pass their own agenda

Cynical beyond belief. Media Creates New Palin Scandal! Sarah Accused of Bringing Hairdresser on Haiti Trip "That's right, what the Palin-hating AP and others fail to report is that the "hair stylist" is Bristol Palin."

Political class, Middle America headed in opposite directions on economy

Bewildering Media Non-Reaction: Obama/Clinton Presser, Socialist Sanders’ Filibuster



After 25 years, time has come to clean up the tax code (again)

Tea Party-backed freshmen win plum committee assignments

Forget the Rich, Let's Increase the Tax Base!

ObamaCare: Flight of the MDs

Everyone Hates Ethanol Subsidies. Why Can't We Get Rid of Them?

Media Demands That President Obama Start “Acting Black” If you remember the "Not Black Enough" debacle, this isn't really news.

The Crisis of the Middle

Another Failed Climate Conference

Virginia Federal Judge to Rule on Constitutionality of ObamaCare

Virginia emerges as a bellwether

Obamacare Heads to Court This Week

The Dems' Crackup

If China Blows Up, So Will Every Other Market

Climate Change and Biodiversity

Yes, ObamaCare Still Worse Than You Thought

Obama Signing Child Nutrition Bill Into Law

Eagle concerns stymie wind farms

Random Round-Up 12-12

President Obama Job Approval

Emergency Rooms: The Canary in the Health Care Coal Mine

Arsonist Strikes on Cape Cod, Leaves Calling Card: 'F--k the Rich'

The Collapse of the Guantanamo Myth This week a Democratic Congress ratified Bush-era policy by refusing to fund any effort to shut the detention facility.

Christie Going After Tenure in Fight With Teachers’ Union

Big Government Economics Is Dead (Again)

Middle America's Economic Woes

Who said? Can you guess which voice of moderation on the Left said this? “In 2012, the Republicans will have their nasty little primary, which will basically be mean people fighting dumb people. So after about two years of this stuff, we’re going to start looking pretty good to people again.” Answer: Van Jones: We are coming for the media and that’s not all

What happens next in the tax-cut standoff: Three scenarios

Still deaf to the voters

It’s a Wonderful Leftist Life Barry Bailout's transformation of Bedfellow Falls marches on.

One nation, under too many laws

Outrageous public-employee pension obligations kill the city's ability to provide vital services

Pigford’s Original Black Farmers Unhappy Over Massive Fraud – Media Ignores


The Cancun Crack-Up The biggest climate conference achievement: Sun tans.

A GOP quip in need of a GOP policy: how would repealing Obamacare create jobs?

Obama riles Dems by spurning New Deal complacency

Killing Obama’s ‘Build America Bonds’ Is a Big Reason to Like the Tax Deal

Should We Gloat Over Obama’s Childish Behavior?

Gary Becker – The Economist’s Economist

Muslims Save Jews in Untold WWll Story. Exhibit showcases photographs of Albanian Muslims who sheltered Jews during the Holocaust

Subsidy Trains to Nowhere Can we sell you a ticket to Borden? It only costs $4.15 billion.



Excellent Polling Data on Spending Restraint vs. Deficit Reduction

When greens pollute

GOP wants Obama to show his sincerity on earmarks

Wow, Obama's relying on Biden. And I thought the Clinton presser looked bad. As the Ground Shifts, Biden Plays a Bigger Role

It’s a Long Way Down

How to get Julian Assange: U.S. should use aggressive prosecution to charge WikiLeaks villain

Random Round-Up 12-11

President Obama Job Approval

Hope for Change - President Obama Brings Bill Clinton In To Talk Tax Plan…And Then Leaves To Go To A Christmas Party!

Bill Clinton Resumes Presidency

Stay Classy Columbia - Palin-Hating Columbia Professor, Huffington Post Blogger, Busted for Incest



Unemployment Benefits Being Held Hostage by Dems

Rock bottom: Obama hits 42% approval in new McClatchy poll

Anything that underfunds crappy green laws and regs is A-OK with me - Three cash-strapped states—New York, New Hampshire and New Jersey—are using funds from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative to plug budget holes.

