John Gushue . . . Dot Dot Dot

A thought on living with your decisions

"All my life, whenever it comes time to make a decision, I make it and forget about it."
- Harry S Truman

A thought on getting somewhere new

"The beaten track does not lead to new pastures."
- Indira Gandhi

Rick Mercer and the Slap Chop minority parliament

Rick Mercer went into infomercial land in last night's season debut, with a sketch about the seeming inevitability of anything other than a minority parliament. (Click here for the rest of the Mercer Report's YouTube channel; you can watch more stuff on the show's site. The Slap Chop commercial is here, if you want to compare kitchens, veggies and such.)

Danny Williams, guitar god

Danny Williams, rock god? Don't laugh too much - the premier was born, after all, in 1949, making him about as old as Gene Simmons, Bruce Springsteen and the guys from ZZ Top. This image comes from Ryan Strickland and the Ramble On page on Tumblr.

A thought about dreamy-eyed futurists

"The world is full of people whose notion of a satisfactory future is, in fact, a return to the idealised past."
- Robertson Davies

Poetry by Sarah Palin, line reading by William Shatner

From the Tonight Show, William Shatner gives just that little dollop of, um, gravitas to Sarah Palin's resignation speech.
UPDATE: The Universal hauled down the YouTube video originally posted here. You can stream the segment from the Tonight Show page on NBC's site.

Peggy Noonan and Maureen Dowd have Sarah Palin for lunch

I read two fiercely written, and very different, critiques of Sarah Palin just now, particularly about the Alaska governor's decision to quit her term early. 

Maureen Dowd of the New York Times wrote a column this week in the voice of Palin, jotting some diary entries, and pretty much nails Palin's peculiar sense of syntax:

It’s the same old double standard. I am not one of those who would whine and cuss. It’s just not how I’m wired!!! But the minute I start to whine and cuss, the mainstream media totally misunderstands my verbiage and the combination of things that brought me to this place of knowing. And I know that I know that I know those crappy bloggers will put out more confliction stories.

I keep explaining what impacted me, but everyone seems more confused and ironic than ever. What is it about average, hard-working Americans like me that Americans can’t understand?

In today's Wall Street Journal, Peggy Noonan urges fellow Republicans to let go of what she calls a Palin myth. She doesn't mince words, either:

In television interviews she was out of her depth in a shallow pool. She was limited in her ability to explain and defend her positions, and sometimes in knowing them. She couldn't say what she read because she didn't read anything. She was utterly unconcerned by all this and seemed in fact rather proud of it: It was evidence of her authenticity. She experienced criticism as both partisan and cruel because she could see no truth in any of it. She wasn't thoughtful enough to know she wasn't thoughtful enough. Her presentation up to the end has been scattered, illogical, manipulative and self-referential to the point of self-reverence. "I'm not wired that way," "I'm not a quitter," "I'm standing up for our values." I'm, I'm, I'm.

In another age it might not have been terrible, but here and now it was actually rather horrifying.

Click on the links above for the full texts.

A thought on politicians and stages

"The view that all actors are undisciplined and self-indulgent is rubbish, if you want to see that kind of behaviour, come to parliament."
- Glenda Jackson

JibJab's new video: Barack Obama, superhero

Your morning funny comes from JibJab, the folks who make amusing e-cards and a series of parody videos. Their latest, featuring a big-eared superhero named Obama, went up yesterday.

Try JibJab Sendables® eCards today!

Barack Obama's Facebook feed

From Slate, an ongoing bit of satire. My favourite lines from the latest bit:

	Rahm Emanuel was tagged in 1,674 photos.
	Rahm Emanuel untagged himself in 1,674 photos.