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You are here: Home / Absent Friends / Friday Night Open Thread

Friday Night Open Thread

by Anne Laurie|  March 4, 201111:40 pm| 171 Comments

This post is in: Absent Friends, Open Threads

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“E.D. Kain gets dropped from the masthead and suddenly Matoko-chan shows up again. COINCIDENCE ? ! ?”
.
.
(Just kidding.)
.
.
(I hope.)

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Previous Post: « Rhymes with winning
Next Post: Saturday’s European League Games on Television in the US »

Reader Interactions

171Comments

  1. 1.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    March 4, 2011 at 11:50 pm

    The absence was lovely, while it lasted. I hope everyone has a pleasant weekend.

  2. 2.

    Omnes Omnibus

    March 4, 2011 at 11:53 pm

    I simply presumed m_c had been given a time-out after she got completely out of control. I presume ED had taken an adjunct status here?

  3. 3.

    Uloborus

    March 4, 2011 at 11:55 pm

    So we would be losing one libertarian who thinks like a liberal and gaining one liberal who thinks like a libertarian.

    We are not winning that trade.

  4. 4.

    jwb

    March 4, 2011 at 11:55 pm

    Has David Koch showed up to announce that he’s unleashed his lethal left blog killing machine, matoko_chan II?

    OMINOUS TRAILER VOICE: This time she’s not coming just for EDK.

  5. 5.

    WaterGirl

    March 4, 2011 at 11:57 pm

    What did I miss? Where did E.D. Kain go? Inquiring minds want to know…

  6. 6.

    Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen

    March 4, 2011 at 11:57 pm

    RISE OF THE SOCKPUPPETS.

    In related news, I want to marry whoever is bringing us Sarah, Plain & Tall.

  7. 7.

    Gustopher

    March 5, 2011 at 12:01 am

    I am so very, very cold. This is the second flu-like illness that I’ve had this season, and it doesn’t seem fair since I got my flu shot.

    I’m pretty sure that the Republicans are the root cause, but that I am too fuzzy headed to figure out how.

  8. 8.

    Carlo

    March 5, 2011 at 12:05 am

    Huh? What happened to ED? Did I miss something? (In other words, what WaterGirl said).

  9. 9.

    jwb

    March 5, 2011 at 12:07 am

    @WaterGirl: He posted at BJ earlier today. But I think he’s decided to put in only an occasional appearance now that he has the new gig at Forbes.

  10. 10.

    jwb

    March 5, 2011 at 12:09 am

    @Carlo: m_c was filling up threads earlier today wondering why EDK is no longer listed among the front pagers.

  11. 11.

    WaterGirl

    March 5, 2011 at 12:10 am

    @jwb: Thanks for the info! No goodbyes, no explanation? Just disappears from the list of bloggers? Gosh, you can’t even take a day off around here without missing something.

    Edit: uh,oh. please tell me that my comment did not sound like m_c.

  12. 12.

    jwb

    March 5, 2011 at 12:14 am

    @WaterGirl: Yes, well, m_c was more or less complaining that EDK hadn’t said a proper good bye and Cole hadn’t announced EDK’s departure. So as is her wont, she jumped to the conclusion that there was some super secret conspiracy to purge EDK while not admitting that that is what happened.

  13. 13.

    suzanne

    March 5, 2011 at 12:19 am

    Awww. I have missed m_c, as she provides me the opportunity to point and laugh without ever having to leave my couch, but I was actually beginning to really enjoy E.D. The more (relatively) sane Arizonans, the better.

  14. 14.

    Steeplejack

    March 5, 2011 at 12:24 am

    @WaterGirl:

    [Deleted for extreme redundancy.]

  15. 15.

    WaterGirl

    March 5, 2011 at 12:26 am

    @jwb: I think we all have a pretty good idea of what the EDK is leaving or the goodbye from EDK thread would have looked like. I’m going with a mix of “I never liked him anyway” and “Oh, I was just starting to like his stuff” and “He was my favorite front-pager”. If I had a new gig at Forbes, I don’t suppose I would want the goodbye post either.

  16. 16.

    WaterGirl

    March 5, 2011 at 12:28 am

    @Steeplejack: Not just run of the mill redundancy? :-)

    Loved your post about your universal remote on one of the earlier threads. Your last line made me laugh.

  17. 17.

    jwb

    March 5, 2011 at 12:29 am

    @suzanne: She’s always come back in the past. This obsession with EDK has been getting very tiresome, however. I wish she’d go back to obsessing about the Wikileaks revolution. Almost all of her best lines came out of that.

  18. 18.

    jwb

    March 5, 2011 at 12:47 am

    @efgoldman: Some cats just gotta sing.

    While I’ve had many cats, I’ve never had one who was even close to that vocal.

  19. 19.

    piratedan

    March 5, 2011 at 12:49 am

    @efgoldman: catnip on a scratching post…. has the desired effect of making said cat drunk and sleepy (in most cases, ymmv). My guess the constant “talking” is due to the need for attention from the previous environment. Rewarding the little furball with attention while there are moments of quiet may have a desired effect as well as the cat will “hopefully” associate the affection with the lack of meowing.

  20. 20.

    Nutella

    March 5, 2011 at 12:49 am

    Hey, our friend David Brooks has written a novel! It’s called “The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement” and is reviewed by PZ Myers here.

    A quote from the review:

    And then I began to resent the omniscient narrator who narrates this exercise in unthinking consumption and privilege that is, supposedly, the ideal of happiness; it’s like watching a creepy middle-aged man fuss over his Barbie and Ken dolls, posing them in their expensive accessories and cars and houses and occasionally wiggling them in simulated carnal relations (have no worries, though: Like Barbie and Ken, no genitals appear anywhere in the book), while periodically pausing to tell his audience how cool it all is, and what is going on inside his dolls’ soft plastic heads.

  21. 21.

    Nutella

    March 5, 2011 at 12:56 am

    More good quotes from the review:

    polysyllabic magical incantations that allow shallow people to pretend to have knowledge

    and

    feels a micrometer deep and a boring lifetime long

  22. 22.

    Donut

    March 5, 2011 at 12:58 am

    I have not one bit of motivation to read Forbes’ web site. Sorry ED. Good luck.

  23. 23.

    hamletta

    March 5, 2011 at 1:01 am

    Oh, Lord, there’s a reason why I don’t participate in my church’s “Contemporary Issues” study group. Our church’s statement on worker’s rights couldn’t be more clear, but the “lesson plan” from this stupid “Christian” site is Broderella all the way.

    Fucking wankers. The one time I went to the class, it was about some nutbar praying against his “enemies,” the ACLU, for petitioning the court on separation grounds.

    This one asshole (who’s a member of the local Sons of Confederate Veterans) said, “separation of Church and State isn’t in the Constitution!” and I just instinctively said, “Don’t give me that shit.”

    Never went back. Sorry! Choir practice! La-la-la! Do-re-mi!

  24. 24.

    Luthe

    March 5, 2011 at 1:02 am

    I’m sorry, all I saw matoko_chan talking about was pie. Did I miss anything?

  25. 25.

    jwb

    March 5, 2011 at 1:06 am

    @Nutella: David Brooks has found his reason for existence: so PZ Myers could write this review, which is a thing of beauty. Now, Brooks can die happy, his purpose in life fulfilled.

  26. 26.

    something fabulous

    March 5, 2011 at 1:06 am

    But! Anne Laurie, you are fanning the fires by bringing it up again on the front page! I say, you thus reveal yourself to be m_c AND ED AND UCT!

