MSN published their most influential men and women of 2007. The list of men was predictable, the women laughable. I was heartened to read comments about the list, specifically

Appalled in St. Louis:

Your criteria or the people evaluating your criteria must be very warped. It is amazing to me that so many of your most influential women are from the entertainment industry. The real world is not populated by entertainers and they have much less influence with real people than you think. Why didn't you look to the world of business, education, law, charitable foundations and science where real changes are made that impact all of our lives? Quit being so incredibly shallow.

JaninaB

Stop for a minute and compare the list of influential men and women. Most of the men were politicians, businessmen, or social activists. Most of the women were in the entertainment industry. Some of them had done nothing more than be successful entertainers and attract gossip. Couldn't you recognize people who actually make a difference in the world??? Two thumbs down, MSN!!!

I couldn't have said it any better. Putting Benazir Bhutto on the same list as Hannah Montana is just insulting. I'm glad other MSN readers agreed. MSN could've come up with this list by polling people at a mall; shouldn't they instead use their resouces and reach to educate their readers about influential people they might not have heard of before, people in science or politics who are making a difference?

This comment said it all:

Hannah Montana? Really? There was a woman who came to the high school where I live and spoke to the students of her life. She works for the U.S. Embassy in Iraq and she has survived two car bombings. She has survived attempted assassinations and has finally been able to flee to the U.S. Her brother and sister haven't gone to school in months because there were terrorist threats upon their lives. Members of her family have been killed off. She recounted her tale of her frightening trip here, and proceeded to write words in Arabic that were projected onto a screen "hope, faith, save us". I think people like this that come to save their country and help our own are much more influential that "the Obama Girl"

What I also found amusing was MSN's article on how they picked their influential people.

When the editors of MSN Lifestyle gathered for their annual assessment of the year's most influential people, a few names—mostly from the world of politics—immediately bubbled to the surface. But as we discussed the election cycle omnipresence of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, the prescient environmentalism of Al Gore, and the continuing emergence of Hugo Chavez, the conversation changed.

It started when the addition of George W. Bush to the list was proposed. The president, by any objective estimation, has had a rough year. Yet the difficulties of his presidency have emboldened the more liberal end of America's political spectrum to such a degree that an African-American and a woman are currently the frontrunners to become the next president of the United States. In this way, President Bush is more influential than either Obama or Clinton by themselves. Call it “influence through anti-influence.”

Let me get this straight. Bush is so bad that we have to resort to a black guy or a woman? Am I reading that right? We hate Bush so much that we're even willing to hand the reins over to minorities? And I thought Republicans were supposed to be the prejudiced ones. Sheesh.

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My husband was taking a turn around the internet in the computer room last night while I was already snuggled into a warm bed. Normally he has this nickname that he calls me around the house, so when I heard him call out "Sarah...," I felt something was funny. It seemed serious. Apparently it was serious enough that he used my real name to call out to me. What could he have found on the internet to make his voice sound like that?

Jamie Lynn Spears Says She's Pregnant

Yeah, you really don't want to know what I have to say about that.

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A cool post from everyone's favorite post-once-every-leap-year blogger: I didn't marry a girly-man
I'm considering paying someone to break into our home so I can see something that hot.

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We watched Live Free or Die Hard the other night, with Lileks' review up on the laptop while we watched. One thing I did like about the movie was John McClain telling the Mac guy to shut the f*#k up. That summed up perfectly the difference between the old man and the new. Can we get more movies like that? Maybe John Wayne could teach Ashton Kutcher to be a man? Or pair up Steve McQueen with Stiffler? These new leading actors could learn a thing or two.

After it was over, somehow the movie Redacted came up. My husband chuckled and said that Pootie Tang made more money than Redacted. We looked at each other, grabbed the computer, and had a good laugh. Pootie Tang whooped Redacted in box office take. Niiiice.

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A couple days ago, I started to hate.
I hated everyone I know who is pregnant. I hated everyone who already has kids.

People keep telling me that there's a lesson to be learned here, that God has a plan for my life. But I'm not so sure I like the changes that have come over me. In the past year, I have felt more bitterness, more jealousy, and more hatred than I have ever felt in my life. I have grown so angry throughout this process. Having a baby is supposed to be a wonderful experience, and instead I am full of rage. I can't help but think that this is making me a worse person, that I would never have felt these feelings if I'd just gotten pregnant and had a baby the easy way.

I don't like what I've become.

And then the doorbell rang, and the UPS man left me a package. Ginger sent me a blanket from Sew Much Comfort. And her son made me some fudge.

