Steve Dyer

COORSLIGHT GUNTITS

buzzfeed:

Josh Romney in the audience of tonight’s debate.

Yes, according to David S. Bernstein and "several people directly involved in the MassGAP effort who confirm":

What actually happened was that in 2002 -- prior to the election, not even knowing yet whether it would be a Republican or Democratic administration -- a bipartisan group of women in Massachusetts formed MassGAP to address the problem of few women in senior leadership positions in state government. There were more than 40 organizations involved with the Massachusetts Women's Political Caucus (also bipartisan) as the lead sponsor. They did the research and put together the binder full of women qualified for all the different cabinet positions, agency heads, and authorities and commissions. They presented this binder to Governor Romney when he was elected.

(Image from your favorite new tumblr)

vh1:

buzzfeed:

jordan-cohen:

When I found out Amy Poehler and Tina Fey were hosting the Golden Globes…

This is going to be the best Golden Globes ever!

Clear all our schedules, it’s Poehler/Fey time!

BITCHES GET SHIT HOSTED!

Well that was a surprise, wasn't it? Romney claims he will provide 12 million new jobs. But that's the consensus view of economists for the next four years regardless who is president. So Kessler goes through the specific Romney campaign claims for job growth and what studies lie behind them:

The specifics — 7 million plus 3 million plus 2 million [jobs] — mentioned by Romney in the ad are not in the white paper. So where did that come from? We asked the Romney campaign, and the answer turns out to be: totally different studies … with completely different timelines...  For instance, the 3-million-jobs claim for Romney’s energy policies appears largely based on a Citigroup Global Markets study that did not even evaluate Romney’s policies. Instead, the report predicted 2.7 million to 3.6 million jobs would be created over the next eight years, largely because of trends and policies already adopted — including tougher fuel efficiency standards that Romney has criticized and suggested he would reverse.

He's a massive, practised, knowing liar.

tastefullyoffensive:

[via]

A new Freakonomics podcast explores how putting out a bounty on something can backfire. Their guest Vikas Mehrotra, a finance professor at the University of Alberta, explains:

[T]he "cobra effect" refers to a scheme in colonial India where the British governor, or whoever, the person in charge in Delhi, wanted to rid Delhi of cobras. Apparently in his opinion there were too many cobras in Delhi. So he had the bounty placed on cobras. And he expected this would solve the problem. But the population in Delhi, at least some of it, responded by farming cobras. And all of a sudden the administration was getting too many cobra skins. And they decided the scheme wasn’t as smart as initially it appeared and they rescinded the scheme. But by then the cobra farmers had this little population of cobras to deal with. And what do you do if there’s no market? You just release them. And so this significantly, by a few orders of magnitude, worsened the cobra menace in Delhi.

Alex Heigl provides yet another reason not to be a devotee of Ayn Rand. He pivots off her statement, "I am done with the monster of ‘we,’ the word of serfdom, of plunder, of misery, falsehood and shame," to argue that such sentiments preclude the deepest pleasures of love and sex:

I have to think Ayn Rand must never have had any truly satisfying sex in her life, because, as anyone who's ever had an orgasm can tell you, you're not really thinking about yourself, and certainly not the glory of yourself, at that point. (Maybe later.) You're not really thinking about the other person, either, except for maybe with some vague gratitude. The point is that you're not thinking. Sex, and its occasional bedfellow, love, remains the great equalizer: everybody loses a little bit of themselves to their partner, and they get something back in return. The more you give, the more you get.

Love is the same way — when you've found someone you can't help but put above yourself, someone whose needs and wants and weird little foibles you would die to fulfill and preserve, you lose yourself as an individual. In this instance, Rand's "I" is the ugly word, the monster. People tend to give couples shit when they shift, all giggly and happy, into "we," but that's an important moment — it's a mindset shift as much as a romantic one.

For a dose of hathos, check out the Objectivist dating site he explored:

There's actually an Ayn Rand dating site. They elected not to take the low road (as I would have done) and name it "The Fountainhead," but went with the more restrained "The Atlasphere." Profiles include blurbs like: "You should contact me if you are a skinny woman. If your words are a meaningful progression of concepts rather than a series of vocalizations induced by your spinal cord for the purpose of complementing my tone of voice," and "I am rational, integrated, and effacious. So far, I've never met a person who lives up to the standard I hold for myself."

