Politics
ddobbs | October 13, 2009
Mount Pisgah, diving into Lake Willoughby, way up noth
Vermont, my chosen and beloved place of residence, took the top spot last week in the Commonwealth's "State Scorecard" for healthcare, which ranks states based on access, quality, costs, and health outcomes.
For people who live elsewhere, this report adds one more thing to add to the list of Things That Make Vermont Cool. (This is a jump up from second place in the 2007 scorecard.) For people who live here, this report raises amazement -- and the feeling that it must be very bad indeed everywhere else.
Vermont's health system is a mess…
drorzel | October 13, 2009The baseball playoffs are upon us, which means that most of the sports media are consumed with baseball talk. I find this faintly annoying, as I'm not really a fan of baseball. And, really, I can't be a fan of baseball, for the same reason that I can't be a conservative Republican activist-- I don't have the mental circuitry necessary to passionately believe self-contradictory things.
For example, being a baseball fan apparently requires one to simultaneously believe that a four-and-a-half hour game three hours of which are just players standing around scratching themselves is part of the…
aardvarchaeology | October 13, 2009
Last night somebody googled the phrase "martin rundqvist republikan" and ended up here on my blog. Note the K: this person probably didn't wonder if I'd vote for Sarah Palin. They wondered what I think about the Swedish constitution, which provides the country with a decorative king. Outside the US, "republican" means "anti-monarchist". And yes, I am an anti-monarchist. I think it's a disgrace that the Scandy countries, which are among the world's strongest democracies, are still symbolic monarchies. And I think it's deeply wrong that the hapless royals are born into their golden cage.
But…
emjohnson | October 12, 2009
This, of course, refers to the famous remarks (almost four days old now) in which Richard Dawkins' suggestion that there be a separation of church and state in public schools was shouted down by O'Reilly's claim that he was imposing fascism.
Poor Winston Smith. When Orwell wrote his novel there was only a three minute hate. Now FOXNews runs 24 hours a day.
Watch the full "interview" here.
jrosenhouse | October 12, 2009I only have time for quick blogging today, so how about a brief observation.
Here is Paul Krugman's latest column. It is a characteristically lucid and informative column about some bad economic ideas that are circulating around Washington these days. Here's a sample:
What ideas am I talking about? The economic historian Peter Temin has argued that a key cause of the Depression was what he calls the “gold-standard mentality.” By this he means not just belief in the sacred importance of maintaining the gold value of one's currency, but a set of associated attitudes: obsessive fear of…
oracknows | October 12, 2009No mà s! No mà s! I surrender!
I give up!
I tried. I really, really did try. I tried really, really hard not to look at the flaming idiocy of Bill Maher again, much less comment on it again. Here I am, in Chicago at the American College of Surgeons annual meeting, taking in all sorts of surgical goodness, trying to take a break from blogging. It's not so much to ask, is it? I didn't think so, anyway.
Then, exactly a week after he accepted the Richard Dawkins Award, Bill Maher couldn't help it but let his freak flag fly! In fact, he started out an interview with Bill Frist by asking:
"…
drorzel | October 11, 2009Over at Physics and Physicists, ZapperZ notes a fairly useless interview with Guy Consolmagno, and suggests some alternative questions:
1. How old do you estimate the universe to be based not only on your observation, but also the consensus among astronomers? Would this be contrary to the biblical interpretation on the age of the universe? What about the Young Earth's interpretation of the age of the universe?
2. What is your view of the treatment received by Galileo by the church? {Oh c'mon, you knew that one was coming, didn't you?}
These would be better questions than what was asked in…
oracknows | October 11, 2009I may have been a bit hard on Richard Dawkins lately, but, if he believed in saints, Dawkins would deserve sainthood for keeping his cool in the face of so much concentrated idiocy coming from Bill O'Reilly:
A couple of lovely O'Reilly quotes:
"I'm throwing in with Jesus because you guys can't tell us how it all got here?"
"When you guys figure it out, then come back to me."
Then, of course, O'Reilly couldn't resist pulling out the "fascism" gambit.
Geez, I don't think I could have restrained myself as well as Richard Dawkins did with Bill O'Reilly. In the face of such blustery nonsense,…
pharyngula | October 11, 2009Right now, people are marching on Washington with a reasonable demand: equality under the law for all gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people. It's not much to ask for; it's simply what every human being in this country ought to expect.
I'm not in Washington DC. I'm sitting in wintery Minnesota. You're probably snug in your homes, too. So what can you do?
How about getting inspired?
