April 2012
72 posts
“The impressive young actress Sophie Turner plays Sansa with the thousand-yard stare and flat-affect voice of an abuse victim living from beating to beating. Sansa gets a lot of grief from fans of the show and the books alike – she’s stupid, she’s insipid, she’s prissy, she’s gutless. Bullshit. She’s doing what she needs to do to survive, as the episode’s opening scene demonstrates. She instinctively plays to Joffrey’s narcissism and cruelty, convincing him to spare a drunken knight’s life while dropping enough “Your Grace”s on him to make him think it was his idea. If she’d been less courteous, like the other Starks would have been, she’d be dead.”
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Sean Collins - Rolling Stones “Game of Thrones Recap: No Man Should Have All That Power” (via fystarks)
Though let’s at least acknowledge that she (specifically in the books) compounds quite a few of her own problems of circumstance with her refusal to acknowledge the realities around her. The benefit and drawback of the books is that you get explicit understanding of the character’s thoughts and emotions.
March 2012
83 posts
Sen. Chap Peterson mulling gubernatorial bid
BY WESLEY P. HESTER
Could you soon be seeing “Chap Peterson for Governor” stickers?
Maybe.
Sen. J. Chapman “Chap” Peterson, D-Fairfax City, said Friday he is giving some serious thought to seeking the state’s top post.
“I’ve talked to some people,” he said. “It’s an open contest at this point, which makes it a little bit unique in that for the first time in several years there are no Democrats that hold a statewide Constitutional office right now.”
A member of the legislature since 2002, Peterson was elected to the Senate in 2007 after serving in the House of Delegates. In 2005, he unsuccessfully ran for lieutenant governor in 2005.
Peterson said he not yet raised any money, but has begun speaking with others about the possibility, including Terry McAuliffe.
A former Democratic National Committee chairman and businessman, McAuliffe has suggested that he, too, is seriously considering a run.
McAuliffe unsuccessfully sought the Democratic nomination for governor in 2009, losing to Sen. R. Creigh Deeds, D-Bath.
On the Republican side, Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling and Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli are expected to battle for the GOP nomination.
Peterson described himself and Cuccinelli, with whom he served in the Senate, as “friendly rivals,” which he said was “part of the attraction.”
Peterson did say he was likely to decide against a run if one of the state’s most popular political figures, U.S. Sen. Mark R. Warner, D-Va., decides to throw his hat in the ring.
He added that he might be interested in running for attorney general “depending on the circumstances.”
All I could think while reading this is that it is Petersen, not Peterson.
Also, Chap threatens publicly so that Terry backs him amongst his circles for AG, because Chap would be him like a drum in a very ugly primary that the DPVA wants to avoid. This way, everybody wins.
In Which Dumb Actions are Compounded →
dailycaller.com
Filmmaker Spike Lee tweeted the wrong home address for George Zimmerman, the Sanford, Fla., man who many are claiming should be arrested for shooting and killing Trayvon Martin. The tweet could have potentially put the woman who actually lives at that address in danger.
The Washington Times’ Kerry Picket went to the address that Lee tweeted as members of the New Black Panther Party were offering a $10,000 cash reward for Zimmerman’s capture, “dead or alive,” and others were demanding his arrest.
TSA Freaks Out, Gets Longtime Critic Bruce Schneier Kicked Off Of Oversight Hearing →
techdirt.com
TechDirt:
He didn’t get sick or have something better to do. Hell, he didn’t even miss a flight. Instead, according to Schneier, the TSA itself had him removed from the panel:
On Friday, at the request of the TSA, I was removed from the witness list. The excuse was that I am involved in a lawsuit against the TSA, trying to get them to suspend their full-body scanner program. But it’s pretty clear that the TSA is afraid of public testimony on the topic, and especially of being challenged in front of Congress. They want to control the story, and it’s easier for them to do that if I’m not sitting next to them pointing out all the holes in their position. Unfortunately, the committee went along with them.
As Tim Lee notes in reporting on this story, the TSA has done similar things in the past, and even been rebuked by Rep. Jason Chaffetz — and yet it had no problem doing it again. The fact that Schneier is a part of that lawsuit is meaningless and shouldn’t stop him from testifying at all. Schneier is a clear thorn in the side of the TSA, and if it’s so afraid of having him speak to Congress, that really says a lot about the (lack of) confidence it has in its own arguments. If you can’t stand to let a critic speak, it suggests that perhaps your own argument isn’t very strong.
Supreme Court Arguments
““This was a train wreck for the Obama administration…This law looks like it’s going to be struck down. I’m telling you, all of the predictions including mine that the justices would not have a problem with this law were wrong… if I had to bet today I would bet that this court is going to strike down the individual mandate.””
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CNN’s Jeffrey Toobin on the way the wind seems to be blowing during the Supreme Court hearings.
I think this is a bit of hyperbole, but at least hearing the audio, it is clear that Obama’s team did not have their shit together.
“Other people have spoken about this a bit, but I’m frustrated and angry when I see other white people pulling the “I am Trayvon Martin” thing, because it’s so dismissive of the real issue, which is that we’re not Trayvon Martin. None of us ever will be. We’re George Zimmerman. Even if we don’t go out and shoot kids for fun, when we allow the images in the media to perpetuate the idea that young black men are violent, when our own speech (I don’t want to talk about the conversation I had to have at lunch today) perpetuates an idea of black Americans as criminals, especially young black American men, we are accessories to murder. We are creating people like George Zimmerman. That’s on us. And it doesn’t matter if we have black friends, or black relatives, or black ancestors– that doesn’t absolve us. In fact, it’s worse when we do, and say nothing, because it’s our loved ones who are suffering and we’re not doing anything to ease that.”
—I was arrested once (via azspot)
“In the last 10 months, I’ve had five days off. Two for Thanksgiving, and three for Christmas. I’ve been working every single day. My wife and my kids, we’re just busting our tail, because we know their future and all of our childrens’ future is at stake in this election and I don’t want to be the guy who has to sit with my granddaughter, 20 years from now, and tell stories about an America where people once were free. I don’t want to have that conversation.”
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Rick Santorum (via politicalprof)
JokeExplainer: In case the irony is lost, there are quite a few people working against this man for the very same reason.
“I was stopped and questioned seven times by University police on my way into the physics building,” he says. “Seven times. Zero times was I stopped going into the gym—and I went to the gym a lot. That says all you need to know about how welcome I felt at Texas.”
—Neil deGrasse Tyson, on racism at the University of Texas, Austin (via sheikhmaat)
Face Reality, Raise Taxes →
dailynebraskan.com
It’s not 1980 anymore. Conservatives need to face facts and make tax increases part of a package to work for more balanced budgets.
