Quotulatiousness

November 12, 2011

Scottish Conservative Party goes non-conservative with new leader

Filed under: Britain, Politics — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 11:09

It sounds like the set-up to a joke, but it really is true: the new party leader is a lesbian kick-boxer:

The 32-year-old former BBC journalist edged out Murdo Fraser by only 566 votes in the bad-tempered contest after he argued the Tory brand was too mistrusted north of the Border for the party ever to succeed.

But Miss Davidson, who is openly gay and a kick boxer, said she will unite the deeply-divided party and attract new support from sections of Scottish society that have stopped listening to the Conservatives.

The result marks the culmination of a remarkably rapid political ascent. She joined the party two years ago and only won election as a Glasgow MSP in May after the Tories’ first-choice candidate was forced to stand down over his financial history.

She won the endorsement of only two other MSPs during the campaign, with the largest group backing Mr Fraser and his plan to replace the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party with a new organisation.

Still no charges in the Gibson Guitar case

Filed under: Bureaucracy, India, Law, Media, USA, Woodworking — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 11:00

An update in the Wall Street Journal just recaps the background to the case, and has an interview with Henry Juszkiewicz, the CEO.

On Aug. 24, federal agents descended on three factories and the Nashville corporate headquarters of the Gibson Guitar Corp. Accompanied by armored SWAT teams with automatic weapons, agents from the Fish and Wildlife Service swarmed the factories, threatening bewildered luthiers, or guitar craftsman, and other frightened employees. A smaller horde invaded the office of CEO Henry Juszkiewicz, pawing through it all day while an armed man stood in the door to block his way.

“I was pretty upset,” Mr. Juszkiewicz says now, sitting outside that same office. “But you can only do so much when there’s a gun in your face and it’s the federal government.” When the chaos subsided, the feds (with a warrant issued under a conservation law called the Lacey Act) had stripped Gibson of almost all of its imported Indian rosewood and some other materials crucial to guitar making.

The incident attracted national attention and outrage. Like Boeing — whose plans to locate new production in South Carolina are opposed by the National Labor Relations Board — here was an iconic American brand under seemingly senseless federal fire.

This week in Guild Wars 2 news

Filed under: Gaming — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 10:40

I’ve been accumulating news snippets about the as-yet-to-be-formally-scheduled release of Guild Wars 2 for an email newsletter I send out to my friends and acquaintances in the Guild Wars community. Third slow news week in a row. This time, the Arenanet folks have been prepping for the G*Star show in Korea, so we’ve got a few new bits from that, but nothing really major.

(more…)

QotD: The uses of junk science

Filed under: Environment, Health, Media, Quotations — Tags: — Nicholas @ 00:05

The Sierra Club campaign against coal is motivated by a desire to reduce CO2 emissions to prevent global warming. But since global warming skepticism and global warming fatigue are widespread, the club has opted for a junk science approach to reach its goals. The club tells people that their babies will die, or at least get asthma, if coal plants continue to operate. Although the cause of asthma is not known, it is suspected that it is related to the high levels of cleanliness in advanced countries that denies children and their immune systems exposure to the dirt and filth found in primitive places. This is known as the hygiene hypothesis. The incidence of asthma is about 50 times higher in developed countries compared to rural Africa. For all the Sierra Club knows, coal plants may prevent asthma. Given the hygiene hypothesis, that seems plausible.

With junk science, it is easy to scare people. There are many things that are bad for us that are present at low levels in the environment — for example, mercury, lead, radiation, or tobacco smoke. The junk science approach to trace toxins is to claim that if a high level of the bad thing would cause X people to get sick, then a level 10,000 times smaller must cause 1/10,000 as many people to get sick. Given 300 million people in the country, this math can give you thousands of people getting sick from low levels of mercury, lead, radiation, or secondhand tobacco smoke. This approach is known as the linear no threshold hypothesis.

The Sierra Club and its ally, the Environmental Protection Agency, lean on the small emissions of mercury from burning coal to work up a calculation of deaths from coal. They minimize the fact that much of the mercury falling on the U.S. comes from China, volcanoes, or even from burning dead bodies with mercury-based fillings in their teeth. Mercury pollution becomes an excuse to get rid of coal. Arguing the science behind such claims often degenerates into a paper chase about statistics and what studies are good or bad. From the bureaucratic point of view, the linear no threshold hypothesis is wonderful because it means that problems are never solved and there is always a need for more bureaucratic activity.

