This is one fucked up list. Although I have to say it is a pretty accurate list. Both Pete Doherty and Amy Winehouse made the Top Ten, despite being under 30. Kudos to them.Wednesday, January 7, 2009
The 100 Most Likely People To Die In 2009
This is one fucked up list. Although I have to say it is a pretty accurate list. Both Pete Doherty and Amy Winehouse made the Top Ten, despite being under 30. Kudos to them.
Why The Real World Brooklyn is moronic
I thought about watching the new season of the Real World, because it takes place about a mile from my apartment, but I no longer have any interest after reading this (read especially the bold part:)
If I saw Chet on the street tomorrow, I'd be likely to shoot him for saying that.
The look of the Red Hook apartment feels equally premillennial. It is in a converted old warehouse with a canoe propped up outside. The show introduces cast members in different spots all over Brooklyn — Brooklyn Heights, Coney Island — as if it were a single neighborhood spackled with pizza and Junior’s cheesecake rather than a place of varied neighbors. The fantasy is that the
yuppies never invaded, and the $7 million brownstones and $25-a-pound wild salmon don’t exist.
As Chet explains when he lands in the borough, speaking just under the Brooklyn Bridge: “Brooklyn is usually spoken of as more of a place you don’t want to end up.” He is worried he might be shot. Some intervention would have helped him realize that there’s little chance of that outside the River Cafe.
If I saw Chet on the street tomorrow, I'd be likely to shoot him for saying that.
It's all about Iran
I found this fascinating quote in Thomas Friedman's column this morning:
It seems that much of Israel's justification for entering Gaza is to contain Iran. In it's own machiavellian sort of way, it's a brilliant move. Immoral as hell. But brilliant.
“The Gaza that Israel left in 2005 was bordering Egypt. The Gaza that Israel just came back to is now bordering Iran,” said Mamoun Fandy, director of Middle East programs at the International Institute of Strategic Studies. “Iran has become the ultimate confrontation state. I am not sure we can talk just about ‘Arab-Israeli peace’ or the ‘Arab peace initiative’ anymore. We may be looking at an ‘Iranian initiative.’ ”
It seems that much of Israel's justification for entering Gaza is to contain Iran. In it's own machiavellian sort of way, it's a brilliant move. Immoral as hell. But brilliant.
The A.V. Club's Best Music of 2008
The A.V. Club always has intelligent, well-thought out reviews and lists, and this one is no different. No other Best Music list I've seen of 2008 includes The Cool Kids album, which is so, so, so very cool, except for this list. Kudos to the A.V. Club as always.
Ann Coulter on the CBS Early Show
Oh brother. Here's Ta-Nehisi Coates's take:
In roughly six minutes, Ann Coulter asserts that Sean Hannity is more likely to be assassinated than Barack Obama, that the country is teeming with "left-wing violence," calls W. the most persecuted and attacked president since Richard Nixon, and calls Tom Delay a victim of oppression. As I said--So. Awesome. My only beef with this interview was that dude should have let her talk more, and disagreed less. Plus no hits on Michelle Obama. Come on man! More thuggism plz!
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Picture from school bombing in Israel
I wrote about the Israelis bombing that school in Gaza earlier, but I thought this picture said it all. Awful.
Great Quote
I have no idea who Algernon Black is, but this is some quote:Why not let people differ about their answers to the great mysteries of the Universe? Let each seek one's own way to the highest, to one's own sense of supreme loyalty in life, one's ideal of life. Let each philosophy, each world-view bring forth its truth and beauty to a larger perspective, that people may grow in vision, stature and dedication.
The religions of humanity should be a unifying force, for all the great religions reveal a basic unity in ethics. Whether it be Judaism, Catholicism, Protestantism, Buddhism or Confucianism, all grow out of a sense of the sacredness of human life. This moral sensitivity to the sacredness of human personality -- the Commandments not to kill, not to hurt, not to put a stumbling block in the path of the blind, not to neglect the widow or the fatherless, not to exploit the servant or the worker -- all this can be found in the Bibles of humanity, in all the sacred books. All teach in substance: "Do unto others as you would that others should do unto you." There is, then, a basic unity among the great religions in the matter of ethics. True, there are religious philosophies which turn people away from the world, from the here and now, concentrating life-purposes on salvation for one's self or a mystic union with some supernatural reality. But most of the great religions agree on mercy, justice, love -- here on earth. And they agree that the great task is to move people from apathy, from an acceptance of the evils in life, to face the possibilities of the world, to make life sweet for one another instead of bitter. This is the unifying ethical task of all the religions -- yes, of all the philosophies of humankind. There is no need to force our own theological points of view upon one another or to insist that the moral life grows out of final, absolute authority.- Algernon Black
25 Best Opening Lyrics of All-Time according to spinner.com
Here's an interesting list, although any list that doesn't include "Woke up late, at about noon, just thought I had to be in Compton soon, gotta get drunk before the day begins, so my mom will stop bitchin' about my friends" is a flawed one.My personal favorite on the list? "What's with these homies dissin my girl?"
