Matt Yglesias

27 Responses to “I Must Interject Here”

1. Max424 Says:
   June 20th, 2009 at 10:11 am

   Don’t you have to have facts and data in order to make charts and graphs?

   I mean, you can’t just bloviate a pie chart.

2. Elias Says:
   June 20th, 2009 at 10:12 am

   I got a kick out of that video, especially when this Jenny Lewis was driving her car down the street and I realized that I bike this same street several times a day, a little shocking as you rarely ever see the little college town ‘o Chico featured anywhere.

3. Ted Says:
   June 20th, 2009 at 10:20 am

   Love this album. The whole album exemplifies a Bush-era mood in indie music — some of the best political songs of the era were less explicitly political than songs about a desperate desire to retreat from the news, block it all out, escape. That’s how I read “Brand New Colony” and “Sleeping In,” and possibly “The District Sleeps Alone Tonight.”

4. Nylund Says:
   June 20th, 2009 at 10:40 am

   Although you quote a fair amount of it already, the whole first Jenny verse reads like a left wing response to right wing blogs:

   I feel must interject here you’re getting carried away feeling sorry for yourself
   With these revisions and gaps in history
   So let me help you remember.
   I’ve made charts and graphs that should finally make it clear.

   But, I think the truth is, to be prominent on the right wing only takes one of two things: family connections (Kagan, Kristol, Goldberg, etc.) or just blind faith and purity of the ideology. Real world skill sets, experience making fact-based arguments, and a nerdy desire for wonkish details, (Ezra with healthcare, Nate and his numbers, etc.) are just not traits that are rewarded on the right side of the divide.

   If one side wants to make a fact-based argument they download data, analyze it, and present the findings. The other has readers peer inside the windows of the house of a 12 year old boy to see what material the countertops are made of.

5. Jesus H. Says:
   June 20th, 2009 at 10:41 am

   Graphs and charts usually point to some data, facts and research. Not the usual stock and trade for Michelle Malkin and Co.

6. cd Says:
   June 20th, 2009 at 10:42 am

   It’s a real shame that Ben Hibbard has such a douchey voice. Nonetheless, the non-vocal music is enjoyable enough.

7. Nylund Says:
   June 20th, 2009 at 10:50 am

   The simple answer is that there is an outright hostility towards the sciences and anything “intellectual” on the right. This is a group that thinks both global warming and evolution are elaborate hoaxes. This is a group that thinks that the best way to prevent diseases is through prayer and religious faith. This is a group that mocks anyone that went to a university not named Regent or Liberty.

   It is a group of people that has spent their entire lives making arguments predicated on the dismissal of the facts regularly displayed in charts and graphs. For them to use scientific data plot in an argument is like Richard Dawkins relying on a biblical passage to prove an evolutionary claim.

8. onymous Says:
   June 20th, 2009 at 10:58 am

   Jen Wood. Not Jenny Lewis. (Jenny Lewis has performed the song live with Ben Gibbard on occasion. But it’s Jen Wood on the album.)

9. Nylund Says:
   June 20th, 2009 at 10:59 am

   Its the direct result of considering the Bible a scientific textbook.

10. Opie Curious Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 11:01 am

    Yeah, and “We Will Become Silhouettes” very clearly describes the return of Cold War nuclear paranoia, what with all the talk of WMDs we were (and somehow still are) hearing.

    Two lines from that album have always puzzled me, though. First, the line in “This Place Is a Prison” in which Ben Gibbard sings, “And you may case the grounds from the Cascades to Puget Sound, but you are not permitted to leave.” Not sure what that means. That area is way too large to be anything actually prison-esque, but way too small to be a good metaphor for society generally.

    Second, the line in “Nothing Better” in which he sings, “I will block the door like a goalie tending the net in the third quarter of a tie game rivalry.” So far as I know, lacrosse is the only sport that has both goalies and quarters, but doesn’t that seem like an odd choice? Since hockey goalies are far more effective net-minders than their counterparts in other sports, why wouldn’t he say “third period”?

11. Ted Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 11:55 am

    Yes, that’s a weird line.

