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Remarkable photos
Here’s a fascinating rundown of photos that made a huge cultural impact. It’s worth reading for the photos alone, but it’s also got lots of the details of what’s behind the photos. My favorite of the lot is Salvador Dali in mid-air, as captured...A truly inspiring piece of journalism
Sometimes subject matter and writerly abililty conspire to create the kind of journalism that resonates on many levels and becomes something far more affecting than a mere piece of reporting. Chris Jones, writing in Esquire about Roger Ebert and his cancer-related...Tea Partier reverses course due to inclement facts
Enter the maze of the Tea Party mind: Tea Party supporters’ fierce animosity toward Washington, and the president in particular, is rooted in deep pessimism about the direction of the country and the conviction that the policies of the Obama administration are...The other war
Interesting things continue in Afghanistan. Obama has messed up plenty when it comes to continuing some of the worst offenses of the Bush administration regarding civil liberties. But things seem to be going well for him in the other war Bush started, the one that...Round and round she goes
Sarah Palin, speaking at a religious gathering in Kentucky, unwittingly summed up what is, for me, the biggest reason her ignorance is so dangerous: Really, it is our solemn duty. Praying for true spiritual awakening to overcome deterioration. That is where God wants...Friday accent blogging
Having recently reconnected with an old friend from Wales, I've felt the need to get up to speed on the intriguing subspecies of English spoken in the far reaches of the British Isle. Welsh is itself a fearsome Celtic language, and gives the Welsh a distinctive,...Comrade Miley
Please enjoy some excerpts from my favorite wingnut article I’ve seen in some time, keeping country music safe from the liberal threat of… Miley Cyrus?: The left in this country has a problem. Well, they have a lot of problems, many of which involve...When Turrism isn't Turrism; new comment changes
The similarities are striking: two politically motivated suicide plane crashes into symbolic buildings, both resulting in deaths, and both hoping to ignite sentiment against the government of the United States. The differences appear to be twofold: clearly, the scale...How many McNuggets for one brain surgery, doc?
Nevada Senate candidate Sue Lowden (R) has certainly raised the bar in the health care reform debate. She said this: “You know, before we all started having health care, in the olden days, our grandparents, they would bring a chicken to the doctor. They would...A wine bar?
American Studies Prof. Harry Targ: According to these sociologists [Robert Perrucci and Earl Wysong] the diamond-shaped distribution of wealth, income, and power that existed during the “golden years” of U.S. capitalist hegemony after World War II began to...I'll see your McNuggets and raise you one turnip for that brain surgery
Weird–is the GOP building a bridge to the 19th century? What’s next? Bargain removal of the stone of folly? For their sake, I hope so. From a debate in Tennessee, via the Nashville Scene: With a straight face, Rep. [Mike] Bell [R-Riceville, Tenn.] went on...For your lunar holiday
Though this appears to chart the weak spots in the Death Star, in fact it marks the spots in the polar region where there’s water on the moon: I guess astronauts can set up a wet bar? ADDITIONAL: The Chile earthquake was pretty powerful all right–it...The future without jetpacks
I remember well the sense of anticipation we all felt about our future jetpacks, an item, I maintain, that we were virtually guaranteed as young Americans. It’s engendered such angst that few people of a certain age can manage to think about the future without...Our Dumb Media
When is it a story–it’s even the headline here–that Obama’s advisors are “set to recommend” something? If he takes this incredibly stupid bit of advice (aka political hari-kiri), I will trot out all the usual annoyance that surfaces...Rolling snake eyes
If someone has been in a plane crash, what are the odds they will be in two crashes? Shouldn’t you fly with them to be safer? And if a plane crashes, shouldn’t you take the next plane out–what are the odds two planes in a row will crash? Such strange...Too conservative even for Texas
Back in my old stomping grounds, Texans narrowly rejected Don McLeroy, the fundamentalist nut who’s threatening to turn textbooks into God first, Reagan second conservative hymnals. Well done, folks! The other guy is a moderate Republican who believes God...Swingin' It, Western-style
Not long ago, I had the pleasure of sitting in for a Sunday afternoon gig at the flea market in Northampton as a trio with steel guitarist Rose Sinclair and guitarist Lyon Graulty, doing Western Swing ala Bob Wills. That is, as the above logo may indicate, some of my...Springfield pastor went to Uganda to support anti-gay fervor
An American anti-homosexual preacher traveled to Uganda to join in the fervor for passing anti-gay laws. And he’s based in Springfield, Massachusetts. (The first pastor mentioned, it bears noting, is Ugandan): Standing onstage in black velvet robes, despite the...A case of Gretsch envy…
Since we’re talking Western Swing and it’s a busy Friday when politics ain’t on my radar, here’s some audio fun of at least a related sort–Chet Atkins in the 1950s doing a Gypsy jazz standard, “Dark Eyes” in a very non-Gypsy...Of Fantasy and Literature
Robert Redick is the Valley-based writer of both an epic fantasy and works of more standard literature. I just interviewed him for a story for the next Advocate, and I’m finding his Chathrand Voyage Series an interesting mix of fantasy tropes and very nice...Handy check for when you think you've discovered perpetual motion
Here’s a particularly absorbing site that’s a sort of museum of failures to invent the permanently elusive “perpetual motion machine”–sort of a monument to the stubborness of those who think they will magically discover that physics is...(A) Green Day
I’ve seen the extremes of St. Patricks’ Day: it once found me, I may or may not be proud to say, onstage at Dallas’ Tipperary Inn, throwing potatoes high in the air and catching them on a fork clenched between my teeth. I was, to be fair, the...In the wake of Cheney
It’s remarkable how often one company shows up at the center of national-level controversy. From getting blamed for shoddy work that apparently electrocuted a soldier to receiving many allegations of tolerating sexual abuses, not to mention insanely inflating...Elephants remember
Robert Reich on health care reform 1993 versus 2010: To paraphrase Mark Twain, history doesn’t repeat itself but it does rhyme. As the White House and the House Democratic leadership try to line up 216 votes to pass health care reform — and as Republicans,...How about trying the free market?
