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Tuesday is worth reading - 11 August 2009
Aug. 12th, 2009 12:12 amThis week has been fun so far - lots of good times on the weekend, including getting to see the Henson exhibit at the Science Fiction Museum (where I got to see a reconstruction of Mahna Mahna and the Snowths among other neat things - each of which could probably be an exhibit unto itself), had fun out gaming, where I recorded my first Settlers of Catan victory. Hey, it’s not ascension, but it feels like an accomplishment. For the last couple of days, I’ve been at the opera, seeing The Ring (for which I will be going back for Parts III and IV later in the week), and work has been good and fulfilling. Life is good at this point.
So, to hop at the top with your daily pessimism, because otherwise this post would float away in its entirety, Craig Ferguson thinks he's figured out why everything sucks - advertisers started targeting youth, and now everyone wants to be young. This compounds when it becomes clear that return policies now require you to give them a cookie in addition to the product. Finally, add on the need to - All Hail Our Reptilian Overlords. Where was I? Oh, yes, for this week, 17 is the new 23, apparently.
The new film Inglorious Basterds is, well, pretty well divorced from the reality of the Second World War, but will make a nice action flick.
Straddling the domestic and the international, when there are no jobs at home, go elsewhere. Like all the way to China. If China is too far away, maybe an internship here? People are paying firms to find them unpaid internships, just so they can get the experience.
In the opinions department, health care is still on the line for many. Criticisms come from both sides of the aisle, to be certain, although they do seem to have a familiar sequence. Criticism on the left seems to mostly be disappointment that the President and the Democrats aren’t doing more with the majorities they have, worries that big lobbyists and corporate interests have already rigged the game against the common person and that the promised smiting of corporations won't happen, which can lead to active hostility at the idea that the President is a liberal from those who really are liberals, and that what we are seeing is a dog-and-pony show designed to make us accept mystery meat and call it steak.
Criticism on the right can involve things that are not true, or are more about the person than about the issues, or it can take things that aren’t related, like debt anxieties and put them to service making it seem like the people don’t want reforms. Mr. Blankley at least realizes the separateness of the issues when commenting on how the President's health-care plan may yet fail through his own fault. And complaints that the Democrats are spending without plans to make it sustainable are legitimate criticisms - but they shouldn’t be mistaken for the idea that the populace wouldn’t like to have some sort of health care guarantee. That said, the major attack angle seems to be the populace doesn't want government health care, and any government plan will inevitably lead to government making care decisions for people, instead of letting them make their own decisions. To the point of suggesting that savings gathered from people being healthier will be offset by care needed because they live longer.
Mr. Krugman attributes the reason we haven't completely free-fallen into a depression to the actions of big government running up big deficits. Not that we still might not topple over the edge, but we’re a little farther away from the precipice now. If you’re already poor, Ms. Ehrenreich knows it's even harder to stay afloat, especially when the law is doing its very best to fine you or put you in prison, even more so if you’re a person of color.
The principal of a Florida school faces contempt of court order charges for asking for a religious invocation after being told there was to be no religious promotion inside the classroom. The pastor in the area for the principal considers it time to fight what he sees as an unconstitutional order. In addition to standing up for the principal, the pastor has a romantic idea of the past, where everyone is white and Christian, with no illegal immigrants or Muslims, and where religion mingles freely in the schoolyard. Naturally, where there’s Jesusitis, there Jesus's General, with the praise and support these warriors clearly need.
For something slightly less satirical, the Slacktivist makes more of his case that The Cult of the Offended is people preferring to be manipulative by being offended at things they don't actually have an issue with, while preying on the Christian directive to not shout down people who are clearly not with the program on insignificant things, preferring overall harmony to detail-quibbling. Thus, in the spirit of go along, get along, suddenly the people who are the biggest detail-quibblers end up in positions of power and influence. This is, according to Paul, WEAK.
Mr. Finley had hoped the Internet would bring about the end of central media control and make people better critical thinkers. Instead, the opposite seems true, and nowhere is it better illustrated than in the birthers.
Well, if you’re going to lie, go big, I guess, or go home. On that theme let’s talk to our quiche recepients. Before we get to them, though, a moment of corporate vindication, of sorts - advertisers continue to flee Glenn Beck's show, even though they continue to advertise on FOX. Guess calling the black President a racist with a deep-seated hatred for white people is a bridge too far, eh, Glenn?
