A pat down, a put down and a big fat let down Willie Geist & His Backseat Pony
Is there a "vast right wing conspiracy" behind the Palinist takeover of reality TV travelogues & celebrity dance contests? You betcha, Rascal! Late Night with Jimmy Fallon
The Roots' drummer Questlove plays Remix The Clips Ed Schultz
Political comedy quickies from Daily Show co-creator Lizz Winstead
The Max-Planck Institute for Astronomy has found a gas giant (at least 1.25 times the mass of Jupiter) orbiting the remnants of what was probably at one time a sun-like star that expanded at the end of its life cycle. Of the nearly 500 planets discovered outside our solar system, HIP 13044b is the first from outside our own galaxy.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau being set up by Harvard Law School Professor Elisabeth Warren has selected Massachusetts Commissioner of Banks Steven Antonakes to help ensure banks adhere to new rules, and don’t mislead and exploit consumers.
Will Anyone Wind Up Happy? Audio Embed: WBUR FM, Boston 11/19/10,
Reporter: Anthony Brooks
So Don't Bite Sarah The Barracuda On The Ass Just Ahead Of A Vote To Defund Public Broadcasting
Video: CNN/HLN Showbiz Tonight - When you see Tina Fey win the Mark Twain award on PBS, it still looks like she has all her teeth. But a few got knocked out in the editing room. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), which funds both NPR and PBS was the subject of a vote on Thursday, 11/18, in which the most recent push to cut funding for public broadcasting was blocked, 239 to 171... And bloc is the operative word. The split along party lines saw only three defecting Democrats voting with Republicans.
Although No. 2 House Republican Eric Cantor of Virginia (set to become majority leader in the next Congress) called it "common sense to cut spending and save taxpayer dollars," it was retribution.
Republicans made no secret that NPR's ouster of (now exclusively) Fox commentator Juan Williams was one major reason for their recent efforts, but complaints of political correctness and liberal bias at NPR predate the Williams dispute.
NPR hailed the "good judgment" of lawmakers.
Over on the other side of the divide, Fox News Chief Roger Ailes used some shocking language to describe some of his real and/or imagined media adversaries. In a Daily Beast interview with Howard Kurtz published 11/18, Ailes labeled Jon Stewart “crazy” for his constant critique of conservatives, but then went on to NPR:
"They are, of course, Nazis," Ailes told the Daily Beast's Howard Kurtz. "They have a kind of Nazi attitude. They are the left wing of Nazism. These guys don't want any other point of view. They don't even feel guilty using tax dollars to spout their propaganda. They are basically Air America with government funding to keep them alive."
The Anti-Defamation League, who can tell a real Nazi from faux Fox Nazis, received and accepted an Ailes apology... NPR didn't get one.
Keith Olbermann to Jon Stewart on Fox, where "crazy starts at the top:"
“Jon, I told you so. I mean, I might disagree with you, but I’d never think you were crazy or hateful. But (Bill) Maher is right! One side sticks to the facts, and the other side is close to playing with its poop.”
CBS News/Kelly Cobiella: Foreclosed, abandoned or neglected properties are safety hazards, not just a drag on property values. Elizabeth Duke, a governor of the Federal Reserve Bank, said improper foreclosure procedures by major banks could cause some people to lose their homes unjustly and ultimately impose huge costs on banks. In testimony to a House Financial Services subcommittee (Thursday 11/18), Duke said the revelations could breed mistrust.
Excuse me, Ms Duke. Can you smell the 800 pound gorilla yet?
In the confidence game of finance it's all about trust... Or the "tricks and traps" that (consumer financial protection architect) Elizabeth Warren cites as integrated into big banking's business model.
In "All the Devils are Here," journalists Bethany McLean of Vanity Fair and Joe Nocera from the New York Times explore whether the blame game should target Wall Street, Main Street, or Pennsylvania Avenue? On greedy traders, misguided regulators, sleazy subprime lenders, cowardly legislators, or clueless home buyers? Or all the above.
In an excellent appearances with PBS' Charlie Rose, and on the Daily Show, they spoke of a whole industry built (over a generation) upon borrowing far more than could ever be repaid, but concluded the crisis (and Great Recession it caused) ultimately wasn't about finance at all; it was about human nature.
The latest fallout is that foreclosure fraud class action suits are piling up against banks. Now looking to negotiate some kind of settlement, all 50 state Attorneys General have intervened to untangle questions of process, procedure and proof.
