AdamSmith

Skit-by-skit review of the O2 show: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/comedy/10940401/The-almost-definitive-guide-to-Monty-Python-Live-Mostly.html

I was thinking the same thing. And that I could take them OFF him with no hands.

Sewer blocked by a large Pooh (and other weird items): Scottish Water launches campaign aimed at reducing 40,000 blockages a year 1 / 3 Scottish Water has launched a campaign aimed at getting some of their customers to use their 'grey fluff' a little more when flushing Rob Williams Monday 17 February 2014 The Telegraph As the 'bear of very little brain' himself once put it: "People who don’t think probably don’t have brains; rather, they have grey fluff that’s blown into their heads by mistake." Scottish Water has launched a campaign aimed at getting some of their customers to use their 'grey fluff' a little more when flushing things down the toilet, after they released a staggering list of some of the weird and wonderful objects found blocking sewers. Among the items people thought it was wise to flush down toilets, or dump in various manholes, were a pair of pants found in a pumping station, a goldfish, a snake at Dunfermline sewage works, 2x4 timber, a dead sheep, false teeth, golf balls, a credit card (which had been stolen from its owner and flushed down a pub toilet), a fax machine and a large Winnie the Pooh teddy. In a storm tank at Gatehead, workers found a dead fully grown cow that had apparently fallen in after someone removed a manhole cover. Elsewhere workers discovered an Action Man figure (with his boots still on), a deckchair and an outboard motor for a boat. Pink ladies bike and fax machine found at East Kilbride Scottish Water has launched their new campaign after it said it dealt with more than 40,000 blockages in the drains and sewer network. Most of these blockages were caused by cooking oil, nappies and baby wipes being put in sinks and toilets. Their new campaign, which sees the screening of the company's first ever television advert tonight, aims to cut down on the blockages which the water company says costs around £7m a year and causes misery and flooding to thousands of households across the country. The advert will also highlight the importance of saving water. "Cooking fat, oils and grease coupled with bathroom waste such as cotton buds, nappies and baby wipes creates a perfect storm of solidified fat and material that can't breaks down easily like toilet paper and collects in large clumps beneath Scotland's streets. These blockages create costs of over £7million a year for the publicly owned utility firm," the company says. Chris Wallace, Director of Communications, Scottish Water, said: "The waste water drain which runs from your house to the public sewer is usually only about four inches wide, which is less than the diameter of a DVD. "This drain is designed to take only the used water from sinks, showers and baths and pee, poo and toilet paper from the toilet. Scottish Water believes the best way to tackle blocked drains and sewer flooding is to work with our customers to prevent blockages that can clog up the cycle in the first place." A snake found in the water works at Dunfermline Some of the objects found in Scottish Water sewers: 1) An outboard motor for a boat 2) A fully functioning clothes iron 3) A scaffolding pole 4) A football 5) Toy soldiers (used to be mounted on the wall at the waste water treatment works in Dumfries) 6) Deckchair 7) 2x4 timber 8) A dead sheep 9) A mattress 10) Hand truck /parcel trolley 11) False teeth 12) Golf balls 13) Lighters 14) Watches 15) Credit card that belonged to one of the guys - was stolen in the pub and flushed down the pub toilet. 16) Mobile phones 17) A frog was found inside the pump right next to the propeller - how he got in there is a mystery 18) A live badger was found in a pumping station well at Drongan 19) Traffic cone - Moodiesburn 20) Timber - Moodiesburn 21) A dead, fully grown, cow, found in the storm tanks at Gatehead. Turns out a cover had been removed from a manhole in a field and the cow had fallen in. 22) A pair of trousers recently turned up at Kirkcaldy waste water treatment works 23) A live otter from the aereation ditch at Dornoch wwtw 24) A live salmon at Seafield WWTW 25) A tractor tyre 26) An Action Man figure, who still had his boots on 27) An orange 28) A railway sleeper http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/sewer-blocked-by-a-large-pooh-and-other-weird-items-scottish-water-launches-campaign-aimed-at-reducing-40000-blockages-a-year-9134054.html

2012 talk by Chris Urmson, lead of the Google Self-Driving Car Project. Formerly with Carnegie Mellon's Robotics Lab. Very cool guy whom I've interviewed and written about professionally.

Video on the making of the previous video:

Interesting, though hard-to-read, diagram of the different kinds of sensors used on autonomously guided vehicles: From this article on a new prototype Mercedes self-driving freight truck: http://www.cnn.com/2014/07/04/tech/mercedes-future-truck/index.html?hpt=hp_bn5

