Yes folks. The fix is in. Much unlike the Black Sox of 1919 fame, however, the White Sox of this day and age have made agreements with bookies to win the series. How will this happen? Well, they've got home field advantage, and they've put magnets in the plate and in the ball. Not heavy enough to change the weight, mind you, but powerful enough to change the direction of the pitch. Like that pitch tonight: it was supposed to be at least an inch above the ground, but with the help of a magnet it bounced nanometers before entering into the catchers mitt. So close, in fact, that nobody knew that it had bounced except the White Sox. How? Because they control the magnets, that's how.
Furthermore, I think it should be hereafter banned that ex-athletes should be announcers on the basis of their on-field performance alone. It's not as though there's a shortage of people who want to be announcers, yet we still get the same crappy retreads every year.
In what world does everyone here live, that the ball bounced? Chicago?
Seriously: when you find a video, look at the dirt beneath the catcher's mitt. No bounce = no mark, no debris-flying-upwards. For once, the brain-dead announcers called one right.
Didn't see it, but the wire report I read this morning has the catcher moaning about how the ump always says "no catch, no catch" when the catcher doesn't field strike three cleanly.
So this is how we have only 10 decent catchers in the major leagues and another 50 shitty ones. They don't even know when they're doing their job! It's the whole effort thing, the thing that makes Jeter a rock star immune from legitimate criticism (and Ichiro a batting champion). Run it out, because just that act makes some people panic.
I watched it 20 times, and I was rooting for the Sox (wait, no... I was *against* the angels). So I'm glad they won. But... you still can't say the ball bounced on the ground "clearly." It *maybe* looked like it bounced *inside* the glove, but that's about it.
Does someone have a link to a video? Maybe my problem is I'm relying on the feed from Fox. Is there a different view?
As far as bad calls go in baseball, this one wasn't that bad. At least it was close. I remember reading about one where the ball was photographed as feet away from first when the umpire called the first baseman out. And how about Cano being called out in the Yankees-Angels game 5 for being outside the base path? There are plenty of bad calls in baseball. This one was close.
I found interesting how quickly the announcers made a big deal of it. Clearly the ball was higher than before it went into the mitt. At least, they could acknowledge that the ump might be right? Of course not, they went straight in for the "oh what a controversy" line, and then of course there was no going back. You'd think for the sake of "balance" one of the 3 commentators would take the "yes it bounced" line. Felt like I was watching Fox News, it did.
I like the way Pinter toggles between the personal and the political. If you hate Beckett, I don't think there's much hope for your liking Pinter, but if you simply don't like Beckett, Pinter might work.
In seriousness, though, Becks, I can't speak for anyone else, but my view is that Pinter (along with Beckett before him) reimagined the use of language in theater. His best work is very spare, with oceans of subtext beneath each line. There's a sort of eerie formality that so many of his characters affect, which (in his plays) comes across as the defense mechanism of one who is terrified of everyone around him. An unspoken violence permeates even the most banal of exchanges, and when it rises to the surface (as in a play such as The Homecoming), it's like a living nightmare.
Interestingly, I think he's one of the playwrights with the most influence on postwar American theater; Mamet, Shepherd and Albee are all strongly influenced by his work, though in different ways. There's hardly a living playwright more deserving of the prize, IMO.
Ok, I'm convinced. The side-view from the Fox feed is the better one (and I spent some time with the pause button and slow-mo there)... the deceptive thing is that Fox kept showing the view from over the pitcher's mound, which is the worse view, and totally deceptive.
Ok, so I'm happy then. Angels lose, and rightly so.
Well, the motion he makes with a fist is definitely a "strike" call, not an out. He made that same motion for strikes the entire game. The question is, what is this "slashing" motion he makes (twice)?
And then... is the ump's "out" call really... a performative thing? Can you take that sort of thing back?
Eddings looked pretty sheepish in the news conference, which also didn't make me think it bounced, too.
Thanks, guys. I appreciate your insight. I definitely agree with your points. It may just be a matter of personal tastes – I'm not a big Beckett or Albee fan, either.
