Monthly Archives: December 2007

It’s Del.icio.us But I’m Not Hungry

Posted on December 12, 2007 by Michael Froomkin

Jon Udell makes the best case I've seen yet for del.icio.us in Discovering versus teaching principles of social information management.

And I still don't feel like I need it…

Posted in Internet | Comments Off on It’s Del.icio.us But I’m Not Hungry

Grading Puzzle

Posted on December 12, 2007 by Michael Froomkin

Here's a nice grading puzzle, smaller versions of which sometimes come up in law school exams: How should you deal with students who make mistakes about basic facts that are not directly relevant to the question:

Big Monkey, Helpy Chalk: “If only we had forgiven Iraq for 9/11”,

I have now received three (3) student papers that discuss Iraq's attack on the Twin Towers on 9/11. All three papers mention it as an aside to another point. I've had two papers on the virtue of forgiveness that argue that if we had just forgiven Iraq for the 9/11 attacks, we wouldn't be at war right now. I just read a paper on the problem of evil which asked why God allowed “the Iraq's” to attack us on 9/11.

The thing that upsets me most here is that the the students don't just believe that that Iraq was behind 9/11. This is a big fact in their minds, that leaps out at them, whenever they think about the state of the world.

Posted in Etc | 4 Comments

‘What is Wrong with These People?’

Posted on December 12, 2007 by Michael Froomkin

The Carpetbagger Report summarizes The right's deranged support for waterboarding.

Each of the following was said recently by a different GOP office-holder, leader, or pundit,

  • “There are different ways of doing it. It’s like swimming, freestyle, backstroke.”
  • “One man’s torture is another man’s CIA-sponsored swim lesson.”
  • opposition to waterboarding is “part of the Democrat blame America first” agenda and goes “right along with their desire to close Guantánamo, where the terrorists are gaining weight on American menus that include honey-glazed chicken and rice pilaf.”
  • Waterboarding is something of which every American should be proud.

As Steve Benen correctly asks, What is wrong with these people?.

Posted in Torture | Comments Off on ‘What is Wrong with These People?’

Join the ‘None of the Above’ Campaign

Posted on December 12, 2007 by Michael Froomkin

No, I'm not talking about the GOP primary. I'm talking about the contest for a new Florida state song.

none2.jpgI admit that this morning I was a little worried about my post attacking all three songs as bad. (The Song Will Not Remain The Same) In fact, I toned it down quite a bit from the first draft, saying to myself that it just came out sounding too curmudgeonly.

Well, I'm feeling bolder now that I've read Flablog, Bad music:

Folks, I hate to find myself in the Simon Cowell role in this talent show, but these are aggressively awful songs.

I don’t mean just awful in a passive, boring, public-assembly way. I mean chair-creaking, clock-checking, eyes-scanning-the-exits, mind-numbingly, risibly awful. One sounds like an infomercial for a television ministry, one sounds like a 19th century Congregationalist hymn, and one sounds like something that should have been recorded on an Edison wax cylinder.

And these were chosen by people who are influencing innocent children.

I tremble for our future.

Maybe what we need is a “none of the above movement”? Is there some way to get a re-do, or to hear the other contenders, or hire a decent rock band, or commission the Dean of the UM School of Music, or something.

Please, someone, tell me help is on the way.

Posted in Florida | Comments Off on Join the ‘None of the Above’ Campaign

W00t the Heck?

Posted on December 12, 2007 by Michael Froomkin

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Year is …. “W00t”.

I'm not a great language purist (I'm a Webster's New World fan, and don't much care for the overly prescriptivist American Heritage), but I don't know that I would call this interjection from leetspeak a 'word' exactly.

I'd have gone with 'waterboarding' myself.

Posted in Kultcha | 5 Comments

The Song Will Not Remain The Same

Posted on December 12, 2007 by Michael Froomkin

The state of Florida is looking for a new state song.

The current (written in 1851 by Stephen Foster, officially adopted by Florida in 1935) state song's official name is “Old Folks at Home,” (lugubrious mp3) but most people know it either for its first line “Way down upon the Swanee River…'' or for its racist lines including “Still longing for the old plantation” and “Oh darkies, how my heart grows weary.”

They had competition for a replacement, and now they are down to three finalists which can be heard at justsingflorida.org. And apparently the public is invited to vote online for the winner. Ballot stuffing anyone?

Here are direct links to the syrupy contenders:

'Florida (Where the Sawgrass Meets the Sky)' | Music and lyrics by Jan Hinton

'My Florida Home' | Music and lyrics by Christopher Marshall

'Florida, My Home' | Music by Carl Ashley, lyrics by Betsy Dixon

I think the first one is awful, the second one dull, and while the third may be the least bad, I don't much care for it, and it would be hard to sing. I hope I never have to hear any of them again, but I suppose they'll start popping up at graduation.

Do any states have good anthems?

Posted in Florida | 4 Comments