Boycott Olympics?

Wouldn't it be a shame if after all that trouble China went to hold the Olympics in 2008 no one went? It's unlikely the athletes would boycott. But how about the tourists. They've probably all paid for their tickets, eh? Well, it would be a nice idea in principle.

SU: Meyer Library Demolition

[FarmReport] I was surprised and happy to read about the plan to demolish Meyer Library on the Stanford campus. I was always partial to Green even when it was partly closed down after the earthquake. The late 1960's built Meyer was unsightly, smelly and decrepit, and even though it got periodic and expensive face-lifts, it never really seemed to improve. Even the renovated and nearly century old original (now Bing) wing of Green is classy by comparison. The newer wing of Green (1980) is stately, modern, and quiet with super comfy chairs, perfect for napping.

Son of W. Buckley writes defending McCain

This Christopher Buckley guy makes it sound like it was all a joke. Like how the conservatives thought it would be funny if they could buy a party and win elections and take over the government and f**k it up. And in a way I kind of believe it. With money to burn, why not? It's like a big joke among the wealthy white folks. But it's funny that he says he's pretty much given up hope of Republicans winning in '06 and '08. [NYT] [Wash. Monthly]

Bin Laden purposely let go!

Here I am repeating a conspiracy theory, but I just finished reading a book about the incredibly cynical thought processes of movement conservatism and the Bush presidency. It just popped into my mind a now seemingly very likely scenario. They purposely let Osama Bin Laden go! I mean what would have happened to the war on terror if they'd caught, captured, and/or killed the guy, there would be no more bogeyman to go after to justify "cheap, quick, and painless" wars in Iraq and Iran. All that seems much less compelling after we have the guy. And how could Bush get re-elected in 2004 without him starting a war. So we purposely let him go. I'm convinced of it. Sad.

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Another possibility is that have killed the guy, but say we didn't. It's a little better, in that we are trying to undermine Al Qaeda through deception, but it still serves the deceitful purpose of justifying the Iraq war.

How to tell if your husband is gay

Checklist republished by gawker (from a Fox 5 New York posting) of how to tell if your husband is gay. Actually, I consider that it's a pretty good list, though probably if I thought harder about it, I could come up with some more interesting suggestions like:

1. He seems interested in sports, but only knows the rules superficially and only mirrors your interest in them, or
   
   
2. He likes to keep strict limits on the interactions between different areas of his life, like work, old high school friends, college friends, and home (at some point, someone knows his true sexual identity), or
   
   
3. He's actually much prettier than you. when you got married, even your girlfriends said you 'scored' and pumped their fists!
   
   
4. He often doesn't shave, and says he thinks he looks better when he doesn't, or
   
   
5. He watches a lot of television, especially when it might be a good time to have sex. You have a television in the bedroom and it was his idea.
   

Related posts:

More how to tell if your husband is gay, or straight rather: some tip-offs that he's definitely straight

Little indications: gaydar: more insights into gay versus straight

NY Mag: double life: an article about closeted gay husbands

When the Beard is too painful to remove: some commentary from me and a link to the NYTimes piece of the same title.

What's up with callboys outing politicians and evangelists: NYTimes on how discreet callboys might be a thing of the past, the gay generation gap.

Revenge

Everything I've learned says that revenge isn't a proper motivation for anything. But anyway, just for fun, here's some twisted reasoning to justify hoping that Clinton wins. The Republicans hate Hillary Clinton. Dems hated W and deservedly so (He was an idiot. He took this country and poured American money and lives down the drain. He trashed our civil liberties. He trashed our environment. I'm not even getting warmed up here...) It will be hard for Hillary to be elected in spite of all those Republicans and "independents" who will vote for McCain, but if she does, it'll just bug the hell out of all those people who hate her. It's a perfect indirect revenge. I mean if I can get over the f**king hell of George Bush, I'm sure they can get over having Hillary Clinton as President.

