WHAT THE PUBLIC THINKS THEY KNOW: The public thinks the average company makes a 36% profit margin, which is about 5X too high.
Archive for 2015
December 31, 2015
OF COURSE, THERE IS NO CHANCE: Why Team Obama’s Israel spying should be a major scandal.
DO YOU THINK CLINTON WILL BE GENTLE? This is just the bloodletting the Republican Party needs.
FOR THE GENUINE ONES, THANK POLITICS: Thank Kim Kardashian for all the fake asses out there.
THOSE GALS OUT IN ALASKA: First female Caterpillar field mechanic in Alaska.
IS IT ME OR IS THE ATLANTIC BLAMING PRESERVATIONISTS FOR SKY HIGH RENTS IN SAN FRAN? San Francisco’s Self-Defeating Housing Activists.
BEYOND OBAMA’S FLAWED ANALOGIES: Assassin’s Screed.
WORTH CONSIDERING: I can tell you from reading my sons’ books through high school and college, that a theme throughout was “aspire to just enough. Don’t reach for the stars.” Gaslighting the Middle Class. Of course, partly is how you look at it. The very technology makes the world interconnected and there’s going to be a painful time of equalizing compensation throughout the world. At the same time the rising ability to work on anything anywhere does represent more individual freedom.
THE ERROR WAS ASSUMING OBAMA WANTED US TO WIN: What It Takes to Win in Afghanistan.
THIS IS MY SHOCKED FACE FOR THE EVENING: Seventy-Five Percent of Americans Dissatisfied with Washington, D.C.
December 30, 2015
NAOMI SCHAEFER RILEY: The secret of ‘Joy’ — how imaginary play can lead to genius.
It’s true that Joy, who is based on Joy Mangano (now a multimillionaire inventor of a variety of bestselling household products) does have a kind of “special power.” Nothing supernatural, though — just a great imagination and the tenacity to harness it.
But if the movie is accurate, she had access to some things that many kids today do not. She had time to herself to daydream and play and the ability to live in a world largely free of electronic distractions.
Though her mother is constantly watching soap operas, Joy is more interested in using household items — paper, tape, crayons — to invent things. Her first invention was a glow-in-the-dark flea collar to make pets more visible to cars at night.
Though Joy came from an ordinary working-class household, it turns out that her childhood shares some elements with many of the world’s creative geniuses.
In their book “Imagination and Play in the Electronic Age,” Yale researchers Dorothy Singer and Jerome Singer note, “Autobiographical reports or direct interviews conducted with eminent writers, inventors and scientists demonstrate that their early experiences with play in childhood . . . are important features of their creative process.”
They describe how we all have fleeting thoughts or daydreams, but the people later regarded as geniuses are able to pay close attention to those fantasies and harness them for innovation.
Unfortunately, it’s increasingly difficult for children to be able to engage in the kind of pretend play that previous generations enjoyed.
In an article in the January issue of The Atlantic, Yale’s Erika Christakis describes how we’re forcing kids to perform academic exercises at earlier ages and taking time away from free-form imaginative play.
Play is work for children. It’s as important as any academic work. But letting kids play on their own doesn’t generate jobs, unionized workers, or self-importance for adults, so it gets short shrift.
CARRIE LUKAS: The Bill Clinton Effect: Why Liberals Treat Women Worse.
Young progressives may only know a whitewashed version of the Clinton scandals, in which rabid conservatives tried to make a mountain out of a consensual-affair molehill. Yet the undisputed facts of the Lewinsky affair reveal a clear and classic example of a powerful man abusing women under his power and creating a hostile work environment: Clinton was a powerful executive having sexual relations with a 22-year-old intern working in his office, whom he rewarded with a taxpayer-financed job and other special treatment. None of the interns working alongside Monica got cushy job offers post-internship. That alone is supposed to be a giant red flag for those concerned about equal treatment and a harassment-free workplace.
But, of course, that was just the tip of the iceberg; Clinton was having his affair with Monica in the midst of an ongoing investigation into his alleged sexual harassment of a state employee (Paula Jones) during his time as Governor of Arkansas. Other women also came forward with allegations of harassment and even assault. Clinton lied about his affair with Lewinsky, at first suggesting she was delusional, both to the public and then when testifying under oath as a part of that sexual harassment suit.
Liberal women’s groups are supposed to frown on men who smear women and undermine the legal process of sexual harassment suits, and take accusations of sexual assault seriously. Yet President Clinton—a good Democrat who supported abortion rights and other feminist sacraments—was largely given a pass. Sure, some feminists murmured their disappointment with Clinton’s behavior and mouthed platitudes about Paula Jones deserving her day in court. But their criticisms were perfunctory at best. Mostly, they stood by Clinton’s side, defending him and remaining silent as he lied and slandered the women who accused him.
Compare this to the treatment of Justice Clarence Thomas. Even if one assumes that every accusation made by Anita Hill is true, Justice Thomas would at most be crass and a little boorish, but very minor-league in terms of sexual harassment compared to Clinton. Yet women’s groups and the liberal media pounded Thomas, almost derailing his Supreme Court nomination, and to this day ensure that his name is synonymous with sexual harassment.
It’s as if this is all about political advantage, not women’s equality.
