I'm a big political junkie, even though I rarely discuss my own political views. But there comes a point when even the biggest fans of something will say "enough!" And I think I'm there ( Read more... )

Watching the evening news on ABC, a couple of stories caught my attention. They led off the broadcast with the skyrocketing price of gasoline, to the point that the reporter, at the end of the taped segment, said "Look at that. Just in the three minutes our tape was playing, the price of gas at this gas station in Los Angeles went up ten cents a ( Read more... )

I just sent the following comment to ABC News, regarding this evening's broadcast, and thought I'd share it more widely. Mind you, I'm not commenting (here) on the fact that the taxpayers shouldn't be paying for the primaries at all (let the political parties pay for them), but on the newscast itself. Agree? Disagree ( Read more... )

Thanks to Dad for this link: http://www.abc.net.au/news/events/japan-quake-2011/beforeafter.htm . Australian television offers a series of satellite photos of Japan, showing the effects of the earthquake/tsunami. Slide your mouse over the pics to see ( Read more... )

I just read James Poniewozik's column in the latest issue of Time (well, it's actually the 17 January 2011 issue, but it arrived today). It's also available online here. I was going to link to it to say it's a nice comparison of Twitter to the CB radios of the 1970s. But before I was able to get to that link, I found this article, which says the ( Read more... )

I was reading Ellen Reiss' editorial in the current The Right of Aesthetic Realism to Be Known (from the Aesthetic Realism Foundation), which talks about the Gulf Oil Spill, and attributes it to corporate greed overwhelming public good. And I keep hearing similar complaints from most every source out there: the evil oil giant BP tried to squeeze ( Read more... )

The public outrage over the Israeli military's attack on a blockade-running flotilla headed for the Gaza Strip would be a lot more convincing if the cheerleaders heading that outrage-the news media-were a bit more equal in slinging about their condemnation.

Where was the outrage when Turkish warplanes yet again bombed Kurds in Iraq? Well, no, ( Read more... )

I'm so far behind that I only just found this news (I'm assuming pretty much everyone else in the world knows about it, but on the off-chance that it's new for someone else...):

Scientists create a living organism: so says CNN.com. The actual report is available for free online from Science: Creation of a Bacterial Cell Controlled by a Chemically ( Read more... )

We just watched the local ABC News programs "special investigative report" about a spate of marriages that took place in Harrison, New York. Apparently five times as many marriages as usual in the space of a month, and all of them men with middle eastern names and women from New York City, and in the months just before September 2001. Sounds ( Read more... )

If, every time the newscaster mentions tomorrow's New York City Marathon, he calls it "The ING New York City Marathon", has he stopped reporting the news for instead broadcasting an advertisement? I find it a little annoying. Then again, I also don't like calling New Shea Stadium "City Field ( Read more... )