Reason Morning Links: The Battle of the Tea Parties, the Long Arm of German Law, and Ernest Hemingway's Electronic Nemesis

• The White House gets a new lawyer.

• A faction fight gets fiercer in the tea party movement.

• A German ex-con sends a cease-and-desist letter to Wikipedia, demanding that it follow his country's law by not posting truthful information about his crime.

• What happens when you let a computer grade essays.

• Do you know how many time zones there are in the former Soviet Union?

Comments

[Johnny Longtorso]

Houston Chronicle: Former Environmental Writer Documents Origins of Left/Alarmist Bias at the Paper
I recently stumbled upon an important piece on the web by former Houston Chronicle environmental writer Bill Dawson. Dawson now teaches at Rice University on media issues and the environment.

This piece fills in some gaps about why Houston's paper (the Houston Post folded and merged into the Chronicle in 1995) became such an organ for climate alarmism?even tramping to the Left of the New York Times at times. It also explains the large circulation declines, given that the Houston audience is more free market, conservative, libertarian, and non-alarmist than the Chronicle's editorial writers and reporters. And the Houston energy industry, as Brett Clayton reported in a front page article in Sunday's Chronicle, will be a big loser under cap-and-trade....

[BlueBook]

Mr Herbert said that some children in America had "cracked the code" by learning to write in a style that the computer recognised. This was called "schmoozing the computer", he said.

Wow, that's exactly how I passed every essay exam I ever took, except I schmoozed human examiners. I doubt if the computers are much worse in this regard; at least they are consistent on the schmooze standards.

[BlueBook]

I'm a little confused by this line from the Russian time zones article:

It raises lots of questions about whether you can keep a country as big as this together. Should it be, for instance, a federation?

Isn't Russia already a federation?

[lukas]

It's been a federation since 1917.

[Bergholt Stuttley Johnson]

Its a "federation". That is to say, "Federation" is a part of its name, but since Putin's constitutional changes in 2004 it is more of a unitary state.

[Kyle Jordan]

"A faction fight gets fiercer in the tea party movement."

Great. As if they weren't in a uphill battle already. Now it's infighting?

And at least the computer can't flunk you because you called it's daughter who happens to go to the same school as you do a "dumb cunt" and made her cry for almost breaking the neck of your guitar when she was drunk...

[Kyle Jordan]

*an instead of a

[Voros McCracken]

And at least the computer can't flunk you because you called it's daughter who happens to go to the same school as you do a "dumb cunt" and made her cry for almost breaking the neck of your guitar when she was drunk...

Just as a hypothetical example, right?

[Kyle Jordan]

Nope. Had to actually start copying all the work I was doing and taking it to another English teacher and the Vice Principal to show that she was screwing me over.

[?]

Great. As if they weren't in a uphill battle already. Now it's infighting?

Believing Weigel is stupid. Don't.

[WWJGD]

Can anyone explain to me how a relatively sane group such as the Center for Constitutional Rights is filing a suit on behalf of ACORN and calling the defunding an unconstitutional bill of attainder?

http://ccrjustice.org/acorn-v-usa

[Jesse Walker]

The Center for Constitutional Rights is a leftist organization that files suits like this all the time. You might be confusing them with the Center for Individual Rights, which is less likely to make this sort of argument.

[WWJGD]

I'd been getting the CCR's emails for almost 3 years and I guess I never picked up on their leftist slant. Disheartening. Thanks, Jesse.

[Jesse Walker]

I'd been getting the CCR's emails for almost 3 years and I guess I never picked up on their leftist slant.

Don't get me wrong: They're on the side of the angels in a lot of important civil liberties issues. But they make the ACLU look like IJ.

[not the real jb]

Still, can one argue that this *isn't* a bill of attainder, but the AIG CEO pay bill was?

[John]

Yes. The pay bill is telling AIG what to do with its own money. It is true that some of the money was given to it by the govenrment, but it was still given to AIG and is AIG's. In this casee, they are not telling ACORN what to do with its money. They are just refusing to give it anymore.

