From the new “Public Editor” of the New York Times, on their belated coverage of the Air America scandal:

There’s another reason to get to the bottom of the scandal. It’s the perception problem

The LA Times has seen a plunge in home delivery:

an analysis of newspaper circulation by Prudential Equity Group LLC found that the Times lost more than 100,000 paid home-delivery subscribers between March 2004 and March 2005. The drop in home delivery was 18.1 percent

This ought to be framed, or perhaps displayed in a museum. It’s a (truly, perhaps in the best sense of the word) liberal reporter who actually seems to live up to the (usually absurd) claim that his politics don’t affect his reporting. He actually saw something wrong with the Al Franken gang diverting funds from poor children to their failed escapade. Can you imagine?

And his band of brothers in the press attempted to steal the story from him:

Last week Executive Editor Michael Horowitz called in to conservative radio host Sean Hannity

I’ve kvetched in the past about needlessly stupid things in science-fiction movies (needlessly in that they don’t even advance the plot, or necessarily add to the drama). Well, here’s someone who thinks the same thing about cinematic swordplay.

If the purpose of lightsaber fight choreography is simply to convey drama and excitement within the context of a story, then choreographers feel they’ve done their job well. But, from my point of view, if a lightsaber fight is supposed to convince the viewer that individuals of great skill are really trying to kill one another with laser swords while using supernatural powers that heighten their senses and physical abilities, well, they fail miserably.

[via Geek Press]

The MSM is at least asking itself if its Iraq reporting is well balanced. We’ll see if anything comes of this.

So, I’m getting ready to go the airport this morning, and I hear on the news that Helen Thomas has promisedthreatened to kill herself if Dick Cheney runs for president. As if we needed more reasons for him to run.

So, I’m getting ready to go the airport this morning, and I hear on the news that Helen Thomas has promisedthreatened to kill herself if Dick Cheney runs for president. As if we needed more reasons for him to run.

So, I’m getting ready to go the airport this morning, and I hear on the news that Helen Thomas has promisedthreatened to kill herself if Dick Cheney runs for president. As if we needed more reasons for him to run.

I’ve been at meetings at NASA HQ all day (sorry, nothing particularly exciting) and I’m about to fly back to Florida for about ten hours, after which I fly to California for the afternoon, then to St. Louis for a weekend family wedding, leaving on Friday morning. Blogging is unlikely for a while…

I will leave you with this irritating vignette from the White House Press Corps, offered by Jeff Foust:

Q And how is the Mars program going?

MR. McCLELLAN: NASA can probably update you on the effort. Again, this is a long-term program, and you can sit there and smirk about it, but the President felt it was important — (laughter) — the President felt it was important to outline a clearly defined mission for NASA. And we’re all excited about today’s launch and we wish the —

Q Will he be speaking about it —

MR. McCLELLAN: Hang on — we wish the crew all the best.

Q Will he be speaking about it —

MR. McCLELLAN: NASA is working on implementing it, John. Thanks for starting out the briefing on such — (laughter.)

Wasn’t that a knee slapper?

That dumb Bush and his fantasy mission to Mars. Yuk, yuk…

McClellan didn’t handle this well. The response to the first question should have been: “To which Mars program are you referring?” (Thus offering the reporter an opportunity to be more expansive on his profound ignorance about national space policy).

After he did so, saying something like, “You know, the president’s plan to send people to Mars decades from now,” the response would be: “Well, John, how much progress would you expect this year on something that’s not going to happen for decades? Do you imagine that that’s the sum total of American space policy? Or haven’t you been paying attention? Are you opposed to the nation having a long-term vision for space exploration?”

Yeah, I know that his job is to answer questions, not ask them, but still.

What’s really annoying about this is that on one of the few times the daily White House briefing leads off with space policy questions (due obviously to yesterday’s successful launch) there can’t be an intelligent discussion about it.

This seems to me worth worrying about. Much more so, in fact, than shark attacks and missing girls in Aruba.