The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age

Blog Posts

Defending Teachers

By PeraclesPlease on Sun, 12/23/2012 - 2:23am |

Bob Somerby at The Daily Howler, as he does frequently, voices the teachers' angle on things - in this case of the massacre - that we've been attacking them for decades, trashing teachers' unions, pretending that public teachers are just lazy and that school vouchers will cure all our ills. Even liberals blasting away at the poor state of education even as minorities make leaps and bounds progress over 2 decades that everyone ignores. Democrats like Rahm Emmanuel and Republicans like Scott Walker blast away at the teachers' unions, one point of sharing in our our rare bipartisan consensus.

How Democracies Work

By PeraclesPlease on Sun, 12/02/2012 - 2:56pm |

Blogger detained for anti-government writings; dies in custody. Head of cyber department fired, 7 officials arrested. Justice & democracy.

Uncharged detainee dies in custody of drug overdose; after unsupervised autopsy, body kept in storage until after general election, when organs have rotted out, at which time remains sent back to Yemen. Permanent war on terror, business as usual.

Afghanistan 4-Evuh!!! War on Drugs!!!

By PeraclesPlease on Fri, 11/16/2012 - 11:48am |

Well, I blew it - I thought with the number of green-on-blue attacks and the complete collapse of our efforts there, plus the pointlessness after getting OBL in Pakistan - that we'd start cutting and running right after election day.

59% Obama vote women

By PeraclesPlease on Wed, 11/07/2012 - 10:01am |

Ayup, looks like 59% of Obama's vote was female voters in a highly gender defined election. Women made up about 54% of the voters and favored Obama 55-45, so roughly Obama's base is 59% women, 41% men.

So will women get some of the love back, or will they have to fight tooth and nail (oops) for basics like use of contraception, proper health care, abortion rights, and some of the less "soft" non-reproductive-related issues that women might prefer?

Big Winner: Nate Silver, Big Data

By PeraclesPlease on Wed, 11/07/2012 - 7:14am |

In a veer to reality-based elections, Nate's total prediction this time, 49 right last gives us hope that the effects of the chattering class will be diminished next time.

After chumps like Dick Morris blew all credibility (did they have any left?) proclaiming a blowout to be, when any casual glance at the ground games in needed states proved it hoo-hah?

An Election Day Wish: End Precinct Voting

By PeraclesPlease on Tue, 11/06/2012 - 8:55am |

In an age where we can pull $1000 out of any ATM worldwide, it's absurd that we're stuck in an age-old tradition of going to a particular precinct on a particular day to stand in a pretty retro booth to vote.

There's no reason not to have voting places where everyone can vote if we can't just do it via our mobile phones (yes, there are considerations for voting fraud, but as new last minute software for Ohio machines shows, we have this to contend with anyway).

Why to Vote Against Obama

By PeraclesPlease on Mon, 11/05/2012 - 9:46am |

 

Alan Grayson catalogs: “a socialist nightmare hellscape.”

Obama Unjumps Shark?

By PeraclesPlease on Wed, 10/31/2012 - 7:34pm |

Perhaps like Katrina was a turning point for Bush's presidency, Sandy will be a turning point for Obama's.

After 4 years of 11-dimensional chess, this one's curiously a no-brainer - get help to people quick, get the power back on, get the payments in, streamline response.

I was ready to write a column about how we could get resources in *before* the storm, since we knew they'd lose power, subways would be flooded - and there's Brownie criticizing Obama for acting too quickly. Well that's a good side of the fence to be on.

Winners & Losers

By PeraclesPlease on Sat, 10/27/2012 - 5:16am |

Winner - Lena Dunham, now the viral video Obama Girl 2012 along with monster book advance - I feel a bad Foreigner hit coming on...

Loser - Donald Trump, still finding ways to look ridiculous post-The Apprentice

Winner / Loser - Mourdock, finding the positive side to Richard Speck and Albert DeSalvo, and portrayed as Voldemort on Stephen Colbert, has earned himself a lucrative earlier-than-expected post-congressional Fox career. 

4th Estate as 5th Column

By PeraclesPlease on Fri, 10/26/2012 - 5:26pm |

I disagreed with Emma a few days ago over the idea we needed more "hacks", but now I'm reconsidering...

Bob Somerby as usual's doing a bang-up job tracking the media madness, and in 2 particular areas his observations fit together -

1) the media pack has gotten chummier of late with its Groupthink as Twitter helps them align their stories (sad, but bars used to serve this purpose, and at least then you could say you got a buzz)

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