Generals Sought More Positive Coverage on Head Injuries, Document Shows - The New York Times

Generals Sought More Positive Coverage on Head Injuries, Document Shows - The New York Times: "Two top Army generals recently discussed trying to kill an article in The New York Times on concussions at West Point by withholding information so the Army could encourage competing news organizations to publish a more favorable story, according to an Army document.

"



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POLITICO Playbook, presented by the National Automobile Dealers Association – PUTIN MOCKS U.S. before Obama bilat – HOT MEMO: ‘POLITICO in full’ -- WATER on Mars – NEW JOBS for Jano, Keil -- ‘DAILY SHOW’ debut – B’DAY: Steve Schmidt; Scott Mulhauser is 4-0 - POLITICO

POLITICO Playbook, presented by the National Automobile Dealers Association – PUTIN MOCKS U.S. before Obama bilat – HOT MEMO: ‘POLITICO in full’ -- WATER on Mars – NEW JOBS for Jano, Keil -- ‘DAILY SHOW’ debut – B’DAY: Steve Schmidt; Scott Mulhauser is 4-0 - POLITICO: "“It will be a real wall. It’ll be a wall that works. It’ll actually be a wall that will look good, believe it or not. ... We’re rounding ‘em up in a very humane way, in a very nice way. And they're going to be happy because they want to be legalized. And, by the way, I know it doesn't sound nice. But not everything is nice.”"



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The Police Told Her To Report Her Rape, Then Arrested Her For Lying - BuzzFeed News

The Police Told Her To Report Her Rape, Then Arrested Her For Lying - BuzzFeed News: "Lara is stuck putting the pieces of her life back together. Now 23, she still has no clue why the police told her to report a crime, then arrested her for doing so. She only knows one thing for sure, she says: No one should ever report a rape to the police.
“The night I was raped, I said I wanted to be left alone,” Lara told BuzzFeed News in August. “People say rape is serious and you should report it, but look what happened to me: I reported my rape, and they told me it never happened.”"



'via Blog this'

The Police Told Her To Report Her Rape, Then Arrested Her For Lying - BuzzFeed News

The Police Told Her To Report Her Rape, Then Arrested Her For Lying - BuzzFeed News: "Lara is stuck putting the pieces of her life back together. Now 23, she still has no clue why the police told her to report a crime, then arrested her for doing so. She only knows one thing for sure, she says: No one should ever report a rape to the police.
“The night I was raped, I said I wanted to be left alone,” Lara told BuzzFeed News in August. “People say rape is serious and you should report it, but look what happened to me: I reported my rape, and they told me it never happened.”"



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Review: ‘Spring Awakening’ by Deaf West Theater Brings a New Sensation to Broadway - The New York Times

Review: ‘Spring Awakening’ by Deaf West Theater Brings a New Sensation to Broadway - The New York Times: "But I hesitate to impose any new meanings on a work that doesn’t need them to move us, or to imply that this “Spring Awakening” would only appeal to those with a particular interest in making more cultural space for people with disabilities. (Incidentally, the cast also includes an actor in a wheelchair — a detail I so easily assimilated that I almost forgot to mention it.) Deaf actors may not have the same tools that most actors do, but the gifted men and women in this splendid production achieve the same ideal ends, lighting up the lives of their characters from within, even when the light only reveals the darkness of their confusion, frustration and despair.

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Stop Googling. Let’s Talk. - The New York Times

Stop Googling. Let’s Talk. - The New York Times: "When college students explain to me how dividing their attention plays out in the dining hall, some refer to a “rule of three.” In a conversation among five or six people at dinner, you have to check that three people are paying attention — heads up — before you give yourself permission to look down at your phone. So conversation proceeds, but with different people having their heads up at different times. The effect is what you would expect: Conversation is kept relatively light, on topics where people feel they can drop in and out."



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A Holocaust Survival Tale of Sex and Deceit | History | Smithsonian

A Holocaust Survival Tale of Sex and Deceit | History | Smithsonian: "Hermann, Marie’s son, shares his mother’s post-war story in an afterword. After a long journey of extreme luck, happening upon sympathetic, generous strangers, including a Communist gynecologist and a circus performer, Marie survives the war, poor and with nowhere to go. She went on to teach at the Humboldt University of Berlin and raise a family. She made good on her promise to her aunt Grete, to survive. She knew all along that "other days would come" and she "ought to tell posterity what was happening."

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The One Method I’ve Used to Eliminate Bad Tech Hires — Medium

The One Method I’ve Used to Eliminate Bad Tech Hires — Medium: "Paying candidates to work on a simple project and then discuss it with our team has almost single handedly eliminated any bad hiring decisions. Paying a candidate that gives you a terrible solution (or no solution) is FAR cheaper (both financially and emotionally) than hiring the wrong person, going through a 3 month performance improvement plan to try to make them the right person and eventually firing them.

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Robert Lewandowski subs on at halftime for Munich, scores 5 goals in 9 minutes | For The Win

Robert Lewandowski subs on at halftime for Munich, scores 5 goals in 9 minutes | For The Win: "I’m not even sure what just happened.