Well I certainly think he didn't get the Nobel for those poems about how awful America is. I'm not familiar with most of the later, explicitly political stuff (19 is from Moonlight, which is later but not explicitly political), but the early stuff can have lots o' political subtext; as someone or other pointed out, in The Birthday Party someone gets disappeared in sweet olde England just like they might have in a dictatorship. And Joey D is right--this is one of those "Why didn't he already have it?" prizes.
My buddy Tom Stoppard gives Pinter what sounds to me like a sour grapes-ish lefthanded compliment, but perhaps I'm just not clever enough to understand it:
"With his earliest work he stood alone in British theatre up against the bewilderment and incomprehension of critics, the audience and writers too."
Well, given that Stoppard said "It was wholly deserved and I'm completely thrilled," I think maybe that means "He was on to something all along and it took everyone else a while to figure it out."
Gotta love the New Criterion! I used to read them rather a lot on my study breaks. I liked to study in the Fine Arts library, because it had nice tables, pleasant lighting and was pretty quiet. The bathrooms were new. They didn't have many periodicals which were accessible to the general reader--a bonus, when you're trying to study--but they did subscribe to the New Criterion. So, I found myself reading it a lot during reading period.
Some of the less polemical articles were actually pretty good.
In my defense, I did know that, Joe. I liked Betrayal ever since reading it in school, and I got into a reasonably heated argument with a fellow theatrical type over whether the backward-running narrative allowed Pinter to supply a happy ending to an unhappy story.
So I tried to leave a comment at the Pinter thread at CT, and it wouldn't let me! I got a "this comment is being reviewed by the overlords" or somesuch. Now, it's vanished.
What kind of North Korean regime are they running over there?
May we use "cocksucker" non-pejoratively? As in, "Did you see that episode of The Wire? It was wizard cocksucker!" Or as a neutral way to designate someone who sucks cocks.
Having just confirmed that Mike D'Angelo thinks WoD wasn't one of the top ten films of 1987 and since I have little problem in many cases just slavishly following his taste, I feel no need to say anything more in it's defense, except to note that footage of the Berlin Wall and certain other parts of Berlin is just cool.
The Sky is Blue over Berlin was a terrible, terrible movie, but I've met people who think it's so good that they show it to everyone they consider a good friend. (Note: I did not see this movie with any of them.)
I have no idea why I'm reading all the comment threads I missed while I was gone, but I have to say I don't remember this place being so interesting. No doubt I was bringing you all down to a lower level.
I wasn't really fishing for compliments, but I do appreciate catching them.
I am telling the truth about finding things more interesting than I remembered. I suspect it's related to being able to see everything after it's come together.*
A lot (relative to what? I don't know, but it seems like a lot) has happened in the last month: new commenters, old commenters with seman desrever, old commenters whose blogs are now accessible, neologisms, discussions of old acronyms with multiple meanings, new directions in moustache theory, new catchphrases, etc.
I was thinking Libby might go down on this, actually, but--well, I'm not a lawyer, but suggesting to someone that she lie under oath is illegal, isn't it? So if we're being questioned about Labs' whereabouts on the night in question, and we both know he was getting his freak on with O'Connor and the Galt, and I say, "Ogged, you should testify, and by the way I>/i> said that Labs was at home crying and masturbating," it sure seems like I'm encouraging you to lie.
Ah, politics, I haven't quite caught up on that yet.
(And re 85: thanks. I will admit to having this fear that one day I'll return somewhere and ask, "Did you miss me?", only to be asked, "Who are you again?" Which I suppose is a better response than: "Yeah, I gotta work on my aim.")
RedHedd (a possibly former prosecutor I think) says "if Tate was in any way trying to tell her how to testify, or to tell her not to testify if she would be adverse to Libby's interests, then he could be in trouble along with his client."
I caught the end of Face the Nation with Bob Schieffer yesterday. It was great. The guy from the L.A. Times who goes on Washington Week was there, and he said that he never saw a president tank this badly before.
