tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17289787337988373332024-02-20T09:50:44.406-08:00Short Hairstyles and HaircutsShort hairstyles for women and girls Ideas Include trendy haircuts galleryUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger161125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-60194905205886522132021-03-31T06:09:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:42.191-07:00"There’s some precedent for a company trying a 'fake news' joke. In 2018, the food chain IHOP briefly tried to convince consumer it was exchanging the 'P' in its name to 'B,' trading pancakes for burgers."<p>"[Volkswagen spokesman Mark] Gillies, after presenting the false information the day before, came clean on Tuesday... '[W]e didn’t mean to mislead anyone. The whole thing is just a marketing action to get people talking' about its new car model." </p><p>From <a href="https://apnews.com/article/volkswagen-us-name-change-prank-voltswagen-f600024d7e80549539dc90831b41ba3d">"An unwelcome prank: Volkswagen purposely hoodwinks reporters"</a> (AP).</p><p>VW must have thought that it's so clearly not true that the longstanding brand name Volkswagen of America would be changed to "Voltswagen of America" that it would work as an Onion-style headline, <i>funnier</i> because it looks like real news. </p><p>But the Associated Press, USA Today, CNBC, and the Washington Post all took it seriously and reported it as news. And some of them are now acting outraged. E.g.: "This was not a joke. It was deception. In case you haven’t noticed, we have a misinformation problem in this country. Now you’re part of it. Why should anyone trust you again?"Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-70881593891922278462021-03-31T04:14:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:42.320-07:00"It's March 2021, and I'm looking back on this comments thread about drawings from Van Gogh Museum. It's so weird to see the one commenter breaking in..."<p>"... with the emergency news that Peter Jennings has died and I must get right on it," I write in the comments to <a href="https://althouse.blogspot.com/2005/08/amsterdam-notebookspage-7.html">a post I put in 2005</a>. </p><p>We were talking about a post that had my ink drawings of Van Gogh and of a museum guard yelling at a baby who'd sat down on the ledge that is there to keep people from standing to close to the paintings, and of the baby muttering "Bummer, bummer, bummer." </p><p>I thought that was pretty amusing, but the commenter was all: "Ann, if you're still up, Peter Jennings' death was just announced 15 mins ago. I have a link in my blog, but so far, only lgf have the story. Since you're doing Glenn's blog this week, it seems you're going to be doing extra-duty on the obit watch -- they'll start to pour any second."</p><p>The notion that I'm here to hop to it when there's breaking news... it was absurd then and it's absurd now. Everyone knew Peter Jennings was dying. It was one of those death-watch situations. And yet it seemed important to some people to burst in and be <i>first!</i> when the dying man is <i>actually</i> dead. Why?! <br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-18151592016874617542021-03-31T03:50:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:42.393-07:00"Two days ago, I decided to stop doing the dishes. I make all the dinners and I am tired of having to do all the cleaning too. SINCE THEN..."<p>"... this pile has appeared and at some point they are going to run out of spoons and cups and plates. Who will blink first? Not me."</p><p><a href="https://twitter.com/MissPotkin/status/1372311382406889474">Tweeted Miss Potkin</a>, with lots of photos (keep scrolling). </p><p>Via <a href="https://www.metafilter.com/190935/Who-will-blink-first-Not-me">Metafilter</a>, where somebody says "So it’s like Wages for Housework, except you get Twitter faves instead of wages, and instead of a deep feminist critique of capitalism, you get a resentful critique of your shitty family?"</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-54573655622874201232021-03-31T03:41:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:42.471-07:00"At this point we’re missing our tourists again. But I think there was a moment of really big joy in getting our city back."<p>Said the owner of an Amsterdam restaurant, quoted in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/31/travel/amsterdam-tourism-post-pandemic.html?smid=url-share">"In Empty Amsterdam, Reconsidering Tourism/Before Covid-19, the city was packed with visitors. Now efforts to rein in the expected post-pandemic crowds are ramping up, but not without controversy"</a> (NYT). </p><blockquote><p>In 2019, a record-breaking 21.7 million people visited Amsterdam, a city with a population of about 870,000.... On a typical Saturday night before the pandemic, the district, known as De Wallen, would have been heaving with young men going from bar to bar — perhaps stepping into sex shops or coffee shops or eyeing scantily clad prostitutes posing in their windows. <span></span></p><a name='more'></a>Several Amsterdammers interviewed for this story said that they would never consider visiting the neighborhood at such a time because of the rowdy, crowded scene. “The public space is dominated by facilities that are almost all redolent of sex, drugs and drink,” Ms. Halsema wrote of the historic city center in an official letter to the city council in July 2019.... <br /><p></p></blockquote><blockquote><p>[One proposed solution is] the relocation of sex workers to a “prostitution hotel” elsewhere in the city... Another headline-grabbing proposal... would make it illegal for visitors to buy cannabis in Amsterdam’s coffee shops, which are concentrated in the Red Light District and which have long been popular with tourists... <br /></p></blockquote><blockquote><p>A tourism “monoculture” has [pushed out] residents... Businesses and services that used to cater to locals — high-quality bakeries, butcher shops, and the like — have been replaced by trinket shops, ice-cream parlors and “Nutella shops,” which serve takeaway waffles and other treats smeared in the hazelnut spread, mainly to tourists. Meanwhile, rising housing prices — due, in part, to the rise of Airbnb and other vacation rental platforms — have made the city center unaffordable for many locals.