And afternoon open thread. more...

Posted by: rdbrewer at 09:17 AM | Comments (162)
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Yesterday's #Gosnell tweet of the day, IMNSFHO (from a Moronette and young mom of a beautiful little boy):

That's pretty much it, right? When you boil off the bullshit, this isn't a "national story" because the left views the victims as expendable. Yet they're the "compassionate" and "caring" ones ... my ass.

Posted by: andy at 03:22 AM | Comments (541)
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I'd recommend it, maybe strongly. Depends on you.

I've had for a month now. I got mine at Costco -- $150 for a package deal, including an in-tank water filter, 60 K-Cups, and My K-Cups filter. I believe this is called the Platinum Plus package. Internal model number is the B70 series (though the actual number may vary-- I've seen B75's, B78's that all seemed to be the same basic thing).

A minor consumer purchase like this can't really have any big effect on your life. However, within the tiny little sliver of possible life-outcomes that a coffee maker could conceivably influence, it's changed it for the better.

It's a costly purchase, of course. Not only is it $150 for the machine, but the K-Cups themselves -- pre-filled plastic coffee cups that you load into the machine to make a single cup of coffee -- are a lot more expensive than plain old coffee grounds, because you're paying manufacturing costs. You can just use the My K-Cups filter for your own coffee, and that's as cheap regular coffee.

But then you don't have the complete convenience of just popping in a K-Cup and hitting the button. (Sometimes I pre-fill the My K-Cups with coffee and stick it in the machine the night before, so I can just hit the button in the morning.)

A big factor in whether or not this makes sense is that this is a Single Cup maker. Single Cup brewing makes sense if you're having a couple of cups, or if a couple of people are drinking coffee but one is drinking decaf. It makes less sense for a couple who drinks a lot of coffee, or someone who drinks a pot all by himself. However, honestly, you can just make one cup after another easily enough. But you will lose some of the convenience factor there.

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Posted by: Ace at 05:20 PM | Comments (394)
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Okay, so this is an inducement onto a property and a conspiracy to commit assault and then an assault.

But, it's still sort of... well, it's funny.

This huge fat gay guy comes out shouting something like "I am Leviathan."

I don't want to encourage it, but these guys have done a lot of provocation of their own-- "protesting" funerals of slain soldiers, for God's sake.

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Posted by: Ace at 03:11 PM | Comments (385)
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Delivered in the form of a funformation crossword puzzle, but obviously there was a lesson attached to it.

Varebrook said she doesnÂ’t believe her daughterÂ’s teacher is the problem, but rather the curriculum sheÂ’s forced to teach.

“I don’t think her teacher is a radical indoctrinator, it’s the curriculum,” she said. “It’s not factual. Every piece of homework I’ve seen paints conservatism in a negative light.

“I can only imagine what high school is going to bring.”

On the back side of the crossword puzzle was a political survey students were required to fill out to identify their beliefs, something Varebrook believes is equally troubling.

The company says it will stop producing this "Liberalism vs. Conservatism" lesson, claiming, as usual, dogs ate their homework.

“Although we are careful to screen the quality of our products, we are not always able to identify the problems seen in Liberalism vs. Conservatism,” Cerebellum President James Rena said in a statement sent to EAGnews.

“As a company we believe in balance. This product is clearly skewed and we find that unacceptable and counter to our culture. We sincerely apologize for this mistake and will rectify it by immediately discontinuing the product,” he said.

Ah, "balance."

Posted by: Ace at 02:36 PM | Comments (142)
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Eh, can we do a silly post?

Geri Halliwell tweeted her admiration for Margaret Thatcher upon her death, and was subject to a withering barrage of very stupid low-rent attacks, the majority of which deployed the c-word.

She took the tweet down and apologized for giving offense.

I can't believe I'm saying this, but Ginger/Sexy Spice is actually doing something of character: she's publicly criticizing herself for cowardice in taking the tweet down, and for not having the iron that Thatcher did.

I realised the best thing to do was to shut up and really get honest with myself. What I hated the most was that I took a tweet down. I had wavered and was full of self-doubt.

I so I asked myself over the last 3 days – why I did I do it? Why did I take that tweet down?

These are my conclusionsÂ…

I. I was so afraid of upsetting people, and not being liked for saying something that was not to everyoneÂ’s taste.

2. Also, I suddenly thought given the adverse reaction, did I even really know enough about Margaret Thatcher? Was I just trying to be relevant? She had obviously upset a lot of people.

3. But now I realise that I do admire a woman, whether she is right or wrong, regardless of her opinions. She had the courage to stand by her convictions. Not like me. I look at my behavior, which exposed how weak I was under fire, not like Margaret Thatcher. Rest in peace.

Who criticizes himself anymore? The New Wisdom is that we're all Special Little Snowflakes whose poopies don't smell and who never make any mistakes at all in life. It's so out-of-fashion to find fault with oneself anymore.

Adam Carola talked about this again recently: as far as unabashed narcissism and burbling "I'm good, I'm great!" like a tiny little child, it's Game On in America and all over the world.

