Depressing, awful, ugly, or all 3?

(Boston.com)

Here's a conversation starter: Nearly half of the 200 Boston teenagers interviewed for an informal poll said pop star Rihanna was responsible for the beating she allegedly took at the hands of her boyfriend, fellow music star Chris Brown, in February.

Of those questioned, ages 12 to 19, 71 percent said that arguing was a normal part of a relationship; 44 percent said fighting was a routine occurrence.

Health counselors are specifically concerned with teenagers' views of the controversy. Of the teens questioned, more than half said both Brown, 19, and Rihanna, 21, were equally responsible for the assault. More than half said the media were treating Brown unfairly, and 46 percent said Rihanna was responsible for the incident.

This is seriously screwed up. Seriously.

Cenk Uygur: The real problem with CNBC

(Huff Post)
I know that Jon Stewart and Jim Cramer have been in a bit of a "fight" lately. Of course, it's not really a fight because Stewart isn't doing this to pick a fight with Cramer or because he doesn't like him. He's making fun of him -- because that's what he does.

Over the last couple of days Cramer and Joe Scarborough have been using (comedian) as a pejorative, but that's the guy's job -- to make people laugh. They are pissed because he's good at it.

But if they think there is a kernel of truth in what Stewart is saying -- which, of course, is why they're actually angry -- they're right. Stewart also wants to make you think about what the role of the media is.

That's not the problem with CNBC. The real problem is their reporting -- or lack thereof. The CNBC reporters and anchors make the Bush press corps look like draconian inquisitors. They are obsessed with access.

I have a close friend who works at a business news station -- and here is the worst kept secret in show business -- it's all about the access. If you piss off the CEOs or the companies, you're going to get a call from your boss. You have jeopardized our relationship with them!

That is very thinly disguised code words for -- don't ever say anything negative about a company we cover otherwise your job is in the trouble. The message is clear -- go along to get along. This isn't journalism. It's public relations by another name.

CNBC never did any exposés about the enormous risks these financial companies took. They never exposed the insanity of the derivatives market. And they never told their audience that the executives of these companies have been robbing their shareholders blind. Because they didn't see that as their job. They saw their job as doing whatever it took to keep Wall Street happy and playing ball with them.

(More)

Stewart v. Cramer: The Smackdown (uncensored)

Jon Stewart hammered Jim Cramer and his network, CNBC, in their anticipated face-off on "The Daily Show," repeatedly chastising the "Mad Money" host for putting entertainment above journalism.

"I understand that you want to make finance entertaining, but it's not a ... game," Stewart told Cramer.

The program opened in mock hype of the confrontation, which caught headlines through the week as each snipped at the other over the air. The show announced it as "the weeklong feud of the century."

In his opening, Stewart announced that it was "go time." He played a video clip of Cramer's Thursday guest appearance on "The Martha Stewart Show" in which Cramer beat a mound of dough, pretending it was Stewart.

Said Stewart: "Mr. Cramer, don't you destroy enough dough on your own show?"

Once Cramer came out for the interview, Stewart wondered: "How the hell did we get here?"

Stewart said he and Cramer are both snake-oil salesman, only "The Daily Show" is labeled as such. He claimed CNBC shirked its journalistic duty by believing corporate lies, rather than being an investigative "powerful tool of illumination." And he alleged CNBC was ultimately in bed with the businesses it covered _ that regular people's stocks and 401Ks were "capitalizing on your adventure."

For his part, Cramer disagreed with Stewart on a few points, but mostly acknowledged that he could have done a better job foreseeing the economic collapse: "We all should have seen it more."
Cramer said CNBC was "fair game" to the criticism and acknowledged the network was perhaps overeager to believe the information it was fed from corporations.

Cramer insisted he was devoted to revealing corporate "shenanigans," to which Stewart retorted: "It's easy to get on this after the fact."

At one point, Cramer sounded the reformed sinner, responding to Stewart's plea for more levelheaded, honest commentary: "How about I try that?" said Cramer. "I'll do that."

