Looking at this dialogue (via Yglesias), I noticed that Huckabee advisor Jim Pinkerton's proposal to put "a cop in front of every mosque" is supposed to be what he calls a "Durkheimian exercise." [Start at about 12:30.] The idea is that, because Durkheim argued that societies are held together by shared norms -- actually, I'm not quite sure how that gets to the idea that we should start harassing Muslims on no probable cause. It seems to be part of an argument that the U.S. should declare itself part of "Christendom" (I haven't watched that whole segment), but I question his Durkheim exegesis.
I'm a little disappointed that the liberal in the dialogue, David Corn, hasn't heard of Durkheim, but he makes up for it by not being a raving loony.
Yglesias asks why the time zones in Idaho, Washington, and Oregon don't correspond to the border between the states. I can testify that the INPC, which is held at Washington State and the University of Idaho (which are about five miles apart), would be a giant pain if the time zones were at the border. I remember being panicked that my hotel room in Washington would be an hour behind the sessions in Idaho and I'd miss a session.
My thoughts about daylight savings time in Indiana have nothing to do with philosophy, so you'll have to read them in Yglesias's comments.
(But here's another question -- why does the border between Mountain and Central time run down the middle of Nebraska? I mean, who cares if western Nebraska is on the wrong time zone? Nobody lives there. -- Though where the actual border is is even more deserted.
In fact, most of the time zone borders don't run cleanly along state borders -- looking at the map, UT-NV, TX-NM, and GA-AL are about the only ones, and even TX-NM is complicated by El Paso.)
[UPDATE: On further review, even GA-AL isn't so clear. I left out OK-CO and OK-NM, but as Gob Bluth would say, "Come on!"]
Why is this supposed to be distinctively postmodern? I imagine that postmodernists would level exactly the same accusation at analytic philosophers.
A couple of years ago I linked to Chris Aubry's "I Still Think of You, Jim Henson." The link is now broken, but I found this link, with a biographical update from Mr. Aubry in the comments. (And another link, which I posted in an update to my old post.)
I was thinking about it because of this (via Larry Cebula), which might be the second saddest comic ever. Calvin is no longer a friend of Narnia. (C.S. Lewis is still a creep, though.)
