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WorldNetDaily is running a survey and I’d appreciate it if you’d consider taking it. It’s only 20 checkbox-style questions and it requires no registration or email address. It’s a nice opportunity to give them some feedback on where you’d like things to go in the future… and among the questions happens to be one about letting them know who your favorite WND columnists are.

How can you not harbor much love for KG? The Sports Guy does:

He transformed the culture of the team. He taught everyone to care about defense, to care about practice, to care about being a professional, to care about leaving everything they had on the court, to stop caring about stats and start caring about wins. He single-handedly transformed the careers of three young players (Rajon Rondo, Leon Powe and Kendrick Perkins), one veteran (Pierce) and one coach (Doc Rivers), all five of whom could have gone the other way. He played every exhibition game like it was the seventh game of the Finals. During blowouts, he stood on the sidelines and cheered on his teammates like it was a tight game; because of that, the bench guys did the same thing for the starters and basically turned into a bunch of giddy scrubs on a 14-seed in a March Madness upset during every game.

The best word for him would either be “contagious” or “selfless.” By Thanksgiving, the entire team was emulating him. Every time a young player got carried away with himself during a game — like the time Perkins started going for his own stats or the time Rondo snapped at his coach — KG was there to set him straight and scare the living hell out him. Every time one of his teammates was intimidated, KG had his back. Every time one of his teammates got knocked down, KG rushed over to pick him up; eventually, four teammates were rushing over to help that fifth guy up, and that’s just the way it goes with the team now. Every time an opponent kept going for a shot after a whistle, KG defiantly blocked the shot just out of principle. Eventually, everyone started doing it. No shots after the whistle against the Celtics. That was the rule. It was a series of little things, baby steps if you will, but they added up to something much bigger.

I don’t think there’s a Minnesotan who doesn’t wish KG well. Even if you don’t care about basketball, you can’t help but admire a player who has always shunned playing superstar in favor of being a great teammate. It’s probably part of why he’s never been the endgame assassin that MJ was and Kobe and Lebron are, but it’s also why he’s so well-loved everywhere he goes.

Spacebunny and I once saw him at a steakhouse, and while it’s not exactly possible for a 7-foot tall All-Star to be unassuming, that’s how he carried himself. KG is a competitor – he wants to win and he wants to win very badly indeed – but he clearly doesn’t think the world revolves around him.

That their scare meme is outdated:

Time managing editor Richard Stengel appeared on MSNBC April 17 and said the United States needed to make a major effort to fight climate change, and that the cover’s purpose was to liken global warming to World War II. “[O]ne of the things we do in the story is we say there needs to be an effort along the lines of preparing for World War II to combat global warming and climate change,” Stengel said. “It seems to me that this is an issue that is very popular with the voters, makes a lot of sense to them and a candidate who can actually bundle it up in some grand way and say, ‘Look, we need a national and international Manhattan Project to solve this problem and my candidacy involves that.’ I don’t understand why they don’t do that.”

I imagine because they have been paying attention to the reports of the climatologists that disprove all of the calamitous computer climate models by pointing out how there hasn’t been any global warming over the last ten years. That’s the nice thing about journalism. You don’t actually have to know anything, you only have to really believe you do.

Some might decry Stengel’s open admittance of bias, but you won’t hear me complaining about it. Everyone is biased one way or another, so it’s much better to have it all out in the open rather than hidden behind a shallow pretense of a nonexistent objectivity.

It appears increasingly likely that the Texas government’s mass arrest of Mormon adults and kidnapping of Mormon children was based on a fraudulent phone call, possibly by a woman with a history of making false accusations:

A 33-year-old Colorado Springs woman has been questioned about a telephone call that sparked a raid at the polygamist Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints compound in western Texas two weeks ago. Rozita Swinton was arrested at her home Wednesday night by Colorado Springs police for an incident that occurred in February. Members of the Texas Rangers were also in Colorado Springs as part of their investigation….

