There's battle lines being drawn.
Nobody's right if everybody's wrong.
Young people speaking their minds
getting so much resistance from behind

Wednesday, June 27, 2012

Linkee-poo reached for the secret too soon

No matter what happens tomorrow morning, lot of people are going to be upset. Time to put on the fire-proof pants so you don't get your bottoms singed.

"In other words, the equation 'In order to enjoy it, I must buy it' has shifted to, 'I must be able to own it, or I won't buy it.'" A thoughtful squib on the rise of "Content Is King" and e-books told from the Manga side of the equation. (Grokked from Jay Lake)

Ever have a secret desire to talk with aliens? And here I'm talking about little green guys from Mars aliens, not the people who make sure we have cheap food on the table and that rich people's lawns are manicured. If so, you'll have a chance to tweet at the "Wow" signal.

Some books are more equal than others. Sigh. Okay, in general I agree that for young readers they should choose books that will challenge them to think outside themselves, but the prudish undertone of "books that are good for the slackers versus books for 'real' students" are just the old moralism showing up in new clothes. Not to mention genre snobbery rearing it's head again. I read "To Kill a Mockingbird" and "Catcher in the Rye" as an adult (somehow I was able to avoid these growing up). TKaM was fantastic, and there's so much in that book that nobody talks about (like how Atticus is the acknowledged top shot in town, but nobody explains about how they know this) instead they get bogged down in race relations (and miss a whole lot more of the social structure of Maycomb). Whereas CitR was complete whiner fiction, IMHO. It might have been radically ground-breaking when written, but it came off as an also-ran when I read it. (Grokked from Jay Lake)

"(Louisiana state officials) set to steer tens of millions of dollars into the new (education) privatization program, which pays for vouchers that parents can use to send their children to religious schools. Gov. Bobby Jindal said the state was 'changing the way we deliver education,' which is a lot like Domino’s saying it's changing the way it delivers pizza by locking up the store and telling everyone to buy a Hot Pocket from the Vatican. In any case, Louisiana Republicans loved the plan. Until a group of folks showed up to ruin the whole thing: Muslims." So, after everyone had a cow over their monies going to this Islamic peoples, and a crack at Scientology, fortunately the Islamic school withdrew their request to participate. You know, facing all that Christian kindness that was thrown their way probably gave them the warm fuzzes (which I understand are related to cooties). Quote Carter, R-Baton Rouge, "They’re not interested. The system works." Yes, the system works to intimidate anybody but those Godly Christians from sucking from the public tax teat. America, fuck yeah. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

Maybe if we don't talk about rape and sexual assault it'll go away. I think we tried that once before, it was called "before the eighties". Whether we discuss rape and sexual assault out in the open or not, people are still going to be victimized. It's just if we have an open discussion about it, maybe some of them will feel empowered to do something about it. Shoving the conversation back in the closet because it makes us feel icky is the sure way to make sure these crimes continue unabated and the guilty remain unaccountable. (Grokked from Ferret Steinmetz)

Hmmm, Justice Antonin Scalia is showing signs of something here, but not what he is discussing. It's a difficult thing to approach someone and say, "You know, maybe it's time to reconfigure the dosages."

"Expanding Medicare to all Americans would be an enormously heavy legislative lift. But supporters of the approach believe President Obama and Democrats will have an immediate political incentive to turn to the idea if the Court wipes their signature achievement off the books." Unfortunately, conservatives in Congress would never even refer it to committee.

I think there's a new page in the conservative playbook; when reality won't serve, just make shit up. "… I also note that the bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform bill I helped draft in 2007 was killed — in part — by then-Senator Obama,” Sen. Jon Kyl (AZ), a Republican leadership member, said in a statement… The problem: Obama voted in favor of Bush’s 2007 immigration legislation, while Kyl joined the filibuster that quashed it." Haven't conservatives learned yet there are these things called the internet and Google? Who am I kidding. That quote will go out on Fox without anyone doing any real checking and Lord knows nobody in media has a memory anymore. The other news orgs will pick it up and run with it as well.

And, conservatives tend to get in trouble when they speak the truth about their agenda. So I guess it's no surprise they have to make shit up.

"'As fresh water from the melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet enters the ocean, it disrupts this circulation, causing the currents to slow down," USGS research oceanographer and study co-author Kara Doran explained… "When the Gulf Stream current weakens, sea levels rise along the coast and the greatest amount of rise happens north of where the Gulf Stream leaves the coast (near Cape Hatteras).'" That's an article discussing why sea level rise on our Atlantic coast is more than predicted by global warming modeling. Or, in other words, to quote Bender, "We're boned." Say, who is it that insures against flooding? (Grokked from Jay Lake)

And a ACA link, turns out conservatives actually like the vast majority of the ACA, they just don't like Obama. (Grokked from Jay Lake)

Alligator Quotient: Do we always have to reinvent the wheel?

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