CJR: Why We Love The Political Gabfest
Yes. Yes. Yes.
Though it is (broadly) a political analysis show, the Politcal Gabfest sometimes makes me laugh out loud. There was one evening last summer where I was that strange person on the subway, giggling maniacally, unable to stop as I listened to the show. The conversation had turned to dogs and mimes. You had to be there.
At Work in Syria, Times Correspondent Anthony Shadid Dies
The death of Mr. Shadid, an American of Lebanese descent who had a wife and two children, abruptly ended one of the most storied careers in modern American journalism. Fluent in Arabic, with a gifted eye for detail and contextual writing, Mr. Shadid captured dimensions of life in the Middle East that many others failed to see. Those talents won him a Pulitzer Prize for international reporting in 2004 for his coverage of the American invasion of Iraq and the occupation that followed, and a second Pulitzer in 2010, also for his Iraq reporting, both of them for The Washington Post. He also was a finalist in 2007 for his coverage of Lebanon, and has been nominated by The Times for his coverage of the Arab Spring uprisings that have transfixed the Middle East for the past year.
Facebook exists to make the world more open
Mark Zuckerberg in the Facebook IPO filing.
What a joke.
SOPA Is Inevitable
More on what I was saying earlier…
Marco Arment has this exactly right. We may have beaten these variations of SOPA and PIPA, but the sad fact of that matter is that they — or something like them — will eventually pass.
Obviously, all things being equal, such bills should never pass. But all things aren’t equal. As with most things, this is actually all about money. The MPAA and the other content lobbies are going to continue to pump money into this until they get what they want.
And again, they will. Consider this: SOPA and PIPA came this close to passing with MPAA head Chris Assclown Dodd banned from direct lobbying. Why is he banned? Because there’s a law that requires politicians to be two years out of office before they can lobby.
Dodd vacated his U.S. Senate seat on January 3, 2011. In a year, he’ll be able lobby all he wants. He’ll be able to directly buy the support of all his former colleagues. He spent 36 years in Washington as both a Senator and Congressman. You think that doesn’t matter? He’s going to be the best lobbyist ever. Which is exactly why the MPAA picked him.
Arment’s hope that people stop supporting the MPAA by stopping watching films clearly isn’t going to happen. But the idea of supporting campaign finance reform to eliminate bullshit lobbying is a good one.
