Celebrity Deathmatch.

"Lions, and tigers, and bears! OH MY!"

Words.

"Before the 2008 election, almost nobody outside Alaska and Arkansas had heard of Sarah Palin or Mike Huckabee. But in a long and crowded campaign season, they were the only Republican politicians who inspired any genuine enthusiasm.

They had other things in common as well. Both came from lower-middle-class backgrounds, and joined a soft-edged social conservatism to a strong populist streak. Both had been considered pragmatists, rather than ideologues, as governors of their home states. Both were untainted by the failures of the Bush-era Republican Party.

And both had the same Achilles’ heel: They seemed unready for high office, and owed their appeal more to personality than to substance.

This meant that both faced the same post-election choice. Did they want to take their newfound eminence seriously? Or did they want to cash in on their celebrity?

For Palin, the serious path required at least serving out her term as governor before returning to the national stage. For Huckabee, it could have involved anything from starting a think tank to running for the Senate in 2010. For both, it would have meant wedding their political identity to ideas as well as attitudes.

So far, they’ve chosen celebrity instead. Huckabee spent the last year hamming it up on a weekly talk show, and the last month hawking a book of inspirational Christmas stories. As for Palin — well, you probably know what she’s been up to lately.

Nobody should begrudge them their choices.

...But they were the wrong moves if either wanted to become president someday. Huckabee’s gabfest is a weekly reaffirmation of the rap that he’s too lightweight for the Oval Office. Palin has sealed her identity as a culture-war lightning rod: she can inspire hysteria from liberals (ably catalogued in Matthew Continetti’s “Persecution of Sarah Palin”) and adulation from conservatives (visible at every stop along her book tour), but she’s unlikely to persuade anyone in the middle to trust her with the reins of government.

It’s possible to be a celebrity and a serious politician at the same time: Barack Obama’s career proves as much. But Obama’s celebrity status is frequently a political liability, and he’s (usually) wise enough to know it. That’s why he plays the wonk as often as he plays the global icon.

For now, no Republican leader projects a similar level of seriousness. Late in the Bush years, it was easy to dismiss conservatism as brain-dead. Among policy thinkers, that isn’t true anymore: the advent of Obama seems to have provided just the jolt that right-of-center wonks needed. But innovative proposals are useless without politicians willing to champion them.

...there are substantial political rewards awaiting the politician who becomes the voice of an intellectually vigorous conservatism. It probably won’t be Mike Huckabee or Sarah Palin. If Republicans are lucky, though, it will be somebody who shares their charisma — but who prefers the responsibilities of leadership to the pleasures of celebrity."

THE NEW YORK TIMES: They Chose Celebrity

My Girl.

Always and Forever...

New flava in ya ear!

Janet Jackson.

Make Me.

Beat Street.

Vampire Weekend.

Cousins.

Touch Me, Tease Me.

New flava in ya ear!

Pretty Ricky.

Say A Command.

Dr. Feelgood.

New flava in ya ear!

Robin Thicke.

Sex Therapy.

"Just another day, living in the hood. Just another day around the way."

New flava in ya ear!

Clipse feat. Cam'ron and Pharrell.

Popular Demand (Popeyes).

"All I need is One Mic..."

New flava in ya ear!

Bone Thugs-N-Harmony.

16 bars.

Coming Attractions.

The Fantastic Mr. Fox.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Sean Hannity Apologizes to Jon
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

American Dreamin'.

Words.

"Consider, for a moment, a tale of two countries. Both have suffered a severe recession and lost jobs as a result — but not on the same scale. In Country A, employment has fallen more than 5 percent, and the unemployment rate has more than doubled. In Country B, employment has fallen only half a percent, and unemployment is only slightly higher than it was before the crisis.

Don’t you think Country A might have something to learn from Country B?

This story isn’t hypothetical. Country A is the United States, where stocks are up, G.D.P. is rising, but the terrible employment situation just keeps getting worse. Country B is Germany, which took a hit to its G.D.P. when world trade collapsed, but has been remarkably successful at avoiding mass job losses. Germany’s jobs miracle hasn’t received much attention in this country — but it’s real, it’s striking, and it raises serious questions about whether the U.S. government is doing the right things to fight unemployment.

