SPIN: National Geographic uses picture of Bush to illustrate story on A123 bankruptcy. They’re getting some flak for it in the comments.
Archive for 2012
October 19, 2012
VIDEO: Talking with Neal Stephenson about his female characters.
A related post from the past, here.
OUT ON DVD THIS WEEKEND: 2016: Obama’s America.
COLD FUSION, ANYONE: British engineers produce amazing ‘petrol from air’ technology. If not a hoax, I’m all for it. It would allow us to stop financing terror.
FROM BOB OWENS, So You Want To Own A Gun? 99 cents on Kindle.
BUDGET? WHAT BUDGET: DNC host committee comes up $13M short.
WILL YOUR NEXT CAR BE A WI-FI HOTSPOT? I love the mobile-hotspot feature of my iPhone, but I’m not sure why building that into a car is a plus, particularly since, as the article notes, “automotive and tech life cycles are notoriously out of sync.”
LOSERS FEAR MOCKERY: Renowned Turkish pianist charged with offending Muslims for Twitter posts. (And this was very mild mockery.)
IT’S NOT THE CRIME, IT’S THE COVERUP: Iowa Law Prof: School Retaliated Against Me for Testifying That Liberal Bias ‘Corrupts Everything School Touches.’
A MASSIVE CAR BOMB just exploded in Beirut near an anti-Hezbollah organization’s office. Lebanese police say the head of police intelligence was the target.
HEY KIDS, WHAT TIME IS IT? It’s time to end the bailout of Fannie and Freddie. Here’s how. Actually, I think it’s past time for that.
21ST CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: Celebrity sperm donor service gears up for launch. “A sperm donor service aimed at matching women with anonymous celebrity dads – such as rock stars and famous athletes – will launch next year, its owners have claimed.” Getcher hypergamy to go!
JONATHAN ADLER: When “Fact-Checkers” Have Problems With Facts.
Media fact checkers not only have a problem characterizing matters upon which reasonable people can disagree as questions of “fact,” they also have problems with facts. So, for instance, ABC’s fact checkers labeled indisputably true statements about energy production on federal lands as “not quite true.” Romney claimed that oil and gas production on federal land is down, even if overall domestic production is up. His statement was true. If ABC had sought to provide critical context for Romney’s remarks, it could have noted that marginal changes in domestic oil production have relatively little effect on retail gasoline prices, or that there’s little any President can do to lower gasoline prices in the short-to-medium term (other than, say, playing with the strategic petroleum reserve). Such commentary would have provided voters with information they could use to assess the relevance of Romney’s claims. Instead, ABC claimed Romney’s literally true statements were “not quite true.”
Another example of fact checkers having trouble with facts can be found in Politifact’s commentary on whether it was fair for President Obama to criticize Mitt Romney for failing to say whether he supported the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. In making its assessment Politifact totally bungled its description of the Supreme Court’s decision in Ledbetter vs. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., and in the process perpetuated a false claim about the decision oft repeated in political debate (including by Lilly Ledbetter herself).
It’s as if they’re really just a Democratic spin operation run out of media offices or something. “The bottom line is that if we can’t trust fact checkers to get their own facts right, how can we trust them to judge anyone else’s?”
THEIR 19TH NERVOUS BREAKDOWN: EU leaders agree ‘fiscal facility’ plan with eye on budget union. Note how their answer to problems caused by central planning is… more central planning. What is the definition of madness again? Do they make Thorazine for continents?
MITT ROMNEY, bringing people together. “It combines a sharp attack on Obama’s economic record with the themes of unity and leadership, and features a split screen from one of the debates where Romney is talking earnestly and Obama is smirking. This is a truly great ad, I think, for this stage of the campaign.”
BY ANY MEANS: Cummings goes after group combating voter fraud.
TRUST ISSUES: Former SEAL Team 6 Commander Supports Romney.
SHOCKED, SHOCKED I TELL YOU: Surprise! CA Official Who Underreported Unemployment Figures is Big Obama Donor Of course, this is the merest coincidence. (via Ace Of Spades HQ)
THE WAR ON WOMEN, at MSNBC.
THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK: Free Online Education Is Now Illegal in Minnesota.
The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that the state has decided to crack down on free education, notifying California-based startup Coursera that it is not allowed to offer its online courses to the state’s residents. Coursera, founded by Stanford computer science professors Daphne Koller and Andrew Ng, partners with top-tier universities around the world to offer certain classes online for free to anyone who wants to take them. You know, unless they happen to be from Minnesota.
A policy analyst for the state’s Office of Higher Education told The Chronicle that Minnesota is simply enforcing a longstanding state law requiring colleges to get the government’s permission to offer instruction within its borders. She couldn’t say whether other online education startups like edX and Udacity were also told to stay out.
As the Chronicle notes, with admirable restraint, “It’s unclear how the law could be enforced when the content is freely available on the Web.” And keep in mind, Coursera isn’t offering degrees—just free classes. . . .
If every government took Minnesota’s approach, free online education probably wouldn’t exist, because the cost of compliance and registration in all 50 states, let alone other countries, would be prohibitive. Here’s hoping that common sense prevails.
Perhaps I’m overly suspicious, but I suspect that this is a case of entrenched academic interests trying to use regulatory power to protect their rice bowls. Which is something that I predicted.