The Duck-Billed Placelot

Progress-ish?

2011-11-21T14:50:00.002-09:00

From an ABC news blog:

Editor’s note: The original version of this blog mistakenly identified Oneal Ron Morris as a man, though she identifies as a woman. The blog was subsequently corrected. We regret this error.

Good job, whoever fixed it! But then, too, this is an article about a woman who injected fix-a-flat into another woman's ass, so...there's some issue to be taken, there.

Stereotypes and Humor

2011-11-15T10:33:00.002-09:00

Two images. Image 1: A man in a wheelchair at the bottom of a set of stairs. Image 2: A man in a wheelchair at the bottom of a set of stairs. At the top of the stairs is a courthouse.

Are these images funny? Why or why not?

Two images. Image 1: A black man eating watermelon. Image 2: A black man holding a slice of watermelon being photographed by a white man. Black man tosses watermelon in trash, cursing.

Are these images funny? Why or why not?

Two images. Image 1: An ugly women in a bar, shouting, "I'm so wasted! I'm so wasted!" Bar patrons look away from her. Image 2: ?

On Children

2011-11-13T11:04:00.002-09:00

Take a moment to compare what you've heard about the child Roman Polanski raped with what you've heard about the children Jerry Sandusky raped. Consider the fact that Angelica Huston pounded on the door of the bedroom during Polanski's rape, but never entered the room, and contrast that with the actions of the 28 year old grad assistant, Mike McQueary. Think of the many people who have spoken up in support of Polanski; remember the students rioting in Pennsylvania in support of Joe Paterno. Recognize the scales, investigate the metrics by which we judge these cases. Grieve.

Daily Fail: Graphs Edition

2011-11-01T00:49:00.004-08:00

Oh, the Daily Mail, where facts are 'facts' and scantily clad women are alternately ogled and concern trolled. Because I'm sure that this was all a simple misunderstanding caused by a careless intern whose only previous published worked included photoshopping cellulite onto some celebrity's hindquarters, I decided to help out.

What the Daily Mail Graph Should Look LikeWhat the Daily Mail Graphs Actually Look Like

So yes, after some seriously high-trending temperatures, it looks like a downward change there at the end - however, that big drop is based on a single monthly data point of an unfinished year (as opposed to the seemingly yearly points of the first graph). I'm way too lazy to actually regraph this thing, so this is what you get. Anyway, matching oranges to oranges (or axes to axes, in this case) makes a big difference in how you see the data, doesn't it? Long-winded explanation after the jump.

Whiskey Fire pointed out some silly graphing by the Mail, in which a few problems arose; can you spot them all? (Daily Mail: Highlights for Adults!) Lessee, the y-axis of the first graph marks the first positive value as '0.5 degrees', while the second's y-axis sports '0.75 degrees'. Why, Daily Mail! That's really misleading! The x-axis of the first graph is marked in units of 25 years, while the second graph is single years. Also, the second graph covers a span of less than ten years. Problem. What's more, the second graph seems (unclear!) to be plotted in terms of months, while the first looks more like yearly data points. Well...well, that's going to be difficult to compare in an accurate way, Daily Mail! It's almost like you commissioned someone at Slate to make this graph for you ("You might think that the Earth has been steadily heating up for the last thirty years, but actually The Strokes are the very best thing to happen to the climate ever!")

In my version of the graph, I've put the two graphs side by side, stretched the second one so that the 0 degree change line and the positive 1.5 degree change line matched on both graphs (matched the y-axis units), and I've shrunk the second one to approximate the x-axis time markings of the first graph. I also traced over (sloppily) the temperature data line on the second one, as all that shrinking made it really hard to see. Oh, and since the first graph covers a significant span of time (9ish years, maybe?) after the year 2000, I've put the second graph (years 2001-some of 2010) over most of that portion of the graph.

This is a sloppy approximation, y'all. Dirty and quick and with absolutely no looking up of new data, and it's still a much clearer presentation than Daily Mail's original graphs. Imagine if someone took the time to actually graph the thing, with science.

SuperCommittee Ice-Breakers

2011-10-31T07:18:00.003-08:00

- Attempt to purchase health insurance without using connections/status.
- Play "Spent", the online game in which your character has lost her job and must survive to the end of the month. If, after three attempts, they don't have enough left over at the end of the month to pay rent, they get kicked off of the supercommittee.
- Compare college tuition rates from this year to the year they entered school.
- Food Assistance Scavenger Hunt: using only the money a family of four in their state can receive for food stamps, they must purchase enough groceries to last a family for four weeks. These purchases will make up the catered breakfasts, lunches, and snacks of the supercomittee meetings.
- Baby-Cries-A-Lot: Remember those plastic babies that kids get to teach them to not get pregnant? That cry until you put the key in? Every supercommittee member gets one for the duration of the meetings. Any member found abusing his (not responding when the child cries) or found 'delegating' his responsibility will get kicked off the committee.

Just a few ideas. I'm sure you can come up with more devious ones.

A Holiday Appropriate List

2011-10-30T02:24:00.003-08:00

Zombies

Ghosts

Vampires

Werewolves

Wild Animals

Science Gone Wrong (may include animals)
Aliens (may include demons)

Serial Killers

What am I missing?

Would Never Have Guessed

2011-10-15T07:07:00.003-08:00

OMG OMG YOU GUYS!

From the Stanford Alumni magazine's follow-up on the infamous prison experiment:

[Dave] Eshelman was a student at Chapman University at the time of the experiment. He was the prison's most abusive guard, patterning himself after the sadistic prison warden (portrayed by Strother Martin) in the movie Cool Hand Luke. Today he owns a mortgage business in Saratoga.

Of course he does.

Independent Dependents

2011-09-13T12:15:00.002-08:00

Ran across a throwaway mention of a woman's 'beautiful, independent 16 month old.' What? I'm pretty sure needing someone to wipe your ass is the line beyond which independence fears to tread.

Socialism and Socialists

2011-09-11T07:45:00.003-08:00

Sweden! Greatest socialized democracy (ed. note: actually a monarchy) in the world! Health care! Paternity leave! Shining capitalist kronas piling up next to kind, fuzzy business practices! Design for the masses!

But Some People, when offered memberships that come with specific perks, will just ABUSE that membership. Some people, when told they can have free coffee and hang out in your store, will hang out in your store! And demand free coffee! THE HORROR. I mean! They're going through so much creamer! So much sugar! Ikea can't possibly be expected to deal with these free-loaders who enter their store on a regular basis and presumably never purchase a single thing despite having disposable time and income! These Shanghai-ers act like they have the right to just go in a place and be there! UPPITY!

No word yet on whether any matches made at these social events result in the happy couple registering at IKEA.

SUPER SPECIAL ANNIVERSARY OF DOOOOOM

2011-09-09T05:21:00.003-08:00

Heard on my local public radio, as the first song of an 'all listener requested hour in honor of the upcoming 9/11 anniversary': Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, "I Won't Back Down". Do you think this is a snide reference to the 2000 Bush campaign? Or a full-throated endorsement of War 4 Eva? (Do you, too, always think of Marky Mark in 4 Eva situations?)

Hipster Fall

2011-08-23T01:06:00.003-08:00

I was totally into the indie protest scene in Tunisia, but the Libyan revolution is way too corporate.

Mornings

2011-08-18T09:25:00.002-08:00

Sometimes I do not win at mornings. Today I have:

*stepped on my cat's tail. (Why you gotta be underfoot, muffin? I missed you, too, but geez.)

*burnt my egg.

*had to turn down a client on the grounds that I couldn't help them. (I mean - yay, ethics, but boo, lack of paycheck.)

*broken a wine glass, cut my wrist. (No, I wasn't drinking. Maybe I should start. [Also, no, I wasn't trying to commit suicide. It's on the back of my wrist. Well, the side. In any case, not down the street, so we're all good. {Except for the bleeding.}])

And now I must prepare my abode for a man to come sand my floor, which means hanging of sheets and pretty much no work done this afternoon. Also, I need to learn spanish carpentry vocabulary, post haste.

Bronte the Third

2011-08-01T19:54:00.003-08:00

Anne is my favorite Bronte, by far. Kids as the enemy! The travails of the worker, unjustly maligned by unfeeling bosses! Hot dude lust, camouflaged by some fine words on morality which are totally undermined by a long bit on attractiveness as an awesome gift from God! A happy ending comprised of one part told-you-so to two parts hot-dude-getting. Oh! You liked me, all this time? Sweet!

So much better than, 'Oh, you lied to me, all this time? WELL, I WILL FORGIVE YOU, NOW THAT YOU ARE SINGLE AND HIDEOUSLY SCARRED.' or even 'Everyone makes terrible matrimonial decisions, dies.'

Also, if anything is to be learned from Regency or Victorian era novels, is it not to keep eavesdropping until the conversation is actually over? So many ships sailed, hearts lost, brooding depressions entered into thanks to storming away after half a sentence.

Cult of War

2011-07-29T08:22:00.005-08:00

An edition in which luck becomes evidence of personal worth.

~~Shorter~~ Verbatim Ed: I don't want to add to the mountain of material in our culture glorifying war, but [...] Salut, Group Captain Stagg! Salut, giant balls!

Shorter and More Logically Consistent Ed: I don't want to add to the mountain of material in our culture glorifying war, so here is an interesting historical fact that shows one of our most vaunted strategic military actions in our least controversial war to actually be a low-information clusterfuck that its architects (particularly this one guy) are very, very lucky didn't turn out to be an even more death-filled day than it already was. Because war is generally stupid, and its architects are generally working with much less information and certainty than they will ever tell you.

Generally ginandtacos is excellent, but if you don't want to glorify war, then don't glorify it. And particularly don't glorify its architects for luck. If the weather had been bad that night, then we'd look back on Group Captain Stagg as the guy who wasted all the Allied boats/troops when they could have waited until the next full moon, which was preceded by two fair days. That he/the Allies got lucky does not make him a personally amazing guy. His willingness to guess (and risk many, many lives) with low/poor information is not an Astounding Tale of Personal Male Bravery.

I mean, if you want to glorify war, go right ahead, I guess. But then leave out saying you don't want to do so.

For Once I Agree With (Future) Republican Talking Points

2011-07-08T11:10:00.007-08:00

Tim F. thinks that Obama will be hurt when Republicans pivot to jobs:

Will people care that Obama gave up talking about jobs because Republicans had the votes to kill any program that might help? I guess we will find out.

No, people won't care. (This has been your episode of Easy Answers to Easy Questions!) The reason that Republicans control messaging, as Tim points out in this very post is that they repeat slogans ad nauseum, in every interview to every outlet, and they either mobilize or outright fund people with signs* and questions for every town hall and every presser.

Of course, the framing here presupposes that Obama actually wants to pass a jobs bill. I see no evidence for that; instead we've had all deficits, all the time for a year and a half. I'm not a fan of the health care bill, but Obama didn't pivot away from Republican intransigence to a different topic. He wanted a health care bill, and he got one. (Not a very good one, mind you, but a health care bill none-the-less.) If Obama/the Dems wanted to make jobs a priority, they could be fighting for it. There's no Gang of Six allegedly discussing the problem. Pelosi and Reid aren't talking about the jobs bill they want to pass. Even if they couldn't get something passed, a few months of Democrats pushing for a job bill would go a long way toward that messaging problem. But this isn't a messaging problem.

It's not that Obama is totally helpless in the face of those mean Republicans and can't fix our unemployment problems, even though he really, really wants to. Sure, Obama will be hurt when Republicans start talking about jobs, jobs, why didn't he try to create jobs. He should be hurt, because he didn't try.

Allies Can Drive Me Fucking Crazy

2011-07-07T10:47:00.005-08:00

SO there's this totally cool guy, right, he's totally cool, and totally for your rights. You know he is, because he'll tell you all about it. He'll tell you all about it in several paragraphs. On a major feminist outlet.