25. "You were working as a waitress in a cocktail bar..." (Human League, "Don't You Want Me?")
24. "I've been a bad, bad girl..." (Fiona Apple, "Criminal")
23. "You never close your eyes anymore when I kiss your lips..." (The Righteous Brothers, "You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling")
22. "Go shorty. It's your birthday..." (50 Cent, "In Da Club")
21. "Hello darkness, my old friend..." (Simon and Garfunkel, "The Sounds of Silence")
20. "I am an antichrist...." (The Sex Pistols, "Anarchy In The U.K.")
19. "Well I guess it would be nice if I could touch your body..." (George Michael, "Faith")
18. "We don't smoke marijuana in Muskogee.." (Merle Haggard, "Okie From Muskokee")
17. "I was dreaming when I wrote this..." (Prince, "1999")
16. "Pigs, they tend to wiggle when they walk" (Pavement, "Stereo")
15. "She was more like a beauty queen from a movie scene..." (Michael Jackson, "Billie Jean")
14. "There must be some kind of way out of here, said the joker to the thief..." (Bob Dylan, "All Along The Watchtower")
13. "What's with these homies dissin' my girl?" (Weezer, "Buddy Holly")
12. "A candy-colored clown they call the sandman tiptoes to my room every night..." (Roy Orbison, "In Dreams")
11. "Oh I just don't know where to begin..." (Elvis Costello, "Accidents Will Happen")
10. "Tommy used to work on the docks..." (Bon Jovi, "Livin' On A Prayer")
9. "Jesus died for somebody's sins, but not mine..." (Patti Smith, "Gloria")
8. "Well it's one for the money, two for the show, three to get ready, now go, cat, go" (Carl Perkins, "Blue Suede Shoes")
7. "In the time of chimpanzees I was a monkey..." (Beck, "Loser")
6. "Why do birds suddenly appear every time you are near?" (The Carpenters, "Close To You")
5. "Don't call it a comeback..." (LL Cool J, "Mama Said Knock You Out")
4. "Well she was just seventeen, you know what I mean" (The Beatles, "I Saw Her Standing There")
3. "Hey, ho, let's go!" (The Ramones, "Blitzkrieg Bop")
2. "I was born in a crossfire hurricane..." (The Rolling Stones, "Jumpin' Jack Flash")
1. "She's a very kinky girl..." (Rick James, "Superfreak")
When Tanks Meet Children in Gaza
This sounds like a pretty awful incident in Gaza:
Israel Defense Forces tank fire killed at least 30 Palestinians at a United Nations school in the Gaza Strip on Tuesday, UN officials and medical sources and at two hospitals said.
Palestinian officials had initially said that 40 people were killed in the attack, but UN sources put the number at 30 killed and 55 wounded.
An IDF spokesman said that troops had fired mortar rounds at the school, after militants barricaded inside shot mortar shells at the Israeli forces.
"Initial checks ... show that from inside the school mortars were fired at Israeli forces," a spokesman said. "In response, the forces fired a number of mortar rounds into the area."
The attack brought the Palestinian death toll to nearly 600 in Israel's 11-day offensive on the Hamas-ruled coastal territory.
I wonder how many of the 30 dead were children? I'm guessing quite a lot. I have to wonder if the members of the Israeli government, if they were really honest with themselves, would really think their actions in Gaza are justified?
Monday, January 5, 2009
Panetta to Be Named C.I.A. Director
Another Santa Clara University grad makes it big:
President-elect Barack Obama has selected Leon E. Panetta, the former congressman and White House chief of staff, to take over the Central Intelligence Agency, an organization that Mr. Obama criticized during the campaign for using interrogation methods he decried as torture, Democratic officials said Monday.
Yet the choice encountered early opposition on Capitol Hill, with some senior Democrats questioning why the president-elect would pick a C.I.A. chief without a deep reservoir of intelligence or counterterrorism experience.
