The Nappy Cat Chronicles
Politics. Music. Life. And the pursuit of fractal integrity in 156,688 Glorious Words. Home | Subscribe to our RSS | Log In
My academic background came from the University of Delaware in Finance and Economics. I'm back writing with Will again providing new and different perspective about the world around us.My Links: Facebook, Last.fm, Michael’s Blog
Your 18% Gratuity Has Been Included »
A few named and vocal people hope Barack Obama thanks George W. Bush for practically everything the prior president had his name attached that was Iraq-related. Because I assume that every person who reads this blog is white and hates Obama for being some sort of communist rather than hating him for the fact he is a normal-Democrat-and-he-does-pretty-much-what-a-Democrat-or-Republican-and-every-other-politician-would-do, I proffer this thought experiment regarding his sincere thanks to Bush.
The only way for Obama’s administration to be better, is if it were worse.
I Guess »
I genuinely like Conor Friedersdorf and a lot of what he writes. However, there is one thing he (and many others) does, which really gets on my nerves.
…if either liberals or conservatives disappeared entirely from the American scene, leaving the right or the left to pursue their best ideas and most flawed excesses alike, this country would be in far worse shape than it is today.
I’m sorry, but thinking and giving credence to the rumor that these two species are that far removed from each other is laughable. Arlen Spector is a Democrat! And riddle me this: what is Joe Lieberman Independent of exactly?
This is What You Want »
I’ve rarely, if ever, had any major disagreements when Patrick Appel has understudied for Andrew Sullivan. However, in this post, his facts are right, but his conclusion I think just misses the mark.
… there were certainly conservative pundits arguing against “Obamacare” but conservative healthcare experts were seriously outgunned. The opposite is also true: liberal foreign policy experts were undoubtedly outnumbered during the lead-up to the Iraq war.
I’m assuming that the possibility that these two “ends of the spectrum” are actually achieving things that they either passively accept, or don’t care about in outcome, hasn’t entered Patrick’s mind.
But that’s really the beauty of the system, is it not? An anti-war group gets labeled as crazy because there are politicians dubbed “on the left” (whatever the hell that means) who support war. Accordingly, a government that has always been an accomplice for state capitalism is then given the honor of becoming socialist because it enacted a healthcare law that was originally conceptualized and enacted by a Republican governor.
Whatever; everyone is obviously making this up as they go along. It’s just that I’m the only one owning up to that.
I’ve Tried »
Patrick Appel plays devil’s advocate to an argument against an idea that Ross Douthat came up with regarding marriage/unions (I came up with this idea as well almost a year ago).
Ross says that this domestic partnership would allow for adoption. Following Ross’s guidelines, let’s pretend that I’m a heterosexual male in a domestic partnership with my heterosexual best friend. We decide that we want to adopt a child together, a right it seems we would have under Ross’s law. What happens, several years later, when one of us meets a woman we want to marry? How do you resolve the domestic partners’ financial obligations to each other and the custody battle?
The best I could do with the conundrum that Appel serves up (I too came up with the same problem) was that the arrangement should be held to a business standard having renewal dates and fiduciary duties that would detail points of action for dissolving the partnership (e.g. penalties, support for children, etc). Such action plans would be necessary if there were children involved. Or they could just do what most family court judges do and award custody of the child to the female, or most effeminate partner. Oh please, as if you thought there was something else they were doing.
A Secret Logic »
While I know left-wing politics does this just as well, my most prevalent memory of hypocritical/double standard logic comes from the old right-wing bit of scaring everyone into brown-pants-syndrome when there’s a leak regarding as to how the U.S. investigates terrorist activity. Specifically, SWIFT. If you recall, the program puts under review transactions in foreign bank accounts.
The controversy regarding the program was that it was done without oversight or anything resembling a warrant. The controversy over the leak was that the U.S. should not let terrorists know how we are spying and investigating them.
