Hordak owns PR

Rumor has it that I won't be the only one making a dramatic return to PR tonite. Hordak says he is also going to jump on his bike. He's been out of the scene since the 80's but apparently has been inspired by Lance to make a comeback.



Watch out for that staff. He's not afraid to use it on you.

Dear Lance

How can I miss you if you won't leave?

I predict..

That Wolverine: Origins & G.I.Joe ROC will both suck. Hard. Sadly, I doubt either will suck bad enough to actually be good.

I mean, you can make a good trailer for the blowiest movies. Yet every trailer of Wolverine looks lame. And I think it's a bad sign that the creators obviously think the scene of Wolverine flying through the air is bad-ass while both times I've seen it the audience laughed / groaned at it.

Also, I chatted with a Hasbro rep yesterday who said that Hasbro is expecting it to tank and pulled budget from the Wolverine: Origins toy line to focus on Marvel Universe.

Race Bloggin'

This blog sucks, mostly cause I was exiled by Stoked to CA and then when I got back home found myself waylaid by the flu and my gut. But I just don't have the desire to blog daily about economics. It just makes me angry and Krugman's right anyway so you should just go read him.

So in an effort to improve your daily lives I am gonna race Tuesday. Yeah, that's right. Just remember I haven't ridden in 3 weeks and if you want full on anger you better not drop me. Cause if that happens I just get quiet and stew.

Oh, and here's my recap of last Tuesday, which I didn't do:

Turn out was low. A break went. XXXX chased too much. Then YYYY sat on and totally used up my mojo to get the win. Lame.

Discuss.

You must be so proud

Still clinging to the illusion that your republican party is run by anything more than barely literate morons (yes, just went ad hominem on their asses) who couldn't hack an entry level position at.. well anywhere?

Here's an example of the alternative budget proposal, h/t to Atrios.

Shorter version:

1. Blame Freddie & Fannie
2. ?????
3. Recovery!

I lied, actually

None of the previous post was my real initial reaction to Battlestar Galactica's finale. My real reaction was "that's one long ass set-up for Terminator: Salvation".

BSG Finale leaves a gouge in my flight deck

BSG is finally over and my reaction, frankly, is I spent 4 years and it's God's plan? That's it. Screw you guys that's lame. Jacob explains the rest of my thoughts better with more words here.

It didn't take me long to buy into the argument Galt might make sense from the characters point of view.

But the God wrap up was just lame. My wife thinks it's cause I'm an athiest. Not true. I actually love biblical movies. Prophecy (the first, not the sequels) rocked. But the problem is that all the religion in the show was left too vague to suddenly become so crisp. It didn't flow; like Jacob says it felt less like the logical conclussion as much as the only option left from the scattered peices the writers had to choose from.

Uncritical outrage or baseless accusations say more about you than the person being accused

Mrs. PruDog is currently annoyed with me for engaging a winger friend on facebook over his unsourced or substantiated assertion that Chris Dodd inserted language into a provision he sponsored that protect the AIG bonuses.

The real story is long and complicated because it requires the reader to sort through dueling accounts as well as developing an understanding of the legislative process. The use of the word "insert" is non-trivial because it carries a different meaning in the legislative than the everday use implies.

If you care to know the details of the provision in question firedoglake and glennzila have extremely well sourced analysis.

The sourcing is the key: you are free to take issue with Dodd's role in this. You are free to disagree with their analysis. But both pieces provide first order sourcing that you can go read for yourself. And their analysis is based on actually taking the time to read these sources.

The winger and his friends were willing to make accusations. They showed no understanding of the legislative process (using commttee and conference interchangibly for example)and where unable to provide sourcing to substantiate their claims. I quit the conversation after Winger claimed that Dodd admitted he lied and had inserted the language in question. I asked if this claim was based on the CNN interview yesterday. Since no source was given it seemed reasonable this might be the basis for his claim. In fairness CNN's headline asserted something like "Dodd admits he inserted language" (and subsequently changed it to "Dodd admits role.." which I think is still misleadig but more accurate) If so, I was going to point out that's not what Dodd says in the video although you have to listen to the *entire* interview to understand what happened. And it is also consistent with his previous statements*. Anyway, the response was "I don't watch CNN" with no reference to a source.

What does this tell me? Well it tells me that Winger's opining may carry weight with his like-minded friends. But I won't waste anymore time giving his opinions any weight: he's established himself as someone willing to make assetions of fact without bothering to check to see if the evidence supports this. Or, he is lying. Frankly, it doesn't matter which.

*The gotcha moment in the CNN interview is that Dodd had said in a previous interview that he didn't know about the "February 11th insertion". This seems to be thin gruel to me for 2 reasons. 1st, he had already released a statement prior to the interview explaining how the change was made. 2nd, it seems to me (and his explaination was ackward but seemed to be the same) that he misunderstood the question which started out as a question about campign contributions and then refered to the change by the date. In otherwards, it seemed to me that the question was poorly worded, he misunderstood it, then did a poor job of explaining he misunderstood it. But again, this balances against previous, consistent statements he's made about his role.

Update: for a lengthier version of what I am talking about here's an Obama winger doing the same thing.

The core allegation relies on a misrepresentation of how amendments & provisions are written. The allegation conflates the group writting process and negotiation that occurs in committee with someone writting for themselves only. It also conflates what it means to agree to something versus actually wanting something to happen.

And I didn't find one example in the article were the writer, who unlike myself is a professional journalist, link to actual evidence of his position*. He links to what bloggers said. But he doesn't link to Dodd's interview, press release, the Wall Street journal article or any of the abundance of source material out there.

*he does link to an article written by Sam Stein, which he claims is an interview with Dodd but is just a report of the CNN interview, that leads with this:

The Treasury Department demanded that Sen. Chris Dodd insert exemptions into the stimulus bill that allowed bailout recipients to receive bonuses, the Connecticut Democrat said on Wednesday.

Which is, you know, exactly what Dodd has been saying. Again, the key is to understand that this was done in conference. That means that Dodd's name was on the provision but it was re-written by a group of legislators.

Farrar!

Perhaps I'm late to the game, but my favorite Wedding Rockstar won a stage of a big race.

Who's holding your phone now?????

Watchdongus

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