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silveradeptHuh. Had the entry there all ready to go and then never hit the send button. So I guess it’s a two-for-one deal. That’s it! Special price today, come on down...
Out in the world today, the new United Kingdom government still solidly backs the mission in Afghanistan, according to the new defence minister.
United States Border Patrol agents shot a young Mexican teen accused of throwing rocks at them. Really? A rock gets thrown, and the response is to shoot and kill? That’s the kind of behavior that encourages rock-throwing and then bullet-throwing at such border patrollers.
In the United States, we peek in on the phenomenon of Spanglish and its increased usage, showing off the ease at which people raised in a bilingual environment can blend together both the languages they speak.
Oh, FINALLY. The Office of Congressional Ethics has decided they want to look into Members of Congress staying at the C Street house, paying well below market rent for their time, and what connections their residencies have with The Family, a secretive religious organization with lobbying influence.
The people looking to solely blame the current administration for the BP oil disaster are stretching. Hard. Witness the following conspiracy that requires Rahm Emanuel, as a pay back for staying with someone who did consulting for BP, did not regulate BP. Ignoring totally all the years of regress beforehand by the Republicans in charge before him. And several other things that would make for much simpler explanations instead of grand conspiracies.
Oh, we should mention the other oil spill, the one in the supposedly safe Alaskan area, having dumped about 100,000 gallons of oil into the environment. And the oil spills in the Nigerian area that have been ongoing without media attention. Oh, also, anyone from BP claiming they didn't see this coming is talking out their ass.
Not that the potential for stupid is strictly limited to people blaming BP The Attorney General for Virginia filed his legal brief against the health care bill by citing...the reasons for the Boston Tea Party. Not precedent, not previous cases, not even necessarily the Constitution, but the Boston Tea Party.
And then there’s the Delaware lawmaker who said people who believed in separation of church and state were Nazis. He has apologized for the remark in the sense of “Oh, that was not at all what I meant to say - I meant to say that Hitler used separation of church and state to bad ends and those advocating for it here in America also want to use it for bad ends”.
Anyway, there were some primary races in several states yesterday. Arkansas Senator Blanche Lincoln survived a serious challenge to her seat from the Lieutenant Governor Bill Halter, managing to survive having joined the filibuster against the public option by helping out with the rest of the agenda. In Nevada, the Tea Party backed candidate beat the candidate that had suggested bartering for medical care to earn the right to face the Majority Leader in November. Considering that she’s against Social Security for younger workers, the Education Department, and the federal income tax, I think she’s going to have an uphill fight. And in South Carolina, the candidate accused of having multiple affairs was forced into a runoff for the Republican nomination.
In technology, sometimes, when reading the dispatches and arcane meanderings of the sciences and technologies, you wonder why they don’t try to bring it to a level that ordinary people can understand. After reading this letter about the differences between creating one's ideal work environment and administering it, as well as teh difficulties of dealing with ordinary people, I think I might understand a bit more of both sides - the frustration of having enius and having to deal with people not on your level, and the need to be able to bring things to the ordinary level, no matter how frustrating it is.
And then there are the cases of the governments that want their citizens to enjoy the Internet and social networking sites, but only those that don't contradict state ideology or advocate against the government. Against them, and those that want to censor with a more subtle hand (than China’s rather Jaegermonster-style approach), organizations like Wikileaks continue, even when one of their contributors is arrested on charges of leaking classified information.
Encouraging news: India may be at the forefront of a coalition designed to sabotage the still-being-negotiated-in-secret ACTA and force those pushing it to give it up. Should India succeed, media cabals might have to negotiate openly to get their whims imposed on the rest of us.
And then, technology put to excellent use - Nokia unveils a cellular phone charger powered by bicycle, which they will roll out in Kenya soon, providing a stable source of power to charge the means by which most Africans communicate, receive news, and connect with other people.
Speaking of neat stuff for the world around us, a treated paper test provides a blood typing for approximately 10 cents USD, whcih would help improve medicine in very poor areas. As could figuring out ways to disrupt communication ebtween bacteria so that skin cells could heal cuts faster.
The United States military has been looking into using technology that powers football broadcasts so that they can find, catalogue, sort, and pick out the interesting bits from the millions of hours of recorded video from drone flights and strikes.
