Category: Obituaries

Alexander Haig is Dead at 85

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In the 1980s, I was always rather contrarian, maintaining that Alexander Haig, who died today, was among the most competent and most sane of the members of Reagan’s cabinet, though that is damning with faint praise.

I think that he understood and appreciated our NATO allies more than most people in the foreign policy establishment.

One interesting note, he was a west pointer, and graduated 217 out of a class of 310, which may imply that success at the Point is orthogonal to success later in life.

I love this quote about him:

Never much of a politician, Gen. Haig in 1988 made a brief presidential run, often described by commentators at the time as “quixotic.” Borrowing a phrase from a supporter, the comedian Mort Sahl, he announced he was “throwing my helmet into the ring.” But he withdrew before the primaries.

Considering the fact that he was a Kissinger protégé, he was relatively non evil, which is again damning with faint praise.

Bad Day for Lowbrow Literature

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Robert B. Parker, author of the Spencer detective novels, and Erich Segal, author of Love Story have both died.

I don’t mean to imply that they were bad authors, I rather enjoyed reading the Spencer books, and I have never read Segal, and so cannot comment on his work at all, but rather I am saying that their books were decidedly mass market, as opposed to the more erudite stuff that you see reviewed in gushing tones on NPR.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?? Shy and Unpretentious?

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Uh-oh, I dissed the mouse. They will send the snow white commandos to kill me

So, Roy Disney just died, and here is how the Dawn C. Chmielewski and James Bates of LA Times described him?

Despite wealth estimated at $600 million, Disney remained shy and outwardly unpretentious, according to people who knew him. His main indulgences were a castle in Ireland, a jet, sports cars and financing a passion for sailboat racing. In 1999, Disney fulfilled a lifelong dream when he and the 12-member crew of his 74-foot sloop Pyewacket — named for the witch’s cat in the 1958 film “Bell, Book & Candle” — won the 2,225-mile Transpacific Yacht Race from Los Angeles to Honolulu, setting a course record.

Let me get this straight, he owned sports cars (plural), owned a 12 crew 74-foot yacht, a private jet, and an Irish Castle, and he’s “unpretentious”?

He might be a nice guy. All I know about him is that he took Michael Eisner down, which is a plus in my book, but when you own sports cars (plural), owned a 12 crew 74-foot yacht, a private jet, and an Irish Castle, unpretentious is the last adjective that should be used.

The guy owned a freaking castle, and probably sharks with frikkin laser beams in the moat.

H/t Radosh.net

Corruption Update: Another Bailout for Bob Rubin’s Old Firm

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Seriously. The fact that the IRS, or let’s be clear about, Timothy Geithner’s Department of the Treasury is allowing Citi to get an additional $32 billion in tax breaks so that it can repay the TARP more quickly:

The Internal Revenue Service on Friday issued an exception to long-standing tax rules for the benefit of Citigroup and a few other companies partially owned by the government. As a result, Citigroup will be allowed to retain billions of dollars worth of tax breaks that otherwise would decline in value when the government sells its stake to private investors.

By way of comparison, the government invested $45 billion in Citi, which has, through various means, converted into common stock at above market valuations.

So, it now appears that we are paying Citi to pay us back the TARP money, $32 billion in tax deductions, so that they can pay back the $20 billion that is still owed as debt, overpay their next CEO.

With the top corporate tax rate at 35%, this translates to about us paying them $11.2 billion to get back our $20 billion, which was earning us 8%, or $1.6 billion a year……Lovely deal, huh?

I’m calling corruption on this.

I’m not sure if anyone in the White House is personally getting rich on this, but, much like the recently deceased Yegor Gaidar in Russia, they are creating and maintaining a corrupt system.

I’m sure, like Gaidar, they see themselves as heroic, but they are looting the United States.

Requiem for a Quack: Hulda Clark

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I am quoting Orac, the pseudonymous blogger at Respectful Insolence, on the death of Hulda Clark, author of The Cure for All Cancers, who, ironically enough, died of cancer.

