Infinite Monkeys
"...a sparkly blog..." - James Lileks"Read them only with extreme caution."- Hugh Hewitt
Infinite MonkeysI posted this on my company weblog this morning:
Michael sent me this link late last week, and it got me to thinking about which browsers I used for which occasions, and why.
In the extended entry section (click below) I have brief pro-con reviews of Camino and Firefox (both from Mozilla), OmniWeb, Safari, and Internet Explorer. In summary, my current "browser of choice" is Camino, which seems to run fastest and most compatibly on the websites I visit, has strong pop-up blocking and tabbed browsing, and integrates well with the OS X keychain and other Mac services.
Of course, your mileage may vary, offer void where prohibited, some side effects may occur.
Camino
Advantages
Disadvantages
Firefox
Advantages
Disadvantages
OmniWeb
Advantages
Disadvantages
Safari
Advantages
Disadvantages
Internet Explorer
Advantages
Disadvantages
Totally subjective speed analysis (fastest to slowest):
Feature delights (not including speed):
Totally subjective perception of overall site compatiblity:
Evil-ness:
Dang. The only remaining non-Mac Monkey, JamesPh, tipped me off that Jacob Slichter from Semisonic was going to be a guest on the Northern Alliance Radio Network broadcast today. Goody! I've listened to the NARN stream many times, and I was looking forward to using Audio Hijack Pro to record the broadcast and listen to it later.
Imagine my dismay when the normally functional NARN link was not launching properly on my Mac! No biggie, I'll try another browser - Safari, Camino, Firefox, OmniWeb, and Internet Explorer. No luck. Hrmmm.
After geeking around a bit, and trying to manually grab the URL in Windows Media Player, I found out what the problem is: NARN's streaming provider, Mainstream Streaming Network, has recently upgraded its streaming software to use an enhancement called Abacast. And damn if they haven't bothered to write a Mac-compatible plugin. Worse, they don't seem particularly interested in doing so. Now, they CLAIM that many Abacast streams are simulcast with a Mac-supported stream. However, it doesn't appear that Mainstream includes such a stream.
Help the Monkeys out, guys! We WANT to listen!
Vox Day illuminates some points made by Matthew Yglesias and Jonah Goldberg about the difference between being "anti-state" and "anti-Left." Important quote:
This vicious circle is where pragmatism over principle inevitably leads. One can only make so many compromises before there is very little left to compromise. If your only distrust is for the Left instead of the State, it will not take long before your behavior will become indistinguishable from that of a leftist, as George Bush and company have been proving for the last four years.
This quote sums up in three sentences what bothered me so much about many chapters in HH's previous book.
Regular readers of this weblog know that I'm a fairly staunch libertarian. I don't like government, I don't trust it, and generally speaking I would like to see it go away.
However, I have a dirty little secret. There is a single area where I would like to see the federal government expand: There should be an enormous federal Department of Getting Old People Off the Road. I think it should be run by a cabinet-level secretary, and it should be enforced at gunpoint. As a matter of fact, I know exactly where the DoGOPOtR can get their enforcers: The BATF and DEA. Nobody is better skilled at using unnecessary force to keep people in line.
Anyone over the age of, say, 60 would be subject to mandatory quarterly driving tests. If they fail to consistently drive at LEAST the posted speed limit, and stay out of the way of more engaged motorists, their licenses would be suspended until the following spring. Three strikes, and they lose their license for good.
Little old blue-haired ladies would receive government-issued stacks of phone books allowing them to see over the steering wheel. They would be forbidden from buying sedans so large that the line of cars behind them cannot pass without being run off the road as they sway back-and-forth across the lanes.
Finally, the entire city of Scottsdale would be considered a special "no tolerance enforcement zone" where poor driving will be met with the most severe penalties. Perhaps the former DEA folks will confiscate the vehicle in question, or the BATF people will set them on fire, or both. Then they will all be forced to view NEA-sponsored works of art. Finally, they will have to move to Mesa, where everyone drives like a freaking idiot regardless of their age.
