There are too many structural impediments to the GOP becoming truly nationally irrelevant. Between the Senate's bias towards rural states and the strong bias towards two parties with first-past-the-post elections, the Republicans will continue to pick up plenty of seats indefinitely.
That's one problem with two-party systems. In a more parliamentary system, the GOP could follow its primary electorate into right wing populist oblivion and some other conservative party would pick up the slack, but now we have a party that's somewhere near half responsible for governing the country in perpetuity no matter how far its primary electorate pulls it into gonzo conspiracy theory land. So our country is half governed by people obsessed with (or at least pretending to be obsessed with) FEMA helicopters and the Amero.
Maybe instead of trying to distill the long story into some contemptuous, sneering crap that you think is side-splittingly hilarious, you should make an effort to respect the amount of work and thought that went into the long story and let it remain the long story.
The Washington version of that film will be more interesting, I think. Not least because it's focused on commercial distribution via a licensing scheme. Growing in your own home is still illegal. So you're talking about Philip Morris or Costco whoever else wants to get on that train going up against the Federal government. I suspect it'll start with Bob's Ganja Emporium getting a license and the bigger brands will wait around to see what happens.
In case it wasn't clear, I absolutely agree it was a bad call, and a bad call poorly executed (where was the white hat?). But I and other Cascadians are at least a little bit bemused that the country is having an existential cry over Green Bay losing a regular season game when, for example, a referee so bungled a series of Superbowl calls that he publicly apologized to the Seahawks. Or that Vinny Testaverde was given an incorrect late touchdown because his head apparently looks like a football in a game that essentially ended Seattle's hopes for the playoffs (and got Erickson fired, so thanks I guess).
Somehow the integrity of the league survived those blunders and the rules still meant something. Which is why one wonders why the very soul of the league is at stake when the Packers lose but a botched Superbowl is just crybabies being crybabies (citation needed).
On the specifics, by rule replay couldn't overturn the play because replay can't determine possession. At least that's my understanding based on all of the yelling of the past few days. Once the ref called touchdown (one of them, anyway), replay was effectively bound to a pretty narrow set of criteria that weren't relevant.
As a Seattle resident and Seahawks fan, I'm both aware of how bad the call was (the postgame Seahawks Twitterverse was a pretty hilarious blend of disgust and excitement) and gratified that national commentators and the general NFL fanbase is outright admitting that the call was worse because it hurt the Packers, implying that if it had been reversed and the Packers had been given an incredibly dubious TD to win over Seattle, it'd be less of a problem and maybe just blow over. The fact that some franchises are given preferential treatment by the media and the rest of the country is a pretty well understood fact here, but it's rare to see it so out in the open.
And that sense of aggrievement at being blamed for an injury to the precious Packers will probably go a long way this season, since as we all know being aggrieved is the most powerful motivation in sports. So it'll probably help Green Bay's season as well.
The problem there is the temporal difference. Changing your mind over time isn't problematic for ranking preferences. Need at least to 3 to get an instantaneous A > B, B > C, C > A relationship.
Greatly enjoyed this overview (thanks!) and, as an occasional Buddhist, I've long felt that neoclassical and main street economics aggressively glosses over the interactions between suffering, desire, and trade. It sounds like the Austrians have their fingers closer to that pulse.
But I did find that the description here of the interaction between unease and action was pretty circular, especially around the topic of intransitivity. If you say that you know that the thing you're doing right now is the thing that reduces the greatest unease because it's the thing you're doing right now, you haven't really said anything. You could just as well assert that the thing your'e doing right now is the thing that God most wants you to do or the thing that the chemical dice in your head landed on. Unease can only convincingly enter into it if you can measure unease by some mechanism other than in observing what you're doing, and then demonstrate that you consistently do the thing that reduces the most unease.
Tremendous stuff, but I wonder if advice should be (like #3) focused on what to do and where to be BEFORE zombification, since once zombified one's ability to follow sound advice is probably compromised by the total lack of higher brain function.