Will the Supreme Court Empower Trial Lawyers to ‘Legislate’ Climate Policy? Fighting the extortion strategy from the greenhouse protection racket.

UN Climate Summit, Cancun, Mexico: Climate Conmen Sending You Back 100 Years

More Than 1000 International Scientists Dissent Over Man-Made Global Warming Claims - Challenge UN IPCC & Gore



Who could blame them - Two black Democrats bolt party for GOP

Arizona Regains Footing in Legal Battle Over Immigration Law

Rep. John Kline and the Secret Ballot Protection Act

Ya think? - ‘Something Very, Very Weird is Going on in Washington’

One Pig of a Fraud

What a fraud magnet - The Pigford President: Obama Signs Black Farmers Settlement

Pigford Witness Report: 700 Claims Filed with My Name on Them, Many From Hundreds of Miles Away

Why are USDA officials off the hook in case of bias against black farmers? As President Obama signs a taxpayer-funded settlement in case of bias against black farmers, some Americans ask: Why didn't any heads roll? Ex-USDA employee Shirley Sherrod is one.

Uh-huh - White House Ordered Me Fired; Obama Can’t ‘Fully Grasp’ Civil Rights Struggle


Probably - Will Pigford vindicate Andrew Breitbart?

Obamacare 12-10

Insurance Companies Stop Treatments Based on Pending FDA Rationing Decision

Who’s Left to See the Patients Post-Obamacare?

White House Concedes Individual Mandate is Not Severable

Debt Panel Punted on Health Care Cost Plan

Woman dies waiting in ER as AG finds little movement

Will Congress Find Funds for Obamacare and Lots of Pork Under the Tree This Christmas?

ObamaCare kills discount drug deals to childrens hospitals

Obamacare Unintended Consequence of the Day: Higher Drug Prices for Kids' Hospitals

Big Union/Leftie Groups 12-10

New NLRB Decision Legitimizes Unions’ Race to the Bottom

NYC Teachers Union vs. the Children

Obama uses labor board to revive Card Check

Teachers: Professionals or ‘Education Workers?’


Crony Car Capitalism

Bully Pulpit. Equating the New Jersey governor's "I calls it as I sees it" style with hate speech is nonsense..

Junk Science 12-10

Rage against the dying of light (bulbs)

The Politication of Climate Science

Let Ethanol Subsidies Expire For Good

Clouds and Climate Confusion

Cancun COP16 attendees fall for the old “dihydrogen monoxide” petition as well as signing up to cripple the U.S. Economy


The unusually chilly global-warming summit Cancun is hosting the U.N. conference on man-made climate change — amid record cold temperatures

WikiLeaks Cables Confirm Worst Fears of Climate Skeptics. Domestic political considerations far outweighed any scientific basis for the Copenhagen Accord

It's a Big Mistake to Expand the FDA's Regulatory Reach to Our Food System

White House backs green tax provisions to build liberal support

Random Round-Up 12-10

President Obama Job Approval

Fantastic - House Dems reject Obama tax plan in current form Way to ruin the economy for everyone, jackasses.

Legislative Documents for the Obama Tax Compromise Bill

The WikiLeaks Vindication of George W. Bush



It's official - He's Carter. Obama won't leave DC until nuke deal is done

When Words Fail

Of course he does - Obama honors Nobel winner with statement about himself



Read My Lips... No New Spending!

Widening the Margin of Voter Fraud. The culture of fraud is clearly in place and it is extensive.

The Great College-Degree Scam

America’s just not that into you, Mr President. The future still looks grim for Barack Obama



More MSNBC Awesomeness: Obama Gets Pimp-Slapped by Rachel Maddow

Most Americans Say They’re Worse Off Under Obama, Poll Shows

Black Conservatives Renew Call for Investigation of Obama Justice Department

Matthew Elliot on Britain's Burgeoning Tax Revolt


When Entitlement Socialism Fails...

O's woes with the angry left

Massive budget bill faces opposition in Senate

Is Congress Above the Law?



