Saul Degraw says:

O1: I think that this article was trying a bit too hard. Not all of these examples are equal. Some are true examples of people trying too hard for a moral highground but these people always existed as Lee pointed out. The shirt example was really bad and I think a women could significantly wonder whether they would be seen as equal’s in a workplace that let a guy wear that shirt. I’ve been thinking about outrage recently and why people can’t say “not everyone will agree” and move on. This is probably because a lot of politics is a constant war over morality. If someone sincerely (but in my opinion wrongly) thinks SSM will lead to God (who probably doesn’t exist) in causing everyone to burn in Hell. How can they just say “I am clearly in the minority and will just let things be.”

O3: What Lee and North said. Also this could be a proxy fight over gentrification. I think that people might see LGBT people in the same stereotypical lens that they see Jews and Asians. Namely, upper-middle class, educated, and polite. However, not all Jews, Asians, and LGBT people are upper-middle class or polite. Plus cities should be allowed to be cities. Not every place should be a suburb and there is something to the argument about keep the character of a place.

O4: I read the profile and found it humane. Interesting that in the end Park is just like so many young college grads and works as a Barista while trying to figure things out. One wonders if the economy was better would we be having all these fights. For some reason, I found her Christianity surprising. DeBoer got a lot of heat on LGM for his take-down of the Toast piece. The Toast is just largely silly and should be taken down as such. I like the observation of the very small slice of the Internet/Twitter. I doubt most people know what the Toast is or know who DeBoer is.

L1: Good

L2: Bad X ruin it for Good X can be said for any profession. As a plaintiff’s lawyer, I usually wince at the firms who go all out with their advertisements in ways that Crazy Eddie would find distasteful.

L6: This is probably the correct ruling as more and more people work remotely because of the Internet. Though I bet a lot of companies will go 1099 just to make things easier.

Pr5: I dislike perfume in general and this seems especially creepy.

CT2: Interesting. Commuting in the Bay Area goes all over the place and no one seems happy. San Franciscans dislike the Google Buses of people who live in the city but work in Silicon Valley because the Google Buses often use public infrastructure and can be quite arrogant. As far as I can tell, the Google Buses are not ADA compliant. The Muni buses are. There have been accidents where a disabled person is getting on a MUNI bus (this slows things down) and a Google Bus tries to pass the MUNI bus in a narrow line and both get clipped. I wonder what causes some businesses to move to suburban office parks but not others. Law Firms seem to like cities because of access to courts. Even if most or all of your lawyers live in the suburb, the major courts are still in cities. It doesn’t make sense of the 9th Circuit to move out of SF or the 2nd Circuit to move out of NYC. Where will they go but NYC can act as a central location for all the suburbs.

CT3: I find it interesting that the American Conservative is complaining about cities being kid free because it is decades of largely conservative policies that turned cities into zones largely for childless people (usually very young) and/or poor minorities. More middle-class educated white people are choosing to raise their kids in cities but we are going to need to reverse decades worth of policies meant to kill cities. Lee points out the big issues are housing and schools. Housing can be built but building affordable housing for two parents and two kids in a city is very tough. The School situation is tougher because you have a lot of different people with different needs and expectations. You can see this in gentrifying neighborhoods where there are clashes between middle-class white parents and poorer parents over resources and what should be taught.

Developers also don’t seem too keen to build 3-4 bedroom apartments. They are much more likely to build studios, one-bedrooms, and two-bedrooms for maximum number. You can upzone all you want but those are what are going to be built. This further makes cities the playgrounds of the young, wealthy, and childless. There are also lots of culture clashes between parents and non-parents. When you don’t have kids, you can live like you are in your 20s all the time. You can go out to bars and restaurants late on a weeknight, take weekend trips, etc. Not so easy with kids. So childless people want bars and restaurants that stay open late. People with kids generally want good schools and quiet neighborhoods. They don’t want to live next to a bunch of 23 year olds who play music until 3 A.M. Some separation might be best.

Po1: I don’t think so. Plenty of Democrats still really, really hate Dubya and Cheeney. We are going to see the rise of the partisan Presidency though.

Po2: I don’t think employers should try and influence the way people vote. It seems morally questionable to lecture to a captured audience or to make employment contingent on listening to political lectures.

Po5: I don’t know how much someone can separate political and moral character. Politics is largely about what we think society and policy should look like and this is always going to involve morals. Law and Policy is morality becoming realized. This is equally true for social safety net loving liberals and social conservatives.Report