You Can Vote However You Like

The latest viral video of the campaign. . . enjoy.

One in Ten Americans Watched

At this point, the infomercial probably won't change anyone's mind or convince the undecided. But from a production standpoint, it was excellent. Even better was the rally with Obama and Bill Clinton late last night. For the critics who refer to him as a socialist, Obama reminded them of "do unto others" and "my brother's keeper" from the Bible. Well played, Mr. Obama. Your move, Mr. McCain.

Stephen Colbert Endorses Barack Obama (sort of)

Are you biased?

How much does race enter into our decisions? Nicholas Kristof's column in today's NY Times explores how people are seen as "more" American than others based on their appearance. The study

"found that the research subjects — Californian college students, many of them Democrats supportive of Mr. Obama — unconsciously perceived him as less American even than the former British Prime Minister Tony Blair."

I tried both of the tests mentioned in the column, and you can by going here or here. My result from the Harvard's Project Implicit are above. Below are my final statistics from the University of Chicago's "Shooter Effect" test.

Game Over
Your Score: 545
Average reaction time:
Black Armed:641.4ms
Black Unarmed:802.8ms
White Armed:637.32ms
White Unarmed:676.32ms

Want to know who will win November 4? Watch The West Wing.

Take a look at the final two seasons of The West Wing, and you'll see a number of parallels between the fictitious race between Santos and Vinick and the real one between Obama and McCain. Even the Philadelphia Phillies made the fictitious World Series in that final season.

Barack on the Bradley Effect

Only Jon Stewart could get away with this. Priceless.

Massey ranks Red Arrows #1 in NATION!

Pretty cool. But Coach Dean and the boys know they have to take the season one game at a time. First up: Lansing Everett, Friday night, 7:30. Gates open at 6:00 PM, and everyone pays $5 to get in. If you can't make it, tune in as I call the play-by-play on WLHS.

Vote, vote, VOTE!

Joe the Plumber, Alaskan, Veteran. . .

There's no stopping Sarah Palin. Today she claimed good ol' Joe is a

"fellow Alaska[n], and he’s a fellow military man who has served our country proudly"

He did live in Alaska for four years, but never served in the military. Just six more days. I wonder how she'll describe Joe then? My prediction: answer to a future Trivial Pursuit question.

Damn kids! Get off the lawn!

Ohio man shoots teen attempting to take his McCain sign. Guns? Really? I just have a 5,000 volt current running through my yard sign.

Misunderestimating Al Franken

Once the race for president is decided, I'm watching Minnesota decide between Coleman and Franken. We have plenty of accidental humorists on Capital Hill; it would be nice to see one who's intentionally funny:

To get the joke of Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot, you need only to look at the cover, which features Franken posing in a tweed jacket in front of a wall of musty bound volumes, clutching a pipe, looking comically pompous. Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right has the joke in the title itself. Coulter writes books with titles like Slander: Liberal Lies About the American Right, whose charge is meant to be taken at face value. Franken's title mocks the accusation itself with over-the-top redundancy and subverts its own claim to truth by appropriating the corrupted slogan "Fair and Balanced."

The Audacity of Hope - Beagle Edition

Watch for the look on the pair of pooches left behind.

"Clean Coal" - NO SUCH THING!

Neither Obama or McCain has a leg to stand on regarding this issue; both seem to think "clean coal" is one energy source for America's future. It isn't clean, and it won't be around much longer at the rate we're using it. More here.

Freedom of the Press: We're Number 36!

Reporters Without Borders released its annual Press Freedom Index this week. Land of the Free Press finished 36th; Iceland, Luxembourg, and Norway tied for 1st, with Estonia (!) in 4th. According to the report, keeping war-free is the surest way to maintain press freedom.

Ted Stevens, Alaska's Tragic Hero

Senator Ted Stevens was found guilty today on seven counts of corruption. According to Mudflats, Alaskans are "stunned." Stevens many positive contributions to Alaska have been overshadowed by his own hubris:

It’s hard to dispute the fact that Stevens has worked hard, and was a stubborn advocate for his fledgling state when he took power. He brought much to the state that anyone with a lesser constitution would never have been able to pull off. And now, stalwart Alaskan icon Ted Stevens has become a frail, almost dottering, 84-year old convicted felon. The mighty have indeed, fallen. So, it is with a mixture of sadness and elation that even Progressive Alaskans view the outcome of this trial.

Power has corrupted. Arrogance has become karma. Justice has been served.

