I was going to make a sex joke about Newt Gingrich and Alabama ...

... but then the section underneath it left me laughing even harder. Or crying. One of those.

(click to see the little horizontal lines that mean "insigificant," full size!)

You don't actually need me to link to the Wikipedia page on Southern Strategy, do you?

(source | via)

Mitt Romney puts his silver foot in his mouth, ...

... again.

(title h/t: Ann Richards | pic. source)

Report from the US Prison Industrial Complex

I have known for some time that the way the game is rigged these days is that if you don't take a prosecutor's plea bargain offer, and instead insist upon your Constitutional right (quaint!) to a trial by jury, you risk extremely harsh punishment if you lose at trial. But I did not know it was quite this bad:

The Supreme Court ruled in 1978 that threatening someone with life imprisonment for a minor crime in an effort to induce him to forfeit a jury trial did not violate his Sixth Amendment right to trial. Thirteen years later, in Harmelin v. Michigan, the court ruled that life imprisonment for a first-time drug offense did not violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

Bad as that is, here's an example of how it gets worse:

No wonder, then, that most people waive their rights. Take the case of Erma Faye Stewart, a single African-American mother of two who was arrested at age 30 in a drug sweep in Hearne, Tex., in 2000. In jail, with no one to care for her two young children, she began to panic. Though she maintained her innocence, her court-appointed lawyer told her to plead guilty, since the prosecutor offered probation. Ms. Stewart spent a month in jail, and then relented to a plea. She was sentenced to 10 years’ probation and ordered to pay a $1,000 fine. Then her real punishment began: upon her release, Ms. Stewart was saddled with a felony record; she was destitute, barred from food stamps and evicted from public housing. Once they were homeless, Ms. Stewart’s children were taken away and placed in foster care. In the end, she lost everything even though she took the deal.

Read the whole article to learn about a novel solution proposed by a brave woman named Susan Burton.

Two Graphic Reminders

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Pics swiped from Strong Intelligent Women Choosing Equality & Freedom Instead Of Religion, on Facebook, via Rita Matthews.

In case you missed my tweet, ...

... don't miss this outstanding post by Kay at Balloon Juice on the never-ending efforts by the Republican Party to suppress minority voters.

(h/t: @edroso and @azjayhawk47)

Remember when The Pantload and The Steyn said this?

Thanks to a spam commenter, I had my attention drawn to something I noted right after the previous presidential election. It is reproduced below for your enjoyment.

Wednesday, November 05, 2008

Doughy (For the Record)

Prediction   [Jonah Goldberg]

Now that McCain has lost, and Sarah Palin has time to reintroduce herself down the road, the anti-Palin conservatives will almost surely look foolish in retrospect.

Foolish is as foolish does. We'll be watching, Mr. Pantload.

And you, too, Mark Steyn:

As for us losers, there's no point going down the right-wing version of Bush Derangement Syndrome. Any shrill vicious ad hominem invective would be much better directed at each other.

Frist!!!1!

As of this moment (before clicking Publish), the Google finds nothing for kim kardashian "tractor trailer trash."

!!!MUST CREDIT BJKEEFE!!!

__________

I don't actually have anything against KK, apart from the usual despair caused by anyone who's famous solely for being famous, but on the other hand, I really was stuck behind one of these big rigs for almost two hours this past Friday.

(Click pic to make ... more voluptuous?)

(pic. source: Pro Trucker)

__________

And anyway, it's not even in the same league with whoever came up with my all-time favorite measure of insignificance: "one of the lesser Kardashians."

__________

[Added] After looking around for a bit, the best bet seems to be The Colbert Report.

Sprung 2

Growth report from twelve days ago to today:

At other spots in the yard, blossoming, blossoming:

Click 'em to big 'em.