Norman Rogers, “Sierra Club at the Metropolitan Club”, American Thinker, 2011-11-11

November 11, 2011

In memorium

Filed under: Britain, History, Military, WW1, WW2 — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 11:00

A simple recognition of some of our family members who served in the First and Second World Wars:

The Great War

  • Private William Penman, Scots Guards, died 1915 at Le Touret, age 25
    (Elizabeth’s great uncle)
  • Private David Buller, Highland Light Infantry, died 1915 at Loos, age 35
    (Elizabeth’s great grandfather)
  • Private Walter Porteous, Northumberland Fusiliers, died 1917 at Passchendaele, age 18
    (my great uncle)
  • Corporal John Mulholland, Royal Tank Corps, died 1918 at Harbonnieres, age 24
    (Elizabeth’s great uncle)

The Second World War

  • Flying Officer Richard Porteous, RAF, survived the defeat in Malaya and lived through the war
    (my uncle)
  • Able Seaman John Penman, RN, served in the Defensively Equipped Merchant fleet on the Murmansk Run (and other convoy routes), lived through the war
    (Elizabeth’s father)
  • Private Archie Black (commissioned after the war and retired as a Major), Gordon Highlanders, captured at Singapore (aged 15) and survived a Japanese POW camp
    (Elizabeth’s uncle)

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)

November 10, 2011

Early game prediction, NFL week 10

Filed under: Football — Tags: — Nicholas @ 12:52

I’ll post the rest of my picks on Sunday, but here’s tonight’s game prediction best guess:

     @San Diego vs Oakland (7.0) Thu 8:20pm

Season to date 80-50

San Diego is a good team, they’re sure to cover the spread, right?

John Scalzi on the Penn State child rape cover-up

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Education, Football, Law — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 12:02

In four points, John Scalzi walks us through what should have happened at Penn State when the first incident was discovered:

1. When, as an adult, you come come across another adult raping a small child, you should a) do everything in your power to rescue that child from the rapist, b) call the police the moment it is practicable.

2. If your adult son calls you to tell you that he just saw another adult raping a small child, but then left that small child with the rapist, and then asks you what he should do, you should a) tell him to get off the phone with you and call the police immediately, b) call the police yourself and make a report, c) at the appropriate time in the future ask your adult son why the fuck he did not try to save that kid.

3. If your underling comes to you to report that he saw another man, also your underling, raping a small child, but then left that small child with the rapist, you should a) call the police immediately, b) alert your own superiors, c) immediately suspend the alleged rapist underling from his job responsibilities pending a full investigation, d) at the appropriate time in the future ask that first underling why the fuck he did not try to save that kid.

4. When, as the officials of an organization, you are approached by an underling who tells you that one of his people saw another of his people raping a small child at the organization, in organization property, you should a) call the police immediately, b) immediately suspend the alleged rapist from his job responsibilities if the immediate supervisor has not already done so, c) when called to a grand jury to testify on the matter, avoid perjuring yourself. At no time should you decide that the best way to handle the situation is to simply tell the alleged rapist not to bring small children onto organization property anymore.

For “organization”, feel free to substitute “Catholic church” for “Penn State University” as required.

Teachers in the US are not underpaid

Filed under: Economics, Education — Tags: — Nicholas @ 09:41

An article in the Wall Street Journal examines the facts over the common belief that public school teachers are underpaid:

A common story line in American education policy is that public school teachers are underpaid — “desperately underpaid,” according to Education Secretary Arne Duncan in a recent speech. As former first lady Laura Bush put it: “Salaries are too low. We all know that. We need to figure out a way to pay teachers more.”

Good teachers are crucial to a strong economy and a healthy civil society, and they should be paid at a level commensurate with their skills. But the evidence shows that public school teachers’ total compensation amounts to roughly $1.50 for every $1 that their skills could garner in a private sector job.

[. . .]

Education is widely regarded by researchers and college students alike as one of the easiest fields of study, and one that features substantially higher average grades than most other college majors. On objective tests of cognitive ability such as the SAT, ACT, GRE (Graduate Record Examination) and Armed Forces Qualification Test, teachers score only around the 40th percentile of college graduates. If we compare teachers and non-teachers with similar AFQT scores, the teacher salary penalty disappears.

While salaries are about even, fringe benefits push teacher compensation well ahead of comparable employees in the private economy. The trouble is that many of these benefits are hidden, meaning that lawmakers, taxpayers and even teachers themselves are sometimes unaware of them.

[. . .]

One important caveat: Our research is in terms of averages. The best public school teachers — especially those teaching difficult subjects such as math and science — may well be underpaid compared to counterparts in the private sector.

H/T to Monty, who writes:

Spiking another myth: public school teachers are not underpaid. Public-sector employees tend to assume that private-sector workers get paid a lot more than they actually do. Public-sector employees also tend to undervalue their own (expensive) benefit packages, and don’t include them in their base salaries. Career public-sector workers would be shocked at how little money comparable private-sector workers actually make, especially when private-sector benefits are compared to public-sector benefit packages.