Are you feeling it now? We all should hope for a world where all the differences between us are no obstacle to full participation in civic life by all people; whether you're gay or godless, black or white…
grrlscientist | October 9, 2009tags: Obama family, miserable Americans, comedy, humor, satire, funny, ONN, Onion News Network, streaming video
This daring news interview with the nations' top thinkers comes right out and says what we've all mumbled under our breath to ourselves in the privacy of the unemployment line: the Obamas are too damned happy! They're so happy that it's downright unAmerican!
catdynamics | October 9, 2009To President Barack Obama for winning the Nobel Peace Prize.
Honestly people, that is really all you have to say.
If you can't say anything nice then, as your mother should have told you, don't say anything.
The guy iust got the fucking Nobel Prize and half the country is having paroxysms and doing the "yeah, so what's he done then"?
Can we just agree that we do not want to have a paranoid President, again, and be nice?
Let the man enjoy it, and then worry what it was about.
For those who want to contemplate the historical analogies: consider President Mikhail Gorbachev, who got the Peace…
illconsidered | October 9, 2009Sorry, I generally like the guy, and I can't quite yet let go of all my hopes, audacious or not, but Barak Obama has not done anything to deserve that yet.
gregladen | October 9, 2009If you are a right wing Republican conservative Yahoo, this letter is NOT for you. If you are a moderate, progressive, liberal, centrist, or anyone associated with the legitimate (i.e., not FOX News) press, this IS for you.
Dear Disgruntled Sisters and Brothers,
Many people are beside themselves, or at least a little annoyed, or in some cases simply bemused, because Barack Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize but he "seems to have not done anything yet." There are so many misconceptions behind that sentiment that I don't know where to start.
If you are one of the people who does not…
palmd | October 9, 2009I am a patriot. This word means different things to different people, but to me it means pride in my nation, one founded by brilliant thinkers and built on the acknowledgment of basic human rights. It does not mean that I agree with everything my country does or with all of my fellow citizens. It means that I believe in our basic values enough to love this country. Patriotism also recognizes a shared fate. There can be no patriotism unless there is a shared identity and a shared fate. Because we share this space, these values, what happens to you very much matters to me. To maintain…
catdynamics | October 9, 2009"...to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses..."
I am in total awe of the Nobel Committee of the Norwegian Storting.
What I really want to know, is who took the phone call at the White House this morning?
Also, just how long does it take them to get a press release out on whitehouse.gov?
"For 108 years, the Norwegian Nobel Committee has sought to stimulate precisely that international policy and those attitudes for which Obama is now the…
pharyngula | October 9, 2009The news that Obama has won a Nobel peace prize was weird — and don't get me wrong, I don't think he has done badly at promoting peace, I just don't think he's made the kind of exceptional effort that something with the prestige of the Nobel ought to reward — but here's something much, much crazier: WhirledNutDaily has begun a campaign to impeach Obama. You might be wondering on what grounds they would commit this act…but they don't seem to have anything specific. I just got email from WND begging for donations for their little crusade, and here's the best reason they offer, from some wingnut…
ddobbs | October 9, 2009The healthcare debate in Lincoln, NE, earlier this year. photo: Nat Harnik, AP, via the NY Times
The tone of discussions of reform in both Congress and the blogosphere has changed remarkably over the last few days. It's gone from pessimistic to optimistic, and from a sense of retreat and a whittling away of substantive reform toward a careful expansion of reform -- including the inclusion of a public option.
Many a slip between cup and lip, of course, and things could (and almost certianly will) bounce around some more yet. But it's certainly getting more interesting.
My own short list of…
drorzel | October 9, 2009The 2007 Nobel Peace Prize went to Al Gore and the IPCC. The 2008 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel went to Paul Krugman. And now, the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize goes to Barack Obama.
Really? I mean, really? I like the guy as much as the next person, and it's nice to see somebody in Washington trying "to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples." But he really hasn't accomplished anything, yet.
Seriously, the best explanation for this is that they're trying to make American right-wingers' heads explode. That, or they're still trying…
emjohnson | October 9, 2009In Aztec cosmology, Venus was associated with the god Tlahuizcalpantecuhtli (Nahuatl for "Lord of the Dawn"). In the mythic tale Legend of the Suns, Tlahuizcalpantecuhtli attempted to shoot the sun with an arrow, but he missed and shot himself instead. The Aztecs had a sophisticated science of astronomy that focused on the movements of Venus and were among the first in the world to calculate that Earth's nearest neighbor orbited the Sun thirteen times every eight years.
Thirteen Venus cycles ago, then-President Bush shot his own arrow in the form of his Afghanistan invasion and it has now…
ddobbs | October 8, 2009Probably dreaming.
But these the rise of the public option and the fade of the flu sometimes seem so real.
swine flu, public option, healthcare reform