By the end, the two-segment interview went far beyond its allotted time. Comedy Central said the on-air version would be cut by about eight minutes, though the entire interview would be available unedited on ComedyCentral.com on Friday. See the unedited interview below.

Intro:

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Intro - Brawl Street: Get Ready to Buy Low! And Sell Die

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things w/ Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Jim Cramer

Jim Cramer criticizes Rick Santelli's rant and admits he made his own mistakes, in this exclusive, uncensored video.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Jim Cramer Unedited Interview Pt. 1

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things w/ Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Jim Cramer

Jon presents Jim Cramer with some old footage from his shady hedge fund days in this exclusive, uncensored video.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Jim Cramer Unedited Interview Pt. 2

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things w/ Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Jim Cramer

Jim Cramer defends his role as a commentator on an entertainment show in this exclusive, uncensored video.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Jim Cramer Unedited Interview Pt. 3

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things w/ Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Jim Cramer

Ummm...... wow.

Indian doctors save boy impaled on iron rod

(CNN) Indian doctors have successfully removed a 1.2-meter rod from a three-year-old boy after he was impaled on it at his grandparents' house.
The Times of India reported that Mehul Kumar had fallen on the rod while playing on his grandparents' under-construction roof terrace in Ranchi, the capital city of Jharkhand state.

The rod pierced through Kumar's body and he then fell to the ground, the newspaper reported.

He was rushed to a nearby hospital and then taken to the Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences in Bariatu, six kilometers away.

Dr Sandeep Agarwal, the leader of the five-strong team of doctors who spent five hours operation on Kumar, told the Times the boy was out of danger.

"We first removed the rod following which an operation was done to repair the vital organs that had been injured,'' he said.

I didn't know Bjorn Borg made underwear

On the par-4 third hole during the first round of the WGC-CA Championship, Henrik Stenson removed his clothes to hack a ball out of the mud.

Stenson found himself in a similar situation in Dubai earlier this year. He kept his clothes on to hit out of the mud and found himself covered in dirt for the rest of the round.

Stenson, who finished the day with a 3-under 69, opted to remove his clothing this time. He got his ball free and made perhaps the most entertaining bogey of his life.



Click here to see the slideshow

Flight 1549 (Hudson River) 3D amination recreation

With time-correct voice over between Captain Sullenburger and the tower.

It's still amazing. Sully sound slike he's reading the phone book, not announcing that he's got to ditch in the Hudson.

Matthews hammers Fleischer

Chris Matthews beats on Ari Fleischer over the "No Attacks" myth the Bushies are propagating.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

The Stewart-Cramer Feud, all in one spot

Jim Cramer is going on The Daily Show Thursday night. He and Jon Stewart have been engaging in a war of words for over a week.

It begins here, when Stewart went after CNBC. The piece was planned, but seemed more relevant when loudmouth revolution leader Rick Santelli stiffed Stewart at the last minute.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

CNBC Gives Financial Advice

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Joke of the Day

Cramer then protested that a statement of his regarding buying Bear Stearns stock was taken out of context.

Stewart conceded the point to Cramer, saying with a hint of mockery, "I apologize, that was out of context, technically you were correct, you weren't suggesting to buy Bear Stearns. That was something you did five days earlier, in your buy and sell segment."

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

In Cramer We Trust

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Economic Crisis

Going on the Today Show, Cramer again tried to deflect criticism of his Bear Stearns call.

Following Jim Cramer's appearance on Today on Tuesday as a rebuttal to Jon Stewart, The Daily Show launched a full frontal assault on the entire NBC family.

Noting the awkwardness of Cramer's appearance on "The Today Show," where he watched Stewart's attack on his credibility, Stewart deadpanned that "it put a human face on my mocking, and gave me a sense of the damage I had done to a real person... It'd be like him having to watch me as his Bear Stearns advice wiped out my parents' 401(k)."

