Month: August 2009

The only credible individual in the whole Palin soap opera is Levi Johnston. Levi is making the most of his opportunity:

"People might criticize him and say, "Well, hey, he is trying to get his 15 minutes of fame. If I was him, I would get 15 and an hour and a week and month and a year. Because he did not ask to be put in this situation. This is the cards that was dealt to him. So now what do he do? Go work at McDonalds? So people can ask him, as he makes $8 an hour, "Hey, how's Sarah Palin? How's Bristol?"

No, it wasn't going to be that way. Levi didn't want revenge, he just wanted to make something of himself, Tank said.

Levi glanced sideways at a table behind us where some might have been taking pictures of him with their phones. I asked them what kind of offer they were hoping for. They started throwing out ideas. A book. A movie. Levi wasn't opposed to modeling underwear for Calvin Klein. Maybe he could host something, he suggested. But on second thought he didn't want to do it alone.

"We gonna make our own show one day," he told Tank. "I don't know what it's gonna be, but it's gonna be sweet, I'm telling you."

My italics. There's a slide-show here. His peeps are really cool. Unlike you-know-who's. The last words on the slide-show? "The truth will finally be told."

A real-life version of this controversial South Park scene:

Oy.

(Hat tip: Buzzfeed)

Some interesting thoughts here. Money quote:

The avalanches of traffic from bigger blogs have also apparently become less frequent. The Dish is way up over last year at this point, but we seem to be an outlier. I don't buy the idea that the blogosphere has been coopted by the MSM. In many ways, we've coopted them. But if the joy of amateur blogging is receding, that would be an enormous loss.

Major pwnage commences at the 4:20 mark:

A fascinating interview with a conservative defender of individual freedom and civil rights. Money quote:

I hope some people will open their eyes to the decency of getting to the point where we allow gay and lesbian individuals to be married and have a happy life… I am getting comments from some segments of the society who feel that it’s the wrong thing to do and I’m betraying the conservative cause and things that I’ve stood for in my life. Some of it is quite hostile. But that goes with the territory. On the other hand, I’m hearing from people, including plenty of Republicans, who are very, very grateful. It has been overwhelmingly gratifying to hear from very decent people who are touched by the fact that we’re trying to help.

A woman came up to me in our library in our law firm and said, “You and I haven’t worked together, but I’m a lesbian. My partner and I have two children.” And she burst into tears. I put my arm around her and she put her arms around me. This stands for what we’re trying to accomplish here. It’s a principle, but it’s a principle that deeply touches human beings. If we’re successful, we can help the lives of literally millions of people. And what a great service that would be.

Indeed. Maybe one day, the current insanity on the right will moderate to a point where a humane and conservative reform can win out over the fundamentalist psyche. But not until the toxins of Rove and Fox are drained out of the system.

A pro-life group puts out a PSA:

These are controversial claims, to say the least. Paul Kennedy and Matthew Connelly wrote about overpopulation for the Atlantic years ago. Virginia Abernethy challenged Kennedy and Connelly's thesis at the time. And Connelly subsequently softened his stance . An old Salon article on this debate can be read here.

(Hat tip: Thomas Peters)

And now the student is suing:

[Justin Gawronski] was reading his copy of 1984 as a summer assignment for school, and had been using one of the Kindle's selling points—the ability to attach notes to specific parts of the e-book text—to prepare for his return to school. Since he was actively reading the work when Amazon pulled the plug, he actually got to watch the work vanish from his screen.

The Dish linked to this portrayal of freezer food as photography yesterday. It has its forebears, most notably William Egglestone's pioneering work.

His latest statement on the torture and show-trials organized by the regime:

The teeth of the torturers and confession-extorters have reached to the bones of the people. Witnessing such trumped-up trials, the only judgment that the conscience of humanity can make is the moral collapse and discredit of its directors.

A wounded Israeli is evacuated following a shooting attack at a gay-lesbian community house in Tel Aviv on August 1, 2009. The incident took place at a time during which teenagers belonging to the gay community were holding a meeting. Israeli paramedics have reported two people dead and least ten people have been wounded, six of them seriously. Dish details here. By Roni Schutzer/AFP/Getty and Israel OUT.