I just want to keep some of these quotes accessible for our readers throughout the holiday season.
Here’s another great quote from the movie Elf:
(Phone Ringing) Buddy the Elf, what’s your favorite color?
Enjoy the audio:
Year: 2009
House Panel To Subpoena White House Gate-Crashers
Congress decided to subpoena the White House gate-crashers to testify about how they got into a state dinner without an invitation.
Lawmakers on the House Homeland Security Committee voted Wednesday to authorize issuance of subpoenas to compel the attention-hungry couple to answer questions about the Nov. 24 incident.
The infamous pair said they would invoke their Fifth Amendment rights to refuse to answer questions.
Buddy the Elf: “I’m singing! I’m in a store and I’m singing!”
I think I’ve seen Elf three times so far this almost-holiday season, and I love it.
Every time I see it, I laugh harder.
Enjoy Buddy the Elf singing:
Buddy: "I’m singing. I’m in a store and I’m singing! I’m in a store and I’m singing!"
Gimbel’s Manager: "Hey! There’s no singing in the north pole."
Buddy: "Yes, there is!
Gimbel’s Manager: "No there’s not!"
Buddy: "We sing all the time!"
Gimbel’s Manager: "No there’s not!"
Buddy: "Especially when we make toys!"
Click on the button below to enjoy Buddy:
How Richard Cohen’s Healing Homosexuality Teaching Inspire Uganda’s Gay-Killing Law
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Rachel Maddow has been following reporting on the passage of Uganda’s hateful new legislation which essentially makes homosexuality a capital offense. In the video above, she shows a connection between self-proclaimed ex-gay Richard Cohen’s "pray the gay away" teachings and the new laws.
Last night, Rachel Maddow continued her "Uganda Be Kidding Me" segment by identifying an important source of inspiration for the country’s "gay-killing" legislation: Richard Cohen, a self-proclaimed "ex-gay" turned homosexual "healer." A staff member from his organization, the International Healing Foundation, traveled to Uganda in March to lead a "pray the gay away" event and, soon after, Cohen’s book, "Coming Out Straight: Understanding and Healing Homosexuality," was used as the primary teaching material for the anti-gay workshop that is directly credited with bringing about this disturbing measure.
Longtime Salon readers might recognize the name: Mark Benjamin wrote about Cohen in his four-part series on "curing" same-sex desires. Cohen also stirred up quite the media storm a few years back with an appearance on CNN in which he demonstrated two therapies for homosexuality: Beating a pillow with a tennis racket and screaming at his mother until he was red in the face ("Mom! Mom! Mom! Mom! Why did you do that to me?") and cuddling a fully grown gay man in an attempt to simulate a healthy father-son relationship. If there is anything to be learned from the segment, it’s that Richard Cohen is a very unwell man in need of therapy — just not the kind he thinks.
Very disturbing.
‘As the World Turns’ Turns No More
The last soap opera I watched consistently was "The Young and the Restless" back when I was in graduate school. I was hooked, and I’m glad I broke the habit.
Apparently, I’m not alone.
"As the World Turns" is going off the air.
From the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:
Procter & Gamble, the company responsible for the phrase "soap operas," is out of the daytime drama business after 76 years now that CBS is making "As the World Turns" stop spinning.
The network announced the cancellation on Tuesday, the day "As the World Turns" broadcast its 13,661st episode. Its last episode will air next September, CBS said.
It’s the second daytime drama CBS has canceled in a year, after "Guiding Light." They were the last two produced by a subsidiary of Procter & Gamble, the company for which the term "soap operas" was created because it used the shows to hawk products like Ivory soap and Duz laundry detergent.
Daytime dramas have been fading as a genre for years with more women joining the work force and the increased number of channels offering alternatives like news, talk, reality and game shows. In tough economic times, paying casts, producers and writers proved prohibitive to networks when there were cheaper alternatives.
The cancellation will leave CBS with only two daytime dramas: "The Young and the Restless" and "The Bold and Beautiful." ABC has three soaps left and NBC one.
Through the years, actors Marisa Tomei, Meg Ryan, Parker Posey and James Earl Jones have appeared on "As the World Turns." The show follows families in the Illinois town of Oakdale.
I won’t miss it.
Quinn to Sign Reform Legislation on Anniversary of Blagojevich Arrest
Gotta give Pat Quinn credit for having a sense of humor.
Gov. Pat Quinn says he will sign into law the state’s first-ever limits on campaign contributions on Wednesday — exactly one year after his predecessor and onetime ally Rod Blagojevich was roused from bed and arrested on federal corruption charges.
Quinn acknowledged today that the campaign reform measure is “not perfect,” but said it’s a crucial first step.
“It’s substantial progress and I think it’ll make a great difference in making elections more competitive in Illinois and more open,” Quinn said this afternoon following an appearance before the Tribune’s editorial board.
The law would for the first time set limits on how much donors can give to political campaigns, though powerful legislative bosses get a pass on some restrictions. The law won’t impact next year’s elections since the money restrictions don’t go into effect until 2011.
Quinn’s signature would mark the end of a nearly year-long battle following Blagojevich’s arrest to limit the amount of money that flows into elections. Quinn vetoed an earlier version of the bill this summer after public push-back from reform groups, who have signed on in support of the latest measure in an effort to put some form of limits on the books.