One of the joys of blogging with comments on (that almost balances the hated spam) is the weird comments you get. For example in this entry, someone asks "where do monkeys live in europe"--no doubt led here by a Google search for something like "monkeys europe." Of course, the person then had to ignore JamesPh's commentary on the EU, and ask an unpunctuated question.
But still, if you have a monkey question, this is the place.
Gibraltar.
I heard on The Bob and Tom Show this morning that the Michigan Department of Community Health has a Public Service Announcement ("PSA") advising people not to fart indoors, the tag line apparently being "take it outside."
Just say No to farting?
UPDATE: Yep, Monkey David is right. The commercial talks about "passing gas" but actually refers to smoking outside. It's a PSA to encourage people not to smoke in their own goddamn homes.
Farting is funnier.
Lileks writes: "It hasn't been a good week, and the black dog is curled at my feet with no sign of getting up." I hear you, brother. Same here. Just keep saying: "Get your mind right." And be strong.
Today is the 25th Anniversary of the storied Miracle on Ice.
On February 22, 1980, a bunch of college kid hockey players shocked the world by beating the invincible Soviet team at the Winter Olympics. By itself, it was one of the greatest sports moments in United States history. But placed in its proper perspective, it probably was bigger than the game itself.
I'm not a big Disney fan, but they can occasionally still turn out a "reel" classic. Miracle, starring Kurt Russell as Herb Brooks, is such a classic.
The opening credits of the movie really set the stage for the Miracle on Ice. The 1970's was not the happiest of decades. Vietnam, Watergate, gas rationing, the Iranian Hostage Crisis, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Hippies, Disco music, Jimmy Carter, etc., all contributed to a feeling of malaise, as President Carter so eloquently put it. As the decade mercifully came to a close, the country was looking for something to feel good about. Something to be united about. The unexpected victory of those college kids, the chants of U-S-A!, U-S-A!, U-S-A! contributed to a revival of spirit, even if just momentary.
Maybe it's no coincidence that within a few months of the Miracle on Ice, Ronald Reagan won the nomination and the Presidential Election, with his vision of restoring that Shining City Upon a Hill.
Happy 25th Anniversary to the Boys of Winter!
So, Hunter S. Thompson blew his brains out at his kitchen table yesterday. Stupid, selfish, dope-addled bastard. He may have outlived Nixon and Agnew, but he never got out from under their shadows.
He did his best work more than 30 years ago. Then he started believing his own hype. I can think of a few memorable sentences he put down in the last dozen years, but 98.5 percent of his writing was awful self-parody. I wonder if his irrelevance finally dawned on him? Or maybe it was all the drugs and alcohol?
Either way, it doesn't look good for guys like me. News of HST's suicide made me slightly sick to my stomach. I devoured his books in college, and like a lot of aspiring writers, I tried to imitate him. You know the difference between an amateur and a pro? The pro eventually figures out he's just not that good. The Twains, the Bierces, the Menckens, the Wolfes, and the Thompsons are the exceptions. Everyone else is fifth-rate. Write what you know, but you better know your limitations. For a guy who used to be as talented as Thompson to kill himself? Abandon all hope, you lousy hacks...
I've been a professional journalist--add your own sneer quotes if you like; I do--off and on for a decade now. And nobody ever described this business better than Hunter S. Thompson. In a just and honest world, this passage from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas would be posted in every newsroom in the country:
Agnew was right. The press is a gang of cruel faggots. Journalism is not a profession or a trade. It is a cheap catch-all for fuckoffs and misfits--a false doorway to the backside of life, a filthy piss-ridden little hole nailed off by the building inspector, but just deep enough for a wino to curl up from the sidewalk and masturbate like a chimp in a zoo-cage.
That's about right. Hell, it could be the Blogger's Creed!
RIP, Doctor. You will not be missed.
While the more cultured among us are searching the earth (or Phoenix, at least) for quality Sushi Bars (quality sushi. that's funny), I was searching the Twin Cities for good grub. And ended up finding a little bit o'heaven at Hell's Kitchen in Minneapolis.
