Author: paul

Don Surber:

Huckabee’s Bible belting does not bother me as much as his populist bent. A chicken-in-every pot is unnecessary in a nation whose poor overwhelmingly suffer from obesity.

[From Annals of Compassionate Conservatism.]

Maybe if they ate more chicken and less over-processed crap . . . . ? Why bother. Like teaching a pig to sing, it’s a waste of time and annoys the pig.

Joe Stalin had these folks pegged: “A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic.“

If you find yourself really delighted that a war of choice has resulted in the deaths of a population the size of Jersey City, or maybe Oakland, instead of one the size of Baltimore, you probably need to rethink your priorities.

[From Crooked Timber » » Post-Invasion Deaths in Iraq]

• The Untold Story: How the iPhone Blew Up the Wireless Industry
  WIRED are still pretty solid Apple polishers, but this is still worth a read: the fact the Verizon and AT&T have both opened their networks confirms this was a game-changer.
  (tags: Apple wirelessphones markets business innovation iphone strategy technology)
• Five-Year-Old Boy Detained by the TSA
  but they were only following orders . . . .
  (tags: securitytheater risks airsafety politics)
• WTF?
  bewildering, to be sure. And an argument for the inheritance/estate tax, in any event. The only values he holds dear are the values of his holdings.
  (tags: taxation values wingnutwelfare hypocrisy corruption money arrogance)
• Because it works.
  Megan is who I would like to be when I grow up.
  (tags: values culture peace truth society)
• Daily Kos: Let’s have some fun in Michigan
  turnabout is fair play, and all that.
  (tags: 2008 electioneering politics)

[From Kashistan.JPG 642×650 pixels]

Theodore Deacon for the Seattle Opera Guild presents a preview of “Pagliacci” by Ruggero Leoncavallo. This Italian tragedy tells of the sufferings of a clown betrayed by his wife.
[From The Seattle Public Library: Branch Events]

This was interesting, if over-subscribed. The presenter said the library expected 15 people: I would guess 50-60 showed up. So the format of a guy presenting the story and talking through the musical highlights didn’t work as well as it might.
So many versions of this aria at iTunes, even the canonical recording by Caruso.
But I learned a few things regardless. Some of it was only peripheral to the music (Leoncavallo’s ego and temperament) but the idea of verismo opera, a slice of life with shorter songs, realistic (ie, common) characters, and best of all, blood, rings true to today.

[House Minority Leader Richard] DeBolt said there’s no argument: “Clear-cuts cause slides. That’s what happened in

our area.”

But he also said that other flood damage was caused by environmental protections, not logging practices. He said salmon-protection laws that require buffer zones of trees left standing near streams contributed to more flooding.

A habitat-conservation plan that was supposed to end long-standing environmental disputes around logging and salmon protection has been proved a “debacle,” he said.

“These are really important questions: Who comes first, the salmon or the humans?”

[From Politics | More talk coming on family leave | Seattle Times Newspaper]

When you hear someone make a proposition like that, a false choice, understand that they don’t give a flying $%^&*() about either option. They are a bought-and-paid-for tool of some vested interest. People and salmon co-existed for many years. The real choice is of salmon or institutional practices that destroy salmon habitat, disrupt their life cycle, and in some cases kill them as they swim, either through hydropower turbines or in irrigation ditches in eastern Washington farmland.

Am I the only one who thinks that Sony is like the anti-Apple? Apple takes average technology and puts a shiny UI on it, and people line up to hand over money that Apple has no reason demanding without wearing a mask and holding a gun. Sony, OTOH, takes the shiniest technology, puts an average face and cheap price tag on it, and then acts like the customers wear masks and wave guns.

[From Why It Won’t Work]