Paragraph You're So Lucky To Have Me: I could totally be doing something else, you know.

Paragraph Obviously I'm Just a Natural Leader: I was surprised, after my unsolicited offer, to be so quickly accepted as a speaker at feminist event after only six months of co-leadership responsibilities. I mean, not surprised that I was accepted. Just that it was so quickly, and with so many exclamation points.

Paragraph Also I'm Way Smarter Than Your Oppressors: I debate those guys all the time, and it's just so lame; they don't even make it interesting anymore.

Paragraph Look at This Light Bulb I Just Invented, Manufactured, and Installed: I realized this thing that noone has ever talked about before, let me enlighten you.

Paragraph(s) Feminism 101: I will now explain to you some things that you, readers of a massive and long-running feminist outlet, have probably never considered before, like, 'Sluts don't deserved to be raped!' and 'Many people's actions show them to disagree with the previous statement!'

Paragraph My Light Bulb Cast a Very Flattering Glow (On Me): I wasn't totally sure people would get behind this light bulb of mine, since it was so completely new and unheard of and untested, but people liked it (ed. note: me)! They really, really liked it (ed. note: me)!

Totally cool guys can mix, match, and re-order these paragraphs free of charge for all their major-traffic-blog-guest-posting-needs.

I mean, I get it. Welcome people with open arms, etc. He's an activist, he acts. Awesome! But to make the portions of his feministe post that were actually written for feministe about how he's the coolest independent idea inventor, on the blog of a woman who gently pointed out in the comments that she wrote an essay on this topic in a published anthology - it's tacky, it's shallow, it's so...masculine.*

*For patriarchal norms of masculinity, particularly in the context of engagement with female intellectuals. Go read Rebecca Solnit again, if you've forgotten.

Why, again? Or for the first time, even.

2011-07-07T07:50:00.003-08:00

So the Post dutifully reports on Obama's insane and terrible 'bargaining tactic' of offering Social Security cuts, and this jumps out:

Privately, some congressional Democrats were alarmed by the president’s proposal

Oh. Well, then. As long as some Democrats are privately alarmed, I'm sure we'll all be fine. Alarmed! That's at least one color closer to red than concerned! (What? This is a much more reasonable interpretation of the color-warning-whatever-system. Level green is totally baked; red is terrified.)

If Nancy Pelosi isn't making angry, acerbic statements on the record by Friday - by which I mean angry, acerbic statements about Obama's plan - then it's done. And by 'it' I mean the New Deal.

nights and noises

2011-07-02T22:59:00.003-08:00

It is hot and sticky in my attic apartment, and outside some passing reveler made a growling noise. A loud, growling noise. And my first thought was, "Zombies?"

Forty Years

2011-06-10T00:44:00.005-08:00

Thanks to Ginandtacos (which, are you reading that? You should be reading that.), I spent an interesting half hour browsing through the Troy, Michigan library's flicker account. Particularly the set of 97 letters written in response to librarian Margeurite Hart's requests for letters to children of Troy upon the occasion of the opening of their town's first library in 1971. It's a kind of fun and zany mix of people (Director of the Detroit Public Library, Clara Jones! Leftist Radical, Saul Alinsky! Notable children's author, Dr. Seuss! The Secretary of the Pope!), but a few names - and their letters - jumped out.

Spiro Agnew: "It is, therefore, a significant occasion when a library is opened; for a library gives rich and poor alike open access to a great store of knowledge. I consider you fortunate in having this new center of knowledge."

Birch Bayh (!): "Books and libraries are among the most wonderful possessions young people -- and, in fact, people of all ages -- can have."

George Romney (!!): "Those who continue to use libraries, continue to learn and grow their entire lifetime."

The best - in a painful, twisted way - is this:

A world without books would be a world without light -- without light, man cannot see...Without spending a penny, you can travel to the ends of the earth, the depths of the sea, and now the infinity of space...This library of the City of Troy will do all these things for you if you will only take the time to let it.

Emphasis added by me. Words by Ronald Reagan.

In unrelated news, a recent white paper on Denver's general operating budget difficulties recommended shuttering six of the city library's 11 branches.

A Hanging

2011-05-02T11:35:00.009-08:00

We summarily executed a horrific criminal last night, and also some of his family members/visitors/staff(?). And then our people (Our People) spontaneously gathered in Times Square and in front of the White House to celebrate it.

How many people died on 9/11? How many hundreds of thousands of people have we killed in Afghanistan and Iraq over the last ten years? And Pakistan and Yemen and who knows where else. How many bin Ladens have we made, with our bombing of weddings and market caravans and ambulances? With sectarian violence and ethnic cleansing that we called the Surge working. With Gitmo and Abu Graib and the black prison of Bagram.

I'm past believing that all these things go counter to our glorious American past, a golden time when things were some hazily-understood conception of better: when (white) men were (white) Men; when America was Democratic and free; when our power was not only unchecked but righteous. There was no such time, and although for a brief period things improved for several groups of underclass, the pendulum done swung, y'all, and we underclass are definitely not on an upward trajectory, and all the crap we're gonna eat (and have eaten) for shared sacrifice and anxious (white) masculinity is not new crap, it is more of the same bullshit that America the Beautiful has heaped across several continents, including her own, for centuries now.

I know. Obama couldn't have tried him; he can't even put taxi drivers on trial here. Also, he orchestrated a massive, murderous event that killed thousands of civilians. Also, we can embody in him, we can blame him for the entirety of what we have lost, as the slim freedoms we had have ratcheted ever back, as the noose of safety has closed ever tighter, we can look at bin Laden and say, because of him. I know. We paid for this, in blood and treasure, and we'll keep paying for it. Let the firemen mourn their fallen brethren with a joyous wake; let Our People find their closure with shouts and laughter and spitting on a grave.

And yes, it is because now secrecy is harder, and yes, all those things above, too, and yes, now, because we cannot go to the Hague, we have cut ourselves off from International Justice because we have so flagrantly flaunted it, but oh, even a Nuremberg, even an Iraqi Special Tribunal, any little nod that there was something else than this endless death from on high. Anything other than these bloodthirsty omelettes, those egg shells hot from the barrel. This death.

It's another form of idealism, I guess, of naivety. How is a death agreed to by twelve better than death ordered by one? As if an unbiased jury could exist. As if unbaised exists. As if justice is a thing that exists in our system, or any system. As if justice is a thing that exists anywhere but our imaginations. But isn't it better, if no single, vainglorious person has the right to murder anyone, anytime, anywhere, without review or standards or even a thoughtful conversation? Even if that has long been the case, always been the status quo, isn't it better if it is at least considered shameful, a crime, beyond?

I keep coming back to that women, the one used as a human shield. Presumed to be one of bin Laden's wives. Most of the reports leave out that 'presumed' bit. Maybe she was his wife; maybe she believed what he believed. Maybe she was Eva, burning in the ditch. But what if she was a servant, or a prostitute? What if she was his wife but only because she'd been given to him, or sold to him, and she thought him evil and frightening, and she dreamed of ropes woven from bedsheets and slipping away in disguise? What if she was more Kim Phuc than Eva? What if she was just a person, neither particularly good nor particularly bad, just a person in the way?

I know. Omelettes, eggs.

Only People Feel Desire

2011-04-22T22:37:00.004-08:00

Apart from the motivations Amanda's already mentioned, I can think of two mindsets that crave the women-hate-sex lie:

A) Men desire women. They want. They see a thing that sparks lust, emotion, hunger, need. They pursue it. They take it. Men are not the objects of desire, because they are not objects; they are people, firmly (and singularly) subjects. Objects do not desire. Women do not desire. See: The Male Gaze, women's bodies are beautiful but men's are not, smile for me baby, and The Daily Mail.

B) Women hate sex, thus every sexual act between a woman and a man is male pleasure wrought from the disgust/hatred/fear/pain of a woman. See: a ridiculous percentage of cinematic depictions of sex, Ayn Rand, just a little longer I'm almost there.

The benefit for men clinging to these ideals is power (as always). Men are the only people, and all the mewling and crying of women (objects) is nothing to the faintest whims of people (subjects). If women are granted an interior life - emotion, desire, ambition, thought - then the entire flimsy structure could collapse. As for the second construction, well. Sadism at least acknowledges an emotional quotient to its victims, I suppose. Although most likely there is some crossover, with some men granting an animal-level sentience to women, a lesser sentience that they delight in tormenting. For women who want this nightmarish vision to be real, maybe the payoff comes in masochism (for some) and the (cold) comfort of authoritarian guidance. Why be a person who makes decisions and choices and fails when you could just do what Daddy says, even if it hurts?

As the forced birth movement has made frighteningly clear, many men simply do not believe that women are people. It's easy to forget that - mostly because it is so stark and sad and bleak. But it's there, lurking behind all the disturbing, confusing stances, making them even more horrifying and terrible than these positions seem at first glance.

And now for some time with pictures of kittens, I think.

Sounds 'Eclectic'

2011-04-07T19:06:00.003-08:00

Currently listening, for the first time, to an LP I found at Goodwill - Nat King Cole in Spanish. It works, unevenly, with certain tracks (Quizas) working much better than others (Noche de Ronda). The songs that are least successful are the ones in which Cole sounds like, well, a person who doesn't speak Spanish. These are the ones that are also most recognizably Cole. A dilemma.

GUYS

2011-03-30T12:37:00.004-08:00

From GoFugYourself:

They were.. busy tweeting Miley that dressing like Step Up 4 The Team: Soccer Dance Fight 4D was a brilliant idea.

WHAT! YES! IMMEDIATELY! Someone please, please, call Amanda Bynes for me. She's got the soccer skills AND the cheeks for this role.

Dead Heroes

2011-03-30T08:59:00.003-08:00

Distance and solitude seem the only refuge.

From Joe Bageant's gorgeous and stark essay on the American machine and the people it eats.

Illusion

2011-03-18T11:38:00.003-08:00

If we can afford to kill Libyans, we can afford to provide preschool to poor children; benefits to senoirs; health care to women; high speed rail; any fucking thing at all for our citizenry.

Mi Casa Not Really Su Casa

2011-02-13T15:44:00.003-09:00

I find it kind of creepy when a house-guest who has slightly overstayed his welcome refers to 'going home' - and means my apartment.

That is all.

2011-01-28T16:57:00.003-09:00

[R]eality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.

from here

h/t Paul Campos at Lawyers Guns and Money

Dirty Slogan Stealing Russians

2011-01-24T13:18:00.005-09:00

A beautiful thing to hear from a leader:

[N]o government could protect all of its citizens from attack all the time.(The) government is taking all (the) necessary measures, but the nature of terror is that none of us, none of the countries in this world, are free from this threat. None of us could ensure 100% security level.

Land of the free and home of the brave, right? Right.

How Can You Participate In This ?

2011-01-20T18:30:00.006-09:00

There is a man I care about pretty deeply, who is smart and interesting and sparks a creativity in me that is all too often fallow. And I forget, over and over, how very blind he is to issues of social justice. By which I mean that although he considers himself a Nice, Liberal Guy, he will shock me with ideas and statements that are so blatantly awful, over and over again. Mostly gender-essentialist, hetero-normative stuff, but here is a nice smattering of examples:

- Heterosexual love is more special than homosexual love.
- PC language is stupid and awful and an onerous burden; why should he have to say 'humankind' instead of 'mankind'? (!)
- Marriage is between a man and a woman, not that he really cares.
- Women are fundamentally different from men, and arguing that gender is largely socially constructed means that you want a sex-free, shaved head and unisex jumpsuit dystopian future.
- Legalizing gay marriage will not change the lives of his gay friends at all.

Every so often we get into major fights about something like this, in which I point out that his privilege is perhaps unexamined in this instance, and he becomes vitriolic and defensive. The latest fight was sparked because, in a discussion of marriage, I mentioned that one of the issues I have with marriage is participating in an exclusionary practice while it is denied to a percentage of our population.

