February 2012
53 posts
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January 2012
93 posts
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Homeric Heroism and Tennis →
Over at Grantland yesterday, Brian Phillips went all in on the sports figures as heroes trope, comparing the Big Three in contemporary men’s tennis to some of the warriors in Homer’s Iliad:
One of the great things about this era of the game, though — it goes along with the cruelty we were just talking about — is that it feels almost epic. That’s a word that gets thrown around a lot...
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Twitter and Censorship
Last week, the internet was abuzz with anger and frustration over Twitter’s announcement that it could block content in specific countries in response to governmental requests. The majority of that buzz has quieted down, either because there are always more things about which we can get frustrated and angry or because people forgot about the whole thing pretty quickly.
At least I’m...
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Thidwick Goes to Washington →
I was wondering what my day was missing and then I saw that Joe Lieberman referenced Dr. Seuss today in the Senate:
Sen. Lieberman did not want his bill to become like Thidwick’s antlers.
I wholeheartedly support more Dr. Seuss references in politics.
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WatchIn the second episode of The Hero Report, our guest is Dr. Zeno Franco.
We discuss the ways in which the idea of heroism has changed over time and then turn to heroism in the news, specifically the Kenyan orphanage attack and the Reddit charitable response.
Tell us what you think, discuss these issues with us on Twitter (Matt Langdon / Ari Kohen), and join us every Friday at 4pm Eastern on...
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Israel First?
I debated with myself about whether or not to wade into the shark-infested waters of the on-going “Israel Firster” debate that’s been raging online for more than a month now. For those who haven’t been following it on the blogs and on Twitter, Spencer Ackerman provided a helpful recap a couple of days ago. Since I teach a class on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, since...
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From Today's Torah Reading
In Parashat Bo, read on January 28, 2012, Pharaoh continues in his refusal to heed God’s command, conveyed by Moses and Aaron, to free his Israelite slaves. Pharaoh’s self-destructive intransigence dismays even his own courtiers, who warn him: “Are you not yet aware that Egypt is lost?” (10:7). On January 28, 2011 – one year ago today – Egypt responded to anti-government protests by cutting off...
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“Why not aspire to build a real Jurassic Park?”
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Newt Gingrich in 1996.
It’s in his book, To Renew America.
So … if you’re interested in dinosaurs living on American moon base, remember: Only a Gingrich administration can promise you this.
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“By the end of my second term, we will have the first permanent base on the moon...”
– Newt Gingrich, in Florida, to applause.
“Does that mean I’m visionary? You betcha,” he said.
You know, if he doesn’t win the nomination, he could always be Space Czar in a Romney or Santorum administration. You know whose administration definitely wouldn’t have a...
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For the record: Story overreached in calling... →
Quite. A. Retraction.
From the Boston Globe:
Editor’s note: A front-page story on Jan. 17 drew unsupported conclusions and significantly overstepped available evidence when it described former Liberia president Charles Taylor as having worked with US spy agencies as a “sought-after source.’’ The story, based on a response by the US Defense Intelligence Agency to a long-pending records...
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WatchHere it is: The first episode of The Hero Report.
I hope you’ll enjoy it and share it widely!
You can also subscribe to the audio-only version of the podcast in iTunes.
Matt Langdon and Zeno Franco’s article on the Costa Concordia, which we mention on the podcast, is here.
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“I am rooting for you, Merrill Garbus. I like your record, and I hope you make...”
– Chuck Klosterman on tUnE-yArDs
I really like what Chuck Klosterman writes, I’ve been baffled by the number of times that people have told me I should give tUnE-yArDs a listen, and I’m puzzled by what exactly people like about this music every time I listen to Merrill Garbus.
So,...
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WatchIn today’s news, Nebraska considers repealing Prohibition.
A few quick thoughts:
Who really wants to drink at 9:30 in the morning?
How much does anyone think this bill really matters, given that every city can make its own laws that would continue the prohibition of alcohol sales on Sunday mornings?
Can I claim, as a member of a minority religious group, that my rights are being unduly...
