Friday, December 3, 2010

In the spirit of the season:

Tony Auth, Philadelphia Inquirer.

Bad Company—

Daniel Crane (1983:  "...sexual misconduct involving a 17-year-old congressional page."
Gerry Studds (1983): "...engaging in sexual relations with a male congressional page."
Charles Wilson (1980): "...personal use of $25,000 in campaign funds and accepting $10,500 from an individual with direct interest in legislation."
Charles Diggs: (1979): "...indicted by a grand jury in 1978 on multiple charges, including taking kickbacks from his congressional staff."
Thomas Blanton (1921): "...abused the privilege granted to lawmakers of submitting items for the Congressional Record." (colleagues found something he had placed in the Congressional Record to be  “unspeakable, vile, foul, filthy, profane, blasphemous and obscene)".

Yesterday Charles Rangel was censured by the House for tax evasion and a bunch of other stuff that probably would have landed us mere mortals in the hoosegow. Instead he gets the equivalent of a finger wag, thus becoming the twenty-third Congressman in American history to be so honored. Those listed above are the five most recent cases, courtesy the Christian Science Monitor. Blanton may be the only person in American history to be censured for blasphemy. Don't we have an Amendment to prevent charges of blasphemy?

Jesus freaking Christ!* You really want to know what's unspeakable, vile, foul, filthy, profane, blasphemous and obscene? Congress, that's what. And the new majority in the House seems intent on keeping it that way.

Rangel takes his medicine.


*Editor's note: We know we probably should have said fucking instead of freaking, but this is a family publication and we try to eschew such vulgarity in case there are any adults who might be reading—even though they probably encounter that word half-a-dozen times a day. But we bet they won't run into the word eschew again any time soon.
You're welcome.


Wikiwool over our eyes!


Joel Pett, Lexington Herald Leader.

An Hour with Keith—

Richards at the New York Public Library. Keith talks about his love of reading, growing up in post-war England, racism in America, music, Mick, the Beatles, fatherhood, women, the damage drugs have done to his brain, the future of the Stones, and Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle. OK, maybe not the last, but everything else.
Viewing time 1 hr. 5 min.

Like Keith, but don't have an hour?—he's not the most eloquent interview, after all. Fora TV has divided the interview up into titled chapters  just for busy people like you..

Einstein explains E=mc2

But it takes him almost a full minute to do it.

C'mon, Albert. Give us the condensed version. We haven't got all day.

Thursday, December 2, 2010

Jim Morin, The Miami Herald.

The Titanic under construction,
Belfast (1911)—


Found at Open Culture.

The Honor System—1930s version:

Helen Hokinson (1893-1949), The New Yorker, April 2, 1938.

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Brother can you spare a billion?

For those of you having trouble figuring out what the hell's going on in the world, Clarke and Dawe sort out for you. You're welcome.
Viewing time 2 min. 35 sec.

For those of you filling out your scorecards, Who's on first, What's on second, and I Don't Know's on third.
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