Actually, it's doomed to remain a shitty-ass pathetic excuse for a contender to the title "fucking weakest blog ever, once-proud magazine division", something on the order of what Siegel might sketch in his spooge-spattered mirror, so long as that goddam SUBSCRIBE TODAY shit keeps materializing whenever you load the fucking thing.
What? I use Firefox on a windows box, and I don't remember that ever happening.
Same here. Nor do I get "SUBSCRIBE TODAY" materializing when I load the page--I'm guessing Adblock takes care of that, though it could be something else.
That said, Open University gets more of an "eh" from me than anything else. It's not particularly interesting or entertaining as writing, and mostly offers more of the same types of posts you can read at any number of websites (Wire rules, torture is bad, will the Democrats ever win, etc.) I suppose it's just the sort of site--academic blog, social sciences and law division--for which I have a limited taste already well-sated. It would have been interesting if TNR had taken the opportunity to do something different.
You sometimes see even idealistic bloggers at places like TAPPED saying things like "Gosh darn it, look at these stats on who has raised money for the DCCC. Congressmen A,B,C,D,E,F,G and X aren't pulling their weight. You need to take your job seriously and get some donations."
I would hope that at least a few congressmen are comfortable enough with their constituents that they don't need to raise money except in a very casual way. I certainly will never run for Congress if it involves cold-calling people asking for donations, and I think that might be true of a majority of people who think about running for office until they realize what it entails. It just shouldn't happen. Whenever you hear of a congressman who gets arrested for being insanely greedy with respect to bribes, it always turns out to be one of those guys who is a fundraising star. Well, aren't those things synonymous?
It's already so humiliating for philosopher kings to return to the normal world that they wouldn't even notice the added humiliation of cold-calling people.
Open University is just like every other blog in that category. I'm in the habit of reading Crooked Timber to satisfy my "blog like that" quotient -- no pop-up ads, no "balanced voices."
8: I actually haven't read it since I upgraded to Firefox (I stopped when Saiselgy left), so it's quite possible that this is not as common a problem as I'd assumed.
I actually do want to run for local office in about 10-15 years, and every time I think about it, my funding plan is to win the lottery. I honestly can't imagine making those calls. They must be awful, although the whole process seems demeaning.
I went to some "meet the mayoral candidates" gathering, and watched the candidates make pleasant conversation with twitchy annoying people and answer inane questions and have to take all their concerns seriously. The candidates had this desperate air about them and I got all mean inside and I wanted to walk up to one and tell him that I would vote for him if he would dance for me right there. I think he would have.
The shear physical stamina required of these people, the way they have to listen to crap for hour on hour, makes me admiring and terrified for them. They really do deserve more respect just for what they put up with every day.
I am always stunned at advisory committee meetings. They listen to the public, who are freaks, for hours, just as they are supposed to as good citizens. Those committees are volunteer, too.
And you know local officials are hounded in their daily life. I see the mayor at Farmer's Market every now and then and I have to remind myself that she just wants to buy her vegetables in peace and that she doesn't want to hear about the need for Sacramento to have more regional sports facilities first thing on a Sunday morning.
I'm pretty sure this is the sentiment behind a lot of the bashing of the blogosphere. You don't normally have to deal with people who aren't a lot like you, but when you go to the DMV, or public meetings, or read blogs, it's shocking.
was going down his list, making calls to ask for donations. I was embarrassed for him. ... This sophisticated analysis of America's political system brought to you by my late night thoughts.
I've been covering politics off and on for almost a quarter-century, and even the really sophisticated analyses of America's political system don't have much to add to that. Covering my first Congressional campaign, I was given the candidate's schedule and saw huge blocks of time blocked off every day with nothing marked. That, an aide told me, was when the candidate was cold-calling potential donors. Nothing much has changed since, and it sucks for all of us.
