2012 archive
A Swamp by Any Other Name Would Smell as Reek 2
Mike Gruss, writing in my local rag, considers the tendency of beseiged companies to change their names to something vaguely latinate and altogether uncommunicative so as to outrun their reputations. He mentions, Philip Morris Altria and Bell Atlantic/NYNEX Verizon (but unaccountably leaves out Southwestern Bell Cingular not-your-father’s AT&T).
Then he focuses on Swampwater, now T/A Xe Academi. A nugget:
Academi may be a top-notch training school, or it may be a place Arnold Schwarzenegger stopped by in “Total Recall.” No one knows because they’ve never seen the word before.
Then the natural instinct is to be afraid.
Which, given Blackwater’s history and pending lawsuits, might not be a bad thing.
A mercenary by any other name is still a gun for hire.
Resolved 0
I gave up New Year’s Resolutions years ago, not that I ever took them all too seriously in any case. The resolutions I have found that I keep are the ones I make because the time is right, not because the calendar flips.
I may reconsider after reading Charlie Booker’s list of suggested resolutions at the Guardian. Here’s a sample:
Stop pretending Lady Gaga and Beyoncé are endlessly fascinating.
Look, it’s not that I don’t see their appeal. I just can’t fathom the apparently infinite depth of it. I appreciate they’re both polished entertainers with a neat line in music videos and some very catchy songs, but beyond that – what are you all seeing, precisely? I mean, it’s nice that the openly kooky Lady Gaga inspires her fans not to give in to bullies and the suchlike, but she also inspires them to “put their paws up” and be a bit annoying, which kind of balances it out, really. They’re not Mayan gods.
Dog Whistles–Silent No More 1
Yesterday, Bob Cesca posted that the odious Republican Southern Strategy has returned.
I’m afraid he’s wrong. It never went away.
What’s different in this campaign is that the Republicans are no longer attempting to camouflage it; everyone can hear the dog whistles.
Writing at the Guardian, Teresa Wiltz recounts the almost constant appeals to racism by Republican candidates and concludes, quite rightly, that
They just don’t give a flying fig.
Gingrich, Santorum and Paul are using the same playbook as DW Griffith did back in 1915 with Birth of a Nation: painting black folks as the boogeymen.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
Politeness grows apace in the Old Dominion:
“Performance, Feedback, Revision” 0
All rapped up in evolution:
Via Delaware Liberal, which has more, including an explanation of bling.
Property Rights 0
From the website: Author Elizabeth Dowling Taylor tells the story of Paul Jennings, who served as one of James Madison’s slaves and ultimately purchased his own freedom.
And, I add, that of his wife and children.
A Picture Is Worth . . . 0
Via the Richmonder, who points out
(snip)
I worry about the depth of dishonesty to which Republicans have allowed them to sink. No matter what the issue, large or small, if Republicans meet with a check or challenge from someone who does not agree with them, their very first instinct seems to be to lie, to trample on the letter and spirit of the 8th Commandment. . . . “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.”
Follow the link for a catechism of the lies.
QOTD 0
William McChesney Martin, from the Quotemaster (subscribe here):
Too many of our prejudices are like pyramids upside down. They rest on tiny, trivial incidents, but they spread upward and outward until they fill our minds.
Football Wizards 1
I made the mistake of turning on an NFL football game (I lasted three minutes–three real minutes, not three football minutes).
It was half-time.
One of the retired jocks on the “fight literacy–keep retired jocks on the air” panel of experts informed me, amazement in his voice, that a player
caught the ball with his hands!
I guess he left his net on the bench.
Furrfu.
Everybody Must Get Fracked 1
Homeowners in Dimock Township have been without a reliable supply of clean water since Cabot Oil & Gas Corp., the Houston-based drilling firm blamed for polluting their aquifer, stopped making daily deliveries more than a month ago.
And, as Atrios points out, the frackers are walking away, leaving the evul fedrul guvmint to pick up the pieces.
Remember, it was the Bushies who exempted the fracking frackers from clean air and water regulations.
The Politics of Fear 0
At Science 2.0, Hank Campbell reports on a study that may shed some light on why Republicans practice the politics of fear.
“It’s been said that conservatives and liberals don’t see things in the same way,” said Mike Dodd, University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) assistant professor of psychology and the study’s lead author. “These findings make that clear – quite literally.”
Mr. Campbell is careful to point out that, despite the researchers’ attempts to divine some evolutionary cause for this, correlation is not causation; the study does not explain why conservatives are more fearful than liberals (or perhaps it’s the reverse: the fearful are more likely to lean to the right).
It does, however, help explain why the Republicans tend to pitch their appeals to the dark side of human nature. It speaks to their followers.
Follow the link for more details and a desription of the study’s methodology.
Little Ricky, Crusader Rabid 0
In the Chicago Trib, Steve Chapman considers Little Ricky Santorum’s deep faith in the power of theocratic rule* to save the world. A nugget:
America is a good place to judge the value of faith in promoting virtue. There is a great deal of variation among the 50 states in religious observance — and a great deal of variation in social ills. It turns out that religiosity does not translate into good behavior, and disregard for religion does not go hand-in-hand with vice. Quite the contrary.
Follow the link above to explore the “contrary.” Visit Attytood to explore Little Ricky’s record of public (dis)service.
______________________
*His theocratic rule, natch, not someone else’s.
“If Johnny Had Three Apples . . .” 0
One word problem stated, “Each tree had 56 oranges. If 8 slaves pick them equally, then how much would each slave pick?” Another said, “If Frederick got two beatings per day, how many beatings did he get in 1 week?”
The school’s defense is that the teachers were trying to work history into the math exercise.
If that was indeed their motive, this was a profoundly stupid way to do it.
The worksheets are being pulled.
QOTD 0
Barry Goldwater, from the Quotemaster (subscribe here):
Religious factions will go on imposing their will on others unless the decent people connected to them recognize that religion has no place in public policy. They must learn to make their views known without trying to make their views the only alternative.
Not with a Bang, but a Whisper 0
In the Denver Post, Edward Wasserman bemoans the lack of notice given the official (at least, as official as it’s going to get) end of the Great and Glorious Patriotic War for a Lie in Iraq. A nugget:
You’d think some sort of examination is in order: Congressional hearings? A truth and reconciliation commission? At least, an extended segment on “60 Minutes”? The events of 9/11 triggered hearings, commissions, reports, reappraisals, soul-searching, reorganizations, sweeping legislation. But the immeasurably greater catastrophe of the Iraq war has brought no comparable reckoning.
The closest our media have come to voicing regret is lamenting the war’s trillion-dollar cost and the torments of our own combatants . . . .
Like devastation wrought in a Family Circus cartoon, all the bad stuff was done by the great American Not Me.
And there will be no reckoning.
The liars and their sycophants, both in politics and in the commentariat, who sold this war will collect their pensions, their speakers’ (dis)honorariums, their commentary commissions, and move on to shilling for the next made-up war.
Driving while Brown 0
How does a 14-year-old American turn into a 22-year-old Columbian and get deported?
By being brown.
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
I have no doubt that, had she not been not-white, someone would have said, “Wait a minute. She doesn’t look 22. Let’s look into this a little deeper.”
No doubt whatsoever.
Via C&L, where’s there’s more.