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Greetings once again. Observe the following: once again, we are reminded that there are places that will happily kidnap teenagers and subject them to abuse in the name of making them into the children their parents believe they should be. Whether it's The Gay, or some minor slight, or some other thing, these camps and their services do their very best to make any of their charges into a sociopath, and someone willing to say anything just to get out and away from the program.
Today's winners of the Just Because Someone's Published Doesn't Mean They Know What They're Talking About Hatchet To The Head is Meghan Cox Gurdon, for a piece about how YA literature is Too Dark and that teenagers don't really want to read fiction where protagonists and teens like themselves suffer horribly or go through life's adversities, or worse, all that Dark Fiction is normalizing things that we should think of as beyond the pale. And there's a sidebar segregating recommendations by gender, as if there was some sort of forbidden territory for boys or girls to be reading. Across the country, you could likely hear the head explosions of many an author and librarian as they read the article. Published writer Yasmine Galenorn points out that books saved her from her childhood abuse.
The WSJ article also advocates for the censorship of those dark YA books, because teenagers should be reading things that are good for them to read and have good morals and lessons. The LA Review of books points out that there's already plenty of YA literature that fits those criteria, but that there's also a need for books that aren't positive sappy stories.
The point is, and the hashtag #YASaves and others point out something important - teenagers read books that are close to their life. If you wonder about the popularity of "Dark" YA, the question you should be asking is not "Are these suitable?" but "What is it about a teenager's life today that makes these books so popular?" The answer is almost always "It reflects my life, and the people in it overcome, so maybe I can, too." The statistics back up this idea - the darkness in YA novels reflects the darkness in their readers' lives.
Finally, data indicating that commuting to work is a negative experience on people - on their health, their relationships, and several other factors of their life that make them very unhappy, unhealthy, and unlucky in love. So living close by really is a good thing.
Out in the world today, the Cisco corporation used Canadian authorities to arrest and criminally charge a whistleblower who was engaged in civil suit against the company, using friends and allies in the United States Attorney General's office to create the charges and then demand that Canada extradite the man back to the United States for trial.
The United States and United Kingdom governments took responsibility for a hacking action against al-Qaeda's magazine, inserting a URL to cupcake recipies instead of the purported bomb-making recipes.
The conflict in Libya escalated again, this time with NATO acknowldging the use of attack helicopters against Gaddafi's forces. Funny how that item has sharply dropped off the radar recently.
The United States Defense Secretary recommended onyl small troop withdrawals from the Afghanistan conflict, believing it made more sense to keep as many troops available as possible. He also suggested support troops be the troops removed first, before any combat troops.
Domestically, staying on the vein, the Defense Secretary also mentioned that members of the military who do not approve of the repeal of the "Don't Ask, Dont't Tell" policy that allows for military members to be openly gay or lesbian will not be allowed to resign their enlistment in protest over the matter. The Secretary made his point clearly: "The reality is that you don't all agree with each other on your politics, you don't agree with each other on your religion, you don't agree with each other on a lot of things,...But you still serve together. And you work together. And you look out for each other. And that's all that matters."
After initially calling it a hacking of his Twitter account, Representative Weiner of New York admitted that he had sent a salacious picture as a joke to women who were not his wife. He said he would not resign, as he believed he had not done anything wrong or unethical that would cause him to lose his job. The Ethics committee of the House of Representatives will likely be the final arbiter of that point, with several prominent Congresspersons calling for an investigation.
In technology, A group naming itself LulzSec has claimed responsibility for several prominent hacks, including the hack of an FBI affiliate based in Atlants. The spate of atatcks seems to have increased the calls for the government to act as though they take Internet terrorism and attacks seriously.
Authorities in the United States are attempting to use technology that reads the body to predict which of its passengers might be likely to commit a terror act. It's a small facet of a larger trend toward trying to predict the circumstances that lead to crime, using statistical analysis and data crunching.
Nintendo introduces the Wii U, a next-generation console with all the capabilities of the current Wii, as well as high-definition graphics, and a screen on the unit itself, making the item a hybrid of portable platform and console for television. It should be interesting to see what comes out for the console.
Finally, a suggestion that a large amount of spammers may be able to be stopped by shutting down the banks that account for most of their transactions.
In opinions, The question of elves as representing white supremacy and racism toward people of color, nicely packaged.
A cleric claiming to follow the being represented by the Tetragrammaton has indicated his belief that ordering the genocide of other peoples is wise and just. This is one of those parts that requires justification - violence in religion is nothing new, but if you're going to go and say that the disobedience of a major commndment is okay, you'd better have some really good evidence to back that up, regardless of what belief system you claim to be following.
Mr. Mauro dismisses the claim that Iran may not be working toward a nuclear device with an IAEA report chastising Iran and Syria about their nuclear enrichment activities and missile development programmes.
Mr. Jenkins, Jr. says the fastest way to stop intrusions into corporate and government e-mails and accounts is to vocally name and shame those responsible, especially China, who will apparently stop because they crave the illusion of control.
