CALLING THE HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE: “At what point does entrepreneurism replace post-secondary education as the new normal?”
Archive for 2012
July 4, 2012
FREE ENTERPRISE: U.S. C02 Emissions Falling Toward 1991 Levels.
July 3, 2012
AT AMAZON, up to 55% off on Blu-Ray Deals.
PRACTICE SAFE FARTING: Fart deodorizers. “Flat-D disposable fart deodorizers are the product that people with digestive disorders have been dreaming of. There is no cure for gas, but this product is a simple solution which will allow everyone to fart with confidence. Just place the pad inside your underwear and let your gaseous emissions activate the carbon in the Flat-D pad, which absorbs and masks fart odor. For additional flatulence support at work, you can purchase Flat-D chair pad. I know some people whose lives will be changed by the Flat-D, although I’m not mentioning any names.”
UPDATE: Reader Paul McKerley writes: “FWIW, you won’t find this in Taubes or Atkins, but my experience, and that of other I’ve spoken to, is that a low-carb diet almost entirely eliminates flatulence. It also cured my acid reflux, which was eating away my oesophagus, and for which proton-pump inhibitors had rapidly diminishing effectivenss.”
And reader Alan LeWinter writes: “Do they make a Biden Brain Fart version?” It’s science, not magic. There are limits.
ALEISTER G. AT AMERICAN GLOB could use some help. I donated.
BOB BECKEL’S weaponized misogyny.
CONFESSIONS OF A DRIVING INSTRUCTOR.
“Did you forget your glasses?” I asked the driver as politely as possible, hoping to hide my frustration under a joke. (The other choice was to throw my helmet, which is frowned upon but not unprecedented.) “I left them at home,” she said, her right foot planted firmly on the accelerator, and traffic cones flying everywhere. “I can’t see a thing!”
Heh.
AT AMAZON, hot new books on Cooking, Food & Wine.
DAN RIEHL: “So that’s a derecho.”
Three days was enough, though. I had pretty much what I needed to get by, or you could get it by then. This was not a catastrophic event, as some homes, public buildings and stores of all stripes within driving distance were spared. Had this been truly catastrophic, say like an EMP attack? I’m fairly convinced the whole thing would have started to come apart pretty fast. You could tell by how many people reacted. . . .
An event like this does focus you, somehow – gives you a certain perspective it’s easy to lose sight of day-to-day. It also reinforced an old Clint Eastwood line from Magnum Force, believe it, or not: “a man’s got to know his limitations.”
Strange, perhaps. But I guess it was a teachable moment, or held a few of them, in some ways. I’m simply not altogether sure what else, if anything, I learned for now. I guess over time, maybe I’ll find out. It was an interesting three days.
Maybe gratitude has something to do with it. It almost sounds silly, now. But if you’re sitting there suffering somehow, large or small – and trust me, people were and still are from this …. The minute it all came back on, when you heard and felt that air conditioning kick on and you knew you could take a hot shower, again – or just go to the refrigerator for a cold drink, or something you wanted to eat? Strange as it may sound to you, there’s a gratitude, a beauty in that moment you can only hope to never forget. Imagine that? Hmm. What can I say? It was an experience. Leave it at that.
Here’s a post on low-budget disaster preparation, and some bug-out bag recommendations. Also, stuff to keep in your car or SUV. More here. And you might want to check out Bill Quick’s disaster-preparedness forum.
FEDS LOOK TO FIGHT LEAKS WITH “FOG OF DISINFORMATION.”
Pentagon-funded researchers have come up with a new plan for busting leakers: Spot them by how they search, and then entice the secret-spillers with decoy documents that will give them away.
Computer scientists call it it “Fog Computing” — a play on today’s cloud computing craze. And in a recent paper for Darpa, the Pentagon’s premiere research arm, researchers say they’ve built “a prototype for automatically generating and distributing believable misinformation … and then tracking access and attempted misuse of it. We call this ‘disinformation technology.’”
Two small problems: Some of the researchers’ techniques are barely distinguishable from spammers’ tricks. And they could wind up undermining trust among the nation’s secret-keepers, rather than restoring it.
