The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Our Homogenous Elite

Posted on | February 22, 2013 | 45 Comments

If you’ve spent much time around the Washington, D.C., political establishment, you know how rare it is to encounter anyone there who might be what folks down home would call “a character.” Colorful people with interesting tales to tell — and interesting ways of telling them — are not common among Capitol Hill staffers, advocacy-group administrators, think-tank “senior fellows” and so forth.

D.C. is overcrowded with straight-A students, valedictorians, and every other type of book-smart goody-two-shoes who ever got beat up for his lunch money in grade school. Even newsrooms, once a bastion of motley hell-raisers and assorted eccentrics, are relatively tame collections of apple-polishing honor students in D.C.

You only notice this, however, if you come to D.C. after having worked somewhere else. I had more than a decade of small-town journalism under my belt before I came to Washington in 1997, so I noticed the weird conformity of the place, the general sameness of background that typifies bureaucratic personalities. However, most of the apparatchik class have never worked anywhere else: They interned in D.C. while in college, came to work in Washington immediately after graduation, and therefore lack any useful perspective on what life is like outside the bubble. Megan McArdle has a long essay on the subject today:

Since I moved to Washington, I have had series of extraordinary conversations with Washington journalists and policy analysts, in which I remark upon some perfectly ordinary facet of working class, or even business class life, only to have this revelation met with amazement. . . .
Then there was the time I responded to the now-standard lament that graduates of elite schools tend to gravitate to banking and consulting by pointing out that traditional management rotation programs frequently involve less-than-glamorous stints in line jobs; one of my friends from business school ended up running a call center for a telecoms firm. Another very smart, very wonky person who I deeply respect argued that this was an idiotic misuse of an elite MBA, for both the company and the MBA. Which is just 100% wrong. It is not a waste to have a smart, well-educated person in telecoms management. And senior executives at a telecom should have run a call center, or done something very similar: that’s where you learn to understand your customers, and the core challenges of your business.
But many of the mandarins have never worked for a business at all, except for a think tank, the government, a media organization, or a school–places that more or less deliberately shield their content producers from the money side of things. There is nothing wrong with any of these places, but culturally and operationally they’re very different from pretty much any other sort of institution. I don’t myself claim to understand how most businesses work, but having switched from business to media, I’m aware of how different they can be. . . .

Read the whole thing, because if she hasn’t hit the nail squarely on the head, Megan has certainly come very close to capturing the nature of the strange insularity in environments where, unless you have a certain degree from one of a handful of super-elite schools, don’t even bother applying. In other words, if you weren’t on the academic fast-track by seventh grade, or if at any time since seventh grade you stepped off the treadmill of hyper-achievement, there are certain positions which no amount of native smarts or hard work — or even any of the manipulative strategic-friendship tactics euphemistically called “networking” — can ever enable you to reach. If you didn’t graduate from Harvard/Yale/Princeton and land a certain job right out of school . . . Well, you can’t get there from here.

And this explains the homogeneity: All of the people in elite environments got there by jumping through the same set of hoops, and this has the effect of eliminating non-conformists.

Back in the day when Megan McArdle wrote for The Atlantic Monthly, I pointed out that she was practically the only one there who didn’t have Harvard on her resumé. Her background is Penn and U. Chicago, both top-notch schools, but . . . not Harvard.

IYKWIMAITYD.

Look, most people would think of a D.C.-based journalist like Dave Weigel as a certified member of the elite. Weigel attended Northwestern University, which has a highly-regarded journalism school and where annual tuition is $43,380. And yet, by D.C. standards, Weigel is a blue-collar plebian. He didn’t go to an Ivy League school, and thus is unlike Matthew Yglesias (Harvard), Ross Douthat (Harvard), and Josh Marshall (Princeton). Perhaps the greatest mystery in D.C. journalism is how Ezra Klein became godfather of the Juice Box Mafia despite having attended lowly UCLA.

Is the homogeneity of the elite a problem? Is there anything, policy-wise, that can or should be done to remedy it?

