I Question The Causality
Lifted from the comments, a teacher tells us things:
Oh, honey. No. https://t.co/cPpIjk02Rv
— Overeducated Gibbon (@MostlyMonkey) June 11, 2025
A thread ensues, from which:
Is it enough to just own the books? Researchers aren’t yet sure.
Consider this an open thread. Share ye links and bicker.
They’re gonna need two big lads and a wheelbarrow.
In addition to the library, we had an illustrated encyclopedia, ideal for preteens, and I skimmed/read the entire thing. In addition my mother had somehow collected a number of nonfiction books like “The Alamo” , “The War in the Atlantic”, “Sam Houston, the Tallest Texan”, all of which I read in 7th-8th grade. But the one that really got me was “Giants of Science” which had short bios of Newton, Pasteur, Einstein, etc. I was hooked and my future career decided. I don’t think my siblings read any of them.
Books are very very important. Having read so much, by high school I was way ahead of my classes in vocabulary and reading comprehension. I was stunned that fellow students could read a paragraph out loud in class and have no idea what it was about.
Books and intelligence: yes, it is cargo cult science to think that having books causes achievement. It is the having of intelligent and educated parents that causes both books in the house and high achievement.
Cargo cult beliefs caused the 2008 US financial crisis, because it was believed that owning a home turned a person into a middle class citizen. Because the poor could not afford to own a home, standards were lowered (forced on banks by the government) and people with terrible credit bought homes. Even ostensibly middle class people got sucked into buying too much home. Often these loans had floating interest rates, thus when interest rates rose people could not pay their mortgage.
Interesting story about redlining: back at the turn of the 20th century, there was a lot of mixing of the races in big cities as blacks moved north to get factory jobs. Landlords were not sufficiently interested in discriminating and initially public housing was integrated. This upset some powerful enough people (not the general public but democrats IIRC) that they got the gov to enforce redlining (via the banks again) and made public housing for minorities only. It was city governments that said asians all had to live in China Towns. Rhetoric the past many decades would have you believe that it is the gov that has been fighting discrimination by evil landlords, but this is backwards from historical reality.
I noticed in the late-90s when I went back to college, the abject lack of basic knowledge (and academic skills) in students that I assumed everyone had based on my own primary education of the 60s. In a required US History lecture class the majority of the students couldn’t even place the Civil War in the right decade let alone muster forth a comprehensible description of the event. Even questions from the professor probing the level of knowledge about WWI and WWII received blank stares.
Yikes.
“mostly peaceful” I heard this from people back in 2020. If the daytime protests are peaceful but at night it turns into burning buildings, the peaceful part is just providing cover for the thuggery. “mostly peaceful” is irrelevant and one should be embarrassed to say it. Same with claims that it is “free speech”. Saw interview with FL gov last night. He said there are hundreds of protests during a year in florida, and the gov does nothing, but the minute they block a street or turn violent it is shut down. He said the highway patrol recently cleared a highway they blocked in 11 minutes. No messing around means it does not get out of control.
I miss the concept of shame.
Three unnamed teen girls murder 75 year old man.
The doctrine of “protecting” juvenile criminals by withholding their names was deeply mistaken–based on childish liberal fantasies. Publish full identities to shame them and to warn those who might encounter them.
Also American voters. The comments contain a suggestion for solving this problem.
[ Unpacks shopping, demands gin and tonic. ]
I’m sorry, I can’t hear you over the size of this gin and tonic.
re the second linked tweet (from which) – the author of that one is building an app to help children to learn to read earlier, so naturally he once came to the attention of a progressive activist who
cheered his efforts to bring literacy to the youngtried to destroy him because an educated populace is an economically productive populace.Fortunately that backfired because even among progressives that level of imbecilic insanity is not universal.
[ Wakes up. Reads latest HMO emails. ]
David, please pour me a very large gin and tonic. With extra gin.
I haven’t any gin so I went for a vodka and tonic. Tito’s, of course.
On the news tonight, pundits were whining that non-criminals are being swept up in ICE raids and that this is causing immigrants “anxiety”. Some thoughts for them:
1) They knew they were breaking the law. Though to be fair, under Biden they probably felt safe.
2) If sanctuary cities/states cooperated with ICE then ICE could focus on criminals (worst first as Trump said). Homan warned months ago that if local govs do not cooperate and they have to do raids, they might sweep up non-criminals.
I think the key to the problem is to enforce laws against hiring illegals. Every place I have worked has required proof of citizenship. If the jobs dry up, many will leave. Also, make it illegal to give out federal benefits like medicaid to noncitizens or social security numbers or driver licenses. Enforce the laws.
Yes!
Also: Tax remittances.
Anything which motivates illegals to self-deport is good. #ByAnyMeansNecessary.
Tito’s, of course.
Tito’s is made from corn, which means it is either unaged bourbon or a gasoline additive, and from the way it tastes, I suspect the latter.
If vodka doesn’t come from Poland, Finland, or preferably The Rodina, it ain’t vodka.
If drinking it straight or a basic vodka martini I like my Polish Chopin or Belvedere. As a mixer with anything with a stronger flavor, which is essentially anything…like tonic water, you’re just wasting money pouring in high quality vodka. Or posing. I use Stoli’s or Titos for those drinks. I could afford to still use the good stuff but it just seems silly.
What, no Valu-Rite? They love it over at Ace’s.
If drinking it straight or a basic vodka martini I like my Polish Chopin or Belvedere.
Yes, the proper way to drink it; from The Rodina, Russian Standard gold, platinum or Imperia, or Beluga. From Poland Chopin potato and Belvedere Single Estate (only been able to find the Lake Bartężek, though).
For something slightly different Żubrówka Bison Grass Vodka, which is hard to find in my neck of the back of beyond, but great straight (cold best), but mixed with apple juice, tastes like genuine apple pie moonshine (not the store bought “moonshine” crap which is really all Tito’s is except for the marketing hype). Mixed with a hard cider it is called a “Polish Kiss”, two or more should be called a “Polish Sucker Punch”.
Des Moines lobster rolls, Brooklyn BBQ, Birmingham borshch, Austin vodka.
There was a very inexpensive brand that we encountered in Poland back in 2004, the name escapes me…not that I could pronounce it anyway because it contains one of those letter ‘L’s with a line through it. Saw it once on this side of the Pond in a huge liquor store somewhere in the north Atlanta suburbs and then a second time in a tiny little strip center across the street from the assisted living facility my father was briefly in. The kind of place with barely enough shelf space for a couple bottles deep. That was in 2007. Haven’t seen it anywhere since, though I generally look when I’m in a new store. I thought it was as good as Belvedere at about 3/4 the price.