Winds blowing for Obama ( I'll whistle along )

From what limited conversations I've had with folks lately, it seems to me that Obama is gaining momentum in California. After seeing some more of him, I think I'm getting more comfortable with him as a good choice, despite what I think is his lack of on screen charisma. My reasoning on the matter:

Being right on Iraq probably means having a prescient sense of the possibility of outright lies coming out of the Bush administration -- lies which few others thought possible until it was too late. This is not something any of the other serious contenders to President can claim. And it does show actually a sense of judgment which is necessary as President. Of course, that stance could have been pure luck as even he says as justification for his stance at the time that we should have been concentrating on winning in Afghanistan. But you know what they say about generals: "he's good, but is he lucky?"

There is also something to the idea of newcomer funded by the people who is not beholden to special interests.

And at the risk of taking a chauvinistic stance on the details versus big picture (women are usually more detail oriented), I think big picture is probably better suited for a President.

Why some people are conservatives?

Link Economist article reports on a Thornhill and Fincher study which showed that kids with difficult childhoods end up as liberals. Those with sheltered ones end up conservatives. It's clear this matches with the stereotype. The kids of wealthy parents who have been to the country clubs, have the fancy BMW and trust fund are probably conservatives.

It has been hypothesized in a recent New York Times article (link) that wisdom comes from setbacks early in life. Perhaps the type of setbacks which go along with 'difficult childhood' mentioned above. So,

liberal = difficult childhood
difficult childhood = wisdom

by associativity

liberal = wisdom

And since its literally true that liberals are wiser than conservatives, it all makes sense. Notice wisdom != intelligence, but I'd say it's on a similar axis.

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(12/29/07) A recent NYTimes piece says that binge drinkers -- even if they haven't done so in years -- tend "to poor decision-making. [As a binge drinker] one can easily fail to recognize the ultimate consequences of one’s actions." In a study done on rats made to binge drink and later kept sober for equivalent rat years, there was "a tendency to stay the course, a diminished capacity for relearning and maladaptive decision-making." Doesn't that sound like George W. Bush?

So is that possibly the correct explanation for it all: that ex-frat boy binge drinkers are conservatives because of the science of their self-inflicted brain damage? And this is the cause of our country's last 7 years of pain and suffering. We should think twice about hiring one of those assholes for the job next time.

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(05/20/07) NYTimes runs a piece on how two conservatives fell this week. Falwell and Wolfowitz. The author goes on to say that the conservatives seem so far undeterred by the recent Wolfowitz setback. He makes a comparison between McNamara and Wolfowitz, but says history somewhat forgives McNamara because wasn't an ideologue.

Bill Clinton negative on Obama on Charlie Rose

Towleroad Boy does Bill know how to walk that fine line. Just seeing that he had spoken negatively about Obama sort of turned me off. Still, after listening to the talk, I was slightly swayed, but still skeptical. Interesting thing is that I read Obama's statement on repeal of don't ask, don't tell and it seems much stronger than Hillary's. Time to switch horses?

Someone mention stagflation?

Reuters It was reported that Greenspan mentioned the word. While I didn't say stagflation in September, I mentioned something else in a post which was housing and credit collapse causing significant reversal in economy.

Queerty: Straight acting gays

Queerty The guys at Queerty are naturally annoyed at the common gay personals attribute of either the postee liking and/or being "straight-acting". Their post is a little confusing, but the first comment clears up the confusion nicely. I.e. there is a good dose of self-hatred implied if one truly believes this is the right sort of attribute to look for. Sure, discretion might be the better part of valor in a gay-bashing world, but most self-accepting gays know the value of honesty in this regard. It just simplies life so much more not having a boyfriend be still in the closet.