This idea he derided as both ludicrous, out of left field, and exactly the same as people who claim that gay marriage would affect straight marriages. After trying several analogies to explain my stance - including sitting at segregated lunch counters as a white person, which he agreed was 'morally repugnant' but also somehow irrelevant to this topic - I somewhat angrily stated that I didn't want to educate him on this topic, which went over about as well as you'd expect. He also managed, in the course of this one conversation, to complain about the methods used by gay rights activists, to deride the 'kind of language you [i.e. feminists] seem to like', and to bemoan my refusing to take his particular life into account before I pointed out his [white, male, rich] privilege.

This man claims to care for me, and I know he harbors hopes/fantasies of a future together. But how would that be possible? How can I partner with someone who sees these crucial human rights issues as a ghettoized special problem, one that occasionally annoys him by asking something of him? How could he be so invested in the idea of exclusion? How could he participate in it without any consideration, without any thought?

How could I participate in a partnership that requires my silence on the issues that I care about the most?

Right As Right Can Be

2011-01-16T13:16:00.001-09:00

"[O]nce you've gone ahead and, say, made excuses for state-sponsored torture, if you want the benefit of the doubt, fuck you."

- Thers at Whiskeyfire

It Is Terribly Sad But

2011-01-13T22:49:00.003-09:00

While the horrific crime of mass murder was, indeed, horrific, and while it is undeniably sad that a young girl died because of an unstable fuck with an extended magazine, when I heard that this tragically dead young girl was born on 9/11, not my first thought, or even my second, but certainly in the top five thoughts was:

Oh, god, the art is going to be so bad.

Crying eagles holding a baby (in talons? Maybe tucked under a wing.), the towers smoking in the background. No, the baby will be saluting. Wait, no, the girl at nine, slain on the ground, with an eagle leaning over her, wings outstretched protectively, and in the eagle's shiny tear will be an image of the towers. In one tear. In another, a rose. And an American flag. God, it's going to be epically bad, people.

NYT MANCHILD AND ECONOMICS 101

2011-01-03T09:59:00.003-09:00

Shorter Ross Douthat: Women are widget-producing machines! Except for those women who want to buy [white] widgets; they're customers. Who count.

h/t Jill, Amanda, everybody in the universe

A Great and Terrible Human Rights Day

2010-12-18T11:43:00.004-09:00

Congratulations to military members, families, and friends!

Sorry we suck, sans papiers of America. We're...we're crappy like that, I guess.

screen capture of New York Times homepage, 12/18/2010

Best Racket Going

2010-10-12T09:24:00.004-08:00

As glad as I am for the two students who were egregiously spied upon by creepy ~~pedophiles~~ school administrators, this is really something special:

School board members voted unanimously Monday night to pay $185,000 to the two students who claimed the district spied on them by secretly activating the webcams on their laptops.

The bulk of the money, $175,000, will be put in trust for Blake Robbins, the Harriton High School junior whose family brought the issue to light in February. Jalil Hasan, who filed his lawsuit this summer after graduating from Lower Merion High School, will receive $10,000.

The district will also pay $425,000 in legal fees to their attorney, Mark S. Haltzman.

Bolds mine. Major props to the staff writer, John P. Martin, who objectively reported the facts in such a way to tell the more interesting version of this story.

Furthermore

2010-08-17T22:48:00.003-08:00

My lady's maid heard from cook, who heard from the second scullery (Bessie, an altogether delightful scrap of pink and white from Cornwall, I believe, who is frightened to pieces of me - of me, can you imagine, not Mother), who had it from your boy at the shop that your valet professed some knowledge of your being morose upon failing to hear from a certain lady by the afternoon post. Ah, Wilberforce! Such tremors of love, to reach so far and so many!

Warmly,
Miss Seraphima Richardson

P.S. Unless you were waiting for a letter from Miss -, in which case you should really look sharp as Mr. - delivered a card and a nosegay Monday last.

Cordially,
S.R.

*****

p.s. oh, for heaven's sake, now i'm going to be writing scraps like this for weeks.

Awful Ideas

2010-08-16T19:45:00.003-08:00

You know what would be terrible/great/terrible again? If there were some major infrastructure failure in the next couple months. Like a bridge collapse, or a water system failure, or what have you. I mean, it would be awful, sad, horrific. But maybe-just-maybe it would also get our Leading Elite Serious Peoples off of the deficit hype bullcrap and onto, oh, I don't know, public works maintenance projects that have been put off for several decades, with money borrowed at 0% interest, given to, like, American people, for working.

And how sad is it that an awful horrific event is maybe the only way that's gonna happen? And even then, probably not, it's probably because of the socialist nazis, who go around at night weakening our infrastructure with their awful inclusiveness and peacemongering.

Stop Being Such An Oppressed Person

2010-08-04T17:00:00.006-08:00

Ah, anthropology and human rights and gender performance. I thought I had given you up in interest of living a calmer existence, but no, alas, alack, I am destined to think about this shit.

Of course it doesn't help that I read interesting articulations on the subject. Garland Grey at tigerbeatdown:

The Swish is a pretty good indicator that the person you are eyeing across the bar might just have his emotional shit worked out related to his queer identity. He might not have his bills paid on time or any books in his house, he may be a toxic sinkhole of a person, but at least he isn’t going to kill you for giving him pleasure he doesn’t understand.

And my first reaction was, damn! Look at my lucky, lucky self, who does not have to contend with such potential violence when I seek sexy fun times or even not quite sexy fun times or flirtatious good times or whathaveyou!

And my second reaction was, oh, crap. Yes, I do.

Now certainly, of all the people likely to face violence from an intimate partner, transsexual/gender queer/intersex folks lose that particular lottery, hands down. And I would guess that gay men follow soon after, right, and then somewhere way back down the football field of super crappy boyfriends are straight, cisgender white women with college educations who are not in the military. I get that. Our particular set of scary truths are less prevalent than other groups. And I don't for a second begrudge the gay community this one thing they've got, this one way it's easier. But wouldn't it be great if, in addition to The Swish, we ALL had a thing to look for?

How many times have you been on a date with what seemed like a reasonable, intelligent man who tells a rape joke? How many times has a guy bought you a drink and talked a nice respectful game and then tried to get (or succeeds in getting) you bombed so that he could 'get laid'? What about that interesting grad student at the party who followed you into the bathroom and locked the door after himself? What about your lover who was all for gay rights but got super offended if it was implied that he is not the most Heterosexual Man Ever, because the worst thing he could be is Like a Girl? What about your boyfriend who hit you during a fight but was so sorry? What about the zillions of guys who just think that she wanted it, she was asking for it, she's making it up, she's a bitch? Liberal men. Educated men. Nice men.

How do you suss them out? How do you protect yourself? How can you mitigate the danger? What is the Humanist Swish? And where can I get some, because it would be nice to be more Out Loud about believing other people are people, too.

To File Under: Ridculous

2010-07-28T11:14:00.002-08:00

Why is it that I am at my most creative-feeling when I have paid work to complete and a deadline to hit? I think this means that I need someone to hire me for tedious work that they don't really need completed, after all. Any takers?

Things to Avoid

2010-05-12T16:06:00.001-08:00

Do not bother preparing - or eating - any sauce with a base of ketchup.

The Last Days

2010-04-22T16:09:00.003-08:00

Amazing pictures! I pray for all the people. Just shows you all the things going on that we need to be prepared for the last days. Earthquakes etc! God help us all! - Margarita Kane

From the comments section of the Boston Times' The Big Picture.

How Much Do You Want To Bet

2010-03-11T20:56:00.003-09:00

That despite the data referenced in this prominent article, a large number of men will ask their doctors to perform the PSA test and forgo the digital rectal exam. Because being examined for warning symptoms of prostate cancer is so gay.

Congratulations, Kathryn Bigelow!

2010-03-09T17:52:00.003-09:00

But we need more jobs. Because in the meat and potatoes of the media world, men are wildly overrepresented. To wit:

Cutting Edge Fire and Ice (as ABC Family would have it, although imdb claims the grammatical colon) is the first of the four Cutting Edge movies to be written wholly by a woman (Cutting Edge 3 had a female story co-writer). None of them have had a female director. Because I guess Figure Skating Love Stories are men's stories.

Ah, geez

2010-03-01T23:30:00.003-09:00

As a (n alleged) Canadian-American, I find the recent hockey events incredibly uplifting but also disappointing. But then also disappointing but simultaneously uplifting. I guess what I am trying to say is, Go, hockey players! I wish that all of you could have won, but that's only possible in a board game my mom got when I was eight called The Ungame, and it was incredibly dull. Even the packaging. Whereas hockey comes with very snazzy packaging indeed.

An Open Letter to Omegle

2010-02-17T19:31:00.002-09:00

Dear OMEGLE:

I enjoy the conceit of your project, I really do. Random strangers! New and interesting conversations with people whom you would never have other contact! It will be just like that spring when I felt super-confident and sat on the terraces of all the city's coffee shops, smiling openly at strangers and giving unsolicited reviews of the books they happened to be reading!

Except that really those conversations weren't quite so random, as I could be assured to have at least an enjoyment of open-air beverages in common with the person. And usually books, and some form of art whether music or fashion or post-post-modern origami stop-motion, and generally the person was an adult, because even I didn't provide unsolicited book reviews for Curious George (Werner Herzog, I'm looking at you), and most often the person was interesting in looks or thoughts or idiosyncratic fidgeting.

But the truly random of Omegle: thus far it has led me to conversations that are short and unfulfilling and end with some form of 'your using sentences that are confusing haha *end chat*'. And really, Omegle, while I certainly can understand that my thoughts tend towards form: oroborus, I do ask questions. I take an interest. I try to engage. But one trisyllabic word and so many of your strangers, unanchored by the allure (or social weight) of my presence, unfiltered by any subconscious assessment of backgrounds/education level/potential for interest, so many of your strangers cut and run, Omegle, and I'm starting to get a complex.

So my feedback, for you, Omegle, is that a) should you want someone to write for you, I would be quite happy to attempt a conversation on a regular basis, to be dissected and shared (with the permission of the Stranger) on your Brand Building Blog, and b) maybe there could be a special button beyond which people promise to chat for 10 minutes, regardless of sentence complexity? I can be kind of charming, once you get over the first shock of it all.

Foreign Indignitaries

2010-02-16T17:37:00.001-09:00

Do people really need it explained to them that the Dalai Lama is a religious figure? That religions have intolerant and arbitrary rules? Even the religion that makes those cute little statues?* That not all young people from an area of the world behave like ascetic monks? (Although, p.s., I've seen many a smoking monk on motorcycles, so behaving like a monk isn't exactly folding one's self up in a stone box anymore.) That traditional dress can seem kind of lame if you're 21?

I mean, hell, I get it that most people don't know that Xinjiang is a powder keg, that Greater Tibet + Xinjiang constitute a massive portion of China's land mass, that those are the two most-rebellious areas/ethnic groups. But that's specific political knowledge. Those opening questions? Those are more are-you-alive-and-basically-sentient political knowledge. Unless, I guess, you are the kind of person who also thinks that Africans all live in the bush, that Aboriginals don't wear shoes, and that Eskimos/Inuits live in igloos. (For those who need a cheat sheet, the correct answer is, "No to the power of greyskull.")

Ok, I guess there's another category of people who might assume that Tibetans are all crimson-and-gold wearing, prayer-wheel-spinning theocrats: people who haven't thought about it. Not even a little bit. What's surprising is that someone who wrote a three page essay on the place falls into that category.

Tibet's enduring hold on Western minds .. together with the energetic, globe-trotting advocacy of the Dalai Lama -- helps explain why the concerns of the region's minority population are so familiar to so many so far away...In the Washington, D.C., neighborhood where I live, more than a few homes have decorative Tibetan prayer flags strung sentimentally across balconies and backyard porches.

