October 15, 2009
Diplomacy by brooch
In her new book, Read My Pins, Former Secretary of State Madeline Albright reflects on choosing jewelry as a means of sending diplomatic messages.
Scream Dracula Scream
Chris Sims of the Invincible Super-Blog has tangled with the undead before, most notably with The Annotated Anita Blake, but now he's taking on the big daddy with the cape and the fangs: It's Dracula Week! Over on Comics Alliance Chris lists Dracula's Greatest Comics Appearances, then back on ISB he's followed up with Batman versus Dracula and Dracula versus Superman. Now he's taking on Dracula in his ultimate, most 70s form. Behold... BLACULA!
His Soul Is Marching On
Today is the 150th anniversary of John Brown's abolitionist raid on Harper's Ferry, and the commemorations are underway.
Yum.A.Lum
Dash and Bella is a blog about cooking with your kids. Its lovely and mouth watering.
Real Texas Justice
Judge William Wayne Justice. 1920 -2009. Appointed to the federal bench in 1968, Judge Justice spent his career as a progressive jurist working to insure the rights of minorities, the poor and the disenfranchised. His rulings forced the State of Texas to desegregate public schools, reform its prison system and provide education to undocumented immigrants.
Podcast about the history of the Normans
Norman Centuries is a new podcast by Lars Brownworth, best known for his podcast series 12 Byzantine Rulers (previously). Norman Centuries, as the name suggests, recounts the history of the Normans, those literal vikings who gained Normandy and then England, Sicily, Malta, Antioch and, well, a whole heck of a lot of other places too. They were a conquering bunch. First two episodes are out with more to follow. [iTunes link]
Fictional Blueprints
Artist Mark Bennett's real blueprints for fake places are fascinating. The home of socialite Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson is, not surprisingly, much more intricate than that of Mr. and Mrs. Flintstone. (via CurbedLA)
Obama's War
Frontline in Afghanistan
In a war that has lasted eight years, what is the way forward now? [more inside]
In a war that has lasted eight years, what is the way forward now? [more inside]
Breastfeeding in Mongolia.
Breastfeeding in Mongolia The author describes the ubiquity of breastfeeding and breast milk in Mongolia, and her experience over a three-year period of breastfeeding her infant in Mongolia and in the West.
Eleanor Cameron vs. Roald Dahl
From October 1972 to October 1973 a controversy over Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory simmered in the pages of The Horn Book. It began with an article, "McLuhan, Youth, and Literature", by Eleanor Cameron, author of the Mushroom Planet series for children and of The Green and Burning Tree: On the Writing and Enjoyment of Children's Books. Spread out over the October, December, and February issues, it tied the ideas of Marshall McLuhan (The Medium is the Massage) to the confection of Charlie, calling it "one of the most tasteless books ever written for children":
"The more I think about Charlie and the character of Willy Wonka and his factory, the more I am reminded of McLuhan’s coolness, the basic nature of his observations, and the kinds of things that excite him. Certainly there are several interesting parallels between the point of view of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and McLuhan’s 'theatrical view of experience as a production or stunt,' as well as his enthusiastic conviction that every ill of mankind can easily be solved by subservience to the senses."What followed was a knock-down, drag-out, letter-writing brouhaha, refereed by Horn Book editor Paul Heins, with librarians, parents, teachers, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Roald Dahl himself joining in, and it was one of the main causes of the book's revision that year. [more inside]
Justice Delayed
Nearly 100 years had passed since nationally syndicated radio host Tom Joyner's "great-uncles, Thomas Griffin and Meeks Griffin were wrongfully executed in South Carolina. On Wednesday, a board voted 7-0 to pardon both men, clearing their names in the 1913 killing of a veteran of the Confederate Army.
...It marks the first time in history that South Carolina has issued a posthumous pardon in a capital murder case." [more inside]
What compelled you to use adorable characters to explore Bush-era fears?
Yellow Cake, a geopolitical fable by animator Nick Cross. Main link includes interview - "There was a lot of talk about 'yellow cake' uranium being sold in ominous tones, but I always thought of yellow cake as being a delicious dessert treat."
Sen. Lamb is confident that the bill will be upheld, calling it "common-sense legislation"
On May 21, 2009, Oklahoma's governor signed the Statistical Reporting of Abortion Act (pdf). The act requires, as a condition of having the procedure done, that each woman fill out an "Individual Abortion Form" containing personal details, including age, county where abortion was performed, race, marital status, years of education, state of residence, number and result of previous pregnancies, and the reason for the abortion. [more inside]
Foreclosures hit a new record
Foreclosures hit a record in third quarter 2009. President Obama took measures to contain the crisis. It is now many months later, and one can start asking how successful these measures have been. [more inside]
UP
The Ajax Experience
There's lots going on with HTML5. Get the latest from the folks at Ajaxian. First, find out What's New in HTML5 (The WHATWG Blog), then look into the new Microdata Spec. There's a Sticky Notes Tutorial, and an examination of the Canvas Tag. Getting the nitty gritty details right.
Steve Jobs interview
I'm 100% sure that if it hadn't been for Mrs. Hill in fourth grade and a few others, I would have absolutely ended up in jail. A timeless and fascinating 1995 interview with Steve Jobs.
New York, You've Changed
A New York City film location scout (mentioned before, here and here) revisits the scenes of the movie Taxi Driver (1976) and compares them to what's there now. [more inside]
Navy moves to put women on submarines
A handful of female seniors at the Naval Academy or in the Naval Reserve Officers’ Training Corps could very well be the first women to be assigned to a U.S. submarine. And if initial plans fall into place, those women — joined by some seasoned supply and surface nuke lieutenants already in the fleet — will be included in four crews assigned to two Ohio-class submarines by late 2011. [more inside]
Tomorrow is today's dream.
If it could be anywhere in the world, where would you wish to wake up tomorrow? This was the question asked to people on the streets of London and Brooklyn. Some of the answers are mundane, some are beautiful. What would yours be? [more inside]
The Swirling Bathtub Drain in the River
"You'll have heard how the city once ended in fire, and around these parts, it threatens to end in ice every few years or so. But once, not too long ago, Chicago flirted with ending in water, an entirely preventable man-made inundation that few saw but everybody felt – a two-billion-dollar sucker punch tsunami that weighed in among the dozen most costly floods in American history." [more inside]
The ultimate freakout team-up.
Plastic surgery
Ever dream THIS MAN?
Ever dream this man? Every night throughout the world hundreds of people dream about this face. [more inside]
There are known unknowns
"My answer is, I don't know. I don't know." US District Court Judge Vaughn Walker asked Prop 8 supporters to define the nature and extent of damage done by same-sex couples to the institution of marriage, and being unable to get any definitive answer, denied the request from supporters of Prop 8 to throw out Perry v. Schwarzenegger and ordered the case to trial in January 2010.
But wait, there's more!
I Have Seen the Future, and It Is Snuggie. The arrival of autumn through much of the United States means that sales should be heating up for Allstar Products Group, the juggernaut behind the Snuggie ads. More and more infomercials are capitalizing on the opportunity to market their wares to mainstream audiences as traditional companies pull back from prime time ad spends. The Wall Street Journal reports that one entrepreneur is bringing "as seen on TV" products to rural India, staging live shows for people without TVs. It seems you really can't escape them.
Wizard, as an ironist, you alone receive some sense of subjective freedom.
The Window Page
The Virtual Window Interactive is a toy based in, and an advertisement for, The Virtual Window, a theoretical Visual Studies text authored by Anne Friedberg, who passed away this week at age 57. If you're like me, the first thing you'll realize is that your native aspect ratio is faulty already.
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