the things that made me pause over the past few days...

DangerMouse and Sparklehorse Team Up With David Lynch...oh really?!?!

How about team up for awesomeness...

Check it out here, with full stream of the album due out in July...

(you may recall past obsessions with DangerMouse when he released the Grey Album in which he uses the a cappella version of Jay-Z's Black Album and the instramentals of album, the Beatles (also known as the White Album)



In other news, a great article from the New Yorker on why the underdog is often victorious, author Malcolm Gladwell uses basketball as the main example to describe the strategy...

Read the article here.

If you like the article be sure to check out the books Gladwell has authored, including The Tipping Point (excellent read), Blink (on bookshelf) and Outliers (on list to buy once I get through some of these other books :)).




Nate Silver, from fivethirtyeight.com does it again. This time he looks at the uphill battle in the NY State Senate gay marriage is facing. Just last week, on May 13, 2009, the NY State Assembly passed the same-sex marriage bill for the second time. The measure past under the leadership of Assemblymen Daniel O'Donnell and Dick Gottfried (among others). Read the NYTimes story here. Tomorrow there is a rally to push the Senate to pass the bill and have NY become the 7th State to allow the marriage between same sex couples. The rally will be from 5-7 pm @ 46th Street and 6th Ave in Times Square, come out and show your support for the same sex marriage and the 1324 rights and responsibilities that go along with it.

Rep. Foxx: NC deserves better

The Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act, also known as the Matthew Shepard Act, passed in the House on April 29. During the floor debate, Rep. Foxx from North Carolina said of Matthew Shepard's 1998 murder "But we know...it wasn't because he was gay. The bill was named for him but it's really a hoax."

Rep. Foxx apologizes for her semantics, not for her utterly offensive and ignorant remarks. I can't say I'm surprised. You say its unfortunate that things get blow out of proportion? I think it's unfortunate that Rep. Foxx is so misinformed. I am saddened by the fact that she did not support the Hate Crimes bill, but more so by her choice to ignore the brutal crimes that are committed against LGBT individuals because of who they are. During the floor debate in the House, Rep. Alcee Hastings from FL reminded us that "we cannot legislate love, but we can legislate against hate."

Why is that so hard for people to accept? Please continue to inform your elected officials about the importance of Hate Crimes legislation.


Yesterday's NYTimes Editorial on the Matthew Shepard Act.

Mississippi: from cotton to corn

I'm really not too surprised, having just read Omnivore's Dilemma. Here the NYTimes reports on the crop shift in Mississippi as the profitability of crops shifts from cotton to corn and soybeans in the south. Farmers say its hard to grow cotton here when the tshirts are being made in China, oh globalization...how do we make you work? One of my favorites, Joseph Stiglitz attempts to answer this in Making Globalization Work. I highly recommend both Omnivore's Dilemma and Making Globalization Work.

Recent websites and articles that have grabbed my attention

I have been terrible in terms of posting anything of relevance here. I really do hope to end this habit. I have started a new blog with the hopes of capturing all of the beautiful, wonderful, crazy things that I have stumbled upon in NYC. This blog will be solely dedicated to short, picture posts in an attempt to get those posts off this blog and refocus this blog to its original purpose, to write about different policy issues and to muse about various topics including music, art, the environment, etc.

In the past few weeks, I have come across a number of articles and websites that I would like to draw your attention to:

Social Earth is a website that I came across that is right up my ally

Same-sex Marriage myths BUSTED at ESPA's website

My obsession with the Supreme Court, Maira Kalman does it again with her take on the Court and Ruth Bader Ginsburg

NPR's story on Ben Folds and his new a cappella album

That's it for right now...I promise that I will make the effort to blog more and only think about it less :-)

Things to look forward to:
-weekend trip to Lancaster, PA to see my niece and nephew for my niece Cailynn's 2nd birthday
-an outing on the 15th
-beach weekend the 22nd - 25th
-412 to 212

Mapping the Human ‘Diseasome’

This is one of the most interesting articles I had read in awhile, I read it last year on my way to Haiti...