Riff off of Brangolina: Churches refuse marriage licenses for straights

Advocate It's not quite as dramatic as it originally sounds, but some liberal metropolitan churches are now not providing the marriage license to any couples straight or gay. Of course, the straight couples are later free to go to a justice of the peace to get a civil marriage license whereas the gay couples generally cannot. Still it is a fine demonstration of solidarity, and on the side a booster to the idea of separation of church and state.

Movies stumble at end of Republican administrations (but music does okay)

Something that comes to mind is that artists tend to be overwhelmingly liberal. I was looking today at the list of Golden Globe nominees, and while actually I haven't seen any of the movies, I was wondering why it seems to be such a bad year for movies of substance that I am interested in seeing.

I also know that I hardly know of any good movies from the Reagan years.

Putting these random pieces of data together: poof, my new theorem is that the movies tend to suck in Republican administrations especially towards the end.

The reason is that the liberal artists are so frustrated and angry with the government that they get distracted and go to protests and spend time helping the Dems get elected that the movies suffer.

On the other hand, I think music tends to still be pretty good in Republican years. I think it's because music is a better medium for protest, and doesn't require such a huge undertaking as a movie does.

HRC Consumer Guide for 2008

PDF (2MB) Seems to be constantly updating, yet some things stay the same. Don't buy gas from Exxon or Mobil, they got a big '0' from Equality survey in treatment of their LGBT employees. Instead go to Chevron or BP. Better to use UPS instead of Fedex. Also, Target instead of Walmart or ToysRUs, Best Buy instead of Circuit City, Staples instead of Office Depot, Whirlpool/Maytag instead of GE, AT&T instead of T-mobile, and Toyota, Ford, GM, Chryser, Suburu, Volkswagon instead of Nissan.

Breaking my Walmart habit will be tough, and I'm sort of locked into T-mobile at the moment.

For men, prospective female mates can't be too smart

NYT More than 10 years ago, I heard that an ex-employee in my department had once commented that he wanted to marry a girl that was dumber than him and shorter than him -- this despite the fact that he was pretty short and people also questioned his mental faculties. He be waiting a long time, people snidely remarked. However, this lends credence to data cited by Dowd in this piece (from an earlier article in the Times) that men just like to marry someone not quite as smart or ambitious as them. They just generally don't go around saying it.

I wonder though for me that if I were to wait for someone smarter than me, I would be waiting a long time. :)

On the other hand, why should I discriminate? Gays have be trading the need for submission or dominance for versatility for a long time.

Lesbian wins discrimination suit against Goodyear

Advocate Sounds like a terrible experience for anyone to have to go through.

Dumbledore is gay

By now everyone knows that Dumbledore is gay, at least according to the author in a sort of unwritten postscript. We might have picked up on it. There are hints in the books apparently and nothing clearly disproves it.

I sort of wish Rowling had written it in more explicitly. And no, not that kind of explicit. Just some words to say that Dumbledore liked men. People will say, but this is a children's book! But Rowling is a billionaire, she could have written anything she wanted...

Is it lack of imagination on her part to imagine a world where muggle discrimination is disregarded in the world of wizards? Why couldn't the wizard world have been more advanced here? Possibly because the world wasn't really advanced in any other aspect of social progressiveness. Muggle borns were discriminated against, in a parallel to racism. Perhaps a gay coming of age of one of the main characters would have been a distraction and beyond her powers to write.

I take it that Rowling is a friend to the gay community and don't want to dismiss her gift the community. Still, I think of a bigger opportunity missed. I guess I'll just have to write that children's book myself.

Older gays don't find acceptance in elder housing

NYT Compared to today's younger generation of increased gay acceptance, gay seniors do generally still face ostracism from other elderly and can be reluctant to enter into senior housing facilities.

Professor says climate change has unconsidered positive feedback

NYT In other words, warming begets more warming. We didn't think that much about this, and this is why the arctic ice melt was so extreme this summer that it was more than anyone expected (this post).

Arctic Ice Dramatically Receded this Summer

NYT It was beyond even pessimistic projections.