    You must be exhausted.

  27. 27.

    Mnemosyne

    March 5, 2011 at 1:07 am

    @efgoldman:

    A cat that’s busy chasing after one of these doesn’t have enough breath for meowing. Plus a good play session right before human bedtime will wear him out and make it more likely that he’ll sleep through the night.

    Also, too, some cats are just more vocal than others. They’re probably going to have to put up with a certain amount of chatter from the cat, but it won’t be as stressful once they convince him to stop waking them up.

  28. 28.

    Anne Laurie

    March 5, 2011 at 1:09 am

    @efgoldman:

    He seems to like his new environment and new people well enough. He is responsive and friendly and apparently trainable.
    __
    He was said to have been rescued from a hoarder.
    __
    And he never, ever shuts up.

    Those last two sentences may be related. Cat comes from a large ‘community’ of other cats, lots of feline-feline interaction, busy all the time. Spends some time in a shelter — also lots of stimulation, busy-ness, activity. Gets picked out of the lineup because (I’m guessing) he’s a friendly, human-interaction-seeking, hi-howareya kinda guy. Suddenly… he’s living in the feline equivalent of a MONASTERY. No other cats, humans gone most of the day, and then not interested in “sharing” for many of those precious rare hours when they are around. Is it really surprising Cat’s literally crying out for more interaction?

    Solution, depending on how long he’s been living with your relatives: If it’s only been a couple weeks or less, give him as much attention as they can possibly spare & a chance to settle down. If it’s been longer than that, especially if he’s getting more needy / noisy… are they in a situation where they can bring in another cat? Because another playmate, the same age or younger, and preferably of the opposite (fixed) sex, would give Cat enough of an outlet that he wouldn’t have to make his humans crazy any more.

  29. 29.

    hamletta

    March 5, 2011 at 1:10 am

    @Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen: Fancy a threesome?

    Sarah, Plain and Tall is hilarious. I miss a lot of comment threads (because I have a job! I am so lucky!) so I didn’t get the “tweens” reference.

  30. 30.

    WaterGirl

    March 5, 2011 at 1:13 am

    @efgoldman: Not sure how many people see these late night threads, so if you don’t get all the ideas you need, I would suggest going to WereBear’s website for information. I have yet to find anything kitty that WereBear doesn’t know. She also has a ‘dear pammy” link on the contact page so you can ask her a question. Good luck!

  31. 31.

    Crashman

    March 5, 2011 at 1:14 am

    @Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen: Been catching up on comments and holy crap… whoever’s behind that sock puppet is super talented. I’d pay for that kind of comedy.

  32. 32.

    Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel)

    March 5, 2011 at 1:29 am

    @hamletta: Move over. It’sa four-way now.

  33. 33.

    Yutsano

    March 5, 2011 at 1:30 am

    @Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel): Take pictures, that’s all I ask.

  34. 34.

    Mnemosyne

    March 5, 2011 at 1:44 am

    @Anne Laurie:

    I’ve actually had a lot of luck with neutered males getting along. They really seem to become bestest buddies (assuming their personalities mesh, of course). Two females can get problematic, though.

  35. 35.

    Mnemosyne

    March 5, 2011 at 1:45 am

    On another topic, I don’t know how I managed to fuck up my bad knee, but I’m now icing it for the third time tonight prior to going to bed with a handful of ibuprofen. Damn it.

  36. 36.

    Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel)

    March 5, 2011 at 2:00 am

    @Yutsano:

    Take pictures, that’s all I ask.

    I’ve actually had a lot of luck with neutered males getting along.

    My eyes played a trick and made me see this as part of the same post.

  37. 37.

    Yutsano

    March 5, 2011 at 2:01 am

    @Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel): +?

  38. 38.

    Martin

    March 5, 2011 at 2:01 am

    @Mnemosyne: Probably true outside of cats, too.

  39. 39.

    hamletta

    March 5, 2011 at 2:02 am

    @Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel): Great minds think alike!

  40. 40.

    Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel)

    March 5, 2011 at 2:08 am

    @Yutsano:

    +4, but from Thursday night. I am such a lightweight it takes me a full 24 to recover.

  41. 41.

    Yutsano

    March 5, 2011 at 2:12 am

    @Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel): Heh. You’re gonna have an interesting time on the road. Sobriety is a hard condition to maintain playing in bars and such.

  42. 42.

    Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel)

    March 5, 2011 at 2:24 am

    @Yutsano: We have a strict no drinkie before the show policy. And the drummer gets tight on one beer. He can drive.

  43. 43.

    Yutsano

    March 5, 2011 at 2:26 am

    @Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel): Percussionists should never be allowed behind the wheel of a vehicle. Evah. I know of which I speak here.

  44. 44.

    Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel)

    March 5, 2011 at 2:28 am

    @Yutsano: Non? Porquois?

  45. 45.

    Yutsano

    March 5, 2011 at 2:33 am

    @Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel): It seemed like the drumline when I was in college was famous for wrecking their cars. I swear like once a month one of them would be in an accident. Even the cymbal players. I never trusted their driving skillz since.

  46. 46.

    Allan

    March 5, 2011 at 3:00 am

    m_c is a syphilitic nutwagon, and if she’s not banned for life, Cole can go fuck himself with a chainsaw.

  47. 47.

    plato451

    March 5, 2011 at 3:03 am

    The 1st day of Mardi Gras weekend and I have stayed far from da quarter. Tuesday, however, I will be in the middle of it costumed, masked, and havin a blast….

  48. 48.

    Yutsano

    March 5, 2011 at 3:09 am

    @Allan: Meh. I’m agnostic about her. She’s just a gadfly with an easily spotted nom de Internet that I can easily ignore at whim.

  49. 49.

    Allan

    March 5, 2011 at 3:17 am

    @Yutsano: Once she appears, every thread becomes about her. It’s either her vomiting streams of random characters onto the screen, or people pointing and laughing, or worse, engaging with her.

    It’s disgusting and disrespectful to the actual human beings who try to have any kind of discourse. Hell, I’m an asshole, but I’m an ON-TOPIC fucking asshole.

  50. 50.

    Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel)

    March 5, 2011 at 3:18 am

    Yutsano: there are some trolls that just seem to get under people’s skin. m_c doesn’t bother me much either. Wyldpirate OTOH, makes me mental for some reason.

    Away to the perfumed feathers. I have to teach at an ungodly (for me) hour.

  51. 51.

    Yutsano

    March 5, 2011 at 3:38 am

    @Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel): There are names that, when I see them, I go into instant glance by mode. I’m just well-trained enough by now to do that. And fortunate that I can count that list on one hand.

  52. 52.

    asiangrrlMN

    March 5, 2011 at 3:41 am

    @efgoldman: White noise machine for the humans while they sleep. It helps.

    @Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel): Both chap my flat ass, which is why I use the pie filter generously.

    @Yutsano: How you be?

  53. 53.

    Mark S.

    March 5, 2011 at 3:51 am

    @Nutella:

    polysyllabic magical incantations that allow shallow people to pretend to have knowledge

    That describes Brooks better than anything I’ve ever read. He gives psuedo-intellectuals a bad name.

  54. 54.

    Yutsano

    March 5, 2011 at 3:56 am

    @asiangrrlMN: Tired but haz mass of purring kitteh fur next to me so can’t really bitch. How’s you hon?