Bayern Munich were trailing to Wolfsburg 1-0 at halftime of their Bundesliga clash on Tuesday, when Munich manager Pep Guardiola decided to make a change.

He brought in striker Robert Lewandowski at halftime to try and add an offensive spark.



Lewandowski then scored five goals in nine minutes. FIVE GOALS IN NINE MINUTES."



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The Dad Who Wrote a Check Using “Common Core” Math Doesn’t Know What He’s Talking About

The Dad Who Wrote a Check Using “Common Core” Math Doesn’t Know What He’s Talking About: "Over the past several years, what math teachers have realized is that kids who relied on memorization, algorithms, and calculators had a really hard time understanding math as they got older. Classes like algebra become scary for those kids because, all of a sudden, they couldn’t just plug things into their calculators. Variables got in the way, they had to start manipulating equations, and they just hit a wall.



I’ve had a lot of those students in my classes over the years. The one thing they had in common was an over-reliance on formulas and methods. They all wanted to know the “right” way to solve a problem, when the truth was that there were a bunch of ways to solve them."



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jeebus_t_christ comments on Your experience with "bacha bazi?"

jeebus_t_christ comments on Your experience with "bacha bazi?":

Listen up, troop: we are very definitely the good guys.

But there ain't no good in this world, oh no. There ain't nothing but wickedness in this world--people hurting people in our own country and in places around the world. This is what happens when you put more than two humans in any place. Humans are wicked.

"Jeebus, how, then, are we the good guys?" I'll tell you, Soldier. We are the good guys because we have to make the Good up from the Bad, because there ain't nothing else to make it out of.

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Carly Fiorina 2016: Why I Still Think Carly Fiorina Was a Terrible CEO - POLITICO Magazine

Carly Fiorina 2016: Why I Still Think Carly Fiorina Was a Terrible CEO - POLITICO Magazine:

And I have to point out the obvious: If the board was wrong, the employees wrong, and the shareholders wrong—as Fiorina maintains—why in 10 years has she never been offered another public company to run?

Now, Fiorina wants to run the country. I am a firm believer in second chances. Just because Fiorina failed at an early career does not preclude her from becoming a good leader later. But I do know, having written a book on how great leaders rebound after career disasters, that to overcome failure is to admit to it and learn from it. During the debate, instead of addressing the facts and taking on my professional observations, Fiorina decided to shoot the messenger. What she failed to see is that this behavior—sidestepping accountability by resorting to demagoguery and deflection—is exactly why she failed as a leader the last time.

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After Slavery Ordeal, Fisherman Finds Self Without a Country - ABC News

After Slavery Ordeal, Fisherman Finds Self Without a Country - ABC News:

I never had any name. Bing is the name the Thai gave me.

I didn't know where my parents were from. I heard they were Burmese but I never knew them. I was living in Ranong (in Thailand). ... A lot of people knew me because I was a beggar. I wonder if they still remember me.

I was taken to a fishing boat and was told by the Thai captain he could give me a good job. I never knew we were going to Indonesia. When I realized that's where we were going, I pleaded to go back. The captain said I didn't have any documents, so I couldn't go. I didn't have papers, not even a birth certificate, because I didn't have parents. So I had to spend all my time at the fishing boat. I was never paid for my work.

I don't want to stay here alone. I want to go back with my friends. ... I don't know if I can find anyone in Thailand or Myanmar, but I just want to go back. I don't know how to live here. I'm afraid to be here alone.

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Richard Sherman And Michael Bennett Are Having A Serious Public Debate On Black Lives Matter

Richard Sherman And Michael Bennett Are Having A Serious Public Debate On Black Lives Matter: "Over the past few days, two Seahawks have publicly offered differing opinions on the Black Lives Matter movement, police brutality, poverty, and a host of related issues. In the usually anodyne world of athlete press conferences, it’s really something.

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Backwards, comrades! | The Economist

Backwards, comrades! | The Economist: "Time and again, Mr Corbyn spots a genuine problem only to respond with a flawed policy. He is right that Britain sorely lacks housing. But rent controls would only exacerbate the shortage. The previous Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition government should indeed have been less austere. It could have boosted demand by spending more on infrastructure. But Mr Corbyn’s notion of “people’s QE”—getting the Bank of England to print money to pay for projects—threatens to become an incontinent fiscal stimulus by the backdoor (rather than serve as an unorthodox form of monetary policy when interest rates are at zero). There is no denying that young people have been harmed by Tory policies that favour the old. But scrapping university-tuition fees would be regressive and counterproductive. For proof, consider that in England more poor students go to university than when higher education was free, whereas in Scotland, whose devolved government has abolished tuition fees, universities are facing a funding crisis and attract no more poor students than they did."