A lot of interesting items on the menu, but I went with the "Mahnomin Porridge" and "Toasted Sausage Bread." Goddamn but it was a good breakfast. I'd never had "porridge" and am still not sure what that is, and toasted sausage bread sounds, well, odd?
I cannot do these items justice, so I'll just quote from Hell's Kitchen's breakfast menu:
Toasted Sausage Bread
Yes, the name sounds strange, but trust us! This is a deliciously dense bread made with bison sausage, spices, currants, pecans, and black coffee. We dare you...and virtually everyone who has taken up our dare has come back for more! $3.25
Mahnomin Porridge:
Warm, Native-harvested, hand-parched wild rice with dried blueberries, sweetened cranberries and roasted hazelnuts, drizzled with warm maple syrup and cream. Folks, if you’ve never tried porridge, you are in for such a treat! Bowl $6.75, Sampler Cup $3.50
As I said, them's good groceries!
But no sushi.
My thanks to Jo, at Jo's Attic, for bringing this place to my attention.
Yes, Jo, it's worth an early start to the day.
I had the extreme honor to hang with the Northern Alliance Radio Network folks today at the White Bear Lake Superstore in White Bear Lake, Minnesota. My all-too-brief moment of glory was (correctly) answering an automotive history trivia question on the air. My prize? Not the highly coveted Hugh "Commissioner of Hockey" Hewitt coffee mug. No, they were keeping that for themselves. I got the 1280am "The Patriot" Mug and T-Shirt prize! Cool, huh? Other trivia contests have better prizes. And Beer.
It was nice to finally meet Captain Ed, Mitch "Cough Button" Berg, Professor King Banion, and The Rocket Man. A nicer and classier bunch of guys you'll never meet.
(no mention of Chad and Brian from Fraters Libertas because I know them and they don't like Women's Hockey. Bastards)
Happy Eleventh Anniversary Eddie and Mrs. Captain Eddie!!
Anybody out there know of an actual GOOD sushi bar in the East part of Metropolitan Phoenix? The kind of place where they sneer at you (in the tremendously polite way that only Japanese people can) if you ask them to make you a roll. The kind of place where you write "$50" on a piece of paper and let the chef serve you whatever he likes.
Places NOT to bring up:
1. Ra
2. Sushi on Shea
3. Kona Grill
4. Shogun
If there's one thing I hate about eating at a bar (particularly alone), it's the high probability that I will be sitting next to mouthy idiots. Tonight was a prime example. Next to me at the sushi bar were a dim-witted couple in their early 30's. Horrible 80's music was playing over the restaurant sound system, and the male kept trying to impress the female with his knowledge of the song and artist names. If this wasn't idiotic enough, he was wrong more often than he was right - Bruce Hornsby was "Stevie" Winwood, Tommy Tutone was Rick Springfield, and Air Supply was, get this: Rush.
Then they started getting into a little debate about which Rocky movies were which. Horrifying. Occasionally she would look up at the television and guess which sports personality was on "The Best Damn Sports Show Period," and again was constantly wrong. All the while, they were continuously using strong profanity with loud voices, despite the fact there was a six or seven year old girl sitting two seats away. The more they drank, the more stupid they became. I hate having to witness the foreplay of morons.
Oh, and to top it off, the sushi bar was packed and the chef was a white guy. I should have known better than to have even sat down in the first place.
I've been musing about blogs a lot, expecially since reading Hugh Hewitt's Blog : Understanding the Information Reformation That's Changing Your World.
One of the interesting contradictions about blogs is that while the mainstream media believes that the Blogosphere is a fragmented, cacophonous place with many voices (which is true), the miss that the best blog writers reach an audience much more clearly and consistently than any columnist. I read virtually every word that James Lileks, Hugh Hewitt, James Taranto, Mickey Kaus, Glenn Reynolds and a few others writes on the web. I can't say that about any magazine or newspaper writer (a good example: if Mark Steyn had a clear, operational website, I'd read everything he writes to, but I find that I only read his columns that are linked by others).
