McArdle re: von Brunn, and The Goldilocks Theory of Racial Intelligence

Obviously, the whole Holocaust Museum situation is horribly sad. I choose to deal with this sadness by quoting people making fun of the white supremacists.

Megan McArdle-

...what really struck me is that John de Nugent telling the Washington Post that "the responsible white separatist community condemns this." What, one wonders, characterizes the responsible white separatists? Are their swastika armbands all made from 100% biodegradeable materials? Do they take care that the leather in their jackboots comes from humanely raised cows? Do they carefully follow the Forest Service's wildfire prevention guidelines when burning crosses? Are their white separatist brownie points for attending school board meetings or chairing the Community Chest drive?

As one commenter pointed out-

But I confess I've always been highly amused by the thinking that goes into being anti-black and anti-Jew. They don't like blacks because of "inferior intelligence," and they don't like Jews because of...well...because of apparently superior intelligence, which permits Jews to control everything over the wishes of "whites."

So I guess they think "the white race" has managed to find the marvelous Goldilocks level of intelligence: just right. Not too smart, and not too dumb.

Of course, someone has to take all of this to task, for being simplistic/inaccurate. So, if you think ignorantly of other ignorant people, what does that make you? To which I say, come on. Who cares? Fuck those hate-filled bastards.

happy thanksgiving

This is excellent - from the McSweeney's archies, a production rider for your thanksgiving tour home. A sample -

...
LOAD IN:

TALENT arrives alone. Upon arrival, do not ask where CREW is. Do not get clever by saying boyfriend/your friend/special friend instead of CREW. Consider VENUE forewarned that when TALENT feels VENUE can act appropriately around CREW, TALENT will bring CREW. So TALENT will be arriving alone.

TALENT will be bringing one (1) duffel bag full of laundry, and TALENT doesn't want to hear she's too old for this. TALENT will do laundry herself. Unless VENUE, you know, was already planning on doing some anyway, in which case it would probably be easier if VENUE just threw it in with whatever VENUE is doing. No big deal.

nunchuck ping pong

The title says it all. This isn't that great, but I like it. It's just a Nokia ad in China, and it has a poor stand-in for Bruce Lee, but it is a minute of nunchuck ping pong.

domino day 2008

The inner dork in me loves this - 4.3 million dominos falling, all filmed for television. A new world record (that link has another vid) that would make Rube Goldberg proud.



If you want yet another vid, with a cheesy Coldplay score, here you go - link


PS - I googled Rube to check the spelling, and found this (today, 11/17/2008) on rubegoldberg.com -
2007 Calendar: $5.00 while they last!

Chart of the day: Nudge

Props to the gf - 85% of her students passed the regents exam for her class (including the special ed kids).

Unfortunately, she made the mistake of showing me the excel spreadsheet she keeps the scores on. After a few minutes and some crunching, I came up with the chart above - how many students scored in each 5 point interval. So while the raw data didn't reveal anything, the chart says something - notice the huge bump at 65% (just passing) compared to the valley at 60% (just failing). Hmmm....

Note, the data doesn't look as bad as that chart. But I'm just saying - no kid got a 64.

"The black son/child Obama - anything is possible!"

The Chinese Google, Baidu, had an image of Obama as it's Google-holiday-esque icon, casting a fishing net.

Pacific Epoch, via Shanghaiist (via, of course, HTWW)-

Following more general features including Hong Kong entertainers and snow storm survivors, Obama comes as Baidu's first foreign installment. In the drawing, a smiling Obama is joined by a dapper donkey as he throws a "net" over the Chinese portion of Baidu's logo.

Check out the page of you clicked on the logo (when it was there). You can click on some good videos there. His speeches work seem very modern alongside the Chinese characters and colorful logos. The title of this post is what it says in Chinese at the top. Another section of the page (translated by a commenter on the HTWW post) -

Two years ago, very few people in the world knew of this "Black kid" Obama. But today, this 47 year-old ethnic African, charismatic and bright, has become the most moving American presidential candidate.

In America's online world, Obama has remained an all-time hot topic. The video of Obama's speech in Philadelphia was the most popular video on the Internet.

In the age of the Internet, it does not matter if one is a common civilian, from a metropolis or from a rural area. As long as one is hardworking and tries to fulfill one's dreams, even an ordinary civilian (as Obama once was), can become a presidential candidate.

Communist propaganda or truth? Yes.

Italian beauties

I've been reading a great non-fiction book by Umberto Eco, Turning Back the Clock: Hot Wars and Media Populism, which is a compilation of articles he's written for various Italian newspapers. He focuses a lot on their Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, and with good reason - he's great fodder for commentary. Imagine the mouth of Rush Limbaugh, the personable mien of Bush, the media reach of Rupert Murdoch (within Italy), and the cutthroat political instincts of Karl Rove all rolled into one.

Some examples: He once told a German politician he would have perfect for the role of a guard at a concentration camp. He calls The Economist the Ecommunist, after harsh criticism. He once named the founders of Rome as Romulus and Remulus. The BBC has a good compilation of gaffes here.

