Category Archives: Newsroom

Linkluster Severus and Leo


snowwhitegunGwen Ifill lamented on Twitter that politicians used to respond to tragedies with thoughts and prayers. Of course, we know what happened to that.

Vox says that shutting down Muslim immigration won’t solve Europe’s security problems. I’m inclined to agree, but let’s be honest: Would Vox ever run a piece that came to the opposite conclusion?

New Zealand won’t be changing its flag after all. Previously discussed here.

Cool! Obama’s new education secretary has a charter school background.

How Mitt Romney came to the rescue in Utah! It wasn’t really just Mitt, though he certainly helped.

I really, really, really hope this doesn’t factor heavily into Hillary Clinton’s game plan. I mean, sure, go ahead and make the argument, but I just hope they’re not depending on it. I’m still reeling over her arguing that one of her main attacks against Trump is going to be “America’s standing in the world.” {shudder}

I’ve been predicting, for a little while now, that the GOP’s stranglehold on the House may be in jeopardy. It turns out maybe not in the most optimistic (for them) scenarios, because Democrats are idiots.

I have mixed feelings about limiting the ability of homeowners to rent their house out for short periods, AirBnB style, but I am otherwise pretty sympathetic to the army contractor dude and being able to rent out to students, and pretty hostile to hard caps.

Are our wind energy tax credits coming to an end?

Toronto to Vancouver in three hours sounds kind of cool.

Culture clash in Pocatello, Idaho. How a university’s need for foreign students (and their money) generated community conflict.

The Challenger engineer who tried to sound the alarm has died.

A ruling in New Mexico may mean that they can’t get doctors in Texas.

How The Sims promotes conservative family values.

We think of flying as having been normalized in the west, but it’s still the province of the elite. I remember back before airline deregulation and before Dad got a few raises and we drove halfway across the country to visit family. It’s weird to consider that people still do that.

At Cracked, Michael Hossey gives seven weird and dispiriting ways that companies screw their workers.


Category: Newsroom

The Mysterious Ways of John Kasich


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Category: Newsroom

Linkluster Domino’s in Australia


wantedWell this is a perfectly Australian story: Venomous spider traps a snake in the garage.

My wife has complained about EMR inbox notifications, and now her complaints have been backed by science.

Related: Living with yourself (or not) after a professional mistake kills someone. Even when there are no lawsuits, hospitals are a liability factory.

Sigh. Also, why are all of Mario Cuomo’s kids so bad.

I suppose “bad lapse in judgment” is one way of putting it.

I have myself seen some connections between the Ascension of Trump and the French Revolution. In mentality, if not trails of blood.

Australia is running so low on koala food that they might have to start euthanizing. Good think they can’t eat flesh anymore.

When practice doesn’t make perfect! Scott Stanley and Galena Rhoades investigate why extensive relationship history (experience!) doesn’t lead to marital success.

Americans are increasingly accepting of social change in most respects, but not divorce. I attribute it to the triumph of experience over hope. {Related}

The retirement of Shamu: SeaWorld announces that its ending its orca program.

I hadn’t thought about it explicitly in this manner, but the Australia-Siberia connection kind of makes sense. And here is Stanislav Zakharkin talking about the Siberian movement.

Volvo is working on a kangaroo avoidance system for Australia.

Well this makes sense. Given the sprawling storyline of Game of Thrones, I can see why it might appeal to prisoners that their prison terms should seem short by comparison.

Australia has something of a Wyoming problem with the Northern Territory, which is insufficiently populated for statehood but too big to be ignored. What about merging it with South Australia?

Matt Novak looks at Australia’s secret history as a White Utopia.


Category: Newsroom

Trump in North Carolina


Something to file away. Bitzer is a professor in North Carolina and was a useful Twitter resource during both the South Carolina and North Carolina primaries.

Here is the full exit poll, which makes for useful comparison. It has varied from state to state, but it is definitely the case in North Carolina that the more educated a voter is, the less likely they are to vote for Trump. Even with that, though, it should be noted that he won 35% of college graduates and 30% of postgrads. In terms of income, he won mostly on the basis of those making $30-50k a year, though again did impressively across the board (and won among those who make more than $100k a year).


Category: Newsroom

Linkluster Full Circle Plus One Hundred


fallout

So, is the EU building illegal settlements in Israel?

Matthew Yglesias has made the important discovery that things matter in presidential contests other than what boxes a candidate checks. Let us congratulate him on his personal growth. Also, Jonathan Chait. Steven Berman responds, as does Noah Berlatsky. At the end of the day… I’ll take it, I guess.

Brendan Nyhan tweetstorms the rise of Donald Trump, and the multifactorial institutional failures that made it happen, and Der Spiegel explains how the US media made it happen.