Stewart then turned to MSNBC, where he introduced Cramer's appearance on "Morning Joe" by saying "I like my news like I like my coffee, white and bitter."

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Basic Cable Personality Clash Skirmish '09

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Economic Crisis

So now you're ready for Part 5, Thursday night.

Stewart Unleashed

Following Jim Cramer's appearance on Today on Tuesday as a rebuttal to Jon Stewart, The Daily Show launched a full frontal assault on the entire NBC family.

Noting the awkwardness of Cramer's appearance on "The Today Show," where he watched Stewart's attack on his credibility, Stewart deadpanned that "it put a human face on my mocking, and gave me a sense of the damage I had done to a real person... It'd be like him having to watch me as his Bear Stearns advice wiped out my parents' 401(k)."

Stewart then turned to MSNBC, where he introduced Cramer's appearance on "Morning Joe" by saying "I like my news like I like my coffee, white and bitter."

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Basic Cable Personality Clash Skirmish '09

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Economic Crisis

Mindblowing

These are multiple YouTube clips (mostly instructional and performance videos) edited into slick mega-mashups by Israeli funk producer, Kutiman. They're not just patchwork assemblages, they're sample-based original creations. What you see is what you hear.

This is really amazing.

See them all:
http://thru-you.com

Jon Stewart and Jim Cramer go toe-to-toe, in seperate segments, on video...

...OK, so it's not technically toe-to-toe. More like they have competing video segments.

Jon Stewart, whose pointed takedown of the network CNBC last week has already become legendary, returned to the subject Monday in response to host Jim Cramer's complaint that he was taken out of context during the segment.

In regards to Cramer, Stewart addressed the host's suggestion that the "Daily Show" had used a particular clip from his show "Mad Money" to make it look as if he had recommended buying Bear Stearns stock a week before it collapsed.

Stewart conceded the point to Cramer, saying with a hint of mockery, "I apologize, that was out of context, technically you were correct, you weren't suggesting to buy Bear Stearns. That was something you did five days earlier, in your buy and sell segment." Roll the clip!

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

In Cramer We Trust

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Economic Crisis

Erin Burnett and Jim Cramer made an appearance on the TODAY Show Tuesday morning, filled with much the same rote nonsense that you hear on the TV every day. How can President Obama, as President, dare to do more than one thing at a time? There are too many bills for Erin Burnett to read, in between reality show appearances. And Jim Cramer just can't understand how a number of issues all dovetail with the economy. Seriously, watch this guy as he mocks the stem cell research order, because sure, there's no way at all that scientific innovations might impact the economy at all! There's no "stem cell research" button on the set of Mad Money that makes a fart noise. SHREWD INVESTORS TAKE NOTE, I GUESS.

Naturally, the ongoing war of japery between Cramer and Daily Show host Jon Stewart came up. Meredith Vieira makes Cramer watch last night's riff on the Daily Show, and, in exquisitely uncomfortable side-by-side boxes, you get to watch Cramer react.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Frank Schaffer: GOP arsonists burned down our national home

(Huff Post)
Open Letter to the Republican Traitors (From a Former Republican)

You Republicans are the arsonists who burned down our national home. You combined the failed ideologies of the Religious Right, so-called free market deregulation and the Neoconservative love of war to light a fire that has consumed America. Now you have the nerve to criticize the "architect" America just hired -- President Obama -- to rebuild from the ashes. You do nothing constructive, just try to hinder the one person willing and able to fix the mess you created.

I used to be one of you.

How can anyone who loves our country support the Republicans now? Barry Goldwater, William F. Buckley and Ronald Reagan defined the modern conservatism that used to be what the Republican Party I belonged to was about. Today no actual conservative can be a Republican. Reagan would despise today's wholly negative Republican Party. And can you picture the gentlemanly and always polite Ronald Reagan, endorsing a radio hate-jock slob who crudely mocked a man with Parkinson's and who now says he wants an American president to fail?!

