Driving Blind: Design on Fire

Ethan Gach

I write about comics, video games and American politics. I fear death above all things. Just below that is waking up in the morning to go to work. You can follow me on Twitter at @ethangach or at my blog, gamingvulture.tumblr.com. And though my opinions aren’t for hire, my virtue is.

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22 Responses

  1. Glyph says:

    Pitchfork has been doing some experimental “new media” type layouts, with shifting graphics etc. They are sort of neat, but invariably I find that it makes the experience more difficult smooth-scrolling & reading-wise (they hang a lot, and I have a big monitor/fast connection/decent computer – I shudder to think what it’s doing without those things).Report

  2. Pinky says:

    Terrible piece at Medium. Elias’s message is that Democrats are supposed to be like the scorpion in the fable. Taking away power is in their nature, and they shouldn’t be held to anything crazy (like their word) when they have an opportunity to do so. Besides, if there’s one thing holding back the Senate from working well, it’s that the members trust each other.Report

    • BlaiseP in reply to Pinky says:

      There’s another of Aesop’s Fables: the Eagle and the Arrow.

      An archer found an eagle’s feather below its nest, fletched an arrow with that feather and killed the eagle with it.

      Moral: we are usually destroyed with the implements of our own success.

      The GOP has played with fire for five solid years, using the byzantine arcana of the Senate’s august rules to balk even reasonable nominations. Those who defend their obstructionism via byzantine arcana have erected a brittle defence, presuming upon the goodwill of the majority which can change those rules. Unreason can be countered with unreason: every attempt to negotiate has failed. Now cometh the argument of brute force. Brutish it may be — but when reason might have served their cause better, the GOP was not interested.Report

      • Pinky in reply to BlaiseP says:

        I know I’m going to be accused of tu quoque here, but please check out this for a little perspective. The modern practice of blocking nominations was a Democratic creation, after all. And “byzantine arcana”? Seriously?Report

        • Pinky in reply to Pinky says:

          Stupid me. It’s called closing a link. It’s basic html. Learn it.Report

        • greginak in reply to Pinky says:

          Is a release from a Repub congressman count as proof. He does have a pooch in the fight after all. Should i find one of the zillion charts showing the number of filibuster/cloture motions in the last 5 years. There have been far more than any previous time. There is no argument that both parties have blocked nominations at times and there might even be good reasons for doing so every now and then. But it is happening more now that before. One knuckle head R even suggested Obama putting up three people for the appeals court in DC was “court packing”.Report

          • Michelle in reply to greginak says:

            Shut weasel clearly doesn’t know what court packing means. Dear idiot R–court packing does NOT mean appointing people to fill vacant positions on the court. Please go read up on FDR’s unsuccessful attempt to court pack.Report

          • Pinky in reply to greginak says:

            If the statistics in the release are correct, then yes, those count as proof. As for “court packing”, the term was misused, no doubt.Report

        • BlaiseP in reply to Pinky says:

          So I looked through your link provided, tyvm, and I see the point of comparison is Bush43’s second term. Let’s talk about real data now, shall we?

          Valerie E. Caproni, Nominated to the Southern District of New York on November 14, 2012.

          Jennifer A. Dorsey, Nominated to the District of Nevada on September 19, 2012.

          Brian J. Davis, Nominated to the Middle District of Florida on Feb. 29, 2012.

          Jill Pryor, Nominated to the Eleventh Circuit on February 16, 2012.

          Rosemary Marquez, Nominated to the District of Arizona on June 23, 2011.

          -would you care to explain these holdups?Report

          • Pinky in reply to BlaiseP says:

            Well, I don’t know about the specifics, but a quick search on the first one finds people on the left and right lined up against her, due to her possible involvement in the Guantanamo interrogations. It also showed that her name was submitted to the Senate, then returned, then resubmitted, which makes me wonder about the length-of-delay stats.Report

            • Michelle in reply to Pinky says:

              And a quick search on another, Jill Pryor, revealed that Georgia’s two Republican senators are blocking her nomination for reasons they refuse to specify.

              http://www.chamberlainlaw.com/news-news-199.html

              This latest move comes after Obama withdrew two of his previous nominees because the two clowns from Georgia also blocked them. No, not obstructionism. Not at all.Report

            • Michelle in reply to Pinky says:

              Caproni was general consul to the FBI from 2003 to 2011. She was unanimously rated well qualified by the American Bar Association. She’s being held up by Chuck Grassley.

              While Republicans dick around, many federal courts are facing critical shortages of judges because Republicans are hellbent on holding up the nomination process.Report

    • Ethan in reply to Pinky says:

      “It’s that the members trust each other.”

      Do you have examples that would support that model of events?

      Personally, my feeling is that their just isn’t agreement on any of this stuff, and yea, things tend not to happen when there isn’t enough representative force to make them happen.Report

    • greginak in reply to Pinky says:

      Pinky- At what point does holding to their word just allows R’s to keep forking them over. If holding to their word means being repeatedly taken advantage of then it seems like their isn’t any working relationship in which that deal is to be part of.Report

  3. Kolohe says:

    Atossa Abrahamian ventures into the Seasteading project and reports her findings.

    On multicultural stories and the ways they might change us.

    Reading these back to back was interesting.Report