- Susan Faludi: How Shulamith Firestone Shaped Feminism : The New Yorker This is a long and fascinating article about the late, great Firestone.
- Bikers Against Child Abuse make abuse victims feel safe. Another long read, and have a hanky handy. (Thanks, Dragon Snap.)
- Judge rules that Obama Admin’s anti-Plan B policy is “politically motivated, scientifically unjustified, and contrary to agency precedent.” Good! He’s better than Bush, but he’s still a politician, and he really deserved to be stepped on here.
- Low-income immigrants help the economy
- Why We Need To Stop Exaggerating The Threat To Cops
- NIYA Infiltrates Michigan ICE: Calhoun County Jail
- 14 Theories for Why Kermit Gosnell’s Case Didn’t Get More Media Attention
- His Black Dress. Terrific fashion site from a man who likes wearing feminine clothes. Makes me wonder where I could find affordable fun skirts in my size.
- In Which The City of Portland Makes Me Seriously Consider Becoming a Registered Libertarian
- Every language needs its, like, filler words
- How Anti-Racism Makes You Stupid
- Why Are People Changing Their Minds about Same-Sex Marriage?
- Speaking of things wrong with Obama: The Worst Thing Obama Could Say On Climate Change
- Busting Myths About Feminism With SCIENCE!
- Stare-at-it-like-a-car-wreck: obscene email from sorority leader telling off her sisters. This is the sort of thing that brings up the “is it offensive or is it funny?” false dichotomy.
- When Dickens met Dostoevsky. Don’t click on this link unless you have time to spare for a fascinating and disturbing story of the most over-the-top sock puppeteer since Msscribe. (John Lott is such an amateur).
- I was 12, and he was my 20-year-old camp counselor. For years, I thought I was asking for it — but not anymore.
- The emotionally abusive stepmother in Disney’s Tangled was written by someone who knew what real emotional abuse looks like.
- How Google Glass could end privacy. It’s worse than you imagine!
- Three Things You May Not Get About the Aaron Swartz Case
- What’s Natural About Natural Law?
- CDC Reports That Lots of Kids Still Suffer From Lead Poisoning
- Report: Ohio Is Illegally Throwing Poor People In Jail For Owing Money
- How to Fix Social Security? Make it Bigger
- Photographer Sara Byrne does amazing portraits with double exposure:
Oh god, _loved_ the His Black Dress blog. Totes subscribed. Enjoyed the various manifestoes, but the everyday posts were pretty fun too.
I wanted to share this powerful piece of writing about consent and masculinity:
http://dirtyoldgentlemen.tumblr.com/post/47920231642/boner-ownership
@9: Liberal government at it’s finest. It’s like DeToqueville said; in a democracy, you get the government you deserve. BTW; that picture of that stump does NOT prove that the tree was dead prior to it’s having been cut down. Take it from someone who’s cut down probably a score of trees, both with axes and with chain saws. It’s quite common to see a live tree with rot and insect damage in the center at the stump level. But I’d doubt that multiple arborists were trying to scam him. What I’m trying to figure out is why the author didn’t know the trees were dead!
@7 – I’m going with reasons 7 and 9 myself.
@9 – having dealt with the City of Portland wrt to my tree at the curb… Wow. My experience couldn’t have been more different. Maybe I lucked into finding out about the City Arborist, but the City Arborist is great. That’s who you talk to first (about things like the city saying it must be cut down – the Arborist overrode that order) and that’s who tells you about the permits you need, gives you the okay, etc. I put the blame squarely on the little a arborist who took down the trees. That’s who should, without a doubt, known that a permit was needed.
Jake, I’m curious as to why the city should require you to get a permit to take a tree down. Hell, I’ve taken down 4 trees on my property and it never even occurred to me to ask if I needed a permit. One of them was quite sizable, maybe 70 feet.
Portland wants to have as many trees as possible. It’s not only aesthetic, it’s also economic. More trees means less runoff into the sewers and less overflow into the rivers/less capacity needed to prevent overflow. So trees within a certain distance of the street (and I have to imagine it’s within the City’s [I’m blanking on the word here, right of way? eminently domainable? impingement? Where the fuck has that word gone? It’s not in my head, that’s for sure.]) are subject to city approval for both adding and removing. Another reason is that trees between your house & the street are often around power lines. If you want to even prune a tree that’s around power lines, you also need a permit. These permits are no cost, btw. Based on what I’ve seen people do with trees just in my neighborhood, I’d say that the permitting and approval process is also a public safety issue.
I believe the word you are looking for is “easement”. When I bought my home I found out that while I theoretically own out to the middle of the street I sure as heck don’t control it.
O.K. I can see where in a city where it rains all the damn time this would be an issue. I can see where cutting down a tree that’s 40 feet tall and is 20 feet from the street would be an issue. I’ve done it, though – with 4 guys pulling on a 1/2″ rope tied 20 feet up into the tree. Never got a permit for it, though, and I’m pretty sure I don’t need one. I was just damn careful when I had to do it and called a pro when I figured I couldn’t handle it. No permit needed where I live, but do something stupid and you’ll pay the price.
There’s a town called Oak Brook near me. VERY expensive/exclusive place to live. Mr. T moved in. Then he decided that all the trees were causing his allergies to kick up and cut down about 20 or 30 of them, basically clear cutting his property. The neighbors were absolutely beside themselves with fury, but it was done before they could react. After that Oak Brook passed an ordinance controlling any future such behavior.
