Halloween Links of Fun

Remember, you have nothing to fear from candy.

25 Awesome Costumes.

Death Panels would be scary, if they were real.

Skull Chic

25 Sexy Halloween Costumes.

I leave you with Thriller:

Coup Rollback

A nice little victory for diplomacy and the Obama administration.

A Question

How much do we need to pay Mrs. Lieberman and Mrs. Bayh in order to get their husbands to support health care reform?

Oh Economic Growth, How I've Missed You So.

It's back! Growth is back! Been gone so long!

Why Pink?

October is breast cancer awarness month. Which means I'm being bombarded with pink. Why pink? People keep trying to sell me pink stuff for breast cancer research. Buy a pink ribbon, buy a pink balloon. Heck I was looking at laptops from Dell and if you buy the pink one, they will kick in ten bucks for the cause.

Don't get me wrong, I love breasts and hate to see anything bad happen to them. But I hate pink. Pink is for baby girls right when they come home and when they go through that phase with princesses and plastic ponies. Heck most adult women I know (don't give me that look, I know a few) wouldn't be caught dead in pink. Manly man that I am, I just can do pink. So why pink?

Is there a way to support breasts and the sisterhood without gettin drapped in pink?

A Piece Fell Off?

That can't be good.

Why Yes, That Does Work

The thought of George W Bush having to pick up dog crap, does motivate me.

I'm ready to take on the day now.

Special

Normally, I don't pay that much attention to up-state New York special elections, but what's happening in New York's 23rd congressional district is pretty fascinating. The incumbent Republican has joined the Obama administration as Army Secretary, and a free-for-all has broken out to replace him. Normally this district would be a easy win for the GOP, but in this case a three-way race has developed. There's a wishy-washy Dem, a wishy-washy GOPer and a hard-core conservative spoiler. All the notable right-wingers, such as Palin, Rush, and Beck, are lining up with the right-winger. With the right side of electorate split, the Dems could pull out a win in a place they should have no right to.

Who says you can't find a good election in an off year? Here comes November!

You Can Escape McDonald's

If your economy goes far enough out of wack, it is possible.

It takes a pretty nasty crash, so this is not recomended. Think of it as "at least your waistline will go down."

The Messy Act of Creation

There's a pretty good reason why the most common metaphor for the legislative process is "making sausage." Good grief this is a messy, ugly process. Public option, no public option, half a public option, 60 votes in the Senate, 218 in the House, this committee and that. Not much to done but keep an eye on the process (read Johnathan Cohn and Ezra Klien)call your Senator from time to time, and wait.

Oh ick, I just got a raw piece of legislation on my shirt.

He Never Stops Teasing Me

When, oh when, will this torment stop.

Too Much Good Stuff

Ok, forget the safe-for-work, safe-for-network television, film institute of whatever top 100 movie quotes list. Check out the Pajiba other 100 best. But don't just read them. Watch them all and let the greatness wash over you:



Not to be played with your boss and/or mother in earshot.

Let's Go Old School

Oh Crap

Scariest story you will read all day:

Suicide bomber strikes suspected nuclear weapons site in Pakistan

My Entry

The Washington Post is holding a contest called America's Next Great Pundit. The grand prize of which is a dozen columns in the paper. Here's my entry, delivered about an hour before last night's deadline:

I may be new to the pundit game, but some parts I already know. First, I’m expected to be an expert about all topics, and two, I’m not an expert on all topics, despite Wikipedia. So I need to cheat. The gap between the pundit’s need to know everything and the size of the human brain can only be filled by cheating. Yelling is an easy cheat. Just make up for low knowledge with high volume. Sadly, this is really only a viable tactic for television punditry and arguments at the local bar. There’s no viable way to yell in a print piece, and ALL CAPS DO NOT WORK. I need some other way to cheat or, put another way, take a shortcut to the heart of the issue. My favorite move is to cite an expert with whom I agree or, even better, an idiot with whom I do not agree.
Take the debate over Net neutrality. Net neutrality is an effort to ensure that the providers of Internet access treat all content equally. There are rules to make sure that everyone’s Web page loads equally fast and everyone’s e-mail shows up at the same time. That no one gets a raw deal due to the content of their site or the company they work for. Of course, that’s just the quick and dirty version. I’m sure when the FCC takes action it will be much more complicated than that, with pages and pages of technical regulations and legal findings and charts and graphs and an easel. At that point it will be beyond my ability to be an expert on the subject. Now one way to cheat, er, take a shortcut to expertise on this matter, would be to cite an expert like the technologist quoted in this Post article, Vint Cerf, one of the builders of the Internet, who urged the FCC to adopt a "pro-innovation policy agenda" by adopting Net neutrality. But even more effective would be to see where the lunatics are, and then run the other way. On his show yesterday, Glenn Beck said that Net neutrality is a plot to get everyone free Internet and for the Obama administration to take over all media.
The fact that Beck believes Net neutrality to be an evil plot that needs to be stopped is the strongest argument I can mount in favor of adopting it.

Thanks to Krissi for the late editing assist, and everybody -fingers crossed. I could call Charles Krauthammer my honored colleague.

Metaphor

Maybe this will help you understand:

Nice

Al Franken, Senatoring the hell out of it.

Senatoring -act of being or acting as a senator. Your Craigorian Chant made-up word of the day.

Ho-Hum

Science marches on. These day we discover new extra-solar planets all the time. 32 new ones announced today. Woo!

We need something fresh to liven these discoveries up. We need a earth sized planet! With green stuff on it!

Need a better telescope.

Making Money Off the Nuts

Mike Madden shows you how.

The lesson here is no matter how dumb the investment move, if you can get enough morons to make the investment, it makes money. It could be comic books, it could be triple-compounded derivatives. Whatever the thing, if enough people buy it, it goes up in price. The intrinsic value doesn't matter, inflation doesn't matter, the price to earning ratio doesn't matter. All you need are enough dopes with money and you get a price increase.

In this case it's gold, but this trick could work with anything. Just put you ad up on Glenn Beck, tell people X is a great investment and will protect you from the Obama administration.

And then count your money.