I think given all the people involved in his shadiness, including Russian oligarchs and the intelligence agencies and through them Putin, Manafort legitimately has to fear for his life and the lives of his family. Don’t get me wrong, he made his bed and I honestly don’t think anything is too good for him (short of his…

As you point out, the key thing is here is the “gradual.” It’s so believable because it is clearly a tough process in this show. Enlightenment like anything only ever happens in a moment, because there’s nothing but the moment, but at the same time it never happens independent of everything that comes before. The…

If your really want to see the difficult loner genius Sherlock subverted, I recommend Elementary. The first season especially, but even as a whole, it is a series in which characters and relationships grow, and in which one of the world’s brightest men realizes why he must change and learns to seek the help he needs…

And it is such to her credit that she’s not allowing herself to be intimidated from standing up for her principles.

That book’s contents put the love in my love/hate relationship with Hitchens.

Holy shit, is that ever sleazy.

Now that you mention it, I think I recall reading Good as Gold way back when and having a similar reaction. Ah, well... his response to the heckler, if true, is perfect.

What a colossal load of horseshit, right on its face. If there were no other options, you might have a point somewhere in the midst of the rest of that horseshit (a fuckload of people I know definitely WERE active about these issues in 2008 and well before that), but the fact is that we have real progressives who are…

No, so thank you very much for the recommendation. I recently got on a Vonnegut jag for the first time in maybe 20 years or more. Finished I recently and my God was he not only so superb and humanistic, but so ahead of his time in what he was writing. It’s no wonder Saunders made me think of him. Anyway, I’ve been…

I love Clooney as an actor and I have liked him as a director, but doing justice to Catch-22 is a very large hurdle.

I love the Nichols movie. It’s fantastic. And I think Heller is one of the great writers of the 20th Century. In addition to Catch-22, I cannot recommend enough his God Knows, with a kvetching King David on his deathbed still trying to schtup Bathsheba, and she keeps putting him off unless he makes Solomon king.…

Jesus Christ, even after having to look at twisted monsters like Delay, Cheney, and Adelson this guy takes the Hellraiser vibe to a new level. And the eyes are only a part of it. His flesh is so mottled and he looks like a sausage about to explode from its casing. All of that with the grin makes him a total nightmare.

That’s okay... I’m learning plenty from living in Capitalist serfdom now.

I thought I knew a lot about the history of pro wrestling, but I did not know this. Beyond that fact, thanks for writing it up in such an interesting way. Thanks.

It’s a distinctly modern, deeply unnerving bit of digital trickery, the kind of thing an octogenarian priest, cross in hand and fear in his eyes, would scream at in Latin.

Thank you for providing that context. It makes me feel better sitting some vitriol his way.

Exclamation marks fail to make you not look as stupid as you are.

I don’t fuck chickens I make love to them, I spell “shill” correctly, and you’re still an unprincipled, dishonest moron.

Hoo hoo ha ha ha! Now in italics: Hoo hoo ha ha ha! Also, “Reichwingers!” and something incomprehensible about “skis.”

So THAT’S why we should capitulate to climate disaster and economic disaster. It all makes so much sense now instead of fighting it. I almost forgot that’s the reason the landmark civil rights era legislation didn’t pass and that we should sit around waiting for the promised era when the old guard will no longer have…