We haven’t had a RatS for a long time, and I’d basically given them up. A couple weeks ago, however, Matt Taibbi wrote a plaintive howl, which seems well worth sharing. Taibbi is one of only two writers/organisations that I pay to read, and one very few writers consistently principled, willing to write what he knows and only what he knows, and without ever seeking to play into tribalism. Taibbi’s howl-post is on the Trump-binary perversion of journalism. The post is public, and Taibbi of course encourages the sharing of his public posts. I hope, therefore, it is not overstepping the bounds to reproduce the post here: Taibbi is great, and people should subscribe to Taibbi’s Racket News. Continue reading “RatS 29: Matt Taibbi – On Escaping This Horrible Era”
Category: RatS
RatS 28: Nate Silver – The Expert Class is Failing
Nate Silver, the famous politics-stats guy, gets a lot of flak for accurately predicting that bad stuff will happen. In general he seems bemused by this, is flippantly contemptuous of his critics and just gets on with accurately predicting more bad stuff. But Silver clearly gets frustrated, that his natural political allies can be so pigheaded and so incompetent and so censorious. The Biden-Harris-Democrats screw-up, gifting Trump the presidency, has made him more frustrated than usual. Continue reading “RatS 28: Nate Silver – The Expert Class is Failing”
RatS 27: Taibbi – Maintain Your Brain
We haven’t had a RatS for a long time. I think they were and are worthwhile, but there’s just been too much work with the day job of educational crusading to post much about the more general cultural decline. This one, however, by Matt Taibbi, struck a very strong chord. Taibbi is one of the very few consistently sane journalists on politics and the media. He is getting busier and angrier, and better, visibly exasperated at the increasing government and corporate control over social media and free speech. Taibbi has a particular loathing for censorious assholes in the legacy media, particularly in particular for the sanctimonious “misinformation” “experts”: see here and here for two recent examples. The following is a public post by Taibbi, with no particular target, simply a Mad As Hell scream.
RatS 26: Taibbi – Are Authorities Using the Internet to Sap Our Instinct for Freedom?
Last week, Meta-Facebook-Instagram announced a program to combat “misinformation” during the referendum for the Voice to Parliament. This is a bad move, if for no other reason that it will be viewed, probably correctly, as the silencing of voices in order to support the Voice. The ironic anti-message will undoubtedly be clear to Voice sceptics. We had thought to write on this, but figured we’d already written enough on inappropriate Voice spruiking, and on the dangers of half-wit authorities declaring what is or is not misinformation.
M-F-I’s misinformation program is not just a bad move, however, for unintentionally screwing up the Yes guys on the Voice. M-F-I claims that their program is “contributing to democracy”, but there is a solid argument that they’re doing the exact opposite. Which brings us to Matt Taibbi. Again.
RatS 25: Taibbi – On the Loony Van Gogh Protests
We try to avoid recommending paywalled stuff, but the Van Gogh nonsense, and the response, is just so depressing, and Taibbi’s critique is so good, we decided to make an exception. Of course, regular readers will be used to our badgering them to read Taibbi, and the subscription is worth it. But readers can also avoid paying by “trying 7 days for free”, and then cancelling immediately (so you don’t then forget and get billed).
A couple paragraphs are below. Read all of Taibbi’s post, and then scream.
Continue reading “RatS 25: Taibbi – On the Loony Van Gogh Protests”
RatS 24: Ed Knight – Guessing C on a NY Algebra Test
Courtesy of frequent commenter Red Five, a maddening and absolutely hilarious article:
Guessing C For Every Answer Is Now Enough To Pass The New York State Algebra Exam
Ed Knight
My student, River, spent more time in the courtroom than the classroom last year. One Friday night in September, a drunk friend called and asked for a ride home from a party. River obliged. That’s a problem when you’re 14 years old. On his excellent adventure with his drunk friend, River drove over the landscaping of several local businesses and ended with his car in the woods caught in a web of maple sugaring lines. Things spiralled from there. Continue reading “RatS 24: Ed Knight – Guessing C on a NY Algebra Test”
RatS 23: David Karoly – CSIRO and the Suppression of Science
So much crap, so little time. We’re desperately trying to get to the Australian Curriculum. Courtesy of the Evil Mathologre, however, we have about 2000 essays to grade. And, due to “must be done” renovations, The Boss is demanding that the massive Everything in our garage be moved two meters to the left. (We suggested it’d just be easier to move the garage two meters to the right, but The Boss didn’t buy it.) Before all that, however, there are a couple posts that really need to be done, including this one, on CSIRO.
Continue reading “RatS 23: David Karoly – CSIRO and the Suppression of Science”
RatS 22: Taibbi – PayPal’s IndyMedia Wipeout
Matt Taibbi has another in his infinite series of posts on powerful and sanctimonious thugs, this one free to the public. This time it’s PayPal doing the thugging, and thieving, and not for the first time, or second time, all the while preening as the defender of Truth, Justice and the American Way. A nice touch is that this time the thugging seems to be in partnership with the Anti-Defamation League. Proving, as if it were needed, that the Old Jews can be just as much assholes as the New Jews.
Read Taibbi’s post, and then scream.
Continue reading “RatS 22: Taibbi – PayPal’s IndyMedia Wipeout”
RatS 21: Taibbi – Twitter’s Chickens Come Home to Roost
(29/04/22 Update below) We had thought about posting on this one but, given the paywall, we had decided against. Now we’ve decided for it. With Elon Musk having arranged to buy Twitter, and given our post yesterday on Twitter Fun, it seems worthwhile.
People are going nuts at the prospect of Musk controlling Twitter. They’ve been going nuts since it became clear a couple weeks ago that Musk was eyeing the company. It is appalling. One doesn’t have be a fan of Musk to be disgusted by the manipulative, hypocritical and, most importantly and nauseatingly, censorious twaddle that would-be-respectable journalists are currently spewing.
Continue reading “RatS 21: Taibbi – Twitter’s Chickens Come Home to Roost”
RatS 20: Michael Lind – The End of Progressive Intellectual Life
Following on from Laura Kipnis, we had also never previously heard of Michael Lind. Unlike Kipnis, who seems consistently great, Lind is a mixed bag. He has a superior tone, which doesn’t sit well with some of his less-than-superior judgments; anybody who writes a book titled Vietnam: The Necessary War is on the thinnest of ice. Nonetheless, Lind is smart and thoughtful and, critically, he is willing to write what he thinks, is willing to annoy anybody.
Last week, Lind had an excellent essay published in Tablet. Titled The End of Progressive Intellectual Life, it begins,
Continue reading “RatS 20: Michael Lind – The End of Progressive Intellectual Life”