If you have DirecTV, turn over to channel 102. You can watch ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC, CNN, Fox News, MSNBC and Comedy Central all at the same time. You can only hear the audio from one (while I've been watching, it's been ABC) but it's kind of an interesting way to look at it all. And I like the fact that they included Comedy Central. Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert are as much America's newsmen as the guys in the other boxes like Hume and Blitzer.
Also pretty good…and some of the rhetoric made a nice fit with Senator McCain's.
Well, let's see. All the networks have Obama at 338 electoral votes. If he wins Indiana or Missouri, either one could give him 11 more and he'd hit my prediction of 349. But he could win both and he's also leading in North Carolina, which I figured would go McCain on us. So maybe I underestimated the guy.
Can I just say that some of the networks spent way too much money on fancy computer graphics? Blitzer on CNN and Chuck Todd over on MSNBC looked like they were trapped in bad videogames.
I like that the victory seems to be unquestioned. For all the fears about stolen votes and malfunctioning voting machines, those concerns seem to have gone away once the returns began coming in. There'll be a few charges of vote theft (or simple ineptness) and they oughta be investigated and rectified even though they won't be numerous enough to change the outcome.
I'll think of more stuff to write in a little while. I just realized I haven't eaten.
It has a nice ring to it.
The remote software that runs this weblog decided to go rogue on me shortly after the previous posting. I wrote some pithy things that might have been funny if they'd been posted at the time but they wouldn't post. Here's what's on my mind at the moment…
In the ten minutes before polls closed in the west and CNN called the race for Obama, Wolf Blitzer kept "hinting" (with all the subtlety of a Gallagher finale) that something big would happen shortly. During this time, he also kept talking about how many people were watching CNN around the world, showing us crowd shots in Kenya and other locales. At first, I thought he was pushing too hard the idea that the whole planet is watching CNN.
And then I realized: It's not that they're watching CNN. It's that they're watching America change its government. That does not happen in every country, at least not without bloodshed. It's one of our strengths as a nation. Every so often, the citizens can get together and change the government. It reminds you that that "We, the People…" thing isn't just for show.
McCain's concession speech — obviously written, probably written some time ago — was generally classy, even if (understandably) some in his audience were not. It may be the first time I've had any respect for John McCain since he began running for President. I'm sorry we seem to live in a country where you can't talk like that until after you lose.
One of my Conservative friends is near suicidal at this moment, lamenting that America is now going to go Communist and surrender to terrorists and I think he also believes that flowers will no longer bloom in the meadow. I have suggested to him that he's suffering the pangs of believing his own bull; that one of the reasons Obama won is that most of America didn't buy all that crap about him being a Socialist or a co-conspirator with mad bombers and such, perhaps because it wasn't true.
Whoops. Obama's about to speak. I want to pay attention to this.
It's not over. McCain could still carry all the houses he owns.
There are many places on the 'net where you can follow election returns tonight but Talking Points Memo has set up an interactive map that looks — to use the most overused word in the English language during the last decade — awesome.
Over at The Huffington Post, regular columnist Robert J. Elisberg has finally (finally!) started listening to someone who makes sense. It's about time.
Here, from 1971, is the original (I think) Coca-Cola commercial based on the jingle, "I'd Like To Teach The World To Sing…" It seems dated now but still a pleasant way to spend a minute…
Since there are eight million other places on the Internet where you can read observations about the election, I feel like I should blog about old sitcoms or places to get great pizza today. How about great pizza? A couple weeks ago when Len Wein and I flew back to Columbus for Mid-Ohio Con, we had a stopover in the Phoenix airport and we shared one of those Pizza Hut pizzas-for-one. Pizza Hut usually proves the rule that franchised pizza can never be great and can at best be just (barely) adequate. But they had this new four-cheese something-or-other — some kind of deluxe thing that cost a buck or two more — and it was darned delicious. If you're stuck in an airport, be on the lookout.
Well, that's about as much as I can write without discussing the election. News reports of long lines make me glad I voted early by mail…but because I did, I feel oddly non-participatory in what looks to be a historic, nation-changing day for this nation and maybe the world. Being in California, my vote for President is largely ceremonial but there's something stirring about going into a polling place, interacting with the precinct workers and your fellow voters. I almost think I'd enjoy standing in one of those long lines today. Note the "almost."