(Game On! meaning everyone's now indulging in the childhood game of endless self-validation and no one's saying boo about it. The boil gets no lancing, and disease festers on.)

Posted by: Ace at 02:24 PM | Comments (100)
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From Politico:

Sharyl Attkisson, the Emmy award-winning investigative reporter, is in talks to leave CBS News ahead of contract, POLITICO has learned.

Sources familiar with the situation cite disputes between Attkisson and network executives, including CBS Evening News executive producer Patricia Shevlin, as the cause for the talks, though the specific issues could not be confirmed.

Just for fun, let's take a look at Sharyl's recent highlight reel of investigative journalism.

She took the lead on investigating the Fast & Furious scandal while the rest of the media including her own network, were seemingly uninterested. She was even screamed at by a White House spokesman over her coverage of the story.

She excoriated both the Administration and Hillary Clinton herself over the Benghazi stonewalling. This is something she continues to pursue, while again, the media has lost interest.

Patricia Shevlin, named above as clashing with Attkisson, of course worked for nearly a decade with Dan Rather on CBS's Evening News. I bring that up because I feel like it.

But, this is just me being cynical again. I'm sure this was probably about inaccurate expense reports or something.

Posted by: JohnE. at 01:15 PM | Comments (200)
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Ooh, that's wicked.

It's not really wicked of course. If they're warriors for truth, they have no fears about transparency in their news-spiking decisions.

If.

Posted by: Ace at 01:10 PM | Comments (54)
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Not sure when on the show; he hasn't covered it yet, but he's teased it.

Apparently shaming the media has borne fruit. Tapper is somewhat "easy" in this way; he actually reads criticism of himself, and ergo he is actually susceptible to reason. By actually reading criticism, he can correct himself.

Note though that he says he had already planned on covering the story again; he did cover it once before on his show. But, either way, he's among the most fair journalists so that's why I call him "easy." It's the people who have decided to live entirely within the bubble who are the tough gets.

Let's just state the obvious: National political reporters are, by and large, socially liberal. We are more likely to know a gay couple than to know someone who owns an "assault weapon." We are, generally, pro-choice. Twice, in D.C., I've caused a friend to literally leave a conversation and freeze me out for a day or so because I suggested that the Stupak Amendment and the Hyde Amendment made sense. There is a bubble. Horror stories of abortionists are less likely to permeate that bubble than, say, a story about a right-wing pundit attacking an abortionist who then claims to have gotten death threats.

But now even the archliberal Anderson Cooper has been embarrassed into reporting on a serial killer.

Well, he seems to have found an angle on this that pleases him: The lack of proper state regulation and oversight. Of course. Why didn't I think of that.

But that is in fact a very real serious issue here -- the Grand Jury reported that this lack of oversight was by design, because pro-choice forces pressured state officials to no enforce any law relating to abortion -- so it's at least a fair entry into the story.

Still, it's amusing. Anderson Cooper's entree into the story is through the prism of "not enough government regulation." So perfect.

Posted by: Ace at 12:22 PM | Comments (384)
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I read this piece the other day. On the emptiness of "sexual empowerment," as currently defined, from a Yale senior. "SWUG" stands for "Senior Washed-Up Girl."

It’s confusing to be a young woman right now — especially if you buy into the traditional narrative of American womanhood. Are we supposed to “Lean In” with Sheryl Sandberg or resign ourselves to the fact that “Women Still Can’t Have It All,” per Anne-Marie Slaughter? Even The New York Times is heralding “The End of Courtship,” in a piece my concerned mother emailed to me. I think she wanted me to tell her the Times was wrong — but I realized I couldn’t.

In a survey I conducted of over 100 Yale students, almost all of the single respondents, ambition be damned, said they were currently seeking a relationship involving dating, commitment or, at the very least, monogamous sex. Basically, the types of relationships which just donÂ’t seem to exist for those of us who are senior ladies, outside of the already-coupled.

Only 33 percent of the senior women I surveyed said they were currently feeling “very” or “a lot” of empowerment in their sexual choices and decisions.

Sixty-six percent of that same group of women recalled feeling “very” or “a lot” of empowerment back when they were freshmen.

My senior year is almost over. I’ll soon go to my last sorority formal, my last frat party, my last night at Toad’s. And at the end of those nights I’ll probably be resigned to going home vaguely dissatisfied and very alone — except, of course, for the company of my sympathetic suitemates. When it comes to my love life, I’ll be leaving Yale in not so much a blaze of glory as a blur of disappointment.

Welcome, then, to SWUG life: the slow, wine-filled decline of female sexual empowerment as we live out our college glory days. Welcome to the world of the ladies who have given up on boys because they don’t so much empower as frustrate, satisfy as agitate. Welcome to what “KiKi” likes to call “SWUG nation.”

This is actually the second Ivy-alumna-speaks-an-unpopular-truth story. There was also the Princeton Mom alumna who suggested marrying early:

Forget about having it all, or not having it all, leaning in or leaning out — here’s what you really need to know that nobody is telling you.