</p></blockquote><p>I went to Amsterdam, solo, in 1993. I was interested in the art, and <a href="https://althouse.blogspot.com/2005/08/amsterdam-notebookspage-1.html">I had my pen and notebook</a>. I never set foot in a marijuana coffee shop, and I tried to move quickly past the sleazier things, but <a href="https://althouse.blogspot.com/2005/08/amsterdam-notebookspage-4.html">I did stop to record some of the sleaziness</a>:</p><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/althouse/31213185/" title="Amsterdam Notebook. by Ann Althouse, on Flickr"><img alt="Amsterdam Notebook." height="500" src="http://farm1.staticflickr.com/21/31213185_739fbf18b3.jpg" width="381" /></a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/althouse/31213226/" title="Amsterdam Notebook. by Ann Althouse, on Flickr"><img alt="Amsterdam Notebook." height="500" src="http://farm1.staticflickr.com/23/31213226_131bf2fdb2.jpg" width="332" /></a> </p><p>The fabulous aesthetic pleasures of the historical city with its grand museums was undermined by some awful, ugly junk even back then, nearly 30 years ago, so it is hard for me to imagine what the residents are complaining about today, which is the crowds and worsening conditions of the last few years. <br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-65331780257612706312021-03-31T03:04:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:42.552-07:00"Unlike so many Hollywood roles, the sexuality at the core of hers wasn’t cute or passive or submissive.""It was challenging, confrontational, defiant; she stared into the camera with those remarkable eyes, almost daring us to return her gaze. The parts became increasingly transgressive: in <i>The Night Porter</i>, Rampling has a sadomasochistic relationship with her Nazi torturer; in <i>’Tis Pity She’s A Whore</i> she has an incestuous affair with her brother; and in <i>Max Mon Amour</i>, she cheats on her diplomat husband with a chimpanzee. 'Ah, the ape – I love it,' she says affectionately.... Rampling says she simply wasn’t interested in Hollywood. 'Let’s use a nice old English expression: it just wasn’t my cup of tea. I wanted to go into the auteur and European world of the semi-darkness.'"<p> From <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2021/mar/27/charlotte-rampling-i-am-prickly-people-who-are-prickly-cant-be-hurt-any-more?CMP=fb_gu&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&fbclid=IwAR2RKc1cxIFi8H4JvLcafQVYKaXiIiz0QVeD61LCrsRBlb_oDUjwvOONteY#Echobox=1616839621">"Charlotte Rampling: ‘I am prickly. People who are prickly can’t be hurt any more’ She’s best known for her dark, difficult roles, and doesn’t suffer fools gladly. The actor talks about swinging in the 60s, family tragedy – and why she’s still got It"</a> (The Guardian). </p><p>Rampling is 75, and she's still doing movies. She's been <a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001648/">in so many things</a> over the years, beginning with the uncredited role of Girl at Disco in "A Hard Day's Night." I haven't seen many of them at all. Avoided "The Night Porter," which was a big deal in its time (1974). I did see "Stardust Memories" (1980):</p><p></p><p></p><p><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/iKTrR260rBI" title="YouTube video player" width="500"></iframe></p>I looked up "Max Mon Amour," and I've got to say the poster is very nice:<div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6vFqGEIm37G-BSFfhDMxp7koywHa6ocAKcBFWqQO3a9UXRaTKjKCl2SwBTkBGsvFbHxSvfh93MGePnO9dxKYSnpcpT8og1ZDQCG50yCB8smMsj6uL-8AZx4wz_K6B2PeT3cPUwQzpHl4/s360/Max%252C_Mon_Amour.jpg" style="clear: left; display: block; float: left; padding: 1em 0px; text-align: center;"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="360" data-original-width="277" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6vFqGEIm37G-BSFfhDMxp7koywHa6ocAKcBFWqQO3a9UXRaTKjKCl2SwBTkBGsvFbHxSvfh93MGePnO9dxKYSnpcpT8og1ZDQCG50yCB8smMsj6uL-8AZx4wz_K6B2PeT3cPUwQzpHl4/s400/Max%252C_Mon_Amour.jpg" /></a></div><p style="clear: both;"></p><p style="clear: both;"> From <a href="https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/max-my-love-max-mon-amour">the reviews at Rotten Tomatoes</a> (where it has a 22% rating): "Impossible to take seriously or as satire, this film is an embarrassment to humanity and our cousins in the jungle"/"A wry mix of <i>King Kong</i> and <i>My Man Godfrey</i>, it's a potent premise that somehow never catches fire."/"On the whole, it works as a witty, black comedy of manners that judiciously avoids the vulgarity inherent in the subject."</p><p style="clear: both;">The Guardian says "the sexuality at the core of hers wasn’t cute or passive or submissive," but are we to take these movies — which she did not write or direct — as expressive of <i>Rampling's</i> sexual core? She got the roles she got. This seems like a good place to bring up Sharon Stone's new memoir. Here's an article about it in TNR, <a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/161846/sharon-stone-fantasy-female-domination-review-memoir">"Sharon Stone and the Fantasy of Female Domination/At the peak of her fame, she exuded total control on screen. According to her new memoir, a different story played out behind the scenes."</a> <span></span></p><a name='more'></a><p></p><blockquote><p>A woman’s performance of power in public—the all-knowing sexual omnipotence built into the idea of Sharon Stone’s celebrity, you could say—has had little to no correlation, in her experience, with her day-to-day life.... As an adult, Stone saw the famous crotch-shot in <i>Basic Instinct</i> for the first time in “a room full of agents and lawyers, most of whom had nothing to do with the project.” All she had been told was, “We can’t see anything—I just need you to remove your panties, as the white is reflecting the light, so we know you have panties on.”... <br /></p></blockquote><blockquote><p style="clear: both;">In 2018, an interviewer asked Sharon Stone if she had any #MeToo stories, and she laughed long and bitterly....</p></blockquote>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-28976751053735837792021-03-31T02:28:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:42.633-07:00"Why operate your business from an expensive midtown office when all you need is a smartphone and laptop, a tasteful backdrop for your video calls, and Amazon Prime?"