2014 archive
Der Spiegel Finds a Bright Spot 0
Der Spiegel looks beyond the distressingly rightward leanings of the EU elections to find a ray of hope. The EU is starting to be noticed.
For the first time in the European Union’s history, the major parties in the European Parliament launched top candidates who campaigned for the job of European Commission president and gave stump speeches across much of Europe in an experiment that affected more than 400 million voters.
I don’t know enough about the European Union to have an opinion beyond this: that the states of Europe, whose petty wars inform the curriculum of “Western History,” are trying to work together is an unavoidably good thing. Just read the rest.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
Politeness demands R*E*S*P*E*C*T.
Moments later, she heard a “pop, pop, pop” on the telephone line, according to Sheriff’s Office reports released Monday.
(snip)
When deputies arrived at the Stewart Road home Sunday evening, John Douglas — Doris Douglas’ husband and Patterson’s stepfather — was on the front porch smoking a cigarette.
John Douglas told detectives Patterson came home drunk and “began to disrespect him,” reports said.
I trust he will get a lot of R*E*S*P*E*C*T in J*A*I*L.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
Be polite to drop-in guests.
After the crash someone emerged from the house and fired on the 18-year-old driver, Hidalgo County sheriff’s spokesman JP Rodriguez said.
School for Scamdal 0
To call this a “kangaroo court” is to insult kangaroos.
Stray Thought 0
I have one Windows computer.
It’s set to dual-boot Windows and Linux (currently, Mageia–it’s not Slackware, but it is a good solid distro).
I’m currently booted into Windows to pick up recent updates and to play a bit with Rainmeter, run virus scans (something not usually needed in my Linux world), and keep my Windows skills fresh. If you are a Windows user and want a decent system monitor program, you might want to take a look at Rainmeter.
Every time I boot into the Windows side of this box, I am reminded how really and truly clunky and annoying Windows can be.
Hollow Thanks 0
I agree with Leonard Pitts, Jr., that “Thank you for your service” uttered to a member of the armed forces is a callow and empty phrase. Indeed, I have had veterans of my personal acquaintance tell me that their reaction to hearing it ranges somewhere between apathy and loathing.
It’s as empty as “I’m sorry for your loss” said by the detective on the telly vision to another character just before starting the third degree.
Pitts points out that the empty thanks have been expressed for a long long time–indeed, for much longer than he cites. A nugget from Pitt’s column:
It would not look like Veterans Affairs facilities across the country requiring sick and injured veterans to wait months to see the doctor, then falsifying records to make it appear they were actually being seen much more quickly. This, of course, is the scandal that has roiled the White House and put Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki on the defensive.
But look past that. A love they could see would also not look like a backlog of disability claims that peaked last year at more than 900,000, forcing some veterans to wait a year or more for their benefits. Nor would it look like the 2007 Washington Post report about wounded men recovering in a military hospital with rotting walls, creeping mold and vermin sauntering about.
Point being, this new scandal is not new. Rather, it is but a variation on a sadly recurrent theme: the neglect of our veterans.
Read the rest. Then read this. And this.
Voices in His Head 0
Honest to Pete, you can’t make this stuff up.
Alpha Male 0
He couldn’t get a girlfriend.
So he killed girls, and, as Chauncey Devega predicts, no notice will be taken.
I got nothing. Just follow the link.
Borrowed Time 0
The SS United States Conservancy is looking to sell a massive propeller sitting on its deck in Philadelphia.
She set records in her prime.
Were she an ugly old building distinguished for nothing more than being old and ugly, preservationists would be clambering to preserve her.
You can see some more pictures of her here.
Belle 0
Yesterday, we went to see the movie, Belle, at the Naro (the Naro is a gem and a treasure).
You should see it too. It is much better than most critics seem to think; the critics seem lukewarm because the characterization is not complex enough for their refined tastes, the issues are too black-and-white (you will pardon the expression) for their complex minds, but, frankly, they miss the point. They are dissecting the movie as a movie, as some stand-alone thing, without context. The movie, for all that it is a movie, lives in today’s world; it brings alive issues of race and racism, subjugation and injustice, bigotry and exploitation, that live still, issues that are, indeed, black and white. Nothing illustrates this better than that one American political party still today exploits race and racism, subjugation and injustice, bigotry and exploitation to maintain its existence and fill the coffers of its candidates.
Portrait of Dido Elizabeth Belle and Lady Elizabeth Murray
Know, though, that it is not a documentary. It is “based on a true story,” but it is not a true story. After all, it’s a movie, and one that is not all comic book heroes and CGI and remakes and silly sex jokes (those qualities suffice to make it an exception in these days, as the movie industry seems rarely capable of coughing up anything other than comic book heroes, CGI, remakes, and silly sex jokes). A “fictionalized” narrative of the real Belle is shoe-horned into a narrative about an insurance court case over the slave ship Zong, in which the crew of the ship tossed their “cargo” over the side of the ship so they could collect the insurance on the lives of the chattels–that is, items of property, such as chairs and tables–tossed them over the gunwales as if they had been chairs and tables.
Little is actually known about the real Belle. If you are interested in her, perhaps the best starting point is this post by Henry Louis Gates.*
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*Remember Henry Louis Gates? He was the Harvard professor who was rousted by the cops for coming home while black.
Stray Thought, Memorial Day Dept. 0
It’s Memorial Day weekend.
Remember that young folks die because old men lie.
As you honor the young folks, so too should you contemn and disdain the old men, the ones who lied.