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Palin as President
comment posted at 12:46 PM on Oct-15-08
comment posted at 7:34 AM on Oct-16-08

According to the Global Extinction Awareness System (GEAS, by the Institute For the Future) - a simulation based on "the worlds’s first massively multiplayer forecasting game" - by the year 2042 AD there is a potentially terminal combination of five so-called “super-threats” which represent a collision of environmental, economic, and social risks. Acting together, the five super-threats may irreversibly overwhelm homo sapiens ability to survive. Spokesperson for United Nations Secretary General “We are grateful for GEAS’ work, and we treat their latest forecast with seriousness and profound gravity.”[[press release]]. The game runs from Oct.8 to Nov. 6, players wanted.
comment posted at 9:10 AM on Oct-8-08

Sarah Palin pals around with Secessionists.
comment posted at 10:41 AM on Oct-7-08

A dress code at the polls? Many states have 'electioneering' laws in place that can be broadly interpreted to mean that clothing with political messages is not allowed. Snopes put a page up advising voters to check with their board of elections. Some election officials have released statements attempting to clarify [pdf] the enforcement of their state's electioneering laws, though those statements aren't legally binding. Other election officials are suing to keep the broad definition of electioneering in place. If rules are interpreted to include campaign shirts and buttons, you will likely need to cover the item up, remove it, or otherwise conceal it.
comment posted at 12:22 PM on Oct-6-08

"There is powerful literature in all big cultures, but you can't get away from the fact that Europe still is the centre of the literary world... not the United States," he said. "The US is too isolated, too insular. They don't translate enough and don't really participate in the big dialogue of literature... That ignorance is restraining."

Nobel literature prize judge Horace Engdahl comes down hard against Don DeLillo, David Foster Wallace, and other crazy American shit that just can't cross the waters.
comment posted at 9:22 AM on Oct-6-08

Sports activism is dead? - so asks Andy Kroll in his review of Dave Zirin's new book, A People's History of Sports in the United States.

"And since the ‘80s, the money, TV time, and narcissism have only increased. Most professional athletes could care less — that is, if they even know at all — that their sponsors’ shoes and jerseys are made in squalid conditions in third world countries."

Author Zirin argues that “[w]e can pretend sports isn’t political just as well as we can pretend there is no such thing as gravity if we fall out of an airplane.”
comment posted at 6:51 AM on Oct-6-08

Sarah palin's lover revealed I guess that takes care of family values...sure, the paper is a tabloid. But they stand by their story and they were the paper that nailed John Edwards. But if Palin is only the number two person, what do we really know about the full medical record of McCain?It is not being made available, and doctors worry about what it contains.
comment posted at 2:16 PM on Oct-1-08

I'm just worried..... Where are we going? Whats going on? No agenda here, no political platforms, no cultural analysis, I just feel some real, tangible undefined sense of real dread of what the coming weeks and months mean for us, y'know, us. All of us. Every one of us on this little place. I don't have kids. I live in a advanced first world country. What am I angling for? Just a general opinion on what we all think about what the coming months and years mean for our weird and dreadful, superb and inspirational species. Just thought I'd ask.
comment posted at 12:36 PM on Sep-25-08

That 700 Billion Dollar number that everyone's talking about? They made it up.
comment posted at 6:41 AM on Sep-25-08

Sarah Palin's email gets hacked by Anonymous (right, that Anonymous). And given the legal controversy surrounding her email, one wonders if the fact that her yahoo email accounts are now deleted constitutes destruction of evidence or violations of public-records laws. Its hit Wikileaks too, but, I'm not sure they have more then what's already released (rapidshare).
comment posted at 11:49 AM on Sep-17-08

