[A] Not often, but I sometimes get conspiratorially-minded. The case of the NCAA screwing up the investigation of Miami (FL) to my usually dormant conspiratorial instincts. This has the potential to save the NCAA from making a very difficult decision. Enough so that I wonder – at least a little – if it wasn’t sabotaged. I’m sure Miami-Ohio is breathing a little easier, though.
[B] Tom Tancredo lost a bet and will have to smoke pot. Awesome. Good on him for keeping up his side of the bargain.
[C] I link to this article of a fire in Chicago because you have to see the picture. It’s far out.
[D] Canada has denied Randy Quaid’s request for permanent status. It looks like we’re stuck with him.
[E] Via the New York Post and AP, an interesting story of how a clerk at Papa John’s managed to talk a thief out of taking money and into taking a pizza instead.
[G] I’ve been addicted to the Android game Temple Run lately. I can play it with one hand, which is very helpful when holding a baby. Here’s the story of how it came to be. Also from BusinessInsider, a look at where Google keeps your data.
[H] Discussed recently on NaPP, a look at the rebound effect of energy efficiency. The “rebound effect” being that people who have more energy efficient things end up using it more and undercut the energy savings. They exist, but are not large enough to offset the energy savings.
[I] A case for and against the Rooney Rule (actually the “pro-” says TRR isn’t enough). The Rooney Rule is the NFL’s insistence that minority candidates be interviewed.
[J] Here is more on the giant squid, and its hunter.
[K] Aquaman gets no respect.
[L] After we made one, what exactly would we do with a neanderthal? Is there a remotely ethical answer to that question?
[M] Minnesota is taking some needed steps to prevent some of the debt collection abuse we’ve been seeing in this country.
[N] My recent experiences with the IRS have been less than pleasant, and apparently I am not alone. But there have been some positive developments.
[O] American companies have pushed their limits on India and outsources.
[P] I think China is in for a world of hurt with a lot of their perpetual construction, but I actually think their knock-off cities and landmarks are kind of cool. It reminds me of Las Vegas, actually. But hard core. Relatedly, a look at China’s future.
[Q] James Bond, for realz. (Well, the seduction angle, anyway.)
[R] Mona Lisa… on the moon.
[S] TechCrunch calls Utah an unlikely tech hub, though there’s really no particular reason for that to be the case. It has a strong white-collar culture, good education system, and business-friendly culture. The corridor between Salt Lake City and Provo is really quite impressive.
[T] The extraordinary cynicism of Dick Morris. What’s notable is that he was a great political mind, once.
[U] Dave Schuler has some ideas on inequality and stimulus investment that are worth thinking about.
[K] they are going to be sorry
http://www.thelovecraftsman.com/2011/04/thanks-to-hp-lovecraft-aquaman-is-no.html
RE: [L]
Walter had the same question about my beautiful ManPorcuBats; but science is its own reward!
RE: [B], he welched:
http://www.salon.com/2013/01/29/tom_tancredo_breaks_pot_smoking_promise_partner/
he has now reportedly backed out of the deal due to pressure from his wife, who is “pissed” and his grandchildren who he says are “very upset with grandpa.”
Those grandkids need to lighten up.
The grand kids need to light up.
I bet the Jets will win the Super Bowl!
Dammit. OK, who’s got some?
If you read the wiki for the Jets, you’ll see that they pulled a fast one similar to the Browns leaving Cleveland back in 1968.
Technically, the Jets *WILL* win the Superbowl. Well, if the 49er’s do.
Crap, they edited it back.
????????????
[D] Score another one for the star-whackers.
[L] Jobs homo sapiens sapiens won’t do.
What could possibly go wrong?
I have the first 3 volumes of a pulpy Image comics series called “Elephantmen” – basically, this mad scientist/corporation bred animals with human intelligence/morphology, which were employed as slaves & mercenary armies to fight wars; later, these hybrids were liberated & granted rights and now live uneasily amongst the human population.
Great concept/art – basically, “Dr. Moreau crossed with Blade Runner” – but the overall story was dragging & I kind of lost track of it.
http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs50/f/2009/287/d/d/Elephantmen___Colored_by_jtchan.jpg
As Devo observed: “God made man / but the monkeys applied the glue”
I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe. Entire forests on fire off the Tunguska River. I watched mastodon tusks glitter in the dark near the Beringia Land Bridge. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.
