Watch very closely at the end of this clip. The man being threatened by the Joker is none other than Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy. Apparently, he’s a huge Batman fan. After having a knife to his throat, he’s probably loves the caped crusader even more.
Two in-depth pieces hit cyberspace ahead of the long weekend and they are a study in contrasts.
One, from Vanity Fair, focuses on the infighting in Hillary Clinton’s campaign. A cross between bad Shakespeare and well…more bad Shakespeare, it’s a telling look at the ultimate demise of the junior senator from New York.
The other is a long profile story from the New York Times magazine on legendary AM talker Rush Limbaugh. Interesting reading on two of the most divisive figures in American politics.
Ever wondered what this “blogosphere” thingy is?
Look at this cloud of hundreds of web sites. It’s roughly organized by slant and shows how interconnected the chatters are.
Sen. Hillary Clinton in her speech in front of a New York audience Tuesday night.
“This has been a long campaign and I will be making no decisions tonight.”
And her supporters went wild!
This marks the fist time a politician has ever been cheered for being indecisive.
Kelley Quinn, a spokeswoman for the Illinois Office of Management and Budget called me Friday about this editorial. She characterized it as “frustrating.” Come to think of it, so do I.
Anyway, she mentioned that Illinois First Lady Patti Blagojevich has been a big supporter of 4-H in the state. As mentioned in the editorial, 4-H is one of the programs that is in serious jeopardy because of the governor’s threats to University of Illinois Extension office funding. I asked Quinn what the First Lady thought about this. Quinn said she didn’t know and that the two haven’t even met. That’s fair enough I suppose, but surely that might be a pretty relevant question to ask, especially considering that the First Lady got a degree in economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Turns out I’m not the first to think this. From Sharon Mosley via The Herald & Review:
University of Illinois Extension Unit Leader Jim Looft asked the board to support a letter writing campaign to urge Gov. Rod Blagojevich to return $12.5 million to the Extension budget. Shelby County’s share of that money is $82,000 and without it, Looft said Extension would not be able to stay open in Shelby County.
“Our future has a lifecycle, and I can tell you it won’t be long,” he said.
Looft said 4-H families, farmers and members of its HCE program also would be contacted to urge Blagojevich to release the funds.
“The governor has done this sort of thing before and backed down, but we don’t know if he’ll back down in this case,” he said.
The board noted that First Lady Patti Blagojevich has been active in encouraging 4-H participation throughout the state.
“Perhaps we should contact her,” Amling said.
“I’m sure it couldn’t hurt,” Looft agreed. “But without this money you won’t see 4-H at the State Fair, something she has taken an active interest in.”
Not a bad idea at all.
If that’s what a 5.4 earthquake feels like, color me underwhelmed.
Maybe I’m just weird but that didn’t really strike fear into my heart.
You know, obviously, HOORAY WE SURVIVED!!!!
But I’m just gonna go back to bed.
What did everyone else think?
Kiyoshi Martinez, former editor in chief of the Daily Illini, got famous today for his founding of angryjournalist.com. The web site is home to over 2000 anonymous gripes from people in the journalism business. A wire piece written today was picked up on Drudge as a supplement to news that CBS will be making cuts to its newsroom staff.
If you’re interested in the inner-workings of a (not so?) modern newsroom, AJ is a good place to start. It’s kind of depressing reading so those with weak stomachs (read: journ majors) beware.
However, despite the growing pains modern journalism is going through, other occupations could use a site like this too. Angryteacher.com? Angrypolitician.com? Angrycop.com? Angryparent.com? Angrystudent.com?
This image was loading from the top down and all I could think of was “Yaaaaaaaaay….awwwwww.”
Katie Hamilton, a U of I student who’s majoring in public policy is now the face of one of the great newspaper battles of recent memory. She’s been interning at the Chicago Tribune and before that she did press work for the Illinois Student Senate. Bravo!
Full disclosure: I’m a Cardinals fan so I’m not as invested in the Cubs as most people in this area are but even I think selling Wrigley is a bad idea.
Student elections are over. (Finally)
Who’d you vote for and why?
Anonymity guaranteed.