By Eugene Robinson —Even in the midst of a terrible natural disaster, spiriting away a busload of kids -- with vague plans to worry about the "paperwork" later -- is no act of charity.
By Chris Hedges —The greatest danger to our security comes not from al-Qaida but the thousands of shadowy mercenaries, kidnappers, killers and torturers our government employs around the globe.
They’re not called the “culture wars” for nothing, but still, the fact that Focus on the Family spent precious seconds of prime Super Bowl advertising airtime (and lots of money) on the abortion debate is a telling reminder that America has some issues, and deeply divisive ones at that.
No, it’s not shaped like a boot, but a new Italian-themed McDonald’s sandwich with the straightforward moniker “McItaly” is causing a stir in Italy, where even the nation’s agriculture minister has weighed in on the controversy. For the record, he endorses the burger and thinks those who oppose it are “ignorant Stalinists.”
This is—no joke—how Sarah Palin began her speech to the tea partiers: “I am so proud to be an American. Thank you so much for being here tonight. Do you love your freedom?” She then thanked the troops for her freedom, repeated that she was proud to be an American and said, “Happy birthday, Ronald Reagan!”
Everyone’s going nuts for functional MRI in research circles these days, it seems. Why, a bunch of wacky neuroscientists from Dartmouth College have even used the technology to study what happens when we humans find something funny.
Steven Spielberg’s big-screen adaptation of “The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn” is in the postproduction stage—yet another sign that the appeal of Belgian cartoonist Hergé‘s Tintin is as timeless as his globe-trotting perma-adolescent wunderkind. However, as Pierre Assouline points out in his new book “Hergé: The Man Who Created Tintin,” Tintin led a far more colorful life than his creator (born Georges Remi) did.
Would any pregnant woman want American viewing audiences to decide whether she should keep or abort her baby? Luckily, even the producers of the new Web-based show “Bump” know that that kind of programming wouldn’t fly, but they did go so far as to dramatize that idea by using actors in various prenatal scenarios to stage their stories for an online voting audience.
Even in the midst of a terrible natural disaster, spiriting away a busload of kids—with vague plans to worry about the “paperwork” later—is no act of charity.
The conviction of the Pakistani neuroscientist Aafia Siddiqui in New York last week of trying to kill American military officers and FBI agents illustrates that the greatest danger to our security comes not from al-Qaida but the thousands of shadowy mercenaries, kidnappers, killers and torturers our government employs around the globe.
Some Senate Democratic moderates are petrified that Republicans will make terrible trouble if health care is passed through the “reconciliation process.” If Democrats are that intimidated by Republicans, they should just give up their majority.
Jenny Sanford was my role model, until I read her book. I once wrote that the wife of South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford offered “a new and improved version of the betrayed political spouse—neither enabler nor victim.” I was wrong.
A friend of mine once had a Toyota that wouldn’t die. The odometer had only a dim recollection of passing 100,000 miles, the body was dinged and the paint was faded and the interior was worn, but the thing just kept running. He finally parked it at the airport, removed the plates and walked away.
Colorado Springs, a laboratory of conservative anti-tax policies, is beginning to reek of economic death. The city is losing cops, firefighters, buses and parks while residents are moving into tent ghettos.
The creator of “iBailout!!” says he wants to put his socially conscious games in front of a mainstream audience that might not normally engage with politics and activism.
The most revealing moments in President Obama’s State of the Union address were not in his remarks, but the reaction to them by those listening on the Republican side of the aisle.
A transfer of billions of dollars in federal aid from public projects in Puerto Rico to one of the world’s largest liquor conglomerates over the next 30 years continues to move forward without any objection from Congress.
A lot of people have said in recent weeks that the space agency simply lacks the chutzpah that put a man on a moon. Figure out global warming? Boring, they say. The Onion has come up with a satirical solution that just might blow your minds: Project Spaceman, the David Bowie-inspired Glam Space Program. (continued)
Thanks to the lousy weather pummeling the nation’s capital, Congress is taking some time off. The House canceled all business pending bluer skies, while the Senate convened for a whole five minutes Monday. As of this posting, there is a 100 percent chance of snow in the forecast for Tuesday and Wednesday.
Police have charged an American soldier with assaulting his young daughter. Specifically, Joshua Tabor of Tacoma, Wash., is reported to have waterboarded his 4-year-old three or four times because she was afraid of water and had trouble with her ABCs.
Google has been pretty successful at just about everything its engineers have attempted, with the glaring exception of social media. Still getting trounced by Facebook and losing buzzshare to upstarts like Twitter and Foursquare, the company plans to get aggressive, starting with new social features in Gmail. (continued)
After serving almost exactly 36 years in the United States Congress, Rep. John Murtha of Pennsylvania has died. He had been in intensive care following gall bladder surgery. He was the first Vietnam War veteran elected to Congress. (continued)
There are few single statements that have the power to evoke terror and delight in the same breath, but surely this is one of them: On “Fox News Sunday,” the channel’s own political commentator and tea-party headliner Sarah Palin opined “that it would be absurd not to consider” a run for the White House in 2012.
In case it wasn’t made perfectly clear in recent months how the American political system actually operates on its uppermost levels, here we have an object lesson to consider: Upset by the notion that the Obama administration might be working on regulating the financial industry next, some of Wall Street’s bigwigs are now focusing their funding efforts on the GOP.
John Thain is back. The ex-CEO of Merrill Lynch, who also once held top posts at Goldman Sachs and the New York Stock Exchange, has returned to the Wall Street fold, this time as chairman and CEO of the CIT Group. However, this time, one imagines, he won’t have a $35K commode at his disposal.
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