Logical Fallacy #2 - False Cause

There's a good number of sub-headings under False Cause (aka: Questionable Cause).
I grabbed this one from Wikipedia just cuz it's my fave:

Post hoc ergo propter hoc (Latin: "after this, therefore because of this") is a logical fallacy (of the questionable cause variety) that states "Since event Y followed event X, event Y must have been caused by event X." It is often shortened to simply post hoc. It is subtly different from the fallacy cum hoc ergo propter hoc (correlation does not imply causation), in which two things or events occur simultaneously or the chronological ordering is insignificant or unknown. Post hoc is a particularly tempting error because temporal sequence appears to be integral to causality. The fallacy lies in coming to a conclusion based solely on the order of events, rather than taking into account other factors that might rule out the connection.

Today's Pix

Where's The Outrage?

From RTD:

RICHMOND -- A felon and admitted longtime gunrunner caught on Interstate 95 headed to Boston with handguns in the trunk of his car is set to be sentenced Tuesday in federal court.

Anthony T. Champion, 33, of Columbus, Ga. who pleaded guilty in November to possession of a stolen firearm, faces up to 10 years in prison when sentenced by U.S. District Judge James R. Spencer.

According to court documents, Champion was stopped by a state trooper near Doswell on Jan. 31, 2013, and nine handguns in a cloth bag were discovered in the trunk of his Toyota Camry -- two were stolen and one had the serial number obliterated.

Gun freaks and Libertarians oughta be teamed up and jumpin' all over this one.

Doesn't a US citizen have the right to take his guns with him on a trip up north?

Doesn't he have the right to make a living selling guns (the ones he owns anyway) to whoever he wants to sell 'em to?

And why do we care if the serial number on one of those guns was obliterated?  It's his gun - he can do what he wants with it.

Since when is it OK for the lawdogs to search a guy's car just because he gets a little nervous and decides to stop by the side of the road and take a short walk to clear his head?

What's this country comin' to?

Interesting Tidbit:  In 2010 and 2011, 825 guns that were used in crimes in New York were traced back to Virginia (eg).  It stands to reason that some number of people were arrested here in The Old Dominion for some kind of illegal-ness connected with those guns in New York.  I wonder if any of the cops (here or there) who made arrests in any of those capers were adherents to some bullshit outfit like the Oath Keepers.  Cuz, y'know - 2nd Amendment is a holy sacrament and if we don't hold it inviolable, Jesus won't love us anymore and then we're really in trouble and ... and actually, as you widen it all out, it just gets weirder and weirder.

God, Guns, and Goons In Uniform - what could possibly go wrong?

Record Intact

The Polk Awards were announced this week, (kinda kicking off Awards Season) which means we've passed another solid year of outstandingness in world journalism, during which DumFux News extended its unblemished record of perfection having received a grand total of ZERO awards for reporting of any kind.  Again.

Brooklyn, N.Y. - Four reporters who revealed the extent of secret surveillance and massive data collected by the National Security Agency are winners of the 65th annual George Polk Awards in Journalism announced today by Long Island University. The four – from the British newspaper The Guardian and The Washington Post – were among 30 recipients from 15 news organizations who were recognized in 13 categories for work in 2013.

Reporting by those honored also triggered probes of statehouse corruption in Virginia and political payback in New Jersey, explored the gap between rich and poor in urban and rural locales, produced telling accounts of mass death in Bangladesh and civilian killings by U.S. forces in Afghanistan, exposed dark sides of pro football and major league baseball and examined community responses to mental illness that ranged from ineffective to absurd.

DumFux News has been around since 1996, and they've never won anything for anything.

No awards. Ever. No Peabody. No DuPont-Columbia. No Loeb. No Murrow. Not even an Emmy. Nada.

Today's WTF

Of all the douche nozzles on the air in whatever capacity - Joe Scarborough, David Gregory, Rush Limbaugh, Dan Marino, Glenn Beck, Michael Savage, Howie Long, Alex Jones etc etc et-fucking-cetera - how is it this guy has just recently managed to scrap his way back - to a thoroughly stupid time slot on a barely findable sub-heading of a sports channel that's not even available on an awful lot of basic cable packages; and one that can't quite figure out when the show might or might not run?  WTF!?!



