How Samantha Bee Crashed the Late-Night Boys' Club | Rolling Stone

How Samantha Bee Crashed the Late-Night Boys' Club | Rolling Stone: "Bee took the same approach to hiring writers, creating a blind application process that didn't favor people who'd already had success. (It spelled out, for example, how scripts should look when submitted, leveling the playing field for the uninitiated.) Lo and behold, she ended up with a writers' room that looked kind of like America: 50 percent female; 30 percent nonwhite. One of her hires had been working at the Maryland Department of Motor Vehicles. "We don't feel like we solved the diversity problem. We didn't fix racism, quite," Bee jokes. "I mean, we almost did. We'll see how things pan out. I'm feeling really good about it." Anyway, the strategy worked. "I have literally filled my office with people who have been underestimated their entire careers. To a person, we almost all fit into that category. It is so joyful to collect a group of people who nobody has ever thought could grasp the reins of something and fucking go for it." 

"



'via Blog this'

As A Poor Kid From The Rust Belt, Yale Law School Brought Me Face-to-face With Radical Inequality

As A Poor Kid From The Rust Belt, Yale Law School Brought Me Face-to-face With Radical Inequality: "The New York Times recently reported that the most expensive schools are paradoxically cheaper for low-income students. Take, for example, a student whose parents earn thirty thousand per year—not a lot of money but not poverty level, either. That student would pay ten thousand for one of the less selective branch campuses of the University of Wisconsin but would pay six thousand at the school’s flagship Madison campus. At Harvard, the student would pay only about thirteen hundred despite tuition of over forty thousand. Of course, kids like me don’t know this. My buddy Nate, a lifelong friend and one of the smartest people I know, wanted to go to the University of Chicago as an undergraduate, but he didn’t apply because he knew he couldn’t afford it. It likely would have cost him considerably less than Ohio State, just as Yale cost considerably less for me than any other school.

"



'via Blog this'

On Centre Court, Roger Federer Shares in an Everyman’s Glory - The New York Times

On Centre Court, Roger Federer Shares in an Everyman’s Glory - The New York Times: "
But he has found both love and a fine patch of tennis form in the past few months, and he managed to reach the main draw at Wimbledon for the first time after getting through the imposing gantlet of prequalifying and qualifying.



 On paper, this was one of the biggest mismatches at this stage of a Grand Slam tournament, and though Federer’s winning score of 6-0, 6-3, 6-4 would indicate that it was a mismatch on grass as well, it was full of engaging rallies, entertainment value and human interest.

"



'via Blog this'

Cracks show inside Islamic State's shrinking caliphate | Reuters

Cracks show inside Islamic State's shrinking caliphate | Reuters: "As an array of forces make inroads into their territory spanning Iraq and Syria, the jihadis are becoming even harsher to maintain control of a population that is increasingly hostile to them, according to Iraqi officials and people who managed to escape.



"They are harsh, but they are not strong," said Major General Najm al-Jubbouri, who is in command of the operation to recapture Mosul and the surrounding areas. "Their hosts reject them.""



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Boundaries Are Conventions: Cloud Atlas is Easily One of the Most Ambitious Films Ever Made, Flaws and All | Tor.com

Boundaries Are Conventions: Cloud Atlas is Easily One of the Most Ambitious Films Ever Made, Flaws and All | Tor.com: "So Cloud Atlas doesn’t succeed in every aspect, but it manages in the place where it matters most—a reminder of what were, what we are, and what we might become.

"



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Jeremy Corbyn, Leader of Britain’s Labour Party, Loses No-Confidence Vote - The New York Times

Jeremy Corbyn, Leader of Britain’s Labour Party, Loses No-Confidence Vote - The New York Times: "“I was democratically elected leader of our party for a new kind of politics by 60 percent of Labour members and supporters, and I will not betray them by resigning,” Mr. Corbyn said after the vote by Labour members of Parliament. “Today’s vote by M.P.s has no constitutional legitimacy.”

"



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Legendary Tennessee Lady Vols coach Pat Summitt dies at 64

Legendary Tennessee Lady Vols coach Pat Summitt dies at 64: "Hall of Fame coach Pat Summitt, a pioneer of women's college basketball who guided the Tennessee Volunteers to eight national titles in her 38 seasons at the university, died Tuesday morning. She was 64.



 Summitt led the Lady Vols to 1,098 victories -- the most in Division I college basketball history (men or women) ­­-- before stepping down in 2012, one year after announcing she had early onset dementia, Alzheimer's type."



'via Blog this'

A Yale Law Professor Warns That Enforcing the Law Is Inherently Violent - The Atlantic

A Yale Law Professor Warns That Enforcing the Law Is Inherently Violent - The Atlantic: "Law professors and lawyers instinctively shy away from considering the problem of law’s violence.  Every law is violent.  We try not to think about this, but we should.  On the first day of law school, I tell my Contracts students never to argue for invoking the power of law except in a cause for which they are willing to kill. They are suitably astonished, and often annoyed. But I point out that even a breach of contract requires a judicial remedy; and if the breacher will not pay damages, the sheriff will sequester his house and goods; and if he resists the forced sale of his property, the sheriff might have to shoot him.
"



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Why Fruits and Veggies Are So Crazy Cheap in Chinatown - WSJ

Why Fruits and Veggies Are So Crazy Cheap in Chinatown - WSJ: "
Her discovery: Chinatown’s 80-plus produce markets are cheap because they are connected to a web of small farms and wholesalers that operate independently of the network supplying most mainstream supermarkets.



 Most of the city’s fruits and vegetables come from wholesalers at the Hunts Point Produce Market, the South Bronx distribution hub boasting all the color and accessibility of La Guardia Airport. Chinatown’s green grocers, in contrast, buy their stock from a handful of small wholesalers operating from tiny warehouses right in the neighborhood."



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Volkswagen Agrees to Pay $14.7 Billion to Settle Diesel Scandal Claims in the U.S. - The New York Times

Volkswagen Agrees to Pay $14.7 Billion to Settle Diesel Scandal Claims in the U.S. - The New York Times:

Volkswagen has agreed to pay nearly $15 billion to settle claims stemming from its diesel emissions cheating scandal in what would be one of the largest consumer class-action settlements ever in the United States.

The proposed settlement, valued at $14.7 billion and involving the federal government and lawyers representing the owners of about 475,000 Volkswagen vehicles, includes just over $10 billion to buy back affected cars at their pre-scandal values, and additional cash compensation for the owners, according to two people briefed on the settlement’s terms.

'via Blog this'

Ten Ways That Carter Influenced Translation -- and Vice Versa

Ten Ways That Carter Influenced Translation -- and Vice Versa: "8. An interpreter makes the president sound too good to be true. In a speech at a small Methodist college in Japan shortly after leaving the White House in 1981, Carter began his speech with a joke. The interpreter delivered it in Japanese, and the audience erupted in laughter. Impressed with the interpreter’s skill, he asked how the interpreter managed to get such a laugh. Eventually, the interpreter admitted that he had said, “President Carter told a funny story. Everyone must laugh.”"