(Image by Benjamin Wheelock)

"We may have too many bees in London."

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NBC is still continuing to find new depths to how much it can torture Community fans. In the past, the Peacock Network has put the show on hiatus, fired creator Dan Harmon, and gave it a late premiere for its truncated fourth season in the "Friday night death slot," but apparently, that's not enough. Vulture reports that NBC has decided to delay the new seasons of Community (and Whitney) indefinitely. Both shows were set to premiere next week on Friday, October 19th, but they've been taken off the schedule, with NBC releasing the following statement:

"Given the success we’ve had for the past four weeks... we’ve decided to continue to concentrate our promotional strength on our new NBC shows that are scheduled Monday through Wednesday and have therefore decided to hold Community and Whitney from their previously announced premieres."

The statement from NBC reveals another bummer, in that the network specifically isn't spending its promo money on its Thursday night block, which needs it the most. The press release also mentioned that there' a possibility Community (and Whitney) will be used to fill in for any sitcoms the network cancels or takes off the schedule over the next few weeks. While it's sad we'll have to wait a while longer to catch the new season of Community (and Whitney), it actually may benefit the shows by keeping them out of the "Friday night death slot," which has been a notoriously difficult day to air new shows for decades.

In other Community news, new showrunners David Guarasco and Moses Port gave a rare interview to Vulture, saying exactly what you'd expect them to about not changing the show and trying to keep it the same for the fans. In the interview, Guarascio and Port reveal that they turned down the job the first time it was offered to them, share some season 4 spoilers, and discuss how surprisingly easy it is to work with Chevy Chase. Also, Community's writers will be conducting a Reddit AMA this Friday at 8:30PM EST, exactly one week ahead of the date/time the show was originally scheduled to debut its new season. No word on whether the AMA will be delayed, as well.

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Lehrer: "I want you two to turn and look at each other. Aww that's nice. Just stare deeply into each other's eyes. Yeah. Good. Now say the first thing that pops into your brain."

Obama: "I don't want to touch sandpaper."

Romney: "I like The Wiz."

This is far more interesting than the real debate.

Watch, AFTER THE JUMP...

The negative response from readers has been so massive that another roundup of criticism is warranted, especially since the Dish doesn't have a comments section:

Part of the thing I've always respected about your perspective is that you have always seemed very much in touch with the sense and direction of America. I think your deep love of this country, coupled with your careful study of it and your outsider viewpoint, have given you a keen sense of the overall mood of America that is quite unique. But you are also prone to reading way too much into present events, and you do allow your emotions at times to get the best of your reasoned judgement.

This is such a time. There are two presidential debates left. If Obama repeats his performance from the first debate in the second or the third, I will join you in total freakout mode. But if I had Romney's money, I'd wager $10,000 that doesn't happen. Obama didn't get to be president by being a terrible politician. And if I've learned anything about the president over the years it's that he is insanely competitive.

Another reader:

I know you are furious and worried - and I am too. I also know you are biased but do your best to be honest. So I don't know if there is any other option besides the way you are covering Obama's debate performance, but please don't do extra - no extra malaise for us or extra ammunition for them. Please. I beg you to use your influence as wisely as possible within the confines of your conscience.

Another:

Right now you’re the top headline on Drudge. This is not OK. I’m not asking you to be a propagandist; I’m not asking you to abandon independent analysis; but as someone who has been informally mentored by you (without you ever knowing it) for years, I am asking you to do as your writing has always implored me: look around, cut through the bullshit, and see the bigger picture.

Yes, I am also somewhere between bewildered and infuriated that someone who has the nerve to e-mail me on a regular basis and tell me "this one counts" and I "really need your help," a man who collected upwards of $180 million this month from a citizenry that is struggling to make ends meet, could fail to even attempt to live up to his end of the bargain at last week’s debate. But this is about so much more than 90 minutes of theatrics. It’s about who we want to be the face of our nation: a man who believes that health insurance is a fundamental right, or a man who would leave tens of millions uninsured; a man who believes that those who love each other should be able to get married, and one who refuses to entertain the seemingly basic notion; a man who has been honest and upfront with the American people for four years, and a man who abandoned all pretense of honesty when he threw his hat in the ring 18 months ago.

