Links galore

[owlmoose]

• Bemoaning the 22nd amendment. Lots of interesting thoughts here, including the contention that the term limiting of Bill Clinton has had repercussions on every election since, and that George W.'s forced retirement is oddly unsatisfying. "If we could vote for whoever we want, regardless of prior service, Bush would probably be dumped unceremoniously in 2008. Only our kooky current system lets him retire undefeated. What this country really needs is to have Bill Clinton run against George W. Bush."
  Dude. What I wouldn't give to see that. Bill would wipe the floor with him.


• Librarian makes U.S. News & World Report's Best Careers 2007 list. I even agree with the assessment. Mostly. The line about a "placid workplace"? Clearly, they haven't been here... ;)


• Remember the READ posters, featuring various celebrities plugging the joys of reading? The ALA still sells them, and sometimes they feature Ewan MacGregor. Mmm. Alan Rickman, too. And they say print is dead.


• Speaking of which. Books do still have some advantages...


• Finally, a couple of blog postings on the culture of politeness and why it's not always good. I haven't read all of them in-depth; the main issue seems to be when politenss derails useful criticism and how that impedes progress. The context is librarianship, but I kept thinking about fandom as I read it. I'll probably have more to say about these later.

Internet update: Our DSL gateway is completely dead. T ordered a new one, and it should be here in a few days. In the meantime, he thinks he's figured out how to get me on the network via dial-up. So hopefully I should have access back tonight. Yay.

Comments

[luvmoose.livejournal.com]

Please welcome Ms. K. to 1997. Tell her about the future!

[oswulf.livejournal.com]

Although, I was sure that Bush wouldn't last through 2004, so careful what you wish for...

In general though, to the extent that term limits tend to sacrifice democracy to empower the wealthy, they probably aren't the best idea. Just don't go repealing 22 too quickly, I'm holding about 1000 shares of "22nd amendment will not be repealed before 2008."

[owlmoose.livejournal.com]

I really dislike term limits. We have a term limiting mechanism; they're called "elections". I know there are all kinds of reasons that it's not that simple, but I think real campaign finance reform would do a lot more good in the long run than term limits.

I think the article resonated with me because I miss Bill Clinton so much. I didn't always agree with his politics, but I always appreciated how intelligent and articulate he was, and how much he genuinely cared about people. Such a stark contrast to what we have now.

[oswulf.livejournal.com]

It seems to me that term limits undermine any possible cause they could conceivably serve. Is the problem 'bad politicians'? We can vote them out, term limits means we can't keep the good ones. Is the problem 'undue influence of money'? Term limits eliminate some of the few things you can build up to counterbalance the influence of money.

Now publicly funded campaigns--there's an idea.

I _frequently_ disagreed with Clinton's politics. But a profound difference to me is the way he would welcome people that disagreed with him. I have an awful lot of respect for that.