Well, as a proud alumnus of Jacksonvile (Ala.) State University, it would be an honor to be asked to address such lofty questions by anyone in a position to pay me to answer it, or who might have the influence to give my answer any practical effect. As it is, however, answering the Big Picture questions is above my pay-grade, and it would be ridiculously pretentious for me to think otherwise.

What I can do is to describe the situation, or at least call your attention to those who describe it as well as does Megan McArdle:

As I say, the mandarins are in many senses deserving: they work very hard, and they are very smart. But there is one important thing they do not know, which is what it is like to be anyone except a mandarin. . . .
[T]he people entering journalism, or finance, or consulting, or any other “elite” profession, are increasingly the children of the children of those who rocketed to prosperity through the postwar education system. A window that opened is closing. The mandarins are pulling away from the rest of America. . . .

Like I said, read the whole thing. (Annual tuition at Penn is $39,088.)

 

Category: Education

The Country’s in the Very Best of Hands

Posted on | February 22, 2013 | 9 Comments

Good thing there aren’t any criminals to investigate:

It sounds like the plot of a bad movie: bugging your boss’ office. Sending naked photos around to co-workers. Sexting in the office. Paying for sex in a massage parlor.
But it all happened in the federal agency whose motto is “fidelity, bravery, integrity” — the FBI.
These lurid details are outlined in confidential internal disciplinary reports obtained by CNN that were issued to FBI employees as a way to deter misconduct.

Via Memeorandum.

Category: Crime

It’s Internet Crazy Day: Special Ironic Menendez ‘Healthy Youth’ Edition

Posted on | February 22, 2013 | 11 Comments

OK, I spent most of this morning exchanging e-mails with various suffering victims of the Butt-Hurt Epidemic that is laying waste to the online world today. If anybody has personal contact info for Bono, I think there should be a special all-star TV concert.

It’s For the Children™ — won’t someone think of the children?

The good news: I heard from the kid with the bad haircut and I think he’s going to be all right, having survived the sarcasm hate crime.

The bad news: Internet Hall Monitor Kurt Eichenwald unfortunately suffered a sudden and mysterious spasm of self-righteousness, and may be on his way to the kind of laughingstock status that typically involves becoming the subject of a Downfall parody.

Meanwhile — back in the world of politics, which is what this blog is allegedly all about — there is urgent news from Capitol Hill:

The Real Education for Healthy Youth Act would expand comprehensive sex education programs in schools, while ensuring that federal funds are spent on “effective, age-appropriate and medically accurate” programs. . . .
Sens. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Al Franken (D-Minn.), Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) and Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) are co-sponsoring the bill, as well as 35 House members.

This stunning news has made headlines:

Show Me on the Doll Where I Touched You.
Slowly. Make it Hot: Bob Menendez Sponsoring
Comprehensive Sex Education Bill

Expert further updates on the escalating madness. Did I mention that somebody filed a peace order against Bill Schmalfeldt?

 


Category: Democrats, Fear. Loathing., humor, Rule 4, Scandal, Sex

Inconvenient History: Jackie Robinson Was A Republican?

Posted on | February 22, 2013 | 15 Comments

by Smitty

Hip Hop Republican points to Jackie Robinson, the baseball great who at least started off as a Republican:

Jackie Robinson is remembered for breaking the color barrier in Major League Baseball, but he played a less heralded role in Republican politics and black community activism. Robinson was a vital voice of reason in the early ‘60’s as the black liberation movement in the urban north grew more radicalized. He struggled to preserve an older, conservative vision of social progress against a wave of left-wing extremism.
In his biography, Robinson described what drew him to Republican politics:

“I believed blacks ought to become producers, manufacturers, developers and creators of businesses, providers of jobs. For too long we had been spending too much money on liquor while we owned too few liquor stores and were not even manufacturing it.

Read the whole thing.

Wikipedia notes he veered left later:

Robinson was angered by conservative Republican opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. He became one of six national directors for Nelson Rockefeller’s unsuccessful campaign to be nominated as the Republican candidate for the 1964 presidential election. After the party nominated Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona instead, Robinson left the party’s convention commenting that he now had “a better understanding of how it must have felt to be a Jew in Hitler’s Germany”. He later became special assistant for community affairs when Rockefeller was re-elected governor of New York in 1966. Switching his allegiance to the Democrats, he subsequently supported Hubert Humphrey against Nixon in 1968.