And then Bob Schieffer said during his little commentary that the White House's claims that they weren't at all worried about these investigations of Karl Rove and Scooter Libby, that they were too busy on important policy issues, sounded a lot like the protestations from the Nixon White House.
You, with your considerate, sensitive nature, wouldn't make a Jew joke, unless you were Jewish; and that you pretend that the Jews have taken something from you is just the twist of Bridgeplatic humor. Fess up, Adam Sandler.
Also. (I must confess, though I am not particulary saddened by Tech's fate--and I think it's just great that UT ran up the score on them--if they'd won you'd be hearing from me.)
I was more shocked than anything that Texas had an opportunity to run up the score on Tech—they're better than they played. That gratuitous game is Coach Leach's signature (against SMU?), and it gives me momentary pause to think that Mack Brown does the same given the opportunity.
Yeah, I don't get it. They should get TiVo in the box.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 10-12-05 9:06 PM
More importantly: controversy! At least they're hyping that. Doesn't much fit into the grande curse narrative.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 10-12-05 9:06 PM
The Sox cheat again! The fix is in!
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-12-05 9:07 PM
Looks like the answer is "not if you're patient".
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 10-12-05 9:10 PM
No, being mad at the announcers is independent of the outcome of the game.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-12-05 9:11 PM
Yes folks. The fix is in. Much unlike the Black Sox of 1919 fame, however, the White Sox of this day and age have made agreements with bookies to win the series. How will this happen? Well, they've got home field advantage, and they've put magnets in the plate and in the ball. Not heavy enough to change the weight, mind you, but powerful enough to change the direction of the pitch. Like that pitch tonight: it was supposed to be at least an inch above the ground, but with the help of a magnet it bounced nanometers before entering into the catchers mitt. So close, in fact, that nobody knew that it had bounced except the White Sox. How? Because they control the magnets, that's how.
Posted by tweedledopey | Link to this comment | 10-12-05 9:58 PM
Furthermore, I think it should be hereafter banned that ex-athletes should be announcers on the basis of their on-field performance alone. It's not as though there's a shortage of people who want to be announcers, yet we still get the same crappy retreads every year.
Posted by tweedledopey | Link to this comment | 10-12-05 10:00 PM
OT: "Stay gold, Pony Boy."
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 10-12-05 10:50 PM
The internets are failing me on the video.
Posted by Joe O | Link to this comment | 10-12-05 11:05 PM
SCMT: Yeah, I liked that too. Is there a source for it?
Posted by slolernr | Link to this comment | 10-12-05 11:21 PM
The Outsiders.
Posted by washerdreyer | Link to this comment | 10-12-05 11:49 PM
This baseball thing is your new strategy for keeping comments a manageable length, isn't it?
Posted by cw | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 1:22 AM
In what world does everyone here live, that the ball bounced? Chicago?
Seriously: when you find a video, look at the dirt beneath the catcher's mitt. No bounce = no mark, no debris-flying-upwards. For once, the brain-dead announcers called one right.
Posted by foo | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 4:44 AM
Didn't see it, but the wire report I read this morning has the catcher moaning about how the ump always says "no catch, no catch" when the catcher doesn't field strike three cleanly.
So this is how we have only 10 decent catchers in the major leagues and another 50 shitty ones. They don't even know when they're doing their job! It's the whole effort thing, the thing that makes Jeter a rock star immune from legitimate criticism (and Ichiro a batting champion). Run it out, because just that act makes some people panic.
Posted by diddy | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 7:49 AM
Is this the right thread for talking about Harold Pinter?
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 7:59 AM
Only to praise him! He's a fantastic choice.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 8:06 AM
Watch it again, foo. When the ball hits the mitt, it's higher than it is an instant before it hits the mitt.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 8:11 AM
I've been waiting for years for him to get it!
(Pause)
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 8:14 AM
What kind of fucking laundry are you if you don't do dry cleaning?
