“That new robot is great, huh? He sure made me look like a pile of crap.” – Bender Back in the mid-90s, I had a theory about computers, the still fledgling internet, and technology in general. This was a time when CD drives, amusingly over-named CD-ROMS, were expensive peripherals and sound cards were just becoming [...]
Archive for November 2010
Minimum System Requirements
Netflix, Net Neutrality, and Available Content
Wrinkled Skin: Our Last Line of Defense
“Bart, the school is a police state. Students are afraid to sneeze, and I have you to thank.” – Principal Skinner There’s no real mystery behind this past week’s massive, multi-front blowback against the genital scanner security theater at airports. The creeping police state that’s been infecting America ever since the cops began militarizing in [...]
Money, Time and Torture
“He probably thinks if he apologizes to everyone we’ll think he’s changed and let him back into our circle.” – Kyle Broflovski One of the most basic equations that all humans are familiar with is the exchange of time for money. Whether one is salaried, hourly, or piece work, money comes in exchange for time [...]
Vote Karzai
“If nobody sees it, then nobody gets mad.” – Shary Bobbins “It’s the American way!” – Bart Simpson In the short run, it’s difficult to see how last week’s election will have any effect on the ongoing passion play that is our Afghan War. Whatever else may be said about Congress becoming much more right [...]
A Pox on the House You Both Share
“Hmm, these campaign buttons are all partisan. Don’t you have any neutral ones? ‘May the Better Man Win’, ‘Let’s Have a Good Clean Election’, that sort of thing?” – Principal Skinner On Monday, Jon Stewart used the opening of The Daily Show to respond to criticism of his rally on the Mall from noted left [...]
Hooverville
“Tough times, eh? I’ve lived through twelve recessions, eight panics, and five years of McKinleynomics. I’ll survive this.” – C.M. Burns “Well even so, sir, we could stand to lay off a few employees.” – Mr. Smithers Early last summer, long before the term “death panels” became famous, before Joe Lieberman reminded everyone that he [...]
A Few More Years in Fantasyland
“Well I’ll be sodomized on Christmas.” – Chef The yammering cacophony of nitwit analysis about yesterday’s election won’t subside for quite some time. I made my stupid contribution to the great “why” circle jerk on Sunday, the short version of which is that a terrible economy combined with right wing fear and an unlimited spigot [...]
