“If you invested $100,000 in the stock market in early 2000, it would now be worth $100,004.”
— Functional Ambivalent putting the new stock market record into perspective. He goes on to say, “Adding inflation to the calculation, you would have lost over $14,000.”
Tom hit that rare best line daily double today.
At Jill and Byron’s, NewMexiKen was poking around the magazines and found the December 2004 issue of American Heritage with its outstanding bibliography of American history. This list is worth saving.
So here it is, certainly the most challenging editorial task we’ve ever attempted—and one of the most rewarding. We have drawn on the knowledge and enthusiasm of leading historians, writers, and critics to offer a compendium of the very best books about the American experience. Divided into both chronological and subject categories ranging from the rise of the Republic to sports, from the years of World War II to the African-American journey, each section presents the writer’s choice of the 10 best books in a particular field, along with lucid, lively explanations of what makes them great. The result, we believe, is both a valuable reference work and an anthology of highly personal views of the making of our country and our culture that is immensely readable in its own right.
“Maybe if Foley had been hitting on a fetus, these folks would get it.”
“Future Fox News commentator Rick Santorum”
“The actual journalistic accomplishment in ‘State of Denial’ is less than grand. It took him three books to arrive at a conclusion thousands of basement-bound bloggers suggested years ago: that the Bush administration is composed of people who like war, don’t seem to be very good at it and have been known to turn the guns on each other. Such an epiphany doesn’t seem to reflect a reporter who had rarefied access.”
— David Carr in The New York Times
“It’s like my grandfather used to say: A mule will work for you twenty years just for the chance to kick you once. It looks like Tenet aimed straight for Condi’s head.”
— Billmon, taking a hiatus from his hiatus.
… was established on this date in 1968.
Stand at the base of a coast redwood and even the huckleberry bushes tower over you. Watch bronze Roosevelt elk grazing in the prairies. Observe the tail of a female Chinook salmon heave skyward as she makes a nest for her eggs. Whether a morning or night person, you can hear the threatened marbled murrelets’ keer across the treetops as they fly from sea to mossy nest.
“Talk about being in a state of denial: praising Woodward for his very-late-to-the-party Iraq pile-on is like a music critic writing a rave of ‘Let It Be’ and getting credit for discovering The Beatles.”
“Hastert expressed relief that Foley had resigned. ‘If he had not,’ Hastert said, ‘I would have demanded his expulsion.'”
“The secretary of state said it was ‘incomprehensible’ that she could have ignored dire terrorist threats two months before 9/11.”
— The New York Times web page sub-head.
I think we’d all agree with her, incomprehensible.
Update Monday Evening: News Item — “A review of White House records has determined that George J. Tenet, then the director of central intelligence, did brief Condoleezza Rice and other top officials on July 10, 2001, about the looming threat from Al Qaeda, a State Department spokesman said Monday.”
Incomprehensible.
NewMexiKen almost bought Bob Woodward’s State of Denial yesterday — Costco had it for $17.
But then I thought, you couldn’t trust Woodward’s reporting in any other book he’s done in recent years, why think you should trust him on this one just because you like its storyline better?
NewMexiKen is thinking that it would be impossible to get a traffic citation for violating this sign’s instruction.
If a deputy is present, it’s OK to turn left.
If no deputy is present, and you turn left anyway, who will write the citation?
BTW, regular gasoline is selling for a little as $1.94 around here (Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C.).
Louis Menand has written a review of Charles Frazier’s new novel, Thirteen Moons. Frazier you will remember is the author of Cold Mountain and Menand’s review discusses that novel as well.
If you’ve ever tried to read Cold Mountain, as NewMexiKen has, and failed, as NewMexiKen has, you will find this review quite interesting.
A chance to listen to Richard Feynman:
A set of four priceless archival recordings from the University of Auckland (New Zealand) of the outstanding Nobel prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman – arguably the greatest science lecturer ever. Although the recording is of modest technical quality the exceptional personal style and unique delivery shine through.
A couple of items worth your time.
First, a brief blog piece from Malcolm Gladwell, “Degree of Difficulty.” Gladwell, bothered that a recent article he did for The New Yorker wasn’t appreciated as much as he would have liked, notes that “We can see all the things that someone, in a different profession than us, does. What we cannot know is the relative difficulty of those tasks.”
Next, the wonderful Peter Matthiessen writes “Inside the Endangered Arctic Refuge” for The New York Review of Books. His opening paragraph:
Wild northern Alaska is one of the last places on earth where a human being can kneel down and drink from a wild stream without being measurably more poisoned or polluted than before; its heart and essence is the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) in the remote northeast corner of the state, the earth’s last sanctuary of the great Ice Age fauna that includes all three North American bears, gray wolves and wolverines, musk ox, moose, and, in the summer, the Porcupine River herd of caribou, 120,000 strong. Everywhere fly sandhill cranes and seabirds, myriad waterfowl and shorebirds, eagles, hawks, owls, shrikes and larks and longspurs, as well as a sprinkling of far-flung birds that migrate to the Arctic slope to breed and nest from every continent on earth. Yet we Americans, its caretakers, are still debating whether or not to destroy this precious place by turning it over to the oil industry for development.
