Patterico's Pontifications

1/22/2014

All Readers Must Participate

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 5:58 pm



Dahlia Lithwick put this up on Facebook:

Screen Shot 2014-01-22 at 5.40.27 PM

That is silly, of course. The sentence will explain no such thing. However, I think it’s an interesting exercise, and I encourage you to post your answers in the comments. It’s a fun little exercise that gives people a chance to have a little insight into what you’re reading (or, if the nearest book to you is someone else’s, what someone close to you is reading).

My answer was: “I’m not jealous of Margot, never have been.” (The nearest book to me was one my daughter was reading.)

If we’re going with the nearest book to me that’s mine, the answer is: “If the standards of traditional sonata form are used as a basis for analyzing this movement, numerous deviations are found.”

One foot further away: “In the Adams Morgan neighborhood, black guys would shoot me sly grins and say. ‘Big pimpin’!'”

OK. Two rules.

First: don’t say what the book is. Just tell us the line. In some ways, this is reminiscent of the post where I asked for punch lines to jokes, but asked you not to tell the joke. Somehow, just giving us the sentence is more intriguing. There’s always Google if you want to find out where someone else’s quote came from.

Second: quote the first complete sentence. Sentence fragments don’t count. In a way, that’s a shame, because in the last book quoted above, it means I didn’t get to use this fragment, which appears at the very top of page 45: “even the nerdiest-looking white guys, bow ties and all, would fix on Hannah’s butt and not give me a passing glance.” Not a complete sentence; doesn’t count.

Third: everyone must participate. Even lurkers.

So, what’s your sentence?

More ObamaCare Woes

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 7:43 am



As this newscast (h/t Hot Air) notes, CoverOregon has spent $200 million on their ObamaCare Web site, and the Web site still does not work. (Hot Air says nobody has enrolled through the site at all, but WaPo says the number is 18,000, which is still remarkably low.)

Meanwhile:

Target Corp. (TGT) said it will end health insurance for part-time employees, joining Trader Joe’s Co., Home Depot Inc. and other retailers that have scaled back benefits in response to changes from Obamacare.

About 10 percent of Target’s part-time employees, defined as those working fewer than 30 hours a week, use the company’s health plans now, according to an announcement posted on the Minneapolis-based company’s website. Target said it would pay $500 to part-timers losing coverage and a consulting firm will help workers sign up for new Obamacare plans.

Paging Juan Williams!

Women Taking Their Husbands’ Names, and Extra Points in Football

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 7:30 am



Politics is boring again today, so how about a couple of topics about the culture? (Don’t worry: everything is still lifted from Hot Air, as usual.)

First: should women take their husbands’ names? A piece by Mollie Hemingway argues, among other things:

How is using the name your father and his patriarchal privilege forced on you somehow less oppressive than taking the name of the man you chose to be your husband and the father of your children?

I told Mrs. P. it didn’t matter to me whether she kept her name or not; I was used to her the way I met her, and part of me didn’t want to change that. But she changed her name so there would be less confusion when we had kids. It was the right choice for us.

Second: should the NFL eliminate extra point kicks after touchdowns? The NFL commissioner says maybe:

“You want to add excitement with every play,” Goodell said. “So there have been some proposals. Some are still going through the process of creativity, but there’s one proposal in particular that I’ve heard about (where) it’s automatic that you get seven points when you score a touchdown, but you could potentially go for an eighth point, either by running or passing the ball. But if you fail, you’d go back to six.”

Allahpundit notes that this would barely be different from what we already have, and proposes a more interesting idea:

If you want to liven up the PAT [point after touchdown], there’s an obvious solution: Move it way, way back. TDs would remain six points but afterward coaches would have a choice. Either go for two from the two-yard line or try a 45-yard kick for the extra point. If your goal is more excitement then you should be increasing the incentive for teams to try two-point conversions by decreasing the incentive for them to kick instead — and if they do kick, you want some real suspense in whether they’ll make it. I’d be all for it, but I realize that the first time a team loses by a point because their kicker missed the PAT by six feet, their fans would be screaming bloody murder and demanding the return of the chip-shot PAT. That’s why we can’t have nice things, America.

My solution would be: don’t mess with football. Sometimes the best solution is to leave it be.

What say you?

P.S. I realize the topics are not particularly related. If you want related topics in a single post, I’m gonna have to demand a raise.


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