AoSHQ Podcast

This week's guest: Jonah Goldberg

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ThePantographPunch: A Dream Of A Fantasy: Looking For Lori Watt
"Lori’s total lack of inhibition and the earnest investment in what she does is both refreshing and confusing, for the simple fact that she does it so badly.... Lori doesn’t care, doesn’t back down, makes no apologies or explanations, struggles on with a self-belief born of earnest ambition and delusion. I love her. Adore her. I soak up her videos, her KoRn hoodie, her every word with cringing relish." A few seconds to savor. [rdbrewer]

Always Faithful I don't recall who linked this but I will never forget it

Fox News: Ohio couple married 70 years die 15 hours apart [rdbrewer]

Video: You can't reason with babies
Via @DoreenHDickson. [rdbrewer]

Comments 4-18-14

Video Dump [rdbrewer]:
• Hungry Hamster
• Indian PSA (NSFW)
• Drunk Russian vs. Fence (stay with it)
• Formula 1 Pit Stops 1950 & Today
• 80's Commercials

The Onion: After Years of Tantalizing Hints, Francis Ford Coppola Reveals That All the Godfather Films Actually Took Place in the Same "Godfather Cinematic Universe" [not_steve]

@StephenByrne86: The real reason @josswhedon signed with Disney. [rdbrewer]

Malcolm Gladwell, The New Yorker: Complexity and the Ten-Thousand-Hour Rule
Whether it's the violin, chess, or basketball, it takes roughly 10,000 hours to become a master. From last August. [rdbrewer]


Lori Watt's latest single
A cover of The Rose. [rdbrewer]

Mail Online: Is THIS America's newest top-secret spy plane? Clearest picture yet of mystery aircraft spotted flying over Kansas just weeks after being seen in Texas
"It appears to be the same aircraft as one that was snapped soaring over Texas last month." Not really. See for yourself. [rdbrewer]


John Fund: The United States of SWAT?
"The proliferation of paramilitary federal SWAT teams inevitably brings abuses that have nothing to do with either drugs or terrorism. Many of the raids they conduct are against harmless, often innocent, Americans who typically are accused of non-violent civil or administrative violations." [rdbrewer]

No Matter How Much We May Wish Otherwise, School Choice Doesn't Change Votes. It's still good policy but stop pretending it's good politics.

The schizophrenic art forger who duped museums for decades
"For 30 years Landis has duped the art world, donating his forgeries to museums and passing them off as originals. Now Landis is the subject of a new documentary, 'Art and Craft,' that premiered Thursday night and continues showing for the next week at the Tribeca Film Festival." [rdbrewer]


Nobody lives here: The nearly 5 million Census Blocks with zero population
"Green shading indicates unoccupied Census Blocks. A single inhabitant is enough to omit a block from shading." Via @slublog. [rdbrewer]

Charles Krauthammer, WaPo: The zealots win again
"For a long time, a simple finesse offered a rather elegant solution: no limits on giving — but with full disclosure.... This used to be my position. No longer. I had not foreseen how donor lists would be used not to ferret out corruption but to pursue and persecute citizens with contrary views. Which corrupts the very idea of full disclosure." [rdbrewer]


Jimmy Kimmel Hits Season High & Tops Late Night With ‘Scandal’ Finale Show [rdbrewer]

Outside the Beltway: Chelsea Clinton Pregnancy Reveals Everything Bad About Political Media
Another thing: In contrast, Jenna Bush's pregnancy wasn't a story. Not that it should've been; this shouldn't have. Via @slublog. Added: More from Newsbusters: Jenna got 33 seconds. Chelsea has gotten over 16 minutes. I guess they must love Democrats or something. Ya think? [rdbrewer]


James Antle: Voting against Bushes is an act of love
"Neither President Bush left the Republican Party in better shape than he found it. They were both succeeded by unified Democratic control of the federal government." [rdbrewer]


Neil Munro: Obama offers new insults, then laments gridlock
As someone at TheDC says, he's the Beethoven of passive-aggressive rhetoric. [rdbrewer]


Reason: David Axelrod Hired to Make a Socialist the U.K.'s Next Prime Minister [rdbrewer]

USA Today: Court seeks arrest warrant for captain of doomed ferry
"'The captain had a third mate be in charge of steering the vessel at the time of the accident,' said Park Jae-uk, chief investigator...." He was also one of the first off the boat. "Investigators are focusing on whether the boat, which was running late due to earlier fog, changed course too sharply, shaking cargo and cars loose...." [rdbrewer]

The Onion: FBI Uncovers Al Qaeda Plot to Just Sit Back and Enjoy the Collapse of the United States

"Multiple intelligence agencies confirmed that the militant Islamist organization and its numerous affiliates intend to carry out a massive, coordinated plan to stand aside and watch America’s increasingly rapid decline, with terrorist operatives across the globe reportedly mobilizing to take it easy, relax, and savor the spectacle as it unfolds.