<p>"Ask the same question on a societal level... why... pour billions into a staggeringly expensive system of urban infrastructure when all you need to keep the wheels of commerce turning is Zoom, Signal, and a reliable, super-fast wireless network…. After Covid, nothing defined 2020 more than an explosion of crime across urban America, even though there were far fewer people outdoors to victimize…. [A]re nightclubs as much of a draw when dating can be now conducted online?… Covid has [sped the] demise of retail stores…. [M]useums and concert halls [and] sports stadiums and arenas to theaters and neighborhood cinemas… are all under assault, [from Covid and from] streaming video and virtual events. Another potential threat to density is the green movement… The manufacture of density’s core ingredients, steel and cement, produces some 15 percent of the world’s carbon emissions…. The fates of major metropolises are hanging precariously as they grasp at untested policies predicated on borrowed stimulus dollars, short-term business bailouts, non-eviction mandates, and other spit-and-glue measures that are most likely unsustainable…. All these challenges will be made even greater as the politics of cities grow increasingly polarized." </p><p>From <a href="https://www.city-journal.org/covid-19-the-death-of-density">"The Death of Density?/To survive and thrive, cities will have to overcome a number of formidable trends"</a> by Richard Schwartz (who has "served in senior positions under 3 New York mayors).<br /></p><p>I've compressed a lot, and I completely omitted the last paragraph — which calls for hope, hope for <i>density</i>. But the argument against density is so strong. You've got environmentalism counting <i>in favor</i> of the suburbs now. You've got all the new patterns of work and social life, all the speed and connection of the internet replacing the physical proximity maintained within a city. And you've got the crime in the city. And the politics, which will skew evermore to the left as people who want the benefits of nondensity — and want out of the ever-tightening grip of left politics — exercise their option to leave.<br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-68545151529212086672021-03-30T16:53:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:42.706-07:00At the Tuesday Night Café...<p> ... you can talk about whatever you want.<br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-65614592761538687252021-03-30T16:47:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:42.782-07:00"Grumpy old white dude assholes frantically trying to pivot to Professional White Ally, on the theory that this will make them money, aren’t making money."<p>"Tweedy party-at-the-Verso-loft n+1 leftists aren’t making money. 33 year olds who follow Tik Tok trends for a living and communicate in slang that’s fifteen years too young for them aren’t making money. Arrogant white nerdoliberals with Warby Parkers and Moleskine collections aren’t making money. Sports bloggers who provide sports news and commentary but with attitude aren’t making money. Softening khaki dads struggling to understand Bitcoin and intersectionality in an effort to survive their next inevitable layoff aren’t making money. Talented and unfulfilled women writers who have learned too late that women’s media is a ghetto they will struggle to escape for the rest of their careers aren’t making money. Aspiring young data scientists who labor over their spreadsheets for hours only to see others copy and past[e] their R graphs without attribution and receive 40x the pageviews aren’t making money. And you won’t either." </p><p>From <a href="https://freddiedeboer.substack.com/p/if-you-want-to-make-it-as-a-writer-293">"If You Want to Make It As a Writer, For God's Sakes, Be Weird/you're in a market, so sell something other people aren't"</a> by Freddie DeBoer (Substack).</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-4220002076604302282021-03-30T16:38:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:42.857-07:00"I only know that it has to do with women. I have a suspicion that someone is trying to recategorize my generosity to ex-girlfriends as something more untoward."<p>Said Matt Gaetz, quoted in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/30/us/politics/matt-gaetz-sex-trafficking-investigation.html?smid=url-share">"Matt Gaetz Is Said to Be Investigated Over Possible Sexual Relationship With a Girl, 17/In inquiry into the Florida congressman was opened in the final months of the Trump administration, people briefed on it said"</a> (NYT).</p><p>UPDATE: Gaetz went on Tucker Carlson's show last night and made some elaborate counter-allegations. I found this hard to follow. He accuses the NYT of interfering with something. The word "extortion" comes up a lot, and after he leaves, Carlson — perhaps wanting to distance himself from the factual assertions — calls it "weird." <br /></p><p><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/PQzLCHLle-g" title="YouTube video player" width="500"></iframe> </p><p>UPDATE 2: I received a press release from Gaetz in my email. It says: </p><blockquote><p>"Over the past several weeks, my family and I have been victims of an organized criminal extortion involving a former DOJ official seeking $25 million while threatening to smear my name. We have been cooperating with federal authorities in this matter and my father has even been wearing a wire at the FBI’s direction to catch these criminals. The planted leak to the New York Times tonight was intended to thwart that investigation. No part of the allegations against me are true, and the people pushing these lies are targets of the ongoing extortion investigation. I demand the DOJ immediately release the tapes, made at their direction, which implicate their former colleague in crimes against me based on false allegations."</p></blockquote><p>On Carlson's show, he named the man he was accusing of an extortion scheme. <br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-48330818703059938722021-03-30T16:36:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:42.926-07:00Major... minor... Biden's dog bites again.<p><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/wwXbMrsjUio" title="YouTube video player" width="500"></iframe> </p><p>ADDED: This is a new incident. Here's the CNN report: <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/30/politics/major-biden-dog-white-house/">"Bidens' dog Major involved in another biting incident."