Single Clue Jeopardy!

Answer: During heated competition in the 1880’s between Edison General Electric Company, which supported DC current and was founded by Thomas Edison, and Westinghouse Corporation, which supported the superior AC current and was founded by George Westinghouse, Mr. Edison waged a smear campaign against Mr. Westinghouse by demonstrating a public execution of small animals using an AC current and later publicly campaigned for Mr. Westinghouse’s name to be synonymous with this, despite Westinghouse’s vocal opposition to the device.

(Edison would later admit that he knew all along that Westinghouse’s AC current was superior.)

Oh, competition.

The Question (er, answer) after the jump.

Personal Achievements In G-mail

It’s lame that I consider this some kind of achievment, right?!

My Current Desktop

Long shadows over hexagonal bricks in Battery Park, NYC. Click pic to enlarge.

‘Joe The Plumber’ To Crowd Of Washington Conservatives: “I’m Horny”

Dear Samuel Wurzelbacher, GO AWAY.

Story and video here.

PS: I’d pro’ly hit that.

Iraq War: Year 7 Begins

G.W. Bush announces the start of the Iraq war via television to the American people on March 19, 2003. (AP)

Remember this address?

Since the war began, 4,259 US military personnel and tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians have died. Sadaam Hussein has also been killed.

The Huffington Post  reports that the focus as we enter the seventh year is on stability through politics:

Sunni and Shiite lawmakers warned Thursday that political and economic challenges could derail the country’s progress toward stability as the Iraq war entered its seventh year. […]

With violence at wartime lows, Sunni and Shiite politicians are focusing more on economic and political issues that the U.S. and many Iraqis fear could stoke the war after U.S. troops begin drawing down this year.

“The political process is full of tensions and contradictions and the situation in Iraqi will deteriorate if political progress isn’t made,” Sunni lawmaker Osama al-Nujaifi said. “There are still a lot of challenges ahead, including unemployment and the immigration millions of Iraqis abroad.”

I’m all-for stability through politics but it seems like everything I hear about their legislature implies that it’s a giant partisan clusterfuck of incompetence over there. Like, even worse than ours.

HuffPo also has a slideshow of the war’s defining moments. De-pressing!

Obama’s New Year Message To Iran

Nowruz is the Iranian new year and falls on the first day of Spring.

Remember Bush’s address to Iran? Oh, right.

Opening Today: Duplicity

Photo: Andrew Schwartz/Universal Pictures

The Times’s A.O. Scott has given it a glowing review:

However you describe it, “Duplicity” is superior entertainment, the most elegantly pleasurable movie of its kind to come around in a very long time. […]

[Writer/director Tony] Gilroy’s most ingenious structural gamble — the duplicity of “Duplicity” — is to make foreground and background almost perfectly reversible. It’s a sharp, sexy comedy masquerading as a twisty tale of intrigue, and vice versa. And as soon as you grow impatient with the pre- or postcoital repartee of Ms. Roberts and Mr. Owen, a nimble army of supporting players comes forward to deliver Mr. Gilroy’s mordantly funny dialogue with perfectly straight faces.

The song featured in the trailer is “The Bomb” by Bitter:Sweet.

Download: Bitter:Sweet – The Bomb

More: “Duplicity” at Rotten Tomatoes; Movie Review: Duplicity (NYT)

Also opening this week is “I Love You, Man” which although starring the adorable Paul Rudd, I have a total aversion to because it reeks of Judd Apatow-style garbage (even though it’s not connected to Apatow). Frankly, I’m really only mentioning it here so I can include Manohla Dargis’s description of Jason Segel: “a gentle belly swell, the suggestion of an A-cup.” Ouch.

Too Populist? Obama Visits Jay Leno And “The Tonight Show”

Is that possible? Is it bad? I’m not sure how I feel about the President’s appearance on “The Tonight Show.” Part of me thinks it’s campaigning 2.0 while another part of me thinks that it’s an effective way to reach the people, albeit a small percentage of them. Perhaps it’s best understood as the Times described it: “a fire side chat for the flat screen age.” All of this aside, the President is still slated for a prime time address this coming Tuesday, which makes a visit with Leno seem all the more unnecessary.

Here’s the video of the full interview (transcript here):

Vodpod videos no longer available.

And yes, there was a gaffe when he compared his bowling score of 129 to the Special Olympics and, yes, they were already doing damage control by the time they were on Air Force One.

The Times has some ridiculously soft-ball articles covering the interview; the Fox News article is a recommended companion (although the fact that they put the Special Olympics thing in the title is a bit over-the-top).

More:
“For Obama, Talk About The Economy Goes Into Late Night” (NYT)
“Seeking Everyman, Obama Does Leno” (NYT)
“Obama on ‘Tonight Show’ Discusses Economy, Makes Special Olympics Joke” (Fox News)
“Transcript: Obama On “The Tonight Show” (NYT)

Jim Cramer On “Daily Show” Brawl, Jon Stewart

CNBC’s Jim Cramer finally commented on his confrontation with Jon Stewart while speaking with Meredith Viera (am I the only one who loves her?) on the Today show:

I think some of Cramer’s points are fair but I also think he slightly skews  (misses?) the fundamentals of Jon’s argument. I think Tucker Carlson’s criticism of the showdown was probably a better defense of Cramer than what Cramer came up with.

Random Thought: Skin Grafts And The Hirsute Body

Exhibit A

So, let’s say your face is mauled by a Chimpanzee and you need a skin graft so you can have a face again.  BUT, what if you’re really hairy and there’s no non-hairy part of your body from which to take the graft? What do they do? Do they just take it from your chest and say, “Well, a forehead with chest hair coming out of it is better than having no forehead at all“?

I wonder.