Well, by that logic, I could then surmise that this algorithmic program being developed by Ian Horsley and Steve Levitt will have absolutely no effect on terrorists because by merely describing some of the variables that are used to indentify terrorists, they will now adapt, and avoid capture. So, according to the logic aforementioned, we shouldn’t even try to engage in this program since the public knows about it. You’re welcome.
Wait, It Gets Worse »
Good news, I’ve been able to add to my list of horrific things that will scare me if I ever get married.
Via Jena Pincott, here is what Rachel Write says:
When Karen decided to go off the pill, her relationship wasn’t going well. She had a husband whose depression hung heavy, dampening the air. Karen began noticing a putrid smell, emanating from her husband. “I couldn’t stand to be close to him because he smelled so bad, it wasn’t what we call body odor, it smelled like a soured clothes…so naturally that is what I thought it was.”
But after digging through his laundry, she had a dizzying realization… the smell suffocating her space was her husband.
Karen could no longer muster a simple attraction. Warmth began to dissipate. A divorce ensued. Later, stumbling across research about pheromones and birth control, it clicked.
In Clause Wedekind’s study, women were given t-shirts that had been worn by men. They were asked to smell the shirts to report attraction. They found women were attracted to men with a different MHC level than their own, and repulsed by one too similar. The theory is this delicate difference of pheromones makes the healthiest offspring.
But, oddly women taking oral contraceptives lost this sense of attraction. Not only could she no longer sniff out her best match, she became actively attracted to men with a similar MHC level, closer to her own genes.
When Karen let a male friend vent about a recent break-up, it sounded familiar. “Had she recently gone off the pill?” She asked. When the answer was yes– she was convinced. “That is when I started calling it the divorce pill” Karen says.
This is akin to the old Brian Regan joke where he explains that while being examined, Regan’s optometrist notifies him that, “You know, your one eye is just slightly lower than the other. This doesn’t affect your vision or anything; I just wanted you to be self-conscious for the rest of your life.” Science FTMFW.
The Problem with Twitter »
I used to be a Twitter user, but have stopped for a few reasons. One of them was my own lack of trending on topics and using the hashtags as much as I wanted. However, the most important reason, and the reason why I think that Facebook still edges out Twitter in many aspects is Facebook’s ability have threaded posts. Allowing for comments and replies to traverse on the same thread as a conversation does so much better than the random timeline stories a user gets from conversations being replied to back and forth from someone they follow.
Also, the threading allows for the conversation to be easily reprised as opposed to Twitter Direct Messages. As well, threading keeps different topics separate.
Facebook has yet to be completely taken over by Twitter for the same reasons message boards have not been outdated or outmoded yet. They simply offer more for conversation by length (obviously) and separation. Critics of Facebook have always given flack for Facebook’s blatant copying of Twitter-like characteristics. While that can easily be seen as true, the real problem is that it only adds to Facebook’s value, despite any “this is going to be the next MySpace failure” revelations.
All that said, Twitter does offer some things that no other medium can right now. First, its ability to trend topics (and its use of hashtags) is useful, if not amazing. Second, within the brevity of its posts, flame wars while still entirely possible, take so much more effort; maybe even enough effort to curtail them a bit.
As a side note, I still fail to understand why more users don’t use RSS feeds. In fact, that’s another Twitter failing, not that they don’t use RSS feeds, they do. The failing is that because most users don’t use RSS feeds, they pick up news from people they follow by looking at their timelines. The problem with looking only at timelines is that you may miss posts, or have users that are aware of this phenomenon and who continue to repost their news (I’m looking at you @Tim Harford) thereby adding duplicate posts for some people.
At the risk of being redundant, there is a silver lining for Twitter versus the idea of simply subscribing to a site’s RSS feed. Twitter allows you to see the person you like conversing with whoever they converse, as opposed to not knowing who talks to whom with a plain RSS feed from a site. But, you can easily fix that if you subscribe to someone’s Twitter RSS feed. Of course, that defeats any argument for not using Twitter.
But not using Twitter has not been my argument. I just think it has its limits, therefore keeping Facebook (and your own blog) relevant.
