Oh Cool, The New Daft Punk Movie Is Coming Out

But where's the other guy?

When You Put It Like That …

I think for a lot of people who grew up from infancy with ubiquitous mascots like the Redskins or the Braves, it isn't clear just how racist the mascots are.  I mean, it's just always been that way, as long as you've been alive.  Put it in a context like this though, and it's inescapable to all but the most dense apologist.

One of These Is Real

Group that opposes "Redskins" and "Indians" team names has now made caps (or at least put them on a poster) showing exactly why. Next: San Antonio Wetbacks?

http://gregmitchellwriter.blogspot.com/2013/10/one-of-these-is-real.html

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More On The Tragic Death Of Sammy Cohen-Eckstein On PPW

The Metro has a good article on Sammy's death and the broader issue of street safety:

Local City Council member Stephen Levin said he had been in touch with the local precinct commander and had been told that there was no alcohol involved, and police believed the driver had not been speeding.

“But they’re doing a full investigation, as they should,” Levin added.

Cohen-Eckstein was just one of three children who has died in traffic accidents in the last three weeks.

On Sunday night, three-year-old Allison Liao was struck and killed while crossing a Queens intersection with her grandmother. Five-year-old Kiko Shao was hit by an Escalade in Sunset Park, Brooklyn.

Concilman Peter Vallone, the chair of the City Council’s public safety committee, held a hearing examining expected reforms to the NYPD’s collision investigations last week.

The NYPD recently changed the name of their Accident Investigation Squad to the Collision Investigation Squad, signaling a shift in approach.

“I’ve been saying for a long time, it’s impossible that the city has treated every one of these as accidents, virtually never bringing criminal charges,” Vallone said. “If these accidents keep happening, we need to look at whether or not the area is problematic.”

- See more at: http://www.metro.us/newyork/news/2013/10/09/boy-12-chasing-after-ball-struck-and-killed-by-van-near-prospect-park/#sthash.vGy6RM2V.dpuf

There are some great quotes in there from my fellow CB6 Transportation Committee member and Park Slope dad Doug Gordon, including this:

Gordon has a 4-year-old daughter and an 8-month-old son and said that as a parent of young children, reckless drivers are a huge source of anxiety.
. . . .
“The scariest thing I do everyday is walk my kids to school,” he added.

Sammy Cohen-Eckstein was an 8th grader at MS 51 and by all accounts I've heard from friends in the Slope, a beautiful kid.  A life tragically cut short.  Let's work together to make sure we have fewer such tragedies.  Transportation Alternatives has published a handy document for the next mayor that highlights the enforcement gap in traffic violations in NYC.  As a society, we need to take a new approach to making our streets safer for all users.

High Cost Of Brooklyn Housing

The variation in the data in these short-term local reports is grossly misreported every quarter due to a number of factors that can strongly skew comparison (e.g. one hot new expensive project has a lot of sales in a given quarter).  That doesn't change the overall trend and basic fact that it has gotten outrageously expensive to live around here.

Brooklyn Home Prices Set 10-Year Record

"The rise becomes more shocking when broken down by housing type and neighborhood. The average co-op in the combined area of Carroll Gardens, Boerum Hill and Red Hook, for example, now costs $937,000 — a remarkable 41 percent increase from the same quarter the year before, said the Post."

http://www.brownstoner.com/blog/2013/10/brooklyn-home-prices-set-10-year-record/

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Urban Renaissance Reaching Critical Mass: A Whole Foods In Newark

The Hahne building is a beautiful structure that has been well preserved in its senescence.  I remember it well from my law school tenure in the early aughts.  The university presence is large and growing.  Factor in Newark's incredibly good transit network connections, and you have a recipe for tremendous growth.  I think Whole Foods is making a good bet.

Shared from the Digg iPhone app:
Whole Foods has signed a lease for a 29,000-square-foot outlet in the former Hahne & Co. department store building in Newark. The formal announcement is expected tomorrow afternoon, a spokesman confirmed.

http://www.nj.com/business/index.ssf/2013/10/whole_foods_coming_to_newark_s.html

Tea Party Hypocrite Gorging On Medicaid Benefits Says Government Should Have No Role In Health Care (For You)

The mentality of these people is just mind-boggling.  There's a real cognitive defect in many of them, like Greg Collett:

“I don’t think that the government should be involved in health care or health insurance,” says Greg Collett, a 41-year-old software developer in Caldwell, Idaho, who would rather pay the fine for now -- $95 the first year -- than signup....

Collett counts himself among the 29 percent of people who said in anNBCNews/Kaiser poll they are angry about the health reform law. “The issue for me is that it is not the proper role of government,” he said.

Collett, who is married and has 10 children, says the kids are covered by Medicaid, the joint state-federal health insurance plan for people with low income and children who are not covered.

What the hell is the matter with these people?

The Destruction Of The Library At Alexandria

Interesting reading:

One of the great tragedies of ancient history, memorialized in myths and Hollywood film, is the burning of the great library at Alexandria. But the reality of the Library's end was actually a lot less pyrotechnic than that. A major cause of the Library's ruin was government budget cuts.

What I didn't know, not to this day, was that it was Reince Priebus all along.

Archaeological evidence of Reince Priebus appearance in an earlier age of Egypt's history.