The Retroactive Table of Contents : February 24 – March 2

Headline of the Week: My Year With Guns

When he was eight years old Tod Kelly fired his first loaded gun and got a black eye, fired his first empty gun and felt like a man, and then had a neighbor’s father put a gun to his head.

Government, Politics and Elections

James K wrapped up his impressive week-long Blogonado by tackling the issues of taxes and welfare.

Elias Isquith took a look at what we really talk about when we talk about welfare.

Pat Cahalan was relieved to see that breaking your own encryption is perhaps a protected right, and shared with us why if you live in a state that borders Wyoming, you might want to put in for a transfer.

But Jaybird found a reason you might stick around Colorado anyway.

And Burt Likko decided that staying put to do government work in Utah might be worth it.

Ryan Bonneville was not overly impressed with Yglesias.

Jason Kuznicki wondered what conspiracy might lie underneath a Cato-Koch lawsuit.

E.D. Kain can’t understand what all the hubbub over the Koch’s is for anyway, and wondered about what Ron Paul’s end game might be.  He is also disgusted in general with the state of the GOP and the Right.

Tod thinks the GOP’s problem is tied to its dependence on its own media machine.

International Affairs

Burt made a strong case that we should get the Hell out of Afghanistan.

BlaiseP did not see eye-to-eye with him on this subject.

Murali was aghast at the thought of arming Syrian rebels.

Nob Akimoto had his own thoughts on Afghanistan, and none of them involved an Elf with +9 in guile.

Philosophy & Religion

Pat presented an absolute must read series of posts on intellectual property.

Murali asked how he might approach the subject of jurisprudence.

Tom Van Dyke argued for traditional morality.

Guest writer James Hanley, shockingly, disagreed with him.

Jason discussed the religious freedom that allows priests to give or not give communion to gays.  He then railed against God, and looked forward to mankind’s immortality.

Burt noted that immortality may not be all it’s cracked up to be once of robot overlords assume control.

Culture, Arts & Personal Essays

Mike Dwyer traveled to a gun show, and pondered gun culture in our society.

Guest writer Sam Wilkinson asked powerful questions after looking back at his experience witnessing child abuse cases as a social workers.

Guest writer A Teacher isn’t going to be able to change his moniker to A Billionaire with all this internet piracy.

JL Wall looked at the difficulties that are inherent in language.

Alex Knapp is not entirely impressed with Douthat’s take on Charles Murray.

David Ryan’s work continued on his amazing boat, but he had enough time to reflect on self-publishing.

Ryan offered a few random thoughts, including his musings on what might be the smartest Star Wars blog post ever.

Christopher Carr gave us an update of what’s going on in his job hunts, his life, and his world.

League Updates & Housekeeping

Mark Thompson went all CSI on the site and discovered what might well be the oddest perpetrator of sock puppetry of a site this size ever.

Erik shared his dreamy dreams of an ideal comment culture, looked to spruce up the joint, and maybe add just a touch of color.

Burt reminded all that League Fest 2012 is coming up in Vegas.  You know who else did Vegas?  Engleburt Humperdink, that’s who.  Also, Sinatra.