Ms. Saunders is nonplusssed about first resopnders who were unable to save a person who intended to drown themselves, because of regulations forbidding offshore rescues in the island town. She does point out that the training for offshore work had been a victim of budgetary cuts, which in my head indicates that the regulation was probably there to stop someone from making things worse and killing themselves and the person drowning by trying to do something wrong - it's very easy for someone to pull another down when in the panic of being pulled under. To Ms. Saunders, however, the hero instinct should have kicked in and the first responders should have flaunted the rules to try and save the person there, and the fact that they stood by means they're not fit to be first responders, who must have that hero instinct always ready.
Mr. Skeel suggests that the current auto recovery could have been accomplished through the normal bankruptcy process, instead of the special government deal, and the messages sent about letting the market remain in control would have been better. Mr. Brownfield is much less kind, considering the auto bailout to have been both precedent-setting and an expensive problem that should have been avoided.
Ms. Noonan believes the defining sentence of Barack Obama's presidency will be "He made it worse" with regard to everything - jobs, debt, and all the other issues people elected him, and then the Republicans, to fix. Mr. Krauthammer is quite pleased at the prospect of blackmail being used against the President to get what the Republicans want, and believes that any progress toward reducing the debt is good progress. Most likely because he assumes the Republicans will insist that all spending cuts come from social programs, allowing them to enact the Ryan budget without having actually been able to pass it through both houses of Congress. Hopefully our future selves will remember the laundry list of dirty tricks turned in politics this and next year when deciding the makeup of the branches of government.
Mr. Pendry defends the political virtue of Sarah Palin, continuing the line of defense that was popular in 2008 - Ms. Palin is a true populist, unlike the snobbish elites in both political parties that are determined to bar her access to power. We have sufficient evidence that Ms. Palin is cut in the cloth of "people you would want to have a beer with". The problem with that are all the gaffes and deliberate statements that Ms. Palin has made that indicate she's not cut out for the job. While, to Mr. Pendry, that sounds like the snobs talking, if one polled the people, they would probably find a fairly significant chunk who would repeat those statements in their own words.
Mr. Thomas has unkind words for the nations of the Middle East, believing that The Bloodthirsty Religion will ensure that there is no actual democracy coming from those nations that experienced revolutions, because they will seize the power vacuums and turn those states into theocracies. He's certain of it, because the dark-skinned people over there have no concept nor foundation of democracy, so they are doomed to failure. Kind of like how the colonies of the English had no foundation in democracy when they overthrew their strongmen, right, Mr. Thomas?
Last for tonight, A letter that accompanied a Purple Heart, discovered in the desk of the President that sent the recipient off to war, and his death.
Today's winners of the Just Because Someone's Published Doesn't Mean They Know What They're Talking About Hatchet To The Head is Meghan Cox Gurdon, for a piece about how YA literature is Too Dark and that teenagers don't really want to read fiction where protagonists and teens like themselves suffer horribly or go through life's adversities, or worse, all that Dark Fiction is normalizing things that we should think of as beyond the pale. And there's a sidebar segregating recommendations by gender, as if there was some sort of forbidden territory for boys or girls to be reading. Across the country, you could likely hear the head explosions of many an author and librarian as they read the article. Published writer Yasmine Galenorn points out that books saved her from her childhood abuse.
The WSJ article also advocates for the censorship of those dark YA books, because teenagers should be reading things that are good for them to read and have good morals and lessons. The LA Review of books points out that there's already plenty of YA literature that fits those criteria, but that there's also a need for books that aren't positive sappy stories.
The point is, and the hashtag #YASaves and others point out something important - teenagers read books that are close to their life. If you wonder about the popularity of "Dark" YA, the question you should be asking is not "Are these suitable?" but "What is it about a teenager's life today that makes these books so popular?" The answer is almost always "It reflects my life, and the people in it overcome, so maybe I can, too." The statistics back up this idea - the darkness in YA novels reflects the darkness in their readers' lives.
Finally, data indicating that commuting to work is a negative experience on people - on their health, their relationships, and several other factors of their life that make them very unhappy, unhealthy, and unlucky in love. So living close by really is a good thing.
Out in the world today, the Cisco corporation used Canadian authorities to arrest and criminally charge a whistleblower who was engaged in civil suit against the company, using friends and allies in the United States Attorney General's office to create the charges and then demand that Canada extradite the man back to the United States for trial.
The United States and United Kingdom governments took responsibility for a hacking action against al-Qaeda's magazine, inserting a URL to cupcake recipies instead of the purported bomb-making recipes.
The conflict in Libya escalated again, this time with NATO acknowldging the use of attack helicopters against Gaddafi's forces. Funny how that item has sharply dropped off the radar recently.
The United States Defense Secretary recommended onyl small troop withdrawals from the Afghanistan conflict, believing it made more sense to keep as many troops available as possible. He also suggested support troops be the troops removed first, before any combat troops.