The guy quotes Eddie Izzard for fuck's sake - on a sports show.  You honestly think that doesn't take some doing?  And do you think some of us don't know this is one of the guys (if not the guy) who made a 24-hour sports channel worth watching in the first place?)

Olbermann
ESPN2
Mon-Thu
11pm (usually - sometimes ya just hafta guess)

Lettin' It Get Ugly

It's important to remember that correlation is not proof - it doesn't necessarily mean that one part of the correlation is the cause of the other part(s).

Keep that in mind.

NYT editorial by SAMUEL BOWLES and ARJUN JAYADEV

Another dubious first for America: We now employ as many private security guards as high school teachers — over one million of them, or nearly double their number in 1980.

And that’s just a small fraction of what we call “guard labor.” In addition to private security guards, that means police officers, members of the armed forces, prison and court officials, civilian employees of the military, and those producing weapons: a total of 5.2 million workers in 2011. That is a far larger number than we have of teachers at all levels.

What is happening in America today is both unprecedented in our history, and virtually unique among Western democratic nations. The share of our labor force devoted to guard labor has risen fivefold since 1890 — a year when, in case you were wondering, the homicide rate was much higher than today.

5.2 million of us - it means that more than 1.5% of our total population is fully engaged in "protecting" the wealth of some Americans from other Americans.

It Isn't Ending Well

I'll have to listen to this a few more times to get it all, but I have some serious doubts that my mood will improve.



We have a capitol building chock-full of people who're really good at getting elected, fucking with each other, and practically nothing else.

With the economy in free fall, Obey met with his Republican counterpart Jerry Lewis of California to start writing a bill.

“And Jerry just grinned and said ‘Dave, I’m sorry, but we’ve got orders from headquarters, we can’t play, we can’t play,’” Obey recalls. “He said it twice.”
Whatever Republicans thought privately – some of them told Obey they agreed that Congress needed to pass a stimulus bill – they weren’t going to publicly help the new president help the economy.

But that wasn’t the scariest thing, Obey says. He realized many fellow House members – Democrats and Republicans – simply lacked a sophisticated understanding of the economy and government spending policy.

“One of the problems that you have today, is that a lot of members of Congress just don’t know a hell of a lot anymore,” Obey says.

We are so fucked. 

Seems A Little Silly

...but sometimes ya gotta beat the horse even after it's dead(?)  I honestly don't know what else to say about it.  Climate Change (most probably due to AGW) is a real thing, and somehow, we still have a substantial percentage of people who just can't bring themselves to recognize it.

I refuse to give Marsha Blackburn any time on my little blog here; and I sure as fuck hate even acknowledging a preening fluffer like David Gregory; so I'll just give ya'll this little bit:

Something Else

...that'll prob'ly never happen.  But hey - we can dream.



Take a good look at Alexis Goldstein

Cosmo Strikes Out

This appeared on Cosmo's Facebook page, and reaffirms what most of us have known for a while about dumfuk magazines "for women".

(paraphrasing a favorite comment):

Dear Cosmo -

Kindly take your ridiculous, arbitrary dictates of what women should want to look like and shove 'em back up your ass.

Sincerely,

Every guy on the planet who's had to spend hours reassuring a wife, girlfriend or daughter (ie: any real-world-perfect-for-me woman) that she's not fat and grotesque, all because assholes like you insist on undermining her confidence by playing on her fears just so you can sell her a load of shit she doesn't need in the first fucking place.

It's An Act Of God

God makes a gi-normous fucking mess, and everybody else gets to clean it up.  Is that why so many "conservatives" claim god as one of their own?

So basically - god's that one dickhead you don't invite back for the next party(?)  I can dig it.

Following Up

I keep hoping the nonsense about "dangerous vaccinations" has receded enough to get  people back to reality, but every so often, one of my Facebook buddies just has to post some bullshit that re-amps the fear.

YouTuber potholer54:




This potholer guy does some good work.  Here's his takedown on Ken Hamm:

Love Is The Answer

Some mid-winter tunes - reaching for softer breezes and milder climes.

Crystal Blue Persuasion --Tommy James and the Shondells

Samba Pa Ti --Santana

Moon Dance --Van Morrison

The Day After

We always get some kind of post-game shit, so what the hell:

Today's Pix