Radicalized

What is up with the word “radicalize” lately? It’s getting a lot more mileage thanks to analysis of those wild ‘n’ crazy Tsarnaev brothers. Everyone seems to be taking it as a given that the bombers were just regular guys–swell guys, in fact, princes among men–until they went through some kind horrible process that “radicalized” … Read more

Analysis of the Analysis of the Boston Bombers

Instead of reading the mainstream media’s overwrought analysis of why, oh, why those two Tsarnaev brothers could’ve done such a dastardly thing, just read this from Powerline. Money quote: When asserting the obvious is not a respectable option, asserting gibberish becomes the option of choice for people of ordinary intellect who wish to opine. And … Read more

Is Patton Oswalt Right?

(Here’s one of those posts where I earn the name of the blog.) In the immediate aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombing, Patton Oswalt wrote this:  This is a giant planet and we’re lucky to live on it but there are prices and penalties incurred for the daily miracle of existence. One of them is, … Read more

A Little Boston Marathon Perspective

I’m not a runner, but Boston Marathon winner Geoffrey Mutai’s time of 2:03 sounded so ridiculously amazing to me that I wanted to break it down into terms that non-runners could understand. Bear with me, and please, double-check my math. There are 1760 yards in a mile, which means that in running one mile you … Read more