Because people can’t be trusted to run their own lives and make the best decisions for society we need a Government, which is made up of people. Anyone else see the flaw in this logic, or does being elected somehow make you a better person?
I’m just curious because either this is an argument in favor of being ruled by an aristocracy, or I should seek public office as a means of self-improvement.
Heinlein said: “The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire.”
Count me among the latter, because I still think Human Beings are inherently good. Am I wrong, or just not cynical enough?
Today’s Nealogisms are pulled straight from the headlines.
Musliminated
The state of having been killed by Muslims for some perceived offense against their religion.
Christianstigated
A situation caused by a Christian to deliberately enrage Muslims.
Note that the image used above, according to the latest sources, is of a Libyan bystander trying to remove Christopher Steven’s body from the scene of the attack and take it to a hospital. It is currently being circulated disingenuously with the implication that his body was ‘dragged through the streets’ in order to further inflame the incident. Also note, people are fucking stupid.
At the last stoplight on the way home from work today I noticed a pair of geese waddling across the grass of a freeway on-ramp, looking back and forth at each other as the human race zipped by in cars and trucks and running shoes.
“You know Bill”, I imagined the one on the right saying, “we used to be motherfucking dinosaurs”.
So in anticipation of GRRM dying of a baconator and fan bj-induced heart attack in a closet at a con after party, I’ve written the ending for ASOIAF:
Arya abandons the Faceless Men after her training is complete and goes rogue, searching for Sansa. Upon finding her, Arya is disgusted to discover that Sansa is legitimately in love with Littlefinger and supporting his ultimate plan of Read the rest of this entry »
I’m not as big of a fan of music as some people; I don’t collect songs or albums, and I certainly don’t obsess about the difference between digital and analog. But I do appreciate certain types of music, especially those that effectively convey emotion or set a scene. That’s something you don’t find too often in most pop music, beyond the conventional garbage bouncing around in the heads of teenagers or adults who still act like them.
Did that read as smug? Yeah, probably. But it helps explain why, in part, I’m not someone who follows music. (The other reason is that I’ve only got so much room for crap to bounce around in my own head.)
Anyway, as I get older I do appreciate certain artists from random genres; punk, rock, hell… even country. I don’t normally write about them, mainly because of that whole “room in my head” thing I just mentioned, but from time to time when I brush up against some of the music I do like, it gets under my skin like botfly larvae. For example, we went to go see the American remake of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. I hadn’t seen the original, or read the book, but the trailer hooked me. And that was because it used a Trent Reznor (Nine Inch Nails) cover of Led Zeppelin’s “Immigrant Song”.
And that particular song did a good job of evoking the image of a viking horde on its way to battle. I know Zeppelin isn’t exactly some kind of underrated band, but it’s amazing how little influence they seem to have on current music. And the bands they did influence with their wide range of subject matter and musical styles, from tributes to Tolkien to hippies and even an attempt at a Caribbean-themed song, only seemed to have picked up on a few tidbits here and there (the entire 80’s “epic metal” scene, Dragonforce, etc.).
Whatever, I’m just writing for my own benefit here; mainly because I started. The salient point is:
“Holy crap, this is a cool cover, and I’d forgotten how much I liked Led Zeppelin”. Here’s the song:
Duverger’s Law is a principle which asserts that a first-past-the-post election system naturally leads to a two-party system. The discovery of this principle is attributed to Maurice Duverger, a French sociologist who observed the effect in several papers published in the 1950s and 1960s. In the course of further research, other political scientists soon began calling the effect a “law.”
Some researchers and mathematicians have devised alternative voting systems which do not appear to be subject to the apparent drawbacks of first-past-the-post, though many would argue that a two-party outcome—all things considered—is a benefit to society. A frequent consequence of Duverger’s law is the spoiler effect, where a third-party candidate takes votes away from one of the two leading candiates.
At the last stoplight on the way home from work today I noticed a pair of geese waddling across the grass of a freeway on-ramp, looking back and forth at each other as the human race zipped by in cars and trucks and running shoes. 