On the bronze level, Mr. Hanson, for his column declaring reform has to be passed now or it never will because the populace is increasingly hostile to the curretn administration. Not a wrong thing by any standards, but his justification that Obama’s popularity and programs are falling because the President was supposed to be bipartisan and post-identity politics is, well, off. The Democrats have been going it alone for much of the time because their counterparts have not really seen fit to offer substantive plans of the opposition, preferring instead to say no and hope it’s sufficient. And “identity politics” based on the Sotomayor nomination (where a supposedly racist remark was taken out of context and then hammered forever by the Republicans), the Holder “cowards” comment and the President’s own “acted stupidly” material is probably some of the more frank talk we’ve had on race matters, instead of platitudes from various white dudes. Different isn’t necessarily good, but we prefer change to status quo in the situation we were in at the beginning of the Presidency.
Making a strong case for the golden pastry is Ann Coulter, who is so incensed at all the accusations of Republicans being conspiracy nuts that she feels she has to name a few of her own - including whether or not the last administrator had knowledge that the 9/11 attacks were forthcoming...which he did. And chose to ignore. Of course, he couldn’t have predicted the day it was going to happen, but there’s at least one memo pointing out that plans were in motion involving commercial airplanes. Her other conspiracies that Democrats are apparently part of include the innocence of O.J. Simpson, Keith Olbermann’s Ivy League degree, and several of the subjects of Michael Moore’s films, for which she claims the Democrats are bigger nuts because they get seen in public with conspiracy nuts. Would that be before or after the Representatives sponsor birther bills, Ann?
Ann misses the mark, however, because she doesn’t have grand enough vision. When lying, go big or go home, really. If you get called out, then you might still take home this dishonor of being the Worst Person in the World. Tonight’s recipient? The editors at Investor's Business Daily, who spread the fear that government euthaniasia and forced consultations on how the elderly want to die is coming because utilitarianism will take over, and great minds like Stephen Hawking wouldn't survive in places like the United Kingdom, where such utilitarianism is already in force. The problem with their claim? Professor Hawking was born in the United Kingdom and has lived his entire life there. It says so on the official hawking.org.uk website's biography, among other places. Just because the computer doesn’t have an accent doesn’t mean the person isn’t a UK citizen.
In technology, the rear-projection urinal, such that one does not have to miss the game while peeing... or could take a leak over one's most despised television personalities, the use of jet engines on trucks and other motor vehicles, often to comedic, high-speed, or flaming effect, a pacemaker that communicates with doctors over WiFi, and the possibility that schizophrenic symptoms may be a result of insufficient neural pathways to process all the data.
Last for tonight, even the 99 cent store holds things of wonder to the sexually adventurous, and social media pillows, because curling up next to your favorite brand icon is popular these days.
This post may need some editing remarks. Here's a few to get you started.
So, to hop at the top with your daily pessimism, because otherwise this post would float away in its entirety, Craig Ferguson thinks he's figured out why everything sucks - advertisers started targeting youth, and now everyone wants to be young. This compounds when it becomes clear that return policies now require you to give them a cookie in addition to the product. Finally, add on the need to - All Hail Our Reptilian Overlords. Where was I? Oh, yes, for this week, 17 is the new 23, apparently.
The new film Inglorious Basterds is, well, pretty well divorced from the reality of the Second World War, but will make a nice action flick.
Straddling the domestic and the international, when there are no jobs at home, go elsewhere. Like all the way to China. If China is too far away, maybe an internship here? People are paying firms to find them unpaid internships, just so they can get the experience.
In the opinions department, health care is still on the line for many. Criticisms come from both sides of the aisle, to be certain, although they do seem to have a familiar sequence. Criticism on the left seems to mostly be disappointment that the President and the Democrats aren’t doing more with the majorities they have, worries that big lobbyists and corporate interests have already rigged the game against the common person and that the promised smiting of corporations won't happen, which can lead to active hostility at the idea that the President is a liberal from those who really are liberals, and that what we are seeing is a dog-and-pony show designed to make us accept mystery meat and call it steak.
Criticism on the right can involve things that are not true, or are more about the person than about the issues, or it can take things that aren’t related, like debt anxieties and put them to service making it seem like the people don’t want reforms. Mr. Blankley at least realizes the separateness of the issues when commenting on how the President's health-care plan may yet fail through his own fault. And complaints that the Democrats are spending without plans to make it sustainable are legitimate criticisms - but they shouldn’t be mistaken for the idea that the populace wouldn’t like to have some sort of health care guarantee. That said, the major attack angle seems to be the populace doesn't want government health care, and any government plan will inevitably lead to government making care decisions for people, instead of letting them make their own decisions. To the point of suggesting that savings gathered from people being healthier will be offset by care needed because they live longer.
