Every day, on my blog, I post a “thought for the day.” Usually, it is something said by someone born on that date. On April 26, for instance, the quote was from Ludwig Wittgenstein, born on April 26, 1889: “For a truly religious man nothing is tragic.”

I’ve thought about this a good deal since I posted it, and have come to the provisional conclusion that it demonstrates considerable insight into the nature of the truly religious man but noticeably less into the nature of tragedy. [Read more →]

Tags: religion & philosophy, that's what he said, by Frank Wilson by Frank Wilson
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I work, I travel, I eat. That’s what I do. Last week I spent three days in Boston (my first trip to Beantown) and I believe I may have eaten at the best Steakhouse in the country.

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Tags: recipes & food, travel & foreign lands by Jessica Alfreds
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From MSNBC, President Obama makes his USSC nomination today.

The comparisons of her to Harriet Miers began over a week ago…

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Tags: politics & government by Mike McGowan
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The precipitous if brief drop of last week which punctuated a drawling decline of several weeks duration has apparently inspired a radical and of course brilliant reaction that has lit a fire under equities; as I type the Dow is up 3.4% on the day. What is this miraculous policy? The collected central bankers of the EU have publicly declared that they will buy bonds from governments at terms they cannot get on the open market. To a tune of $960 billions. [Read more →]

Tags: money, politics & government by Ken Watson
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How bad a guy is Lawrence Taylor? Over the years, the former NFL great has done a lot of bad things. Most of his documented problems have involved drugs, particularly cocaine. This time, though, he appears to have hurt someone other than himself. Taylor was arrested last week and charged with third-degree rape and patronizing a prostitute. The victim is a 16-year-old girl who ran away from home at fifteen. [Read more →]

Tags: bad sports, good sports by Alan Spoll
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10. The price of sardines should come down, with no need to pack them in oil

9. It makes Katrina seem less severe

8. The British Petroleum backlash should help U.S. gas stations

7. It provides a new topic for New Orleans blues singers

6. It’s good practice for the next oil spill

5. It’s a great sales opportunity for manufacturers of 4-story 100-ton steel-and-concrete domes

4. With all this cleanup practice, there might be a spillover effect on BP gas station restrooms

3. So far, FEMA isn’t involved

2. Free gas for people on the Gulf Coast

1. The oily bird catches the worm
 

Bob Sullivan’s Top Ten Everything appears every Monday.

Tags: Bob Sullivan's top ten everything, ends & odd, environment & nature by Bob Sullivan
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Sometimes a film, for all its length and breadth, contains for me a singular moment, a brief cinemagical gem that becomes — for me, at least — a keystone, or a pivot point for all the sights and sounds, the words and actions that precede it, and follow it. [Read more →]

Tags: movies by Jeff McDonald
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Today is Mother’s Day, and what better way to celebrate my mom than by comparing her to others who fall short? Here are five famous (or infamous) mothers whose DNA I am grateful I do not share. [Read more →]

Tags: art & entertainment, family & parenting by Meg Boyle
4 Comments »

Many of you may not know this, but today is Mother’s Day. “What is this ‘Mother’s Day that you speak of?” you may ask. Well, let me tell you.

Mother’s Day has its roots in Ancient Greece which had a “festival to Cybele, a great mother of Greek gods.” (Encyclopædia Britannica (1959) Vol.15, p. 849). Just as a side note, that was quoted from Wikipedia and not off the top of my head. It’s not like I know EVERYTHING. So anyway, the Greeks invented it and, their current economic decisions notwithstanding, it was a good call for a number of reasons. Mother’s Day is the number one day to dine out in the US. That means that the Golden Corral/Western Sizzlin’/or some other trough feeding frenzy establishment in NC will be even busier than usual. According to the aforementioned Oracle of Knowledge (wiki), Americans will spend about 2 and a half billion (with a B) dollars on flowers and more than 1 and a half billion (with a B) on gifts like spa treatments. [Read more →]

Tags: family & parenting by Jeffrey Maryak
1 Comment »

There’s so much going on in the world of Mixed Martial Arts these days. When I watch my monthly UFC bouts on PPV, I always think about how interesting the sport is and how lucky I am to live in these times. The last generation that got to watch anything like this actually knows When Fell the Coliseum. If MMA is a symptom of the downfall of our society, than I say burn baby burn, because it’s a great watch, and MMA is destined to stand in the pantheon of popular sports.

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Tags: race & culture, sports, television by David Alfreds
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So a colony of Group A Streptococcus bacteria made landfall on the back of my throat on Thursday evening, and has now erupted into a thriving settlement, planting corn and making friends with the natives. The resulting raw patch on the back of ye olde windpipe makes talking and swallowing difficult, and when a 300-pound man has problems swallowing his food, well, it’s time for a doctor’s visit.