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Backwards, comrades! | The Economist

Backwards, comrades! | The Economist: "Time and again, Mr Corbyn spots a genuine problem only to respond with a flawed policy. He is right that Britain sorely lacks housing. But rent controls would only exacerbate the shortage. The previous Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition government should indeed have been less austere. It could have boosted demand by spending more on infrastructure. But Mr Corbyn’s notion of “people’s QE”—getting the Bank of England to print money to pay for projects—threatens to become an incontinent fiscal stimulus by the backdoor (rather than serve as an unorthodox form of monetary policy when interest rates are at zero). There is no denying that young people have been harmed by Tory policies that favour the old. But scrapping university-tuition fees would be regressive and counterproductive. For proof, consider that in England more poor students go to university than when higher education was free, whereas in Scotland, whose devolved government has abolished tuition fees, universities are facing a funding crisis and attract no more poor students than they did."



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An hereditary meritocracy | The Economist

An hereditary meritocracy | The Economist: "More than 50 years ago Michael Young warned that the incipient meritocracy to which he had given a name could be as narrow and pernicious, in its way, as aristocracies of old. In America some academics and thinkers on the left are coming to similar conclusions. Lani Guinier of Harvard speaks for many when she rails against the “testocracy” that now governs America. Once progressives saw academic testing as a way of breaking down old structures of privilege; there is now a growing sense that it simply serves to advantage those who have been schooled to excel in such situations. Heirs to Andrew Jackson on the right have their own worries about the self perpetuation of an American elite, but no desire at all to use government as a leveller. Both sides can agree that the blending of merit and inheritance is un-American. Neither has plausible ideas for what to do about it.

"



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The National Building Museum found $433.24 in loose change at the bottom of ‘The Beach’ - The Washington Post

The National Building Museum found $433.24 in loose change at the bottom of ‘The Beach’ - The Washington Post: "If you lost a baseball cap, chances are, yours may be among the 32 hats she pulled out of the deep. If you lost a wedding ring -- well, you may be out of luck.

"We weren't able to return five of them, which is a bummer," she said. There were nine rings reported missing, but only four were found.  "We tried -- oh my goodness, did we try. Everybody involved was so careful."



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This was the first episode of House I watched

The procedural turned personal on a one-of-a-kind House episode · A Very Special Episode · The A.V. Club: "For one night in 2005, House was the best show on television. And I’ll go even further than that. For about three years, House was an example of network TV at its sharpest. A forward-thinking hybrid of the medical procedural and the “antihero” drama, the show delivered fiendishly difficult case-of-the-week mysteries, solved by a prickly, pill-popping diagnostician named Gregory House—a character modeled directly on Sherlock Holmes. (Get it? House? Holmes?) And then on May 17, 2005, toward the end of season one, Fox aired “Three Stories,” an episode written by creator David Shore and directed by Paris Barclay, which set such a high bar for what House could be that even though the show ran for seven more seasons—and was mostly excellent for two of those—it never again realized its full potential.

"



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Irving ISD student detained for invention resembling bomb

Irving ISD student detained for invention resembling bomb: "ccording to Irving police, Ahmed's case contained a digital clock that the student had taken apart and rearranged. Police said the student had the briefcase in his English class, where he plugged it into an electrical outlet and it started to make noise.

Ahmed told WFAA that his English teacher confiscated his case. A few hours later, the student said the principal and school resource officer pulled him out of class and questioned the high school freshman.

Officers said Ahmed was being "passive aggressive" in his answers to their questions, and didn't have a "reasonable answer" as to what he was doing with the case. Investigators said the student told them that it was just a clock that he was messing around with.

Police confiscated the case along with Ahmed's tablet computer.

Officers did not file formal charges against the teenager and released him to his parents."



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Why Late-Night Television Is Better than Ever | Vanity Fair

Why Late-Night Television Is Better than Ever | Vanity Fair: "What’s conspicuously missing from late-night, still, is women. How gobsmackingly insane is it that no TV network has had the common sense—and that’s all we’re talking about in 2015, not courage, bravery, or even decency—to hand over the reins of an existing late-night comedy program to a female person? While Amy Schumer has acknowledged that she turned down The Daily Show, happy where she is at Comedy Central, that doesn’t mitigate the fact that Chelsea Peretti, Megan Amram, and Jen Kirkman, to name but three contenders, are alive, sentient, funny, and presumably open to taking a meeting. (And how great would Lea DeLaria be as an M.C., going places Ed McMahon never dared to go? It’d be weird, wild stuff.)

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Behind the Photo: The ‘Vanity Fair’ Men of Better-Than-Ever Late Night at Their Most Uncensored «

Behind the Photo: The ‘Vanity Fair’ Men of Better-Than-Ever Late Night at Their Most Uncensored «: "The article has words, but atop those words is a photo of the 10 men, all wearing suits together, and looking very much like 10 men in suits enjoying being 10 men in suits.

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John Oliver’s Our Lady of Perpetual Exemption Church

John Oliver’s Our Lady of Perpetual Exemption Church: "It is I, Megareverend and C.E.O. of Our Lady of Perpetual Exemption Church, Pastor John Oliver.