  55. 55.

    asiangrrlMN

    March 5, 2011 at 3:56 am

    @Mark S.: I resent the implication I am inferring from perusing your cogent remark. It appears to me, good sir, that you are maligning people with prolific vocabularies, such as myself (pretentious red alert, using myself in this fashion). I demand that you rescind your inflammatory remark posthaste, or I shall have to take more drastic measures.

    @Yutsano: Awwwwww! Kittehs make everything moar better.

    I am logy, depressed, and fuxxored in my sleep. Same as it ever was!

  56. 56.

    Yutsano

    March 5, 2011 at 4:04 am

    @asiangrrlMN: You are, however, motherless. Which means you didn’t annihilate each other. Which means whatever she wanted this time you once again resisted. So neener.

  57. 57.

    asiangrrlMN

    March 5, 2011 at 4:09 am

    @Yutsano: I am, indeed, motherless. And, you are right that we did not annihilate each other. Came close, though, thus my current state. It always takes me a few days to shake off a visit.

  58. 58.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 4:10 am

    EDK showed up to link-whore here with a bunch of “free market solutions” for education reform recycled from the Glibertarian Nation (TAS).
    Please, do go read him at Forbes and LoOG.
    I swear on the Necronomicron that you will never see me at either place.
    And I just thought John Cole finally gave him the hook.

    Anne Laurie….so you dont think Forbes is a glibertarian rag?
    The magazine for Free Market Evangelicals everywhere.
    Like I asked you before….is LoOG promo week still on? Because Mistermix and DougJ have neglected promoting pimping some posts at the apes discussing philosophy conservatives discussing science blog.
    I particularily enjoyed Yearning for Distributed Jesusland.

    Cole gave me a time out to work on my sentence structure.
    I knew he was a teacher but I didn’t realize he taught english.
    >:(

  59. 59.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 4:13 am

    And I thought From Same Sex Marriage to Marrying Farm Animals; the Elusive Slippery Slope was fantastic as well.
    :)

  60. 60.

    Yutsano

    March 5, 2011 at 4:13 am

    @asiangrrlMN: You’ll be fine. And you just got some delicious pie too! Don’t turn it off, you’re just missing a whole bunch of obsessive gibberish.

  61. 61.

    asiangrrlMN

    March 5, 2011 at 4:15 am

    @Yutsano: Nom nom nom. Blueberry pie is good. So is apple. I love a good berry pie.

  62. 62.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 4:23 am

    You see….I have argued against free market solutions for education reform for 2 years with Dr. Manzi in mails. I could do it in my sleep.
    Do you know, for example, Anne Laurie cher, that NCLB is a freemarket solution?
    School funding is tied to test scores.
    Ah, the Invisible Hand of the Market.
    It guides us all.

  63. 63.

    Yutsano

    March 5, 2011 at 4:24 am

    @asiangrrlMN: Yesh and yesh. And I’m at my limit tonight. I think I’ll do better tomorrow after muchas snoozing and such. Enjoy the pie goodness!!

  64. 64.

    MikeJ

    March 5, 2011 at 4:30 am

    @efgoldman:

    He has been neutered
    He seems to like his new environment and new people well enough. He is responsive and friendly and apparently trainable.
    He was said to have been rescued from a hoarder.

    Are you discussig ED Kain’s new gig at Forbes?

  65. 65.

    asiangrrlMN

    March 5, 2011 at 4:31 am

    @Yutsano: Night, hon. I’m on my way out, too.

    @MikeJ: SNORT.

  66. 66.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 4:33 am

    @jwb:

    But I think he’s decided to put in only an occasional appearance now that he has the new gig at Forbes.

    I expect he will just drop by to link whore occasionally because DougJ and Mistermix have inexplicably stopped linking his glibertarian free market bullshytt at Forbes and the LoOG.
    You guys are just pissy because EDK scammed you.
    He has been a free market evangelical all along.

  67. 67.

    Peter

    March 5, 2011 at 4:33 am

    Is that the Dr. Manzi IN FRANCE, matoko?

  68. 68.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 4:36 am

    And you juicers should be glad I didn’t comment on the EmilyEsther/ABL thread.
    You would not have liked what I had to say.

  69. 69.

    gnomedad

    March 5, 2011 at 4:38 am

    @jwb:

    But I think he’s decided to put in only an occasional appearance now that he has the new gig at Forbes

    .
    Evacuate now, in his moment of triumph?

  70. 70.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 4:41 am

    @gnomedad: Like I said, I predict he will only drop by to link whore now. DougJ and Mistermix have stopped linking him for some occult reason.
    He’s off the masthead.
    Isn’t anyone else curious?

  71. 71.

    jwb

    March 5, 2011 at 4:46 am

    @matoko_chan: Can’t you go back to talking about wikileaks? Even your dumb IQ schtick was better than this.

  72. 72.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    March 5, 2011 at 4:48 am

    @matoko_chan:

    Isn’t anyone else curious?

    Maybe a tiny bit bi-curious.

  73. 73.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 4:57 am

    @jwb: Why are you resisting the truth? Because you are invested in the EDK Conversion Mythology? EDK is a free market evangelical. The free market solutions for education reform come right from TAS. He is linking Manzi and Millman.
    I have argued about this shit for two years.
    Empirically it cannot work. They ALL know it.
    Yet they keep vomitting it out.
    I unnerstand this is all fresh to you juicers. But this is what the glibertarian wankstahs have been churning out for the past two years at TAS.
    Try to get your pointy little head around this—there are 30 years of actual documented correlations between school and student performance and the SES and involvement of parents….. and free market solutions (like EDK is pretending to explore) are EMPIRICALLY incapable of ever addressing those problems.
    EDK knows this.
    BJ is a just a set of fresh marks that haven’t seen this sideshow before.

  74. 74.

    gnomedad

    March 5, 2011 at 4:57 am

    @matoko_chan:

    And you juicers should be glad I didn’t comment on the EmilyEsther/ABL thread.

    For a pound, I’ll leave this sketch thread completely uninterrupted.

  75. 75.

    Peter

    March 5, 2011 at 5:08 am

    Why is it that whenever matoko claims that something is certain empirically, it never is? Not that I’m a fan of free market education solutions. But I am also a fan of using words correctly.

  76. 76.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 5:11 am

    @jwb: A Sully reader

    I’m not sure if you’ve seen this recent post by Kevin Drum, but I think it is very pertinent to your discussion. The paper [pdf] that Drum refers to, by Nobel Prize-winning economist David Heckman and released just a few weeks ago, makes a compelling case that most of the achievement gap between poor children and their higher income peers goes back to early childhood and is already firmly entrenched by the time these kids start kindergarten. Heckman concludes that the low-hanging fruit for improving education and alleviating poverty in this country is early childhood education.

    The way to reform our education system is social justice. EDK and the rest of the glibertarian wankstahs will simply never acknowlege this.
    They are free market evangelicals.

  77. 77.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 5:18 am

    @Peter: Oh? Do tell me how free market solutions can address social justice issues.
    Pardon, I thought that was fairly obvious.

  78. 78.

    PurpleGirl

    March 5, 2011 at 5:19 am

    @hamletta: I knew right away before I clicked your link that it was ELCA. I was a member of a Lutheran congregation for a decade back in the mid-80s. (I remember the tsouris of the time and ELCA’s founding.) They are good people who mean well but, yeah, you could die from the extreme seriousness and length of their statements.

  79. 79.

    Mark S.

    March 5, 2011 at 5:25 am

    @matoko_chan:

    And you juicers should be glad I didn’t comment on the EmilyEsther/ABL thread. You would not have liked what I had to say.

    Really, what were you planning on saying there?

