'One'

Three Dog Night. 

Althouse wrote about this song way back in 2006, and I didn't know, but Aimee Mann also sings it, in a quite subdued rendition.

Watch:

Charles Grodin, 1935-2021

Charles Grodin wasn't a favorite of mine. In fact, I can barely remember watching him on film. I don't know why. I think when he was on film I wasn't going to the movies that much. Besides, I like hardcore drama --- tearjerkers --- more than I do comedy, though I'm for a good laugh as much as the next guy. (And I like war movies, and Grodin didn't star in those, as far as I can tell.)

L.A.T. has his obituary, "Charles Grodin, activist, author and actor who made grouchiness cool, dead at 86."

The fact is, though, I probably wouldn't be blogging this if I had seen this at Althouse: "Perfection."

Grodin's hilarious, so I can see why he starred in comedies. 

Interesting, when you think about it, is that Althouse has disabled comments. She takes comments by email, which raises the question if that's better than taking them at the blog, moderating them. If people don't like you, they're going to attack you with hatred, so it's six-in-the-one-hand and half-a-dozen in the other. You'll be moderating either way. I don't pay attention to this stuff that much, but I think it's easier to block people in Gmail than it is at Blogger, so perhaps that's the payoff to the cost-benefit analysis. But that brings up another question? I thought Althouse's blog was all about the comments, or at least eliciting good comments, right? I mean, what's Althouse if you can't go in there a post your reactions? She's always prided herself on comments, to the point that she wouldn't (or couldn't) leave Blogger without them. Of course, that's not my problem, since I'm not a New York Times-profiled blogger. But blogs aren't as numerous as they used to be, so if you like reading 'em you might be bummed that Althouse has dropped the ball a bit on hers, or some folks might think. 

But as noted, this is a laugh-riot. Maybe I should stream some old Grodin movies. Either that, or go back and find more "Tonight Show" episodes for the lolz. 

"'Oh My Heavens' This is Joe Biden's Thanksgiving Day message. He has no idea what the Psalms are. He calls them the 'Palmists' and then looks confused..."

"Oh God" is right. 

Cringeworthy. 

At Althouse, "The LORD is my Teleprompter and my shield; my heart trusts in Him, and He helps me... except when He doesn't help me... and I'm sure He has His reasons...."

'I don't know why I'm convinced I get Mick Jagger, but this...'

According to Althouse:

This is sarcasm .... I got there via Ed Driscoll at Instapundit who doesn't seem to be reading Mick's tweet as humor, but come on.

I’m so looking forward to coming back to an America free of harsh words and name calling and be amongst people who I know have common ground and harmony. It’s a challenge but it can be done!

— Mick Jagger (@MickJagger) November 7, 2020

Ann Althouse Visits Madison Anti-Shutdown Rally

See, "We drove up to the Wisconsin Capitol to see the anti-shutdown rally...... and from the completely closed car, I was able to get some photographs."

PHOTO CREDIT: Ann Althouse on Flickr.

Weekends at Althouse's

I noticed somewhere that Ann Althouse is a "professor emerita of law" at the University of Wisconsin.

She writes about her post-retirement weekends here, "I've completed the year without weekend weekends":

Having retired from my lawprof job, I experience weekends as the time when the people with structured jobs flow into activities that the nonstructured among us can do all the time. That affects me slightly. My job was already relatively unstructured, except for class times and the occasional meeting, so I was already experiencing the joy of the unstructured life (especially in the summertime). And when you let go of your structured employment, you will employ yourself doing something. In my case, I was and continue to be strongly structured to write this blog every morning, but the nonstructured thing about it is ending the process — breaking the trance. I don't have to break the trance because a structured task is approaching. I love that! I was pretty sure I would love that, and I chose to retire from my lawprof job so I could jump fully into the nonstructured life. Looking back on the year, I'm thoroughly happy about where I have landed...

Keep reading.

'Is the media trying to get rid of Trump and seizing on Fiorina only because she's useful for that and because their real aim is to cause the Republicans to lose the election in the end...?'

