I take another slant on this.  I read Williamson's full account on The Corner.  He states that the theater asked the audience to turn off all cell phones before the show started.

So isn't the theater culpable?  By my lights, Kevin still owes the girl a cell phone if it was broken.  But the theater management should have acted.

Next up, kids in restaurants:  If parents can't or won't control their kids, should management act?

I understand why Peter applauded the archbishop, but why does it take guts for a Catholic bishop to speak out against abortion?  As far as I can tell, it's actually pretty common. The Church has taken a strong stand on the issue.  I'll even hazard a guess that the Holy Father won't even call the Archbishop to congratulate him.  He's only doing what was expected of him.

We can't get around prosecutorial discretion, and it's why lawsuits of that type fail.  As for standing, it can easily be defined in statute.  It could be restrictive or not.

I actually think that basic EMT training is a little much unless you're going to volunteer on a rescue (ambulance) squad.  I scanned the comments, and I did see one suggestion that CPR / First Aid is more appropriate.

If you take a typical EMT-B class, training includes the administration of oxygen, oropharyngeal and nasopharyngeal airways, the use of a bag valve mask, applying a traction splint, etc.

If you take that training with the expectation that you'll use these particular skills during a big emergency, it doesn't seem likely, since that equipment won't likely be available to you.

In addition, unless you use these skills, they'll atrophy over time.  By all means, learn the basics on controlling arterial bleeding, taking a pulse, and CPR.  If you want to go beyond that, go find yourself an ambulance to ride on.

From what little I've read on the subject, that's a tough nut to crack.

The show stopper for me is the low payoff.  That for a 500+ day mission, they wouldn't actually land (plus my days of weighing 154 lbs is way over).  Of course, the Apollo 10 mission involved that.  The crew went around the moon without landing, but it was only an 8 day mission.

I watched the Super Bowl.  I turned on the TV at kickoff time, and missed the National Anthem.  I didn't really do this deliberately, but it was just as well.

I did read a comment in either The Corner or here in Ricochet that Beyonce's performance was sub-par, as has been typical of Super Bowl performances.  But I also don't like watching shots of many of the players on the field being disrespectful of the anthem while it's sung.  The shuffling around, or maybe a player has his legs spread wide; he just can't be bothered to stand at attention.

When halftime came, I deliberately changed the channel to the NFL network and watched their take on the game.  When halftime ended, I switched back to the game.

So I missed the pre-game festivities, including Beyonce, and the half-time performance.  I did watch the post-game awarding of the trophy (a little hokey; the NHL has the best trophy in sports, the Stanley Cup, along with the way they award it).

Stripped of all that baggage, the Super Bowl becomes an enjoyable event.

How's that for checking out of the culture?

Arguably the greatest player in the game of Tennis, Andre Argassi, said he hated the game. Would he have been better off not being a professional player?  I don't know. The question posed by Judith Levy has no one right answer.

But we also live in a time, a fortunate time, when those of us who are reasonably well educated have a good chance of finding fulfilling work.

The individual chances for that were much lower a 100 years ago, and so was getting that education. So whining about having to do something you did well, but didn't like, would not impress some schlub working a factory floor day after day supporting his family.

I heard this second hand, and googled around for an actual quote, but couldn't find it.  My understanding is that Justice Antonin Scalia, who with his wife, raised nine kids, said that you have to have strict rules. When kids grow up to be teenagers they will rebel.  Better to have something in place to rebel against, so they're not rebelling against something important.

Your link seems to be bad.

Steve Jobs's personality can be compared to some notable people who worked in government:

Lyndon Johnson, Douglas MacArthur, and Hyman Rickover come to mind, as well as Winston Churchill.  They were all convinced of their own greatness and treated the "little people" like dirt.

It's not that he treated his direct reports at Apple badly.  They were talented in their own right, were paid well, and could walk away at any time and get a lucrative job anywhere else.  It's how he treated waitresses when he was unhappy with the food (he was very picky about his food). Johnson could be just as bad (see Robert Caro's bio of him). Yet when they had to, when they were up against the wall and they needed help, they'd turn nice real fast until the crisis past.

I can admire Jobs's accomplishments, but not like the person.

This is not Savage's point.  But if you're going to make any point at all, you're bringing in a lot of baggage when you use Jobs as an example.

I've read that most of the climate change proponents are social scientists.

Nevertheless, grant money goes to people with projects that "prove" human caused climate change, not to people attempting to disprove it.  Tenure hasn't made a difference in balancing the points of view in that "field."

I'm opposed to a mandatory retirement age in anything. However, I can see term limits for judges, including the Supremes.  In the case of the Justices, I'd advocate Fourteen years, and out.

If you're advocating for elderly judges, they can start their term at seventy.

How come iTunes hasn't isn't downloading this episode?

Well, there's back and forth on the issue of tenure in the comments. 

I think tenure overrated, and it should go.  But I can understand the arguments for academic freedom for a law professor, or professors in the humanities, which can touch on political, social, and moral controversies, which again, I don't buy in the end.

But why does a math, or engineering professor need that protection?

And another thing about maps (well nautical charts).  My rating in the Coast Guard was Quartermaster (in the naval services, the QM specialty involves marine navigation, among other duties on the bridge, not supply as in the Army).  We had to maintain the charts (they were never called maps, just like a deck was never called a floor) which included hand corrections.  If a buoy moved, it had to be noted on the chart we were using.

During a normal bridge watch underway, it was the QM's job to note or fix the ship's position in pencil on the chart, often done every fifteen minutes depending on how close to land you were.  You could do this visually, by radar, or electronically (LORAN) with different levels of accuracy in the 1980's.

While the Navy still has this rating, the Coast Guard merged it with Boatswain's Mate, effectively getting rid of it.  With satellite navigation, the skills QM training provided are not as needed.  I suspect that in the Navy, the average QM's navigation skills have atrophied.

I'll bet it's the same with aeronautical navigation.

Regarding the aside on George H.W. Bush flying in combat at 19 years old, and not being able to drive a truck today at that age, I'll point out that it's also impossible, today, to become an aviator in the military without a college degree.  So one probably won't make it any earlier than 22 years old.  And even in 1943, Bush was the youngest Naval Aviator, meaning he was the exception, not the rule, which was probably the early to mid twenties.

Strangely, there's no minimum age limit to get a private pilot's license, and there's no hard age limit for a commercial license either as far as I can tell.