Wednesday’s Forum
Steven L. Taylor
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Wednesday, June 21, 2023
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52 comments
About Steven L. Taylor
Steven L. Taylor is a Professor of Political Science and a College of Arts and Sciences Dean. His main areas of expertise include parties, elections, and the institutional design of democracies. His most recent book is the co-authored
A Different Democracy: American Government in a 31-Country Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his BA from the University of California, Irvine. He has been blogging since 2003 (originally at the now defunct Poliblog).
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The Florida headline of the day- Florida woman leaves inheritance, Tampa estate to 7 Persian cats
Ugh:
Sounds like a pretty good idea to me.
Your point is? Making sure your sub is “constructed and inspected to accepted standards” does not preclude them from holding themselves to even higher standards.
Where have we heard that BS before? How often?
The only redeeming fact about this whole meshugas is that “Stockton Rush, the chief executive and founder of OceanGate – creator of Titan – is among those missing.” He bore the life and death risks too.
Macron and world leaders call on private finance to help reduce global poverty
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA….. When pigs fly.
@OzarkHillbilly: Thankfully, our Libertarian friends have assured me that this is not a concern because the invisible hand of the market will sort out that the company has dangerous practices and nobody will use them going forward.
The headline of the day- Restaurant hired fake priest to extract ‘confessions’ from workers, feds say
Whaddya expect from a libtard pedo Obama judge? s//
Elmo has decided that “cisgender” is a slur and that using it on Twitter is grounds for suspension. Actual slurs for trans people are allowed though because freeze peach.
Happy Summer Solstice!
@OzarkHillbilly:
I read the opinion. It is a brutal takedown of the State of Arkansas. It is methodical about the parties and evidence. It’ll be hard to overturn on appeal without being nakedly transphobic. One of my favorite paragraphs:
I cried when I got to that one.
Another issue for these states is that they keep selecting the same “experts” who throughly discredit themselves.
And
I wonder why.
You might ask where did they find these bigots?
Oops.
@OzarkHillbilly:
Heh. What were MAGA’s thoughts on the Trump judge who struck down Tennessee’s drag ban as an unconstitutional goverment attack on free speech?
@Beth:
It’s a special kind of lie to give an organization a name that describes the polar opposite of the organization’s actual purpose.
Do the people opposed to genital modification surgery of children have a position on circumcision? For some the procedure is an emblem of the covenant earned by our forefather Abraham. However, for the vast majority of Americans it is simply a cosmetic procedure. Do we allow cosmetic genital surgeries for infants?
If you can’t tell, I do have PTSD from my circ.
@CSK:..Happy Summer Solstice!
Summer
War
My time of year
From Rolling Stone, via Raw Story:
http://www.rawstory.com/donald-trump-thought-he-crushed-it/
Donald thought he triumphed over Baier in that Fox interview. His attorneys think otherwise.
I get the sense that Twitter is becoming more and more irrelevant though I must admit I cancelled my account in Jan 22. But I just listened to this author on a podcast and can’t help feeling a little schadenfreude.
Will Elon Lose Control of Twitter?
Given the amount of wealth Musk has, maybe he just doesn’t care. Which is an argument for rigorous wealth taxes.
I listened to this podcast this morning. From the NYT “The Daily”.
The Re-Militarization of Germany
A couple of facts I didn’t know about:
– Germany just published its 1st National Security Strategy since WWII.
– It’s first donation to Ukraine was just 5000 helmets
– It is now the second largest donor (in absolute terms) after the US
– Basically just doubled it military budget
– Weaned off Russian gas
Another consequence of Putin’s utter failure.
@CSK:
https://twitter.com/neal_katyal/status/1670980935783727107
From beyond the blue line, he shoots…he scores!
@Beth: And here I thought they found them swimming around the local sewage pond.
@DK: What? That f’n RINO??? Ya know, he wears those robes because he’s just a closet drag queen. S//
@Flat Earth Luddite:
Smith must be rubbing his hands with glee.
http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2023/06/donald-trump-classified-documents-excuses
@OzarkHillbilly:
While I applaud the results in Arkansas, it should be noted that this is not the first ruling to overturn such a ban, as The Guardian and others claim.
The ACLU of Indiana beat them to the punch by about 5 days: https://www.losangelesblade.com/2023/06/20/trump-judge-blocks-indiana-trans-ban/
ETA: Ah, I see the distinction they are making. This is a full judgement past the TRO stage. My apologies for my mistake.
I do not apologize for taking the opportunity to brag about my office, though.
Lauren Boebert says she’s being directed by God to impeach Biden.
@CSK: She can join these guys…
@MarkedMan:
Boebert may actually believe she’s on a mission from God.
PLUS: Marjorie Taylor Greene is mad at Boebert for stealing her impeachment idea.
@Mister Bluster: Don’t forget Sly and the Family Stone’s Hot Fun in the Summertime. Great bands, just heard War’s Cisco Kid was a Friend of Mine on my community fm station yesterday, lots of memories.