Let's not settle for the big-government status quo, which is what the president's deficit commission offers.

Hopefully the DREAM act is dead - Democrats delay action on young immigrants bill

Democrat Congressman: Illegal Aliens Are ‘De Facto Citizens’ Sort of like if I break into your home, I'm a "de facto" homeowner?


A Little Late for the Third Way

The Tea Party's brew includes gays and lesbians TEA Partiers welcome anyone so long as they believe in privacy, responsibility, individual freedom, and minimal government.

CEOs find new friend in Obama - nobody else does though.

Cuccinelli Pushes Repeal Amendment

National Conference of State Legislators gathers over ‘dire’ numbers

Miracle Man Wants More Money

California Budget Gap May Reach $28.1 Billion Over 18 Months, Brown Says

What Might Have Been

Congress Must Cut Spending!


Private Citizen Goes Undercover, Performs Sting on High-Ranking Nazi. Holocaust scholar Mark Gould spent four years posing as a neo-Nazi to gather evidence against the notorious Bernhard Frank. This week, Gould filed a civil lawsuit against him

Economic Storm Clouds on the Horizon

Lame Duck Congress Faces Reality on Taxes

There goes the neighborhood - US home values set to drop 1.7 trillion dollars in 2010



The Barack Obama Tax Reform Plan?

Obama and the Democratic Revolt The White House must convince Dems—50 in the House and about 15 in the Senate.

Why Democrats Are Deserting Obama.

Nothing Redemptive About This Country.


Obama Directs His Staff to Analyze Options for Overhaul of U.S. Tax System

From Audacity to Animosity No president has alienated his base the way Obama has.



Senate fails to pass bill for military policy

Revolting against reality

This Is What Happens When You Get Engulfed by a Wave

WikiLeaks and Assange pretend there are no consequences

The Humble Hero

This man should be an inspiration to us all. The video making the face book rounds is here. If anyone can tell me how to donate to his efforts, please send me a link. Thanks

Riots in London

A test of liberty in London by my husband about the idiocy of leftist students in Great Britain who prefer to free-ride on the backs of taxpayers rather than pay for their own college education.

No sympathy for having to pay college tuition from this side of the Atlantic.

Last Quack

It appears that this disasterous and now lame duck Congress is about to vote on one more monstrocity.

Massive budget bill faces opposition in Senate

I love how they've added all sorts of insults to the American people in this bill just to drive home the point that they have no clue why they are so hated by voters.

ARGH! Just go home and crawl back under your rocks!

Old Words Are New Again

I'd use any of these words in a heartbeat if only to jargogle whomever I was with.

20 Obsolete English Words that Should Make a Comeback

I use freck all the time but am apparently "off definition".

Other terrific words: Deliciate, Malagrugrous, and Ludibrious. The first ten are terrific, the second ten not so much. Still read the whole thing. As a former professional writer and a gal with a BA in Medieval English Lit., I love this clobber.

Junk Science 12-08

Ethanol: Let Protectionism Expire It’s high noon for ethanol subsidies and import tariffs, but not for the ethanol industry.

Well the incandescent light bulb is a far, far better product than that poisonous mercury crap thingy. Fred Upton, author of the light bulb law, turns against it

The U.N.’s climate summit is the same thing all over again.



North America: The new energy kingdom

The correct and standard response to all Greenie/Leftie suggestions is "You First" - Memo to Turner Hypocrites, every last one of them. For example, Five-Time Father Ted Turner Calls for One-Child Policy

Obamacare 12-08

Fresh Poll: What Do Voters Think of ObamaCare Now?

Medicare needs sustainable 'doc fix'

Health Care Rationing: The Real Death Panels Are Coming Our Way

Obamacare Waiver List Swells AND More Health Waivers AND The List

Another Obamacare Oops - I'm not sure I can take another one of these and I know children's hospitals can't either.

This is why all government programs are crap. They might start small, meaningful, and effective but always grow into large, intrusive, and inefficient toilets, draining taxpayers of money better spent elsewhere. This is how nearly all government programs evolve. Always. Obama: “When Medicare was started, it was a small program. It grew.” You don’t say!

