Politics
pharyngula | November 9, 2010This is the Republican who wants to be in charge of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, John Shimkus.
We don't have to worry about global warming or pollution or other such merely human problems! God promised that we never have to worry about that again, and he believes in the truth of the literal word of god.
We are so screwed.
(via Juan Cole)
gregladen | November 9, 2010There are two reasons that the Republicans "won" the house and took more senate seats. One of them was made clear last night at dinner. Our waitress was funny. She started out a little funny-strange, then went to funny-ha ha, and I left the restaurant liking her and wishing more people were mostly like her. The funny-strange bit derived from her thoughtful pauses following certain questions like "do you have vegetables" and "you are out of my favorite beer, what should I drink" and so on. It turns out that we were pretty nearly her first customers ever, and she was hiding her nervousness…
drorzel | November 9, 2010I'm taking a bit of flak in comments to my silly Bob Dylan post from Sunday, with various right-wingers spontaneously popping in to tell me that JFK cut taxes. My initial reaction to this is to think that supposing a perfect equivalence between JFK cutting the top rate from 90% to 70% during a time of relative peace and prosperity and our current economic scenario is yet another demonstration of the fine grasp of historical and mathematical reasoning that makes the Tea Party crowd such a treat.
But, then, it occurred to me that maybe their claim is that it's the act of cutting taxes that…
pharyngula | November 7, 2010There are hints of the direction our country will be taking in the near future.
Medicaid is one of our rare social safety net programs — it provides basic health care support for low income, disabled, and elderly people, and is supported by both federal and state level funds. Emboldened by the recent election results, which apparently tell them it's now open season on the poor, Texas Republicans are talking about ending Medicaid. By refusing to carry their 40% of the Medicaid bill in the state of Texas, they'd lose the 60% coming from the federal government — so poor Texans would lose 100%…
drorzel | November 7, 2010I bought the Witmark Demos a week or so ago, because I could always use another 50 Bob Dylan songs, and listening to them on shuffle play has managed to earworm me with one song in particular, "I Shall Be Free", which it occurs to me has great current relevance:
Well, my telephone rang it would not stop
It's President Kennedy callin' me up
He said, "My friend, Bob, what do we need to make the country grow?"
I said, "My friend, John, Brigitte Bardot
Anita Ekberg
Sophia Loren"
You might think Dylan's plan for prosperity through importing attractive foreign women is a little fanciful, but it's…
pharyngula | November 7, 2010What was the worst moment in the George W. Bush presidency? You might be thinking it had to be the loss of life in 9/11, or the war and its devastation, or the consequences of his bad economic decisions, but no…to poor sensitive George, it was the moment a black man publicly criticized him.
MATT LAUER: You say you told Laura at the time it was the worst moment of your Presidency?
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: Yes. My record was strong I felt when it came to race relations and giving people a chance. And -- it was a disgusting moment.
This moment, when dopey incoherent Kanye West clumsily…
illconsidered | November 5, 2010Judith Curry has become quite a blog sensation, and did so long before starting her own. I have expressed my frustration with her in the past for a seemingly reckless affinity for "hit and run" postings. I will appreciatively grant that she comments alot, and engages many conversants extensively, but she has posted many very inflammatory or technically flawed diatribes in the past, the kind sorely needing defending or ammending, and left the clear and substantive rebuttals unanswered or inadequately answered. Frequently interested readers were left with only vague promises of "more on that…
pharyngula | November 3, 2010Lauren Rose went to vote yesterday, wearing a t-shirt that read "liberal anti-theist". Her polling place was in a church (as is mine, as are a great many polling places across the country), and the poll-workers tried to get her to cover up, and when she refused, started loudly praying for her. All this at a polling place splattered with Republican campaign signs.
This is something that ought to change. Why are the polling places so dominated by churches? It's about the only time I ever have to enter one of those temples to hate and ignorance, and I'd rather not go at all, especially if they'…
jrosenhouse | November 3, 2010Not much to say about last night's elections. Basically the Republicans just got rewarded for their policy of obstructionism and cynicism. Now they can return to their back rooms and laugh at all the suckers they fooled into voting for them. There are many villains behind this election, but we should probably reserve our strongest contempt for the folks who were just too unmotivated to vote last night. If all of the sensible people had managed to show up at the polls all the corporate money and sleazy television ads in the world would not have saved the Republicans.
