Author: david

  • Lesson from a Master

    Lai-chui Hsien of Hopei achieved great mastery of Chinese neijia (“internal martial art”–Tai-Chi, etc.) “Sometimes when following the technique exactly, you feel that your body is not coordinated, your abdomen does not feel good, the postures are bad, and you are not happy. “Do not worry! You have gained something and are at a point…

  • Lovely, interesting

    A 30,000-year-old instrument is uncovered in southern Germany: His early experimentation suggests that the old flute would have allowed a relatively sophisticated level of musical variation. “The tones are quite harmonic,” he says. They don’t seem to follow a diatonic scale, he notes, but rather the rules of the pentatonic scale that predominates in Asia.…

  • Do Economists Indulge in Parenthetical Witticisms?

    Thursday 12/16/2004 ———————————————————– RELEASE: In October, Czech retail sales continued to follow the trend of the preceding months and increased…1.1% on a seasonally adjusted month-to-month basis. On a year-ago basis, retail sales advanced 1.7% (not seasonally adjusted). DKo: A full-year seasonal adjustment? It must make sense somehow, but it does sound funny. Economists don’t indulge…

  • How an unconscionable punishment became an enlightened incentive.

    DKo: Boldface is mine. USA TODAY, 6-22-04 On Nov. 27, 2002, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld approved 17 “Category Two” interrogation techniques….He also approved one “Category Three” technique,…”non-injurious physical contact.”….Rumsfeld rejected three proposed Category Three techniques: exposure to cold weather or water;… DKo: So in November, punishment by exposure to cold was unconscionable, not allowed even…

  • Don’t They Know It Hurts?

    “Remember, more than 90 percent of American homes celebrate Christmas. But the small minority that is trying to impose its will on the majority is so vicious, so dishonest–and has to be dealt with.” –Bill O’Reilly, Fox News: Cited in NYT, 2004: The Year of ‘The Passion’, by Frank Rich I was reading the Newsweek…

  • The Iraqization Program

    But the police have performed poorly in the Sunni Muslim areas in central and northwestern Iraq…. A wave of attacks [in Mosul] on police stations and other government buildings prompted 3,200 of the city’s 4,000 police officers to abandon their jobs. (Washington Post) DKo: The apparent reliance on former Kurdish militia as backup is explosive,…