</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-70552634084314345792021-03-30T10:19:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:42.996-07:00"Kipling Williams has studied the effects of the silent treatment for more than 36 years, meeting hundreds of victims and perpetrators in the process..."<p>"A grown woman whose father refused to speak with her for six months at a time as punishment throughout her life. 'Her father died during one of those dreaded periods... When she visited him at the hospital shortly before his death, he turned away from her and wouldn’t break his silence even to say goodbye.' A father who stopped talking to his teenage son and couldn’t start again, despite the harm he knew he was causing. 'The isolation made my son change from a happy, vibrant boy to a spineless jellyfish, and I knew I was the cause,' the father said to Williams. A wife whose husband severed communication with her early in their marriage. 'She endured four decades of silence that started with a minor disagreement and only ended when her husband died,' Williams said. Forty years of eating meals by herself, watching television by herself—40 years of being invisible. 'When I asked her why she stayed with him for all that time... she answered simply, "Because at least he kept a roof over my head."'" </p><p>From <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2021/03/psychology-of-silent-treatment-abuse/618411/">"What You’re Saying When You Give Someone the Silent Treatment/Social ostracism has been a common punishment for millennia. But freezing someone out harms both the victim and the perpetrator"</a> by Daryl Austin (The Atlantic)(paywall challenge to overcome).</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-74090016505064013112021-03-30T09:14:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:43.068-07:00WaPo Fact Checker gives Biden 4 Pinocchios for saying that the new Georgia voting law is "sick … deciding that you’re going to end voting at five o’clock when working people are just getting off work."<p><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/03/30/biden-falsely-claims-new-georgia-law-ends-voting-hours-early/">Glenn Kessler writes:</a> </p><p></p><blockquote><p>On Election Day in Georgia, polling places are open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., and if you are in line by 7 p.m., you are allowed to cast your ballot. Nothing in the new law changes those rules.... </p><p>So where would Biden get this perception that ordinary workers were getting the shaft because the state would “end voting at five o’clock"? We have one clue. The law used to say early “voting shall be conducted during normal business hours.” Experts said that generally means 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. The new law makes it specific — “beginning at 9:00 AM and ending at 5:00 PM.” </p></blockquote><p>Obviously, nearly everyone would read Biden's statement to refer to Election Day. The bit about early voting could have been used to cut Biden some slack and back off from the full 4-Pinocchio denouncement, but that would be wrong, because the new law didn't even cut back early voting. </p><p>I'm glad to see Kessler giving 4 Pinocchios when deserved. Last month, <a href="https://althouse.blogspot.com/2021/02/it-will-be-hard-for-wapo-fact-checker.html">I was critical of him for backing off</a> to 3 and said: "Stop babying Biden! He's the damned President. If he needs to be babied, get him out of the presidency."Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-86701117430957370232021-03-30T08:35:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:43.142-07:00"Three burglars botched a jewellery heist when they were caught running from a neighbouring tweed shop covered in brick dust having set off the alarm on a safe by drilling through a cellar wall."<p>"The trio broke into the Cheltenham Tweed Company shop in the spa town’s promenade on January 9 and drilled their way through the dividing wall in the basement to get into the adjacent antiques and jewellery shop. Tim Burrows, for Newman said: 'They were all flummoxed by the safe. It was while they were trying to gain entry into the safe that the alarm went off.' Judge Ian Lawrie, QC, interjected: “They behaved like three buffoons with utter incompetence in carrying out this burglary.... Judge Lawrie told Rabjohns: 'You were a complete idiot to get involved in this burglary. You need to take greater care who you mix with in future.'"</p><p>That's from England, obviously. Lots of clues, and I didn't even include the part about the "spanner" in the "boot." Notice the spelling "jewellery." In America, we laugh at people who speak as if "jewelry" were spelled "jewellery."</p><p>From <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/buffoon-burglars-sentenced-for-botched-jewellery-heist-bzgtjbb5z">"‘Buffoon’ burglars sentenced for botched jewellery heist"</a> (The London Times).</p><p>It's one thing to get caught committing a crime, quite another to have the judges all mocking you for how stupid you were to get caught. </p><p><i>Running from a tweed shop covered in brick dust! </i></p><p> Judge Lawrie: "I don’t think the three men visiting the clothing shop were really interested in adding tweed to their wardrobe when they went on a scouting mission in December."</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-51914871107106097252021-03-30T08:12:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:43.214-07:00"Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said Monday that neither a gas tax nor a mileage tax would be part of President Joe Biden's sweeping infrastructure plan to be detailed on Wednesday."<p><a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/29/politics/buttigieg-no-gas-tax-mileage-tax-biden-infrastructure-plan-cnntv/"> CNN reports.