Big piece.

One of the cherished vanities of the media class is that they are sophisticated thinkers who see deeply into stories -- unlike brutish conservatives, whose primitive minds can only detect the crudest outlines of things.

Oh?

The media seems entirely unwilling to even confess the possibility that being dragooned into actual participation in a gay marriage might be fairly characterized as impinging on someone's religious faith.

The Washington Post has it all figured out:

Let's be honest: The media likes gays and hates religious people, and they're eager to frame their reportage based on these preferences.

And then they'll mock the religious for believing themselves to be under siege and attacked and demeaned by the media and other important transmitters of cultural power (including, firstly, the government).

They'll call them paranoid for believing such a crazy thing.

Posted by: Ace at 08:57 AM | Comments (291)
Post contains 211 words, total size 2 kb.

Wow. But See Caveat/Caution, Below.

The reason offered is that there has been a "rash" of vandalism on campus, some break-ins, and a recent shooting on school grounds. (The victim was not himself a student.)

The chip, I think, will not actually track everyone at all times. That is, I don't think it contains a strong radio signal that would allow a general second-by-second tracking of movement. I think the idea of the "proximity chip" is that it will only register a signal when it's brought close to specific locations which will detect proximity. So I'm guessing that mostly it will track people coming in and out of buildings, and perhaps their presence in major outdoor locations like the middle of a quad.

Though one could, of course, build so many such proximity-detection stations as to achieve that moment-by-moment tracking. Thus, in principle, they've established the principle of second-by-second location tracking. The only thing restraining them is budget -- how many position locators can you afford?

This is creepy, and it seems once again to be government/institutional overreach. The school, being a state school, is part of the government. The "problem" being solved here is... vandalism, which is a crime, and destructive, and annoying, but does that justify second-by-second monitoring of every student, as if he were a prisoner?

The shooting seems to be a one-off thing -- their press release speaks of a "rash" of vandalism but just the one shooting. Break-ins are ominous, but... isn't that why dorms have locked doors?

Every creepy, monitoring, controlling move is and will be justified by "safety" and "health" concerns.

I'm very curious about how all this happened. I'm curious about how people just decided that this was a perfectly reasonable response to vandalism.

Caveat/Caution: Commenters question whether or not this is simply the well-known sort of swipe card -- or touch card -- that are in common and widespread use in office buildings.

The news release makes it sound like it's more than that -- but perhaps they want to make it sound like it's more than it is to show they're really doing everything possible to crack down on vandalism. Maybe they're using terms like "proximity chip" when they really should just say: "We've now got swipe card readers on all exterior doors."

I don't know. But commenters make a good case that I'm blowing this out of proportion without knowing what is actually going on.

More:

Okay, well, if that's true, I'm not sure what's left of this post. Wearing an ID badge on campus is annoying, and not usually done, but I'm not sure I can pitch a proper bitch about that.

Posted by: Ace at 07:44 AM | Comments (266)
Post contains 521 words, total size 4 kb.

Bloggers are annoying as eff. Even I think that, and I am one.

Last year Jeff Gordon shot a commercial for Pepsi Max in which he "pranked" people by unexpectedly taking them on a fast, wild ride.

Well, a blogger with the Gawker group claimed it was "fake." (Many commenters actually think the first video was fake, to one extent or another.)

So many people are probably taking some satisfaction in Jeff Gordon "pranking" the blogger who claimed the earlier was fake, by now taking him on a high-speed "escape" from pursuing "police."

Below is the first video -- the one claimed as "fake" -- and then a vengeance video that definitely isn't. (?)
more...

Posted by: Ace at 08:23 AM | Comments (126)
Post contains 265 words, total size 2 kb.

This, the New York Times understatedly tells us, represents a "substantial" revision of the figure.

The figure was actually lowered below the level analysts expected. They thought it would be lowered to 2.5%.

They say they expect "lackluster" growth throughout this year. And:

It is also well below the so-called breakout speed economists have been hoping to see the economy sustain for more than a quarter or two.

No sh*t really?

Analysts are of course blaming... the weather. Yes, they figure it was all this Global Warming falling over much of the country that is responsible for the economy's failure -- now it its fifth year -- to reach break out speed.

Posted by: Ace at 06:34 AM | Comments (338)
Post contains 138 words, total size 1 kb.

IT'S FRIDAAAAAAAY!

Yesterday, Ace wrote about Nazis.

So did Jonah Goldberg over at NRO.

Eugene Volokh wrote about that American flag ban at a California high school. more...

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:49 AM | Comments (287)
Post contains 39 words, total size 1 kb.

Well like Ace I'm just going to rely on my cumulative word average tonight.

25 Signs You're Grown Up

I've always said that if you have more than 3 keys on your keychain, own your own vacuum cleaner, and know all your tax rates, you're deeper down the gullet of the Snake of Aging than you might think. But here are 25 more indicators.

Life At 93

I've endured a few knocks but missed worse. I know how lucky I am, and secretly tap wood, greet the day, and grab a sneaky pleasure from my survival at long odds. The pains and insults are bearable. My conversation may be full of holes and pauses, but I've learned to dispatch a private Apache scout ahead into the next sentence, the one coming up, to see if there are any vacant names or verbs in the landscape up there. If he sends back a warning, I'll pause meaningfully, duh, until something else comes to mind.