What can we learn from this? I’m by no means a scholar of the details, but it sure seems that, when adhering to basic conservative principles, the GOP succeeds, and when it gets caught up in the elitist stereotypes played to such great effect by the Obama campaign in 2012, the GOP gets whacked.

Update: more at Grand Old Partisan.

Category: Republicans

Never Doubt That Kurt Eichenwald Cares Deeply About Gay Kids With Bad Haircuts

Posted on | February 22, 2013 | 34 Comments

Thursday I posted a “coming out” video by a mopey kid with a bad haircut. This evidently enraged a Vanity Fair writer:

Thu, February 21, 2013 7:38 PM
From: KURT EICHENWALD <[email protected]>
To: Chris Smith <[email protected]>; “[email protected]” <[email protected]>
Subject: you are both despicable

I will address you both as adults, even though you clearly are not. The fact that you could use your site to make fun of an abused, frightened teenager is the most abhorrent thing I have ever seen by supposed “professional” commentators. Your decision that this kid was a fake was the type of arrogance I would expect to see from a 5th grader, not an adult. If you have nothing better to do than direct derision and contempt towards a child, then maybe you should stop pretending you are anything more than bullies who have nothing better to do with their lives.
You deserve all of the contempt possible. And hopefully, you will pay a price for your arrogance and immaturity.
Kurt Eichenwald

Not content with that, he followed up with this:

Thu, February 21, 2013 8:01 PM
Re: you are both despicable
From: KURT EICHENWALD <[email protected]>
To: Chris Smith <[email protected]>; “[email protected]” <[email protected]>
Oh, and by the way, you immature bastards….
I have invited my 7,000 twitter followers to contact your advertisers and demand they stop advertising with your site. And they’re doing it.
Have a nice life. You bastards.

Well, this was certainly a charming introduction to Kurt Eichenwald, and he is a man of his word, because a few hours later, one of our advertisers forwarded to me this e-mail:

Subject: your add on a hate site
Date: Thu, 21 Feb 2013 20:00:11 -0600
From: KURT EICHENWALD <[email protected]>
To: [REDACTED]
You are currently advertising on a site called http://theothermccain.com. In the last two days, these “adults” took a youtube video of a young gay teen who was both coming out and revealing abuse he has been suffering at the hands of his mother and not only made fun of him (for his haircut!), but invited their followers to do the same. The followers happily complied. This site does not represent your values. Moreover, this child is clearly depressed and discussed the times he considered suicide. If the torment of these “adults” on this site contributes to the boy acting on those feelings, you would not want to have any connection to it.
Many thanks.
Kurt Eichenwald
Contributing Editor
Vanity Fair
914-552-2588

The advertiser, in forwarding the note, remarked that she is “a former socialist turned conservative” who is not intimidated by Eichenwald’s secondary boycott threat, which looks for all the world like a re-play of the “Stop Rush” operation.

A lot of people are probably wondering, “Who the hell is Kurt Eichenwald?” You can consult his Wikipedia entry. His biggest controversy was a story about a teenage boy running a pornography site, in which Eichenwald reportedly paid money to the site operator and . . . something about “ethics”:

Mr. Eichenwald wrote several articles on Mr. Berry and Internet child pornography, the first of them published in The Times on Dec. 19, 2005.
“I have no independent memory of any payments I am alleged to have made in June 2005 through PayPal,” he said in a written statement yesterday. “If these PayPal payments did occur in June 2005, I am deeply sorry that my inability to remember them has resulted in permitting a series of convicted felons to cast doubt on the nature of my wife’s and my efforts to save a young man who was caught in the grip of a cycle of drugs and abuse.”
He has said he gave the $2,000 payment not as a reporter but as a person concerned that Mr. Berry was in danger from sexual predators. It was a month later, he has said, that he began to pursue the young man’s story as a journalist.
He did not disclose the financial connection to his editors while working on the articles, and Mr. Eichenwald has said that he simply forgot it.

