Wednesday, August 19, 2009

More Odds and Ends

The Blog Fodder file is overflowing and my brain can only work so hard and fast to keep up with it all. And so, in the grand tradition of Gilahi and others, here are a few items that could, perhaps, rate full posts ... but which are being addressed in the Readers' Digest tradition. By the way, Readers' Digest has filed for bankruptcy. Sigh.

The other day, I posted about our TV and radio transmissions which are now reaching nearby stars. Yesterday, one of my coworkers sent me this cartoon from Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal which suggests a possible outcome. I wish I'd seen this when I did the original post...


I've often felt that way after watching an evening of television.

I'm starting to see a few really good articles that address the nearly unbelievable level of lunacy surrounding the debate over health care reform. I liked this one by Farhad Manjoo that discussed how to squelch the stupid rumors about "death panels": just quit repeating them. Farhad Manjoo is the author of the wonderful book I blogged about some time ago, True Enough: Learning to Live in a Post-Fact Society, which is very much worth reading ... especially now.

The current issue (August 24 & 31) of Newsweek Magazine has an interesting single-page graphic titled "Did Britain Wreck the World?" You can read it online here, but without the clever used-tea-bag illustrations included in the print version. It summarizes how the colonial and post-colonial activities of the British government contributed to the current colossal messes in Iraq, Sri Lanka, India/Pakistan, Israel/Palestine, and several other places. Thanks, Your Majesty.

The lineup of "stars" for the next season of "Dancing with the Stars" has been announced, and I'm generally underwhelmed. The only two standouts appear to be model/businesswoman Kathy Ireland (woo-hoo!!) and former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. Tom DeLay? The Tom DeLay who resigned from office when accused of campaign finance irregularities? This I've got to see. But Kathy Ireland will look much better in fringe and glitter.

Speaking of "dancing," I have finally recovered my vision and added my comments to the ... uh ... interesting dance videos posted the other day by Mike. I wonder where he finds these things. I also wonder that Claudia allows him to watch it.

Okay, that's all for the moment. I promise to have a real, coherent post tomorrow.

Have a good day. More thoughts coming.

Bilbo

4 comments:

The Mistress of the Dark said...

Don't forget Kelly Osbourne...Its time for all these shows to pack it in and go away. I think the choices for Strictly Come Dancing this season were equally as awful.

Gilahi said...

There has been a long tradition, especially among the radical right, of twisting words around until they obscured the true intent of what was said. With the current administration, they seem to have gone completely over the edge and are just making stuff up out of whole cloth. The fact that people just buy it is infuriating. That's when I want to start firing lasers.

Wv: holyp - A swelling on the colon of the pope.

Jean-Luc Picard said...

Oddly enough, it's only the American version, not any of the european ones.

Mike said...

They have specially appointed prosecutors. Maybe we could get a specially appointed death panel for some special people.

Wv: fries - what comes with them?