Risk for Real: Wars of Religion

[brother-dour.livejournal.com]

http://sploid.gizmodo.com/watch-how-the-major-religions-have-conquered-the-entire-1469439712

I thought this article and graphic was very interesting.  Basically, it shows how the world's major religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) have ebbed and flowed throughout time. Imagine how the Americas would look if, around the 1492 AD mark, China and India had hauled ass east when Columbus and all the other bloodthirsty tyrants intrepid, brave Europeans were hauling ass west.

The article compares the map to a game of Risk, but that just makes me wonder: how does this map compare with all major wars fought over that same time period (3,000 BC-today)? Not all wars are absolutely about religion, but I bet there is a correlation to be seen...

The Senate takes the option.

[dexeron.livejournal.com]

Holy smokes! The nuclear option!

To folks not in the know: the United States Senate, under Harry Reid, just changed the rules when it comes to the approval of nominations by the President. ( Read more... )

Hating on the Poor

[paft.livejournal.com]

The author responds to a comment on her blogpost Why I Make Terrible Decisions:

I would like to understand what you are really angry about. Is it that I am poor and insufficiently servile about it? Is it that you legitimately think that you are somehow morally superior? Is it that I dared to write my thoughts down and someone forced you to read them? Is it that you never spend fifty dollars a month on something that could be used elsewhere, and you are extra judgey about it because it is the thing you have to be judgey about? Is it that you are an antismoking warrior and doing the world A Service by wishing ill on random Internet bloggers? Is it that you are uncomfortable with the idea that even if I have no money I am allowed to sometimes complain about life? How rich do I have to be before I am allowed to have objections to the current class system? What amount of money do you think gives me the right to be human?

More and more, offline and on, I’ve been seeing the “a feature, not a bug” argument about the increasing income disparity between the very rich and the rest of us. It’s an argument best summarized as, “Forget the poor. They’re losers.” Salon has an acid piece up about Tyler Cowen and the upcoming “hyper-meritocracy,” which includes some of the euphemisms people like Cowen love to use about the fate of the non-wealthy in the brave new world he’s so excited about. “Tough trade-offs,” and “common sense” for the rationale (which I’ve encountered here) that since we can’t help every single poor person, we shouldn’t help any of them.

Along with this blithe rejection of an increasingly large portion of the human race is a tendency to vilify the poor. After all, if one is going to relegate all these people to a life of hunger, illness, and exhaustion, it’s important to convince oneself that they deserve it.

( Read more )

50 years ago in Dallas, President Kennedy was assassinated

[telemann.livejournal.com]

THREE SHOTS WERE FIRED AT PRESIDENT KENNEDY’S MOTORCADE IN DOWNTOWN DALLAS . . .

FLASH
FLASH

KENNEDY SERIOUSLY WOUNDED
PERHAPS SERIOUSLY
PERHAPS FATALLY BY ASSASSINS BULLET.



Today is the 50th anniversary of President Kennedy's assassination in Dallas, Texas. I don't remember the events of that day, but one of my earliest trips as child with my family, was to visit the Kennedy memorial at his grave in Arlington National Cemetery in 1964. The lines were extremely long. And the grief you saw on faces was palpable. When I became a newspaper boy years later, when I collected payments, you would see homes with framed photos of President Kennedy in windows, or when the door would open, you'd see framed photos hanging on the wall opposite the door. Some even would have Palm leaves from Palm Sunday wrapped over the photograph, and that symbolism wasn't lost on me. In the generations after Watergate, I suppose it's hard to explain how things changed for a generation that was inspired by President Kennedy.







When President Kennedy was shot and later pronounced dead, the Boston Symphony was in the middle of an afternoon concert, that was being recorded for broadcast by WGBH. The connection between Boston and President Kennedy was a strong one, his own grandfather had been the mayor. Erich Leinsdorf breaks the news of Kennedy’s assassination to the audience. There are two waves of reacting to the news, more so when the orchestra started playing the funeral march from Beethoven's Eroica Symphony (The Hero Symphony). Time magazine's James Inverne, has a great feature on how the BSO music librarian had to go around the orchestra placing music on the stands, and informing the musicians about the change and what was going on.

