Links for you. Science:
Cornstalks Everywhere But Nothing Else, Not Even A Bee
In Defense of Science: How the Fiscal Cliff Could Cripple Research Enterprise
Misguided cancer goal
Congress Promotes Dangerous Anti-vaccine Quackery
What Is the World’s Most Dangerous Animal? Sharks? Lions? Grizzly bears? Try bats.
Other:
Republican Congressman Urges Country ‘To Return To Gold’ (they are this fucking nuts)
Let this sentence be enshrined in memory
Greedy Geezers, Reconsidered
Fire Bob Costas
Maybe we should be teaching men not to rape
Vox Day is a White Nationalist, who’d have thought? (my personal run-in with this fucking moron is here)
Teacher Sabrina Crashes ALEC Meeting
Florida’s value-added model snares top Alachua teacher
Don’t Overthink the 2012 Election: Why One Equation Seems to Explain (Almost) All Of It.
High-Speed Trades Hurt Investors, a Study Says
A Question for A.O. Scott and Ta-Nehisi Coates
The Obscenely Rich Men Bent on Shredding the Safety Net
America Isn’t as Decadent as Social Conservatives Think It Is (I would add that a lot of people aren’t having many kids because if they have enough for their own personal needs, they think it’s selfish to contribute to unnecessary population growth, which is hardly narcissistic)
mikethemadbiologist
*** Republican Congressman Urges Country ‘To Return To Gold’ ***
This is stupid on too many levels to bother with. Another link I couldn’t bear to discuss is the one about the departing Dan Burton. If that man could live to be two hundred years old, I don’t doubt he’d be re-elected in his district each and every time for the whole while.
*** Vox Day is a White Nationalist, who’d have thought? ***
This fellow sort of caught my interest, so I started a little research program (topic: him/her) with a truly open mind. At first I figured this was a simple case of a fellow turning off the parts of his brain which interfered with the contortions involved in claiming to be a “Christian Libertarian”. (a contradiction in terms if there ever was one) So “no” on evolution, “no” on global warming, and oddly, the claim Ayn Rand was a better author than Isaac Asimov! Pretty much as I’d expected.
But it was when I continued deeper with my search I realized I was dealing with a thoroughly contemptible, detestable person.
http://manboobz.com/2012/06/06/does-manosphere-blogger-vox-day-really-support-the-murder-and-mutilation-of-women/comment-page-3/
http://voxday.blogspot.ca/2012/06/scientist-beats-up-pz.html
I saved the second link to a brand new folder I created on the hard drive called “Internet Monsters”.
Yes, throwing acid in the face of young girls is a good thing because “a few acid-burned faces is a small price to pay for lasting marriages, stable families, legitimate children, low levels of debt, strong currencies, affordable housing, homogenous populations, low levels of crime, and demographic stability.”
But do keep in mind he’s a Good Libertarian Christian. And as you might guess with the ‘let the pregnant sluts die’ business in the abortion section of that horrific piece, the blogger claims his Christian Virtues are of the Catholic variety. I’ve never run into such an ugly critter in real life, but the Internet Tubes seem to be infested with them.
A fixed and stable monetary standard would be a good thing. Maybe there is something better than gold, maybe not. But fiat currency facilitates the concentration of wealth into few hands. As the Fed prints (and it will soon monetize nearly all of the deficit), asset prices rise, and this primarily benefits the 1% who own assets. There is also the free money the Fed doles out to well-connected banks, who turn around and lend at higher rates. This kind of elitist cronyism is much harder to maintain under a hard money standard.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-12-16/jp-morgan-admits-qe-will-offset-almost-all-next-year%E2%80%99s-government-deficit
I haven’t read the Vox Day blog, but “Christian libertarian” is hardly an oxymoron. Since Roman times there has been opposition between Christians and the state. Prominent thinkers and activists like Tolstoy, Jacques Ellul, and Dorothy Day considered themselves “Christian anarchists,” while opposition to state-sponsored injustices, like slavery and segregation, largely originated in evangelical Christian circles.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_anarchism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abolitionism