Archive for December, 2011
This is intended to enrage you. (Part 4)
Friday, December 9th, 2011Texas Law.
Friday, December 9th, 2011Lawrence is on top of the UT Law School dean resignation story, but there’s one aspect of this story that troubles me.
From the Statesman:
Mmmmmkay. The Statesman goes on to quote officials with the Law School as saying that “Every member of the faculty with a named professorship or chair gets summer support and/or a salary supplement from the foundation,” and “Sometimes we help people with mortgage loans and things of that sort.” How many people does this amount to? And where does the foundation get funds?
But here’s the thing that makes me go “Hmmmmm”:
Settlements?
So was the Law School underpaying people and engaging in discriminatory behavior (or at least, giving people reason to believe such a thing was going on)? And were they using money from this fund to pay off people who otherwise would have sued? Because that’s sure the implication I get from the word “settlement”; that this money was going to folks who otherwise would have gone to court.
If my reading of this isn’t too far off base, it strikes me as being even sleazier than the forgivable $500,000 loan to the dean.
Mumia.
Thursday, December 8th, 2011I’ve been following the case of Officer Daniel Faulkner for years.
I believe, along with such notoriously conservative sources as Vanity Fair and Salon, that Mumia Abu-Jamal killed Officer Faulkner. I believe that anyone who maintains otherwise, in the face of all the evidence against Abu-Jamal, is delusional. I can respect the people who said “Mumia Abu-Jamal shouldn’t be executed because nobody should be executed.” I understand that position, and respect the intellectual consistency of it. I can’t respect anyone who says “Mumia Abu-Jamal shouldn’t be executed because he should be walking around free because he didn’t do the crime.” The evidence is too overwhelming.
The district attorney in Philadelphia has decided that he’s not going to seek a new sentencing hearing for Abu-Jamal. He will remain in prison for the rest of his life, instead of being executed for killing Officer Faulkner.
I’m torn by this. I believe Abu-Jamal deserves to be executed. I know I’ve threatened to write a longer post about my views on the death penalty (and I will do that some day). People I respect a great deal argue against the death penalty. I’ve given a lot of thought to their arguments, and I’ll admit I’m about 51% in favor, 49% against.
What it comes down to for me is that I believe some people do things so awful to other people that they deserve to die. I believe Ted Bundy deserved to die. I believe Ronald Clark O’Bryan deserved to die. And I think Abu-Jamal deserves to die.
But Officer Faulkner’s widow supports the decision not to pursue the death penalty again. Good enough for me. May Abu-Jamal vanish back into well deserved obscurity, and may he die alone, unmourned and unloved.
This is intended to enrage you. (#3 in a series)
Thursday, December 8th, 2011Ice, ice, baby.
Wednesday, December 7th, 2011Since I have been slightly involved with the profession, I am compelled to call attention to Popehat’s post about Homeland Security funds being used to purchase snow-cone machines. (Edited to add: Just to clarify, that is the snow cone/shaved ice profession, not the Homeland Security profession.)
There are several things that bother me about the coverage of this:
- “…the snow cone machines can make ice to prevent heat-related illnesses during emergencies”. No. Snow cone and shaved ice machines do not “make ice”, at least in the sense of producing it from liquid water. These machines require a supply of ice, generally in blocks.
- Are they snow cone machines or shaved ice machines? The article linked from Popehat uses both terms. But there is a difference: snow cones are generally composed of larger ice particles, and are a little more grainy. Shaved ices are composed of finer ice particles, closer to snow in texture, and are generally smoother.
Obit watch: December 7, 2011.
Wednesday, December 7th, 2011Harry Morgan. (Edited to add: LAT obit.)
Most of the obits I’ve seen so far reference his work on “M*A*S*H” right away, but I prefer to remember him in his other famous role.
Edited to add: As Lawrence points out in the comments, Morgan also had one heck of a film career. In that vein, I’d like to spotlight Sean O’Neal’s obit at the Onion A/V Club site.
I’ve noted that the A/V Club obits, especially those written by O’Neal, do a very good job of summarizing the accomplishments of the people they are eulogizing (especially older Hollywood figures) and explaining why their lives mattered, without snark.
Always be sure of your target and what is behind it.
Wednesday, December 7th, 2011Hmmmmm hmmmmm hmmmmm. A “reality television” show. I wonder what show that could be. Actually, I don’t wonder: I took a guess as soon as I saw the headline. Anyone want to play along? I’ll put this behind a jump…
TMQ watch update.
Tuesday, December 6th, 2011Mike the Musicologist pinged me while I was at dinner, and we had a pleasant conversation about a couple of items in this week’s TMQ watch.
Unfortunately, this conversation took place through text messages, which means that we had limited space to discuss our views. (MtM: “What?! There’s thoughts that can’t be contained in a tweet?! My world is shattered.”)
(There may have been some sarcasm there.)
(Also, I am starting to think that MtM is the Random Eddie to my TJIC. Except with fewer burritos, because he doesn’t come up here often enough.)