12. soullite Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 12:11 pm

    Liberals like charts because they were taught that humans are logical, rational beings that can understand logical, rational arguments.

    Liberals are, of course, full of shit on that one.

13. Roddy McCorley Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 12:14 pm

    Max 424 beat me to it. Charts and graphs might be termed subsets of “facts.” And our conservative friends have a problem with facts.

    Also, they have lousy taste in music and don’t listen to the Postal Service.

14. Milind Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 12:41 pm

    @10&11: It’s because “third period” doesn’t scan. Sometimes one just has to take poetic license.

15. fluxisrad Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 12:46 pm

    Were liberals not all big fans of the 2000 Grandaddy album The Sophtware Slump, with the song “Chartsengrafs”?

16. Todd Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 1:25 pm

    Charts and graphs focus attention on facts. Facts aspects of reality. And reality has a well-known liberal bias.

17. esque Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 1:32 pm

    Commenter #8 is absolutely right. Jen Wood.

18. SN Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 2:21 pm

    The “third quarter” line was due to the fact that it rhymes, of course. But it still doesn’t change the fact that after all the goalkeeping activity of the third quarter, there’s still one more quarter left.

19. FlipYrWhig Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 4:23 pm

    Oldsters like me remember “Everything Counts” by Depeche Mode:

    The graph
    On the wall
    Tells the story
    Of it all
    Picture it now
    And see just how
    The lies and deceit
    Gained a little more power

20. Hedley Lamarr Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 4:39 pm

    Re the Post Office: The other day I saw Congressman Boener denigrating gov’t health care by asking how we’d like health care to be like the service we get at the Post Office.

    Can’t think why reporters present didn’t ask him about our military being gov’t empolyees as well, but they did not.

21. cw Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 5:21 pm

    I am always struck by the increadibly wimpy music young bloggers seem to like. That song is totally weak. BReak upsongs? REally? Why would I care about that fat guy’s personal life? I’m just appalled.

22. HERCULE SAVIEN Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 5:42 pm

    THE INTERNET!

    (Blogging not easy)

    Now, we prefer that the PeterMarshallBlog.Moderators, overview the blogs submitted by TRIATHLON/HERCULE SAVIEN, it is very difficult to work between various sights and countries dealing with the Internet System. The idea is not to be banned for LIFE, as most sights tend to do, instead of making it a first time a month, second time six months, and up at six month segments for breaking their rules or just because they don’t like your political views.

    (Linkages)

    Now, on (WWW.TheDailyBeast.Com) the sight hosted by Drudge Triathlon is banned for life due to a linkage, one found on (WWW.InfoWars.Com) a site hosted by Alex Jones, which showed actual photos of rapes and other War Crimes committed by the troops or Blackwater Security Forces upon Iraq Citizens, and these were the real deal, as the saying goes they were and are passed around like “Baseball/Soccer (European Football) Cards of players. So, linkage sites are a problem in the United States/(AIE) American Israeli Empire, either because of so called legal reasons or political as the government does not what the photographic truth out there but it’s the Internet. But, you know lawyers, a few hundred at the bottom any body of water is a good start, so links can be a bloggers down fall.

    (Posting of Article Comments)

    The posting of Article Comments in one country as long as it is SOURCED, is considered legal, yet in another it is considered possible grounds for copyright violations. And, yet other feel that they may have been taken out of context, when many others feel that the comments especially of those making them may have been an attempt to “Slip one By” on the public, or the public takes a separate view of what the comment was meant to have been said. This is used primarily by British Sites, so just going after one would not be fair.

    (Profanity and Personal Attack)

    Now, on (WWW.TheDailyBeast.Com), (WWW.InfoWars.Com.), Profanity is the order of the day, there is no profanity that can not be found upon their sites, which can or can not have a valid place in the discussion, George Carlin (40) forty years ago made a valid argument concerning the use of profanity in his “Seven Dirty Words” and on the Internet there would have to be a site decision on that. And, if it necessary to make a valid point, and the site is liberal, good for them, George Carlin made sense (40) years ago and it still makes sense today.

