Somebody That I Used To Know

I'll be the first to admit that I'm not very up on new music.  Actually, I'm not very up on new anything much anymore.  So, it should come as no surprise that I had not heard of  the song Somebody that I Used to Know by Gotye until this week.  Hell, I'd never before heard of Gotye.

My first brush with the song was somewhat unknowing.  I was shopping for a refrigerator last weekend at Best Buy and the video for the song was on all of the televisions in the store.  The sound was down, of course, and I didn't even know that it was a music video.  However, it was very eye-catching and I watched some of it as a result.  (It was a great indicator of television performance!)

Then, Tuesday night, Glee featured the song in an episode.  While it was a bit weird having two brothers singing it to each other, I liked the version a lot.  My wife mentioned that she was familiar with the song and really liked a cover by a Canadian band "Walk Off the Earth."  So, last night I finally saw all three versions of the song and their videos on YouTube.

It is a good song and I like both covers very much.  I'll throw in an appearance by Walk Off the Earth on Ellen as a bonus.  Enjoy.

Original



Walk Off the Earth



Glee

 Ellen





13 April 2012

Super Pac Ads on PBS & NPR?

The following came to me from FreePress.net:

“Sesame Street,” brought to you by Mitt Romney. Up next: “Downton Abbey,” but first, a word from Obama’s Super PAC.


We’re not kidding! Moments ago a U.S. appeals court struck down a ban on political ads on public broadcasting stations. That means your local PBS or NPR station could start running nasty attack ads right away.1

Tell PBS and NPR: No Attack Ads!

The court said that permitting these sorts of ads would not threaten or undermine the educational nature of public broadcast stations.

But polluting public programming with misleading and negative ads is not in keeping with the original vision of noncommercial broadcasting. And it’s certainly not the solution to funding public media.

Many Americans turn to public TV or radio to escape the offensive political ads that have flooded commercial stations. Please join us and tell the leadership of PBS and NPR stations that they must reject political ads:

Act Now: Political Attack Ads Have No Place on Public Media

An overwhelming majority of Americans say public funding for public media is money well spent. PBS and NPR and their member stations should know that accepting political ads is not the solution to public broadcasting’s funding problems.

We need to invest in public media, not open it up to dirty Super PAC money.

Take action now and then forward this email to your friends.

Their follow-up included a call to share this information on Facebook and Twitter, with links included.  Should you use either of those services, please do so.

Mercy, but I do not want to see politcal ads on public media.
 
13 April 2012

Behind the Buffet Rule

Brian Beutler discussed the real motivation behind the Buffet Rule at TPM.  Yes, it is political, but done right, it would raise a great deal more revenue than the media are currently -- and blindly -- giving it credit.

13 April 2012

Romney Isn't Stiff When He's Unzipped

I'm not trying to pick on Ann Romney here.  I'm really not.  It is all too easy to say something in the wrong way when you are under the pressure from the media spotlight.  Having said that, this made me laugh so hard I was pretty much crying.  From Luke Johnson at The Huffington Post:

Ann Romney, asked in an interview Monday if she has to defend her husband against charges that he is too "stiff," responded, "we better unzip him and let the real Mitt Romney out because he is not!"



"You know, it is so funny to me that that is the perception out there. Because he is funny, he is engaging, he is witty," she told Baltimore's WBAL, according to ABC News. "He is always playing jokes. When I met him as a teenager, he was the life of the party. And yet, he is also a very serious person and an accomplished person. And I think a lot of times, people see him in the debate setting."

As you might imagine, the late-night comedians had a field day.

11 April 2012

Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act

It would appear that the president joined the Republicans on the wrong side again.  Take a look at this piece by Matt Taibbi in Rolling Stone.

10 April 2012

Conservatives: "Low-effort Thinking"

One of my favorite political bumper stickers reads Vote Republican.  It's easier than thinking.  Now, there may be a study to back that up.  From David Freeman at The Huffington Post:

As The Huffington Post reported in February, a study published in the journal "Psychological Science" showed that children who score low on intelligence tests gravitate toward socially conservative political views in adulthood--perhaps because conservative ideologies stress "structure and order" that make it easier to understand a complicated world.



Ouch.


And now there's the new study linking conservative ideologies to "low-effort" thinking.


"People endorse conservative ideology more when they have to give a first or fast response," the study's lead author, University of Arkansas psychologist Dr. Scott Eidelman, said in a written statement released by the university.


Does the finding suggest that conservatives are lazy thinkers?


"Not quite," Dr. Eidelman told The Huffington Post in an email. "Our research shows that low-effort thought promotes political conservatism, not that political conservatives use low-effort thinking."

The first link in the quote is to a different study and story about it on THP.
9 April 2012

"Moderates" & Paul Ryan

Paul Krugman has written a great op-ed titled "The Gullible Center" about how the Republican center -- such as it is today -- has fallen under the dubious spell of Paul Ryan, whose budget plan balloons the deficit and redistributes weath upward while cutting services for those most in need.

9 April 2012