Hey, people forget things. It happens.

As to the post that led Eichenwald to write to our advertisers, describing this as a “hate site,” I’ll say: Somebody called that video to my attention and I watched it — or, I should say, I tried to watch it, before giving up — and my main reaction was, “What’s with that haircut?” 

The thought occurred to me that (a) the kid is basically inviting everybody to attend his pity party, and (b) our sarcastic commenters were likely to say rude things about him.

The video already had nearly 20,000 views in barely a week and — in case this didn’t cross anybody else’s mind — that translates to a bit of YouTube advertising revenue for young Austin Gates. So he’s like a professional pity-party event planner or something.

Are his tales of abuse and suicidal thoughts true? Has anyone verified his story? “If your mother says she loves you, check it out,” but if a kid says his mother hates him, don’t bother, eh?

Habitual cynicism, that’s my problem. Having been a teenage hoodlum myself, I see a video like that and instantly think: “Scam.”

Kid’s probably hustling contributions to buy himself some weed. Or maybe he’s angling for a guest spot on daytime TV talk shows, maybe even a reality TV series deal. For all we know, the minute the video ended, Austin Gates was high-fiving his buddies: “How was that, huh? Did you like that whiny thing I did at the end about suicide? Hey, man, fire up the bong and let’s burn some buds.”

We’re not supposed to think that way anymore, I guess. It’s “bullying” to see a mopey kid and say, “Stop moping — and get a haircut!”

One of my sons is in Army basic training now. He called home last night and reported that he was one of only two men in his platoon to qualify on their first day at the rifle range. Before it’s over with, he’ll be expected to hike 12 miles in full gear. And . . .

Kurt Eichenwald wants to shut down our advertisers. Because we’re a “hate site.” Maybe I should start moping and threaten suicide, but I’m not a gay boy with a bad haircut, so I guess Kurt Eichenwald probably wouldn’t be interested in my feelings.

IYKWIMAITYD.

Damn that habitual cynicism . . .

UPDATE: The habitually feisty Kathy Shaidle:

Progressives live in the past.
They still think their bullying tactics work, especially their Selma-era “I’m gonna start a boycott against you” bullshit.
The same tired, tapped out bullshit that doubled Glenn Beck’s net worth in 12 months.

If you’re not following Kathy Shaidle on Twitter, you should. She’ll fight ’em ’til hell freezes over, then she’ll fight ’em on the ice. Also, this might be a good time for readers hit the tip jar. 





 

Category: Gays, Journalism

LIVE AT FIVE: 02.22.13

Posted on | February 22, 2013 | 2 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho


TOP NEWS
Obama, Congressional GOP Look To Soften Impact of Budget Cuts

One agency most Americans won't mind seeing cuts to

One agency most Americans won’t mind seeing cuts to

President finally picks up phone to seek help

Vegas Strip Shootings Put City’s Image In The Crosshairs
Five violent incidents since January; LVPD warns of increased crime on the Strip

Officials Analyze Water In Tank Where Missing Canadian Tourist’s Body Found
“Do not drink” order issued for L.A.’s Cecil Hotel after Elisa Lam’s corpse found in cistern



POLITICS
Big Business, Big Labor Agree On Immigration Principles

If Chuck U. Schumer is smiling, you know it's going to be bad...for you.

If Chuck U. Schumer is smiling, you know it’s going to be bad…for you.