Delingpole’s word of the day: monotesticularity

Filed under: Britain, Media, Politics — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 09:03

He’s talking about Nigel Farage, leader of the UK Independence Party:

‘Farage has only got one ball.’ The last time I made reference to the Ukip leader’s monotesticular status, I got a rocket from an outraged reader. But the reader had missed the point entirely. Nigel Farage’s handicap is a strength, not a weakness. He’s open about it, he’s unembarrassed by it and he’s a better man for it. Yes, Farage may have lost a bollock to cancer, but by God he’s got more cojones than almost any Conservative you could name.

Our Nigel is a Conservative himself, of course. Just one who has been temporarily dispossessed by the mainstream party. When you talk to Farage he’s perfectly upfront about what he considers to be Ukip’s role: to act as the Tory party’s conscience. The moment the Conservatives start behaving like proper Conservatives again — Eurosceptical, small government, low tax, etc — that’ll be it. Most of the 7 per cent of voters who are currently Ukip’s will be straight back into the Tory fold and we’ll have a proper, Thatcherite government again doing the Lord’s work.

Seven per cent! That figure — from the latest YouGov poll — is pretty amazing, isn’t it? It puts Ukip only one point away from the ailing Lib Dems, meaning it’s on track to become Britain’s third largest political party. Yet you’d scarcely be aware of this development, the way it has been ignored by most of our mainstream media.

Peter Oborne nailed it in a recent Telegraph column: ‘If a left-wing party had reached Ukip’s size and consequence, the media would be fascinated. But, because of its old-fashioned and decidedly provincial approach, it has been practically ignored. In the 2004 European elections, the party gained a sensational 16 per cent of the vote. Had it been the Greens or the communists that had pulled off this feat, the BBC would have gone crazy. Instead it chose not to mention this event, coolly classifying Ukip as “other”.’

Common resumé mistakes from hopeful IT graduates

Filed under: Education, Randomness, Technology — Tags: — Nicholas @ 08:54

Dominic Connor reads a lot of resumés from recent graduates. He’s offering some simple tips to help yours avoid the short trip to the shredder:

Does Ferrari say it makes “reelly good carrrs”? No, it bloody doesn’t. So why do you spell the name of your degree subject wrong? Why do you use slightly different fonts in each paragraph that screw with my ancient pimp’s eyes?

Why in the name of God do you think I care that you did OS/2 v1.1 in 1989? You may have just finished a PhD in Physics from Cambridge or Stanford, but your astonishing lack of any clue is demonstrated by the fact that more space is given over to the summer job you had in Starbucks than describing why you might actually be of use to the investment banks I recruit for.

Sometimes, just to wind me up, you send me a blue CV. Yes, black text on a blue background. Not only does the motivation for this leave me dumbfounded but when I blogged that this was silly several people somehow interpreted “please don’t send blue CVs” as “please do”.

Why do you send your CV to me with no mobile phone number? Do you not have one? Nor a landline? Why do you think your religion means you are a great match for my requirement of hardcore C++ skills?

I already know you want to leave your current job or else we wouldn’t be talking. So why are you listing the defects of your employer? Do you think it makes you look good?

Why did you send the file as a Word document? That may not sound too bad until you realise that every damned word you spelled wrong is underlined in red on my screen and your grammar is also ridiculed by a £70 bit of software that is apparently smarter than you.

I’ve been on the hiring side of the desk a few times, and I’ve seen almost all of these errors on resumés. I had one candidate who must have “borrowed” someone else’s resumé and just changed the name and address, because he knew far too little about the jobs he was supposed to have held. I’ve also had a candidate arrive for her interview on the way back from the gym, still in her gym clothes (not having showered). But my favourite interview subject was one who presented me with samples of his work . . . that I had written for a previous employer.

November 9, 2011

Under attack by overwhelming economic forces, French and Germans consider retreat to citadel

Filed under: Economics, Europe, France, Germany — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 14:42

If they’re floating ideas like this, the Euro is done:

German and French officials have discussed plans for a radical overhaul of the European Union that would involve establishing a more integrated and potentially smaller euro zone, EU sources say.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy gave some flavor of his thinking during an address to students in the eastern French city of Strasbourg on Tuesday, when he said a two-speed Europe — the euro zone moving ahead more rapidly than all 27 countries in the EU — was the only model for the future.

The discussions among senior policymakers in Paris, Berlin and Brussels go further, raising the possibility of one or more countries leaving the euro zone, while the remaining core pushes on toward deeper economic integration, including on tax and fiscal policy.

As in any retreat, some outlying forces (countries) will have to be sacrificed to save the main body (France and Germany). A small retreat may not be enough — but Greece, Italy, Spain, and Portugal are likely to be left outside the walls.

Penn State’s problem

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Education, Football, Law — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 12:55

Russ from Winterset loses his temper over the truly disturbing way Penn State is handling their child rape issues allegations:

So Joe Paterno is going to retire at the end of the season?