How Jefferson pooped! An article courtesy of the Thomas Jefferson Encyclopedia. Click for more. Filed in: Monticello (House) Privies "And with regard to English conveniences, they are also an unknown luxury in the United States, where there are only 'little houses' five hundred paces from the house whenever possible. That is very disagreeable in winter with the snow, and in summer when summer complaint, diarrhea, is quite a common ailment. Irénée has done an extraordinary thing for me with a 'little house' twenty-five paces away in a little thicket; and when it rains I should like it better even closer. In Washington, Madam Barlow placed hers at the end of the piazza; that is a great improvement. But that lady has French manners. At Monticello, Mr. Jefferson's home, one has the choice of three hundred paces in the garden and on the terraces or through an underground tunnel, level with the cellars and built for that purpose." -- Pierre S. du Pont de Nemours to his wife, Sept. 28, 1816 [1] Du Pont de Nemours' remarks reveal that as late as 1816 indoor toilets, with or without flushing mechanisms, were uncommon in America. Such was not the case in Europe. Thomas Jefferson himself had enjoyed the luxury of flush toilets in the Paris townhouse he rented 30 years earlier. But according to du Pont de Nemours, Mrs. Joel Barlow and Thomas Jefferson were among the very few to practice "French manners" on this side of the Atlantic. Yet his account of the privies at Monticello[2] - the only contemporary one that has come to light &— does more to confuse than to settle the question of the location of these conveniences. This could be explained by the fact that more than nine months had elapsed between his December 1815 visit to Monticello and the letter to his wife. Furthermore, owing to delays and miscommunication, the visit occurred while Jefferson was at his retreat, Poplar Forest. And although he confessed to being "overwhelmed by the kindness of Mrs. Randolph" during his three or more days at Monticello, du Pont de Nemours apparently did not experience, let alone see, the "conveniences" that Jefferson had inside the house. We know from what physical evidence remains that there were three privies in the house proper. In his building notebook, Jefferson referred to these conveniences as "air closets." Two were located off the first- and second-floor south stair passages and a third adjoined Jefferson's bedroom. These interior spaces were shafts lighted by skylights and not much larger than what was needed for a seat. Each shaft extended below the floor to the sub-cellar level, where each joined a single masonry-lined "sink" (also called by Jefferson a "conduit") approximately 2 1/2 feet wide and 3 3/4 feet high with a fall (according to his specifications) of 3 inches in 10 feet. The termination of this tunnel can be seen today about 125 feet east of the house. The only document that has come to light regarding the construction of these privies is Jefferson's letter of April 24, 1802 informing James Oldham, "I would much rather have the 2d. and 3d. air-closets finished before any thing else, because it will be very disagreeable working in them after even one of them begins to be in use." Since Oldham was a joiner, it is assumed that he was responsible for the finished woodwork in those spaces. But just how the interior privies worked is still a question. Clearly Jefferson's reference to a "sink" implies some transport of waste. An undated plan, roughly sketched by him, shows how water from the higher mountain adjoining Monticello to the south could be piped to both a fish pond near the house and to what appears to be a privy in what is now the alcove of the South Square Room or (assuming another possible interpretation of that part of the plan) the cellar space directly below the Square Room. There is also a line that branches off to the South Piazza—Jefferson's greenhouse. Nonetheless, all evidence points to mere intent, for nothing has come to light that indicates that a flushing mechanism was in operation or even installed. Nor is there physical evidence to support the intriguing statement from a 1902 publication claiming, "This cellar is said to have had tunnels from it to convey the sewerage out to pits, by earth cars." When the Foundation acquired Monticello in 1923 apparently nothing remained of the Jefferson-period fixtures, and the conversion of the privy shafts into supply and return air ducts for the modern heating and air-conditioning system in 1954 no doubt erased additional evidence. Furthermore, photographs of the tunnel from that time show an earthen floor and not the "slatestone" specified about 1800 for "the sink, and for the covered way, kitchen, & offices." One hypothesis is that the waste was collected in a pot under each seat and then lowered to the cellar level where it could be removed by opening a door in the passage wall. Although today there are openings in the cellar wall for each of the three shafts at a convenient height, the only door that existed before 1954 is for the privy off the first-floor passage. The other two openings were added, according to the restoration architect Milton Grigg, to provide access to the modern ductwork. And given that the partition walls between all three shafts extend as far down as the cellar floor, there is no way one door could serve the adjoining privies. Another hypothesis is that Jefferson adopted a simple routine of having a slave enter the room and remove the chamber pot from under the seat. As for the "sink," it may have functioned as an air tunnel, supplying the shafts with fresh air drawn by a powerful draft through a connecting chimney flue. Of the three interior privies, only the one adjoining Jefferson's chamber was "restored." In 1955 a wooden seat, typical of the period, was installed. Two additional conveniences were located at the north and south ends of the passageway that connects the cellars to the stable and kitchen wings. At the North Privy a pit under the seat connects to a straight tunnel that opens in the hillside. It is about 44 feet long and has a descent of 4 ½ inches. Although the South Privy has not been excavated we know that it too was to be served by a tunnel. And although all physical evidence of a mechanism, if any, is gone, the idea of an "earth car," perhaps operated by a pulley system, seems more likely at these two locations. Even so, we know that Jefferson was paying slaves for regularly "cleansing sewers." These payments, which were recorded in his memorandum books sometimes as often as once a month, were usually in the amount of one dollar. The task, however, was never described and so we are at a loss to know if it involved digging out a pit, emptying an "earth car," or some other operation. It is regrettable that the Jefferson-period fixtures had been removed from the North Privy by the time of the restoration of the northwest dependencies in 1938. We judge from what was recorded as existing, and from what was restored in that year, that all that remains today from Jefferson's period are the stone walls (up to about the top of the window), the window frame, some evidence of plaster (with most of what is left dating from the later nineteenth century), and evidence of early (Jefferson period?) slate paving in the outer passage. The present floors and plaster walls (with remains of earlier plaster preserved-some with graffiti from the 1850s) date from 1999-2000 as does the single-hole seat, which is based on a Jefferson floor plan and on details of an original seat at Poplar Forest. The stepped-pyramidal roof (based on Jefferson's design) and the inner and outer doors and door frames all date from the partial restoration in 1938. On the matter of doors, Jefferson wrote to James Oldham on June 22,1802, "I think the outer door of the South East necessary must be a panelled door, hung flush with the inside of the wall, and the upper panel (instead of being glass as I before proposed) had better be of Venetian blinds, as that will give air as well as light. As soon as you have done the S.E. necessary, I would rather you would proceed with the N.W. one." The only other known privy on the mountaintop was located southeast of the house along Mulberry Row. Its location near the nailery is noted on Jefferson's insurance plat from 1796, where it is described as "a necessary house of wood 8. feet square." This might be the one identified by du Pont de Nemours as "three hundred paces in the garden and on the terraces." It is assumed that the Mulberry Row necessary was for the use of those living and working along that plantation street. More of a question is the use of the two privies off the south stair halls and the ones at the ends of the cellar passageway. We do know that the second-floor privy had what appears to be a cupboard lock operable by a key from the outside, and that the first-floor air-closet had, over a period of time, three or even as many as four different locks. As for the cellar passageway privies, the records tell us that Jefferson wanted one "japanned" closet lock installed on the door to the "North necessary." Other than these few references there is nothing to enlighten us whether all were welcomed or whether use was restricted by gender or status. Footnotes1. Hagley Museum and Library; translation from the French supplied by Hagley. 2. This article is based on William Beiswanger, Monticello Research Report, August 2000; Revised February 2003, August 2003. http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/privies