  80. 80.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 5:29 am

    @Mark S.: wallah, im a muslimah. trust me. you dont want to know.

  81. 81.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 5:36 am

    There are only two sides to education reform. There are the free marketeers, like EDK, Manzi, Millman etc, and there are the social justice reformers…like our Very Own President Barak Black Obama.
    The last thirty years of EMPIRICAL data support the social justice reformers.
    So why are we even talking about anti-empirical free market solutions?
    Because that is what glibertarians do.
    And they will keep it up until people start calling them on it.

  82. 82.

    stuckinred

    March 5, 2011 at 5:49 am

    @matoko_chan: Noodle doodle!

  83. 83.

    arguingwithsignposts

    March 5, 2011 at 5:51 am

    head/desk m_c

  84. 84.

    Angry Black Lady

    March 5, 2011 at 6:10 am

    @matoko_chan: like that’s ever stopped you before.

  85. 85.

    Sarah, Proud and Tall

    March 5, 2011 at 6:16 am

    @matoko_chan:

    you dont want to know.

    Yet another poorly punctuated and ungrammatical screed no doubt. Oh, I know, actually being comprehensible is for old people.

    Seriously, dear, have you considered getting some of those different colored glasses that epileptics wear? It might help with your typing issues.

    Not much help for your brain, I suspect.

    I suppose you fit in quite well in whatever sheltered workshop you spend your time, sticking together matchsticks and macaroni into pretty pictures. Perhaps it would assist with your tendency to crap the bed.

    Mrs Jenkins in the next room sounds just like you when she speaks. However, she’s 94 and only has half her skull, so at least she has an excuse.

    I’m not a doctor though, so what do I know?

    ETA: Silly me. I’ve just realized it’s not epileptics who were those funny glasses. It’s dyslexics. Epileptics wear those funny hats with the propeller on top.

  86. 86.

    Sarah, Proud and Tall

    March 5, 2011 at 6:31 am

    @Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen:
    @hamletta:
    @Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel):
    @Crashman

    I was going to thank you all for your kind words, but then you started talking about threesomes and such filth, so I won’t.

    My husband Keith and I never had a threesome, unless you count the time that Senator Barry Goldwater slept between the two of us in our bed when he was passing through Idaho during the 1964 primaries.

    This was about the time he was having financing problems because Nelson Rockefeller had paid off every Republican party official in the entire potato belt.

    I went straight to sleep, so I can’t say for sure whether Barry and Keith got up to anything naughty, except for an odd squelching noise I heard around 3am when I woke up for a glass of water.

    I certainly had Ida May scrub those sheets the next day.

  87. 87.

    Ann B. Nonymous

    March 5, 2011 at 6:32 am

    @matoko_chan:

    Please, do go read him at Forbes and LoOG.
    I swear on the Necronomicron that you will never see me at either place.

    Somebody, somewhere!
    In the heat of the night
    Looking pretty dangerous
    Running out of patience!

    Tonight in the city
    You won’t find any pity!
    Hearts are being twisted!
    Another lover cheated, cheated!

    In the blogs and the cafes, passion!
    In the message boards and alleys, passion!
    A lot of pretending, passion!
    Everybody searching, passion!

  88. 88.

    Donut

    March 5, 2011 at 7:34 am

    I’m only posting this because I dumped the cache on my iPhone. Move along please.

  89. 89.

    dmsilev

    March 5, 2011 at 8:10 am

    I’ve finally realized what matoko_chan reminds me of. The venerable Emacs program has a whole bunch of strange modes and functions buried inside of it. Two in particular are a Zippy The Pinhead text generator and an implementation of the ELIZA computer psychologist. And then there’s M-x psychoanalyze-pinhead, which feeds the output of the former into the latter. That’s matoko.

    dms

  90. 90.

    Phyllis

    March 5, 2011 at 8:19 am

    Weekend Today is doing a story about Charlie Sheen that has been running for six minutes so far. Featuring Gloria Allred. How the f*ck is this news?

    ETA: I’ve had the teevee muted the entire time. I’m apparently the loser here-why am I paying for this sh*t?

  91. 91.

    polyorchnid octopunch

    March 5, 2011 at 8:35 am

    @matoko_chan: Actually, this is not really addressed to you, m_c. This is for everybody else talking on this thread.

    I want you all to go read this particular post again (turn off the pie filter if you have to) and try to tell me she’s wrong about this.

    Seriously. Your education system is designed to create an aristocracy disguised as a meritocracy, and it’s done a very good job.

  92. 92.

    alwhite

    March 5, 2011 at 9:09 am

    No ED? Hey, this place just keeps getting better and better! MC back *SIGH* into every blog a little rain must fall.

  93. 93.

    THE

    March 5, 2011 at 9:12 am

    polyorchnid octopunch

    She’s right about a lot of things PO.
    Not everything by a long shot, but a lot all the same.

    The reference is to James J. Heckmanis’ paper here (pdf file)
    h/t Andrew Sullivan, Kevin Drum, matoko_chan

  94. 94.

    Omnes Omnibus

    March 5, 2011 at 9:18 am

    @polyorchnid octopunch: The problem with her comment is that it is directed at ED Kain. I just read through his Forbes education blog posts and I do not see him advocating a free market, competitive approach to education policy. Her antipathy toward Kain has reached a point where she is fighting with an imaginary Kain who seems to exist only in her mind rather than reading and addressing the actual Kain of today. I find it interesting that someone who claims to have been a Bush supporting Republican, as she does, cannot accept that someone else may take a journey leftward. As someone who has always been at least left of center, I can say that it is pretty rich to watch a recent convert denigrate the conversion of another. I have now spent too much time taking m_c seriously, but I thought your comment was worth a response.

  95. 95.

    scav

    March 5, 2011 at 9:21 am

    @polyorchnid octopunch: The rightness or wrongness of any single position espoused by m_c (insofar as anything so coherent can be determined from her, um, textual output) is irrelevant. dmsilev @ 90 has got it. She’s a microcephalic with a photographic memory that introduces buzzwords and misspellings to an otherwise random meme-stream. One can see patterns and read deep meaning into the images of television static but you’re gazing into the abyss.

  96. 96.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 9:51 am

    @Omnes Omnibus: Omnes….the whole approach is wrong.
    “Fixing” the “teacher problem” can empirically do nothing to fix the education problem. Because the education problem is the parent problem, parental SES and parental involvement.
    EDKs favorable links all go to the glibertarian nation at TAS. Manzi and Millman. ALL those guys talk about is free market solutions. I have known them for years.
    Doing anything about teachers to reform education is EXACTLY like bailing out banks to create jobs. There is no linear relationship.
    The glibertarian wankstahs all know this. They never acknowledge it, they just keep spinning. It is what they do.
    I loathe EDK for the same reason I loathe Douthat. They cloak anti-empirical free market solutions in a fog of pretty language and fake reasonableness in the name of “discussion”. EDK developed a formula here.
    EDK used his formula of “run a conservative meme up the flagpole, get ass kicked in comments, rinse, repeat” until he hit pay dirt with the unions and the teachers.
    So now he can front as a “reasonable libertarian/liberal-tarian” and churn out free market chum larded with a few bits of BJ sanity at the Forbes bullshit mill.
    That would be BJ sanity that he stole from you guys. :)
    You see ……it doesnt come natural to EDK. That is why is was so incredibly hard for him to give up on fetus=slave. He doesnt really see anything wrong with it.
    For example…..