Mr. Krugman attributes the reason we haven't completely free-fallen into a depression to the actions of big government running up big deficits. Not that we still might not topple over the edge, but we’re a little farther away from the precipice now. If you’re already poor, Ms. Ehrenreich knows it's even harder to stay afloat, especially when the law is doing its very best to fine you or put you in prison, even more so if you’re a person of color.
The principal of a Florida school faces contempt of court order charges for asking for a religious invocation after being told there was to be no religious promotion inside the classroom. The pastor in the area for the principal considers it time to fight what he sees as an unconstitutional order. In addition to standing up for the principal, the pastor has a romantic idea of the past, where everyone is white and Christian, with no illegal immigrants or Muslims, and where religion mingles freely in the schoolyard. Naturally, where there’s Jesusitis, there Jesus's General, with the praise and support these warriors clearly need.
For something slightly less satirical, the Slacktivist makes more of his case that The Cult of the Offended is people preferring to be manipulative by being offended at things they don't actually have an issue with, while preying on the Christian directive to not shout down people who are clearly not with the program on insignificant things, preferring overall harmony to detail-quibbling. Thus, in the spirit of go along, get along, suddenly the people who are the biggest detail-quibblers end up in positions of power and influence. This is, according to Paul, WEAK.
Mr. Finley had hoped the Internet would bring about the end of central media control and make people better critical thinkers. Instead, the opposite seems true, and nowhere is it better illustrated than in the birthers.
Well, if you’re going to lie, go big, I guess, or go home. On that theme let’s talk to our quiche recepients. Before we get to them, though, a moment of corporate vindication, of sorts - advertisers continue to flee Glenn Beck's show, even though they continue to advertise on FOX. Guess calling the black President a racist with a deep-seated hatred for white people is a bridge too far, eh, Glenn?
On the bronze level, Mr. Hanson, for his column declaring reform has to be passed now or it never will because the populace is increasingly hostile to the curretn administration. Not a wrong thing by any standards, but his justification that Obama’s popularity and programs are falling because the President was supposed to be bipartisan and post-identity politics is, well, off. The Democrats have been going it alone for much of the time because their counterparts have not really seen fit to offer substantive plans of the opposition, preferring instead to say no and hope it’s sufficient. And “identity politics” based on the Sotomayor nomination (where a supposedly racist remark was taken out of context and then hammered forever by the Republicans), the Holder “cowards” comment and the President’s own “acted stupidly” material is probably some of the more frank talk we’ve had on race matters, instead of platitudes from various white dudes. Different isn’t necessarily good, but we prefer change to status quo in the situation we were in at the beginning of the Presidency.
Making a strong case for the golden pastry is Ann Coulter, who is so incensed at all the accusations of Republicans being conspiracy nuts that she feels she has to name a few of her own - including whether or not the last administrator had knowledge that the 9/11 attacks were forthcoming...which he did. And chose to ignore. Of course, he couldn’t have predicted the day it was going to happen, but there’s at least one memo pointing out that plans were in motion involving commercial airplanes. Her other conspiracies that Democrats are apparently part of include the innocence of O.J. Simpson, Keith Olbermann’s Ivy League degree, and several of the subjects of Michael Moore’s films, for which she claims the Democrats are bigger nuts because they get seen in public with conspiracy nuts. Would that be before or after the Representatives sponsor birther bills, Ann?
Ann misses the mark, however, because she doesn’t have grand enough vision. When lying, go big or go home, really. If you get called out, then you might still take home this dishonor of being the Worst Person in the World. Tonight’s recipient? The editors at Investor's Business Daily, who spread the fear that government euthaniasia and forced consultations on how the elderly want to die is coming because utilitarianism will take over, and great minds like Stephen Hawking wouldn't survive in places like the United Kingdom, where such utilitarianism is already in force. The problem with their claim? Professor Hawking was born in the United Kingdom and has lived his entire life there. It says so on the official hawking.org.uk website's biography, among other places. Just because the computer doesn’t have an accent doesn’t mean the person isn’t a UK citizen.
In technology, the rear-projection urinal, such that one does not have to miss the game while peeing... or could take a leak over one's most despised television personalities, the use of jet engines on trucks and other motor vehicles, often to comedic, high-speed, or flaming effect, a pacemaker that communicates with doctors over WiFi, and the possibility that schizophrenic symptoms may be a result of insufficient neural pathways to process all the data.
Last for tonight, even the 99 cent store holds things of wonder to the sexually adventurous, and social media pillows, because curling up next to your favorite brand icon is popular these days.
This post may need some editing remarks. Here's a few to get you started.