So not only where on the body should one get bitten, but also where geographically. Cities are great for an early feeding frenzy, but once the populace is mostly converted the zombie to food ratio is going to be very high and mass starvation is probably inevitable. In a small town the conversion rate will be slow enough that it's possible for the food to gang together and kill the zombies to end the epidemic locally. So you probably want to be converted in a mid-size suburb where food will be plentiful enough for a good supply without being so plentiful that you create a competing hungry army.
Also, back to post-zombification advice, the inverse of #3 is that you should go for the legs and jaws to reduce future competition.
But you make the point yourself. You don't think GWB was a real racist in his heart of hearts, but it didn't matter because his political coalition was beholden to racist views. So whether you can suss our 'real racism' is irrelevant. If a candidate goes on about voter IDs and vote fraud that's really bad, whether he's really a racist or not.
And bringing up the DOJ reminds me of another aspect, which is that minorities currently vote for Democrats by large majorities and it's therefore in the cold political interests (at least short-term) of Republican operatives to reduce minority voting, whether they're racist or not. That's an awful thing for minority rights, and it's much more important than what Newt Gingrich thinks about food stamps. Trying to figure out who's a racist and who's just making political calculations is a waste of time.
56. And when I sit around with my evangelical, political-disagreeing friends having a smoke, drinking a Coors, and watching Jimmie turn left, we mostly talk about how much of a clown Charles Murray is.
Got most of my points from growing up in a town of 800 with a dirt poor truck driver as a 'breadwinner'.
I'm not sure I understand entirely why I'm supposed to care whether Newt is actually racist or just playing one on TV or an innocent victim of the PC thought police.
Suppose we could somehow generate hard evidence that Gingrich (or any other conservative or anyone else) was a racist — as in actually believes that his race is inherently superior to some other race(s). Now what? Is his moon colony idea any better or worse?
Any attempt to dispute any of his policies based on it would obviously be ad hominem. Of course, ad hominem works all the time in practical politics, so maybe that's the goal. But if he resigns in shame because of his outed racism he'll just be replaced by some other conservative candidate who may or may not be racist.
Is the problem with his pandering to racist votes the pandering or the existence of racist votes? If the latter, 'proving' he's a racist isn't going to do anything to the racist voting bloc. Dog whistles as a strategy aren't going to go away because you silenced one whistle.
The goal of race-neutral politics should be to ensure that people of every race are given an equal opportunity to vote and otherwise affect the political process. To that end, racist poll watchers and elections officials are much, much more dangerous than racist candidates and much, much less scrutinized.
You can't shame away candidates' ability and desire to pander and you shouldn't even bother trying.
Jay Rosen lucidly refers to political journalists' prioritization of being clever and connected over being correct and useful as 'the cult of savviness'. Good summary of his thoughts here.
Most of it comes from identifying more with the people they eat lunch with than their audience.
Well, to bring the conversation around in a circle and tie a bow on it, it's possible that those notions have arisen because rural poverty is perceived as largely white and urban poverty is perceived as largely black.
But now that I think on it, I think rural poverty among blacks (largely in the South) is given the same sort of mystical nobility that is given to poor, rural whites. So maybe it really is a rural/urban thing.
I only use it when referring to my vacation ranch.
Actually, I just maintain that the word ending in 'er' and the word ending in 'a' are distinct, and actual racists never use the latter, so that seems safe.
On “Javarrrgh!”
"Here’s the problem in a nutshell: I’ve been writing Java since the first night it was available from Sun."
Wait, so Java's busted security model is your fault, Blaise?
:)
On “Sailing Away to Irrelevance, Epilogue: In Which the GOP is Finally and Inevitably Made Irrelevant”
There are too many structural impediments to the GOP becoming truly nationally irrelevant. Between the Senate's bias towards rural states and the strong bias towards two parties with first-past-the-post elections, the Republicans will continue to pick up plenty of seats indefinitely.
That's one problem with two-party systems. In a more parliamentary system, the GOP could follow its primary electorate into right wing populist oblivion and some other conservative party would pick up the slack, but now we have a party that's somewhere near half responsible for governing the country in perpetuity no matter how far its primary electorate pulls it into gonzo conspiracy theory land. So our country is half governed by people obsessed with (or at least pretending to be obsessed with) FEMA helicopters and the Amero.