    Quote for the day
    __
    by E.D. Kain
    __
    “And understand this: If American workers are being denied their right to organize and collectively bargain when I’m in the White House, I’ll put on a put on a comfortable pair of shoes myself. I’ll walk on that picket line with you as president of the United States.” ~ Barack Obama in 2007 on the campaign trail.
    __
    Guess that means the President is headed for Wisconsin, folks.

    Glibertarian playbook page 21….snark about something Obama once said. Make it about Obama.
    You see…..EDK doesnt have any integrity of his own….so he had to borrow some from you….long enough to a get a column at Forbes.
    Forbes has to have “reasonable” libertarians to give cover to the endless stream of trickle-down-free-market-innovation-supply-side wankery that they pump out.
    And EDK is just the ticket.
    A lot of people here seem to be emotionally invested in EDK.
    I’m sorry but I’ve known him for years…..he hasnt changed. He is still a free market evangelist.
    And free market solutions can never reform education.
    NCLB is a free market solution. Did you know that? School funding is based partly on test results. Has NCLB worked?
    We know the answer to that.

  97. 97.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 9:58 am

    Look. Im aspergers positive.
    I have difficulty with social interaction. I get obsessed with detail.
    Part of the reason Cole gave me a timeout was to force me to write in sentences, a concept I normally scoff at.
    He said he cant understand what I am saying.
    I am trying.
    Although not required for diagnosis, physical clumsiness and atypical use of language are frequently reported.
    My parents enrolled me in twelve years of ballet.
    Cole is making me write in sentences.

  98. 98.

    jinxtigr

    March 5, 2011 at 10:08 am

    @MikeJ:

    Cole IS a hoarder. Of frontpagers :)

  99. 99.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 10:08 am

    I should have said glibertarian hivemind at TAS.
    That is a much better description.

    Dr. Manzi will love it.
    ;)

  100. 100.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 10:15 am

    @Angry Black Lady: I’m trying to cut back.
    See above.

  101. 101.

    THE

    March 5, 2011 at 10:19 am

    If ever you’re looking for a peaceful, quiet, thoughtful space on the Web to spend some time, you know where to find it m_c.

  102. 102.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 10:24 am

    @Ann B. Nonymous: I don’t know how much clearer I can make this.
    EDK is an intellectual whore.
    We could never hook up because of my morbid fear of cyberSTDs.

  103. 103.

    suzanne

    March 5, 2011 at 10:24 am

    @matoko_chan:

    I have difficulty with social interaction.

    Color me shocked.

  104. 104.

    jinxtigr

    March 5, 2011 at 10:29 am

    @matoko_chan: Keep trying. Slow down. I understand completely, because I have a whopping dose of Asperger’s myself, at least as much as you.

    I have old books in the field I work in, which have the margins filled with commentary just as intense as yours. Twenty years later, some of it turned out to have merit… all of it was presented with the same rage and passion, whether or not it turned out too blindered and obsessed.

    I’ve always had an ability to read through surface social stuff to the secret motivations of a situation, rather like a dog picking up on the undertone of a conversation while remaining incapable of understanding the conversation itself. Once I got flipped out completely by a social situation that was, on the surface, totally innocuous, only to be told later that one of the people present was a woman who’d stayed with the guy who abused her daughter…

    You’re doing the same thing with Kain, but you don’t understand that people get to OVERRIDE their deepest levels. You simply can’t go around insisting, “Kain used BJ but didn’t learn humility and still thinks he knows best!”. First, nobody cares, and second, if he’s learned some new behaviors, it doesn’t matter as much what he feels in his heart- we all strike a balance between our raw id and the learned behaviors we put on to appease society.

    Well, except you, but I swear it’s a useful and common trick :) I recommend it heartily! It even makes you a more effective social actor, certainly more influential.

    Here, have some music as token of my sincerity, which clearly cannot have been created by a normal mind (and also benefits from years of obsessive aspie focus on things like sound engineering) :)

    Nice to see you back, and even I enjoy reading your posts better when you take more effort to construct them more coherently. Even if I completely understand the other ones, they’re just more work to follow.

    Think of it as like this: in order to read your post, the person must take the same mental steps to reconstruct your sentences as you did constructing them. If you’re dancing around hitting points with artistic sparseness, or grinding away little steps half an inch apart, it’s tiring to reproduce. Relax, allow simpler statements that are less exact.

  105. 105.

    kdaug

    March 5, 2011 at 10:36 am

    (I may regret this, but): m_c – Push. Think. What is the solution to education policy? Seriously. Ultimate solution. What should we do? Not magic wands. Take into account vested interests. Textbook publishers. Unions. Endowments. What do you do?

    Maximize education obtained for maximum people in the most cost-efficient methods.

    What does this look like? Describe.

  106. 106.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 10:39 am

    @jinxtigr: wow…shukran.
    I see your point. Unpacking info-dense statements takes many joules of brain energy.
    Cole said it is like im writing haiku sometimes.

    very nice musiks.

  107. 107.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 10:42 am

    @kdaug: social justice. There are only two sides to any argument in america.
    social justice vs free market wankerery.
    And free market wankery is anti-empirical.

  108. 108.

    kdaug

    March 5, 2011 at 10:44 am

    @jinxtigr:

    the learned behaviors we put on to appease society.

    Ah, there’s the rub.

    The rest of the world is here to be appeased, whilst your special in-group of (X) needs only be taught how to tolerate them.

    That line of thought has led to some very bad places, my friend.

  109. 109.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 10:44 am

    lawls….I just did it again didnt I?
    kdaug, I will craft a sentence structured response that doesn’t require decryption.
    Back later.
    Much later.

  110. 110.

    kdaug

    March 5, 2011 at 10:45 am

    @matoko_chan: And achieved how?

  111. 111.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 10:55 am

    @kdaug:

    That line of thought has led to some very bad places, my friend

    like in X-men?
    jinxtigr and I are mutants, right?

  112. 112.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 10:59 am

    @kdaug: right. :)
    I have to make that translation.

  113. 113.

    THE

    March 5, 2011 at 10:59 am

    We are all mutants matoko.
    Variation is the fuel of evolution.

  114. 114.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 11:00 am

    I’ll be back.
    ;)

  115. 115.

    polyorchnid octopunch

    March 5, 2011 at 11:01 am

    @scav: Clearly, you didn’t read the post that I was referencing. Completely coherent from beginning to end.

  116. 116.

    JMC_in_the_ATL

    March 5, 2011 at 11:02 am

    @matoko_cudlip: The word you’re looking for is “voila,” not “walla.” I am surprised that it was never auto-corrected by the French authorities during your two year long email correspondence with Dr. Manzi.

  117. 117.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 11:06 am

    @JMC_in_the_ATL: lawls.
    wallah is arabic for AMG! I’m a revert.

  118. 118.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 11:15 am

    @Angry Black Lady: and….how become you are the only chick that gets to be ANGRY around here?
    could it be…..nah.
    I wont say it.
    ;)
    /jk

  119. 119.

    jinxtigr

    March 5, 2011 at 11:15 am

    @kdaug: Everybody has to be appeased. Me and m_c included. Just because we are prone to acting so weird that we can be safely mocked, doesn’t mean we can’t be appeased.

    With m_c simply making an effort to listen and follow the reasoning is hugely appreciated (and leads to lots more THEORIES OMG, so it kinda backfires). Me, I just holed up in Vermont and don’t talk to people, but I think I’m a bit older than Matoko.

    I think it’s a good thing to consistently make some effort to appease people you don’t understand, and one hopes it’s a little bit reciprocal.

