What the Hell is Going On?

is

the

world

serious?

Are the Saudis screwing us again? Why did we support this group until four months ago, if we've ever stopped?

Bobby V. and Bush

Did this really happen?

And remember this?

Pants

When I read that George Will wrote a column about how much he hates jeans, I thought someone had dredged up something he wrote in the 1970's. I think we're turning into a nation of five year-olds more than the next guy, but this is completely insane.

Vancouver

Great marketing ploy for the Pacific Northwest.

Japan Japan Japan

I wonder what senile guys would think of Japanese video games. What are people thinking over there?

Ron Howard: Make a Movie About This

Is the Supreme Court becoming a papist conspiracy?

I'm sure this guy thinks so.

So Serious

I saw this in a local paper in Long Beach last week. So awesome.

Too Horrible

The First Amendment (porn) lawyer who runs the Legal Satyricon blog unabashedly wins a 'worst boss of the year' award:

Sometimes he has to watch “scat porn” (yes, for work). It makes him throw up. He throws up in his trashcan and THEN calls me in and makes me watch what just made him throw up.

Powell

If Obama fixes the economy and we don't have a World War or groundbreaking peace treaty within the next four years, Powell is the only person who has a chance against him in 2012.


Watch CBS Videos Online

But he's black and he voted for Carter, so it'll never happen.

Update: I didn't know he was 72. So of course he's not running for president.

Quote

Saw this recently and think it's pretty good.

The feud between the capitalist and the laborer, the house of Have and the house of Want, is as old as social union, and can never be entirely quieted; but he who will act with moderation, prefer fact to theory, and remember that every thing in this world is relative and not absolute, will see that the violence of the contest may be stilled.
-George Bancroft

Iran

Zakaria talks some sense on Iran. Apparently you have to be a fucking genius nowadays to point out that it can be possible for a country composed mostly of twenty-something guys who want nothing more than to be able to bring their hair into the 21st century to want nuclear weapons for strategic purposes, and not just to act out a national death wish. An attempted takedown on TNR to follow shortly . . . .

Botchedbecue

I finally managed to grill something this Spring without messing it up in some way. These were the attempts.

April 28 Thin sliced chuck steak. This marinade. This is a standby, but I accidentally left it soaking for about a week. It was soaked through and came out as a kind of semi-jerky.

April 30 Skinless chicken breasts. Teriyaki. La Choy teriyaki with soy sauce and cayenne. Bleh. La Choy is flavorless gruel.

May 8 Chicken drumsticks. Like a dozen of them. Attempted to recreate this chicken


by bastardizing this recipe. Yes that recipe is apparently from a website about preserving traditional Cambodian culture within a small region of Vietnam (see if you can find the page with the MIDI anthem). water vegetable oil curry powder cayenne coriander garlic soy and fish sauce. It wasn't spicy enough. There was too much water and I didn't use the chilis.

May 10 Chicken drumsticks. Fake tandoori. Not spicy enough even with cayenne added, but a good, crispy skin.

May 12 Whole chicken breasts. Smothered in sweet chili sauce. This was a failed experiment. The skin completely burned to a crisp very quickly and the sauce didn't provide enough flavor.

May 20 The steak marinade again. It worked this time because it only marinated for one night. It's hard to screw this one up.

Now I am one step closer to becoming my hero, a guy I heard about once who keeps pictures of everything he's ever eaten on a website somewhere. But I guess it's cooler when he does it, since he's an eccentric Japanese artist or something.

Brian Grant

This is very sad. Maybe he will figure out a way to be even more inspirational.

Happy Nightmares

The whole set is here. I assume they're also making trading cards.

Hazy Reasoning

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that no Supreme Court in the next 25 years will find a constitutional right to smoke marijuana.

Rummy's Crusade

This is insane.

Siegelman

The Siegelman debacle might end up in the Supreme Court. Holder should really put the case under review before that.

Subtle Craft

. . . I agree with the part about juggling. The rest would have me locked up.

Entrapment

Telling guys like this that you're "'Brother Mohammed' from al-Qaida" who's going to help them blow up the Sears Tower and then convicting them of conspiracy to commit terrorism is like sending a 17 year-old cheerleader to an SCA convention in skimpy medieval garb and having her tell some hairy, fat, insane guys that she wants to fuck them and then convicting them of conspiracy to commit statutory rape.

Margaret O'Neale Timberlake Eaton Buchignani

But she was not destined to live a quiet retirement—at age 61 she married twenty-one year old Antonio Buchignani, her granddaughter's dancing teacher and deeded all her belongings to him. Less than a year later he eloped to Italy with her granddaughter, and Peggy was forced to work as a dressmaker to support herself.

Today's political sex scandals are lame.

The Roozi Rozegari

About a year ago, John Barth's 1957 novel, The Floating Opera, won the first annual Iranian prize for translated fiction, the Roozi Rozegari. Barth's acceptance of the prize included complaints about the fact that the Persian translation was pirated and unauthorized, which is totally acceptable in Iran because the country does not belong to international copyright treaties. But otherwise, the fact that some Iranians seemed to be interested enough in American fiction from the 1950's to award it a prize was generally regarded as a good thing.