Finally, recall that lots of people think ambient solar radiation has more than enough power in it to be beamed down to Terra and used to run our electrical world and are working toward making that world a reality.
Opinions opens up with quick htis from the Slacktivist about bicycle generators, vadals, and peopel who claim separation of church and state started with Hitler.
From there, the General's Inner Frenchman lambasts the Prescott City Council and school for their despicable behavior regarding the lightening of the child's skin on the mural.
Author Meghan Lindholm, also writing as Robin Hobb, explains why she thinks drugs like Ritalin are the very worst thing you can do to yourself or your kids, because drugs have consequences that take you away from your super-special natural self, and that everyone should be forced to cope without those kinds of drugs. Especailly if you ever want to have any success as an artist - you just have to accept the crazy and deal, or you can take the drugs and become a soulless, mindless zombie! Um, yeah.
Mr. Rubin suggests he's got the basics of radical terrorism strategies, most of which is “we’ll try to make bad PR for you and force you into making mistakes that we can exploit”. Which is asymmetric warfare at its finest. Mr. Rubin thinks the best way to beat such terror groups is to not be convinced by their pyschology attacks and to keep fighting them forever, without believing there is such a thing as a diplomatic solution of a military one. The actual point of his column, however, is to say that liberals and bright people are perpetually deluded and pawns of terrorists when they believe that diplomacy or military solutions are possible and doable. I'm guessing there's also some sort of required support for Israel against THEM implied or required.
The WSJ's editorial board claims not to be bkaming the president for the BP oil disaster, but they are trying to take a smug superiority in that the complaints about regulators and industry being too close together has been a conservative staple for years. That may be true, but the conservative solution to that problem has been to get rid of the regulators and let the companies operate with no oversight, instead of attempting to rein in the coziness and put the regulators back in the regulator seat. Whcih is what the WSJ is all about in their implication that Barack Obama is deluded in believing that regulation can still work.
Speaking of accusing the president of delusions, Ms. Rabinowitz chooses her words carefully in describing the "alien" in the White House, being very careful to talk only about his governming philosophy, his apparent out-of-touchness with the regular American, his treatment of old allies as foreign persons and enemies as people in teh same boat together. It would not do at all to actually accuse him of being an illegal alien, because that’s nonsense, but if we can manage to raise that spectre through talking about how foreign he is, well, what conclusions people draw is their own business. Just remember, says she, he can’t or won’t name “radical Islam” as The Enemy and go crusading (see how word choice matters?) against them like the last president did.
Another delusion accusation flung around more generally - Mr. Carrol says there's an easy way to balance the budget - go back to spending only as much as Reagan did in his era, or at least back to the beginning of the Bush 43 presidency, and the budget will balance itself without any tax increases. And then, of course, expect the Republicans to sit on demands for tax cuts or to spend the surpluses we might generate in attempting to make a balanced budget on military spending. And the Democrats to not use surpluses to fund the social program funds that have been raided by Republicans and Democrats alike to pay for other things. And the people to be okay with the government taxing them lots so as to pay for debt obligations and an actual budget. Delusions all around.
And last out of opinions tonight, Mr. Klein claimed that liberals fail basic economics based on responses to a Zogby survey that counted which political groups made "unenlightened" answers to their questions, based on whether they agreed or diagreed with the statements made. The statements themselves are:
If you’re going to accuse someone of failing basic economics, one must first define what sort of economics you’re talking about, and then communicate to the people you’re asking about what kind of economics you’re talking about, then define your questions and statements in such a way as to be as objective as possible, and even then, you have to collect more detailed responses so you can discard the responses that are clearly not talking about the kind of economics you’re talking about. If, after that point, you still have a statistical sample worthy of reporting on, then you can talk about it, having mentioned all the other people that were discarded for being unsuitable. I’m thinking his ignorant liberals probably wouldn’t pass the statistical muster.
Last for tonight, critical analysis of couch cushion construction, and then more critical analysis of couch cushion construction.
Out in the world today, the new United Kingdom government still solidly backs the mission in Afghanistan, according to the new defence minister.
United States Border Patrol agents shot a young Mexican teen accused of throwing rocks at them. Really? A rock gets thrown, and the response is to shoot and kill? That’s the kind of behavior that encourages rock-throwing and then bullet-throwing at such border patrollers.
In the United States, we peek in on the phenomenon of Spanglish and its increased usage, showing off the ease at which people raised in a bilingual environment can blend together both the languages they speak.