7 bogus grammar 'errors' you don't need to worry about You actually can start a sentence with a conjunction — and end it with a preposition By Ben Yagoda | March 5, 2013 The Week When it comes to the English language, I'm not an anything-goes kind of guy. If I were, I wouldn't have written a book called How to Not Write Bad: The Most Common Writing Errors and the Best Ways to Avoid Them. It's just that I hate to see people waste their time hunting down so-called mistakes that really aren't mistakes at all. So consider this a public-service announcement in the wake of Monday's National Grammar Day. Here are seven rules you really (really!) don't have to worry about following. 1. Don't split infinitives The rule against splitting infinitives — that is, putting an adverb between the word to and a verb — was pretty much made up out of whole cloth by early 19-century grammarians, apparently because they felt the proper model for English was Latin, and in Latin, infinitive-splitting is impossible. However, English is not Latin, and infinitives have been profitably split by many great writers, from Hemingway ("But I would come back to where it pleases me to live; to really live") to Gene Rodenberry ("to boldly go where no man has gone before"). It's okay to boldly do it. 2. Don't end a sentence with a preposition The idea that it's wrong to end a sentence with a preposition (from, with, etc.) was invented by the English poet John Dryden... in 1672. He probably based his objection on a bogus comparison with — you guessed it — Latin, where such constructions don't exist. In any case, there is no basis to the rule in English grammar, and, once again, great writers have ignored it with no great loss to their prose or reputations. Jane Austen: "Fanny could with difficulty give the smile that was asked for." Robert Frost: "The University is one most people have heard of." James Joyce: "He had enough money to settle down on." Trying to avoid ending with a preposition frequently ties you into the awkward knot of "to whom" and "to which" constructions. On a memo criticizing a document for committing this "error," Winston Churchill allegedly wrote: "This is the type of arrant pedantry up with which I will not put." It is true that prepositions are a relatively weak part of speech and, all things being equal, it's desirable to end sentences strongly. So sometimes it pays to rewrite such constructions. Thus, "He's the person I gave the money to" isn't as good as "I gave him the money." 3. Don't use "which" as a relative pronoun The bogus idea here is that only that, never which, should be used to introduce so-called defining or restrictive clauses. For example, "The United States is one of the countries which that failed to ratify the Kyoto Protocol." One again, this is totally made up. Geoffrey Pullum, co-editor of the authoritative Cambridge Grammar of the English Language, has written, "The alleged rule has no basis. Even in edited prose, 75 percent of the instances of relative 'which' introduce 'restrictive' relatives." The culprit here seems to be the great language commentator H.W. Fowler, who popularized the notion in his 1926 book, Modern English Usage. In fairness to Fowler, he merely speculated that if writers were to follow this custom (as he acknowledged they currently did not), "there would be much gain both in lucidity & ease." Language sticklers took that and ran with it, and this idea reigned for most of the rest of the century. Even now, it has a lot of adherents. But it still doesn't have any justification. One of the great sticklers, Jacques Barzun, advised in a 1975 book that we ought to avoid such whiches. But as Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage points out, on the very next page Barzun broke his own rule, writing, "Next is a typical situation which a practiced writer corrects 'for style' virtually by reflex action…." 4. Don't start a sentence with a conjunction Except possibly in the most formal settings, there is absolutely nothing wrong with starting a sentence with And or But. A funny thing about the supposed rule against doing so is that no one has been able to find a book or authority that has ever endorsed it (with the exception of a single 1868 text turned up by the scholar Dennis Baron). But countless people feel this is unacceptable, possibly because the notion was pounded into their head by some middle school grammar teacher. Get over it! (It has become popular recently to follow sentence-opening conjunctions with a comma, for example, "But, we got there too late for the early-bird special." That is indeed wrong. No comma.) 5. Don't use the passive voice The poster child for passive-hating is a quote from President George H.W. Bush. In a 1986 speech about the Iran-Contra scandal, he said, "Clearly, mistakes were made." Just as clearly, the problem is that the grammar fudges a crucial question: Who made the mistakes? Passive construction can indeed propagate such obfuscation, as well as wordiness, and thus should be used judiciously. But there's nothing inherently wrong with it, and when the subject of a clause or sentence isn't known, or isn't as important as the object, passive voice can be just the thing. Tom Wicker's classic New York Times opening sentence of November 23, 1963, would have been ruined if he'd tried to shoehorn it into the active voice. Wicker wrote: "President John Fitzgerald Kennedy was shot and killed by an assassin today." 6. Don't neglect to use singular verbs Etymologically, data is the plural of the Latin datum. But from the time it first appeared in English, it has been treated as a collective noun (such as water or money), and collective nouns take singular verbs. Every single citation in The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) pairs data with such a verb, starting with, "Inconsistent data sometimes produces a correct result," from an 1820 edition of the Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal. Thus, insisting on the data are… is pretentious and unnecessary. Media, meaning the various means by which information is disseminated in a society, appeared later — 1923, according to the OED. Although it's plural of the Latin medium, it too was treated from the start as a singular. The media are… is an unfortunate recent affectation. A similar issue arises when a word such as group or bunch is followed by the word of, then a plural. For example: "A bunch of my friends is/are coming over." Some sticklers insist on is, because group is singular. But this is an area where English grammar is flexible, and are is acceptable as well. My advice is to choose the singular or plural based on whether you're emphasizing the collection or the individuals. In the above example, I would go with are. Saying A bunch of my friends is coming over sounds as stuffy as your nostrils in the middle of a particularly bad cold. 7. Don't use words to mean what they've been widely used to mean for 50 years or more An instant's glance at the OED confirms that the one thing about words that never changes is that their meanings always change. The process takes time, and to be an early adopter of a new meaning means putting yourself at risk of both incomprehension and abuse. However, at a certain point, clinging to old definitions is a superstitious waste of time and thought. Here's a list of words and expressions whose new meanings, though still scorned by some sticklers, are completely acceptable. (If it puzzles you that there is any objection to some of these, or to find out the original meaning, Google the word or phrase. You will find a lively debate, to say the least.) It's okay to use... Decimate to mean "kill or eliminate a large proportion of something" like to mean "such as" liable to to mean "likely to" hopefully to mean "I hope that" over to mean "more than" since to mean "because" while to mean "although" momentarily to mean "in a moment" the lion's share to mean "the majority" verbal to mean "oral" I could care less to mean "I couldn't care less" And if you have a problem with that, I could care less. ……………………………………………………………………………… Ben Yagoda is the author of How to Not Write Bad: The Most Common Writing Errors and the Best Ways to Avoid Them (published last month by Riverhead) and nine other books. He is a Professor of English and Journalism at the University of Delaware. His website is www.benyagoda.com. http://theweek.com/article/index/240882/7-bogus-grammar-errors-you-dont-need-to-worry-about

