December 2011
82 posts
“(For the record, World Peace will cost you $49.99 at the N.B.A.’s online store.)”
– For Lakers’ Metta World Peace, a New Name and Outlook - NYTimes.com
I am kind of obsessed with Ron Artest’s name change (and whole person, really).
“Wireless Internet service was available [to journalists reporting on the Wukan...”
– Amazingly savvy “PR work” by the villagers: they utilized foreign and Hong Kong journalists to get their story out, framing and shaping it themselves, instead of letting their movement be defined from without. Also, Wong makes clear that much credit goes to Malcom Moore, of the...
Gingrich campaign to launch "Pets with Newt" →
dcdecoder:
From ABC News:
The campaign said today that it will soon launch a “Pets With Newt” site aimed at Gingrich’s love for animals, intended to show a “lighter side” of the candidate. “As speaker I made it possible for people in public housing to keep their pets in 1988. I love pets so we’re going to have an entire project,” Gingrich said….
The campaign also plans to release a music...
“Sentenced on the other crimes, he surely won’t go free / But we find he can’t be...”
– Judge J. Michael Eakin • Apparently, this Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice is known locally as the “rhyming judge” for — you guessed it — issuing judicial verdicts in verse. We love that people like this exist. (Correction: The initial post had the wrong state. Oops, sorry about that.) source...
“But Mr. Gingrich represents a new kind of Catholic, one very different from the...”
– Newt Gingrich Represents New Political Era for Catholics - NYTimes.com
This is another reason why the trendiness of Catholicism among evangelicals makes me nervous…not because I don’t have great respect and appreciation for many things about Catholicism, and think that there are many...
“Inside Wukan, in a council meeting hall, bags of rice were piled high in a...”
– Demonstrators Who Took Over Chinese Village Halt Protest - NYTimes.com
The last sentence highlights the success of the CCP’s strategy, over the last couple of decades: when it comes to corruption or unjust practices, it is the fault of the local government, not the system or of Beijing. The...
Chinese villagers agree peace deal - FT.com →
Semi-breaking news re: Wukan. Anyone else have other sources?
“There’s one other aspect to the adulation of Hitchens that’s quite revealing....”
– Christopher Hitchens and the protocol for public figure deaths - Glenn Greenwald - Salon.com
While I disagree with some of Greenwald’s points (think he lets Hitch off the hook for his obnoxiousness, when it came to atheism; also, I think kindness and generosity are good things in general, and...
#xmaslit
wwnorton:
Our Bodies, Our Elves
Nativity Son
Things Fall Apart as soon as you lose the receipt
and much much more….
English major nerd alert!
“With a recent Gallup poll indicating only 2 percent of his party supports his...”
– Huntsman Quietly Relieved To Be Polling Poorly Among GOP Voters | The Onion - America’s Finest News Source
Old but fabulous. H/t my friend Jake. Featured in the “Year in Review” on the Onion (not my friend Jake—this piece; but my friend Jake is pretty funny, and SHOULD be...
Karen Green, “With a Meek and Quiet...
“Let us not do Hitchens the injustice of wishing him eternal peace. Let’s...”
– Fors Clavigera: In Memory of Christopher Hitchens
Jamie Smith: wonderful, as always, on Hitch.
Guys, these orange cookies are pure bliss. Go make them immediately.
4 tags
ShortFormBlog: Our five favorite Fox News debate... →
shortformblog:
Siri, who’s winning this debate?Siri: “There are 7 hot dog stands near you. Here’s the directions.”#iowadebate #foxdebate
— Joe (@KDX125) December 16, 2011
Picking up from where Herman Cain left off, Rick Santorum quotes from the “Gummi Bears” theme song. #FoxDebate
—…
amazing. the hits just keep coming. wish i was watching!
Choice quote from Mark Driscoll's new book on...
invisibleforeigner:
In this season we shifted into ministry-and-family mode, neglecting our intimacy and failing to work through our issues. This became apparent to me when my pregnant wife came home from a hair appointment with her previously long hair that I loved chopped off and replaced with a short, mommish haircut. She asked what I thought, and could tell by the look on my face. She had...
“The Gospel takes away our right forever, to discriminate between the deserving...”
– Dorothy Day (via classyliving
)
"Christianity/theology/bib studies/church...
If there was such a tag or list, there are some great people I would like to alert the tumblr-sphere to. I can’t think exactly what the category would be, though: “people who are smart, awesome, quirky, in some kind of academia and also Christian”? Anyway, I have really enjoyed interacting with and getting tips from all of you guys on the internets, even though I don’t...
invisibleforeigner asked: Ok, I found it. It's in Orthodoxy. And "empirically provable" seems to just be a corruption.
“Certain new theologians dispute original sin, which is the only part of...”
– G.K. Chesterton (via invisibleforeigner)
I have always loved this quote, but didn’t know it was from Chesterton, who I am fond of calling a fascist. It’s funny, as someone who has questioned/doubted/etc., I am “orthodox” as hell when it comes to original sin, because, well,...
“This is awesome: a Mormon gambling with an evangelical over who is the biggest...”
– JON STEWART, remarking on Mitt Romney’s $10,000 wager with Rick Perry over the former’s wanton desire to provide universal healthcare, on The Daily Show.
Heh.
(via inothernews)
McSweeney’s Internet Tendency: Look, We Can Either... →
fun finals week reading, even for those of us not in law school.
Sinica Podcast: The Soul of Beijing →
Today we’re pleased to share a special live edition of Sinica recorded last Saturday at Capital-M in Beijing. Held to a standing-room only crowd, we talked all about our ongoing love-hate relationship with Beijing, and asked what on earth is happening to the city that so many of us have known since the 1980s and even earlier. As housing prices and rents soar, hutongs get ripped down and...
shortbreadsh asked: "I will tell you regarding myself that I am a child of the age, a child of nonbelief and doubt up till now and even (I know it) until my coffin closes. What terrible torments this thirst to believe has cost me and still costs me, becoming stronger in my soul, the more there is in me of contrary reasonings. And yet sometimes God sends me moments in which I am utterly at peace." -...
“We are more religiously polarized than ever. In my secular, urban and urbane...”
– Americans and God - NYTimes.com
I think this article has a lot more depth and profundity than people will likely give it credit for. I come from the background described in the first paragraph. As an adolescent, I became a Christian in the evangelical/confessional mold (Presbyterian then Anglican),...
“There are conflicting reports as to whether the two [gay penguin] parents are...”
– Gay male penguins become adoptive parents in Harbin: Shanghaiist
Amazing paragraph.