"
Maybe instead of trying to distill the long story into some contemptuous, sneering crap that you think is side-splittingly hilarious, you should make an effort to respect the amount of work and thought that went into the long story and let it remain the long story.
On “One Of The Perplexed Makes A Request For Clarification (Weed Edition)”
The Washington version of that film will be more interesting, I think. Not least because it's focused on commercial distribution via a licensing scheme. Growing in your own home is still illegal. So you're talking about Philip Morris or Costco whoever else wants to get on that train going up against the Federal government. I suspect it'll start with Bob's Ganja Emporium getting a license and the bigger brands will wait around to see what happens.
"
Asking for a friend?
On “Cranberries.”
Bravo, sir. For not including 3 cups of sugar in the recipe. Cranberries are cranberries. They aren't cherries.
On “Week Three Roundup”
In case it wasn't clear, I absolutely agree it was a bad call, and a bad call poorly executed (where was the white hat?). But I and other Cascadians are at least a little bit bemused that the country is having an existential cry over Green Bay losing a regular season game when, for example, a referee so bungled a series of Superbowl calls that he publicly apologized to the Seahawks. Or that Vinny Testaverde was given an incorrect late touchdown because his head apparently looks like a football in a game that essentially ended Seattle's hopes for the playoffs (and got Erickson fired, so thanks I guess).
Somehow the integrity of the league survived those blunders and the rules still meant something. Which is why one wonders why the very soul of the league is at stake when the Packers lose but a botched Superbowl is just crybabies being crybabies (citation needed).
On the specifics, by rule replay couldn't overturn the play because replay can't determine possession. At least that's my understanding based on all of the yelling of the past few days. Once the ref called touchdown (one of them, anyway), replay was effectively bound to a pretty narrow set of criteria that weren't relevant.
"
As a Seattle resident and Seahawks fan, I'm both aware of how bad the call was (the postgame Seahawks Twitterverse was a pretty hilarious blend of disgust and excitement) and gratified that national commentators and the general NFL fanbase is outright admitting that the call was worse because it hurt the Packers, implying that if it had been reversed and the Packers had been given an incredibly dubious TD to win over Seattle, it'd be less of a problem and maybe just blow over. The fact that some franchises are given preferential treatment by the media and the rest of the country is a pretty well understood fact here, but it's rare to see it so out in the open.
And that sense of aggrievement at being blamed for an injury to the precious Packers will probably go a long way this season, since as we all know being aggrieved is the most powerful motivation in sports. So it'll probably help Green Bay's season as well.
On “There will be bad blood”
Ditto. And that fast-scrolling solution is helped immensely by custom avatars. So everyone get one. Especially the funny people.
On “Austrian Utility Theory (long)”
The problem there is the temporal difference. Changing your mind over time isn't problematic for ranking preferences. Need at least to 3 to get an instantaneous A > B, B > C, C > A relationship.
"
No, because demand is desire and desire occasionally leads to suffering
"
Greatly enjoyed this overview (thanks!) and, as an occasional Buddhist, I've long felt that neoclassical and main street economics aggressively glosses over the interactions between suffering, desire, and trade. It sounds like the Austrians have their fingers closer to that pulse.
But I did find that the description here of the interaction between unease and action was pretty circular, especially around the topic of intransitivity. If you say that you know that the thing you're doing right now is the thing that reduces the greatest unease because it's the thing you're doing right now, you haven't really said anything. You could just as well assert that the thing your'e doing right now is the thing that God most wants you to do or the thing that the chemical dice in your head landed on. Unease can only convincingly enter into it if you can measure unease by some mechanism other than in observing what you're doing, and then demonstrate that you consistently do the thing that reduces the most unease.
On “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Zombies”
Tremendous stuff, but I wonder if advice should be (like #3) focused on what to do and where to be BEFORE zombification, since once zombified one's ability to follow sound advice is probably compromised by the total lack of higher brain function.
