Has Newt, for all his visceral hatred of Mitt, realized how badly Mitt needs him to stay in?
Click here to read Alexander Burns’ “Mitt Romney Tries to Break Southern Losing Streak” in Politico.
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Krystal Ball “ranted” on Dylan Ratigan this week about Rush Limbaugh and other blowhards. Check it out: Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy The new iPad has been announced, and will be available for crazy tech nuts like the RP on March 16. Here’s the story [Engadget] Sorry Coke lovers… the Center for Science in the Public Interest says the caramel color used in many sodas causes cancer. [USA Today] Mad Man fans can’t imagine a world without the charismatic Don Draper. But NY Mag writers took Don’s stats and history to a real actuary to see how long they predict he’ll be around. [NY Magazine] Talk about a catch 22: both antidepressant use and untreated depression in pregnant women can lead to risks for babies. What should expectant moms do? [Time] In new research, one in five pilots reported making a serious error on the job due to sleepiness. [Wall Street Journal] Is it stress and anxiety to blame for your constant nodding off… or is it narcolepsy? [NY Times]
Facebook is a place where millions of people seemingly give advice to millions of other people daily but are really just using others as an excuse to give—and hopefully take—their own advice. And I think that’s a very good thing. The advice is communicated in status updates containing inspirational quotes, wise advice, clever slogans, and touching stories. Which seems lately to be on the rise. We are telling ourselves that we need to adopt that particular thought or this mindset or take that action. It’s always easier to take advice ourselves if we can do so under the guise of giving that advice to others. It’s easier to hear, to accept, and ultimately to take. And FB gives us that always ready third-party, i.e. the FB world. So, maybe, through all the status updates where we are seemingly nudging the world to become a little bit better place is actually working. By allowing us more often to nudge ourselves to each become a little bit better person. And so maybe that isn’t so much a Facebook secret as much as it is the secret to Facebook. This story about contributing RP Rod Jetton appeared in The Fine Print blog, giving an interview about his past and recovery to Eric Olsen:
Rush’s raw, heartfelt apology to a young female student for calling her a “slut” and a “prostitute” was just what the nation needed to begin healing after this unfortunate miscommunication “that distracted from the point I was trying to make,” as Rush bravely put it. This magnanimous act of humility and recompense not only touched us all but inspired me to look within myself and think about young people I had recently called a “slut” or “round heel” or just an ordinary “prostitute” —and made me want to offer them an apology too. “For distracting from my point.” And I have Rush Limbaugh to thank for that.
In fact, I’d like to call on all Americans who have recently defamed a young person they didn’t know by calling them a vulgar and despicable name, to reconsider your words and offer that young person a heartfelt apology. In honor of Rush’s statesman-like profile in courage and teaching example that no matter how right you are, you shouldn’t share every personal insult publicly.
Think of it. The person that would chose to identify himself with this crashing, jarring adjective would be a person more naturally aligned with the showmanship of Barnum & Bailey than with the thoughtful commentary of, say, McNeill/Lehrer. Which is why I didn’t consider Rush calling a young lady a “slut” reason enough to be up in arms. When Rush is not attempting to offend and provoke, he is committing a form of carnival malpractice. That is his venue and his point….to shock, inflame, and thrust through his enemy….but we forget Rush is not really a gladiator. He is more of a vaudevillian. He is like an immobile and aging warrior who has become a form of public curiosity by his knack for squeezing all of his internal frustrations to the pointy tip of his tongue. We want to watch and hear what that looks and sounds like. So we watch Rush, the secluded man in a cage, so it seems, talk to himself on his jerky webcam. And gladly pay. It is the “Bearded Lady” except instead of a physical oddity breaching the bounds of human decency it is the “Shouting Man” who seems almost crazed at times and who with his eruptive personal pronouncements against perceived enemies breaches the bounds of human decency in a different way. R Read the rest of…
All families need stories that make them better than they really are. The key is that the have to be believable (or willing to be believed) and told by a credible elder of the family. Usually repeatedly. When I was about 14 and felt about as confused and insecure as, well, a 14 year old should, I was alone with my grandmother (Mamaw) and struck up a conversation that had great potential. We were watching TV at her house and she was eating a PB&J sandwich and half paying attention to me. I loved her more than about anyone. She told things like they were. She lived in Muhlenberg County and although she never finished high school, I always felt she was smarter and wiser than my other grandma who was Phi Beta Kappa. Plus, I was her favorite grandchild. I’d been hearing about other kids at school who were making straight A’s and were National Merit Scholars and geniuses so on. “Mamaw,” I asked, “You know how some kids are gifted intellectually?” “Oh, I suppose. Your Uncle Jim Bob was.” (Jim Bob was her son and she liked him more than even me.), she replied predictably. “What about the grandchildren, though?” Mamaw? “What do you mean?” she asked. “Well, when we were younger did any of us seem, you know, kinda gifted or especially bright or special in some way?” My grandmother took a bite of her sandwich and without ever looking away from the TV responded lovingly (in her own way), “Well, none of you were retarded or anything like that, if that’s what you mean.” That ended the conversation as well as my hopes of being gifted at anything. I never got to tell her that wasn’t what I meant. But I always loved her—even after that. And sometimes the gift of loving candor is better than being gifted at some random skill anyway. |
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