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13 Dec 2009 23:41

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Politics: Max Headroom: Not even Barbara Walters can soft-pedal Glenn Beck

  • The Odd Couple Here’s that Alan Greenspan video we mentioned earlier. Our boy Al says a lot of smart stuff here, but the part that weirds us out is the fact that his sparring partner is crazy financial guy Jim Cramer. Great match, guys.


  • The Moderate Couple
    On “Face the Nation,” Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson were standing their ground for a health care option which gets rid of all the stuff that makes the health care bill desirable. These two guys are holding the bill back, liberal types.


  • The Vapid Couple
    Barbara Walters’ “10 Most Fascinating People” must’ve hit the bottom of the barrel this year, because Glenn Beck was on the list. Here’s the interview, and we must warn you: Glenn Beck still sounds like an idiot when he’s talking to Barbara Walters.

12 Dec 2009 18:53

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Politics: Joe Lieberman is a Jewish playa for walking to work today

  • 5 mile walk to stop a filibuster; he doesn’t drive on the Shabbat source

12 Dec 2009 11:00

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Politics: ACORN finally gets some good news from the courts

  • They have been singled out by Congress for punishment that directly and immediately affects their ability to continue to obtain federal funding, in the absence of any judicial, or even administrative, process adjudicating guilt.
  • Judge Nina Gershon • On her decision to overturn the House ban on grants for ACORN, which was ruled unconstitutional yesterday. Gershon and others argue that the bill equated to a “bill of attainder,” which punishes a group without the benefit of a trial. Conservative groups perhaps played their hand a little too loosely on this case. Even though ACORN screwed up, they didn’t commit any crimes other than large amounts of idiocy. So this decision was the right one. source

12 Dec 2009 09:42

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Politics: The Wall Street Journal on Tiger Woods: Gossip can be useful

  • The Tiger gossip is replete with moral messages and motivations that are compelling, instructive and powerful. Moral guidance can often sound like a collection of tired bromides when expressed in the abstract. But when told as part of a compelling drama—as gossip—it can appear as an eloquent demarcation of good behavior.
  • Wall Street Journal columnist Nicholas DiFonzo • In an article defending gossip’s usefulness in the media. He’s says that why much gossip can be ugly, sometimes it can teach lessons to outsiders. Woods’ situation is especially messy – the cheater passed off as the wholesome family man, the do-no-wrong sports figure doing lots of wrong – but it makes the lessons stronger. source

10 Dec 2009 11:00

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09 Dec 2009 09:46

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Politics: GOP congressman going to Copenhagen to end “scientific fascism”

  • Their behavior has caused grave damage to the public trust in climate science in general, and to the IPCC, in particular. They should not be allowed to do so in the future.
  • Wisconsin Rep. James Sensenbrenner • On “Climategate,” the hacked e-mail controversy which has convinced him to go to Copenhagen to give a Republican response to Obama’s stance on the issue. Great. Just what the world needed – some guy to bring our crazy to the rest of the world. source

08 Dec 2009 23:03

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Politics: A couple PR rules, through the vector of Tiger Woods’ idiocy

  • What Gotti understood, albeit at some primitive level, is that the news media abhor a vacuum and that if you don’t face them on your own terms, they will create the terms for you.
  • Reuters columnist Charles Feldman • In a column titled “What Tiger Woods Can Learn From John Gotti,” which looks at Woods’ mishandling of the media. Feldman is making the very argument we’ve been making for the last week and a half. Which is that Woods is so concerned about his privacy that he’s doing the opposite of everything he should be doing as a public figure. Woods isn’t afraid to accept the public’s money for his success, so he shouldn’t be afraid to come clean when he’s done wrong. He’s completely allowed the press to write the terms of his failings, so now the fall from grace is even more spectacular and painful as a result. (David Letterman clearly knew this, BTW.) source
 

08 Dec 2009 10:52

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Politics: Abortion fail: Fox News pulls out dicey “low-income babies” card

  • That’s some hard-hitting questioning on abortion right there, Alisyn Camerota of Fox News. Some would argue that it’s racist or disrespectful to the poor. We’d argue that it just makes you an awful human being. Our favorite part of the clip is the obvious disbelief about the line of questioning by Kate Obenshain, her guest. source

08 Dec 2009 10:19

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Politics: Climate change expert: That e-mail controversy no big thang

  • Well, I can tell you, privately when I talk to my friends, I use language much worse than that. This was purely private communications between friends, between, colleagues, they were letting off steam. I think we should see it as nothing more than that.
  • Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Chairman Rajendra Pachauri • Throwing in his two cents on the climate change hacked e-mail scandal. He points out that even if they were trying to push inaccurate information into reports, the reports are peer-reviewed so it would’ve never gotten through. “There are so many checks and balances in the processes and procedures that we follow at the IPCC, there is not one iota of possibility that something like this would happen,” he said. source

07 Dec 2009 21:14

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Politics: Mitch McConnell is an old man who does nothing but complain

  • If your goal was to come up with a plan for financial ruin, you couldn’t come up with a better idea than cutting a program by $500 billion and simultaneously expanding the number of people it is required to cover.
  • Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell • Making another one of his snippy comments about the health care bill. It’s too bad he’s saying it about a potential breakthrough for the bill in the Senate. The latest idea being bandied about: Allow lower-income people as young as 55 to bask in the glory that is Medicare. Now, McConnell does have a point about this – they’re cutting Medicare AND adding people to it – but then again, it’s not like this jerk has actually come up with a solution besides “complain more and stonewall any reasonable progress.” Do more than that and we’ll give you credit. source