If you look for a dot of purple along the right-hand edge of the middle picture, about two thirds of the way up, that's the single flower shown in the first of the three images. [Added: visual aid 1, visual aid 2]

GAME CHANGER

(source | h/t: KK)

Say ... maybe there IS something to that online tracking business

Item #2 in the "Recommended For You" list the NYT just displayed to me:

Sod Off, Scotch
Irish Whiskey, an Unfussy, Constant Companion

Melanosomes!

Did you know it is now possible to say something about what color a bird's dinosaur's feathers were, from looking at its fossil?

Whoa. I sure didn't. And apparently it is pretty new:

A year ago, Canadian paleontologists described some of the first examples of feather coloring in the age of dinosaurs. They were found in 70 million-year-old amber preserving 11 specimens with a wide variety of feather types, some in bright colors. A different pigmentation method produces the brighter-colored features of, say, cardinals.

Here's how the article starts:

Sexual drive, not flight, may have been the main reason for the feather color and pattern of Microraptor, a four-winged dinosaur that lived some 130 million years ago in what is now northeastern China.

New research by American and Chinese scientists shows that the animal had a predominantly glossy iridescent sheen in hues of black and blue, like a crow. This is the earliest known evidence of iridescent color in feathers. The animal also had a striking pair of long, narrow tail feathers, perhaps to call attention to itself in courtship.

In the study, published online Thursday in the journal Science, the researchers compared the patterns of pigment-containing cells from a Microraptor fossil with those of modern birds. The shape and orientation of these cells, known as melanosomes, were narrow and arranged in a distinctive pattern, as in the case of living birds with glossy feathers.

Only recently has it become possible with scanning electron microscopes to examine well-preserved fossil remains of melanosomes, so tiny that a hundred can fit across a human hair. Such pigment agents in many birds are generally round or cigar-shaped, but these were especially narrow, like those of blackbirds. The iridescence arises when the melanosomes are organized in stacked layers.

Read all the words.

*Gasp.* Looks like teevee actually got a bit smarter.

I did not know until just now that Melissa Harris-Perry has her own show on MSNBC. And it's got a hashtag to die for!

Apparently, it launched 18 February 2012, and it airs right after the show that tweeple know as #uppers.

Thanks to ZandarVTS for explaining what #nerdland refers to. See Michael P Jeffries for a quick intro to the new show. Congrats to MHP and MSNBC.

College professors hosting political talk shows! Can't wait till Rick Santorum hears about this!

[Added] If you're reading this remotely, don't fail to drop by and see Jack's note in the Comments.

I am just now learning why no one calls her Four Eyes

(Apparently big in 2010.)

Is Google's Search By Image system developing a sense of humor?

(embiggen)

[Update] The crack researchers in the RomanceScam.com forums lead me to believe that the model's name is Denise Milani. I mean, if you wanted to know.

Line of the Day: 2012-03-04 [sic]

Somehow or another, this post got stuck in Drafts. But this summary paragraph of Roy's, wrapping up a survey of the GOOD RIDDANCE huffing and puffing by some of the usual suspects reacting to news of a certain senator's retirement, is timeless, or so it seems these days.

[Washington Examiner "senior political columnist" Timothy J.] Carney has been peddling this line for a while -- that there's a secret, saving remnant that works behind the scenes in the Republican Party to keep it, and America, on the straight and narrow. Thus he feels compelled to describe what has clearly been the most powerful force in that Party for decades as a beleaguered minority. Why does he even try? Well, there's traditional conservative persecution mania, but I think another factor comes into play: Conservatives have fucked this country up pretty badly, and maybe they think if they pretend to have been cowering under the blows of David Frum all this time, they can convince some dummies that it was Olympia Snowe's fault.

Which inspires variation on a theme:

How many times do you think "uppity!!!1!" was typed into the wingnutosphere in the past 24 hours?

Always nice to see the teevee wing of the GOP get mocked, though, isn't it?

(alt. video link)

Way to speak truth to power, Mr. President!

(h/t: Progress Report, 6 Mar 2012 edition. (Will add permalink when they make one.))

