Charles Schulz / "Mad Men" / Radio Lab

"But in the mid-1950s a large part of [Schulz's] public consisted of good, plain people who felt guilty at being discontented in an epoch of unprecedented prosperity. Peanuts struck a chord with those who had thought they had everything they wanted only to discover that they didn't, and needed an acceptably gentle reminder of this insight."

-- David Michaelis, Schulz and Peanuts pg 342.

Mad Men begins at the dawn of the sixties but the same dynamic is in play. Today the existential anxiety is coming from the unprecedented level of possibilities the connected world promises to offer (or should that be threatens to offer), as discussed in the first part of WNYC's Radio Lab latest program "Choice" with it description of new college grads frozen into inaction from fear of making decisions -- each decision taken represents an elimination of some tantalizing (and now lost) hypothetical opportunity.

Nanowrimo: The Widgets

I'm writing a novel called "Red Jacket." This is how the first draft is going:

Write Or Die thingy.

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lab.drwicked.com

If you don't believe me, maybe you'll believe Shermer

Nah, probably you won't.

Skepticblog » Gay Marriage: Stone Them to Death! : "Mark my words. Here is what is going to happen. Within a decade, maybe two, Christians will come around to treating gays no differently than they now treat members of other groups whom they previously persecuted — women, Jews, blacks — but not because of some new interpretation of a biblical passage, or because of a new revelation from God. These changes will come about the same way that they always do: by the oppressed minority fighting for the right to be treated equally, and by a few enlightened members of the oppressing majority supporting their cause."

-- Michael Shermer

First Couple

Joe McCain Apologizes For Cursing At 911 Operator

He apologizes for swearing, but not for the real abuse, namely the abuse of the 911 emergency number for his personal complaining. He still doesn't get it, does he?
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Just saying

The lyrics of "Comedy Tonight," the opening number in "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum" make up a five-minute master class in the elements of farce.

3 Things Obama can do on January 21st 2009 ...

to restore the rule of law, begin rebuilding our reputation abroad, and aspire to make the Unites States a just nation.

1. Close the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay.

2. Re-ban torture.

3. Begin Iraq withdrawal.

There is a fourth and a fifth, but I don't have faith that any President, even Barack Obama will do it, and that is: work to repeal the Patriot Ace, and call for the criminal prosecution of Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld for war crimes.

Technorati Tags:
civil liberties, Civlib, Democrats, McCain, News, obama, Politics, Sarah Palin, patriot act, Guantanamo Bay

Requires research ...

Your challenge is to write crossover fanfiction combining Dilbert and NYPD Blue.
The story should use a sex-change operation as a plot device!

Generated by the Terrible Crossover Fanfiction Idea Generator

Via Mamatas

"Senator, I think it hurts you, too, sir."

American Rhetoric: McCarthy-Welch Exchange During the Army-McCarthy Hearings

Technorati Tags:
civil liberties, McCain, Obama, Politics, Sarah Palin

"And sure he is an honorable man."

Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare

Act 3. Scene 2. The Forum in Rome.

ANTHONY
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears.
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interrèd with their bones.
So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus
Hath told you Caesar was ambitious.
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath Caesar answered it.
Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest --
For Brutus is an honorable man,
So are they all, all honorable men --
Come I to speak in Caesar's funeral.
He was my friend, faithful and just to me.
But Brutus says he was ambitious,
And Brutus is an honorable man.
He hath brought many captives home to Rome,
Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill.
Did this in Caesar seem ambitious?
When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept.
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff.
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious,
And Brutus is an honorable man.
You all did see that on the Lupercal
I thrice presented him a kingly crown,
Which he did thrice refuse. Was this ambition?
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious,
And sure he is an honorable man.
I speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke,
But here I am to speak what I do know.
You all did love him once, not without cause.
What cause withholds you then to mourn for him?
O Judgment, thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason!

McCain's macaca moment

"That One," McCain Calls Obama in Debate (VIDEO)

This could be McCain's "macaca moment" not that one was needed. Some are saying that too much is being made of this phrase: McCain contemptuously referring to Obama as "that one." But that's a very dismissive way to speak about another human being, let alone a candidate for the most powerful office in the world. A lot of women, a lot of people of color, a lot of young people, a lot of people who have felt social disadvantage of one kind or another in their lives, will recognize that tone and that phrase of McCain's, will recognize what it feels like to be on the receiving end of this dismissive objectifying characterization, and they will not think better of McCain for it, nor should they.