At Least In One Way United Audio Embed: CBS Radio's Osgood File 11/17/10.
MSNBC: Fraudulent foreclosures could bring about an even bigger financial collapse. Last Word guest host Chris Hayes talked to an attorney who’s taking on the financial industry in court & winning.
MSNBC/Dylan Ratigan: It's the same old culprits behind the scams.
In this conversation recorded as part of the New York Public Library series LIVE from the NYPL, Steven Johnson (author of Where Good Ideas Come From) and Kevin Kelly (author of What Technology Wants) explain that the things we make—from spoons to microwaves to computers—are an extension of the same evolutionary processes that made us. And we may need to adapt to the idea that our technology could someday truly have a mind of its own.
Inventions Are Inevitable Audio Embed: NPR & WNYC's Radio Lab,
Hosts: Robert Krulwich & Jad Abumrad.
When a team wins a championship and the parties and parades have ended, the players usually turn their attention to repeating their title.
That's not the case for the San Francisco Bay Area's FC Gold Pride, who won last year's Women's Professional Soccer League title but folded on Tuesday... The class of the league: gone.
What does the Gold Pride's demise tell us about the young league?
Gold/No Goal Audio Embed: WBUR & NPR's Only A Game Host: Bill Littlefield.
Video: CBS/Late Night with David Letterman - Steve Martin plays Dueling Banjos with the winner of his prize for Excellence in Banjo and Bluegrass, Noam Pikelny.
A previous post was among our most popular, mostly from image searches, not clever composition... But the hit counter went crazy with news of Eva Longoria's divorce from basketball's Tony Parker.
Video: Newsy.com
I thought I was going to stay out of celebritown by not posting anything related to an upcoming royal wedding. You might have heard of it... Between Jessica Simpson and some former football dude.
But, no. Just when I thought I was out... They pull me back in.
Air passenger rights groups are calling on people to boycott the US Transportation Security Administration’s new full body scanners next Wednesday, the busiest travel day of the year. The groups object to the scans, which allow screeners to see through a person’s clothes.
Of course the alternative is a more invasive time-wasting TSA agent pat down, which some irate flyers have compared to molestation.
And Don't Touch My Junk, Either Audio Embed: BBC, PRI & WBUR's Here & Now 11/17/10,
Host: Robin Young.
Video: MSNBC/Countdown - Former El Al security chief: Are full body scans and TSA pat-down/feel-ups at airports are worth the upset they cause to passengers? During the Autumn 1965 "Rubber Soul" sessions at EMI studios, London, The Beatles spent an entire day working on this version of "I'm Looking Through You"... But then revisited the song nearly two weeks later to pick up the pace and add the "why, tell me why" bridges in the cleaner arrangement familiar to listeners until this version was issued as part of "Anthology 2," released in March 1996.
CBS/Late Late Show - Craig Ferguson had planned a "Doctor Who" musical extravaganza to start the show... So what went wrong with the grand plan? Blame The Black Hole
Astronomers believe a 1979 supernova became a black hole.
Video: Newsy.com The Star Shines Anyway
CBS/Late Late Show - Craig Ferguson welcomes the latest "Doctor Who" star, Matt Smith. It's his first American chat show appearance. No bears were harmed.
Although the Hoosiers played (and got killed) in the '68 Rose Bowl, I went to IU anyway... If only to be in the band, where as a freshman we went on a road trip to Madison to play Wisconsin in the one nationally televised game of my stint with the Marching Hundred. It was blacked out in New England where they showed Harvard/Yale.
The good news: halftimes were on TV then.
The bad news: my parents never saw a second of it.
The bad news: the Hoosiers lost that day, too.
The good news: not as badly as 2010's 80-23.
Now that's a shellacking, Mr. President... But a damn fine band.
Video: MSNBC/Rachel Maddow - Mascot-gate in Madison: Bucky Badger flagged for unsportsmanlike conduct; illegal substitution in push-up marathon
Dan Simmons of the Wisconsin State Journal found the truth... The exhausted, wet and smelly truth: 3 human mascots inside only 2 Bucky Badger suits who combined for a total of 535 post-score push-ups.
Video: MSNBC/Keith Olbermann with Bill Maher - Reactions to midterm elections and thoughts on whether "yes we can" has any chance against "hell no you can't."
Video: MSNBC/Rachel Maddow - Conventional wisdom isn't wise; just conventional. Uncoverring who is more responsible for federal deficit and debt despite talking points & unscrutinized policy proposals... Does anyone who covers also count?