Debating the best movies of 2008
Every year, Slate has a debate among a few film critics, who discuss the best movies of the year, and every year I read it like crazy. It's worth a look if you're a film geek like me.
Ed Reed is a God
I don't know if anyone saw the Ravens-Dolphins game yesterday, but if you did, you saw an amazing performance by Raven's safety Ed Reed. Check out the play below. (I tried to find another video of his other interception, which was even more amazing, but haven't yet.)
In my humble opinion, Ed Reed is the best defensive player in the NFL. He might even be the best player in all of the game.
In my humble opinion, Ed Reed is the best defensive player in the NFL. He might even be the best player in all of the game.
Israel a liability to the U.S.?
I'm not sure I agree with this, but it's food for a thought:
As Israel escalates its efforts to root Hamas and its rocket launchers out of Gaza, the global reaction is increasingly negative -- except in the United States. Washington provides Israel with diplomatic backing, U.N. Security Council vetoes of "anti-Zionist" resolutions, and of course $3 billion a year in military aid. But what does Israel provide in return? Yes, Israel and America cooperate on counterterrorism, but how many of the groups on which Israel provides intelligence would be gunning for the United States if it wasn't supporting Israel? Setting aside for a moment the emotional and religious anchors of the U.S.-Israel alliance, what is its value to the United States in practical, realpolitik terms?
Sunday, January 4, 2009
Mini-Me a dynamo is bed
All I can say is hahahahaha:MINI-ME pocket rocket Verne Troyer proved size didn’t matter the night he first bedded blonde Playboy model Genevieve Gallen.
Because the 2ft 8in tall Celeb Big Brother star took the beauty who would become his wife to HEIGHTS of passion she’d never dreamed of.
After he’d hopped on a CHAIR first to reach the bed, of course.
Curvy 5ft 6in stunner Genevieve, 36. reveals: “We had to be creative—but because of my yoga experience I could get into the right positions to make it work. And I was soon head over heels in love with Verne.
“We could have sex up to 10 times in a single day. We’d do it for 45 minutes and he would just keep on going as I had orgasm after orgasm.
“He was a sex addict. He was then only the second man I’d ever slept with. He told me he’d had huge numbers of girls.”
Scenes from The Wire: D'angelo Barksdale discusses The Great Gatsby
Many critics have said that The Wire has the depth of great literature, and this scene is a perfect example of why. In it, D'Angelo Barksdale discusses The Great Gatsby in a prison reading group and shows some wonderful insight into the Gatsby character. But here's the kicker... about half way from through his little speech about Gatsby, you realize that D'Angelo is really talking about himself. Very, very few shows have that many layers and have that much depth.
Ann Coulter=asshole
An excerpt from Ann Coulter's new book:
Coulter wrote, "Her obvious imitation of Jackie O's style - the flipped-under hair, the sleeveless A-line dresses, the short strands of fake pearls - would have been laughable if done by anyone other than a media-designated saint."Coulter said Cindy McCain, the wife of vanquished GOP nominee John McCain, "dressed well without freakishly imitating famous First Ladies in history."
Coulter facetiously and snidely refers to Michelle Obama as a "saint" and "Mother Teresa" and suggests that her public service career "advanced in lockstep with the political advancement of her husband."
I hate to even talk about this because it gives attention to someone who doesn't really deserve the attention. But come on, how is everything on the right "great" and everything on the left "awful" to Coulter? All she is doing is being mean and bitter just to be mean and bitter. It's an attempt to stay relevant after the crash and burn of the Bush years. But if Obama turns out to be the president I think he'll be, Coulter, Michelle Malkin, Sean Hannity and the rest will become more and more irrevelant.
Healthy Foods for Under $1
If you're on a budget like I am, this sort of list is a godsend: 1. Oats: High in fiber and good for cholesterol. A dollar buys you a week’s worth of breakfast or keeps you well-supplied in oatmeal cookies.
2. Eggs: Costing about a dollar for a half-dozen, these are one of the cheapest sources of protein, says DivineCaroline. The site suggests huevos rancheros, egg salad sandwiches and frittatas.
3. Kale: At about a dollar a bunch, this is one of the cheapest greens you’ll find in the supermarket. Toss into a stir-fry or check out recipes for German-style kale or traditional Irish colcannon.
