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Not a whole lot of time to compose today, but we’ll still do the best we can with the time we have. We’ll start with counts of disappeared interests from LiveJournal's daily popular interests report, thanks to the new management. Hat tips to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
stewardess for noticing and compiling the blanked-out figures. The missing material also seems to indicate a tendency toward striking out homosexual activity, in addition to being anti-fanfiction. Apparently, actually admitting the people who use your service have diverse, and yes, adult interests is unacceptable.
Internationally, some Muslim leaders are ready to sue those who "defame" Islam through political cartoons or other statements, trying to make a counterweight to the long-established tradition of free speech by compelling people to consider their remarks in light of the slight it gives to religions. Such precedents could mean that Christians or Scientologists could sue and have their cases heard, as well. And in the case of rising anti-Semitism across the world, there’s a good chance that those crying about Muslim discrimination might find themselves being counter-cried against by Jews who are the recipient of Islamic invective.
Ecuador's president has told Mr. Bush to put up troops or shut up with regard to his accusations that Ecuador harbors Colombian rebels. Mr. Bush also accused Venezuela of harboring terrorists. It’s pretty clear to see where Mr. Bush’s loyalties and allies lie, and I wonder if he isn’t contributing fuel to a fire, rather than trying to defuse a situation. Then again, Mr. Bush invaded Iraq by trying to tie it to al-Qaeda. Maybe he likes war and death. The Oakland County Sheriff, on the other hand, thinks cigars would be nice for the troops.
China's President is elected to another term. With the Olympic Games coming to Beijing this summer, he has his work cut out for him if he wants to present a good image of China to the world. Especially now that protests over Tibet's independence are spilling out into other Chinese provinces.
The CyberCast News Service says that families earning a little more than $100,000 can get on Massachusetts state-subsidized health care plan. Which is true... if they’re a family of eight. Of course, that doesn’t stop the writer from quoting people that say “Isn’t this terrible? We’re going to crowd out private insurance with state-mandated health care!” The sky is falling, the sky is falling, and those entitlement programs are just bad news... I don’t know, maybe those people who don’t have to worry whether their health care premiums are going to eat them alive can get on with the business of raising their family and actually being able to spend time with them. CNS also wants us to know that military recruitment offices are being attacked more frequently. Apparently, protests and sit-ins also count as attacks for this purpose. And then there’s the money statement that attacking recruitment centers or protesting them is attacking the troops. I still think the best way of supporting our military is not sending them on false premises and not insisting that anyone who disagrees with the President is a traitor, so that more people can be exposed to the horrors of war. Continuing in the fearmongering section, disgraced former ambassador says North Korea will sell nuclear technology to terrorist organizations. Like hell they will. Selling that technology puts it out of your hands, and means that it might come back to bite you. I don’t think too many organizations or governments would be willing to sell knowing that.
Google Earth is a potential threat, say commanders, who want Google to blur out or delay the feeds of their satellite pictures so that troop movements or sensitive areas aren’t available to opponents with an Internet connection. Well, if the media was misled on the first Gulf War, then even Google should be easy enough to fool, if the pictures that go up are of ambiguous strategic knowledge. Just goes to show how technology really is changing conflict.
In actual news on the domestic front, top TSA officials are alleged to be running a private security consultant firm while retaining their government clearances. The TSA is saying nothing, nor is the Department of Homeland Security. Cheaters, crooks, and liars has been a running theme of these last eight years, so this is hardly surprising anymore. Which is probably a bad thing - we’re so used to things being corrupt that we don’t really care anymore.
Feministe rails against the handling of a transgendered woman's murder, including the possibility that the defense will try to lessen or excuse it by claiming that the murderer panicked when he found out the woman was transgendered. Coincidentally, the New York Times has a several-page article about the increasing presence of transgendered persons.
David Mamet describes his "defection" from liberalism to the conservative side, saying that he could no longer believe the idea that things were so very wrong with the world when faced with the evidence of his daily life. Which is a fair assessment - it’s very difficult to believe that things are wrong when in our own life, things are going just fine. That doesn’t necessarily mean that they aren’t going pear-shaped for someone else, which is what I thought a lot of liberalism was looking out for. The person with the comfortable life is doing okay, the liberals want everyone to have that comfortable life, or at least one free of the concerns over basic necessities being available and affordable.
