The University of Chicago Welcomes the Class of 2020

And does so gloriously. Would you like to read more about the University's robust commitment to free inquiry and expression?  Of course you do!

Granted, it's kind of sad that it even has to declare something that should be obvious at a university, but in this day and age ... 

Oh, and here's a bit from the letter to incoming freshmen (or do I now have to say "freshpeople"?):

"Our commitment to academic freedom means that we do not support so called ‘trigger warnings,’ we do not cancel invited speakers because their topics might prove controversial, and we do not condone the creation of intellectual ‘safe spaces’ where individuals can retreat from ideas and perspectives at odds with their own."

Quote of the Day: Glimmers of Hope at Brown University

There are still defenders of free speech and open inquiry on campus.  As one of them just said in an interview with FIRE, if he were a university president, he would say this:

"I would make some sort of public statement—whether unprompted or prompted by one of these events—in which I said, 'This is academia and you have the right to say anything, no matter how radical it is, no matter how offensive it may seem to existing power structures. You are not required to uphold ideals held by mainstream America at all.'

Every time one of these issues came up, I would say, 'You can say here whatever you want. We can't police what you say. We can police what you do. And even though we can't police what you say, we discourage students in the strongest of terms attempting to shut down other students and we reject the notion that there are no open questions on controversial matters.'"

He then boldly slams Brown's administration for its deplorable spinelessness.  Kudos.  More of this, please.  Nobody cares much if teachers push back, but if more dissenting students do, it matters more in these ongoing and increasingly nasty campus culture wars.

Happy 2015!

Delightful Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield has a great message about optimism and the conscious resolution to do some good this year to make the world a better place:

Blood Is Thicker Than Politics

A timely reminder that humanity should > politics.

I'll Take That As A Compliment

One of my students just called me a "badass"!

High Five, Fellow Capitalist Pigs!

Thanks to free markets, over the last 20 years nearly 1 billion people have been raised out of extreme poverty.

A Brave Marine, a Beautiful Blonde, and a Sweet Reunion

Sealed with a kiss too.  I think I have something in my eye.  

From Russia With Love

Via Neatorama comes this great collection of video clips from Russian dash cams.  You know, the news lately has been so full of awful reports, so jammed with terrible people doing terrible things.  We could all use a reminder that (a) there are good people out there doing good things, and (b) we should be among them.  Pretty darn fitting for a Sunday, actually.  Enjoy some lovely video, stay positive, and go do some good, gentle reader!   (PS: Chivalry lives!)

I think I have something in my eye.

The Morning After: Arguing About the Filibuster

In the interest of fairness, here is an opposing view of yesterday's/last night's/this morning's Paulian Senate floor fireworks.  There's also this from the Economist.

I, here in the cold light of morning as opposed to the electrifying atmosphere of the filibuster as it was in progress, still think it was a good thing, by the way. According to a recent poll cited by Reason, plenty of people are concerned about drones and the abuse of power.  There's hope yet.

Here, take a look at 3 things we can take away from the filibuster.  In fact, it yields the Quote of the Day:

The filibuster succeeded precisely because it wasn't a cheap partisan ploy but because the substance under discussion - why won't the president of the United States, his attorney general, and his nominee to head the CIA explain their views on limits to their power? - transcends anything so banal or ephemeral as party affiliation or ideological score-settling.

Dare We Hope

... that somehow out of the filibuster we might get a new GOP that focuses on freedom, liberty, limited government, and American optimism?  that presents a shining vision of America in opposition to the miserable pettiness of the status quo and its power-grubbing mandarins? OHGODPLEASE.  Paul, Rubio, Cruz, et al are making me dare to hope a little.  It's terrifying and exhilarating all at once.  Let it start here with the pushback against the abuse of power.  As Rand Paul just said, this isn't about Republicans or Democrats, but about executive power and the US Constitution.

