The random political thoughts thread (Part Deux)

[Alex]

Originally Posted by Ghoulish Delight

Holy hell. Y'all remember that hanged census worker in Kentucky? Seems he staged it all and hung himself!

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34130128/ns/us_news-life/

I like when I end up looking smart, in this case for not jumping on the crucify Michelle Bachmann bandwagon (though she is, of course, thoroughly nuts).

Originally Posted by Me, back then

Not saying that was the reason, it [that he was killed to protect illicit drug/alcohol operations] just strikes me as equally likely (and there are many other possibilities) based on the currently available information as it being someone inspired by Michele Bachman's comments on the census itself.

Ultimately, unless there is direct evidence found one way or another, it may not be possible to assign one murder to one cause. And jumping to conclusions isn't particularly useful except as a rhetorical club. It is something to watch and investigate, of course.

And why is it that people who write on themselves to incite outrage in others can never seem to do it properly.

[BarTopDancer]

Google apologizes for results of "Michelle Obama" image searches

For most of the past week, when someone typed "Michelle Obama" in the popular search engine Google, one of the first images that came up was a picture of the American first lady altered to resemble a monkey.

On Wednesday morning, the racially offensive image appeared to have been removed from any Google Image searches for "Michelle Obama."

Yet they did nothing about the images that came up with Bush as a monkey. Or is it different because Mrs. Obama is the First Lady and not POTUS?

[BarTopDancer]

Originally Posted by Ghoulish Delight

Holy hell. Y'all remember that hanged census worker in Kentucky? Seems he staged it all and hung himself!

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34130128/ns/us_news-life/

Glad you posted this. Read that yesterday, came to post it and got distracted. I've spent a good part of today trying to remember what I was going to post yesterday.

[Alex]

Google has a history of modifying search results when people are intentionally manipulating things to distort results. If the Obama photo reached the top through such means then the action wouldn't necessarily be out of character.

Otherwise, my preference is that Google not tweak search results because somebody is unhappy about the results given.

It is true, though, that calling a black person a monkey has a racial connotation that calling a white person a monkey does not. The Bush comparisons were pretty clearly intended to call him stupid. Since I don't think there is anybody who calls either Obama stupid, I think that further highlights the reason that particular comparison was taken. So it could be argued that the photo is offensive in a different way and therefore different responses are not necessarily hypocritical.

It should be pointed out that while the photo is not returned with a simple Michelle Obama search, it can still be retrieved by other Google image searches.

But still, if the image reached the top organically then it should be left there. Google's algorithms are designed to figure out what people searching actually want and apparently (if it was organic) people want a racist image of Michelle Obama. This is always a problem, though, with automated dot-connecting, remember a few years back when Wal-Marts automated DVD recommending system included "Planet on the Apes" with searches for (I think) Martin Luther King.

[Betty]

Originally Posted by Alex

But still, if the image reached the top organically then it should be left there. Google's algorithms are designed to figure out what people searching actually want and apparently (if it was organic) people want a racist image of Michelle Obama.

Google bombs only require a large group of people acting together. Take any image, give it a name that doesn't apply, have enough people link to it using that name, and it will rise to the top of the results.

It would require a greater number of people linking to a photo of her with the correct name to overcome that.

I doubt there is a group of people working to link to nice image her that is greater than those working to push the inappropriate photo.

I would usually agree to let Google stay out of the organic manipulation and just let things happen but in this case, I'm not so sure.

[BarTopDancer]

Good points Alex. As always.

[BarTopDancer]

This girl I work with just said "women should support Sarah Palin because we need more strong women like her in our government. She's smart and she's looking out for all women".

[alphabassettgrrl]

I'm surprised at the support for Ms. Palin.

It has been an opportunity, also, to think about solidarity. I look for and find solidarity in different areas- cyclists, women, stagehands... different kinds of understanding, different kind of shared experience. It's interesting.

[BarTopDancer]

At the top of my list of things I look for when looking for solidarity is people who aren't bat fvcking insane.

I'm still disgusted by what she said. That wasn't all of it. She defended the stepping down from governor by saying "She did what was smart. No one liked what she was doing and she needed time to promote her book".

I had to leave the conversation. I walked away saying "so she's just going to quit being POTUS if people don't like her or she wants o do something else? She's bringing nothing but harm to the woman's movement and I will move to Canada if she is elected"

I seriously lost all respect for her today.

[alphabassettgrrl]

I laughed at your comment about walking away from being POTUS if people don't like her. I've asked husband where he'd like to move if we get someone like Palin as POTUS. I hear the Mediterranean is nice. I don't know about Canada- they have winter.

I'm with you on wanting connections among sane people. I wasn't implying you should be friends with this ... nutter. I was just thinking that solidarity was an interesting thing, and pondering where we look for it and where we find it.