Apparently, there’s an election taking place somewhere overseas. Those in search of distraction may wish to explore the Museum of Antique Dental Instruments. It’s surprising and melodious. Alternatively, the archives are worth a poke, as are the greatest hits. 

Further to our discussion on redistribution, the following reader’s comment, left at Protein Wisdom, caught my eye. It’s a sort of mouth-and-trousers thing. 

As a business owner who employs 30 people, I have resigned myself to the fact that Barack Obama will probably be our next President, and that my taxes and carbon fees… will go up in a big way. To compensate for these increases, I figure that the customer will have to see an increase in my costs to them of about 20%. So connect economic ankle to shin, shin to knee, knee to thigh, and I will have to lay off roughly 8 of my employees in my forced tithe to “The One.” This really, really bothers me. I believe we are family here and I wasn’t sure how to choose who will get to stay and who will have to go.

So, I strolled through the parking lot this morning and found 8 Obama bumper stickers on my employees’ cars. These folks will be the first to be laid off.

Fair?

Answers on a postcard, please.

A couple of weeks ago, while noting another example of academic attitude correction, I wrote:

I’m inclined to wonder exactly how egregious and pervasive this phenomenon has to be before concern becomes legitimate. After all, if you want to propagate tendentious ideology and make it seem normative, respectable and self-evidently true, insinuating that ideology into schools and universities would be a pretty good way to do it. “Debate” can then be had on what is most likely an unequal footing, thus arriving at the approved conclusions with a minimum of informed and realistic opposition. If faculty and students are obliged to regurgitate that ideology and perhaps internalise it, while mouthing fuzzwords like “social justice,” all the better. Is it enough to bemoan certain socio-political trends or bias in areas of the media if one doesn’t also address the place where many of these things originate? And are we supposed to believe that the ideologues who push for such measures are going to get tired and desist of their own volition, and then politely roll back the idiocy they’ve been so keen to put in place?

Regarding that last question, the good people at FIRE have revisited last year’s Delaware indoctrination saga (discussed here) and provided an answer of sorts. 

First, lest we forget, here’s a reminder of what was being shoehorned into soft student brains:

The University of Delaware’s Office of Residence Life… used mandatory activities to coerce students to change their thoughts, values, attitudes, beliefs and habits to conform to a highly specified social, environmental, and political agenda… We were first alerted to the situation in October 2007, when a parent wrote us about the coercive activities his son was experiencing in the University of Delaware (UD) dorms. His son described the first set of activities as,

ugly, hateful and extremely divisive. It forced the students to act out the worst possible racial stereotypes and was replete with left-wing ideological commentary and gratuitous slurs… The teachers handed out an array of propaganda materials to support this seminar. However, at the close of the session, they insisted on collecting all the materials so that the students could not take it with them.

We heard similar reports from two UD professors, Jan Blits and Linda Gottfredson… Anything deemed remotely “oppressive” by anyone was to be stamped out, and resident assistants were being taught that “[a] racist is one who is both privileged and socialized on the basis of race by a white supremacist (racist) system. The term applies to all white people (i.e., people of European descent) living in the United States, regardless of class, gender, religion, culture or sexuality.”

Interactive 360º light field display. Yes, it’s done with mirrors. (h/t, The Thin Man) // Things found in the folds of fat people’s skin. Cutlery, marijuana, uneaten sandwiches. // The personal blimp. I’m sorely tempted. // A gallery of vintage airships. // Airship rides. $495. // Ejaculation “a potential treatment for nasal congestion.” Or perhaps not. // Being offended on someone else’s behalf. (h/t, AMac) // “What are the Joker’s powers again?” // Marvel superheroes versus giant robot. // Ninja Terminator. // Vintage detective badges. // Underwater panoramas. // Galapagos sea life. Wait for the whale shark. (h/t, Coudal) // Collective animal nouns. A siege of herons, a parcel of hogs. // A visual history of video recorders. // A time-lapse tutorial. // Baconnaise. // Brokers with hands on their faces. // Broccoli mystery deepens. // And, via The Thin Man, it’s Mr Kim Jong-il.  

With Halloween almost upon us, I feel it’s time to share François Macré’s multitracked a cappella rendition of Thriller. Be sure to wait for the Vincent Price monologue.

(h/t, Coudal)