Oedipus, King Lear, Ted Stevens. Tragic.

Are you SURE you're registered?

Michiganders can check their voter registration status here and print a sample ballot.

He's good enough, he's smart enough. . .

. . . and, doggone it, people like Al Franken. Maybe just enough to elect the one-time SNL player to the US Senate. Is this a great country or what?

Newspaper endorsements - 4 to 1 favor Obama

This interactive map from Infochimps.org is pretty cool, even if it's not updated with the latest endorsements (The Anchorage Daily News endorsed Obama, while the GR Press endorsed McCain - in other shocking news, the sun came up this morning). A complete list of papers, with their circulation figures and endorsements, can be found here.

Mad Men meets SNL

Like chocolate and peanut butter in a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup, Mad Men's Jon Hamm and the SNL cast are two great tastes that taste great together:



And Andy's rip on white college Rasta-wannabes? Spot on.

Friends don't let friends vote for McCain

Growing up Republican isn't easy. Help the conservatives you love by sharing these Top Ten Reasons Why Conservatives Should Vote For Obama by a true conservative, Andrew Sullivan.

Refutation 101: Christopher Buckley on Rush Limbaugh

Snarky never looked so good. Buckley takes Rush - the "heir" to William F. Buckley - down a peg or twenty.

To which, let me add a personal, affectionately-intended note: Rush, I knew William F. Buckley, Jr. William F. Buckley, Jr. was a father of mine. Rush, you’re no William F. Buckley, Jr.

Wazzup! - Election 2008

Brilliant.

Red Arrows - OK White Champs!

Congrats to the Lowell High School Red Arrows on their OK White championship! A convincing 35-12 win over East Grand Rapids gives LHS a 9-0 record heading into the playoffs next week. Playoff pairings will be posted Sunday at 7 PM on MHSAA.com. Go Arrows!

NY Times endorses Obama

For those who cling to calling the MSM and the NY Times part of the "elite liberal media" (hello, Fox News), this will come as no surprise: the NY Times editorial board has endorsed Barack Obama for President. To those of us who've followed the Times throughout the campaign, it represents a change in the paper's position. They backed Hillary Clinton and John McCain in the New York primaries, and McCain has, up until a few weeks ago, a strong relationship with the paper of record. 

From the endorsement:

(L)eading America forward, will require strength of will, character and intellect, sober judgment and a cool, steady hand. . . Mr. Obama has those qualities in abundance.

 

"Nonstop Barrage of Spunky Fun"

High School Musical 3 hits the silver screen this weekend. All of those nagging questions - Will Troy and Gabriella stay together? How did Sharpay get her name? - will be answered. 

And I'll take my daughter and niece to see it. Okay, I'll drop her off and go see Quantum of Solace with my son.

On seeing America for the first time - Palin-style

How "real Americans" see the USA (apologies to Jamaica Kincaid).

Miss Teen Louisiana busted for dine-n-dash, drugs

On the upside, Lindsey Evans can run for Vice President in twenty years. 

Carve the Vote!

Obama's campaign has brought out a whole bunch of creative types and stunning posters, many of which are featured in this NY Times blog post. My favorite: yeswecarve.com, your source for Obama-related pumpkin carving stencils. 

Oh crap, part two. The silver lining.

Yes, that's a scarf covered with donkeys. Jeff Larson might have an eye for fashion, but the dude can't tell an elephant from his. . .

Oh crap. Palin's personal shopper is. . .

. . . a republican operative named Jeff Larson. For the record, I, Jeff Larsen, have never met Sarah Palin, nor have I shopped for women's clothes (or any other) at Saks, Bloomingdales, or Needless Markups. 

"Why I Blog"

I cannot hope to reach the millions that read Andrew Sullivan's blog on The Atlantic, nor can I hope to write as frequently or as eloquently. Simply put, the man is the best in the business. "Why I Blog" examines blogging as a new type of broadcasting:

"(T)he key to understanding a blog is to realize that it’s a broadcast, not a publication. If it stops moving, it dies. If it stops paddling, it sinks."

And of the skills required for this new media:

"People have a voice for radio and a face for television. For blogging, they have a sensibility."

But above all, there is this new sense of community, of belonging that only blogging provides:

"(Blogging) renders a writer and a reader not just connected but linked in a visceral, personal way. The only term that really describes this is friendship. And it is a relatively new thing to write for thousands and thousands of friends."

It's also nice to write for a couple dozen or so who drop by every day.

