Two sad passings to report. First, Stephen Jay Gould, noted paleontologist and author, whose ideas on “punctuated equilibrium” invigorated the scientific debate over macroevolution. I quite enjoyed his (often heated) exchanges with Richard Dawkins, a more traditional Darwinian evolutionist (whose views I tend toward). Dr. Gould was 60. [link via Robert Musil] Second, David Berg, cartoonist of Mad Magazine fame, whose strip “The Lighter Side of…” I grew up with.

Nice, casually droll dismissal of the latest “TV is the Devil”-junk science — courtesy of Reason’s Nick Gillespie. Here’s a bit: This latest study [by Dr. Jeffrey G. Johnson of Columbia University and the New York State Psychiatric Institute, which equates time spent in front of the TV with propensity toward violent outbursts] is, of course, the same claptrap that we

So “Philly” is gone. Same with “Undeclared,” “The X-Files,” “Spin City,” and “Dark Angel.” Oh. And let’s not forget “Politically Incorrect,” a show that — whether you love Bill Maher or hate him — was eminently watchable. Because face it: anything’s preferable to Jay Leno… Here’s The National Review’s Jay Nordlinger, in his latest “Impromptus” column, paying modest tribute: […] What about ‘Politically Incorrect’? It is due to expire at

Now this is the kind of essay I try to get my students to write, but all they ever want to write about is the first time they got drunk and vomited cheese-steak into their own hair, then “hooked up” with somebody who “didn’t respect” them the next morning. From The New Yorker’s “Shouts and Murmers” Department, here’s Andrew Barlow’s pithy “All I Really Need To Know I Learned By

Wait, didn’t I just see this on an episode of “Boston Public”…? Only the female teacher was played by Fyvush Finkel…?

From David Tell’s Weekly Standard column, “Church of the Objectivity”: The current Newsweek has a long, cover-story retrospective on the siege of Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity. The piece is invaluable for its detail — but exasperating for the filter of ‘objectivity’ through which correspondent Joshua Hammer apparently feels obliged to view his otherwise excellent work. The standoff in Manger Square, Hammer writes, ‘seemed to capture the essence of the

The New York Post reports that Huey Lewis is hung like a Clydesdale. Whereas Greenday’s Billie Joe Armstrong….well, let’s just say he’s got a great personality. And some people still won’t take the Post seriously as a news, er, organ…

Oh, Britney! You naughty li’l minx, you! Such a nasty girl you are. All’s I can say is, somebody’s due for a good spanking. A nice, loooong spanking, too. Yup. It’ll be for your own good, though, honey. Trust me. This’ll hurt me a lot more than it hurts you, Britney baby…

Oh, Britney! You naughty li’l minx, you! Such a nasty girl you are. All’s I can say is, somebody’s due for a good spanking. A nice, loooong spanking, too. Yup. It’ll be for your own good, though, honey. Trust me. This’ll hurt me a lot more than it hurts you, Britney baby…

First, it was the Yale chick, with her “bobbin’-for-apples, if-you-know-what-I-mean”-lifestyle column. Now, even certain fish are getting involved with the intrigue of sexual politics: Swedish scientists have found that female brown trout fake orgasms in about half of their spawnings. Erik Peterrson of Sweden’s National Board of Fisheries said out of 117 spawnings they observed, 69 were false orgasms. During a normal spawning, the female digs a gravel pit for