White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs is leaving the White House. But only in his capacity as Press Secretary. Gibbs "will step down and become an outside political adviser to the president and his re-election campaign." Not surprising, since he was an integral part of Obama's election campaign the first time around.
I'll really miss all the hippie-punching, though. *single tear*
Sayonara, Press Secretary Gibbs (Hello, Campaign Strategist Gibbs)
(Non-Sarcastic) Science News
This weekend, I played some Rock Band, watched some football, and roller skated. In that order.
10-year-old Kathryn Aurora Gray of Fredericton, New Brunswick discovered a supernova. Which is approximately fifty kerfuffletillion times cooler than anything involving Whitesnake and a plastic guitar.
The Toronto Star:
“Kathryn pointed to the screen and said: ‘Is this one?’ I said yup, that looks pretty good,” said Paul Gray, describing his daughter’s find.
“It’s fantastic that someone so young would be passionate about astronomy. What an incredible discovery. We’re all very excited,” said Deborah Thompson, executive director of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada.
Awesome.
Via NPR.
No More "Death Panels"
Dateline: Capitulationtown.
The Obama administration, reversing course, will revise a Medicare regulation to delete references to end-of-life planning as part of the annual physical examinations covered under the new health care law, administration officials said Tuesday.Literally, the Obama administration just caved to GOP framing because the GOP is going after his healthcare plan, and instead of standing their ground, in fear of Sarah Palin screaming, "Death panels!" again, they dropped the regulation, despite the millions of people it may have helped.
The move is an abrupt shift, coming just days after the new policy took effect on Jan. 1.
Many doctors and providers of hospice care had praised the regulation, which listed "advance care planning" as one of the services that could be offered in the "annual wellness visit" for Medicare beneficiaries.
While administration officials cited procedural reasons for changing the rule, it was clear that political concerns were also a factor. The renewed debate over advance care planning threatened to become a distraction to administration officials who were gearing up to defend the health law against attack by the new Republican majority in the House.
There is certainly an argument to be made that conceding one "controversial" component to save the rest of the legislation is "smart politics." But that argument is contingent on ignoring the reality that the GOP will just find something else to wildly misrepresent and mendaciously use to undermine the legislation.
This wasn't a move of strength. It was a move of weakness. The battle hasn't even begun, and the Dems are already losing.
Daily Dose of Cute
Video Description: Dudley is full of beans at the dog park, plays tag with Iain around our favorite bench.
Him & His Property
Shaker FilthyGrandeur sent me this screencap announcing the break-up of two successful and well-known young actors:
"Culkin Splits From Longtime Girlfriend"
"Longtime Girlfriend" Mila Kunis is one of the stars of a little movie you may have heard of called Black Swan, which is one of the most successful films currently playing in theaters.
Kunis also starred in the hugely popular sitcom That '70s Show for eight years and has been in numerous films, including the wildly successful (ugh) Forgetting Sarah Marshall.
Culkin, whose work in smaller films I quite like and am not intending to diminish, has not been in a box office hit since Ri¢hie Ri¢h in 1994. Yet he is still considered The Star, and she his (former) property.
For perspective, think how strange it would be if Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher split, and the headline read: "Moore splits from husband."
That, of course, would be considered absurd.
Brett Favre News
[Trigger warning for sexual assault, which applies to both links]
[Link includes descriptions of sexual assault] Associated Press:
"Two massage therapists sued Brett Favre on Monday, saying they lost them their part-time jobs with the New York Jets after complaining about sexually suggestive text messages from the veteran quarterback."This is a significant (and totally unsurprising) development, in that the allegations involve some pretty serious wrongdoing on the part of the Jets.
The NFL has already put the Favre matter to rest.
"The NFL also reviewed media reports that Favre pursued two massage therapists who worked at the Jets' facility in 2008, but the league said that claim could not be substantiated because people with 'potentially relevant information' wouldn't cooperate with investigators. O'Toole's and Scavo's lawyer, David Jaroslawicz, said he told investigators about the information his clients had."Maybe if the NFL won't find something rotten with the NFL, the courts will.