The Fog Computing project is part of a broader assault on so-called “insider threats,” launched by Darpa in 2010 after the WikiLeaks imbroglio. Today, Washington is gripped by another frenzy over leaks — this time over disclosures about U.S. cyber sabotage and drone warfare programs. But the reactions to these leaks has been schizophrenic, to put it generously. The nation’s top spy says America’s intelligence agencies will be strapping suspected leakers to lie detectors — even though the polygraph machines are famously flawed. An investigation into who spilled secrets about the Stuxnet cyber weapon and the drone “kill list” has already ensnared hundreds of officials — even though the reporters who disclosed the info patrolled the halls of power with the White House’s blessing.
The country’s in the very best of hands.
ORDER EFFECTS: To Influence Choices, Get There First. “The study found that especially in circumstances under which decisions must be made quickly or without much deliberation, preferences are unconsciously and immediately guided to those options presented first. While there are sometimes rational reasons to prefer firsts, e.g. the first resume is designated on the top of the pile because that person wanted the job the most, Carney says the ‘first is best’ effect suggests that firsts are preferred even when completely unwarranted and irrational.”
FROM THE FUTURECRIME DEPARTMENT: L.A. Cops Embrace Crime-Predicting Algorithm.
SCIENCE: More Women Look Over the Counter for a Libido Fix. “In the absence of a government-approved female counterpart to men’s potency drugs like Viagra, Cialis and Levitra, many women are turning to over-the-counter products, including lubricants, arousal gels, massage oils, nutritional and herbal supplements, and vibrators. Drugstore chains are now selling these products right next to the bandages and heating pads.”
BILL WHITTLE: Afterburner: The Glorious Fourth.
HOW TO MAKE FAMILY ROAD TRIPS SUCK LESS: Leave the kids behind? (Just kidding.) But the reader who sends the link emails: “I am on a family road trip right now, and can tell you half of these don’t work. But you can try them anyway.”
SUPERMARKETS: So very 20th Century? I enjoy grocery shopping, but I wouldn’t mind doing most of it online.
READER BOOK PLUG: Clayton Cramer’s book, My Brother Ron: A Personal and Social History of the Deinstitutionalization of the Mentally Ill is now out. On Kindle, too.
THE SPIRIT OF FREEDOM breathes on Europe:
Tours to Chernobyl, scene of the world’s worst nuclear accident, are popular with tourists visiting the Ukraine, but an even bigger attraction, particularly with football fans and gun enthusiasts, are the city’s shooting ranges.
Since the collapse of communism in Europe some 20 years ago, shooting ranges where tourists can fire automatic and semi-automatic weapons have sprung up on the outskirts of Kiev and in eastern European countries.
Everyone from businessmen to members of bachelor parties turn up to fire a few rounds from weapons most Europeans only ever see in the movies.
“There are shooting ranges in France but nothing like this. And certainly not an AK-47,” said Phillippe, a security consultant from Paris, who preferred not to give his surname.
Each member of the group of French tourists at the Falcon Sport Shooting club near Kiev had a chance to fire an AK-47 in automatic and semi-automatic modes, before switching to the Soviet-made Dragunov rifle.
“Previously our business was mostly British groups,” said Vika Dobrovolska, operations manager at Kiev Tours, which arranged the shooting practice session.
“But during Euro 2012 (Football Championship) we’ve had hundreds of Swedes out here, French, Italians, often several groups a day. I would say it’s our most popular activity by far,” she said.
Dobrovolska said shooting is a very “manly activity,” and that most of the visiting football fans are men.
Actually, plenty of women dig it too.
GREGG EASTERBROOK ON POWER OUTAGES: The Politics of Electricity. “Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley wants to run for president in 2016, but he can’t even deal with a dismal power utility in his home state. . . . Montgomery County, Maryland, is one of the nation’s bluest and wealthiest counties; its perennially awful power service raises the question of whether liberals can make the trains run on time.” Plus, corruption in the news media. . ..
ED DRISCOLL ON THE POWER OUTAGES: Question Asked And Answered.