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I walked from Liverpool to London. Brexit was no surprise | Mike Carter | Opinion | The Guardian

I walked from Liverpool to London. Brexit was no surprise | Mike Carter | Opinion | The Guardian: "Stafford, Cannock, Wolverhampton. Different towns, same message: “There’s no decent work”; “the politicians don’t care about us”; “we’ve been forgotten”; “betrayed”; “there’s too many immigrants, and we can’t compete with the wages they’ll work for”. Nobody used the word humiliation, but that’s the sense I got.

"



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How American Politics Became So Ineffective - The Atlantic

How American Politics Became So Ineffective - The Atlantic:

Trump, however, didn’t cause the chaos. The chaos caused Trump. What we are seeing is not a temporary spasm of chaos but a chaos syndrome.

Chaos syndrome is a chronic decline in the political system’s capacity for self-organization. It begins with the weakening of the institutions and brokers—political parties, career politicians, and congressional leaders and committees—that have historically held politicians accountable to one another and prevented everyone in the system from pursuing naked self-interest all the time. As these intermediaries’ influence fades, politicians, activists, and voters all become more individualistic and unaccountable. The system atomizes. Chaos becomes the new normal—both in campaigns and in the government itself.

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U.S. Political Institutions in Decay | Foreign Affairs

U.S. Political Institutions in Decay | Foreign Affairs: "he Forest Service, in contrast, was the prototype of a new model of merit-based bureaucracy. It was staffed with university-educated agronomists and foresters chosen on the basis of competence and technical expertise, and its defining struggle was the successful effort by its initial leader, Gifford Pinchot, to secure bureaucratic autonomy and escape routine interference by Congress. At the time, the idea that forestry professionals, rather than politicians, should manage public lands and handle the department’s staffing was revolutionary, but it was vindicated by the service’s impressive performance. Several major academic studies have treated its early decades as a classic case of successful public administration."



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Wright: Faced with Donald Trump, journalists need to stand their ground - San Jose Mercury News

Wright: Faced with Donald Trump, journalists need to stand their ground - San Jose Mercury News: "During the course of his speech, there were about 10 protesters who were ejected, some with excessive force. The excessive force was usually applied in the last 20 feet before they exited the side door. That area was out of view for the media, who were restricted to the press pen.

Because I'm not a journalist, I was able to wander around the convention hall and record video of these ejections with my iPhone, and I was the only one doing so.

A press pass used to give a journalist greater access to news events. In the Trump universe, a press pass does the Orwellian opposite. It imposes a severe restriction."



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Tony Blair: Brexit’s Stunning Coup - The New York Times

Tony Blair: Brexit’s Stunning Coup - The New York Times: "It was already clear before the Brexit vote that modern populist movements could take control of political parties. What wasn’t clear was whether they could take over a country like Britain. Now we know they can.

"



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The Dark Side of Longform Journalism | Literary Hub

The Dark Side of Longform Journalism | Literary Hub: "Lately, for better or worse, I’ve been writing more fiction than journalism. One advantage to writing fiction is that it does not oblige you to engage in tacit contracts with real subjects, and so there’s no pressing onus to define its purpose and value, or to weigh that purpose and value against whatever ethical awkwardness it might entail. I don’t mean to suggest that the stakes of fiction are somehow lower than the stakes of journalism—I don’t believe that; I tend to think the opposite might actually be true. All I mean is that you don’t have to watch an ignominious killing in order to describe one. You don’t have to give false hope to desperate people. You can emerge from it relatively unsullied because you can do it from start to finish while sitting alone in an empty room.



 That’s a place I’ve sometimes found appealing."



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The Playboy Interview with Ta-Nehisi Coates | Playboy

The Playboy Interview with Ta-Nehisi Coates | Playboy:

Did any of the criticism hurt?
All of it hurt. I had criticized Cornel for going after Obama, but not in that sort of personal way. The bell hooks shit hurt because she was talking about my son. The Loury shit, that hurt. Eventually I figured out that they were aiming at the gaze of white folks. I didn’t account for how much that shit controls everything. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gone somewhere and the question has been “What’s up with white people reading your book?” It alters everything. You’re talking about money right there. But I think on top of that it’s the prestige part. “Oh, you’re a MacArthur genius now?” Now people have to look at you a certain way and talk to you a certain way, and that has nothing to do with what you’re actually saying. People start shouting out your name and they ain’t even talking about you.



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The talent trap: why try, try and trying again isn’t the key to success

The talent trap: why try, try and trying again isn’t the key to success: "None of this is to say that raw talent is a passport to success. Yet you can’t be a high performer without it, while I’m not sure the same is true of grit. Consider one of grit’s two components, passion – a powerful inner drive to achieve in your chosen domain. Mozart, as biographers have attested, was driven to create masterpieces more by money (what psychologists term an “extrinsic motivation”) than by love of his art. Anyone who has read Andre Agassi’s memoir, Open, will recall that far from loving what he did he hated tennis, but was compelled to play it by his overbearing father. Only in late career, with several Grand Slams under his belt, did he start to enjoy the game.

"



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Devshard comments on Can we start a "just got into medical school survival thread" for the incoming newbs?

Devshard comments on Can we start a "just got into medical school survival thread" for the incoming newbs?: "Life is unfair. Most things that are worth achieving are difficult. Deal with it, move on. There are people that are significantly smarter than you. There are also people that are much more clever than you are. Nothing guarantees you equality, and complaining on the Internet most definitely does not grant it to you.
"



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3D maps of London Underground stations / Boing Boing

3D maps of London Underground stations / Boing Boing:

The axonometric, not-to-scale diagrams are pretty sweet -- like the castings made of underground ant-colonies, cross with the insane arcology furutism of Paolo Soleri.

Ian Mansfield's taken the maps that Transport for London released and improved them, releasing them on his site:

"In total, some 120 stations are represented in this motherlode of tube and map geekery. I’ve removed the redacted black blobs that are scatted over the originals, and generally cleaned them up a bit."

'via Blog this'

The Scientist Who Talks to ISIS - The Chronicle of Higher Education

The Scientist Who Talks to ISIS - The Chronicle of Higher Education: "Atran also trotted out one of his favorites, the switched-at-birth scenario. What would happen, he asked, if a Christian or a Jewish child was raised by a Muslim family, one that believed in Shariah law and jihad? The commander had two responses. If the child was from a Christian family, he or she would grow to be a devout Muslim. But not the Jewish child. Jews were from hell, and no amount of godly instruction could alter that. The commander then asked if Atran was Jewish, a fact that the translator unwisely confirmed. Sensing an unwelcome change in the conversation’s tenor, Atran excused himself and slipped out the back door.

"



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The problem with reinforced concrete

The problem with reinforced concrete: "By itself, concrete is a very durable construction material. The magnificent Pantheon in Rome, the world’s largest unreinforced concrete dome, is in excellent condition after nearly 1,900 years. And yet many concrete structures from last century – bridges, highways and buildings – are crumbling. Many concrete structures built this century will be obsolete before its end.