    I say ‘understand’ because everybody’s got motivations, and if you’re not making any concessions- if you’re not failing to get some of your point across, if you’re not a little bit disappointed and frustrated- you’re not appeasing anybody.

    The whole point is that people will not entirely agree, or entirely comprehend each other, and we’ve gotta get along in spite of that.

    You CANNOT construct any set of behaviors or expectations that are really the ‘default’ ones, and point at the ‘special in-group’, and say, how dare you call it ‘appeasing’ us, as if you are special and perfect and you have to sully that by meeting our needs.

    To take such an attitude only proves that you’re mainstream enough that you don’t have to think about ‘appeasing’ anybody. (may or may not be true for kdaug…)

    I prefer the whole ‘appeasing’ thing because, like liberalism, it’s defining the world as splinter groups in which everybody generally has to give some ground in order to cooperate. There is no platonic ‘way to be’ where, if everyone just straightened out and did that, there would be no conflict ;) no, there’s a lot of ways to be, so there are a lot of conflicts and you gotta keep jockeying for position, and ‘appease’ so that you can be appeased in turn, and everybody should come out more or less okay.

  120. 120.

    polyorchnid octopunch

    March 5, 2011 at 11:20 am

    @Omnes Omnibus: It wasn’t addressed to EDK. It was addressed to the blog at large. EDK is mentioned in it, but it’s not addressed to him.

    The key point being… addressed to the blog at large, and pointing out that the extreme pressures on working poor, blue collar, and middle class families are doing far more to damage their children’s education and future than any number of problem teachers. You can’t fix the education problem in this country by fixing the education system; you need to fix the context the education system functions in.

    The right’s focus on problem teachers is there to distract all those people from the real problem, which is that they have been *at best* treading water for the last thirty years while the waves grow around them. A few days back there was a reference to a lecture given by Elizabeth Warren at UCB about why the middle class is going away, with a very detailed analysis of what’s gone wrong and how government statistics are being manipulated to hide the true cause so the middle class may be blamed for their “failures” and “shortcomings”. You should watch it, and when you go look at the red columns climbing out of sight about forty minutes in, keep in mind that those are all the categories that have been excluded from the basket of goods used to calculate consumer inflation. It is absolute MUST SEE education for anyone who’s trying to figure out what the hell went wrong with the middle class over the last thirty years.

  121. 121.

    jinxtigr

    March 5, 2011 at 11:21 am

    Goddamnit. “With m_c, simply making an effort”. Balloon Juice locked up and I couldn’t edit the post.

  122. 122.

    Peter

    March 5, 2011 at 11:28 am

    @matoko_chan: I’m not saying that it can. Or that I know one way or the other; I am not an expert in the field by any means. In fact, I said that in the very post you responded to. If ‘responded’ is in fact an accurate description of what you do, it seems much more like you respond to a strawman that says whatever argument you are prepared to knock down that day.

    However, I do know this: It is logically impossible to prove a negative empirically.

    You keep using that word. I don’t think it means what you think it means.

  123. 123.

    eemom

    March 5, 2011 at 11:29 am

    John Cole. Why the fuck did you let her back in here??

    Tell the truth — you really DON’T want there to be actual discussions, consisting of coherent, temperate exchanges of substantive, well-reasoned ideas to be going on on this blog, do you?

  124. 124.

    Corner Stone

    March 5, 2011 at 11:30 am

    EDK was a scam from the beginning. Anyone who can’t see that needs to take a step back and reevaluate. Cole traded him front page space in return for repeatable clicks.
    I for one am deeply suspicious of his contorted “conversion”, and his mile a minute change of direction once he decided that would work best for him.
    Someone please tell me how a young man who has no displayable credentials in the field becomes an “education” blogger at Forbes?

  125. 125.

    Corner Stone

    March 5, 2011 at 11:35 am

    @polyorchnid octopunch:

    of what’s gone wrong and how government statistics are being manipulated to hide the true cause so the middle class may be blamed for their “failures” and “shortcomings”.

    It’s what a lot of the modern day Church preach as well. Joel Osteen and the Wealth Effect and Success. If you are righteous then the Lord will reward you. And if you are already rewarded then obviously it’s because you are righteous.
    And if you’re not rewarded? You’ve failed the Lord in your duty at some point.

  126. 126.

    Peter

    March 5, 2011 at 11:45 am

    @polyorchnid octopunch: Here’s the thing, though: that wasn’t her point. The thesis of that comment was, in fact, about EDK. She scraped off a comment by someone else to use as a club so she could bash on EDK with it some more.

    Its accuracy or validity are irrelevant: she’s not arguing in good faith, or arguing at all, when she starts going on about EDK. She’s just looking for excuses to call him a ‘free market evangelical’ and other ways of making him look bad.

  127. 127.

    soonergrunt

    March 5, 2011 at 11:49 am

    @Uloborus:

    So we would be losing one libertarian who thinks like a liberal and gaining one liberal who thinks like a libertarian.
    We are not winning that trade.

    There is nothing liberal about howling insanity.

  128. 128.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 11:51 am

    @jinxtigr: @jinxtigr:

    there are a lot of conflicts and you gotta keep jockeying for position, and ‘appease’ so that you can be appeased in turn, tribology. the science of rubbing.
    ;)

    @polyorchnid octopunch: and there is 30 years of data that the glibertarians willfully ignore.
    The most significant correlate with student educational performance over the last 30 years of measurement is parental involvement. And that means jobs, education, civil rights and civil welfare for the parents. The most significant correlate with school performance over the last 30 years is SES of the parents in the district. Again that means jobs, education, civil rights and civil welfare for the parents.
    The destruction of the middle class is the major cause of the degradation of our education system.
    And EDK wanking about teachers is just more glibertarian radar chaff.

  129. 129.

    Josh

    March 5, 2011 at 11:54 am

    goldman, we rescued a cat from a traumatic environment and she spent a lot of time demanding reassurance, day and night. None of the activities we tried really worked, and we ended up having to give her Prozac every other day, which helps a lot.

  130. 130.

    Omnes Omnibus

    March 5, 2011 at 11:54 am

    @polyorchnid octopunch: Virtually all of her comments are addressed at EDK either directly or indirectly. Nevertheless, a focus on social justice and ensuring that children have proper nutrition, a good home life, and a perception that they can succeed if they try is an absolute necessity for a proper educational system. Unfortunately for m_c, the wheat of her valid points is too often lost in the chaff of her Kain vendetta. Moreover, her prescription, while valid, is so vague that it is little more than platitudes. Who of good heart is could be against it? It would be like being opposed to puppies.

    Edited for improved clarity.

  131. 131.

    cyntax

    March 5, 2011 at 11:56 am

    @eemom:

    Actually this post by m_c from the teaching thread seems to have everything you’re asking for:

    The most significant correlate with student educational performance over the last 30 years of measurement is parental involvement. And that means jobs, education, civil rights and civil welfare for the parents. All of which I see Obama attempting to improve, and EDK and the glibertarians trying to supress. The most significant correlate with school performance over the last 30 years is SES of the parents in the district. Again that means jobs, education, civil rights and civil welfare for the parents.
    EDK has preserved his dreadful lack of reading skillz it seems.
    —
    Race to the Top is actually a bottom up program that address improving parental involvement and improving schools from the roots.

    Though I do disagree with her assessment of Race to the Top, since it continues in the high-stakes funding vein of NCLB.

