On Cliven Bundy:
My neighbors’ cows came into our field once when someone left a gate open, but he didn’t send an armed militia to my back porch to make sure they could stay there because he’s not a gigantic paranoid asshole.
– Hunter
Category Archives: Thought for the Day
Thought for the Day: 10 May 2014
There is no place for guns at political protests — not carried by police, not carried by participants. It’s just not a democracy when you can’t argue over the government’s policies without fear of being shot.
– digby
Thought for the Day: 21 April 2014
Boston.com‘s new format is awful. Their old format was fine. (More generally, the standard newspaper layout is fine.) “If it isn’t broken then don’t fix it.”
Thought for the Day: 15 April 2014
What if the IRS had discovered the quadratic formula?
(Hat tip to Vox.)
“To serve as custodians of creation is not an empty title; it requires that we act, and with all the urgency this dire situation demands.”
Twenty-five years ago people could be excused for not knowing much, or doing much, about climate change. Today we have no excuse. No more can it be dismissed as science fiction; we are already feeling the effects.
This is why, no matter where you live, it is appalling that the US is debating whether to approve a massive pipeline transporting 830,000 barrels of the world’s dirtiest oil from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico. Producing and transporting this quantity of oil, via the Keystone XL pipeline, could increase Canada’s carbon emissions by over 30%.
If the negative impacts of the pipeline would affect only Canada and the US, we could say good luck to them. But it will affect the whole world, our shared world, the only world we have. We don’t have much time.
This week in Berlin, scientists and public representatives have been weighing up radical options for curbing emissions contained in the third report of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The bottom line is that we have 15 years to take the necessary steps. The horse may not have bolted, but it’s well on its way through the stable door.
Who can stop it? Well, we can, you and I. And it is not just that we can stop it, we have a responsibility to do so. It is a responsibility that begins with God commanding the first human inhabitants of the garden of Eden “to till it and keep it“. To keep it; not to abuse it, not to destroy it.
Thought for the Day: 9 April 2014
When was the last time you heard an advocate for nuclear power or fracking attempt to gain the support of an environmentalist by making an argument along these lines?
“Climate change is a serious problem requiring urgent action; we need to pay any price to cut emissions. That includes carbon taxes and investment in renewables, along with strong efficiency regulation and tariffs to promote global compliance. Nuclear and fracking should be part of the mix.”
Thought for the Day: 7 April 2014
We are not in a brave new world where the basics of economics and technology are destined to screw the vast majority of workers absent major changes in public policy. We are in the vicious old world where the bad guys are actively manipulating public policy in ways that are screwing workers now. If we are going to make any headway in reversing this process we have to keep our eye on the ball.
Question of the Day: 2 April 2014
Why aren’t the Republicans who were upset that Healthcare.gov didn’t work not thrilled that millions have gotten coverage?
Thought for the Day: 1 April 2014
Being conservative in signal detection (insisting on high confidence that the null hypothesis is void) is the opposite of being conservative in risk assessment.
Thought for the Day: 30 March 2014
We should no more want the government to be run like a business than a business to be run like the government. … The problem in a nutshell, is that not everything that is profitable is of social value and not everything of social value is profitable.