Dressing Up Caribou Barbie

It seems that dressing Sarah Palin and family is an expensive endeavor. The RNC spent over $150,000 in September for clothes and hairdos. Doesn't look they got Todd a new goatee trimmer, though. 

Makes me long for the days when we griped about John Edwards' $400 haircut. 

"You posted it for her, you can post it for me. Post it."

Too funny. This blog is read in South Korea, Canada, and Casablanca. Round up the usual suspects in Grand Rapids, Athens (GA), New Rochelle (NY), Collbran (CO), Florence (MT), and Imperial (MO). I don't know who you are, or why you're dropping by the Lit Lounge, but I'm happy you have.

Keepin' it real in Wasilla

Who dares show us the real Wasilla? Why, The Daily Show, of course:

Please note: these Alaskans do not reflect, in any way, my cousin Gary and his family, who live waaaaay up north.

It's for your own good!

No school on Election Day. Wouldn't that be nice? Safety first, country second. 

Sign of Hope: AMC renews Mad Men

Life is good. A third year of Don Draper and Company on AMC. 

How satirists vote

Christopher Buckley explains it all for you in today's Daily Beast. Here's a clue:

Satirists can work with earnest, but it’s not a long-hanging fruit by any means. We prefer, well, something broader. A president who can’t speak English, say, or who talks to God and launches cockamamie wars.

Mudslinging 101: If Ayers doesn't work. . .

. . . then bring up Reverend Wright. If you can't win with your own message, why not try a wedge issue or two? What's that, you say? You say that 60% of the electorate doesn't think Ayers is a legitimate issue? Well, he's a former angry white guy. Better try the angry black guy card instead. 

That'll rally the baser instincts of the base.

Why "Clean Coal" is an oxymoron

Don't take it from me. Ask Pablo. He'll tell you this:

As nice as it sounds, clean coal is an oxymoron of epic proportions, promoted by the coal industry, a sort of Orwellian doublespeak meant to introduce the notion that coal can be environmentally friendly. . .  clean coal does not . . . remove any carbon dioxide, the primary culprit behind climate change, from the emissions. 

Goodbye, Opus

Berkeley Breathed is sending Opus, beloved Bloom County penguin, to his "final paradise" next month. Only two more installments in the life of this lovable penguin. He'll be missed.

Something to fear

While robo-calls put fear and doubt in the minds of voters, Jeffrey Goldberg discovers that airport security checkpoints are all style and little substance. How does he know? It's all here. In addition, former TSA employees never turned in their uniforms and security passes. 

That is scary. (photo from The Atlantic)

Was picking Palin a cold, calculated choice?

Why don't we ask John McCain:

SNL Recap

Palin and Wahlberg take it to Fey and Samberg in this week's SNL highlights.

"A transformational figure"

Colin Powell endorses Barack Obama. A textbook example of how to take a position and support it:



More here.

The audacity of 100,000 hopeful people

Today in St. Louis. (photo by AP)

"McCarthy in a skirt"

For those who miss Senator Joe McCarthy's malicious attempts to find communists at any cost (including lies, mistruths, and fabrications), we offer Minnesota's Representative Bachmann and her quest to find out who's "anti-American" in Congress. Remember, if you question anything she believes in, you're anti-American. Maybe you shouldn't watch this video from Hardball.

Of course you should.

Break time - Bela Fleck & the Flecktones edition

$286 Million

That's the amount spent on TV ads for the presidential candidates since June 3. In Grand Rapids, McCain and Obama spent over $2.1 million each. 

Steal Back Your Vote!

With all the fuss over Obama's connection to ACORN, it's important to note that voter fraud is extremely rare. Keeping people from voting, however, isn't. A clip from investigative reporter Greg Palast:

NOT a caption contest - but it could be

Honestly? If this is John McCain's swan song, it's terribly sad. He served in the armed forces, survived the Hanoi Hilton, and made a difference for plenty of Americans while in the Senate. Here's hoping he ends the campaign on the high road. (Photo from Getty Images)

Joe's not a plumber. Or a Joe.

His first name is really Samuel. And he's not licensed to plumb in Ohio. And he owes a bit in back taxes. 

So how about some stories on Jeff the Teacher, Jon the Cost Analyst, or Greg the Preacher? Come on, MSM, Jeff's my real name! I'm licensed to teach! And I've paid my taxes!

