August 2010 archive

Well, I’m going to call the end of Shark Week at 9 pm ET when Discovery switches to Croc Attack.  It’s still all about animals eating humans, but Crocodiles are not Sharks.

• AMC– More Marion Morrison
• Comedy– Employee of the Month (not even the good Christina Applegate version)
• ESPN– Pro Football Hall of Fame Induction
• E!– Dick
• ABC Family– Mean Girls (more Lindsay)
• FX– Doomsday (28 Days Later meets The Road Warrior)
• History– How the Earth Was Made
• Lifetime– Mad Money (Diane Keaton not Jim Cramer)
• TNT– Deep Impact
• Oxygen– Liar Liar x 2
• Turner Classic– The Sea Hawk, Adventures of Don Juan (all Errol Flynn, all the time)
• USA– Pretty Woman
• Disney– Summer Belongs To You x 2

Yeah, it pretty much sucks.  I’m going to give How the Earth Was Made another try so I can find the 30 seconds they talk about the Moon that I keep missing because I get distracted.  If you really like that sort of thing there’s Deep Impact.

I have no idea who’s the target audience of Sports Award shows.  They’re not Sports and they’re not Awards, why does anyone except your family care?

And when was beating women with coal shovels ever cool?  What were they thinking?

Later-

• AMC– Cahill, United States Marshal (still more Marion)
• Turner Classic– Gentleman Jim, Edge of Darkness
• Comedy– Balls of Fury

Boondocks, Ballin’ and The Fried Chicken Flu, GitS: SAC Testation and Android and I (episodes 2 & 3 if you want to get in on the Mobile Armoured Riot Police series).

Joke Line

As for myself, I deeply regret that once, on television in the days before the war, I foolishly – spontaneously – said that going ahead with the invasion might be the right thing to do. I was far more skeptical in print. I never wrote in favor of the war and repeatedly raised the problems that would accompany it, but mere skepticism was an insufficient reaction too. The issue then was as clear as it is now. It demanded a clarity that I failed to summon. The essential principle is immutable: we should never go to war unless we have been attacked or are under direct, immediate threat of attack. Never. And never again.

I’ll believe it when I see it.

Asshole.  You’re responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people.

If I believed in hell I’d hope you’d rot in it for eternity.  When are you going to quit moron?  You’re too fucking stupid to be a pundit.

News?  What News?

Evening Edition is an Open Thread

Welcome to the Stars Hollow Health and Fitness weekly diary. It will publish on Saturday afternoon and be open for discussion about health related issues including diet, exercise, health and health care issues, as well as, tips on what you can do when there is a medical emergency. Questions are encouraged and I will answer to the best of my ability. If I can’t, I will try to steer you in the right direction. Naturally, I cannot give individual medical advice for personal health issues. I can give you information about medical conditions and the current treatments available.

Spinach is the green that comes to mind for light summer dishes. It’s available year-round both at farmers’ markets and supermarkets, wilts in minutes, and afterward keeps well in the refrigerator.

In summer, you can use it for cold soups or quick omelets, or combine it with seasonal tomatoes in easy pastas. Spinach contains iron, vitamin A and vitamin C, manganese, folate, calcium, potassium and a variety of other nutrients.

One thing to note: The sodium content can be high in some brands of bagged spinach. A 3-ounce serving of Dole organic baby spinach, for example, contains 135 milligrams of sodium. The same amount from Fresh Express contains 65 milligrams. The difference may have to do with the solution that certain commercial producers use to wash the spinach.

If you do use bagged baby spinach, check the values on the package. A 3-ounce serving (85 grams) should not have more than 70 milligrams of sodium.

Fareed Zakaria: Build the Ground Zero Mosque

I believe we should promote Muslim moderates right here in America. And why I’m returning an award to the ADL.

Ever since 9/11, liberals and conservatives have agreed that the lasting solution to the problem of Islamic terror is to prevail in the battle of ideas and to discredit radical Islam, the ideology that motivates young men to kill and be killed. Victory in the war on terror will be won when a moderate, mainstream version of Islam-one that is compatible with modernity-fully triumphs over the world view of Osama bin Laden.

As the conservative Middle Eastern expert Daniel Pipes put it, “The U.S. role [in this struggle] is less to offer its own views than to help those Muslims with compatible views, especially on such issues as relations with non-Muslims, modernization, and the rights of women and minorities.” To that end, early in its tenure the Bush administration began a serious effort to seek out and support moderate Islam. Since then, Washington has funded mosques, schools, institutes, and community centers that are trying to modernize Islam around the world. Except, apparently, in New York City.

Fareed Zakaria’s Letter to the ADL

Five years ago, the ADL honored me with its Hubert Humphrey First Amendment Freedoms Prize. I was delighted and moved to have been chosen for it in good measure because of the high esteem in which I hold the ADL. I have always been impressed by the fact that your mission is broad – “to put an end forever to unjust and unfair discrimination against and ridicule of any sect or body of citizens” – and you have interpreted it broadly over the decades. You have fought discrimination against all religions, races, and creeds and have built a well-deserved reputation.

That is why I was stunned at your decision to publicly side with those urging the relocation of the planned Islamic center in lower Manhattan. You are choosing to use your immense prestige to take a side that is utterly opposed to the animating purpose of your organization. Your own statements subsequently, asserting that we must honor the feelings of victims even if irrational or bigoted, made matters worse.

Senator Al Franken speaks about protecting Net Neutrality at NN10 in Las Vegas. Sign his petition

The Comcast-NBC merger is the first domino. If it falls, the rest will soon follow. If no one stops them, how long do you think it will take before 4 or 5 megacorporations effectively control the flow of information in America not only on television, but online? How long do you think it will take before the Fox News website loads 5 times faster than DailyKos?

It’s almost too late to stop this from happening, but not quite. The government can stop them. . . but first the government has to be MADE to act.

Net Neutrality is THE First Amendment issue of our time. If you want to protect the free flow of information in the country and all that depends on it, you have to help me fight this.

Today I posted m 814th post at The Dream Antilles.  Sadly, it was meta: it said that 8/7/10 was the Fifth Blogaversary of the blog.

I have been plugging away, writing this blog, The Dream Antilles for five years.  That’s 35 woozle years.  It’s 30 pootie years.  And in the life of the Internet, it’s about 3 nanoseconds.  I’ve probably outlived about 10,000,000 other blogs, all of which you can still read.  If you want to.  And yet, I haven’t achieved fame, wealth, or any of the other benefits you might imagine.  There is no new Porsche in  my driveway.  I haven’t been on Rachel.

Why, you might ask, am I posting this here?  What’s the point?  

You know that you have gone too far with the wing nuttery when both Lou Dobbs and Alan Keyes think you have jumped the shark.

Lou Dobbs, for as anti-immigrant as he is, says that the 14th Amendment is not the problem

I part ways with the Senators on that because I believe the 14th amendment, particularly in its due process and equal protection clauses, is so important. It lays the foundation for the entire Bill of Rights being applied to the states.