the blog quebecois

Toronto Star:

Polling and journalism, particularly political journalism, have a lot in common.

Both enjoyed huge surges in prestige, as well as income, in the 1970s and 1980s, when the trades began to be viewed as professions.

And that's about as much as I can take from the likes of Susan Delacourt, who is a hardbitten practitioner of the oldest profession of the bunch.

Offbeat Empire:

Increasingly, I've started recognizing this kind of behavior for what it is: privilege-checking as a form of internet sport. It's a kind of trolling, with all the politics I agree with, but motivations and execution that turns my stomach. It's well-intended (SO well-intended), but when the motivations seem to be less about opening dialogue about the issues, and more about performance, righteousness, and intolerance for those who don't agree with you… well, I'm not on-board.

This is where it starts to feel like the "GOD HATES FAGS!" sign-wavers. While the political sentiments are exactly opposite, the motivations are remarkably similar: I WOULD LIKE TO DERAIL THIS CONVERSATION AND HAVE AS MANY PEOPLE AS POSSIBLE WITNESS HOW RIGHT I AM. I don't care if your politics are progressive and your focus is on social justice: if you're shouting at people online and refusing to have a dialogue, you're bullying. I don't care if you're fighting the good fight: your methods are borked. It doesn't matter if you're fighting for the one true phrase that we should all use to describe the Romani people, or fighting for the one true God… if you're fighting in a way that's more about public performance, shaming, and righteousness, I'm not fighting with you.

Daniel Greenfield:

The Nazi propaganda rag Der Sturmer may have gone out of publication around the time that the Fuhrer's ashes were smoldering in his bunker beneath the Wilhelmstrasse, but its motto is present today in almost every liberal newspaper in the Western world. Der Sturmer's daily invocation of "Die Juden sind unser Unglück!" or "The Jews are our misfortune!" is omnipresent in the media coverage of almost anything involving the Middle East or Islamic terrorism.

The theme is much the same now as it was then, the Jews are responsible for all our problems. The presentation is of course much more subtle, but then Der Sturmer was considered vulgar even by much of the Nazi hierarchy, which preferred the more staid Völkisch Observer. Today's papers prefer to be in the Observer mode, the Storming they leave to the "plausible deniability" blogs of an Andrew Sullivan or a Glenn Greenwald, material that they pay for, but like a lot of the Nazi hierarchy and Der Sturmer, don't necessarily want to be too closely associated with.

This was written a couple of years ago, but plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose, as we Froggies say.

What would happen if you exploded a nuclear bomb in the eye of a hurricane? Would the storm cell be immediately vaporized?

—Rupert Bainbridge (and hundreds of others)

This question gets submitted a lot.

It turns out the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration—the agency which runs the National Hurricane Center—gets it a lot, too. In fact, they’re asked about it so often that they’ve published a response.

I recommend you read the whole thing, but I think the last sentence of the first paragraph says it all:

“Needless to say, this is not a good idea.”

It makes me happy that an arm of the US government has, in some official capacity, issued an opinion on the subject of firing nuclear missiles into hurricanes.

Hey kids! Unfortunately Mr. Science couldn't make it today, so we'll have to make do with Randall Munroe, a guy with a degree in physics, better known as the creator of xkcd.

The Onion:

BURLINGTON, VT—Despite his staunch opposition to the National Rifle Association and U.S. military operations in Afghanistan, peace activist Paul Robinson conceded Monday that the Barrett .50 caliber sniper rifle is "pretty damn cool."

"Look, I realize that the use of this instrument of destruction, even in wartime, is morally reprehensible, and I don't see how anyone with a conscience could justify owning one," said Robinson, 31, a University of Vermont graduate student in sociology and president of the campus chapter of Amnesty International. "But you have to admit, it's pretty wild to think that it's capable of throwing a half-inch bullet into a man-sized target 1,500 meters away."

Robinson first became aware of the high-powered, exceptionally accurate weapon in 1995 while researching U.S. military involvement in Somalia, which he protested while pursuing a masters degree at Bates College.

"While gathering data for a petition letter condemning U.S. policy in Somalia, I was appalled to learn that the Special Forces were using a gun called the Barrett M82A1 to take out trucks from a mile away," Robinson said. "A friggin' mile. Can you imagine?"

Last week, a guilt-ridden Robinson bought a copy of Guns & Ammo containing an article titled "The Guns Of Black Hawk Down," which prominently featured the Barrett.

"It's a big gun, the Barrett," said Robinson, leafing through the article. "It's about five feet long and weighs almost 30 pounds. It fires the largest widely available cartridge in the world—a machine-gun bullet, really. It can empty a 10-round magazine as fast as you can pull the trigger. And thanks to its ingenious dual-chamber muzzle brake, gases are vented away, and the user feels no more recoil than you get with a 12-gauge shotgun. Not that anyone should know what the recoil feels like on any gun."

I don't know who Mastodon is and I doubt I'll be buying their latest album (or any of them, now that I think about it), but I plan to start my own Norwegian death-metal band (tentative name: Ölaf ünd th' Ümläuts) next Thursday and I'm pleased to announe that I've already found my drummer, this chick. (Or whatever other stage name she prefers.)

So you Keith Moon wannabe losers can stop with the audition tapes already. This Chick has got the gig.

Mark Steyn:

In the American republic, even the dogs cost more. The Queen is a famous corgi lover and has been breeding them since she was a young girl. Now in her late 80s she’s slowing down and only keeps four. The president has one pooch, a photo-op accessory called Bo, who unlike the corgis requires a full-time handler. In contrast to the stingy remuneration offered by the royal household, the presidential dog-walker is one of 226 White House staff earning over $100,000 a year. For many centuries, the King had a courtier whose somewhat intimate duties were reflected in his title: the Groom of the Stool, a position abolished in 1559. Now, after two and a third centuries, the American presidency has evolved to the point that it has a full-time six-figure Groom of the Canine Stool. Will he be accompanying the president on Air Force One to liaise with the Keeper of the Privy Flatscreen over screenings of Lassie?

I'll be heading out of town for the festivities, so let me wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, in which I hope to make my return, regardless of how you feel about it.