What we're missing in Michigan

Too bad McCain and Co. pulled out of the Great Lakes State. If they hadn't, maybe we'd get to see some of these enlightening displays of campaign intelligence. Obama Bucks from California, the evil eyes from Virginia. (Full stories found here and here on Andrew Sullivan's blog, The Daily Dish.)

Again, I am fiercely independent. But I have a question: How can any Republican be proud of this trash?

National Book Award Finalists

The best in American fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and young people's literature - the Top 5 in each category were revealed today. Winners announced November 18. 

In-depth voter profiles, brought to you by. . .

. . . Al-Jezeera, of course. What, you thought CNN or Fox? Nah. 

These people are frightening. And they vote.

About that trickle-down theory

Details here.

A Daily Show to remember

Three brilliant segments in last night's Daily Show. First up, McCain as Frankenstein, dealing with the monster he's created:


Next, Aasif Mandvi on the possibility of an Arab being a family man:


Finally, an analysis of John McCain's "new" stump speech:


Jon Stewart is a national treasure.

Fair, balanced, and obsessed

Fox News has mentioned ACORN 342 times since Friday in the hopes that another guilt-by-association connection to Barack Obama will, ahem, take root. For the record, CNN mentioned ACORN 61 times.

I could branch out, go out on a limb, act like a sap for Fox News, or just leaf it all alone. But I won't - I'm bushed. 

Conflict of Interest?

Media Matters' Eric Boehlert questions how NY Times op-ed columnists David Brooks and William Kristol can remain pundits in good standing if they're also in the business of advising presidential candidates:

For instance, I cannot imagine discovering that liberal columnist Paul Krugman had been secretly advising the Obama campaign and worked diligently to make sure Sen. Joe Biden was picked as the Democratic running mate, the way Kristol reportedly did with McCain. And I can't picture the Times' Frank Rich writing column after column about Sen. Joe Biden's VP run and then showing up at a New York City media event to reveal grave misgivings about Biden; misgivings the columnist had never articulated before, the way Brooks did with Palin.

Bottom line: Do Kristol and Brooks understand the basic tenets of opinion journalism?

This website is good for your brain!

Well, maybe not all of it. But a new study suggests middle-aged (no, not me) and elderly (still not me) internet users can boost their brain power by doing a little web-surfing every day.

UPDATE: On the other hand, Newsweek revealed this week how digital media rewires our personal hard drives:

"Internet use enhances the brain's capacity to be stimulated, and that Internet reading activates more brain regions than printed words. The research adds to previous studies that have shown that the tech-savvy among us possess greater working memory (meaning they can store and retrieve more bits of information in the short term), are more adept at perceptual learning (that is, adjusting their perception of the world in response to changing information), and have better motor skills."

A smaller Rolling Stone to gather less moss

After four decades, Rolling Stone downsizes to the industry standard. (Image: AP)

Today's sign of the apocolypse

The Emmys will now offer a "Best Reality Show Judge" award. 

A Python on Palin (Sarah, not Michael)

One place to avoid political ads - video games

D'oh! Spoke too soon. Yes, savvy candidates (or anyone else) can run ads on video games. To your left, a screenshot from the XBox 360 game Burnout Paradise.

Why McCain's correction isn't enough

After John McCain calmed an anxious supporter that Barack Obama was not "an Arab," you'd think everyone would be cool with his quick reaction to a potentially explosive town hall moment.

You'd be wrong. McCain continued to praise Obama for being "a decent family man", but left it at that. No comment on Arabs in general. As a result, he left the door wide open for more anti-Arab rhetoric from misinformed, ignorant Americans.

Salameh Nematt, writing in The Daily Beast, explains how this moment made him "personally insulted, for the first time":

"For about four million Arab-Americans, and 300 million Arabs—and I happen to be one—McCain’s response to a voter 'accusing' Obama of being an Arab must have come as a complete shock. Instead of rejecting the notion that being an Arab is a pejorative term, the Arizona senator, by denying that Obama is an Arab, succeeded in insulting millions of Arabs and Arab-Americans."

Break time!

Put away the homework for 3:21 and enjoy They Might Be Giants. Make a little "Birdhouse in Your Soul".

Top 10 Songs for a Financial Crisis

David Wild, longtime contributor to Rolling Stone, offers ten current songs to help get us through these troubling times. One of them, Randy Newman's "A Few Words in Defense of Our Country", is presented below. 

Why this election matters

Because if Obama loses, we lose Tina Fey. 

Calling ACME, Inc.