We thank you for all your kind donations, but I’m sorry to report that we have closed down the church.



And let me take a moment to explain why - it’s certainly not because we have to.

We have still, miraculously, not broken any laws by promising you untold riches in return for sending us money.



We’re also not closing down because you all kept sending us actual seeds, even though we explicitly told you not to. We’re closing because multiple people sent us sperm through the mail. And when someone sends you jizz through the mail, it’s time to stop whatever you’re doing.

So we are shutting this s**t down. Praise be! "



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Jeremy Corbyn, Labour, and the Challenge for British Politics - The New Yorker

Jeremy Corbyn, Labour, and the Challenge for British Politics - The New Yorker: "This conundrum may be all the more acute for Corbyn, because few of his M.P.s want him as their commander-in-chief. They did not choose him. He was chosen under a new set of Labour Party rules that, like many things devised in the interests of fairness, have concluded in a splendid fiasco. You might think that, because M.P.s are elected by the populace, they could—or logically should—be trusted to appoint their own overlord. Not so. There was a time when the trades unions, fettered by history and loyalty to Labour, wielded great influence in the matter of its leader, but that age has faded. Instead, with a bracing simplicity, every paid-up member of the party now has a vote. The payment is three pounds (about four dollars and sixty cents). For that trifling sum, you get to sway the direction of Labour’s future, and, if enough of you sign up—many minds with but a single thought—the outcome will be anything but a trifle. That is what transpired in 2015: the Corbynistas ran amok. They swarmed to their man. Corbynmania was born."



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Blog | The Righteous Mind

Blog | The Righteous Mind:

In modern Western societies, an ethic of cultural tolerance – and often incompatibly, intolerance of intolerance – has developed in tandem with increasing diversity. Since microaggression offenses normally involve overstratification and underdiversity, intense concern about such offenses occurs at the intersection of the social conditions conducive to the seriousness of each. It is in egalitarian and diverse settings – such as at modern American universities – that equality and diversity are most valued, and it is in these settings that perceived offenses against these values are most deviant. [p.707]. [Again, the paradox: places that make the most progress toward equality and diversity can expect to have the “lowest bar” for what counts as an offense against equality and inclusivity. Some colleges have lowered the bar so far that an innocent question, motivated by curiosity, such as “where are you from” is now branded as an act of aggression.]



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How Grown-Ups Deal With 'Microaggressions' - Bloomberg View

How Grown-Ups Deal With 'Microaggressions' - Bloomberg View: "The debate over microaggressions often seems to focus on whether they are real. This is silly. Of course they've always been real; only the label is new. Microaggressions from the majority to the minority are as real as Sunday, and the effect of their accumulated weight is to make you feel always slightly a stranger in a strange land. The phenomenon is dispiriting, even more so because the offenders frequently don't realize that their words were somewhere between awkward and offensive (once again).



On the other hand, in a diverse group, the other thing you have to say about microaggressions is that they are unavoidable. And that a culture that tries to avoid them is setting up to tear itself apart."



[This is a good post for a reminder that I post lots of things I don't necessarily agree with - WLS]



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U.S. Drops Charges That Professor Shared Technology With China - The New York Times

U.S. Drops Charges That Professor Shared Technology With China - The New York Times: "But months later, long after federal agents had led Dr. Xi away in handcuffs, independent experts discovered something wrong with the evidence at the heart of the Justice Department’s case: The blueprints were not for a pocket heater.

Faced with sworn statements from leading scientists, including an inventor of the pocket heater, the Justice Department on Friday afternoon dropped all charges against Dr. Xi, an American citizen.



It was an embarrassing acknowledgment that prosecutors and F.B.I. agents did not understand — and did not do enough to learn — the science at the heart of the case before bringing charges that jeopardized Dr. Xi’s career and left the impression that he was spying for China."



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What Do You Say to a Roanoke Truther? - The Daily Beast

What Do You Say to a Roanoke Truther? - The Daily Beast: "In the minds—and YouTube videos—of some conspiracy theorists, Chris is not a news anchor at WDBJ in Virginia. Chris, the videos say, is a “crisis actor" invented less than a month ago by the United States government as part of a false flag operation that will eventually allow the New World Order to take away every American citizen’s guns and force them into a life of subjugation and tyranny.



Every day now, Chris wakes up to find strangers’ hate on his Facebook wall that he has to personally delete. Or he’ll Google Alison to find the people he has to thank for donating to her scholarships and he’ll see, instead, another conspiracy theory YouTube video, viewed 800,000 times over, that says Alison was in on it all along, and that she’s been given a new life and maybe plastic surgery by the government."



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Fathers Who Serve as the Primary Parent - The Atlantic

Fathers Who Serve as the Primary Parent - The Atlantic: "Three years ago, my wife, Anne-Marie Slaughter, wrote in these pages about how difficult it remains for women to “have it all”—a family and a career. She’d recently left a high-powered job in Washington, D.C., to return to our home in Princeton, New Jersey, where I had been acting as lead parent to our children. Somewhat ironically, her article on work-life balance led her to increased prominence on the national stage, which reinforced my role as the lead parent of our two sons—a role I continue to fill today."