The Best Thing You'll Read All Day
Doctor urges new view of obesity:
"I think one of the biggest misconceptions when we talk about obesity in general is that obese people are obese largely because of their lifestyles and because of the way that they live," Dr. Arya Sharma of the University of Alberta, told CBC News. [Sharma is the chair of obesity research and management at the University of Alberta and medical director of the Weight Wise program at Edmonton's Royal Alexandra Hospital.]Sharma notes there are all sorts of benefits for the body to exercising and eating healthfully (if one is able), but that weight loss simply isn't one of them for many people.
Sharma points to studies where people's eating and activity are carefully monitored. They show that some people can eat an additional 1,000 calories per day and not gain a gram, while others would gain five to six kilograms over a six-week period.
"There's a huge variability in how people can cope with extra calories," he said in an interview with CBC News.
He says people who tend to pack on the pounds simply have bodies that burn calories very efficiently and store the excess as fat. "They just take their extra calories, they don't even burn them because they're very fuel efficient, they'll just store those calories and they'll put them away."
..."Some people are just naturally lean. They can have crappy lifestyles and it doesn't seem to affect them."
..."We keep hammering home the stereotype of the fat, lazy slobs who are eating fast food all the time who are not moving, not exercising or not taking care of themselves, making poor choices, when there's very little science that actually backs this up."
Gee, that sounds suspiciously like what lots of fat people have been saying about their own bodies and lives and realities for years!
[H/T to Shakers Sarah and Wondering. Reminder: That many people don't choose to be fat does not render choosing to be fat an invalid choice. It is a valid choice.]
Quote of the Day
"Courage is not a man with a gun in his hand. It's knowing you're licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what. You rarely win, but sometimes you do."—Atticus Finch, in Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird.
The Thing Is, Rapists Lie
[Trigger warning for sexual assault.]
Greg Mitchell, who I normally really respect, just retweeted the following:
RT @DanielEllsberg Sex charges against Assange are grave, but having heard his account personally, I believe they're false and slanderous.That's an interesting thing to say, for lots of reasons.
I wonder if Ellsberg has also personally heard the accounts of Assange's accusers, and found them unconvincing. I doubt it.
I suspect that he just assumes that they would sound like liars, were he to speak to them, because Assange sounded sincere. And why would he not make that assumption? One of the key narratives of the rape culture is that false accusations are extremely common. (They are not.)
Or maybe he just assumes that rapists are easily identifiable, that he can suss out a rapist by talking to him. Unlike the stupid women who trust them, date them, marry them, work alongside them unawares. Until.
It's funny, ahem, how much implicit victim-blaming is embedded in the assertion to know a man has been wrongly accused.
The truth is, it doesn't really matter what Assange or his accusers sound like to Ellsburg, or anyone else. Because sounding honest and being honest are often mutually exclusive concepts.
And rapists are excellent liars.
Who sounds credible is frequently cited as a sound method of determining the veracity of rape allegations, and that is one of the primary reasons that justice remains so frustratingly elusive in the majority of sexual assault cases.
Dishonesty comes with the territory. Vanishingly few accused rapists are inclined to be honest about their crimes, for what ought to be evident reasons, and, further, rapists know they can rely on a breathtaking scope of rape apologia to contextualize and excuse their behavior. It is accusers, survivors, who sound like the liars, the fantasists, as they stammer and fume in the face of an entire culture primed to disbelieve them.
And even if they are credible, and taken seriously, adjudicators (official and amateur) shrug their shoulders and murmur phrases like "he said, she said." Impossible to know.
Sounding innocent isn't proof of innocence.
Like Daniel Ellsberg listening to Julian Assange, I personally heard my rapist's account of what happened between us. He sounded sincere. His cool recounting made my charges seem false and slanderous to the men who were listening.
He was lying.
I don't know if Julian Assange is guilty or innocent of the allegations made against him. I do know, however, that Daniel Ellsberg's opinion of his truthfulness is evidence of exactly nothing.
