October 2008
17 posts
Squawk -or- A Very Ameritocracy Halloween To You
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore, While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door. `’Tis some visitor,’ I muttered, `tapping at my chamber door - Only this, and nothing more.’ Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the...
Is race a late entry into the race?
For a presidential race that saw the first ever black candidate recieve a major party’s nomination, the subject of race has been kept surprisingly under the radar. Which is not to say it hasn’t been there: invocations of the Civil Rights movement here, a little paranoia about Obama being a secret Muslim terrorist there…
Is this an indication of America’s relative and...
Internet Sensation-of-the-Day: "WTF, WFTV"
The most talked-about YouTube video (today) is this interview between WFTV (Orlando, FL) anchor Barbara West and V.P. candidate Joe Biden.
It includes West invoking Karl Marx
It also includes Biden asking such probing questions as “Are you joking?”
Here is her interview with Biden:
And by contrast, here is her interview with John McCain:
What do you think? Fair and...
Questions, ladies and gentlemen? Questions?
As you may have read in out community email or on the blog last week, one of the many cool features of Ameritocracy is our Questions feature.
Here’s a picture of The Riddler. Y’know…’cause he asked a lot of questions. Right?… What? Fine, I’m tired today.
One of Ameritocracy’s main objectives is to help our community members understand complicated...
Election protection in an acorn shell
The right to a valid, counted vote is a democratic (with a lower-case “d”) issue of such import that it should be a priority of all Americans - regardless of party afflitiation - and especially the media to point out when it occurs, to whom, and why.
The fact is, in the history of democracy, there probably never has been a 100% fair election. Tampering happens, votes are miscounted...
Muse Coffee Co. = awesomeness.
We got some coffee shop lovin today that totally tickled me. James and Porter have been patronizing Muse Coffee Co. as of late and awesomely (that’s the point here), one of the crew there wrote up a generous mention of us after discovering the two working on the site. That’s awesomeness right? I thought so too.
Muse is located in Queen Anne at 1907 10th Ave West.
Thanks guys!!!
7 tags
Politics lesson #47: Saying stuff on the TV is...
Especially in the age of YouTube. And Ameritocracy.
One of our goals here is to hold people accountable for what they say and to help you decide whether or not their words have been taken out of context.
Do did Michele Bachmann make an enormous, career-ending gaffe?
Just a few days ago (October 17) on Chris Matthews’ show Hardball, Minnesota congresswoman Michelle Bachmann came on to...
7 tags
...1 cup sugar, 1 lb cherries, 3 ounces Human...
The candidates have moved away from baseballgate and moved on to piegate.
Yep, that’s right - with two weeks to go til election day, the national dialogue has centered around apparently-genetically-modified enormous America-sized pies, which can be shrunk and grown based, apparently, upon which of the two candidates’ economic policies are implemented.
First, here’s John...
Let's go [insert local team name here]!!!!
We love politics. And we love baseball. And we love the absurdity of political campaigns.
So we couldn’t help but feature this quote on the homepage this afternoon.
Seemingly out of angles of attack, McCain appears to have attempted a Hail Mary play (<—- see what I did there?) tapping into the deepest fear of the American electorate: that the man they are electing president does...
6 tags
Brad Friedman accuses Fox News of being "fair and...
Check it out right here at ye olde Ameritocracye
Of course, I’ve buried the lede here, pretty dramatically, by disguising the true story - the arrest of GOP worker Mark Anthony Jacoby in California for registration fraud. The story just happened to break during an interview with Friedman on Fox News, and he took the opportunity to rein in Fox’s obsessive coverage of the ACORN...
Read me, Seymour. READ me!
Ameritocracy’s mad scientists have been hard at work in their lab the last couple weeks, and in the midst of accidentally producing 3 mutants spiders that can recite the works of Beckett backwards and our CTO now having the ability to program his TiVo from 40 feet away using only his mind (which, in an unfortunate coincidence, due to brain trauma resulting from a previous...
4 tags
Obama was born in a manger???""
Someone’s gotta fact-check this stuff. Among the probably not-quite-accurate claims made by both candidates last night. Two examples:
McCain-“All of their positions will now be held by a man named Joe the plumber” [after having claimed to have fired his entire campaign]
Obama- “Contrary to the rumors you’ve heard, I was not born in a manger. I was actually...
8 tags
ROBOTS!!! ROBOTS AND CAPITAL LETTERS ATTACK...
It’s pretty much a universally agreed-upon fact that robots are one of maybe the eight coolest things of all time (OR IS IT???? Post this quote - “robots are one of maybe the eight coolest things of all time” - and attribute it to ME with THIS URL and find out! First one to do that wins the “I Have Too Much Time” Award. Shiny.)
Exhibit A
But sometimes robots...
Thanks, Pacific Standard!
The coolest beer bar in Brooklyn (seriously, if you like beer, this place will make you think you won some kind of prize where you get to magically manifest your dream bar…like those old “McWorld” commercials, minus all the saturated fats and corporate evil) Pacific Standard was cool enough to let us and our friends from beermenus.com sit in at their debate-watching party and...
I say, the gentleman from Freetopia wants to...
The highest rated show on TV last night involved two men in suits sitting at a table arguing about policy! No, producers from the Charlie Rose Show didn’t secretly hack into the broadcasting frequency of “Deal Or No Deal”. We’re talking about the third (and last) debate!
Still, neither of these guys are gonna get as many votes as David Cook…
And it was...
Ameritocracy ups its awesomeness for YOU!!!
Hey there, Ameritocracy Community!
We’re excited to tell you about some new features available to you on Ameritocracy.com. First you will already have begun to see some cosmetic changes to the homepage. These include better access to our blog and more featured content, including a featured community member. We are implementing these changes with you in mind, to make navigating the site...
Valleywag intern posts first blog - we're the...
The well-known Silicon Valley gossip rag has kicked off the academic year with what must be a post from a new intern. The aspiring online media pundit got most of their facts right, including the successful copy-pasting of a quote in the body of their blog and the correct citation of Esther Dyson as an investor in Flickr. There was just one wee little misstatement, probably just a lack of coffee...