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Robert Macfarlane: why we need nature writing

Robert Macfarlane: why we need nature writing: "“Nature writing” has become a cant phrase, branded and bandied out of any useful existence, and I would be glad to see its deletion from the current discourse. Yet it is clear that in Britain we are living through a golden age of literature that explores relations between selfhood, landscape and ethics and addresses what Mabey has described as the “growing fault line in the way we perceive and talk about nature”. I don’t know what to call this writing, nor am I persuaded that it needs a name. It is not a genre or a school. An ecology, perhaps? In the Guardian in 2003, I described what I saw as the green shoots of a revival of such writing. Twelve years on, those shoots have flourished into a forest, richly diverse in its understory as well as its canopy.

"



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John Lanchester reviews ‘The Wright Brothers’ by David McCullough and ‘Elon Musk’ by Ashlee Vance · LRB 10 September 2015

John Lanchester reviews ‘The Wright Brothers’ by David McCullough and ‘Elon Musk’ by Ashlee Vance · LRB 10 September 2015: "However, Musk’s innovations could all come to pass, with SpaceX heading for Mars by the end of the next decade, and electric cars increasingly popular in the first world, and solar energy increasingly practical, and yet how different would the world really be for most of its seven billion inhabitants? His businesses employ 15,000 people, which is quite a few, but on the other hand is also less than half as many as work in a single Hyundai factory in South Korea. Also, the sheer scale of the capital and resources deployed in Musk’s businesses shows just how hard it is to innovate fundamentally in these industries. Two tinkerers changed the world with an invention they knocked up in their spare time in a workshop. Musk deploys tens of billion dollars in capital and a huge amount of brainpower and gives a lot of pleasure and entertainment in the process, but the upshot is still disputable."



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The Next Genocide - The New York Times

The Next Genocide - The New York Times: "Today we confront the same crucial choice between science and ideology that Germans once faced. Will we accept empirical evidence and support new energy technologies, or allow a wave of ecological panic to spread across the world?

Denying science imperils the future by summoning the ghosts of the past."



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On MVPs, Glueing Things Together, and $270 flights to South Africa. — Medium

On MVPs, Glueing Things Together, and $270 flights to South Africa. — Medium: "You can recognize an opportunity and validate it by seeing if people will pay for it THAT DAY. You don’t need a fancy site. You don’t need a complete backend (I still have to unsubscribe people manually!). You don’t even need to build it all yourself — there are services for pretty much everything.



Just glue stuff together.

At this stage, there is absolutely no reason to roll your own anything except glue. I think the hip term for this these days is the “no stack startup.” That term sounds silly, because I have a stack (and I LOVE it). My stack is: Wordpress template, Formcrafts, Stripe, Mailchimp, Twilio, Zapier, and my php script."



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Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken” Is Our Most Misread Poem

Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken” Is Our Most Misread Poem: "According to this reading, then, the speaker will be claiming “ages and ages hence” that his decision made “all the difference” only because this is the kind of claim we make when we want to comfort or blame ourselves by assuming that our current position is the product of our own choices (as opposed to what was chosen for us or allotted to us by chance). The poem isn’t a salute to can-do individualism; it’s a commentary on the self-deception we practice when constructing the story of our own lives. “The Road Not Taken” may be, as the critic Frank Lentricchia memorably put it, “the best example in all of American poetry of a wolf in sheep’s clothing.” But we could go further: It may be the best example in all of American culture of a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

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Donald Trump Likens His Schooling to Military Service in Book - The New York Times

Donald Trump Likens His Schooling to Military Service in Book - The New York Times: "Perhaps his most revealing statement applies to the time-honored virtue of self-reflection.



Mr. Trump is not in favor of it.

“When you start studying yourself too deeply, you start seeing things that maybe you don’t want to see,” Mr. Trump once told Time. “And if there’s a rhyme and reason,” he continued, “people can figure you out, and once they can figure you out, you’re in big trouble.”"



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Officer Who Arrested James Blake Has History of Force Complaints - The New York Times

Officer Who Arrested James Blake Has History of Force Complaints - The New York Times:

The New York Police Department released surveillance video of the arrest on Friday, offering a minute-long glimpse of the manhandling of a biracial sports star by a white plainclothes officer that compelled officials to swiftly strip the officer of his gun and badge.He finished by digging his knee into Mr. Blake’s back and handcuffing him, never easing up even though the athlete barely flinched as he let himself be tackled.

He finished by digging his knee into Mr. Blake’s back and handcuffing him, never easing up even though the athlete barely flinched as he let himself be tackled.