Pope Francis just expertly trolled his critics When faced with a McCarthy-esque smear campaign, best to pull a communist switcheroo By Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig | 8:03am ET The Week Nothing diabolical going on here. (Franco Origlia/Getty Images) Since Pope Francis began speaking in public about the Christian view on economic matters, opponents have engaged in what often feels like a McCarthy-era smear campaign, accusing the Pope of things like Marxism, communism, and Leninism. It was Rush Limbaugh on his radio show that first leveled charges of Marxism after the publication of Pope Francis' apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium; he later doubled down on the accusations: Pope Francis called today for governments to redistribute wealth to the poor in a new spirit of generosity to help curb the economy of exclusion that is taking hold today…That's Marxism, that's socialism. That's not charity. Following suit, an Economist blogger diagnosed Pope Francis' recognition of a link between capitalism and violence as Leninism. "Francis may not be offering all the right answers," the piece opines, dripping with patronizing conceit, "or getting the diagnosis exactly right, but he is asking the right questions. Like a little boy who observes the emperor's nakedness." The pattern is always the same: dismiss Pope Francis, with the greatest respect for his office or the most genteel admiration of his character, by labeling his ministry more political than theological. And the motives attributed to Pope Francis are never neutral; rather, they're mere metonymy, short for larger arguments. Identifying Pope Francis' theological analyses with the boogeymen political ideologies of yesteryear denies, however implicitly, that what he is doing is strictly Christian. This is accomplished by conflating what is religious with what is secular, and in part through selecting ideologies that have been defamed in American culture for their anti-Christian tendencies. It will likely never matter to these critics that Pope Francis himself has emphatically denied any association with Marxism or Marxist ideology. And so in a recent interview, he took another tack: Rather than making another attempt to roundly decry a set of ideologies no one seriously suspects him of adhering to, Pope Francis turned the criticisms around on the critics: "I can only say that the communists have stolen our flag. The flag of the poor is Christian. Poverty is at the center of the Gospel," he said, citing Biblical passages about the need to help the poor, the sick and the needy. "Communists say that all this is communism. Sure, twenty centuries later. So when they speak, one can say to them: 'but then you are Christian'." [Pope Francis, via Reuters] In other words, since his concern for the poor causes critics to accuse him of Marxism, Pope Francis reversed their accusations: rather than Christianity looking suspiciously communist over its concern for the poor, perhaps communism looks suspiciously Christian. After all, justice for the poor is hardly a communist invention; as Pope Francis points out, a focus on helping the poor was native to Christianity long before the 19th century. But Pope Francis' reversal has another effect: namely, it calls into question why our political narratives immediately categorize any demand for justice for the poor as anti-Christian communism. In fact, it would seem rather impossible to practice any legitimate form of Christianity without seeking justice for the poor. If we immediately identify support for impoverished people as evidence of some anti-Christian impulse, then we've built up a political narrative that can't sustain the truth about Christianity. For that reason, Pope Francis' refusal to capitulate to how political types would like to contain the radical power of Christianity is especially valuable, and especially irksome. For as long as he's unwilling to contain his Christianity to the realms it's politically welcome in — say, legislation related to sex and reproduction — it will be too vast and too revolutionary for his critics, who will fail to see it as Christian at all, and will continue bandying about accusations of communism, Marxism, and so forth. But it's hard to imagine those kinds of attacks will ever do much to harm Pope Francis or his message, given that his refusal to pay heed to secular political categories offers a broader range of political thought than his critics' tribal views. Pope Francis puts Christian ethics first, rather than trying to see where Christian ethics will fit in a given political ideology. It's for this reason he can say that communism has stolen the flag of Christianity, and it's his fundamental grounding in faith that will ultimately make his message so powerful. http://theweek.com/article/index/264174/pope-francis-just-expertly-trolled-his-critics