</a> </p><blockquote><p>The absence of both taxes to fund the infrastructure proposal marks a shift from Buttigieg's comments Friday. <br /></p></blockquote><blockquote><p>"I think that shows a lot of promise," Buttigieg said of the mileage tax. "If we believe in that so-called user pays principle, the idea that part of how we pay for roads is you pay based on how much you drive.... The gas tax used to be the obvious way to do it -- it's not anymore, so a so-called vehicle-miles-traveled tax or mileage tax, whatever you want to call it, could be a way to do it... [I]f there's a way to do it that doesn't increase the burden on the middle class, we can look at it, but if we do, we've got to recognize that's still not going to be the long-term answer." </p></blockquote><p>That was last Friday, after which Buttigieg got "roasted" (<a href="https://theweek.com/speedreads/974279/buttigieg-gets-roasted-from-all-directions-mileage-tax-idea">according to The Week</a>). The big problem with that "user pays principle" is that richer people live in the more close-in suburbs and have the benefit of a shorter commute, and the poorer people who must buy further-out real estate and put up with a longer commute would now be expected to pay more for their opposite-of-privilege.</p><p>Here's Buttigieg displaying absurd glibness embracing the principle and acting like he and that principle never met:<br /></p><blockquote></blockquote><blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">As <a href="https://twitter.com/jaketapper?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@jaketapper</a> says after, "something of a backtrack" on this:<a href="https://t.co/FBafw2Tudx">https://t.co/FBafw2Tudx</a></p>— The Recount (@therecount) <a href="https://twitter.com/therecount/status/1376633955101855747?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 29, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-81088334097174648412021-03-30T07:52:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:43.290-07:00"These highly-qualified candidates reflect the President’s deeply-held conviction that the federal bench should reflect the full diversity of the American people – both in background and in professional experience..."<p>Says <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/03/30/president-biden-announces-intent-to-nominate-11-judicial-candidates/">"President Biden Announces Intent to Nominate 11 Judicial Candidates"</a> (White House press release). </p><p>Quote attributed to Biden: </p><blockquote>"This trailblazing slate of nominees draws from the very best and brightest minds of the American legal profession. Each is deeply qualified and prepared to deliver justice faithfully under our Constitution and impartially to the American people — and together they represent the broad diversity of background, experience, and perspective that makes our nation strong."</blockquote><p>Who writes this stuff? You've got the "best and brightest" cliché (puffed up with "very"). You've got the silly mixed metaphor, "trailblazing slate." You've got the syrupy ideology — "broad diversity... makes our nation strong."</p><p>Looking at the list, I see that 9 of the 11 are female.<br /></p>Here's the NYT article: <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/30/us/politics/biden-judges.html?smid=url-share">"Biden Names Diverse Nominees for the Federal Bench/The president’s first choices for district and appeals court openings reflected his campaign promise to choose judges from outside of traditional backgrounds."<span><a name='more'></a></span></a><blockquote>Mr. Biden is not the first Democratic president to try to reshape the federal bench. When Mr. Obama was elected, his lawyers also considered appointing judges who did not have the traditional pedigrees of litigating experience at major law firms, graduating from top colleges, selection to elite clerkships and service as federal prosecutors. <br /></blockquote><blockquote>But when Mr. Obama’s counsel’s office sent the names of public defenders or sole practitioners to the American Bar Association for the standard review before nomination, the group frequently objected. One person familiar with the effort said the Obama White House ran into what he called “endless difficulties” with the bar association, which would indicate privately that it intended to rate such candidates poorly. </blockquote><blockquote>Late last year, during his transition, Mr. Biden agreed with advisers to end the tradition of Democratic presidents of submitting names to the bar association before nominating them. The association will be free to issue judgments on those nominees, but only after the president has already made his selections public. </blockquote><blockquote>That could help Mr. Biden fill judicial vacancies more quickly, said several people familiar with the process. The president and his lawyers are keenly aware that Democratic control of the Senate may not last past the midterm elections in 2022, giving him a short window in which to make his mark on the judiciary....</blockquote><p>ADDED: In my American experience, the phrase <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Best_and_the_Brightest">"The Best and The Brightest"</a> has a dark, sarcastic edge. <br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-90119463376238623942021-03-30T07:35:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:43.362-07:00"It’s more necessary than ever to find the empathetic experience of meeting another person, being in another culture, to smell it, to suffer it, to put up with the hardship and the nuisances of travel, all of that matters."<p>The pro-travel position, aspirationally articulated by Paul Theroux, quoted in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/28/books/paul-theroux-under-the-wave-at-waimea.html?smid=url-share">"Would the Pandemic Stop Paul Theroux From Traveling? No. Of course not"</a> (NYT). </p><p>Nice photo of Theroux's workspace at the link. <a href="">I'm a longtime fan</a> of that genre of photography, and I declare this example worth a click. </p><p>I'm also a longtime participant in the debate about whether to travel, and I'm more of a con than a pro. In that light, I'll say that Theroux sets a <i>somewhat</i> high bar for what you're supposed to be doing in this thing called travel — "empathetic experience," "being in, "smell it," "suffer it," "put up with the hardship." It's no <i>pleasure</i> trip. </p><p>Another Theroux quote at the link: "You cannot be a grumpy traveler. You will not get anywhere. You’ll be killed, you’ll be insulted, you won’t be able to travel. So you need to get along with people. I think that I’m characterized as cantankerous perhaps because if you see things the way they are, and you just describe things the way they are, you can be accused of being unkind."