CNN: An ex-Nixon speechwriter's take on taxes, recession, investment banks and the financial powerhouse Rolling Stone called a "giant sucking vampire squid."
Rolling Stone reporter Matt Taibbi, author of "Griftopia" (about the 2008 financial collapse), says a high-speed housing court in Florida is pushing through legally dicey (and possibly fraudulent) foreclosures by mega-banks... It's like robo-signing in judicial robes.
Fast tracked Foreclosures Audio Embed: BBC, PRI & WBUR's Here & Now 11/16/10,
Host: Robin Young.
Rockets In The Pocket
Paul Barrere and Fred Tackett of Little Feat, live in Carmel CA (2003).
NRBQ's 1974–1994 classic lineup of pianist Terry Adams, bassist Joey Spampinato, guitarist Al Anderson, and drummer Tom Ardolino on NBC's "Night Music" (c. 1989).
The Metropolitan Museum in New York plans to return stolen objects from King Tut's tomb to Egypt. The Egyptians' perspective is that most all their antiquities on exhibit around the world are stolen... So they're asking the British Museum to return the "Rosetta Stone."
What would it be like if you couldn't remember faces? And not just to place a face you've known briefly, or in another context, but people who know you well and are important to remember?
For author Heather Sellers, it's a common frustratingly random occurrence and/or gift, recounted in "You Don't Look Like Anyone I Know: A True Story of Family, Face Blindness, and Forgiveness."
"While the poor people sleepin'
With the shade on the light
While the poor people sleepin'
All the stars come out at night" -- Steely Dan - Show Biz Kids (1973)
It's a local affiliate fundraising coup to snag a visit from the long-term NPR host of Weekend Edition Sunday on her pre-retirement goodbye tour... But there's also a chance that she'll go back to DC with one or more stories the local powers that be won't like.
Las Vegas pushed... So far.
A Good-Time Guy For Bad Times
Former mob lawyer Oscar Goodman, famous for his public appearances with scantily clad showgirls, has been mayor of Las Vegas since 1999. He discussed the city's past, present and future as it struggles through the second economic downturn of his term.
Part Politician, All Pitchman Audio Embed: Weekend Edition Sunday 11/14/10,
Host: Liane Hansen.
Betting The (Unemployment) Line
At 15 percent, the city's unemployment rate is one of the nation's highest. And the Las Vegas job market has changed. Now employers are looking for computer skills -- something many workers lack. So the laid-off with low skills learn to adapt, or prepare to leave.
It's A Longshot
Audio Embed: Weekend Edition Sunday 11/14/10,
Reporter: Adam Burke, KNPR/Nevada Public Radio
The latest Las Vegas WTF: Even though many homeowners in the Las Vegas valley are underwater on their mortgages and there's a backlog of unsold existing homes, builders are rolling the dice and once again putting up new houses.
Mayor Goodman's son the doctor knows the term for growth that's out of control... In medicine, they call it cancer.
A Mississippi high school placekicker is now back on the team, after he sued his school district for being cut... He followed the NFL's example and wore pink cleats during Breast Cancer Awareness month.
If you're down on the farm, you've probably gone in the wrong direction.
Dickson Despommier worked with his students at Columbia University to envision an innovative way to make cities more sustainable. They literally thought up vertical farms.
Maybe it's not surprising in New York, among the world's most vertical cities, where it takes an area the size of Virginia (nearly 43,000 square miles) to feed the the 8.4 million who live crammed into only 469 square miles which make up the boroughs.
Author Dickson Despommier,
Photo: Marlene Bloom.
It's an idea as old as the hanging gardens of Babylon, whose future takes shape as a skyscraper of self-contained and self-sustaining greenhouses. Living On Earth's Steve Curwood talks with Despommier about how vertical farms could help solve environmental problems associated with agriculture... Or the obstacles of places like Iceland or Arabian deserts which aren't favorable to growing food.
Oh Grow Up! Audio Embed: PRI's Living On Earth 11/12/10,
Introduced by host Bruce Gellerman.
Every year, it's a weekend of emotional ambiguity marking two medical anniversaries with totally different outcomes.
More recently, a life saving surgery. In the distance, a reminder that one of the few potentially life saving amateur tools in which the public is trained fails 9 of 10 times.
The painful truth is that your best may not be enough to save a loved one. But because they are a loved one, you try... And live with the memory through your Sadderdays.
Earthquake, tsunami,
