2011 archive
Twits on Twitter 0
They know where you are:
The words you write on Twitter can tell people more than just the status of your relationship or how you like the latest Bon Jovi CD. It may just indicate not only how you’re living, but where you’re living in the U.S.
And if you twit in Spanish, there’s a good chance you’re in Argentina.
“I’ll Be Dining at the Club” 0
One does so hope that the cuisine will be palatable.
Dick Destiny reports on a doctoral dissertation about “Food Defense Management Practices in Private Country Clubs.”
I’ve only dined at one or two private country clubs, once at a reunion and once at a wedding.
I did determine that I needed to defend myself against the food.
Aside:
It appears that, as the number of doctoral candidates increases, the number of non-silly dissertation subjects decreases.
QOTD 0
Andrew Dickson White, from the Quotemaster (subscribe here):
The cardinal doctrine of a fanatic’s creed is that his enemies are the enemies of God.
Flame On 0
Over the years, I have become pretty good at flaming trolls and troglodytes on the innertubes.
There is a true skill to doing it such a way that it sneaks up behind the offender with an appearance of reasonableness and proceeds, in relatively polite language, to slice and dice him or her so that his or her credibility in the forum in question is forever lost.
It’s a skill I do not use in this space.
But, geez oh man, I have to tip my hat to this.
Sadly, it will not make its target go away, because some persons are too stupid for wor–oh, never mind.
Men Are All Alike 0
Comically Vintage explains.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
Fact Check dot org investigates:
Lee: And to the contrary, I think there is abundant research suggesting that in cities where more people own guns, the crime rate, especially the murder rate actually goes down.
That’s not true.
Follow the link for the full report.
On the Other Hand, There Is No Other Hand 2
In response to the shootings in Tucson, persons (including me, not that anyone other than my three or four regular reader will notice) have called out the rightwing’s habit of demonizing and dehumanizing those with whom they disagree.
The right has responded with the classic which we all remember from our teen-aged years,
But everybody does it.
As your mother pointed out when you tried that, “No, everybody is not doing it” and “Even if they were, that doesn’t make it right.” (I’ll leave out the part about, “If everybody was driving cars off a cliff, . . . .”)
Stephen Budiansky considers the “have cake, eat it too” elements of the rightwing’s rationalizations. A nugget:
Dick Polman considers:
So, no, this is not a shock. Rather, it’s the inevitable side effect of our toxic stew, runneth over. Sooner or later, some whacko out there was going to drink too much.
Budiansky link via Andrew Sullivan.
Oops 0
Er,
yeah.
I say it’s worth noting because political violence was once a regular feature of American life; in the 20th century, four presidents survived assassination attempts, while two — William McKinley and John Kennedy — were victims. In the 19th century, violence claimed two presidents: Abraham Lincoln and James Garfield, while Andrew Jackson survived an assassination attempt. Attempts have been made on the lives of presidential candidates, some successful — like the assassination of Robert Kennedy — and others, like the attempt on George Wallace, less so. Dozens of elected officials have been violently attacked over the course of American history, and dozens more have been killed (including 24 officials in the Reconstruction South). And of course, this is to say nothing about periods of widespread mob violence, and violence against prominent social leaders, like Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Jr.
It’s impossible to say whether we’ll see a renewed spike in political violence, but it suffices to say that this current period is remarkably calm, and something of an achievement.
Another nice catch by Feastingonroadkill.
Beached Whale 0
I know from my days in the security industry, because I knew persons who worked for manufacturers, that Walmart would volunteer to teach manufacturers how to move their factories to China.
Bruce Sterling:
American soft power is vanishing. Foreigners are much less interested in American television, movies, pop music… America once had a tremendous hammerlock on those expensive channels of distribution, but those old analog megaphones don’t matter half as much in today’s network society.
The USA has become a big banana republic; in other words, it’s come to behave like other countries quite normally behave. The upside is that we don’t get blamed for what happens; the downside is, nothing much happens. Decay and denial. Gothic
But, as a consolation, Goldman’s sacks are full.
Via Feastingonroadkill.
Twits on Twitter 0
This tale of suspense, betrayal, and the Golden Turnip is weirdly fascinating in a train wreck kind of way.
Background:
(Warning: Some language that you are likely to hear at your local school bus stop and on the Daily Show.)
Clowns to the Left, Jokers to the Right (Updated) 0
I received an email today from one of my leftie mailing lists with the subject line
Tell Sarah Palin: Violent threats have consequences.
You may recall that many found Sarah Palin’s gun sight graphic deplorable when it was first published.
