Blog Archives
Be free. Believe in nothing.
So, as some suspected, it turns out that Tanya Cohen was not real after all.
Kevin D Williamson writes the editor notes that he wishes the New York Times foreign desk editor had written.
Anthony Weiner lasted only a couple weeks at a PR firm, only to be canned. The PR firm being a PR firm, they tried to minimize the conflict by suggesting it was mutual, but Weiener was having none of it.
Those Ashley Madison leaks sure were funny, weren’t they?
This bothers me more than the pig.
I was wondering about this: Deez Nuts may have committed a campaign violation.
Before Donald Trump ruined everything, Jeb Bush ruined everything.
Big Mountain Jesus emerges victorious against some atheists who wanted it gone.
In case there was any uncertainty, Kim Davis’s cause is a political loser, and actually threatens more credible cases. Also, in case you wondered what the marriage licenses look like.
So when can we start donating to Brian Mason’s County Clerk campaign? The slogan writes itself: “Mason ’18: He does his job.”
Meanwhile, in the next county over, the County Clerk is not Kim Davis.
Zaid Julani passes on a story of some Georgia cops refusing to move to a racist call, and explaining that no, they won’t investigate cases of a single white kid in a car full of non-whites.
Europe may be looking at wave upon wave of refugees.
According to Margaret Wente, Sweden is presently feeling the pinch, having some difficulty with assimilation and integration.
It’s… really hard to look at these pictures and come away with the belief that however things turn out, it’ll be bad. With neither the support to let them in, nor the resolve to keep them out, the result is inevitably that it’s going to be a long time before they feel close to being “home” at wherever they’re headed, but that also that’s where they’re nonetheless going to be.
Median household earnings for African-Americans are lower in Minnesota than Mississippi. This could be related to the refugee debate see also, Maine).
This became a really big deal during my wife’s pregnancy, because we were waiting on some medication sent from Arapaho and if it both (a) didn’t fit into the mailbox and (b) arrived on a Saturday, that would mean that we wouldn’t get it until Monday. We were already worried about the pregnancy at that point, and that didn’t help our state of mind. I was checking the mailbox every day at two o’clock ready to drive to the post office at 3:30 if need be. It turned out to be a non-issue because it arrived on Friday, did fit in the mailbox, and the pregnancy was not a successful one for unrelated reasons.
Even so, after years and years of hearing about how great the USPS is while UPS and FedEx only deliver packages to about three metropolitan areas or somesuch, it’s funny that the first time we have run into this problem is with the USPS and not UPS and FedEx, both of which delivered to everywhere we have lived up to and including the town with less than 5,000 people in it. But the USPS won’t come up our street. Which, to be fair, seems like an unusual circumstance.
In the past, the United Parcel Service would leave the parcels at your doorstep. Instead, USPS wants to cram it into your mailbox. But if you miss your mail for a day or the package doesn’t fit into your mailbox, you’re out of luck… the parcels end up back in the dead letter room at your local post office.
So instead of delivery, the Amazon customer has to go to pick up the package at the Post Office. That’s a line even more dreaded than Wal-Mart’s. Americans hate standing in the USPS line. And this is what’s happening to thousands of Amazon customers around the nation.
Instead of enjoying the delivery of Amazon Prime, you’re now faced with the hell of waiting in the line at the Post Office.
What sounded like a good idea on paper is a disaster for the Amazon customer. I wonder if Jeff Bezos and the other leaders of Amazon know what they’re doing to their own customers.
The person from whom I got the link has also had problems with the USPS both at home and at work. I don’t know if there has been an official policy change, if the carriers are expected to cover more ground and therefore don’t have time to get out of their car, or what. Either way, it’s making them look kind of bad.
The article is about Amazon. It’s possible that Amazon is aware of what’s going on because sometime earlier this year, they stopped using the USPS. Now almost everything is arriving by way of FedEx. Which is great for whenever I order from Amazon because now it arrives at our doorstep. I still have to worry about trips to the Post Office when I get something off eBay, though.
The funny thing is that at a previous time in my life, I might have even preferred picking up packages at the Post Office. I remember at various times worrying about a package being left at my doorstep and taken. It only happened once, in Cascadia, but it was a doozy*. UPS and FedEx wouldn’t let you say “Just leave it at the depot and I’ll pick it up” which always annoyed me. Now they seem to have ways to do that, which is great. It took them too long, though, and it doesn’t help us any.