  132. 132.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 11:59 am

    @soonergrunt: I’m not howling insane, I’m aspergers positive. Like I explained.
    @Peter: Lie. In that comment I’m refuting the entire glibertarian hivemind argument that freemarket solutions can fix our education system.
    THIS comment is my personal attack on EDK.
    I loathe EDK for the same reason I loathe Douthat. They cloak anti-empirical free market solutions in a fog of pretty language and fake reasonableness in the name of “discussion”. EDK developed a formula here.
    EDK used his formula of “run a conservative meme up the flagpole, get ass kicked in comments, rinse, repeat” until he hit pay dirt with the unions and the teachers.
    So now he can front as a “reasonable libertarian/liberal-tarian” and churn out free market chum larded with a few bits of BJ sanity at the Forbes bullshit mill.
    That would be BJ sanity that he stole from you guys. :)
    You see ……it doesnt come natural to EDK. That is why is was so incredibly hard for him to give up on fetus=slave. He doesnt really see anything wrong with it.
    For example…..

    Quote for the day
    __
    by E.D. Kain
    __
    “And understand this: If American workers are being denied their right to organize and collectively bargain when I’m in the White House, I’ll put on a put on a comfortable pair of shoes myself. I’ll walk on that picket line with you as president of the United States.” ~ Barack Obama in 2007 on the campaign trail.
    __
    Guess that means the President is headed for Wisconsin, folks.

    Glibertarian playbook page 21….snark about something Obama once said. Make it about Obama.
    You see…..EDK doesnt have any integrity of his own….so he had to borrow some from you….long enough to a get a column at Forbes.
    Forbes has to have “reasonable” libertarians to give cover to the endless stream of trickle-down-free-market-innovation-supply-side wankery that they pump out.
    And EDK is just the ticket.
    A lot of people here seem to be emotionally invested in EDK.
    I’m sorry but I’ve known him for years…..he hasnt changed. He is still a free market evangelist.
    And free market solutions can never reform education.
    NCLB is a free market solution. Did you know that? School funding is based partly on test results. Has NCLB worked?

  133. 133.

    Peter

    March 5, 2011 at 11:59 am

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Moreover, her prescription, while valid, is much like is so vague that it is little more than platitudes. Who of good heart is could be against it? It would be like being opposed to puppies.

    Ah, thank you for defining what was bugging me about that. When people ask what you suggest as an alternative and all you say is ‘social justice’…you’re not really saying much of anything, are you? I, too, am a fan of social justice, but it’s a pretty damn broad term. Just saying that without further qualification or practical steps is pretty useless.

  134. 134.

    Omnes Omnibus

    March 5, 2011 at 12:01 pm

    @Peter: I wish you had waited until I edited before quoting me. Oh well.

  135. 135.

    Peter

    March 5, 2011 at 12:01 pm

    @matoko_chan: Being asperger’s positive doesn’t actually excuse you from being an incoherent mess. It just provides an explanation for it.

    And yes, that comment was an attack on EDK, and I don’t see how you can reasonably deny it. Of the three sentences that you actually supplied for that comment, one was directed at Kain and the other two were leadins to that one.

  136. 136.

    scav

    March 5, 2011 at 12:02 pm

    @polyorchnid octopunch: Covered by the photographic memory part of my comment. It somehow missed her usual scramble sub-routine. Well, actually, that bit’s almost her main block of code.

  137. 137.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 12:04 pm

    @cyntax:

    Though I do disagree with her assessment of Race to the Top, since it continues in the high-stakes funding vein of NCLB.

    ok…it is a hybrid then. I see Obama doing this a lot, giving the right a few crumbs to secretly push his agenda.
    Like the Bush taxcuts. The guy is a pragmatist.
    He always buys half a loaf when he can’t afford the whole thing.
    The only exception, the only place where I dont understand Obama is Wikileaks…I think…the poor guy is just trying to slow the non-linear systems collapse of America with patching and hotfixes.

  138. 138.

    soonergrunt

    March 5, 2011 at 12:05 pm

    @polyorchnid octopunch: Stopped clocks, law of averages, etc.

  139. 139.

    soonergrunt

    March 5, 2011 at 12:07 pm

    @jinxtigr: That’s ironic on many levels.

  140. 140.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 12:09 pm

    @Peter: i told kdaug I’m workin’ on it.
    I suppose lies and platitudes and general glibertarian hivemind wankery are superior to what I said in your esteem?
    What do you not understand about this?
    Wanking about teachers is a “free market” solution.
    Dig Cornerstone.

    EDK was a scam from the beginning. Anyone who can’t see that needs to take a step back and reevaluate. Cole traded him front page space in return for repeatable clicks.
    I for one am deeply suspicious of his contorted “conversion”, and his mile a minute change of direction once he decided that would work best for him.
    Someone please tell me how a young man who has no displayable credentials in the field becomes an “education” blogger at Forbes?

  141. 141.

    cyntax

    March 5, 2011 at 12:15 pm

    @matoko_chan:

    Like the Bush taxcuts. The guy is a pragmatist.
    He always buys half a loaf when he can’t afford the whole thing.

    I think that’s a fair assessment of what his general approach is. However, in this case, I think that he’s taking a fundamentally free-market approach; for more on that, check this link.

  142. 142.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 12:15 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus: I defined my position.
    EDK is for free market solutions. Fixing teachers is a free market solution.
    I SAID we need to address civil rights, jobs, civil welfare and education FOR PARENTS. That is social justice. That is the theory. We need to address the practice.
    EDK and the glibertarian hivemind wanking endlessly about anti-empirical “free market” solutions is like trying to fix jobs creation by bailing the bankstahs.
    Is is simply spin and misdirection.

  143. 143.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 12:18 pm

    @Corner Stone: Someone please tell me how a young man who has no displayable credentials in the field becomes an “education” blogger at Forbes? By farming the BJ commentariat for enough stolen nuggets of sanity to dress up the endless stream of glibertarian bullshytt that Forbes pumps out.
    He got the job the same way Douthat got the NYT gig.
    A token “reasonable” voice on the right.

  144. 144.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 12:24 pm

    @cyntax: I totally agree with you….but Obama’s description of Race to the Top as a grassroots system in his education speech is just more half the loaf. It is orders of magnitude better than NCLB.
    I dont think people quite understand….NCLB has been as horrifically damaging to our education system as the 8 year Bush admin has been to our foreign policy and our economy.

  145. 145.

    Corner Stone

    March 5, 2011 at 12:25 pm

    “Race to the Top” is rebranded NCLB with a couple tweaks. The premise is the same, that teachers are the problem and need to be fixed and we can do that by further standardizing test results.

  146. 146.

    Allan

    March 5, 2011 at 12:33 pm

    @matoko_chan: Quoting Cornerstone doesn’t actually help your argument.

    Now go clean out your ear-wax with a chainsaw, you disgusting freak.

  147. 147.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 12:40 pm

    @Corner Stone: hmm….ok Im wrong ;)
    I think RtT is probably just patching NCLB now that you put it that way.
    Like COIN is just patching the Bush Doctrine.
    @Allan: relly? Cornerstone just made the same argument. How does that not support my position?

  148. 148.

    David Brooks (not that one)

    March 5, 2011 at 12:41 pm

    @Mark S.:

    That describes Brooks better than anything I’ve ever read. He gives psuedo-intellectuals a bad name.

    Hey, I resemble that remark! Apposite adumbrations, associated with pertinent polysyllablic persiflage, are quintessential elements of a coruscatingly perfervid prefuckingfrontal cortex. MitchDanielsMitchDanielsMitchDaniels.

