Our dear friend David Horowitz has a new site up: Discover the Network. The proported purpose of this site is to let the inquiering defender of freedom discover all the connected individuals and organizations that make up the dreaded Left. This is rather brilliant piece of horse feces, I've got to admit.
One can clearly see that the American Library Association is tied to Zacarias Moussaoui who is tied to Harvard University who is tied to Fidel Castro who is tied to Martin Sheen. It's like the Kevin Bacon game for fanatical conservative assholes.
I think that we can pretty clearly say that if Michael Moore is head propaganda douchbag of the radical left David Horowitz is head propaganda douchbag for the radical right.
Wednesday, February 23, 2005
Tuesday, February 22, 2005
A Unique Problem
I have this problem where I seem to find all of the coolest websites after 2:00AM. The later (or..err...earlier) the hour, the more massively awesome the discovery. I mean, I don't look for these things, they find me in passing. So, as I was writing my post last night I did a search for "Teela Brown" because I wanted to be sure I had her last name right and I was curious if there was some sort of, I don't know, fan site or something about her to which I could link. In doing that, I stumbled upon something of immense awesomeness (and questionable legality, so I will not link to it), but suffice to say, my morning was shot.
Monday, February 21, 2005
Booty Dance
If you have not already started reading Questionable Content, then it is your duty to start doing so now.
For some reason Ellen reminds me considerably of Teela Brown from Larry Niven's Ringworld novel. There are parallels...They're both about the same age, they both come off as naive, and they both can be rather intelligent when given a chance. They also seem to like to have sex with older men (though Ringworld's Louis Wu is...err...considerably older than QC's Steve). However, I doubt that Ellen possesses that most powerful of psychic powers, Author Control.
For some reason Ellen reminds me considerably of Teela Brown from Larry Niven's Ringworld novel. There are parallels...They're both about the same age, they both come off as naive, and they both can be rather intelligent when given a chance. They also seem to like to have sex with older men (though Ringworld's Louis Wu is...err...considerably older than QC's Steve). However, I doubt that Ellen possesses that most powerful of psychic powers, Author Control.
What is the Meaning of Human?
I very much enjoyed this article in today's New York Times on the severe faults of Intelligent Design (via Boing Boing). Intelligent Design is something that only works in your head if you don't think about it too hard. It's one of those diseases where the more you believe it, the less the likelyhood that you'll see the vast flaws in it sitting right in fornt of your face. ID is really a form of egotism..."Look at me, I'm a Picaaso! I have such a wonderful designer!"
Daniel Dennett calls evolution "Darwin's Dangerous Idea", and for good reason...It forces you too change your dialectic about viewing the Universe, and youself. If forces you to question your beliefs about fate, about meaning, and about purpose. If the fact that you're here is an accident, that you are the result of a myriad of random conditions ariving down one of a myriad of paths, than how can we say that any one of us has any special purpose or fate attached to us? How can any of us, mere pieces of matter, be any more special than any other pieces of matter? Your brain might be pretty complex, but is it any more complex than a star? Consciousness is just another process, not unlike nuclear fusion. It is not a gift. There are no gifts; only accidents.
Some people call that view depressing. They've been tought to expect gifts, to prize fate, to ponder meanings as if no other question has value. But, that's to be expected of people who have had their worldview torn asunder. Depressing? Certainly not. The correct word is liberating. We create our meanings. I mean, that's the whole point of Intelligent Design. It's a craving for meaning where some people feel meaning needs to be assigned. But that is like using a supercomputer to balance your checkbook; there are far more interesting things to ponder. For example, if we create our own meanings, what is the meaning of War? What is the meaning of Freedom? What is the meaning of Morality? What is the meaning of Imagination? What is the meaning of Knowledge? If we, human beings, are what we decide to be, what is it that we want to be? What is the meaning of Human?
