What’s in a Name? 0
Sometimes, quite a lot.
End Times 0
At Psychology Today Blogs, Laura Otis offers a theory to account for the impulse to hoard toilet paper in the face of a respiratory disease pandemic. I think she may have a piece of the puzzle.
Here’s a bit:
Aside:
I’ve linked to several other articles also attempting to explain this phenomenon (you can find them with the search over there ——-> on the sidebar), because, frankly, the irrational stupidity (stupid irrationality?) of it leaves me gaga.
In related news, I had to visit my local drug store today and the TP shelves are still empty.
Lowering the Barr 0
Methinks that a strong argument can be made that the current United States Attorney-General is the nation’s top law defacement official.
Rand Gestures 0
And yes, Joe Patrice, to use your words, some Senators are indeed gobsmackingly stupid.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
Another great moment in politeness.
According to the caller, after inspecting the property they were headed back to the house when she stumbled and accidentally shot her brother in the shoulder.
Guns and stupid, guns and stupid.
They go together like love and Cupid.
Let me tell you brother,
You can’t have one without the other.
Tales of the Trumpling: the Trumpling Goes Viral 0
At the San Francisco Chronicle, Bonnie Tsui tells tales of Trumpling in these viral times. A snippet:
Geeking Out 0
Mageia v. 7 with the Plasma desktop running on a Zareason desktop. The running applications are shaded (or rolled up, to use another term). The background is from my collection.
A Tune for the Times 0
Warning: Some language.
The Art of the Con, Going Viral Dept. 0
The Philadelphia Inquirer reports on the epidemic of scams designed to feed on the fear of COVID-19. Here’s a bit about one of them; follow the link for the lengthy litany.
“It will seem legitimate to people who have heard in the news that those distributions might be coming,” said Jonathan Sasse, marketing executive at First Orion, an Arkansas company that builds scam protections for mobile-phone users. “And often times, where scammers are very successful is if they’re dealing with a too-good-to-be-true thing like an offer of funds in times of desperate financial conditions.”
As the saying goes, if it sounds to good to be true, it probably is.
Crisis Response, Florida Man Style 0
Brendan Kuty is–er–somewhat taken aback at the doings in the Florida Man state.
Crisis Response 0
At The American Scholar, Philip Alcabes argues that the coronavirus presents us with a crisis, but not as it is being portrayed. He suggests that actual crisis is manifest in three ways. Here’s one; follow the link for the other two.
Second, we face a crisis of leadership. The playbook for a public health approach to contagion is clear and well known, and it has been practiced often: test widely for infection, trace contacts of the infected to locate further cases, isolate cases so they don’t infect others, refer the sick for treatment. But that has not happened yet in the United States. It should have, but it didn’t.
(snip)
Why this kind of stewardship didn’t happen is hard to know. Perhaps there’s no hope for such stewardship in an administration that has not so much created a vacuum of leadership as actively attacked it. For instance, Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, has often tried to take on the role of communicator, only to be undermined by the president. We are left with the present siege situation.