This isn't a small thing. Other columnist often have to belabor points, and start each column as if the reader is coming new to a topic, but blog writers can assume they have a steady audience (or just say "scroll down for more!"), and so I know much more about these writers, their biases, their quirks, and even their blind spots. That actually makes them much, much more powerful in influencing public opinion.
Also, of course, it's true what your high school English teacher used to say: you can't really understand something unless you read about it, then write about it. A newspaper columnist whose work is skimmed over coffee at Starbucks will never have the impact of someone like Hugh, who gets people to write on their blogs about what he's written, engage with him, argue, and ultimately be influenced in some way by his blog. It's powerful stuff.
P.S. I'd end with an upbeat "the full impact remains to be seen," but I stand by my earlier prediction that a full-scale media backlash is on the way.
Anybody else hate it when non-geeks call you a geek? It always sounds so, well, derogatory. I think sometimes it is. I think only geeks should be able to call themselves geeks.
Does the fact that when I saw the headline "Robotic ball that chases burglars" I immediately thought of The Prisoner make me a geek?
Mmm...I thought so.
Well.
I really have no business writing about sports (I defer to these guys) and I quit following baseball in 1994 after Tony Gwynn's chase for .400 was interrupted by a strike, but after watching 60 Minutes today (O.K., after watching the first 5 minutes of 60 Minutes) where Jose Canseco talks about steroids, I wonder if just as we refer to the "dead ball" era, we should start refering to the "steroid" and "real" eras of baseball...
(Yes, that's one sentence. Sue me.)
I am vacationing in sunny and warm Minnesota (I am not joking. It's warmer here right now than it is back home in Northern California!) and today I got to see what is probably the best team in any sport, at any level, right now: The University of Minnesota Gopher Women's Hockey team. The girls beat North Dakota* 7 to 0, to improve their record to 26-1-2. The Gopher gals are a machine and a thrill to watch. At times they are like a cat playing with a mouse. Anyone who really appreciates sports should catch this team in action.
Chelsey Brodt. Anya Miller. Allie Sanchez.
And the human highlight reel, Krissy Wendell. Goddamn is she fun to watch.
On a side note, apparently there is some L.A. radio shock jock here in town as well. Today, at 6:00 pm, he is at a book signing at the Barnes and Noble at the Mall of America. Some book about Blogs or some such nonsense. Can't say I've heard of him.
Me, off to see the Gopher Men blow another game to one of the weaker college hockey programs. You know guys, you can dominate puck possession all night on the ice, but if you don't put that little rubber think in the big net, you can't win. Go figure.
Thank god for the girls.
*At least two Minnesota colleges (Minnesota and St. Cloud State) refuse to idenitify the North Dakota team mascot: the Fighting Sioux. How PC. And childhish. Sad.
I believe the Blogstorm over Eason Jordan will be a turning point for the mainstream media. No, not the point when blogs passed them in influence--that time was long ago (in Internet time).
No, this will be the moment when the mainstream media realizes it. Trent Lott, Rathergate...even as far back as Drudge breaking the Lewinsky story--was all treated by the media as isolated incidents, partisans in the middle of campaigns, and in many cases the MSM just used blogs as a tool to get a story going that otherwise they would have had to ignore. Bloggers were just another source, in their mind--less reliable, more partisan, but still outside of the media. Note that point: in their mind, bloggers are outside of the media, not just outside of the mainstream.
But this time, it really is one of their own (Rather wasn't, really, since he was from a long-ago generation) and more important, Mickey Kaus is using the story as a club to bludgeon Howard Kurtz, a guy who works for the paper that just bought Slate, and is trying to get into this crazy Internet thing in a big way.
This time the media will really realize it. And mark my words: the backlash is going to be ugly. These guys are going to be hitting blogs hard, as if they were fighting for their lives. Which they are.
