For weeks, Mr. Trump has been engaged in not-so-quiet discussions about making a potential White House bid, but he has taken few visible steps, beyond television interviews, to test his support and demonstrate his seriousness. By accepting an invitation to appear at [CPAC], Mr. Trump is once again fueling speculation about his political future — and generating maximum exposure in the process.
Help us Flying Spaghetti Monster, HELP US!
Lots of good stuff in this article:
The last great building binge in the NFL was from 1995 through 2003, when 21 stadiums were built or refurbished in order to create more luxury boxes, at cost of $6.4 billion. Know how much of that the public paid for? $4.4 billion.
The richest people in the richest, most popular sport in America. And you and I foot the bill for almost all of it in the name of “economic impact” that those eight home games a year supposedly have on a stadium neighborhood that’s inevitably parking lots as far as the eye can see. Hell, we’re even on the hook for the half-million dollar flyover. Absolute lunacy. Sally, the Superbowl, and the mega-arenas built to host it, can be any scale the NFL (and the owners running it) want it to be. Just so long as they are willing to pay for it.
But let’s not leave this quote on the floor:
the state of Texas [spent] $31 million to host the Super Bowl, even as deficits force public school cuts
Says it all.
(reblogged from wanderingreveries)
As I’ve said before, lots of Glenn Beck listeners aren’t in on the joke. Unlike Roger Ailes, Jonah Goldberg, and every staffer at the Heritage Foundation happy hour, they don’t realize that the Fox News Channel puts this man on the air fully understanding that large parts of his program are uninformed nonsense mixed with brazen bullshit. When a Fox News host tells these viewers, “I’m not going to treat you like you’re a moron,” playing on their insecurity about other media outlets talking down to or lying to them, they take it at face value. What sort of callous, immoral person allows these viewers to be played for fools?
And I’ve been wanting to learn more about nothing! Preferably through the liberal application of carefully disguised bromides.
(courtesy of the Malcolm Gladwell Book Generator)
Give a man a fish, and you’ll feed him for a day; give him a religion, and he’ll starve to death while praying for a fish.
A magnificently honest, accurate portrayal of life in science…and coming to realize it is time to walk away from same:
So, what went wrong? There are a great many alluring things about an academic scientist’s lifestyle that are simultaneously liberating and dangerous. The best of these are that you can work pretty much whenever you like, on whatever is interesting; the flip side is that “whenever you like” often translates into “all the time,” and “interesting” is a matter of who you’re talking to. For the first 5 years or so, I loved the freedom of being a scientist in what was touted as a meritocracy. I did work very hard, and I got somewhere […]
However, I was always hampered by self-doubt. My initial conviction – essential for anyone who wants to make it as a scientist – that I could really make a difference, maybe even win a few prizes and get famous, eroded when I realized that my brain was simply not wired like those of the phalanx of Nobelists I met over the years; I was never going to be original enough to be a star. This early realization, combined with a deep-seated lack of self-confidence, meant that I was useless at self-promotion and networking. I would go to conferences and hide in corners, never daring to talk to the speakers and the big shots. I never managed, as an infinitely more successful friend put it, “to piss in all the right places.”
All I have to say to that is: yep. Painful but (usually) true. The realization is half the battle. There’s a nice little career to be had while not being a shatteringly important thinker in your field. At least I hope there is…
via commonunity
We already knew that Starbucks’ new 31-ounce Trenta iced coffee cup is larger than the average human stomach, but here’s something you might not know: The new cup can actually hold an entire bottle of wine.
News you can use.
Yglesias points out the creeping government takeover of everything in the socialist hell that is Obama’s America…
I can’t imagine why conservatives aren’t more honest about this.
But the facts remain: government is smaller under Obama. Jobs in the private sector have been created under Obama, and some of those jobs have been created through the actions of the stimulus. Period.
TPM reports:
Rep. Peter Defazio (D-OR) proposes that people be allowed to opt out of the insurance mandate altogether – but if they do, they will not be allowed to free-ride on the new health care system.
Under his plan, a person opting out “must file an ‘affidavit of personal responsibility’ with the state exchange. Such a filing will waive their rights to: 1) Enroll in a health insurance exchange; 2) Enroll in Medicaid if otherwise made eligible; and 3) Discharge health care related debt under Chapter 7 bankruptcy law,” DeFazio wrote in a letter to colleagues Tuesday.
Under his plan, if a person wants back into the system, they’d need to buy insurance on their own, out of pocket, for five years. The idea here, and with other, similar plans, is to moot one of the constitutional complaints about the mandate – that it penalizes “inactivity.”
Exactly. No doubt the legions of “go die in the streets” conservatives who are morally wounded by the very concept of the individual mandate are lining up to cosponsor this. Right? Right?
Lemkin 