The whole thing is made a bit more complicated by the fact that the recipient isn’t the customer. So the sender has less reason to care whether it’s unsafe to leave a package at my doorstep, or the USPS won’t deliver to our house. Sometimes they give you the option, but usually only if you’re willing to shell out. But it’s definitely preferable if they were to simply be able to look at your address and have a note that says “residents prefer to pick up package” or “residents would prefer the package be left in this particular spot if no one is home.”
* – It was a computer monitor, and other things. It was shipped in the original packaging which probably made it a more enticing item. On the other hand, I had considered our shipping situation there relatively safe because they would leave it on the back porch. So it wouldn’t be sitting streetview for hours on end. Someone may have seen them take it to the back, though.
In the infamous Planned Parenthood videos, the organization feared the kinds of headlines that the New York Times might run if their actions were publicized. Turns out, they needn’t have worried.
Freddie deBoer has a couple of good pieces on some of the lefty tendencies towards ideological conformity.
The folks at 538 discuss their bets for the GOP nomination. For my part, I’d Buy Cruz (a lot), Rubio (some), Kasich (a little). Sell Jeb (some), Trump (to almost 0), Fiorina (to almost 0), Carson (to 0), Huck (to 0). (These odds laid down on 9/19)
I wonder what would happen if a kid took this clock to school.
The Clintons and Haiti.
My wife and I have been muttering on the small size of our recycling bin, but it turns out smaller may be better.
Here’s a nice story of a program in Tennessee to help foster kids adjust to their post-fostered lives.
John McWhorter argues that we need to start accepting a paradigm-shift in writing, that people are going to start writing more how they speak.
Behold, the accomplishment of the ramen noodle.
I am intrigued.
Here’s an interesting study on rats and empathy, which discovered that rates will forgo chocolate to save a drowning comrade.
I already knew this, but in case you didn’t: Don’t get sick or injured in July.
Aaron K defends the infamous Armored Daredevil costume. Though not perfect, I actually thought it was pretty great and a step up from the typical costume. On the other hand, I think the first Jean-Paul Valley Batman costume was superior to Bruce Wayne’s in every way, but at the same time it just wouldn’t have worked as a permanent costume. Maybe Armored Daredevil couldn’t work, either.
Money doesn’t equal happiness. When it comes to lawyers, at least.
Cracked looks at why modern CGI looks so crappy.
Paul Campos writes more on the subject of college costs.
Samsung is giving physical keyboards on smartphones another chance… sort of:
Never content to sit on the sidelines, Samsung is now trying its hand at blending yesterday’s hardware keyboard with today’s modern, slab-style phones. A new accessory for the just-announced Galaxy Note 5 and S6 Edge+ brings back those tactile keys that so many people have long forgotten.
Unlike the Typo keyboard, which communicated with the iPhone over Bluetooth and extended the length of the device to unwieldy proportions, Samsung’s keyboard case snaps on top of the phone’s display, effectively blocking half of the screen. The phone recognizes the keyboard and adjusts its user interface accordingly, shrinking everything to the top half of the screen. Keypresses are sensed by the screen underneath, eliminating the need for any batteries or Bluetooth pairing hassles in the keyboard itself. You can pop the keyboard on and off pretty easily, and if you want the full glory of an unobstructed display, you can snap it to the backside of the phone for storage.
And not-unexpectedly, Blackberry:
Taking a look at the images attached below, we’re getting a good look at the Venice’s display and slide-out keyboard. Although we can’t be entirely certain of the display size, previous rumors have pointed to a 5.4-inch screen size. As for the software experience, this device seems to stick very closely to vanilla Android, with some added BlackBerry features thrown in. For instance, our anonymous tipster tells us there will be keyboard shortcuts available for creating quick tasks and a few others. As you can see from the third image below, there also looks to be some software shortcuts when swiping up from the home button. Aside from the normal Google Now shortcut, you’ll also be able to perform a quick local search and create a new message with ease.
Blackberry appears to be releasing the phone that might have been quite the splash five years ago. Today… I’d be surprised if they made a whole lot of progress. The brand loyalty is gone. As is the love affair with keyboards.