A long entry from Ann Althouse, "'I'm interested in the Althouse reaction to Rush on Friday, about Fiorina being the agreed Trump destroyer between both establishment Dems and Republicans...'":

I do think that much of the media (but certainly not all), wants to help Democrats win in the end. But the general election is a long way away, and for now, the media want ratings, and Trump has been great for ratings. He's very exciting and entertaining, but a lively challenger to Trump is also good for ratings, and Fiorina is a feisty, forcible speaker, unlike all the others, some of whom are almost ludicrously low key. In the end, I think the party is better off with someone who seems normal and has normal credentials — probably Bush, Kasich, or Rubio. But these people aren't much fun for now...

Still more.

'I've never given them money, in case you're wondering why they send me email...

That's Ann Althouse, in a disclaimer on the idiotic email she received from NARAL Pro-Choice America: "'We just learned that TIME magazine apologized for including 'feminist' on their poll of words to ban. What a victory!'"

Seriously.

American Soccer Players Don't Fake Injuries or Exaggerate Contact as Much as Others

I posted a few soccer tweets the other day, joking about how I was waiting for the Angels game to come on (although I didn't go so far as to say soccer wasn't an American sport --- I used to enjoy playing soccer as a kid).

I later got a kick when I saw Althouse hilarious dissing the soccer sensationalism over the World Cup. See, "Why I'm not clicking on Google doodles for a while." And the comments are a riot:

Finally Althouse gets something right. One of the few remaining reasons to be proud of being an American is that we are the only people who realize that soccer is shit. It's the only sport that bans the use of the hands, and using our hands is what makes us human. Thus, by definition, soccer is a game for sub-humans, and, boy, do the fans show it. To be fair to them, though, the games themselves are so boring that the only way to stay awake is to start a riot or a war, or at least turn to the guy next to you and head-butt his face in.

In any case, I guess we're not so great at the sport's cheating culture either. At the New York Times, "On Soccer: Where Dishonesty Is Best Policy, U.S. Soccer Falls Short":

NATAL, Brazil — The list of improvements that the United States men’s soccer team needs to make is considerable. Coach Jurgen Klinsmann would like to see a more consistent back line, better touch from his midfielders and plenty more production from the attackers.  

Yet as Klinsmann and his players begin their World Cup here Monday against Ghana, trickier questions of soccer acumen have come into focus:

Are the Americans bad at playacting? And if so, should they try to get better?

The first part seems easy enough. For better or worse, gamesmanship and embellishment — or, depending on your sensibilities, cheating — are part of high-level soccer. Players exaggerate contact. They amplify the mundane. They turn niggling knocks into something closer to grim death.

They do all this to force the referee to make decisions, with the hope that if he is confronted by imagined bloodshed often enough, he will ultimately determine he has seen some. Applying this sort of pressure on the official is a skill that, by their own admission, United States players generally perform poorly, if they perform it at all...

More.

The Unelectable Whiteness of Scott Walker?

Seriously?

The New Republic's epic smear of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, at Althouse, "'I live in Wisconsin, and I've been following Scott Walker since the 2010 election here, and I have no idea what the 'toxic strain of racial politics' refers to. But congratulations to TNR for it's eye-catching and weird sexualization of Walker: 'Scott Walker Is So Hot Right Now' and for having the nerve to sub-head with "too bad" as you smear him with the accusation of "toxic strain of racial politics'."



Althouse subscribes to TNR and has the smear, "The Unelectable Whiteness of Scott Walker: A Journey Through the Poisonous World That Produced a Republican Star," on her iPad.

'Whatever happened to Vox and FiveThirtyEight?'

At Althouse.

I've never even clicked on the new 538, and I've read and linked Vox exactly once. I just don't care about these sites and they're not generating very much buzz, except among those noting how they're not generating very much buzz, like Althouse.

Twin Hipster Homosexuals

Kinda rockabilly, heh.

Via Ann Althouse, "How to be as unheterosexual as possible." (And don't miss the comments.)