    (Personal Attacks)

    Now, Personal Attacks, they are wide open on the (WWW.TheDailyBeast.Com), (WWW.InfoWars.Com.), and on (WWW.NewsWestNotes) hosted by Bill Bradley, and Bill Bradley himself takes great effort to join in, which adds nothing to the discussion but its his sight paid for by the Democratic Party, and the site is the (VERY BEST) for the latest Democratic Left-Wing Conspiracy, Talking Points it makes the Communist Party look like a Right-Wing Conspiracy. Now, Bill Bradley is a love/hate relationship, Love the site for the LATES IN LEFT-WING CONSPIRACY, TALKING POINTS, but Hate, as a typical Liberal, name calling and personal attacks as a method of counter argument, it is like blogging with Ann Coulter if you are Bill Bradley, now that would be a knock down drag out fight! So, get your talking points (TAG) the Site and leave if your not FAR, FAR, FAR LEFT!

    (Hackers)

    But, thank if there is a deity, for hackers and underground Internet Café Users, Open, Closed and Gone. They are our front line of defense against the EMPIRE, if they can cause enough trouble in cyberspace until the Shi-ite Persian Republic of Iran can develop a Nuclear capability and forestall a preemptive Nuclear Attack upon that country the entire International Dynamics will change, it is time for the Empire the Bully of the Global Community to be put on notice NO MORE, will others be in fear of them. The (BRICK/CBS/SDR) Global Sphere Revolution is in swing, there is CHANGE!!! And Hackers against the Hierarchical Structure Empire are forces in the Vanguard.

    (Conclusion)

    Dealing on the Internet is not as easy as it would appear to the (PeterMarshallBlog.Moderators), the (WWW.Guardian.Com) has banned Triathlon for life over what who knows they don’t even notify the blogger of the reason for the removal for life “Specific” but YOUR GONE FOR LIFE, (WWW.RussiaToday) and the (PeterMarshallBlog.Moderators), are the best on the Internet, its simple, you submit like your handing your blog to an editor, you either say NO! Or, return with recommendation for resubmission if the offending part can be removed or rewritten for posting, vise “YOUR GONE FOR LIVE”. Beyond providing employment for the (PeterMarshallBlog.Moderators), unless it the(WWW.TheDailyBeast.Com), then with all the unemployment the lawyers over there feel that there are far to many posting to allow for each posting to be screened, unemployment up, they can find my postings, but can not find time to censor and simply remove, you just have to love lawyers, NOT!. Any more the Internet is not allowing the bloggers to continue the vital communications between the peoples of the Global Community, which our elected officials in their infinite lack of political will or “We Know Better” mentality won’t engage in. The public is tired of the pretty talk and wants the march toward a Nuclear War stopped, and the Internet maybe the last Hope!

    Triathlon/Hercule Savien

23. Mike Collins Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 6:45 pm

    The song is synthesized weaksauce, but I did break up with a girl once using the aid of charts and visual aids, so I have to sympathize.

24. S.P. Gass Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 10:21 pm

    GoRemy has a piechart in his Carbon Offsets video. I also like his Arlington Rap, McDonalds Rap, Maccaca Blues, Turbo Tax, America’s Worst Cook, and Birthday Hat videos.

25. lackluster Says:
    June 20th, 2009 at 10:24 pm

    One theory: The majority of analysis quantitative enough to produce graphs comes from academics and other ‘experts’, who the modern right seem very distrustful of. So the number of sources producing graphical analyses that right wing bloggers would consider legitimate is probably considerably smaller. Since left-wingers don’t view mainstream academia as a socialist conspiracy, there’s a lot more material.

    And yes, that song is weak.

26. Michael H. Says:
    June 21st, 2009 at 12:23 am

    I’m just popping in to confirm, according to my liner notes, it is indeed Jen Wood, not Jenny Lewis, in this song. Jenny Lewis does, though, do the majority of the female vocals.

27. Cliffy Says:
    June 22nd, 2009 at 10:52 am

    Instead of graphs, couldn’t she have just shown him his reflection in a mirror? Because anybody with that facial hair is asking to be dumped.