For years (decades, really) we have been bombarded with advice on professional advancement, breaking through that glass ceiling and achieving work-life balance. We can figure that out — we are Princeton women. If anyone can overcome professional obstacles, it will be our brilliant, resourceful, very well-educated selves.

...

For most of you, the cornerstone of your future and happiness will be inextricably linked to the man you marry, and you will never again have this concentration of men who are worthy of you.

HereÂ’s what nobody is telling you: Find a husband on campus before you graduate. Yes, I went there.

....

ItÂ’s amazing how forgiving men can be about a womanÂ’s lack of erudition, if she is exceptionally pretty. Smart women canÂ’t (shouldnÂ’t) marry men who arenÂ’t at least their intellectual equal. As Princeton women, we have almost priced ourselves out of the market....

Here is another truth that you know, but nobody is talking about. As freshman women, you have four classes of men to choose from. Every year, you lose the men in the senior class, and you become older than the class of incoming freshman men. So, by the time you are a senior, you basically have only the men in your own class to choose from, and frankly, they now have four classes of women to choose from. Maybe you should have been a little nicer to these guys when you were freshmen?

Let me turn to the first article, and this notion of "empowerment." This is one of the most laughably sad things I've ever heard. It's so laughable the Onion did a piece on it.

Nothing important can come from anything easy. Sorry to break this to everyone.

"Empowerment" is, as I conceive it, important.

How on earth would empowerment derive from the easiest thing in the world, having sex with a guy, who, frankly, is either going to have sex with A) you, or B) someone else, or C) his hand, or D) a pomegranate, if A) and B) both fail and he's feeling a little carpel tunnel which precludes C) or maybe is looking for a little Fruit Strange?

When teenagers want to "be adults," what do they do? They smoke cigarettes, they drink booze, they have sex they think they're old enough for but actually, on a maturity level, are not.

They do, in short, Easy, fun things. Does this make them adults? Of course not. They're not doing the difficult things of adulthood -- working full-time, paying their own way, and paying for others to whom they have responsibility. They're doing the easy things.

It's a cargo cult sort of things: Adults do these things, so doing these things make me an adult.

They're merely badges of adulthood, but not adulthood itself. Not actual maturity and sophistication, but little petty false signifiers of it.

This also applies to the notion of "empowerment," which has been defined, as a popular definition, of doing the easiest possible things and claiming that those easy things have somehow given birth to something important, elevated, and noble.

Hooking up with guys (and by the way, there's no challenge here; a guy will sleep with you, even out of boredom, if you ask him) is the easiest possible thing a woman can do, and yet somehow, it is postulated, this results in the achievement of something difficult and profound, full intellectual and moral "empowerment" of a woman.

Really?

There are some ideas so plainly stupid that only a faux intellectual could believe them. This is among the most laughable.

Smoking a cigarette does not make a 14 year old boy a man and sleeping around with a bunch of random dudes does not make a 19 year old girl "empowered" or some kind of autonomous fully-formed intellectual and moral being.

I'm not going to knock 19 year old girls sleeping around -- I thank every one of them who once took pity on me and did so -- but it's not an act of "empowerment," so long as "empowerment" means anything other than sexually loose.

If it means something more than that-- if it means something important -- I'm afraid I have to inform people that difficult, important things are accomplished by difficult, taxing work. And not just by blowing Cubby the Earth Sciences major in the back room of Tau Kappa Sig.

In the constellation of Difficult Things, inducing a 18-year-old boy to do something involving his penis is definitely not the most distant and difficult star to reach.

There may be good reasons to have sex -- such as simple hedonism, which gets a bad rap in our society, even among leftists, for crying out loud* -- but "empowerment" is not on that particular list.

But "empowerment" by simply sleeping around is a popular notion. It's dumb, and it's easy. And in our effed-up culture, Dumb is Easy and Easy is Holy. So of course the notion is popular! It plays right into the current National Credo.

No wonder the SWUGs are disappointed. They were having sex to satisfy needs it was it was never intended to satisfy, and never capable of satisfying.**

* Just as an aside: Our culture is so f***ed up, with everyone claiming to be Working Towards Some Important Cultural or Moral Good at all times, that apparently no one can say "I have sex occasionally because it feels good and gives me a feeling of validation." (No one ever admits the latter because it's a confession of weakness and vanity; I'm here to declare that that's a big part of sex, and that we are all, in fact, weak and vain, and that's... okay. Such are human beings.)

No, even the left, for crying out loud, is so puritanical that they have to dress up a simple human act of pleasure-seeking as some spiritually-consequential Work For the Soul.

It isn't. Work is work and pleasure is pleasure.

Can anyone in this stupid culture admit they ever do anything just because it gives them pleasure to do so? Must we all carry on with this absurd posture of Always Working For the Betterment of Man and Self?

** Someone should do a cartoon: "I know you came here for empowerment, but all I've got here is this penis. But let's give it a whirl."

Cargo Cult and Madonna: This idea that sexual looseness = "empowerment" seems to have been given a massive lift by Madonna. more...

Posted by: Ace at 11:25 AM | Comments (366)
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