Music
Recent iTunes purchases
* "All Alone" by Julie London * "Brimful of Asha" by Cornershop * "You, Me and the Bourgeoisie" by The Submarines * "Dry the Rain" by The Beta Band * "Hi Hi Hi" by Paul McCartney & Wings
Steve Casburn
In Memoriam
Don LaFontaine, 1940-2008
Don LaFontaine, the man of a thousand trailers, died yesterday. His voice is familiar to us all, but he also got a little screen time in a recent GEICO commercial.
Music
Jerry Reed, 1937-2008
Jerry Reed, best known for his role as Snowman in "Smokey and the Bandit," died yesterday. "Smokey and the Bandit" is a great and timeless comedy. It's still hilarious after 30 years, in large part because of Reed's good ol' boy
Politics
The latest unconvincing Palin defense
In tomorrow's New York Times, David Brooks writes: When McCain met Sarah Palin last February, he was meeting the rarest of creatures, an American politician who sees the world as he does. […] Sarah Barracuda was picked because she lit up every pattern in McCain’s brain, because she
Life
The Great Vacation ends
I'm back to work in less than 12 hours. It's been a good time off. Mostly relaxing. Of the seven things I had hoped to do during the vacation, I finished two and made serious headway on a third. Round about Tuesday, my will to get
Politics
Experience and preparation
One of the defenses of John McCain's choice of Sarah Palin as his running mate is that Bill Clinton and Barack Obama were each also in their 40s and relatively inexperienced when running for President. The problem with that defense is that Clinton and Obama each prepared for
Music
Hello, Goodbye
I was sitting in the Green Dragon yesterday afternoon (with a book, in the corner, with the lights down low) when the Beatles' "Hello, Goodbye" starting playing, and I couldn't help stopping to listen to it. What a great little piece of fluff that song
Music
The DC5 has landed
The entire Dave Clark Five catalog has been out of print for more than a decade (it appears that Dave Clark just likes it like that), but one of their greatest hits albums is now available on iTunes. In case Clark changes his mind again, I have taken the precaution
Politics
The 3am phone call
To answer the question asked by that Hillary Clinton commercial… Of Obama and McCain, Obama is the one I would want to answer that 3am telephone call at the White House. Obama has the even temperament, keen intelligence, and mental vigor that I would want a leader to have when
Politics
Four campaign observations
1. The GOP is focusing on tearing down Obama rather than building up McCain. 2. To the extent that the GOP does talk about McCain, the talk rarely refers to anything he has done in the last 35 years. 3. The Democratic National Convention was well-managed, if somewhat boring.
Sports
College football season begins
The first major college football game of the season starts in about four hours. One of these years, I will get cable hooked back up, buy a big-screen TV, and lose myself in football season the way I did when I was a teenager. Every summer, I ask myself
Craftwork and wage-earning
In Book I (345e-347a) of the Republic, Socrates distinguishes between one's ability to succeed at a craft (to be a craftsman) and one's ability to succeed in being paid (to be a wage-earner); and states that the two abilities should be considered in isolation