I'll win the James Gandolfini lookalike contest this year for sure.

As a baseball fan, I'm ashamed to say I'd never heard of him, but those are some great stories.  Fantastic obit.

That's pretty much all you're going to get. Holmes vs Moriarty is used as shorthand to describe a bitter rivalry because "everyone" knows about their war, but it's another example of something "everyone" has wrong.  The Holmes stories are great and have had a deservedly long life, but Moriarty is an extremely small part of the catalog.

Coolidge by Amity Shlaes.  Liking it so far.  My biggest gripe is the chapter length.  At 30-40 pages a pop, I have to set aside a large chunk of time to read one chapter, and time is at a premium these days.

Up next, probably The Chill by Ross Macdonald.

Some good points by all.  Current circumstances are forcing more people to get engaged in the struggle.  After abdicating the cultural and educational wars for so long, the Left is much stronger than it used to be.

This is true, but doesn't fill me with as much hope as it once did.  We've been saying the Dem bench has been weak since 2000.  It's been true, but we've also seen people come out of nowhere, like the current President.

Can I have it both ways?  My critique of the Republican party for many years has been that they missed the point of Reagan.  He had strong convictions and pursued them with laser-like focus.  But he wasn't trying to be the next so-and-so.  He was always focused on what's best for America and on how to increase her liberty.  We can, and should, keep his ideas of smaller government and low tax rates, but shouldn't keep harping on "What Would Reagan Do".

What a great way to start a Saturday morning.  Thanks, Yeti!

"Sandra Fluke, Thomas Friedman, and David Brooks walk into a bar ..."  Who pays?

Brooks, because Fluke expects someone else to pick up the tab and Friedman wanted to go for Chinese.

I've seen a couple comments taking umbrage with my use of the phrase "deeply flawed".   I didn't mean that he was a crook or an evil man like his detractors say.  Perhaps I used the wrong formulation.  I was referring more to his insecurities and lack of self-confidence.  He may have said "I don't care what the NY Times says about me", but he really wanted to know what the NY Times said about him saying he doesn't care about them. Did that make sense?

Neolibertarian has a good question.  What were they trying to find out?  From what I remember, wasn't Nixon projected to win in a landslide even before the break-in?

I'm not saying we should all become Nixon Republicans.  The CNN article is just another example of the media using a previously despised Republican/conservative to bash the current party (see: Reagan, Ronald; Goldwater, Barry; WFB).  I'm only wondering if there's anything to learn from Nixon other than don't get caught bugging your rival's offices.

It's odd to think of Nixon and honor together because of the disgrace of Watergate, but could his resignation and concession to JFK in 1960 be seen as honorable acts?  Watergate damaged the nation and the Republican brand for years (the country's still paying for Watergate), but I believe that things would've been 100x worse if we had to go through impeachment proceedings.

For all the paranoia and disgraceful comments about an evil Jewish Cabal, maybe there was some deep part of him that was still in touch with his Quaker heritage.

I listen to the Flagship Podcast with the most regularity, so I can only recommend episodes from there. The episodes with Steyn are all keepers.  The one recorded with Jonah Goldberg right after Andrew Breitbart's death is fantastic (episode 108: Andrew).  Actually, Jonah's episodes are usually good, too.  Definitely check out the unfortunately titled GLoP podcast.

Others Flagship episodes with a listen:

Episode 74 - The Governors, with Mitch Daniels and Haley Barbour.

Episode 70 - To Infinity and Beyond.

Episode 55 - In July, with Harry Shearer and VDH.

Clemente by David Maraniss.  There are some repetitive parts and Maraniss doesn't always introduce the Pirate teammates before telling stories about them, but it's a good read.

I humbly submit William F. Buckley's Blackford Oakes series (and not just because it's my namesake). They're full of spycraft, suspense, sex, and real moral questions for our hero to grapple with.  For example: is it wrong to kill one man if doing so will stop a nuclear war and save millions of lives?

Thank you for this wonderful piece.  One of the great things about Ricochet is we get things like this in and around all our political talk.

The sky is definitely one of my triggers, too. As is Bach.  Maybe this is why I feel so much calmer and have a better day when I listen to one of his piano concertos before work.