Bernie Mac has died at the age of 50 from pneumonia, which just seems insane.
I guess there will be no Ocean’s Sixteen.
*** Update ***
Small world. Skippy worked with him.
This Made Me Laugh
Remember the Unitarian Jihad? Now you can get your own name:
My Unitarian Jihad Name is: Brother Holy Claymore of Enlightened Tranquility. What’s yours?
Summer Camp
Might I suggest sending your children to Camp Inquiry:
This is a place where kids can be themselves. We work toward helping youth confront the challenges of living a non-theistic/secular lifestyle in a world dominated by religious belief and pseudoscience. Grounded on the conviction that kids can begin establishing habits of the good and ethical life early on, Camp Inquiry 2008 adopts a three-part focus: The arts and sciences, the skeptical perspective, and ethical character development comprise an integrated approach to this “Age of Discovery.” Campers, counselors, and teachers will address key issues around individual identity, forging trusting relationships, establishing a sense of local and global community, and living with respect for the natural world.
Sounds like a good idea to me. There was actually a story about this on All Things Considered yesterday. Very interesting. Imagine, kids actually being taught to think, question, and learn at camp rather than being taught to simply have faith that things are the way they are because it’s all part of the plan of an omnipotent being.
Of course, the downside to sending your kids here is that, chances are, they’ll never have a shot at becoming President of the United States.
Sleepytime
Yeah, this is so sweet I feel like I need to brush my teeth:
Things That Are Worth It
I’ve been fighting the IRS over a stupid mistake made for over three years ago (my former mortgage company didn’t report my mortgage interest properly.) It involved several phone calls, several letters, and a lot of general bitching. Today, I finally got a check from them for $4100, based on a mortgage my partner an I held jointly that year. Never give up on these people (and the reps who answer your calls ARE people.) The IRS’ll rob you blind if you let them.
Larison’s Take
Daniel Larison has a pretty perceptive piece up that is worth visiting:
Of course, the “fiercely independent” McCain spent the bulk of 1999 and the early months of 2000 (and many years after that) trying to please other people. The difference then was that Ignatius and other members of the Washington press corps were the ones he was trying to please and unironically, accurately referred to members of the media as his base. During the 2000 campaign, he referred to the GOP establishment as the “evil empire,” which seemed perfectly fair and satisfactory to his boosters in the press because they thought this was simply a description of reality and not a slur. Pretty much every “maverick” episode in McCain’s career has involved staking out a position in opposition to his party in the interests of attracting good press and cultivating a reputation as one of the “good” Republicans–the “noble, tolerant” McCain that Conason refers to in his piece–and he has done this by adopting a haughty, self-righteous tone as a champion of reform fighting against the forces of corruption (campaign finance) and bigotry (immigration “reform”) within his own party. By endorsing the worst prejudices about his party held by his party’s political opponents (while enabling some of their genuinely worst attributes in his warmongering), he became renowned for his integrity, just as Republicans have been lauding Joe Lieberman for his character and courage for denouncing liberals, his own party and that party’s nominee in terms that perfectly fit GOP talking points…
That he now approves of taking the so-called “low road” against Obama is nothing new. Indeed, by comparison with the treatment of some of McCain’s other opponents in policy debates, Obama is still being treated pretty easily.
He has a point. Much of what created the perception of his being a maverick was the object of his attacks. What made him a maverick was that he spent much of his time attacking Republicans, which made the press love him and the party hate him. Now, the target has changed, and we find the rank-and-file slowly moving towards him and the press wrinkling up their noses in disgust.
And let me just state again that you really should be reading the American Conservative magazine.
Open Thread
I won’t bother you guys with all the stuff that I have to deal with with for my new job, but it’s a lot. No complaints though. Being busy as all get-out means that I get to spend my waking hours doing stuff that I like (TIRF-FRET FTW, bee-yotches). The downside is that I can’t even read blogs more than once every couple of days, and as Ta-Nehisi Coates points out in a post that I recommend for a wealth of reasons, a blogger that doesn’t read a ton is a weak blogger. BJ will remain John’s show until I can scare up the time to blog again on a regular basis.
Also, One Of These Days.