Month: February 2010

Adrastos, Political Crack2 Comments

Berlusconi Channels Sinatra

Peter Adrastos Athas

I’ve been reading a really trashy biography of Frank Sinatra by Anthony Summers. It’s a fun read but it goes into Sinatra’s sex life in exhaustive, and exhausting detail, while omitting minor details like how important Frank was to American popular culture and music. The fact that he supplied hookers to JFK trumps that and it is, of course, fascinating in a lurid sort of way. I thought of Sinatra’s seamy side when I read this in the Guardian: Silvio Berlusconi risked renewed criticism of his selection of candidates for election when he unveiled a list that included a MissItaly … Continue reading Berlusconi Channels Sinatra

Athenae, Sports11 Comments

USA Hockey Crack Van Sunday

Tune in around 2 p.m. CST for crackage. Because Doc asked, and hey, we did the Super Bowl. I watched the USA team wax the Finns todayvia Yahoo Sports’ liveblog. By the second period the US was up 6-0, and the jokes started coming: “Nokia’s stock is tanking today … go figure.” “America just announced they’re building a bunch of Wal-Marts all over Finland. No one can stop us now.” “Is there now a free-throw line in hockey?” “Does Wal-Mart carry Purina reindeer chow?” “I feel like I’m watching Bambi’s mother get killed.” “Hockey is not a red-headed stepchild. Hockey … Continue reading USA Hockey Crack Van Sunday

Athenae, Geek Cred6 Comments

Dealers Who Said They Were Through With Dealing: Caprica Thread

p>Jacob: Amanda hears something in his voice, there at the end, and while her question is good — “What is this to you?. Did you lose someone on that train?” — his silence is better, and his eventual answer is best: “I losteveryone on that train.” So awesome. Now, I don’t trust him one inch, because he seems just as one-track as anybody else you can’t trust on this show, and that’s clearly not the real whole answer anyway, but as a thing for a person to say? Dude, I went from total hate to total love forLee Adama just … Continue reading Dealers Who Said They Were Through With Dealing: Caprica Thread

Current Affairs, Doc5 Comments

Stand by your words

Robert Marshall got himself into hot water earlier in the week for stating that disabled children were a form of divine retribution against women who had undergone abortions. Initially, he stood by these comments. Then, he kind of blamed himself a bit. However, when none of that seemed to be working, he took vestige in the time-honored tradition most pols avail themselves of: He blamed the media.Specifically, in this case, he blamed student media. Marshall isn’t the first one to pull the “I didn’t really say everything I said” defense out of his hat. When I advised a student paper … Continue reading Stand by your words

Athenae, Political Crack, So Called Liberal Media3 Comments

Your Modern Political Media

The man who runs this thing has a spot on the Pulitzer board, everybody: Obama earned nearly universal praise for his performance at the House Republicans’ annual retreat in Baltimore last month, when he abandoned precedent and let the TV cameras capture his 1½-hour exchange with GOP lawmakers. This time, the president won’t have the advantages of a lectern, a raised stage or a single camera trained on him the entire time, but he has proved more adept on the fly than all but a few politicians in recent memory. So Democrats are exceedingly confident that their man will own … Continue reading Your Modern Political Media

Athenae, Political Crack1 Comment

Life So Far

The Rude Pundit has liveblogged the HCR summit, and I think this is the central point: 10:47: What Obama has done here is fascinating. He’s making a public demonstration of the competence and bipartisanship of the Democrats. If Republicans were smart, they’d walk out. They’re about to get their asses handed to them. A walk-out would make change the story. But, you know, they’re Republicans. They’re gonna try to bully their way out of this. A. Continue reading Life So Far

Adrastos, Hurricane Katrina & Federal Flood, Law/Justice6 Comments

The Danziger Bridge Case Explodes

Peter Adrastos Athas

Remember the Danziger 7? They were the New Orleans cops accused of murdering people on the Danziger Bridge in the chaotic aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and the Federal Flood. A state court dismissed charges against them in 2008 but the Feds launched their own investigation into the episode and subsequent cover-up. The case exploded yesterday when the police Captain who investigated the incident pled guilty to obstruction of justice and admitted that it looked like a “bad shoot” from the git go. This is the *perfect* witness for the Feds: he knows all the details and wasn’t one of the … Continue reading The Danziger Bridge Case Explodes