Tom Brokaw has a new book and documentary that details how Americans came to grips with the assassination. "Where Were You?" turns the clock back 50 years to reassess a darkly pivotal day in the nation's history in which many suggest America lost its innocence. Examining both the minute details and long term ramifications of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Filmmakers, musicians, politicians, are all interviewed. Andrew Young, who was a civil rights worker, was with Martin Luther King, Jr when they heard about the assassination. Martin Luther King noted that if the President of the United States, with all the protection of the armed Secret Service agents couldn't be protected, expressed his own concerns that he too would more than likely be shot. Jane Fonda's interview is particularly poignant. The documentary will air tonight, and you can see an interview here with Mr. Brokaw, as well as significant excerpts.









Vice President Johnson and his wife Ladybird were a key component of the trip to Texas, which was to mend fences in the Texas Democratic party. A Texas native and stanch New Deal Democrat, Johnson's abilities in healing the rift between the progressive and more conservative wing of the party were a high priority for this trip, prior to the 1964 presidential election. Ladybird Johnson had been keeping an audio diary for several years, and it was her day-to-day routine at night to narrate the events of her day onto a tape recorder that would be transcribed by a secretary later. She describes the awkward moment when she encountered Jackie Kennedy in a hallway, and what to say.


Ladybird Johnson, L.B.J., and Mrs. Kennedy at a Fort Worth, Texas breakfast, prior to the Dallas motorcade.


Parts 1 and 2 of Lady Bird Johnson’s Audio Diary for November 22, 1963. and the transcript with her handwritten notes. (pdf) cf. illustration below<







The Library of Congress has an exhibit on political and editorial cartoons from this period, and folks who enjoy cartooning and history would no doubt enjoy looking through the collection: Herblock looks at 1963: fifty years ago in editorial cartoons.

New World Order, Inc.

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

Just yesterday, I read that the belief "that we could have utopian prosperity if we got rid of private businesses and had the government run everything" should be marked down to "stubborn stupidity." Fair enough. As hyperbolic and Straw Manned-up as that statement is, thwarting all independent economic activity would be a bit delusional, given that nobody even agrees upon the definition of "individual", let alone of "collective."

That said, I find it fascinating how many screeds railing against "statism" (again, whatever that might be) completely ignore the actual clear and present danger that non-state actors are continuously exacting on the right of countries to exercise any semblance of sovereignty, and all under the geas of "free trade." Don't these folks know that given enough size, a corporation today has—via the power granted by over-reaching trade agreements—greater legal right ( than most countries? )

Friday WTF. Stand up, U clowns!

[abomvubuso.livejournal.com]

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See, I love football. Okay, let's call it soccer for your convenience. I just love it. Always have. Been playing it both on amateur and semi-profi level since my childhood. That's why I wish the old European dudes who oversee the world's most popular sport would make it easier for me to defend "the beautiful game" to the haters out there in North America by coming down hard on dives. (Not to mention the introduction of video replays that's been very, VERY long overdue).

You see, it's hard to make a case for the game when you've got grown men flopping around all over the pitch like imbeciles. Someone gets within a couple feet of them, and they immediately collapse, grab their ankle, face, or both, and start rolling around in pretend agony. Then the idiot ref walks over and pulls out a yellow card - AND NOTHING REALLY HAPPENED. So you see my conundrum. How am I supposed to convince someone who loves, say, American football, that "soccer" ain't just a game for sissies when this kind of stuff is going on?

Still, I'm gonna say one thing about soccer's great floppers: it's really fun to hate them. They do make you laugh, granted. And I'm willing to bet they'll make you laugh, too. So here are a few hilarious pics of the greatest soccer flops you'll ever see.

( HILARITY ENSUE! )

Friday LOLs. Finally, a way to make the world a better place!

[luvdovz.livejournal.com]

...Just make yourself dumb, you know.

"The world's a much brighter place when you're not too bright for it".

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This pill is highly recommended for folks who lose too much sleep thinking over, well, stuff. ;)

"...We recommend lowering your IQ to around 70. But don't worry. With an IQ of 70 you can still tie your shoe-laces, write an average rap song".