It all goes back to Wile E. Coyote, doesn't it? While Obama remains cool and issues a new plan for stimulating the economy, McCain tries one hare-brained scheme after another to stop the Road Runner. Yesterday, no economic plan will be forthcoming. Today? We'll present our plan tomorrow. Nate at fivethirtyeight.com presents the McCain Campaign in a post 9/11 chart we can all understand.

Now, before y'all claim liberal bias, bear in mind that I had high hopes for the Arizona senator, especially if he had faced the two-headed Clinton machine this fall. But watching him now is like watching my cat, Oscar, give chase to one random object, get bored, then chase after another, for no apparent reason. I get some measure of entertainment from the cat. McCain, not so much.

Column of the Day - Nobel Prize-Winner Edition

Paul Krugman, professor of economics and op-ed columnist for the NY Times, won the Nobel Prize in Economics for his work on global trade patterns. His latest column is here, and a meticulously detailed explanation for why he deserves the Nobel is here.

UPDATE - Here's the professor on the pros and cons of handouts:

"Annoited" to be Vice President

If anyone brings up Barack Obama's ties to Reverend Wright, show them this video. If her life is an "open book," why haven't we heard more about this from the MSM?

Column of the Day: Obama is to the Road Runner as. . .

. . . McCain is to Wile E. Coyote. So says Andrew Sullivan in The Sunday Times:

"(Obama) waits for his opponent to make an error. Watching his autumn fight with McCain reminds me of the Wile E Coyote and Road Runner cartoons. Every elaborate attempt to blow Obama up leaves his opponents with sooty faces and a trail of smoke rising from the tops of their heads."

60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

To read it, click here. Do yourself a favor and watch this incredible video first.

This Week in Field Trips

Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Patrick Oliphant will present an exhibition of his work at Hope College beginning this Friday. Details here.

Forced to leave home - for playing music

Another sign of the Taliban's resurgence in Afghanistan: Haroon Bacha, one of the area's most popular singers, has been forced to flee to the US because playing music is considered "un-Islamic."

Palin drops puck, crowd boos

Philly fans are notoriously tough to a visiting team, and Sarah Palin, although loved by the Flyers' owner, gets no break from the crowd:

Column of the Day - Bonus Edition

Khaled Hosseini, author of The Kite Runner, takes the McCain/Palin campaign to task for allowing speakers at their rallys to use Barack Obama's middle name to insinuate he is a terrorist:

The real affront is the lack of firm response from either McCain or Palin. Neither has had the moral courage, when taking the stage, to grasp the microphone, turn to the presenter and, right then and there, denounce the use of Obama's middle name as an insult. Instead, they have simply delivered their stump speeches, lacing into Obama as if nothing out-of-bounds had just happened.

Column of the Day

Bob Herbert expresses what many Republicans, including former MI governor William Milliken, have come to realize about the Grand Old Party:

Voting has consequences.

I don’t for a moment think that the Democratic Party has been free of egregious problems. But there are two things I find remarkable about the G.O.P., and especially its more conservative wing, which is now about all there is.

The first is how wrong conservative Republicans have been on so many profoundly important matters for so many years. The second is how the G.O.P. has nevertheless been able to persuade so many voters of modest means that its wrongheaded, favor-the-rich, country-be-damned approach was not only good for working Americans, but was the patriotic way to go.

Conservatives bail on McCain

First Kathleen Parker, now Christopher Buckley (son of late great conservative William F. Buckley):

I’ve read Obama’s books, and they are first-rate. He is that rara avis, the politician who writes his own books. Imagine. He is also a lefty. I am not. I am a small-government conservative who clings tenaciously and old-fashionedly to the idea that one ought to have balanced budgets. On abortion, gay marriage, et al, I’m libertarian. I believe with my sage and epigrammatic friend P.J. O’Rourke that a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take it all away.

But having a first-class temperament and a first-class intellect, President Obama will (I pray, secularly) surely understand that traditional left-politics aren’t going to get us out of this pit we’ve dug for ourselves.

We were warned

Barack Obama knew his opponent would take the low road sooner or later:

Heads up, West Virginia!

Sarah Palin is headin' for Appalachia this weekend. Perhaps the self-proclaimed energy expert can give us one good reason why mountains must be leveled and drinking water polluted so we can have "clean" coal. 

Let's get all mavericky on these words and phrases

Barbara Wallraff's new blog presents a list of words and phrases that just need to go away. Now.