Given the survival of ancient structures, this may seem curious. The critical difference is the modern use of steel reinforcement, known as rebar, concealed within the concrete. Steel is made mainly of iron, and one of iron’s unalterable properties is that it rusts. This ruins the durability of concrete structures in ways that are difficult to detect and costly to repair."



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My Four Months as a Private Prison Guard: A Mother Jones Investigation | Mother Jones

My Four Months as a Private Prison Guard: A Mother Jones Investigation | Mother Jones:





"Where do you think is one of the No. 1 areas that we get hit on as a confinement business?" Assistant Warden Parker asks us at a staff meeting. "Medical! Inmates have this thing that if they have a sniffle they are supposed to be flown to a specialist somewhere and be treated immediately for that sniffle." His tone becomes incredulous. "Believe it or not, we are required by law to take care of them."
It's true: Under Supreme Court rulings citing the Eighth Amendment, prisons are required to provide inmates with adequate health care. Yet CCA has found ways to minimize its obligations.



At the out-of-state prisons where California ships some of its inmates, CCA will not accept prisoners who are over 65 years old, have mental health issues, or have serious conditions like HIV. The company's Idaho prison contract specified that the "primary criteria" for screening incoming offenders was "no chronic mental health or health care issues." The contracts of some CCA prisons in Tennessee and Hawaii stipulate that the states will bear the cost of HIV treatment. Such exemptions allow CCA to tout its cost-efficiency while taxpayers assume the medical expenses for the inmates the company won't take or treat.
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Speaking Nonsense to Power: Misadventures in Dissent Over Syria

Speaking Nonsense to Power: Misadventures in Dissent Over Syria: "First, the Assad regime’s external supporters, principally the Russians and Iranians, have roughly the same idea about negotiating from a position of strength. The United States and its regional allies have intervened and escalated in Syria many times since 2011, even if they have not taken the more forceful measures advocated in the cable. The Iranians and Russians always responded in kind with more support to the Assad regime. This includes the 2015 Russian intervention, which stemmed from a fear that the end of Assad’s regime was near. The end result of these combined efforts at negotiating from strength has been an endless cycle of escalation and war.

"



'via Blog this'

Let’s just say it: The Republicans are the problem. - The Washington Post

Let’s just say it: The Republicans are the problem. - The Washington Post: "It is clear that the center of gravity in the Republican Party has shifted sharply to the right. Its once-legendary moderate and center-right legislators in the House and the Senate — think Bob Michel, Mickey Edwards, John Danforth, Chuck Hagel — are virtually extinct.

"



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$5.4-billion expansion of Panama Canal could reshape world trade routes - LA Times

$5.4-billion expansion of Panama Canal could reshape world trade routes - LA Times: "The upgrades have implications far beyond Panama. It could reshape world trade routes, opening new markets for commodities from South America, pushing back against competition from the Suez Canal and shifting how goods enter the United States."



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Trump Packs His Blunt Phrase Book Abroad - The New York Times

Trump Packs His Blunt Phrase Book Abroad - The New York Times: "Over the course of 40 minutes, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee made pronouncements, predictions and asides that would have set off serious backlash for almost any other candidate.



 But Mr. Trump seems to be graded on a different curve. Here are some of his more provocative remarks:

"



'via Blog this'

When it comes to Trump, a Republican Treasury secretary says: Choose country over party - The Washington Post

When it comes to Trump, a Republican Treasury secretary says: Choose country over party - The Washington Post: "Republicans stand at a crossroads. With Donald Trump as the presumptive presidential nominee, we are witnessing a populist hijacking of one of the United States’ great political parties. The GOP, in putting Trump at the top of the ticket, is endorsing a brand of populism rooted in ignorance, prejudice, fear and isolationism. This troubles me deeply as a Republican, but it troubles me even more as an American. Enough is enough. It’s time to put country before party and say it together: Never Trump.

"



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'This Is Not My Party': George Will Goes from GOP to Unaffiliated | PJ Media

'This Is Not My Party': George Will Goes from GOP to Unaffiliated | PJ Media:

Will, who writes for the Washington Post, acknowledged it is a “little too late” for the Republican Party to find a replacement for Trump but had a message for Republican voters.

“Make sure he loses. Grit their teeth for four years and win the White House,” Will said during an interview after his speech at a Federalist Society luncheon.

Will said he changed his voter registration this month from Republican to “unaffiliated” in the state of Maryland.

“This is not my party,” Will said during his speech at the event.

'via Blog this'

Many experienced GOP strategists unwilling to work for Trump

Many experienced GOP strategists unwilling to work for Trump: "WASHINGTON (AP) — Donald Trump has finally acknowledged that to best compete against Hillary Clinton he needs more than the bare-bones campaign team that led him to primary success.



But many of the most experienced Republican political advisers aren't willing to work for him.

From Texas to New Hampshire, well-respected members of the Republican Party's professional class say they cannot look past their deep personal and professional reservations about the presumptive presidential nominee.



 While there are exceptions, many strategists who best understand the mechanics of presidential politics fear that taking a Trump paycheck might stain their resumes, spook other clients and even cause problems at home. They also are reluctant to devote months to a divisive candidate whose campaign has been plagued by infighting and disorganization."



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Cornwall votes for Brexit then pleads to keep EU funding | Home News | News | The Independent

Cornwall votes for Brexit then pleads to keep EU funding | Home News | News | The Independent: "Cornwall, which has a poor economy and as such has received millions of pounds in subsidies from the EU each year for over a decade, voted decisively to Leave. 

But this money is now threatened following the severing of ties with the EU.



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'via Blog this'

allmhuran comments on UK citizens vote to LEAVE the European Union

allmhuran comments on UK citizens vote to LEAVE the European Union: "Australia has had five prime ministers in five years, the poor yanks look as though they'll have to choose between two options both of which have more disapproval than approval, and the UK leaves the EU. It seems like a ridiculous amount of instability. One might even call it absurd.
But it's not surprising.
You can't feed a society exaggeration, hyperbole and propaganda for over a decade, and then claim surprise when people don't seem to be making rational decisions on the basis of well established truth.
There's a cost associated with not telling the truth. There's a cost associated with polarized, adversarial public discourse. There's a cost associated with media more concerned with profits than the public interest.
It is, apparently, time to pay the piper."



'via Blog this'

Aziz Ansari: Why Trump Makes Me Scared for My Family - The New York Times

Aziz Ansari: Why Trump Makes Me Scared for My Family - The New York Times:

“DON’T go anywhere near a mosque,” I told my mother. “Do all your prayer at home. O.K.?”

“We’re not going,” she replied.

I am the son of Muslim immigrants. As I sent that text, in the aftermath of the horrible attack in Orlando, Fla., I realized how awful it was to tell an American citizen to be careful about how she worshiped.