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 8:19 AM
You can expect the right wing blogs to start decrying the anti-Americanism of the Nobel Committee for selecting Pinter in 3...2...1...
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 8:27 AM
Yep. I'm sure Sullivan's on the case.
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 8:29 AM
I watched it 20 times, and I was rooting for the Sox (wait, no... I was *against* the angels). So I'm glad they won. But... you still can't say the ball bounced on the ground "clearly." It *maybe* looked like it bounced *inside* the glove, but that's about it.
Does someone have a link to a video? Maybe my problem is I'm relying on the feed from Fox. Is there a different view?
Posted by foo | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 8:30 AM
As far as bad calls go in baseball, this one wasn't that bad. At least it was close. I remember reading about one where the ball was photographed as feet away from first when the umpire called the first baseman out. And how about Cano being called out in the Yankees-Angels game 5 for being outside the base path? There are plenty of bad calls in baseball. This one was close.
Posted by tweedledopey | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 8:59 AM
You can see the video here.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:01 AM
ESPN has a shot from the opposite side of the batter, but there's no way to pause their video.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:03 AM
Can someone please explain the Pinter love to me? I've only seen The Caretaker but that fell far short of the hype.
Posted by Becks | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:19 AM
Becks, I would, but I can unfortunately only do so through subtext.
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:20 AM
I found interesting how quickly the announcers made a big deal of it. Clearly the ball was higher than before it went into the mitt. At least, they could acknowledge that the ump might be right? Of course not, they went straight in for the "oh what a controversy" line, and then of course there was no going back. You'd think for the sake of "balance" one of the 3 commentators would take the "yes it bounced" line. Felt like I was watching Fox News, it did.
Posted by wi | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:25 AM
I like the way Pinter toggles between the personal and the political. If you hate Beckett, I don't think there's much hope for your liking Pinter, but if you simply don't like Beckett, Pinter might work.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:39 AM
Baseball schmaseball
Posted by Matt McGrattan | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:40 AM
In seriousness, though, Becks, I can't speak for anyone else, but my view is that Pinter (along with Beckett before him) reimagined the use of language in theater. His best work is very spare, with oceans of subtext beneath each line. There's a sort of eerie formality that so many of his characters affect, which (in his plays) comes across as the defense mechanism of one who is terrified of everyone around him. An unspoken violence permeates even the most banal of exchanges, and when it rises to the surface (as in a play such as The Homecoming), it's like a living nightmare.
Interestingly, I think he's one of the playwrights with the most influence on postwar American theater; Mamet, Shepherd and Albee are all strongly influenced by his work, though in different ways. There's hardly a living playwright more deserving of the prize, IMO.
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:41 AM
Ok, I'm convinced. The side-view from the Fox feed is the better one (and I spent some time with the pause button and slow-mo there)... the deceptive thing is that Fox kept showing the view from over the pitcher's mound, which is the worse view, and totally deceptive.
Ok, so I'm happy then. Angels lose, and rightly so.
Thanks for the link :-).
Posted by foo | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:47 AM
My first-ever changed mind!
(There's still some controversy about whether the ump called him out before he took the base....)
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:49 AM
Baseball schmaseball
Hear, hear. Especially when the news out of the NFL is so much more salacious. Vikings, indeed.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:50 AM
Well, the motion he makes with a fist is definitely a "strike" call, not an out. He made that same motion for strikes the entire game. The question is, what is this "slashing" motion he makes (twice)?
And then... is the ump's "out" call really... a performative thing? Can you take that sort of thing back?
Eddings looked pretty sheepish in the news conference, which also didn't make me think it bounced, too.
Posted by foo | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:55 AM
Thanks, guys. I appreciate your insight. I definitely agree with your points. It may just be a matter of personal tastes – I'm not a big Beckett or Albee fan, either.
Posted by Becks | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:58 AM
I believe that there's a strict NFL rule that 1-3 teams can't have orgies.
Posted by John Emerson | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:58 AM
Shall we start calling you "Jeffrey Mayer"?
