Politics

Supporting the Writers Guild Strike

I'm in full support of the 10-day-old Writers Guild strike, which you can follow by reading their strike blog United Hollywood and television writer Mark Evanier's News From Me blog. There's a lot of money being made in DVD sales and online viewing of TV shows, and writers get bupkiss, as Lost head writer Damon Lindelof explains: My show, Lost, has been streamed hundreds of millions of times since it was made available on ABC's Web site. The downloads require the viewer to first watch an ... (read more)

2007/11/15

Obama Hits Wrong Note with National Anthem

Of all the presidential candidates to make their feelings known about symbolic expressions of patriotism like flag lapel pins and the National Anthem, none has been more candid than Sen. Barack Obama -- hands down. In early October, Obama told a TV reporter in Iowa that he had made a conscious decision to stop wearing a flag pin on his lapel, a standard fashion accessory for American politicians since 9/11. "You know, the truth is that right after 9/11, I had a pin," Obama said. "Shortly after ... (read more)

2007/11/08

Ron Paul: The $4.2 Million Dollar Man

I gave $25 to Ron Paul Monday because I couldn't resist being part of the largest grass-roots fundraising day in the history of American politics. The libertarian Republican raised $4.2 million from 37,000 contributors, according to a final tally provided to USA Today, from an effort that wasn't even organized by the campaign. The idea to raise his profile with a "money bomb" on Nov. 5 was the brainchild of Trevor Lyman, the publisher of ThisNovember5th.Com. Lyman adopted the incendiary ... (read more)

2007/11/07

Clinton Skirted Questions in Philly Debate

I caught the last 90 minutes of the Democratic presidential debate at Drexel University Tuesday night, which told me that Hillary Clinton thinks she can win the nomination without telling anyone what she'll do if elected. Clinton had a commanding demeanor throughout the night, despite taking shots from every other candidate except for Bill Richardson, who appeared to be running for vice president with one of his answers. "I'm hearing this holier than thou attitude towards Senator Clinton, and ... (read more)

2007/10/31

Running for President, One Spam at a Time

I don't know who I'm going to vote for in the 2008 presidential election, but I've given small donations to both John Edwards and Barack Obama in response to specific initiatives I thought worthy of support, so I'm on their mailing lists. They both send personalized emails frequently, like the one I just got from Obama: Rogers, I'm leaving the Tonight Show studio and I wanted to share something. Jay Leno just asked if it bothers me that some of the Washington pundits are declaring Hillary ... (read more)

2007/10/18

'Kid Nation' Contestants Rip Into President Bush

You know things are going bad for the president when he can't escape his problems on reality TV. The CBS series Kid Nation gave each of its 40 contestants, children aged 8 to 14, a chance to answer the question "Who are some of the worst presidents and why?" Here's the response that Sophia, a 14-year-old Florida teen, posted on the CBS web site: I think George W. Bush takes the cake. The planet is disintegrating, we’re fighting an unnecessary war, millions are without health care, the school ... (read more)

2007/09/20

Men's Restroom Etiquette for Dummies (and Senators)

I like Alex Dering's take on Idaho Sen. Larry Craig's clumsy attempt to form a rump caucus in the men's restroom at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport: For all the men in the audience. Does the description of Larry Craig's actions sound like anything you would do in a public bathroom? I'm pretty sure the gay, the straight, the bi-curious, the hetero-transmetro-vanilla, the unsure, are all gonna answer the same way: "When I use a public bathroom I make no eye contact with anyone. I ... (read more)

2007/08/29

Republicans Made a Bad Bet Against Online Poker

The British online gambling firm PartyPoker is taking it in the shorts after the U.S. cracked down on online gambling last fall. The company lost $47 million in the past six months and saw a 70 percent drop in profits. I have an crazy theory about the 2006 mid-term elections, and I am going to share it on the principle that every American is entitled to one off-the-wall explanation for an election's outcome, per election. Forget Rush Limbaugh's cruel pantomime of Michael J. Fox, the quagmire in ... (read more)

2007/08/29

Radio Interview with Peter Boyles

I got a chance to discuss Philip Atkinson's Bush should be president for life commentary Wednesday on the Peter Boyles Show, a talk radio program that's huge in Colorado. As a former Denver resident, I had to fight the urge to do shoutouts to my old coworkers at Zing Systems (failed interactive TV company) and DiveIn (failed city portal site). To get it out of my system, word to Jonathan Bourne, Phil Weinstock, Don Wrege, Lev Lawrence, Stefanie Lerner, Meg Cardamone, Andrew Borakove and Jeff ... (read more)

2007/08/25

Big Encyclopedia is Watching You

On July 11, Wikipedia accused me of censoring right-wingers on the Drudge Retort: Cadenhead actively supports liberal causes by removing rightwing commentary he disapproves of, and bans some posters to his sites because they are too effective in discrediting liberal correspondents. Naturally these efforts are rationalized as necessary for political correctness. Wikipedia changed its mind four hours later, but the claim has found its way to the all-seeing Eye on Winer, where McD makes this ... (read more)

2007/08/21