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Judge rules on taxi industry lawsuit: Compete with Uber or die | Crain's New York Business

Judge rules on taxi industry lawsuit: Compete with Uber or die | Crain's New York Business: "The “catastrophe” he cited is the possible slew of loan defaults in the coming months if owners stop making payments on medallions that have plunged in value since peaking at more than $1 million and don’t generate enough income for the borrowers to repay their debts. No medallions have been sold since February, when two went for $700,000 each. A wave of foreclosure auctions could reveal that the market now considers medallions to be worth substantially less, which could trigger more defaults and auctions—a so-called death spiral.

Judge Weiss made clear that that’s not his concern. “It is not the court’s function to adjust the competing political and economic interests disturbed by the introduction of Uber-type apps,” he wrote."



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How the Star Wars producer went from secretary to studio boss - Fortune

How the Star Wars producer went from secretary to studio boss - Fortune: "Kennedy persuaded the young woman working at the institute to let her borrow two palettes of “ocular prosthetics,” promising to return them that same day. She hurried back to Spielberg, who was simultaneously shooting a new horror movie. “I go running onto the set of Poltergeist,” says Kennedy. “And we went through the eyes and figured out what combination of colors we wanted for E.T. And then I raced back.” Kennedy asked the young woman at the institute to paint the model for E.T.’s eyes. The woman wasn’t allowed to get paid for doing any outside work, so the quick-witted producer came up with a different plan: Kennedy would furnish her apartment instead out of the film’s budget. “That was our handshake deal,” she says, chuckling at the memory. “And she did an absolutely fabulous job—she found the look, she found the soul.”

"



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On the Other Hand : Longreads Blog

On the Other Hand : Longreads Blog: "As part of the pre-launch media rush for 2011’s The Muppets, the first feature film since Disney bought the characters from The Jim Henson Company, journalist Steve Marsh wanted to interview Whitmire. Disney wouldn’t allow it. Instead, Marsh got to interview Kermit while Whitmire stood there, his hand answering questions his own mouth could not. Marsh snuck in a meta-query: “What are the differences between working with Jim and working with Steve?” Kermit answers: “Boy, it’s hard for me to tell. They both have very warm hands.”

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Darlingside's "Birds Say" Is Like an Irish Spring Commercial | No Depression

Darlingside's "Birds Say" Is Like an Irish Spring Commercial | No Depression: "Two of the album’s best tracks, "Go Back" and “God of Loss,” somehow encompass all of these genres. The imagery in these tunes evokes Mother Nature, gorgeously; Darlingside is spiritually inspiring without proselytizing, which is a neat trick. And just when you think you’ve got the band pegged, the fuzzier back half of the album features a pair of songs, “Water Rose” and “Volcano Sky,” which Wilco or The Lemonheads could have easily recorded.

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What a banking firm decimated on Sept. 11 did for murdered employees' children (OPINION) | OregonLive.com

What a banking firm decimated on Sept. 11 did for murdered employees' children (OPINION) | OregonLive.com: "I called the Sandler O'Neill Foundation the other day to talk about those children, and here are some things you should know: 54 young men and women have had their college tuitions paid so far, with 22 young men and women still eligible. The 54 who are attending or have attended college have gone to every sort of college imaginable — from Stanford to Notre Dame to community colleges and technical institutes. Four students have attended Boston College, the alma mater of Welles Crowther, the 24-year-old Sandler O'Neill employee who saved as many as 12 people from death in the south tower before running back upstairs to save more people and never being seen again.

"



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V. David Zvenyach's Blog -- 6 months into 18F

V. David Zvenyach's Blog -- 6 months into 18F: "It’s #AspirationalFTW indeed. But, like, we’re also kinda actually doing it. And we’ll keep getting better at doing it. It’s breathtaking to consider that, at its core, the result of our little experiment may be turning “historically awful” into “delightful.” That sort of government alchemy, if we can do it repeatedly, in small ways, might just be most damn exciting thing I can think of.

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DoD 'Force of the Future' includes civilian Digital Service team

DoD 'Force of the Future' includes civilian Digital Service team: "The plan cites a recent consulting project between DoD and 18F — the innovation arm of the General Services Administration — that saved the department some $150 million by taking a "more technically informed approach to procurement."

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The Maximums of Maximums: The Hurricanes, Earthquakes, and Other Disasters That Worry Emergency Planners Most - The Atlantic

The Maximums of Maximums: The Hurricanes, Earthquakes, and Other Disasters That Worry Emergency Planners Most - The Atlantic: "In 2008, she collaborated with a team on the sort of project that many scientists would be nervous to undertake: a fact-based, fictionalized story of what might happen in a 7.8 magnitude quake.



 It’s perhaps even scarier than the movie—if nothing else because it so carefully sticks to a science-based scenario. The initial shaking would go on for almost a minute. Freeways would become impassible, as would rail connections. L.A.’s legendary gridlock would come to a true standstill. Oil and gas pipelines would snap, bursting into flames, as would water and sewage pipes underwater. Hundreds of buildings would collapse, and many more would slide off their foundations. There would be tens of thousands of aftershocks large enough to feel in the coming months. The quake would ignite 1,600 fires, and while most of them would be out within three days, a few would remain: “super-conflagrations,” encompassing hundreds of blocks of the city. After a month, tens of thousands of Angelenos would still be without a job or shelter. The water might not be safe to drink for nearly a year."