As Orac notes, she was a quack’s quack:

In that post, I listed a number of Clark’s claims, as documented by Quackwatch:

  • The adult liver fluke — which she misspells as Faciolopsis buskii — “stays stuck to our intestine, (or liver, causing cancer, or uterus, causing endometriosis, or thymus, causing AIDS, or kidney, causing Hodgkin’s disease).” Or the pancreas, causing diabetes; the brain, causing Alzheimer’s disease; the prostate (causing prostatitis; or the skin if you have Kaposi’s sarcoma.
  • As soon as there are adults in the liver. . . . a growth factor, called ortho-phospho-tyrosine appears. Growth factors make cells divide. Now YOUR cells will begin to divide too! Now you have cancer. . . . Having propyl alcohol in your body allows the fluke to develop outside of the intestine.
  • When the fluke and all its stages have been killed, the ortho-phospho-tyrosine is gone! Your cancer is gone.
  • Clearly, you must do 3 things: (1) Kill the parasite and all its stages; (2) stop letting propyl alcohol into your body; and (3) flush out the metals and common toxins from your body so you can get well.
  • It is not unusual for someone to have a dozen (or more) of the parasites I have samples of. You can assume that you, too, have a dozen different parasites.
  • Three herbs, used together, can rid you of over 100 types of parasites: black walnut hulls, wormwood, and common cloves. But the amino acids ornithine and arginine improve this recipe.
  • Use of these five products will kill the cancer-causing fluke in the first five days and the remaining parasites in another two weeks.
  • It takes 5 days to be cured of cancer regardless of the type you have. Surgery, radiation, or chemotherapy can be canceled because, after Clark’s recipe cures the cancer, it cannot come back.
  • All metal (fillings, crowns, bridges, etc.) should be removed from the mouth, and all teeth with root canals should be extracted, because their presence damages the immune system.
  • To prevent recurrence, stay on a maintenance program of killing parasites and give yourself a high-dose program at least twice a year. Also treat all family members and household pets.
  • The method is 100% effective in stopping cancer regardless of the type of cancer or how terminal it may be. It follows that this method must work for you, too, if you are able to carry out the instructions.
  • No matter what kind of cancer you have (or HIV or pains or weakness), a complete program of lifting the burdens on your immune system will miraculously clear it up.

(emphasis mine)

Ms. Clark made a good living shortening the lives of thousands of people.

I don’t want to start any blasphemous rumours

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Pictured in Happier Times

But I think that God’s got a sick sense of humor
And when I die I expect to find Him laughing.*

Meleanie Hain, who made headlines when she showed up to a kids soccer game with a pistol strapped to her hip, and then filed a 7 figure lawsuit against the sheriff when her carry permit was revoked, has been shot to death in an apparent murder-suicide, along with her husband.

Thankfully, the children, who were in the house, have not been physically injured.

God Bless the 2nd amendment.

*Song Blasphemous Rumors, artist, Depeche Mode.

Went to a Funeral

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I went to MSgt Wade’s funeral this afternoon.

Wade led a life in which he made many friends, and helped a lot of people, and made even more people laugh. As his son noted, in the most positive way possible, he was a “goofy bastard,” and a lot of that was because of his sense of deep abiding honesty.

He was a military Chinese linguist, and among other things, lobbied the chain of command or immersion training to be a part of military foreign language training. (Which it now is)

He is also the one who told me that the name I gave one of my cats, Tudza, not only meant “Rabbit,” but was also Chinese slang for gay, which might explain why my fixed since age one cat has a serious catnip problem. (Not really, if cats cared about their names, they would come when called).

One thing that I still have a problem with in non-Jewish funerals is the open casket bit.

I’ve been to about a dozen funerals, with about ¾ being Jewish, and hence closed casket, and I still don’t get the open casket funeral. It gives me the serious willies.