If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers.

This is the weblog of Kevin Lipe.

squashed:

Was this judicial activism?

If “judicial activism” means that a judge did something conservatives didn’t like, then yes, it was judicial activism. Aside from that, this was a very well-reasoned opinion. Everybody got a fair trial. And one side won resoundingly.

This is a great explanation of what exactly was decided yesterday in California, what it means, and how the rest of this scenario will play out. It’s obvious to anyone who knows anything about the Mormons and other key groups funding the pro-Prop 8 campaign that this won’t be the end of the whole ordeal, not by a long shot.

I sure wish all the “family” groups (read: Evangelical Christian organizations) fighting tooth and nail against gay marriage would just devote their attention elsewhere. I find it incredibly hard to believe that Jesus would prefer using money to keep two dudes who love each other from getting married to using it to help someone.

I also find it fascinating that the key Christian group fighting for “one man, one woman” legislation is one that originally specifically included polygamy as part of its doctrine. That may be a low blow, but it’s baffled me since I first heard about the massive LDS campaign to push through Prop 8. I mean, you know, that’s kind of like Mississippi mounting a campaign to end racism in Alabama.

Posted at 12:50pm.

imremembering:

Clarissa Explains It All

(via jessijaejoplin)

Those look like my glasses. Mine and every hipster I know. I guess we now know who started that trend.

Posted at 12:37pm.

imremembering:

Clarissa Explains It All
(via jessijaejoplin)

Those look like my glasses. Mine and every hipster I know. I guess we now know who started that trend.

Looks like Google is finally killing off Wave:

But despite these wins, and numerous loyal fans, Wave has not seen the user adoption we would have liked. We don’t plan to continue developing Wave as a standalone product, but we will maintain the site at least through the end of the year and extend the technology for use in other Google projects.

I always liked the way Wave looked, but I’ve spent the last year trying to figure out how in the hell to use it to get actual work done in any sense. I guess my brain just isn’t advanced enough—maybe if I’d been born in the ’90s or something.

That said, they (Google) definitely took a big chance on Wave, launching it without having any idea how it would work or how people would use it—if they could use it at all. It’s telling that there are a whole lot of web pages with the title “WTF is Google Wave?”.

I think the lack of popularity was at least partly due to the fact that you had to watch a YouTube video to have any idea what was going on. People stick with tools they can learn organically: I’ve been using TextMate for years and it still surprises me, but even before I knew anything other than Cmd-S, it was instantly usable. Wave? Not so much.

[Link via ForkBombr (which I still try to type with a space in the middle).]

Posted at 6:14pm.

The Sun appears to have jolted from its deep slumber, blasting tonnes of plasma into interplanetary space on Sunday, which is expected to collide with the Earth within the next 24 hours.

“This eruption is directed right at us, and is expected to get here early in the day on 4 August,” says astronomer Leon Golub of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. “It’s the first major Earth-directed eruption in quite some time.”

There’s a really cool QuickTime video of the actual stuff exploding away from the Sun over on the article page.

With any luck, this will knock out the power at work, at I won’t have to go today. C’mon, Sun.

Posted at 12:56pm.

Carl Hegelman (which is a pseudonym) in The Economy: Why It Sucks - The Awl

Posted at 12:51pm.

The stock answer to this quandary is that we must invent new industries and re-train workers in the skills required to drive them; but, frankly, that’s bullshit and I think we secretly all know it. The truth is, there is no good answer to this quandary.

The tagline of this old (2004) GQ article is “Rock music used to be a safe haven for degenerates and rebels. Until it found Jesus.”

That’s selling this essay short. It’s a powerful meditation on Evangelicals, “rock” music, faith, and the dissolution thereof, and it brought tears to my eyes a couple of times, so clearly did I see myself in the narrator’s voice.

I don’t care if you have to print this thing out. Read it.

Posted at 10:58pm.

merlin:

glass:

Photos from Graceland

Ladies and Gentlemen, please put your hands together, and give a very warm Tumblr welcome to Chris Glass vs. Graceland.

You know, I’ve lived in Memphis my whole life, and I’ve never been past the gates of Graceland. I don’t really even like Elvis that much, except for his Sun stuff and “Suspicious Minds” (which is one of the top 25 singles of all time, and if you disagree, you’re a moron). I guess I don’t get the appeal—but then, nobody in Memphis seems to. It’s like the rest of the world realizes something that we don’t.

I think the opposite is true: I think the people of Memphis love Elvis, but they love him the same way they love every other musician from Memphis (or, anyway, who lived here and/or made it big here): as humans. As talented, creative, awesome humans, but, hey, Elvis was just a guy. A guy from Tupelo. There are still people in this town (lots of them) who remember just running into Elvis one day while they were out and about. That makes it kind of hard to worship the guy.

My high school cross country team used to run past his first house several times a week. I never even realized it was Elvis’s house until I read about in Memphis magazine. That’s the typical Memphis mindset, I guess.

As Elvis week approaches, and the annual deluge of Japanese and British Elvis fanatics descends on us like pompadoured locusts, I’m struck by that fact. Elvis was “one of us.” It’s what makes the new show Memphis Beat so inaccurate: the real Elvis-worshippers aren’t from Memphis. We love the guy, yeah, in Memphis, he’s one of us rather than some abstract rock ‘n roll deity.

Posted at 2:41pm.

merlin:

glass:

Photos from Graceland

Ladies and Gentlemen, please put your hands together, and give a very warm Tumblr welcome to  Chris Glass vs. Graceland.

You know, I’ve lived in Memphis my whole life, and I’ve never been past the gates of Graceland. I don’t really even like Elvis that much, except for his Sun stuff and “Suspicious Minds” (which is one of the top 25 singles of all time, and if you disagree, you’re a moron). I guess I don’t get the appeal—but then, nobody in Memphis seems to. It’s like the rest of the world realizes something that we don’t.
I think the opposite is true: I think the people of Memphis love Elvis, but they love him the same way they love every other musician from Memphis (or, anyway, who lived here and/or made it big here): as humans. As talented, creative, awesome humans, but, hey, Elvis was just a guy. A guy from Tupelo. There are still people in this town (lots of them) who remember just running into Elvis one day while they were out and about. That makes it kind of hard to worship the guy.
My high school cross country team used to run past his first house several times a week. I never even realized it was Elvis’s house until I read about in Memphis magazine. That’s the typical Memphis mindset, I guess.
As Elvis week approaches, and the annual deluge of Japanese and British Elvis fanatics descends on us like pompadoured locusts, I’m struck by that fact. Elvis was “one of us.” It’s what makes the new show Memphis Beat so inaccurate: the real Elvis-worshippers aren’t from Memphis. We love the guy, yeah, in Memphis, he’s one of us rather than some abstract rock ‘n roll deity.

Sometimes my employed friends remark, charitably, how nice it must be to be without a job and free during the day, and walk wherever and whenever I want. To be free! A comment analogous to saying how nice it must be to have no hands, what with saving so much on the cost of mittens and all.

Posted at 6:16pm.

Paul Graham, The Acceleration of Addictiveness.

Everything is addictive. The basic premise of Graham’s piece is that technological progress turns everything into a more concentrated, addictive form of itself over time. Hard to argue with, and something I fight against every day. I know I’m not the only one.

Posted at 1:54am.

You can probably take it as a rule of thumb from now on that if people don’t think you’re weird, you’re living badly.