Josh Whedon on Romney

I'm not exactly in the core demographic for Whedon's filmwork, but I might rethink that...

 

George McGovern, R.I.P.

News that former senator and presidential hopeful George McGovern has died will stir some memories for people of a certain age. I hadn't remembered that he lost the presidential race in one of the biggest landslides in history. And I guess as a cautionary tale, I'll point out that the People, in all their wisdom, decided to re-elect the scoundrel Richard Nixon and his ilk instead.

Anyway, Slate has a very good piece by Ron Rosenbaum, conjecturing that the failure of the press to get off the campaign bus and out on the trail of more newsworthy stories may have contributed to this sorry state of affairs.

It hasn't been a good week for journalists, I'm afraid. Adrian McKinty put up a great blog post excoriating sports journalism for its failure to bring out the truth on Lance Armstrong earlier.

At the behest of my book group, I'm reading an entertaining old collection of Molly Ivins new stories called Molly Ivins Can't Say That, Can She?

We could sure use you right about now, Molly...

Malala

I seem to be on kind of  a roll here with women's issues right now. I thought I'd link to the XX Factor piece on why the Taliban fear teenage girls, which is short and good. I was glad to see that Pakistan's populace turned out in prayer and sympathy for Malala Yousafzai,  a fourteen girl who was shot in the head by, well, misogynists, basically because she was more intelligent, articulate and charming than they are. To give them any greater political credence would be to flatter them.

Half the sky, people. Half the sky.

Footnite: I don't usually use this blog for advocacy, but if you'd like you can head on over to Avaaz, and sign their petition calling for the education of all girls in Pakistan.   

Ken Jennings News Quiz

Let me just start out by saying that I suck at this. But maybe you won't find it such a painful letdown as I do. In any event, the Jeopardy winner extraordinaire is putting up a quiz every week on Slate, and you can see how well you do against the average player as well as one of the Slate columnists. Don't be afraid--go ahead and try it. I think I just lowered that average substantially... 

Without further ado, the Ken Jennings news quiz.

TJ Elevator Fan at Hampton Inn

Because every once in awhile,you have to reward a great ad...

Half the Sky, the documentary

I watched the first part of Half the Sky on PBS last night, and wanted to share the opportunity with others. I was happy to discover that the first half is now already on line and available to everyone, at least in the U.S. You can find it HERE. PBS actually very generously offers the embed for the whole film, but I thought I would just put up this trailer and you can head over to PBS for the viewing. If you're in the U.S., the second part is being broadcast tonight.