Technorati Tags:
civil liberties, Democrats, Obama, Politics, McCain

Biden on his Boss's "Intellectual Security"

via HuffingtonPost:
"Biden says Obama reminds him of Bill Clinton in his 'confidence, cognitive ability, judgment' and intellectual security--that he can listen and absorb advice without having to prove he's the smartest person in the room, a critical leadership skill. He says he experienced an 'epiphany' during a recent conference call on the bailout bill with Bob Rubin, Paul Volcker, Warren Buffett, Paul O'Neill, Joseph Stiglitz, Larry Summers and Laura Tyson. 'He [Obama] comes on the call and says, 'Well, folks, sorry I'm late. I've got four questions.' He was in total frigging command! Here's a 47-year-old guy in one of the most complicated economic dilemmas anyone has had to face since 1929 to '33. And it was like, 'Bang! Bang! Bang!' I called him afterward and said, 'You sold me, sucker!' "

Fox News, GOP Tag-Team Obama With Voter Fraud Smear

Classic Rove: Accuse your opponent of having YOUR weakness. Republicans are the vote thieves in the 21st century. Fox is lining up its alternate reality script. They have to talk about something for the next four years, and they certainly don't want to admit the majority of voters will support the Democrat this November. One thing they will claim is that Obama didn't "really" wins.
About Fox News
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Winkers

From used car salesman to card sharp, never trust a winker. Today they're trying to say "hey buddy, you and me, the joke's on them other folks." But tomorrow the jokes on you.

via Huffington Post

Ever wonder what a video of a Swedish choir singing Kate Bush's "Wuthering Heights" using sets and costume from Olivia Newton John's "Physical" video would look like?

Now you don't have to.

Palin/Couric (OK, she ISN'T qualified)

Palin on CBS with Katie Couric was bad, because you can't have the candidate begging with her eyes for the interviewer to bail her out of questions. And the questions weren't exactly tough. Palin can't form sentences and her head is just filled with talking point gobbledygoo so nouns and verbs just fly out of her mouth without any descernible relationship to the question asked or even to each other. It was a stunning display. I have to take back everything I ever said even remotely positive about her. She is probably not qualified to be mayor of Wasilia. No joke. It's bad when your first thought is McCain should pick Katie Couric to replace her.

Technorati Tags:
News, Obama, Politics, Sarah Palin

Our Perennial Iraq Policy

John Amato found the truth in the BBC Petraeus interview and nails it down:

Crooks and Liars » We’ll aways do just well enough in Iraq to never leave.

Friedman/Rich 9/14/2008

Freidman:

Op-Ed Columnist - Making America Stupid - Op-Ed - NYTimes.com: "Who cares how much steel John McCain has in his gut when the steel that today holds up our bridges, railroads, nuclear reactors and other infrastructure is rusting? McCain talks about how he would build dozens of nuclear power plants. Oh, really? They go for $10 billion a pop. Where is the money going to come from? From lowering taxes? From banning abortions? From borrowing more from China? From having Sarah Palin ‘reform’ Washington — as if she has any more clue how to do that than the first 100 names in the D.C. phonebook?"

Rich:

Op-Ed Columnist - The Palin-Whatshisname Ticket - Op-Ed - NYTimes.com: "The question today: What kind of president would Sarah Palin be? It’s an urgent matter, because if we’ve learned anything from the G.O.P. convention and its aftermath, it’s that the 2008 edition of John McCain is too weak to serve as America’s chief executive. This unmentionable truth, more than race, is now the real elephant in the room of this election.

"No longer able to remember his principles any better than he can distinguish between Sunnis and Shia, McCain stands revealed as a guy who can be easily rolled by anyone who sells him a plan for ‘victory,’ whether in Iraq or in Michigan. A McCain victory on Election Day will usher in a Palin presidency, with McCain serving as a transitional front man, an even weaker Bush to her Cheney."

If McCain is elected our foreign energy dependence is going to last as long as the culture war. A long, long time.