Torture as a negotiable virtue

“A civility that considers torture a negotiable virtue is a civility long past redemption.

I will take my values real but rough, and leave ‘values’ of a David Broder or David Brooks where they lie — abandoned in the name of centrist balance, hollowed from disuse, weakened so as not to offend or provoke.

I would rather face God with this voice than the other.”
—Hunter, commenter on “Why I’m mad: An open letter to David Broder from a fellow journalist” defending “vituperative, foul-mouthed bloggers on the left”

The linked article, from Will Bunch, a senior writer for the Philadelphia Daily News, is also a great read.Continue reading

Kawaii

Someone left an interesting one word comment on a photo I took:

First jeans

First jeans
Valley Fair Shopping Center, Santa Clara, California

Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX1
1/8 sec @ f/2.8, iso 400, 6mm (28mm)

The word was “kawaii.” (可愛さ)Continue reading

Aryan Fever

Someone from Taiwan told me their sister isn’t digging some guy because he’s Asian and she’s not into Asians.

This, of course, reminded me of “Yellow Fever.” What’s weird about that mockumentary is that it isn’t about “Yellow Fever” since that’s when a white guy is digging some East Asian girl.

What do you call it when a asian girl only goes out with white guys?

I asked my good friend Redgee for what they call it—after all, if anyone should know it should be a Filipino. 😀

First he suggested “twinkie” but that wasn’t quite right. He didn’t know so he coined the term “Aryan Fever.”
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Solve sudoku

Mark Frauenfelder inadvertantly shows his egotism and stupidity.

I clicked on the linked article expecting to learn something. What a mistake! This is the sort of methodology anyone who has completed the simplest puzzle has stumbled upon. This strategy doesn’t even solve any puzzle that is halfway interesting…assuming you find sudoku halfway interesting, which I don’t (because I’m bad at logic puzzles).

Solve this! (without even thinking)

Solve this! (without even thinking)

Is there a better way to scream, “I’m a moron!” then to link that instructable article and add a comparison to solitaire: an entirely different game since not all solitaires are winnable and there is no single strategy to winning determined by logic alone. Hmm, Mark, maybe you find this stuff “boring” because you don’t know how to solve them. Let’s face it, the only reason you held crossword puzzles up on a pedestal is because Sundance told you to. Why don’t you join Cory and switch to Ubuntu. You’ve become exactly the sort of egotistical latte-sipping Gen-X dickhead that you rail against.Continue reading

Cutting memories from suburbia

Money Clip Knife

Listening to NPR on the way to work, the program was about job prospects for high school graduates.

The first person interviewed was a kid who was selling Cutco knives for Vector Marketing. I’m sure Mark will get a kick out of that.

Though I was spared the opportunity of thinking selling knives was cool, I do have a book with a lot of holes poked in it by a Cutco money clip knife thrown by someone less fortunate than me.
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