This is about so much more than 90 minutes in Colorado, and I know you know that, because your blog taught me that.

Another:

I had the good fortune to be able to volunteer at the Obama rally in Madison the day after the debate, where 30,000 people on Bascom Hill enthusiastically welcomed the president after waiting for hours in long lines on a cold rainy day. Of course people talked about the debate while we were waiting for the rally to start. A common view: we wished it had gone better, but everyone can have an off day, even a president ... keep calm, carry on, look forward, work hard. He gave a terrific speech, people left energized, with a clear view of what is at stake in this election, most were determined to pitch in and help.

There are thousands of us everyday people out here who have been and are continuing to work incredibly hard to re-elect this good man, going door to door talking to voters, making calls, registering voters, finding volunteers for the final push, others giving the small amounts of money they can afford if they can't give time. We don't have time to sit around moaning and wailing because the President got upstaged by his opponent in the first debate; we have work to do. I really wish you would do something helpful, or else shut the hell up and stop making our task harder.

Another volunteer writes:

I live in Summit County, which is one of the most important counties a candidate has to win to take Ohio.  I am an Organizing for America volunteer, very active in the campaign here in my hometown of Stow and the surrounding areas of northern Summit.  I don't have any access to internal polling or internal opinions at all; I depend more on what my volunteers are telling me and what folks are saying on the phone when we call them. Yes, the debate upset people.  We are getting asked about it a lot, quite frankly, and our approach, at least mine anyway, is to agree with the person and pivot to how important it is to not sit back and assume re-election is in the bag; we still have a lot of time left to fight back. 

This choice of approach (my own - not campaign suggested at all) is working rather well to keep folks interested, I think.  I hold a weekly phone bank/canvass at my local library, every Saturday.  My volunteers are still showing up, still making calls.  They are not disheartened in the least by the debate; they believe there is still plenty of time for Obama to expose Romney and his bullshit lies.  In fact, I'd almost say this has made them more energetic about coming in to volunteer.

Another bit of information for you about Summit County: early voting started last Tuesday.  In 2008, just over 400 some people voted in person the first day.  This year, it was over 1000.  By the end of the first four days, roughly around 3300 people had voted early. That destroys the numbers from four years ago, and I think signifies that folks are not as disheartened as you may think.  They are determined to get out and cast their vote, both before and after the debate.  In fact, the numbers did not slack off after the debate at all.

One more:

In addition to campaigning, Obama has to run the country and there's a lot going on right now. I think he, rightly so, chose to focus on managing the country instead of days of debate pep. I also think he's an honest man who was thrown by Romney's chameleon act. He'll come back - comebacks are what Obama does best.

Please, keep the faith. It's a marathon, not a sprint.

I'm sorry if these are not things an Obama supporter should say at this point. But the demoralization is profound: thebea.st/TcCh8Z

— Andrew Sullivan (@sullydish) October 8, 2012

Andrew Sullivan is not a useful metric for measuring the opinions, stances or engagement of American voters slowly waking to the reality of a presidential election next month. The Daily Beast blogger and Newsweek essayist is, by any rational assessment, a demographic of one—a conservative liberal gay Republican Obama loyalist and Irish-English Oxford man who sought and secured permanent U.S. residency. But when I returned to the media world last week, after a six-month sabbatical, it was immediately evident that the best way to "catch up" with half a year's political media freakouts was by studying Sullivan's blog and Twitter output, backwards. Seared in my brain was an airport-newsstand glance at that Newsweek cover of Barack Obama looking like Augustus Caesar, with the words "The Democrat's Reagan" followed by the only byline that could possibly go with such a sweeping, over-the-top pronouncement.

Just two weeks later, Sullivan watched the same dull debate I saw, but to him it wasn't just a lackluster performance from a president who sat out the primaries. It was the worst disaster of the Obama presidency. There are no small moments in Andrew Sullivan's online world.

I am bored silly by Obama. If I am bored silly by this wonkish lecture, and his refusal to rebut specifics, i.e. lies, he's in trouble.

— Andrew Sullivan (@sullydish) October 4, 2012

Everything means Everything, all the time, and the only respite is the "Mental Health Break" viral videos and the weirdly depressing snapshots from his readers' windows. Like some CGI action movie, Sullivan's Daily Dish blog is all explosions and implosions and dazed weeping survivors seeking only a catchphrase that will keep the wounds and memories fresh until the next apocalypse, tomorrow.