Anyway, so I've been reading this book, and notice this is one of the top headlines on Bloomberg -

Berlusconi Says Opposition Has Poor Taste in Women


I went to the article, helping ensure it remained a top story.

``The left doesn't even have good taste when it comes to women,'' Berlusconi told Sky TG24 television in an interview today. The women in his People of Liberty party ``are more beautiful and moreover all have super degrees. When I say ours are better looking it's because when I look around in parliament, there really is no comparison."

Wow - better looking AND with better degrees. Not like those stupid un-hot feminazis.

What about investing in Italy?

Visiting the New York Stock Exchange in September 2003, he told investors to put their money in Italy because ``the secretaries are beautiful, so at least you can take pleasure working there.''

What about his personal life?

The ex-premier has also been known to make racy public comments about his own marriage. In response to newspaper reports of his wife Veronica's alleged affair with Venice Mayor Massimo Cacciari, Berlusconi joked at a 2002 news conference with Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen that he might ``introduce Rasmussen to my wife, because he is much better- looking than Cacciari.''

I'm surprised I knew so little about him. Could you imagine the Daily Show in Italy?

Attractiveness Scales

Thanks to Long or Short Capital, we can graph, first for man-to-woman relationships...



And woman-to-man...



What's great about these charts is that they allow for some good data plotting. For example, using {x,y} notation, and assuming each axis as displayed goes to a count of 10, one might have Ashley/Kristen at {8,0.5} for example. I believe this is part of my enlightened view of women, which is multi-dimensional (where "multi" is two).

Of course, the same applies to men, so Spitzer might be a {5,7}? (please note that the attractiveness axes are inverted between the 2 charts) Of course, women are more complex than men, so perhaps the w2m chart should be 3-dimensional, where the y-axis represents wealth, in which case Spitzer is a {5,7,9}, which of course, isn't so bad. Ladies let me know.

Of course, each of us has a utility curve, but given that, marriage becomes a simple problem of optimization - finding the person who gives you maximum utility, to whom you provide the same. Fuck eHarmony.

In the interest of compiling data, please feel free to add people and their coordinates in the comments. Also, realize this is now going to be part of my description of everyone, so familiarize yourself with these charts before I see you again.

What leap year?

So what if the market was down size (almost 3%) yesterday?

From my new favorite finance-snark blog, Long or Short Capital - a rough draft from Bernanke's speechwriter.

Friday, February 29th, doesn’t count. That’s right. Simply didn’t happen. It was the leap day of a leap year, an anomaly, and we have the ability at the Fed to strike an anomalous day from existing. We plan to utilize this power that we have at our discretion, and by open market actions, remove the existence of February 29th from the record books.

If we let Friday exist, it will distort comparisons with prior years and also it meant that markets went down a lot. And to that I say, not on my watch, sir, not on my watch. So expect all your portfolios and investments to be reset to their close of business Thursday values very soon. And remember, who loves you? I do. Thank you.

Cien años

"Like hope, but different."

I'm taking, of course, from Jake.

I got work to do

from Spin magazine -

Kidz in the Hall "Work To Do (Obama Campaign)" Over a bubblin', we-gotta-make-it sample of the '72 Isley Brothers jam "Work to Do," this Ivy League rap duo solicit your support for our next president

This is for people who thought the other song sounded too much like a Gap ad.

download

Oh...Canada....

That's a chart of the Canadian vs. US Dollar. The US Dollar is again the stronger currency - a CAD would cost you $.98.

But I consider this terrible personal news. I am that guy. If you read this blog, you are getting nothing new, only regurgitated group-think. I'm like the Chris Matthews of casual financial banter. My blog is a contrarian indicator for any trend, and this saddens me. Basically, it's time to sell when I call something out.

In fairness to me, the top of the CAD-USD rally came a couple months after my blog post. Also, I wasn't also advocating putting all your money in Canadian investments. Also, I'm prepared to blame this one on my new colleagues at work, whose opinions I haven't yet learned to ignore while forming my own.

As a side note, one of the said colleagues was visiting Canada during the weekend of the CAD-USD peak in November. He doesn't like this chart either, because he's paranoid that the world's financial markets are out to get him.

Barack O'Ballywood

"East meets West meets acid." Turn away if you're not into weird Bhangra/presidential candidate mashups.

Thank you HTWW.

Throwing Bush under the bus

Wow.

Joseph Stiglitz buried Bush in Vanity Fair. It's stuff we all know, but it's a succinct, super-brutal rehashing of the ruin wrought by Bush over 7 years. I haven't been following political news closely of late, so maybe I had some Bushenfreude withdrawl.

(Speaking of which how dated does this article seem? "As an economic strategy, the tax cuts have plainly worked." Really? More than negative real interest rates of the time?)

Anyway, read on - The Economic Consequences of Mr. Bush.

Fox Business Channel: "Oh, The Arabs. OK."

I'm home sick, so I get to blog a little. But I'll just post about this awesome flub by the Fox Business Channel.

Run with the story first, then change course as needed. Brilliant.

http://valleywag.com/tech/clips/fox-business-newss-apple+amd-flub-323889.php

Bear Stearns: Up In Smoke

"Bear Stearns announces stock spliff" - I wish I'd seen it while it was up on Bloomberg still. I guess something has to get you through the day when your stock is getting smoked. I kill me.