Scott Walker's Right-to-Work Legislation Has Had 'Devastating Effect' on Wisconsin's Public-Sector Unions

This is why the left seethes with burning hatred for Governor Walker.

At the New York Times, "Wisconsin’s Legacy for Unions":

Three years ago, a labor leader named Marty Beil was one of the loudest opponents of Gov. Scott Walker’s “budget repair bill,” a proposal that brought tens of thousands of protesters out to the Wisconsin State Capitol in Madison in frigid February weather. A gruff-voiced grizzly of a man, Mr. Beil warned that the bill was rigged with booby traps that would cripple the state’s public-sector unions.

He gets no satisfaction from being right. Since the law was passed, membership in his union, which represents state employees, has fallen 60 percent; its annual budget has plunged to $2 million from $6 million.

Mr. Walker’s landmark law — called Act 10 — severely restricted the power of public-employee unions to bargain collectively, and that provision, among others, has given social workers, prison guards, nurses and other public employees little reason to pay dues to a union that can no longer do much for them. Members of Mr. Beil’s group, the Wisconsin State Employees’ Union, complain that their take-home pay has fallen more than 10 percent in recent years, a sign of the union’s greatly diminished power.

“It’s had a devastating effect on our union,” Mr. Beil, its executive director, said of Act 10. He was sitting in his Madison office, inside the headquarters that his union, hard up for cash, may be forced to sell. The building is underused anyway, as staff reductions have left many offices empty.

Wisconsin was the first state to grant public-sector unions the right to negotiate contracts. Before Gov. Gaylord Nelson signed that law in 1959, only unionized workers in private companies had a government-protected right to bargain collectively. But the Wisconsin idea soon spread around the country. Act 10 is an about-face, and Mr. Walker and his Republican supporters see it as a tough-minded strategy that other states can follow. History repeating itself, if in reverse.

Many labor leaders and union members are still fuming about the law. It bars public-sector unions from bargaining over pensions, health coverage, safety, hours, sick leave or vacations. All they can negotiate is base pay, and even that is limited: any raises they win cannot exceed inflation.

“I speak to union officials in other states, and I tell them, ‘Don’t be misled,’ ” Mr. Beil said. “We thought this could never happen here. But it did. You have to stay vigilant.”

Mr. Walker, who is widely viewed as a Republican presidential contender in 2016, has already emboldened other Republican-controlled states to enact measures that weaken unions and cut benefits. Tennessee and Idaho passed laws that cut back bargaining rights for public schoolteachers, while Ohio curbed collective bargaining for all state employees — though that law was repealed in a 2011 referendum. Even longtime union strongholds like Michigan and Indiana have enacted right-to-work laws that undercut private-sector unions by banning any requirements that workers pay union dues or fees. (A state judge’s decision that declared the Indiana law unconstitutional is being appealed to the state’s Supreme Court.)

Mr. Walker’s tough stance toward public-employee unions has steeled governors and mayors grappling with large unfunded pension obligations. And his criticisms of pensions have been reinforced by the turmoil in Detroit, where the often-generous and sometimes scandal-ridden pension system played a substantial role in the city’s bankruptcy.

“You’re seeing more politicians willing to stand up to public-sector unions,” said Gary Chaison, a professor of labor relations at Clark University. “Fairly or unfairly, public-sector unions are increasingly being seen as part of the problem.”

Photo Credit: Althouse (on Flickr).

'So Friedrich Engels was gay...'

That's Meade's response to see this headline, at Althouse, "'How Friedrich Engels’ Radical Lover Helped Him Father Socialism'."

Well, it makes sense. "Radical lover" sounds so homosexual.

Click though for the full story.

Comments Closed at Althouse

This happened over the weekend.

Ann writes:

There were some great commenters over the years, some of whom were driven away by vicious commenters. I emphasized free speech until I was forced to retrench and make good faith the test. But that was a deletion policy. I (and Meade) can't spend all our time monitoring comments and deleting. Some truly ugly people stooped to active harassment. This is my place, after all, and I can't host an endless party where there are guests who continually abuse my hospitality. I had to close the door.