Chamber of Commerce, AFL-CIO reach agreement on importation of low-skilled workers

Former Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice And Her Two Sisters Convicted On Corruption Charges

Democrat Mayor Breaks Ranks, Endorses Christie For Governor

Hampton Roads, Va. Braces For Defense Cuts

Texas Bill Would Block Police From Enforcing Federal Gun Laws

GOP Senators Call On Obama To Withdraw Hagel Nomination

Mitt Romney To Address CPAC

Army Puts Kibosh On Broadwell’s Promotion



THE ECONOMY, STUPID
Oil Tumbles On Poor U.S. Jobs Data, Weak Demand, Fall In Eurozone Manufacturing Activity: NYMEX $93.21, Brent $114.14
Japan’s Economic Turmoil May Open Door To Free Trade Pact
Bond Market, White House Disagree On U.S. Economy
HP’s 1Q Net Slips 16%, Still Tops Forecasts
Jobless Claims Jump 20K To 362K
Mortgage, Deposit Rates Go Their Separate Ways
Ford Investing $200 Million To Build Turbocharged Engines In Cleveland
Google’s Pixel Chromebook A Delight For Microsoft
Norks To Switch On Mobile Internet For Foreigners
Foxconn Puts Hold On Hiring, Cuts iPhone 5 Production
Over 100,000 Sign White House Petition To Legalize Mobile Phone Unlocking
NBC Website Hacked, Infected With Citadel Trojan
Microsoft Cooler Than It Used To Be, Say Half Those Polled



SPORTS
Brad Keselowski Shares His Vision For NASCAR’s Future

Brad K has a few things to say

Brad K has a few things to say

Reigning Sprint Cup champ details dramatic changes he’d like to see

A New Start For The Red Sox

“Small Ball” Leads To Big Win As Heat Scorches Bulls 86-67

Blue Jackets Rally To Tip Wings 3-2

#23 Ducks Fall To Golden Bears 48-46

Rangers Fall 3-2 To Senators

Knicks Offer Veteran Kenyon Martin A Ten-Day Deal After Trading Brewer To Thunder

Horton Scores Twice As Bruins Beat Lightning

#6 Duke Trounces Virginia Tech 88-56

Pudge Rejoins Nationals As Special Assistant To GM Rizzo



FAMOUS FOR BEING FAMOUS
Taylor Swift Channels Beyonce At Brit Awards

Taylor Swift and Beyonce

Taylor Swift and Beyonce

Busts some familiar moves as well as (unsuccessfully) aping the look

Josh Brolin, Diane Lane Divorcing

Kate Hudson Flaunts Her Legs

Wiz Khalifa, Amber Rose Welcome Baby Boy

Rihanna Celebrates Her 25th In Hawaii With Chris Brown

Mila Kunis And Ashton Kutcher Moving In Together

Octomom: I Can Get Stoned And Take Care Of 14 Kids!

Courtney Stodden Turns Down “Reality” Video Remake Offer From Adult Website

“Most Sadistic Reality Show Of The Decade” Is Back

Wheelchair-Bound Lady Gaga Tweets Thanks To Fans For Helping Her Through Hip Surgery



FOREIGNERS
Japan’s Popular PM Heads For Washington
Guatemala: Drug Lord “El Chapo” Guzman Dead?
Fourteen Dead, Hundreds Injured In Hyderabad Bombings
Friends, Roommate Thought Pistorius And Steenkamp Were Happy
Huge Car Bomb Near Baath Party HQ In Damascus Kills 60
Former PM Hariri Blasts Lebanese Government For Silence On Hezbollah Involvement In Syria
Three Indian Girls Aged 6-11 Raped, Murdered And Thrown Down Well
Palestinians Clash With Security Forces In West Bank
French, Malian Troops Eject Jihadis From Gao City Hall
Berlusconi Surge Evokes Recurring Nightmares For Italian Left
Venezuelan Government Reports Chavez’ Health Not Improving



BLOGS & STUFF
Troglopundit: Is Danica Patrick Sexist?
Althouse: New Ad Includes Laura Bush, Colin Powell, And Dick Cheney Supporting Gay Marriage
Jon Huntsman: Marriage Equality Is A Conservative Cause
Allahpundit: New GOP Sequester Plan – Let Obama Decide What To Cut
Yuval Levin: The Sequester In Proportion
Andrew Stuttaford: A Tax By Another Name
Weasel Zippers: Obama – Helping Rich The Only Thing Binding GOP Together
Hit & Run: Gun Expert Joe Biden Advises His Wife To Illegally Discharge A Shotgun
Sense Of Events: Dem Lawmaker Promotes Weapens
Not a typo
Atlas Shrugs: Christian Priests In Egypt Told To Convert To Islam Or Face Death
Vox Popoli: Which Is Worse, Work Or Rape?
James Taranto: The Fallows Principle
Jihad Watch: Three UK Muslims Convicted Of Plotting Mass Murder Bigger Than 9/11, 7/7
NRO Corner: Rick Scott’s Big Reversal
National Review: War On Women 2.0
Weekly Standard Blog: Lindsey Graham Proposes National ID Card, “The Public’s Way Of Contributing”


