He's almost twice as popular as BP!

According to the the NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, Barack Obama's numbers are down but they're not as bad as the approval ratings for Congress and a number of other government agencies. But you know whose numbers are really down? BP has a favorable rating of 6%. That's six. Half a dozen. Two times three.

By contrast, O.J. Simpson has an approval rating of 11%. But here's the odd thing. I can almost understand Simpson's number. There are people in this world who think he didn't murder his ex-wife and Ron Goldman…that he was wronged, framed, ruined, whatever. I think they're either ninnies or largely unfamiliar with the details of the case, but I understand how there could be the 11%.

But the 6% who like BP…where are they coming from? Do they think Shell put all that oil into the gulf and arranged for Mark Fuhrman to plant a bloody glove so BP would take the blame? Maybe they're stockholders. If I were a stockholder in BP, I think I'd be royally pissed at its management but I'd probably say nice things about the company to pollsters.

Really, who are these people? I know they didn't poll Congress because the number there would be a lot higher than 6%.

I'm guessing the 6% are mostly people who think it was just one of those silly little mistakes that can happen to anybody who doesn't invest in minimal safety precautions. In a strange way, it's probably comforting to the BP execs. I mean, they don't have to worry about doing something foolish and hurting their reputation. Tomorrow, the members of the Board of Directors could all go out and molest nuns and their rating would only drop to like 5.5%.

The article says that the poll has only gotten a few lower ratings of anyone or anything. Saddam Hussein and Fidel Castro each clock in at 3%…which gives me a great idea for the new BP ad campaign: "As popular as Saddam Hussein and Fidel Castro combined!" If I were them, I'd spend a couple of billion on commercials and billboards spreading that slogan. It would be a much better investment than, say, actually cleaning up their mess.

Number four in a series…

And here's Fred Kaplan's take on the whole McChrystal magilla.

Here's a link to the Rolling Stone article by Michael Hastings that's causing so much talk. It's about General Stanley McChrystal — as of this moment, the commander of all U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan. As a result of this piece, that could change any minute.

Here's another article about the idea of putting a high-speed train between Los Angeles and Las Vegas. The DesertXpress one sounds like about the dumbest, certain-to-fail idea I could imagine. It would carry passengers to and from Vegas but would go no farther west than Victorville, which is about 80 miles east of Los Angeles. What they don't seem to get is that that's the difficult 80 mile part of the trip from L.A. to Vegas. The appeal of a rail system to Vegas would be to be able to avoid the bumper-2-bumper trudge to get out of Los Angeles…and you'd have to go through that to get to Victorville and pick up the train there. You'd also be leaving your car in a very strange place. The main competing proposal wouldn't go from L.A. to Vegas, either. Angelenos would have to drive to Anaheim to pick it up…and wouldn't.

I'm thinking an L.A./Vegas high-speed train would be great. But I'm not going to see a useful one in my lifetime.

As Matt Zoller Seitz notes, Jon Stewart and The Daily Show have been giving it to Obama pretty good lately, proving their rapier is, to coin a term, Fair and Balanced. This is one of those things the right-wing will never admit but there it is.

As everyone this side of Mel Cooley has pointed out to me, I screwed up in the previous item. The complete DVD set of The Dick Van Dyke Show is 25 DVDs covering five seasons. It is not a 5-DVD set. I was confused because everyone around me lately is eating walnuts…and I keep hearing this weird music…and Ohmigod, my thumbs have disappeared!

They say it's only a one-day sale but one day is enough if you're reading this today. Amazon is selling the complete DVD set of The Dick Van Dyke Show for $74 and it qualifies for free shipping. That's the 5 DVD set which ordinarily retails for $250. This is really a splendid set of a splendid series so you might want to take advantage of this link before the price reverts to whatever it'll be tomorrow. Yesterday, it was $182.

And in case you don't know how this works: If you buy it by going through that link, this site receives a tiny cut of not only the $74 but on any additional items you might purchase from Amazon during the same visit. So while you're there, shop around. Friendly hint: You could use a new Rolex because that old one's beginning to look a little shabby.

You know what's missing for me when I go into a gas station to fill up my tank? Show tunes. I always find myself longing to see 30 seconds of some current Broadway musical on a tiny screen right above the little computer readout that tells me I just paid sixty bucks for Super Unleaded.

Well, all that is about to change…

PumpTop TV Showcases The Bright Lights
Of Broadway at The Gas Pump

PumpTop TV and The Broadway Channel® Announce Partnership Showcasing The Biggest Shows On Broadway On Nation's Leading At-The-Pump Network

Irvine, CA — PumpTop TV and The Broadway Channel® announced a partnership today that will give millions of motorists around the country an inside look at some of the hottest shows on Broadway. The partnership will bring high quality 30-second clips of some of the biggest names on Broadway to the PumpTop TV network, which reaches millions of motorists each month at gas stations across the country.

PumpTop TV will feature national and localized content for Broadway and touring Broadway shows, with targeted theatrical content for the New York and Los Angeles markets. The partnership will lead off with an inside look at the Tony Award winning rock opera, American Idiot, which is currently playing on Broadway. American Idiot tells the exhilarating story of a new generation of young Americans as they struggle to find meaning in a post-9/11 world, performed along with Green Day's Grammy winning and electrifying score. The Broadway Channel has provided a 30 second clip showcasing this exciting new musical.

Shows that will be touring nationally will have local show date information in the banners, like Mary Poppins, which will be airing on PumpTop TV later this month. Mary Poppins is the Tony Award winning "family fun" musical that is currently on Broadway and also on tour nationwide.

Matthew Hege, Vice President of The Broadway Channel stated, "We are excited about our partnership and for providing unique and entertaining Broadway content to PumpTV's captivating audience; we are engaging with Broadway audiences in all directions!"

Doug Woo, Executive Vice President of AdtekMedia, the parent company of PumpTop TV, added, "It is extremely important for us to provide our viewers with dynamic and interesting content to make their experience at the pump entertaining, informative and enjoyable. We feel that The Broadway Channel is a perfect fit for PumpTop TV and allows us to demonstrate our unique ability to target specific markets with personalized content relevant to that area, especially in the Los Angeles and New York markets. PumpTop TV is extremely excited about the opportunity to partner with The Broadway Channel."

New York Times obit for Al Williamson. Have all the tributes and memorials sufficiently made the point that in addition to being a great artist, he was also just plain a great guy?

As you may know, the San Diego Padres play at Petco Park, which is right next to the convention center where the Comic-Con is held. They put it there because they thought the traffic and parking weren't quite bad enough when we're in town. (But hey, it would be worse in L.A., next door to the Staples Center.)

The Padres are away from S.D. the week of Comic-Con. They'll be in Atlanta and Pittsburgh, which should be about where the nearest vacant hotel rooms will be available. However, the Friday night before the con — July 16 — the Padres are playing the Arizona Diamondbacks at Petco Park and they're advertising it's Comic-Con Night. Douglass Abramson, a devout reader of this site, told me about it and he doesn't know what it means, either. Maybe all the players on one team will be dressed as Klingons and all the ones on the other will be dressed as The Joker and for the seventh-inning stretch, I'll go down onto the field and host a panel.