You know, I fall for it every time. I go to public meetings because I have opinions about the City's field reservation algorithm. I would like to discuss it with park bureaucrats and other park users. Every time, I think that the other people will be like me, only with other priorities and we will reasonably come to a compromise. I keep thinking that maybe someone will drop by from another meeting, who will say, oh, this reminds me of that time when he had to solve that other allocation problem and we used that other method and then it would dawn on all of us that the other method would work for us too!
But it is never like that. Instead we get people saying that if there are bathrooms in the parks, homeless people will come to their neighborhoods. And people saying that if the play area has a space ship theme, their Creationist children will be corrupted and are we inviting the Devil into our children's parks? And people saying that the noise from the constant dribbling at the basketball courts is shaking the mortar loose from their brick walls and the City is going to be liable for that. None of them can stay under three minutes. Every time I leave a public meeting I swear again that the people are freaks and should never be allowed near decisions.
And I still want to run for City Council in ten years.
16 - I knew someone who had been mayor of his little town (back when he was, oh, 20 or so), and eventually took to doing all his grocery shopping at 2 AM at Meijer's just so he could actually get his frigging shopping done without having to listen to two hours of lecture.
Actually, it's doomed to remain a shitty-ass pathetic excuse for a contender to the title "fucking weakest blog ever, once-proud magazine division", something on the order of what Siegel might sketch in his spooge-spattered mirror, so long as that goddam SUBSCRIBE TODAY shit keeps materializing whenever you load the fucking thing.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 09-21-06 10:33 PM
Is that really any worse than the way TAPPED sometimes randomly sends you to a new page filled with ads?
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-21-06 10:39 PM
Beats me. I think I've visited TAPPED maybe three times.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 09-21-06 10:40 PM
Fuck DRM!
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 09-21-06 10:44 PM
Trust me, it's annoying.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-21-06 10:46 PM
If you have a substantive point to make, ogged, please, feel free to make it.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 09-21-06 10:47 PM
I find it somewhat odd that the post makes no reference at all to the current proposal for public financing of elections in California.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-21-06 10:54 PM
Is that really any worse than the way TAPPED sometimes randomly sends you to a new page filled with ads?
What? I use Firefox on a windows box, and I don't remember that ever happening.
Posted by gswift | Link to this comment | 09-22-06 1:55 AM
What? I use Firefox on a windows box, and I don't remember that ever happening.
Same here. Nor do I get "SUBSCRIBE TODAY" materializing when I load the page--I'm guessing Adblock takes care of that, though it could be something else.
That said, Open University gets more of an "eh" from me than anything else. It's not particularly interesting or entertaining as writing, and mostly offers more of the same types of posts you can read at any number of websites (Wire rules, torture is bad, will the Democrats ever win, etc.) I suppose it's just the sort of site--academic blog, social sciences and law division--for which I have a limited taste already well-sated. It would have been interesting if TNR had taken the opportunity to do something different.
Posted by JL | Link to this comment | 09-22-06 4:29 AM
I agree with the campaign solicitations point.
You sometimes see even idealistic bloggers at places like TAPPED saying things like "Gosh darn it, look at these stats on who has raised money for the DCCC. Congressmen A,B,C,D,E,F,G and X aren't pulling their weight. You need to take your job seriously and get some donations."
I would hope that at least a few congressmen are comfortable enough with their constituents that they don't need to raise money except in a very casual way. I certainly will never run for Congress if it involves cold-calling people asking for donations, and I think that might be true of a majority of people who think about running for office until they realize what it entails. It just shouldn't happen. Whenever you hear of a congressman who gets arrested for being insanely greedy with respect to bribes, it always turns out to be one of those guys who is a fundraising star. Well, aren't those things synonymous?
Posted by Cryptic Ned | Link to this comment | 09-22-06 7:04 AM
yeah, i wonder how the necessity of raising money would have changed the Republic.
Posted by Michael | Link to this comment | 09-22-06 11:31 AM
It's already so humiliating for philosopher kings to return to the normal world that they wouldn't even notice the added humiliation of cold-calling people.