It was indeed crude, rude, stupid, combative, tasteless, and silly all wrapped up in one cute little ball of yarn-spinning (much like Palin herself).
But it was not a threat.
Calling it one detracts from the larger problem and requires ridicule, for it clouds the issue, which is this:
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Adherents of the right wing quickly and casually label those with whom they disagree as traitorous, treasonous, and unAmerican (as well as perverted, godless, and whatever else pops up in their Roget’s–no insult is beyond their pale).
Rightwingers cannot brook disagreement. Anyone who disagrees with them becomes not just an opponent, but also their and the country’s enemy. Once someone is so labeled, he or she becomes fair game for whatever loony-toon decides that the violent rhetoric of the right is not rhetoric, but a call to action.
You seldom hear violent rhetoric from the mainstream left (such as it is). As Bob Cesca pointed out this morning:
Furthermore, the rightwing’s tactics of hate militate against reason and compromise.
After all, one cannot reason with a traitor, can one? If one’s political opponent is ipso facto a traitor, simply because he or she opposes you, conciliation becomes impossible.
So, why do they do it?
The facts lean left.
Fear and hate obscure facts. Fear and hate is what they got.
Addendum:
I did not expect to have an update for this post, but I really must direct you to Field’s remarks.
Untold Stories 0
Offered without comment:
(snip)
“Only they know what they were doing; we can’t speculate on that,” said Virginia State Police Sgt. Steve E. Lowe. “As to what they were engaged in, you can draw your own conclusions. She was on his lap – we’re going to leave it at that.”
(Some) Details at the link.
2nd Amendment Remedies (Updated) (Updated Again and Kicked to the Top) 1
(First published January 8.)
From AZCentral dot com:
“She was shot one time in the head through and through,” Dr. Peter Rhee said at an afternoon news conference at University Medical Center in Tucson.
The bullet entered one side of her head and exited the other after passing through her brain, Rhee said.
Giffords, 40, a third-term Democrat, was shot at an event in Tucson Saturday morning, at a Safeway at Ina and Oracle roads. Authorities identified the gunman as Jared Loughner and said the 22-year-old suspect is in custody. (Initial news accounts and reports from authorities misidentified the name as Laughner.)
Six people, including a girl who was about 9 years old, were killed and 18 were injured in the shooting at a Safeway in northwest Tucson at Ina and Oracle roads. Sources told The Republic that federal Judge John Roll was among the six killed.
President Obama speaks on the shooting:
TPM has the latest on the suspect. He appears to be a rightwing loonie of the type which calls itself “sovereign citizens.” (TPM is likely the best site for keeping up with this story as it breaks.)
No doubt this was completely unrelated to the drumbeat of anti-government and anti-Obama sentiment in Wingnut World.
This SPLC video, prepared for police to use for training during shift roll-calls, describes the particular form of sovereign citizen lunacy. The video is not for the squeamish.
Read more about sovereign citizens here.
Addendum:
The county sheriff speaks:
In the meantime, those who speak the rhetoric of violence are busily washing their hands, saying, “Oh, no. It wasn’t us.”
I need a drink.
Addendum-dee-dum-dum, Two Days Later:
Another indication of the shooter’s having been attracted to the “sovereign citizen” ideology (idiotology?) is his fascination with language, as outlined in the Guardian this Monday:
While a small number of defendants have previously sought, without success, to use Wynn Miller’s methods to defend themselves against tax avoidance charges, he has until now remained largely unknown outside of far-right US circles. His name was connected to the Loughner inquiry when an official from the Southern Poverty Law Centre, which monitors extremist groups, told US television that it seemed Loughner had been “getting some of his key ideas from David Wynn Miller”.
Goldman’s Sacks 0
Writing at Bloomberg, David Pauley dissects Goldman Sachs’s behind-the-scenes trading of Facebook in the “shadow stock marked.” He is skeptical of their valuation:
Investors with short memories will pay whatever the shadow market and Goldman Sachs, the prospective underwriter, say they should.
Back in 2000, Cisco Systems Inc., then already the dominant company in computer network gear, had a P/E approaching 200. It’s now 15.
There’s another even more down-to-earth problem for the company. Facebook is now seen by analysts as a threat to Google as a gatherer of ad revenue. Who’s to say a few years from now another startup won’t pose a similar threat to Facebook?
Based on Goldman’s past, it could easily be that they are betting against the investors in the shadows. They have done it before.
The “shadow” part of the “stock market” should provoke extreme caution.
Remember, in three-card monte, the marks always lose.
Can’t Win for Losin’ 0
Wasserman:
