Thursday, October 16, 2003

The Peter Paul Case

Here's the latest.

• Posted at 4:56 PM · LINK

Recommended Reading

Michael Kinsley on where our president gets his news.

• Posted at 1:04 PM · LINK

Leaks

I cribbed this from Atrios, who is one of the leading left-wing bloggers. It's a paragraph from an honest-to-God news item...

Bush told his senior aides Tuesday that he "didn't want to see any stories" quoting unnamed administration officials in the media anymore, and that if he did, there would be consequences, said a senior administration official who asked that his name not be used.

Wouldn't it be embarrassing to be the guy who got fired for leaking that one?

• Posted at 12:35 PM · LINK

Comic Strips on Parade

Clark J. Holloway has some great web pages about comic strips. Here's a terrific history of Bringing Up Father (aka "Maggie and Jiggs"). And here's another one devoted to Alley Oop.

• Posted at 3:30 AM · LINK

Great Nixon Quotes

Someone just sent me a transcript of the 1978 Playboy magazine interview with David Frost. This was conducted just after Frost had conducted his historic interviews of Richard M. Nixon. To Playboy, he told the following anecdote which I've always thought was indicative of something quite amazing (I'm not sure what) about our thirty-seventh president...

Small talk, of course, is never easy with Nixon. For instance, one day, Nixon — wanting to be one of the boys — turned to me as we strolled in to start taping and said, "Did you do any fornicating this weekend?" And I just could not believe he'd said that. Quite apart from the fact that lovers use the word fornicating about as regularly as newsmen say, "Well, we've managed to trivialize matters again tonight, Henry." I mean, I just couldn't believe it. One almost had to warm to the sheer clumsiness of it all. It really did fascinate me that Nixon could have gotten through 30 years of politics, of attending countless fund raisers and such, and still be so bad at small talk.

One thing that's interesting about it is that as the transcripts of the infamous White House tapes show, Nixon was not at all reticent about using the more common "f" word around his buddies and underlings. Leaving aside the question of why he would even inquire about David Frost's sexual exploits, you have to wonder why the choice of the word, "fornicating?" Was it because Frost was British? Did he talk to Margaret Thatcher that way?

• Posted at 3:24 AM · LINK

Recommended Reading

I haven't mentioned Spinsanity lately so here's a mention of the most rational political site on the web. The folks there debunk and fact-check articles and speeches by prominent politicos and commentators from all corners of the political spectrum. They just posted a bunch of articles that catch Michael Moore, Bill O'Reilly and William Safire distorting the truth, as well as various people who've recently attacked Wesley Clark and John Ashcroft with bogus data. I wish there were more websites that could recognize bullshit from other than their political opponents.

• Posted at 3:06 AM · LINK