Wiki-Leaks - 12-08

Cry me a river - Report--WikiLeaks In CHAOS!

Assange's Media Allies

Julian Assange’s EgoLeaks WikiLeaks is the journalistic equivalent of the art world’s Piss Christ — a product of the cynical postmodern West. I like this line "Only a perpetual adolescent believes that one has to be perfect in word and thought to be good."



Hackers Target WikiLeaks 'Enemies': Mastercard, Twitter, Paypal, Even FoxNews.com

Bill Ayers Defends Wikileaks, Calls Weather Underground Terrorism "Restrained," Bashes America It's Tool One and Tool Two!

Dereliction of Duty: Obama and the WikiLeaks Train Wreck

Random Round-Up 12-08

President Obama Job Approval

ARGH - House Democrats tack controversial food-safety bill to spending measure

This kinda sums up my evolution as well - Sooner or later you have to join the side you’re on

The top U.S. banks are bigger than ever. Do they pose a threat to the economy?

BRITAIN IS FREEZING TO DEATH

Birther of The Nation You'll never believe how upset the hard left is at President Obama.. Oh honey, we're all angry at Obama.

Sharpton wants FCC to take Limbaugh off the air



Save the North Koreans!

While his base rages, Obama faces tax-cut reality

The Economic Incompetence Of The Political Class

Small-Biz Killers

I don't really want to think about the democrats position on this at all. Stop And Think About The Ridiculousness Of The Democrats' Position On Taxes

AIG, U.S. Treasury Plan Stock Sale

10-Year Work Permits for Millions - millions of illegal immigrants that is. Given the current unemployment rate for native Americans, this should be another nail in the DREAM Act's coffin.

Freeze Taxes, Freeze Spending, and Go Home



Porker poker? Harry Reid tries to add online poker to tax bill Nope, just Reid's payback to the SEIU casino workers who coughed up big money to get him re-elected.

Walter Williams' Memoir

Anything that hurts unions is a good thing. A union in and of itself isn't necessarily bad, just that they no longer work to protect the workers. O'Sullivan's Law is in effect. Wis. Governor-Elect raises prospect of union decertification to balance budget

Why Pigford Matters

Black Farmers Advocacy Helped Get Obama Elected for Pushing Pigford II; Says BFAA ‘Rural ACORN’ Video

Pigileaks: The Pigford Applications

Why Do the Poor Stay Poor?

Of course he does - Obama Opens The Door To Raid Social Security

Warren Buffett, Robber Baron?

Quite frankly, this messing with the internet is merely a reflection of the Left's hatred of innovation and lack-of-control. The single most innovative and helpful invention of the last 40 years and they want to put their grubby fingers all over it and ruin everything for the rest of us. FCC's pay-as-you-go Internet plan raises video, access questions



Of course he is - Suspect in Baltimore Bombing Plot Is an American Convert to Islam

President Obama's Scorecard on Promises Kept, Broken

Liberal Math

Elites Should Blame Selves, Not Obama, for Believing His Messianic Pretensions

Why Obama can't shake Bush

But I love Walmart (not as much as Nordstrom Rack but I do care) Homeland Security & Walmart Team Up To Fight Terrorism In The Checkout Line

Pelosi escalates criticism of tax-cut deal. She really is a turd, isn't she?

Crisis in the States

The 10 Biggest Conservative Stand-Outs of 2010

War on Consumers Continues

Sniffing out injustice

What ever you do, don't get sick.

Can't Even Print Money Right

Government can’t print money properly

Explain to me why we should trust the government to do something new like control our healthcare, when they can't even do something they've done for centuries correctly?

