July, 2013 archive
Twits on Twitter 0
A fervent belief of some is that, if you don’t acknowledge racism, it is as if it never were.
Bullet Points 0
Cultural Anthropologist Griffin Dix explores the proliferation of firearms and find that, in the immortal words of Yogurt, it was all “merchandising, my boy, merchandising.”
A nugget:
The industry’s marketing effort emphasized the need to have a handgun instantly available when — inevitably — your home is invaded. Gun marketers circulated criminologist Gary Kleck’s wildly inflated estimate that guns are used 2.4 million times per year for self-defense. Kleck’s research was riddled with errors soon exposed by Harvard’s David Hemenway. Subsequent studies showed that rather than providing protection, gun ownership greatly increased the risk of homicide and suicide in the home.
Read the rest.
“Rage against the Machine” 3
Will Bunch returns from vacation and posts an angry but quite rational reaction to Trayvon Martin’s stalker’s “Get Out of Jail Free” card and, as seems common at Bunch’s place, the comments turn into a cesspool of racism.
What is it about newspaper story comments pages that so attracts racists?
Do, please, read the post and the comments.
See how George Zimmerman’s defenders think.
Wonder Whether He’ll Get To Sysadmin from Solitary? 0
You can’t make this stuff up.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
Practice random acts of politeness towards the police.
A Boiling Springs town commissioner has been charged with pointing a gun at state troopers.
The Shelby Star reports (http://bit.ly/13KW5VO ) that troopers were responding to a call at around 10 p.m. on July 12 when 54-year-old John C. Glenn shined a laser light at them.
Authorities say Glenn then drove to his nearby lumber business. Troopers say they arrested Glenn there and found a gun with a laser sight in his car.A Boiling Springs town commissioner has been charged with pointing a gun at state troopers.
Too soon armed, too late smart.
One More Time: The Internet Is a Public Place 0
The “Grandma” scam has surfaced in these parts.
You’ve probably heard of it. Someone posting as grandkid calls up claiming to need bail or to have lost his or her wallet in some foreign clime and requests money.
How do they make themselves convincing, you ask?
From the marks’ own words. From my local rag:
The phony grandchildren, nieces or nephews also say they don’t want to get their parents involved.
The Voter Fraud Fraud 0
George Smith explains what it’s all about.
Walking while Black 0
Deborah Orr, writing in the Guardian, on the other side of the Big Pond, sees what Americans are unwilling to see.
The death of Trayvon Martin was rooted in bigotry, as was the exoneration of his stalker.
It was a contemporary version of a phrase I heard often in my youth:
It was only a n****r.
So an unarmed kid dies as he walks while black from the store to his father’s house, and the jury was all “Zimmerman was such a nice well-intentioned boy and, after all, it was only a n*****r.”
A snippet:
Even though equal civil rights for black Americans are still so new, their achievement still so clear in living memory, the US just can’t see what the rest of the world sees – that inequality so entrenched in the history of a state doesn’t disappear in matter of decades; on the contrary, the baleful fruits of generations of inequality can be used to justify the very prejudice that promoted the inequality in the first place.
If your eyes are open, you know I’m right.
Free Speech: Life in the Hoodie 0
One standard for you, two for me.
Sauce for the Goose 0
From the webpage:
f they really believed their own rhetoric – the NRA and its friends in the Republican Party would start talking about giving people like Trayvon Martin – not George Zimmerman – easier access to firearms.
Also, pigs, wings.
Responsible Fiscals 2
Republicans: Watch what they do, not what they say.
Dan Morain reports in the Sacramento Bee:
Rep. McClintock, a Republican who represents the Sierra even though he resides in Elk Grove, has cultivated a reputation for being tight with a dollar, for having been a tea partyer back before the tea party existed, and, most of all, for sticking to his stated principles.
So imagine my surprise when it turned out that in addition to being paid $174,000 a year by Uncle Sam, McClintock has been collecting a California Legislators’ Retirement System pension since he arrived in Congress in 2009, courtesy of the taxpayers he says he tries so hard to protect.
More what they do at the link.
Dave & Buster’s Comes to Town 1
Just what we need: Chuck E. Cheese for grown-ups.
I visited the Dave & Buster’s in Philly once.
Ex and I dropped to boat over in Wilmington and ran up to Penn’s Landing, where we tied up and walked about.
The gaming stations had buttons for calling tech support and the wait staff (to bring more drinks).
All I can say about the experience is that the Delaware River can be a lovely place for a boat ride.
I outgrew Chuck E. Cheese three kids ago.
The Regent’s Friends Lawyer Him Up 0
The yoghurt is getting deeper.
Gov. Bob McDonnell’s friends want to help out with his legal bills.
Some of his Hampton Roads supporters have formed a political group to raise money for legal expenses he incurs due to the gift controversy around him.
Wonder whether they plan to pay the lawyers in Rolexes or in shopping sprees at Bergdoff Goodman or perhaps in rental properties?
The Regent Diversifies 0
It’s a long and winding road from State Rape to Real Estate.
Let Rachel guide you.
Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Via The Richmonder.
Privileged Communications 0
The idea that the President of the United States should not comment on a racially charged incident of deadly stalking (apparently because the President is a Not White person) is just about as racist and white-privileged as it gets.
As a white folk, I must ask, since when can anyone trust white folks about race?
It’s remarkable how the Zimmerman case has flushed the racists out of the wall.
We knew they were there and that they never give up; now they unabashedly show themselves, scurrying across the floor and soiling the discourse.
As my mother would have said, “The nerve of some people!
Have they no sham–oh, never mind.
Image via BartCop.