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Tags: science by Mike McGowan
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I watched an interesting piece on Fox News where Ann Coulter, an amusing verbal bomb-thrower, spoke to Bill O’Reilly about the liberal media’s sympathy for Faisal Shahzad, the would-be Times Square car bomber.

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Tags: terror & war, trusted media & news by Paul Davis
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Sorry I’m late getting in this weekend’s box office predictions, but it’s MOTHER’S DAY ON SUNDAY and I don’t mean to shout like that but you all got to remember to get your mother something nice. She did all those great things for you. She taught you right (helping little old granny ladies across the street) from wrong (kicking little old granny ladies down the street). She locked you in the closet for eight hours a day when you did poorly on your grammatical tests. She took you to your first cockfight. She let you stay up until way past your bedtime so that you could watch “Carrie” with her, back when HBO would only show R-rated movies at night and she was too scared to watch it by herself. She pretended not to notice when you stole her cigarettes and smoked them yourself (she was trying to quit anyway). She taught you how to hold your liquor.

So get her something nice on Sunday, huh? At least a card with one of those messages that’s real heartfelt, a sort of “Thanks for all the great stuff you did for me” (choose from list in paragraph above)!

Now that all of that weepy stuff is out of the way, let’s take a look at this weekend’s box office predictions! [Read more →]

Tags: movies by Ricky Sprague
3 Comments »

Sitting, as I am, at ground zero for the modern know-nothing movement — that’s Arizona, the Grand Canyon state to you non-news-junkies — I have a certain less-than-impressed perspective on the latest wave of jingoism. For starters, while the state’s recent directive to law-enforcement agencies to drop everything else they’re doing and focus on harassing brown people draws wide support, it strikes me that it enjoys an especially enthusiastic reception among all the snowbirds who settled here after they got tired of waiting for global warming to creep its toasty way north and finally render Minnesota more habitable than the surface of Mars. They upped stakes, bought houses in Phoenix, and woke up one morning with the disturbing sensation that everything around their new domiciles is a little spicier, more colorful, and suntannier than it really ought to be.
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Tags: politics & government, race & culture by J.D. Tuccille
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The late great Groucho Marx said that military justice was to justice what military music was to music.

But thankfully we saw some justice when Navy SEAL Special Operations 2nd Class Matthew McCabe was acquitted of charges that he punched a captured notorious Iraqi terrorist.

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Tags: on the law, terror & war by Paul Davis
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To kick things off this week,  I want to tell you all about a website that instantly brings me back to my childhood. VirtualNES.com is a site where you can legally and safely play almost any game from the Nintendo Entertainment system. It is hilarious to see how simple the games were then, and how far we have advanced in video game technology. I’m not a “gamer” by any means but love playing old Nintendo games and harking back to my youth of hanging out with my friends playing RBI Baseball and listening to the Beastie Boys “Licensed To Ill” over and over.

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Tags: art & entertainment, Marty digs, music, sports by Marty O'Connor
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Justin Bieber, did your parents take you out of school too early? I mean, I know it’s important to be a superstar to tween girls, and maybe your family needed the money, but really, aren’t there mandates about hiring a tutor or something?  Seriously — this is why people from other countries (particularly my friends on the other side of the Atlantic) say Americans are stupid. At first I thought it was a problem with the accent, or maybe he misunderstood the question… but no… I think he’s never heard the word “German” before. See for yourself!

Tags: art & entertainment, education by Amy Boshnack
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Oh so briefly yesterday I was a genius. The stay was brief indeed but for a moment my decision to straight cash out my 401k last fall, derided by good and intelligent people in my life and in media was vindicated in an instant and for an instant as the Dow dipped below where it was when I bailed. [Read more →]

Tags: advice, politics & government by Ken Watson
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How much of a douchebag do you have to be before people speculate you have brain damage? That’s the diagnosis one writer made of Steeler QB Ben Roethlisberger. The theory is someone with frontal lobe damage is less likely to pick up on social cues (like a woman screaming, “No!”) and doesn’t consider future consequences of an act (such as police investigations and lawsuits). Big Ben’s had four documented concussions and apparently has little understanding of social mores in general — the articles notes his surprise to discover married men dislike it when you hit on their wives right in front of them — so it seems entirely possible, and with years of football and head trauma still to come will only get worse. If so, it adds a rather tragic twist to the case of Mr. Roethlisberger, and the only thing that would make it sadder is if he’s actually fine and this is just who he is.

Tags: sports by Sean Cunningham
2 Comments »

So, why do some people in other parts of the world have a negative view of America and its people? Is it because of our President (or his predecessor)? Is it because of our government, our culture, our religion (or lack thereof), our sense of superiority (both real and perceived)? Or, is it because of news stories such as the one that headlined yesterday’s “The Scoop” at msnbc.com ? [Read more →]

Tags: art & entertainment by Jeff McDonald
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