She'll reopen the comments. Althouse isn't a blog that can survive without them. But she's been getting too many trolls and it's been taking too much time to deal with them. There's some background that I haven't completely mastered yet, but the sense is that a lot of Instapundit readers are coming over to Althouse and f-king sh*t up.

Here's a post with a long comment thread that relates, "'A somewhat dismissive response'." And Ann's response, "Instapundit says that what he thinks about what he calls my "advice" is "immaterial" but that it's 'probably pretty good advice'..."

That latter post features nearly 300 comments and is time-stamped at 9:26am on the 7th.

Then, checking the search function for "comments," Ann posts a poll on comments at 6:17pm that evening; a flashback to opening comments at the blog in 2005 at 7:07pm; and an invitation to comment by email to Meade at 7:53pm.

Ann's also ruminating and commiserating publicly in updates.

Reading through some of the comments at the various posts, I saw mention of using comment moderation, but Ann indicates that the Blogger "moderate comments" function is not working for her blog. I switched to Disqus some time ago, so I can't comment on how well comment moderation is working on Blogger. I emailed Ann with some information about Disqus commenting, which works well for a lot of Blogger bloggers, especially the useful service of importing old Blogger comments into the Disqus system. It worked for me, although I don't know with Ann's huge archive of comments that it's worth the risk. Ann loves that archive as a history of a community, and once you switch over to Disqus you might have a hard time switching back to Blogger commenting. I don't know, since I haven't felt like switching back, but it's a dilemma.

But something else occurred to me: Clicking on the "post a comment" link at the blog reveals that "Comments on this blog are restricted to team members." I've never used that function, but basically any commenter at the blog has to be a pre-approved team member of the Althouse community. It's not much different that comment registration at a Wordpress blog, and that raises the possibility for Ann and Meade just to create and solicit a pre-approved Althouse blog commenting community. I hesitate to use the example, but folks may remember that Charles Johnson's Little Green Footballs was one of the top counter-jihad blogs, and putatively conservative. Charles is positively obsessed with controlling his comments. He pre-approved comments though a sort of random lottery where he'd open the commenting system to new registrants for a short time at unannounced intervals. He'd often get dozens --- if not hundreds --- of new commenters who registered, which he called "hatchlings." It was kind of a big deal back in the day, because folks really wanted to be part of the LGF community. Charles would close the registration window and announce how many new members joined. People would constantly be checking the blog, at the least, to see if they could catch the window opening for new commenters. I never did register, because I didn't care about it that much, and besides, when LGF started posting all the aggressive Darwinism/anti-Christian hatred ... well, the idea of joining the community decidedly lost its appeal. And as for LGF today ... no doubt readers are aware of that tragedy.

But still, it's an interesting example. Say Althouse were to open her comments to new registrants periodically, say on the weekend mornings. This could be done by email requests sent to Ann or Meade by interested readers. They'd have to have a Blogger ID and then could be approved to comment at the blog. If at any time those commenters became abusive they could be banned at a moment's notice.

She's going to need to do something like this. A large plurality responding to her poll said that the blog was basically all about the comments. I actually read Althouse more for the content than the comments, but certainly the comments are a major draw for any reader. I'll never forget the Jessica Valenti "breasts" controversy, at which time I found myself reading comments for hours. That was seven years ago. The blogosphere wouldn't be the same without those periodic Althouse blasts of observation that upend sensibilities and rejigger thinking on some important issue or another. And of course, Ann married one of her commenters --- so c'mon, you're going to tell me that a blog that was featured at the New York Times, in a report on the blogress and her suitor, is going to now be without comments, the very feature that has defined what it is to be an Althouse reader? No way.

