Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Debate


Parliament in the Ukraine debating the extension of the lease to a Russian naval base. I'm not sure whether this makes me feel better about our own Congress--or if I wish they'd just do this and get it overwith. Especially if the dude getting the business were Mitch McConnell. Or Joe Lieberman. Or Ben Nelson. Or John McCain. Or Michele Bachmann (yeah, I know she's a rep, but picture Boxer of Cantwell feeding her a knuckle sandwich and tell me that doesn't make you smile).

Friday, April 23, 2010

Happy Friday!



"Do you know that President Obama is considering banning fishing in America? Fishing."

It boggles the mind, doesn't it?

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Weirdness

Hey. The blog's been a bit schizophrenic lately--lots of updates to the format and layout and all the window dressing, but not much else. Well, I'm trying new templates and attempting to restyle it a bit but have not found the magic combo. And rather than go back to the way it was, I press on.

I'll be up and running again soon. Just need to find that 25th hour in the day.

Check back later for some Range Life preview action.

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Teabags


There's a big rally going on. I saw a study that said Tea Party folk are of higher income and education than the general population.

I don't believe it for a second.

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Steve Reid, RIP



The great Steve Reid, jazz drummer and collaborator of incredible depth, died last night in New York. He was 66, and he'll be greatly missed.

The video above is of he and Kieran Hebden (aka Four Tet). The pair have produced a gorgeous body of work together over the past few years.

Tuesday, April 06, 2010

POTUS



Great stuff.

Tour of the Basque Country

An exciting finish in yesterday's opening stage of the Tour of the Basque Country. I won't spoil the finish in case you want to watch it--because you CAN watch it, even without Versus.

www.cyclingfans.com has a really nice list of free spots to watch this tour and lots of other sports we usually don't get here. Watch the stages live with commentary in Spanish or Danish or whatever's on the list for the day, or watch videos after the fact right on www.cyclingfans.com.

So far, the Spaniards are on fire, but a certain Canadian made a strong showing, possibly indicating a breakout season...

Thursday, April 01, 2010

Drilling

The new proposal from the Obama administration on offshore drilling has taken a lot of people by surprise, it seems. Once the first reaction dies down, though, I think we'll see this as pretty sensible middle ground in this often unreasonable battle. As the NY Times says today:

The new strategy — the result of more than a year of work by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar — also confronts an essential political reality: the Senate will insist on offshore drilling as part of a broader bill, expected after Easter, addressing climate change and other energy-related problems. Mr. Obama is trying to anticipate and shape that discussion by identifying areas that he thinks can responsibly be opened for exploration while quarantining others.


We need oil right now, but we can't just keep drilling. And we need to cut our energy dependence. As far as I can see, the Alaskan wilderness areas that are so controversial are not on the table. Instead most of the leases will be in places already being explored or drilled.

That makes sense to me--hiding these things in remote wilderness where we can't see them but where the effects on nature and wildlife could be significant is a bad idea. We need this oil, why not drill for it where we are? Why hide it and pretend it doesn't exist? Lets mar the landscapes we've already marred with our presence and leave the pristine as it is.

At the very least this is another shrewd move from a president who finally has his feet under him, whose efforts are finally starting to merge and pay off. It's good to see.