Month: October 2010

#rsrh QotD, ‘It’s a HORSE FILM’ edition.

John Nolte (via Ed Driscoll), on a Salon review of new Disney flick Secretariat that reads like someone had lost a bet:

Wow! Cross burning, xenophobia, Leni Riefenstahl, master-race, and whiteness and power, all in a review of a harmless little family flick about a horse. There’s part of me that admires O’Hehir’s ability to summon that kind of rage. Where was he when I couldn’t pull those grocery carts apart?

John’s not kidding; all of those terms are in the review.  Apparently, in this flick Secretariat was a member of ODESSA* – which, ironically, would have made me more likely to watch the film if only the director had had the courage to pursue his inner vision to such an extent.  Or something like that.

Moe Lane

*The Odessa File was actually pretty good, for a potboiler.

#rsrh @maddow, come on over to the Dark Side.

We have cookies.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zj0YS9RS3Lk

I’m not saying that you have to go Full Metal Pachyderm or anything; but come on. Wouldn’t you rather see Rand Paul in that Senate seat? Honestly and truly? At least he’s not insulting your intelligence like the way that this Conway guy is.

Seriously.  One little bit of independence from the Democratic party line won’t do you any harm.

Moe Lane

PS: Rand Paul for Senate.

Moe Lane

The Inexorable McMahon Job-Creation Ad.

If you missed Dick Blumenthal’s incredibly clueless answer to Linda McMahon’s simple question “How do you create a job?” at the last debate, don’t worry: the McMahon campaign has had boiled it down to a television ad.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ovIBLQyl7HE&feature=player_embedded

And in the process they managed to do what was I would have thought would be the impossible; they managed to cram two minutes of idiocy into a thirty second clip. Including Blumenthal’s rictus grin; as God is my witness, when I watched that originally I fully expected Dick to end his ‘response’ with the happy declaration that he had just done a Number Two in his pants. Continue reading The Inexorable McMahon Job-Creation Ad.

#rsrh Random act of political… optimism?

I got nothing really to base this off of, and I’m writing this while RCP is downgrading the seat – but it feels like Gillibrand’s lead is perilously (to her) shaky and could collapse at any reversal, darn it.  Then again, I’ve always been less willing than many to concede NY, so that may be coloring my perceptions.

Anyway.  DioGuardi for [Senate].  [And here I was happy to have gotten the name spelled right. Thanks, Constant Reader IJB.]

#rsrh BLS unemployment survey out soon…

…the last one before the election. Nobody’s expecting anything much in the way of short-term news, but apparently they’re going to have revisions to the non-farm employment numbers from April 2009 to March 2010.  Translation: the current unemployment rate probably won’t go up or down much, but past ones might*.  Remember, might: also remember, we want good news.  People are hurting out there, and somebody needs to care about that, even if the current ruling party apparently doesn’t.

Moe Lane

*As MarketWatch puts it, “Friday’s new numbers could vastly alter perceptions of labor conditions. They may also change perceptions of how well the stimulus legislation worked as a job-creating program.”  It would certainly be nice if the numbers were better than we thought…

Movie of the Week: Sleepy Hollow.

I quite liked Sleepy Hollow, actually: Tim Burton’s always interesting, even if he’s sometimes a little uneven, and the movie had nice sensibilities to it.  Also, Christopher Walken.  Besides, it’s October, so maybe it’s time to do a little of the horror genre for these things.

And so, adieu to Iron Man 2.  Which had been up there for a while, really.

Connecting the dots on the Missouri wind farm payoff.

The video is largely self-explanatory, but here is the time-line, with links.

Democratic Death Panel Watch, 10/07/2010.

Via Hotline, here are the latest races where the DCCC has begun the euthanasia process:

  • AZ-08.  The incumbent is Gabrielle Giffords, facing Jesse Kelly.  The DCCC has cut one week’s worth of ad buys, claiming that Giffords doesn’t need its help.  Cook rates this race as Leans Democratic; polling is very sparse, but shows a tie.
  • CO-04.  The incumbent is Betsy Markey (yes, the one who has her supporters babbling about internment camps): her opponent is Cory Gardner.  They’ve cut back her outside ads, probably because she can’t get any traction (and has supporters babbling about internment camps).  Cook rates this race as Toss-Up: the most recent polling shows Gardner ahead.
  • FL-24.  The incumbent is Suzanne Kosmas; her opponent is Sandy Adams.  Like Markey, her outside ads have been cut.  The DCCC is claiming to be planning to still match the NRCC’s buys there. Cook rates this race as Toss-Up: there is no recent polling, but RCP lists the seat as Leans GOP.
  • KS-03.  Open seat.  Democratic candidate Stephene Moore, facing Republican candidate Kevin Yoder.  The DCCC has canceled one week’s worth of ad buys. Cook rates this race as Leans Republican: there is no recent polling, but RCP lists the seat as Leans GOP.
  • NM-02.  The incumbent is Harry Teague; his opponent is Steve Pearce.  Here the DCCC is moving its ad buys down a week in either an attempt to firewall, or as a preliminary to canceling them altogether. Cook rates this race as Toss-Up: the most recent polling has Pearce ahead.

There’s also LA-02, but that might legitimately be the DCCC thinking that they don’t need to worry about that race. The article also mentions IN-08 and TX-17, but that were covered a couple of days ago. Continue reading Democratic Death Panel Watch, 10/07/2010.