I never read the Democratic Underground forums because it's just too stupid (like most forums, actually) but this story is priceless.
This e-mail was sent out to all State of California government employees at two (here unnamed) State of California buildings. It amused me (in a "you-have-to-be-kidding sort of way), but I am not sure why.
"followng reminder from the Joint Labor Management Health & Safety Committee at XXX Strett and YYY Street buildings:
We spend at least 40 hours a week in our workplace, and while it's hardly a "home-away-from-home," a little bit of thoughtfulness and respect for others can make our building safer, healthier and just an all-around more pleasant place to be. Sometimes amid the stresses of our workday, we forget that what we do, and don't do, at the office affects our co-workers, often in significant ways.
Consider these simple, but at times overlooked items:
Few of us would leave food in our refrigerator at home until its so moldy as to be unrecognizable, yet we often find such "science experiments" in our kitchens here at the office.
Spills in microwaves and dirty dishes in sinks don't magically clean themselves.
Burning popcorn in a microwave or burning bread in a toaster can set off smoke alarms and result in lost worktime if an evacuation is triggered. [Monkey Note: State workers can be quite stupid when cooking popcorn. You'd be surprised at the number of times we have had to evacuate because some dumbass doesn't watch their goddamn popcorn]
Doors that open into the central, east-west hallway on each floor need to be kept closed. These hallways are our evacuation routes in emergencies.
Power conservation hasn't gone out of style. Turning off PCs at the end of the day is office policy, and personal appliances, such as coffee pots, should also be turned off every evening to save electricity and prevent fires. On their nightly rounds, our security officers routinely find appliances left on.
Our building maintenance folks work hard to make our offices and work areas safe and comfortable for everyone, but they don't have ESP. Report burned-out lights, broken door handles, spills and other hazards, so they can be fixed or replaced.
When it comes to indoor temperatures, we all have our own comfort level. If it's too cold or too hot in your work area, report that to building maintenance, too. They do their best to make everyone comfortable, but the State has policies about maximum and minimum thermostat settings in public buildings - again to conserve precious energy and the natural resources that are used to generate it.
Our in-building parking garages are a great convenience - secure and dry, but they aren't race tracks. Observing the posted speed limit is a matter of safety and common courtesy.
In short, thinking of our workplace as a community and our co-workers as our neighbors helps remind us that health and safety at the office is everyone's responsibility.
Your Joint Labor-Management Health & Safety Committee meets every three months to discuss issues of concern to all ZZZ employees at XXX Strett and YYY Street. Meetings are open to everyone, and we're always looking for new members. Our next meeting will be at 10:00 a.m. on April 27 in the ___ Office, Room 750.
XXXXXXXXXX
on behalf of the JLMHS Committee"
I think I saw this on the wall in school.
When I was five years old.
Maybe it's just me, but has anyone ever noticed how James Lileks sounds almost exactly like Ann Coulter? I'm just not sure who has the deeper voice, or . . . .
I dig my new toy. It's wee. And it sounds great. But it has one FATAL FLAW! (dum - dum - DUMMMMMM)
I've got over 24,000 songs right now, and that number expands by at least 90 per month due to my eMusic account alone. I have several playlists that are based on the number of plays a song has received and/or how long it has been since I last played the song. For example, I have a playlist called "Recently Added (unplayed)" that includes all tracks that have been added in the last six months but have NOT been listened to yet.
My older iPods would, when syncing with iTunes, transmit play information back and update the database. The "Recently Added (unplayed)" list, along with all of my other dynamic lists, would automatically be updated and the iPod would be reloaded with songs that have not been played so recently. These playlists represent my most common way to listen to my music.
Unfortunately, the iPod Shuffle does not transmit play information back during synchronization. So using it as the primary play device for my "unplayed" songs is unfortunately out of the question for me. Gotta stick with my "huge and bulky" hard-drive-based iPod for daily use.