Whiskey? Tango? Foxtrot? Does Joe think he is going to be carried off the MISS PIGGY field to the BEAKER cheers of the DR. BUNSEN HONEYDEW crowd after leading Penn STADLER State to another GONZO bowl game? FOZZIE BEAR that noise. He should have the common DR. TEETH & THE ELECTRIC MAYHEM decency to slink out the back door of the coaching offices in shame like John SAM THE EAGLE Edwards leaving a session of a Federal RIZZO THE RAT Grand Jury.

That moderation expressed in my first update? KERMIT that. If Joe JANIS THE BASS PLAYER Paterno is allowed to coach another ANIMAL football game at Penn RALPH THE DOG State University, every WALDORF fan in the stadium who so much as smiles when their BERT team scores their first ERNIE touchdown can go Suck The Barbed Cock of Satan as far as I’m concerned.

BIG BIRD! Now I’m pissed.

And when you come back with the “look at all he’s done for the community” card, tell me this. How many other kids have been raped since 2002 because JoePa and the other jackasses at Penn State didn’t think it was necessary to get the police involved in this situation? Ten? Five? Even one? Is that a fair trade for all that Joe Paterno has done for his community?

If it’s not quite clear from context, he “replace[d] all but one of my f-bombs in the original draft of the post with the names of Muppet Characters”

Federalism does not mean “do what the Feds say”

Filed under: Government, Law, USA — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 12:41

The US government is actively undermining California law when it comes to medical marijuana:

When you get a new car, you start noticing the same model all over the highway. It’s the same way when you figure out what California’s marijuana dispensaries look like — green crosses and signage about “medicine” and “420” start popping up all over the City of Angels: On your commute to work, in your neighborhood, around the corner from your favorite restaurant. To put it bluntly, it’s not hard to find weed in California.

But that all might be about to change. The state’s four U.S. Attorneys are gamely trying to alter the broadly popular status quo with arrests and threats of prosecution and property seizure for landlords who rent to dispensaries, a campaign announced in a rare joint press conference in October. Medical marijuana advocates call it an “intense crackdown” and have launched a lawsuit claiming the federal attorneys’ tactics violate California’s tenth amendment rights (Rick Perry, call your office).

State and local officials, meanwhile, are divided in their reactions to the influx of dispensaries in California, but many say that overly eager federal intervention is undermining the state-regulated medical marijuana system that they have taken pains to set up. In other words, as long as the federal crackdown contained itself to targeting egregious offenders of state law, it was hard for anyone to object; many applauded. But by raising the prospect of a federal assault on city mayors and town councils, Obama’s Department of Justice could be making more enemies than friends in California.

This is not news: Toronto is Canada’s least-liked city

Filed under: Cancon, Media — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 09:07

In fact, a strong case could be made that hating Toronto is one of the key factors that binds the rest of Canada together:

Ontario’s capital not only had the lowest rate of positive responses, it also had the highest rate of “very negative” responses. “Many Canadians have a hate-on for Toronto,” said Myer Siemiatycki, a Ryerson University politics professor. “Toronto is regarded as totally self-indulgent, so there’s a sort of ‘Who do they think they are believing they’re the centre of the country and the universe?’” Jim Milway, executive director of the Martin Prosperity Institute at the Rotman School of Management, said the poorer perception of Toronto — 19% of respondents gave negative responses — is due to animosity more than anything else. “It’s not necessarily that people like their city more than Toronto,” he said. “It’s that people just don’t like Toronto, period.” Prof. McGrane, of the University of Saskatchewan, said the “grudge” is rooted in historic grievances, particularly harboured by westerners who have long felt “left out.” “It’s not that we hate (Torontonians), but we’re a bit suspicious about them and their motives,” he said.

I can’t claim to have been everywhere in the country, but from Nova Scotia to British Columbia, hatred of Toronto and distaste for Torontonians is almost universal among Canadians.

Recapping World War 2 through Twitter updates

Filed under: History, Military, Technology, WW2 — Tags: — Nicholas @ 08:56

It’s a huge undertaking, but Alwyn Collinson will be sending out frequent Twitter updates with 72-year-old “breaking news”:

The account, @RealTimeWWII, features up to 40 tweets each day and has attracted almost 45,000 followers as German forces tear across Europe in the autumn of 1939.

It covers major military and political developments, as well as featuring eyewitness testimony from the battlefield, contemporary photography and newsreel footage.

Created by 24-year-old Alwyn Collinson, the project is an attempt to “help people feel like they’re there”.

“I’m hoping to use Twitter to help bring the past to life, helping people understand the past as people at the time saw it, without the benefit of hindsight,” he said.

“I want them to see that people then were just like they are.”

I’d follow this myself, but I’m already overwhelmed with all the Twitter accounts I currently follow. This is a much bigger undertaking than the “live tweeting” of the Battle of Britain by the Imperial War Museum.

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