Last year Maggi cook was an activist, now she is a blogger and she was kind enough to talk to me again:
You can find the rest of my field guide here. Her blog the Madison project is here
Archive for the ‘internet/free speech’ Category
DaTechGuy’s Field Guide to Bloggers Maggi Cook
Posted: February 9, 2011 by datechguy in blogs, internet/free speech, short films/interviews, special eventsTags: cpac, cpac2011, datechguy's field guide to (cpac) bloggers, have fedora will travel
The comments are where the action is
Posted: February 8, 2011 by datechguy in internet/free speech, opinion/newsTags: history, irony, tolerant left
Instapundit, Stacy and Legal Insurrection and hotair headlines have all commented on this story concerning social scientists and the left:
If you want to really understand why I believe that the same elitist attitudes that caused democrats to support Slavery, Jim Crow and abortion (all three are about one group of people being better or more worthy than others) still run strong check out the comments section of the story itself:
Stuff like this:
Interesting article, but not proof of bias. There may be a selectivity effect that explains the dominance of liberals in the social sciences.
Or this:
The same “bias” would show up among physicists and other “hard” science people. Conclusions? Draw your own. Mine? Most thinking people are not very likely to be what you call “conservative”.
Or this:
there’s a bias against non-thinking people in a lot of fields.. that would mean non -liberal.
Or this:
Alternative hypothesis: closed-minded conservatives don’t make very good scientists.
All these comments were highly recommended by times readers, now lets play a game and re-write all of these comments with the words “liberal” and “conservative” replaced by “whites” and “blacks”:
Interesting article, but not proof of bias. There may be a selectivity effect that explains the dominance of “whites” in the social sciences.
The same “bias” would show up among physicists and other “hard” science people. Conclusions? Draw your own. Mine? Most thinking people are not very likely to be what you call “black“.
there’s a bias against non-thinking people in a lot of fields.. that would mean non –“whites”.
Alternative hypothesis: closed-minded “blacks” don’t make very good scientists.
Ladies and gentlemen I give you the children of Alexander Stephens and Cotton Ed Smith, the modern democratic party, same arrogance, same bigotry, different targets.
Just to put the AOL think in perspective
Posted: February 7, 2011 by datechguy in blogger for hire, blogs, business, DaTechGuy on DaRadio, internet/free speech, mediaTags: aol, arianna huffington, datechguy on daradio
Stacy McCain does the match on AOL and points out something interesting about the money in the AOL deal:
What it means, I suspect, is that the Left is willing to “invest” in liberal media ventures that are supposedly for-profit but which, in fact, lose money. Because, after all, whose money is being invested? Not theirs.
Five words: Government employee union pension funds.
That, I suggest, explains this whole deal. Private investors are now selling their AOL shares, while managers of pension funds for AFSCME, SEIU and other unions are buying AOL stock, thus providing the investment capital necessary to fund expansion of the Left’s online media presence in advance of Obama’s re-election campaign.
Belvedere notes that this is not an issue for the left:
Profit doesn’t mean much to the Committed Left — not if you mean the word in it’s classical sense [OED: ‘financial gains’]. Oh sure, they need money to fund their various schemes, but the Manic Progressives are always willing to sacrifice dollars for propaganda [see: MSNBC]. Besides, if they play it right, they can always funnel some taxpayer dollars into funding their schemes.
Broadcasting their lies relentlessly until they get absorbed by enough of the masses is a tactic the Leftists have employed successfully for a century now.
The daytime range of my radio show, looks pretty good for ads doesn't it?
Alas that is not the case, every day I’m going door to door pitching the show, extolling the range of the radio station, the strength of my guest and the appeal of my show to a growing audience, doing my best to make the sale and pay the mortgage.
The “interests” I’m beholden to are Basement Technologies of Western Mass., Aaron Pallet, Putnam Street lanes. and every other advertiser who buys time on my show. Each of them offer valuable services or produces to my listeners and buy ads on my show to attract customers. Yet ironically the left would paint me because I’m a person of the right as beholding to rich interests while at the same time they are paid millions for a product that doesn’t justify its value.
The world is a weird place.
Wishful thinking from the Ahmadiyya Muslims
Posted: February 7, 2011 by datechguy in internet/free speech, opinion/newsTags: ahmadiyya muslim community, islam in america, peacful islam, radical islam, religion
I’ve mentioned the Ahmadiyya Muslims on my blog before, they have a mosque on main street Fitchburg and march regularly in our 4th of July parade. They are good people and they certainly mean well with this effort:
“Our hope is to emphasize to our fellow Americans,” Sayed said, “that it is the religious duty of a Muslim to be loyal to the country where he resides…Number two that there are negative influences being exerted — upon especially the Muslim youth in the United States — by people like al Awlaki on the Internet and third the press pays attention to violent acts that people commit in the name of Islam….If we just sit by, more and more these extremists will take hold the banner of Islam and say this is what Islam is.”
I’m torn by this. It’s a worthy effort and a necessary one, and Islam needs reforms from within. Unfortunately many Muslims consider the Ahmadiyya’s a breakaway sect, they have been targets of terror and murder for their peaceful views. I don’t know if western support would simply marginalize them further within greater Islam.
So as I applaud their efforts I don’t have a lot of hope that we will see more of their point of view and less of this:
An Afghan physiotherapist will be executed within three days for converting to Christianity.
Said Musa, 45, has been held for eight months in a Kabul prison
and remember this is not Pakistan, this is Afghanistan!
He claims he was visited by a judge who told him he would be hanged within days unless he converted back to Islam.
But he remains defiant and said he would be willing to die for his faith.
He told the Sunday Times: ‘My body is theirs to do what they want with.
‘Only God can decide if my spirit goes to hell.’
Defence lawyers have refused to represent him, while others have dropped the case after receiving death threats.
As long as Islam is generating these headlines it will be a tough sell.
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