Still, the Shuffle is lots of fun, and I have two routine uses for it despite the aforementioned weakness. It has very long battery life (12+ hours), so when I go on lengthy trips for work, I load it up with some of my favorite songs so that when the battery on my other iPod gives out, I've got something to listen to on the plane when I'm coming home. It's also quite useful for the occasional poker party or other group gathering.
I never get tired of seeing this picture, or reading about this man.
(Hat tip: Fraters Libertas)
Someone tell me that the woman in this story is not the world's biggest b*tch!
Durango - Two teenage girls decided one summer's evening to skip a dance where there might be cursing and drinking to stay home and bake cookies for their neighbors.
Big mistake.
They were sued, successfully, for an unauthorized cookie drop on one porch.
The July 31 deliveries consisted of half a dozen chocolate-chip and sugar cookies accompanied by big hearts cut out of red or pink construction paper with the message: "Have a great night."
Sued for an "Unauthorized cookies drop." Sorry, never heard'a that one.
The notes were signed, "Love, The T and L Club," code for Taylor Ostergaard, then 17, and Lindsey Jo Zellitti, 18.
Inside one of the nine scattered rural homes south of Durango that got cookies that night, a 49-year-old woman became so terrified by the knocks on her door around 10:30 p.m. that she called the sheriff's department. Deputies determined that no crime had been committed.
Oh shut up, just shut the hell up.
But Wanita Renea Young ended up in the hospital emergency room the next day after suffering a severe anxiety attack she thought might be a heart attack.
A Durango judge Thursday awarded Young almost $900 to recoup her medical bills. She received nothing for pain and suffering.
Nothing for pain and suffering? Damn the legal system!!
"The victory wasn't sweet," Young said Thursday afternoon. "I'm not gloating about it. I just hope the girls learned a lesson."
Yep, Ms. Wanita Renea Young, they learned a lesson. Two, as a matter of fact.
Lesson number one: You're a bitch. Big time.
Lesson number two: Never, ever, ever do anything nice for someone ever again in your whole damn life. Never, never, never. Ever.
Taylor's mother, Jill Ostergaard, said her daughter "cried and cried" after Judge Doug Walker handed down his decision in La Plata County Small Claims Court.
"She felt she was being punished for doing something nice," Jill Ostergaard said.
Well, they were, for crying out loud. That and the whole Wanita being a b*tch thing we've already discussed.
The judge said that he didn't think the girls acted maliciously but that it was pretty late at night for them to be out. He didn't award any punitive damages.
Taylor and Lindsey declined to comment Thursday, saying only that they didn't want to say anything hurtful.
Young said the girls showed "very poor judgment."
Yes, Wanita, being nice to you is VERY poor judgment. No question about that. You being a b*tch and all.
Just as dusk arrived a little after 9 p.m., Taylor and Lindsey began their mad spree. They didn't stop at houses that were dark. But where lights shone, the girls figured people were awake and in need of cookies. A kitchen light was on at Young's home.
Court records contain half a dozen letters from neighbors who said that they enjoyed the unexpected treats.
Sad that this is a point that many felt needed to be made. Worse, that it did not help.
The cookies were good. It was a nice surprise. They weren't scared.
Really? No shit?
But Young, home with her own 18-year-old daughter and her elderly mother, said she saw shadowy figures who banged and banged at her door. When she called out, "Who's there?" no one answered. The figures ran off.
She thought perhaps they were burglars or some neighbors she had tangled with in the past, she said.
"We just wanted to surprise them," Taylor said.
Young left her home that night to stay at her sister's, but her symptoms, including shaking and an upset stomach, wouldn't subside. The next morning she went to Mercy Medical Center.
Oh for crying out loud, someone shut this drama queen up. Good lord. Unmentioned is the very obvious fact that the cookies were left there and that either this b*tch found them or the cops did when they got there. With the note!! And she gets the vapors and runs off to a hospital??
"We feel that knocking on a door and leaving cookies is a gesture of kindness and would not create an anxiety attack in the general public," Taylor's parents wrote to the court.