How is Obama's closing so fucking sad, confused, lame? He choked. He lost. He may even have lost election tonight. thebea.st/RdXvE9

— Andrew Sullivan (@sullydish) October 4, 2012

Sullivan's blog and Twitter feed can be a car wreck–a car wreck witnessed from a window, close enough to be tearfully blogged but too far away to actually walk outside and help–but his online persona is unique for its lack of cynicism and irony. Peggy Noonan's grand pronouncements read like they've been fished from a shoebox of 30-year-old cocktail napkins, and the only believable emotion at National Review's "The Corner" is Kathryn Jean Lopez's unrequited love for Joseph Ratzinger. As Obama's re-election by electoral college votes has been fairly certain all year long, pundits on the right have been transparently trying to wring a daily outrage from a dried-up sponge. For a self-described conservative writer in America, Andrew Sullivan is the only one who seems to believe what he's writing ... which is problematic, for a paid political thinker, when that belief also makes you a supporter of the liberal Democrat president.

I'm trying to rally some morale, but I've never seen candidate this late in game, so far ahead, just throw in the towel:thebea.st/RrBEcK

— Andrew Sullivan (@sullydish) October 8, 2012

The cable-news hacks and professional political surrogates drip with insincerity. It was an amusement at my last job to collect screen captures of the pundit panelists reading sports sites or shopping online before and after commercial breaks. Sullivan approaches this tired game with the enthusiasm of a TV recap blogger, one of those ultra-fans who can quickly create a deep timestamp philosophy from the shoddiest episode of "Doctor Who."

This is a rolling calamity for Obama. He's boring, abstract, and less human-seeming than Romney! thebea.st/RdXvE9

— Andrew Sullivan (@sullydish) October 4, 2012

What I've learned from reading Sullivan backwards is that Obama's re-election was inevitable, that he would remake the nation in ways unseen since FDR or Eisenhower or Lincoln or whoever, that Obama was "moving in for the kill" with a probable landslide victory as recently as two weeks ago, that Obama intentionally destroyed this safe re-election, and that even Sully's dogs are suffering wild mood swings.

Look: you know how much I love the guy, and how much of a high info viewer I am, but this was a disaster for Obama. thebea.st/RdXvE9

— Andrew Sullivan (@sullydish) October 4, 2012

Studying the very recent past through the Andrew Sullivan lens is important because his very human up-and-down reactions to the White House horse race are a favorite of the Washington and New York press corps. National media figures lost their real emotions around the time they realized it would take constant brutality to get to the top of the heap, and my suspicion is that Sullivan is read carefully to see what "humans are supposed to feel." His outbursts of sincerity are processed and regurgitated by the cynical people who create each news cycle's National Narrative ... and that's why the top story on Google News is still the debate from a week ago.

New ABC/Post poll suggests Obama weathered debate debacle: abcn.ws/SZwmEi

— David Grann (@DavidGrann) October 9, 2012

Ken Layne was editor of the political disaster site Wonkette from 2006 to 2012, and invented blogging along with Andrew Sullivan.

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Following the revelation that his group Invisible Children was financially tied to anti-gay Christian fundamentalist groups, KONY 2012 co-founder Jason Russell's personal life came under scrutiny, a scrutinization that was magnified after an apparent mental breakdown, in which he marched back and forth in a nude rant at a California intersection.

Yesterday, Russell appeared on Oprah's Next Chapter to talk about his breakdown. Oprah asked him if he's gay:

“Yeah, I’ve heard those rumors...In the video I was snapping my finger up and down. I grew up in theater. My parents started a large children’s theater organization, so I am animated. I am theatrical. That's me by nature. So when you take me, times it by ten, I don't know what was in my head but it was controlling my body and making me do really strange things."

Russell says he hardly remembers anything about the episode on the sidewalk: "I think I was trying to ask cars to take me to the airport, in my underwear."

Russell says it took him two weeks to come back to himself.

Watch, AFTER THE JUMP...