I started thinking, and I started crying. I don't deserve a Sew Much Comfort blanket. I haven't lost nearly as much as the people who normally get those blankets, and I sure haven't done it with much dignity. Here I am, being hateful and feeling sorry for myself, and I get the most selfless gift imaginable from the most selfless family on the planet.

I'm working on being a better person, I promise. I have to earn the right to have that blanket.

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I saw two very interesting and related events today that made me start thinking about race relations.

First, I was in the dollar store and a white dad and his white son were oohing and aahing over these "bling bling" toys. They were plastic necklaces shaped like dollar signs and stuff like rappers would wear. The white dad was using his outdoor voice to tell the kid how cool the bling was. And there were a whole lot of black people in the store who didn't bat an eye or seem to think this was at all weird.

Secondly, I later heard two middle-aged women at Michaels talking about beading and jewelery making. The white one told the black one that a certain type of magnetic clasp was "the bomb." And the black lady agreed.

Now I don't know exactly what each of these exchanges means on a grander scale. But it seemed to me today that elements of black culture are seeping into white culture, and the black people I observed today didn't seem to notice or mind. I thought it was pretty fascinating that in no way did the white people feel like they should watch what they said lest they appear to be co-opting someone else's culture or sound condescending, and the black people took it as fairly normal that a white lady would say "the bomb" or a white kid would want some 50 Cent style necklace.

I just thought it was cool. And I hope it does say something grander about our society.

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Last night we lost power for over an hour. In the grand scheme of things, that's not a major tragedy, but it's so easy to forget how much we rely on electricity to do everything. What do you do when the sun's already gone down and there's no internet, no TV, no phone, no radio, and no heat? Most people make a baby, but we're already ahead of that game. It's amazing how life slows to a snail's pace when the power goes out.

But my husband said the silver lining was that we didn't give a dime to any Saudis during that hour.

Posted by: Sarah at 04:39 AM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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1 Sorry to spoil the silver lining...but not all that much electricity comes from oil. In the US, the starring roles are held by coal and natural gas, with hydropower and nuclear playing the supporting roles. So the Saudis hardly lost any dimes at all...

Posted by: david foster at November 16, 2007 05:17 AM (ke+yX)

2 David -- Aw, rats. Well, the joke was funny anyway

Posted by: Sarah at November 16, 2007 05:27 AM (TWet1)

3 an hour???not here.....every time I call in a power outage(we live in SDAK, and the 1-800- number for excel energy is in Wisconsin) the computerized message tells us not to even expect the ''return of power, for at least 4 hours''. yes, we own a gas powered generator...for winter/ice outtages, that have left friends, neighbors and family without power for as long as 22 days(Nov.2005, my In-Laws)

Posted by: debey at November 16, 2007 03:12 PM (kocrl)

4 The joke does work. Like debey says, there are gas-powered generators. But you also didn't drive anywhere to seek power, heat, internet, etc. – or flashlight batteries, like we did.

Posted by: deltasierra at November 16, 2007 04:13 PM (woXks)

5 Yeah, if lots of people run home generators, it will help out the Saudis and other oil producers. Which raises an interesting point: The "progressive" wing of the Democratic Party is hostile to energy, and to the extent it gains power is likely to bring the nation's electrical system to a condition which combines very high prices with frequent outgages in many locations. Should this happen, the John Edwards of the world will be happily running their large home generators, which are far less efficient than central-station power. Other people and businesses will do the same to the extent they can afford it, resulting in a significant increase in demand for imported oil.

Posted by: david foster at November 17, 2007 08:22 AM (ke+yX)

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Do I have some sort of sign on my forehead that says "Tell Me How Much You Hate Bush"? It happened to me again in the airport last night, where some man wanted to rant about "those maniacs in the White House." What makes strangers think I want to talk about this crap with them?

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Boortz on what we can expect for the future:

As you undoubtedly have noticed, the 2008 campaign has, for Democrats, been nothing but new entitlement programs, expansions of old entitlement programs, and tax increases. This is the essence of what it means to be a member of the MoveOn Democrat Party. Create more government dependency, and tax those not dependent on government to pay for it.

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1 Republicans waste WAY more money on government spending than democrats. But for some reason, because the republicans waste the money on bombs instead of health care, and because they refuse to balance the budget and instead drive the country into debt and dependence on foreign banks, conservatives think it's the party of fiscal responsibility. Oh well. I live in Canada. My dollar is worth MORE than yours now. Think I'll take a trip down to seattle to buy some cheap pumas with my almighty Canadian dollar. Yeah, keep those economic geniuses of the republican party in power... it works at well for us in the rest of the world.

