Kant we all just get along?

The Categorial Imperative put to rest

Odessa: Argument about Kant’s philosophy leads to shooting.

MOSCOW (AP) — An argument in southern Russia over philosopher Immanuel Kant, the author of “Critique of Pure Reason,” devolved into pure mayhem when one debater shot the other

A police spokeswoman in Rostov-on Don, Viktoria Safarova, said two men in their 20s were discussing Kant as they stood in line to buy beer at a small store on Sunday. The discussion deteriorated into a fistfight and one participant pulled out a small nonlethal pistol and fired repeatedly…..

It was not clear which of Kant’s ideas may have triggered the violence.

Fisticuffs, even a little gunfire over Robert Nozick, sure; but Kant?

Heck of a job, Barry, II

 

This puts them exactly where we want them!

Obama waives prohibition against providing arms to Syrian terrorists.

Janes Report: Nearly half of all Syrian rebels Al-Qaeda or hard-line Islamists.

Heck of a job, Barry

 

You need Congressional approval to do that – wait, maybe you don’t; uh, yes you do! No you don’t! Heck, let’s just ask Vladimir.

FEMA grounds private drones assisting in Colorado relief efforts, threatens operators with arrest.

On Saturday, FEMA grounded Colorado company Falcon UAV — a drone manufacturer that had been helping local authorities map the disaster area in near-real time — and threatened to arrest anyone flying a drone over the disaster area, IEEE Spectrum reports.

Falcon UAV had been volunteering its services with the Boulder County Emergency Operations Center’s (EOC) relief efforts for several days prior; the company’s drone, called the Falcon, uses GPS and cameras to create detailed maps of the ground it flies over.

The company said in a blog post that when they were heading up to Lyons, Colo. early Saturday morning to conduct damage assessment they were notified by the Boulder EOC that FEMA had taken over the relief operations, denied Falcon UAV’s request to fly a drone, and said “that anyone flying drones would be arrested.”

Falcon UAV also noted that while Civil Air Patrol and private aircraft were authorized to fly over the damaged town, the mountainous landscape made it difficult to see and help provide visual support for the recovery efforts.

“Meanwhile we were grounded on the Lyons high school football field with two Falcons that could have mapped the entire town in less than 30 minutes with another few hours to process the data providing a near real time map of the entire town,” said Falcon UAV.

Somewhere a federal bureaucrat is sleeping soundly tonight.

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2013/09/16/fema-threatens-to-arrest-volunteer-drone-operators-during-colo-flood-relief/#ixzz2f62lMTIG

Two more real estate tidbits to mark the close

Sale and  price cut.

191 Lake Avenue

191 Lake Avenue sold, for $1.225 million. It started at $1.875 which probably wasn’t wise, but it did sell. Lower Lake Avenue is not at all my favorite spot in town; not for a residence. However, it is close to town.

73 Glenville Rd

And around the corner (and west a ways) from the Lake Avenue property, 73 Glenville Road has dropped to $2.395 million from its first price of $2.8. This is an okay, 1947 home with charm but not an awful lot of useable yard on its one-acre lot. Owners paid $2.2 million for it in 2005 and that might have been a better place to start this time.

Turns out, there IS a limit

And not just in Riverside, as these transactions from all parts of town show.

5 Old Mill Lane

5 Old Mill Lane, 14,000 sq.ft of questionable taste on 2 acres, sold for $10.375 million. That’s  lot of money, for some of you, but the sellers paid $11.2 million for it in 2007. They originally priced it at $12.750 this past winter, but that proved overly optimistic.

5 Irvine

5 Irvine Road, Old Greenwich’s price trajectory also illustrates, maybe, that there’s  a ceiling after all. It’s marked down today (pictures will be posted soon, I assume), for $2.835 million. That’s a lot for a house with a FARport instead of a garage to keep Stamford bicycle thieves at bay, but it sold for $2.750 in 2004, $2.875 in 2005, and $3.225 in 2007. This time around, in 2012, it started at $3.350 million before falling back to earth. Welcome back to 2004, if someone’s lucky.