</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-45629743358507225122021-03-29T15:58:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:43.436-07:00At the Sunrise Café...<p><a data-flickr-embed="true" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/althouse/51012267870/in/photostream/" title="IMG_3232"><img alt="IMG_3232" height="375" src="https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/51012267870_b988a0ffc6.jpg" width="500" /></a><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js"></script> </p><p>... you can talk about whatever you want.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-23598881115301675832021-03-29T15:40:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:43.505-07:00"I'm going to reflect on the recurring feeling I have of impending doom. We have so much to look forward to... but right now, I'm scared."<p>"We have come such a long way...just please hold on a little while longer. I so badly want to be done. I know you all so badly want to be done. We are just almost there, just not quite yet." </p><p>Said CDC Director Rochelle Walensky:</p><p><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/3lnWAE0AfGc" title="YouTube video player" width="500"></iframe></p><p> Not long after that, as <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/03/29/world/covid-vaccine-coronavirus-cases#covid-cases-vaccines-eligible">the NYT reports</a>:<br /></p><blockquote><p>President Biden on Monday called on governors and mayors to maintain or reinstate mask-wearing orders, saying that because of “reckless behavior,” the coronavirus was again spreading fast, threatening the progress the nation has made so far against the pandemic. “People are letting up on precautions, which is a very bad thing,” he said. “We are giving up hard-fought, hard-won gains.”... <br /></p></blockquote><blockquote><p> Asked if states should pause their reopening efforts, the president replied simply, “Yes.” He said that governors, mayors, local officials and businesses should demand mask-wearing, calling it a “patriotic duty” that is crucial to the nation’s fight against the virus.</p></blockquote>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-34454536410267957192021-03-29T15:08:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:43.576-07:00"Here's how the full moon helped free the stuck ship Ever Given in the Suez Canal."<a href="https://www.space.com/full-moon-helps-free-stuck-ship-suez-canal">Space.com explains.</a><blockquote>"We were helped enormously by the strong falling tide we had this afternoon," Peter Berdowski, CEO of Boskalis, the salvage firm charged with freeing the Ever Given, told The Associated Press. "In effect, you have the forces of nature pushing hard with you, and they pushed harder than the two sea tugs could pull."</blockquote>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-68706061156432687192021-03-29T15:04:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:43.647-07:00"The uproar over Michael Tomasky’s hiring at TNR underscores the extent to which any institution that isn’t explicitly right wing now faces enormous pressure to go 'woke.'"<p>"Tomasky is a through and through liberal but is being cast as a villain simply for not being further left." </p><p>That's a tweet by Thomas Chatterton Williams, quoted in a Substack piece John Ganz titled <a href="https://johnganz.substack.com/p/the-dumbest-tweet-i-have-ever-seen">"The Dumbest Tweet I Have Ever Seen/Not Really, but C'mon."</a></p><p>Ganz writes: <span></span></p><a name='more'></a><p></p><blockquote><p>Is there a political aspect to the disappointment with the situation at The New Republic? Certainly. Have some of the things written online about Michael Tomasky been uncharitable to him, not even giving him a chance before he gets started? Also, certainly. But the reality of the situation is not some grand ideological clash, the constant invocation of which is growing monotonous, to say the least. The fact is, first of all, people are worried about their jobs. It’s that simple. Some are having an emotional reaction, which might appear excessive, but it’s ultimately about their livelihoods, after all....</p></blockquote><blockquote><p>What was happening at TNR is exactly what anti-woke culture warriors say they miss in media and magazines: ideological and perspectival diversity.... [F]rom my perspective, the attitude in that Tweet is just an example of anti-intellectualism, a total lack of interest in the world, an unwillingness to care about or engage with anything but one’s pet issues, myopia, laziness, hopeless decadence and corruption of the mind etc. Whatever you want to call it, it’s just bullshit. I’m getting pretty tired of it.</p></blockquote>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-25522377686540775892021-03-29T09:09:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:43.718-07:00"The Louvre museum in Paris said Friday it has put nearly half a million items from its collection online for the public to visit free of charge."<p>"As part of a major revamp of its online presence, the world's most-visited museum has created a new database of 482,000 items at collections." </p><p><a href="https://news.yahoo.com/louvre-puts-entire-collection-online-152734085.html">Yahoo reports.</a> </p><p><a href="https://collections.louvre.fr/en/">Here</a>'s the site. </p><p><a href="https://collections.louvre.fr/en/ark:/53355/cl010094873">Here</a>'s the first thing I looked for:</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLka9fN7tIwUVZD0lJu9RCJp2CIw7BN7iwggdFop0P-XVoTMZtpVAsv_daqh4x606OadAc4QzL9959YwMIPLV3InXjj_BpAYqEex8pJiqUeTCs9SMG7wTPSpiV6OnWKn2qOrMlbOEVrHA/s1474/Screen+Shot+2021-03-29+at+11.02.23+AM.png" style="clear: left; display: block; float: left; padding: 1em 0px; text-align: center;"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="1474" data-original-width="1152" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLka9fN7tIwUVZD0lJu9RCJp2CIw7BN7iwggdFop0P-XVoTMZtpVAsv_daqh4x606OadAc4QzL9959YwMIPLV3InXjj_BpAYqEex8pJiqUeTCs9SMG7wTPSpiV6OnWKn2qOrMlbOEVrHA/s400/Screen+Shot+2021-03-29+at+11.02.23+AM.png" /></a></div><p style="clear: both;"></p><p style="clear: both;">I wanted to see that because I have a strong memory of drawing it (in person) and only remembered my drawing (blogged before, <a href="https://althouse.blogspot.com/2004/11/todays-drawing-voltaire-pens.html">here</a>): </p><p style="clear: