The Breaking Bad phenomenon

I have not watched the TV sensation that is now just two episodes away from the conclusion of its five-season run and that seems to have people completely hooked. But despite that, I did read the breathless coverage of last Sunday’s episode (it was impossible to avoid) that seemed to have been quite violent. As a result, I have (I think) a pretty good idea of the story line. [Read more…]

Using terrorism to make the extraordinary seem normal

We have been steadily observing over time the encroachment of the civil liberties and the violation of constitutional protections by the government, using fear-mongering about terrorism in order to get people to acquiesce. The government seizes any excuse to make inroads into our due process rights, often stampeding people at times of crisis, and terrorism is the best excuse they have. [Read more…]

Syria war billboard update

Yesterday I wrote about the big yellow board that had been placed in front of the university library to let people write their views on a possible war with Syria. The board only went up yesterday and so there were not that many comments. On my way to the library today, I checked on the board to find that it had been almost completely filled up with written comments. Tomorrow is the last day it will be there. [Read more…]

The fleeting nature of popular culture fame

Late night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel sent his crew out to interview people who attended the Fashion Week activities in New York. The crew threw out names of people who were NOT designers and asked the attendees what they thought of their creations. The people reacted as if they were familiar with the names and their designs and the show played those clips. [Read more…]

The greedy Walton family

The children of Sam Walton, founder of the Walmart empire, are among the richest people in the world. Walmart is notorious for paying its workers poorly and treating them badly. As this article from Bloomberg shows, they use every trick in the book to prevent paying taxes so that they keep as much of their money as possible. What seems like generous gifts to charity are in fact tax dodges. [Read more…]

More fallout from NSA revelations

It looks like Edward Snowden is settling in to life in Russia, learning the language and the culture. He may well decide to stay on there if the Russian government lets him. Although he apparently travels freely and is unrecognized by people, he is living incognito at a secret location with security, presumably just in case the US government gets an insane idea to kidnap or even kill him. They are less likely to do that in Russia than in some smaller country like Venezuela or Ecuador because the US government, like all bullies, only picks on people that cannot fight back. [Read more…]

Dude, Where’s My War?

Now that the chances for an imminent bombing campaign against Syria have receded, the bloodthirsty warmongers that infest the top levels of the US political and media worlds are sad, even though US support for the rebels continues. They were so looking forward to seeing the US once again demonstrate its high-tech weaponry by unleashing death and destruction on a small country containing Muslims and Arabs, whom we all know are sub-human and thus their lives don’t count. [Read more…]

How do you make a smart phone kosher?

By making it into a dumb phone and disabling its internet and call-making capabilities.

From time to time I have been having fun at the expense of religious institutions that try to find ways of getting around the restrictions that their religious rules place on them. Orthodox Jews are the most source of fun, both because of the Byzantine rules that they have as well as for the convoluted logic used to get around them when they become inconvenient in this day and age. But this latest move is one of the most absurd. [Read more…]