I sure hope the election is relatively clean. As disappointing as Gore's loss in 2000 was to some of us, I think it was even more disappointing that legitimate reports of voting irregularities were trampled and ignored and in some cases, treated like after-the-fact cheating attempts. No one whose guy won seemed to have the slightest concern that some citizens who had a right to vote (and a right to have those votes honestly counted) were denied their rights. It was like, "We won so quit your whining." It's tempting to wish that Republicans would experience the victimized side of that situation but it wouldn't lead to meaningful reform. It would just escalate the slap fight.
This is not something we can or should "get over." It's something we should fix. People should not be going to the polls today, as so many are, half-convinced their ballot will be stolen or that they'll vote for Obama and the machine will decide that one black guy's like another and tally another for Alan Keyes. We'd holler Bloody Murder and it would shut down our economy if ATMs counted our money as recklessly as votes are counted in this country. And the problem seems so fixable…if only we could get past the idea that the system is only broken when it doesn't deliver for you.
I've got to get some work done today so I can devote a lot of attention this evening to the election coverage. Enjoy whatever you can of all this…and if you haven't voted yet, today might be a good day to get it over with.
Well, one way or another, tomorrow's going to be a very interesting day…
Have the networks called the election yet?
Do you know about Strike.TV? It's a website that was set up after the recent Writers Guild strike. Some of Hollywood's top talents create little videos and the revenues it generates are going to the Actors Fund's Entertainment Assistance Program, a very good cause. There are a number of great concoctions over there and I'll tempt you with this one starring Mr. Bob Newhart…
I'm sorry…I mistyped or misphrased or mis-somethinged. I said Jeannine Riley, who was in that 1967 Li'l Abner pilot, had appeared on the (then) recently-cancelled Petticoat Junction. But Petticoat Junction wasn't cancelled until 1970. Ms. Riley left the series in 1965, which is why she was available to play Daisy Mae.
Today, we're linking you to five minutes from an unsold pilot for a Li'l Abner TV series allegedly written by Al Capp. I'm supposed to be an expert on this comic strip and its many dramatizations but I don't know a whole lot about this puppy. It bears a 1966 copyright date but it aired on NBC on September 5, 1967. My understanding is that it was prepared for the syndication market, it didn't sell and NBC agreed to run the thing as filler during one of those weeks when they don't measure Nielsen ratings.
I have the vague recollection that when I researched the Abner Broadway show and movie, someone I spoke with told me that there was talk of hiring many of the same actors for a series like this but it never happened. I'm guessing that when they assembled this pilot, they decided to avoid using any of the same casting (or other elements, like the music) because then those with a financial interest in that version could have claimed financial participation in this one.
The cast ain't bad. Sammy Jackson, who'd starred not long before in the short-lived TV series, No Time for Sergeants, played Abner. Jeannine Riley, who'd appeared on the (then) recently-cancelled Petticoat Junction was Daisy Mae. Larry D. Mann — who seems to have played a guest role on every TV series ever produced — played Marryin' Sam. Judy Canova played Mammy Yokum and Jerry Lester played Pappy Yokum. In the role of Jack S. Phogbound, who you'll see a lot of in the clip, was comedian and cartoon voice actor Dave Barry. We wrote about Dave back in this post when he passed away. Robert Reed, who was a few years from starring in The Brady Bunch, had a guest role.
But it's a pretty dreary affair, starting with that generic theme music that doesn't fit a comedy, especially one with a country/hillbilly motif. There's no tangible evidence that Mr. Capp didn't write it but it sure feels like a typical, Hollywood-scripted sitcom of the day and it lacks the sparkle of his strip. Capp was known to complain that the rural sitcoms of the sixties, especially Beverly Hillbillies, were written by "rummaging around in my wastebasket." Maybe he should have rummaged in theirs.
Here's the clip. Thanks to "louis59" who e-mailed me the link…
As some of you might imagine, I write some of the many obituaries that appear on this site in advance, before the person has passed away. I just wrote one that I expect to need within the week…and I accidentally hit the wrong button and posted it.
It has been deleted. It was only up for about thirty seconds. But if you saw it during that period, just pretend you didn't see it. Sorry.
The L.A. Times says that the folks making the case for Proposition 8 in California (the anti-gay marriage amendment) are basically lying to make that case. Is anyone surprised?