'via Blog this'

Britain's EU Problem is a London Problem | Dissent Magazine

Britain's EU Problem is a London Problem | Dissent Magazine: "In shorthand, Britain’s EU problem is a London problem. London, a young, thriving, creative, cosmopolitan city, seems the model multicultural community, a great European capital. But it is also the home of all of Britain’s elites—the economic elites of “the City” (London’s Wall Street, international rather than European), a nearly hereditary professional caste of lawyers, journalists, publicists, and intellectuals, an increasingly hereditary caste of politicians, tight coteries of cultural movers-and-shakers richly sponsored by multinational corporations. It’s as if Hollywood, Wall Street, the Beltway, and the hipper neighborhoods of New York and San Francisco had all been mashed together. This has proved to be a toxic combination.
"



'via Blog this'

Chrousos explains why GSA's new line needs a new commissioner

Chrousos explains why GSA's new line needs a new commissioner: "When I came in under Dan Tangherlini, I was paired with a bureaucracy hacker. A really amazing woman named Vicky McFadden, who became my chief of staff. I wouldn’t have been able to get anything done — anything done — without her translating my ideas.

"



'via Blog this'

Turbulence and Uncertainty for the Market After ‘Brexit’ - The New York Times

Turbulence and Uncertainty for the Market After ‘Brexit’ - The New York Times: "
LONDON — No one really knows what happens now. The collective imagination leads to dark places.

The world map has been redrawn with the rules of commerce across Europe, the largest marketplace on earth.



Britain’s vote on Thursday to leave the European Union has set in motion an unprecedented and unpredictable process that threatens turbulence and potential crisis — for Britain, for Europe and for the global economy.

Of most immediate consequence, Britain’s vote to leave Europe sent global markets on a wild descent. Investors gaped at this major refashioning of the global landscape and decided it looked perilous — or at least so pockmarked with uncertainty that they preferred to pull their money out of riskier corners like stock markets."



'via Blog this'

This comment perfectly explains why Brexit has left the UK's young feeling so devastated - Vox

This comment perfectly explains why Brexit has left the UK's young feeling so devastated - Vox: "
A quick note on the first three tragedies. Firstly, it was the working classes who voted for us to leave because they were economically disregarded, and it is they who will suffer the most in the short term. They have merely swapped one distant and unreachable elite for another.



 Secondly, the younger generation has lost the right to live and work in 27 other countries. We will never know the full extent of the lost opportunities, friendships, marriages and experiences we will be denied. Freedom of movement was taken away by our parents, uncles, and grandparents in a parting blow to a generation that was already drowning in the debts of our predecessors.



 Thirdly and perhaps most significantly, we now live in a post-factual democracy. When the facts met the myths they were as useless as bullets bouncing off the bodies of aliens in a HG Wells novel. When Michael Gove said, ‘The British people are sick of experts,’ he was right. But can anybody tell me the last time a prevailing culture of anti-intellectualism has led to anything other than bigotry?"



'via Blog this'

EU referendum result: Britain votes leave – live updates | Politics | The Guardian

EU referendum result: Britain votes leave – live updates | Politics | The Guardian: "Nigel Farage, the Ukip leader, has told ITV’s Good Morning Britain that he thought it was a mistake for the Vote Leave campaign to say that it could save £350m a week by leaving the EU and that the money could go to the NHS.

"



'via Blog this'

Unicode Power Symbol | We did it! How a comment on HackerNews lead to 4 ½ new Unicode characters

Unicode Power Symbol | We did it! How a comment on HackerNews lead to 4 ½ new Unicode characters: "On 22 June 2016, Unicode version 9.0 was published. As part of that, 4 new symbols were introduced – and another one was re-purposed.

This is the (brief) story of how a couple of geeks added ⏻, ⏼, ⭘,⏽, ⏾ to Unicode!"



'via Blog this'

C-Span Delivers on Sit-In, Even With Cameras Off - The New York Times

C-Span Delivers on Sit-In, Even With Cameras Off - The New York Times: "“We always told ourselves that if we were successful, we were building a tool to give a voice to the voiceless,” Kayvon Beykpour, co-founder and chief executive of Periscope, said in an interview. “It’s showing you the truth from different people’s perspectives. It’s a really raw way of experiencing what you watch.

“In this case, it’s really ironic that the voiceless were our elected representatives.”"



'via Blog this'

PrematureApotheosis comments on I have apperceptive agnosia. Ask me stuff.

PrematureApotheosis comments on I have apperceptive agnosia. Ask me stuff.: "It's a specific form of blindness. I'm not a neurologist, so my explanation no doubt leaves something to be desired, but the gist of it is that my eyes work fine (including dilating in reaction to light, tracking movement, even making eye contact with faces and face-shaped objects), my optic nerve works fine, and the visual part of my brain works fine... but the visual part of my brain does not communicate correctly with the part of my brain which IDENTIFIES what it is seeing (think colour recognition, symbol recognition, shape identification, light-and-dark detection, etc.). Most of the time, this occurs at one of two variable levels of 'intensity,' either an 'interrupted signal' which looks extremely similar to 'snow' on an old CRT-style television- basically just white noise crackling- or 'no signal' which looks like eigengrau, a flat dark grey that is close to black but not quite black proper.
"



'via Blog this'

How Subarus Came to Be Seen as Cars for Lesbians - The Atlantic

How Subarus Came to Be Seen as Cars for Lesbians - The Atlantic: "For its first Subaru ads, Mulryan/Nash hired women to portray lesbian couples. But the ads didn’t get good reactions from lesbian audiences. What worked were winks and nudges. One campaign showed Subaru cars that had license plates that said “Xena LVR” (a reference to Xena: Warrior Princess, a TV show whose female protagonists seemed to be lovers) or “P-TOWN” (a moniker for Provincetown, Massachusetts, a popular LGBT vacation spot). Many ads had taglines with double meanings. “Get Out. And Stay Out” could refer to exploring the outdoors in a Subaru—or coming out as gay. “It's Not a Choice. It's the Way We're Built” could refer to all Subarus coming with all-wheel-drive—or LGBT identity. “Each year we've done this, we've learned more about our target audience,” John Nash, the creative director of the ad agency told the website AdRespect. “We've found that playful coding is really, really appreciated by our consumers. They like deciphering it.”

"



'via Blog this'

All Human Systems are Enormous Trash Fires — Medium

All Human Systems are Enormous Trash Fires — Medium: "Eventually you even start to appreciate the beauty of it. How impressive it is that we manage to get anything done at all, given how completely trash everything is, and how on fire it is all the time. How good it feels when you manage to put out even a tiny piece of it. How lucky we are that we even get to try, as the world burns all around us.
"



'via Blog this'

LeBron James announces return to Cleveland Cavaliers

LeBron James announces return to Cleveland Cavaliers: "In Northeast Ohio, nothing is given. Everything is earned. You work for what you have.



 I’m ready to accept the challenge. I’m coming home."



'via Blog this'

Mike Allen, Politico’s Newsletter Pioneer, Is Handing Over the Reins - The New York Times

Mike Allen, Politico’s Newsletter Pioneer, Is Handing Over the Reins - The New York Times: "SIREN: WASHINGTON TO LOSE ITS DAILY BARD AT A MOST UNCERTAIN TIME: MIKE ALLEN WILL STOP WRITING POLITICO’S MORNING PLAYBOOK COLUMN MIDCAMPAIGN, on July 11 — A Guide to Capital Intrigue Through Entire Obama Era and Part of W. Bush’s — MILLENNIAL TAKEOVER: Politico Young Guns ANNA PALMER, JAKE SHERMAN and DANIEL LIPPMAN Grab the Baton — CHANGES IN STORE FOR A NEW ENVIRONMENT — Times Subscription Deal: 50 percent off for a year!

