May
18
2006

URLs du Jour

2006-05-18

  • Is today the happiest day of the year? Find out in this article, headlined "Today is happiest day of the year." (Via Club for Growth.)

    If you're not reading this today, that's just too damn bad, grumpo.

  • But putting a little frowny face on my day is the Official Notice from the Seattle Public Schools that I'm a racist. According to their page on "Definitions of Racism" anyway. Specifically a "cultural" racist, because I'm in major agreement with "emphasizing individualism as opposed to a more collective ideology".

    Also I suspect I may have an unfortunate "future time orientation." Comes from reading too much science fiction at an early age, I think. (Via Volokh. Radley Balko also comments, and has a suspect perp picked out.)

    Update: The CEI blog has a more serious analysis of the page.

  • New White House press secretary Tony Snow is getting denouced for his use of a "racially charged term." And—don't laugh, please—that term is "tar baby." For examples, see here and here and here and here. For extra credit, try to find the most idiotic overreaction among these examples, or any others you can pry out of the Google.

    Of course the controversy is entirely phony, manufactured by people who don't imagine for a moment that Snow was motivated by racial malice, but just love to stir the pot. Read Goldstein for an antidote to the claptrap.

    [It's probably worth pointing out that I almost started this item with "New White House press secretary Tony Snow is also being tarred with the racist brush …". But with the Seattle Public Schools after me, who needs that kind of additional trouble?]

  • Joe Malchow comments amusingly on an article on Princeton's efforts to "boost staff diversity."

  • We previously blogged about Dr. Diana, topless USC prof. Now Joanne Jacobs discusses the case of 10th grade world history teacher Erica Chevillar, who supplemented her $33K salary by joining the USA National Bikini Team.

    If you're diligent enough, you can follow the links to compare and contrast Dr. Diana's and Ms. Chevillar's, um, cases. They're both very interesting examples of free expression outside the classroom! Although, um, there are important … differences. I don't think I can comment further, however, without typing something that would get me in trouble either at home or work, and probably both.


Last Modified 2012-10-24 3:55 AM EDT