Daniel Dennett calls evolution "Darwin's Dangerous Idea", and for good reason...It forces you too change your dialectic about viewing the Universe, and youself. If forces you to question your beliefs about fate, about meaning, and about purpose. If the fact that you're here is an accident, that you are the result of a myriad of random conditions ariving down one of a myriad of paths, than how can we say that any one of us has any special purpose or fate attached to us? How can any of us, mere pieces of matter, be any more special than any other pieces of matter? Your brain might be pretty complex, but is it any more complex than a star? Consciousness is just another process, not unlike nuclear fusion. It is not a gift. There are no gifts; only accidents.
Some people call that view depressing. They've been tought to expect gifts, to prize fate, to ponder meanings as if no other question has value. But, that's to be expected of people who have had their worldview torn asunder. Depressing? Certainly not. The correct word is liberating. We create our meanings. I mean, that's the whole point of Intelligent Design. It's a craving for meaning where some people feel meaning needs to be assigned. But that is like using a supercomputer to balance your checkbook; there are far more interesting things to ponder. For example, if we create our own meanings, what is the meaning of War? What is the meaning of Freedom? What is the meaning of Morality? What is the meaning of Imagination? What is the meaning of Knowledge? If we, human beings, are what we decide to be, what is it that we want to be? What is the meaning of Human?
Friday, February 18, 2005
Senate Bill 24
I saw this excellent editorial in the BGNews yesterday:
Senate Bill 24 doubts students, faculty By Megan Schmidt
If State Senator Mumper wasn't such an asshole, he'd make a great comedian. This is a man who told the Columbus Dispatch:
In any event, this whole issue is nonexistant. Take a careful look at what Mumper (and dodos like Horowitz) are saying and you'll see what they're really after. What they claim is that professors are over politicising classrooms by presenting one-sided views, which leads to indoctrination of students.
There are really two issues at stake here. One is laughably minor and the other concerns the fate of our nation.
The indoctrination accusation is already a load of horse hockey. These are college students here, not 2nd graders. There's no indoctrination happening in college classrooms. If you're a student, you know the score...When a professor goes off about something controversial, there are two types of people in that room:
So, what's the real agenda here? Senate Bill 24 would require colleges to ensure that classes that cover controversial subjects present "balanced" viewpoints. This is designed to destroy departments like Women's Studies and American Culture Studies. If these departments were required to teach "balanced" courses, it would defeat the point of the exercise. These are departments that study history created by liberals of the past, read books written by liberals, and produce research on topics of interest to liberal causes. Most, if not all of the people who teach these courses and take these degrees are more liberal than the average person on the street. If you wanted to be blunt about it, you could say that these departments are taxpayer funded enclaves for people with unconventional political beliefs. That's what Horowitz and Mumper want to eliminate. It's also why they're deeply wrong.
By the same logic, you could call the Math department a taxpayer-funded enclave for people who love math. I mean, most of the population hates math and actively tries to avoid having to involve themselves in it. Should we try to target math departments for destruction? Astronomers seem to be more interested in the stars than most people, does that mean we should destroy that department too?
The fact is that colleges exist not only to educate students, but to act as incubators for research to be done in a myriad of relatively esoteric fields. The people who make up the Women Studies department, or the American Culture Studies are undoubtedly more liberal that most of the nation, but the fact is that researching the place of women in society and the effect of race on our society are just as worthy a project as supporting mathematics or psychology research. We're talking about universities here...Uni as in universal. The whole point of these institutions is to act as incubators for a diverse set of ideas in a diverse set of fields.
The society we have today is undoubtledly a knowledge based, post industrial society. We have a knowledge based economy and the Internet is a knowledge based communication system. Universities are to a knowledge based society what steel mills are to an industrial society. Without steel mills you don't have ships and trains and bridges and skyscrapers. Steel mills are the foundation that allows you to build everything else. In a knowledge based society, universities are the foundation, they allow you to build everything else. Whether or not Mumper and Horowitz like it, universities only work when they're allowed to work without restrictions, planting the seeds of the future in a diverse set of fields. In a society where change and growth come from unpredictable sources, the only way to ensure your future is to put your eggs into as many baskets as possible.