Anyway, point 1: MtM questions the “ever since” in “there’s no good New York style deli in Austin, ever since Katz’s closed”. I say: I never had a bad meal at Katz’s. MtM says: he did, where “bad” = “did not stay down”. I say: Yeah, I can understand your position. Meals that do not stay down generally put me off a restaurant for life. Also, it is probably fair to say “New York style”: Katz’s probably wasn’t a true NY deli, but more like a close approximation for Austin. (I say “probably” because I haven’t been to NYC in 20 years, and didn’t eat in any delis while I was there.)
Point the second: MtM argues that Easterbrook, in his “Golden Age of News” item, confuses “access” (or arguably “quantity”) with “quality”. Just because we have more access to news, is that a good thing, when “news” consists of “who won this year’s glorified karaoke competition”?
I think this is a fair point to bring up, but at the same time it raises some slippery questions. Was the New York Times of 1933 a higher quality newspaper than the NYT of 1958? Was the NYT of 1958 a better paper than the NYT of 2003? How do you judge the quality of a newspaper in an objective fashion?
I wouldn’t be so quick to say “Well, the people of 1933/1958 were much less obsessed with trivia like sports and entertainment than the people of today.” Are you sure of that? There was certainly a market for Confidential magazine, to take one example. How much difference do you think there is between the old Confidential and TMZ? Even if you want to go back to the 1930s, try reading Only Yesterday and Since Yesterday: one of the big things I took away from both books is that the people of the 1920s and 1930s were just as obsessed with the things we consider “trivial” today as we are now. The difference is, other than contemporary observers like Fredrick Lewis Allen who were writing things down as they happened, most folks have forgotten the trivia.
I’m rambling a bit here. I bring this up because I think it might provoke a worthwhile discussion, and MtM doesn’t really like posting in my comments section. So have at it, folks.
Motorola Galaxy Optimus Prime Plus XT
Tuesday, December 6th, 2011You want to make sure to get the XT model, not the regular Prime Plus.
Seriously, this kicked over our giggle box: the Android Phone Name Generator.
(Admit it: you thought for a second that the “Galaxy Optimus Prime Plus XT” was real.)
(Hattip: Mr. Vodka soaked himself.)
TMQ watch: December 6, 2011.
Tuesday, December 6th, 2011“What’s the secret of Packers’ success?”
Here at WCD, we believe the secret of the Packers’ success is…cheese. We are firm believers in the awesome power of cheese. No holiday for us is complete without a port wine cheese ball, one of the traditional foods of our people. It fills us with delight that our neighborhood grocer is selling gourmet cheese balls. A favorite quick and dirty appetizer in the circles we move in is: take a block of cream cheese, pour a nice sauce over it (something like this Raspberry Chipolte Sauce
Where were we? Oh, yeah. The Packers. And this week’s TMQ after the jump…
Random crap from the NYT some people might find amusing.
Tuesday, December 6th, 2011Hmmmmmm. What do you suppose is the difference between Vermont and…other states?
Part 3 of the Derek Boogaard series.
You’ll shoot your eye out, kid! But at least when you do, it will be set to music!
A lot like Christmas watch.
Monday, December 5th, 2011I was doing some Christmas shopping over at ThinkGeek, and stumbled across an item I had not seen before: the make your own Pruno kit.
Yes, they don’t promote it that way, but isn’t that really what the product is?
How long before we see the ThinkGeek “Make your own AR-15 lower” kit?
(No, I didn’t order one. No, I’m not asking for one for Christmas.)
Hit somebody!
Monday, December 5th, 2011I’ve spent most of my life living in Texas.
The current outside temperature is 41 degrees Fahrenheit.
It is hard to develop an appreciation for hockey when the number of sustained below freezing days can be counted on the fingers of both hands. I never have (though I did attend a Houston Aeros game once, and it seems to me that I had a good time).
So I’m probably not the best person to comment on this, but I did want to highlight the NYT series on Derek Boogaard, former NHL enforcer. (Part 1. Part 2. Part 3 to come.)
I haven’t had a chance to fully digest this yet, so I really don’t have anything profound to say. But it does look like this is worth reading.
Your loser update: week 13, 2011.
Sunday, December 4th, 2011NFL teams that still have a chance to go 0-16:
Indianapolis
Bonnie and Clyde: The Musical!
Friday, December 2nd, 2011I just spent the better part of the past month immersed in the 1933-1935 gang rampages (Bonnie and Clyde, Dillinger, “Machine Gun” Kelly, “Pretty Boy” Floyd, “Baby Face” Nelson, and Barker/Karpis), so I got a kick out of this.
I note that the credits list “Ted Hinton” but not Frank Hamer. Makes you go “Hmmmm”, it does. I also would be curious to see how they stage the ambush scene; but not curious enough to go to New York and pay for a ticket.
Edited to add: From the great Terry Teachout: “It is, however, quite sufficiently bad enough to qualify for the finals of this year’s What-Were-They-Thinking Prize.“