Square Zero

“At Least We're Closer Than Square Negative Fifty”

Damon and the Dinosaurs, Part II

Posted by Eric (September 14, 2008 at 3:22 pm)

Tyranosaurus in an F-14The following was originally posted in the comments of my last post on Matt Damon’s urgent need to know whether Sarah Palin believes dinosaurs were here 4,000 years ago, “because she’s gonna have the nuclear codes”. My old high school buddy Jim Macchione turned up to defend Damon, and I wrote a lengthy reply, which my wife April suggested I make into a post. Which I did.

Jim writes:

You of all people should understand nuance.

Nuance? Damon’s remarks about Sarah Palin exhibit all the nuance of sledghammer—a big, puffy clown sledgehammer made of styrofoam, equally incapable of achieving subtle effect or landing a telling blow.

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Posted in Law & Politics | 22 Comments »

Damon and the Dinosaurs

Posted by Eric (September 11, 2008 at 10:57 pm)

Actor Matt Damon is terribly concerned to know what Republican Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin thinks about dinosaurs:

Not national defense, energy, healthcare, the economy, infrastructure or the housing crisis. No—of all the issues confronting our nation, the one that really troubles Matt Damon is dinosaur policy. Because of the nukes, of course.

I dunno—is Damon is angling to be appointed Ambassador to the Dinosaurs under an Obama administration? Is he afraid Palin plans to nuke the dinosaurs?

All I can say is, I’m glad someone has finally had the courage to bring up the thorny question of what we ought to do about dinosaurs. Matt Damon wants to know. He needs know.

Matt Damon, defender of the dinosaurs.

Posted in Law & Politics | 9 Comments »

The Worst Thing About Airports . . .

Posted by Eric (July 23, 2008 at 7:53 pm)

United 625There are so many horrible things about airports, and I might usually name the indignity of removing one’s shoes as chiefest, but right now what I really hate about this airport, Washington Reagan, is that I can’t go outside—not without going back out through security.

The massive storm that delayed and than canceled my flight is now passing over. From the looks of it, it’s a deluge—skies blackened and flickering with lightening, waves of rain sweeping the tarmac. I love a good storm, but this one I can neither hear nor feel.

It would be some consolation for the tedium of sitting here at the gate to stand outside and feel the wind and thunder, to hear violence of the downpour. But you’re all locked up at an airport.

Fortunately, I sweet-talked my way onto an earlier flight—the 4:35 back to Chicago, which is predicted to depart at 9:10. Unlikely, since that’s only ten minutes from now and we haven’t even borded. In any case, it hasn’t been canceled yet.

Posted in What Not | 1 Comment »

But Who Are We Replacing?

Posted by Eric (March 31, 2008 at 1:30 pm)

The ReplacementsLast September this blog picked up an incoming link from the blog of  a woman named Alex Remy. In her post, “Reoccurring [sic] nightmare: I am pregnant and cannot find an abortion clinic”, she laments that pro-choicers—unlike pro-lifers—don’t do enough to make their case.

She’s right. Pro-choicers don’t do enough to make their case. But Remy misses the reason why: when it comes right down to it, it’s hard to make a good case for killing unborn babies. That’s why so often pro-choicers prefer to demonize pro-lifers.

That’s exactly what Remy does, and that’s where she links to this blog. She complains about “anti-abortion advocates, who frequently produce far beyond the replacement rate”, and links to my bio page, which mentions my eight children.

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Posted in Culture & Society, Family, Pro-Life | 13 Comments »

Vegan Black Bean Soup

Posted by Eric (February 25, 2008 at 11:30 am)

Black bean soup with cornbreadReaders will get the idea this is some kind of cooking blog. I’ve just been too busy to give any time to the blog, and whatever spare time I have left after the kids go to bed has been devoted to reading about the Civil War—about which perhaps I will post a blog entry some time soon.

But I find that the blog is a convenient place to take notes on a recipe; I want to keep track of recipes anyway, so why not just post them here?

[Continue reading this entry »]

Posted in Brewing & Cooking | 3 Comments »