31 Vista is not a new listing, but its agent switched brokers and took this property with her. Given its history, her old broker was probably glad to see it go. It’s been for sale since early 2010, when it wanted $16.750 million, and has been at its current price, $8.995, for more than a year. Not happening. I’m not sure what a waterfront building lot’s worth over here: I’d guess around $5 million, but whatever that price is, that’s what this place is worth.

6 Meadowcroft

And here’s a surprise: 6 Meadowcroft, which started at $17.4 million in 2011 and finally reported a contract on its last price of $13.750 million a few months ago is back on the market, still at that $13.750 price. The contract was reported as fully executed, no contingencies, so I wonder whether the defaulting buyer walked from his 10% deposit? That would hurt.

BOE candidates finally reveal their opinions on redistricting and challenging the state’s racial laws

All seem to agree that massive redistricting shouldn’t happen; there’s more disagreement on mounting a legal challenge to the concept of race-based redistricting that Hartford seeks to impose.

I thought this quote from Brian Paldunas, responding to  question about magnet schools, was pretty good (which of course, just means I agree with him – maybe we’re both idiots):

I’m fully supportive of a magnet school focusing on math and science at the elementary level. I would not be supportive of a technology/engineering focus, and that’s coming from a chemical engineer. I think in order to address our achievement gap, within the district and our gap to comparable districts, we need to focus on the basics, and to me engineering and technology are not basics. You need to focus on arithmetic, science and core language arts.

Activity, or not

Results of a February bidding war and two more price cuts.

8 Dearfield

8 Dearfield Drive, cheek by jowl to the commercial zone, asked $1.195 last February and promptly entered a bidding war. It closed just now, at $1.4 million.

39 Hearthstone

39 Hearthstone, on the other hand, has cut its price to $1.795 just 59 days after starting off at $1.950 million. It sold for $1.450 in 2009 and when it first came on this time I questioned whether it could really fetch such a premium price for some fairly modest improvements. Guess not.

12 S. Baldwin

And back with yet another broker and a brand new price, 12 S. Baldwin Farms is now looking for $5.295 million.

Jay Silver assembled this spec home in 2007 and priced it at $12.495. That proved to be the wrong price for this French Chateau/farm house/American Eclectic style (the “Dog’s Breakfast Model”, I’d call it) and its price dropped down to $8.995 in 2008, when Patriot Bank started a foreclosure suit. The bank eventually prevailed and brought the house back on in 2011 for $7.499. That price was no more popular than Mr. Silver’s suggested retail so now, another broker, another price.

At $2.975, you might have a deal.

You can’t find this on Hearthstone

Sister Lorin was visiting last week and she took this picture at sunset from our deck.

Ole’s Creek

Elizabeth Warren must be bursting with pride over her granddaughter’s triumph

 

Isn’t that your limo she’s stealing?

Indian wins Miss America contest. Sweet.

The honeymoon is over

Wasn’t it just this weekend that Barry and his grown-up lover Vladimir were taking sunset horseback rides in the mountains?

Today, a man with an AR-15 (illegal in D.C.) used ammunition (illegal in D.C.) to shoot at least ten people (illegal in D.C.)  in the Navy Yard. The Ruskie’s response? This tweet, from Russia’s parliamentary foreign affairs chief Alexey Pushkov.

“A new shootout at Navy headquarters in Washington – a lone gunman and 7 corpses. Nobody’s even surprised anymore. A clear confirmation of American exceptionalism.’”

 

From Camp David

Quick sale

9 Roberta Lane, $3.1 million, already has an executed contract after just 18 days. I always thought that the chief virtue of Roberta Lane was its Ez-On, Ez-Off access to the graveyard behind St. Michael, but young families live there too, apparently.

And 363 North Street is back again, with an impressive new price tag of $5.295 million. The owners tried and failed to sell this from 2008 -2012, starting at $4.350 and dropping all the way down to $3.495, which still proved to be too much. This is a great old 1930s house but it was quite a prospect to bring it up to date and no buyer was willing to step up and take on that job. So the owners have done it themselves, according to the listing, and performed a total renovation.