Wait, maybe you are Jeffrey Mayer.
Posted by Brett | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 9:59 AM
The real controversy about Pinter involves his own political opinions, I gather. But we know right to ignore those.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:04 AM
Well I certainly think he didn't get the Nobel for those poems about how awful America is. I'm not familiar with most of the later, explicitly political stuff (19 is from Moonlight, which is later but not explicitly political), but the early stuff can have lots o' political subtext; as someone or other pointed out, in The Birthday Party someone gets disappeared in sweet olde England just like they might have in a dictatorship. And Joey D is right--this is one of those "Why didn't he already have it?" prizes.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:13 AM
3...2...1...
And they're off!
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:19 AM
My buddy Tom Stoppard gives Pinter what sounds to me like a sour grapes-ish lefthanded compliment, but perhaps I'm just not clever enough to understand it:
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:21 AM
Roy Edroso has some interesting remarks.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:21 AM
Was Roger Kimball always like that, or is this self-parody? I can't remember.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:21 AM
42: That definitely smacks of Twain on Wagner, don't you think?
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:22 AM
45 - yep.
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:22 AM
Well, given that Stoppard said "It was wholly deserved and I'm completely thrilled," I think maybe that means "He was on to something all along and it took everyone else a while to figure it out."
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:24 AM
What's the matter with you, ogged? Announcers don't make the calls.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:24 AM
Weiner, when I selectively quote someone for my own purposes, I'd appreciate you not pwning me.
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:25 AM
Remember, Ben: you're not allowed to comment about sports.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:27 AM
I was commenting about you.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:27 AM
Gotta love the New Criterion! I used to read them rather a lot on my study breaks. I liked to study in the Fine Arts library, because it had nice tables, pleasant lighting and was pretty quiet. The bathrooms were new. They didn't have many periodicals which were accessible to the general reader--a bonus, when you're trying to study--but they did subscribe to the New Criterion. So, I found myself reading it a lot during reading period.
Some of the less polemical articles were actually pretty good.
Posted by bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:30 AM
You tried this "it wasn't really about sports" defense last time too. Then you were pwned.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:31 AM
It was Pinter's robust defense of Milosevic that pissed everybody off. He called that one like last night's announcers called that pitch.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:31 AM
54 -- yeah, that was pretty embarrassing.
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:32 AM
Yeah, not saying I like his politics. Didn't Handke defend Milosevic too?
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:34 AM
Though the only Handke I'm familiar with is Wings of Desire, which blew.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:35 AM
I especially liked the Pinter where they went to India for the Oh Henry! heiress's wedding.
Posted by slolernr | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:36 AM
I thought "blew" "blows" and "cocksucker" were non-preferred forms of insult.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:37 AM
58 -- in a sly homage to Betrayal, that episode played backwards.
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:40 AM
Yes, they have been replaced by "burly."
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:40 AM
Okay, I totally made that "homage" thing up. But it could have been!
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:41 AM
In my defense, I did know that, Joe. I liked Betrayal ever since reading it in school, and I got into a reasonably heated argument with a fellow theatrical type over whether the backward-running narrative allowed Pinter to supply a happy ending to an unhappy story.
Posted by slolernr | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:42 AM
So I tried to leave a comment at the Pinter thread at CT, and it wouldn't let me! I got a "this comment is being reviewed by the overlords" or somesuch. Now, it's vanished.
What kind of North Korean regime are they running over there?
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:50 AM
May we use "cocksucker" non-pejoratively? As in, "Did you see that episode of The Wire? It was wizard cocksucker!" Or as a neutral way to designate someone who sucks cocks.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:50 AM
64: the best kind!
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:52 AM
62: Totally an homage, apparently. The episode was called "The Betrayal," one character is named "Pinter," yadda yadda yadda.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:54 AM
Whoa. I knew the character's name was Pinter, but not the episode title.
My ass is A GOLD MINE.
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:56 AM
"It was wizard cocksucker!"