Posted by: Will at October 25, 2007 12:44 PM (bNKhO)

2 You live in Canada? Heh, I knew something wasn't right about you

Posted by: Sarah at October 25, 2007 01:20 PM (TWet1)

3 Or maybe Canada's conservative government is doing an excellent job with *their* economy?

Posted by: Ted at October 25, 2007 01:28 PM (yRolC)

4 I wish I could respond to either of you, but no matter what I write, I get a "questionable content" error message.

Posted by: Will at October 26, 2007 10:16 AM (JzKuA)

5 canada

Posted by: Will at October 26, 2007 10:16 AM (JzKuA)

6 Oh, i figured it out. I'm not allowed to write the word: S O C I A L I S T

Posted by: Will at October 26, 2007 10:18 AM (JzKuA)

7 Ha. I share a comments spam blocker with all other mu.nu blogs, so someone else must've blocked the s-word And as a real response to your comment: Trust me, you can't be any more disgusted with the Republicans than we are. They have abandoned their principles and deserved the beat-down they got last election. The problem is that the alternative is so much worse, in my opinion.

Posted by: Sarah at October 26, 2007 10:24 AM (TWet1)

8 It's not the "S" word, it's that "c i a l i s" is embedded in there. Death to drug spam, and the mu.nu commies just have to deal with it.

Posted by: Ted at October 26, 2007 01:45 PM (yRolC)

9 God damn drug companies are ruining Sarah's comment section.

Posted by: Will at October 28, 2007 01:22 PM (0Yps+)

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I wasn't going to waste time writing about this because if I wrote about every time something on TV made me mad, well, this would become a TV blog. But I saw this link on Conservative Grapevine and immediately thought, "I saw that piece of crap episode."

The latest episode of the CBS crime show "Cold Case" depicted presumably devout Christian teens in an abstinence club as sexually active hypocrites who literally stone a member to keep their sins secret.

OK, look, I get that most of Hollywood is going to scoff at abstinence programs in schools. Fine. But there was something just so wrong about some of the scenes in this show. The cops kept rolling their eyes at the witnesses they interviewed from the abstinence club. Smirking and making smartass comments about how weird their beliefs are. And we're talking about the murder of a fifteen year old. The 40-year-old virgin might bring in some laughs, but seriously? Cops are sneering at 15 year olds who aren't gettin' any? It was just offensive. Who in their right mind looks down on abstinent 15 year olds?

So the show had the repressed Christian kids who kill the slut with the heart of gold. Now I'm rolling my eyes...

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Awww, man. I just heard that Jim Michaels passed away last night. I'm going to miss him on Forbes on Fox. What a lovable, crusty old man...

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I've been following the Hollywood debate articles between Ehrenstein and Breitbart. Breitbart's last hurrah:

I would argue the entertainment industry does matter — because it is the way we send out the message to the world that we take our freedoms seriously. And with freedom comes deep responsibility and I don't think Hollywood quite gets that.

[Boos]

For one it's our second largest export behind aero-space. Surely if China has a responsibility not to send us toxic toys, we have a responsibility not to send them toxic entertainment.

Heh. Indeed.

When I read Ehrenstein's submission on Day 2, I had to read the beginning twice, and then out loud to my husband, just to make sure I was actually seeing straight.

A fortiori I'm not so sure about the "love my country" bit as I'm markedly disenchanted with the entire concept of all nation-states. Move an inch beyond language and culture and their meaning and purpose almost invariably mirrors that of the Crips and the Bloods.

I don't know how you can debate any details of our national image with someone who doesn't believe there should even be countries. This goes back to the idea of common ground. Lileks, in one of those Bleats I return to often:

My point? Simple: we live in an era of non-contiguous information streams. I believe one thing; someone else believes another – and the bedrock assumptions are utterly contradictory. This is what drives me nuts about discussing current events with some people. It’s like discussing the Apollo program with people who think it was all faked, or discussing archeology with those who believe the world is six thousand years old. I think the Iraq Campaign was part of a broad war against Islamicist fascism and the states that enable it; others think it’s all about oil and Halliburton jerking the strings of a Jeebus puppet. No. Middle. Ground.

We can debate Hollywood's message and we can debate whether she projects a favorable image of the US around the world, but if we can't even agree on the validity of the concept of the nation-state, well, what's the point of debating anything after that?

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So here's something that happened over the weekend.