I just hope he doesn’t start spouting stuff like Chuck Colson's adamant belief that the West's movement away from Christian roots is responsible for protocols in the Netherlands that assess whether a baby is going to have good quality of life and the recommend either for or against euthanizing the child. There are plenty of ethical objections one could make on these grounds without having to invoke any sort of God-being, and Colson even mentions one - the Hippocratic Oath. Depending on what “Do no harm” means, it may be unethical for doctors to recommend or perform these procedures. At the same time, it may be doing much more harm to keep a child in the world that will only suffer quite a bit through a short life. These subjects do need to be discussed, but no progress can be made if there’s a knee-jerk reaction that says “All babies must live!” even if their conditions ensure a miserable life or the way they were born means they will suffer greatly or die early.
I’d rather that he made comment like David Stokes, who suggests that partisanship actually does produce good results, and he’s right, with the brand of partisanship that he espouses, between George Washington and George Mason, where both sides were fighting for something they believed in, but were actually listening to each other’s arguments and ideas. Both sides eventually won, first with the Constitution, and then the Bill of Rights. That kind of partisanship is okay. The stuff of the modern era is more like “I’m right, you’re wrong, and I’m doing everything the way I want to, regardless of what you have to say or think”, which is not productive at all, and leads to some pretty stupid decisions when the opposition’s policies would be better for the country and the people. Bipartisanship doesn’t necessarily mean complete agreement on everything, but it does indicate a willingness to examine what the other side has to say and see if it has merit, or something that you can steal and add to your own plan.
Jackie Gingrich Cushman praises the unconventional but effective teaching methods of Ron Clark, who has found that making learning more than just rote memorization and girds and squares engages children and gets them to learn. Those sorts of methods deserve support and funding, because it’s pretty clear that the way we do things now doesn’t work for everyone and doesn’t necessarily retain interest except foe the dedicated. Like the teacher who educates as a Cyberman.
Making the requisite listmania, hot travel tips from Sir Francis Bacon. A lot cooler list is the top ten barely legal gadgets for the modern spy, as presented by WebUpon.
Last for tonight are the nightmare future robots of Kenji Yanobe. And maybe I should scale back the linking a bit... apparently, the world is chowing down on lots of information, only some of which is needed, or relevant, or interesting at any given time. So here’s one more morsel before bed. Apparently, there is no crying in the military.
stewardess for noticing and compiling the blanked-out figures. The missing material also seems to indicate a tendency toward striking out homosexual activity, in addition to being anti-fanfiction. Apparently, actually admitting the people who use your service have diverse, and yes, adult interests is unacceptable.Internationally, some Muslim leaders are ready to sue those who "defame" Islam through political cartoons or other statements, trying to make a counterweight to the long-established tradition of free speech by compelling people to consider their remarks in light of the slight it gives to religions. Such precedents could mean that Christians or Scientologists could sue and have their cases heard, as well. And in the case of rising anti-Semitism across the world, there’s a good chance that those crying about Muslim discrimination might find themselves being counter-cried against by Jews who are the recipient of Islamic invective.
Ecuador's president has told Mr. Bush to put up troops or shut up with regard to his accusations that Ecuador harbors Colombian rebels. Mr. Bush also accused Venezuela of harboring terrorists. It’s pretty clear to see where Mr. Bush’s loyalties and allies lie, and I wonder if he isn’t contributing fuel to a fire, rather than trying to defuse a situation. Then again, Mr. Bush invaded Iraq by trying to tie it to al-Qaeda. Maybe he likes war and death. The Oakland County Sheriff, on the other hand, thinks cigars would be nice for the troops.
China's President is elected to another term. With the Olympic Games coming to Beijing this summer, he has his work cut out for him if he wants to present a good image of China to the world. Especially now that protests over Tibet's independence are spilling out into other Chinese provinces.
The CyberCast News Service says that families earning a little more than $100,000 can get on Massachusetts state-subsidized health care plan. Which is true... if they’re a family of eight. Of course, that doesn’t stop the writer from quoting people that say “Isn’t this terrible? We’re going to crowd out private insurance with state-mandated health care!” The sky is falling, the sky is falling, and those entitlement programs are just bad news... I don’t know, maybe those people who don’t have to worry whether their health care premiums are going to eat them alive can get on with the business of raising their family and actually being able to spend time with them. CNS also wants us to know that military recruitment offices are being attacked more frequently. Apparently, protests and sit-ins also count as attacks for this purpose. And then there’s the money statement that attacking recruitment centers or protesting them is attacking the troops. I still think the best way of supporting our military is not sending them on false premises and not insisting that anyone who disagrees with the President is a traitor, so that more people can be exposed to the horrors of war. Continuing in the fearmongering section, disgraced former ambassador says North Korea will sell nuclear technology to terrorist organizations. Like hell they will. Selling that technology puts it out of your hands, and means that it might come back to bite you. I don’t think too many organizations or governments would be willing to sell knowing that.