..."Most of the people my age is dead. You could look it up" was the way Casey Stengel put it. He was seventy-five at the time, and contemporary social scientists might prefer Casey's line delivered at eighty-five now, for accuracy, but the point remains. We geezers carry about a bulging directory of dead husbands or wives, children, parents, lovers, brothers and sisters, dentists and shrinks, office sidekicks, summer neighbors, classmates, and bosses, all once entirely familiar to us and seen as part of the safe landscape of the day. It's no wonder we're a bit bent.

How To Avoid The Big Screw-Ups In Life: Advice To A 20-Year Old From People Twice His Age

• If you can make a reasonable living doing what you love, DO WHAT YOU LOVE.. You may not get rich, but you'll get to do what you love. Don't quit your day job until doing what you love pays the bills, but don't incur big debt getting a law degree or an MBA if you really want to be an artist.
• It's amazing how easy life is when you're honest with yourself and others. This doesn't mean you should be rude and inconsiderate, but it's better to be upfront when you have to rather than concealing things and letting them grow.
• Set up a safety fund. Yes, I know the savings account interest rates suck right now, but having 3-6 months of expenses in readily accessible cash can save you a lot of hassle. It also allows you to loan money to friends when needed (do this judiciously).
• The biggest disappointments in life are the result of misplaced expectation. Tempering unrealistic expectations of how great something will be can greatly reduce frustration.
• Understand that at 22 you are at your most energetic and most creative, but your labor is valued very little. All the more reason to 1) stand up for yourself and look for the highest bidder and 2) get that degree.

And more at the link.

Posted by: Maetenloch at 06:45 PM | Comments (809)
Post contains 1645 words, total size 14 kb.

Warning- wide margins. more...

Posted by: CAC at 05:09 PM | Comments (356)
Post contains 494 words, total size 3 kb.

Maet mentioned this on the ONT a couple nights ago, but this was a very good catch by Prof. Jacobson over at Legal Insurrection, so I wanted to highlight it again. Read the whole thing.

IÂ’m not old enough to remember Tulipomania, but I am old enough to remember the inflation-readjusted real estate crash of the 1980s, the eyeballs-to-price ratios of the 1990′s tech bubble, and the no-money-down no-income-verification mortages of this centuryÂ’s first decade.

...

New paradigm. Hmmm. Where have I heard that recently? (emphasis added)

>>>But as the Polk [Award] judges rightly recognized, Greenwald meets the definition of journalist – joining the long line of reporters who have broken accurate stories after sifting classified documents purloined by whistle-blowers. And he’s still working the Snowden material, as evidenced this morning on The Intercept, the new online magazine bankrolled by eBay billionaire Pierre Omidyar. Greenwald has decided to hang his digital shingle on that site. In a revolutionary era of new journalistic paradigms, who needs the old media?

Journalists should play an important role in exposing bubbles before they get too big.

But what if the journalists are the bubble?

Regarding Ezra Klein specifically, I was always a little curious as to why so many in the media were surprised by the Washington Post's decision to let him go. The numbers never matched up. Many were impressed by WonkBlog's roughly 4 million pageviews per month. Well, okay. But, how much of that traffic was based off the very strong lead in from a major American publication? There's no way for us to tell what percentage of that traffic came from all that marketing and cross-promotion, but I'd bet it's a non-trivial amount.

For the sake of argument, let's say it's zero. Let's say Ezra could pick up his operation and start elsewhere (as he is basically doing). So take that 4 million pageviews a month and move it. Ezra reportedly wanted a staff of more than 30 and an annual budget of $10 million.

So do the math. At $10 RPM (revenue per thousand impressions), which many said was an ambitious goal, his site would only be making $40,000 a month. This is orders of magnitude away from reality, and why Jeff Bezos likely bit his tongue laughing at Ezra's proposal.

How many of these millionaire pet projects are going to continue to be around five or ten years from now? You have to wonder. It's often hard to tell, but traditional publications still need to turn a profit.

Also, open thread.

Posted by: JohnE. at 04:20 PM | Comments (179)
Post contains 433 words, total size 3 kb.

Just until someone posts some actual content.....

And....one puppy is a theist, one puppy is an atheist. Platinum membership (without ampersands) for all who guess correctly.

Posted by: Open Blogger at 05:14 PM | Comments (164)
Post contains 30 words, total size 1 kb.

• VDH: The Limits Of Outrage
  
• Bringing Extinct Animals Back to Life Is Really Happening
  
• Tea Party Probe Has Cost IRS 7.9 Million So Far
  
• Can Ukraine Avoid Partition
  
• Scott Walker's Weakness And The Snag In Exploiting It
  
• Nazis: Still Socialists
  
• Crimea On Edge
  
• Guy Who Had Insurance Cancelled By Obamacare Will Run Against Mark Udall
  
• Rome Days Away From Bankruptcy
  
• Obama Plans To Spend More Money On Something Stupid
  
• This Is One Of The Reasons I Have Duct Tape Over My Webcam Lens
  
• It's About Telling Stories
  
• No, Russia Isn't About To Invade The Ukraine
  
• NASA Discovers 715 New Planets
  
• Parrot Helps Cops Solve Murder Mystery
  

Follow me on twitter.

Posted by: Open Blogger at 05:00 AM | Comments (395)
Post contains 118 words, total size 2 kb.