4. Potatoes: Stay away from fries and chips, and eat them skin and all as a good source of vitamin C and potassium. Choose sweet potatoes or yams for an added serving of beta carotene. Here’s a recipe for easy breakfast potatoes that uses just 2 tablespoons of olive oil.
5. Apples: Tasty, cheap and filling, apples are a fun way to dress up a meal, either cooked or turned into applesauce.
6. Nuts: Some nuts like pecans and macadamias cost more, but peanuts, walnuts and almonds, particularly when bought in the shell, won’t break your budget. Eat them plain or sprinkle in salads. Nuts aren’t as fattening as you might think. Read more in Going Nuts for the Holidays.
7. Bananas: Shop around for deals; DivineCaroline found them for 19 cents apiece at Trader Joe’s. A dollar gets you a banana a day for the workweek, and they are great in smoothies, cereal and with yogurt.
8. Garbanzo Beans: Also known as chickpeas, garbanzos are cheapeast in dry form, but even precooked beans will still only cost about a dollar. If you don’t like garbanzos, any bean will do. Check out DivineCaroline’s recipe for orange hummus.
9. Broccoli: Easy to make and cheap, broccoli is a no-brainer for any budget meal.
10. Watermelon: The whole melon costs more than a dollar, but the per-serving cost is only about 20 cents, the site says.
11. Wild Rice: About the same as white rice, but better for you with a nutty flavor.
12. Beets: Roasted in the oven or shred into salads, beets are packed with nutrients. For extra value, buy them with greens on for stir fry or to toss in a salad. Beets have been a popular topic on Well. Check out Pass the Beets, Again for several recipes that take beets beyond the can.
13. Butternut Squash: In season, the butternut squash costs less than a dollar a pound. It can be tough to cut up, but it’s hearty and easy to bake or prepare as a soup. Check out DivineCaroline’s pear and squash bruschetta.
14. Whole Grain Pasta: A cheap staple, but pick the whole grain variety for added nutritional punch.
15. Sardines: A little fish so low on the food chain it doesn’t accumulate mercury and packs tons of nutrition. Mash them with parsley, lemon juice and olive oil for a spread or toss into salads or on pizza.
16. Spinach: Cheap year-round, packed with nutrition and great in salads or a spinach frittata.
17. Tofu: An inexpensive protein source. Add to smoothies for a protein boost, suggests DivineCaroline.
18. Milk: Per serving, milk and many milk products like yogurt are still under a dollar.
19. Pumpkin Seeds: Not the most practical item on the list because most of us aren’t carving pumpkins every day and they are expensive to buy on their own. Still, they are great on salads and as a snack, so it’s always worth saving pumpkin seeds when you have a pumpkin.
20. Coffee: Skip the Starbucks and make it at home, where it’s just 50 cents a cup. Plus, there’s plenty of evidence that it’s good for you.
Israeli Troops Advance, Bisecting Gaza
Israel continues to tear shit up: GAZA — Israeli troops advanced into Gaza on Sunday under cover of heavy air, tank and artillery fire after opening a ground war against the militant group Hamas on Saturday night.
Witnesses said the Israeli forces had punched across Gaza, bisecting its northern and southern parts, and had taken over certain strategic areas, including what the military has described as rocket launching sites.The ground campaign came after a week of intense airstrikes. Israel’s stated goal was to destroy the infrastructure of Hamas, the Islamic group that controls Gaza’s government, and to significantly decrease the threat to southern Israel from Palestinian rocket fire.
I'm just waiting for the other shoe to drop and the Shias in Iran and Syria intervene on the Palestinians behalf. That's when we get an all-out Middle East war.
Friday, January 2, 2009
IE falls below 69% market share, Firefox climbs above 21%
I thought this was good news:Chicago (IL) – Microsoft was not able to slow the market share loss of its Internet Explorer (IE) web browser in December. IE surrendered more than 1.5 points in December, according to Net Applications, while Firefox, Chrome and Safari posted substantial gains. Over the past 12 months, IE has lost almost 8 points, leaving the browser with the least amount of market share since 1999.
Net Applications released updated global browser market share numbers today, indicating that IE is losing users at an accelerated pace. The browser’s share dropped from 69.77% in November to 68.15% in December. Most rivals were able to pick up a portion of what IE surrendered. Firefox gained more than half a point and ended up at 21.34%, Safari approaches the next big hurdle with 7.93% and Chrome came in at 1.04%, the first time Google was able to cross the 1% mark. Opera remained stable 0.71%, but it is clear that the Norwegian browser cannot attract any users IE loses.
