Presidential Speeches Are For Sixth-Graders →

Derek Thompson:

Is political rhetoric becoming less sophisticated over time? One interesting way to answer the question is to study the complexity of presidential speeches, from George Washington's first inaugural to the recent addresses of Barack Obama.

To do that, the site Vocativ used the Flesch-Kincaid readability test, which was developed by the U.S. Navy in the 1970s to ensure the simplicity of military instruction manuals. The Flesch reading formula is not a measure of vocabulary or the technical construction of sentences. Instead, it measures two variables—syllables per word and words per sentence. So a cryptic sentence like this:

As mist slunk in, the oiler on the rig slewed the boom of the crane.

actually has a lower (simpler) Flesch score than this sentence of equal words:

The cat was so happy after eating the goldfish that it made a big smile.

because happy, after, eating, and goldfish have two syllables, even though they're far more common than one-syllable words like slunk, rig, slew, or boom.

With that caveat out of the way, here is a look at presidential-speech complexity over time.

I was curious to see what the internet’s reaction would be to this piece. I think the dumbing down of speeches is fine—the cleaner the language, the more obvious the lie.

Anita Sarkeesian Cancels Talk at Utah State University Over Threats of ‘The Deadliest School Shooting’ in US History →

Alex Hern:

“Forced to cancel my talk at USU after receiving death threats because police wouldn’t take steps to prevent concealed firearms at the event,” she tweeted. “Requested pat downs or metal detectors after mass shooting threat but because of Utah’s open carry laws police wouldn’t do firearm searches.”

Good thing we’ve got all of these guns and lack of gun restrictions around to protect our freedom.

Kierkegaard Explains the Psychology of Bullying and Trolling—in 1847 →

Maria Popova:

In an immeasurably insightful entry from 1847, 34-year-old Kierkegaard observes a pervasive pathology of our fallible humanity, explaining the same basic psychology that lurks behind contemporary phenomena like bullying, trolling, and the general assaults of the web’s self-appointed critics, colloquially and rather appropriately known as haters. Kierkegaard writes:

“There is a form of envy of which I frequently have seen examples, in which an individual tries to obtain something by bullying. If, for instance, I enter a place where many are gathered, it often happens that one or another right away takes up arms against me by beginning to laugh; presumably he feels that he is being a tool of public opinion. But lo and behold, if I then make a casual remark to him, that same person becomes infinitely pliable and obliging. Essentially it shows that he regards me as something great, maybe even greater than I am: but if he can’t be admitted as a participant in my greatness, at least he will laugh at me. But as soon as he becomes a participant, as it were, he brags about my greatness.

That is what comes of living in a petty community.”

Nailed it.

‘Everything Will Change’ Trailer

‘Everything Will Change’ is a feature-length documentary concert film of The Postal Service's performance at the Greek Theater in Berkeley, CA during their 2013 reunion tour. A collaboration between Benjamin Gibbard (of Death Cab for Cutie) and Jimmy Tamborello (from Dntel), with Rilo Kiley's Jenny Lewis, The Postal Service released Give Up, their one and only album, in 2003.

All I can say is that I sincerely hope that they really do never put out another album, because all of this fanfare will really be a bad look if they do.

/via Devour

Blue State vs. Red State? Starbucks vs. Chik-fil-A? Nope—Try Whole Foods vs. Cracker Barrel →

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David Wasserman:

A few weeks ago, the new moderator of “Meet the Press,” Chuck Todd, took to his “Nerd Screen” to outline an unconventional way to think about the midterm political landscape. His theory: 2014’s hottest races are boiling down to big Democratic urban areas and inner suburbs with lots of Starbucks coffee shops versus heavily Republican exurban hinterlands and rural areas with lots of Chick-fil-A restaurants.

But after immersing myself in numbers, maps and, admittedly, a spicy chicken sandwich, I discovered a slight problem: Neither chain’s political geography fits neatly into Todd’s heuristic.

Nothing makes me happier than when data disproves institutional thinking.

Consider the Log Lady: Questions (and Answers) About the Return of ‘Twin Peaks' →

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Andy Greenwald:

In the spring of 1990, when ABC debuted Twin Peaks, the network was still pulling in an estimated 14 million viewers a week for Full House. One of its most popular programs — and, in fact, Twin Peaks’s initial lead-in — was Father Dowling Mysteries, a genteel hour in which a priest and a nun, played by Mr. Cunningham from Happy Days and these guys’ older sister, solved crimes. (Just how long ago was it? There was a prime-time show about the Flash.) You could say TV wasn’t ready for a show as dark, as weird, as insanely idiosyncratic as Twin Peaks. But that’d be like saying prehistoric cavemen weren’t ready for Snapchat. Twin Peaks wasn’t a gradual, evolutionary step in the development of television as an artistic medium. It was the guy responsible for [the incredibly unsettling opening of 'Blue Velvet'] pressing fast-forward with his middle finger.

I was trying not to get too excited about the return of Twin Peaks, mostly because it’s 1.5 years away, but also because Season 2 really left a sour taste in my mouth. But this mailbag from Greenwald sucked me in. It’s going to be a damn fine 2016.

Baking the Cookie Dough in Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream →

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Andy Kryza:

It was a surprisingly sober night when, halfway through a pint of delicious Ben & Jerry's Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough, the thought struck me: sure, this was tasty and all, but what would a Ben & Jerry's cookie actually taste like? Would the dough even bake into a cookie? Or had B & J created some sort of ice cream-exclusive cookie wonderfood, like Flubber with sugar, that thrives in cold and heat without changing form?

I had to find out.

Well I, for one, am glad that we’ve at least got that sorted out.

/via The Kitchn

Z is for Zebra—90 Percent of the Time →

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David Goldenberg:

To get a sense and take a census, I analyzed 50 animal ABC books ranging in publication date from 1820 to 2013. They weren’t individually selected, but were simply the ones available to me: The older books were sourced online through OpenLibrary.org; the more recent ones were found in the San Francisco Public Library. (I couldn’t convince FiveThirtyEight to give me an Amazon card to buy the thousand or so I missed; we’ll have to go with a representative sampling, instead.)1 There were 1,300 data points (50 books multiplied by 26 letters) in all.

What I found was a whole lot of zebras.

A perfectly fascinating, useless, and data-driven article. FiveThirtyEight’s bread and butter.

Brickjest—‘Infinite Jest’ Retold in 122 Lego Scenes →

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p. 3 These are three Deans--of Admissions, Academic Affairs, Athletic Affairs. I do not know which face belongs to whom.

Brickjest:

Kevin Griffith, Professor of English at Capital University, and his son Sebastian first envisioned translating David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest into Legos after  reading The Brick Bible, by Brendan Powell Smith.  Wallace's novel is probably the only contemporary text to offer a similar challenge to artists working in the medium of Lego.  The artist in this case was Griffith's eleven-year-old son, Sebastian, who created all the scenes based on his father's descriptions of the relevant pages.

The edition of Infinite Jest used for this project is the Tenth Anniversary paperback edition, published in 2006.

The creators of this site neither expect nor intend to make money on this project.

Well there goes talking to my family tonight.

/via Vox