UPDATE: It's 11:40 PM, and we're all still up and a-filibusterin'.  How much longer can everyone keep going? Honey, grad students don't sleep as a matter of course.  We're in for the long haul (while doing schoolwork, natch).  (Meanwhile, I note that a bunch of other people are finally showing up on the Senate floor to jump on Paul's bandwagon.  Shamed into action, eh?  GOOD.  Do the right thing for the wrong reason, eh?  So long as the right thing gets done in a snakepit like DC.)

Tweet of the Day on Raul Paul's Filibuster Against Drones

The spectacle of Rand Paul's filibuster today (still going as I type, with 10 Senators involved now!) has been eating up the news, so I'm not going to babble much about it here other than to say that it's pretty darn awesome.  It was high time somebody poked the establishment in the eye about this.  I think you all might also appreciate this observation that just appeared via Twitter:

That awkward moment when your Nobel Peace Prize-winning President won't promise not to kill US citizens. #StandwithRand
— Jary (@Jary798) March 7, 2013

Oh, heck with it. Here's the beginning of the whole thing: 

Watch More News Videos at ABC | Technology News | Celebrity News

“I rise today to begin to filibuster John Brennan’s nomination for the CIA. I will speak until I can no longer speak. I will speak as long as it takes, until the alarm is sounded from coast to coast that our Constitution is important, that your rights to trial by jury are precious, that no American should be killed by a drone on American soil without first being charged with a crime, without first being found to be guilty by a court, that Americans could be killed in a cafe in San Francisco or in a restaurant in Houston or at their home in Bowling Green, Ky., is an abomination. It is something that should not and cannot be tolerated in our country.”

Change You Can Believe In!

Hmmmm.  Well, that is certainly some change.  Oh, and at the end ... et tu, Canada?

Meet the Biblioburro of La Gloria, Colombia

Here's the story of schoolteacher Luis Soriano, his burro, and an unusual library.  

Hey, One Journalist Who's Actually Doing His Job!

While a large number of his colleagues seem to have turned into shameless cheerleaders and boosters for the Obama campaign, here's one instance in which ABC's Jake Tapper is still doggedly doing his job.  

My darling, actually testing politicians' mendacious and self-interested claims against verifiable facts?  How delightfully quaint and old-fashioned!  My, my, you'd think Tapper still subscribes to such unfashionable ideas as journalistic integrity and disinterested analysis and actual skepticism of politicians' claims or something.  Follow him on Twitter.

Disgustingly Cute: Three Stowaways

This story is from last year, but I don't care.  The news lately has been so awful that I think we need (a) some feline cuteness as a balm, and (b) a reminder that good and decent folks live in our world too.  The attention in recent days has gone to the worst of the violent psychotics.  Please to contrast ambassador-murdering criminals with military personnel who foster lost kittens in their spare time.

Here's the story straight from one of the folks involved:

I'm Navy deployed overseas... 

We were in port a few days ago, and a cat came aboard via mooring line. We lost track of her, and found her later that evening. We managed to get her back to the pier, and waved goodbye as we took off. This cat seemed unusually upset by this... 

Turns out, in the short time she was on board, she gave birth to THREE kittens. The poor things went almost four days with no food or mommy before we found them in the machine shop. We have been bottle feeding them all day, and have already contacted local veterinary services to come check them out. 

After the initial shock of being found, and feeding, the kittens are just as happy and playful as any other cute little bugger you'd find anywhere else. They were a great boost to crew morale, and I LOVE THEM. 

I'm a sucker.

Kudos, sir!  More awwww-inducing photos here.  Know your past too, as this is just one instance in the long, long history of military personnel taking time for kittehs (see this for more photos ranging from 1888 to 1959).