I do still miss the physical keyboards. I still don’t think the virtual keyboards are an adequate replacement for more serious use. But I have gotten at least moderately comfortable with the viboards and adequate is good enough. While Blackberry is releasing the phone I wanted a few years ago, the advantage of having a physical keyboard is no longer sufficient to completely outweigh other factors, such as memory, storage, and battery. If they are competitive on the other things, though, I will give them a look.
In part because I’m going to be in the market for something new next time around. Samsung has gone the Dark Side, and two of the big reasons I’ve been a repeat customer – replaceable batteries and storage cards – are going away. It seems like LG is the only hold out, making it more likely that LG will by next phone. But maybe not. I am addicted to the replaceable battery, but the storage cards don’t mean as much (in part because of Android’s new way of handling them). Maybe I’ll get over it. Due to Samsung’s betrayal, I will probably be holding on my Note 4 for a really long time. It’ll take a lot for a successor phone to compensate for everything the Note 4 has. If I stick with Samsung, I’ll lose the replaceable battery. If I switch to LG, I’ll lose the S-Pen.
I will be looking at both the Samsung tack-on and the Blackberry for Clancy’s replacement phone whenever that time comes. But there, too, physical keyboards are not the end-all, be-all. Her Stratosphere 2 disappeared for a while and she was using a Galaxy S3 and I think she’s become accustomed to the viboard. But she doesn’t need nearly as much screen space as I do (nor does she switch out batteries), making the Samsung option viable. And the Blackberry might be right up her alley. The S3 is becoming increasingly dated, so she will be in the market for a new phone sooner rather than later.
This explains a lot:
There’s a funny thing about [Scott Walker]: The governor has a curious verbal tic—well known among some Walker watchers but largely ignored by everyone else—where, well, he says yes to everything.
Ask him a question at a press conference or in a gaggle, and he’ll bob his head up and down while saying something like “Yeah” or “Yeah, absolutely.” He says that the way other people might say “Um,” or “Listen,” or “Hmm.” It’s a filler word.
But here’s the thing: Not everyone knows that.
I had sort of picked up on it. Which is to say there were two back-to-back cases where everyone looked at what he said and drew a completely different conclusion than I did. The first instance was the Birthright Citizenship question, where the “Yeah” was followed by what looked to me like an evasion of the question and a desire to speak in generalities rather than answer the question asked. But everyone reported it as “Scott Walker wants to repeal the 14th Amendment.” And I couldn’t say otherwise[1], because as much as a lot of people want to pretend otherwise a desire to repeal birthright citizenship is, by any reading of popular opinion, a political mainstream opinion. It’s one I disagree with and more than that it’s a position that would make me less likely to vote for a person who supports it, but it wouldn’t have surprised me that it was Walker’s position. He later said it wasn’t.
But however non-surprising I might have found that position to be, the notion that Walker would even rhetorically support a Canadian Wall was not credible to me and a quick reading of what was said demonstrated it as much. Really, Walker’s argument didn’t even make sense on his critics’ own terms. He hates Mexicans so much he wants to build a wall to keep out Canadians? That’s a weird pander. If he had stuck by it, I would have guessed it would have had more to do with not wanting to seem racist by shrugging and saying “Sure, let’s keep out white people, too, because border and I’m not racist.” But he didn’t stick by the comment and it once again seemed to me there was some midwestern agreeableness going on along with saying “Yeah” at the top. From the Daily Beast article:
“[P]art of this may be due to Walker’s unfortunate verbal tic where he answers questions with what appears to be an affirmative before giving his intended answer,” Sykes wrote on Right Wisconsin. “If a reporter approached him at the Paducah County Fair and asked Walker if he supported a federal plan to beat baby whales to death with the bodies of baby whales, Walker might reply, ‘Yeah…. But what we should focus on is returning power to the states and the …’”
Sykes should know. He’s one of the single most powerful conservative voices in the Badger State, and estimates he’s interviewed Walker hundreds of times since his early days in the State Assembly.
“We joke about it all the time,” he told The Daily Beast. “It’s almost like a parlor game: What did you get him to say yes to, initially? Anything!”
And perhaps this is why I ended up coming a bit to Walker’s defense. It wasn’t because I liked the candidate. If I an open to his getting the nomination it’s basically by figuring he will lose and it would be better for the party for him to lose than Jeb to lose. It wasn’t even because of my belief that contrary to the assumptions of everyone the GOP isn’t all trying to out-Trump Trump[2], because I wouldn’t have been surprised if Walker had made a lunge for Trump supporters. But I actually find myself coming to his defense because… well, I have a similar verbal tic.