All pregnancies are now recommended to be screened for Down Syndrome. 90% of those tested positive have opted for an abortion, while some in support groups discourage this to avoid becoming a vanishing minority with less funding. Now that campaign promises are being made to those with special needs, while vowing to outlaw abortion, a parent or voter might want to know more details. The costs used in this analysis were $146 for first-trimester screening, $66 for the second-trimester Triple Screen, and $86 for a second-trimester Quad Screen. A consultation with a genetic counselor is estimated at $68, and if a diagnostic procedure is also done, the total cost is $1,308. Terminations of pregnancy done in the first and second trimester are $648 and $1,146, respectively. The societal cost of raising and caring for an individual with Down syndrome is $762,748. Previously on Metafilter.
comment posted at 7:51 PM on Sep-15-08
comment posted at 8:04 PM on Sep-15-08

Support Our Poops
comment posted at 12:38 PM on Sep-11-08

Uncle Sam & 911: "Listen man, I think I have to move on…" (cartoon)
comment posted at 6:27 AM on Sep-11-08

Despite not being physically attracted to other people, Paul Cox, 24, explains how he and his wife found love and happiness as an asexual couple.
comment posted at 9:34 AM on Sep-9-08

A Promise Kept: "When two medical flight helicopters collided near a Flagstaff, Ariz., hospital June 29, a promise died. It was a sacred promise from a Red Sox-loving father to his three young sons. On his 37th birthday in August, they would make the 2,100-mile pilgrimage to see the Red Sox play in Fenway Park."
comment posted at 9:45 AM on Sep-8-08

Fox, the BBC and CNN have all revealed that Republican US presidential candidate John McCain has picked Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate on his 72nd birthday on the eve of the start of Republican National Convention. Despite being wildly popular in Alaska, Palin has recently been involved in an investigation over whether she dismissed a public safety commissioner because he refused to dismiss her former brother-in-law.
comment posted at 8:02 AM on Aug-29-08
comment posted at 8:06 AM on Aug-29-08
comment posted at 8:20 AM on Aug-29-08
comment posted at 8:33 AM on Aug-29-08
comment posted at 9:19 AM on Aug-29-08
comment posted at 10:41 AM on Sep-2-08

In the wake of some pretty nasty harassment directed towards women at San Diego Comic-Con, Rachel Edidin from the Inside Out blog at Girl Wonder has established a means of constructively dealing with the problem: the Con Anti-Harassment Project.
comment posted at 12:34 PM on Aug-26-08
comment posted at 12:46 PM on Aug-26-08
comment posted at 1:02 PM on Aug-26-08
comment posted at 2:43 PM on Aug-26-08

What to Expect When You're Aborting: I'm 23. I'm knocked up. And I don't want to keep it. You can fuck yourself, Judd Apatow.
comment posted at 2:00 PM on Aug-22-08
comment posted at 7:54 PM on Aug-22-08
comment posted at 8:37 PM on Aug-22-08

Architectural Digest Visits Senator and Mrs. John McCain. [Via PoliticalFilter]
comment posted at 1:25 PM on Aug-22-08

A People's History for the Classroom [pdf] is a high school history lesson plan/workbook based on Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States. The entire 124-page workbook available for free as a downloadable PDF, as part of the Zinn Education Project, supported by Rethinking Schools and Teaching for Change. You must enter an email and agree to take a later survey to download.
comment posted at 1:06 PM on Aug-20-08

Newsfilter: A.R.M.A.G.E.D.D.O.N. Discussion? (McCain v Obama is so last week...)
comment posted at 8:00 PM on Aug-16-08

Fast Food Apartheid: The Los Angeles City Council has placed a one-year moratorium on the opening of fast-food restaurants in sections of the city with low-income residents. The council says it's meant to encourage healthy fare in locations that lack ready access to supermarkets and healthy restaurant. This columnist calls it "fast food apartheid." We're not talking anymore about preaching diet and exercise, disclosing calorie counts, or restricting sodas in schools. We're talking about banning the sale of food to adults. Treating French fries like cigarettes or liquor.
comment posted at 10:32 AM on Jul-31-08

It's almost time again for everyone's favorite WTF Olympic Sport -- Modern Pentathlon. But as the Games approach, the sport is rocked by scandals -- faked scores, questionable competitions, international disputes. Meanwhile, the French MP team, not content to merely swimshootfenceriderun, add singing to their skill set with this catchy tune "T'as les jambes et t'as la tête".
comment posted at 10:06 AM on Jul-23-08