Oh, FINALLY. The Office of Congressional Ethics has decided they want to look into Members of Congress staying at the C Street house, paying well below market rent for their time, and what connections their residencies have with The Family, a secretive religious organization with lobbying influence.
The people looking to solely blame the current administration for the BP oil disaster are stretching. Hard. Witness the following conspiracy that requires Rahm Emanuel, as a pay back for staying with someone who did consulting for BP, did not regulate BP. Ignoring totally all the years of regress beforehand by the Republicans in charge before him. And several other things that would make for much simpler explanations instead of grand conspiracies.
Oh, we should mention the other oil spill, the one in the supposedly safe Alaskan area, having dumped about 100,000 gallons of oil into the environment. And the oil spills in the Nigerian area that have been ongoing without media attention. Oh, also, anyone from BP claiming they didn't see this coming is talking out their ass.
Not that the potential for stupid is strictly limited to people blaming BP The Attorney General for Virginia filed his legal brief against the health care bill by citing...the reasons for the Boston Tea Party. Not precedent, not previous cases, not even necessarily the Constitution, but the Boston Tea Party.
And then there’s the Delaware lawmaker who said people who believed in separation of church and state were Nazis. He has apologized for the remark in the sense of “Oh, that was not at all what I meant to say - I meant to say that Hitler used separation of church and state to bad ends and those advocating for it here in America also want to use it for bad ends”.
Anyway, there were some primary races in several states yesterday. Arkansas Senator Blanche Lincoln survived a serious challenge to her seat from the Lieutenant Governor Bill Halter, managing to survive having joined the filibuster against the public option by helping out with the rest of the agenda. In Nevada, the Tea Party backed candidate beat the candidate that had suggested bartering for medical care to earn the right to face the Majority Leader in November. Considering that she’s against Social Security for younger workers, the Education Department, and the federal income tax, I think she’s going to have an uphill fight. And in South Carolina, the candidate accused of having multiple affairs was forced into a runoff for the Republican nomination.
In technology, sometimes, when reading the dispatches and arcane meanderings of the sciences and technologies, you wonder why they don’t try to bring it to a level that ordinary people can understand. After reading this letter about the differences between creating one's ideal work environment and administering it, as well as teh difficulties of dealing with ordinary people, I think I might understand a bit more of both sides - the frustration of having enius and having to deal with people not on your level, and the need to be able to bring things to the ordinary level, no matter how frustrating it is.
And then there are the cases of the governments that want their citizens to enjoy the Internet and social networking sites, but only those that don't contradict state ideology or advocate against the government. Against them, and those that want to censor with a more subtle hand (than China’s rather Jaegermonster-style approach), organizations like Wikileaks continue, even when one of their contributors is arrested on charges of leaking classified information.
Encouraging news: India may be at the forefront of a coalition designed to sabotage the still-being-negotiated-in-secret ACTA and force those pushing it to give it up. Should India succeed, media cabals might have to negotiate openly to get their whims imposed on the rest of us.
And then, technology put to excellent use - Nokia unveils a cellular phone charger powered by bicycle, which they will roll out in Kenya soon, providing a stable source of power to charge the means by which most Africans communicate, receive news, and connect with other people.
Speaking of neat stuff for the world around us, a treated paper test provides a blood typing for approximately 10 cents USD, whcih would help improve medicine in very poor areas. As could figuring out ways to disrupt communication ebtween bacteria so that skin cells could heal cuts faster.
The United States military has been looking into using technology that powers football broadcasts so that they can find, catalogue, sort, and pick out the interesting bits from the millions of hours of recorded video from drone flights and strikes.
Finally, recall that lots of people think ambient solar radiation has more than enough power in it to be beamed down to Terra and used to run our electrical world and are working toward making that world a reality.
Opinions opens up with quick htis from the Slacktivist about bicycle generators, vadals, and peopel who claim separation of church and state started with Hitler.
From there, the General's Inner Frenchman lambasts the Prescott City Council and school for their despicable behavior regarding the lightening of the child's skin on the mural.
Author Meghan Lindholm, also writing as Robin Hobb, explains why she thinks drugs like Ritalin are the very worst thing you can do to yourself or your kids, because drugs have consequences that take you away from your super-special natural self, and that everyone should be forced to cope without those kinds of drugs. Especailly if you ever want to have any success as an artist - you just have to accept the crazy and deal, or you can take the drugs and become a soulless, mindless zombie! Um, yeah.