Here in America, the philosophy behind jobs policy can be summarized as “if you grow it, they will come.” That is, we don’t really have a jobs policy: we have a G.D.P. policy. The theory is that by stimulating overall spending we can make G.D.P. grow faster, and this will induce companies to stop firing and resume hiring.

...In a recent interview, Lawrence Summers, the Obama administration’s highest-ranking economist, was dismissive: “It may be desirable to have a given amount of work shared among more people. But that’s not as desirable as expanding the total amount of work.” True. But we are not, in fact, expanding the total amount of work — and Congress doesn’t seem willing to spend enough on stimulus to change that unfortunate fact. So shouldn’t we be considering other measures, if only as a stopgap?

...Right now, workers who lose their jobs aren’t moving to the jobs of the future; they’re entering the ranks of the unemployed and staying there. Long-term unemployment is already at its highest levels since the 1930s, and it’s still on the rise.

And long-term unemployment inflicts long-term damage. Workers who have been out of a job for too long often find it hard to get back into the labor market even when conditions improve. And there are hidden costs, too — not least for children, who suffer physically and emotionally when their parents spend months or years unemployed.

So it’s time to try something different."

THE NEW YORK TIMES: Free to Lose

Spoils of the Spoiled.

Words. For Your Consideration...

"Our company, J.P. Morgan Chase, employs more than 220,000 people, serves well over 100 million customers, lends hundreds of millions of dollars each day and has operations in nearly 100 countries. And if some unforeseen circumstance should put this firm at risk of collapse, I believe we should be allowed to fail. As Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner recently put it, "No financial system can operate efficiently if financial institutions and investors assume that government will protect them from the consequences of failure." The term "too big to fail" must be excised from our vocabulary.

...As we have seen clearly over the last several years, financial institutions, including those not considered "too big," can pose serious risks for our markets because of their interconnectivity. A cap on the size of an institution will not prevent that risk. Properly structured resolution authority, however, can help halt the spread of one company's failure to another and to the broader economy.

While the strategy of artificial limits may sound simple, it would undermine the goals of economic stability, job creation and consumer service that lawmakers are trying to promote. Let's be clear: Banks should not be big for the sake of being big. Moreover, regardless of a company's size, it must be well managed. As we've seen in many industries, companies that grow for the sake of growth or that expand into areas outside their core business strategy often stumble. On the other hand, companies that build scale for the benefit of their customers and shareholders more often succeed over time.

...It is vital that policymakers and those with a stake in our financial system work together to overhaul our regulatory structure thoughtfully and well. While changes may seem arcane and technical, they are critical to the future of the whole economy. It is clear that we must modernize our financial regulatory system. The stakes are simply too high and the consequences too far-reaching to do this hastily. Many of the rules governing our markets today were put in place more than 70 years ago. On a timeline, that Depression era would be closer to the Civil War than to our current century.

Global economic growth requires the services of big financial firms. It also requires that big financial firms be allowed to fail."

THE WASHINGTON POST: No more 'too big to fail'

THINK!

A Moment of Clarity.



Words.

"President Obama and Congress will soon make defining choices about health care and troops for Afghanistan.

These two choices have something in common — each has a bill of around $100 billion per year. So one question is whether we’re better off spending that money blowing up things in Helmand Province or building up things in America.

...Granted, the health care costs will continue indefinitely, while the United States cannot sustain 100,000 troops in Afghanistan for many years. On the other hand, the health care legislation pays for itself, according to the Congressional Budget Office, while the deployment in Afghanistan is unfinanced and will raise our budget deficits and undermine our long-term economic security.

So doesn’t it seem odd to hear hawks say that health reform is fiscally irresponsible, while in the next breath they cheer a larger deployment of troops in Afghanistan?

...The health reform legislation in Congress is imperfect, of course. It won’t do enough to hold down costs; it may restrict access even to private insurance coverage for abortion services; it won’t do enough to address public health or unhealthy lifestyles.

Likewise, troop deployment plans in Afghanistan are imperfect. Some experts think more troops will help. Others think they will foster a nationalist backlash and feed the insurgency (that’s my view).

So where’s the best place to spend $100 billion a year?"

THE NEW YORK TIMES: America’s Defining Choice

Love Hangover.

New flava in ya ear!

Dirty Money.

Love Come Down.

Stillness is the Move.

A Cover.



By Solange Knowles.

PITCHFORK: Premiere: Solange Covers Dirty Projectors' "Stillness Is the Move"

BONUS:

Black Hole, SON!

