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Archive for 2011
October 24, 2011
PATTERICO: My Interview with a Twitter User Who Told Andrew Breitbart: “Please Die.”
I wonder if there’s any connection to this.
HEARING AIDS WITH WIRELESS RECEIVERS:
There were no special headphones. This time, the words and music were transmitted to a wireless receiver in Mr. Einhorn’s hearing aid using a technology that is just starting to make its way into public places in America: a hearing loop.
“There I was at ‘Wicked’ weeping uncontrollably — and I don’t even like musicals,” he said. “For the first time since I lost most of my hearing, live music was perfectly clear, perfectly clean and incredibly rich.”
His reaction is a common one. The technology, which has been widely adopted in Northern Europe, has the potential to transform the lives of tens of millions of Americans, according to national advocacy groups. As loops are installed in stores, banks, museums, subway stations and other public spaces, people who have felt excluded are suddenly back in the conversation.
Faster, please.
POLITICO: Dems Duck Obama On Campaign Trail. “In trips to Michigan, North Carolina and Pennsylvania — all states that he carried in 2008 — members of Congress were notably missing from the president’s side.”
BRAIN REGIONS CORRELATE with Facebook socializing. I started to make a Farmville joke, but that’s just barrelfishing at this point.
LESSONS IN GOVERNANCE from the Mexican Mafia.
ASK SLASHDOT: How To Enter The Private Space Industry As an Engineer?
K.C. JOHNSON ON Duke, MSNBC, and racism.
HEADLINE OF THE DAY: Pope-A-Dope?
Related thoughts from Dan Mitchell: The Vatican Should Try to Save Souls, not Ruin Economies.
UPDATE: Media reports in error? Rubbish.
Drudge got it wrong: “Vatican Calls for ‘Central World Bank’.” CNBC got it wrong: “The Vatican called on Monday for the establishment of a ‘global public authority’ and a ‘central world bank’.” The best of the Italian Vaticanisti, Sandro Magister of L’espresso, linked Occupy Wall Street and “the Vatican at the Barricades” in the headline of his insta-commentary, a theme also harped upon by the deposed editor of America, Fr. Thomas Reese, S.J.
All of which was “rubbish, rubbish, rubbish.”
The truth of the matter is that “the Vatican” — whether that phrase is intended to mean the Pope, the Holy See, the Church’s teaching authority, or the Church’s central structures of governance — called for precisely nothing in this document. The document is a “Note” from a rather small office in the Roman Curia. The document’s specific recommendations do not necessarily reflect the settled views of the senior authorities of the Holy See; indeed, Fr. Federico Lombardi, the press spokesman for the Vatican, was noticeably circumspect in his comments on the document and its weight. As indeed he ought to have been. The document doesn’t speak for the Pope, it doesn’t speak for “the Vatican,” and it doesn’t speak for the Catholic Church.
Which, to their credit, the two senior officials of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace tried to make clear in presenting the document at a Roman press conference.
Not clear enough, apparently.
A “WAR ON DRIVERS?” “Car-To-X” Communication System Testing Begins. “Though the idea that there is a ‘war on cars’ appeals to certain segments of society, there’s little evidence for any such effort. On the other hand, it’s pretty clear that there’s a ‘war on drivers’ on, and it’s being led by the automotive industry. On the one hand, cars are being ever-more laden with distracting gizmos and toys, while simultaneously, companies are testing systems that minimize the need for drivers at all. Though Google’s autonomous cars get a lot of media play in this country, another system is moving Europe towards a similar endgame. Known as ‘Car-To-X,’ the system allows cars to swap information like speed and direction, not just with each other but with traffic lights and traffic data collectors. The idea is to avoid traffic and crashes, by warning drivers of oncoming traffic in a left-hand turn scenario, for example. Because who wants to use their eyes to make sure they’re safe when technology can do it for you?”
MICHAEL STOKES PAULSEN: It’s A Girl. I’m not so sure banning sex-selection is the answer.
