Monthly Archives: November 2014

That’s My Police Chief (UPDATED)

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Austin Police Chief Art Acevedo apparently enjoyed some ChiPs reruns on Thanksgiving:

Then this happened:


I’m glad to see Austin remains entertaining, if not always as weird as it used to be. I hope everyone had a good holiday, in whatever way they opted to spend it.

UPDATE (11/28/2014): This is somewhat related, and came up in conversation:

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MLK’s Nonviolence Meme (UPDATED x 2)

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I’ve seen the following meme passed around on Facebook in recent days, generally in response to the protests in Ferguson. I think that the quote lacks context.

mlk-nonviolence

The meme, in case you can’t see the image, it quotes Martin Luther King, Jr. as follows:

Violence never brings permanent peace. It solves no social problem: it merely creates new and more complicated ones. Violence is impractical because it is a descending spiral ending in destruction for all. It is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his understanding: it seeks to annihilate rather than convert. Violence is immoral because it thrives on hatred rather than love. It destroys community and makes brotherhood impossible. It leaves society in monologue rather than dialogue. Violence ends up defeating itself. It creates bitterness in the survivors and brutality in the destroyers.

A common tactic to discredit a movement is to point to illegal acts of some people and associate that with the entire group. That way, people start to see nothing but violence in months of peaceful protests with only sporadic violence by some people, combined with people’s reactions to a grossly disproportionate police response (and I don’t think that ought to be a controversial characterization of the situation in Ferguson from August until a few days ago, but others may disagree).

I think it’s important to look at the MLK quote in its broader context. He drew a considerable amount of inspiration from Gandhi, who for all of his virtues had an almost comically naive view of how people should have responded to Germany in WWII. That said, nonviolence is a strategy that is much more complex than just saying “don’t be violent.” Without expressly defending certain things that may have happened on the protesters’ side in the past few months, I will say that history reveals again and again that you can only push people so much before they start to push back, and people in Ferguson have been pushed quite a bit. Now, getting back to the MLK quote, here’s a larger section from the speech (his acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964):

Continue reading →

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Initial, Hastily-Scribbled Thoughts on the Darren Wilson Grand Jury

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[By popular request (i.e. at least one person), here are some thoughts* I jotted down on Facebook earlier today, partly in response to articles on NPR and Vox. Edited to correct spelling/grammar/formatting only.]

In a nutshell, the prosecutor presented exculpatory evidence to the grand jury, lobbed softball questions at the prospective defendant, and did just about everything he could to soft-pedal the case—given that the grand jury is supposed to be the time when the prosecutor presents a one-sided, self-serving narrative of the case in order to secure a conviction, I’m inclined to call bullshit on the whole thing.

A few other points:

1. Double jeopardy does not attach at the grand jury stage, so there is no legal reason why another grand jury couldn’t meet and indict Wilson. He is not “exonerated,” nor is he “not guilty” in a legal sense. In just about any other criminal proceeding, the prosecutor would be explaining that to us, instead of the other way around. Continue reading →

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The Cat Shall Avenge You

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Time for a shout-out to a supremely awesome person, followed by a shout-out to a funny internet comment. First of all, Ben Schwartz of San Francisco may be one of the best people on Earth, and we can only wish that it hadn’t taken a near-fatal attack for the world to realize this (h/t Lynn). This could prove to be a superhero origin story, either for him or his cat.

Via Jezebel

That’s what Kinja user DarthPumpkin seems to think, anyway.

Screen Shot 2014-11-21 at 12.22.13 PM

Others went further, even noting the similarities to Dex-Starr’s origins: Continue reading →

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Bribery in a post-Citizens United World

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If money is “speech” in an electoral context, what about during the course of governance?

Could direct payment of cash, or some other thing of value, to an official in exchange for some official action, or forbearance from some official action, be construed as a very convincing argument that is protected by the First Amendment?

To give an example, suppose two people have separate meetings with an official regarding a pending application for, say, a building permit. The first person is a resident of a neighborhood that adjoins the property on which the proposed project will be built. That person explains to the official that the project will cause substantial noise pollution at all hours of the day and night, will depress property values to a significant degree, and will cause all of the residents of the neighborhood to develop a non-fatal condition that causes them to grow additional heads that emit flatulence from their mouths, which will cause unemployment problems.

Like this, but I guess with more farts.

The second person meets with the official and explains that the briefcase in his hand has $1 million in cash that will belong to the official if the permit is issued. Continue reading →

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Rhinoceros Guard Duty

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I saw this on the Fascinating Pictures Twitter feed:

There really are only six northern white rhinos left, after a 34 year-old male died on October 17, 2014. He was one of only two surviving males, meaning the species has very grim prospects for survival (and yes, I’m trying to avoid sounding defeatist.) Only four of them are actually in Africa, at the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya. The other two are at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park in California. I saw one of them back in 2011:

White rhinoceros

The northern white rhinos in Kenya have been under 24-hour armed guard for a while, as reported by the Telegraph back in 2012. Even with the guards, though, poachers have continued to pick the rhinos off: Continue reading →

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The ’80s Sitcom Parody (or Whatever This Is) We Didn’t Even Know We Needed Until We Saw It

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You’ve probably already seen Adult Swim’s “Too Many Cooks” informercial (whatever that means), but in case you haven’t, it’s worth eleven minutes of your time. Stop asking questions and watch it:

The overwrought ’80s sitcom intro was ripe for surreal parody, when you think about it, but you probably never did before because why would you? Somewhere along the line, between the still-lengthy intro to Friends, the abbreviated intros to shows like Scrubs (did you know that’s actually an entire song?), and the just-get-in-with-it show openings of today, I mostly forgot that goofy sitcom intros ever existed (except for the songs—I’ll never forget classics like Diff’rent Strokes and their like). Only HBO shows (and their imitators) seem to have extended intros anymore, and except maybe for Game of Thrones—which you need to watch for any changes to the map—I suspect most people fast-forward through them.

Anyway, this seems like an important moment in our cultural history that we will have forgotten about by next week, so enjoy it while you can.

Also, I learned about “Too Many Cooks” thanks to this GIF on Imgur, which seems to capture the most truly WTF moment: Continue reading →

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My Thoughts on the Election After One Week, in GIFs

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Quite a few people are angry. Some might even be looking for payback. Sure, the Republicans will talk a good game, like they’re all sunshine and sweetness. But really, we won’t be sure whom to trust. Continue reading →

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A Thought for NaNoWriMo Participants

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We are eleven days into November, and I haven’t actually started on National Novel Writing Month yet. That doesn’t mean I’m out, just that I procrastinate proudly.

For those who are actively participating, and who might be feeling sone frustration, this bit of wisdom from Chuck Wendig might not make you feel better, per se, but hopefully it will remind you that all creative endeavors are painful at some point.

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