Random Round-Up 12-06

President Obama Job Approval

Bush job approval rating higher than Obama's

Holder Must Go - Panel finds Justice reluctant to take cases of white victims

How to Balance the Budget Without Raising Taxes

The GOP’s California Blues

We Want You Morons Back

Report: WikiLeaks' Assange to Talk to UK Police, Attorney Says

GOP's Global Warming Skeptics to Take House Chairs on Energy, Science

Deciding Who Lives and Who Dies

Ending child marriage helps communities across the developing world

The Pigford Shakedown: How the Black Farmers’ Cause Was Hijacked by Politicians, Trial Lawyers & Community Organizers — Leaving Us With a Billion Dollar Tab



Defying the will of the people, Obama governs by regulation

BWAHAHAHA - Al Gore's climate group shrinking

A Joyless Jobless Report. Those dreadful new unemployment numbers are even worse than they look.

What's Up With 'Sputnik?' Obama Makes '50s Space Race a Rallying Cry

The Next Step in the Walmart Employment-Discrimination Case

Do we need a “repeal amendment”?

Shocker: Rangel May Face More Ethics Charges

The Real Dream of Illegal-Immigration Advocates

A Dispatch from the Kinston Voting-Rights Trial

WikiLeaks cables: Barack Obama is a bigger danger. WikiLeaks harms the US. But the president's refusal to acknowledge the threats we face is a bigger danger

Unusual methods helped ICE break deportation record, e-mails and interviews show

Russian satellites fall into Pacific

Sunshine in Kansas: State Transparency Spotlight

MSM Inertia: What We Can Learn from 120 Years of Climate Catastrophe Reporting. The media falls in love with catastrophic predictions, and is consistently 10-15 years behind(!) in reporting on what the global temperature is actually doing.



BIG SIS INVADES WAL-MART: 'IF YOU SEE SOMETHING, SAY SOMETHING'

Obama presidency turns government up to 11

So Explain to Me Again Why We Need Illegal Aliens?

Democrats on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown

Americans Don’t Hate the Rich

Ohio Blowout Raises Red Flag for Democrats

Must Liberals Ruin Our Sports, Too?

Caribou!

An Index That Charts Risk

Julian Assange, Information Anarchist WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange hopes to hobble the U.S. government.

WikiLeaks: Fishing With Dynamite



Dems aim for 100+ bills in 1 swoop

Where Have All The Capitalists Gone?

They should lay off Obama on this stuff, it's hard to remember these details when you weren't even born here - Obama muffed U.S. motto.

PIG Out on Kevin Williamson’s New Book

You’ve Met Government Motors. Now Meet Government Computers

Me & Mrs. Sherrod — And The $1.25 Billion Pigford II Black Farmers’ Settlement

No Country for Burly Men. How feminist groups skewed the Obama stimulus plan towards women's jobs

Obama V. Events

New regs = more pink slips

The sayings of New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie

The Green Economy Is Here, and It Ain't Pretty



Pension Woes Prompt GOP Move

Worse Is to Come for Euro as Trichet Fails to Calm Crisis, Forecasters Say

The ‘Unholy Alliance’ Between Islamic Jihad and Utopian Socialism

Our Elites at Work

The DREAM Act Is an Amnesty Bill That America Cannot Afford

Soon my daughter won't be allowed to sell Girl Scout cookies - Finally, Air Force Can't Afford Bombers, Schools Can't Hold Bake Sales

Politics: WikiLeaks Took Advice From Media Outlets

What should each party have learned from the 2010 midterms, and what incorrect conclusion are they most likely to extract

Obama Made ‘Big Mistake’ on Climate Bill, Turner Says - Ted Turner seems increasingly irrelevant to me these days.

The Walking Death Tax Without Congressional action, it returns with a 55% rate vengeance in 26 days..

WikiLeaks and U.S. Computer Security: The ‘Second Spy’ Theory. Either U.S. intelligence is massively incompetent, or PFC Manning had help — an insider with high-level access.