Post-Exxon Valdez legislation makes companies liable for the damages from oil spills, but caps the liability at 75 million dollars–in the end, rather a paltry sum that then passes the rest of the bill on to taxpayers. Proposals are afoot to raise that amount....Democratic fortitude?
So the Democrats did the right thing politically. They passed the health care reform bill, the whole Frankensteined thing. I remain unconvinced that it’s the right bill to give us the health care system we really need, because I remain a supporter of many...Unchecked executive power, here we come!
Obama may madden the right for, well, just about everything, but in the one thing that matters most to me in our current political landscape–civil liberties, as opposed to the nearly undefinable political term “freedom”–he’s doing pretty...When Hawks Cry
The great tidal wave of conservative backlash against health care reform? David Frum, former Bush speechwriter, ain’t buying it. He’s written quite a screed (called “Waterloo”) about the failure of conservatives, so provocative that it appears...How can I roll when the wheels won't go?
Here’s the entire interview with Donald Simanek from this week’s Art in Paradise story about perpetual motion machines: 1) Is it safe to assume that nature will allow a machine that runs for an unusually long time without input of energy? Are the kinds of...New numbers; Zweibel lives
Polls are merely inexact and momentary snapshots, of course, but this is certainly interesting: More Americans now favor than oppose the health care overhaul that President Obama signed into law Tuesday, a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll finds — a notable turnaround from...Giving Muppets a bad name
So that’s what Grover “I mean, [the estate tax on the wealthiest 2 percent] is the morality of the Holocaust” Norquist has been up to. Dude seems to get off on attempting to claim black is white. From a must-read at Think Progress: Net neutrality, a...Don't Think of An Elephant in a Gangster Hat
That’s gratitude for you–David Frum, the Bush speechwriter who coined the term “axis of evil,” offered a stark take on Republicans’ “just say no” health care reform approach.Three days later, the American Enterprise Institute...Not for the faint of heart
Don’t say you weren’t warned. Just a little Friday entertainment from Awkward Family Photos.ABeckalypse Now
I just rewatched Apocalypse Now for probably the fifth time, so it was with a heavy dose of Marlon Brando in my head that I listened to this passage from Glenn Beck’s radio program. It’s frightening to know there are people out there who take this...Your tax dollars at work
Intelligence reporter Jeff Stein delivers a collection of tidbits that makes you wonder just what’s in the water at the CIA. Exhibit 1 is a scrapped 2003 plan to make a gay sex video with a fake Saddam Hussein, for distribution in Iraq (I’m sure there...Alan Grayson does not mince words
From an article by John Nichols in The Nation: “What George Orwell wrote about in 1984 has come true. What Eisenhower warned us about concerning the ‘military-industrial complex’ has come true,” [Rep. Alan Grayson, D-Fla.] argues. “War is...Reaping the Whirlwind
Turns out courting certain elements of the tea party movement comes back to bite you. It’s going to be very interesting to see how this kind of struggle, which will almost certainly become more common as tea party-supported candidates push out standard GOP...Of Pigeons and Men
It’s hard to know what’s crazier–India’s pigeon spy suspect detention policy (how’s the pigeon going to testify?), or Obama’s policy of “we can’t prove they’re a threat, so we won’t try them” Kafka...Rock you like a hurricane
This NOAA map of Gulf hurricane paths near the BP disaster is the most terrifying graphic I’ve seen lately. The site of the oil leak (not spill, by gum–this is a leaking oil deposit) is marked by a red star, and the hurricane paths are from the last 100...I guess he hangs out with his pals Superwizard and Okieman
It’s a bad run for BP these days. Besides the leaking undersea oil field, things haven’t been going so well at the Texas City refinery where an explosion killed 15 people in 2005: TEXAS CITY — At BP’s Texas City refinery, more than 400 pounds a...Spare a dime for BP?