[Added] In case you don't have your scorecard handy, that FoxNews Reporter™ is Ed Henry. Apparently, he was hired away from CNN after writing the "worst article in American history."

What could possibly go wrong?

I don't know anything more than what I just read in that sales brochure (PDF). But doesn't it seem like a door through which the bad guys could inject something to infect your system at a very low level?

Paranoia is a fact of life for PC users. Mac and Linux weenies may commence chortling now.

Smell that? Mmm. Ahhh. Yes, the blogosphere just got measurably smarter.

Guess who just went Galt.

And M.B. is right about this, too, x2: don't miss Susan of Texas in comments over at Inside the Beltway.

Parting song.

A great thing from a couple of weeks ago

(Reblogging the dead trees once again.)

I'd find it as hard to believe if you told me as you're going to right now that I'm telling you, but I'm telling you, when I got to the end of this Ben McGrath piece which starts out seeming to be about nothing special, especially given what EVERYONE was writing about a couple of weeks ago, I could only think, even in my dreams, I'll never be able to write like that.

The LA Times shamelessly panders to my inner little boy

What? You're moving a 340-ton granite boulder from Riverside County to LACMA? And you have an interactive diagram of the truck for me to look at???

---

(embiggen, although not nearly enough)

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Map of the planned route. Follow @LACMARock and Culture Monster for turn-by-turn action! (Okay, maybe not quite that much. Plus, it's only moving at 5mph. WHICH IS WAY FASTER THAN THE SPACE SHUTTLE.)

(h/t: MK, via phone)

[Added] Good picture of the early phase here.

Take it from someone who lives there

Gershom Gorenberg, who has been living in Israel for about thirty-five years, appears here in a diavlog with Glenn Loury that was recorded on 26 Feb and posted 3 March 2012. These are slightly longer than soundbites, and deserve to be.

First, how many self-identified Republicans know this, do you think?

(alt. video link)

Also, how about them madrasas!!!1!

(alt. video link)

And a parting thought:

(alt. video link)

Beat that, for four words to live by.

I encourage you to watch the whole thing. And, if you're interested, you can read the first chapter of The Unmaking of Israel for free, on Amazon.

Colors in the White House

Sure it's staged, but that doesn't mean it's not beautiful. Click it to big it.

(source | via)

Probably you wouldn't want to wear this if you had a big belly

Happened across this while looking for something else:

Digging @alxtorres 's new graphic designer shirt. twitter.com/rcktorres/stat…

— Rick Torres (@rcktorres) October 15, 2011

(h/t: Meghan Kelly/VentureBeat)

[Added] The title was a nod to Hannibal Lecter fans, of course. Here's a definition I didn't know, though:

Noun

render (plural renders)

1. A substance similar to stucco but exclusively applied to masonry walls.

More anniversary celebration

How cool is this? The radio broadcast of the fourth quarter of that game is available online for your listening pleasure.

And they have very kindly set it up so you can jump to any point in that quarter.

(h/t: Richard Sandomir)

Fizzy logic

Distribution of "pop," "soda," and "coke" usage, as determined by an analysis of tweets:

Yellow dots indicate “pop,” red dots indicate “Coke,” and blue dots indicate “soda.”

Zoom out and wonder along with me why Canadians use the term most prevalent in the US southeast.

Bigger and even more more interactive map here.

Bigger static maps, showing results from different workers using different methodologies, here.

More info, and topics, starting at Jennifer Schuessler's fine post. Wherein, concerning some matters discussed, this blogger needs educated. But it's all hella cool!

Deep thought

Via email from @DrBallester, who also taught me a new word: paraprosdokian.

Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.

(Origin unknown.)

Happy 50th Anniversary!

The first time they met was in December of 1956, in Lawrence, Kan. — inside some all-purpose room at the student union that was reconfigured to accommodate a few TV cameras.

Somebody shoved a few tables together and placed some chairs behind them so the players could sit down and face the media, and if he was asked any memorable question about how he was about to become a bystander to history, Joe Ruklick cannot recall it.

