Yesterday was a sort-of victory for LGBT youth: the Boy Scouts of America...
Recent News
I-5 bridge collapse: reflecting on our crumbling infrastructure
The I-5 bridge has collapsed in Washington and there are “vehicles and people [in] the water.” No word yet on casualties, and here’s hoping there are none. Meanwhile, as bad as I hate to say we told you so, we told you so. Various S&R writers have written about various infrastructure issues in the past, […]
UPDATED: Pope Francis says atheists can go to heaven: Sweet Jesus! The College of Cardinals done elected a hippie
Did you hear what the Pope said? No, seriously. DID. YOU. HEAR? In impromptu remarks made during yesterday’s Mass in his residence, Pope Francis shocked many by declaring that atheists can be just as good as Catholics if they “do good.” Referencing a passage from the Gospel of Mark in his homily, the Pope recounted […]
Denver FOX News affiliate caught making shit up
Well, this is fun. FOX31 reported Saturday that Daniele Perazzi, president of the world-famous Perazzi gun brand and grandson of its famous founder, was detained at the Colorado Gun Collectors Association show near 58th and Washington Street. FOX31 said a cab driver alerted police thinking Perazzi was a potential terrorist. The gun company, the Adams […]
“Useful Enemies”: U.S. admitted not just Nazis after WWII, but their sadistic collaborators
Why did the United States feel the need to admit Baltic and Eastern Europeans who at times exceeded the Nazis in brutality? Lost count of the sordid episodes in America’s past? In Useful Enemies: John Demjanjuk and America’s Open-Door Policy for Nazi War Criminals (Delphinium Books, 2013), Richard Rashke chronicles one that few of us […]
The time a source has to respond to request for comment? Virtually none.
The deadline is now. Thirty years ago, I faced a deadline once a day. For any reporter today, the deadline is … well, now. The technological leap into the Internet era that changed the notion of deadlines has consequences, as I wrote three years ago: Speed kills. Accuracy dies when hordes of people, each with […]
Profiling the Tea Party: In defense of the IRS. Sorta. Or not.
You’ve probably noted the controversy surrounding the Internal Revenue Service’s apparent “profiling” of groups aligned with the Tea Party. A discussion on the issue broke out here at S&R this week, with our colleague Sid Bonesparkle suggesting on our internal e-mail forum that perhaps such action, even if it only involved a couple of “rogue” […]
Saturday Video Roundup: “Imagine the Band,” by John Lennon and Wings
If you play it backward you can hear Paul singing “eat your vegetables.”
The Rest is Noise (6)—Descent into the Maelstrom
It’s been leading up to this, the past several months, as we have tracked the descent of the twentieth century into its mid-century madness through the course of its music. Alex Ross’s book is quite clever in this—but it seeks to illuminate the music of the century through its intellectual and social history. The focus […]
I hate handguns, but I have still considered owning one
I’d never own a handgun to protect myself from the government. Protesting myself my armed fellow Americans who are terrified of the government, on the other hand….
Redneck jokes are racist
I am not one of those people that believes in reverse discrimination, and that old white males are struggling for equality in a pitiless world run by women and people of color. (Affirmative action is a bad idea, but a necessary one to counteract a worse one, segregation and institutionalized povertization of the black underclass.) So […]
Largest study of peer-reviewed literature to date finds overwhelming climate disruption consensus (UPDATED)
A new study of 11,944 peer-reviewed papers over the course of 21 years finds that 97% of all papers with a stated position on climate disruption, and 98.4% of their authors, agree that human activity is driving climate disruption.
Boehner: Oh, so now you’re angry?
I can’t deal with the IRS news coverage right now. In case you haven’t turned on a television, booted up your computer, glanced at a newspaper or listened to a radio in the past few days, the news is all a twitter (and so is Twitter) about the IRS – it just came out that […]
Angelina Jolie and a brave, terrifying decision
Subjective rant in 3…2… This one’s for those with opinions about Angelina Jolie’s boobs, especially those who don’t have ‘em. Sadly, it seems even some women don’t get this. Generally, I couldn’t give less of a crap about celebrity anything, but I’ve got a soft spot for her. I respect her for the difficult decision […]
Expand nuclear weapons programs to protect missileers’ tender psyches
Nuclear missile officers’ jobs weigh heavy on them but not for the reasons you’d think. On May 8 we posted about an article by Robert Burns of the Associated Press, in which he reported that the Air Force removed authority to control – and launch – nuclear missiles from 17 officers of the 91st Missile Wing in Minot, […]
UPDATED: Why do liberals hate science?
Shikha Dalmia at Reason.com had a few things to say about liberals and their penchant for ignoring inconvenient evidence in an article entitled, “The Myth of the Scientific Liberal.” Since part of the subject matter involves climate disruption, I’m sure Brian Angliss would ordinarily have much of weight and merit to contribute, but alas, time […]
The student loan interest rates are too damn high
Like many other twentysomethings, I was watching the Daily Show the other night to see what news Jon Stewart and his crew were mocking/making sense of, and the middle segment hit a little close to home. Obviously, this is meant to be a goof. Education is a wonderful thing, and encouraging people not to go […]
