http://b612foundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/dinosaur-cartoon-new-yorker.jpg

A deep constitutional scholar such as yourself probably already knows this:

"For more than a hundred years, the answer was clear, even if the words of the amendment itself were not. The text of the amendment is divided into two clauses and is, as a whole, ungrammatical: “A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.” The courts had found that the first part, the “militia clause,” trumped the second part, the “bear arms” clause. In other words, according to the Supreme Court, and the lower courts as well, the amendment conferred on state militias a right to bear arms—but did not give individuals a right to own or carry a weapon.

Enter the modern National Rifle Association. Before the nineteen-seventies, the N.R.A. had been devoted mostly to non-political issues, like gun safety. But a coup d’état at the group’s annual convention in 1977 brought a group of committed political conservatives to power—as part of the leading edge of the new, more rightward-leaning Republican Party. (Jill Lepore recounted this history in a recent piece for The New Yorker.) The new group pushed for a novel interpretation of the Second Amendment, one that gave individuals, not just militias, the right to bear arms. It was an uphill struggle. At first, their views were widely scorned. Chief Justice Warren E. Burger, who was no liberal, mocked the individual-rights theory of the amendment as “a fraud.”"

source: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/comment/2012/12/jeffrey-toobin-second-amendment.html

I just read the New Yorker article. Fascinating.

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/01/07/130107fa_fact_green

@ChaosEngine

Wine-tasting is mostly in our minds:


"In one test, Brochet included fifty-four wine experts and asked them to give their impressions of what looked like two glasses of red and white wine. The wines were actually the same white wine, one of which had been tinted red with food coloring. But that didn’t stop the experts from describing the “red” wine in language typically used to describe red wines. One expert said that it was “jammy,”5 while another enjoyed its “crushed red fruit.”

"Another test that Brochet conducted was even more damning. He took a middling Bordeaux and served it in two different bottles. One bottle bore the label of a fancy grand cru, the other of an ordinary vin de table. Although they were being served the exact same wine, the experts gave the bottles nearly opposite descriptions. The grand cru was summarized as being “agreeable,” “woody,” “complex,” “balanced,” and “rounded,” while the most popular adjectives for the vin de table included “weak,” “short,” “light,” “flat,” and “faulty.”"

New Yorker

>> ^ant:

>> ^FlowersInHisHair:
I love the old lady who wants to go to the cinema! She's my new FAVOURITE PERSON IN THE WORLD EVER. This week.

You would go with her and have sex?


No because I are teh gayz0r. But nearly.

Man, yeah, please.

And thank you.

Have you seen the next cover of the New Yorker?

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/culture/2012/10/cover-story-the-first-presidential-debate.html

I have been reading the comments and I am absolutely appalled.

I am so frigging naive....

In reply to this comment by dystopianfuturetoday:
*promote positive change

... Every weekend of this summer I went down to the Briton Beach area (next to Coney Island in NYC) which has a big Caspian-Russian/Ukrainian populace. Me and my friend try to arrive early in the morning in order to take full advantage of our day, because by lunchtime is when all the non-locals from other parts of the city start pouring in.

The beach is noticeably cleaner and quieter in the morning even when there are several people running about, generally getting a tan or going in for a quick swim. And as soon as 10:30am hits, locals start folding their beach towels and walk off, and you begin to see the non-locals and tourists moving in. You start to hear loud music, you hear vendors selling water and beer, cellphones and loud laughter.

Over the past few months I've noticed a major difference between beach habits of locals and non-locals, which is that non-locals usually brought big coolers filled with food and drinks, while as the locals didn't. Those who were hungry usually had some fruits or a piece of pastry in plastic bags, and left no crumbs on the sand. Meanwhile the non-locals were having a feast, opening bags of chips, fried chicken and what have you, and the seagulls start showing up.

When we arrive at the beach in the morning there were maybe 1 to 0 seagulls to be seen. In the afternoon, packs of seagulls with about 4 or 5 seagulls per pack were roaming around on different areas of the beach. Then you start hearing such complaints from these people as "Omaigawd this beach is so dirty" or "F*cking seagulls, they're everywhere!" This goes to tell you that it isn't just the seagulls that are annoying, it's the people who lack proper beach etiquette that ruin it for the rest of us. Tourists are bad, but it's mostly the non-locals coming in from other parts of the city that are the worst, because they 'think' they know the city. They mouth off the tourists coming outside of NYC, and yet to the locals of Brighton Beach, the non-local New Yorkers are the most annoying rats of all.

Anyways, don't bring food into the sand people. Goto a deli and eat it at the boardwalk or something.

Bloomberg forced New Yorkers to have dialogue.>> ^renatojj:

Fuck dialog, let's force people to understand.

Here's a simpler explanation: Bloomjerk is insane, New Yorkers are sheep.

>> ^shuac:

No apostrophe necessary in the title.


Curses, I've been caught! Thanks.

i totally agree.

i live in florida now but i came from rhode island and lived in new york and chicago and i can attest to how differently these regions deal with conflict.

in new england and new york things are dealt with pretty directly..and quickly..which is viewed by those from the south as being "rude and opinionated" but in actuality is just dealing with a possible conflict directly and getting it out of the way.
there is nothing wrong with being direct and honest if you do it with respect.

so when i moved to florida (first miami,then ft lauderdale and now tampa)i found many of the people here to be two faced and a bunch of shit-talkers but what i didnt realize is that is how the south deals with possible conflict.they can do this due to the fact that they are not living on top of each other and can allow space to let the conflict die down.

i do not agree with that philosophy and still deal with people with the direct and honest approach but having gained this newfound understanding i deal with southerners with a much more gentle touch and it has done wonders to clear up any misunderstandings.

an interesting side note:i took my buddy from the rural country of pasco county to brooklyn with me to visit family and he was amazed at how very cool and awesome the people were there.as if somehow all new yorkers were douchebags.
i had to remind him that when you have millions of people living on top of one another you better learn to get along or its gonna be a bumpy ride.

" In America, it has been, for so long now, the belief that guns designed to kill people indifferently and in great numbers can be widely available and not have it end with people being killed, indifferently and in great numbers. The argument has gotten dully repetitive: How does one argue with someone convinced that the routine massacre of our children is the price we must pay for our freedom to have guns, or rather to have guns that make us feel free?"
-Adam Gopnik (New Yorker)

I watched the first two episodes -- I really like the series. To me, its about trying to move a news show in a new direction. Not dwell on what has happened, but report on new "news." He doesn't blame the young or intend to be a crotchety old man. He genuinely cares about people and wants to report on the story.

He even talks about his "melt down," which we just watched, and how he wants to run a show. I think it is really clever. To steal a line from the show, " [we] weren't looking to right the ship, you are building a whole new one."

I'm looking at this from a worker's man view. I'm sure the ny times and new yorker won't like, but I'm okay with that. We can always change the channel. That's why I like videosift -- tons of options.

>> ^RhesusMonk:

Absolutely would. We love stuff like this and like the annual pantsless subway ride specifically because we believe stuff like this could only happen in NYC.>> ^PlayhousePals:
Musta been tourists ... surely a true New Yorker would not succumb to such blatant frivolity [would they?] =oO



Good to know =o)