Category: Live at Five

Improv Actress With BFA Degree in Theatre — or Sex Education Expert?

Posted on | February 21, 2013 | 35 Comments

Apparently, it’s not an either/or choice. The qualifications to become a “sex education expert” seem to be pretty flexible, so that studying acting in college (along with such experiences as writing novels and hiking in Spain) will suffice as credentials.

What inspired this discovery was an article by Katie McHugh of The College Fix about “I Heart the Female Orgasm,” a special event that Alleghany College hosted in the school’s Ford Chapel:

The two sex educators, Marshall Miller and Kate Weinberg, talked students through a variety of masturbation techniques during the event.
“Sometimes it can be difficult finding your G spot by yourself, because it involves inserting a finger or fingers inside the vagina into the front wall of the body, and that kind of results in an awkward, kind of clawlike hand position,” Weinberg said, demonstrating with a pawing motion as the audience giggled. “Obviously, there are better ways you can position your body. Or if you’ve got a partner, you can get your partner to insert their finger or fingers inside your vagina in the front wall of your body in a sort of a J curve.” . . .
In statements to The College Fix, the college’s chaplain defended the event’s location, calling its theme “responsible,” and a campus spokesperson said it offered a “great message.” . . .
“Some people figure out masturbation and orgasm as teenagers, some people figure it out later than that,” said Weinberg, describing her lifelong fascination with pleasuring herself. “And some people figure it out earlier than that. Like preschool age. I was part of that last category.” . . .
Weinberg later held up two books titled I’ll Show You Mine and Petals, encouraging students to flip through them after the program: “We’ve got two amazing books up here with pages and pages of art photographs of vaginas and vulvas.”
The event was hosted by Allegheny’s student government and Allegheny College’s Reproductive Health Coalition, along with Young Feminists and Queers and Allies. It was funded by student activities fees.

All-righty, then.

You can read the entire article at The College Fix, and there are a lot of angles worth considering about this story, but one of those gut-hunch impulses prompted me to wonder, Exactly who is this Kate Weinberg person? I mean, besides being someone who’s been diddling herself since “preschool age.” Well . . .

Kate Weinberg
Kate graduated from DePaul University in Chicago. She describes a “lightbulb moment” she had while taking an intensive HIV/AIDS course in college, when she realized how sexuality “is a thing so intimately connected to politics, religion, guilt, expectation, Kate Weinbergthe ways in which we live and are allowed to live. It’s one of those things that seems to explain the world around it.” Little did she know at that moment, but she had begun her journey toward becoming a sex educator.
In addition to reading nearly every sexuality book she could get her hands on, Kate trained as a teacher of the Our Whole Lives comprehensive sex education program for adults and college students, and now teaches sex education workshops for inner-city youth through a Newark, NJ nonprofit. She’s a certified yoga instructor and the author of an acclaimed young adult novel. Kate lives in Brooklyn, NY, and has long wished that she could be a mermaid. She co-presents our Female Orgasm program.

OK: “DePaul University . . . young adult novel . . . Brooklyn.”

Keep those reference points in mind, because Google turns up more than one result for Kate Weinberg:

Kate Weinberg grew up in exotic Baltimore, Maryland. She Mid-Westernized at the tender age of seventeen to study acting at The Theatre School at DePaul University in Chicago, as well as feed her burgeoning interests in poetry, improvisational comedy, and the visual arts. In 2009, she walked across the north of Spain and ate lots of cheese sandwiches on hard bread despite her body’s cruel intolerance to lactose, worked on farms in Spain and Ireland, moved to Brooklyn, and refused to eat a cheese sandwich ever again. She has published a few weird little poems using her real name, and a Young Adult novel under the opaque, gauzy disguise of a top-secret pen name, and is a firm believer in the power of impromptu, improvisational dance and song, as well as road trips, to unite all the world in peace.