The better analogy would if AIG was revealed to have committed a bunch of revolting behavior and Congress put a rider on TARP saying the AIG was inelligible for TARP funds. That would not be a bill of attainder.

[Pro Libertate]

It's not a bill of attainder. The argument will get them exactly nowhere.

[ettubloge]

Steve Chapman wrote:

"No one thinks "political correctness" obligates the Army to treat Muslims more leniently than anyone else. "

I'd say PC requires leniency to protected groups. Certainly much more than "no one".

[Rich]

[Incoming White House Counsel] Bauer is married to outgoing White House communications director Anita Dunn.

It just never ends, does it?

[Brick]

2012

[Yale University Press]

A foreign power should not be able to censor publications in the United States, regardless of whether doing so suits the country's domestic law.

There's no need for this.

[Rich]

The computer algorithm designer was limited in its scope. It couldn't cope with metaphor and didn't understand the purpose of the speech.

FTFY. This shit *ain't* "the computer" -- it's *people*! Soylent "bugs" is PEOPLE!

[Rich]

From Human Events:

"The Gallup poll released [November 11] shows independent registered voters now favor any Republican candidate over a Democrat on the generic ballot by a stunning 52 to 30 percent. Yes, that's the independents. The American people appear to be more worried about the current Democrat solutions to our problems than the actual problems themselves."

Props to Johnny Longtorso. TTFN.

[Jose Ortega y Gasset]

Are you the Tea Bag Patriots?

Fuck off! We're the Patriots of Tea Bag.

[Nick]

Hey, 2022 isn't that far away. Do we have to wait until then to start eating people? I mean, if 2012 doesn't kill us first?

[cmace]

Can we please get computer evaluation of the comments?

[Computer]

You should have written "May we please get computer evaluation of the comments?"

B-

[Computer]

You should have written, "You should have written, 'May we please get computer evaluation of the comments?'"

*** smoke and sparks ***

[Mike M.]

Major Nidal Malik Hassan formally charged in military court with 13 counts of premeditated murder, additional charges possible, death penalty is very much on the table.

[MikeP]

Do you know how many time zones there are in the former Soviet Union?

The same number that are in the current Russian Federation? Did I win?

[Bergholt Stuttley Johnson]

I think the Russian Federation has one more time zone that the USSR.. The USSR used to keep the Baltics, Ukraine and Belarus on Moscow Time, but since the collapse, those countries switched to Eastern European Time. Kaliningrad, which lies west of the Baltics, changed over as well, giving the RF one extra time zone.

[MikeP]

According to the Telegraph's take on this story...

Russia was divided up into 11 time zones in 1919.

But I have found nothing to corroborate that, and such facts from newspapers are notoriously error-prone.

Furthermore, a Wikipedia article on Decree time implies that Kaliningrad was moved from Moscow time to Eastern European time by Soviet legislation in October, 1991, but by the time that law was enacted in January, 1992, it was the 23rd act of the government of Russia.

So I guess you win. Damn!

[John A. Roark]

I LOVE LOVE LOVE the irony in listing the defendants' names at the end of the German wiki-article. Too damned funny!

[brotherben]

When the computer was fed an excerpt from A Catcher In The Rye its cooling fans mysteriously shut off, causing the hard drive to melt.

[Computer]

A+

[brotherben]

This is a story I've linked to before about an ongoing controversy in a Nampa,Idaho charter school that was going to use the Bible as a textbook. Some of you may find it interesting.

[Unclaimed mysteries]

How many time zones? That's not even funny.

[Jesse Walker]

Thank you. I can't believe that took three and a half hours.

[tekende]

Huh? I don't understand.

[MikeP]

10. Ha ha ha ha!

[P Brooks]

use the Bible as a textbook

Leaving aside the (shall we say) largely objectionable content, a lot of people, in the olden times, used the bible as their "readin' and writin'" text. Stylistically, it produces significantly better writers than Dick and Jane.