Texas authorities launched their raid on the compound after receiving a warrant based on a phone call from a girl named “Sarah” who called for help, claiming she was pregnant and living inside the compound with her 49-year-old abusive husband. Flora Jessop, an outspoken ex-member of the FLDS group, told KUSA-TV she believes Swinton may have been the person she spoke with by phone, who claimed to be Sarah’s twin sister. She said the woman she believes is Rozita Swinton called again Thursday morning after Swinton bailed out of the El Paso County Jail.

It will be interesting to watch the gyrations of government agents attempting to retroactively justify their outrageous actions once the details of the fraud becomes apparent to all and sundry. I don’t know if it’s actually Swinton who is responsible, but since the accused man is known to have been living in a different state than the caller reported, it’s already fairly clear that the justification for the arrests and kidnappings is based on a false foundation.

It’s not easy to find the right sort of critic to review this kind of art:

Beginning next Tuesday, Shvarts will be displaying her senior art project, a documentation of a nine-month process during which she artificially inseminated herself “as often as possible” while periodically taking abortifacient drugs to induce miscarriages. Her exhibition will feature video recordings of these forced miscarriages as well as preserved collections of the blood from the process.

It’s rather a pity that the noted Dutch film critic M. Bouyeri isn’t presently at liberty to display his own striking form of performance review. Actually, I expect this to turn out to be the usual collegiate fraud.

UPDATE: Yep.

Her art project includes visual representations, a press release and other narrative materials. She stated to three senior Yale University officials today, including two deans, that she did not impregnate herself and that she did not induce any miscarriages. The entire project is an art piece, a creative fiction designed to draw attention to the ambiguity surrounding form and function of a woman’s body.

How did I know? Because if a college girl is saying something that has drawn media attention, the probability that what she is saying is untrue rises towards certainty in correspondence with the amount of media coverage. If you haven’t figured this out yet, you simply haven’t been paying attention.

JD asks about good books for children:

My little nephew is learning to read, and I want to provide him with good reading material in the years ahead. I remember you referring to the introductory books about Greek philosophers you read as a child, such as Aristotle and Demosthenes, and I was wondering if you remembered the titles of this series or who printed them.

I can’t and I find that very annoying. They were a series of mid-sized hardcovers without dust jackets; each book was a different color and was arranged according to theme. Tom Brown’s School Days and some Jack London was included in the brown book, while abridged Greek classics were in the green one. I think poetry was orange. The trim was always black. If anyone can identify this series, I’d really love to know what it was. I seem to recall there were somewhere between eight and twelve books in it.

UPDATE: CL nails it precisely. Based on the cover images I’ve seen, ours must have been the 1960 deluxe edition:

I believe that the set you referred to in your blog was The New Junior Classics published by Collier. My parents had a set that I read when I was a child in the 50’s, and I later bought an earlier (and superior) set published in 1938 for my son as part of my scheme to shield him from our contemporary anti-intellectual, anti-male cultural milieu, I hope with some success, as he is presently a National Merit Scholar and first year Physics major on full scholarship at Baylor) .

The set can be found in book stores and obtained at Amazon.

I am almost disturbingly excited about finally learning this. It’s interesting what one remembers, as ten volumes would appear to be right between eight and twelve. Highly recommended.

1. Your base of operation is the bar. If you’re not actively doing anything else, that’s where you should be at all times. It’s where a lot of the real players are.

2. Make a few friends based solely on personal compatibility, not professional synchronicity. Always try to at least have lunch with them, it’s good to take a break from the incessant business blather. Go out of your way to introduce them to your contacts that might be interested in what they are doing, and whom they might find useful. These friendships will make future conferences FAR more enjoyable.

3. Blow off the afternoon sessions if there’s nothing you’re really interested in and work out at the fitness center instead. You’ll feel much better and have more energy. In combination with a second afternoon shower, you’ll be far fresher and less run-down than everyone else over the course of the evening.

4. The first night and the last night are the nights to close down the bar. Don’t go out with the strip club/casino crew. Stay away from the beer, red wine, shots, and chick drinks. White wine and screwdrivers will keep you feeling good and functional in the mornings. Don’t skip breakfast either.

5. Make a list of who you want to meet at the conference and try to meet them all by the middle of the second day. If you know someone who knows them, ask them to track them down and introduce you. But don’t be a stalker and manufacture lame excuses, just be straightforward about your interests.

