United States

I have been told that some folks (which can only mean, like, 3 people I don’t live with) miss my postings. I have been remiss — blame poor educational services in US urban areas — and plan to make this up with more than quick hit videos. Therefore, beginning this very moment, and continuing every workday (various deities permitting) through next week, you\’ll get a short post on one of the groups in the upcoming World Cup.* I’ll try to talk about every team, but I’ll admit, I don’t know much about half these squads. If they...

Today marks the beginning of the official hurricane season, and NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center predicts a pretty hectic season: Across the entire Atlantic Basin for the six-month season, which begins June 1, NOAA is projecting a 70 percent probability of the following ranges: 14 to 23 Named Storms (top winds of 39 mph or higher), including: 8 to 14 Hurricanes (top winds of 74 mph or higher), of which: 3 to 7 could be Major Hurricanes (Category 3, 4 or 5; winds of at least 111 mph) “If this outlook holds true, this season could be one...

If you’re one of the four-or-so frequent readers of this here blog, chances are you also occasionally check out the New York Times op-ed page. You may even know the names: Thomas “Friedman Ain’t Free” Friedman, Gail “The Colander” Collins, Nicholas “The Dark Crystal” Kristof, &c. Well, I’ve decided to devote a daily feature to these folks, by daily pointing out one line that is either awesome, funny, insightful, intelligent, ridiculous, or utterly divorced from reality. I hope you enjoy. Today\’s is from Bob \”Day Job\” Hebert, who in his column today \”Our Epic Foolishness,\” writes: For...

Glenn Beck says all the time that people should leave families alone. But, I guess it didn\’t stop him from making fun of Malia Obama on his radio show. Dude, she\’s 11. You\’re making fun of a little girl; that\’s just sick. Via Media Matters, above is some audio, and a partial transcript below: BECK: (imitating Malia) Daddy? Daddy? Daddy, did you plug the hole yet? Daddy? PAT GRAY (co-host): (imitating Obama) No I didn’t, honey. BECK: (imitating Malia) Daddy, I know you’re better than [unintelligible] GRAY: (imitating Obama) Mm-hmm, big country. BECK: (imitating Malia) And I...

If you’re one of the four-or-so frequent readers of this here blog, chances are you also occasionally check out the New York Times op-ed page. You may even know the names: Thomas “Friedman Ain’t Free” Friedman, Gail “The Colander” Collins, Nicholas “The Dark Crystal” Kristof, &c. Well, I’ve decided to devote a daily feature to these folks, by daily pointing out one line that is either awesome, funny, insightful, intelligent, ridiculous, or utterly divorced from reality. I hope you enjoy. Today\’s is from Roger \”Life of the Party\” Cohen\’s great piece \”Hell in the Islamic Republic,\” in...

Tuesday, the GOP rolled out a new website, AmericaSpeakingOut.com, which solicits new ideas from the public and allows this very same public to give the ideas a thumbs-up or thumbs-down. They’re very, very proud and excited about this. “I would expect the ideas that come out of this Web site and the involvement of our members will lead to ideas that we can attempt to implement today,” House Minority Leader John Boehner proclaimed. “We want to continue to offer better solutions to address the problems that America is facing, and we see this as a giant step forward,...

If you’re one of the four-or-so frequent readers of this here blog, chances are you also occasionally check out the New York Times op-ed page. You may even know the names: Thomas “Friedman Ain’t Free” Friedman, Gail “The Colander” Collins, Nicholas “The Dark Crystal” Kristof, &c. Well, I’ve decided to devote a daily feature to these folks, by daily pointing out one line that is either awesome, funny, insightful, intelligent, ridiculous, or utterly divorced from reality. I hope you enjoy. Today\’s is from Gail \”The Colander\” Collins, who in her column \”Who Wants to Elect a Millionaire?\”...

CC photo from Argonne National Laboratory Conservative critics love to talk about how the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, otherwise known as the “stimulus package,” has clearly not worked, because the economy hasn’t recovered yet. All I had to do was a cursory Google search to find this: According to the latest survey of its members by the National Association of Business Economists: “The vast majority (73%) of respondents reported the fiscal stimulus enacted in February 2009 has had no impact on employment to date. While 68% also believe a jobs bill, such as the one recently...

It’s NBA play-off time, and the Phoenix Suns (playing the Los Angeles Lakers) donned their “Los Suns” jersey for the home games. Usually, they only wear the jerseys for games celebrating Hispanic heritage. This time, it was in protest of Arizona’s new immigration law. And supporting the protest is none other than the President of the United States: “I think that just because somebody’s a sports figure or you’ve got a sports team doesn’t mean that you’re not part of the community and you’re not part of our democracy,” Obama said during a halftime interview on TNT....