Now that is beautiful. In fact, as an expression of greatness, it's wizard cocksucker.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:56 AM
In my mind, 66 was an allusion to Pascali's Island.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:56 AM
My ass is A GOLD MINE.
shaft.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 11:56 AM
Fine fine, "Wings of Desire" blew donkeys. Won't anyone defend it?
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 12:00 PM
No.
Posted by slolernr | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 12:01 PM
as an expression of greatness, it's wizard cocksucker.
Thanks, apo. It's wizard cocksucker of you to say so.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 12:09 PM
Deadwood uses "cocksucker" so often that it's stripped of any perjorative context. It's the Chinese guy's English word for person.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 12:18 PM
But Swearengen regrets having ever taught it to him. Peter Falk is excellent in Wings of Desire, as is Nick Cave.
Posted by washerdreyer | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 12:24 PM
True. The WoD soundtrack is much better than the movie--in fact it's much better than the movie at what the movie is trying to do.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 12:35 PM
Having just confirmed that Mike D'Angelo thinks WoD wasn't one of the top ten films of 1987 and since I have little problem in many cases just slavishly following his taste, I feel no need to say anything more in it's defense, except to note that footage of the Berlin Wall and certain other parts of Berlin is just cool.
Posted by washerdreyer | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 12:41 PM
Wings of Desire is worth seeing.
Posted by Joe O | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 12:46 PM
Wings of Desire is wizrd Mineshaft, and all that implies.
Posted by peter snees | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 4:13 PM
"wizrd" being so much more street than "wizard" -- and my spacebar is cranky.
Posted by peter snees | Link to this comment | 10-13-05 4:14 PM
The Sky is Blue over Berlin was a terrible, terrible movie, but I've met people who think it's so good that they show it to everyone they consider a good friend. (Note: I did not see this movie with any of them.)
I have no idea why I'm reading all the comment threads I missed while I was gone, but I have to say I don't remember this place being so interesting. No doubt I was bringing you all down to a lower level.
Posted by eb | Link to this comment | 10-15-05 6:19 PM
but I have to say I don't remember this place being so interesting. No doubt I was bringing you all down to a lower level.
eb, are you fishing for compliments? Cause I don't thing that's true at all.
Posted by bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 10-15-05 6:36 PM
I wasn't really fishing for compliments, but I do appreciate catching them.
I am telling the truth about finding things more interesting than I remembered. I suspect it's related to being able to see everything after it's come together.*
A lot (relative to what? I don't know, but it seems like a lot) has happened in the last month: new commenters, old commenters with seman desrever, old commenters whose blogs are now accessible, neologisms, discussions of old acronyms with multiple meanings, new directions in moustache theory, new catchphrases, etc.
*And that's not a euphemism.
Posted by eb | Link to this comment | 10-15-05 6:59 PM
I don't know what "seman desrever" is, but it sounds dirty.
Erm, I think you're right though, and of course bg is right that you were missed.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-15-05 7:09 PM
I don't know what "seman desrever" is
Can we all just admit that Yale is the better school?
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-15-05 7:11 PM
Urk. It still sounds dirty.
So since this thread seems open, how about that Judy Miller? I think Kleiman is right--that sure sounds like suborning perjury to me.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-15-05 7:14 PM
Eveyone who's ever spoken to Patrick Fitzgerald is going to jail.
(I'm sure Tate was doing something wrong, but I don't see being able to make a case against him.)
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-15-05 7:18 PM
I was thinking Libby might go down on this, actually, but--well, I'm not a lawyer, but suggesting to someone that she lie under oath is illegal, isn't it? So if we're being questioned about Labs' whereabouts on the night in question, and we both know he was getting his freak on with O'Connor and the Galt, and I say, "Ogged, you should testify, and by the way I>/i> said that Labs was at home crying and masturbating," it sure seems like I'm encouraging you to lie.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-15-05 7:27 PM
Stupid tags. I blame Harvard.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-15-05 7:27 PM
There just doesn't seem to be any way, absent other evidence, to prove that that's what he was doing (again, not that I doubt he was).
