Justin Katz
I have to admit a passing addiction to a Flash game called Swinging Ball. Simple, and yet somehow intriguing. Rolling and swinging a simple line-drawing ball around puzzles brings to mind the importance of mechanics. The images could have been anything, really — Spider-man would have been one obvious trapping. I know nothing about game…
The RI Senate has passed the budget 36 to 2. Again, “the plan softens the blows to some programs hit hard under the governor’s original budget proposal.” How’s that? The Providence Journal report on last night’s House offered this noteworthy commentary: Indeed, lawmakers couldn’t recall another budget vote that passed without a single “No” vote.…
Evidently, my Anchor Rising shirt with the target on the back ended up in Marc’s laundry, yesterday. Perhaps if I make a similar point to his, but stepping outside the boundaries while the garment is in the wash, we’ll manage a fruitful discussion. Although it is without doubt the hope of many who support same-sex…
Perhaps the feeling isn’t as common as I implied last night on the Matt Allen Show (segment streamable by clicking here, or download), but I can’t shake a feeling of creepy serenity around the budget battle. Thus far, the legislature hasn’t changed anything dramatic from the governor’s proposal that would fire us up on the…
Hot in the emailbox: The House of Representatives voted unanimously today to approve a $6.89 billion budget for the 2009 fiscal year. The proposal, which will now head to the Senate, will reduce state spending by $85 million from the current year to address the state’s deficit. The savings will be achieved without raising citizens’…
Paul Bovenzi’s response to an excellent op-ed by Bill Wilson raises an interesting question. On the one hand: Also, there are jobs (teaching and otherwise) that are not Union. People have a choice. They can work for a private school if they are completely opposed to being in a Union. Maybe the reason they don’t…
Maggie Gallagher gives the impression of one exasperated with the same-sex marriage debate: What about polygamy? Is that the natural next step? When people ask me this, my stock answer has become, “I don’t know, go ask the guys in the Harvard Law School faculty lounge.” Because if the California decision stands, there simply is…
One hates to see children harmed, but we must face the consequences of our policies: Among the 2,800 already removed from RIte Care, just under half are illegal immigrants. But the other half have the right to be here. And all of them are children. Some, in fact, are very sick children. Neighborhood Health Plan…
Something has seemed forced — in a “just a bit too perfect” way — about the promise of “green jobs” as some sort of savior of our economy. Ben Lieberman suggests that, even if such jobs do proliferate, they don’t match up with the number of jobs lost to the larger ecological zeitgeist: According to…
As one who flirts often with the edge of burnout, I hear the hum of truth in this: Burnout has been long associated with being overworked and underpaid, but psychologists Christina Maslach and Michael Leiter found that these were not the crucial factors. The single biggest difference between employees who suffered burnout and those who…