Just you watch...



I, I, -------------- [FLATLINES]

VIDEOGUM: Good Luck On Criminal Minds Tonight, Gavin Rossdale!

"OOPS!, I DID IT AGAIN!"

Words.

"In an interview with The Sunday Times of London, the cocky chief of Goldman Sachs said he understands that a lot of people are “mad and bent out of shape” at blood-sucking banks.

I know I could slit my wrists and people would cheer,” Lloyd Blankfein, the C.E.O., told the reporter John Arlidge.

...When Arlidge asked whether it’s possible to make too much money, whether Goldman will ignore the people howling at the moon with rage and go on raking it in, getting richer than God, Blankfein grinned impishly and said he was “doing God’s work.”

Whether he knows it, he’s referring back to The Protestant Ethic and The Spirit of Capitalism — except, of course, the Calvinists would have been outraged by the banks’ vicious — not virtuous — cycle of greed and concupiscence.

Blankfein’s trickle-down catechism isn’t working. Now we have two economies. We have recovering banks while we have 10-plus percent unemployment and 17.5 percent underemployment. The gross thing about the Wall Street of the last decade is how much its success was not shared with society.

Goldmine Sachs, as it’s known, is out for Goldmine Sachs.

As many Americans continue to struggle, Goldman, Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan Chase, banks that took government bailout money after throwing the entire world into crisis, have said they will dish out $30 billion in bonuses — up 60 percent from last year.

The saying used to be, whatever happens, the lawyers win. Now, it’s whatever happens, the bankers win."

THE NEW YORK TIMES: Virtuous Bankers? Really!?!

CAPTAIN AMERICA!

Words. For Your Considertation...

"...military choices must be announced and pursued with neon clarity. It is the purpose of wartime presidential leadership to turn a debatable strategy into a national commitment.

We have yet to see this type of leadership from Obama. His rhetorical focus has been mainly domestic. Communication concerning Afghanistan and Iraq has come when there is no other choice. These wars have fallen into the category of inherited problems --less national causes than a distant uncle's debt.

Obama's high-profile international speeches, such as his Cairo remarks and United Nations address, have sought to transcend ideological debates, not engage them on one side. In this rhetorical approach, the world has many criticisms of America, some of them unfair, but America also has many flaws and failures. Thankfully, the bad old days of misunderstanding are now over, because of the arrival of Obama himself.

Call this what you will -- narcissism comes to mind -- but it has little to do with the wartime leadership (during wars hot and cold) of presidents such as Franklin Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan. They expressed an unyielding commitment to one side of an ideological divide -- the side involving freedom and self-government. And they revealed metal beneath their charm, which inspired American troops and disconcerted American enemies.

Even on domestic priorities such as health care, Obama is more professorial than passionate, more explanatory than inspirational. In tragedy -- such as the Fort Hood shootings -- his public reactions can be oddly muted and medicinal. What makes Obama outraged? For what would he willingly sacrifice his popularity, his pride, his presidency?"

THE WASHINGTON POST: A strategy needs some steel

"NEW SHIT!"

PITCHFORK: New Hot Chip: "Take It In"

...

Just you watch...



Say it with me now, y'all: "This can't be life!"

Art. School. Confidential.

New flava in ya ear!

Lady Gaga.

Bad Romance.

In Memoriam.

[Originally posted Wednesday, December 19, 2007 ]

Singled Out.

TAUWAN'S "TOP TEN" SINGLES OF THE YEAR

SEVEN.



(AND Gronlandic Edit - Of Montreal)

Let me tell you why these two songs are special: It's the beat! Sit me down and ask me what these songs are about exactly and I couldn't really tell you, this, despite the fact that I can practically sing along til the wheels fall off everytime I press play on either of these tracks. This ain't a diss, it's a compliment to the tactile groove and idiosyncratic funk present in both these jams. It's not a cerebral thang, it's a physical thang, as the underlying bass, ebullient funk and melodies of Of Montreal's Gronlandic Edit, and the thick and heavy dancefloor stomp and dark decadence of !!!'s Must Be The Moon hit you hard, squarely in yo hips and toe tappin feets. They say people don't dance no more [hipsters I am looking at you] but you'll be hard pressed to find a back against the wall when these jams are in rotation.

PITCHFORK.TV: SPECIAL PRESENTATION !!! Must be the Moon