"



'via Blog this'

Home Free - The New Yorker

Home Free - The New Yorker: "On May 12, 2013, the Times published a front-page story about Scarcella, co-written by Robles, which mentioned Jennette and Hamilton, and detailed a long history of alleged misconduct, including falsifying confessions and coercing witnesses. In at least six murder cases, including Jennette’s, the article said, Scarcella had relied on the same alleged eyewitness, a prostitute with a crack addiction. The D.A.’s office had announced plans to review every homicide case that Scarcella had worked on, focussing on those which had gone to trial and ended with a conviction. The review eventually expanded to seventy-one cases. When the Times asked Scarcella about Hamilton’s allegations, he said, “He can drop dead. The man is an out-and-out liar.”

"



'via Blog this'

How Intel Makes a Chip - Bloomberg

How Intel Makes a Chip - Bloomberg: "Chips are made by creating tiny patterns on a polished 12-inch silicon disk, in part by using a process called photolithography and depositing superthin layers of materials on top. These wafers are kept in sealed, microwave oven-size pods called “foups” that are carried around by robots—hundreds of robots, actually—running on tracks overhead, taking the wafers to various tools. The air inside a foup is class 1, meaning it probably contains no particles at all. Periodically, the wafer is washed using a form of water so pure it isn’t found in nature. It’s so pure it’s lethal. If you drank enough of it, it would pull essential minerals out of your cells and kill you."



'via Blog this'

Did Jesus Have a Wife? - The Atlantic

Did Jesus Have a Wife? - The Atlantic:

“People don’t want to read Karen King’s book” on Gnosticism, or the books of other academics, because they’re too dense, he said. “People want something they can take to bed. The facts alone, they don’t really matter. What matters is entertainment.”

The book, he assured me, would be a runaway best seller: “A million copies in the first month or so.” Our collaboration, he said, “could really make a big difference.” But he insisted on the need for fabrication. “You have to make a lot of stuff up,” he said. “You cannot just present facts.”

“The truth is not absolute,” he explained. “The truth depends on perspectives, surroundings.”

I let him go on for a while, but I was stupefied. I was reporting a story about a possible forgery, and the man at its center was asking me to “make a lot of stuff up” for a new project in which he’d be my eager partner. It was a proposal so tone-deaf that either he was clueless, incorrigible—or up to something I couldn’t quite yet discern.

'via Blog this'

Can Netflix Survive in the New World It Created? - The New York Times

Can Netflix Survive in the New World It Created? - The New York Times: "And Hastings was aware that even after the bundle is vanquished, the disruption of his industry will be far from complete. “Prospective threats?” he mused when I asked him about all the competition. “Movies and television could become like opera and novels, because there are so many other forms of entertainment. Someday, movies and TV shows will be historic relics. But that might not be for another 100 years.”"



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To Build a Brick Wall: My First Six Months at MIT as an International Student – Hiro Ono's Odyssey

To Build a Brick Wall: My First Six Months at MIT as an International Student – Hiro Ono's Odyssey: "In retrospect, what filled me up in my first days at MIT was not a real confidence, but merely an extrapolation of the limited success in a small community. It was like the gas in a balloon, which can inflate a small rubber membrane, but goes away quickly once the balloon is punctured.

Real confidence is like a brick wall. Gaining confidence really means building up your accomplishments, trust from colleagues, and friendship with someone who really understands you through patient and tenacious effort, as if piling up bricks one by one to build a wall that will never give in to rain or wind.



If I were to achieve some success in my life, the wall would be the foundation of the success. If I were to fail, the wall would protect me from storms. Looking back, I honestly think losing all the confidence was the best experience I had at MIT."



'via Blog this'

Interview With a Woman Who Recently Had an Abortion at 32 Weeks

Interview With a Woman Who Recently Had an Abortion at 32 Weeks: "Elizabeth* is 35. She grew up in the South, currently lives in Brooklyn, and has been married for two years. After a previous miscarriage at 10 weeks, she was overjoyed to find herself pregnant for a second time. At 31 weeks, she found out that the baby boy she was carrying wouldn’t be able to breathe outside the womb and would not survive. And at 32 weeks, she flew to Colorado to get a shot that would start the process of a third-trimester abortion; she then flew back to New York to finish the delivery. We talked on the phone two weeks into her recovery.

"



'via Blog this'

Banning Russia From The Olympics Helps Russian Athletes - Forbes

Banning Russia From The Olympics Helps Russian Athletes - Forbes: "As the BBC reports, Putin stated,”There are universally recognised principles of law and one of them is that the responsibility should be always personified. The people who have nothing to do with violations, why should they suffer for those who committed the violations?” However, who are the biggest victims from the extensive use of banned substances among Russian athletes? Sure, many athletes from various countries were unfairly denied medals by losing to athletes who had unfair advantages and deserve sympathy. Sure, such doping does further taint sports for everyone. But the biggest victims may have been Russian athletes. The IAAF ban can only help Russian athletes. How so?"



'via Blog this'

Hack the Pentagon Just the Beginning

(1) Facebook: "We know that state-sponsored actors and black hat hackers want to challenge and exploit our networks. What we didn’t fully appreciate before this pilot was how many white hat hackers there are who want to make a difference and who want to help keep our people and nation safer. Thank you to everyone who participated in this program to make us stronger and more resilient.
"



'via Blog this'

Rider on the Storm • Damn Interesting

Rider on the Storm • Damn Interesting: "“I’d see lightning,” Rankin would later muse, “Boy, do I remember that lightning. I never exactly heard the thunder; I felt it.” Amidst the electrical spectacle, the storm’s capricious winds pressed Rankin downward until he encountered the powerful updrafts—the same updrafts that keep hailstones aloft as they accumulate ice—which dragged him and his chute thousands of feet back up into the storm. This dangerous effect is familiar to paragliding enthusiasts, who unaffectionately refer to it as cloud suck. At the apex Rankin caught up with his parachute, causing it to drape over him like a wet blanket and stir worries that he would become entangled with it and drop from the sky at a truly terminal velocity. Again he fell, and again the updrafts yanked him skyward in the darkness. He lost count of how many times this up-and-down cycle repeated. “At one point I got seasick and heaved,” he once retold.

"



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A Funeral for a Fire Chief, 15 Years After He Died on 9/11 - The New York Times

A Funeral for a Fire Chief, 15 Years After He Died on 9/11 - The New York Times: "The printers buzzed to life in every firehouse in New York City last week, and each spit out an identical bulletin. It bore the worst sort of news the Fire Department must relay to its members, the Code 5-5-5-5. A death in the line of duty.

“With regret, the department announces the death of Battalion Chief Lawrence T. Stack,” the note read, “as a result of injuries sustained while operating at Manhattan Box 5-5-8087.”