Title and screenshot taken from Minyanville. h/t to, who else, Dealbreaker.

Update: funnier because of a WSJ article today, that talks about the CEO smoking pot.

After a day of bridge at a Doubletree hotel in Memphis, in 2004, Mr. Cayne [CEO of Bear] invited a fellow player and a woman to smoke pot with him, according to someone who was there, and led the two to a lobby men's room where he intended to light up. The other player declined, says the person who was there, but the woman followed Mr. Cayne inside and shared a joint, to the amusement of a passerby.

Is this Murdoch's WSJ or what?

They could have just hired me

Apologies that I didn't blog about this the MINUTE I heard about it, but if you haven't heard of the SAC Capital scandal, let me fill you in.

A senior trader, Andrew Tong, thought that junior traders were too aggressive. But where there is a problem, there is a solution - I'll let DealBreaker explain:

For those of you who don’t have Google alerts set up for “some pretty fucked up shit,” Andrew Tong, who was fired last year from the hedge fund, has accused Ping Jiang of sexual harassment that had Tong taking female hormones (which he bought on the black market) in order to reduce aggressiveness and make him more effeminate, and, in turn, a better trader. Additionally, there’s been talk of “sexual relations between two men.” Tong has also stated that the hormones caused him significant emotional and physical distress, as well as impotence.

You can also watch the video on CNBC about the story. Pretty screwed up, right?

Up in Stamford, SAC employees are flummoxed. Not by the accusations, per se, but the rationale behind them. "If taking female hormones actually helped you do your job, they would simply hire women here," one said. "But they don't.”

Umm, yes, because the senior guy was having sex with the junior one...

Anyway, I was a complete wuss when I was trading, I had no idea that style was in demand.

R.I.P. My Alter Ego

It used to be, when you googled my name, the top hit would be a page on the Philadelpia Eagles site, doing a fan spotlight of someone with my name (even including the 'Jr.'). It was a tragic, but uplifting read. He talked about how he and his father had bonded over being fans of the Eagles, and how after his father's passing, he was able to continue being a fan.

That site is no longer up. It seems that it was taken down from Eagles site, and if you google me, it doesn't show up anymore. But, as many of you have seen, the picture from that site lives on, as my avatar in various places (like in Google Talk). I discovered that the site was down when someone asked me "What's that picture?" I was upset when I couldn't find it. It was like I lost an old friend. The article was a funny heartrending portrayal of a man - a man who wore funny hats with Eagle's wings on them.

Most of the details from that article escape me. I remember he mentioned his rough upbringing, and there was some story about how he taunted a Giants fan at some contest in a bar.

The only remnant of the intense Eagles fandom of my tocayo is a pic still on the Eagles site, shown above.

Meet me at the front

During my first visit to the gf's new school, I spent a couple of minutes waiting for her at the school's entrance on Hester St. I felt weird - hanging outside of a high school, after school, by yourself, just looking around, I felt that everyone was looking at me, wondering what I could possibly be doing there. Not that it was a big deal, but I was glad when she came down to bring me in.

Fast forward a week or so - The school makes the front page of the Post. The headline: After-School Sex Specials. There was a brothel operating nearby, that was targeting the school's students, operating out of the Robo-Pong Training Center, a ping pong hall.

The men would try to lure students to the Robo-Pong Training Center by distributing business cards outside the school, sources said. The cards were printed only with a contact number, an image of a topless woman - and a word, "Good."

It seems Time Out New York put a clip up of that very place on YouTube (that's my speculation). I'd never heard of robo-pong, but it is like a batting cage for ping pong, in that you have a machine aim balls at you to hit. Anyway, from Gothamist:

The NYPD ran a sting operation and undercover cops (from the 21 Jump Street division?) were told, "You can pick any of these girls for sex, and it will cost you $35." A police source told the Post, "It was obvious that they were targeting young students, because the prices were so low [$35-60]. Most brothels charge at least $100."

This is the kind of stuff that ruins the reputation of men who are waiting outside of high schools for their girlfriend-teachers. KS - I'll visit your school, but meet me at the front.

Dragon Wars

The How The World Works post begins like this:

WARNING: Under no circumstances should the following post be interpreted as a positive review of the movie "Dragon Wars: D-War." By reading any further, you absolve How the World Works from all potential liability for psychic pain suffered, in this universe or any other, as a consequence of viewing "Dragon Wars."

I'm such a freak, I kind of want to see it.

He goes on to quote Dustin Pittman at The MovieBoy.com:

"Dragon Wars" is destined to go down in history as one of cinema's most blunderingly, catastrophically bad big-budget films of the last few decades. Only worth seeing with a large group of friends and a bottle of hard liquor by your side, the movie bypasses the barest hints of behind-the-scenes sanity and enters a realm where the viewer legitimately wonders if what he or she is watching was made by homo sapiens."

Not likely though. I already got the gf to see another South Korean movie, The Host, with me (which was very good). I doubt I'll have luck on this one too, especially when I can't possibly lie about it maybe being good. 17%!!