Senate Bill 24 doubts students, faculty By Megan Schmidt
If State Senator Mumper wasn't such an asshole, he'd make a great comedian. This is a man who told the Columbus Dispatch:
"80 percent or so of them (professors) are Democrats, liberals or socialists or card-carrying Communists."Gee, Senator Mumper, are there 57 card-carrying Communists in the Defense Department, too? That quote just creeps me out...
In any event, this whole issue is nonexistant. Take a careful look at what Mumper (and dodos like Horowitz) are saying and you'll see what they're really after. What they claim is that professors are over politicising classrooms by presenting one-sided views, which leads to indoctrination of students.
There are really two issues at stake here. One is laughably minor and the other concerns the fate of our nation.
The indoctrination accusation is already a load of horse hockey. These are college students here, not 2nd graders. There's no indoctrination happening in college classrooms. If you're a student, you know the score...When a professor goes off about something controversial, there are two types of people in that room:
- People who don't care.
- People who already opposed the professors viewpoint and aren't changing their minds.
So, what's the real agenda here? Senate Bill 24 would require colleges to ensure that classes that cover controversial subjects present "balanced" viewpoints. This is designed to destroy departments like Women's Studies and American Culture Studies. If these departments were required to teach "balanced" courses, it would defeat the point of the exercise. These are departments that study history created by liberals of the past, read books written by liberals, and produce research on topics of interest to liberal causes. Most, if not all of the people who teach these courses and take these degrees are more liberal than the average person on the street. If you wanted to be blunt about it, you could say that these departments are taxpayer funded enclaves for people with unconventional political beliefs. That's what Horowitz and Mumper want to eliminate. It's also why they're deeply wrong.
By the same logic, you could call the Math department a taxpayer-funded enclave for people who love math. I mean, most of the population hates math and actively tries to avoid having to involve themselves in it. Should we try to target math departments for destruction? Astronomers seem to be more interested in the stars than most people, does that mean we should destroy that department too?
The fact is that colleges exist not only to educate students, but to act as incubators for research to be done in a myriad of relatively esoteric fields. The people who make up the Women Studies department, or the American Culture Studies are undoubtedly more liberal that most of the nation, but the fact is that researching the place of women in society and the effect of race on our society are just as worthy a project as supporting mathematics or psychology research. We're talking about universities here...Uni as in universal. The whole point of these institutions is to act as incubators for a diverse set of ideas in a diverse set of fields.
The society we have today is undoubtledly a knowledge based, post industrial society. We have a knowledge based economy and the Internet is a knowledge based communication system. Universities are to a knowledge based society what steel mills are to an industrial society. Without steel mills you don't have ships and trains and bridges and skyscrapers. Steel mills are the foundation that allows you to build everything else. In a knowledge based society, universities are the foundation, they allow you to build everything else. Whether or not Mumper and Horowitz like it, universities only work when they're allowed to work without restrictions, planting the seeds of the future in a diverse set of fields. In a society where change and growth come from unpredictable sources, the only way to ensure your future is to put your eggs into as many baskets as possible.
Wednesday, February 16, 2005
The Past Is Prologue...
I moved over all the old posts from my old blog so that all of my relatively recent Internet writings are all in one place and have the cool Blogspot.com look. You can find them using the archive links on the right.
It's interesting how much I've changed politically in the past year or so. Looking at some of those older posts, I looked fairly conservative, though if you asked me I'd try to pull off a "centrist" sort of thing, because even back then I was beginning to distrust the Bush Administration.
Those who know me know today know that I'm a pretty liberal guy. Admittedly, I used to be more libertarian, and admittedly I did listen to way, way too much right wing trash talk radio in the 90s. Since I've been at college and become aquainted with liberal philosophy and shit like Abu Ghriab and Issue 1 keep happening, I've become rather solidly liberal. So, there was a shift there where at the beginning I could still trust right-wingers and today I can't stand them. These entries from 2003 and 2004 capture that transition, and that's one of the reasons I wanted to preserve them. That entry from February 2004 was basically the last gasp of whatever remaining trust I had in the right. When Abu Ghriab happen, those last gasps left rather quickly. I guess you could say that if nothing else, the Bush Administration has been an enlightening intellectual experience for me.