SGT. PEPPER’S LONELY VICTIMS CLUB — or Maxwell’s Silver Microaggressions? “When Beatlemania Is a Microaggression…It is time to rejoice, for all our troubles are so far away…,” Nick Gillespie quips at Reason.
Gillespie spots psychology professor Adam J. Rodriguez of California’s Notre Dame de Namaur University, who takes to the Huffington Post* to whine that “My friend, caught in his ethnocentric blindness, could not grasp that somebody would have a different experience and values from him:”
For him, there was a given. The given was that everybody would love the Beatles. My lack of interest in their music could only be understood by him as psychopathology. I was flawed. It could not be understood as a cultural difference. Of course, he has no idea who Oscar Hernandez is, and believes that Carlos Santana wrote Oye Como Va (he didn’t, by the way). But that’s okay. How should I expect him to know these things when they are so outside of his cultural experience?
As always, life imitates Bill Murray in Stripes, who said to his girlfriend at the start of the movie, “Someday, Tito Puente’s gonna be dead, and you’re gonna say, ‘Oh, I’ve been listening to him for years, and I think he’s fabulous.'” But then, as Gillespie — himself no fan of the Beatles** — responds, lighten up, Adam:
There has never been less of a dominant monoculture than ever before and there has never been as open a standing invitation to open people’s minds to what you like, care about, and think is totally fab and gear. Without a doubt, there are people who are convinced and terrified that the world they grew up is in its death throes (watch this if you don’t believe me), which only underscores the point that the mainstream has shrunk since the mid-’90s when we talked with Rodriguez, much less 1970, when the Beatles broke up (thank you for that, Yoko Ono, thank you, thank you, thank you). From that 1994 interview again:
Most people tend to use culture in a static sense—he represents this culture and I represent this culture. I think culture is much more fluid and experiential. I belong to many cultures. I’ve had many cultural experiences. And the notion that I’ve lost my culture is ludicrous. because you can’t lose a culture. You can change a culture in your lifetime. as in fact most of us do. I’m not my father. I didn’t grow up in the state of Colima in Western Mexico. I grew up in California in the 1950s. The notion that I’ve lost his culture is, of course, at some level true, but not interesting. The interesting thing is that my culture is I Love Lucy.
For the perpetually aggrieved, time has stood still as it did for Miss Havisham and they mistake the current moment, which has different problems and advantages and contexts, for a past whose issues and indignities no longer pertain in the same way. The hunt is always afoot not for moving to a future that is open-ended, inclusive, and far more interesting and innovative than the present but for reviving and maintaining grievances, no matter how trivial and inconsequential.
Read the whole thing; no word yet if Rodriguez has any strong opinions on the Rutles.
* In an age when so many global warming experts insist, as they have for the last 45 years, that Mother Gaia only has five years to live, is this really the best use of the Huffington Post’s giant air conditioned server farm to hasten her demise?
** No seriously, how can anyone not love the Beatles?
NEWS YOU CAN USE: Is your home earthquake-ready? How to prepare for the Big One.
Thoughts on earthquake preparation, here. Plus, an earthquake preparedness list. But everyone, everywhere, should be prepared for disasters.
ERNIE PYLE WAS UNAVAILABLE FOR COMMENT: Reporters claim PTSD from watching violent news. “Most have never left the comfort of their big city offices, but a growing number of reporters and editors are claiming to suffer trauma from watching and posting violent videos on news sites, according to a new study of media and human rights workers.”
GIANT SQUID SURFACES FROM THE DEEP in Japanese harbor. Can Godzilla be far behind?
THIS JUST IN: No, Jesus Was Not a Palestinian.
NEWS YOU CAN USE from Kurt Schlichter, on What Conservatives Need To Know Before They Go On Mainstream Media Outlets:
Sometimes the host is going to be hostile to you, though the bookers and behind the scene staff are always very nice. That’s OK – your host is almost certain to be a liberal and does not want you to be able to get out your message if it is not what he’s looking for. Many feel that coherent, capable conservative commentators have to be disrupted, confused or cut off before they can make their points. But you can’t back down. You’re under no moral obligation to agree with the host just because you’re a guest. If you think he’s wrong, tell him. He might not like it, but he’ll like the attention the hit gets on the web afterwards.
No matter how well a conservative does, you’re going to get every commie, pinko, and left-wing loser in sight saying that you were incoherent, deranged and/or embarrassing. Ignore them. Their vitriol is your measuring stick in assessing how well you did. The angrier they are, the better your hit.
Remember, there’s no hypocrisy in going on the mainstream media to make our case. They need us, and we need their podium to get our ideas out. But understand that you’re at cross purposes. What they want from you is either ratings or help taking down a Republican. Your goal is to be an articulate, interesting advocate for conservative views. Get out into that alley and start preaching.
Speaking of which, “A week after he cut the mic of conservative guest Kurt Schlichter for bringing up Bill Clinton’s history of sexual misconduct, CNN’s Don Lemon found himself trying to shut down another guest” on Monday. Instead, Hugh Hewitt “Schools Lemon on Need for Trump, GOP to Educate Millenials on Bill Clinton Sex Scandals.”
CONTAINED: Brussels Cancels New Year’s Eve Fireworks Due To Threat. “Brussels was home to four of the radical Islamic attackers who killed 130 people in Paris Nov. 13. The week, Belgian authorities arrested two people in connection with another suspected plot to attack police, soldiers and popular Brussels sites during the holidays.”