The major media outlets want a horse race, but this presidential election isn't nearly as close as we're being told. Media continuously cites any source that makes things sound like the presidency is in a statistical dead heat. One look at pollster.com tells a significantly different story. It might not be a nail biter, but it is a far more accurate look at the race than we're being fed.
NEWSPEAK! editor Aaron Retka (right) presents a Golden Slingshot Award to Springs Culture Cast producers Craig Richardson (left) and Klayton Elliot Kendall (center) at the 2007 NEWSPEAK! War Against Christmas Holiday Bash. (Photo by Sue Spengler)
There are some parts of the human body that get a bum rap from society. People are so uptight and afraid of these things that they get are granted status as an unspeakable in good, decent circles. Just bring up labia or glans in front of a few people that you don't really know very well, even if used in proper context, and you'll see what I mean. It is strange if you think about it. Here now we have a children's book that deals with this exact topic. Scrotum. Is it such a bad thing to discuss? Is it wrong to teach a kid what it is? Some apparently think so, even when used in a totally benign context. This inability to be comfortable with our own physiology is a sign of societal dysfunction. There are far too many scrotums walking around to ignore them.
The word “scrotum” does not often appear in polite conversation. Or children’s literature, for that matter.Yet there it is on the first page of “The Higher Power of Lucky,” by Susan Patron, this year’s winner of the Newbery Medal, the most prestigious award in children’s literature. The book’s heroine, a scrappy 10-year-old orphan named Lucky Trimble, hears the word through a hole in a wall when another character says he saw a rattlesnake bite his dog, Roy, on the scrotum.
While my bud Noel Black is probably going to wet himself over Dan Savage's appearance tomorrow night, I'm much more looking forward to seeing Daniel Pinchbeck this Thursday. I wonder how well Pinchbeck will work next to Stephen Colbert? I am trying really hard, and I can't imagine 2012 being received well on a comedy show. Even with the most tender presentation, much of the material in that book is too far-out for most folks. Maybe they can be softened up little by little. ;)
In an odd twist of fate, Pinchbeck has in the past been a guest blogger right here on Non-Prophet while Dan Savage currently writes for Noel's Newspeak paper.
This almost makes me wish I had television service in my home. Viva-la-youtube!
Snagged with a Google Alert:
THE COLBERT REPORT, Comedy Central
Mo 12/11: Dr. Peter Singer
Tu 12/12: Dan Savage
We 12/13: Doris Kearns Goodwin
Th 12/14: Daniel Pinchbeck
This is a perfect example of how the media in the US has been emasculated. Cries of liberal bias and the general need to keep everyone in a safe little bubble of pseudo reality TV (so that we can all be effectively marketed to) has replaced authentic and honest journalism. The news is a business that is not unlike any other, and if you think for a minute they have delivering important information about current events as their top priority, think again.
via The Raw Story:
The cover of International editions, aimed at Europe, Asia, and Latin America, displays in large letters the title "LOSING AFGHANISTAN," along with an arresting photograph of an armed jihadi.The cover of the United States edition, in contrast, is dedicated to celebrity photographer Annie Leibovitz and is demurely captioned "My Life in Pictures."
The International cover story begins:
"You don't have to drive very far from Kabul these days to find the Taliban. In Ghazni province's Andar district, just over a two-hour trip from the capital on the main southern highway, a thin young man, dressed in brown and wearing a white prayer cap, stands by the roadside waiting for two NEWSWEEK correspondents. It is midday on the central Afghan plains, far from the jihadist-infested mountains to the east and west. Without speaking, the sentinel guides his visitors along a sandy horse trail toward a mud-brick village within sight of the highway. As they get closer a young Taliban fighter carrying a walkie-talkie and an AK-47 rifle pops out from behind a tree. He is manning an improvised explosive device, he explains, in case Afghan or U.S. troops try to enter the village."
The United States Story cover story begins:
"Annie Leibovitz is tired and nursing a cold, and she' s just flown back to New York on the red-eye from Los Angeles, where she spent two days shooting Angelina Jolie for Vogue. Like so many of her photo sessions, there was nothing simple about it. 'I talked with Angelina before the shoot,' says Leibovitz, who's famous for her preparation. 'She felt like she was coming back from having the baby and she felt very sexy and ready to go.' ... There were 50 people on the set, and racks of clothes from the New York spring collections to be tried and styled."
Considering the tiny amount of time that I spend watching it, $600/yr was just too much money. Back when I watched broadcast news things were a bit different but these days, with the exception of The Daily Show, I never find myself turning on, tuning in and dropping out in front of my television. I can watch The Daily Show online. So for these reasons I officially killed my TV service today.
I spent manu an hour watching this man. He always had a tone and lilt to his voice that made ABC's World News Tonight my favorite news source when I was a youngster. When Mr. Jennings spoke, he grabbed your attention and reeled you right on in. He will be missed.
from ABC News:
ABC News Anchor Peter Jennings died today at his home in New York City. He was 67. On April 5, Jennings announced he had been diagnosed with lung cancer. He is survived by his wife, Kayce Freed, his two children, Elizabeth, 25, and Christopher, 23, and his sister, Sarah Jennings. "Peter died with his family around him, without pain and in peace. He knew he'd lived a good life," his wife and children said in a statement.In announcing Jennings' death to his ABC colleagues, News President David Westin wrote:
"For four decades, Peter has been our colleague, our friend, and our leader in so many ways. None of us will be the same without him.
I'm wacking broadcast news out of my life. I can't take it anymore. I just want to scream out of frustration. I know I'm behind the curve on doing this but the time has come. It just all sucks so much that I've been driven away. Thanks Rupert Murdock. Thanks infotainment enthusiasts.
Back when I was in college I got in the habit of being able to catch 20 minutes of CNN Headline News at any convenient time to see if anything was going on in the world. It was pretty straight, with Bobbi Batista just hitting the headlines. I could cook dinner and see if anything interesting was happening anywhere. It was brief, fairly unemotional, and more or less to the point. As time passed I used HLN in much the same way, but supplemented my "briefings" with more in-depth reading online when I felt like it or I had the time.
As time passed I have found less and less use for HLN. It has turned into something closer to "Entertainment Tonight" recently. Since moving to Colorado watching world news on the big three isn't practical because it airs an hour earlier, before I usually can watch it. Bleccch.
I have tuned in to FOX's lame-assed excuse for a news network from time to time and I mention it here only because its methodologies, and what it finds important, seems to have taken over. Mostly, I find it shallow and biased. It's not news by any means. Its main goal seems to be making things news. I can see why people watch that network though: It is entertaining. They decide what the issue of the month is going to be and then they let you root for a team. It's infotainment.
Between the Schiavo deathwatch, and now the endless coverage of the Pope dying, I can't take it anymore. I don't want to spend a couple of hours searching the web ever day in search of real news, but it has come to that. The multi-tasking approach of doing a survey while half watching "HLN-classic" and cooking or cleaning simultaneously was nice, but it's been dead for a long while now.
I'm going to put some time into assembling some online sources and I hope to be able to make them reasonably efficient. Maybe cruising AP releases on myway.com will be a reasonable substitution.
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