In terms of most policy matters, my views on individual issues haven't actually changed (I've been solidly for seperation of church and state for as long as I can remember, etc), but I did have to break through the "liberals will ruin our country" bullshit that I picked up from the claptraps on the radio. On a few things, like Affirmative Action and things like universal healthcare and education, I've become more open minded, but most of my views haven't changed. What changed was my confidence in which side I can trust to run the country.
It's interesting how much I've changed politically in the past year or so. Looking at some of those older posts, I looked fairly conservative, though if you asked me I'd try to pull off a "centrist" sort of thing, because even back then I was beginning to distrust the Bush Administration.
Those who know me know today know that I'm a pretty liberal guy. Admittedly, I used to be more libertarian, and admittedly I did listen to way, way too much right wing trash talk radio in the 90s. Since I've been at college and become aquainted with liberal philosophy and shit like Abu Ghriab and Issue 1 keep happening, I've become rather solidly liberal. So, there was a shift there where at the beginning I could still trust right-wingers and today I can't stand them. These entries from 2003 and 2004 capture that transition, and that's one of the reasons I wanted to preserve them. That entry from February 2004 was basically the last gasp of whatever remaining trust I had in the right. When Abu Ghriab happen, those last gasps left rather quickly. I guess you could say that if nothing else, the Bush Administration has been an enlightening intellectual experience for me.
In terms of most policy matters, my views on individual issues haven't actually changed (I've been solidly for seperation of church and state for as long as I can remember, etc), but I did have to break through the "liberals will ruin our country" bullshit that I picked up from the claptraps on the radio. On a few things, like Affirmative Action and things like universal healthcare and education, I've become more open minded, but most of my views haven't changed. What changed was my confidence in which side I can trust to run the country.
La Fille Aux Cheveux de Lin
Sometimes, I am astonished at how touching and emotional a work of art can be, no matter how simple it is. If you've never listened to Claude Debussy's "La Fille Aux Cheveux de Lin" (The Girl With The Flaxen Hair), do yourself a favor and let yourself get lost in it sometime. It's strikingly simple, but it tears at your heart. I've heard it perhaps dozens of times, but it never loses it's impact.
Tuesday, February 15, 2005
WBGU
I saw in the Blade today that WBGU FM, the FM station on campus, is holding a fundraising drive because their funding was cut...
Even as a person who loves radio, I've never found WBGU all that appealing. I've only really actively tuned into one of their shows, the 2AM techno thing they had a few years ago. Admittedly, more because it was effective at putting me to sleep with the repetative noises and things than any enjoyment I had for the music. Other than that, I've never found anything they do to be too exciting. On occasion I've tuned in to find a show where the music mostly consisted of a guy screaming into a microphone. I've also heard sports coverage so abysmal that it became transcendatly comedic.
Of course, I've got to admit that I have a major bias here because I tend to dislike listening to music on the radio. For some reason, listening to music on the radio is about as exciting to me as watching paint dry. When I think of what radio should be as a medium, I think of most of a good public radio station's weekend schedule, or the BBC World Service, or even the good old days of Art Bell's Coast To Coast show. This is not to say that I like talk radio (99% of which is total sludge), but that between the sludge of political talk and the drudgery of music, there lies a great expanse of awesome radio, and that's what I tend to like.
However, my personal biases aside, I have no doubt that part of WBGU's problem is that their goals all seem to contradict each other. They seem to want to be the "anti-Clear Channel" of pioneering anti-corporate radio, they want to be a sandbox for the dozens of volunteer hosts, they want to be very low budget, and they want to be a decent radio station. The current mishmash of talent, ideas, genres, and hosts seems to miss all of these goals, and it doesn't seem to garner a lot of listeners either. Honestly, outside of the dozens of DJs, who listens to this station?