Science: Atheists are Angry Liars
CNN: Anger at God common, even among atheists.
So the researchers in question are recruiting volunteers for a study on anger at God. I'm not signing up for that-- I'm not even *not* angry at "God", because I don't subscribe to one of the big three Western religions. The "atheists" that did sign up were undoubtedly the ones that were really interested in God. Duh.
Selection bias + popular narrative = media sensation. See also: every Science Times story on sex and gender.
Also:
It seems that more religious people are less likely to feel angry at God and more likely to see his intentions as well-meaning, Exline's research found. [emphasis mine]
Sure, uh-huh.
Just like with people in your life, you can respect and feel anger toward God at the same time. And you can move toward forgiveness by reframing the way you view the negative event: Perhaps God was not responsible for it or that he acted in that way for a reason [emphasis mine]
Perhaps. Or definitely not, in the case of my fellow atheists. :headdesk:
CNN also recommends that you read about how "Atheists are not so smart after all." Because CNN is an asshole. It's a story about atheists scoring better than average on some quiz about religion. I know.
[A screen capture of CNN's website, listing five articles "We recommend", including the aforementioned article on atheists not being so smart, and as a bonus: "Memo to Women: Please stop faking!"]
Oh, I Get It. He's Actually a Comedian.
And his presidency is performance art. Like Kaufman, only grander and no kooky accents.
Now it all makes sense. Because this is fucking hilarious:
Obama did not specifically address the GOP's plans [to immediately try to repeal the health care reform law], but acknowledged, "there's gonna be politics, that's what happens in Washington" when asked if he expects a chilly reception from the new Republican majority.Ha ha! Good one, Obama. HIGH FIVE!
"They are going to play to their base for a certain period of time. But I'm pretty confident that they're going to recognize that our job is to govern and make sure that we are delivering jobs for the American people and that we are creating a competitive economy for the 21st Century," Obama said.
Breaking News: Scalia's an Asshole
Not for the first time, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia has asserted that "the Constitution's 14th Amendment doesn't guarantee protection against discrimination on the basis of gender or sexual orientation."
"Certainly the Constitution does not require discrimination on the basis of sex," Scalia told California Lawyer. "The only issue is whether it prohibits it. It doesn't. Nobody ever thought that that's what it meant. Nobody ever voted for that."Marcia D. Greenberger, founder of the National Women's Law Center, underlines one inherent problem with Scalia's position: "In these comments, Justice Scalia says if Congress wants to protect laws that prohibit sex discrimination, that's up to them. But what if they want to pass laws that discriminate? Then he says that there's nothing the court will do to protect women from government-sanctioned discrimination against them. And that's a pretty shocking position to take in 2011."
Scalia, long known to be a constitutional "originalist" and a conservative stalwart on the Supreme Court, argued that it's up to legislatures to pass laws that protect women against discrimination, and doing so wouldn't be unconstitutional.
"If indeed the current society has come to different views, that's fine. You do not need the Constitution to reflect the wishes of the current society," he said. "If the current society wants to outlaw discrimination by sex, hey we have things called legislatures, and they enact things called laws. You don't need a constitution to keep things up-to-date. All you need is a legislature and a ballot box."
...Scalia's position on gender and sexual orientation discrimination is nothing new. The Reagan-appointed justice told an audience last summer that the 14th Amendment doesn't protect women because that wasn't the intent of the amendment when it was written in 1868.
He also said the Roe V. Wade decision that struck down laws against abortion was based on "a total absurdity."
And Big Tent Democrat underlines another inherent problem here: "What Scalia says is that even though the original understanding of the 14th Amendment would, if applied today, prohibit gender discrimination, since in 1868 it was understood not to, then the 19th Amendment was necessary to give women the vote. This leaves Scalia with a significant problem in my view - what of other forms of gender discrimination? To me, Scalia's statements require him to state that other forms of gender discrimination are CONSTITUTIONAL."