Awesome, with a side of space!
[ L],
Being able to resurrect extinct species is perhaps the single coolest thing humans could ever do, particularly if we can re-establish viable populations.
Neanderthals are a really problematic case, though. They are not H. Sapiens, so they are not us, but they are humans, a human species. So what is their legal status? I would argue for full equality, but what is the status of this prospective baby? The geneticist resurrecting extinct species can own a mastodon, but can he own the Neanderthal baby? Is he the legal parent, automatically, or through an adoption process, and what if the latter would be required, but the geneticist doesn’t do it?
There are answers to these questions, of course, and if they’re not resolved beforehand I have no doubt our political and legal systems will scramble to solve them after the fact. But it’s a puzzle because it presents a question about the legal line between person and non-person that we’ve never had to face before (Sci fi stories about cyborgs notwithstanding).
[K] And he needs the work, too. His house is underwater.
[L] Run him for the Senate.
Posting links to the NRO regarding race should be a penalty: move back ten lines of code and lose a down.
That guy makes every generic argument possible and doesn’t seem to know what the Rooney rule actually says. He seems to think its affirmative action, although i guess if he wants to argue that just getting people an interview is AA he could. However he didn’t and i think that is stretching the point. If anything the Rooney rule is the kind of thing Con’s might actually like. All it does is open the door, the candidates still have to win the job themselves. Nobody is given a job based on race. The NRO pinhead also doesn’t seem to get that blacks weren’t getting hired much as coaches even though they had made up a large percentage of players for years. Of course if he were to wonder why all those black players hadn’t been able to move up the coaching tree despite all those numbers he might have to ask himself why that was. And he wouldn’t want to ask himself that.
I’m mostly interested in what the black coaches think. But it’s hard to gauge their opinion since they don’t want to come out and say that potential employers are wasting their time or that the system is so warped that their failure to get jobs they interview for causes future potential employers (and others) to look at them in a negative light.
It certainly addresses a real problem. I don’t know how effectively it does it, or whether it should be continued, terminated, or expanded.
As for why the NRO is against it, I think it’s because it is seen as excessively race-focused, bringing the conversation back to something that should be sorting itself out. (Whether that last part is true or not is a point of contention, though your view and mine are more similar to mine and theirs.)
The idea, I think, is that even an interview that clearly won’t end in a job offer [1] is the best training for one that could. And the NFL is a small neighborhood. Even if you don’t hire the guy, you might mention to another owner that he impressed you.
1. I’m sure the 49ers interviewed some minority coaches while they were going full-bore after Harbaugh, and both sides knew there was no chance of a hire.
Meh on NRO. It seems to be the standard kind of criticism that just pokes at a potential solution, without ever openly addressing whether there is a real problem in the first place and if they have any better solutions. They don’t really want to just come out and say “do nothing” but they don’t have any other ideas. Well of course its race focused, its trying to solve a problem regarding race.
It would be interesting what the coaches would say. I’d guess at least some of them were really happy to get an interview and chance. Sports in general is incredibly tied to an old boys network. Who you know has always been a trump card. In some sports, baseball especially, having some major league experience, even if you sucked, makes it so much easier to get back to the majors.
Say what you will about NRO-bashing, at least it’s an ethos.
BTW fancy seeing you on Goldblog’s post on Ed Koch
Holy flock of fish….shut down the toobs, they reached the maximum level of stupid.
Goldblog and I go way back,
greg,
Have you seen the NRA’s Enemies List?
/that/ is maximal level stupid, plus a critical fail in P.R.
(plus, um… posting it online?)
a better link to the neanderthal story than Gawker. (in short: it doesn’t use quotes for something nobody actually said)
Be that as it may, I have a grudge against PBS. They’rethe rreason there is no “F”.
[R] The story is kind of misleading; in case it wasn’t clear, NASA did not project the image of Mona Lisa onto the Moon or any other surface.
However, this does represent a super-exciting tech demonstration.
At least it wasn’t a soda ad. (I’m assuming you’re read The Man Who Sold the Moon)
I haven’t actually. But I did see The Tick episode where the chair-head dude attempted to carve his name into the Moon with a laser.