Archive for 2013

WHEN PREGNANCY is an injury.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: Why Settle For A Princeton Man? “At a time when women outrank men in education and income, it no longer makes economic sense for a woman to marry up in terms of education. The most economically productive marriages for professional women are ones in which husbands are freer to care for the needs of the family while the women focus on their lucrative careers.”

But can women abandon hypergamy? The rising infidelity rates cited in the article suggest otherwise.

TOOLS: Going ape over new gadget for wallet. “The stainless steel tool, which is the same size and thickness as a credit card, serves 12 functions in one, including bottle and letter opener, ruler, screwdriver and banana nicker.”

WELL, IT’S NOT MUCH OF A SLOGAN, BUT IT IS MORE ACCURATE THAN “LEAN FORWARD:” MSNBC: The Network America Turns to for Irresponsible Speculation About News. All that Aryan Brotherhood talk? Never Mind! “In other words, the important thing about this crime — the thing that made it worth eight minutes of national network air time — was that it gave Chris Matthews a chance to stoke the paranoia of MSNBC viewers with the bogeyman specter of dangerously violent racists who (as all MSNBC viewers know) are the core constituency of the Republican Party. Fast-forward 11 days, and Chris Matthews is completely discredited by the latest headlines.”

LIFE IN A POLARIZED SOCIETY: Friendships cut short on social media as people get ruder: survey. “Rudeness and throwing insults are cutting online friendships short with a survey on Wednesday showing people are getting ruder on social media and two in five users have ended contact after a virtual altercation. As social media usage surges, the survey found so has incivility with 78 percent of 2,698 people reporting an increase in rudeness online with people having no qualms about being less polite virtually than in person.”

LOOKING FOR A WORD TO DESCRIBE gadget dysfunction.

INTERNET AND TECHNOLOGY: Tim Wu on Evgeny Morozov’s new book. “Because of its hostile and abstract air, the main audience for Morozov’s work won’t be Silicon Valley readers, but tech-hating intellectuals warmed by his attacks because they already despise Google, Twitter and maybe just the West Coast in general. I came to the book sharing many of Morozov’s concerns about the tech industry, but finished it feeling as though I’d watched a more intellectual version of cable news.”

KERMIT GOSNELL: The Alleged Mass-Murderer and the Bored Media. “Let’s just state the obvious: National political reporters are, by and large, socially liberal. We are more likely to know a gay couple than to know someone who owns an ‘assault weapon.’ We are, generally, pro-choice. Twice, in D.C., I’ve caused a friend to literally leave a conversation and freeze me out for a day or so because I suggested that the Stupak Amendment and the Hyde Amendment made sense. There is a bubble. Horror stories of abortionists are less likely to permeate that bubble than, say, a story about a right-wing pundit attacking an abortionist who then claims to have gotten death threats.”

ACCOUNTABILITY: Jury convicts Minneapolis SWAT team leader for knockout punch. I like this part:

“Everyone assumes we’re going to give him a break because he’s a police officer,“ prosecutor Blair Buccicone said. “We treat everyone the same. David Clifford is no different from anybody else.”

That’s how it should be, of course.