I’m curious to see how this works out, but it could come out well for the owners. Project houses are not popular these days, so a gracious older house, ready-to-go, might find buyers that it’s older version could not. I’m thinking of 49 39 Doubling Road, same era, which is either at the foreclosure knackers or soon to be there. It once sold, foolishly, for $6.250 back in 2007 and $2.5ish would have taken it last month. Sooner or later, someone’s going to restore it and return it to the market, I hope, and maybe a success here at 363 North will inspire that effort.

Gun safety

We’ll just call the CDC, thank you

Pregnant woman didn’t want a gun in her house, until she did.

A Texas man’s pregnant wife made it clear she was against having a firearm in their house. However, the husband insisted she learn how to use a gun to protect herself just in case. In fact, it was just a few months ago that he took her out to teach her the basics.

The pregnant woman, identified only as “Alex,” told KGBT-TV that she was startled by the sound of a man banging loudly on her front door while another man walked around to the back of her Palmview, Texas, home. Her husband had just left 20 minutes before.

“I’m a young woman, I’m pregnant, I’m home alone. I’m not going to answer the door – I mean, I know better,” she recalled.

Sensing something was very wrong, the pregnant woman retrieved her husband’s handgun for protection. With one hand on the firearm and the other dialing 911, one of the men broke into the house.

“Oh my gosh, he broke in!” the woman told the operator.

She remembered what her husband told her while practicing shooting just months before: “When you’re in a situation like that- you’re not going to think twice.”

He was right.

When the two men realized the woman was armed, they took off towards their truck. Alex’s “adrenaline kicked in” and she shot once at the vehicle. She said she was not aiming to shoot the men, but rather at the truck to both scare the burglars and provide police an identifying marker that might help them track it down.

Palmview Police and SWAT eventually tracked down the suspects, brothers Lucas and Jesus Ortiz, who had barricaded themselves inside a different home. Authorities blocked off the area and negotiated with the two men, ultimately arresting them.

“Palmview Police say Lucas and Jesus Ortiz were high on unknown drugs at the time of the burglary and that they are still not being cooperative with the investigation,” KGBT-TV reports.

Well then how do they know guns should be banned?

Mayor Mike and his six armed bodyguards arrive at Mayors Against Guns press conference

The editors of Michaels Bloomberg’s News despair at rural rednecks’ recall of “sensible” Coloradoan politicians over gun confiscation laws they pushed through, and blames to result on the lack of data detailing the ill effects of guns.

Gun reform advocates …  lack a sufficient body of research on the relationship between guns and public safety. This makes it more difficult to articulate a compelling case.

The paucity of research is no accident. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other government researchers have been thwarted by a heavy-handed legislative directive that prohibits funding to “advocate or promote gun control.” President Barack Obama has sought to mitigate the damage through executive action, but it’s Congress that controls the nation’s purse.

Research won’t resolve the rural versus urban or individualism versus communitarian conflicts that predate the republic. But it will put the old debates on newer, more solid ground. Given the deep animosity of the National Rifle Association to credible research, proponents of sensible gun regulation can distinguish themselves by pushing for more and better research on the health and safety effects of guns.

Let the research show what it will. And then fashion the arguments accordingly.

These genius “journalists” fashioned their argument against guns long ago; now they admit they don’t have the data to support their argument? Don’t confuse me with the facts, my mind’s made up.

Put another way, wise eastern liberals already “know” that guns in the hands of civilians are too dangerous to be tolerated, they just some need some data to support what they have already intuited. Because, you know, liberals are sensible and nuanced.

Things fall apart; The centre will not hold

 

Vladimir will save us!

Vermin infestation in White House

Possum infestation evicts Australia’s PM

This would explain Louisiana’s Mary Landrieu

I don’t get it

Brain-eating amoeba found in Louisiana water system.

It was always thus

 

Greenwich Republican/Democrat song book

Greenwich Time, 1913:

Sept. 19, 1913: The Republicans held a caucus, called by some a primary this week, at which there was no friction for the reason probably that nothing was said and a printed ticket to vote was handed out to all who came to the polls. Of course, one could vote for anybody else other than for those on the ticket that was printed. “But what good would that do,” said a prominent Republican when asked how he voted. “I had to vote that ticket or I might as well not have gone to the polls at all.”