Google Earth is a potential threat, say commanders, who want Google to blur out or delay the feeds of their satellite pictures so that troop movements or sensitive areas aren’t available to opponents with an Internet connection. Well, if the media was misled on the first Gulf War, then even Google should be easy enough to fool, if the pictures that go up are of ambiguous strategic knowledge. Just goes to show how technology really is changing conflict.
In actual news on the domestic front, top TSA officials are alleged to be running a private security consultant firm while retaining their government clearances. The TSA is saying nothing, nor is the Department of Homeland Security. Cheaters, crooks, and liars has been a running theme of these last eight years, so this is hardly surprising anymore. Which is probably a bad thing - we’re so used to things being corrupt that we don’t really care anymore.
Feministe rails against the handling of a transgendered woman's murder, including the possibility that the defense will try to lessen or excuse it by claiming that the murderer panicked when he found out the woman was transgendered. Coincidentally, the New York Times has a several-page article about the increasing presence of transgendered persons.
David Mamet describes his "defection" from liberalism to the conservative side, saying that he could no longer believe the idea that things were so very wrong with the world when faced with the evidence of his daily life. Which is a fair assessment - it’s very difficult to believe that things are wrong when in our own life, things are going just fine. That doesn’t necessarily mean that they aren’t going pear-shaped for someone else, which is what I thought a lot of liberalism was looking out for. The person with the comfortable life is doing okay, the liberals want everyone to have that comfortable life, or at least one free of the concerns over basic necessities being available and affordable.
I just hope he doesn’t start spouting stuff like Chuck Colson's adamant belief that the West's movement away from Christian roots is responsible for protocols in the Netherlands that assess whether a baby is going to have good quality of life and the recommend either for or against euthanizing the child. There are plenty of ethical objections one could make on these grounds without having to invoke any sort of God-being, and Colson even mentions one - the Hippocratic Oath. Depending on what “Do no harm” means, it may be unethical for doctors to recommend or perform these procedures. At the same time, it may be doing much more harm to keep a child in the world that will only suffer quite a bit through a short life. These subjects do need to be discussed, but no progress can be made if there’s a knee-jerk reaction that says “All babies must live!” even if their conditions ensure a miserable life or the way they were born means they will suffer greatly or die early.
I’d rather that he made comment like David Stokes, who suggests that partisanship actually does produce good results, and he’s right, with the brand of partisanship that he espouses, between George Washington and George Mason, where both sides were fighting for something they believed in, but were actually listening to each other’s arguments and ideas. Both sides eventually won, first with the Constitution, and then the Bill of Rights. That kind of partisanship is okay. The stuff of the modern era is more like “I’m right, you’re wrong, and I’m doing everything the way I want to, regardless of what you have to say or think”, which is not productive at all, and leads to some pretty stupid decisions when the opposition’s policies would be better for the country and the people. Bipartisanship doesn’t necessarily mean complete agreement on everything, but it does indicate a willingness to examine what the other side has to say and see if it has merit, or something that you can steal and add to your own plan.
Jackie Gingrich Cushman praises the unconventional but effective teaching methods of Ron Clark, who has found that making learning more than just rote memorization and girds and squares engages children and gets them to learn. Those sorts of methods deserve support and funding, because it’s pretty clear that the way we do things now doesn’t work for everyone and doesn’t necessarily retain interest except foe the dedicated. Like the teacher who educates as a Cyberman.
Making the requisite listmania, hot travel tips from Sir Francis Bacon. A lot cooler list is the top ten barely legal gadgets for the modern spy, as presented by WebUpon.
Last for tonight are the nightmare future robots of Kenji Yanobe. And maybe I should scale back the linking a bit... apparently, the world is chowing down on lots of information, only some of which is needed, or relevant, or interesting at any given time. So here’s one more morsel before bed. Apparently, there is no crying in the military.