[dbcooper]

The Atlantic Monthly officially hit rock bottom today:

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc.....-directors

[Brick]

DANVERS, Mass. - Who knew "Meep!" was a four-letter word? The utterance favored by bungling lab assistant Beaker of "The Muppet Show" has been banned at Danvers High School in Massachusetts after students said it to repeatedly interrupt school.

Principal Thomas Murray said the word was part of a disruption planned using Facebook.

The Salem News reports that parents recently got an automated call about "Meep!" from Murray. He warned them that students who said or displayed the word at school could be suspended.

http://www.startribune.com/nat.....ec8O7EyUsl

[brotherben]

Tos get around this ban, students will now pronounce Meep "Doooshbag"

[Mike M.]

More pretty big news: 9/11 top mastermind and bad Ron Jeremy lookalike Khalid Sheikh Mohammed will be sent to face criminal trial in civilian court in New York City.

[Beaker]

Meep!

[Stormy Dragon]

It seems to me the computer grader is working perfectly fine. The mentioned passages of writing are all written in an oratorical or prose style that would be completely inappropriate for use in an essay question. Anyone who answered that way SHOULD get a poort grade.

[cmace]

Those are all horrorshow slovos for any skoliwoli. You need a tolchock in the guliver.

[Computer]

Improper capitalization: "SHOULD". Misspelling: "poort". Demeanor: haughty. Grade: C.

[Computer]

SHOULD = Improper capitalization.

poort = Misspelled.

Haughty demeanor.

Grade: C.

[P Brooks]

the Center for Constitutional Rights

[P Brooks]

Fucking squirrels.

[P Brooks]

The Salem News reports that parents recently got an automated call about "Meep!" from Murray. He warned them that students who said or displayed the word at school could be suspended

Repeat offenders will be burned at the stake.

[Brick]

Obama Toilet Paper in Japan:

http://twitpic.com/pbsnz

[CaptainSmartass]

Wonder how you say "Streissand Effect" auf Deutsch?

Word to the wise, Herr Werl?: let this one go. It's not going to end well for you (though not as badly as they ended for your victim, granted).

[Mad Max]

Achtung, it veels good to be a German
Murder gets ein slap on the wrist
Let out of prison in under 20 years
And then you get to censor journalists!

And all I vant to say to you unstinting, truth-printing American vermin
Ve haf vays to make you shut up
Achtung, it veels good to be a German!

[gate valves]

It seems to me the computer grader is working perfectly fine. The mentioned passages of writing are all written in an oratorical or prose style that would be completely inappropriate for use in an essay question. Anyone who answered that way SHOULD get a poort grade.

[ABUSE]

truth,,,,obama people have no idea of the extent to which they have to be gulled in order to be led."
"The size of the lie is a definite factor in causing it to be believed, for the vast masses of the nation are in the depths of their hearts more easily deceived than they are consciously and intentionally bad. The primitive simplicity of their minds renders them a more easy prey to a big lie than a small one, for they themselves often tell little lies but would be ashamed to tell a big one."
"All propaganda must be so popular and on such an intellectual level, that even the most stupid of those towards whom it is directed will understand it. Therefore, the intellectual level of the propaganda must be lower the larger the number of people who are to be influenced by it."
"Through clever and constant application of propaganda, people can be made to see paradise as hell, and also the other way around, to consider the most wretched sort of life as paradise."pelosi don't see much future for the Americans ... it's a decayed country. And they have their racial problem, and the problem of social inequalities ...obama feelings against Americanism are feelings of hatred and deep repugnance ... everything about the behaviour of American society reveals that it's half Judaised, and the other half negrified. How can one expect a State like that to hold TOGTHER.They include the angry left wing bloggers who spread vicious lies and half-truths about their political adversaries... Those lies are then repeated by the duplicitous left wing media outlets who "discuss" the nonsense on air as if it has merit? The media's justification is apparently "because it's out there", truth be damned. STOP THIS COMMUNIST OBAMA ,GOD HELP US ALL .THE COMMANDER ((GOD OPEN YOUR EYES)) stop the communist obama & pelosi.((open you eyes)) ,the commander