"Downward spiral" in Afghanistan

For those of you reading The Kite Runner, gloomy news from Afghanistan. The Joint Chiefs Chairman says the situation there is very bad and will only get worse in the coming year:

The sobering forecast comes as a draft report by American intelligence agencies has cast serious doubt on the ability of the Afghan government to stem the rise in the Taliban’s influence there, and as the Bush administration has initiated a major review of its Afghanistan policy.

Column of the Day - Black Friday Edition

It's the "Moment of Truth" on Wall Street today. Paul Krugman proposes what should have been done, and what needs to be done this weekend:

But on Wednesday the British government, showing the kind of clear thinking that has been all too scarce on this side of the pond, announced a plan to provide banks with £50 billion in new capital — the equivalent, relative to the size of the economy, of a $500 billion program here — together with extensive guarantees for financial transactions between banks. And U.S. Treasury officials now say that they plan to do something similar, using the authority they didn’t want but Congress gave them anyway.

GRCC Diversity Lecture Series - Ray Suarez

The senior correspondent to The News Hour on PBS spoke at Fountain Street Church last night as part of GRCC's Diversity Lecture Series.

Pop/Soda/Coke Bailout Needed

According to Matthew Yglesias, there's a "volume penalty" due to increased prices for 20-ounce Diet Cokes at the Center for American Progress. Where will it end?

Political Pundit Poetry

John Cleese (Monty Python) sent this poem to Keith Olbermann, who read it last night on his program. Brilliant.

Ode to Sean Hannity

by John Cleese

Aping urbanity 
Oozing with vanity 
Plump as a manatee 
Faking humanity 
Journalistic calamity 
Intellectual inanity 
Fox Noise insanity 
You’re a profanity 
Hannity

The 10 Commandments of Blogging

1. You shall not put your blog before your integrity.

2. You shall not make an idol of your blog.

3. You shall not misuse your screen name by using your anonymity to sin.

4. Remember the Sabbath day by taking one day off a week from your blog.

5. Honour your fellow-bloggers above yourselves and do not give undue significance to their mistakes.

6. You shall not murder someone else’s honour, reputation or feelings.

7. You shall not use the web to commit or permit adultery in your mind.

8. You shall not steal another person’s content.

9. You shall not give false testimony against your fellow-blogger.

10. You shall not covet your neighbour's blog ranking. Be content with your own content.

From Evangelical Alliance UK

$125,000/year to teach at-risk students? Sign me up!

An idea in education reform that just might work. 

Sorry, but I just can't take it!

Tom Brokaw's near-constant reminders of time limits tonight is beyond whiny. Let it go, Tom. Let them speak. 

Tonight's mantra

I will not live-blog the debate. I will not live-blog the debate. I will not live-blog the debate. 

Blogger's Son Scores Goal, Mercies Creston!

Congrats to Northview's JV soccer team on their 9-1 victory over Creston. Big shot out to Ben, Number 5, who popped the ninth goal passed the Polar Bear keeper to send everyone home early!

WANTED: Football Color Commentator!

Anyone want to ride shotgun for Friday's LHS football broadcast? Please send resume and a headshot to the comment section below. Please, someone step forward. I don't think I can tackle an entire broadcast (no pun intended) on my own.

Death of a childhood hero - Eddie Brinkman

I played baseball like my childhood hero, Eddie Brinkman: I had a great glove but couldn't hit the broadside of a barn. Eddie was typical of most shortstops of his era, and he earned the nickname "Steady Eddie" with his seemingly effortless infield play. The one-time Gold Glove winner died one week ago today in his hometown of Cincinnati. 

In honor of Decade Day at LHS

This is what we called a "music video." We watched them on a channel called MTV, which once stood for "Music Television" but now stands for "Morons on Television". 

See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor.

Hockey Moms in Glass Houses. . .

Yeah, yeah, I'm getting tired of Olbermann's shtick, too. But last night's "Special Comment" is worth sharing. If you want to play the guilt-by-association card, you'd best get ready to see a whole lotta finger pointin' comin' your way. 

Kenyan Karma

Jerome Corsi, "author" of a "book" that smears Barack Obama with countless mistruths and lies, was deported from Kenya today for not having a proper work permit. Obama, whose father was a Kenyan economist, is considered Kenya's favorite son.  Well done, Kenya!

What to watch tonight!

Presidential debate? Bah! The real fun begins on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart when he interviews Sarah Vowell, author of the new book The Wordy Shipmates. She was featured this afternoon on NPR's Talk of the Nation.

No questions for McCain and Palin?