A man was in custody Sunday after police said he ripped the head off a tame duck that lived in a hotel lobbyÂ’s ornamental pond.

Scott D. Clark, a guest at the Embassy Suites Hotel in St. Paul, cornered the duck early Saturday morning, grabbed the bird and ripped its head from its body while a hotel security guard and others watched, police said.

And let's look at the conclusion the article gives us.

If convicted, he could face up to two years in prison and a $5,000 fine, said Tim Shields, general counsel with the Minnesota Federated Humane Societies. Shields said the incident was “unconscionable,” and that having live ducks in a hotel lobby puts them at risk of being stepped on or run over by suitcases.

“I think Embassy Suites needs to take another look at this and review how they keep ducks safe, or use fish like most hotels would use,” Shields said.

So it's the hotel's fault for keeping ducks in the first place. They should've protected their ducks from every sort of harm that could possibly befall them, including having their heads ripped off. Oh, I get it, it was a failure of imagination.

What is wrong with our priorities when we feel blame has to be shared between the psycho and the hotel?

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My husband and I had a roaring good laugh at this article on Drudge: Singles will check out eligible candidates at Obama rally. It's not really that funny -- if I were single, I too would rather meet someone at a political rally than a bar -- but some of the quotes were just hilarious.

Even the invite for the event reads like a singles bash:

"Hope hits the Big Apple! Join us at Jay-Z's 4-0/40 Club on Thursday as we ride the winds of change from the hottest rally in New York. Move to the music, socialize with friends, and let your voice be heard as we celebrate with audacity."

Lindsay Schaeffer, 25, may even skip the rally for the nighttime bash.

That cracks me up. Why would someone waste time on the silly politics when she can just skip ahead for the hook-up scene? I want to date an Obama supporter, without all that pesky Obama stuff killing my buzz.

One ardent Obama supporter (who declined to give his name because he works in politics) says he'll attend both the rally and the after-party, and he doesn't expect to be going home alone.

He's confident for a reason.

"Let's face it: Leftie girls are easy," he says.

Bwahahaha. Nice.

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I just really loved this article: Soldier Loses 160 Pounds in Order to Meet Weight Requirement

Especially this part:

Pfc. Trippany's father, an infantryman with 24 years of active-duty service, had a solution. She moved back home, started a special diet and began her body transformation.

"I did Jenny Craig for the diet and then for exercise I would walk four miles per day. My dad wanted me to keep a 3.6 mile-per-hour pace in order to keep my cardio up, so every day, for 17 months, my dad drove behind me in his truck while I walked," said Pfc. Trippany.

"My dad even moved the family refrigerator out to the garage and bought another refrigerator for the food I was allowed to eat and put that one in the kitchen. There was no way for me to sneak food as the family fridge had a key lock on it and I didn't have the code. So, I was really on lockdown."

I think that parents often need to let their adult children face their own challenges and tackle their own demons. The helicopter parent phenomenon is a little creepy. But I love the fact that, once she came to her father for help, he took her seriously and really helped her. He spent money for a new fridge and countless hours trailing her in the car because he loves her and wanted to help her reach her goal. She said she wanted to lose the weight, and dad busted her butt to help her do it.

I just think that's really good teamwork.

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I started thinking about forgiveness the other day when I was in Blockbuster and happened to walk by a movie called Forgiving Dr. Mengele. It's about an Auschwitz survivor who learns to forgive the Nazis for the genetic experiments they did on her. Ouch.

And I come back to forgiveness today with this headline: Amish donate cash to school gunmanÂ’s widow

I'm thinking about the virtue of forgiveness. I would imagine that, in those circumstances, one might feel the need to forgive in order to move on. But as an outsider, I don't really forgive any of those bastards.

But no one's ever accused me of being nice.

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1 I wonder how many of those who donated now wish they hadn't. Frankly, I'd be pissed.

Posted by: tim at September 14, 2007 04:59 AM (nno0f)

2 Everyday I get at least 3 or 4 hits looking for an update on the Amish School Shooting. This donation does not surprise me one bit. It's who they are. That "man" was a part of their community. An "English", but a part non the less. They will NOT allow his family to suffer for his deeds. It is not their way. No, I'm not surprised to read this at all. But I'll tell you, even having been a part of that "culture" I don't have that kind of forgiveness in me. It's not in my personal make-up.......

