Davison online

Why some of us are praying for any other Democratic candidate to win: The Politics of Parsing.

Hope everybody had a great Halloween. From top to bottom we had a super hero, a construction worker, and a leopard. Trick-or-treated locally for a bit, drove to my parents, then headed out for a "Harvest Party" at a church in West Salem. Good times and too much candy, though on the latter point mostly for the adults.

If you believe that capitalism is the big bad bogey man then this next bit isn't for you, because this is a story about everyday people become micro lenders--essentially international financiers--to the third world. Do much research at all on US foreign aid and you'll find that many experts consider it worse than a waste. Not only does it not help people...

Readers who value correct English punctuation will "rejoice." Click here to lose another 5-10 minutes of your life to the Internet.

A test. Apparently, I'm muddled somewhere in the middle because I can spin that silhouette either direction almost at will. Took a little practice, though. (I did it by using my peripheral vision if that helps.) I'm not sure that this means anything, the same thing you can say about most of the stuff on the Internet.

A general guide to figuring out which candidate has an issue profile compatible with yours. (Tip of the hat to Adam Robins.) I was somewhat surprised by my results: Kucinich 33 Dodd 30 Biden 29 Gravel 29 Richardson 28 Edwards 26 Brownback 24 Obama 23 Clinton 23 Paul 15 Giuliani 15 McCain 14 Huckabee 12 Hunter 10 Thompson 9 Tancredo 9 Romney 7 Gilmore 4...

Women Catholic priests. Now I'm not a woman, a Catholic, or a priest so I understand that this isn't my battle. (If it were, I'd be on the side favoring women's ordination and an end to the priesthood's celibacy requirement.) But I'm driven to distraction by the two things: First that people should show such disrespect to an institution that while it has...

Babel takes four interconnected stories and weaves them into a two hour and thirty minute mosaic, the overarching theme of which seems to be that human stupidity knows no geographic boundary. From Japan to Morocco to Mexico, us humans are idiots in our own culturally-influenced idiosyncratic ways. I'm as big on the "there is more that unites us than...

Look, he might be a self-hating, closeted homosexual homophob, but that doesn't make him a bad US Senator. It's his voting record that does that. Of course, all that stuff doesn't make him a good US Senator either, I'm just saying it's not a disqualifying factor. Whatever wide-stance, foot-tapping, finger-showing crime he pled guilty to in Minnesota is...

Did the reunion thing this weekend. Twenty years is a long time and no time at all. Enjoyed reacquainting with everyone. The events (meetings at a bar, a restaurant, and a city park) were not even remotely worth the $60 per person we paid, especially since Erin and Jillian got kicked out of the bar after the first hour. But that's not to say that it wasn't...