6. Try to keep the maximum number for dinner down to four, eight if at least six of the diners know each other well. One random hanger-on is fine if he’s not a drip, but two is too many.

7. Stay away from the sort of people who look around when talking to you. Avoid the people who throw around huge numbers relating to past and present accomplishments in the first two minutes of a conversation. They’re almost always full of it and even when they’re not, they’re too self-centered to hear a word you say anyhow.

8. If a group of guys are buying shots for a woman of your acquaintance and you suspect one or more of them to harbor nefarious intentions, it is your duty to surreptiously get rid of them for her without their knowledge. This rule supercedes #4. It’s also okay to order a chick drink if doing so will cause particular embarassment to the guy ordering the round for everyone.

9. Carry a fire-starting implement and always spend a portion of the evening outside with the smokers. Even if you don’t smoke, your acknowledgement of their primary need will render your company welcome.

10. Don’t attempt to leave in the afternoon or evening of the last day. Some of the best meetings are the leisurely ones that take place after everything is over. Take it easy and leave the next morning, or better yet, the next afternoon.

11. Learn from the wisdom of the old vets and big dogs. One reporter commented that he didn’t need a card from me or an older friend of mine who happens to be a senior executive at a very large technology corporation, since he knew he could always find us at the next conference holding down the fort at the corner of the bar.

“Allow me to correct you,” answered my friend, a sophisticated citizen-of-the-world sort who exudes effortless cool. “We are merely here to take our evening espresso. In a moment, we shall retire to the most comfortable chairs in the area being served by the most attractive waitress, and there we shall hold our court.”

The startled reporter didn’t quite know what to say and glanced over at me. I just laughed and said “kiss the ring, baby.”

If you don’t find this funny:

An Italian woman artist who was hitch-hiking to the Middle East dressed as a bride to promote world peace has been found murdered in Turkey. The naked body of Giuseppina Pasqualino di Marineo, 33, known as Pippa Bacca, was found in bushes near the northern city of Gebze on Friday. She had said she wanted to show that she could put her trust in the kindness of local people.

It’s seldom pretty when utopianism collides head-on with the vagaries of human nature. One way or another, it usually seems to end in bloodshed. While one might well harbor doubts about the deceased’s judgment, one must also credit the scientific spirit that led her to put her hypothesis to the test. I should be very interested to know if any utopian idealists plan to replicate this empirical experiment in the essential goodness of Man.

Feminists are always metaphorically running to Mommy one way or another:

I usually delete crappy, sexist comments like that, but my trigger finger is itching to publish this asshole’s email and IP address. That isn’t something I’ve ever done, because I don’t believe in putting peoples’ personal information out on the internet just because I disagree with them, no matter how vile their views.

Amynda concurs: Publish the information. I think you relinquish your right to me keeping information you gave me private when you threaten me physically, which is the implication of his comment.

Very well, my dear feminists. You have made your wishes quite clear. Henceforth, every threat, implied or explicit, emailed to me by a feminist shall be published complete with all the private information that I have hitherto refrained from releasing. Because we’re all equal, right?

Il cavaliere returns to power:

Huge, perhaps historic, victory for Berlusconi’s “Popolo della liberta’ ” (which translates a bit awkwardly as “the people of liberty;” maybe it’s better to call it “the freedom folks”). It’s considerably worse than AP lets on. Berlusconi defeated Walter Veltroni’s “Democratic Party” by a full 9 points in both the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies. And since the Italian electoral system gives a bonus to the winning side, the margins are very big and stable: 340 to 241 in the Chamber (with another 36 for a couple of small parties), and 167 to 137 in the Senate (with 5 to three little parties), which was expected to be a photo finish. Eighty percent voted, down about three percent from last time.

The big news is that the Communists are gone, for the first time since the end of the Second World War. Really gone. They didn’t win a single seat in either chamber.

Another thing that you won’t find is that part of the unpopularity of the Prodi government was its ties with the EU. Now that the Communists are gone, it would be wise for Berlusconi to begin pulling Italy out of the clutches of their intellectual successors. Unfortunately, Berlusconi is probably far too corporatist to embrace the obvious.