At any rate, Michael…
pharyngula | November 3, 2010The election last night wasn't as bad as it could have been — the teabaggers who'd received much ridicule, Angle and O'Donnell and probably Miller, were defeated (there's a lesson there, I think) — but sanity did not win out, and the Republicans have taken over the US House, and here in Minnesota, they've taken control of both the state house and senate — Democrats have probably won the governorship, but it's so close that there's going to be a recount. These next few years are going to be extraordinarily painful. Personally, I'm going to take a hit: the Republicans will do their best to gut…
stoat | November 2, 2010Thank heavens, James Annan wrote this so I don't have to.
Truely, you have to hand it to our politicians: whenever you think you are finally inured to their stupidity, they find a further depth to sink to.
PS: no, I did *not* vote for them.
esiegel | November 2, 2010"Every man is free to rise as far as he's able or willing, but the degree to which he thinks determines the degree to which he'll rise." -Ayn Rand
We're all aware that one of the ways that human life on Earth could end, conceivably, is the same way that the dinosaurs went down.
And asteroid tracking and deflection technology is fast becoming one of the hot issues of the day. It appears so often in the news that you'd think we are at a high risk, any day, of being hit by a catastrophic asteroid.
But -- and my opinion here definitely runs against the mainstream -- I think this hysteria is…
oracknows | November 2, 2010It's depressing to think that after today people like this may well be running the House:
This year, willful ignorance is a campaign platform.
pharyngula | November 2, 2010It's election day here in the US, but far be it for me to tell you how to vote.
I'll let HP do it for me.
As for the Republicans — how can one regard seriously a frightened, greedy, nostalgic huddle of tradesmen and lucky idlers who shut their eyes to history and science, steel their emotions against decent human sympathy, cling to sordid and provincial ideals exalting sheer acquisitiveness and condoning artificial hardship for the non-materially-shrewd, dwell smugly and sentimentally in a distorted dream-cosmos of outmoded phrases and principles and attitudes based on the bygone agricultural…
sa smith | November 2, 2010Some people think Im joking when I say Im an anarchist. Im not. This is why.
drorzel | November 2, 2010If you're in the US, go vote. Preferably for a candidate who isn't barking mad, but ultimately that's between you and your conscience.
If you're not in the US, or you've already voted, enjoy some cute, as SteelyKid is first skeptical about the idea of lots of kids in masks visiting the house:
Then happier once she heard about the candy:
(She's home sick today, and thus somewhat less cute than these pictures from Sunday. But, you know, even when sick, she's pretty cute.)
These are also another flash/no-flash pair, which is a slightly better comparison than the previous round, given that they…
pharyngula | November 2, 2010It's a serious question. You'd think a crude thug who thinks assassination is the way to solve the world's problems would not be gainfully employed as a columnist anywhere, but no—he's still pumping out the stupid schlock.
I'd like to ask a simple question: Why isn't Julian Assange dead?
So again, I ask: Why wasn't Assange garroted in his hotel room years ago?
you'd think Assange, super-whistle-blower of the international left, would be a greasy stain on the Autobahn already.
I think Assange is an asset. I wish we had serious journalists who were willing to ask serious questions and…
illconsidered | November 1, 2010In the spirit of letting things speak for themselves, I just wanted to juxtapose two recent stories I came across, each about conspiratorial meetings you are supposed to find significant.
Story number one involves billionaires from finance, oil and coal and health care industries:
Koch Brothers Convened Right-Wing Meeting in June
New details have emerged on the right-wing groups spending tens of millions of dollars to influence the upcoming midterm elections. The website ThinkProgress reports the billionaire brothers David and Charles Koch held a secretive meeting with influential right-…
drorzel | November 1, 2010In last weekend's post about arguments from innate differences, I suggested that I might be willing to illustrate my position with adorable toddler pictures. On thinking more about it, I'm a little hesitant to write about this at length, because it could easily topple over into arrogant-physicist territory. But then, it's an excuse to post adorable toddler pictures, so...
So, let me put a short disclaimer up front: I'm not attempting to claim that I have suddenly uncovered a unique and obvious flaw in innate-difference arguments, by virtue of my Big Physicist Brain. I am well aware that the…
jrosenhouse | October 31, 2010Your humble blogger went to the big rally yesterday. Here's what it looked like:
I never noticed it before, but the National Mall looks a lot like the Vienna/Fairfax Metro stop. But let me start at the beginning.
I hit the road at 8:30 in the morning, which normally would get me to DC well before noon. I figured there would be traffic and delays, but I did not feel obligated to attend the whole, three-hour event. Maybe I get there by one, I thought, and still have two solid hours of rally fun! It had occurred to me to drive to DC the night before and find a place to stay for the…