Obama Sacrifices Jobs to Save His Own

Bernanke's Arrogance Problem

Assange making arrangements to meet police, lawyer says



Why the left is angry at Obama

WikiLeaks cables: Barack Obama is a bigger danger. WikiLeaks harms the US. But the president's refusal to acknowledge the threats we face is a bigger danger

Public pensions and your right to know

Author claims we're in the grip of a mini ice age

Fear Of Malicious Envy Elicits Altruistic Behavior

Investors Appear To Be Avoiding Past Mistakes

No end in sight to U.S. economic crisis as 'scariest jobs chart ever' shows post-recession unemployment is at its worst since World War Two

Barrett Brown’s Lawyer Sends Me an Email Threatening ‘Legal Proceedings’

Alaska's legal climate far from harsh

What I’ve Learned. We can’t keep politics out of school reform. Why I’m launching a national movement to transform education.

It's all speculation which is pretty much all Wall Street - WikiLeaks' Wall Street Bombshell

Alternative Energy and the Academy at Lagado

My husband's terrific article in the American Spectator:Alternative Energy and the Academy at Lagado

Alot of otherwise sensible people have been calling recently for massive government investment in alternative energy research, arguing that it is the only solution to the risk of global warming that doesn't involve economic ruin. I can see their point and have often considered it myself. Then I remember Gulliver's Travels. Jonathan Swift's classic work is not a simple fairy tale, as so many children's adaptations have made it seem, but a biting satire that tells us that certain popular conceits are not new, and we should be wary of falling for them again.

The most relevant passage is in Part III, when Gulliver visits the Academy of Lagado. The Academy is DARPA in all but name, a brain trust where those with great ideas can work on those ideas at will, free from the corrupting demands of the marketplace. The first academic Gulliver meets is working on a new source of energy:

The first man I saw was of a meagre aspect…He has been eight years upon a project for extracting sunbeams out of cucumbers, which were to be put in phials hermetically sealed, and let out to warm the air in raw inclement summers. He told me, he did not doubt, that, in eight years more, he should be able to supply the governor's gardens with sunshine, at a reasonable rate: but he complained that his stock was low, and entreated me "to give him something as an encouragement to ingenuity, especially since this had been a very dear season for cucumbers."

Yes, Gulliver met a solar power researcher. How does this speak to us today? Consider that in Germany, the world leader in solar power, photovoltaic solar panels supply 0.6 percent of the country's energy, but the total cost to the country's economy for those modules, which have been installed in the past decade, is likely to reach almost $75 billion. It is always a very dear season for solar power.

Others at the Academy are pursuing equally noble research projects. One, for instance, is trying to figure out how to turn excrement back into food. Another is teaching boys how to write treatises on politics using words generated randomly from a machine.

Yet it is the Academy's mission and the attitude of Lagado's citizens to it that speaks most closely to proposals for massive government investment in alternative energy:

In these colleges the professors contrive new rules and methods of agriculture and building, and new instruments, and tools for all trades and manufactures; whereby, as they undertake, one man shall do the work of ten; a palace may be built in a week, of materials so durable as to last for ever without repairing. All the fruits of the earth shall come to maturity at whatever season we think fit to choose, and increase a hundred fold more than they do at present; with innumerable other happy proposals. The only inconvenience is, that none of these projects are yet brought to perfection; and in the mean time, the whole country lies miserably waste, the houses in ruins, and the people without food or clothes. By all which, instead of being discouraged, they are fifty times more violently bent upon prosecuting their schemes, driven equally on by hope and despair.

As Swift so ably reminds us, innovation for its own sake comes at a cost, particularly when it is preceded by rejection of the old. Would that the Obama administration had kept that in mind before imposing stricter automobile fuel economy standards without any real idea of how to reach them!

The irony is that Lagado was once a happy and prosperous place, but fifty years before Gulliver's arrival, some citizens went abroad and, on gaining a smattering of learning elsewhere, "began to dislike the management of every thing below, and fell into schemes of putting all arts, sciences, languages, and mechanics, upon a new foot." Gulliver's host had not fallen for the new fashion. Instead, he continued to live in an estate run along the old lines. The price he paid was also dear:

[S]ome few other persons of quality and gentry had done the same, but were looked on with an eye of contempt and ill-will, as enemies to art, ignorant, and ill common-wealth's men, preferring their own ease and sloth before the general improvement of their country.

Apparently, Swift even anticipated the price of being a global warming skeptic.