And now for something completely different: a vagina fitness tracker. http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/architecture-design-blog/2014/jul/04/kgoal-fitness-tracker-vagina-pelvic-floor

P.S. Photos of Franken & co. at Twin Cities Pride. http://www.alfranken.com/2014/07/01/photos-team-franken-twin-cities-pride/

PUT CITIZENS UNITED IN THE DUMPSTER OF BAD IDEAS Look, Citizens United was a disaster. The question is, what are we going to do about it? How are we going to stuff this “corporations are people, elections are auctions, democracy is for sale” mess into the Dumpster of Bad Ideas? Here’s how: A constitutional amendment that puts power back in the hands of the people. The actual, human people. Sign below to join me in calling for a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United. PETITION We, the undersigned, have had it. Corporations are not people. Elections should not be auctions. And we refuse to let our democracy be put up for sale. We are standing together to call for a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United. SIGNED, Al Franken & [YOUR NAME HERE] http://www.alfranken.com/landing/w1311cu/?subsource=CK-AF-CU-A06-FB-FBLP.D-FLL-NA-LA12-BO-18p-A101.C5.T5.P1

I can see it!

The tremors were in either the forum software or my Internet connection. Not, regrettably, my mouse-wielding posting hand.

(Sorry for repeat-posting glitch above.)

Please forgive the absence of all standards in the second 10,000 posts. You did the first time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=pLHEIQSb48c

Humanity Surprised It Still Hasn’t Figured Out Better Alternative To Letting Power-Hungry Assholes Decide Everything News • world leaders • News • ISSUE 50•25 • Jun 25, 2014 Billions worldwide agreed that, by this point in human civilization, they would have expected a better process than entrusting all their political, commercial, and social decisions to vindictive, self-absorbed fuckers. NEW YORK—Noting that it has had thousands of years to develop a more agreeable option, humankind expressed bewilderment this week that it has yet to devise a better alternative to governing itself than always letting power-hungry assholes run everything, sources worldwide reported. Individuals in every country on earth voiced their frustration that, in spite of generations of mistreatment, neglect, and abuse they have suffered at the hands of those in positions of authority, they continue to allow control over the world’s governments, businesses, and virtually every other type of organization and social group to fall to the most megalomaniacal pricks among them. “We’ve all seen what this system leads to, so you’d think that by now, someone, somewhere would have sat down and thought up another way to keep our societies functioning without giving all the power to arrogant, amoral dicks whose only concern is improving their own status,” said Mumbai software designer Ankan Rao,%