Mr. Rubin suggests he's got the basics of radical terrorism strategies, most of which is “we’ll try to make bad PR for you and force you into making mistakes that we can exploit”. Which is asymmetric warfare at its finest. Mr. Rubin thinks the best way to beat such terror groups is to not be convinced by their pyschology attacks and to keep fighting them forever, without believing there is such a thing as a diplomatic solution of a military one. The actual point of his column, however, is to say that liberals and bright people are perpetually deluded and pawns of terrorists when they believe that diplomacy or military solutions are possible and doable. I'm guessing there's also some sort of required support for Israel against THEM implied or required.
The WSJ's editorial board claims not to be bkaming the president for the BP oil disaster, but they are trying to take a smug superiority in that the complaints about regulators and industry being too close together has been a conservative staple for years. That may be true, but the conservative solution to that problem has been to get rid of the regulators and let the companies operate with no oversight, instead of attempting to rein in the coziness and put the regulators back in the regulator seat. Whcih is what the WSJ is all about in their implication that Barack Obama is deluded in believing that regulation can still work.
Speaking of accusing the president of delusions, Ms. Rabinowitz chooses her words carefully in describing the "alien" in the White House, being very careful to talk only about his governming philosophy, his apparent out-of-touchness with the regular American, his treatment of old allies as foreign persons and enemies as people in teh same boat together. It would not do at all to actually accuse him of being an illegal alien, because that’s nonsense, but if we can manage to raise that spectre through talking about how foreign he is, well, what conclusions people draw is their own business. Just remember, says she, he can’t or won’t name “radical Islam” as The Enemy and go crusading (see how word choice matters?) against them like the last president did.
Another delusion accusation flung around more generally - Mr. Carrol says there's an easy way to balance the budget - go back to spending only as much as Reagan did in his era, or at least back to the beginning of the Bush 43 presidency, and the budget will balance itself without any tax increases. And then, of course, expect the Republicans to sit on demands for tax cuts or to spend the surpluses we might generate in attempting to make a balanced budget on military spending. And the Democrats to not use surpluses to fund the social program funds that have been raided by Republicans and Democrats alike to pay for other things. And the people to be okay with the government taxing them lots so as to pay for debt obligations and an actual budget. Delusions all around.
And last out of opinions tonight, Mr. Klein claimed that liberals fail basic economics based on responses to a Zogby survey that counted which political groups made "unenlightened" answers to their questions, based on whether they agreed or diagreed with the statements made. The statements themselves are:
- Restrictions on housing development make housing less affordable,(“UE”: Disagree)
- Mandatory licensing of professional services increases the prices of those services (“UE”: Disagree)
- Overall, the standard of living is higher today than it was 30 years ago (“UE”: Disagree)
- Rent control leads to housing shortages(“UE”: Disagree)
- A company with the largest market share is a monopoly (“UE”: Agree)
- Third World workers working for American companies overseas are being exploited (“UE”: Agree)
- Free trade leads to unemployment (“UE”: Agree)
- Minimum wage laws raise unemployment (“UE”: Disagree)
If you’re going to accuse someone of failing basic economics, one must first define what sort of economics you’re talking about, and then communicate to the people you’re asking about what kind of economics you’re talking about, then define your questions and statements in such a way as to be as objective as possible, and even then, you have to collect more detailed responses so you can discard the responses that are clearly not talking about the kind of economics you’re talking about. If, after that point, you still have a statistical sample worthy of reporting on, then you can talk about it, having mentioned all the other people that were discarded for being unsuitable. I’m thinking his ignorant liberals probably wouldn’t pass the statistical muster.
Last for tonight, critical analysis of couch cushion construction, and then more critical analysis of couch cushion construction.
no subject
Date: 2010-06-10 12:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-06-10 12:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-06-10 02:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-06-10 09:06 pm (UTC)I really think that she is absolutely, one hundred per cent wrong. Drugs should be considered on an individual basis; they're effective for many people (including me), but for others, they're not. It really, really depends on the person's biochemistry and psychological makeup, and whether they're taking the right sorts of drugs.
no subject
Date: 2010-06-11 03:06 am (UTC)