So not only where on the body should one get bitten, but also where geographically. Cities are great for an early feeding frenzy, but once the populace is mostly converted the zombie to food ratio is going to be very high and mass starvation is probably inevitable. In a small town the conversion rate will be slow enough that it's possible for the food to gang together and kill the zombies to end the epidemic locally. So you probably want to be converted in a mid-size suburb where food will be plentiful enough for a good supply without being so plentiful that you create a competing hungry army.
Also, back to post-zombification advice, the inverse of #3 is that you should go for the legs and jaws to reduce future competition.
On “Don’t Fear Me”
If you're white, yes.
On “More Police Brutality”
Which other sorts of people are represented in the video? Did Henderson just get unlucky and end up with only the bad sort?
On “Arguing Racism”
You wrote "final solution". Twice. *chortle*
"
But you make the point yourself. You don't think GWB was a real racist in his heart of hearts, but it didn't matter because his political coalition was beholden to racist views. So whether you can suss our 'real racism' is irrelevant. If a candidate goes on about voter IDs and vote fraud that's really bad, whether he's really a racist or not.
And bringing up the DOJ reminds me of another aspect, which is that minorities currently vote for Democrats by large majorities and it's therefore in the cold political interests (at least short-term) of Republican operatives to reduce minority voting, whether they're racist or not. That's an awful thing for minority rights, and it's much more important than what Newt Gingrich thinks about food stamps. Trying to figure out who's a racist and who's just making political calculations is a waste of time.
On “No Points for Thinking of Richard Branson”
Also, I'm offended by the lack of questions about smokeless tobacco (could even call it snoose for real small town cred). Huge swing and miss.
"
56. And when I sit around with my evangelical, political-disagreeing friends having a smoke, drinking a Coors, and watching Jimmie turn left, we mostly talk about how much of a clown Charles Murray is.
Got most of my points from growing up in a town of 800 with a dirt poor truck driver as a 'breadwinner'.
On “Arguing Racism”
I'm not sure I understand entirely why I'm supposed to care whether Newt is actually racist or just playing one on TV or an innocent victim of the PC thought police.
Suppose we could somehow generate hard evidence that Gingrich (or any other conservative or anyone else) was a racist — as in actually believes that his race is inherently superior to some other race(s). Now what? Is his moon colony idea any better or worse?
Any attempt to dispute any of his policies based on it would obviously be ad hominem. Of course, ad hominem works all the time in practical politics, so maybe that's the goal. But if he resigns in shame because of his outed racism he'll just be replaced by some other conservative candidate who may or may not be racist.
Is the problem with his pandering to racist votes the pandering or the existence of racist votes? If the latter, 'proving' he's a racist isn't going to do anything to the racist voting bloc. Dog whistles as a strategy aren't going to go away because you silenced one whistle.
The goal of race-neutral politics should be to ensure that people of every race are given an equal opportunity to vote and otherwise affect the political process. To that end, racist poll watchers and elections officials are much, much more dangerous than racist candidates and much, much less scrutinized.
You can't shame away candidates' ability and desire to pander and you shouldn't even bother trying.
On “Obama, Punditry, and the State of the Union Address That Ensured a Second Term”
Jay Rosen lucidly refers to political journalists' prioritization of being clever and connected over being correct and useful as 'the cult of savviness'. Good summary of his thoughts here.
Most of it comes from identifying more with the people they eat lunch with than their audience.
On “Gingrich: The Wrong Conversation”
Well, to bring the conversation around in a circle and tie a bow on it, it's possible that those notions have arisen because rural poverty is perceived as largely white and urban poverty is perceived as largely black.
But now that I think on it, I think rural poverty among blacks (largely in the South) is given the same sort of mystical nobility that is given to poor, rural whites. So maybe it really is a rural/urban thing.
On “Race, Privilege, Music, and The N-Word”
I only use it when referring to my vacation ranch.
Actually, I just maintain that the word ending in 'er' and the word ending in 'a' are distinct, and actual racists never use the latter, so that seems safe.
On “The 10 Commandments of Tod”
Tod-men
On “Liveblog at the End of the Universe”
Hm. Christmas Island seems to have escaped His wroth for obvious reasons. Christchurch up in an hour and a half. No surprise if it's spared.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.