That box number was grimly familiar to all firefighters. It was followed by the time of the call from that box — 8:47 a.m. — and the date: “September 11, 2001.”"



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Laurent Dubois on Twitter: "I feel like this presidential election is essentially a battle between the article and the comments section."

Laurent Dubois on Twitter: "I feel like this presidential election is essentially a battle between the article and the comments section.":



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The Disadvantages of Being Stupid - The Atlantic

The Disadvantages of Being Stupid - The Atlantic: "We must stop glorifying intelligence and treating our society as a playground for the smart minority. We should instead begin shaping our economy, our schools, even our culture with an eye to the abilities and needs of the majority, and to the full range of human capacity"



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The Obama Doctrine: What the President Actually Thinks About Radical Islam - The Atlantic

The Obama Doctrine: What the President Actually Thinks About Radical Islam - The Atlantic: "The fundamental difference between Obama and Trump on issues related to Islamist extremism (apart from the obvious, such as that, unlike Trump, Obama a) has killed Islamist terrorists; b) regularly studies the problem and allows himself to be briefed by serious people about the problem; and c) is not racist or temperamentally unsuitable for national leadership) is that Trump apparently believes that two civilizations are in conflict. Obama believes that the clash is taking place within a single civilization, and that Americans are sometimes collateral damage in this fight between Muslim modernizers and Muslim fundamentalists.

"



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The Obama Doctrine: What the President Actually Thinks About Radical Islam - The Atlantic

The Obama Doctrine: What the President Actually Thinks About Radical Islam - The Atlantic: "Obama, in my reading, does not—contra his right-leaning critics—suffer illusions about the pathologies afflicting the broader Muslim world. If anything, his pessimism on matters related to the dysfunctions of Muslim states, and to the inability of the umma—the worldwide community of Muslims—to contain and ultimately neutralize the extremist elements in its midst, has, at times, an almost paralyzing effect on him. The president has come to the conclusion (as I outlined in my recent Atlantic cover story, “The Obama Doctrine”) that the underlying problems afflicting Islam are too deep, and too resistant to American intervention, to warrant implementation of the sort of policies that his critics, including his critics in foreign-policy think tanks, demand.

"



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A Former Soldier Explains Why Trump Was Wrong About the Troops - The New Yorker

A Former Soldier Explains Why Trump Was Wrong About the Troops - The New Yorker: "It would have been nice if Trump had used the bully pulpit in Greensboro to point out how programs like cerp, in fact, give veterans experience managing significant amounts of money in complex situations, and how that experience is directly transferrable to the job market. Unfortunately, he didn’t. The campaign’s only follow-up to Trump’s remarks came from his surrogate Hope Hicks. She attempted to clarify his comments Wednesday morning, on NBC News. “Mr. Trump was referring to Iraqi soldiers,” Hicks said. You can watch the the video and make up your own mind.

"



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United States' individual GDPs compared to countries around the world [1450x1100] - Imgur

United States' individual GDPs compared to countries around the world [1450x1100] - Imgur: "United States' individual GDPs compared to countries around the world [1450x1100]
"



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Southern Baptists and the Confederate Flag - Russell Moore

Southern Baptists and the Confederate Flag - Russell Moore: "
As I’ve said before, the Cross and the Confederate flag cannot co-exist without one setting the other on fire. Today, messengers to the Southern Baptist Convention, including many white Anglo southerners, decided the cross was more important than the flag. They decided our African-American brothers and sisters are more important than family heritage. We decided that we are defined not by a Lost Cause but by amazing grace. Let’s pray for wisdom, work for justice, love our neighbors.

And let’s take down that flag."



'via Blog this'

Obama Denounces Donald Trump for His ‘Dangerous’ Mind-Set - The New York Times

Obama Denounces Donald Trump for His ‘Dangerous’ Mind-Set - The New York Times: "“We hear language that singles out immigrants and suggests entire religious communities are complicit in violence,” Mr. Obama said at the Treasury Department, without mentioning Mr. Trump by name. His statement, an extraordinary condemnation by a sitting president of a man who is to be the opposing party’s nominee for the White House, came after Mr. Obama met with his national security team on the status of the American effort against the Islamic State, a meeting that the president said had been dominated by discussion of the Orlando rampage.

"



'via Blog this'

Open Letter on Trump from GOP National Security Leaders

Open Letter on Trump from GOP National Security Leaders: "His vision of American influence and power in the world is wildly inconsistent and unmoored in principle. He swings from isolationism to military adventurism within the space of one sentence.

His advocacy for aggressively waging trade wars is a recipe for economic disaster in a globally connected world.

His embrace of the expansive use of torture is inexcusable."



'via Blog this'

A Bug and a Crash by James Gleick

A Bug and a Crash by James Gleick: "  "The board wishes to point out," they added, with the magnificent blandness of many official accident reports, "that software is an expression of a highly detailed design and does not fail in the same sense as a mechanical system." No. It fails in a different sense. Software built up over years from millions of lines of code, branching and unfolding and intertwining, comes to behave more like an organism than a machine.
   "There is no life today without software," says Frank Lanza, an executive vice president of the American rocket maker Lockheed Martin. "The world would probably just collapse." Fortunately, he points out, really important software has a reliability of 99.9999999 percent. At least, until it doesn't."



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Watch Ken Burns’s Powerful Take-Down of Donald Trump at Stanford Commencement - The Daily Beast

Watch Ken Burns’s Powerful Take-Down of Donald Trump at Stanford Commencement - The Daily Beast: "As a student of history, I recognize this type. He emerges everywhere and in all eras. We see nurtured in his campaign an incipient Proto-fascism, a nativist anti-immigrant Know Nothing-ism, a disrespect for the judiciary, the prospect of women losing authority over their own bodies, African Americans again asked to go to the back of the line, voter suppression gleefully promoted, jingoistic saber rattling, a total lack of historical awareness, a political paranoia that, predictably, points fingers, always making the other wrong. These are all virulent strains that have at times infected us in the past. But they now loom in front of us again—all happening at once. We know from our history books that these are the diseases of ancient and now fallen empires. The sense of commonwealth, of shared sacrifice, of trust, so much a part of American life, is eroding fast, spurred along and amplified by an amoral Internet that permits a lie to circle the globe three times before the truth can get started.
"



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My Declaration Of Independence From The Republican Party

My Declaration Of Independence From The Republican Party: "Trump reached peak narcissism when he said, “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn’t lose voters.” If that isn’t evidence of a cult-of-personality following, I don’t know what is. It is difficult to imagine anyone who would be a greater antithesis to the humble example set by George Washington."



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The Unexotic Underclass | The MIT Entrepreneurship Review

The Unexotic Underclass | The MIT Entrepreneurship Review:

Take the veterans. (I will beat the veteran drum to death.) According to the VA’s latest figures, there are roughly 23 million vets in the United States.  That number sounds disturbingly high; that’s almost 1 in 10 Americans.  Entrepreneurs and investors like big numbers.  Other groups you could include in the underclass: ex-convicts, many imprisoned for petty drug offenses, many released for crimes they never even committed.  How does an ex-convict get back into society?  And navigate not just freedom, but a transformed technological landscape?  Another group, and this one seems to sprout in pockets of affluence: people with food allergies.  Some parents today resort to putting shirts and armbands on their kids indicating what foods they can or can’t eat.  Surely there’s a better fix for that?