Posted by: Tammi at September 14, 2007 05:35 AM (eAXdf)

3 Guess I'm not a nice enough person. Not when it's something like forgiving Mengele. The widow of the school shooter - I don't know what to think of her. She didn't do it, I don't know that she could have stopped it unless he told her what he was going to do. Yet she gets to live with what he did for the rest of her life. If she was as taken by surprise as the rest of the country - I feel very sorry for her. If she knew about it and had a chance to stop it yet didn't do anything - she's worse than he is. It's the not knowing that puts me in a quandary about her.

Posted by: Teresa at September 14, 2007 06:02 AM (rVIv9)

4 I don't mean my post to make it sound like I'm blaming the widow. She wasn't one of the "bastards" I meant I do feel sorry for her, and I don't mind that donated money goes to help her...actually, less than I mind that donated money went to Kathy Trant.

Posted by: Sarah at September 14, 2007 08:55 AM (TWet1)

5 I wish I could say that I could give that kind of forgiveness but I don't think it is in me either.

Posted by: Lemon Stand at September 14, 2007 02:51 PM (JROsA)

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Every year on this day, I spend some time refocusing. I remember my laser beam. But this year I feel pretty good, actually. I feel that my family is focused, that we're headed down the right path, that we will be useful to our country in the biggest struggle of my lifetime. My laser beam is intact, so today I will instead focus on remembering those we've lost, in NYC, in Bali, in Spain, in OEF and OIF. And daily in places that rarely get mentioned when people speak of jihad, like Thailand. This war is far from over.

From an article on MSNBC:

The total number of victims killed six years ago — 2,974 — includes 2,750 at the World Trade Center site. Forty were killed in Pennsylvania and 184 died at the Pentagon. Those numbers do not include the 19 hijackers.

As they damn well shouldn't.

MORE TO GROK:

Jay Tea writes at Wizbang that, while most remember the sadness, 9/11 was a day of rage. I re-read my old post about the first anniversary of 9/11, and I still have plenty of rage: Anger.

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The Swedes have a word that we don't have, a word for your degrees of separation with celebrities. If your brother's friend was a finalist on American Idol, then that's called a "Lassie" (Wikipedia explains why). That's probably my biggest Lassie, but I just discovered another one: a girl who was on study abroad in France at the same time as I was is now on that show Sunset Tan. I watched an episode -- and remembered why I hate reality shows; one episode is plenty -- just for kicks, and, um, yep...that's her. Whew, she grew up to be a spray tanner, so all is right in the universe.

So, what's your Lassie?

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I missed this while I was on vacation a month ago, so forgive me for rehashing old news. But wtf?

Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards on Thursday unveiled a plan that would increase taxes for the wealthy and create tax breaks for the middle class.
...
Among the proposals, Edwards would make long-term savings easier for low-income families with “Get Ahead Accounts” that would match savings up to $500 per year.

Wow. We really live in a country where a presidential candidate wants to take money that belongs in the earner's savings account, launder it through the government tax system, and put it in the savings account of someone who didn't earn it.

What I hate about Republican candidates is that they never seem to cut through the euphemisms. There's always a way to rephrase what Democrats want to do that makes them look bad. All you have to do is point out that someone worked hard to earn that money, and the government took it away and put it into someone else's bank account. If you get someone to admit that that's what he wants to see happen, you reveal something about his character and values. If you let him call it pretty things like Get Ahead Accounts, you let him frame the debate. Republicans need to refocus things like this on the taking of the money and stop letting Democrats focus on the giving of the money.

John Edwards wants poor people to take home rich people's money. That's fine if he wants to start passing out his own hundred dollar bills, but it plain stinks when he wants to force the whole country to participate.

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Via Boobs, Injuries, and Dr. Pepper blog, I learned that playing around with anything that can even be remotely construed as possibly maybe racist in some way can get you fired from your job.

The Germantown administration on Wednesday defended its firing of three theater workers who tied stage-rigging ropes into hangman's nooses.

...

"I've seen plenty of stagehands whittling their time away by tying all kinds of knots," said Bob Hetherington, chairman of the department of Theatre and Dance at the University of Memphis.

"If they were trying to send a racial message of any kind, the fly system of a theater would be the last place anyone would see it."

But someone did see the nooses.

Another city employee, an African American, complained of a hostile work environment when he saw the nooses.

...

Laraway gave The Commercial Appeal his account of what happened.

"I was working with a gentleman I had never worked with before and we were talking about how to tie different knots. I asked him if he knew how to tie a bowline and he said yes. Then I asked him if he knew how to tie a hangman's noose, and I showed him.

So some people are sitting there with a bunch of rope, comparing different ways of tying them. Naturally, that makes them racist.

Geez Louise, have we completely lost touch of all common sense in this country?

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