  149. 149.

    Allan

    March 5, 2011 at 12:41 pm

    @matoko_chan: I just sent my email to John about your continued infestation of his comments. Please don’t talk about me when I’m gone, which will be until you are banned forever, or you drink a gallon of battery acid, whichever comes first.

  150. 150.

    Corner Stone

    March 5, 2011 at 12:42 pm

    @matoko_chan: Allan is saying he’s a yipping, ankle biting little Pomeranian who apparently has nothing.

  151. 151.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 12:43 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    Someone please tell me how a young man who has no displayable credentials in the field becomes an “education” blogger at Forbes?

    The same way McMegan got hired at the Atlantic. The same way Suderman got hired at Reason.
    The same way Douthat got hired at NYT.
    Need more?
    Oh…that was a rhetorical question, wasn’t it?
    ;)

  152. 152.

    Chris Grrr™

    March 5, 2011 at 12:46 pm

    I’m glad people get nth chances to rejoin the nuttery here. It’s become quite easy to skip over posts when I see certain names, but the reaction they cause is occasionally informative.

  153. 153.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 12:51 pm

    @Peter: EDK IS a free market evangelical.
    Read the fucking link.

    So look, I believe that free markets are absolutely the way to go. Don’t go with the central planners – who wants wage controls dictated from the top down?

    “Fixing” teachers is a free market solution. “Fixing” schools is a free market solution. “Fixing” students is free market solution.

  154. 154.

    Nutella

    March 5, 2011 at 1:02 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    It’s like becoming the business and economics editor of the Atlantic. Their daddies must have something on somebody important.

  155. 155.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 1:11 pm

    @kdaug: And achieved how? How to put theory into practice? Obama has pointed the way. Do you know the term bricolage?
    It means also to utilize existing structures for a new purpose, or to canabilize existing structure to make something new.
    Like Obama has done with junior colleges and the early graduation program.
    You see…not everyone needs a 4-year lib arts degree. But trade school is lower social capital. So how do you make trade school equivalent in social capital to a 4year college degree?
    Obama is bricolaging junior colleges into cool vo-tech schools….trade schools.
    Its pretty genius. That is an example of bricolaging an existing educational structure– junior colleges.
    So I would look for ways to bricolage existing structures to bootstrap parents.
    Ways to bricolage social justice. ;)
    Any suggestions?

  156. 156.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 1:15 pm

    @Nutella: not in EDKs case. He used Balloon-juice for his fake conversion narrative so he could get a token “reasonable” voice on the right position.

  157. 157.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 1:22 pm

    @kdaug: The existing structures in the American system were actually set up for free market capitalism, supported by White Patriarchy Social Cohesion Model. So those structures need to be retooled or bricolaged or cannibalized for parts to support regulated market capitialism and Social Democracy Cohesion Model.
    WPSCM crashed when blacks and women got the vote. Social Democracy has been evolving ever since.
    Social Democracy Cohesion Model is the delivery vector for social justice, where free market capitialism is the delivery vector for survival of the greediest.
    As we just witnessed in the Econopaplypse That Ate Americas Jobs.

  158. 158.

    Dr. Squid

    March 5, 2011 at 1:41 pm

    What I want to know is how Peter Cudlipp feels now that his name is being used as an insult, and by a PC cop, no less.

  159. 159.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 1:46 pm

    @Dr. Squid: its not from there.
    Cuplip is from Black Man/Thirteen.
    The book is titled Black Man in the U.K.
    Thirteen in the US, because we are racists.

  160. 160.

    polyorchnid octopunch

    March 5, 2011 at 1:56 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus: There’s a world of difference between ketchup is a vegetable in a school meal, and making sure that the parents can have a life that permits them to devote a little time actually raising their kids instead of just barely managing to house, clothe, and feed them.

  161. 161.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 1:57 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    Cole traded him front page space in return for repeatable clicks.

    I really dont think this is true…John Cole was just being Lincolnesque.
    I was very biased against EDK in the beginning, and Cole persuaded me to give him a chance.
    Eventually I realized the whole thing was a scam on EDK’s part and lost patience with the whole deal.
    But John Cole is an honestly good man.

    A drop of honey catches more flies than a gallon of gal. So with men. If you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend. Therein is a drop of honey which catches his heart, which, say what he will, is the highroad to his reason.

    It is just that EDK is not.

  162. 162.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 2:05 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus: you know Omnes, that is what the right always does. They try to deflect arguments against them by saying it is personal. And they try to destroy the character of the person making the argument like EDK saying he rejected an essay of mine and that I was a racist.
    I am saying ALL EDKs argument is glibertarian standard free market boilerplate gussied up with a fake conversion narrative.
    And EMPIRICALLY it looks like I am correct, doesn’t it?

  163. 163.

    THE

    March 5, 2011 at 2:22 pm

    As we just witnessed in the Econopaplypse That Ate Americas Jobs.

    It’s not out of the question you only experienced the first one. Brent is back above $110/bbl

  164. 164.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 2:22 pm

    /sigh

    It is always about love. I love you guys.
    This Tim F post changed my life.
    The scales fell from my eyes.
    I was a hereditary republican.
    Guns, dogs and ponyclub. The first time i voted i voted for Bush. My family had a fucking party.
    But Sarah Palin convinced me otherwise.
    I worked on Obama’s campaign as an Obamican. I was still a registered republican when I voted for him..
    I just couldn’t bear to see EDK running his shell game here week after week.
    It was unbearable.
    Sorry.

  165. 165.

    Omnes Omnibus

    March 5, 2011 at 2:38 pm

    @polyorchnid octopunch: No disagreement from me on that point.

  166. 166.

    chopper

    March 5, 2011 at 6:03 pm

    @dmsilev:

    oh jesus, that’s a flashback. and it makes absolute perfect sense.

  167. 167.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 6:21 pm

    It is always about love. I love you guys.

    I guess I should say loved.
    Once upon a time.
    ;)

  168. 168.

    matoko_chan

    March 5, 2011 at 7:00 pm

    haha.
    I cant resist this.
    Where is my hattip, you useless glibertarian wanker?

    Do you want to see how its done?
    Behold how a glibertarian turns Heckman’s social justice for early childhood poverty premise into More Glorious Free Market Solutions.

    Education is an investment, and it pays off in the long run. The more money we spend on education now, the less we spend on prisons later. A more educated populace makes more money, uses fewer government services, and pays more taxes. They also invest their money in private companies, buy more goods, and spend more money overall. Every dollar spent on education translates into two dollars of savings in prison costs alone [pdf].
    __
    It’s time to make universal pre-K education a reality. We can start small, working from the poor neighborhoods out. We could allow private preschools to become charters, and we could fund the creation of public preschools as well. The money spent now would be a generational stimulus, saving our kids billions of dollars down the road. It’s a shame the political will for this sort of investment is simply nonexistent.

    “Fix the schools” is a free market solution. That can simply never work, because the problem is parental SES and parental involvement.
    And the only fix for those problems is social justice.

  169. 169.

    thalarctos

    March 6, 2011 at 5:52 am

    @Allan: I posted this yesterday, but it doesn’t seem to have made it in. FYWP.

    I love your last sentence, and want to marry it.

  170. 170.

    E.D. Kain

    March 6, 2011 at 10:55 am

    I’m not gone. I’m just focusing more on my solo-blog.

  171. 171.

    matoko_chan

    March 6, 2011 at 11:23 am

    @E.D. Kain: then respond to my fisk, you useless glibertarian free market evangelist grifter.

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