There are a lot of really good recommendations on this thread! I have definitely found out a few animes I'd like to check out from reading. 

I can't boost Evangelion, Lain, Ghost in the Shell (TV series) and Paranoia Agent enough... So... 

"Great Teacher Onizuka" was an excellent manga, and very good anime that needed to run a few more episodes. I highly recommend both! 

"Gankutsuou: The Count of Monte Cristo" is an amazing anime up till the last 2 episodes where it falls to pieces. Before the last two eps I was going to call it one of my favorite animes.

"Dead Leaves"? What was that all about? It was so weird. But in a good way. The direction was top notch. 

And I must say it... "Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt" Gainax hit a home run. I don't think there will be a season 2 so the ending comes off as a massive troll. 

I tried to watch FLCL twice... years apart. I really can't stand that anime and all the praise it gets.

I'm not a big cereal eater but I eat Fiber One cereal cause it's healthy and fiber is one thing that's easy to miss from your diet. Also, it fills you up quickly. 

Did someone say anime? I was just planning to lurk but if we are talking about anime...

The opening post was very good. It is hard to think of anime as a "genre." First argument I'd make about anime-- Anime is fun. I love anime. That's all one should need right?

But I think the idea of their being something Japanese about anime is a draw for me. The Japanese animes show a very a different approach to nationalism and community than American TV shows do (in some cases, of course). Just look at the treatment of world war 2 in the US and in Japan. Akira was born out of the same anxieties that say... Grave of the Fireflies was.  The anime "highschool slacker" is very different in some respects from a US "highschool slacker" typically because American slackers never have goddesses drop from the sky on them and they don't get sent to monster boarding schools but w/e. 

Evangelion was mentioned. I love Evangelion. Cowboy Bebop, Ghost in the Shell-- all must watch shows. I'd also say please watch Paranoia Agent and Serial Experiments Lain. 

I'd have to withhold judgment until I watch it. The idea-- even as a TV show-- isn't really new. Maybe that 12year olds are watching it is new-- and that isn't a small thing-- but still. It could be interesting. It just depends on how they handle it. I must admit... I saw an anime "Birdy the Mighty: Decode" which had roughly the same idea and it was a pretty cool show. 

I probably wouldn't have tweeted what he tweeted, but then again, I'm not John Piper, and probably wouldn't be able to minister the way he ministers either.

The first tweet to me seemed a bit off putting, as in "I didn't get the point." But when I read the second tweet, I got the point. Actually, it caused me to search and listen to sermson for a bit-- not about Job-- but about submission to God in the face of tragedy and dissapointment and... Piper's right, from a spiritual/Christian point of view-- some things take God-- there are wounds that won't be healed even when the roof of the house is back on (I happen to be Cat adjuster).

I'm talking about these particular tweets.  As I said, I don't know much about Piper himself, I've heard a few minutes of Piper here and there, and he seems to be a good guy. And he handled the fallout well. But also... Twitter is hard (I guess). I don't know what the lag time between the two tweets were but that can affect how things are interpretted.

Great post! 

With respect to the whole thing regarding "just Providence" it seems that Mr O'Hare basically was trying to stick his fingers in the eyes of people like  Pat Robertson [who made the Katrina claim] and anyone else who was sympathetic to Pat Robertson. I don't agree with Pat Robertson on that. But Pat Robertson was offering a theodicity. It was misguided, but in theory it could be correct. Mr. O'Hare, far from offering a theodicity, which presumably Christians would have to accept if they accepted Robertson's, admits, basically, he was trying to be mean.

And I think he's just wrong on the science and the policy recommendations, so this is just a "fail" all around. He just wanted to lash out at his enemies and get his policies pushed through. 

This tornado has brought out a lot of bad things from many on the left. Politics is contentious, but this is something that was largely a-political, so it's strange that many of them are so mad. 

I'm not Catholic, so I don't know what the Church would consider an exorcism or not. Can someone be freed from varying levels of demonic influence? Yes. Are they all exorcisms? I don't know. The effect is roughly the same though.

