December 2009
58 posts
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Obama and his Telepromter
squashed:
jgh writes,
Since when do politicians not read from Teleprompters? Obama has written many of his own speeches. I’m unsure of what this talking point is supposed to be about.
Can somebody help?
I think it’s mostly the logical paradox of a man who these folks a priori distrust and despise (for an assortment of reasons that are left as an exercise for the reader) being quite...
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“The reductions in Medicare Republicans are now decrying are more equitable,...”
– Jonathan Cohn, writing for The New Republic, and creating a little koan for us all to recite. Also, keep in mind that John McCain himself pushed cuts in the neighborhood of $1.3 trillion just ~8 months ago during the campaign. And is now all worked up over revisions that total $487 billion (mostly...
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Annals of Scientific Publication
It’s not every day one gets to write a paper that includes such excerpts as:
[the] structure would be assembled in space near the sun by an army of robots and built out of space-based materials
while talking about small black holes, Dyson spheres, and the possibility of re-purposing SETI as a means of detecting the telltale gravitational waves of and/or the gamma emissions from poorly...
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“We don’t tell you we’ve used 1½ pounds of cream and butter with 1¾ pounds of...”
– Indeed we do not. Even less so the reveal in the next sentence that Robuchon rose to prominence on the back of an even higher butter/starch ratio. Whoa.
via Give Me Something To Read: Why we use cookbooks
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“…what if we chose to accept the fact that every few years, despite all...”
– Fraidy Cats: David Foster Wallace Was Not Afraid
November 2009
30 posts
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Tiger: Likely Bankrupted
Well, looks like this about wraps it up for Tiger Woods:
An Orange County Utilities manager told the Sentinel today his agency likely will bill the golfer about $600 for the expenses related to repairing the fire hydrant the pro-golfer struck.
It cost about $85 to pick up the damaged hydrant. And now there’s a work-order with the county for about $450 to repair and replace the hydrant.
...
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Joementum today, tomorrow, forever! →
ryking notes with evident pleasure the wingnut pursuit of Charlie Crist over an Obama embrace. I don’t see it as being all that different from the reaction on the Left to this:
And it will probably have about as positive of an outcome, though this time impacting the GOP.
And, naturally, is bad for the Democrat.
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“SHIELDS: We have a president of real intellectual horse power who is cool,...”
– —Mark Shields, who should be shipped off along with his buddy David Brooks. Seriously, what is wrong with these people? Why are they still allowed to exert control over the print and televised discourse?
(via Think Progress)
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A Joke
David Brooks, yesterday, 11/15:
[Sarah Palin is] a joke. I mean, I just can’t take her seriously. We’ve got serious problems in the country. Barack Obama’s trying to handle war. We’ve just a had guy elected Virginia governor who’s probably the model for the future of the Republican Party, Bob McDonnell, pretty serious guy, pragmatic, calm, kind of boring. The idea...
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True Lies Wide Shut
Every now and then a statement rolls in front of your eyes that you stop and re-read, then think about, and then read again. But it’s the same information every time. Rest assured, I am not making this up:
After he finished making “True Lies,” [director James] Cameron called [Stanley] Kubrick, by then a recluse, and invited himself over. They spent a day, in the basement of Kubrick’s house...
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“The funny thing about all of this is that no matter how bad all their ideas are,...”
– John Cole, hitting on a very basic reality for today’s GOP. Naturally, this is bad for the Democrat.
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“By far the fastest way to end the war in Afghanistan would be to ask General...”
– Matt Yglesias
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Price of Failure
Lots of people seem to think that if we don’t get all the way to single payer (or some other abstract, personal measure of “success” in health insurance reforms) that the reform is not worth doing. I think Ezra Klein destroys that meme rather completely while noting that failure doesn’t breed more expansive second-tries; instead, it only breeds more caution on the...
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“Some of the people (at the rally) that wanted to engage me in conversation...”
– Barney Frank, (D), MA
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“Every vote over the minimum necessary to secure passage represents compromises...”
– Rafe Colburn, who I currently agree with 100%. 