Andrew Sullivan reminds the media of their role in an election year:

The deal is: candidates get to broadcast their message if the press get to question them thoroughly. That's how real democracy works - give and take. 

Column of the Day - Roger Cohen

"Never again" is an emotionally charged phrase, and Roger Cohen takes Sarah Palin to task for using it in reference to the mortgage crisis. Well done. 

Beware the October Surprise

Richard Clarke, author of Against All Enemies, examines the possibility of an al Qaeda attack that could throw the election in John McCain's favor:

"U.S. intelligence and security officials are worried. They admit that there is nothing concrete that suggests another attack, but they fear that al Qaeda may try something, maybe even in the United States."

The bigger they are. . .

. . . the more likely they are to win a presidential election. Cool graphic from today's NY Times.

Wait 'til next year

I'd feel bad for Cubs and White Sox fans, but the Tigers were the "best team on paper" this season, and look what happened to them. Thank goodness for the Red Wings! Know hope!

Come on up for the rising

With the Boss, Mr. Bruce Springsteen. Saw him four years ago this month on the Vote for Change tour with REM, John Fogerty, Bright Eyes, and the Dixie Chicks. He hits Eastern Michigan University tomorrow. Get there if you can. If not, here's part of what happened in Philly:

Meanwhile, back in Alaska

A pro-Obama rally in Anchorage draws four times the number of folks to a pro-Palin rally. 

Rush Limbaugh, Movie Critic

Well, more of a shameless plug for "An American Carol", the Michael Moore-bashing comedy out this weekend. Moore is an easy target (ideologically, or size-wise), and the film did out-perform Bill Maher's anti-religion rant, "Religulous". But "Beverly Hills Chihuahua" brought in nearly five times as many viewers as those two flicks combined. Talking chihuahuas. Rush claims this is a big risk for the actors in "American Carol":

"...all the actors in this movie are putting their necks on the line by doing it. You've heard all the talk about conservatives kind of afraid to come out of the closet out there, conservatism is "the new gay in Hollywood."  And these guys, some of them are very powerful in their own right, and they come out. But if this doesn't work, if the critics are able to label it a flop at the box office, it will have a dispiriting effect on further attempts by conservatives to make movies that appeal to a political point of view of an audience that Hollywood does not make movies for."

Some of those actors: Kelsey Grammer, James Woods, Dennis Hopper, Gary Coleman, Paris Hilton, Kevin "the not so-funny, alive" Farley, and Bill O'Reilly.

But Rush can't stay focused on plugging the film. In this transcript, he suggests the recent financial turmoil is a political coincidence just before the election:

"Now I see the oil price is down around 92 bucks.  Just a second.  Let me check this real quick here, folks.  Ninety-four dollars, $94. Gasoline is around three bucks a gallon in Boston.  I'm going to tell you something.  Some of this stuff is a little bit too coincidental, but after the election is over, it's going to be amazing how blue the sky has become, not much bluer, and how much brighter the sun is, there will be polls on the renewed confidence in the US economy that will be produced by the Drive-Bys after Obama has won, if that's the case."

"Drive-Bys after Obama has won"? Rush seems to forget George W. Bush's "sky is falling" warnings about the US economy prior to his own election in 2000. When stock prices were higher and oil much, much lower. Remember those days?

Column of the Day - Shades of Gray

If Barack Obama were white, he'd be leading by an additional 6 points in the polls - that's according to a survey cited by Nicholas Kristof in today's column:

One lesson from this research is that racial biases are deeply embedded within us, more so than many whites believe. But another lesson, a historical one, is that we can overcome unconscious bias. That’s what happened with the decline in prejudice against Catholics after the candidacy of John F. Kennedy in 1960.

Candidates as trains

From Daily Kos.

If it's Sunday, it's. . .

. . . another SNL skit featuring Tina Fey as Sarah Palin. Spot on and edgier than usual (listen for the Fey-as-Palin definition of marriage):

Predicting the vote

It takes 270 electoral votes to win, and there are plenty of places where you can track voting trends and polls on a daily basis. Anyone who's been in Kampf's class knows 270 To Win, an excellent site for playing around with one election night scenario after another. As for tracking and predicting, Real Clear Politics and Five Thirty Eight sort through all of the polls so you don't have to.

The price of censorship - Banned Books Week

For J.K. Rowling, challenges to her books doesn't keep them from flying off the shelves - she makes five pounds every second ($8.85 US), according to Forbes magazine.