That was a good article. It is sad that a lot of people aren't more upset about Benghazi. She was right though-- Benghazi happened because Obama and Clinton knew they could get away with it and that is partially because they knew the press would help them. It is is very sad. Was it Steyn who wrote a few weeks ago, basically, "in a decent society the people involved would step down." Obama and Hillary know they were wrong, but just as they worked very hard to convince themselves that "it was a tough decision and there wasn't enough information" they have also worked hard to convince themselves that they are so indispensable to this country that they ,it's remain in power! Wow! It's sad. But they need to go. They can make money doing something else but they shouldn't be in any type of representative government. They are only representing themselves.

The article didn't impress me. And I believe the writer confuses the issues. The IRS excuses of low level staffers and too much work don't hold water. The orders came from the top to thwart and Harris conservatives (of the ORS at least). Applications for groups were lower as well. Additionally the ORS breezed liberal groups through. That isn't profiling. That's simply anti conservative. The crazy questions they asked, as an example Profiling is something cops are mixed on, but this wasn't the same thing. Not even close. Discretion from theIRS serves no purpose here. The stated intentions of the groups were all known. Profiling is for when you don't know why this person is walking around at 2 am in the morning. Or you don't know why a kid or group of kids who should clearly be in school are not in school.

What a great post. I'm already calling shenanigans on the political process. Government is mainly made to work for the people inside it. This isn't a left or right issue but big government is there for the people at the switches. It's very disturbing what has gone on in this country. I thought the debt and the spending was bad-- but reasonable people can disagree about the facts and the theories-- the government in some sense though has (at least temporarily) dropped the idea of rule of law.

Wow. In perverse way... that makes sense. I think that's kinda messed up, but it makes, if you have a big explosion, you're out of business so don't  pay extra money for insurance for the cleanup or lawsuits. 

This will be something interesting to follow. 

I was/am busy. The Weekly Standard post got a little long for me (tl;dr on pg3). 

I'm sympathetic some of Mr Labash's complaints about Twitter. I think it may be dumbing people down in certain ways-- the fear is that some of these people on Twitter actually think they have expressed some sort of coherent thought or argument, and will then feel validated in their beliefs at the end of a "conversation." There are a lot of dummies on Twitter and it's easy to be dumb on Twitter. 

But it is a great way to follow the news and communicate. I've often thought of joining Twitter for people like Ace (of Spades) and Iowahawk and many other great tweeters. The idea that you can tweet at a famous person and get a response is kinda cool. 

Like many things, it's a double-edged sword. 

Years ago, people were saying the same thing about blogs...

That's really crazy. 1 million in general liability coverage? That sounds like way too little.  It will be interesting to read about this. But perhaps that means the company will be paying out of its own coffers for the damages...

13/13! Yay. But yes, that was a fairly simple test.  But honestly... if someone doesn't do well on such a test, I don't really know if I care. Most people will talk more about sports and what not, no one (who's not in school) really talks much about science (unless you are a scientist or you're on Ricochet). I'm not sure those questions have any bearing on whether your mechanic can fix your car, or your roofer can fix your roof. They don't even have any bearing on whether your thoughts on X political issue (not related to science) should be decided by voting "D" or "R" in the next election. 

What a wild story! That human rights commission sounds like a great way for the city to make some money. I doubt there is any way to run a business without discriminating on someone. Isn't "disparate impact" still a thing? Everything will have some disparate impact, so everything will be discrimination. 

Let the bar have a server knowledgeable of Welsh Culture. 

The thing about it is this-- the cops will get in trouble with "community leaders" for "profiling." The risk of a short-term controversy stoked by an Al Sharpton or a Jesse Jackson outweigh the long term benefits to the community for any particular politician. Especially if the cops stop a few people and it turns out the people weren't doing anything wrong. 

The controversy will be immediate, and they will have to apologize and explain "what else" they are doing for the community (monetary shakedown!). The benefits the community receives won't happen until much later, possibly after that politician gets voted out of office. 

So I can see, cynically, why these crime pockets haven't been policed heavily. I really doubt it was because cops didn't already know where the crime occurred.