Links (most recent first) that caught my eye, but did not warrant full-blown blog entries ….
- The Coalition Against Israeli Democracy – With all due respect to history and tradition, setting up a state as being formally dedicated to being of one religion or ideology or even ethnicity is, ultimately a recipe for tyranny, not “democracy.” That’s not solely true for Israel, by any means, but Israel is not immune to it.
- California GOP Congressional Candidate Wants To Eliminate Public Eductation – And if the system didn’t work for anyone — well, there weren’t pesky child labor laws in those days, either.
- Dramatic Prairie dog attacks people – Remember, kids — always treat wild animals with respect …
- Gmail Auto-unsubscribe Search – If it’s a legitmate target for unsubscribing, it’s not spam. If it’s spam, I don’t want to bother with sending back an unsubscribe. I’d rather see a Delete-and-unsubscribe tool.
- Where have you gone, William F. Buckley, a nation turns its lonely eyes to you – “This is not to characterize Buckley as some kind of moderate. He was, after all, a staunch critic of the civil rights movement, an apologist for Jim Crow, and a supporter of segregation. My point here, though, is that when it came to fringe hysterics and wild-eyed conspiracy theories, Buckley played the role of a voice of reason. As the conservative movement descends further into madness, there is no comparable voice now.”
- Kilmeade makes outrageous and obviously false claim that “all terrorists are Muslims” | Media Matters for America – But will he be asked to step down? Of course not.
- ThinkProgress » Rep. Space Runs Ad Supposedly Depicting China With Video Of Asian Americans In San Francisco – Man, I’m betting there’s an ad director who’s going to have a very, very unpleasant conversation Monday morning with his client …
- Science In My Fiction » Blog Archive » Goldilocks Is Nothing (But Noise) – And that’s the sound of a thousand sci-fi writers scratching out “Gliese” and scribbling back in the planet they’d had originally …
- ThinkProgress » Personally Invested In Mortgage Banks, Cantor Opposes Fix For ‘Foreclosure-Gate’ – Y’know, if I sign a contract, I’m held responsible for it — claiming that there were too many papers for me to sign to review them properly doesn’t let me escape that responsibility. While not the folks footing the policies that have allowed this to flourish, prosecution of some of these “robo-signers” for fraud, larceny, or perjury (depending on the nature of what they’re signing) might go a ways toward making folks think twice before being told, “Don’t read the thing, just sign.”
- 708-4: Questions and Answers: Sixpenny nails – This one’s for Jim.
- Idle Mendacity: DC Comics & The Destruction of Mary Marvel – Wow. That’s pretty … sad.
- Comic Riffs – ‘CHARLOTTE’S WEB’ cover art snares $155K at auction – very cool.
- Mitt Romney got a bestseller by demanding bulk-purchases of his books in exchange for lectures – Sorry to hear CMC got sucked into the scam.
- iPad app helps you understand US health care reform – Interesting, and pretty cool. Not available as yet for Android. Not sure about that icon, though.
- First Cataclysm cinematic footage in Sunday’s NFL commercial – It’s fascinating to me that WoW is so big and mainstream that they are advertising in NFL games.
- Quote of the moment: Hamilton, on taxes and the Constitution, Federalist #30 – The Tea Partiers are strongly Jeffersonian — limited taxation, limited federal power, idealization of rural “yeomen” — except when it comes to Jefferson’s arguments for civil liberties and his irreligiosity. They’d have been the ones protesting the Federalist side — the faction who actually crafted and defended the Constitution they claimed to love. And too many of them would have bee right there with Aaron Burr, rooting him along against Hamilton.
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2. Does he really expect private K-12 schools to charge “modest tuition”? Also, I do not think he understands the term “quantum leap.” At best, his plan would allow moderate increases in educational quality.
3. I fell for this until 40 seconds in. Wilhelm! 😀
7. They do not actually say that the video is of a scene in China. The VO and caption is “As they say in China…” The video shows people celebrating the Chinese New Year, as they do in China. I think this may be an over-reaction.
8. Oops! But wait… The cast of Real Life is there now!
11. Yeah, that was stupid. Of course, I feel pretty much that way about the whole Final Crisis muddle.
2. I don’t know where he comes up with the “modest” description. Private schooling today is not cheap. Unless he anticipates that we’ll replace tax funding of public schools with tax funding of private schools.
Even if some folks — those who could afford it — would possibly get better education in some ways, the majority of folks, as described, would end up with vocational ed, if that. But, then, that’s the cheap-labor conservative alternative …
3. Ditto.
7. Oh, it’s not a huge gaffe, but it’s another example (along with the “evil, menacing Mexican trio” recently) of using stock footage that isn’t what it’s actually being purported to be.