is Madonna losing her appeal? For that matter, is soccer better than porn?

Coaster at Six Flags Over Georgia Related

Gosh. Look who’s showing all the grace of Gollum: It has long been known that Mr Clinton is angry at the way his own reputation was tarnished during the primary battle when several of his comments were interpreted as racist. But his lingering fury has shocked his friends. The Democrat told the Telegraph: “He’s been angry for a while. But everyone thought he would get over it. He hasn’t. I’ve

According to the Washington Post, Barack Obama’s sudden shifts on public financing and electronic surveillance are not flip-flopping.  Rather, Obama is being pragmatic… with nuance (yes, David Sirota is even quoted dropping the n-bomb): [A}fter eight years of Bush’s uncompromising approach to the issues, Obama aides say they believe he can turn his subtler approach to his advantage.  ***  “After eight years of ideology driving decision making, is pragmatism reform? Yes, it is,” said

PJM’s Richard Fernandez notes the debate between Excitable Andy and Max Boot over America’s postwar relationship with Iraq. Sullivan once asked how having 50 long-term bases in Iraq was not empire, only to adopt a modified, limted hang-out position on his own question about two weeks later.  He still gets itchy over Boot invoking postwar Germany as any sort of historical analogy for a long-term presence in Iraq, arguing that a

The Washington Post  gives front-page space today to Democratic accusations that Republicans are blocking popular legislation as a strategy to produce a “do-nothing” Congress.  The reality is a bit more nuanced. The first example cited is the mortgage lender bailout bill: On a test vote, 83 senators supported provisions intended to halt the steepest slide in home prices in a generation. Still, the measure stalled, undone by a dispute over whether to add

Me, or your lying brain? In an article about how one’s bias can affect how one recalls and views “evidence”, the NYT author helpfully gives us a wide variety of examples: FALSE beliefs are everywhere. Eighteen percent of Americans think the sun revolves around the earth, one poll has found. Thus it seems slightly less egregious that, according to another poll, 10 percent of us think that Senator Barack Obama,

Dana Milbank at the WaPo: Throughout the Bush presidency, he toiled in secrecy deep within the White House, a mysterious and feared presence who never stepped into the sunlight of public disclosure. [Pans from aboveground shot of White House down and in underground to subterranean caverns] Until yesterday. [Closes in from back of mysterious figure hunched over pipe organ who suddenly turns about, revealing horribly disfigured face] There he sat,

It isn’t news that rampant corporatism has killed creativity in the arts, or more precisely, prevented creative artists from getting wide exposure.  There are a lot of bands that would have been staples of FM radio in the old days, but can’t get in the door now.  Mumbo Gumbo is a great little band out of Davis, CA that’s fronted by two very talented women, main singer-songwriter Tracy Walton, and