Brief CBS News Video from “60 Minutes” of Bob Woodward — who now sees the light. Worth a look.
Dan Froomkin reminds us:
[Woodward’s] first two books on Bush — “Bush at War” and “Plan of Attack” — were largely flattering depictions of the president.
Woodward’s image took a major bruising last November, (see my November 16 column ) when it was revealed that he had kept secret for more than two years that he was the first reporter to whom a senior administration official leaked the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame.
Woodward apologized for failing to tell his superiors at The Post. But the irony of a journalist sitting on information like that, along with murmurings in Washington about what he had given up in return for the unparalleled access to the Bush White House, combined to raise doubts about his reportage.
As reported at Shakespeare’s Sister:
Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL) resigned from Congress today after “ABC News questioned him about sexually explicit internet messages with current and former congressional pages under the age of 18.” In addition to the questionable emails sent to a 16-year-old former page, the IM messages, which “made repeated references to sexual organs and acts,” were also found.
The GOP will have to appoint a new chairman of the House Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children, which Foley will vacate with his departure. You can’t make this shit up.
Update: From Josh Marshall:
If I’m understanding this correctly, that means that the leaders of the House Republican caucus have known for almost a year that a member of their caucus was having cybersex with an underage congressional page. And apparently they did nothing about it.
Guy #1: That was a beautiful pit bull.
Guy #2: Yeah, I’d love to have that pit bull, but I’m not responsible enough to have a dog. I’m gonna have some kids first so they can be responsible for the dog.
–Amtrak train
Goodness gracious, great balls of fire, Jerry Lee Lewis is 71 today.
Ian McShane is 64. Big party at the Gem. (McShane played the c***s**k** Al Swearengen on Deadwood.)
Bryant Gumbel is 58.
Actress Anita Ekberg is 75 today, meaning her age still hasn’t doubled her famous bust size.
Gene Autry was born in Tioga, Texas, on this date 99 years ago today.
According to The Writer’s Almanac and others, Miguel de Cervantes may have been born on this date in 1547.
This is a NewMexiKen perennial and today is the day.
Dear Abby,
I recently read your column advising grandparents on “tough love” for grandparents to give misbehaving grandchildren, whose own parents let them run wild. I have followed your advice, and enclosed a picture demonstrating my technique when my grandson just won’t behave while I’m babysitting for his parents. They have told me not to spank him, so I just take him for a ride, and he usually calms down afterward.
Sign me,
Tough Love Grandpa
Of course, this grandpa’s Sweeties are absolutely delightful and I enjoyed time with five of them today!
A rather interesting, brief biographical sketch of Marie Antoinette by Judith Thurman in The New Yorker.
Report from CNET News.com:
What: Police seize computer without a warrant after husband declines permission but then wife consents.
When: 8th Circuit Court of Appeals rules on Aug. 25.
Outcome: Court decides that computer seizure was illegal and sends case back to trial judge for further proceedings.
Follow the link to read about the case.
“On September 30, 2006, for one day only, museums across the country will join the Smithsonian Institution in its long-standing tradition of offering free admission to visitors.”
Freakonomics author Steven D. Levitt:
All of these clippings were from The Dallas News, from February 2006 to the present. The articles had two things in common: (1) all of them were stories reporting on crimes, and (2) the perpetrator’s middle name was “Wayne.”
I have to say I was stunned by the number of examples she sent me:
Eric Wayne Kelley—sex charges
Nathan Wayne Green—kidnapping and beating, homicide
Ronald Wayne Spencer, Jr.—triple homicide
David Wayne Rhodes—10 years for practicing nursing without a license
Larry Wayne King—homicide
Paul Wayne Mitchell—Theft
Michael Wayne Hills—theft
Jeremy Wayne Hopkins—homicide
Garry Wayne Carriker—knowingly having unprotected sex when HIV positive
Bruce Wayne Potts—homicide
Joshua Wayne Jones—assault of officer
Billy Wayne Sinclair—homicide
Billy Wayne Boyer—assault
Billy Wayne Miller—attempted murder and robbery
Kenneth Wayne Downs—sex assault
Jerry Wayne Lucas—attempted homicide
Tony Wayne Swinnie—aggravated assault of grandmother in front of her grandchildren, robbery
Larry Wayne Dacy—home invasion
Richard Wayne Miles—police standoff
Charles Wayne Thomas—homicideMaybe you could assemble a list this impressive for some other middle name, but I doubt it. Of course, these folks are following the path set for them by the notorious Chicago serial killer John Wayne Gacy, Jr.
A interesting brief commentary from Elizabeth Kolbert that NewMexiKen read on the plane today. It includes this:
If you examine Bush’s record, you find that the technologies he supports are either those which were developed in the past—coal mining and oil drilling—or those which lie securely in the future: cars and buses that zip around on hydrogen. When presented with new technologies that could actually change the way Americans live in the here and now, the White House wants nothing to do with them.
