Wednesday, December 30, 2009

The fun continues

His ONeness now informs us that there was a systemic failure. So, he has clarified the secretary's prior statement; the system working well means failing.

Many are acting like this ends the story, but I think it is just beginning! First of all, this systemic failure one year into his administration will result in no one getting fired, certainly none of the people that he put in charge of the system. And we have the idiotic counter measures watch: no on leave your seat an hour before the flight ends. That is perfect. Like most of our security measures it is useless: now terrorists know when they have to make thier move. But this one reaches a new height of idiocy: the one thing that stopped this guy was other passengers getting out of their seats to stop him! Any garden variety incompetent could do useless, but actually doing harm takes a degree from Harvard. The one thing that worked--people using their common sense to preserve their lives--will be outlawed. You may not be able to teach stupid, but you can, through higher education, inculcate a sense of societal self-loathing and a commitment to abstractions divorced from reality sufficient to produce the functional equivalent of stupidity: implementing measures of no practical benefit which actually make matters worse. You may not be able to teach stupid, but if you go to a good enough law school you may be able to learn it.

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