The Dish

Lord Byron is spinning, at 10,000 rpm, in his grave.

(Hat tip: Likecool)

The Atlantic has a wonderful article in the new issue by David Dobbs on how the same genes can be advantageous or debilitating:

Gene variants generally considered misfortunes (poor Jim, he got the “bad” gene) can instead now be understood as highly leveraged evolutionary bets, with both high risks and high potential rewards: gambles that help create a diversified-portfolio approach to survival, with selection favoring parents who happen to invest in both dandelions and orchids.

In this view, having both dandelion and orchid kids greatly raises a family’s (and a species’) chance of succeeding, over time and in any given environment. The behavioral diversity provided by these two different types of temperament also supplies precisely what a smart, strong species needs if it is to spread across and dominate a changing world. The many dandelions in a population provide an underlying stability. The less-numerous orchids, meanwhile, may falter in some environments but can excel in those that suit them. And even when they lead troubled early lives, some of the resulting heightened responses to adversity that can be problematic in everyday life–increased novelty-seeking, restlessness of attention, elevated risk-taking, or aggression–can prove advantageous in certain challenging situations: wars, tribal or modern; social strife of many kinds; and migrations to new environments. Together, the steady dandelions and the mercurial orchids offer an adaptive flexibility that neither can provide alone. Together, they open a path to otherwise unreachable individual and collective achievements.

Kottke:

From a book called Obsolete, a list of things that were once common but not so much anymore: blind dates, mix tapes, getting lost, porn magazines, looking old, operators, camera film, hitchhiking, body hair, writing letters, basketball players in short shorts, privacy, cash, and, yes, books.

And real conservatives.

A gallery of 35 WTFs.

A reader writes:

When I first heard that Hannity was offering up an apology (confession?) for his video lie, I was impressed. I honestly didn't think he had it in him. And then I watched the damn thing. Turns out I was right. Forget the tone, which I found gratingly smug. Or the final punchline thanking Stewart's writers for watching, a lame attempt to diffuse the troubling transgression with humor. What keeps nagging at me is his claim that it was some sort of accident. That no one meant for it to happen. Sorry, but I don't buy that for a second. Those sorts of things don't simply "happen".

Let me explain.

I have been working in television for the past 15 years. I know in detail how these things work: 1) you are assigned a story, 2) you send out a crew to shoot the necessary footage, 3) the footage is brought back to the studio and loaded into the Avid, or whatever editing system you are using, 4) you cut together your piece based on THE FOOTAGE AT

HAND.

For footage from a different event that took place months earlier to find its way into an entirely new piece, well, someone had to: 1) make the decision to lie in the first place (and lets be clear, it IS a lie), 2) locate the old footage, 3) cut the footage into the new piece, 4) a producer or the like had to approve the clip for air.

Yes, accidents can happen. But I guarantee you someone on his show said, "Man, we need to make those crowds look bigger" (don't get me started on the ethical quagmire of that decision) and a writer, producer or editor said, "I know, we can use some stuff from Glenn's rally. No one will ever notice." True, Hannity may not have been aware  of that editorial decision (he cannot supervise every piece of footage that airs on his show) but let's be clear: contrary to what he said, someone DID mean for it to happen, they simply did not mean to get caught. And his lame apology is covering someone's ass. It also leads me to wonder how often this is being done on his network.

Twisting words for political gain is one thing; manipulating video to deceive millions of viewers is another, and one that makes your Pravda reference all the more prescient.

As Cartman might say: "I'm just asking questions".

Yes, but not enough to swing an election.

Sources with access to Palin have indeed told to me that the Wasilla whack-job was an obsessive reader of this blog as it dared to ask factual questions about her past that could be easily answered. I have no way of knowing this myself, and regard it as odd that a vice-presidential candidate would be hell-bent on suing a blogger who, presumably, was merely making a total ass of himself in wondering if Palin's surreal account of her last pregnancy was factually accurate.

Or is there something there – of some unknown sort – that she desperately wanted to intimidate and suppress? As Bubble would note: "Who can say?" What can Levi possibly mean that "she knows what I got on her?"

The MSM won't touch this, of course.

But here's the WSJ piece. Money quote:

Ms. Palin was particularly angry at bloggers and the media, associates said, for speculation that her baby Trig was really the child of Bristol, her daughter.

At one point, according to people familiar with the discussions, Ms. Palin considered pursuing a libel suit against at least one blogger, the Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan. Ms. Palin decided against such a move because of the publicity it would bring.

Mr. Sullivan, in response, said asking "factually verifiable questions is obviously not libel."

A spokeswoman for Ms. Palin didn't respond to email requests seeking comment.

And so the pattern of refusing to be accountable on anything continues.

Best of Wikipedia:

Redshirt is a slang term for a minor stock character in an adventure drama who dies violently  soon after being introduced to dramatize the dangerous situation faced by the main characters. The term originated with the science fiction television series Star Trek, from the red shirts worn by Starfleet security officers, who frequently beamed down with a landing party, only to become the first, and sometimes only, victims within the party.

Blogawiki:

Nutraloaf, sometimes called prison loaf, confinement loaf, seg loaf, or special management meal,^[1] is a food served in United States prisons to inmates who have demonstrated significant behavioral issues.^[2] It is similar to meatloaf in texture, but has a wider variety of ingredients. Prisoners may be served nutraloaf if they have assaulted prison guards or fellow prisoners with sharpened utensils. Prison loaf is usually exceedingly bland in taste, perhaps even unpleasant, but prison wardens argue that nutraloaf provides enough nutrition to keep prisoners healthy without requiring utensils to be issued.^[3]

Although prison loaf has been employed in many United States prisons, its use is controversial.

The standards of the American Correctional Association, which accredits prisons, discourage the use of food as a disciplinary measure, but adherence to the organization’s food standards is voluntary.^[4][5] Denying inmates food as punishment has been found to be unconstitutional by the courts,^[6] but because the loaf is generally nutritionally complete, it is sometimes justified as a “dietary adjustment” rather than a denial of proper meals.^[4]

Lawsuits have taken place in several states regarding nutraloaf, including Illinois,^[7] Maryland, Nebraska, New York, Pennsylvania, Washington, and West Virginia.^[2] In March 2008, prisoners brought their case before the Vermont Supreme Court, arguing that, since Vermont state l aw does not allow food to be used as punishment, nutraloaf must be removed from the menu.^[8]

Petrelis pushes HRC to open itself up to the public:

Imagine if [HRC executive director Joe] Solmonese began holding regular monthly town halls at HRC's state-of-the-art media center at their DC headquarters, with any member of the gay public allowed to ask direct questions and questions submitted from gays around the country via email, YouTube and Twitter, and all of it streamed on HRC's web site.

Why, we'd have some genuine transparency and utilization of modern communication tools to better mobilize and organize the community to move forward more cohesively on a gay agenda. HRC would also be seen less as a monarchy given to ruling from an ivory tower with a rainbow hued foundation. Just as with Obama's town halls, there are great things to come of Solmonese's town halls, if they ever occur.