Glimmers of Hope: A Student Opinion About Opinions

More of this, please.  I boldfaced my favorite part:

Bit concerned about the people saying they don’t want anyone who supports Romney to be in the Nerdfighting or Harry Potter community. That’s not really how it works. Shutting people out of communities, for one, implies that the way you think is the only thing that matters, which isn’t really a community if you think about it. I understand why people are reacting in that way because I used to feel a lot like that, especially in secondary school when I was very left-wing and almost all of my friends supported the tories (who are to the left of the Democratic party in the USA, really, but at the time I just thought it was outrageous and unacceptable) and sometimes I wondered whether it wasn’t worth just walking away from those friendships with those people because I didn’t understand why they thought the things that to me seemed so unfair and objectively wrong. I tried to listen but every justification seemed flawed to me. Disagreement, however, isn’t enough of a reason to break down a community into people who agree about everything, or even just people who agree about everything politics. It’s reason to keep talking. Keep talking in a way that is larger than simply a back and forth conversation with an individual who thinks in a different way than you do, keep the larger conversation going by sharing articles and ideas with anyone who follows you and anyone you follow and above all, value good discourse. How are we going to get anywhere as a community (both smaller scale i.e. HP or NF and larger scale i.e. country/planet) if we only surround ourselves with people we agree with and don’t listen to anything else? By all means challenge it, but in order to challenge it properly, you have to listen first and the communities have to exist in which that kind of communication can be possible.

Post-RNC Hangover

Not an actual hangover, mind you, but a mental one.  On top of it all, I was up wayyyyyy too late last night because I wanted to hear Romney's speech, and I'm up early this morning because I have a ton of work to do.  so this is going to have to be short, but ...

• Clint Eastwood is still Da Man.  At 82, he shows us that you're never too old to kick butt.  I heard from the Cine-Sib who was also watching Eastwood's speech live: "Still badass!"  Eastwood made our day with a speech that was humorous yet pointed, genial yet direct.  Instead of being barnstorming, it was gently reflective, and that made it more awesome than ever. *blows a kiss to Clint*  UPDATE:  The day's stream of often-unhinged criticisms of Eastwood from the left side of media convinces me that his speech hit the target.  It reminds me a bit of the leftist frothing against another towering American icon, Charlton Heston.  As I had said for those critics, I'll say for these: they're like yippy lap dogs nipping at the heels of a Great Dane.  Besides, if Michael Moore is trashing you, then I shall have to congratulate you for having done something worthwhile.  Another thought: all you media types trashing Eastwood for being a crazy old geezer?  Has it ever occurred to you that indirectly demeaning the entire senior voting population of the country is a really bad idea right before a major election?  When your candidate has dipped into Medicare in order to funnel funds into Obamacare?  Besides, ageism is ugly, you haters.  Didn't your mamas teach you to respect your elders?
• Marco Rubio killed it with his personal story of his Cuban roots, his shoutouts to other minority Republicans, and his meditation on the American Dream.  Good Lord, I'm cynical as all hell, but he made me think again of that American Dream that I'm living too. *blows a kiss to Marco*  I will expect great things from you in the future, Marco!  And he is one of the young hotshots of the party, and along with folks like Susana Martinez, Bobby Jindal, Nikki Haley, Mia Love, and Allen West, he just by existing bursts the cherished leftist meme that the GOP is more white bread than a bakery.  Seriously, I don't know why there's not better outreach to minorities.  The whole idea of succeeding through hard work and self-reliance is at the core of the immigrant experience, certainly from the Asian perspective.
• Romney's speech. I'm not blowing kisses to Mitt, but I do have to say: he needed to give the speech of his life, and I think he did. I had been hoping that he would pin the whole thing on jobs and the economy while mostly ignoring the social cons, and he did.

MTV Cancels "Jersey Shore"

Right on the heels of this comes this glorious news.  "Jersey Shore" among my students has become a kind of  symbol for modern trash culture.  I for one won't mourn the passing of this total train wreck and its awful "stars."

Book Review: "Stylish Academic Writing"

The effort to make the phrase "stylish academic writing" not an oxymoron!

Awesome: Doing It Right

Christian Bale went to the hospital to visit victims of the Aurora theater shooting.