As Trump serves as a warning sign about democracy for the rest of the world, an insider explains how the nomination could be stolen from him.

Sarah Fallon and Wired explain that cancer rates spiking in Fukushima were not due to radiation.

Mark Judge argues that cities are the new suburbs and suburbs are the new cities.

The arctic island of Svalbard is trying to figure out how to get people to come visit during its very dark, very cold winters.

Should we fix our broken hearts and inappropriate desires with pharmaceuticals?

There are various aspects of my wife’s job that can get her very worked up. This is one of them. She proverbially (and sometimes literally) weeps for patients that are kept past their time.

Six (non-conservative) psychologists and sociologists in three studies suggest there is a substantial ideological bias in social science research. {More}

Hey, there’s something about Canada we don’t want to talk about.

A Taiwanese model posed for a picture in an ad for a cosmetic clinic. It ruined her life and she sued.

Exxon finds itself in the unenviable position of people asking them “Hey, isn’t that what the tobacco companies did?”

It came around too late for me, but it does seem like Facebook would be fertile ground for flirting and all that. It seems weird to me they never really did the matchmaking thing. They’d have some great analytics.

Peter Tatchell has changed his mind on the gay cake issue. It’s a bit different from the wedding cake issue over here, though, as it required a specific message being put onto the cake.

It’s not just me: Anime really was great twenty years ago.


Category: Newsroom

Linkluster CDLIX


Jason Russell explains how the GOP can wrest the presidency from Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton even if the former is the nominee. Just crazy enough that it could work! Not sure the public would go along with it, though.

The Friedman Foundation takes issue with an Indiana Journal Gazette article that unquestionably cites Diane Ravitch on the subject of vouchers.

Walter White made meth out of an RV in the desert. Some dude in Albuquerque sold heroin out of a port-a-potty in an adult video parking lot.

If you’re looking to escape Trump’s America, here are some options.

Batman was “created by Bob Kane,” but… really wasn’t.
Teachers informing on students who express anti-government attitudes? This is going to turn out well.

A theory that the end is high for the Higher Ed Bubble. The argument makes sense, and I can see some colleges being in danger, but I’ve been reading these predictions for a decade now.

Oh, this is nice: In addition to the other concerns I have about unnecessarily splitting up families, I have for-profit foster care to worry about.

The world isn’t all bad! A man and his penguin.

While liberals and anti-Trumpers pat themselves on the back for not being as authoritarian and scientifically inferior to Trumpers, it may be that the cause and correllation between personality and politics may not be what we think it is.

Ghost in the Shell turns 20. The meta of it all was really kind of lost on me, but holy crap it was gorgeous then and is gorgeous now.

According to the Brookings Institute, Utah has become the bastion of the middle class.

To combat terrorism, a federal pilot program is reach out to Somali youth in Minnesota.

A poll suggests that Australians, Canadians, New Zealanders, and Brits support EU-style free movement. Hey, can we get in on this?

Neil Strauss, known for designing “The Game” (of the seducing ladies sort), has repented and settled down. As with Tucker Max, the whole phase may have something to do with his mother.

Mental Floss looks at the relative value of $100 in each state. Also, the richest town in each state.

An Australia man is growing too many potatoes.


Category: Newsroom

Please Do Not Make A Hero Of This Guy


CNN Exclusive: ‘Trump is a bully,’ says man who rushed stage

When Thomas DiMassimo tried to rush Donald Trump’s stage in Ohio over the weekend, he had a clear goal in mind.

He wanted to send a message.

“I was thinking that I could get up on stage and take his podium away from him and take his mic away from him and send a message to all people out in the country who wouldn’t consider themselves racist, who wouldn’t consider themselves approving of what type of violence Donald Trump is allowing in his rallies, and send them a message that we can be strong, that we can find our strength and we can stand up against Donald Trump and against this new wave he’s ushering in of truly just violent white supremacist ideas,” DiMassimo told CNN.

This isn’t some college rally, nor is it stealing the podium from a controversial guest-speaker. This is rushing towards a presidential candidate. It goes beyond speech into straight recklessness. He should be charged and should not be on CNN. As Dave Hackensack points out, networks have learned that if you refuse to televise people rushing on the field, fewer people do. Inversely, if you publicize them, more people will try it.

This is spectacularly dumb, cannot be tolerated, and certainly can’t be encouraged. Someone may get hurt. Someone could get killed.


Category: Newsroom

Tweetstorm: Battle of Chicago


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Category: Newsroom

Linkluster Steve Jobs Patents


As it turns out, if you make it more difficult to form a hospital, fewer hospitals are formed. Relatedly, rural hospitals are shutting down delivery rooms.runfrombat

Uncle Steve looks at when crime does pay.

