About the AR-15

It’s supposed to be more deadly in the hands of ill-trained draftees than any rifle yet built.

What About The Other Side of the Anne Frank Accusation?

Instead of continuing down that path, I propose we simply refer to Mr. O’Flaherty as “Paul ‘Fuckwad‘ O’Flaherty’. It has all the deservedly mean-spirited “you are a violently stupid person” ring to it, and it’s easier to get through than a half-dozen pages worth of “I have obviously never cracked open a book on abuse, […]

The Right Question

So, this is almost short enough to stuff into a tweet, but I was wondering if there was an actual list of ways in which GNOME Shell fell short of Canonical’s requirements or desires? In other words, there is a list of problems that are severe enough to cause Canonical & Co. to think it’s […]

Thoughts on Privacy

This post is pretty heavy on the pontificating, but I’ll tie it back into GNOME at the end, I swear. I’ve been thinking quite a bit about privacy lately. Most of the shiny things here on the internet are some type of service where you abandon some degree of privacy to an intermediary in return […]

Screaming in an Elevator

Getting on the elevator this morning, it turned out I should have waited. Some woman was yelling at someone on the elevator about how he should support health-care, and some randomness about the unnamed politician who’s bumper sticker adorned his jacket was so terrible and such. She continued to rant at him all the way […]

Essential Spirit

I’d like to thank all of those who voted for Scott Brown. You’ve done the courageous thing by making sure the rest of the country cannot have a health care system roughly equivalent to the one you already enjoy in Massachusetts. Most people—ordinary people—would not allow themselves to simply ignore the monumental shamefulness of that. […]

Siding with the Bastards

Let me preface this by stating a few things: if you are going to tell me that girls are inherently bad at technology, programming, or are getting their panties in a twist, please fuck the fuck off. I feel confident in judging you a waste of an opportunity for a perfectly good pair of ovary […]

Hrmmmm….

Travelling for work, my roller carryon died. Looking for places which have cheap luggage turned up this: I wonder how old this entry for “Target” is…

Al Gore

Remember that line from An Inconvenient Truth, shortly after the animation of Lower Manhattan underwater, about how there are more things than just terrorism to be concerned about? Turns out that’s even more prescient (via) than he was likely aware at the time.

I Hate Illinois Nazis

See also: UNESCO: Fight against Racism, Discrimination, and Xenophobia SPLC: What You Can Do

Ubuntu Ruined My Life

[There’s a whole bunch of meandering academic pontificating and me taking myself too seriously. About two thirds of the way down it gets really good, though. I promise. Also, the woman is now online and back in school. -JC] So apparently, someone was trying to take online courses, ordered the cheapest Dell with a CD—which […]

Cooler, Wiser

Clearly, any specific assistance [to ailing financial institutions] will have to include penalties for those managers who have left their institutions overexposed. Central bank credibility in enforcing these penalties will go a long way in limiting moral hazard. Raghuram Rajan in 2005, explaining how to pick up the pieces after the 2008 financial collapse (via […]

Just… Wow

By selecting Tim Geithner as his Treasury secretary, Barack Obama has opted for a figure who plausibly represents change while also offering a high degree of continuity with both the Paulson Treasury and its Clinton administration pre-decessors. Krishna Guha, Geithner ready for top job as Treasury chief, Financial Times, 2009-11-23 How can you read that […]

They Thought There Were Free Toys

I’ve just ordered a Kindle and finished a review of (warning: spoilers, big-assed swastika on the front cover) They Thought They Were Free, a book about ordinary people in Germany who became Nazis that’s been on my list for a long while after it made the rounds on some of the lefty blogs I read. […]

Vision

Obama is asking for ideas, and while I have no faith that they will go anywhere, I sent one in anyways. Namely, I’d like to see a sovereign wealth fund ultimately responsible to the Treasury, under advisement of Commerce and Labor. The mandate for the organization would include: Ensuring restored market liquidity by sheer force […]