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The Maximums of Maximums: The Hurricanes, Earthquakes, and Other Disasters That Worry Emergency Planners Most - The Atlantic

The Maximums of Maximums: The Hurricanes, Earthquakes, and Other Disasters That Worry Emergency Planners Most - The Atlantic:

In a rebuke to a techno-utopian age, natural disasters remain a greater threat than almost anything humans can produce.

“As you look at the scale of things, short of a full-scale nuclear attack, Mother Nature still produces the worst scenarios for response,” Fugate said.

Of course, those natural disasters are often abetted by humans. Construction in floodplains, lax building codes, lack of preparation, the malign effects of climate change, and even underinsurance exacerbate the impact of the disasters. The number of weather-related disasters that cost more than $1 billion has been gradually increasing over the last few decades...

How AIPAC lost the Iran deal fight - The Washington Post

(Note that this article has absolutely nothing about the merits of the deal, which are discussed in much more detail in the writings of people like Cory Booker. This is disappointing journalism, born of a "horse race" mentality.)



How AIPAC lost the Iran deal fight - The Washington Post: "Many say AIPAC’s efforts were doomed to fail in the aftermath of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s combative speech to Congress in March — an appearance brokered by Israel’s ambassador to the United States along with House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) without White House consultation. Many of AIPAC’s supporters also blame Obama and what they see as a process he rigged and a debate he polarized.

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How Edward Snowden Inadvertently Helped Vladimir Putin's Internet Crackdown - BuzzFeed News

How Edward Snowden Inadvertently Helped Vladimir Putin's Internet Crackdown - BuzzFeed News: "Snowden may not have known or realized it, but his disclosures emboldened those in Russia who wanted more control over the Internet. Parliament debated Snowden’s revelations of mass surveillance in special hearings. Sergei Zheleznyak, deputy speaker of the lower house, suggested that the Snowden disclosures meant citizens should be forbidden from keeping their personal data on foreign servers. “We should provide digital sovereignty for our country,” he said. Ruslan Gattarov, chairman of one of the pro-Kremlin youth organizations and a member of the upper house of parliament, invited Snowden to “investigate” what he described as the surrender of Russian citizens’ data to American intelligence agencies.
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The believer: How an introvert became the leader of the Islamic State | Brookings Institution

The believer: How an introvert became the leader of the Islamic State | Brookings Institution: "Many of the ex-Baathists at Bucca, some of whom Baghdadi befriended, would later rise with him through the ranks of the Islamic State. “If there was no American prison in Iraq, there would be no [Islamic State] now,” recalled the inmate interviewed by The Guardian. “Bucca was a factory. It made us all. It built our ideology.” The prisoners dubbed the camp “The Academy,” and during his ten months in residence, Baghdadi was one of its faculty members.

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Yousef Al-Otaiba Is The Most Powerful Man in Washington You've Never Heard Of - The Huffington Post

Yousef Al-Otaiba Is The Most Powerful Man in Washington You've Never Heard Of - The Huffington Post: "Otaiba continues to talk frequently to Secretary of State John Kerry, Susan Rice and many commanders at the Pentagon. But his jabs at Obama have frayed relationships. “Here's the piece of the puzzle that he's missing, and that he frequently misses, which is that the American people aren't Washington," says the first senior U.S. official. "At the Four Seasons everybody's for bombing people and no deal with Iran, but Congress ultimately does have to be wary of public opinion." One respected foreign policy expert said he was worried that Otaiba was essentially trying to create “an Arab secular version of AIPAC.” "He's moving too quick, too fast, too hard, with too much money," he added. “He could become someone you don’t want to take to the party.”

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How Social Media Is Ruining Politics

How Social Media Is Ruining Politics: "Emotional appeals can be good for politics. They can spur civic involvement, even among the disenfranchised and disenchanted. And they can galvanize public attention, focusing it on injustices and abuses of power. An immediate emotional connection can, at best, deepen into a sustained engagement with the political process. But there’s a dark side to social media’s emotionalism. Trump’s popularity took off only after he demonized Mexican immigrants, playing to the public’s frustrations and fears. That’s the demagogue’s oldest tactic, and it worked. The Trump campaign may have qualities of farce, but it also suggests that a Snapchat candidate, passionate yet hollow, could be a perfect vessel for a cult of personality.

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We are sacrificing the right to walk – Antonia Malchick – Aeon

We are sacrificing the right to walk – Antonia Malchick – Aeon: "We came to scorn walking, to fear it. Real Americans fold themselves into cars, where they feel safe and in control. For exercise, the better-off mimic walkers, bicyclists, hikers, and farmers on stationary machines in health clubs. They and the middle class drive to parks and wilderness preserves for the privilege of walking outside among trees and birds and clean air, and the poor are left with vast wastelands of road and concrete; the advice to ‘walk three times a week for your health’ easier given than followed when there’s nowhere safe to place your foot.