I think that's a good question. Consider, this is a station that puts out less power than your average dorm microwave (they claim 1000W, but the FCC documents say 450W), so there's not really a huge market to work with here. Perhaps, years ago, there was a need for independent music radio, but today in the post-Shawn Fanning era, I think the audience for that has dwindled. WBGU seems to be driven by the uber-ultra-mega-indie scene (read: stuff no one has ever heard of and never will), and while there will always be a core group for that, it's never going to be too broad.
What I would like to see on WBGU is some creative talk content. As the shoestring budget WNIR in the Akron-Kent area can profess to, talk is cheap. Right now, as far as I know, the only talk content WBGU has is a half hour show hosted by...err...Daniel Boudreau. Regardless of my feelings about the man or his politics, I think that in general , rabidly political talk is not what most people want to hear. The beautiful thing about talk radio, and what most of the talk radio on commerical radio misses, is that talk radio can be about anything. You can talk about local issues (which we seem to have plenty of), you can talk about health, you can talk about music, you can talk about cars, you can talk about sports, you can talk about computers, you can talk about books, you can talk about the stars, you can talk about relationships...
Seriously, you can talk about literally anything. WNIR appeals widely to the Akron area because to the people of Akron, that is their radio. It's about their town. When Clear Channel came in and set up a station specifically to try to put WNIR out of business, it failed because what people already had was radio about themselves, and it doesn't get any better than that. In a nutshell WNIR is to the people of Akron what WBGU wants to be for the students of BGSU. There's a lesson there.
Even as a person who loves radio, I've never found WBGU all that appealing. I've only really actively tuned into one of their shows, the 2AM techno thing they had a few years ago. Admittedly, more because it was effective at putting me to sleep with the repetative noises and things than any enjoyment I had for the music. Other than that, I've never found anything they do to be too exciting. On occasion I've tuned in to find a show where the music mostly consisted of a guy screaming into a microphone. I've also heard sports coverage so abysmal that it became transcendatly comedic.
Of course, I've got to admit that I have a major bias here because I tend to dislike listening to music on the radio. For some reason, listening to music on the radio is about as exciting to me as watching paint dry. When I think of what radio should be as a medium, I think of most of a good public radio station's weekend schedule, or the BBC World Service, or even the good old days of Art Bell's Coast To Coast show. This is not to say that I like talk radio (99% of which is total sludge), but that between the sludge of political talk and the drudgery of music, there lies a great expanse of awesome radio, and that's what I tend to like.
However, my personal biases aside, I have no doubt that part of WBGU's problem is that their goals all seem to contradict each other. They seem to want to be the "anti-Clear Channel" of pioneering anti-corporate radio, they want to be a sandbox for the dozens of volunteer hosts, they want to be very low budget, and they want to be a decent radio station. The current mishmash of talent, ideas, genres, and hosts seems to miss all of these goals, and it doesn't seem to garner a lot of listeners either. Honestly, outside of the dozens of DJs, who listens to this station?
I think that's a good question. Consider, this is a station that puts out less power than your average dorm microwave (they claim 1000W, but the FCC documents say 450W), so there's not really a huge market to work with here. Perhaps, years ago, there was a need for independent music radio, but today in the post-Shawn Fanning era, I think the audience for that has dwindled. WBGU seems to be driven by the uber-ultra-mega-indie scene (read: stuff no one has ever heard of and never will), and while there will always be a core group for that, it's never going to be too broad.
What I would like to see on WBGU is some creative talk content. As the shoestring budget WNIR in the Akron-Kent area can profess to, talk is cheap. Right now, as far as I know, the only talk content WBGU has is a half hour show hosted by...err...Daniel Boudreau. Regardless of my feelings about the man or his politics, I think that in general , rabidly political talk is not what most people want to hear. The beautiful thing about talk radio, and what most of the talk radio on commerical radio misses, is that talk radio can be about anything. You can talk about local issues (which we seem to have plenty of), you can talk about health, you can talk about music, you can talk about cars, you can talk about sports, you can talk about computers, you can talk about books, you can talk about the stars, you can talk about relationships...