Humanity Surprised It Still Hasn’t Figured Out Better Alternative To Letting Power-Hungry Assholes Decide Everything News • world leaders • News • ISSUE 50•25 • Jun 25, 2014 Billions worldwide agreed that, by this point in human civilization, they would have expected a better process than entrusting all their political, commercial, and social decisions to vindictive, self-absorbed fuckers. NEW YORK—Noting that it has had thousands of years to develop a more agreeable option, humankind expressed bewilderment this week that it has yet to devise a better alternative to governing itself than always letting power-hungry assholes run everything, sources worldwide reported. Individuals in every country on earth voiced their frustration that, in spite of generations of mistreatment, neglect, and abuse they have suffered at the hands of those in positions of authority, they continue to allow control over the world’s governments, businesses, and virtually every other type of organization and social group to fall to the most megalomaniacal pricks among them. “We’ve all seen what this system leads to, so you’d think that by now, someone, somewhere would have sat down and thought up another way to keep our societies functioning without giving all the power to arrogant, amoral dicks whose only concern is improving their own status,” said Mumbai software designer Ankan Rao, one of 7.1 billion humans who conveyed continued surprise that their species has so far proven incapable of formulating a method of governance that was even slightly more tolerable. “Everybody dislikes the people in charge and everybody knows they’re only serving their own personal agendas at the expense of everyone else, but we just keep allowing these jerks to make our decisions time and time again. And it’s not just here—it’s everywhere in the world.” “Boy, maybe we shouldn’t do that anymore,” Rao added. “Anyone have any better ideas?” Speaking with reporters, citizens across the planet unanimously expressed their bafflement at the consistency with which they either formally or informally select corrupt and self-obsessed sacks of shit for leadership roles in all facets of life, including positions atop corporate boards, judicial and legislative bodies, religious institutions, parent-teacher associations, the military, intramural softball teams, and international and national professional associations, as well as groups of friends deciding where to eat. In addition, sources offered countless examples of the counterproductive and perplexing practice of entrusting power to the world’s least scrupulous individuals, ranging in scale from a domineering dictator who plunges his country into civil war in order to consolidate his power, to a Foot Locker shift manager who forces his subordinates to close up without him so that he can go home early. Moreover, everyone across the planet acknowledged that the tradition of allowing an exploitative asshole to take charge of a given situation has been the principal system for group decision-making from the earliest formation of tribal societies to the present day, an admission that caused each member of the human race to either emit an exasperated sigh, shake his or her head, or mutter a profanity. “My old boss, my sorority president, my congressional representative, my current boss—they’ve all been soulless, backstabbing dickheads whose only concern is getting what they want,” said administrative assistant Sheryl Gittens of Fort Worth, TX, who went on to list the bully back in her seventh grade class, her homeowners association president, and the coordinator of her Bible study group among the legions of selfish jagoffs who have inexplicably been granted commanding roles by the acquiescent masses. “What’s even more annoying is that we essentially reward these people for only thinking of themselves and repeatedly screwing us over. If you stop and think about it, that’s pretty messed up.” “Jesus,” she continued. “What the hell’s wrong with us?” Given the prevalence throughout history of compassionless, two-faced leaders whose lust for control and inflated self-importance have led to disastrous results for society at large, many individuals questioned if, going forward, they should instead try giving power to someone other than a greedy, self-serving bastard. “Maybe we should try letting a kind, responsible person run things for a change,” Cairo resident Nathifa Bakhoum told reporters. “I, for one, don’t want to be told what to do by another narcissist who’s drunk on power and who has absolutely no regard for my well-being. It’s just a thought, but perhaps we could go with a good, decent human next time, or at least someone who’s not a completely egotistical pile of dogshit. That seems like a good thing to try at least once, right? Could we even do that? It’s probably worth a shot.” When pressed for further comment, however, every member of humanity agreed that the current system, though deeply flawed, remains far better than one in which they actually have to make decisions for themselves. http://www.theonion.com/articles/humanity-surprised-it-still-hasnt-figured-out-bett,36361/

When I Need Strength, I Turn To The Bible Or Whatever Else Is Around Commentary • Opinion • religion • ISSUE 50•25 • Jun 24, 2014 By Kathy Crines We all go through tough times in life. Maybe you’re struggling at work and filled with self-doubt, or perhaps the loss of a loved one has left you wondering if you’re strong enough to carry on. In those dark hours, it’s easy to fall victim to feelings of helplessness. But, fortunately, there’s hope, and it’s as close as your bookshelf. I’ve found that when I need strength, I can always turn to the Bible or anything else that’s handy. Several years ago, I was diagnosed with cancer. During my long battle to get well, I often took comfort in the Good Book or whatever other book was nearby. When chemotherapy left me too exhausted to even get out of bed, I would find myself picking up the Bible, if that’s what happened to be on my nightstand, and reading a favorite verse or two. But if there happened to be a copy of The Hunger Games there instead, a couple of chapters of that would also do the trick. God is our strength, we read in Psalm 18, and as powerless as I felt during those agonizing months, I discovered courage in His wisdom when it was within arm’s reach, just as I did with Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers and David Baldacci’s thriller Stone Cold. Throughout my life, in fact, the Bible or some other reading material has been there when I needed it most. When I lost my job and worried about how I was going to scrape together next month’s rent in the middle of a brutal recession, I often relied on the Bible, A Tale Of Two Cities, In Cold Blood, The Audacity Of Hope, The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Seabiscuit, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, a pocket road atlas of the Great Lakes region, The Oxford Companion To Ships And The Sea, or Fodor’s Montréal And Québec City 2009. Anything lying around, to be honest. Whenever I’ve felt stretched to my breaking point, I’ve found solace in turning to the New Testament, or just turning my head a bit until my gaze fell upon the framed cross-stitch on my wall that reads “Bless This Mess.” Or any calendar. I distinctly remember one moment during my divorce. I’d just been sitting in my room all day with the shades drawn, crying and wondering if I’d be spending the rest of my life unloved and alone—if I died right there, who would even know? But in those bleakest hours, I was lifted from despair by my Bible and my 2006 Ford Focus owner’s handbook. According to Scripture, “the Lord your God is with you wherever you go” (Joshua 1:9), and according to my car’s manual: “The defroster turns off automatically after 14 minutes or when the ignition is turned to the OFF position. To manually turn off the defroster before 14 minutes have passed, push the control again.” It’s hard to think of words more comforting than those. We all wish there was no pain in life. But at least I know the ingredients list on a box of Grape-Nuts, the word of God, or anything at all written on someone’s T-shirt are there for me. I am so, so grateful that I can find peace any time I need it by writing a phone number or drawing a little star on the back of my hand and looking at it, or just by staring at the asphalt on my driveway. Yes, our demons rise up again and again, but we can answer them just as often by turning to the Bible or running a blender for hours on end until the motor burns out or throwing old clothes and hats into a river or doing anything else, without exception. Try it, whatever it may be, and you might find an inner peace you’ve never felt before. http://www.theonion.com/articles/when-i-need-strength-i-turn-to-the-bible-or-whatev,36351/