“We have intercepted electronic communication indicating that al-Qaeda members are actively plotting to stay out of the way while America as we know it gradually crumbles under the weight of its own self-inflicted debt and disrepair,” FBI Deputy Director Mark F. Giuliano told the assembled press corps. “If this plan succeeds, it will leave behind a nation with a completely dysfunctional economy, collapsing infrastructure, and a catastrophic health crisis afflicting millions across the nation. We want to emphasize that this danger is very real.” [toby]

Found! First Earth-Size Planet That Could Support Life
"For the first time, scientists have discovered an Earth-size alien planet in the habitable zone of its host star, an 'Earth cousin' that just might have liquid water and the right conditions for life." More from LA Times. [rdbrewer]

Dan Kahan, The Cultural Cognition Project, Yale: More on 'Krugman's symmetry proof': it's not whether one gets the answer right or wrong but how one reasons that counts
"The test for motivated cognition is not whether someone gets the 'right' answer but how someone assesses evidence.... That Krugman is too thick to see that one can't infer anything about the quality of partisans' reasoning from the truth or falsity of their beliefs is ... another element of Krugman's proof that ideological reasoning is symmetric across right and left!" More from Jonathan Adler at The Volokh Conspiracy. Via @GabrielMalor. [rdbrewer]


Media Matters for America is resisting SEIU's effort to unionize its staff
"Last week, the union filed a representation petition with the National Labor Relations Board, indicating that the nonprofit media watchdog organization rejected an effort by the union to organize MMFA's staff through a Card Check election." Via @slublog. [rdbrewer]

CPI: Super PAC leaders score perks from political donations
"Political committees’ expenses include golf fees, steakhouse dinners and payments to organizers’ firms." And payments to organizers' firms are another way of getting money to organizers beyond what the PAC already pays them, right? Via @slublog. [rdbrewer]

Comments 4-16-14

Elizabeth Warren sticking to campaign script on Cherokee claim (Update: Blames “some blogger”)
Damn those bloggers. "If Warren had mistakenly lived her life openly as a Cherokee thinking she was Cherokee, that would be one thing and would be consistent with the supposed family lore. But she didn’t. She only was Cherokee when she was climbing the ladder to Harvard...." [rdbrewer]

Mediaite: Scarborough Hits Back at Krugman’s ‘Shrill Attack’ over Census Numbers
"Paul Krugman swiped at Joe Scarborough today with a blog post calling him (though not by name) an 'Obamacare truther' promoting the 'vile' idea the White House is using the census to cook the books. Scarborough fired back...." Video. [rdbrewer]


Charges will be dropped in 'disorderly conduct' / recording of bullies case
Maybe go after the bad guys, huh? Also from The Volokh Conspiracy: Ilya Somin, The new liberal “nationalist” case for federalism. [rdbrewer]

ExtremeTech: We’ve found the oldest star in the known universe – and it’s right on our galactic doorstep
From February, but it's interesting. It's older than the Milky Way. [rdbrewer]

Pundit Press: CNN: 'Breaking News: Titanic Sunk'
Chyron fail. [rdbrewer]

Megan McArdle, Bloomberg: Is Obama Cooking the Census Books for Obamacare?
"But why, dear God, oh, why, would you change it in the one year in the entire history of the republic that it is most important for policy makers, researchers and voters to be able to compare the number of uninsured to those in prior years?" [rdbrewer]

TIFO: Why Cashews are Not Sold to Consumers in Their Shells and Why Pistachios Used to Be Dyed Red
Cashews (yuck) come from the poison ivy family. Via @DebbyWitt. [rdbrewer]


GOP writes legislation to deny Eric Holder his salary
"A Republican congressman has introduced a bill that would stop government paychecks for officials who have been found in contempt of Congress...." [rdbrewer]


Rep. Louie Gohmert: Holder’s ‘childish and lame’ performance at hearing undermines his credibility on the IRS scandal
"Rep. Louie Gohmert said that his recent heated exchange with Attorney General Eric Holder exposed Holder as a 'partisan and extremely petty'...." [rdbrewer]

The oddest WTF video you will see today. Funny. Sexy. Bloody. Odd NSFW [dri]

Comments 4-15-14

A 13-year-old eagle huntress in Mongolia
"A photographer who snapped what could be the world's only girl hunting with a golden eagle says watching her work was an amazing sight." [rdbrewer]

AFP Video: Stradivarius viola could sell for $45 million [rdbrewer]

Eric Cantor — The New “Mr. Amnesty”?
"Denham’s amendment isn’t about helping a few patriotic DREAMers. It’s about getting an immigration bill–any immigration bill–to the Senate where Democrats led by Senators Reid and Schumer can expand it by adding as much of the massive Gang of 8 amnesty as possible, and then going to 'conference’ with the House on must-pass piece of legislation. It is, to use the technical term, a Trojan Horse." [rdbrewer]

James Taranto: Meet the New Boss: Sebelius steps down, and ObamaCare supporters pretend to rejoice [rdbrewer]