@CSK: Yosemite Samantha (Boebert) is getting quite a bit of bad editorial press here in her Western Slope district. When you’re getting jabbed by citizens in Mesa County you are in deep caca.
Thought this was an interesting quote from an article in The Atlantic. The topic was thinking of internet disinformation as a public health rather than a technological issue, but this factoid about the 19th century cholera outbreaks in London seems to speak to our current trumpish anti-maskers screaming at poor county health officials at town halls:
🙂 🙂 🙂
@Mr. Prosser:
Well, her various sordid family scandals don’t help much, do they?
https://www.bustle.com/wellness/is-therapy-speak-making-us-selfish
The article is a little old and from the sounds of it, already made the rounds on the internet. But I heard the author on a podcast and found her take fascinating. While I think she chose some pretty extreme examples for the piece, I definitely do see how “therapy speak” dramatically shifts the way in which interactions, conversations, and relationships are impacted by it’s usage and agree with the conclusions Fishbein offers.
I would even say that I see the 2nd generation of this with my students as many of them are absorbing and adopting this mindset from their parents. Some of that is just kids being kids — which perhaps speaks to the challenges presented from the use/thinking behind “therapy speak” — but having it so strongly affirmed definitely means I have to manage their social interactions differently.
@Stormy Dragon:
I admit I’m having trouble keeping up with Musk’s rationale on how he thinks the platform is supposed to be moderated. He has said in the past that he will allow anything as long as it isn’t illegal. Of course that was always pure horseshit. Even if he sincerely believed in such a principle, it would be totally unworkable–for a variety of reasons. But I was under the impression he had dropped the platform’s policy against slurs. Like it or not, slurs are legal in the United States. That can get to be a blurry line when it comes to harassment, but most of the time Americans are pretty much able to use slurs to their liking. There can be consequences–you could be fired from a job–but you won’t get arrested for it.
And indeed, it was reported late last year that ever since Musk’s takeover of Twitter, incidences of the N-word on the platform had increased 500%.
But reading about the recent “cisgender” fiasco, it seems Twitter still has an official policy against the use of slurs. It never got rid of it, it just “interpreted” it in Elon’s preferred way. Which means in effect, use it as a pretext to kick off people he doesn’t like while claiming to be a free speech warrior. But we knew that already.
Summertime
Ella Fitzgerald
1968
@Mister Bluster:
Wonderful.
Encore!
Donald Trump to Bret Baier: “Those weren’t documents; they were papers.”
The more this Trump thing drags on, the more sure I get of my hunch that the real reason Trump tried to get away with keeping the documents is that some had already gone missing, and he knew it. I don’t have a hunch on whether he knew because he gave or traded them to someone, or because he noticed something missing.
@CSK:
“Those weren’t documents; they were my precious.”
What’s more newsworthy, the missing submarine or hundreds of dead migrants?
https://newrepublic.com/article/173808/media-cares-titanic-sub-drowned-migrants
@dazedandconfused:
That’s about what Trump sounds like now.
Newsworthy
@Mikey:
FOX News? Club for Growth? Americans for Prosperity?
My goodness. According to Mediaite, Marge Taylor Greene called Lauren Boebert “a little bitch” on the House floor today.
Cat fight.
@CSK:
Something even weirder from the RWNJ-o-sphere.
She paid $100,000 for McCarthy’s used Chapstick.
@CSK: Interestingly the family stuff (divorce and a child fathered by her 18 yoa son and possible physical abuse of another son) aren’t brought up in the complaints, mostly it’s the fact she isn’t doing a damn thing for the district.
@dazedandconfused:
Yeah, I heard. That is seriously weird.
@Mr. Prosser:
Squawking loudly about God ‘n’ guns only takes you so far, I suppose.
@gVOR10: Moms For Liberty too. All lies in name form.
Geene called for decorum and the reaction was fun.
Of all the people to hand the gavel to…
Note to Disney: kid who can turn into fire? Cool. Kid who is literal fire? Um. . . .Adult who is literally fire. . . in a romance with another adult who is literally water? Seriously? This made it past how many people? And they’re surprised it flopped?
Hey, kid, wouldja like to see a movie about a romance between two elements? No?
@Michael Reynolds:
In the meantime my daughter has discovered the “Hotel Transylvania” series and watched it roughly a billion times. I hate it so much.
@Kingdaddy: There’s a billionaire or three on the sub — can’t they just pull themselves up by their bootstraps?
@Michael Reynolds: Given that Disney had a movie about a guy who wants to fuck half a fish that was popular enough they are remaking it… I think it’s a matter of how well a story is told, rather than what the initial concept is.
They can’t all be “trash bot falls in love,” “crazy cat lady but with dogs,” “drugged woman gets kissed against her will,” or “2001, but for children”.
@Gustopher: I only have one thumb’s up to give, but I’d give 40 more for that comment to @Kingdaddy. 😉
The Tik Tok Kids are wondering if canned CEO tastes better at 12,000 ft under sea level…….
@Gustopher:
Man and mermaid sex can get complicated.