Domestically, staying on the vein, the Defense Secretary also mentioned that members of the military who do not approve of the repeal of the "Don't Ask, Dont't Tell" policy that allows for military members to be openly gay or lesbian will not be allowed to resign their enlistment in protest over the matter. The Secretary made his point clearly: "The reality is that you don't all agree with each other on your politics, you don't agree with each other on your religion, you don't agree with each other on a lot of things,...But you still serve together. And you work together. And you look out for each other. And that's all that matters."
After initially calling it a hacking of his Twitter account, Representative Weiner of New York admitted that he had sent a salacious picture as a joke to women who were not his wife. He said he would not resign, as he believed he had not done anything wrong or unethical that would cause him to lose his job. The Ethics committee of the House of Representatives will likely be the final arbiter of that point, with several prominent Congresspersons calling for an investigation.
In technology, A group naming itself LulzSec has claimed responsibility for several prominent hacks, including the hack of an FBI affiliate based in Atlants. The spate of atatcks seems to have increased the calls for the government to act as though they take Internet terrorism and attacks seriously.
Authorities in the United States are attempting to use technology that reads the body to predict which of its passengers might be likely to commit a terror act. It's a small facet of a larger trend toward trying to predict the circumstances that lead to crime, using statistical analysis and data crunching.
Nintendo introduces the Wii U, a next-generation console with all the capabilities of the current Wii, as well as high-definition graphics, and a screen on the unit itself, making the item a hybrid of portable platform and console for television. It should be interesting to see what comes out for the console.
Finally, a suggestion that a large amount of spammers may be able to be stopped by shutting down the banks that account for most of their transactions.
In opinions, The question of elves as representing white supremacy and racism toward people of color, nicely packaged.
A cleric claiming to follow the being represented by the Tetragrammaton has indicated his belief that ordering the genocide of other peoples is wise and just. This is one of those parts that requires justification - violence in religion is nothing new, but if you're going to go and say that the disobedience of a major commndment is okay, you'd better have some really good evidence to back that up, regardless of what belief system you claim to be following.
Mr. Mauro dismisses the claim that Iran may not be working toward a nuclear device with an IAEA report chastising Iran and Syria about their nuclear enrichment activities and missile development programmes.
Mr. Jenkins, Jr. says the fastest way to stop intrusions into corporate and government e-mails and accounts is to vocally name and shame those responsible, especially China, who will apparently stop because they crave the illusion of control.
Ms. Saunders is nonplusssed about first resopnders who were unable to save a person who intended to drown themselves, because of regulations forbidding offshore rescues in the island town. She does point out that the training for offshore work had been a victim of budgetary cuts, which in my head indicates that the regulation was probably there to stop someone from making things worse and killing themselves and the person drowning by trying to do something wrong - it's very easy for someone to pull another down when in the panic of being pulled under. To Ms. Saunders, however, the hero instinct should have kicked in and the first responders should have flaunted the rules to try and save the person there, and the fact that they stood by means they're not fit to be first responders, who must have that hero instinct always ready.
Mr. Skeel suggests that the current auto recovery could have been accomplished through the normal bankruptcy process, instead of the special government deal, and the messages sent about letting the market remain in control would have been better. Mr. Brownfield is much less kind, considering the auto bailout to have been both precedent-setting and an expensive problem that should have been avoided.
Ms. Noonan believes the defining sentence of Barack Obama's presidency will be "He made it worse" with regard to everything - jobs, debt, and all the other issues people elected him, and then the Republicans, to fix. Mr. Krauthammer is quite pleased at the prospect of blackmail being used against the President to get what the Republicans want, and believes that any progress toward reducing the debt is good progress. Most likely because he assumes the Republicans will insist that all spending cuts come from social programs, allowing them to enact the Ryan budget without having actually been able to pass it through both houses of Congress. Hopefully our future selves will remember the laundry list of dirty tricks turned in politics this and next year when deciding the makeup of the branches of government.
Mr. Pendry defends the political virtue of Sarah Palin, continuing the line of defense that was popular in 2008 - Ms. Palin is a true populist, unlike the snobbish elites in both political parties that are determined to bar her access to power. We have sufficient evidence that Ms. Palin is cut in the cloth of "people you would want to have a beer with". The problem with that are all the gaffes and deliberate statements that Ms. Palin has made that indicate she's not cut out for the job. While, to Mr. Pendry, that sounds like the snobs talking, if one polled the people, they would probably find a fairly significant chunk who would repeat those statements in their own words.
Mr. Thomas has unkind words for the nations of the Middle East, believing that The Bloodthirsty Religion will ensure that there is no actual democracy coming from those nations that experienced revolutions, because they will seize the power vacuums and turn those states into theocracies. He's certain of it, because the dark-skinned people over there have no concept nor foundation of democracy, so they are doomed to failure. Kind of like how the colonies of the English had no foundation in democracy when they overthrew their strongmen, right, Mr. Thomas?
Last for tonight, A letter that accompanied a Purple Heart, discovered in the desk of the President that sent the recipient off to war, and his death.