With people like Limbaugh as the loudmouth image of the Republican Party -- you need no enemies. But something far more serious has happened than an image problem: the Republican Party has become the party of obstruction at just the time when all Americans should be pulling together for the good of our country.

...more



"The Republican base is now made up of religious and neoconservative idealogues, and the uneducated white underclass with a token person of color or two up front on TV to obscure the all-white, all-reactionary, all backward, there-is-no-global-warming rube reality. Actual conversatives, let alone the educated classes, have long sense fled." - Frank Schaffer

Jack Cafferty: GOP is becoming a cartoon

(CNN)
The Republican Party is becoming a cartoon.

If the Republicans are ever to emerge from the long dark night they have created for themselves it will have to be without pandering to the right wing nuts that comprise Rush Limbaugh's radio audience. Didn't they learn anything in the last election?

All of which is to say the GOP is blowing it big time. They were handed a golden opportunity to redeem themselves with the election of Barack Obama -- a chance to line up and in unison condemn the evil their party put in the White House the previous eight years.

But instead of getting on board the change train and recognizing the incredible amount of damage their people had done to the country, Republicans go blithely along as though nothing has happened.

I hate to break it to them, but a lot has happened. And they're not going to like any of it.

The latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll shows the Republican Party's favorability rating at an all-time low. President Obama's is at an all-time high. The same poll shows that Republicans are getting most of the blame for the partisanship that hinders governmental progress. And perhaps most telling, when asked which party is best equipped to lead the country out of recession, the Republicans trail the Democrats by a stunning 30 points.

(...more)

Eric Clapton - Tell The Truth

Brilliant version of the classic Derek and the Dominoes tune at Hard Rock Calling in London, 2008.

Great message too: "The whole world is watching now, can you feel it? A new dawn is breaking now, can you see it?"

vintage Smithereens

The Smithereens performing "Behind The Wall of Sleep live on the UK tv show "The Tube" recorded Friday January 30th, 1987

Obama restores science to it's rightful place

(Huff Post)
President Barack Obama urged researchers on Monday to follow science and not ideology as he abolished contentious Bush-era restraints on stem-cell research. "Our government has forced what I believe is a false choice between sound science and moral values," Obama declared as he signed documents changing U.S. science policy and removing what some researchers have said were shackles on their work.

"It is about ensuring that scientific data is never distorted or concealed to serve a political agenda _ and that we make scientific decisions based on facts, not ideology," Obama said.

Bill Maher's Ode to Government

Bill Maher ended his show Friday with a humorous and also impassioned segment on why government is important in light of recent attacks on its place in American life. Pointing to Bobby Jindal's suggestion last week during his response to Obama's speech that government was at odds with the American people, as well as attacks on the stimulus plan as typical 'tax and spend,' Maher responded by explaining that "the people are the government": "the first responders who put out your fires, that's your government. The ranger who shoos pedophiles out of the park restroom."

Instead of wanting less government involvement, Maher said that "recent years have made me much more wary of government doing the opposite--of stepping aside and letting unregulated private enterprise run things it is plainly to greedy to trust with."

Start at 2:25

Mexico's Drug War

As a nation we're so (rightly) concerned with our own problems that we're not noticing the complete disintegration of our neighbor to the south. Mexico's drug war is literally tearing the country apart and overfilling the morgues with victims. The bodies of the dead bear clear marks of almost unspeakable torture.

(MSNBC)
Death froze his exhausted face.

The attackers lashed or punctured nearly every part of his body. Then they cut off the dead man's head, wrapped it in a plastic grocery bag and dumped it with his body between two tractor-trailers on a city street.

As with most murders in Ciudad Juarez, police found no witnesses, no weapons. Only the battered corpse on the steel coroner's table carries clues to who he was and how he died.

Bodies stacked in the morgues of Mexico's border cities tell the story of an escalating drug war. Drug violence claimed 6,290 people last year, double the previous year, and more than 1,000 in the first eight weeks of 2009.

