USA’s formidable women’s team is no accident. It’s a product of public policy [Moira Donegan/The Guardian]
… title IX effectively turned the American education system into the world’s most successful women’s sporting development organization. The success story of women’s sports under title IX shows how marginalized groups can be given opportunities through policy interventions; how the talents and passions of individuals can be fostered when they have institutional support.
Greg McVerry: “Find a passion, start a blog.” Or you can just do what I do and post whatever pops into your head wherever you can find a text box on the web.
Pratik talks about taking photos on vacation, blogging in a post-Facebook world, and inability to do the Vulcan “Live Long and Prosper” salute.
“Muhammad Ali is a singular figure in American life. But there are elements of a modern-day Ali in Rapinoe’s stance toward sports and social activism, to say nothing of her ability to turn the glare of publicity—much of it controversial—to her advantage.”
USA 2019 Womens World Cup champions were unflappable, unequaled [SI.com]
Larri Thomas in The Silencers (1966)
Monday, July 8, 2019
Why Is Measles Back? [The Atlantic] Peter Beinart, the author of this article, blames the anti-vax movement on rising idiocracy, but downplays betrayal by government, business and the medical establishment. Anti-vaxxers are wrong about vaccines, but they’re right to mistrust institutions.
Monday, July 8, 2019
A Bitter End For Regular Joe? Scientists Engineer A Smooth, Beanless Coffee [NPR] A startup has developed coffee that’s made without the bitter flavor – and without coffee beans, too. Should they really be allowed to call it “coffee?”
Conair Impressions crimper, 1989
Monday, July 8, 2019
Fish replacement may be the next big wave in alternative protein development I’m intrigued by the idea of plant-based fish. I’m allergic to fish and would love to be able to eat it. Or to even know what fish tastes like. I can eat shrimp, lobster and other shellfish, but not tuna, salmon, or other fish that swims. I’ve never had a tuna salad sandwich or sushi.
Monday, July 8, 2019
Microsoft’s Bill Gates: Steve Jobs cast spells on everyone but he didn’t fool me Sounds ridiculous in a headline but Gates makes good points. Yeah, Jobs was often full of shit but the products were and are great anyway.
Shedding Light On Domestic Violence [Fresh Air podcast]. An average of four women are killed by their partners every day in America. Crisis center CEO Suzanne Dubus and journalist Rachel Louise Snyder talk about identifying risk factors in abusive relationships, prevention, and how to set victims up with resources to rebuild their lives. Snyder’s book is ‘No Visible Bruises.’
Spreadsheet [50 Things That Made the Moden Economy podcast]. A grid on a computer screen gives us a glimpse of the future of automated work. There are 400,000 fewer accounting clerks today than they were in 1980, the year after the PC spreadsheet debuted. But there are 600,000 more accountants.
Weeding is Fundamental [99% Invisible podcast.] When the San Francisco Public Library renovated 20 years ago, librarians fought to stop administrators from throwing out hundreds of books, and the card catalog.
The Town that Stayed Quiet: The This is Love podcast visits a city in northern Italy where everyone decided to stay quiet to save something beautiful.
Welch’s Juice. LIFE, June 9, 1947.
First impressions of micro.blog: Community, people and content looks great. Design and UI are wonderfully simple. Performance is slooooow. Hopefully I signed up on a bad day.
Get a Spine! Stories about people – including a scientist who studies invertebrates – who get a spine, finding the courage to do what needs doing. On the This American Life podcast.
Maureen Dowd: It’s Nancy Pelosi’s Parade - The New York Times
I’m feeling warmer toward Pelosi after reading this article; she’s less of a toady to Trump than I thought. She’s clearly trying to oppose Trump, implement a progressive agenda, while keeping the moderate Democrats – in other words, the big-money donors – on board.
Still, she needs to understand that Trump and the Republicans are the enemy; they are not the loyal opposition. Pelosi is a peacetime consigliere, not a wartime consigliere, and this is war.
And Dowd is Patient Zero for the epidemic of corporate executives who have become coopted by the institutions they’re supposed to cover.