Archive for the ‘politicish’ Category
one million strong for Facebook sucking! »
Friday, September 30th, 2011
Three times already, I’ve been encouraged to enable the new “Timeline” feature on Facebook. I won’t, but I know enough about it that I’m sure it’ll totally set some people off.
With each redesign (can we call them that?) of Facebook, there’s outrage, but why? We use their product, it’s not our Facebook. It’s our speck of collected statuses in a vast, vast, vast wasteland of other collected statuses.
We’ve changed the definition of “ownership” in the digital space, haven’t we? We use Twitter, Facebook, and Tumblr to share our thoughts, sure, but then those thoughts aren’t really ours anymore, right? (more…)
our brief affair with representative democracy »
Monday, May 9th, 2011
Over the weekend, I had the pleasure of spending time with my parents. They were on the way back homeward after a long road trip, part of which was spent in colonial Williamsburg.
This is noteworthy for two reasons. First, did you know we were once colonies? That whole thing with Will and Kate (or, you know, Wite) makes a lot more sense.
Second, it was mentioned that, before our Revolution, only nobility could vote. I vaguely remembered this but, having been reminded, it’s fun to see how we’ve come full circle. (more…)
Wisconsin’s a symptom »
Tuesday, February 22nd, 2011
The protests and the uproar are nonsense. That’s sad, right? I mean, DEMOCRACY!! and the PEOPLE and whatever?
Early last November, a highly conservative, mostly elderly crowd, made their way to vote across the nation. There was no uproar, no shipping of pizzas from all over the world for volunteers and no schools closed.
On that day, the events of the past weeks were set. A mass of uninformed ideologues took to the streets, single file. In an orderly fashion, the battle was won without signs, chants or sleeping bags. (more…)
some dude’s transit plan »
Thursday, February 3rd, 2011
I should have no influence in whom you vote for. In fact, most of you aren’t even in Chicago, so it won’t matter, right? Anyway, Rahm Emanuel recently released his transportation plans and it’s notable for a couple reasons.
First, because it’s amazing that anyone is putting any attention toward alternative forms of transportation. The Republicans are complete idiots on this. With the recent bailouts, cars are now patriotic—trains (or, shudder, bikes) are not.
It’s a bold move but the second reason is even broader. The parts specific to biking are sort of awesome. (more…)
what will it be worth? »
Wednesday, October 20th, 2010
My father’s habit of listening to Clark Howard convinced me to snag a few podcasts. The man isn’t so much a financial guru as a commonsense voice. (Things like avoiding pyramid schemes or not using a computer if you’re old.)
He does tend to be thorough, though. Unfortunately, one he breezed over was the oft-repeated tale of how only a few hundred dollars invested early will make you a millionaire.
It goes like this: investing $2k every year from 16 years old to 21, you’ll have a million when you retire even if you don’t invest more. After so much depth in other areas, why is this never expanded to what that million will buy you? (more…)