I, too, say “Yeah” or “Yes” or even “sure” before saying what I intend to say which can completely contradict what I just said “Yeah” to. It’s less a verbal stall – though it may be that a little – and more an acknowledgement of polite “I gotcha.” I have actually been known to say “Yeah, no I don’t agree with that at all.” Some people want to build a wall to block off Canadians? “Yeah, [let me tell you what I think about that].” Now, in my case, I might say something to the effect of “Yeah, I understand that some people are really considered about border security to the north, but while I don’t even believe a wall blocking off Mexico is an especially good idea I believe it’s a really bad one to try to block off Canada.”
That’s not what Walker did, of course. Walker avoided answering the question, which added undue importance to the verbal tic. Of course, Walker is a politician and he has to be careful in what he says and so it’s understandable that he would fall into a trap I’d be at least modestly more likely to clear. But… he’s a politician, and this is definitely exposing a weakness of his. Journalists may be aching to get him to agree to just about anything to get a good story (rather than accurately assess his views), but at some point Walker himself needs to account for that. He’s not. And while I think he’s getting too much criticism for holding views that it seems apparent he doesn’t affirmatively hold, that itself should give any waffling Republican primary voter pause. Because it’s not going to magically go away if he secures the nomination.
[1] Except to say that “Terminating birthright citizenship” is not the same thing as “Repealing the 14th Amendment.” That this was the accepted framing is, like the notion that ending birthright citizenship is an outrageous position, an indication of a disconnect between popular opinion and people with a license to actually be heard.
[2] If anything, Trump’s audaciousness has had a bit of a calming effect. Because almost everybody realizes that they’re not willing enough to go far enough out there to meet Trump in hard core anti-immigration land. Instead, while Ted Cruz has made the calculated decision to try to reap a post-Trump windfall, most of the rest really haven’t. Instead, relatively casual comments have been assumed to be what they don’t actually seem to be.
The Gators had just sealed a win over East Carolina with a fumble recovery, and Alex McCalister saw the end zone ahead of him. But his teammate, Jarrad Davis, realized that scoring another TD was unnecessary. Perhaps if McCalister had continued running, he would’ve tripped and fumbled and ECU would’ve recovered it and run another play and scored a touchdown.
But if he went to the ground, the game would end. (Of course, Davis probably ran a higher risk of causing a fumble by trying to tackle his teammate than just letting him run, but, whatever.) So Davis tackled McAlister, and Florida kneeled out the game for a 31-24 win.
Even with the context, I think that was a bad move. McCalister had a clear path and while a fumble was possible, it was more likely to occur with a tackle (even a friendly fire tackle) than otherwise.
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In Canadian football, this is apparently a thing:
I’d be interested to know what the counterarguments on this are.
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Welp. God is Mormon. I'm as surprised as you are.
— Ryan Noonan (@noonanville) September 5, 2015
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No video (for obvious reasons), but there was a play in Southern Tech’s game where a kick returner ill-advisedly left the endzone to run it back. All across Colosse and the country, Packer fans said “Noooooooooo!!!!” which was followed by relief that he got to the 20, followed by “Goooooooooo!!!!” as he ran it from endzone to endzone to tie the game.
In the post-game interview, the coach said that it was an amazing effort, an amazing run, and that he has talked to the player and has been assured that it will never, ever happen again.
If Jeb did this,
I would want very badly to vote for him.
Vox has a list of five times that network executives were right to clip creative wings. The only one I disagree with is Jack on Lost. I think the series would have been better without him.
As commented recently by Peter: Uber, but for Big Yella.
Amiga Computers turns 30. For those of you two young to remember, in technological terms the Amiga was the iPhone of personal computing. I remember seeing them long past their prime, in the mid-90’s, and they still blew Windows and Macs out of the water.
Steven Horwitz writes about the politics of nostalgia, formerly the province of the right but having since infected the left.
Cracked looks at suicide in the Age of Twitter.
So here’s the thing… while such a relationship is entirely and utterly inappropriate, and the man should never be able to teach again, if the young lady is willing to marry the guy in order not to testify against him, I can’t say I am in favor of trying to prosecute him whether they can make a case without her testimony or no.
