I'm relatively sure that, as I watched this video, the feeling I had will probably be the closest thing I could come to what it must have been like for black people in the 1950s to see the likes of Pat Boone cover songs from the often-bawdy black roadhouse music scene that would become Rock n Roll.
Before you write me/comment about how it's not remotely similar and how Little Richard et al. were robbed, check the title of the post and chill out. I get it, but it's not like it's 'too soon' or anything.
via Daily Dish.
"Only the refusal to listen guarantees one against being ensnared by the truth" - Robert Nozick
Friday, October 23, 2009
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Spit-take Funny
A friend of mine just turned me onto a blog that happens to be written by a former intern at my job who's teaching English as a Second Language (ESL) to young children in Korea. I just added it to my reader--you should too.
It's basically Kindergarten Cop meets Kids Say the Darnedest Things, only in this scenario, it's the students and not thegovernor teacher that speak broken English.
A taste:
Hilarious stuff. I wish Kaylin the best of luck.
It's basically Kindergarten Cop meets Kids Say the Darnedest Things, only in this scenario, it's the students and not the
A taste:
In which the author obnoxiously says "in which the author" and is a pig being eaten by a dinosaurmonster
In my 5 year-old class we have been reading a story book called Monster, Monster for Halloween. We had some extra time today so I decided to have a contest to see who could draw the scariest monster.
The girls all drew three-eyed princesses. A couple other kids drew three-eyed aliens. A few more drew ghosts, but the democratically-chosen winner drew a house with a pig in it getting eaten by a dinosaurmonster.
He brought it to me and said, "Teacher I am finished. This is dinosaurmonster. This is Kaylin Teacher."
"Really? Because it looks like a pig."
"Yes it is pig and Kaylin Teacher. Kaylin Teacher is pig."
"Thanks."
Hilarious stuff. I wish Kaylin the best of luck.
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
iRat
Despite Godwin's Law, there comes a point when analogies to certain vicious security states of the 20th century are appropriate. This video has made me so angry that I'm gonna "go there" to make my point.
There is something so fundamentally wrong with this campaign that I'm getting a migraine from trying to figure out where to begin.
Even at the height of the Third Reich, there were very few Gestapo officers relative to the population of Germany and, subsequently, German-occupied Europe. Thus, to get information, the government relied heavily on everyday citizens reporting to the Gestapo's local and regional offices. The files recovered after the war document the copious amounts of information they had collected, most of which was voluntarily given by citizens about other citizens. Like today's "fusion centers" that aggregate data on Americans, the Gestapo had too much information to run efficiently. (Former FBI agent Mike German has done invaluable work on fusion centers at the ACLU.)
Collecting information this way is not only a threat to individual liberty, but it also is counter-productive to law enforcement's legitimate and necessary counter-terrorism efforts because the resources required to investigate so many bogus leads. Thus, informing on fellow citizens actually helps terrorists because law enforcement agents are too busy wasting their time with superfluous allegations. (Of course, law enforcement will happily arrest and prosecute people for whatever non-terrorism related information they find as they dig into the lives of those people unlucky enough to be reported on.)
Our police should do their jobs and our citizens should mind their own damned business.
H/T: Allison Gibbs
There is something so fundamentally wrong with this campaign that I'm getting a migraine from trying to figure out where to begin.
Even at the height of the Third Reich, there were very few Gestapo officers relative to the population of Germany and, subsequently, German-occupied Europe. Thus, to get information, the government relied heavily on everyday citizens reporting to the Gestapo's local and regional offices. The files recovered after the war document the copious amounts of information they had collected, most of which was voluntarily given by citizens about other citizens. Like today's "fusion centers" that aggregate data on Americans, the Gestapo had too much information to run efficiently. (Former FBI agent Mike German has done invaluable work on fusion centers at the ACLU.)
Collecting information this way is not only a threat to individual liberty, but it also is counter-productive to law enforcement's legitimate and necessary counter-terrorism efforts because the resources required to investigate so many bogus leads. Thus, informing on fellow citizens actually helps terrorists because law enforcement agents are too busy wasting their time with superfluous allegations. (Of course, law enforcement will happily arrest and prosecute people for whatever non-terrorism related information they find as they dig into the lives of those people unlucky enough to be reported on.)
Our police should do their jobs and our citizens should mind their own damned business.
H/T: Allison Gibbs
Monday, October 19, 2009
Mood Music Monday
The intro is a bit long-winded. If you want to skip it, the song starts around 2:40.