So does anybody want to venture a guess as to whose manuscript just won the prize for the best critical monograph on a feminist topic in Hispanic literature?

Yes.

I’m very happy that people will be able to read it because it has some research that I think is valuable and useful.

P.S. I highly recommend that people with unpublishable messy doctoral dissertations contact Jonathan Mayhew who helps transform them into books.

A vicious freakazoid called Richard Cohen writes in the WashPo:

The first thing you should know about the so-called Steubenville Rape is that this was not a rape involving intercourse.

The “so-called rape”, got it? I’m guessing it is “so-called” rather than “rape” because there was no intercourse. Which, judging by the pompous nature of this declaration, is hugely important to the vicious freakazoid. He thinks we have been duped by the victim and the mobs she summoned into believing that it was “real rape” when, in fact, it was not a crime at all:

The Internet — in e-mails and tweets and Facebook…formed itself into a digital lynch mob that demanded the arrest of the innocent for a crime — gang rape — that had not been committed…

How come this condescending, stupid, preachy fellow who treats his readers like complete idiots has a well-paying job at such a popular newspaper? Do we really want him polluting our lives with his stupid excretions on a regular basis?

P.S. I’m not linking to this animal’s article because he should not be able to boost his readership this way. Instead, I’m linking to a good, valuable article that quotes this monstrosity.

Of course, the minimum wage is an absolutely crucial achievement of civilization that has to be preserved and cherished. And obviously the minimum wage in the US has to be raised because right now it is shamelessly low and not enough for a person to make ends meet*.

However, can’t this important point be made in a way that doesn’t discredit the idea completely? Why do Liberals enjoy being so drama-queenish about everything that they end up sounding worse than any parody of Liberalism the staunchest opponent can concoct? See the following picture, for instance:

Surely, this important issue can be discussed without making minimum age workers sound like spoiled brats who can’t survive without having three rooms per one person. I’m getting a feeling that some smug upper middle-class grad student came up with this after straining his limited imagination in search of what would constitute the most horrible horror of all horrors.

The real tragedy of living on a minimum wage is not that you have to confine yourself to one or two rooms. It is that you often have to pawn your check days before you get it and pay a crushing fee to do so. It is that you can’t make even the most minimal savings and have to live in constant terror of what might happen. It is that a tooth-ache feels like the end of the world because you know you will never be able to afford a dentist. It is that there is no hope that each new day will bring anything but more of the same drudgery and fear.

This reminded me of a colleague back at Yale who was far to the left of me on the political spectrum and who once asked completely seriously, “Clarissa, why do you never travel in the summer? Don’t you like traveling?”

* As I said before, the great danger implicit in raising the minimum wage is that many employers will kick out half of the workers and pile their job duties onto the remaining half. I’ve seen this happen with my own eyes.