MICHAEL YON ON MEDEVACS IN AFGHANISTAN: Golden Seconds: An Open Letter to Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, and President Barack Obama.
IN THE MAIL: From Paul Clayton, White Seed: The Untold Story of the Lost Colony of Roanoke.
WELL, THAT’S A RELIEF: Hillary Clinton had serious doubts about Obama, but she has really, really come around.
A LAW SCHOOL BUBBLE? I talk on WSJ TV.
CAN SOUTH AFRICA AVOID turning into Zimbabwe? “Some commentators have compared Julius Malema to Robert Mugabe before the latter lurched in the wrong direction. However, I wonder if Malema could turn out to be even worse if he eventually wins the presidency.”
WALTER RUSSELL MEAD: Rhode Island As the Athens Of America. And not in any “Golden Age Of Pericles” kind of way:
Rhode Island is looking more and more like Greece, and not in a good way. That is one message of this important piece by Mary Williams Walsh in the New York Times. Years of blue social policy have wrecked local and state government finance in the country’s smallest state, and now the bills are coming due. Services are being cut to the bone and elderly retirees are losing money they thought was secure.
In Rhode Island, it is Democrats, not nasty union-hating Republicans, who are doing the dirty work. Democratic mayors are telling their unions that there isn’t any money — not because they are vicious corporate stooges who hate working people and want to see them suffer, but because There. Isn’t. Any. Money.
Because Rhode Island listened to timeserving blue politicians too long, and union leaders and public sector workers lost their grip on any mathematical realities beyond the numbers at the ballot box, the pension system grew more and more out of control. State and local governments lurched into a crisis. Vote yourself a raise, vote yourself a pension: why not?
But there is financial math as well as political math and in any war with financial arithmetic, the money numbers win. If there isn’t any money, the checks won’t clear. Ultimately, you will have to fire existing workers, stop paying pensions or a mix of both. That is where Rhode Island is now: its economy can’t generate the revenue to support its existing governance system and to pay its pension obligations.
That’s actually where America is, too.
THIS MUST BE MORE OF THAT “SMART DIPLOMACY” WE WERE PROMISED (CONT’D): “From Iraq to Israel, Egypt to Bahrain, Washington finds itself relegated to the sidelines rather than directing the action.”
TELEGRAPH: World Power Swings Back To America. Well, possibly. If so, it’ll mostly be because other countries have an even worse political class than we do . . .
Plus this: “America retains a pack of trump cards, and not just in sixteen of the world’s top twenty universities. It is almost the only economic power with a fertility rate above 2.0 – and therefore the ability to outgrow debt – in sharp contrast to the demographic decay awaiting Japan, China, Korea, Germany, Italy, and Russia.” Like I said.
DEAL OF THE WEEK: AutoDesk Sketchbook Pro for $39.99.
THINGS YOU MIGHT HAVE MISSED THIS WEEKEND:
Arab Spring looking more Arab than Spring.
Hyperinflation — don’t worry, it can’t happen here. But you can always get ready!
Occupy Movement — No Exit Strategy? Plus, blowback for Jeff Immelt.
China pinches off rare-earth supply. Good news for Nebraska.
Public Pensions: Rhode Island is broke, but Chicago leads the way.
Upsides of the Locavore movement.
What the social contract does and does not cover.
Reminder: Obama’s Failed Stimulus Cost More than 9 Year Iraq War.
Fast And Furious: Slain ICE agent’s family still searching for answers.
NOW HE’S WORRIED: Bernard Henri-Levy is concerned war he started may not end up the way he hoped. Stupid neocons.
UPDATE: Reader Ed Bradley emails: “An interesting thought is that the ‘War Criminal’ Bush caught Saddam and put him on trial. While on Obama’s watch Gaddafi was shot while trying to surrender. And while Obama may not have pulled the trigger they are certaily claimnig credit for it as Hillary said, ‘We came, We saw, He died’.”