But even before the proceedings began, before anyone could ask Wilt Chamberlain about the collegiate debut that would take place the next day, Ruklick leaned across the table and nervously stuck his hand in the direction of this massive sculpture of a man the national media had come to see.

"First of all, taking his hand was like trying to hold the wide end of a tennis racket," said Ruklick, at that time an 18-year-old sophomore center from Northwestern University.

"So I was still looking at it when I said, 'Wilt, I just wanted to apologize — I was picked as the starting center at the North-South High School Game two years ago in Kentucky, where they wouldn't let you play because you were a Negro. I stood in your place, and that was wrong, because you should have been there.'

"And Wilt, incredibly gracious, just said, 'Hey, my man — don't give it any thought. You earned it.' "

From that moment — even though they would meet only once more in the next three years — the tall, stocky white kid from a village in central Illinois was bonded to the colossus from Philadelphia.

Of course, Chamberlain, two years his senior, may have had another reason to be gracious: sympathy. The next day, he set two Big Seven Conference records by rolling up 52 points and 31 rebounds with astonishing ease, and hardly anyone noticed that the poor kid trying to guard him scored 22 himself.

That wouldn't be the last time the two men would collaborate on a number that turned the sports world on its head.

Remember what else Joe Ruklick isn't much remembered for? Read the rest of Dave D'Alessandro's fine piece to find out.

And, from a different night, but just because it's such a great picture:

Above: one of the few reasons to wish I was older than I am

Both pix may be clicked to enlarge, although, sadly, not quite to life size. They were swiped from Rompedas, who has a bunch more.

Thanks for the reminder, C. (Who is from Philadelphia, of course. (And, shhh. Don't tell her that wasn't the 76ers that night.))

[Added] There's more.

Plans for world domination through service integration ...

... appear to have a few wrinkles yet to be ironed out.

Yep. That's a real email message, really from YouTube. But try telling Gmail's spam filters that.

That's EXACTLY the problem, Congressman

Yet another Republican for whom facts don't matter, when they're inconvenient to his superstitions:

We’re not talking about scientists. Ma’m we’re not talking about scientists here, we’re talking about religious belief. Ma’m, I’m asking you about a religious belief. In a religious belief, that is a violation of a religious belief.

But tut, tut. Not to worry about a theocracy, they keep telling me.

Above: Rep. Tim Murphy (R-Obvs.) and
what he'd probably tell you is the last science textbook he ever read

(Photo credit: Randy Jarosz)

Tweet of the Day

From Fed Up Fed:

All the noise #wingnuts made about zombie voters in SC, and we'll hear crickets on the results of the investigation http://thkpr.gs/xIEGwl

The headline and some excerpts from that quoted link:

Investigation Finds No Dead Voters — And Zero Voter Fraud — In South Carolina

South Carolina elections are still free of dead voters.

That’s what the State Election Commission concluded from its investigation into South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson’s declaration that over 900 dead people may have voted in recent elections.

Though the charge itself is laughable, South Carolina was still compelled to devote taxpayer money to investigate whether their elections had indeed been tainted by zombie voters. Unsurprisingly, they uncovered no evidence of voter fraud:

[...]

When Wilson first leveled the charge, many conservative media outlets, from Human Events to Fox News to Weasel Zippers and others, jumped on the story, using it as justification for South Carolina’s discriminatory voter ID law. Now, four days after the State Election Commission released its initial findings, none of these organizations have ran an update or correction, much less a full story informing their readers that “dead voters” in South Carolina still don’t exist.

That’s the major problem with Scooby-Doo accusations like “dead voters”: the investigation is sexy, but the finale is always far more mundane. As ThinkProgress wrote earlier this month, “when the allegations are inevitably shown to be false, far fewer news outlets follow up.” As a result, many people are still left with the mistaken impression that dead voters tainted South Carolina’s recent elections.

Never forget: there is a faction of the Republican Party that really, really doesn't like democracy.