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The Hero Report
I’m excited to announce a new venture on which I’m about to embark: A weekly video podcast on heroism with my friend Matt Langdon, an educator and blogger from Michigan (via Australia) with whom I’ve been in conversation for a few years now. Our first episode — which features a discussion on the Costa Concordia shipwreck, the captain’s dereliction of duty, and whether...
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“If any case properly should be described as extraordinary, it is this one. For...”
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In breaking news, Joe D’Ambrosio has been exonerated and becomes the 140th inmate released from death row in the United States since 1973.
The above quote, from Judge Kate O’Malley provides some insight into D’Ambrosio’s exoneration.
More here (via NCADP).
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On Joe Paterno's Passing
When I read about Joe Paterno’s passing this weekend — on two separate occasions, strangely — I found it impossible to separate the coaching legend of so many decades from the sexual abuse scandal of recent memory. For good or ill, one event or choice can fundamentally alter public perception of a person’s life and legacy.
Indeed, this is a central element of the book...
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U.N. genocide court moves first case home to... →
News from the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda:
“With significant law reform, we’ve been able finally to convince the judges that the legal framework in this country adequately provides fair trial for any of the accused who is sent over to this country,” ICTR prosecutor Hassan Bubacar Jallow told a news conference in the Rwandan capital, Kigali.
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The Right to an Attorney, Any Attorney →
Scott Lemieux comments on the Supreme Court’s decision this week in the Maples case about the right to legal counsel:
Surely the right to counsel guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment entails more than being nominally represented by someone who has passed a bar exam somewhere. But Scalia’s defense of the “right” of the state of Alabama to put people to death (even if they’ve never been...
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Doctors Demand Restrictions On Another Execution... →
For lack of a better phrase, the noose continues to tighten around lethal injection in the United States. With sodium thiopental already so difficult to come by that states are turning to drug brokers in other countries to provide them with an ill-gotten supply, now we learn from Brian Evans at Amnesty International USA’s blog that doctors are taking aim at the second in the traditional...
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Watch
In this recent Bloggingheads diavlog, Glenn Greenwald and Katha Pollitt debate whether or not the disgruntled Left ought to embrace Ron Paul. Not at all surprisingly given their columns on Paul, Greenwald and Pollitt come to this question from different angles, though they both seem to have moderated their positions a fair amount from what they wrote in the recent past. Also not surprisingly,...
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“The rushed and arbitrary deadline insisted on by Congressional Republicans...”
– Barack Obama, nailing shut the coffin of the Keystone XL pipeline.
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Watch
Here is some good news as a final follow-up to my post from ten days ago, in which I called on readers to sign a petition asking that Robert Gattis be spared the death penalty:
Delaware Gov. Jack Markell today announced he is sparing the life of condemned killer Robert A. Gattis, who was scheduled to die by lethal injection early Friday morning.
It is the first time in modern memory, and...
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Is religion ridiculous? Many atheists think that...
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One U.S. family is responsible for half of... →
This is all sorts of fascinating:
Members of a single American family have donated half of the NIS 330,000 Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has raised for his Likud party primary campaign in the past few weeks. Four members of the Falic family from Florida are responsible for contributing some NIS 165,000.
There’s an interesting discussion already underway — in Israel and in the...
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A Centrist's Lament →
The Jerusalem Post published as an op-ed today a piece by Erika Dreifus — whose work I must admit I’ve never read — that describes a serious problem she faces. She’s an American author who has to keep unsubscribing from email lists, unfollowing other authors on Twitter, and declining to join petition campaigns because they all become “a reliable source of condemnation...
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Roosevelt, Corporations, and Politics
The Constitution guarantees protections to property, and we must make that promise good. But it does not give the right of suffrage to any corporation. The true friend of property, the true conservative, is he who insists that property shall be the servant and not the master of any commonwealth; who insists that the creature of man’s making shall be the servant and not the master of the...
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Appropriating Auschwitz
Earlier this week, David A. Graham posted this photo of Newt and Callista Gingrich at Auschwitz over at The Atlantic:
There was, he said, “something distinctly off” about it.
The photo is several years old, but it was quickly picked up by a whole bunch of people and pretty much everyone rushed to agree that this is one of the more stunning examples of Gingrich being clueless and...
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