I’ve received lots of useful feedback on my earlier cloning post, and on at least one point, the risks involved in cloning, it’s clear I need to revise and expand my remarks. But first another little defence of cloning that popped into my mind.
I just got some voting slips for participant proposals for the TIAA-CREF accounts that I have. I assume many readers of this blog have similar accounts, which is why this might be interesting.
One of the proposals was to stop investing in all companies that support gun control. It almost goes without saying that this is a Very Bad Idea, and one that I’d strongly recommend people vote against. I doubt the proposal has much chance, but just in case a few gun-lovers with college jobs get behind it, it is worth taking the time to vote it down.
A few weeks back I posted on cruelty to animals and was surprised to receive an inquiry about whether I’d be willing to write on the subject for “TechCentralStation”:http://www.techcentralstation.com/ . I declined (too right-wing for me). Reading “Nicholas Confessore’s article on the site and its backer”:http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2003/0312.confessore.html , I’m doubly glad I did. The bloggers who write for the site are mainly conservatives and libertarians, but not exclusively so (liberals such as “Matthew Yglesias”:http://www.matthewyglesias.com/ have featured there). I wonder if any of them will regret their choice in the light of Confessore’s exposure of TCS as being little more than a corporate lobbying operation? (via “Brad DeLong”:http://www.j-bradford-delong.net/movable_type/ ).
UPDATE: I should, of course, link to “Andrew Northrup”:http://www.thepoorman.net/archives/002201.html#002201 on this one.
Who knew that the book publishing world was so full of bizarre criminal intrigue? If this were fiction, an editor would laugh at the absurdity of a villian whose alias was Melanie Mills but whose name in fact turned out to be Roswitha Elisabeth von Meerscheidt-Hullessem. Real life, having no moral to impart or plot to resolve, has no such difficulties.
I’m not sure why Josh Chafetz thinks it ironic that the distribution the Guardian‘s Dear George letters doesn’t line up with data from opinion polls (data that the paper itself reports on). The mix of letters printed in a newspaper should be broadly representative of the correspondence it receives, not public opinion in general. Guardian readers are more likely than not to oppose Bush’s policies and this seems to be a minority view at present. While that might make Josh happy, I don’t see how it’s ironic.
Like Tim Dunlop I am a little disgusted but not at all surprised to hear that President Bush will not be addressing Parliament on his visit to Britain. According to ABC News, “such a speech could invite the kind of heckling the president received when he spoke to the Australian Parliament last month.” One might have thought that a leader with thicker skin might have told the begrudgers to “Bring it on.” Bush’s aversion to explaining himself to people who might talk back is well known, of course, but it seems insulting to treat the representative body of your staunchest ally in this way. Some Tories appear to think so, too, though most of the anglospheroids seem content to bash Red Ken instead.
Needless to say, the spin on the visit — see the same ABC news story — is that Bush is in London to “address” and “confront” those who doubt his policy in Iraq. He’ll just be doing this without, you know, addressing or confronting anyone.