Seriously, you can talk about literally anything. WNIR appeals widely to the Akron area because to the people of Akron, that is their radio. It's about their town. When Clear Channel came in and set up a station specifically to try to put WNIR out of business, it failed because what people already had was radio about themselves, and it doesn't get any better than that. In a nutshell WNIR is to the people of Akron what WBGU wants to be for the students of BGSU. There's a lesson there.
Monday, February 14, 2005
Daniel Boudreau Watch: Vol 1
The college paper here, the BGNews seems to be regularly printing columns written by my old Ethnics instructor, Daniel Boudreau. This makes sense, considering that whatever you think about the guy, it's clear he's always got an opinion, usually involving radical politics.
In class, it was rather apparent that even with a subject matter such as "Ethnics" (which roughly translates as "history as seen by the radical left"), he was constantly holding himself back from launching into full radical tirades. To be fair, the class was eminently thought provoking. I must say, I was rather pleased with myself, when discussing the impact of MLK jr. with him, I got him to say "American Imperialist Project". As nutty radical left vocab goes, that's solid gold.
Daniel Boudreau's February 9th column was "War glorification uncalled for". Now, I hate to try to say that Mr. Boudreau in some way represents a whole diverse wing of radical politics, because that's not quite fair, but all too often their writings can be identified rather quickly with two trademarks:
In February 14th's piece, "Bush out of touch with citizens", Daniel Boudreau returns to discussing Social Security. This piece starts off strong, and does in fact have a pretty solid thesis. That the right is out to squeeze the life out of the middle class is not something I disagree with. However I take issue with the way this is accomplished. Take this, for example:
It should be noted here, though, that as content on the BGNews opinion page goes, I've seen far, far, far worse.
More coverage of Daniel Boudreau's columns will occur as they happen...
In class, it was rather apparent that even with a subject matter such as "Ethnics" (which roughly translates as "history as seen by the radical left"), he was constantly holding himself back from launching into full radical tirades. To be fair, the class was eminently thought provoking. I must say, I was rather pleased with myself, when discussing the impact of MLK jr. with him, I got him to say "American Imperialist Project". As nutty radical left vocab goes, that's solid gold.
Daniel Boudreau's February 9th column was "War glorification uncalled for". Now, I hate to try to say that Mr. Boudreau in some way represents a whole diverse wing of radical politics, because that's not quite fair, but all too often their writings can be identified rather quickly with two trademarks:
- The chances that there will be a quotation or anecdote included from a member of the radical pantheon such as Howard Zinn or Noam Chomsky are about 92%. (Note that this rule also works for the radical right, though they tend to use the likes of Ayn Rand, the Bible, and Ronald Reagan)
- They have so many things to complain about that the piece turns into a rambling, incoherant mess.
In February 14th's piece, "Bush out of touch with citizens", Daniel Boudreau returns to discussing Social Security. This piece starts off strong, and does in fact have a pretty solid thesis. That the right is out to squeeze the life out of the middle class is not something I disagree with. However I take issue with the way this is accomplished. Take this, for example:
"Take a moment to let the implications of the president's commentary on Mary Mornin's everyday reality sink in. 'Uniquely American'? 'Fantastic?' This from a child of privilege who was raised in the pampering environs of Washington D.C. and the blue-blood communities of New England (though he does his damnedest to cultivate a good ole Texan boy persona), and who has never truly worked hard for anything in his life, seeing every opportunity come his way due to family connections."That's pure character assassination. Look, I don't like Bush, and I don't like the right, but these people need to be attacked with the facts. Maybe I'm spoiled with the excellent factually based critiques I've been reading about the Social Security privitization plan (at Matthew Yglasias and elsewhere), and maybe I'm just totally sick of the character assassination I've seen lately (Michael Crichton, Eason Jordon, Ward Churchill, etc), but this shit has to stop.
It should be noted here, though, that as content on the BGNews opinion page goes, I've seen far, far, far worse.
More coverage of Daniel Boudreau's columns will occur as they happen...
It Just Works
Skype is one of the coolest applications I've seen in a long time. Who knew that the people who made Kazaa (which is made with the ground up remains of aborted fetuses) could create soemthign so cool?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
