Lions Den III: Kate Paulk

Along with Dave Freer, Sarah Hoyt, and Chris McMahon, Kate Paulk is a member of the Mad Genius Club. She is also a Mensa-qualified history buff and her take on Vlad Tepes, aka Dracula, Impaler, is based on the actual historical figure and military leader, as opposed to the caped seducer. Please note that we […]

Naked authoritarianism

We appear to be rapidly reaching the end of the grand pretense of liberal democracy: While the much publicized Sunday morning detention of Glenn Greenwald’s partner David Miranda at Heathrow on his way back to Brazil, in a stunning move that as we subsequently learned had been telegraphed apriori to the US, could potentially be […]

Lions Den II: Michael Z. Williamson

The level of interest in the Lion’s Den has been high enough that I’m going to have to post one every week for a while. As it happens, Baen Books author Michael Z. Williamson has a newly released collection of essays and short stories entitled Tour of Duty: Stories and Provocations. It’s eclectic, and as […]

Congress exempt from Obamacare

Just in case it wasn’t sufficiently clear that Obamacare is going to wreck American health care, the executive branch has given the congressional branch an exemption from the law: The White House has approved a deal that will exempt members of Congress and their staff from some of the provisions of the Affordable Care Act, […]

Response Part VIII

In Section B.2, Matthew Johnson appears to reveal the real source of the SFWA’s institutional fury, which is the fact that I have drawn attention to the organization’s increasingly shabby reputation and nonexistent integrity.  It is a little ironic, as again, there is nothing that I could do as a single member that could possibly […]

Greenwald Salon interview

Read the whole interview.  This is very far from over: Yesterday, you reported some more details from these documents that Snowden has been sharing, including the fact that “Microsoft has helped NSA to circumvent its encryption to address concerns that the agency would be able to intercept web chats.” I’m quoting directly from the story. […]

Mike Williamson and Larry Correia weigh in

Standout Author Michael Z. Williamson and I don’t exactly see eye-to-eye on everything, but he’s written a very good post on his experience with SFWA.  He, too, has had a run-in with The Puppinette: Mary Robinette Kowal, self-described professional puppeteer and part time writer, is very upset with some of the drama going on in […]

Response Part IV

Section 3 is where Matthew Johnson really begins to send the SFWA Board Report off the rails of reason: 3. Harassment The following is the SFWA policy on harassment: The SFWA administration, employees, members, and volunteers are responsible for assuring that all persons who participate in SFWA programs and activities do so in an atmosphere […]

Cops aren’t rocket scientists

I find this report of the 2nd Circuit Court decision to be interesting for two  reasons: A man whose bid to become a police officer was rejected after he scored too high on an intelligence test has lost an appeal in his federal lawsuit against the city. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in […]

Post-Christian pagan revival

You may recall that a pan-European pagan revival was something I predicted a few years ago ago.  Secularism is not an option because it has nothing to offer philosophically or spiritually; that’s precisely why the humanists are always producing manifestos as well as books attempting to explain why it is possible for someone to square […]