Waxing Poetic »
In regards to the reason why humans (particularly men) past, present, and future wax poetic regarding love (i.e. sex), I have surmised that characterizing these outlets as “forms of art” is putting it all rather nicely. They are merely the letters of ordinary people that have come back return to sender. And those musings when disseminated to the public abroad simply become the idea onto which someone else projects their own daydream.
They might be art now, but don’t be mistaken because they were never written for the sake of art.
Even more relevant today, a lover could never read any greater piece of literature than by an author whose professional title is, “Sugardaddy.”
Guest Post: Excuses for Excuses Sake »
My friend Bryan writes:
Excuses for Excuses Sake
After reading an article by Scott Moritz earlier this morning, I came to the conclusion that people/reporters try to make a story out of anything. I honestly have no idea how an article that doesn’t really make much sense makes it to the front page of Yahoo. In the article Mr. Moritz states 5 reasons NOT to buy the new iPhone 4. There very well may be 20 reasons not to buy the new smart phone, but these 5 reasons just don’t seem like a deal breaker.
Scott’s first point is regarding the camera. He states, “HTC, Motorola and Nokia embrace the megapixel race with 8-megapixel and 12-megapixel cameras, Apple’s new iPhone keeps it cheap with a 5-megapixel model.” Is he stating that the quality of the camera is only based on the megapixels? Being a photographer, this is probably the comment that irks me the most. So using his logic, the cameras that are included in the HTC, Motorola, and Nokia phones are better than an entry-level DSLR camera (ex. Nikon D40)? Just because they have more megapixels? This is so far from the truth it’s not even funny.
Mr. Moritz’s second point of not having the “Swype” feature does not hold water in my opinion either. First of all, is this really a reason not to buy a superior phone? I say no, but that is for the consumer to decide. Plus, in all honesty, there will probably be an app for that. Along with this he makes his third point, regarding the video-calling feature. Yes, the feature limits you to only other iPhone 4 users, but that is what it is meant to do. He comments “not exactly an application of global Skype-like proportions.” Yes, he is correct, but the Skype app, will be available for those who want it. So, I don’t understand what he is complaining about.
Scott’s final two points are that there will be phone shortages, and that the iPhone is not available for Verizon. If a customer is loyal to Verizon’s service, that is their choice, but I still don’t understand all the complaints with AT&T network. Finally he states that the phone being in short supply is a blemish for the phone. Last time I checked, Americans, or people in general love rare things. Why do people buy Ferraris, Rolex, and special editions of things? They do this because they are rare, and to most, rare is sexy, and it means you’r important if you have one. Also, a couple months down the road, there won’t be a wait anymore either. So there goes that argument.
All in all there are definitely reasons not to get the new iPhone 4, however I don’t think this article show any of them.
I’m not sure that Moritz was giving five reasons not to buy the iPhone, but I certainly know that he wrote an article of complaints because complaining about the new iPhone is a great to get your story put up on digg and reddit. One thing I want to comment on that I found puzzling when I read the article was his bizarre logic on how 1 million iPhones per month is something to complain about. If anything, the great demand that will shorten supply only signals that this phone is worth getting.
Posts by Michael »
- Politics: Your 18% Gratuity Has Been Included
- Politics: I Guess
- Politics: This is What You Want
- Culture: I've Tried
- Politics: A Secret Logic
- Sexuality: Wait, It Gets Worse
- Technology: The Problem with Twitter
- Culture: Waxing Poetic
- Blogasms: Guest Post: Excuses for Excuses Sake
- Culture: Huh?
- Culture: Penmanship
- Economics: On Democracy
- Music: A Diversion Worth Diverting To
- Economics: Points Made Without Knowledge
- Economics: I Didn't Say It
- Blogasms: Oh Please
- Economics: Two Heads - Same Coin
- Politics: What Else Do You Want to do With Them?
- Blogasms: You Cannot Be Serious
- Economics: By Any Other Name
