Category Archives: Popular Culture

Media Criticism, Philosophy, Political Commentary, Popular Culture, Social Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

The Philosophical Divide In Space

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Go read this whole thread.

As I wrote a year and a half ago:

…we have to be ready for that debate. There is a moral case to be made for settling space by humanity, warts and all, and we have to be prepared to make it.

I think that many in the space community underestimate the depth of this cultural divide. And they’ve already deployed the race card against human expansion into the solar system.

Business, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Popular Culture, Social Commentary

“Fake News”

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No, the real problem is dumb news:

Media is a product. Firms that provide this product are servicing a need, and we’d only be kidding ourselves to claim news consumers desire only to be informed. This isn’t a matter of simple bias confirmation. News outlets have begun to cater not just to partisans but the minimally informed for whom fleeting and shareable controversies provide a sense of feeling informed. What media consumers reward outlets for are rarely deeply reported stories on matters related to consequential items of public policy. What takes off are emotionally stimulating stories that don’t require of their readers any background knowledge to fully understand them and to opine on them.

This kind of entry-level politics is not a new phenomenon, and its victims are bipartisan. Colin Kaepernick, the Black Lives Matter movement, college-age adults devolving into their childlike selves, or pretentious celebrities politicizing otherwise apolitical events; for the right, these and other similar stories masquerade as and suffice for intellectual stimulation and political engagement. The left is similarly plagued by mock controversies. The faces printed on American currency notes, minority representation in film adaptations of comic books, and astrophysicists insensitive enough to announce feats of human engineering while wearing shirts with cartoon depictions of scantily clad women on them. This isn’t politics but, for many, it’s close enough.

These are emotionally gratifying confirmations of tribal moiety. They provide readers a chance to affirm and demonstrate clannish loyalty. They are attractive to media organizations because they allow them to forgo the five sentences of exposition that are required to understand any subject of objective policy relevance—sentences that, in some cases, news outlets literally cannot afford.

This is a continuing product of our failed public-education system and academia. But then, perhaps it’s not a failure — it might be exactly what people running those institutions have been trying to achieve.

Law, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Popular Culture, Social Commentary

Occam’s Weiner

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Thoughts on the mess from Mark Steyn, who will soon have his own show.

[Update a while later]

“My guess is Weiner’s perversions were to some extent a cry for help. He wanted to be caught. At some point, he desperately wanted out of the Clinton nexus (who wouldn’t?).”

[Update a few minutes later]

Hillary didn’t see Carlos Danger coming:

Carlos Danger (Anthony Weiner) once held high political office. He talked smart trash. He sassed Republicans and snickered. The liberal media loved it. Can’t catch me, I’m Carlos Danger.

Carlos Danger is also a pervert who sends naked pictures of himself to underage females.

Thanks to Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s criminal deceit and his wife’s (Huma Abedin) complicity, after Carlos left office in disgrace he still had access to classified national security information.

Let’s review key incidents in The Lowest Cesspool. The pervert digitally exposes himself to 15-year-old girl. How vile. The cops investigate. Good. But oh the irony. The perv’s exposure incidentally exposes the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate as a crook and serial liar. The pervert’s estranged wife may face perjury charges. The pervert is cooperating with the FBI because he’s a coward and a punk and he’ll cop a plea to save his arse.

Unlikely plot twists? Not all that surprising, given the crooked characters. No need for Greek gods to dispense justice. Crooked characters do crooked things. At some point they take a crooked step and fall. Even crooks who think they can design a centralized and cost-effective national healthcare program, the kind of megalomaniacal crook who thinks she can foresee every contingency, a crook who thinks she can control the narrative just because she has ABC and NBC and CNN and The New York Times in her pocket—even a crook with that kind of power eventually trips up.

He certainly chose an appropriate name for himself.

[Update a couple minutes later]

The Democrats asked for this.

Yes. It’s what happens when you ignore all of the klaxons and flashing lights and nominate a corrupt incompetent serial felon.

Popular Culture

The Cubs In The Series

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Somewhere up there, the late great Steve Goodman is smiling.

[Late-night update]

If you’re interested in late 70s/80s folk, just let the Youtube roll. You’ll hear a young Steve Goodman sing his song “City of New Orleans,” the way he wrote it, not the better-known Arlo Guthrie cover, as well as some great duos with John Prine. I’d also note that while he wasn’t showing off in the Cubbies song, he was a greatly underrated guitarist.

History, Popular Culture, Social Commentary, Technology and Society

Interstates

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I’ve driven large sections of almost all of these over the decades, but none of them end to end. Closest I’ve come is I-10, but I broke off to head south on the turnpike before I got to Jacksonville. Have to say I’m surprised that they’ve never bypassed Breezewood (which I remember from the turnpike as a kid driving from Michigan to New York in the sixties). I guess tunneling the mountain would be too much of a PITA and disruptive to residents.