both;"><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050610085727im_/http://homepage.mac.com/annalthouse/.Pictures/Photo%20Album%20Pictures/2004-11-24%2005.02.54%20-0800/Image-9F93B52A3E1911D9.jpg"><img border="0" src="http://web.archive.org/web/20050610085727im_/http://homepage.mac.com/annalthouse/.Pictures/Photo%20Album%20Pictures/2004-11-24%2005.02.54%20-0800/Image-9F93B52A3E1911D9.jpg" width="500" /></a><br /></p><p style="clear: both;"></p><p style="clear: both;"> ADDED: Oh, no, wait. It's this one — an older, nakeder Voltaire. This is the "portrait absolument fidèle" that I drew: </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_7ChSZ6wKkEJqJIJyIE-FJgr2sffZ-omQw6whhwL6Hq6lUNbmBimJQq89G4Wf6K3fie2F6T1-dw55a-PkHc-GbwHXwgeFsAumpVRTIBnvDH1dqq6SL1ZOZIUDUYDgm9BkBQ50Z9A0UZs/s1618/Screen+Shot+2021-03-29+at+11.12.56+AM.png" style="clear: left; display: block; float: left; padding: 1em 0px; text-align: center;"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="1618" data-original-width="1158" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_7ChSZ6wKkEJqJIJyIE-FJgr2sffZ-omQw6whhwL6Hq6lUNbmBimJQq89G4Wf6K3fie2F6T1-dw55a-PkHc-GbwHXwgeFsAumpVRTIBnvDH1dqq6SL1ZOZIUDUYDgm9BkBQ50Z9A0UZs/s400/Screen+Shot+2021-03-29+at+11.12.56+AM.png" /></a></div><p></p><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-52698637440189028312021-03-29T08:51:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:43.795-07:00"'There is no political or social cause in this courtroom,' Mr. Chauvin’s lawyer, Eric Nelson, says. He is trying...""... to focus the jury on the specifics of the evidence and steer them away from the wider issues of race and policing in America that the case symbolizes to the world outside the courtroom." <p>From <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/03/29/us/derek-chauvin-trial-live">"Derek Chauvin Trial Live Updates: Lawyers Present Case in George Floyd Killing/The murder trial of the former police officer begins Monday in Minneapolis, 10 months after Mr. Floyd’s death set off protests across the nation"</a> (NYT). </p><blockquote><p>The defense will try to argue that Mr. Floyd took a fatal amount of fentanyl, but now [the prosecutor, Jerry W.] Blackwell is saying that is not true, that he had built up a tolerance and was not exhibiting signs of overdose. “Mr Floyd had lived with his opioid addiction for years… he was struggling, he was not passing out.”... </p><p>The prosecutor is trying to head off arguments from the defense that George Floyd’s size had anything to do with his death — “his size is no excuse,” he said. George Floyd was already more than six feet tall in middle school and he rapped under the name Big Floyd with popular DJs and rappers in Houston. </p><p>Mr. Chauvin’s lawyer begins his opening arguments with the notion of “reasonable doubt.” He needs one juror to buy in to the idea that drugs killed Mr. Floyd, not Mr. Chauvin’s knee, to hang the jury and force a mistrial.</p></blockquote><p>Here's a live feed of the trial: <br /></p><p></p> <iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/j8uWCAf4H_w" title="YouTube video player" width="500"></iframe>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-20249177182826828762021-03-29T08:35:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:43.867-07:00"I was repulsed and even a little afraid (I could easily imagine that the homeowner belonged to a militia group) but also fascinated..."<p>"... perhaps because he plainly also wanted very much to connect, to declare himself, to put forth his vision as any storyteller would. It also seemed as though he wanted to make people laugh, or at least smile. Because, as the display evolved over time, it became clear that he wasn’t just putting up political signage; he was directing a subtly changing Kabuki entertainment for the neighborhood. Some days you’d go by and the white-guy doll would be wearing a scowling Trump mask; then he’d be himself again. Some days there’d be a huge Trump figure sitting in the driver’s seat of one of the vehicles out front; some days not. One day in the fall, an outer-space creature with glittering green eyes appeared beside the male doll, wearing a Trump 2020 hat; later, the alien returned from whence it came and was replaced by a benign Yoda type, who also supported Trump. A friend who stayed at our house while we were out of town for about a month told us that at one point she saw the male doll and the green-eyed alien embracing; she later said she wasn’t sure she really had seen this—which reminded me of my husband’s impression of the fist pulling back the flag. Something about the tableau actively engaged your imagination and made you think you saw things that weren’t there (or possibly were there, who knows—maybe the alien and the male doll did embrace). Which was, I guess, why I came to enjoy the tableau and to secretly root for its creator. Although the content expressed a political view that I didn’t share, the form was artistic, with art’s inherently apolitical ambiguity...."</p><p>From <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/a-trump-tableau">"A Trump Tableau/Politics and art in a Catskill front yard"</a> by Mary Gaitskill (in The New Yorker).</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-69815993521954384402021-03-29T05:57:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:43.939-07:00Sunrise.<p><a data-flickr-embed="true" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/althouse/51012268290/in/dateposted/" title="IMG_3225"><img alt="IMG_3225" height="375" src="https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/51012268290_040b731cab.jpg" width="500" /></a><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js"></script> </p><p><a data-flickr-embed="true" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/althouse/51012268615/in/photostream/" title="IMG_3222"><img alt="IMG_3222" height="375" src="https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/51012268615_9aa6c47505.jpg" width="500" /></a><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js"></script></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1728978733798837333.post-48442561293528079962021-03-29T04:14:00.000-07:002021-03-31T08:51:44.012-07:00"Stay home Patrick of Tennessee. We don’t need maga anti-vaxers spreading pestilence across our country. As a matter of fact, don’t even leave your trailer park."