It didn’t look good before, but now it seems the Hubble’s days are really numbered. NASA, who otherwise comes out ok under the new Bush budget, nevertheless cancelled plans to service the telescope by robot (strangely enough, before the engineers in charge could even present their work.) I have a bad feeling about this.
Watching the Detectives.
A hearty congrats to Chris at Do You Feel Loved?, who procured one of his dream jobs yesterday, and will be working for none other than DC Comics starting next week. With this and Batman Begins, is Detective Comics back for the ’05?
Class Dismissed.
“‘It’s a bill that’s going to significantly harm small consumers who want to hold large companies accountable for defrauding them,’ said Frank Clemente, director of the Congress Watch division of the consumer group Public Citizen.” So guess which side Dubya and the GOP were on? In the name of “tort reform” (and at the behest of their corporate overlords), the Senate GOP pass the Class Action Fairness Act, which moves state class action suits into the (less favorably disposed) federal court system. They did so after gunning down a series of Democratic amendments that tried to strike a more stable balance between private power and public accountability. Or would it have been too litigious to exempt cases brought by state attorneys general? We wouldn’t want some aspiring Mr. Smith cutting in to Old Man Potter’s profit margin, now, would we?
All the President’s Men.
Journalism then and now: As Slate writer and Nixon historian David Greenberg reports in from the opening of the Watergate papers, Salon‘s Eric Boehlert surveys the strange case of “Jeff Gannon”, a.k.a. James Guckert, fake newsman for Dubya.
Take that, Gryffindor.
This will just seem bizarre if you never caught the original meme (or, alternatively, its TTT incarnation)…but, via my sister Tessa, here’s what might have happened had Harry Potter been assigned to Hufflepuff…
I’ll be in my trailer (with the geeks).
Hey y’all…sorry for the paucity of updates this week. I’ve been helping some friends of mine finish their film school projects (I’ve put up a few pics from each in my Flickr thread), which has meant getting up at 6am and shooting all day, in addition to my usual academic and freelance obligations well into the wee hours of the night. The upshot is (a) film-acting is much harder than I thought it’d be, since it involves waiting around for long stretches between short bursts of being in character, and (b) I’ve gotten very little sleep over the past week or so, and thus have been too tired at the end of the day to do anything other than plop down in front of the TV and watch some more brilliant episodes of Freaks & Geeks.
Speaking of which…
- I think I’m developing a moderate crush on Lindsey Weir, particularly in her brief Mathlete incarnation.
- My sophomore year of high school, I used to play Warhammer (A better-than-average D&D knockoff) on Saturday afternoons with a party that basically broke down half-freak, half-geek (I count myself along the latter — my closest analogue probably would be Sam the baby-faced fanboy, with perhaps some Lindsey and a dollop of Ken.) At any rate, one of these guys (and I really hope he doesn’t read this blog) was the spitting image of Harris (Stephen Lea Sheppard)…the hair, the proto-‘stache, everything. It’s creepy.
- I know it’s way too late to bring the show back, but could we at least get a Bill Haverchuck spinoff TV movie or something? That guy is funny on a stick.
Even more a roving.
Dubya consigliere and strategy guru Karl Rove is promoted to Deputy Chief of Staff, making official his imprimatur on White House policy decisions. Hmm. It seems doubtful this particular reshuffling will enthuse Dems on the administration’s second term agenda.
Lex and Kumar go to White Kandor.
Move over, Otis: Harold & Kumar‘s Kal Penn joins the cast of Superman as “Riley,” Lex Luthor’s #2. Will Supes be sent slip-slyding away?
Hard Times.
With the Dubya deficit looming over the second term agenda (and it’s not going anywhere anytime soon) and the proposed Social Insecurity PSAs now costing trillions (per Vice-President Cheney), the administration releases a $2.57 trillion budget which “eliminates dozens of politically sensitive domestic programs, including funding for education, environmental protection and business development” and doubles the prescription drug copay for veterans. (America’s children and Armed Forces — our nation’s richest 1% thank you again for your sacrifice.)
One Love.
“Bob Marley, all of his songs are fire to Satan, the dragon quake. Bob Marley is still alive, vibrant style, Rastafari.” On what would have been his sixtieth birthday, Ethiopia (and Time Magazine) celebrate the music and legacy of Bob Marley.