Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Back to Wordpress

Rather than write up a long explanation, I just quickly say that I am going back to Wordpress and you can find the blog here.


Monday, January 18, 2010

Mine Eyes Have Seen The Glory ...



"Suicide" At Gitmo

Read this horrifying account of three alleged suicides at Gitmo. Is this the smoking gun? Will this be the catalyst to finally move the administration to investigate the possible war crimes of the Bush/Cheney folks? One can only hope these crimes are investigated and prosecuted. It sickens me to think that the Obama administration would continue to look the other way.

Saturday, January 16, 2010

Concerning Trolls

Andrew,

I read with great interest this reader email. If that letter is not the definition of concern trolling then none exists. To wit:

I'm with you in thinking that Obama is the best thing the Democrats have going for them right now. But I also think that in having the supermajority, they actually undercut him. They don't have to compromise and so they don't try to. Instead, what passes as legislation is a horrid mismash of corporate interests and traditional, not progressive, balms of the Democratic Party. I know this country can do much, much better. And I think Obama needs a less powerful Democratic party to make it happen, like Clinton did.
OK. The Democrats are corporate shills so Obama needs fewer corporate shills to get through his progressive agenda. I'm with on that. But, I would quibble that Obama isn't a progressive. He is a center-left pragmatist, but lets not get sidetracked by definitions here. (At least not yet!)
We all agree that the GOP is a mess.
I'm not sure who the author means by we, but I do agree that the GOP is a mess right now.
But we also all agree that we need a stronger GOP.
Um, no. We ALL don't agree. But I will concede that a saner GOP would be more helpful to the country as a hole. We had a strong GOP during the first six years of the Bush/Cheney regime and that didn't work out so well, did it?
And despite the rhetoric, I can't think of a better candidate to help than Scott Brown. He's not perfect, but if he thinks he can go along with the national GOP and keep the seat in the next election, he's going to be out of a job.
You can't think of a better candidate? Do the names Jim Leach and Lincoln Chafee ring a bell? Scott Brown is a malleable, half-bright opportunist who doesn't think that Red Cross volunteers working with the 9/11 recovery effort deserved financial assistance from the state of Massachusetts. This homophobic prick is the answer to the GOP's problem?
He touched off a political firestorm in 2001 when he disparaged Democratic state Senator Cheryl Jacques and her domestic partner, Jennifer Chrisler, for deciding to have children. In an interview with the Globe, Brown said it was "not normal" for two women to have a baby. He also dismissed Jacques's role in the relationship as her "alleged family responsibilities."


But this just boggles.

In voting for him, I hope he'll moderate that party.

So yeah, if that's the kind of person who has the character and political savvy to mitigate the Teabaggers and Christianists I understand the emailers logic in voting against Democrats who bow to the corporate oligarchy by replacing those Democrats with a ... Republican!

Kill. Me. Now. This country is fucked.

Sincerely,
TGP

Thursday, January 14, 2010

RIP, Teddy Pendergrass

Classic footage of Teddy in a 1972 appearance with Harold Melvin and the Bluenotes on Soul Train singing their classic "If You Don't Know Me By Now." Unfortunately embedding is disabled on that video but do click through because the video and audio quality are excellent.


Wednesday, January 13, 2010

The Geithner Chronicles

I can think of no good reason Geithner should still be our Treasury Secretary. Here is a good case against him.



Game. Set. Match. Time for Geithner to go.

Saturday, January 9, 2010

The Rielle World

Reading this excerpt from Halperin and Heileman's book 'Game Change: Obama and the Clintons, McCain and Palin, and the Race of a Lifetime'. Right now I'm in the middle of the part about the early Edwards campaign and how he met Rielle Hunter. Of course I immediately find this:

There was nothing legit, however, about Hunter’s behavior. It was freaky, wildly inappropriate, and all too visible. She flirted outlandishly with every man she met. She spouted New Age babble, rambled on about astrology and reincarnation, and announced to people she had just met, “I’m a witch.” But mostly, she fixated on Edwards. She told him that he had “the power to change the world,” that “the people will follow you.” She told him that he could be as great a leader as Gandhi or Martin Luther King Jr. She told him, “You’re so real. You just need to get your staff out of your way.” She reinforced everything he already believed, told him everything he wanted to hear.
(My emphasis added.)

Yea, about getting that staff out of your way, John. You should have heeded her advice. You still wouldn't be president now, but you might have a shred of your reputation intact.

Saturday, January 2, 2010

A Thousand Words

A Thousand Words from Ted Chung on Vimeo.



Friday, January 1, 2010

Revenge Of The Intertubes: Wikipedia Edition



This is the screen capture of Mike Allen's Wikipedia entry. It has since been edited. Click on the image to get a better view and read it.


Thursday, December 31, 2009

Favorite New Blog: 2009

Edible Geography, is my favorite new blog this year. You will find interesting stories from every aspect of one of my favorite topics: food. Nicola Twilley writes about how global warming affects the quality of Czech pilsners, the EU’s legal standards of beauty for produce, and the Subway sandwich shop being built atop a crane at the Freedom Tower construction site. She mines the web for inscrutable and intriguing facts that make the blog a must for any serious food lover.

New Year's Eve Movie Marathon

Tonight is when I stay home. Move marathon night for me. Tonight's theme is Movies I Can Watch Over and Over. This list is by no means exhaustive as many movies I watch again and again, but these are the ones I've chosen for this evening.

1. The Big Lebowski

2. Memento

4. The Man Who Would Be King

4. Sophie's Choice

Do you watch certain movies again and again? If so, which ones? If not, why?