...because God knows you need some satisfaction in life besides shagging Captain Cardboard! And I never really liked you anyway. And you have stupid hair!

Spike ,'Selfless'


Natter 60: Gone In 60 Seconds  

Off-topic discussion. Wanna talk about corsets, duct tape, or physics? This is the place. Detailed discussion of any current-season TV must be whitefonted.


Gudanov - Sep 22, 2008 9:20:54 am PDT #9911 of 10003
Coding and Sleeping

Barack and Michelle Obama have one car, a Ford Escape hybrid.

I believe the Ford Escape is the mandatory candidate car, American and a Hybrid! I think he had a Chrysler 300 before running.


Burrell - Sep 22, 2008 9:22:54 am PDT #9912 of 10003
Why did Darth Vader cross the road? To get to the Dark Side!

I thought that was the super power that brought down the 50-foot woman.

No, that was menstrual cramps.


erikaj - Sep 22, 2008 9:39:13 am PDT #9913 of 10003
Always Anti-fascist!

Go Emmy winning Ed Danvers! He was good in the half of Damages I managed to watch, but I've always thought he was good...I don't know what, like, pushed him over. Yeah, I agree. That hybrid sees a lot of action.


brenda m - Sep 22, 2008 9:53:48 am PDT #9914 of 10003
If you're going through hell/keep on going/don't slow down/keep your fear from showing/you might be gone/'fore the devil even knows you're there

Tom, that at least explains where Fringe is getting their plotlines.


Frankenbuddha - Sep 22, 2008 10:01:47 am PDT #9915 of 10003
"We are the Goon Squad and we're coming to town...Beep! Beep!" - David Bowie, "Fashion"

Allyson - a couple of words occurred to me. How about "twit" or "git"?


JenP - Sep 22, 2008 10:02:21 am PDT #9916 of 10003

Hee. A cute guy with Ronon Dex hair just winked at me as he rode by on his bike. Some days it's the little things.


Kathy A - Sep 22, 2008 10:11:09 am PDT #9917 of 10003
We're very stretchy. - Connie Neil

A well-written tribute to the cops of Chicago.

(I'd probably disagree with his "only in Chicago" line, though--I'm sure there are just as great and singular cops everywhere in the world.)


sumi - Sep 22, 2008 10:13:05 am PDT #9918 of 10003
Art Crawl!!!

BSG related tidbit from Watch with Kristin:

BATTLESTAR GALACTICA: The ragtag fleet reassembles! According to Grace Park (love her!) at the EW party, several Battlestar Galactica castmembers—including Park herself, her real-life husband and her onscreen BSG husband, Tahmoh Penikett—are living at Jamie Bamber's house in Studio City while Family Bamber is in London for Bamber's gig on Law & Order: UK. And over at the Los Angeles


tommyrot - Sep 22, 2008 10:13:09 am PDT #9919 of 10003
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

Some stuff on this bailout thing:

Yet a critical - and radical - component of this bailout package has thus far failed to garner the serious attention of anyone in the press. Section 8 (which ironically reminds one of the popular name of the portion of the 1937 Housing Act that paved the way for subsidized affordable housing ) of this legislation is just a single sentence of thirty-two words, but it represents a significant consolidation of power and an abdication of oversight authority that's so flat-out astounding that it ought to set one's hair on fire. It reads, in its entirety:

Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.

In short, the so-called "mother of all bailouts," which will transfer $700 billion taxpayer dollars to purchase the distressed assets of several failed financial institutions, will be conducted in a manner unchallengeable by courts and ungovernable by the People's duly sworn representatives. All decision-making power will be consolidated into the Executive Branch - who, we remind you, will have the incentive to act upon this privilege as quickly as possible, before they leave office. The measure will run up the budget deficit by a significant amount, with no guarantee of recouping the outlay, and no fundamental means of holding those who fail to do so accountable.

Is this starting to sound familiar? Robert Kuttner cuts through much of the gloss in an article in today's American Prospect:

The deal proposed by Paulson is nothing short of outrageous. It includes no oversight of his own closed-door operations. It merely gives congressional blessing and funding to what he has already been doing, ad hoc. He plans to retain Wall Street firms as advisors to decide just how to cut deals to value and mop up Wall Street's dubious paper. There are to be no limits on executive compensation for the firms that get relief, and no equity share for the government in exchange for this massive infusion of capital....

The differences between this proposed bailout and the three closest historical equivalents are immense. When the Reconstruction Finance Corporation of the 1930s pumped a total of $35 billion into U.S. corporations and financial institutions, there was close government supervision and quid pro quos at every step of the way. Much of the time, the RFC became a preferred shareholder, and often appointed board members. The Home Owners Loan Corporation, which eventually refinanced one in five mortgage loans, did not operate to bail out banks but to save homeowners. And the Resolution Trust Corporation of the 1980s, created to mop up the damage of the first speculative mortgage meltdown, the S&L collapse, did not pump in money to rescue bad investments; it sorted out good assets from bad after the fact, and made sure to purge bad executives as well as bad loans. And all three of these historic cases of public recapitalization were done without suspending judicial review.

So basically, we're giving this guy $700,000,000,000 to play with, with no oversight.

Dirty Secret Of The Bailout: Thirty-Two Words That None Dare Utter


Kathy A - Sep 22, 2008 10:19:06 am PDT #9920 of 10003
We're very stretchy. - Connie Neil

How did I not know that Grace Park and Tahmoh Penikett are married? I'm really out of the geekTV gossip loop!