I happen to have read The Floating Opera a few months ago, so I have something to say about this. That is, before declaring this to be a wonderful cultural exchange, look at the novel a little closer.

Saeed Kamali Dehghan, who writes for The Guardian and accepted the prize for Barth, says that "The Floating Opera, Barth's first novel, is the story of a lawyer Todd Andrews, who changed his mind on June 21, 1937, and decided not to commit suicide." However, what I remember happening in the novel is this. Todd Andrews has something of an existential crisis, he decides to commit suicide for almost no reason whatsoever, he tries to set up an explosion that will kill him along with most of the people in his hometown, and then although he does not to try to kill himself again after there is no explosion, he does not really second guess his initial decision.

So something tells me that in today's Iran, this novel is about more than just a cute existentialist narrative. Although the book can be read as being very much in favor of life over suicide, its ultimate effect is to give one empathy for suicide bombers by imputing an undeserved level of thought and rationality to their decisions.

And I know all this sounds really dark, but it's actually a really funny book, and Todd Andrews is a great character.

Traditional Conservative Pornography

Among other things to happen to conservatives last week, Bristol Palin was airing her saga, Joe the Plumber quit the party, and this happened (video; not work appropriate). Yes, Miss California alleges that she's being smeared with topless photos from her past because of her stance against gay marriage, and says that she was 17 in the most recent photo as a way of preventing you from seeing this politically relevant topless photo of Miss California. Access Hollywood does what's necessary: it gives all of their best explanations for why it's not illegal for them to show the photo over and over, including the opinions of forensic panty experts.

And that guy, hosting the pageant, and I think narrating that segment. That's the second-most publicly-embarrassing Bush, Billy. (Third if you count actual publicly-exposed pubic hair.)

So, everything OK over there, on the right?

A-Crop

The A-Crop (finally) makes national news.

The Zen of Bobby V

The Zen of Bobby V can only be purchased if you own an XBOX because . . . why? They're hoping to get a nationwide theatrical release? It's gone back in the ESPN Films vault so that it will generate more interest in 20 years? Looking for a copy, I only found other posts of grown men crying in blog comments because they missed seeing it on TV. ESPN is sitting on a gold mine.






Update: I heard that it's going to be on TV this week, so nevermind.

Mets

This play was ridiculous.



(A video that really shows how Sid Bream-slow Delgado was running and that Werth had absolutely no reason to hold on to the ball is here.)

Also the ribs at CitiField are not bad, and a good deal at $10.

Burgers

I wish they could expand these pictures to include every burger in the city.

Immigration Prison

The judge moved on. “The respondent, after proper notice, has failed to appear,” he said for the record. And as she declared, “I’m going to die now,” he entered an order deporting her to China, and sent her back to the Glades County immigration jail.

That exchange, and her bleak experience in the immigration enforcement system, have come to light only through a fluke.

Forget the argument over whether to let more immigrants in and whether to legalize the people who are here already. We need to deal with the gulag we're operating for the people who have been caught under the current rules.

All Progressive Media Stereotypes are True

I occasionally listen to Break Room Live, mostly because I think Maron is really funny. I usually listen to the podcast in the car, but today I caught part of the live streaming video show (no, it's not the most productive thing you can do at work). During the live streaming show, part of the screen includes a bunch of people chatting about the show. Today I saw this go by:

15:38 nightbird : not now moops
15:38 sixfingahz : the deal is 65 an eigth, 125 a quarter bo
15:38 WhenIsItEnough : Maron can't be a Cubs fan...he has a brain
15:38 bretth313 : i think pro baseball should recruit sexy female players that'd be awesome

So yes, people who like left wing radio are not only pot dealers, they are also gouging their customers with high prices. (I won't say anything about how stupid the other comments are, because that's just part of any chat room-type thing.)

Movie Review: Earth

Disney doesn't need more money, but they made this anyhow.

Something seemed oddly familiar at the beginning. And midway through I realized that I was watching footage that I had seen already, on the Discovery Channel, with better narration and with the goriest parts and creepy sea bottom creatures left in.

Clips here.

Tea Baggin'

I came across that today while looking for something else. It's from the Boston Post-Boy in Sept. 26, 1774. (Maybe newspapers are folding now because they don't have awesome enough names?)

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	M - Th 11p / 10c
Tea Party Tyranny
thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Economic Crisis First 100 Days

More Gitmo Hand-Wringing

The Times makes it sound like Obama is acquiescing to Bush Admin. logic on detainees because they will probably not be tried in federal court. This is bullshit to the point of being disingenuous. They were never going to be tried in federal court. Ever hear of the right to a speedy trial, unlawfully obtained evidence, the right to counsel, or any of the other 53 things that would make a Gitmo detainee trial in federal court an automatic loss for the government? When the Bush Admin. military commissions were originally announced, the most common criticism of them was that the military already had a system in place for trying war crimes, and why weren't we using that? We'll probably end up using something more likely that.

Anyway, trying these guys for crimes is virtually meaningless, since we assert the authority to hold them them as prisoners of war until the war on terror is over, whenever that is, regardless of whether they are ever tried or convicted of anything, even if they are acquitted. Although it's possible that being tried, even by the hated military commissions, can improve the lives of detainees. Just look at David Hicks.