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"A reporter should not be assigned to cover subject X unless he has as good an understanding of X as a baseball writer is expected to have of baseball."[1]
Shouldn't media outlets be embarrassed into retracting stories written by people who know nothing about the subject? Shouldn't the reputation of the media outlet suffer?
1 - https://www.theatlantic.com/personal/archive/2007/08/the-bas...
Wasn't the "baseball test" an accepted norm in journalism? "A reporter should not be assigned to cover subject X unless he has as good an understanding of X as a baseball writer is expected to have of baseball."[1] Shouldn't media outlets be embarrassed into retracting stories written by people who know nothing about the subject? Shouldn't the reputation of the media outlet suffer? 1 - https://www.theatlantic.com/per…
But then under what condition should a writer not be assigned to write about baseball? (Unless he or she as knowledgeable about baseball as a baseball reporter?)
Well written piece. I stopped reading news after Trump got into office and I have no shame about it. It feels great and I don't I miss out on anything. When people talk or ask me about politics I just say I don't know because I don't read. They make s surprised face and then continue talking and arguing about absolutely pointless topics and about the upcoming apocalypse. I just hope someone tells me an hour beforehan…
That was your lesson from this? Stick your head in the ground and pretend politics is pointless? Ignorance of politics is a luxury afforded only to citizens of authoritarian regimes. You live in a democracy (assuming that discussion of Trump in politics means you live in the US). Politics is how society chooses to make and use government. People pretending they are morally superior or lead better lives through ignora…
As one who has not reloaded ammunition in a number of years, I’m going to guess that the only reason Amazon won’t sell you black powder (or gun powder) outright is due to shipping restrictions. Which means instead of buying the ingredients with a highly-trackable transaction from Amazon, your low-budget terrorist will have to resort to buying the powder pre-made, and anonymously in a cash transaction from the local g…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> First of all, we don't have a direct democracy. This isn't an argument against being informed, it's a pointless debate over semantics. You and anyone reasonable understood what GP meant, they meant democracy as a "national built on foundations of democratic values, such as freedom of press, freedom of speech (to varying extents), right to assemble, etc" in contrast to "authoritarian regime where those values are no…
> You're probably free to move to an authoritarian regime if you cared to. No one chose to be born into a government system, but to claim no responsibility in a system that you've benefited from since you were born is passing the buck. Ah yes, the "if you don't like it, you can go back to where you came from" argument, in different clothing of course. This is just never a good rhetorical device. What a person did or…
What
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you truly think that the repeal of ACA won't affect you directly, I suppose there's nothing anyone can do to convince you that the news does matter.
Please explain. I honestly have no idea how repeal of ACA will affect me.
Well written piece. I stopped reading news after Trump got into office and I have no shame about it. It feels great and I don't I miss out on anything. When people talk or ask me about politics I just say I don't know because I don't read. They make s surprised face and then continue talking and arguing about absolutely pointless topics and about the upcoming apocalypse. I just hope someone tells me an hour beforehan…
That was your lesson from this? Stick your head in the ground and pretend politics is pointless? Ignorance of politics is a luxury afforded only to citizens of authoritarian regimes. You live in a democracy (assuming that discussion of Trump in politics means you live in the US). Politics is how society chooses to make and use government. People pretending they are morally superior or lead better lives through ignora…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I recall a high school chemistry demonstration where they made flour "explode". (From _vague_ 35 year old memories, a coffee tin with a spark plug and an assembly that blew compressed air in through the flour to distribute it in a mist...) I'd stop short of claiming that flour "detonates" or that flour purchases are terrorist indicators...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dust_explosion
(We must now put all bakers on terrorist no fly lists...)
This is a good piece but I have one nit: it is incorrect to say "thermite [...] will not detonate." I was shocked to discover this first hand some years ago: http://olivernash.org/2009/11/12/fun-with-thermite/index.htm... I can still recall the echoing boom of that (copper) thermite.
Thank you for this correction. Do you know whether Al + Fe2O3 thermite as normally prepared (meaning, not ground up into nanoparticles) will detonate? I'll update the piece accordingly. Moreover, are you sure this was a detonation (shock wave) rather than a deflagration?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> You live in a democracy > People pretending they are morally superior or lead better lives through ignorance never cease to amaze me. First of all, we don't have a direct democracy. This concept that everyone has to be 100% engaged (or even 90, or 80, or whatever subjective figure in your head that qualifies good enough is, which is another issue, your concept of being engaged enough doesn't match another) need not…
> First of all, we don't have a direct democracy. This isn't an argument against being informed, it's a pointless debate over semantics. You and anyone reasonable understood what GP meant, they meant democracy as a "national built on foundations of democratic values, such as freedom of press, freedom of speech (to varying extents), right to assemble, etc" in contrast to "authoritarian regime where those values are no…
Agreed.
The post you're replying to is less a thoughtful disagreement and more mental-gymnastics made literal.