In January of 2004, Disney shut down their Florida animation studio, part of their decision to move away from 2D, or cell-shaded, animation for good. Two years later, as part of the new deal with Pixar, John Lasseter and Ed Catmull were brought in as heads of Pixar and Walt Disney Animation Studios, and promptly declared that 2-D Animation would thrive again on their watch. For their first new project, the team wanted to show support for the still-struggling New Orleans, and simultaneously introduce Disney's first Black Princess in "The Frog Princess" (Or The Princess and the Frog, as it is now known), a fairy tale set in 1920's Jazz-era Louisiana, with Randy Newman providing a period-specific score. Much response to the project has been quite positive, but as with all things, the devil is in the details.
comment posted at 7:15 AM on Jul-23-08

Humor goes back a long way. The oldest recorded joke in the world was told 4,600 years ago to Pharoh Snefru by the magician Djadjamankh: "How do you entertain a bored pharaoh? You sail a boatload of young women dressed only in fishing nets down the Nile and urge the pharaoh to go catch a fish," and there's lots more ancient Egyptian humor (some quite dirty) as well. Humor really got rolling with the Greeks, however, and the Philogelos (Laughter Lover) a joke book from the 4th century. A representative joke: “An intellectual was on a sea voyage when a big storm blew up, causing his slaves to weep in terror. ‘Don’t cry,’ he consoled them, ‘I have freed you all in my will'."
comment posted at 10:27 AM on Jul-16-08
comment posted at 11:38 AM on Jul-16-08

In response to Israel's show of might, Iran tested long range missiles capable of hitting Israel and other U.S. targets in the region. Was the image AFP used photoshopped?
comment posted at 8:33 AM on Jul-10-08
comment posted at 8:41 AM on Jul-10-08

Renegade high school English teacher Connie Heermann was suspended without pay for 18 months for using the book The Freedom Writers Diary in her class.
comment posted at 6:31 AM on Jul-9-08

"...aside from the Devil, you have no enemy more venomous, more desperate, more bitter, than a true Jew... What shall we Christians do with this rejected and condemned people, the Jews? Since they live among us, we dare not tolerate their conduct, now that we are aware of their lying and reviling and blaspheming.... First, to set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn, so that no man will ever again see a stone or cinder of them. This is to be done in honor of our Lord and of Christendom, so that God might see that we are Christians.... Second, I advise that their houses also be razed and destroyed.... Third, I advise that all their prayer books and Talmudic writings, in which such idolatry, lies, cursing and blasphemy are taught, be taken from them.... Fourth, I advise that their rabbis be forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of loss of life and limb." -- From On the Jews and Their Lies, authored by the man voted by his countrymen the second greatest German of all time, the theologian whose break with Rome began the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther.
comment posted at 7:05 AM on Jul-8-08

Gene Weingarten, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his story on Joshua Bell's busking stunt in a D.C. subway station, tells the story of an earlier busker performing in similar circumstances. With a spooky surprise ending:
comment posted at 8:09 AM on Jun-30-08
comment posted at 8:41 AM on Jun-30-08
comment posted at 9:08 AM on Jun-30-08

Preparing the Battlefield: The Bush Administration steps up its secret moves against Iran.
comment posted at 7:21 AM on Jun-30-08

Heller v. District of Columbia, the U.S. Supreme Court's first actual interpretation of the Second Amendment, has just come down. In a 5-4 decision, the Justices ruled D.C.'s comprehensive handgun ban to be unconstitutional. Antonin Scalia writes for the majority.
comment posted at 8:14 AM on Jun-26-08
comment posted at 8:21 AM on Jun-26-08

Philip Pullman interviewed about the ideas behind "His Dark Materials" [YT,1 hour, South Bank Show,parts 2,3,4,5,6,7]. Inside, and hidden from those who don't want spoilers, are links relating to the ideas raised and about the books generally.
comment posted at 7:38 AM on Jun-24-08

StarWarsCrawl.com. Generate your own Star-Wars-style opening crawl.
comment posted at 2:11 PM on Jun-23-08