Good news in Mexico? Murders are declining. Bad news in Mexico, the economy is struggling. The two were supposed to be connected.
Driverless cares are, really, only the beginning.
This is pretty brilliant: Just Another Day In Hell.
It turns out, if you remove something unfavorable to liberals in the description, it may be that your social science work is more likely to be published.
The ISIS Sex Slave Market, from the point of view of the slave.
Jim Gilmore’s stealthy stealth campaign is something I still can’t quite grok.
Jonathan Coppage writes how Brad Pitt hindered New Orleans’ recovery.
As we celebrate Queen Elizabeth’s term as the longest-reigning monarch, Seth Mandel explains why Americans are so fond of the Queen.
Who isn’t sold on Kim Davis’s plight?: Rod Friggin‘ Dreher isn’t.
I’d known, vaguely, that Attorney General Kathleen Kane (D-PA) was in trouble. I had no idea that the scandal was so weird, though.
Robert Greene II writes of the southern identity that Jimmy Carter and Julian Bond tried to forge.
Employers have to be careful not hire unauthorized immigrants, but not too careful, or it may cost them.
I missed out on what was probably my last chance to own an Amazon Fire Phone. Not that I really wanted one, but for $10-30? Yeah, I would have done that. Anyway, people gettin’ laid off.
Michael Brendan Dougherty argues that immigration may be the definining issue of the 21st century. I think that’s probably more likely to be true than his belief that Romney and Mormons can save the GOP.
I bet this would be worth five points in the GOP primary in August a year before an election.
In an article about problems in the conservative coalition within the GOP, Daniel McCarthy and Nate Cohn make a point frequently made by Michael Cain, which is that establishment candidates win the GOP nomination on the shoulders of blue states.
The New Republic makes unexpected arguments against getting Syrians in (and also, in favor of Chris Christie against Bruce Springsteen), and against Kim Davis going to jail.
This piece on why Gulf States aren’t accepting Syrian refugees made me more rather than less sympathetic about inviting some here. And Syrians might prefer Europe to both the US and the Gulf States anyway.
If we’re looking for a relative success story for refugees of war, Bosnians in St Louis may be an example that could give Detroit hope.
Germany is getting a lot of good press for taking in so many refugees, but some of it may be that they so desperately need young people. And UK, for all of its faults, may be putting itself at a disadvantage by going about it in the more morally admirable way.
In what has to be the most obvious headline of 2015, the New York Times fears that the influx of refugees might help the far-right politically. Ya think?
Kevin Kelley made waves with his “never punt” philosophy. Now he’s got another one: explosive plays!:
Well, the Washington Post recently ran a story on Kelley’s next innovative idea that is going to buck conventional coaching, and give defensive coordinators nightmares. After using an ESPN database to study college football history, Kelley found a new trend emerge last season where teams that recorded more explosive plays of 20 yards or more won 81% of games.
Kelley also found that on typical plays where two players touched the ball (QB and RB or WR), those 20 yard plays came at about a 10% clip, but when at least three players touched the ball (on a lateral or trick play of some sort), the percentage for an explosive play almost doubled to about 20%.
This could be huge! But the statistics don’t necessarily tell us much. At best, the cause/effect is dubious.
Southern Tech had a season in the recent past where it struggled mightily. Someone did some number-crunching and decided that what the Packers really needed to do was run the ball more. In games where the offense ran the ball 60% or more of the time, they won! Less running, they lost. QED!
Except that the causality was reversed. The higher run-rate was indicative of trying to kill the clock after we’ve taken a lead. The high passing rate was the product of a team struggling to catch up against a running clock.
It wouldn’t surprise me in the least if the same were true of explosive plays. Teams with explosive plays win precisely because they’re the team that can effectively run explosive plays against the other team. Explosive plays are difficult and are more likely to require an asymmetry of talent.
Not unlike “Half Time Stats.”
When you’re watching a game, the announcers will often say something like “When Southern Tech is up by two touchdowns or more, they win 84% of the time…” which sounds impressive. It means Southern Tech can hold leads. Yay if you’re Sotech! Except that a fourteen point lead at half-time is more often than not going to be indicative of a talent asymmetry or just better play. Chances are a team ahead by that much at half time won’t just win because they can spot 14 points, but also because the way that the game has been going indicates that they are the better team. They’ll probably win the second half, too, for that reason alone.