<p>"Board the doors shut and stay inside with your AR-15. I think all of these anti-vaxers should be required to have ‘do not resuscitate’ tattooed on their foreheads." </p><p>Says the top-rated commenter on a Washington Post article, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/03/28/vaccine-passports-for-work/">"‘Vaccine passports’ are on the way, but developing them won’t be easy/White House-led effort tries to corral more than a dozen initiatives."</a> </p><p>The commenter is responding to this: </p><blockquote><p>There is evidence vaccine passports could motivate skeptical Americans to get shots. Several vaccine-hesitant participants at a recent focus group of Trump voters led by pollster Frank Luntz suggested their desire to see family, go on vacation and resume other aspects of daily life outpaced fear of the shots, particularly if travel companies and others moved to require proof of vaccination.... <br /></p></blockquote><blockquote><p>Some attendees dissented and warned that requiring a credential would backfire. “I would change my travel plans,” said a man identified as Patrick of Tennessee.</p></blockquote><p>Is the developing opinion that only troglodytes resist <i>vaccine passports</i>? Because I just noticed this: <br /></p> <blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p dir="ltr" lang="en">This is the absolute end of the line for human liberty in the West and if you don’t understand why, ask a techie. Once you agree to this platform any functionality can be loaded into it turning off and on access to society, goods, information, movement, based on your behavior. <a href="https://t.co/PtxbtqVfw1">https://t.co/PtxbtqVfw1</a></p>— Dr Naomi Wolf (@naomirwolf) <a href="https://twitter.com/naomirwolf/status/1376264954702131210?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 28, 2021</a></blockquote><p> <script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>Don't conflate resistance to vaccine passports with resistance to getting vaccinated. That's what I think the WaPo commenter did. Patrick of Tennessee objected to "requiring a credential," not to getting vaccinated.</p><p>ADDED: I think <a href="https://junkee.com/naomi-wolf-anti-vaxx-porn-johnny-sins/290811">Wolf may be an anti-vaxxer</a>, so her warning isn't scary.</p><p>SO: Let's look at the Guardian article she links to, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/mar/28/give-pause-before-you-raise-a-glass-to-prospect-of-vaccine-passports?utm_term=Autofeed&CMP=twt_gu&utm_medium&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1616918660">"Give pause before you raise a glass to the prospect of a vaccine passport/The prime minister’s ‘papers for pints’ scheme is nothing less than a national ID card by stealth."</a> </p><p>Obviously, that's the UK, and in the U.S., the "passports" would probably be handled at the state level, like our other IDs. I can imagine the question of vaccine passports in the U.S. getting swirled up into the voter ID drama. Is getting an ID oppressive or something everyone should gladly, willingly do? <span></span></p><a name='more'></a><p></p><p>From The Guardian: </p><blockquote><p>The UK has already toyed with national ID cards. It rejected them in 2010. As Theresa May, then home secretary, explained in 2010: “This isn’t just about cost savings, it’s actually about the principle, it’s about getting the balance right between national security and civil liberties, and that’s what the new coalition government is doing.”... <br /></p></blockquote><blockquote><p> Already, the Conservatives have announced plans to introduce a bill to make photo ID mandatory from 2023 for all UK-wide and English elections....</p></blockquote><p>Aha! It is already mixed up in the voter ID matter in the UK. <br /></p><blockquote><p>[T]here would be no need to make photo ID mandatory at elections if people could simply use their “vaccine passport” – because, once we’ve built a system that links our identity to our health data and made this a condition of re-entering pubs, cinemas or concerts, or even our workplace, we could link it to other data too, public or private. This could be used by more than just pub landlords or election officials. The data on our vaccine passports could be used by the police, just as Singapore’s authorities admitted in January to using contact-tracing data. <br /></p></blockquote><blockquote><p> All this – effectively, as I say, <b>a stealth national ID card without the necessary debate</b> – when we don’t even know if vaccine passports would help to solve our biggest problem: stopping the spread of the virus.... <br /></p></blockquote><blockquote><p>In January, the health secretary, Matt Hancock, said: “We are not a papers-carrying country.” Yet, here we are, with the government reviewing plans to become just that. Only last month, the vaccine minister, Nadhim Zahawi, ruled out vaccine passports, arguing that they could be “discriminatory” since it is not compulsory for people to get the vaccine.</p></blockquote><p>But some Americans (like the commenter at WaPo quoted above) are enthusiastic about discriminating against anti-vaxxers. <br /></p><blockquote><p>Israel, Estonia, Sweden and Denmark are all countries that have introduced, or plan to introduce, vaccine passports for domestic use. There is a key difference: all of them already have a national ID card system. If we are to follow their example, we would first need an evidence-based explanation as to how vaccine passports will help to stop the spread of the virus.... <br /></p></blockquote><blockquote><p>The pandemic has made armchair public health experts of us all, but we need to hear from the real ones to know which trade-offs are necessary, and which are not, as we move into whatever phase is coming next....</p></blockquote><p>I don't think that public health experts can be the last word on "trade-offs," and I don't even know if they can be considered experts on vaccine passports. The issue is whether, given the level of immunity we've already built up, we should limit certain facilities to people who've had the vaccine and, if so, whether we need them to prove their status with an official government document? </p><p>And what are the collateral effects of this document? Are we concerned about government surveillance and losing our privacy? Are we collaterally enthused because the document could become the voter ID?<br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com