Monthly Archives: January 2012

Turnout Watch: Florida

Posted on January 31, 2012 by

As I mentioned after South Carolina, one of the most interesting things to watch in this campaign is the difference in turnout between 2008 and 2012.   In that post, I noted that turnout in the two bluer states at … Continue reading →

Posted in GOP Primary | Tagged , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Sneak peek at our Florida Pretty Charts post

Posted on January 31, 2012 by

Here’s a chart I made with Crosstabs Grapher for the crosstabs from CNN‘s exit polls from the GOP Florida Primary. In our post of pretty charts about the South Carolina primaries, I noted that the GOP might have a potential … Continue reading →

Posted in GOP Primary, Pretty Charts | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Yawn. Romney wins Florida

Posted on January 31, 2012 by

I guess one downside of Nate Silver’s blog is that for a lot of these elections we pretty much know who the winner is going to be, and waiting around to see exactly how close Silver’s projection turns out isn’t … Continue reading →

Posted in GOP Primary, I hate my brain, Inequality | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

EverQuest goes Free-to-Play

Posted on January 31, 2012 by

After 13 years, Sony Online Entertainment has made the decision to turn their flagship product, EverQuest, into a free-to-play game.  This isn’t terribly surprising considering the state of play right now in the Massively Multiplayer Online (MMO) industry.  In fact, … Continue reading →

Posted in Videogames | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

To My Old Master

Posted on January 31, 2012 by

I came across an absolutely amazing letter today. It’s such a gem of history that gives us a small bit of insight into a world in which humans were owned as property by other humans. Also, this fine, fine gentlemen … Continue reading →

Posted in Inequality | Tagged | Leave a comment

Why Choice Shouldn’t Matter

Posted on January 31, 2012 by

I’ve long been an advocate of the fact that humans do not choose their sexuality. I’ve also always believed in the “shades of gray” theory of human sexuality, if you want to call it that. Sexuality is not defined in … Continue reading →

Posted in Inequality, LGBT | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Reagan’s Poisoned Apple

Posted on January 31, 2012 by

If you have any conservative friends on Facebook who like to post about their political beliefs, then there’s a good chance that, at some time, you have seen this quote from Ronald Reagan: We must reject the idea that every … Continue reading →

Posted in Philosophy, POTUS | Tagged , , , , | 9 Comments

Comparing Reagan to Obama

Posted on January 30, 2012 by

Yesterday, Ezra Klein posted an interesting comparison between Obama and Reagan at this stage in their presidencies.  On the surface, there are more similarities than might be expected in terms of the economic conditions they inherited and the recovery over … Continue reading →

Posted in Economy, POTUS | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

STOCK Act passes Senate procedural vote

Posted on January 30, 2012 by

So Obama charged Congress with passing a bill to stop insider trading by Congresscritters and wonder of wonders, the Senate has just passed a procedural vote for a bill that does just that by a 93-2 margin.  (And if you … Continue reading →

Posted in Congress, Miscellaneous | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

The Ask Why Campaign

Posted on January 30, 2012 by

One of the concepts most lacking in our public discourse is a desire to ask a simple question. Saying “why,” or “how” (basically, “prove it”) always seemed natural to me. Everyone does this when they’re young: Based on my own … Continue reading →

Posted in Engineering, Philosophy | Tagged , , | 2 Comments