Same person, right? But no reference to her enthusiasm for sex education, and why? Because this is from her profile as an instructor at the 2012 Vermont Governor’s Institute of Art, a “2 week intensive program for high school students.” And here is Kate Weinberg in the 2011 cast of the improvisational show Tambourine at the Magnet Theater in New York:

Kate Weinberg grew up in Baltimore and received her BFA in acting from DePaul University in Chicago, where, additionally, she messed up a lot in an African Dance class she had to take, had a really creepy landlord, and studied at IO. She has worked at an outsider art museum, walked across Spain, published some poems, written a novel for young adults, and also likes to draw weird naked bird-ladies and make shrinky-dink jewelry. She is so grateful for the very wonderful, welcoming Magnet community, and for every teacher, performer, and audience member she has had the chance to encounter as a result of its stunning, stellar, gorgeous existence.

So, two years ago, Kate Weinberg was performing in an improv troupe, last year she was teaching theater to high school kids in Vermont, and this year, she’s teaching a female orgasm seminar to college students in Pennsylvania!

Busy and versatile performer, this young Ms. Weinberg and, in addition to her “young adult novel” (which became “acclaimed” rather recently it seems), she’s adept at writing the quirky/clever type of autobiographical profile of herself.

You’re probably asking yourself, “With her busy career as an actress — and also the novel-writing, hiking in Spain and so forth — how did Kate ever find time to train as a teacher of the Our Whole Lives comprehensive sex education program”?

Does the phrase “three-day weekend” ring a bell?

Yep: That’s how long it takes to undergo the training sessions for “Our Whole Lives,” a program of the United Church of Christ.

This is the kind of top-notch expertise student fees at Alleghany College were paying for, and you’ll probably not be surprised that the organization that brings the highly-qualified Kate Weinberg to campus has also provided similar services for dozens of colleges and universities, from Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College (Tifton, Ga.) to Worcester State University in Massachusetts.

Can you say Higher Education Bubble, boys and girls? Good.

One more thing, kids: If you’re in college and don’t know what a vagina looks like, you’re probably too stupid to be in college.

 

Category: Education, Sex

Grief Tends Not To Transmit Far

Posted on | February 21, 2013 | 8 Comments

by Smitty

Jerry makes a good point here:

It’s interesting to note where priorities lie for people. I clearly recall after my brother passed away unexpectedly last year feeling not a little anger toward those too self-preoccupied to express condolences even after having been directly notified about what was happening. I also heard from more than a few conservative new media types that I needed to “get over it” and was grieving far too much whenever I mentioned this. Such individuals make this whole forgiveness thing quite the challenge, but it’s a work in progress.

I’ll link this post by way of apologizing for being in the “too pre-occupied” category last September when he wrote it. I recall that we’d made a trip to Germany around then, and were just back. I (looking at YouTube uploads) that I was over at LibertyCon around then.

But the excuse “I was too busy” isn’t really the point. No, the real issue is that, in the detached online world, working up significant emotion for unmet people is a Hard Thing. One’s immediate family, co-workers, members of the community of faith: when they pass, we’re moved. Heroes, statesman (that dwindling breed), artists: when they go, we write a blog post.

For people I haven’t met or don’t know of, genuine emotion just isn’t there. Sure, there is the general honor afforded all veterans, and the comfort of knowing that those of faith may be encountered in the next world. But in a firehose of online information, things like Benghazi draw the attention. The sheer volume of data moving through makes being online a “best effort” endeavor at best, short of contractual obligation.

To our detriment. The Internet was supposed to be a digital utopia, helping the truth get out, and allowing time to focus on Important Matters. Well, that didn’t happen. Jerry, I’m sorry your brother passed, and further sorry about the slow reaction. I’m not sure how the overall situation can be improved.

Category: Uncategorized
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