The Runcible Blog

Last night I watched Lake of Fire, a fascinating (if long-winded) documentary about the abortion debate in America. I don't want to say much about the film except that even though perhaps more screen time was given to pro-life activists, the pro-choice intellectuals definitely had more thoughtful and thought-provoking stances on the issue. Only Nat Hentoff had what seemed to be a pro-life argument based not on religion. Because the abortion debate in America has as much or more to ......
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This is a real message that was forwarded to me. From: xxxxxxx@xxxx.com Date: Aug 7, 2007 6:50 AM Subject: Fwd: Fw: Disturbing Information????????????? lets vote thm out they take starting jobs and are getting our ssi benefits if they want to benefit from citizen ship then let them become americans like u and every immagrant that came to america learned english my daughter volunteers her time to teach english to immagrants now this is america the offcial language should be ......
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What are the qualities of a successful progressive movement or leader? Last week I sent this video of a Henry Rollins rant to Albert, the resident conservative at work. He asked if Rollins was the "liberal Michael Savage," and I think that perhaps his style is similar. And yet, I don't think he's worth listening to, even if I do often agree with what he says. I started thinking about why Rollins doesn't resonate with me, which lead me to ......
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I wandered around the mall for an hour and a half specifically to photograph the spectacle of "black friday", only to leave the building without a single photo. Fully aware of the legal grey-area that is mall photography, I didn't want to shoot indiscriminately. I spent some time looking for visuals that would describe the shopping phenomenon and silently condemn such crass consumerism. Surely I'd be able to find an example at the Cambridgeside Galleria. But then something hit me. ......
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When people assess a past experience, they pay attention above all to two things: how it felt at the peak and whether it got better or worse at the end. A mild improvement—even if it's an improvement from "intolerable" to "pretty bad"—makes the whole experience seem better, and a bad ending makes everything seem worse. From a recent New Yorker article on the economy....
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That dark gaping hole used to contain my $150 car stereo.  I approached my car one morning to find both front doors unlocked, and my Alpine CD player efficiently removed from the dashboard.  The thieves stole nothing else except for the Prince CD that was still inside the stereo.  I wondered why they didn't just take the whole car.  I wondered why they'd bother to steal a fairly boring stereo but not take the extra few minutes to swipe my "Steely ......
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