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The Ledes

Saturday, May 18, 2024

New York Times: “Dabney Coleman, an award-winning television and movie actor best known for his over-the-top portrayals of garrulous, egomaniacal characters, died on Thursday at his home in Santa Monica, Calif. He was 92.”

The Wires
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The Ledes

Friday, May 17, 2024

AP: “Fast-moving thunderstorms pummeled southeastern Texas for the second time this month, killing at least four people, blowing out windows in high-rise buildings, downing trees and knocking out power to more than 900,000 homes and businesses in the Houston area.”

Public Service Announcement

The Washington Post offers tips on how to keep your EV battery running in frigid temperatures. The link at the end of this graf is supposed to be a "gift link" (from me, Marie Burns, the giftor!), meaning that non-subscribers can read the article. Hope it works: https://wapo.st/3u8Z705

Marie: BTW, if you think our government sucks, I invite you to watch the PBS special "The Real story of Mr Bates vs the Post Office," about how the British post office falsely accused hundreds, or perhaps thousands, of subpostmasters of theft and fraud, succeeded in obtaining convictions and jail time, and essentially stole tens of thousands of pounds from some of them. Oh, and lied about it all. A dramatization of the story appeared as a four-part "Masterpiece Theater," which you still may be able to pick it up on your local PBS station. Otherwise, you can catch it here (for now). Just hope this does give our own Postmaster General Extraordinaire Louis DeJoy any ideas.

The Mysterious Roman Dodecahedron. Washington Post: A “group of amateur archaeologists sift[ing] through ... an ancient Roman pit in eastern England [found] ... a Roman dodecahedron, likely to have been placed there 1,700 years earlier.... Each of its pentagon-shaped faces is punctuated by a hole, varying in size, and each of its 20 corners is accented by a semi-spherical knob.” Archaeologists don't know what the Romans used these small dodecahedrons for but the best guess is that they have some religious significance.

"Countless studies have shown that people who spend less time in nature die younger and suffer higher rates of mental and physical ailments." So this Washington Post page allows you to check your own area to see how good your access to nature is.

Marie: If you don't like birthing stories, don't watch this video. But I thought it was pretty sweet -- and funny:

If you like Larry David, you may find this interview enjoyable:


Tracy Chapman & Luke Combs at the 2024 Grammy Awards. Allison Hope comments in a CNN opinion piece:

~~~ Here's Chapman singing "Fast Car" at the Oakland Coliseum in December 1988. ~~~

~~~ Here's the full 2024 Grammy winner's list, via CBS.

He Shot the Messenger. Washington Post: “The Messenger is shutting down immediately, the news site’s founder told employees in an email Wednesday, marking the abrupt demise of one of the stranger and more expensive recent experiments in digital media. In his email, Jimmy Finkelstein said he was 'personally devastated' to announce that he had failed in a last-ditch effort to raise more money for the site, saying that he had been fundraising as recently as the night before. Finkelstein said the site, which launched last year with outsize ambitions and a mammoth $50 million budget, would close 'effective immediately.' The New York Times first reported the site’s closure late Wednesday afternoon, appearing to catch many staffers off-guard, including editor in chief Dan Wakeford. As employees read the news story, the internal work chat service Slack erupted in what one employee called 'pandemonium.'... Minutes later, as staffers read Finkelstein’s email, its message was underscored as they were forcibly logged out of their Slack accounts. Former Messenger reporter Jim LaPorta posted on social media that employees would not receive health care or severance.”

Contact Marie

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Page Links
Sunday
Nov142010

Constant Weader -- I get a lot of supportive letters from readers, and some hilarious pans, too, but this post in the Democratic Underground is really something:


Marie Burns has built a cult following and a blog based on her trenchant comments on New York Times op-ed pieces. Today she adds another dimension to Paul Krugman's piece, "The World As He Finds It."

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/15/opinion/15krugman.htm...

Marie's take:

-edit-

"... we were in trouble not because we had been governed by people with the wrong ideas, but because partisan divisions and politics as usual had prevented men and women of good will from coming together to solve our problems."

This of course the pose that made Obama famous in his 2004 convention speech: "... there's not a liberal America and a conservative America; there's the United States of America...." I'm not much of an historian, so I'm not sure any other single speech has ever created a President, but it could be argued that this one did. Even though I live in Republicanland, the day after the 2004 election, when I was totally down in the dumps, a car passed me by sporting a bumper sticker that read "Obama 2008." Cheered me right up.

We all want to believe the sentiments of the 2004 speech. But adults with clear views of the political landscape know better. I expect Obama, who has borne the brunt of the untruthiness of his inspiring fantasy, knows better, too. But. But. It is the pose that made him, and he seems incapable of escaping it. In fact, even a casual observer can now see Obama has no interest in trying to escape the illusion of kumbaya America.

However, we err in believing Obama "just doesn't get it"; that his waffling and repeated capitulations to Republicans, to China, to whatever counterforce he meets -- are the result of his naivete or inexperience or lack of a skill set. I think Obama knows just what he is doing. He believes in the correctness of the elite establishment. He is a David Brooks dream President. "The world as he finds it" is messy, and this is a guy who picks up his socks. He prefers the neat platitudes of the ruling class he has been invited to join. He admires those "smart businessmen" on Wall Street who financed his campaign. He likes to chat with "respectable" establishment newsmen like John Harwood & Steve Kroft (how many interviews has Obama given "60 Minutes"?). He enjoys the company of long-time lobbyists like Tom Daschle. The President of the United States likes smooth operators. It is his intention to be one of them.

The smooth operators are not inclined to cede any of their power to the riffraff that is the rest of us. They have, once again, a friend in the White House, and they're happy with that. If Mitch McConnell & John Boehner are not exactly la creme de la creme, they too do the bidding for the elite. They do it for the cash, if not for the cachet.

The President returned to Washington from Japan yesterday, and today his ostensible friends & foes in the Congress will be back to bicker. Obama may have missed the kabuki theater in Japan, but he'll be right at home in Washington where he will star once again in a very familiar kabuki dance. We in the hinterlands are the captive audience of this stylized drama, a form of theater that holds few surprises and inevitably ends tragically for us. (All emphases D/U.)

For a better comment on Krugman's column, check out Karen Garcia's (#10) masterpiece. And recommend it!

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