Scalia takes originalism to a ludicrous degree. His position does not reflect the thoughtfulness and nuance that any US citizen has the right to expect of one of the nine people chosen to make the nation's most difficult legal decisions. It is, instead, approximately as sophisticated as a child who still believes his daddy can't ever be wrong.
That is, quite evidently, not good enough for the marginalized people in this country who frequently have to depend on the Supreme Court for access and equality.
Which is, of course, the point.
Scalia isn't a stupid fella. He's just a bigot. A bigot with a lifetime appointment to make decisions about the rights and lives of people against whom he holds deeply entrenched bigotry.
In a decent country, there would be outrage about that unambiguous injustice sitting square in the middle of the Supreme Court. But in this country, it barely gets noticed. After all, there's no explicit right to fairness for marginalized people in the Constitution.
As Justice Antonin Scalia will happily tell you.
Cuomo to Take One for His Team
New New York (try again) Governor Andrew Cuomo just announced that he'll be returning 5% of his gubernatorial salary.
Shocking coincidence: The State of New York's contracts with many of its largest public employee unions (I'm a member of one of these) will expire soon.
Shocking fact: Politicians and the media are really vilifying public employees these days.
I just don't have the energy to fully go into the war on public employees (FWIW, my father is and grandmother was a public employee, so I'm used to it), but I do have a couple of issues.
1) Just as entitlement programs aren't *the* problem with the US Federal budget, public employees' wages and benefits aren't *the* problem with state and local budgets. Didja know that lately New York State has generated around 20 percent of its income from the taxes paid by Wall Street paper shufflers? This would seem to indicate a systemic problem. New Yorkers used to make steel and chemicals and air conditioners.
IMO, New York's never figured out what (or perhaps more appropriately, if) to do about the rust belt. Granted, issues arising from global capitalism are best tackled globally, but it'd be good to at least see New York State's leaders acknowledge Upstate New York in a way that doesn't involve vague references to Ma, Pa, and flannel.
2) We're not all in this together. Well, we should be, but the notion that if 'we' all do our 'fair share' of sacrificing 'we' can pull through this is bullshit. The Governor of New York is giving back several thousand dollars on what is a $179,000 salary.
While as far as I'm concerned, $179,000 is an eminently reasonable salary for a state's top executive (hint, hint...), this number doesn't count the Governor's assets, including the house he shares with someone who's a national television personality. I haven't talked to Cuomo's financial advisor lately, but I think it's pretty safe to assume that he has a financial advisor.
While New York's public employees do have jobs (at least a lot of us still do), it's a bit disingenious to imply that we need to sacrifice for the good of 'the team.' We sacrifice every other Wednesday (or Tuesday, if we have direct deposit-- speaking of which, I am so buying groceries tonight). Sometimes we go to the doctor, sometimes we don't.
And while public employees might count ourselves lucky to get paid money to do unimportant work and to possibly retire with pensions that governments may or may not default upon, it's hardly fair to use other people's misfortune (which is also ours, given that many of our households rely on income from the private sector, too) as an excuse to call for public employees to 'share' the pain. As I see it, governments are supposed to be the ones setting the example here. Perhaps that's the problem.
Most USians are already doing their share of sacrificing. While I don't begrudge Cuomo's faux-sacrifice, let's be clear about what it is: another attempt by a member of the ruling class to pretend to do hir share to get the country out of the mess the wealthy created for their own benefit. We don't need charity. We need change, and that includes revisiting the policies that led to the massive inequalities in wealth that make such grand gestures possible.
Discussion Thread: Good Relationship/Sex Advice
[Trigger warning: Many of the responses to this question may reference narratives of the rape culture, by way of being good advice that one does not have to abide by the "conventional wisdom" that is the superfluity of consent.]
As the natural follow-up to yesterday's thread on terrible relationship/sex advice, this thread is about the best advice we've ever gotten.
Please note that advice or mentoring regarding sexual orientation (including asexuality) and/or gender presentation are absolutely on topic for this thread.
What is the best advice you've ever gotten about dating, romantic relationships, marriage, or sex?