I've long thought Firefox was a far superior product compared to Internet Explorer. It looks like the rest of the world is starting to figure that out.
John Travolta's Son Dies
I hate reporting celebrity news, but this was pretty tragic:
Rand Memorial Hospital in the Bahamas tells TMZ the son of John Travolta died today.
We're told 16-year-old Jett was vacationing with Travolta and wife Kelly Preston.
There have been reports that Jett was autistic, though Travolta has denied it, saying he suffers from Kawasaki Syndrome, a condition which often leads to heart disease.
Death is never a great thing, but to see someone so young lose their life is especially tragic. My prayers to the family.
Andrew Sullivan on Gaza
Andrew Sullivan has some interesting thoughts on Gaza, many of which I haven't considered:And so you have an excruciating confluence of the questions of proportionality in a just war and asymmetry in the war against terrorism. What renders the current awfulness particularly wrenching is that the immoral means Hamas uses are logical from the point of view of an entity that is committed to Israel's destruction but not powerful enough to achieve it. And the response of Israel is logical from the point of view of a Western country enduring constant terrorist bombardment. Hence the never-ending argument in which both extremes reinforce themselves. This is not, one remembers, a Likud government. This is what the center left needs to do in Israel to stay in power at this point. And it has the backing of Egypt.
The nature of the conflict therefore ensures that Israel will kill and injure and traumatize far more human beings than Hamas can, even though Israel's intentions may be more honorable (and the relative lack of civilian deaths, given the pounding that has been going on in Gaza, is striking evidence for Israel's relative scrupulousness). This means that Israel will continue to lose the war of ideas and that Hamas will benefit from the impasse. Meanwhile, Jewish Israelis face a demographic reckoning and the forces of Jihadism gain a new recruiting tool. Abbas is temporarily weakened; and Iran's ideological strength temporarily waxes. Democracy, pace the neocons, is not a panacea: Hamas has more democratic legitimacy, it seems to me, than Mubarak.
Paul Krugman's "Bigger Than Bush"
Paul Krugman wrote a great column today about the Republican party: But most of the whining takes the form of claims that the Bush administration’s failure was simply a matter of bad luck — either the bad luck of President Bush himself, who just happened to have disasters happen on his watch, or the bad luck of the G.O.P., which just happened to send the wrong man to the White House.The fault, however, lies not in Republicans’ stars but in themselves. Forty years ago the G.O.P. decided, in effect, to make itself the party of racial backlash. And everything that has happened in recent years, from the choice of Mr. Bush as the party’s champion, to the Bush administration’s pervasive incompetence, to the party’s shrinking base, is a consequence of that decision.
If the Bush administration became a byword for policy bungles, for government by the unqualified, well, it was just following the advice of leading conservative think tanks: after the 2000 election the Heritage Foundation specifically urged the new team to “make appointments based on loyalty first and expertise second.”
Contempt for expertise, in turn, rested on contempt for government in general. “Government is not the solution to our problem,” declared Ronald Reagan. “Government is the problem.” So why worry about governing well?
Where did this hostility to government come from? In 1981 Lee Atwater, the famed Republican political consultant, explained the evolution of the G.O.P.’s “Southern strategy,” which originally focused on opposition to the Voting Rights Act but eventually took a more coded form: “You’re getting so abstract now you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is blacks get hurt worse than whites.” In other words, government is the problem because it takes your money and gives it to Those People.
Oh, and the racial element isn’t all that abstract, even now: Chip Saltsman, currently a candidate for the chairmanship of the Republican National Committee, sent committee members a CD including a song titled “Barack the Magic Negro” — and according to some reports, the controversy over his action has actually helped his chances.
Its not something we in the political arena think about much these days because it is so coded in cryptic language, but as Krugman points out, the modern Republican party was founded as a party for black and white segregation.
As the years moved move, however, and obvious racism become more and more out of fashion, the racism became subtler and subtler. But those elements are still in the party.
This is one of the major reasons why Barack Obama's election is so important. It does not end racism in America. That is far from over. But what it does is end a period in American history, the history after civil rights until now, where blacks and minorities began the slow climb to equal treatment with whites, but had to fight against a racism that was far subtler but almost as insidious as what those in the past faced.
But the times, they are a changing. We have a smart as-hell, Harvard-educated president. And he just happens to be a black dude.
Thursday, January 1, 2009
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