Maybe you could fix that.

'via Blog this'

Silicon Valley Has A “Problem” Problem — Life Learning — Medium

Silicon Valley Has A “Problem” Problem — Life Learning — Medium: "Please, pitch us your service provision enterprise. Tell us how it will make our lives here even better, and how investors will make large sums in our commitments. Tell us how it will free-up 20 minutes of our day. The market size of ‘preserving a proportion of people’s time’ is huge and will always be extremely valuable. Not every company has to claim to solve problems that change the world. As is clear from recent examples in the media, vision at the expense of truth can have huge repercussions for both consumers and investors alike. Not only this, but the lack of humility and the sprinkle of spin distracts us from what’s really important. Humanity’s grandest challenges.
"



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Republicans Didn't Cave to Obama | National Review

Republicans Didn't Cave to Obama | National Review: "Which is to say that, absent super-majorities in both houses (super-majorities that the Republican party has enjoyed at no time since 2010), the scope for reversing rather than blocking Obama’s gains has always been slim. There is only one way in which the Republican party is going to usher in the sort of sweeping change that its voters would like to see, and that is to add the White House to its collection of public offices. Sadly, the party’s voters seem to have chosen another course. Worse still, they seem to have decided to risk their backstops as well, thereby rendering it likely that a loss at the presidential level will be transmuted into a loss everywhere else. I suspect that those responsible for this approach will only come to understand how utterly foolish is the idea that the GOP doesn’t matter when, having weakened it to an ignominious rump, they are forced to sit and watch in horror as the dam finally breaks.

"



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Can Julia Stewart Save Applebee's? - ABC News

Can Julia Stewart Save Applebee's? - ABC News: "
"We called it a waitress back then," Stewart said. "Not a food server. And I wore the hat and the apron and the, you know, the cuffs, and I got hooked. I fell in love with the restaurant business. I love the constant feedback. I love the interaction with the guests. I love the ability to make a difference in someone's life in 35 minutes or 40 minutes — from the day I went in the restaurant and put on the uniform and felt proud to be a part of IHOP."

Stewart was a 16-year-old waitress who worked her way up and became the chief executive of the company where she once poured the coffee and delivered the flapjacks.

"I'm the luckiest woman in the world, right? I'm living the American Dream. You know, food server made good," Stewart said.

"



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Wrongfully convicted Brian Banks disgusted by Brock Turner ruling - NY Daily News

Wrongfully convicted Brian Banks disgusted by Brock Turner ruling - NY Daily News: ""I would say it's a case of privilege," Banks said. "It seems like the judge based his decision on lifestyle. He's lived such a good life and has never experienced anything serious in his life that would prepare him for prison. He was sheltered so much he wouldn't be able to survive prison. What about the kid who has nothing, he struggles to eat, struggles to get a fair education? What about the kid who has no choice who he is born to and has drug-addicted parents or a non-parent household? Where is the consideration for them when they commit a crime?"



 It wasn't until 2012 when the Banks’ accuser recanted her story that he got his life back and was declared an innocent man. He wound up serving five years and two months in prison and five years of high custody parole."



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An Obama Nominee’s Crushed Hopes - NYTimes.com

An Obama Nominee’s Crushed Hopes - NYTimes.com: "Cotton eventually released the two other holds, but not the one on Butts. She told me that she once went to see him about it, and he explained that he knew that she was a close friend of Obama’s — the two first encountered each other on a line for financial-aid forms at Harvard Law School, where they were classmates — and that blocking her was a way to inflict special pain on the president.



 Cotton’s spokeswoman did not dispute Butts’s characterization of that meeting, and stressed, in separate emails, that Cotton had enormous respect for her and her career."



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A Weekend in Chicago: Where Gunfire Is a Terrifying Norm - The New York Times

A Weekend in Chicago: Where Gunfire Is a Terrifying Norm - The New York Times:

There is no stopping the gunfire, which comes in bursts and waves, interrupting holiday barbecues, igniting gang rivalries, engulfing neighborhoods, blocks, families.

From Friday evening to the end of Monday, 64 people will have been shot in this city of 2.7 million, six of them fatally. In a population made up of nearly equal numbers of whites, blacks and Hispanics, 52 of the shooting victims are black, 11 Hispanic and one white. Eight are women, the rest men. Some 12 people are shot in cars, 11 along city sidewalks, and at least four on home porches.

'via Blog this'

China Does Not Want Your Rules Based Order | The Scholar's Stage

China Does Not Want Your Rules Based Order | The Scholar's Stage:



The decision then, lies not with them, but with us. An illiberal China is rising. No matter how nuanced our negotiation or how righteous our indignation, the Chinese will always feel that any attempt to get them to play by rules they did not have a hand in making is 1) morally wrong and 2) damaging to the Party's domestic power. They are interested in making a new order for the 21st century. In this the Chinese of today are not too different from the Americans of yesteryear. We forget that sometimes. There was once an era where Americans were the ones demanding that the shape of the world change to better match their values and interests.

The question before us then is whether we can compromise with the Chinese on this, and if so where those compromises can be made. What form that compromise might take—spheres of interest are the classical model here, though others exist—is still up for discussion. If this is our path then these discussions must be had with fierce urgency.

The alternative to compromise is containment. If we decide that any compromise with illiberal China would poison the international order beyond repair then we must move swiftly to contain China before its power grows further still. Our aim will not only be to restrain but also to reduce Chinese power when and where we can. This too will require spirited discussion, for containment is fraught with danger. We must ponder long and hard how we might go about limiting Chinese power without making the Party's domestic position so vulnerable that they see no alternative but war before them.



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Unless You’re Oprah, ‘Be Yourself’ Is Terrible Advice. - NYTimes.com

Unless You’re Oprah, ‘Be Yourself’ Is Terrible Advice. - NYTimes.com:

When Dr. Ibarra studied consultants and investment bankers, she found that high self-monitors were more likely than their authentic peers to experiment with different leadership styles. They watched senior leaders in the organization, borrowed their language and action, and practiced them until these became second nature. They were not authentic, but they were sincere. It made them more effective.

The shift from authenticity to sincerity might be especially important for millennials. Most generational differences are vastly exaggerated — they’re driven primarily by age and maturity, not birth cohort. But one robust finding is that younger generations tend to be less concerned about social approval. Authentic self-expression works beautifully, until employers start to look at social media profiles.

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A foundation against the gales of populism | TribLIVE

A foundation against the gales of populism | TribLIVE:

Pure conservatives like Nichols scratched their heads in primary after primary this spring, watching voters support the same people they say they are angry with — along with a celebrity with no coherent message or visible plan.

How angry can you be if, in all the primaries across the country, incumbent House members retained their seats in the same elections where Trump crushed every establishment challenger?

What's happening is complicated but certainly not unforeseen. The third party that everyone has been searching for has emerged — within the Republican Party. Less certain is what will happen after November to the host party infected by an angry electorate.