Open University is just like every other blog in that category. I'm in the habit of reading Crooked Timber to satisfy my "blog like that" quotient -- no pop-up ads, no "balanced voices."
Posted by Adam Kotsko | Link to this comment | 09-22-06 3:19 PM
8: I actually haven't read it since I upgraded to Firefox (I stopped when Saiselgy left), so it's quite possible that this is not as common a problem as I'd assumed.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-22-06 3:30 PM
I actually do want to run for local office in about 10-15 years, and every time I think about it, my funding plan is to win the lottery. I honestly can't imagine making those calls. They must be awful, although the whole process seems demeaning.
I went to some "meet the mayoral candidates" gathering, and watched the candidates make pleasant conversation with twitchy annoying people and answer inane questions and have to take all their concerns seriously. The candidates had this desperate air about them and I got all mean inside and I wanted to walk up to one and tell him that I would vote for him if he would dance for me right there. I think he would have.
Posted by Megan | Link to this comment | 09-22-06 3:32 PM
The shear physical stamina required of these people, the way they have to listen to crap for hour on hour, makes me admiring and terrified for them. They really do deserve more respect just for what they put up with every day.
Posted by I don't pay | Link to this comment | 09-22-06 3:37 PM
I am always stunned at advisory committee meetings. They listen to the public, who are freaks, for hours, just as they are supposed to as good citizens. Those committees are volunteer, too.
And you know local officials are hounded in their daily life. I see the mayor at Farmer's Market every now and then and I have to remind myself that she just wants to buy her vegetables in peace and that she doesn't want to hear about the need for Sacramento to have more regional sports facilities first thing on a Sunday morning.
Posted by Megan | Link to this comment | 09-22-06 3:55 PM
the public, who are freaks
I'm pretty sure this is the sentiment behind a lot of the bashing of the blogosphere. You don't normally have to deal with people who aren't a lot like you, but when you go to the DMV, or public meetings, or read blogs, it's shocking.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 09-22-06 4:15 PM
was going down his list, making calls to ask for donations. I was embarrassed for him. ... This sophisticated analysis of America's political system brought to you by my late night thoughts.
I've been covering politics off and on for almost a quarter-century, and even the really sophisticated analyses of America's political system don't have much to add to that. Covering my first Congressional campaign, I was given the candidate's schedule and saw huge blocks of time blocked off every day with nothing marked. That, an aide told me, was when the candidate was cold-calling potential donors. Nothing much has changed since, and it sucks for all of us.
Posted by Lex | Link to this comment | 09-22-06 4:17 PM
You know, I fall for it every time. I go to public meetings because I have opinions about the City's field reservation algorithm. I would like to discuss it with park bureaucrats and other park users. Every time, I think that the other people will be like me, only with other priorities and we will reasonably come to a compromise. I keep thinking that maybe someone will drop by from another meeting, who will say, oh, this reminds me of that time when he had to solve that other allocation problem and we used that other method and then it would dawn on all of us that the other method would work for us too!
But it is never like that. Instead we get people saying that if there are bathrooms in the parks, homeless people will come to their neighborhoods. And people saying that if the play area has a space ship theme, their Creationist children will be corrupted and are we inviting the Devil into our children's parks? And people saying that the noise from the constant dribbling at the basketball courts is shaking the mortar loose from their brick walls and the City is going to be liable for that. None of them can stay under three minutes. Every time I leave a public meeting I swear again that the people are freaks and should never be allowed near decisions.
And I still want to run for City Council in ten years.
Posted by Megan | Link to this comment | 09-22-06 4:45 PM
16 - I knew someone who had been mayor of his little town (back when he was, oh, 20 or so), and eventually took to doing all his grocery shopping at 2 AM at Meijer's just so he could actually get his frigging shopping done without having to listen to two hours of lecture.
Posted by Tom Scudder | Link to this comment | 09-23-06 9:42 AM