Quinn said he decided to sign the bill on the anniversary of Blagojevich’s arrest to encourage citizens to look back on the past year and the changes that have been implemented since Blagojevich’s ouster.
Irony, thy name is Blagojevich.
Senate Leaders in Tentative Deal to Radically Alter Public Option
The New York Times is reporting this evening that Senate leaders are in talks to radically alter the public option.
The Senate majority leader, Harry Reid of Nevada, said on Tuesday night that he had reached “a broad agreement” among a group of 10 Democrats who have been working to resolve the dispute over a proposed government-run insurance plan that has posed perhaps the biggest obstacle to major health care legislation.
Mr. Reid refused to provide details, saying only that the group of 10 senators – five liberals and five centrists – would be sending proposals to the Congressional Budget Office for analysis. The broader Senate Democratic caucus appeared to be in a state of confusion with even some senior party leaders saying they were unaware of any agreement.
But Democratic aides said that the group had tentatively agreed on a proposal that would replace a government-run health care plan with a menu of new national, privately-run insurance plans modeled after the Federal Employee Health Benefits Program, which covers more than eight million federal workers, including members of Congress, and their dependents.
This is bad news for America. There is broad support for the public option among the public. Senator Harry Reid and the other leaders are caving to the for-profit health insurance industry.
U.S. May Reindict Blagojevich
Federal prosecutors are promising to bring a new indictment against former Gov. Rod Blagojevich to avoid issues connected to an appeal before the U.S. Supreme Court on the scope of the federal "honest services" statute under which Blagojevich has been charged.
That would prevent the need to delay Blagojevich’s June trial date, they said.
In a filing today, prosecutors said they would handle the honest services question in the new filing against the former governor. The high court is expected to hear arguments tomorrow related to the limits of the federal statute.
Honest services fraud criminalizes schemes that deprive the public or the government of the right to have public officials perform their duties honestly.
The honest services statute makes up a portion of a number of the charges against Blagojevich, alleging that he violated his official duties while illegally leveraging the powers of his office to benefit himself.
Coming soon to every news channel imaginable, The Summer of Blagojevich.
Check your local listings.
I Don’t Care Who Tiger Woods is Sleeping With, and Neither Should You
I was tired last week of hearing the name Tiger Woods. The guy can golf. I don’t care who he’s sleeping with.
Do I believe in fidelity in marriage? Yes, I do. Am I sad to hear that Tiger has allegedly strayed? Yes, I am. Is it any of my business?
No. Absolutely not.
Welcome to Puritanical America. We judge you no matter who you sleep with, even if you only sleep with you wife.
It sounds like Tiger and his wife, Elin Nordegren, are taking some time apart. That’s okay with me. And that is none of my business either.
Tiger Woods is not some pol who has spent the last 20 years of his life railing against liberal social mores. I have no notion whatsoever of where Tiger Woods stands politically, and, right now, I don’t care.
I hope that, during this time apart, he and his wife can find some privacy, occasionally chat on the phone.
Yes, the man needs to make some decisions, now that it’s all public.
But that decision rests between him and his wife.
In Support of Obama’s ‘Surge’ in Afghanistan
The New York Times posted an extensive article on the process through which President Obama arrived at his decision to send 30,000 troops to Afghanistan. Obama was "haunted by the human toll," his advisers say, and wrestled with the economic toll. One estimate claimed that an expanded presence would cost $1 trillion over 10 years. The "fiscally conservative" far right doesn’t bat an eye at these costs. Obama was concerned.
From The New York Times:
Now as his top military adviser ran through a slide show of options, Mr. Obama expressed frustration. He held up a chart showing how reinforcements would flow into Afghanistan over 18 months and eventually begin to pull out, a bell curve that meant American forces would be there for years to come.
“I want this pushed to the left,” he told advisers, pointing to the bell curve. In other words, the troops should be in sooner, then out sooner.
When the history of the Obama presidency is written, that day with the chart may prove to be a turning point, the moment a young commander in chief set in motion a high-stakes gamble to turn around a losing war. By moving the bell curve to the left, Mr. Obama decided to send 30,000 troops mostly in the next six months and then begin pulling them out a year after that, betting that a quick jolt of extra forces could knock the enemy back on its heels enough for the Afghans to take over the fight.
The three-month review that led to the escalate-then-exit strategy is a case study in decision making in the Obama White House — intense, methodical, rigorous, earnest and at times deeply frustrating for nearly all involved. It was a virtual seminar in Afghanistan and Pakistan, led by a president described by one participant as something “between a college professor and a gentle cross-examiner.”
Mr. Obama peppered advisers with questions and showed an insatiable demand for information, taxing analysts who prepared three dozen intelligence reports for him and Pentagon staff members who churned out thousands of pages of documents.
We never heard President George W. Bush described as "intense, methodical, rigorous, earnest," although he may have been "deeply frustrating for nearly all involved." Obama was "deeply frustrating" for different reasons.
“I don’t want to be going to Walter Reed for another eight years,” he told his advisers.
Read the NYTimes article. Any who thought Obama was not listening to his generals should take heed. He was taking them back to boot camp, pushing and challenging them more than they had been pushed or challenged before. As Commander-in-Chief, he alone makes the policy decisions in war. The generals meet the professor.
I’m with the professor and the generals.
No one gets everything they want in a time of war.