If the concerns of the population were truly familiar to people, you wouldn't need to write this essay, which covers the basics of the basics concerning Tibet. And prayer flags? Honey, Tibetan prayer flags were the white earbuds of the 90's.

While I appreciate the author's willingness to scratch at the burnished brass surface that is the Dalai Lama, this essay could have been so much better. It could have been interesting. Her focus on the random young man** offered up some fertile ground; he and his friends think Michael Jackson and smoking are cool. Really? Will they discover Nirvana sometime soon? They think China needs to give Tibet more autonomy but not necessarily independence. Wow! Could that have anything to do with her translator, who was most likely Han Chinese if not a Party approved chaperone? What about the elders of that community? Do they agree? It's surprising how Tibetans have a strong cultural identity, even if they don't live in the region that the current government calls Tibet. Amazing! Is that because of anything more than the 'Greater Tibet' - more historically accurate and broader regions for the Tibetan people? Such as possibly because of visual ethnicity clues? Or having a distinct language from the Han Chinese, which she doesn't even mention? Or how about, if you're trying to update Western conceptions of Tibet, you could maybe use a picture other than one of the Dalai Lama?!

Lost opportunities aside, my biggest gripe with this piece is the fuzzy, lazy writing. Consider:

Judging by appearances, the new generation of Tibetans seems, in a superficial sense, rather un-Tibetan. But that, too, is an oversimplification, [because they don't care about money and are religious].

Let's start at the end and work backwards.
-In the paragraph following the one I quoted, she explains that many forms of Buddhism are practiced throughout China, some but not all endorsed by the government. So, I guess, the Tibetans are religious, unlike those other Chinese people, many of whom are religious.
-Throughout this essay, she discusses at some length the business saavy of Tibetans, so...so I guess they do care about money.
-'Judging by appearances', 'in a superficial sense', these Tibetans are so not the Tibetans of my Brad Pitt inspired dreams.

I'm pretty sure that last sentence, rewritten just that way, is her thesis. It's a shame that she wasted three pages not so much fleshing it out as fluffing it- pages that could have gone to actually complicating people's view of a major public figure and a massive, ongoing, human-rights-violating occupation.

* I'm not saying it's wrong. I've got a hat knitted by the Dalai Lama's monks. It's pink. It's adorable. The proceeds provided money for young people in exile from their homeland. Get you a cute little statue if you want one.

**Perhaps her....taxi driver!?!?

This Post Goes Out To All The Kids At Slate/TNR - Contrarianism what! No, seriously, what?

2010-02-12T00:42:00.005-09:00

I've had a slew of conversations recently in which people I consider reasonable will point out some 'controversy' comprised of the right wing lie factory doing what they do best against all evidence and science and reason, and these reasonable people will then detail why, really, it doesn't even matter if the fakely controversial thing is true or not, because there are all these reasons that outcomes/goals supported by, you know, evidence/science/reason/truth that just happen to make the non-crazy/non-lying position the better one. Regardless of its truth or falsehood. Specifics? Global warming. Man's effect on global warming. Obama's place of birth. Women's abilities as stacked up against men's. Women's worth as stacked up against men.

Ok, listen. I oscillate towards the existential/nihilist arc of depressive crazy sometimes. But as a philosopher once told me, we're all pragmatists when it comes to buses and street crossings. So outside of mentally masturbatory conversations whilst under the influence of mild hallucinogens, we need to get something straight.

Reality is real. There are things that happen, and conclusions can be drawn from them. Are conclusions infalliable? No. But that doesn't mean that the correct response to liars is to say that reality doesn't have to be real for it to be a good idea. A major part of the power of the right wing is the willingness of the media machine, politicians, and the public at large to hear their baseless assertions, treat them as valid arguments, and then declare any evaluative decisions to be in poor taste. Saying it 'doesn't matter' where Obama was born, 'at this point'? That's....dude, that's not being polite or listening to both sides; that's racist. Global warming 'may or may not be real'? That's not keeping an open-mind. That's being flattened by an express in the crosswalk.

ABC Family Nooooooo

2010-02-07T17:18:00.002-09:00

Ugh, of course. There is an abstinence-teaching story line. "Abstinence is a choice that empowers you!!!!"

Le sigh. Le double sigh. ABC Family your stance will lead to bigger families for younger women. Super empowering.

Oh for the love of all that is holy

2010-02-06T15:13:00.000-09:00

I have discovered an ABC family show. About young women. Who are top flight gymnasts.

WELL there go the next three days.

DADT and old-fashioned, testosterone laden tough guys

2010-02-02T09:36:00.002-09:00

So some people (whom Gleen Greenwald handily responds to here)think that allowing gays in the military would be bad for the bigoted, reactionary young enlisted men in our military.

First, obviously, I don't think that most of our military are bottom feeders who can't respect and trust people who happen to be a little tiny bit different than they are.

But secondly - and this is a point I haven't seen anyone make yet - why wouldn't we want to make bigoted, reactionary young men uncomfortable with our armed forces? After last year's DHS report that showed a major uptuck in right wing militarization and specifically in extremist groups using the military as a way to gain experience with weaponry and explosives, why would we not want to try to keep those elements from seeing the military as such as an amazingly attractive bastion of super-violent and rigidly bigoted masculinity? Shouldn't we be doing everything we can to make them feel less welcome in the military? Not to mention that people who can't recognize gay Americans as people worthy of respect are, I would venture to guess, less likely to view people in other countries as worthy of respect. A bigot rarely orders single-scoop hatred; don't we want to avoid putting guns and grenades in the hands of people who can't respect lives that are different from their own?

I say we should institute a quota system, so that every unit (and every prospective military member) will be assured of having at least a couple of gay or lesbian members. The more uncomfortable we make old-fashioned bigots, the better.

Mmmm dessertation

2010-02-01T19:46:00.002-09:00

You realize, of course, that Lady Gaga will spawn a thousand dissertations. I can't wait! Let's imagine a few:

"Gaga For You: Female Provocative Performance Art as Pacifier"
"Gagalicious: Textures and Tones on the Canvas of the Body"
"The Lady Doth Obsess Too Much: Overdetermined (and Underwhelming) Art"
"Bad Romance: How Lady Gaga Spoiled Two Generations of Lovers"
"Harlequin: Lady Gaga, Big Dogs, and the Cultural Value of the Jester"

Oh, man. I want to read that last one. Will someone write it, please? Probably someone will. Someone who is 13 right now. Enjoy, 13 year old! The next few years might be tough, but eventually you'll be a grown up and writing theses that me and a dozen other people are dying to read.

Open Hieroglyphs

2010-01-31T06:38:00.002-09:00

Dear President Obama:

You have mentioned, multiple times in several big profile events recently, the phrase 'not re-litigate the past'. As you've not been too flash in the messaging department lately, I am forced to conclude that this is a phrase you'd like to become part of the Village (and general) vernacular.

Mr. Obama. We will be happy to avoid re-litigating the past. Please just litigate it once.

Sincerely,
A Citizen For Upholding the Rule of Law and Against War Crimes and Massive Theft

Why aren't Republicans for single-payer health care?

2010-01-29T11:29:00.003-09:00

How many workers struggle to keep jobs that they hate, that they perform poorly at, that they miss lots of, that they barely scrape by in - because of current illness or a pre-existing condition that means they can't get health care if they leave? Wouldn't it be better for the Masters of the Universe if they could send workers away who can no longer perform? If they could say, "You know, Jim, it's really too bad that you're ill. We're worried about you. Which is why you can't work here anymore. You need to focus on you. (And we need people who are focused on making us more money.)" Not that they don't boot people for illness, but if they were allowed to do so without negative PR....and, like, moral culpability, not that such a thing matters to them....

Of course, I think the same thing about good education. (Why wouldn't you want workers with quality educations to help them achieve to the best of their abilities and also have well-honed skills for learning? Why wouldn't you want workers that know how to read and write and do arithmetic and figure out solutions to problems and order from catalogs and understand why $80 a month for a computer ends up being a terrible deal? I mean, just generally, you want your workers to not sink your company through incompetence, right? Unless your entire business model is predicated on taking advantage of people, or something equally heinous!....Oh.)

But the health care one still stands.

shark-jumping, fridge-nuking apple

2010-01-28T19:11:00.002-09:00

Listen, Mr. Steve, if you're going to promise me a 'magical' and 'revolutionary' device, it better be a magic wand or...or that other kind of Magic Wand.

So Apparently There is No Liberal Party Anymore

2010-01-26T12:56:00.002-09:00

As now the White House isn't even pretending to have any reasonable ideas. And I thought Hillary was a pro-business hawk centrist.

"A non-security discretionary spending freeze." H. Christ, people, we already have that, out here in the real world, in wages that never go up or go down or disappear. It sucks. It is not a good idea.

Why is it that politicians pretend that poverty is not a matter of life and death? There are more kinds of safety than security theater, and all that money that you can't possibly touch and must increase forever to pay off the twin gods of masculinity and cowardice; all that money could be feeding our hungry children or creating alternatives to poisoning our planet or reworking the health care system so that homelessness and a short lifetime of terrible pain are not highly possible scenarios in the lives of millions of Americans.

I Watch Terrible TV But Use It as a Springboard to Deep Thought...ish

2010-01-22T22:05:00.003-09:00

So Private Practice is this sexy, stupid show, about sexy, stupid people with sexy, smart jobs. Doctors, soap opera, you know the drill. You probably know the show. What you might not know (because oh, god, it is really terrible, this show - except also they just did an abortion show, so maybe it's great. All of you watch it immediately.) is that one of the main characters is anti-choice. And in this last episode, her 15 year old daughter confesses she is pregnant. And the anti-choice Doctor Mom tells her she has to have an abortion. And then slaps her when she says she won't.

Now. Now, now, now. First of all, I've been dreading this day, because the whole show is these hot grownups, and then there is this one kid. This one girl kid. This one girl kid whose mom is all pro-forced-birth. But as I listened to Dr. Mom explain that she truly believes that she is going to hell for forcing her little girl to have an abortion but that she will Totally Go To Hell, because dammit she will do Anything to Protect her Little Girl including, apparently, slap her and pretend she is not a person - as I listened to that, on the 37th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, I realized that this is exactly how anti-choice women and their daughters end up in clinics, waving their disgusted faces at the other women there because by god those women choosing to have abortions are disgusting. And that girls with anti-choice parents are probably equally in danger of being forced into an unwanted abortion as they are of being forced into an unwanted birth.

Because being against abortion is about two things, really. It's about believing that women are disgusting, that women's bodies are horrific and disgusting, and it's about believing that you know better than the person concerned. Both Amanda at Pandagon and Jill at Feministe have written eloquently about these issues, so I'll be brief.

But let's start with the second thing, because the through line is easier to see: believing you know better. That's what, at its base, the anti-choice sector is saying. "We, these personally unaffected observers, can say, with blanket authority, that we know better than the women whose bodies and genetic material are personally, intimately concerned. We, not they, know their true hearts and minds - or the ones they would have if they weren't damned and evil. For their own good, without knowing any particulars of their fiscal security or home lives or health or goals or the circumstances of their pregnancies or anything at all except that they are women and pregnant, for their own good we will make this decision and say that this one thing is bad and wrong always no matter what." Which.....guys? We don't even think that should be the case with murder.

And, actually, pretty much all the things that I thought were verboten in our society turned out to be alright in certain circumstances for certain people, like torture or preventative detention or spying on your own people or defrauding the government (Goldman Sachs, I'm looking at you). Or the way that Thomas Jefferson was a horrible slave owning rapist (who wanted to send all his children by Sally Hemings to Haiti, so it could become, like, the island of lost and horribly oppressed black children, I guess?), but still we love and worship him as a Founding Father.* But there's always nuclear war, right? We're all against that no matter what, unless you talk to the many, many people who claim that bombing Japan saved lives, which is true as long as you think that Japanese people in general are not lives per se. I mean, name me a crime for which we don't allow exceptions. So why would we think that this thing that is not a crime should be a thing that we should decide about for other people in circumstances that we do not know of or understand?

