Liberal Talk Radio

On the occasion of Norm Coleman’s concession and Al Franken’s election: Can you imagine what this would be like if breaking a filibuster still required 67 votes? Jiminy Christmas!

Here’s a grammar pet peeve of mine: Peter Shapiro was bounding around Brooklyn Bowl one recent evening, showing off all that his new music club slash bowling alley would have to offer. Why is the word “slash” written out? Didn’t we start using “slash” in spoken English as a way of pronouncing the “/” character [...]

The global warming bill passes the house, health care stalls, and finally, our international news roundup, with a Mideast flair. Links Mentioned: arrests in Iran … coup in Honduras … poppies in Afghanistan

Alan Wolfe says all that needs to be said about Gov. Sanford: The problems with Sanford lie elsewhere. He is by all accounts a somewhat typical product of what the Republican Party’s leadership selection process produces: a political extremist, a grandstander, a policy ignoramus, and a man of amazingly inflated self-importance. Those, to me, are [...]

A strange, bizarre, and yet somehow pedantic rant from the increasingly irrelevant American far right: … thankfully, Americans are not buying it. In spite of the fact that one can drive by an open field on Saturdays and usually see it filled with young boys and girls playing soccer, the game’s popularity has not moved [...]

On the podcast this week, we discuss the situation in Iran, and the president’s latest reaction. “Moral” language crept into Obama’s rhetoric this week as he invoked Martin Luther King and gave encouragement (if not outright support) to the Mousavi voters who are protesting the election. Many on the right are criticizing Obama for not [...]

Episode 391 wasn’t downloading properly before. I’ve re-loaded it, it should be better now.

More protests in Iran, the transportation bill takes a time out, and finally: health care reform gets expensive. Links Mentioned: HuffPo covers the protests … details on the Oberstar transpo bill.

Just another pig-bites-woman story: According to the complaint, the woman and her husband were taking a break between courses at the Herbfarm Restaurant on Jan. 11, 2008, when they wandered to the establishment’s pigpen. Equipped with a restaurant-issued pan of pig food, the couple was hoping to feed the animals. … “Out of the darkness [...]

A game in which you can test your familiarity with the two humorists. Andy Rooney excerpts are taken from his 60 Minutes commentaries. David Sedaris excerpts are from his Me Talk Pretty One Day story collection. For each subject there are two writing examples; you decide who is who. Part One: Computers David Sedaris or [...]