(The pathologist's) assistant, Ivan Ramos, 20, matches the head to the body. He holds it in place as Molina shoots a photograph, using a paper identifying the man by number to cover the gap in his neck. That makes it easier for loved ones who have to see the picture.

The doctor notes the rest of his injuries: broken left tibia, broken right humerus, severely bruised and cut abdomen, bruised left thigh, stabbed right thigh, sliced chin, knife punctures on lower right calf, lashes on his back. He has no distinguishable traits — no moles, no scars, no tattoos.

Molina unwraps what appears to be a tourniquet on his left biceps. She speculates it was put there by the killers to stop the bleeding from a stab wound so he would not die before they finished their torture. His knees are bruised. He was forced to crawl at one point.

The GOP's circular firing squad

(MSNBC)
Simply put, the public isn't buying what Republicans are selling right now.

An NBC/Wall Street Journal poll this past week put Republican popularity at near historic lows. Just 26 percent in the survey viewed the party positively, compared with 68 percent for President Barack Obama, despite the economic crisis and sharp GOP criticism of his $3.8 trillion budget plan.

Republicans trailed by more than a 30-point margin on the question of which party is best positioned to end the recession.

(David Frum in Newsweek)
It wasn't a fight I went looking for. On March 3, the popular radio host Mark Levin opened his show with an outburst (he always opens his show with an outburst): "There are people who have somehow claimed the conservative mantle … You don't even know who they are … They're so irrelevant … It's time to name names …! The Canadian David Frum: where did this a-hole come from? … In the foxhole with other conservatives, you know what this jerk does? He keeps shooting us in the back … Hey, Frum: you're a putz."

Here's the duel that Obama and Limbaugh are jointly arranging:

On the one side, the president of the United States: soft-spoken and conciliatory, never angry, always invoking the recession and its victims. This president invokes the language of "responsibility," and in his own life seems to epitomize that ideal: He is physically honed and disciplined, his worst vice an occasional cigarette. He is at the same time an apparently devoted husband and father. Unsurprisingly, women voters trust and admire him.

And for the leader of the Republicans? A man who is aggressive and bombastic, cutting and sarcastic, who dismisses the concerned citizens in network news focus groups as "losers." With his private plane and his cigars, his history of drug dependency and his personal bulk, not to mention his tangled marital history, Rush is a walking stereotype of self-indulgence—exactly the image that Barack Obama most wants to affix to our philosophy and our party. And we're cooperating! Those images of crowds of CPACers cheering Rush's every rancorous word—we'll be seeing them rebroadcast for a long time.

Rush knows what he is doing. The worse conservatives do, the more important Rush becomes as leader of the ardent remnant. The better conservatives succeed, the more we become a broad national governing coalition, the more Rush will be sidelined.

But do the rest of us understand what we are doing to ourselves by accepting this leadership?

Vatican: The washing machine liberated women

(The Independent)
As International Women’s Day is celebrated, the Vatican had a novel message for the women of the world: give thanks for the washing machine. This humble domestic appliance had done more for the women’s liberation movement than the contraceptive pill or working outside the home, said the the official Vatican newspaper, Osservatore Romano.

“In the 20th century, what contributed most to the emancipation of Western women?” questioned the article. “The debate is still open. Some say it was the pill, others the liberalisation of abortion, or being able to work outside the home. Others go even further: the washing machine.”

The article is entitled, “The washing machine and the emancipation of women: put in the powder, close the lid and relax”, taking its name from the Washy Talky, the Electrolux bilingual-talking washing-machine launched in India seven years ago, which would|remind the absent-minded housewife how to use the appliance.

The Catholic Church was never likely to laud the pill for its transformative power on women’s lives. Since Pope Benedict became the leader of the world’s 1.1 billion Catholics, he has published a religious document condemning contraception for “negating the intimate truth of conjugal love, with which the divine gift [of life] is communicated” and has urged pharmacists to refuse to dispense the morning-after pill. The Osservatore Romano held the pill responsible for polluting the environment and contributing to male infertility.