And now the other thing, about anti-choice - the disgust for women/women's bodies. Because women are just gross, right? They bleed and stuff. And they're girls. Icky! So of course they should never be having sex, because they are icky and cootie-laden and disgusting, and they should be always celibate until a man puts a ring on it and then have a million babies. Whether he beats her or not. Whether they're poor or not. Whether her health is in jeopardy or not. But mostly probably women should not be having sex. Because of the gross. See, if they weren't having sex, they couldn't get pregnant! (Unless they were raped. And that's probably ok, right, pro-life peoples? Most people think a raped-lady can have an abortion. See? Rape is ok, ladies!) So if a lady does get pregnant, it's because she was having sex. Which is slutty and wrong and mostly, ok, gross. No abortions for yooouuuu! First you were gross, and then you got your grossness all over a guy (high-five, guy!), and now you're getting punished by a huge health risk that will permanently change your body and major financial drain and also this huge health risk may try to track you down one day and demand advice or a kidney. (Please, that is a totally valid point, and one that never gets talked about, I feel like. So much so that it gets its own paragraph:

Seriously. That is such a huge flaw in the 'why not adoption?!' concept. Well, what if a women has an ugly baby? So the ugly baby goes into some terrible foster care situation and gets repeatedly abused and then runs away and becomes a crack whore at 14? Now: this is not to say that 14 year old crack whores do not have value as people. They do. But for the love of jehovah, why would anyone choose that path for a mass of undifferentiated tissue? Or what if a women has a baby and gives it up for adoption and then at 30, the now-grown baby needs a piece of liver, or a kidney? Since she's already given up the right to control her body to this person once....Why do anti-choice people not get that having a baby means having a baby? Like a real person who will have needs and thoughts and things and whose life may not work out very well and whose life could indeed still impact the woman much, much later. [And I am not trying to hate on women who have babies and then turn them over to someone else. That is a totally ok and hopeful choice to make, but the result is not always going to be stickers and lollipops and happy blended families and never a thought or inconvenience again on the part of the birth mother.])

So these two things together, this knowing-better-than and the fundamental icky nature of females. That's how anti-choice mothers end up deciding that they know better than their daughters, their sweet lovely daughters, who let their fundamental ickiness show. Mothers, please stop believing that your daughters are icky for having a body and for having desire. And please start believing that your daughters are people, with thoughts and feelings and stuff. And let your daughters decide for their own bodies.

That goes double for everyone else.

Post-Filibuster Apocalypse: Man on the Street Reaction

2010-01-20T14:32:00.005-09:00

Sir, can you please tell me how you feel about the Democrats ending the filibuster?

"What's that again?"

It is a rule in the Senate that requires a 3/5ths majority to proceed to a vote.

"What?"

It means that if 60 Senators don't agree that they want to vote on legislation, the Senate can't vote on it.

"And the Democrats changed that?"

Yes.

"So...wait, explain it again?"

For example, the jobs bill that just passed sending billions to the states to create new jobs, the J.O.B.S. Act of 2010*-

"Yeah, my cousin - she's been on unemployment for six months now, real tough on the family, you know - just got hired to run an after school thing at her daughter's middle school! The money is coming from that."

Yes. Well, previously, 60 Senators would have to vote 'yes' to allow the Senate to begin discussing the issue. And then 60 Senators would have to vote 'yes' to finish discussing the issue and move to a vote. And then -

"How many Senators have to vote 'yes' now?"

51.

"How many Senators are there again?"

100.

"So they take a vote to be able to take a vote?"

Yes, and, out of 100 Senators, 51 Senators have to vote 'yes' to -

"So they win the vote. I mean, to be able to vote, they have to win a vote to say they want to vote."

Yes.

"And then they vote. And whoever wins, wins."

Ye.....yes.

*long pause*

"The Democrats did what now?"

As Massachuesettes Goes....

2010-01-20T14:11:00.003-09:00

It is really, really frustrating that politicians whose values align most closely with mine are so freaking terrible at governance. Oh, noes! We only have an alleged 59 votes in the Senate now! We only control two of three branches of government! There's absolutely no way we can -

Yes, you can, you freaking jerks.

Reconciliation: pass a sickandquick national public option for anyone who wants in. It will be more liberal than most Democratic Senators want (because of parliamentary restrictions on the reconciliation process), but too bad. They tried the complex way, and they couldn't get it done. Promise to fix it in floor votes. Tax the hell out of the super-wealthy and insurance companies. Screw 'em: let them bitch and moan, but if people who are kicked off of their private insurance can immediately get public insurance, they'll either adapt or go under. Try to use a regular vote to end rescission and pre-existing conditions. When Republicans refuse to let a vote come to pass on the issue, clusterbomb the media. "Republicans don't want regular insurance companies to have to actually provide health care! No wonder they were against health reform! They want all of you to die!" I recommend booking Grayson non-stop on any media outlet that will have him. After two weeks of that, destroy the filibuster. Burn it to the ground. Tell your caucus that if any of them vote against it, they will be primaried by candidates championed by the DNC. Have a list of names ready. Set up a fund specifically for unnamed candidates to challenge Democrats (or Joe Lieberman) who vote no. Be prepared to actually do it; if regaining a functioning government isn't worth tough party discipline, nothing is. Then move on to the other major issues facing the country, like the economy and global warming and two wars. By the election this year, Democrats will have huge legislative accomplishments to brag about and, if they're not idiots, enormous outlays of cash helping people screwed over by the big banks as well as some good financial reform. By 2012's election, millions of voters will be enrolled in the health care provided by Democrats - who, Obama will remind them, really need to be re-elected so they can make sure that the 10-year period for reconciliation legislation doesn't end this new, awesome, affordable, secure health care that people are loving.

Stop acting like these issues don't matter. Stop acting like Republican & centrist Senator's "feelings" do. They had a year. Make this one yours.

There's gold in them there tubes

2010-01-19T00:24:00.004-09:00

Empty Web Addresses as of Today:

boringwebsite.com

ohmygoditsawebsite.com

sothisistheinter.net

seriesoftubes.org

elephantepithets.com

nancydrewcankissmyplumpass.com (this would make a great gift for a happily rotund friend named Bess, if you have one.)

babyhalfnote.com

misshavishamscake.org

thundercats-hoe.com

owhatatangledwwwww.com

smythingisthenewxbox.net (you know you've got a Ren-Freak Friend who would love this site.)

cutestthingsinthewholeworld.com (this one seriously disappointed me.) (I mean, really.)

maybe it bothers me because

2010-01-02T09:21:00.004-09:00

what's the deal? why do i hate avatar sight unseen?

maybe because it feels like a death knell to an art that is still coming into its own.

maybe because it feels like cheating.

maybe because it's more of the lucas-ing same - let's just make it fancy and fuck the story.

maybe because it irks me that Kathryn Bigelow couldn't have just one movie, one year.

maybe because easier perfection makes me sad.

maybe because it is breathtakingly tragic that the best film that money can buy is still about the White Guy.

maybe because i need to hate it while i still can, before the shiny takes my breath away.

shiny blue example of political allegory

2009-12-30T08:35:00.005-09:00

My dad sent me a link to an article positing that Avatar is maybe liberal's Atlas Shrugged.* And no, he didn't mean because the dialogue is terrible.

It is amazing just how awful a grasp crazy libertarians and right wingers have on the fundamentals of liberalism. As if just because a thing involves Natives and the idea that we shouldn't rape and bomb a planet, then it is the Liberal Bible. Also, the glorious io9 article tearing the film to shred as white guilt/privilege fantasy has been out for days and made the rounds of the usual liberal writers, so clearly the guy decided to make some shit up without checking in with the people he's making claims about. Which....is kind of Avatar's/James Cameron's fatal flaw, so that's pretty apropos.**

But again, this is just more proof of how heinous conservatives are, as usual. Because what dude is saying, right, is that Liberals care about (wait for it) a people who are getting slaughtered overtly for profit, their entire ecosystem which just happens to be sentient, and, in a charming throw away line about Cameron not employing the casting couch, people getting jobs without having to have sex for them -and that these are bad things, these awful liberal values.

He also mentions that Ayn Rand is more creative than James Cameron (SHE WROTE THE SAME BOOK TWICE, GUY; YOUR ARGUMENT IS CLEARLY FLAWED), that the Navi 'subside off the land'***, and implies that Liberals hate New York.

No, really. He does.

So I guess my take on all this, as I have managed to not do much in the way of actual analysis yet - except to point out that random townhall libertarian dude has no clue what he's talking about and conservatives are bad, which is hardly news or analysis, at this point - I guess my take is that families are difficult and twisted places, and that people can seem rational but also be covertly reading townhall, and that maybe this isn't that healthy, really. The whole pointandlaugh or full fisking or even the ginandtacos.com treatment is maybe not the best for us, as a whole. Or me, as a person. I don't know, I just started this thing off with some nice, clean outrage and ended up kind of blue, and really I wish fafblag was more regular about itself, is all. Because brilliant writing makes the awful paranoid smoking caldron of a mess that is our public discourse seem more bearable, but the nice clean outrage kind of leaves me feeling a little empty inside, like sex with an ex who you really truly don't love anymore.

*I'm not going to link to it, because it's awful. Other people can link to the right wing madness they point and laugh at. I don't really want to. It leads to money for people I think are bad for the country.

**OH MY GOD guys I know that the Large Smurfs are not real people, but what the hell, you know Cameron didn't visit any reservations to get feedback on this crap, and if he tries to say that it is not a Native story, he sure as shit shouldn't have named them the Navi.

***Yes, it's probably a spellcheck issue. No, I don't think that's petty; if you have problems spelling 'subsist', you shouldn't be writing in a public forum about Natives or ecology or, well, much of anything.

I'm Like a Media Professional or Something

2009-12-28T10:01:00.003-09:00

HEE sending invoices for media work makes me such a happy camper. Such a happy camper with tons of expensive equipment. Also: I have begun writing a children's book, and I think I can finish the writing and one concept illustration by Friday, which, I mean, DOPE.

Media: I will conquer it! In various formats! Or, um, contribute.

The Great Potoo and other awesome animals

2009-12-28T05:13:00.003-09:00

This great interactive slideshow on mimicry from the National Geographic is an excellent mental sorbet. Keep an eye out for the best named bird, a name that honestly I would have given my cat if I had known of it before this morning.

h/t PZ Myers

AH Memories

2009-12-24T17:22:00.004-09:00

My earliest memory of critical thinking - of weighing conflicting ideas against available evidence and making a judgement call - is the Christmas on which I stopped believing in Santa.

We had just moved to a new place, and we were staying in a rental home that had a banisterred landing looking out over the great room. I was five, and my older brother, at eight, was more of an authority figure than peer. Or rather, amongst the underclass of children, he was my dear leader. In any case, on Christmas Eve, he tap tap tapped on my door and enticed me out to the landing. I resisted, at first - Santa! Bad children! Sleep on my soft flannel sheets dotted with cartoon sheep! - but eventually he won out with a combination of threats, cajoling, and appeals to curiosity.

I remember him wearing footy pajamas, although that seems the kind of odd, charming detail that is often apocryphal. We crept to the banister, peering out over our industrious parents. They were wrapping presents, happy. He whispered into my wispy, brown hair, horrible lies. Lies! I fled back to my room, taking comfort in the inevitable coal-stuffed stocking he would discover the next morning. Mine would be stuffed with candy and small toys, and I wouldn't share. At all. Except for the candies with nuts; I hated those.

In the morning, we both had candy-stuffed stockings. He didn't need even my nut candies, so ample were our bounties. O Santa, how you hath forsaken me in this hour of justified revenge! But the worst was yet to come.