11 words that are much older than you think The 'recency illusion' makes us believe words and phrases we've just noticed are new. But it isn't always the case David Shariatmadari theguardian.com, Tuesday 1 July 2014 05.30 EDT Charles Dickens' manuscript of Great Expectations. The verb 'to hang out' appears in the novelist's work. Photograph: Cambridge University Press Sometimes it feels like we must be the snarkiest, slangiest, least-formal generation in human history. What other age could have coined the word chugger, invented ROFL and its many permutations, or seen vocal fry ripple out from Kim Kardashian in an unstoppable wave? This idea fits snugly next to that familiar prejudice about language: that it's gradually deteriorating. And it is part of a broader cognitive bias that leads us to extrapolate from our own experience in order to make theories about the world. The linguist Arnold Zwicky has labelled it the "recency illusion" – "the belief that things YOU have noticed only recently are in fact recent" (my italics). Thankfully, there's a big chunk of actual data on the history of English to check our assumptions against: it's called literature. It doesn't necessarily reflect the way people spoke, but it sheds light on the lexicon of the literate classes. The lack of a word doesn't tell us it was never used, but the occurrence of one strongly suggests it was. In any case, hidden amongst the mass of written records of English are some real surprises. (Some of the examples that follow are taken from this Metafilter thread.) HighAs in intoxicated by drugs. It must be from the 1960s – the era of psychedelia, right? In fact, being "high – under the influence of a narcotic" appears in an edition of the Baltimore Evening Sun from 1932. And when we confine ourselves to booze, we find the usage goes back much further. In 1627 Thomas May wrote "He's high with wine". BoozeSpeaking of which, booze meant "potable liquid" at least as far back as the 1730s, as in the phrase "peck and booz" for meat and drink. In terms of alcohol, the earliest reference found by lexicographers working on the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is Hotten's 1859 compendium of slang. And a Daily Telegraph court report from 1895 goes as follows: "Mr Willis: 'She heard some men shout that they wanted some more booze.' Mr Justice Wright: 'What?' Mr Willis: 'Booze my lord, drink.' Mr Justice Wright: 'Ah!'" Not!Stick this at the end of a statement to negate everything that went before it. "I'm really looking forward to spending time with my great aunt Iris. Not!". Ask anyone who was a teenager during the 1990s how this caught on and they'll probably refer you to the film Wayne's World. But in the 1860 novel The Mill on the Floss there's a very similar construction. "She would make a sweet, strange, troublesome, adorable wife to some man or other, but he would never have chosen her himself. Did she feel as he did? He hoped she did—not." The OED records several further instances. Hang outThe verb hang out, meaning to spend time or live, is attested in this 1811 "dictionary of Buckish Slang". "The traps scavey where we hang out" means "The officers know where we live". In Dickens' Pickwick Papers, from 1836, a character asks: "I say old boy, where do you hang out?". CribThe use of this word to denote a dwelling place – linked in many people's minds with African-American slang, particularly hip-hop subculture – has a long pedigree. The OED describes it as meaning "a small habitation, cabin, hovel; a narrow room." In this last sense, Shakespeare has King Henry IV ask "Why rather, sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs, Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee ... Than in the perfumed chambers of the great?" BabeThe OED has found babe – as in sexually attractive female – back in 1915. The American Dialect Society's journal of that year records the phrase "She's some babe". DoableTo me, at least, this sounds like office speak. "Is this doable before close of play today?" an email might demand. But it's a surprisingly ancient coinage. Bishop Reginald Pecock writes in 1449 of "a lawe ... which is doable and not oonli knoweable". Cotgrave's 1611 French-English dictionary translates faisable as "doeable, effectable". LegitThe abbreviation of legitimate has a modern ring to it. Ex-cons in TV crime dramas struggle to go "legit" after they've served their time. But precisely this use is attested as far back as 1897, in the US National Police Gazette: "Bob is envious of Corbett's success as a 'legit'," it tells us. Sexed-upThe use of this phrase, which has a very recent flavour because of the saga of the September dossier, published in the run-up to the Iraq invasion of 2003, has plenty of precedents in printed material more than 70 years old. OMGOK, it's not a word, exactly. But a joke in a letter to Winston Churchill may well have given the world its first taste of OMG – an exclamation so ubiquitous on the internet, and now even in speech, that it must be about to fall out of fashion. Given its practical, space-saving nature, who's to say there aren't thousands more private instances of early OMG out there? UnfriendThis may be cheating. Unfriend, as used by Thomas Fuller in 1659 (He wrote: "I Hope, Sir, that we are not mutually Un-friended by this Difference which hath happened betwixt us") clearly does not refer to the act of removing someone from one's list of Facebook acquaintances. It does, however, mean the severing of a friendship – so maps quite closely onto Mark Zuckerberg's word. It's hardly a coincidence that they both chose the same construction, given the flexibility of the "un-" prefix. Just goes to show, there's nothing new under the sun. So why do we always fall for the idea that there is – and why does the recency illusion (a form of inductive reasoning) hold such sway, in language as elsewhere in life? This is probably down to the fact that it was very useful, from an evolutionary point of view, to be able to construct models of the world based on our individual experience of it. For example, not hunting on the side of the mountain where you were once bitten by a hyena could save your life. But what if the hyena attack was a freak occurrence, and the odds of it happening again extremely small? Personal encounters aren't always the best guide. Now we have data, historical accounts, advice from the past and from our peers. We don't need to rely on gut feeling to tell us whether something's true about the world. When we do so, we're often wrong. http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jul/01/words-much-older-than-you-think-language

