HEADLINE FROM IRAQ: head-chopper al Zarqawi<\/b> finally got a taste of his own poison, courtesy of the U.S. Air Force. Nice work, dart-drivers (i.e., F-16 pilots) and spooks (intelligence people). Enjoy your post-mission beers.<\/p>\n
Z’s death is certainly front-page news, but is it cause for joy and celebration? Not really. Not that the guy didn’t deserve it. But in the end, it’s just another facet of war. They kill our guys, we kill their guys. Nothing really new here. If we someday figure out how to change our genetics in a way that eliminates the drive to go to war, now THAT would be front-page news. The world would then become a truly different place. But until then, it’s just the same old world as it has been for what, oh, maybe 5000 years. <\/p>\n
WHEN THE DOG BITES, WHEN THE BEE STINGS, WHEN I’M FEELING SAD, I SIMPLY REMEMBER MY FAVORITE BEERS AND THEN I DON’T FEEEEEL — SOOOOO — BAAAAAD: Despite war and all the other horrible things, beer makes the world almost worth living for. Here’s a list of some of my favorite beers<\/b>, in no particular order:<\/p>\n
Stoney Creek Vanilla Porter
Molson Golden Ale
Dixie Blackened Voodoo
Victory Storm King Imperial Stout
Samuel Adams Cherry Wheat
Wyerbacher Raspberry Imperial Stout
Sierra Nevada Pale Ale
Lancaster Four-Grain Ale
Shipyard Export Ale
Alaskan Oatmeal Stout
Buffalo Bill Pumpkin Ale
Dogfish Head Raison D’Etre
Lancaster Milk Stout
Genesee Cream Ale
Otter Creek Stovepipe Porter<\/p>\n
As you can see, I have a thing for flavored beers and heavy ales (porters and stouts). Also I don’t include any German beers or Belgian ales. I appreciate the German purity law, and a fine Belgian (like Chimay) can be a real treat. But those beers just don’t seem like home to me. Oh, I didn’t include any IPA’s; sorry, but all those hops get on my nerves after a while. That’s just me. And the light, high-production American lagers don’t make the cut, although Yuengling Lager on tap sometimes has a nice, nutty flavor to it. So maybe it should make the list (but in bottles, I’d go with Yuengling Premium first).<\/p>\n
So, here’s to good beer drinking. At my age, you don’t want to drink much, so you might as well drink quality (even if quality for you is meibocks<\/b> or extra special bitters<\/b> or pilsners<\/b>). <\/p>\n
AND FINALLY: In War and Peace, Tolstoy<\/b> argues that the great men of history were actually powerless to change the course of history. They were simply the puppets of their times. By contrast, Tolstoy praises people who learn to make the best of things by going with the flow, such as Commander Mikhail Kutuzov. Tolstoy is very Taoist in this regard. In contrast to Tolstoy is Hegel<\/b>, who says that the “great men of history”, driven by a will to change things, pull the right levers at the right time and in fact do change things (if they’re at the right place at the right time). This change is not necessarily for the better; but certainly things do change. E.g., Julius Caesar in the transition from the Roman Republic to the Roman Empire. Was al-Zarqawi a man of history, or just a chump? Something to think about, is all I’m saying . . . . . while drinking a Stout’s Fat Dog.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
HEADLINE FROM IRAQ: head-chopper al Zarqawi finally got a taste of his own poison, courtesy of the U.S. Air Force. Nice work, dart-drivers (i.e., F-16 pilots) and spooks (intelligence people). Enjoy your post-mission beers. Z’s death is certainly front-page news, but is it cause for joy and celebration? Not really. Not that the guy didn’t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,25],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/458"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=458"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/458\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2853,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/458\/revisions\/2853"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}