Santa, in our household, brought the biggest presents and the best presents. The presents that appear after all the cat-blankets and books and socks have been unwrapped, and you are pushing listlessly at the rising tide of tissue paper and thinking, is that all? while simultaneously aware that you have amassed a pile of wealth to make Croesus blush. The presents that are hidden in a closet or deep amid the tree branches or, later, on the driveway with a big red bow that screams, "FREEDOM." Santa brought those presents to us.

And so when we had unwrapped our gluttonous, glorious piles, and my mother chirped that there 'might be one more', and a large box was produced, I was immediately worried. "TO: THE DUCK-BILLED PLACELOT," it cheerily proclaimed. "FROM: SANTA!" I unwrapped the thing slowly, fearing what was inside, but in my heart, my sinking, leaden heart, I knew already. The box held a doll that spoke and played cassette tapes inserted in her robotic back; a doll I had coveted openly; a doll that I had seen my mother gift-wrapping the night before.

I think I cried immediately, those heavy, choking sobs that only children can produce. I'm sure it took some time for my parents to get the story out of me; I'm fairly certain my brother has never completely forgiven me for ratting him out to the overlords - on Christmas day! But that breaking of my known conception of the universe - one in which Santa existed, in which reindeer could fly, in which my parents were trustworthy people - was an exceptional gift, in many ways. It was the unlocking of my skepticism, and the beginning of a long tradition of the kind of mistrust in the face of things that makes the world an eternal, joyful puzzle.

just how stupid are we, honestly?

2009-12-21T02:13:00.003-09:00

The Nelson Abortion Compromise that (along with some federal dollar$ for Nebraska) got Nelson to be the 60th vote is - to use one of my brother's favorite words - asinine.

Women literally have to send two checks (or make two credit transactions or whatever) to their insurance companies to doubly-extra ensure that separate, special abortion money is set aside for those evil, evil abortions.

Has there ever been a more transparent harass-the-bitches strategy in the history of the Abortion Culture Wars? I mean, honestly. It doesn't block abortions. It doesn't lower the abortion rate. It doesn't actually change the non-federal-funding of constitutionally protected medical procedures. It just exists to make things a leeetle bit more annoying for women.

Can we not institute some sort of you've-got-to-be-kidding rule? Also, Nebraska, ya'll need to get your shit together and get a progressive up in your government, 'cause this guy blows. (But you're still in less trouble than Connecticut.)

Nuclear Psychology

2009-12-20T15:40:00.003-09:00

For everyone hoping that the filibuster will be destroyed (read: anyone who hopes the Senate can become a functioning part of government again), I have a question for you.

Why the fuck would Democrats vote to repeal it seven years down the road?

Seriously, now, in what ridiculous universe would a group of people say, "Yes, we think this rule is harmful to our group accomplishing things - or any group in our organization accomplishing things. We should change the rule through either incredibly difficult negotiations that involve us giving awful things to at least nine people, seven of whom are not in our group. or by simply forcing the change in a way that will cause the other group to publicly call for our heads. Oh, and, also, we should promise to continue to be bound by this rule until maybe the other group is in charge. Even though it's clearly terrible."

Guys! That is idiotic. First of all, you all know that the Republicans will still cry bloody murder over it, regardless of when it kicks in. Second, a long period of difficult negotiations? The Senate Does Not Have The Time. Climate, anyone? Two wars? Stalled economy with 10% unemployment? They have Shit To Do. And then - why shoot yourself in the face? The thing that will lead to losses for Democrats is not getting things done. If they change a rule to help get things done.....then they should avail themselves of that change.

Why would Senators take a strong stand for something that will not help them at all? That will not further their policy goals for, in the best case scenario, seven years?

PEOPLE I know you think it looks principled and would create a bipartisan consensus, but the Republicans are not going to go for anything at all while Obama's president. And you know what? It's not really principled. It's craven and stupid. What, did someone count up years of Democratic majority vs. Republican majority in high filibuster years and determine that the Democrats are 'owed' seven extra years of total gridlock? If a rule is bad, it is bad, and waiting to implement the change simply because you are in power is the worst kind of self-defeatism.

People need to read more

2009-12-19T23:41:00.004-09:00

Why does this 100 worst books list contain all books I know (of, at least)? I mean, sure, it might be hard to argue with the many screeds of Ann Coulter, or the long, long, long, long, terrible, long regurgitated same stories of Ayn Rand, or Left Behind, which, I can tell you, after reading the amazing slacktivist, to be one of the worst conceived and executed series in the history of story-telling. All these, ok, I get it. And I suppose you could make a case for Dan Brown's books, the Bible, and I guess Ann Frank's diary wasn't the best novel, although it seems kind of churlish to call it the 77th worst.

But really, the list reads like people ran out of books to nominate. Lord of the Flies? Fahrenheit 451? Love in the Time of Freakin' Cholera??

People. I bought a Harlequin Spanish-Language Romance featuring a dark, brooding love interest called Dexter, called Paseos Del Amor. Or Fuego Del Amor.* Or...I don't know, it was part of the "Deseo" imprint, and I gave it to my roommate to read first, as I am ostensibly learning a Native American language right now, and it has disappeared into his bookpiles. But I am pretty confident that it is a much worse book than Eragon, which was pretty entertaining.

Or, if you must stay with Well Known Books from which Movies Have Been Made (which is, apparently a third of this list), what about the Vampire's Assistant series? I mean! Guys! I read seven of them. Awful. Truly, truly awful. First person novels from the perspective of a protagonist who is so awesome (read: unbelievable and poorly conceived)! Just this regular guy! Who becomes (SPOILER) the King of Vampire Kings and also controls armies of spiders and wolves and can walk through fire and, um, his one weakness is his love and forgiveness. Come to think of it, it would make a pretty fantastic re-imagining of the Jesus story. But it's not! And instead it is simply awful!

Toni Morrison is on this list, guys. For Beloved. It's not my favorite Morrison novel, but seriously? The worst? This can only be the list of people who have read less than one hundred books in their lives.

But hey, feminists, finally we have a book list that includes a healthy contingent of female authors.

*It was a dollar at the second hand shop. My Spanish needs work. Don't judge.

h/t Roger Ailes

a knowing term for talking about things privy only to people in the know

2009-12-17T18:10:00.001-09:00

So, a couple of people have pointed out this video of Franken denying Lieberman extra speaking time on TPM.

UGH. Guys. This is not "Liberal Catharsis". This is a combination of Franken doing what he was asked to do and the most childish, ridiculous, touchy group of mostly-men in the known universe. *

Franken: "You have 10 minutes, because there are 100 of us to go, and some of us are currently missing our religious holidays with family right now, including you."

Lieberman: "Ok! Blah blah [interval of 10 minutes] blah blahtey-blah."

Franklin: "Your 10 minutes is up."

Lieberman: "I want more than my 10 minutes."

Franken: "No, I was instructed to not let anyone go past 10 minutes."

*GASPS OF SHOCK AND HORROR* Followed immediately by outraged speech and wonky frissons.

Guys. GUYS: this is not the best thing that happened all day or a major pwnage. This is not even a minor ownage. This is 10 minutes*(all the Senators who want to talk=Over Two Workdays. This is ridiculous, and I hate that the more I learn about the Senate, the more it reminds me of Calvin's treehouse, minus the wisdom.

Also, Young Liberal Bloggers, please be careful. If this insider-baseball kind of 'smackdown' is impressing you now, I hate to think what you'll write in 30 years. This is more like someone demuring at an opponent's request for an extra turn in croquet than, you know, vengeance.

*I mean the Senate, not liberal bloggers.

Reasons Responsible Liberals Are Calling for a Boycott of the HCR Bill*

2009-12-17T17:44:00.000-09:00

- Straight up populist anger
- Disappointment at the unarguably terrible gaming Democratic leadership (both in the legislature and White House) played on this one
- Strategic noise-making to keep the bill from getting too awfully terribly worse (see Lieberman's reaction to Rockefeller's joy)
- Strategic noise-making to give leadership support/pressure to improve the bill in conference
- Strategic noise-making to pressure leadership to game better on other upcoming fights (climate change, bank regulations, the inevitable pre-2012 Afghanistan drawdown)
- Recognition that this once-in-a-generation meme is a self-fulfilling prophecy of total tautological doom. To wit:

"This bill is terrible!" "Ah, but if we don't pass it, we won't pass anything, because it is only a once in a generation thing!" "But this bill is terrible, and there are other mechanisms for getting closer to what we want." "Well, hush, now, we can still use those mechanisms after we pass this bill, which we must, because it is only once in a generation." *terrible, reverse-stone-soup bill passes* "Ok! Let's use those mechanisms, now that we've got that framework." "Oh, we can't do that. We passed a once in a generation thing!" "But it's terrible. You said we could make it better later." "Yes, but we passed a thing, and it is the same generation, and so we are done."

AD NAUSEUM.

Obviously, if this health care bill failed, it is possible that Democrats could go the full chicken shit and not do anything about it. Or, since many of them would otherwise have to campaign on all the things they didn't get done, maybe the Democrats would hike up their sad-pants and use reconciliation and start actually doing better.

It just feels like people are begging Dems not to use the nuclear option. When really, what we need is for Democrats to use only the nuclear option until everyone agrees to repeal the filibuster. This broke-ass government isn't going to get better if Dems can say they passed the Best Legislation Evah. Even if it's terrible.

*I would probably still vote for the goddamned bill. Mainly because it would be really, really hard to not help the people the bill will help. But in the long run, I don't think this bill will actually, you know, help. I think it is will end up being similar to applying silicone sealant to the San Andreas Fault. If the San Andreas Fault had a profit motive and no ethics.

another sketch of a thing that consistently makes me smile

2009-12-16T15:21:00.002-09:00

sometimes the eyes are necessary.

is it just me, or do all manga eyes look a little certifiable?

A sketch of a thing that consistently makes me smile

2009-12-16T14:26:00.005-09:00

It's not Friday, but, then, I've been skipping Friday consistent smiles for a while now, so. Take your happy where you can get it. Even in the form of evil cats.

Amazingly UnFake Holidays

2009-12-16T00:13:00.003-09:00

Today (just yesterday, now), in response to an escalation of greetings, I wished a friend a "Good Leaven's Day." On being challenged, I declared it a holiday for muffins.

Guys.

It is (was) actually National Cupcake Day. I made up the actual holiday.

Also, Good Leaven's Day is a much better name for it, particularly as it allows for the non-sweet cupcake, the muffin, to be celebrated, as well. I mean! The Banana-Nut Muffin is a thing of beauty and a joy for about five minutes.

In which I ask Matthew Yglesias to school me

2009-12-15T22:13:00.002-09:00

I tried to write a 'tip' for Mr. Yglesias in the helpful box on the side of his blog. It became more of a .... well, kind of a rant, if rants are ever comprised almost wholly of questions. Non-rhetorical questions:

Why is the health care bill so freaking long? Not in the 'legislative language' sense, but in the 'things to accomplish' sense. Why didn't the House/Senate pass a law that made recission illegal with stiff penalties for companies that practice it? And then a law that made denying coverage of pre-existing conditions illegal? And then a law on community rating?

Granted, separating the whole bill into parts would mean a million votes, but even half a dozen of the clear-cut, populist, obviously moral/rational choices could have already come and passed in the last, oh, ten months (because surely even Ben Nelson would have a hard time justifying voting for recission). And then Democrats would have a half-dozen useful votes. Not to mention the public opinion boosts of Democrats passing tons of sorely needed reforms.

Why is the strategy so ... Grand Bargain-y? If I need to get my washing machine fixed and also want to extend my lease a couple of months, I don't tell both things to my landlord at once, lest something that is obviously his responsibility to take care of become a bargaining chip in something that is up for negotiation. Doesn't lumping all these things together both weaken the negotiating position and tie liberals to reforms because of the obvious-necessity stuff? Just...aren't there good things in that reverse-stone-soup of a bill that could pass on their own? What about the legislature pushes them towards these incredibly ambitious, broad bills? And should they stick to it (or, can they change it)?