We, like you, are not particularly interested in listening to Miffed Romney spout bizarre lies about one B. HUSSEIN Obummer’s foreign policy record. So instead, we will listen to the geniuses at Bad Lip Reading in their most brilliant video yet, one focusing on none other than our Old Handsome Joe as he illuminates the perils of prickly-pear bush. You’re welcome, America. [Youtube]

My mom made a bizarre comment in passing about tampons that has always stuck with me: “Don’t ever buy anything other than Tampax because you’ll be able to feel it.”

I don’t know that I (or anybody else, really) can necessarily “feel” a difference, but that’s not what matters. Buying Tampax instead of store brand tampons made my mom’s “time of the month” slightly more bearable. She afforded herself that small luxury not because she had loads of disposable income, but because she didn’t—and couldn’t—afford that feeling of luxury elsewhere in her life.

Small indulgences make budgets less bleak. I’m in the privileged position to believe that life is too short for 100 percent austerity, 100 percent of the time. My small luxuries have grown in relation to my income, but the idea remains the same.

For me, at this moment, my life is too short for:

• 1-ply toilet paper
• Store brand ketchup and mayonnaise (although mustard is fine for some reason)
• Anything from Forever 21

At the same time, I can’t get my head around certain “real” luxury spending. There are just way too many things that I could do with that extra $75 for first class train fare, for example.

For me, at this moment, my life is too long for:

• Ordering bottled water at a restaurant (tap is fine, thank you)
• Cable TV
• Shampoo and conditioner over $3

This is a fun game to play with friends, because the answers tend to be revealing, and are sometimes inconsistent. Take my list for example: It depresses me to use store brand mayo in my tuna, but I consider ordering anything to drink other than tap water at a restaurant akin to throwing money away.

What are on your lists?

Deana Burke tweets and “works” on the “Internet.” Photo: bradcerenzia

"The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age." - H.P. Lovecraft, "The Call of Cthulhu"

(Hat tip: Ben Woodward)

Who never wavered in his love and support for me from the second I told him I was gay; whose face dropped like an ashen landslide when he discovered I had become HIV-positive; who - a former high school rugby captain, national mid-distance runner, and player on our town's team, a man's man in many ways - has never faltered in defending his son's orientation even to his boss in a pretty conservative small town. He has been a rock for me on this question my adult life.

I remember a conversation long, long ago, when I was dating someone way out of my league, before I had come out to my folks. My boyfriend, who was older, Californian, and goddamn beautiful, said something to me that never left my consciousness, when I told him I hadn't yet told my folks: "Don't you deserve to have parents?" I said: "I do and they love me." He said "But how can they love you if you will not allow them to see all of you? If they do not know the part that loves another human being, how can they love the full you?"

I suddenly saw the closet was both a form of self-protection but also something that hurts and wounds a family. The closet denies your family and some of your closest friends the chance to embrace as well as disdain. It is a silent statement that you do not think they can rise to the occasion. In some cases, it can lead to disaster. But in more cases than you'd think, it doesn't. In fact, it is that self-revelation that, in my view, is almost entirely responsible for the shift in attitudes toward gay equality and integration. This was a grass roots development that the center had to adjust to; not a crazy idea foisted upon a world unready for it. Watch the honest video above and see how ready many can be.

It's a risk. Integrity is always a social risk. But you only have one life. Why not tell the truth and be set free? Why not give your own parents the chance to love all of you? When you make yourself that vulnerable, there is a kind of freedom in it.

And a chance for grace.

(Video from Expedia.)

eddypurry:

OhLongJohnson123:

The lovely moment where you shatter your Iphone and there’s two touching penis’s on the back.

"Cocktail trees" are created by grafting several types of fruit-bearing trees together. For example:

Stone fruit salad trees grow peaches, plums, nectarines, apricots and peachcots. Citrus salad trees offer a winter and summer orange, mandarins, lemons, limes, grapefruits, tangelos and pomelos. Multi-apple trees boast between two and four different kinds of apples and multi-nashi trees produce between two and four different kinds of Asian pears.

Why they are popular:

The main advantage of multi-graft plants like fruit salad trees is convenience. Many people do not have room for several large fruit trees in their backyard, but would ideally like to harvest more than one kind of fruit. Different multi-graft techniques work best for different combinations of species. In general, the more closely related the plants, the more successful the graft. Getting a single tree to bear apples, oranges and bananas is probably too problematic a goal to come to fruition.

Submitted by: Unknown (via The Hollywood Reporter)