The girls wrote letters of apology to Young. Taylor's letter, written a few days after the episode, said in part: "I didn't realize this would cause trouble for you. ... I just wanted you to know that someone cared about you and your family."
The families had offered to pay Young's medical bills if she would agree to indemnify the families against future claims.
Young wouldn't sign the agreement. She said the families' apologies rang false and weren't delivered in person. The matter went to court.
They offered to pay her bills but the b*tch wanted more! Goddammit, is this woman for real?
Young said she believes that the girls should not have been running from door to door late at night.
"Something bad could have happened to them," she said.
Something bad did happen, Wanita. You.
Anyone out there in Colorado have any eggs?
UPDATE: You can hear a local radio interview of one of the girls here.
UPDATE II: I have been deleting personal addresses, with the exception of the mailing address offered by the family of one of the young girls involved in this. I wish for that B*tch Wanita to become a pariah in her community (and I suspect she is, now), but I am uncomfortable with encouraging harassment of her. She is symbolic of a wider problem with frivolous lawsuits. Fix that, and you fix people like that worthless bottom-feeder Wanita.
Up in the cold, desolate north, the gents at Powerline have been involved in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent: The Minneapolis Star Tribune. Seems the Strib, as it is affectionately known, cannot help but libel Powerline.
A couple of days ago, Monkey David noted an earlier smack-down of the Minneapolis Star Tribune by the guys at Powerline.
It would be pretty bad in itself if the Strib just publishing an article - devoid of any fact whatsoever (again) - accusing Powerline of not fact-checking. But they went beyond that. First, admitting that the Strib editors did no fact checking whatsoever before they ran the article "accusing [Powerline] of failing to check facts. None. Zippo. Zilch. Nada." was bad enough.
Today, Powerline strikes back. The ease with which Ms. Gage's article - or the original reporting by Powerline - could have been fact-checked by the Strib is astonishing. That they did not, but eagerly ran with the column anyways volumes about their intent and mentality.
Did the Strib know that the statement was false and defamatory? Or did the Strib publish the statement in reckless disregard of whether the matter was false and defamed the Powerline guys? I'm just a small-time gummint lawyer, but that's an argument I'd have fun making.
It's getting to be time for Powerline to take the gloves off and put an end to the Strib's libel of them. They are well respected professionals, with well-deserved solid reputations. They do not deserve this, and the Strib knows it.
Finally, some decent radio in the afternoon.
Mitch Berg and the detritus of the Northern Alliance will be sitting in for Hugh Hewitt* Thursday (2/3/05) and next Tuesday (2/8/05).
Here, finally, radio the way it was meant to be.
UPDATE: Mitch, dude! Cough button! Geez, sounded like he was dying.
*I think Hugh has a book out? That he might be out flogging?
The Pope is in the hospital, and this may be the end for him, at least in this world.
I remember when I was a kid, I was irritated when Saturday morning cartoons where pre-empted so we could watch for white or black smoke as the Cardinals selected a new Pope...then, irritated again when we had to go through it all again soon after.
But now I wonder a couple of things: one, whether Fox would allow the Pope's death to effect Super Bowl coverage. Two, whether the mainstream media will handle this Pope's death, and the selection of a new one, with the appropriate respect. Pope John Paul II deserves much of the credit for ending the Soviet Union, and I would expect media eulogies to be as (surprisingly) respectful as President Reagan's was. And the selection of a new Pope deserves the respect that one of the world's great religions should have, but there I'm more skeptical--expect to hear the words "abortion," "gay priests," and "American Catholics" a lot (the last in the sense that liberal American Catholics supposedly aren't--but should be--listened to in the Vatican).
It will be interesting--I might even switch away from the cartoons on Boomerang channel to watch.
Oscar Wilde said "Never argue with a man who buys ink by the barrel." The Minneapolis Star-Tribune must still believe this, and keeps going after Powerline.
Guys, our "ink" on the Internet is virtually free, and there's a lot more bloggers than there are newspapers. Wake up.
Update: It looks like DakotaPundit had the same thought a few weeks ago.