Athenae, So Called Liberal Media, Sports11 Comments

Commentary Fail: Tony Kornheiser, Hannah Storm and Chris Chase

Background: Tony Kornheiser, who is a passable sportswriter but a horrendously bad TV/radio commentator and who is mainly known for having Brett Favre’s five-dollar-footlong farther down his throat at all times than just about anybody, recentlymade this stunningly stupidass comment about Hannah Storm: Hannah Storm in a horrifying, horrifying outfit today. She’s got on red go-go boots and a catholic school plaid skirt. Way too short for somebody in her 40s or maybe early 50s by now. And she’s got on her typically very, very tight shirt. So she looks like she’s got sausage casing wrapping around her upper body. … Continue reading Commentary Fail: Tony Kornheiser, Hannah Storm and Chris Chase

Athenae, Political Crack11 Comments

Imagining Less

John: No amount of public pressure is going to get the votes, because we are dealing with folks who just don’t care what you or I think. Period. I’m to the point now that I think the Senate is only floating the public option to fire up the House and make them more opposed to any bill without a public option, so that way they can blame the house for no bill passing when the Senate public option effort fails. I know it is fashionable to beat up on Joe Lieberman, but honestly, I’ve seen nothing the past few months … Continue reading Imagining Less

Adrastos, Carnival, Diary, Hurricane Katrina & Federal Flood, Krewe du Vieux, New Orleans, Television4 Comments

Confessions Of A Carnival Parade Recreator

Peter Adrastos Athas

I almost called myself a reanimator but since I lack Dr. Frankenstein’s powers I decided not to. Recreator sounds quite weird enough, y’all. It makes me sound like the Jahweh of re-runs. Or is the proper term recreationist? Probably not, sounds more like Darwin denial to me… Now that I’ve mucked about with word play, off we go. TheTreme filming was something of a clusterfuck, which I know is quite typical. That’s why they call it show business with the emphasis on the latter. If anyone else decides to do some extra-ing, I have one piece of advice for you: … Continue reading Confessions Of A Carnival Parade Recreator

Do Something, Of Interest, VirgoTex, Web/Tech2 Comments

Real change in the real world

This is the most interesting thing I’ve encountered all week. I’m fascinated by how people have an effect, how they move events and issues toward a discernible goal, how they produce, how they are viable, what lessons they can teach. It’s true: we need all kinds of minds. Temple Grandin‘s TED talk: p> http://video.ted.com/assets/player/swf/EmbedPlayer.swf Continue reading Real change in the real world

Music, Television, VirgoTex7 Comments

“He’ll have that scar on his chin forever”

First off, this is not merely an attempt to suck up to theboss lady. Rather, it’s a confession that, once again, I fail miserably at “getting” hockey. Even during theUS/Canada match the other night, I was more interested and amused by the online response of the faithful who were live tweeting it than I was in the actual game. (I wonder, do “real” hockey fans even use Twitter?) I don’t know, maybe I should try more than just every four years, or actually attend a live game. Meantime, in my defense, I can offer that two songs I absolutely love … Continue reading “He’ll have that scar on his chin forever”

Athenae, Games2 Comments

Elder-Wii

This is awesome: Youngster giving Wiis to seniors A Christmas trip to visit his great-grandmother in a nursing home sparked an ongoing service project for 10-year-old Lorenzo Little. His trip to Heartsong Nursing Home in Belleville left an impression. “(Residents) always look so bored,” the Janesville boy said. “So I thought that at home, if I enjoyed my Wii, why wouldn’t they enjoy a Wii?” he said. He talked with his parents, Greg and April, about his idea during the car ride home. With their help, Lorenzo’s goal is to raise money to put Nintendo Wii gaming systems in as … Continue reading Elder-Wii

