December 2010
21 posts
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Tea Party star Christine O'Donnell denies misusing... →
I support O’Donnell here, although only on condition that she actually did “misuse” campaign funds, because what she is accused of doing (paying her rent out of campaign donations) is perfectly fine, and should be legal. The ban on candidates using campaign funds for personal expenses is completely undemocratic: it means only the independently wealthy can treat running for office...
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I Am The Blob: On looking at the TED website →
The main thing that occurs to me just now upon watching this lecture, is how good Americans are at talking…. here seems to be something particularly American about it, something related to the comfort that Americans feel with oral communication.
It’s true; Americans really are the animal having the logos. I wonder if this is connected to imperialism, the confidence that comes from...
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tomewing:
I will say this for Katy Perry: she...
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False Nostalgia: How VH1 Ruined the Taste of a... →
The original 1982 film made only $33 million in box office revenue during its initial run, a number that Porky’s, released in the same year, would best in about three-and-a-half weeks. It is therefore necessarily true that most people who talk about and who are in the intended audience of the Tron sequel haven’t actually seen the original.
Awl blogger apparently unaware of existence of VHS,...
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Michael Bérubé for Democracy: A Journal of Ideas →
This article on the Sokal hoax is generally pretty good, but I think this misses the mark:
But what of Sokal’s chief post-hoax claim that the academic left’s critiques of science were potentially damaging to the left? That one, alas, has held up very well, for it turns out that the critique of scientific “objectivity” and the insistence on the inevitable “partiality” of knowledge can serve the...
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Britons 'downloaded 1.2bn illegal tracks this... →
Of course, the headline here actually should be “BPI study shows illegal downloading no threat to music industry.”
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Andrea Louise Campbell for Democracy: A Journal of... →
If a VAT is truly under consideration, it is crucial for progressives to engage the debate and bring to the table a VAT designed to achieve not just fiscal balance but progressive goals as well.
The guiding principle of “progressivism” is to always preemptively agree with conservatives, to avoid the possibility that, if you argue against them, the conservatives might win. If you...
“Are we aware of our obligations to a mob? It is the mob that labour in your...”
– George Gordon, Lord Byron, Debate on the Frame-Work Bill, in the House of Lords, February 27 1812 (via disposalunit)
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Taylor Momsen: From Grinch to grunge | Music | The... →
Still, as I wait for Momsen in a Manhattan diner, the image that haunts me is not this on-stage flashing, but her appearance, earlier this year, on ITV’s This Morning, meeting Phillip Schofield and Holly Willoughby’s softly-softly enquiries with dead-eyed scorn.
Oh Taylor, with your scowling and your eyeshadow and your actually quite good pop-grunge.
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Original WikiLeaks: Trotsky on the publication of... →
fuckyeahmarxismleninism:
The abolition of secret diplomacy is the primary condition for an honest, popular, truly democratic foreign policy. The Soviet Government regards it as its duty to carry out such a policy in practice. That is precisely why, while openly proposing an immediate armistice to all the belligerent peoples and their Governments, we are at the same time publishing these treaties...
Transcript Of Obama's Press Conference On Tax Cut... →
This not an abstract political fight. This is not isolated here in Washington. There are people right now who, when their unemployment insurance runs out, will not be able to pay the bills.
People used similar arguments to make the case for voting for the Democrats in the midterms, despite their terrible record of actual accomplishments. The claim appears to be that you are only allowed to...
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