At Politico Magazine, retired Foreign Service officer James Bruno notes that President Barack Obama, Mr. Googoo in Chief, has appointed a higher percentage of “cringeworthy” political hacks as ambassadors than his not terribly principled predecessors. While previous presidents filled about 35% of our embassies abroad with political pals of varied eminence, Obama has kicked it…
Author: Alan Vanneman
Screw the high-speed rail, cue the big-ass bus!
Andrew Sullivan’s “Dish” presents a capsulized version of Eric Holthaus’ “to grow green, go bus” argument. Eric neglects to prove that we need to go green in the first place, and accidentally proves that if you’ve got the cash, flying is greener than anything, but, hey, you can’t do it all. Anyway, one thing this…
Pseudo New Yorker
Legal humor here. “I wasn’t funny. Why did they throw you overboard?” “Submissive? Oh, hell yes. I wrote the book on submissive.” “I guess we’ll have to make our own entertainment.” “What am I like? Well, ‘funny and non-judgmental’ pretty much sums it up.” “You really make that palm tree work.” “Have I been a…
Woody Allen: Guilty as not charged
I am not much of a fan of Woody Allen as an “artist” and, as a person, he comes off as an overprivileged prick. But, amazingly, I can still feel sorry for the guy, for a little while. Andrew Sullivan, who I believe at one time has occasionally argued for a right to privacy, has…
A Walk Around The Site—Literature R Us explained
I started this site to promote my unpublished if not unpublishable fiction, but that old mutatis mutandis thing took over—I had a dedicated band of about seven readers, plus the ebook thing was coming along, plus President Obama was turning himself into Cheney Light, so now I’ve rearranged things, going the self-publishing route for my…
Pete Seeger: If I had a hammer, I’d help Hitler exterminate the Jews
OK, that’s a little harsh, but it’s not inaccurate. Pete, the subject of innumerable hagiologies in the mainstream media, was a communist’s communist back in 1939, supporting the Nazi-Soviet Pact that led to World War II and fighting aggressively against FDR’s efforts to aid Great Britain and, ultimately, prepare for U.S. entry into the war…
Manhattan Institute dude gets War on Poverty half right, most of the time
Scott Winship, a fellow at the Manhattan Institute, home of the cop-loving, Sarah Palin-hating Heather MacDonald* and various other assorted right-leaning, tea-sipping double-domes, has a piece in the current Politico magazine that, shockingly concludes, “despite the alarm of the current debate about America’s poor, the country has actually reduced poverty more than we often appreciate—and…
Holden Ross & the Florida All-State Band 2013—“Ask Me Now”
A Bill Prince arrangement. Posted by GNU Stat Studios
Pseudo New Yorker
Legal humor here. “No, I know I don’t get paid to whisper in your ear ‘Thou too art mortal’ and I’m deeply sorry if I said anything to suggest that I believed that I did.” “Well, if you aren’t sitting on Madge’s get-well card, who is?” “No, JB, a display case containing the skulls of…
Sean Wilentz, last seen falling on his big, fat ass
It’s totally unnecessary, but I will join the pile-on squishing poor old Sean Wilentz for his attempted take-down of Glenn Greenwald, Julian Assange, and Edward Snowden for the terrible crime of telling Sean more than he wanted to know about his government is doing. Andrew Sullivan administers an abbreviated beat-down while Henry Farrell supplies the…