Meanwhile, MIT is building a Trumpbot that can sound very Trumpy.

Laurie Penny argues that no, Brits should not Clean for the Queen.

The secrets of salt. Does anyone else remember when George W Bush mentioned that he was reading a book about the history of salt and the author of said book felt the need to denounce him? Good times.

Sometimes differences between couples compliment one another nicely, but not when it comes to impulsivity. Fortunately for the Himmelreich-Truman household, we’re both fuddy-duddies.

Jesse Singal looks at the relationship between sleep and appetite.

The notion of “vaping chic” is dumb as I can’t imagine anyone doing it to look cool. It really doesn’t. Smoking, on the other hand, has a history with cool.

Well, with all of the babies being born in Utah, I suppose this was bound to happen at some point.

Christina Cauterucci looks at the relationship between child care costs and women opting out. One argument is for free day care (which I am more amenable to than you might think), though another is a low-ish level of regulation that makes having more options beneficial (which I am, as one might guess, very amenable to). Whatever the case, it’s not expensive because of how much the childcare workers are being paid.

We’re not yet having these discussions explicitly, but I feel like they’re happening non-verbally with increasing frequency.

Dating sites catfishing clients… it’s not just for Americans.

Here’s an interview with a language inventor.

Good employers are let go or chased off on a regular basis due to employers’ failure to understand this. Also, how cool would it be if more employers understood this?

At NRO, Kevin Williamson says we should let dying communities die.


Category: Newsroom

The Republican Field, As Styled By Hollywood


Last week, I tweeted this:

And now I’m going to expand on it:

Donald Trump is a Republican character as though written by a crappy liberal writer who cannot see Republicans as anything more than caricatures. Ridiculously over the top. The writer needs to go back to writing school.

Ted Cruz is a mastermind villain written by genuinely good writer with an ideological blind spot who assumes that most people who disagree with his worldview are either insanely slimy and corrupt or stupid. The script called for the former, and Ted Cruz was what they created.

Marco Rubio was written by one of the rare breed of conservative Hollywood writers. Unfortunately, the role was entirely miscast and when he changed jobs, subsequent writers just screwed him up.

John Kasich was written by a well-intentioned liberal writer who wanted to create a sympathetic Republican character but just didn’t know how. The result is that the character is wooden and inconsistent.

Jeb Bush was written as the hapless foil the whiz-kids working on the Democratic campaign had to take down in the primary so that they face a weaker opponent. The writers omitted what, exactly, made the character somebody that they didn’t want to face. Because, as written, he seemed like a great character to face in the general.

Ben Carson was suggested as a potential character, but everybody else in the room laughed at it because it was such a ludicrous concept. They told the writer that his character was bad and he should feel bad. And feel bad he did, because the character was stupid.

Chris Christie was written because a mobster show had a political tie. Because they wanted a character who was obnoxious and corrupt, they made sure to let slip that he was a Republican. Writers spent a lot of time coming up with inventive, tortuous death scenes for the character.

Carly Fiorina was created on the spot, without much forethought. The writers must have needed a Republican character from California because that’s where the show is filmed, and they went with a businessperson because no Republican gets elected to major office in California.

Mike Huckabee was created by a frustrated southern transplant who has some major issues about where he comes from. Another writer kind of resented this, and suggested Rick Santorum instead, but everyone agreed that Pennsylvania is a blue state and that wouldn’t work as well.

Rand Paul was the unfortunate biproduct of a writing room war. A couple of the writers thought that he should be cool and sympathetic, but others couldn’t fathom that in a Republican politician and so would insert plots about Neo-Confederate supporters. The result was a mess, and a character that once had promise had to be written off the show.

Lindsay Graham was written as an embarassing relative of one of the main characters in a comedy. People on Twitter get mad because such a right-wing character is presented as a mildly sympathetic goofball, but others point out that his rightwingery is usually a setup for a joke at his expense.

Scott Walker was written to be the Republican opponent, but the writers never cared so they never fleshed out the character. The writers would later express regret that they never fleshed out the character, one of them swearing up and down that the Rick Perry character had been swimming around in his head the whole time.

Robert Jarvis was written to be an out-of-touch blue blood with contemptuous attitudes towards the poor, but later stories called for a religious nut so that was retconned into his story. After writing the character, there were some concerns from the studio about diversity, so they decided to make him an Indian-American, but it was too late in the process to change much else.

George Pataki was written by an aging writer who stopped following politics 25 years ago and isn’t current on who Republicans are anymore.

Jim Gilmore was only sort of written. There was, presumably, a Republican opponent in the last election, but they never talked about him or developed him. You only know his name is Gilmore because the main character is an officeholder and there is a flashback scene on election night where you see on the vote totals television and the other guy was named “Gilmore.”


Category: Newsroom