First Looks category archive

Via All Things Amazing, an image site (some images NSFW).

Suzanne Degges-White has some pointers that may cast light upon some of our polity.

Shorter David Mills: Plastic bag people, you’re such a drag.

Aside:

Thanks to the arrival of the German chains Lidl and Aldi in our neck of the woods, we’ve become quite used to supplying our own reusable bags, and, frankly, it works out quite nicely. Usually, two of the reusable bags suffice where, before, we would leave the store with five or more plastic bags.

At the Portland Press-Herald, Victoria Hugo-Vidal argues that have forgotten what the phrase, “working class,” means. Here’s one example she cites (emphasis added):

I was thinking about class drag, and class in general, because of Rep. Jared Golden. After I wrote a column about his out-of-character Twitter student loan forgiveness rant, Golden published a post to the online platform Substack, saying, “Recently, a political opinion writer described me as living in the cocoon of my present work in politics and my past service in the military and, therefore, out of step with the working class. This fragment of my work history ignores the fact that I spent many years working at the business that belongs to my mother, and before her, to her father.”

(snip)

But more important is Rep. Golden’s second sentence, implying that having worked for his family business puts him more in step with the working class. Here’s the important thing to remember: Working a job does not make you working-class. We’re talking about a multigenerational family business (a golf course, specifically) here. The profit that business generates goes to the family that owns the business. The owners dole out part of those profits to their employees in the form of salaries or wages. Those employees who do the labor are the working class. Not the owners.

Methinks the entire piece is worthy of your attention.

Bad Voltage, S03E61.

It gave me a laugh on my drive to this month’s DL.

Off to drink liberally.

Via PoliticalProf.

When I worked for the railroad, I took the train to New York more times than I can remember. The first view of New York was the towers of the World Trade Center above the New Jersey bluffs before the train entered the tunnel to Penn Station.

Many years later, when I was no longer working for the railroad, I had occasion to take the train to New York. The first view of New York was no World Trade Center above the New Jersey bluffs before the train entered the tunnel to Penn Station.

Image via All Things Amazing, an image site (some images NSFW).

Jim Hightower is not impressed by Big Pharma’s hissy fit.

We human beings sometimes do some terrible things in pursuit of the almighty dollar. But to our credit, one moral line we humans don’t cross is to profiteer by gouging sick people on the price of medicines their lives depend on.

Unless, of course, you count executives of giant pharmaceutical corporations as human beings. Gouging patients is their preferred business model.

I commend his entire piece to your attention.

When news coverage went from being a loss-leader and a service to being a profit center, when news went from information to “infotainment,” well, that’s when this discourse became dis coarse.

At Psychology Today Blogs, Claudia Skowron tries to make sense of the pumpkin spice phenomena. A snippet:

Many will argue that the pumpkin spice flavor itself is delicious. Ironically, most pumpkin spices have next to no pumpkin in them . . . .

Monarch of the Glen. It starts off kind of slow, but rapidly becomes an absolute hoot.

It’s currently available on tubi and possibly other streaming services.

I remember hearing the McGuire Sisters on Arthur Godfrey’s radio show back in the olden days, when I was a young ‘un. I liked them then, and I like them now.

One more time, “social” media isn’t.

At The Kansas City Star, a retired Army officer and self-described “life-long Republican” explains why he has become disenchanted with today’s Republican Party. Here’s the gist; follow the link for the bill of particulars.

The Christian right’s influence on the GOP continues to grow. As a result, the party has lost its way. It no longer applies the concept of less government regulation of social life. Instead, the GOP increasingly gives the Christian right a path of manically forcing its values on Americans through public policy and laws.

(Broken link fixed.)

Gadzooks! The gullibility!

This blog is 18 years old today.

It may be drivel, but it’s my drivel.

From my recent visit to my dentist (who is excellent, by the way) to have some old fillings repaired:

Dentist: Now let’s numb this other tooth. Be ready for a sting–maybe worse than last one. This may hurt a bit.

(Dentist applies syringe. I hardly feel a thing, but I still flinch, as years of evolution tell us not to allow others to stick pointy things into our bodies.)

Me: I barely felt a thing. Is that some kind of psychological tactic to make me think it wasn’t as painful as it might have been?

Dentist. Well (long pause) yes.

By the way, he is a highly skilled and extremely competent dentist and I am very happy to be among his patients.