In any case, I personally expect commenting to open back over there not too long from now, for the reasons that I've outlined above. Ann and Meade need to find the right way to manage it, because the hatred and vitriol online is extremely "mellow-harshing," as I've written about here many times. But bloggers have their own systems. Some don't allow comments and work more as portals to the Internet. Some bloggers are vanity whores where having comments would be impossible since they'd expose the naked emperor. The opposite of that is Ann's blog, which the New York Times situated as a metaphor for a royal court. That's a pretty good one, as Ann's certainly a benign blog monarch who tolerates much in the realm. But of late the commoners have become so rancid as to completely discombobulate the kingdom (or princess-ipality, be that as it may).

In any case, I'll be checking over at Althouse to see how things go. It's going to work out.

UPDATED: Ann writes to say that opening the comments to "team members" would open the front page to everybody, which is a no-can-do situation. Well, I tried.

New Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue Attacked as Racist

Serves 'em right.

SI turned all progressive lately, so it's a taste of their own medicine

At the New York Times, "Sports Illustrated’s New Swimsuit Issue Rouses Ire Over ‘Ethnic Props’."

And see Althouse's response, "'This photo cements stereotypes, perpetuates an imbalance in the power dynamic, is reminiscent of centuries of colonialism (and indentured servitude)...'"

Aaron Swartz Suicide

I saw this story trending on Memeorandum and thought, "Okay, let's see what this is all about."

This Swartz guy apparently hacked into the JSTOR academic journal database, gaining access to "millions" of scholarly journals (articles?). He was facing trial on multiple counts and looking at up to 35 years in jail. Most of the commentary's even more emotional than usual, since the guy was some kind of Internet genius. It's like he was some 21st century Jesus, or something.

In any case, Althouse is fascinated by the legal aspect and is sympathetic to the argument of government bullying, although what caught my attention was this comment from Beldar:

Our host asked in comments above, "Assuming the law is important -- as was said about the law David Gregory violated — why was it in the public interest to go against Swartz and try to get this creative, well-meaning, energetic young man put in prison for 35 years?"

But the presumtion that the MAXIMUM potential punishment sought is also the ONLY possible punishment that might have resulted makes this a loaded question.

If the laws he's accused of violating have social value, it's to protect intellectual property.

On other occasions Swartz tried to change those laws more directly, but on this occasion he was accused (apparently with good reason) of having engaged in a massive and deliberate violation of them, indeed the most shocking sort of violation of the law that he could contrive — for, he claimed (in his best Robin Hood voice), the most altruistic of purposes.

What Professor Althouse sees exclusively as a "creative, well-meaning, energetic young man" was indeed probably that, but he may also have been a deliberately notorious thief of intellectual property. Certainly if one only focuses on the "words trying to be free," one comes up with a different evaluation than if one also weighs, for example, the financial damage to the net worths of both the academics and their institutions whom the current law deems worthy of protection.

There's no doubt that the late Mr. Swartz' suicide is sad. But when I'm picking my heroes, even when I'm looking among those whose heroism is supposedly demonstrated by their noble civil disobedience, I expect to see in them a frank acknowledgment and acceptance of the costs and consequences of that disobedience.

More at Althouse, on Lawrence Lessig's comments, "'Prosecutor as bully'."

Krazy Jim's

See this great post from Althouse, "'The passage of right-to-work legislation in the state House and Senate may have Lansing in turmoil...'":

"... but residents of Ann Arbor learned yesterday of a more immediate concern."

It's Krazy Jim's Blimpy Burger in Ann Arbor, closing in Summer 2013. But read it all at the link.

'Dismal' Obama Springsteen Rally in Madison

Althouse's husband Meade was on hand for the "big" Obama rally today in Madison, Wisconsin. Let's just say the enthusiasm's not matching up with the phenomenal Republican excitement.

* "A disappointing turnout for the Obama rally in Madison, Wisconsin."

* "Photos from the dismal, dull Obama rally in Madison today."

* "Obama rally video."

PHOTO: At Althouse's Flickr page.

RELATED: At NewsBusters, "Jay-Z Substitutes ‘Mitt’ for ‘B-tch’ While Rapping at Obama Rally" (via Memeorandum).

Mark Rothko Mural Defaced in Tate Modern gallery

Rothko's my favorite.

I saw this story the other day at Althouse.