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Russia's 'valiant hero' in Ukraine turns his fire on Vladimir Putin | World news | The Guardian

Russia's 'valiant hero' in Ukraine turns his fire on Vladimir Putin | World news | The Guardian: "
Strelkov, whose real surname is Girkin (Strelkov is a pseudonym derived from the Russian for “the Shooter”), believes Putin dithered at the crucial moment in 2014, for fear of breaking off ties between Russia and the west for good. A radical nationalist who believes Russia should seize all the lands where ethnic Russians live, and who describes Ukrainians as “Russians who speak a different dialect”, Strelkov said it was fatal that Putin stopped after annexing Crimea.

“He crossed the Rubicon, but then stopped unexpectedly and illogically. He didn’t retreat, but didn’t go forward either. He has no ideas and seems to be waiting for a miracle. He’s stuck in the middle of a swamp.”"



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Why You Can’t Get a Ticket to the NBA Finals … — The Ringer

Why You Can’t Get a Ticket to the NBA Finals … — The Ringer: "
So the biggest artists sign contracts that guarantee them money every time they step on the stage, and that guaranteed amount is usually more than 100 percent of the revenue if every ticket is sold at face value. Which means that if every ticket in the venue “sells out” at the face value printed on the ticket, that wouldn’t be enough to pay the artist what they are contractually guaranteed by the promoter for the performance.

Getty Images
How does the promoter make up the difference? You guessed it: by selling some of the best seats directly in the secondary market, so that artists don’t get flack from you for pricing them high right out of the gate. That means the artist is either directly complicit, or that the artist is taking a massive check for the performance while looking the other way."



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Donald Trump and the Seven Broken Guardrails of Democracy - The Atlantic

Donald Trump and the Seven Broken Guardrails of Democracy - The Atlantic: "To the extent that Donald Trump has policies, I’m probably more sympathetic to them than Jindal is. Much of the traditional conservative ideology was obsolete. Migration should be reduced. Americans reasonably depend on Medicare and Social Security. It’s time to move past culture wars on private sexual behavior. Policy, however, is not the first or second or third impetus of the Trump campaign. It’s driven by something else—and the source of that something is found inside the conservative and Republican world, not outside. The Trump phenomenon is the effect of many causes. Yet overhanging all the causes is the central question: Why did Republicans and conservatives react to those causes as they did? There were alternatives. Of all the alternatives for their post-Obama future, Republicans and conservatives selected the most self-destructive of the options before them. Why? What went wrong? That will be the excruciating mystery to ponder during the long and difficult work of reconstruction ahead.

"



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Under attack | The Economist

Under attack | The Economist: "
Intolerance among Western liberals also has wholly unintended consequences. Even despots know that locking up mouthy but non-violent dissidents is disreputable. Nearly all countries have laws that protect freedom of speech. So authoritarians are always looking out for respectable-sounding excuses to trample on it. National security is one. Russia recently sentenced Vadim Tyumentsev, a blogger, to five years in prison for promoting “extremism”, after he criticised Russian policy in Ukraine. “Hate speech” is another. China locks up campaigners for Tibetan independence for “inciting ethnic hatred”; Saudi Arabia flogs blasphemers; Indians can be jailed for up to three years for promoting disharmony “on grounds of religion, race...caste...or any other ground whatsoever”.



The threat to free speech on Western campuses is very different from that faced by atheists in Afghanistan or democrats in China. But when progressive thinkers agree that offensive words should be censored, it helps authoritarian regimes to justify their own much harsher restrictions and intolerant religious groups their violence. When human-rights campaigners object to what is happening under oppressive regimes, despots can point out that liberal democracies such as France and Spain also criminalise those who “glorify” or “defend” terrorism, and that many Western countries make it a crime to insult a religion or to incite racial hatred."



'via Blog this'

Louisiana Refuses to Budget for Public Defenders - The Atlantic

Louisiana Refuses to Budget for Public Defenders - The Atlantic: "In La Salle, another parish under Carson’s jurisdiction, the swell of cases grew so overwhelming that he enacted a “restriction of services” plan and, mid-summer last year, stopped representing some defendants accused of misdemeanors. While Carson is more desperate than most, “every jurisdiction is headed this way,” he said. “It’s just a matter of time.” More than three-quarters of the state’s 42 public defenders’ offices are struggling to avoid insolvency. The Louisiana Public Defender Board, which oversees every district office, has predicted “systemic failure in the public-defense system” by this summer.

"



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China’s Youth Think Tiananmen Was So 1989 | Foreign Policy

China’s Youth Think Tiananmen Was So 1989 | Foreign Policy: "That passivity is no exception among young people in China today. It’s fashionable to hope that China’s young and educated want to keep the flame burning for the protesters who called for democratic reforms in summer 1989, only to suffer in deadly clashes with soldiers in and around central Beijing’s Tiananmen Square on June 4. But from all I have seen and heard, China’s young elite aren’t interested in preserving the memory of Tiananmen, which official press shuns discussing and which the ruling Communist Party has nearly erased from public discourse. The country’s youth just want to focus on making money and staying out of trouble.

"



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The Benghazi Committee’s Dead End - The New York Times

The Benghazi Committee’s Dead End - The New York Times: "The Benghazi committee, which was set up in May 2014, has been operational for longer than the 9/11 Commission was. It has dragged on longer than congressional investigations into the attack on Pearl Harbor, the assassination of President Kennedy, Watergate, the Iran-contra scandal, the 1983 bombing that killed 241 American service members in Beirut and the response to Hurricane Katrina.


"



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Measuring 18F's value - GovFresh

Measuring 18F's value - GovFresh: "It’s very easy, especially in a political environment, and especially for a high-profile organization like 18F, to be critical of its operations. There are a long list of items I’d like to see GAO look into and, right now, 18F isn’t one of them.

I’ve always admired GAO’s work and, hopefully, its assessment is fair and doesn’t reflect the tone of the article (the author of whom I also admire).

Every Silicon Valley startup that sees 18F’s revenue-expenditures ratio and customer adoption rate over the past years would be envious."



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The parable of the ox — FT.com

The parable of the ox — FT.com: "In 1906, the great statistician Francis Galton observed a competition to guess the weight of an ox at a country fair. Eight hundred people entered. Galton, being the kind of man he was, ran statistical tests on the numbers. He discovered that the average guess (1,197lb) was extremely close to the actual weight (1,198lb) of the ox. This story was told by James Surowiecki, in his entertaining book The Wisdom of Crowds.

"



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Ukraine Declares War on Journalism - The New York Times

Ukraine Declares War on Journalism - The New York Times: "Most senior Ukrainian officials have avoided commenting on the release of journalists’ names and information. But they should now act in accordance with the Western values that they claim to believe, and condemn the defamation of journalists just for working in separatist-controlled areas. They must also ensure that the offending website is shut down and that the investigation into who published the list results in criminal charges. This alone will not ensure that the country’s news media is free and fair, but it will help set the right tone. Ukraine must not sacrifice press freedom in its struggle to survive war.

"



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