Republican bigwig John Boehner (that’s “Baner” to you) floats an idea that can’t be helped by any amount of PR carefulness. How will tea partiers respond?: In response to a question from TPMDC, House Minority Leader John Boehner backed Tom...Don't Even Look at It
This is what happened when a private seaplane operator attempted to get permission to take a New Orleans Times-Picayune photographer over the Gulf to document oil plumes: “We were questioned extensively. Who was on the aircraft? Who did they work for?”...A Pantheon of Particles
The search for the elusive Higgs-Boson particle continues unabated, but a sidecar idea has arisen among phsyicists at the Tevatron, a lower energy U.S. particle accelerator that’s been eclipsed by the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland. It’s a...Do they know it when they see it?
The tea party movement is taking it to the arts. Just got a press release about an artist who calls herself “Megrit” and has created a work dubbed “The Tea Party,” a still life of a teapot, cup and saucer and (I think) a box of sugar. It is,...E-I-E-I-O
Big bad jihadists or petting zoo fans? The Atlantic shares some surprising info about the reality of our terrorist enemies: Nowhere is the gap between sinister stereotype and ridiculous reality more apparent than in Afghanistan, where it’s fair to say that the...Ne touchez pas mon vuvuzela, s'il vous plait
I love when unusual words enter the English language, inveterate devourer of words that it is. But it’s truly a shame that the producer of an incessant buzzing sound that drives people to insane rage gets a cool moniker like “vuvuzela.” I’m no...(18th-century) London Calling; BP Oil Leak Aerial Footage
These computational contraptions we stare into by the hour seem remarkable in that they are customizable tools that can do anything you dream up within certain parameters. One of the most interesting things yet dreamed up for perusing and using on the Internet is...Post-Fourth (Red White and) Blues
Ah, nationalism! Pass me a heap of the greatest jello the world has ever seen, oh ye huddled masses in your amber waves of grain. Forget counter-insurgency–one cold and jiggly slurp of Aunt Ethel’s ambrosia salad and the Taliban would come whimpering into...Ice, Ice Shoji
One of the biggest poisoners of Merkin politics is Some. Some are always getting in the way of the rest of us. And now Some are saying that jello, the Ramones and double-can hats are somehow anti-Merkin, just because leftward fellow travellers enjoy them together on a...Tonight I'm Gonna Party Like It's 1989
From the “Nobody could have predicted” department: The gap between the wealthiest Americans and middle- and working-class Americans has more than tripled in the past three decades, according to a June 25 report by the Center on Budget and Policy...The worst comic of all time; did BP seek the release of the Lockerbie bomber to help a drilling deal?
The worst comic of all time has finally been discovered. Witness the scintillating action as the ISG consults with the NCO and the SJA to explain the ramifications of the word “reliable” in assessing those who’ve witnessed homosexual conduct! Thrill...A Headscratcher
GOP crazy has been all the rage for some time, with mad stars like Michelle Bachmann, Sarah Palin and Sharron Angle. And that is some really good crazy, the kind of crazy that leaves you wide-eyed. If Palin said the moon was full of communists, she’d get equal...Perverted Spartans: Proving that Jesus Wore Pants
I’ve seen egotistical leaders of Sunday School empires gone wild-eyed with the certainty of Rapture based on numerology and too much caffeine, heard many a nutball prediction of when the world will end. All par for the course growing up in the Southern Baptist...Misery loves… is that Meathead?
Beyond “rad,” “def” or even “cool”: here are the owners of the worst band name in history. I mean, this is worse than Broken Social Scene, Forest for the Trees, or even Heavy Young Heathens (what–Fine Young Cannibals and...Tea and No Tea
Glad I saved all my Confederate money. Zach Wamp, Republican from Tennessee, says change health care or we quit: “I hope that the American people will go to the ballot box in 2010 and 2012 so that states are not forced to consider separation from this...More Tea and No Tea
You picked a fine time to lead me, Lucille–the current Republican dilemma illustrated: KUSA – U.S. Senate candidate Ken Buck refers to members of the Tea Party who question the President’s citizenship as “dumbasses” in an audio recording...Stateless
Jay Rosen, in a disjointed bunch of notes about the Wikileaks bombshell, brings up some intriguing points. Beyond the usual questions of American politics raised by the release, Wikileaks, he argues, is something truly new: a stateless news organization. It’s a...Things That Are Not Good
Just because it’s sunny outside doesn’t mean we can’t find a few things to darken it all up! 1) Bottom of food chain going away: Despite their tiny size, plant plankton found in the world’s oceans are crucial to much of life on Earth. They are...Science gets all Star Trek on us
Been a good few days of Spock fever in Northampton, courtesy of Leonard Nimoy’s show at the Michelson Galleries. So it’s just that much cooler to see science catching up to Star Trek. Yep, teleportation! Finally… Well, okay,...E-Edition
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