September 2008
58 posts
Goddammit. Startled myself into wakefulness when I was 99% asleep. Is there a name for that? (I mean, besides “welcome to insomnia”)
My decision to read a book about 18th century boxing may have been misguided.
“To those, Sir, who prefer effiminacy to hardihood—assumed refinement to...”
– Pierce Egan, dedication of Boxiana
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Recently read: A Neutral Corner, by A.J. Liebling
The “other” (i.e. harder to find) collection of A.J. Liebling’s boxing essays from The New Yorker. Liebling’s writing is wonderfully digressive and personal and works particularly well in describing both the buildup to a boxing match and the match itself. His fight descriptions are never blow-by-blow accounts, but...
siracusa: Pithy insight from a guest Fox News(!): “It’s like the old headline from The Harvard Crimson: ‘Harvard beats Yale 29-29’”
Still hate how candidates turn debates into opportunities to give mini-stump speeches instead of to engage in actual, you know, debate.
Wait, now Obama wants to use Bush’s strategy with Iran?
Note: both candidates are wrong about Russia and Georgia. Of course, it’s the one issue they agree on.
Someone finally says something unequivocally right: the biggest winner from the Iraq situation is Iran.
Correction to earlier note: they also agreed with their initial responses to the 9/11 question before it devolved into bickering over Iraq.
Obama’s closing statement: solid. McCain’s: complete non-sequitur.
What the hell is with the matching dead soldier bracelets?
How is dealing with Pakistan less important than restricting the poppy trade?
Fuck yes! Destroy ethanol subsidies.
Would someone please tell Obama that wind and solar power are worthless?
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“I was convinced an Obama/McCain campaign would be measurably different on almost...”
– Jon Stewart
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Recently read:
Losers: The Road to Everyplace but the White House, by Michael Lewis — Journalistic “diary” of the 1996 election, with a lot of emphasis on the dubious cast of characters involved in the Republican primary (Lewis being well aware that the losers in that primary were more interesting than the winner — as is true in most primaries). Especially...
textism: Wait, there are people who think Facebook exists for any reason other than to spray them with advertising? Funny.
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Watson-Crick pairing, the Heisenberg group and... →
Siddhartha Gadgil
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Looking over scratchwork from yesterday. Last line: “This would seem to cancel off everything…Well of course it fucking does.” Promising!
Is there any rational explanation for Mike Tomlin’s end-game strategy other than that he was trying to cover the point spread?
Why is it I can read $100 worth of books in a week but I can never finish a quart of milk or a container of arugula before it goes bad?
Let the Heads Roll →
Michael Lewis tells you who to blame for this week’s financial crisis: Christopher Cox, head of the Securities and Exchange Commission:
He went as far out of his way as he could to enable the brokerage firms by harassing the small group of informed financial people who have been trying to tell the truth to the markets: the short sellers. They bet against the stock price of a company and...
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Recently read: You’re Stepping on My Cloak and Dagger, by Roger Hall
Amusing memoir of Hall’s time as a member of the OSS.
Remiel: New law: mandatory, reversible vasectomies at birth. “Going fertile” later requires two adult signatures and fifty bucks.
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Recently read: The Great Outdoor Fight, by Chris Onstad
A compilation of Achewood’s greatest epic (which can be found online starting here). The art doesn’t translate very well from the screen to the printed page, but the writing doesn’t suffer at all.
nevenmrgan: Wait, Microsoft announced their new ads? What do these people do for Christmas, show their kids the receipts for the gifts in November?
Borges on the Couch →
David Foster Wallace reviews a biography of Borges:
Tics and obsessions aside, what makes a Borges story Borgesian is the odd, ineluctable sense you get that no one and everyone did it. This is why, for instance, it is so irksome to see Williamson describe “The Immortal” and “The Writing of the God” — two of the greatest, most scalp-crinkling mystical stories...
Moltz: Congratulations comrades! I awoke to the glorious news that we have begun to nationalize our industries! Our communist paradise is nigh!
Okay, Crashy McCrasherson, you’re getting updated to 2.1.
Can someone point me to a substantial issue (other than abortion) on which Obama’s and McCain’s positions are demonstrably different?
A modest proposal →
Jeffrey Zeldman suggests that networks should prevent campaigns from running dishonest political advertisements:
So here’s my idea. One that could actually work, if America’s networks remember they are Americans first, revenue seekers second.
Just as they once united to stamp out cigarette advertising, radio and TV stations and advertisers must get together and agree that false statements...
How many years in a row is this that the Broncos have a crappy defense? 10?
What Makes People Vote Republican? →
Not surprisingly, the answer is that they care about different things than Democrats. Liberals have done themselves a great disservice of late by dismissing people with conservative beliefs as deluded fools. Money quote:
Unity is not the great need of the hour, it is the eternal struggle of our immigrant nation. The three Durkheimian foundations of ingroup, authority, and purity are powerful...
Can’t they both lose? →
Vijay has it exactly right:
So the Democrats are either incompetent or they are evil. Either way, how could you vote for them?
[…]
And the Republicans… do I really need to say anything at all?
Anathem
Neal Stephenson’s latest book, Anathem, was released this past Tuesday and, being the fanatic that I am, I bought it Tuesday night and finished it on Thursday. I thought it was good, but not quite up to the standard of The Baroque Cycle or Cryptonomicon. The metaphysics are very interesting and the world Stephenson dreamed up is extremely well-rendered, but the actual story is a bit flat. ...
cleversimon: Leaving your hanging body for your wife to find. You fucking asshole.
Terrible news: David Foster Wallace committed suicide Friday night http://xrl.us/oq3w8. Unfortunately, I can’t say it’s a complete surprise.
codinghorror: “a computer lets you make more mistakes faster than any other invention in history, with the possible exceptions of handguns and tequila.”
On-target review of Neal Stephenson’s ANATHEM: http://www.amazon.com/review/R970P4G1AOG3J/
toldorknown: If McCain’s right about how many women plan to vote with their vagina, election day’s going to be nastier than a Tijuana donkey act.
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Recently read: Anathem, by Neal Stephenson
Longer review here.
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Two dimensional compact simple Riemannian... →
Leonid Pestov, Gunther Uhlmann
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The boundary distance function and the... →
Leonid Pestov, Gunther Uhlmann
ironicsans: Web Browser feature request: Automatically mute sound from all my tabs except the one that currently has focus. (does such a plug-in exist?)
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Recent progress in the boundary control method →
M I Belishev
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On determining a Riemannian manifold from the... →
Matti Lassas, Gunther Uhlmann
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Semiglobal boundary rigidity for Riemannian... →
Matti Lassas, Vladimir Sharafutdinov, Gunther Uhlmann
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Linearized inverse problem for the... →
Vladimir Sharafutdinov