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Why Teen-Agers Are the Worst - The New Yorker

Why Teen-Agers Are the Worst - The New Yorker: "Teen-agers are, as a rule, extremely healthy—healthier than younger children. But their death rate is much higher. The mortality rate for Americans between fifteen and nineteen years old is nearly twice what it is for those between the ages of one and four, and it’s more than three times as high as for those ages five to fourteen. The leading cause of death among adolescents today is accidents; this is known as the “accident hump.”

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White woman accidentally impregnated with black man’s sperm loses legal battle - The Washington Post

White woman accidentally impregnated with black man’s sperm loses legal battle - The Washington Post: "At the heart of the lawsuit was Cramblett’s claim that she was unprepared to raise an African American child and that her community and her “unconsciously insensitive” family members might not be accepting of a child of a different race.

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how do I get out of this suicide pact | Fredrik deBoer

how do I get out of this suicide pact | Fredrik deBoer: "In fact, many professors are so sensitive to the impression that they’re biased against their conservative students that they bend over backwards to accomodate them. I’m just a limited observer, and absence of evidence isn’t evidence of absence. But the best evidence available to me suggests that the contemporary American college is not inhospitable to conservative students.



 But, god, we seem desperate to give the opposite impression."



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The Truth of ‘Black Lives Matter’ - The New York Times

The Truth of ‘Black Lives Matter’ - The New York Times: "The “Black Lives Matter” movement focuses on the fact that black citizens have long been far more likely than whites to die at the hands of the police, and is of a piece with this history. Demonstrators who chant the phrase are making the same declaration that voting rights and civil rights activists made a half-century ago. They are not asserting that black lives are more precious than white lives. They are underlining an indisputable fact — that the lives of black citizens in this country historically have not mattered, and have been discounted and devalued. People who are unacquainted with this history are understandably uncomfortable with the language of the movement. But politicians who know better and seek to strip this issue of its racial content and context are acting in bad faith. They are trying to cover up an unpleasant truth and asking the country to collude with them."

Taylor Swift's 'Wildest Dreams' video draws backlash for racism

Taylor Swift's 'Wildest Dreams' video draws backlash for racism: "
The reality is not only were there people of color in the video, but the key creatives who worked on this video are people of color. I am Asian American, the producer Jil Hardin is an African American woman, and the editor Chancler Haynes is an African American man. We cast and edited this video. We collectively decided it would have been historicially inaccurate to load the crew with more black actors as the video would have been accused of rewriting history. This video is set in the past by a crew set in the present and we are all proud of our work."



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The Birds - The New Yorker

The Birds - The New Yorker: "Thoreau, in a mysteriously beautiful passage in his 1862 essay “Walking,” likens the diminishing numbers of passenger pigeons in New England to the dwindling number of thoughts in a man’s head, “for the grove in our minds is laid waste.” Thinking of the birds as missing thoughts is a good way to honor them. Martha and her billions were undone by the complicated, pitiless tangle of our modern industrialized world, but Thoreau’s nineteenth-century protest—“Simplify, simplify”—will not help us in the twenty-first. Indeed, when it comes to our relationship to nature, the wish for simplicity may be the most destructive thing in the world. ♦

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Jimmy Carter’s faith

Jimmy Carter’s faith:



He smiled often. “I’m perfectly at ease with whatever comes,” he said, in such a way that you believed him without question. And it was impossible to feel sorry for him.



 Partially, that’s because we all die and if — still only an if — cancer is what takes James Earl Carter Jr. away, well, there are worse things than to go having reached 90 years of age, having been president of the United States, having been married to the love of your life for almost seven decades, having sired a large and sprawling family and having done significant work toward the eradication of disease and the spreading of democracy in the developing world.



 But here’s the other reason it was impossible to feel sorry for him. Feeling sorry would have felt like an insult, a denial of the virtues he showed and the faith he didn’t need to speak because it was just … there.

Teen Boy Will Be Charged As Adult For Having Naked Pics of a Minor: Himself - Hit & Run : Reason.com

Teen Boy Will Be Charged As Adult For Having Naked Pics of a Minor: Himself - Hit & Run : Reason.com: "The implication is clear: Copening does not own himself, from the standpoint of the law, and is not free to keep sexually-provocative pictures, even if they depict his own body.

But consider this: North Carolina is one of two states in the country (the other is progressive New York) that considers 16 to be the age of adulthood for criminal purposes. This mean, of course, that Copening can be tried as an adult for exploiting a minor—himself.

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The Culture of Shut Up - The Atlantic

The Culture of Shut Up - The Atlantic: "We need to learn to live with the noise and tolerate the noise even when the noise is stupid, even when the noise is offensive, even when the noise is at times dangerous. Because no matter how noble the intent, it’s a demand for conformity that encourages people on all sides of a debate to police each other instead of argue and convince each other. And, ultimately, the cycle of attack and apology, of disagreement and boycott, will leave us with fewer and fewer people talking more and more about less and less.

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