Certainly, we are where we are with Health Care Reform, but a question of strategy on big issues will certainly be applicable in the upcoming months - could you see this less-grand bargaining concept as useful in the climate change work ahead?

Hopefully he will write about it, because damn if i'm not actually curious. And damn if the Democrats don't seem to need some help with that whole strategery puzzle.

What did i say? What did i just

2009-12-10T17:42:00.004-09:00

Major Republican grass-roots opinion maker calls for the abolishment of Medicare.

And the health bill isn't even finished.

Ok, sure, this isn't quite the same as an actual Republican politician saying it, but just wait. Some bright politician will explain that it's ok to be on Medicare and also call for its abolition, because it's a way to bleed the beast of big government. Which is a totally legitimate ideological stance, uncorrelated with any problematic interest groups. Look out for the idea of grandfathering-out, with current Medicare recipients keeping it but requiring upcoming populations - particularly post-boomer - to pay. Just not in the form of taxes, because that would be anathema to freedom.

YOU GUYS I HAVE SOLVED IT

2009-12-08T15:19:00.004-09:00

As I noted below, reconciliation is that thing that for no good reason people kind of stopped talking about - so what if the Senate and the House combined reconciliation and this ping-pong concept in a magical mash-up of procedural mojo? The 50-odd Senators who actually want health care reform could get it using this Crazy (Testosterone-y?) Loophole of Legislative Strength.* In order to have the House play along, the Senate - buzzing over its upcoming display of majority strength - would meet with the House and fold in the better part of the House's desires to their bill before passing it via reconciliation. The House would immediately pass the bill, because it got most of what it wanted and also maybe in a show of thank-buddha-governance-is-still-possible. Obama signs it.

A stronger, more progressive bill gets to Obama. Both Houses look good. American legislators get to spend the holidays with their families. Joe Lieberman is suddenly irrelevant. (Ok, that's not a goal, just a happily accidental perk.) The filibuster is shown to be the awful, horrible obstruction that it is, and maybe the Senate can move back towards a functioning branch of government again.

Seriously, would this be procedurally possible? Does anyone know? And if so, can I offer a form letter/phone script for you to call your Senator and Congressperson?

*I realize this would never happen in a million years. This would require - horrors - functioning government to take precedence over 'politeness', 'tradition', and 'the clubby atmosphere of the worst secular legislative body in the known universe'.**

**Hyperbole, you say? Name one that's not religious and is also worse.

If you fail to plan...

2009-12-08T07:45:00.000-09:00

Can anyone tell me why Reid doesn't have, oh, Sens. Rockefeller and Landrieu (she's on board now, right?) busy meeting with the 50-odd senators who support health care, coming up with an alternate bill in case of reconciliation? Because if they decide to ignore the centrists/Lieberman, then they'll pass a better bill, right? A stronger one? The very best one they can come up with? Go big or go home?

If Lieberman is planning on simply obstructing (yes) and the Republicans ladies don't jump on board (highly probable), then what? Then Reid has to scramble and oh, my, it's so close to the holidays now, maybe we can't do this, maybe we'll wait, etc, etc. Wouldn't it be both good politicking (see, Lieberman? we will move on without you if you don't fall in line) but also just....time saving?

I guess it's not like the Senate has any other big, important legislation to pass or anything.

Footballs and Sweaters and Oddly Shaped Heads

2009-12-07T18:31:00.001-09:00

First, this is so patently a bad idea I almost can't believe it. Not, mind you, because Medicare becoming available for pay to more citizens is a bad idea, in and of itself. Medicare for everyone would be great! This, however, is just dumb. Here's how it will play out:

1) Progressives capitulate on the public option, reasoning that helping the over 55 crowd would be helpful!
2) Republicans will get lots of seats in 2010, because Ben Bernanke thinks that 10% employment is just fine.
3) Polling for extending health care to the rest of the populous - that polling that showed, over and over, that old people on Medicare were least likely to be supportive of health care reform - will now have a new, bigger group of old people who will not be supportive of health care reform. These people will also most likely be the people who ~~bribe~~ donate the most to politicians.
4) Some enterprising neoBush will try to get the over 65 crowd to start paying premiums, because, see, it's working out so well for the under 55, even though this is obviously a terribly unpopular policy idea.
5) The next health care battle will see progressives working to save Medicare, instead of expanding programs or improving cost controls or what have you.

So. Less public support for health care reform, more support going to people more likely to have money and less likely to be considering starting business. (Remember? Remember that big Free Market concept of innovators with public health care having the freedom to start their own businesses? No?) Listen, the I've Got Mine Mentality is seductive and pernicious. I don't think it's bad that over-55s gain access to health care, but that's a big, ~~whiny~~ powerful demographic to increment-away from the bigger picture. Sure, I'm young and have an unstable career path, but I don't think I'd be happy if someone said that college grads between the ages of 24 and 32 could have insurance but no one else. Universal care is big, difficult change in the way we view our society - or at least the way we implement the social contract. Subdividing the interest group makes real change less likely, not more.

Also, don't think for a minute that Republicans won't point to the future deficit and claim that the over-55 crowd just can't be justified for Medicare, what with the precious futures of the precious grandchildren that their children can't afford to have.

The Moral Case for the Public Option

2009-12-07T06:31:00.000-09:00

or
I Hate Paying for CEO'S Persian Rugs and Other Assorted, Expensive Bullshit

So say that, miracle of miracles, the public option survives both the Senate and conference, and you, yes, you, there, with the coffeecake crumbs on your shirt, you are granted access to the exchanges because you are self-employed, or your employer is a jerk, or whatever reason it is that you're not in a group health care plan.

Would you rather

a) buy insurance that funds the multimilllion dollar salaries and bonuses of people that have spent years denying life-saving care to people all over the country: insurance that you might still get kicked off of if you need care or delayed care?

or

b) buy insurance that can't kick you out or deny you medically necessary care: insurance that funds modest but reasonable salaries of administrators and puts the rest of your money to your care or the medical care of fellow human beings?

OH GEEZ GUYS. WHAT A TOUGH DECISION.

Sure, some people will still want to purchase the private insurance, probably. Some people have so swallowed the robber-baron theology that they can't see what's good for them - for each other. Hey, if they want to fund some CEO's villa in Martinique, more power to them. But they're idiots.

Category: Words that make my skin itch. From the inside.

2009-12-04T18:03:00.000-09:00

Grow, in that weird secondary action business-speak. I am so pissed that this caught on, dudes. Seriously. It's so awful.

"I will grown my business through targeted demographic utilization."
"We need to grow the economy through tax cuts."*
"He did grow his portfolio by purchasing high-yield baby factories."

UGH. I hate it. There are so many better words for this idea! Improve, strengthen, ameliorate, exacerbate...why you gotta be screwing up the language, MBAs? Is it because you don't have anything better to do? May i suggest painting? Or an interest in local softball? Or World of Warcraft? I hear that one takes up a lot of time.

*Everything Reagan said was wrong, you guys. Please stop with the venerating.

Lists of things for which I would trade the public option

2009-12-02T17:45:00.000-09:00

Three categories: Things that are never going to happen, things that would be reasonable to expect, and things that have a chance in hell of actually happening.

Category the first: Things that are never going to happen. Any one of this list would be a good trade for the public option.

* total removal of troops from Afghanistan and Iraq
* single-payer
* prosecution of Bush administration for any number of treasonous or plain illegal acts
* the mid-term subbing (even with moderates!!) of any two of Justices Roberts, Scalia, Alito and Thomas
* sweeping (like really seriously huge) climate regulation / funding for green research and implementation

Category the second: Things that would be reasonable to expect to trade. All the things from this list together would be a reasonable trade for the public option.

*Immediate illegality and enforcement of end of rescission practices, so that people can't get dumped from their health insurance when they get sick.
*Immediate illegality and enforcement of end of pre-existing conditions exclusions, so that people who have ever been sick can still buy health insurance.
*Immediate enforcement of community rating pricing rules, so that people who have ever been sick can actually afford to buy health insurance.
*Bigger subsidies for up to 400% of the poverty line, so that even poor people can afford to buy health insurance.
*Immediate illegality and enforcement of end of yearly or life-time caps on coverage, so that sick people can keep getting help.
*Legal requirements for coverage of preventative health care including women's health care, so that our society is healthier and more productive. Including the women. Even if they have sex.

Note that four of those things are simple Google-rule* restraining of the vampiric tendencies of the industry, one of them is a major give-away to the health insurance industry, and the last one would be good for big business in general. Oh, my, this crazy liberal list of ridiculous!

Final category: Things that have a chance in hell of happening.

This is not, actually, what I would trade for the public option, but rather what will probably happen.

*Progressives rationally and forcefully state the logical case for the public option.
*Lieberman/Snowe/another irrational jerk complains about the budget or the government and how it never works (HELLO GUYS, WHEN PEOPLE SAY THAT, THEY'RE TALKING ABOUT YOU.)
*Leadership makes a 'huge'(1) 'sacrifice'(2) to 'pass historic legislation'(3). (Translation: (1)'The insurance industry will give me huge campaign contributions for this!' (2) 'As long as I'm making liberals sacrifice something they want, it's probably the right move.' (3) 'To make sure to avoid the historic, career damaging embarrassment of not passing some kind of crappy legislation.')
*This 'compromise' will probably involve not using the Stupak-Pitt amendment but will not actually put women's health care (even exams/birth control) on the required coverage list.
*Progressives eventually vote for the bill anyway, and we start paying tax money to the insurance industry, who continue to raise rates, discriminate, and generally act like the vampiric, Big-Industry, ethics-free jerks they are.
*Obama/Reid/Pelosi/ as well as assorted obstructionists like Conrad, Nelson, et. al. claim a huge victory for progressive, equitable America. Please donate for upcoming campaigns now.

The Public Option is Necessary

2009-12-01T15:34:00.003-09:00

Despite what Ezra Klein has to say about it. He says that it's pretty much a crappy, kneecapped shell of a program that wouldn't help very many people. I think it's a very important crappy, kneecapped shell of a program that wouldn't help very many people! It creates a scaffolding for what we need, and even though it is definitely going to be awful, it will start the process.

Listen, in India, they make scaffolding out of bamboo or random sticks tied up haphazardly with pieces of string. This is in big cities, on fancy, big projects; in Mumbai, in Delhi, in freaking Hyderabad, home to the largest non-Chinese concentration of software engineers in the world. It looks rickety and scary and awful, these ill-matched lengths of wood tied about with pink and yellow string. But still - buildings get built. Let us have our crappy bamboo scaffolding, Ezra.

Addendum

2009-11-21T20:20:00.001-09:00

My previous post may have been slightly hyperbolic.

Nooooo

2009-11-21T00:29:00.002-09:00

Every time I type 'syfy', a little piece of my heart spasms and then kills a small, puppy-shaped alien life form.

disappointment and self-medicating

2009-11-19T00:09:00.003-09:00

people can be terribly disappointing. particularly people whom you think of as smart, as kind, as fun. as allies. sometimes i think there is no such animal as a man who sees me as human. how is it possible that men think that arguing with a woman about rape and assault (danger of) is a good idea? who cannot distinguish between the category of 'men' and the category of 'rapists'? who gets his feelings hurt when a woman talks about men-who-rape as, you know, bad and in a lot of places?

oh, that's right. almost every man in the world.

I just get so fucking tired of it. so fundamentally tired of consistently being reminded that my safety/bodily autonomy/life are not as important as the feelings/dignity/whims of men. it is so corrosive and so disheartening, and there seems to be no bottom to the well of male surety and righteousness. you've read about the impostor syndrome, discussed in a new-ish book by Susan Pinker; what is missing from discussions on this phenomenon is the pervasiveness of it. It is not a job that I feel I don't quality for. After years and years of unrelenting dismissal and degradation, some days I don't think that I qualify for human life.