Easement! Thank you, that was just killing me.
Keep in mind that most lots in Portland are 50 x 75. Any decent sized tree will be able to reach at least 2 houses if you bring it down wrong. We’ve got a triple-trunked, 100 foot tall cherry tree in our back yard. Even though the 2 lots behind us are house free, I believe it can reach 5 houses (including mine) were it to topple. Perhaps even 3 houses at once if the job was really botched!
Breaking news: Boy Scouts of America admit that the whole “no gays” thing really isn’t about being “morally straight,” it’s just that they really do think adult gay men are pedophiles.
So here’s the revised policy to be voted on by National Council:
The complete resolution is here and a five page executive summary of all of the internal studies – broken down in numerous ways – is here.
In my opinion the bottom line here is that based on those studies (which actually makes interesting reading) National crafted a resolution they think they can get passed. Contrast that to what happened with the various anti-gun resolutions placed before the Senate recently (hey, don’t blame me, that’s what Sen. Reid called them). President Obama and Senator Reid tried to get too much at once and lost everything. I’m thinking that National is trying not to make that mistake and is trying to take what they can get.
So if we deny them based on sexual orientation AND thing X, that’s just fine by everybody. It’s definitely an advance in that will allow troops that don’t want to discriminate to not discriminate. At the same time it in no way stops discrimination by troops that wish to discriminate.
Yeah, the inclusion of the word “alone” there is actually really gross and creepy.
That’s actually *more* wide-reaching than they were considering earlier, isn’t it? I had thought the proposed update would have each troop decide, based on what its sponsoring organization was comfortable with.
I admit, it really freaks me out when people who weren’t part of Harry Potter fandom know about msscribe. Though it is a cracking story. (That whole thing came out just before I went to a Harry Potter convention with a bunch of people who’d been around long enough to remember every single event discussed. Fun times.)
KellyK, you’re right.
Jake and Elusis, if a unit (unit = Pack, Troop, Crew or Team) wants to toss a kid out for “being gay and ‘x'”, they can right now just toss them out for “being ‘x'”. So you’re not going to see a unit drop a kid because he or she is ‘homosexual AND x’. My understanding of the wording is that it’s meant to keep a unit from dropping a kid because he’s gay. The previous concept was that the decision of whether or not to admit gay youth was going to be “local option” – it would be up to each sponsoring institution. If this resolution passes – and there’s no guarantee of that – then the sponsors won’t have that option.
The issue I’m afraid of is that you’ll see families start suing units to force them to register their gay kids when they have perfectly legitimate reasons to not register him that has nothing to do with his sexuality. Those would include disruptive behavior (on the part of either the child OR the parent), they or their parents are not affiliated with the sponsoring institution, etc, etc. Now, sure, the unit could probably defend itself against that – but that means time, expense, lawyers, etc. that most sponsors just can’t afford.
Never mind these trivial things like civil rights and the relationship between property rights and civic governance.
Mandolin, do you play “Neptune’s Pride” under that name?
What are the powers of the purse strings?
1. Compelled speech. May Congress withhold federal grants from people who decline to engage in federally-specified speech, where that speech is incidental to, or even antithetical to, achieving the stated purposes of the grants?
Context: Congress authorized funds for over-seas anti-AIDS/HIV programs, but specified that no funds may be given to a group or organization “that does not have a policy explicitly opposing prostitution….” Parties before the Supreme Court object that 1) the policy is counterproductive, in that it impedes their ability to work with prostitutes, and 2) the policy infringes on their freedom of speech.
2. Gag order. May Congress withhold federal grants from people who decline to refrain from engaging in federally-disapproved, but otherwise legal, speech? For example, may Congress withhold anti-AIDS/HIV funds from organizations that actively promote prostitution?
3. Compelled conduct. May Congress withhold federal grants from people who decline to engage in federally-specified conduct, where that conduct is incidental to, or even antithetical to, achieving the stated purposes of the grants? For example, may Congress withhold building contracts from firms that do not have an Affirmative Action policy?
4. Compelled restraint. May Congress withhold federal grants from people who decline to refrain from engaging in federally-disapproved, but otherwise legal, conduct? For example, may Congress withhold family planning funds from agencies that provide abortions?
5. Tax exemption in lieu of grants. May Congress withhold tax exemptions from people who decline to engage in federally-specified speech/conduct, where the speech/conduct is incidental to, or even antithetical to, achieving the stated purposes of the tax exemptions? May Congress withhold tax exemptions from people who decline to refrain from engaging in federally-disapproved, but otherwise legal, speech/conduct? For example, may Congress withhold a tax exemption from a not-for-profit university that engages in racial discrimination?
p.s. The Washington Post characterizes the government’s defense of its policy as follows:
Renounce? As in, Give up? Abandon? Discontinue support for?
here’s a really fascinating (and depressing) article on prison rates
http://prawfsblawg.blogs.com/prawfsblawg/2013/04/setting-the-stage-the-explosion-in-prison-populations.html
Congratulations to Rachel Swirsky on her Nebula win, for “Portrait of Lisane da Patagnia”!
Grace
As much as I adore Rachel’s writing, she didn’t win this time; “Portrait of Lisane da Patagnia” was nominated in the Novelette category, which was won by “Close Encounters” by Andy Duncan.
Aw, nuts. Did I misread the list? I must have.
Sorry, Rachel.
Grace