Archive for September, 2006

Death And Discovery Of A Poet

Friday, September 29th, 2006

One of my favorite authors, Ken MacLeod, tells us John M. Ford has died. Not knowing who Mr. Ford was, I clicked through to discover a poem I quite like. I don’t usually like poetry, despite having gone through a teenage phase where I wrote some. But what really through me for [...]

Trans Fat America

Thursday, September 28th, 2006

New York City has joined other cities and countries in regulating (via a ban) trans fats from restaurants.
Well, almost anyway. There’s a review period and a final vote in October. But it’s pretty much done. After an initial distaste over another government ban (which always seem heavy-handed), a cursory review of the [...]

Lewd Wedding Songs

Tuesday, September 26th, 2006

The world needs more lewd wedding songs. (An observation elicited by a random sentence in the middle of Spin, another great book from Robert Charles Wilson. Really good.)
Related to that, the world needs some sort of new tradition (distinct from a wedding) to celebrate the intentions of a pair of people to share [...]

Short Overview Of American Party Politics

Monday, September 25th, 2006

Bouldin at The Daily Gotham (an arguably left/progressive site) has put up an article on “The Greens in the two-party system” (main title “Worse than Worthless”). It provides a nice overview of how the two parties do manage to encompass a wide range of views, how the system works overall, and what role “third” [...]

Actions More Important Than Whining

Monday, September 25th, 2006

Kos writes about whining. I think it’s important to remember, and it’s applicable beyond the political realm, too. And it reminds me of thoughts I would have whenever classmates would complain to the teacher (or professor; this happened in college, too!): “I meant to do the homework, but…” or “I wanted to finish [...]