Maybe they're right. Maybe my opinion is not as valid as any man's, despite reading or education or thought or personal experience in a matter. Maybe my life and safety and body are not as important as a man's desire to be pleasured or exalted or respected or right. Maybe i should apologize for being difficult and demanding. Maybe i'm wrong, and i haven't really been in danger or been transgressed upon or lost basic human dignity or safety. Maybe, despite countless verbal assaults, casual physical assaults, infinite amounts of coercion , and multiple rapes, maybe i am over-reacting.

fuck them. fuck all of them, for so carelessly and casually and constantly making women feel selfish for being alive.

i am eating a cookie and never speaking to men again.

Caulking the wagon would be easier if i had some caulk

2009-11-15T23:55:00.004-09:00

Photo credit  Synaesthesia

Why didn't my eight year old self pay attention? I could be merrily scripting away, now, pleased to have a new tool of ActionScript which is cumbersome, but totally understandable to me! Because of my deep, amazing knowledge of computer science! And also physics!

Instead, I am wading through internet tutorials and laboriously trial-and-error-ing my way through various parameters i do not understand. It's something like trying to maneuver in an unknown language - you change out each piece and then compare the results: this one gets me juice, this one gets me water, this one gets me larger quantities of water, this one gets outrage and should probably be carefully noted so as not to repeat for it is surely something filthy, etc, etc.

Alas. This is how it will be for a couple months, I think. And yet....Flash 10 is so awesome, you guys! Even though right now I am using it in the hunt-and-peck mode!

In which i argue politely with Kevin Drum

2009-11-14T14:13:00.002-09:00

Mother Jones! (And yes, i did just cross-post a comment, Virgina.)

Drum complains that subsidies have not received the same amount of progressive furor as the public option and the ridiculous-if-it-weren't-so-tragic Stupak-Pitts amendment. He says

In terms of real-world effect on real-world people, subsidies are the biggest issue by a mile. But not a very sexy issue, apparently.

Look, Drum is a writer and thinker I respect, so I'm not going to say that he forgot to count women as real-world people. Although it's tempting. No, I think this is just a thing where he maybe didn't see all the ripples. So. Here, Mr. Drum, are some ripples.

contraception was kept out of the required basic coverage by the same anti-choice assholes. somehow, i see forced-birth for women who can't scrape together $500 as likely to have pretty serious impact. on families, not just women. on children. on society in general.

we're not worried (well, i'm not worried, and i suspect many progressives would agree with me) about insurance companies being 'too lazy' to offer multiple plans or egregiously expensive riders. i'm worried about insurance companies being run by private market Stupaks, who will happily institute (more) anti-women policies. i'm worried about those egregiously expensive riders effectively wiping out subsidies if women expect to protect themselves. we're worried about the erosion of our constitutional right to bodily autonomy and equal protection under the law, which is what this is.

the real-world effect is the codification into legislation of the uterus as a pre-existing condition.

A sketch of a thing that consistently makes me smile

2009-11-13T18:13:00.001-09:00

I come bearing gifts....

thank you, kimya dawson

2009-11-10T15:53:00.003-09:00

just a little opening sketch one day, with Kimya Dawson's "Tire Swing" fortuitously popping up on last.fm.

Color Change

2009-11-03T22:55:00.002-09:00

I came home to a cat much darker than the one I left. Remarkably dark, in fact, only her chest the same powdery tawny color that used to cover her from ruff to tail. She is fatter, too. And sweeter, somehow. More excited about daytime snuggling. Growing up. Bittersweet.

30 is a Big Deal

2009-10-28T21:56:00.002-08:00

But only because we live in a base 10 system.

No, go with me on this one. Imagine that we had six fingers a hand. Ok, now that you're over the ew factor, think about how much better, biologically that would be. First major milestone: 12.* Right at the puberty changeling crossover time. Next major milestone: 24.** Out of college (even on the five year plan) and time for a gap year and the transition to semi-grown-up. Our 30 would be the middle of the Becoming a Real Adult part of life. 36 would be the final Seriously Adult Person bit. Doctors would be out of school and practicing, people who were planning on kids would probably have started with them, and maybe even I would have the trappings of adult by then.

Now if only we all had extra fingers.

*Yes, I know the number is not right for a base 12 system. We'd have to invent some new symbols.
**See above.

YA (yes, always)

2009-10-27T23:27:00.004-08:00

me: i really love YA supernatural crap
D.Rizzle: young adult?
me: yup
D.Rizzle: or yesterday's antelopes?
me: yellow armadillos?
D.Rizzle: or yard asparagus?
me: yapping ardvarks?

D. Rizzle: or yummy aspirations?
D. Rizzle: or yelling aphorisms?
me: yearning aspics?
me: yowling anteaters?
me: oh
D.Rizzle: yawning athiest
me: does that count as a repeat?
D.Rizzle: (that's me)
me: haha
D.Rizzle: atheist
D.Rizzle: which is the repeat?
me: no, i like athiest
me: you're the athi-est!
D.Rizzle: I'm the athiest atheist of them all!
me: ardvark and anteater?
D.Rizzle: different words, yo
me: but the same animal
D.Rizzle: doesn't matter
D.Rizzle: yawing animal
D.Rizzle: ("yaw" is a flying term)
me: (or a boating term)
D.Rizzle: (a type of rotation)
D.Rizzle: (righto)
me: yanking articulations
D.Rizzle: yaks, approximately
me: yuppie assholes
me: (i can't believe it took me this long for that one)
D.Rizzle: you are
D.Rizzle: (zing!!)
me: (ha)
me: you're a yuppie asshole
me: (double!)
D.Rizzle: yaya
me: yachting aspens
D.Rizzle: that's the secret of the yaya sisterhood!
me: haha
me: (i will not stop until you do)
me: (just to let you know)
D.Rizzle: yearly arrhythmia
me: Yangtze afternoon
D.Rizzle: yoyo antics
me: yarrow antiseptic
D.Rizzle: okay, you win:

People are ridiculous

2009-10-01T21:41:00.002-08:00

Inclusive of me.

My cat, however, she makes perfect sense. If 'acting insane and tearing around when she feels like it' is sensical. Which I'm beginning to think it is, because jesusgod it would be nice to tear around when i feel like it. And not have to put up with other people's awfulness and make nice and go to work every day fucking hell how do people do this their whole lives and my job isn't even that bad seriously how do people not just run away constantly.

A transcript of a thing that consistently makes me smile

2009-09-18T19:06:00.002-08:00

During a discussion of mail-order prescription medicines, with my friend, the doctor

Dr. Monk: I get mine from Vanatu.

me: what's Vanatu?

Dr. Monk: It's an island nation in the South Pacific!

Dr. Monk: I assume!

me: (silence)

Dr. Monk: (defensively) They're all really professionally packaged!

me: you realize what you just said, right?

Seriously: We Mean It - Please Love Us

2009-09-07T20:00:00.002-08:00

Does this need any further comment?

Horor Show Beauty

2009-09-01T21:28:00.000-08:00

Went out to an end of the road system here; a place whose name, in the native language, means 'point of land'. What a tragically prosaic name for an incredibly beautiful place. There are several overgrown shells there, grass-covered concrete bunkers. Relics from The War. (The second one.) Driving back, we took a wrong turn and ended up at another, larger shelter, big enough to drive through (although we did not).

We headed inside, the graffiti on the walls muted and tired looking, one wall curving around towards blackness. A huge piece of jagged wood hung at a crazy angle in front of a doorway. As my roommate strode ahead, he disappeared in the dark
and i hesitated, because i knew that darkness and those echoing footfalls and the coolness. I called out to him to say,

'maybe this isn't a good idea'

'maybe we should get a flashlight'

'maybe we shouldn't expose ourselves to what is so clearly the setting of violence and death'

but before i could get past his name, he yelled back to me,

'whoa! There's a carcass out here!'

I stopped, for a second. Stopped thinking, stopped breathing, stopped pumping blood through my veins. But the heavy darkness pushed in on me, pushing down my throat and into my chest, and i ran after him. When i came around the curve, the setting sun came blinding in through the open mouth of the shelter, glowing around my roommate - and the twisting, hanging form, strung from the top of the entryway. Mostly bone left, some entrails: grey fur still full on hanging paws. Golden and red, glistening in the sun, the carcass of a fox, stretched long and lean and twisting in the dying summer breeze.

a picture of a thing that consistently makes me smile

2009-08-28T18:04:00.001-08:00

my office view

yeah, it's pretty sweet. don't worry, i'll be moving into a closet (literally) at the end of the year.

Influence

2009-08-26T23:55:00.007-08:00

A friend - an internet friend - intrigued me with vague references to 'making music', and i decided to create a song for collaborative purposes. Between the drive to work and sometime that night, i came up with a piece influenced by, well, my work (what a surprise!). (Seriously, check after the cut. It's pretty good. [If i do say so myself. {And i do!}])

The place that I work has to do with Native Americans and Russians. I spend a lot of time with old people, asking them about their history, and really it's an awesome job, in theory, although in practice it is political and kind of tragic, as I have a front row seat for the end of a culture and people. But anyway. So yesterday, as I was writing this song in my head, I was in real time reviewing discussions of fishing voyages, and that combined with this Significant Person of mine who lives a million miles away (yes, Mars! how did you guess!!!??!), turned into a song that is, somehow, Irish and also from this place I'm in and also mine mine mine. It is a song from generations of women, and also a song from me, to him.

And it's pretty freaking great.

....aaand apparently blogger is not down with sharing it with you. WTH, blogger.

Summer Salmon

2009-08-23T20:12:00.000-08:00

the pinks are running up Sergeant creek right now, a few dog salmons (big, stripes) and maybe a couple of silvers mixed in. they are gnarly and nasty and awesome, hundreds of humpbacked old fish, pushing and pushing and pushing, advancing past the current with an inorexible, primal need. dead fish litter the shallows and riverbanks. some shine silver under the water. some have sloughed off too much skin, and their pink muscles look too close to sushi for comfort with eyes already picked clean by seagulls. They have hooked beak-like mouths and sharp looking teeth, and their skin, or whatever is left of it, has stretched taught and papery across their drying flesh and bones.

I waded out into the creek, cold glacier water numbing my feet, my flip-flops sliding on the slick river rock. So many fish, shimmying in the shallows. Fins and humps and tails all above the water line in certain places. They were quick to react, panicking forward when I splashed near. I straddled a likely looking channel, waited. Several fish brushed by my calves; inside, outside, slick and quick and so real. I plunged my hands in the water, cold and crystal clear, and half a dozen fish slipped through my grasp. I was surprised that there was no smell, from the dead fish on the banks and the rotting fish slipping past my legs. Ocean, that's all.

Abandoning the passive method, I chased several fish, the way I had seen the bear lumber through the water. Splashing. One pink hung himself temporarily on a shallow spit, and I grabbed him around his slim middle. No hump, this one, so he was young. Or she. Silver and white and writhing, gasping for water in my hands and totally alive. When I put him back in the water for a breath, he swung back and forth with rapidity, splashing me with salty estuary water and serious about his freedom to climb up further before death.

I caught a humpy, later. It writhed in my hands so, I was worried it would manage to bite me. When I put him back down, he lay drunkenly on his side in a shallow, one gill waving futilely in the open air. It was so pink, beneath that skin, so pink and blooded and alive. I picked him up again and found him deeper water, but he swam immediately up onto a rocky shore. It took three times before I found him a deep enough spot, or a populated enough spot, to avoid his suffocation. Self-preservation at an all time low.

A picture of a thing that consistently makes me smile

2009-08-21T17:42:00.001-08:00

I'm pretty sure this picture broke my pancreas.

A picture of a thing that consistently makes me smile

2009-07-31T20:34:00.000-08:00

Winnie the Pooh! If he were, um, nine feet tall.

A picture of a thing that consistently makes me smile

2009-07-17T18:33:00.000-08:00

Sometimes I love my job.