Athenae, So Called Liberal Media4 Comments

Politico’s Comments

Like newspaper comments, but LESS AWESOME. Fromthe story on the dissolution of the national ACORN structure (which is a whole other thing but too rage-inducing to attempt this early in the day): it is asinine to compare Blackwater to ACORN. One is a private company competing for bids and fulfilling those contracts; the other is a publicly funded organization which has been consistently focusing on ways to break state and federal laws. As a conservative I have no qualms with organizations helping underprivileged with housing – in fact I financially support several charitable organizations to this end. I do however … Continue reading Politico’s Comments

Athenae, Immoral Values8 Comments

Then There’s This Asshole

Charming: “The number of children who are born subsequent to a first abortion with handicaps has increased dramatically. Why? Because when you abort the first born of any, nature takes its vengeance on the subsequent children,” said Marshall, a Republican. “In the Old Testament, the first born of every being, animal and man, was dedicated to the Lord. There’s a special punishment Christians would suggest.” Marshall was among more than 20 people, mostly Christian pastors and clergy, who gathered for the press conference in the General Assembly Building. There’s so much going on here, with the simplistic good people win/bad … Continue reading Then There’s This Asshole

So Called Liberal Media6 Comments

Great Moments in Journalism #314,159

I almost died last Friday. I won’t bore you with details, but it involved soap, a shower curtain, a razor, and NPR. See, Scott Horsley was covering theObama visit to Colorado to stump for Michael Bennet, and produced this little gem as I was engaged in my morning ablutions: “One woman at the Bennet fundraiser held a sign with the number ’51’ on it — as if to say, the party that had a 60-vote lock on the Senate several weeks ago, will now feel fortunate to hold onto a bare majority.” Seriously. I think you can understand the near-death … Continue reading Great Moments in Journalism #314,159

Athenae, Diary, Faith9 Comments

Our Fate is Your Fate

Go read Megan. This post isn’t about the ideas of Christianity. Every religion celebrates times of abundance and times of solemnity. Yom Kippur, Ramadan. They talk of repentance, of turning away from our past and our sins. For me, this year, this season is more about turning toward than turning away. Turning toward other people and embracing their pain, rather than ignoring it. It is a difficult discipline. But our true wealth, says Wendell, comes when we recognize that while one of us suffers, we all suffer. While our brothers and sisters live in poverty, we do too. Until that … Continue reading Our Fate is Your Fate

Athenae, So Called Liberal Media2 Comments

Money for Journalism

Can’t believe this didn’t work: In an utterly unsurprising development, the tip jar quietly has disappeared from the Miami Herald website. Guffaws and groans greeted the paper’s decision in mid-December to add a heartfelt plea for voluntary donations from readers to the bottom of each of its web pages.But the plea and the link to an accompanying payment page were nowhere in evidence on the website over the weekend. [snip] “I thought those advertisers actually paid you guys to put all this stuff up that we have to see if we want to look at this site,” said a reader … Continue reading Money for Journalism

Adrastos, Political Crack1 Comment

The Shrum Curse: U.K. Edition

Peter Adrastos Athas

p>A Prime Ministerial meltdown brought to you by the man who brought you the Gore and Kerry campaigns: Brown’s anger about that was as nothing compared with his reaction on Wednesday evening, when he learnt of the coverage in theTimes. Danny Finkelstein, the paper’s comment editor, a former speech-writer to John Major and a keen student of American politics, had been struck by the familiarity of many phrases in Brown’s speech. Finkelstein confirmed his suspicions by Googling any line that sounded like a speech-writer’s phrase. Brown said: “Sometimes people say I am too serious.” That was awfully similar to a … Continue reading The Shrum Curse: U.K. Edition

Athenae, Political Crack4 Comments

Why Start There?

Ugh: Separately, the White House proposal strengthens the employer responsibility requirement in the Senate bill. Like the Senate bill, it does not specificallyrequire employers to provide insurance to their workers, but would require them to pitch in more money for each employee who ends up on federal assistance to buy their own health insurance. That money will be used to help cover the cost of subsidies, which are slightly higher on average in the White House bill than in the Senate bill. Using the Senate bill as a baseline, White House proposal preserves the Senate bill’s abortion language, and state-based … Continue reading Why Start There?