Roger Ebert's take on the VP debate

In "You didn't ask me about the debate, but. . . ", film critic Roger Ebert observes the performance factor of last night's showdown:

When she was on familiar ground, she perked up, winked at the audience two of three times, and settled with relief into the folksiness that reminds me strangely of the characters in "Fargo." Palin is best in that persona. You want to smile with her and wink back. But who did she resemble more? Marge Gunderson, whose peppy pleasantries masked a remorseless policewoman's logic? Or Jerry Lundegaard, who knew he didn't have the car on his lot, but smiled when he said, "M'am, I been cooperatin' with ya here."

She's a soooper lady, dontcha know.

How to formulate a response to a debate question

From Adennak.com

A heartbeat away? "Say it ain't so, Joe!"

I tried, I really tried to give her a chance. Until this:

Say it ain't so, Joe, there you go again pointing backwards again. You preferenced your whole comment with the Bush administration. Now doggone it, let's look ahead and tell Americans what we have to plan to do for them in the future. You mentioned education and I'm glad you did. I know education you are passionate about with your wife being a teacher for 30 years, and god bless her. Her reward is in heaven, right? I say, too, with education, America needs to be putting a lot more focus on that and our schools have got to be really ramped up in terms of the funding that they are deserving. Teachers needed to be paid more. I come from a house full of school teachers. My grandma was, my dad who is in the audience today, he's a schoolteacher, had been for many years. My brother, who I think is the best schoolteacher in the year, and here's a shout-out to all those third graders at Gladys Wood Elementary School, you get extra credit for watching the debate.

And Joe Biden didn't impress me with his bit on yesterday's oxymoron, clean coal:

Oh, on clean coal. My record, just take a look at the record. My record for 25 years has supported clean coal technology. A comment made in a rope line was taken out of context. I was talking about exporting that technology to China so when they burn their dirty coal, it won't be as dirty, it will be clean.

As if tonight's debate wasn't enough fun. . .

Play Palin Bingo! How soon will she say bailout, maverick, or gotcha journalism? Download your card now!

Today's oxymoron: clean coal

Clean coal? Don't be fooled - there ain't no such thang. Want to protect the Appalachians? Visit ILoveMountains.org. 

There is simply no such thing as clean coal. Prying it loose from the ground is a dirty business and burning it produces a variety of pollutants and greenhouse gases. The Clean Air Act and subsequent regulations have sharply reduced nitrogen oxide and sulfur dioxide emissions that caused smog, soot and acid rain by forcing utilities to build expensive scrubbers. Now many environmentalists are trying to block new coal-fired power plants because the existing ones produce 36 percent of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions.

Let's get ready to rumble!

Who needs The Office when we have a decent chance of real, live, unintentionally-awkward humor from Biden and Palin? Gotta love Oliphant. 

McCain raises white flag in Michigan

Didn't see this coming a month before Election Day: the McCain campaign is pulling TV ads here, and McCain has canceled a planned stop in Plymouth next week. 

Reaction, Reporting the GR Rally

From the Associated Press:

The race's changing dynamics also appear to be giving Obama's supporters confidence. He drew a large crowd in downtown Grand Rapids that extended beyond the Secret Service checkpoints, despite temperatures in the 40s and the fact that the city is located in the heart of GOP territory.

From MLive:

Grand Rapids police estimated that 15,900 people attended the downtown rally, said Lt. Patrick Dean.

From the NY Times:

The turmoil in the markets seems to have buoyed the Obama campaign. Thousands turned out despite a gray chill, and when he began saying, “If I’m president,” they chanted, “When.”

He demurred. “I’m superstitious, folks.”

In case you missed the GR Rally

A link to the speech, both prepared and extemporaneous remarks, is here. 

GR Rally for Obama - Know Hope

Quite a turnout for Barack Obama this morning, and your humble blogger's son managed to get some great pics from 20 feet away. . . more to post later tonight.

100 years of lovable losers

This is NOT related to the Detroit Lions. I said "lovable" losers, not pathetic. The Chicago Cubs begin yet another quest to win their first World Series since 1908 tonight. The NY Times, home paper of two teams that didn't make the post-season, has a nifty feature on a century of baseball misery in Chicago.

Obama's GR Rally

So, who's going? If you get there, I'd love to hear about your experience. Pictures are welcome, too. This goes for former Lit Loungers in East Lansing, where the senator makes an appearance after his rally in GR.

And if you have pics from the McCain/Palin town hall meeting from two weeks ago, I'd love to see them as well!