Liberal Talk Radio

Iraqis fall in love with the Lionel-Industrial Complex:
The service between Baghdad and Basra resumed with little fanfare in December after a hiatus of 18 months. Few dared use it at first, but word has spread of a safe and cheap journey, and railway officials are scrambling for funds for more carriages.
“There’s been a [...]

I love this headline, which just appeared in my RSS reader:

The collision of the lame pun and journalistic-headline-writing-comma-sytle makes for a funny juxtaposition.
Sadly, the actual article opts for a longer, less hilarious headline.

Blu-ray officially won the hi-def format war with HD-DVD this week. This odd for two reasons. One, HD-DVD was the backward-compatible format, and two, Blu-ray was backed by Sony. If you ever have to bet in a format war, there’s one rule of thumb (besides, of course, never getting into a format [...]

Yes, it’s bad.
Seattle’s even worse.
All of this was predicted months ago by the Professor on our podcast.
That is all.

Flexcar was a much better name. The name described the service, no explanation really necessary.
On the other hand, Flexcar’s logo looked like someone who had been run over, which seems like a mixed message.

The award for most stunningly understated paragraph of the day goes to Nicholas Kristof for this gem from today’s column about Kenyan tribal chaos:
Until he was circumcised with a machete in front of a jeering mob and then dragged off to be beheaded, Robert Ochieng had been a symbol of modern, post-tribal harmony in Kenya.
Bonus [...]

The New York Times pleaded with the candidates in an op-ed yesterday to devote a little time to developing a real urban agenda:
By now, many Americans have heard the presidential candidates talk about issues close to the heart of rural America. They fell all over themselves to praise ethanol in Iowa and condemn nuclear storage [...]

Yes He Can:
Obama will secure all loose nuclear materials in the world within four years.
Personally. He will personally board a small, agile Navy vessel and personally collect all loose materials. Every last material.

Obama has said in his policy statements that he’s going to bring troops home from Iraq without permanent bases there, but unless I’m wrong, there seems to be a great deal of wiggle room in his position:
Obama will immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq. He will remove one to two combat brigades each [...]

Is Obama in thrall to the powerful Lionel-Industrial Complex or just skittish plane travelers? From Obama’s Transportation policy factsheet (.pdf)*:
As president, Barack Obama will continue to fight for Amtrak funding and reform so that individuals, families and businesses throughout the country have safe and reliable transportation options.
Meaning, we’re going to subsidize scaredy-cats who won’t board [...]