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In case you didn't hear, Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel used a derogatory term associated with those with mental disabilities when speaking privately about some liberals. Rightfully so, some, if not all, with loved ones with mental disabilities, like Sarah Palin, took offense. Emanuel apologized. Here's SNL's version of Emanuel's apology:
First Jon Stewart's take on the State of the Union:
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| Speech Therapy | ||||
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I remember hearing about a Tea Party strike planned for Jan. 20, 2010. Back in late December and early January it received a great deal of media coverage.
So what the heck happened?
The great, sure-to-show-the-strength-of-the-Tea Party strike of 2010 never happened.
Welcome to the world of populist movements where many different talking heads try to pull the "movement" in different directions. Organization is difficult at best and long term sustainability rare. The Tea Party is already showing signs of being pulled in multiple, different directions.
I mention this only because the of the forthcoming Tea Party convention, Feb. 4-6. The Tea Party convention will restrict media coverage of their event. Way to go supressing the freedom of the press Tea Partiers! I wonder what other rights found in the Bill of Rights will be restricted at their convention. Maybe the Tea Partiers will search some convention goers without a warrant, detain others without probable cause and force other conventioneers to quarter troops while attending.
Scheduled to appear/speak include but, are not limited to, Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann.
Plus, the $500.00+ per ticket price tag to attend all the Tea Party convention events sure seems steep for a grassroots, every-person, working class movement. And that price doesn't include the travel and lodging for out-of-towners. How many "real Americans" can afford that I wonder?
That is if the convention actually happens. I mean, remember, the Jan. 20 Tea Party strike was going to happen too. So herd them cats away from the Jan. 20 Tea Party strike and toward the Feb. 4 Tea Party convention!
More on the Tea Party convention to come.
Update: Bachmann and one other Representative, Marsha Blackburn, have backed out on the Tea Partiers. And the convention is apparently having trouble selling tickets to Palin's keynote address.
OK, now that Bachmann has backed out will Palin actually show up? What wheels off moments will happen during the convention ? Please, comment below.
(the following was written during/after the State of the Union - text here)
Key, but not all, topics covered: recession, stimulus bill, bailout, budget, environment/green tech, jobs bill, health insurance reform, financial reform, super-majorities in the Senate, education, Supreme Court decision regarding corporate spending on campaigns, national security, the wars, veterans, loose nukes, Haiti, civil rights, don't ask don't tell.
I'll be honest, to me it seemed a bit partisan and almost too casual at the beginning. Too much joking around. Too many jabs at the GOP'ers and veiled blaming of the past administration for the mess we're in. Were the jabs and assertions regarding the past administration deserved and/or true? Yes. But, the State of the Union doesn't seem like the time or place. Maybe that's just me.
Of course during the speech I also didn't like the GOP'er's snickers and and passivity. I especially found annoying minority whip Eric Cantor smirking and shaking his head every time they showed him--it was incredibly annoying. He looked like a second grade smart-aleck in the back of the room making fun of the kid giving a speech at the front of the classroom. And GOP minority leader John Boehner was as orange-tan as ever. Boehner and Cantor next too each other looked like Tan-man & Grinnin', the boy blunder.
Towards the end of the speech the tone turned more serious. The President dished out and took some blame for where we are.
Overall impressions: Tense. But, these are tense, hyper-partisan times we live in. I've seen better and I've seen him do much better too. It seemed a little like a campaign stump speech, especially at the beginning. I want State of the Union speeches to be inspirational and forward looking. And President Obama's speech was inspirational and forward looking at times, especially towards the end.
Overall grade for the speech according to yours truly: B (maybe because I expect a lot from President Obama-of course I expect a lot out of the Congress generally and especially the Senate.)
(*adjusted for inflation)
The asteric above and what it means are important, at least to me anyway. It's been getting on my nerves that Titanic is always declared the box office king year after year and now Avatar is number 2 on lists of the top grossing movies of all time. Lists that rank Titanic number 1 (and now Avatar has been declared to have over taken Titanic) neglect to adjust the box office receipts for ticket price inflation which of course makes a huge difference.
Comparing movies' receipts without adjusting for inflation is, for example, like equating a millionaire's buying power today with the buying power of a millionaire back in 1950. Sorry, it doesn't quite work that way. I'm not an economist or anything but, I'll go out on a limb and assert that a million dollars back in 1950 was worth just a little more than a million dollars today.
So, if you adjust ticket prices for inflation you get a ranking based of what each film made if each movies' tickets had been sold for an equal price. Or, in other words, you get a list reflective of the total number of actual tickets sold.
At least 2 different sites (click here or here) have a good list of the top grossing movies of all time adjusted for inflation. Guess where Titanic is. It's number 6 behind such movies as Gone With the Wind and Star Wars. Avatar is number 27.
Below is a good list of the top 10 movies adjusted for inflation:
Rank Title Adjusted Gross Unadjusted Gross
1 Gone with the Wind $1,485,028,000 $198,676,459
2 Star Wars $1,309,179,000 $460,998,007
3 The Sound of Music $1,046,753,000 $158,671,368
4 E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial $1,042,629,400 $435,110,554
5 The Ten Commandments $962,850,000 $65,500,000
6 Titanic $943,342,300 $600,788,188
7 Jaws $941,379,300 $260,000,000
8 Doctor Zhivago $912,395,600 $111,721,910
9 The Exorcist $812,679,700 $232,671,011
10 Snow White and the... $801,150,000 $184,925,486
Unless you've been on a remote island with no means of communication then you've probably heard that Democratic candidate Martha Coakley lost the late Ted Kennedy's Senate seat to Republican candidate Scott Brown in a special election.
How could a Republican win in mega-blue state, ultra-Democratic Massachusetts?
In the political campaign play book I don't think going on a week long vacation within 1 month of election day is recommended. Who would GO ON VACATION with an election for a U.S. Senate seat, you're supposedly trying to win, literally only weeks away? Martha Coakley would and did go vacation. Oh by the way, Coakley had a double digit lead in the polls before the ill advised vacation.
Also not found in the political campaign play book is the strategy of bad mouthing an admired statewide sports figure. Who would say that Curt Schilling is a Yankees fan, even if it was intended as a joke? Martha Coakley would and did. Moreover, she also made the Schilling-Yankees joke less than a month before the election. That would be like Kay Bailey Hutchison joking about Roger Staubach being an Eagles fan.
Furthermore, it's probably not a good idea to make fun of your opponent because he decided it would be a good idea to shake hands with voters outside Fenway Park.
So after losing the election what does team Coakley do? What every losing campaign seems to do these days, start pointing fingers at others. In this case the Coakley campaign started blaming the D.C. Democrats and White House for not helping out enough and thus causing the predicted Coakley loss BEFORE ELECTION DAY!
So let me get this straight, candidate Coakley goes on vacation for a week right before the election, makes fun of a local sports hero and lost to a guy that posed nude. Then, her campaign tries to throw the blame for the loss on out-of-town/out-of-state Dems? One definition of vacation is as follows:
vacation : an act or instance of vacating.
Coakley vacated her responsibility as a candidate when she and her campaign believed their own press and looked at the poll numbers and decided that it would be OK for her to take a break from trying to win a seat in the U.S. Senate. Maybe those in glass vacation houses shouldn't throw stones at D.C.
hilarious and a great impression:
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