Where Will the Slippery Slope of ‘Hobby Lobby’ End? There’s no telling how far religious exemptions will go under Justice Alito’s ruling. Katha Pollitt July 2, 2014 | This article appeared in the July 21-28, 2014 edition of The Nation. Facts are stubborn things, as John Adams famously said. Unless, that is, you’re talking about religion. Then facts don’t seem to matter at all: right you are if you think you are. The Hobby Lobby case was billed as a test of religious freedom versus the power of the state: Did the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) mean that David Green, the evangelical Christian CEO of a chain of crafts stores, could be exempt from providing coverage for the full range of contraceptives for his employees under the Affordable Care Act? Green balked at including Plan B, Ella (another form of emergency contraception) and two kinds of IUD, because, he claimed, they caused “abortion” by preventing the implantation of a fertilized egg. The Court’s 5-to-4 decision—which featured all three women justices ruling for the workers, and all five Catholic men ruling for the corporation—was wrong in many ways. But the thing I really don’t understand is why it didn’t matter that preventing implantation is not “abortion,” according to the accepted medical definition of the term. And even if it was, Plan B, Ella and the IUDs don’t work that way, with the possible exception of one form of IUD when inserted as emergency contraception. As an amicus brief from a long list of prestigious medical organizations and researchers laid out at length, studies show that emergency contraception and the IUD prevent fertilization, not implantation. They are not “abortifacients,” even under the anti-choicers’ peculiar definition of abortion. (Green is actually more moderate than some anti-choicers, who include hormonal contraception, aka “baby pesticide,” as abortion.) Why doesn’t it matter that there is no scientific evidence for Green’s position? When did Jesus become an Ob/Gyn? For five members of the Supreme Court to accept a canard that happens to accord with their oft-expressed anti-choice views suggests that their sympathies from the outset lay with the anti-choice CEO and not his women employees. What about those workers’ religious freedom? The decision means that the government cannot compel a CEO to violate his religious beliefs, but a CEO can violate the religious beliefs of his workers. How is that fair? But then, it was a bad day all around at the Court for women and workers. In Harris v. Quinn, the same five justices ruled that home health aides, even when paid by Medicaid, are only “quasi public” employees, which means that those who refuse to join a union don’t have to share in the costs, even though all workers will benefit from union victories. Ninety percent of these aides are women, whose ability to bargain collectively will now be significantly weakened. Where will it all end? “It is not for us to say that their religious beliefs are mistaken or insubstantial,” Justice Alito writes. There is no limit to religious requirements and restrictions in our land of a thousand “faiths.” Several companies have already filed cases that object to all forms of contraception, not just the four singled out by Hobby Lobby, and the day after the decision the Court clarified that its ruling applied to all methods. And why draw the line on legal exemptions at religion anyway? Plenty of foolish parents now risk their children’s lives and the public’s health because they reject vaccines on “philosophical” grounds. What happens when Aristotle, the CEO, claims that birth control—or psychotherapy or organ transplants—goes against his “philosophy”? Justice Alito’s opinion is canny. Slippery slope? No problem: “our decision in these cases is concerned solely with the contraceptive mandate. Our decision should not be understood to hold that an insurance-coverage mandate must necessarily fall if it conflicts with an employer’s religious beliefs.” He specifically mentions vaccines, blood transfusions and protection from racial discrimination as being in no danger, but he gives no argument about why Hobby Lobby’s logic would never apply. In other words, birth control is just different. Of course, it’s about women. Anyone could need a blood transfusion, after all, even Alito himself. And it’s about powerful Christian denominations, too, to which this Court slavishly defers—for example, in the recent decision finding no discrimination in the Christian prayers that routinely open town council meetings in Greece, New York. As Ruth Bader Ginsburg argues in her stirring dissent, there’s “little doubt that RFRA claims will proliferate, for the Court’s expansive notion of corporate personhood—combined with its other errors in construing RFRA—invites for-profit entities to seek religion-based exemptions from regulations they deem offensive to their faith.” The reason it’s unlikely the Supreme Court would uphold a religious exemption for vaccinations or blood transfusions is not something intrinsic to those claims; it’s simply that Alito finds them weird. Birth control is banned by the Bible? Sure. Blood transfusions are banned by the Bible? Don’t be silly. For now. We have no idea, really, how far the Court might be willing to extend RFRA. Could a CEO refuse to pay childbirth costs for unmarried women? Could he pay married men more because that’s what the Lord wants? (Actually, he’s probably already doing that.) But here’s my prediction: the day a religious exemption burdens by so much as a mouse’s whisker the right of men to protect their own bodies from unwanted, well, anything, is the day the Supreme Court Five discover that religion is not so deserving of deference after all. It would be nice to think this ruling, which applies only to “closely held corporations,” will affect few women. Unfortunately, these are not just sweet little family businesses. As Ginsburg noted, some are huge—Dell, Cargill, Mars. Altogether, they employ some 52 percent of the workforce. True, most either offer contraception coverage already or are exempt because they employ fewer than fifty workers, but who’s to say what the future holds? Companies change hands, CEOs find Jesus—or Allah or Thoth or L. Ron Hubbard. It’s not reassuring that a CEO’s views of a fertilized egg get deference today, but workers’ contraceptive coverage is left to the fates. http://www.thenation.com/article/180499/where-will-slippery-slope-hobby-lobby-end