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-15-05 7:30 PM
Ah, politics, I haven't quite caught up on that yet.
(And re 85: thanks. I will admit to having this fear that one day I'll return somewhere and ask, "Did you miss me?", only to be asked, "Who are you again?" Which I suppose is a better response than: "Yeah, I gotta work on my aim.")
Posted by eb | Link to this comment | 10-15-05 7:42 PM
RedHedd (a possibly former prosecutor I think) says "if Tate was in any way trying to tell her how to testify, or to tell her not to testify if she would be adverse to Libby's interests, then he could be in trouble along with his client."
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-15-05 10:00 PM
Pujols.
At the Mineshaft.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 10-16-05 6:05 PM
You'd think a guy that big would go in head first...atm...
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-16-05 6:07 PM
Hey, will you guys put some more effort into amusing me? I just fact-checked a reference to WorldNetDaily. I'm desperate here! Unf? Alameida? Bob?
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-16-05 6:15 PM
Pujols.
SB is a man!
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 10-16-05 6:27 PM
I caught the end of Face the Nation with Bob Schieffer yesterday. It was great. The guy from the L.A. Times who goes on Washington Week was there, and he said that he never saw a president tank this badly before.
And then Bob Schieffer said during his little commentary that the White House's claims that they weren't at all worried about these investigations of Karl Rove and Scooter Libby, that they were too busy on important policy issues, sounded a lot like the protestations from the Nixon White House.
Posted by bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 8:37 AM
via Atrios, Bloomberg the News Service says the investigation's heading towards Cheney. W00t!
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 8:39 AM
Hava Nagila? What the hell?
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 9:22 PM
Traditional baseball organist tune, if I understand you aright.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 9:24 PM
Have we lost even baseball to the J/ews?
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 9:29 PM
Pujols!!!
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 9:38 PM
Indeed, it's too late, Bridgeplate: male and Jewish.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 9:40 PM
You'll have to unpack that for me.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 9:43 PM
You, with your considerate, sensitive nature, wouldn't make a Jew joke, unless you were Jewish; and that you pretend that the Jews have taken something from you is just the twist of Bridgeplatic humor. Fess up, Adam Sandler.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 9:44 PM
Um, the use of "Jew" as an adjective is dispreferred, cocksucker.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 9:48 PM
I can take a compliment.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 9:50 PM
I have to get back to my Wire watching, you Jew boys sort this out.
Posted by ogged | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 9:51 PM
Mustachioed cocksucker then.
Posted by washerdreyer | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 9:52 PM
Sorry, Ogged, that was no compliment. It contained neither a "wizard" nor a possessive.
Posted by Becks | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 9:53 PM
You'll have to unpack that for me.
I'll bet you say that to all the boys.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 10-17-05 11:55 PM
The Victory Hop has to be the most disturbing thing about baseball.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 10-23-05 9:31 PM
Is this the place to make fun of Cowboys fans?
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-23-05 9:45 PM
Why not?
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 10-23-05 9:56 PM
Is this the place to make fun of Cowboys fans?
This thread is actually about making fun of Tech fans.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 10-23-05 9:59 PM
D'you know any?
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-23-05 10:06 PM
Also. (I must confess, though I am not particulary saddened by Tech's fate--and I think it's just great that UT ran up the score on them--if they'd won you'd be hearing from me.)
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 10-23-05 10:08 PM
I was more shocked than anything that Texas had an opportunity to run up the score on Tech—they're better than they played. That gratuitous game is Coach Leach's signature (against SMU?), and it gives me momentary pause to think that Mack Brown does the same given the opportunity.
[. . .]
And now I feel much better.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 10-23-05 10:20 PM
118: not even I read my blog.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 10-23-05 10:21 PM
Which shows great good sense.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 10-23-05 11:04 PM
It was funnier when I said it.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 10-24-05 6:25 AM
Tie game!
Posted by washerdreyer | Link to this comment | 10-25-05 9:36 PM