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A recreation of iconic scenes, featuring the actors from the original films for Empire Magazine’s 20th Anniversary issue. h/t The Daily What. The images are of Tom Cruise (Minority Report), Mel Gibson (Braveheart), and Sam Neill (Jurassic Park). Check out more here.
Posted on December 1, 2009
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![thedailywhat:
Clip + Save of the Day: From this month’s Cosmo.
This Swine Flu business is finally starting to pay off!
[via.]
I can’t believe someone wrote this article. I really can’t believe that another person approved it for publication. I hope this is fake.](http://18.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_ktzdgxOI5J1qzpwi0o1_500.jpg)
I can’t believe someone wrote this article. I really can’t believe that another person approved it for publication. I hope this is fake.Clip + Save of the Day: From this month’s Cosmo.
This Swine Flu business is finally starting to pay off!
[via.]
Posted on December 1, 2009 via The Daily What with 616 notes
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What if Gore Had Won?
This could have been awful, but was kind of brilliant.This week, we’re playing the alternate history game, in which we ask three writers to write the history of the last 10 years if the Supreme Court had decided differently in Bush v. Gore. (Here we must admit that, as great as these three pieces are, none come close to the genius of Thurber’s “If Grant Had Been Drinking at Appomattox”). First up for us is Rakoff, with an alternate, oral history of the 00s.
Posted on December 1, 2009 via Newsweek with 22 notes
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The Last Days of Gourmet. A photo-essay by Kevin DeMaria, former art director for the defunct magazine. h/t Serious Eats.
Posted on November 8, 2009
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The Unexamined World of Mike Bloomberg
Sigh. I miss real NY newspapers. It’s kind of sad that no one ever looked under the surface of some of the mayor’s most highly touted accomplishments.
Posted on November 4, 2009
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tupac, vibe interview part 4.
i’m digging these. i like when his public persona comes down when she asks him if he reads.
Great watching.
Posted on September 25, 2009 via i am davidbrothers dotcom
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Part Two of Vibe Magazine’s ‘lost’ interview with Tupac Shakur, ca. 1996. h/t Nah Right
Posted on September 18, 2009 with 1 note
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If The New York Times really does subscribe to this philosophy—the public’s right to know, the journalist’s duty to be skeptical of authority, etc.—it should reimburse the British government for the cost of the mission to save Farrell (even if it means taking another loan from Carlos Slim) and compensate the dead soldier’s family. (That it should compensate handsomely the family of the Afghan interpreter who died is not even open to discussion.) After all, the military has quite enough on its plate not to have to worry about extracting reporters from deadly contretemps of their own making.
Farrell took a huge risk on behalf of his for-profit employer to give it an edge in the news business. Afghanistan is an extremely competitive beat; and war and competitive journalism make for a very perilous—and profitable—alloy. So whereas one would be loath to corral and stifle reporters, why can’t there be some financial incentive for journalists to behave responsibly when they venture into battlegrounds? Why not bill publications for the cost of a rescue and require journalists to give half the royalties from any books they write to the military, in the event of a costly rescue?
Embedded here is a broader question regarding the costs and benefits of war reporting. As the Farrell tale demonstrates, journalists tend only to consider the benefits, but not the costs, of their actions. This is a problem in a country like the U.S. in which the majority supports the military in its endeavors, but the press is disproportionately from a minority that reflexively dislikes the military and is suspicious of its motives—and so intuitively discounts the costs of journalistic actions to the effectiveness of our forces.
Taunku Varadarajan, on the rescue of Steve Farrell (the New York Times reporter rescued by British troops from Taliban custody —> he was captured while investigating a story in Taliban controlled Afghan territory against the strong recommendations of the British military), allocating moral culpability for the death of one of the rescuers, and allocating financial responsibility for these rescues to encourage more prudent behavior on the part of the media. This sounds like a fine idea in theory (human beings respond to incentives), but would be unworkable in reality (how does one determine ‘recklessness’? Wouldn’t a system like this encourage the media to become overly cautious?). Great read, though. h/t Abu Muqawama.Posted on September 15, 2009
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Ambinder on Palin on Zeke Emanuel
Unfortunately, the end of life care component of the health care debate has fallen victim to the normal bullshit that characterizes our broken system of national politics. Fortunately, Marc Ambinder of the Atlantic has sifted through the nonsense (and has actually seemed to take efforts to comprehend the relevant arguments) to present a fair reading of Zeke Emanuel’s position on end-of-life care. He also lays out why the Republican (to be fair, Palin-Gingrich) characterization of Emanuel and Obama’s position is disingenuous at best, without being overly bombastic.
Posted on August 11, 2009
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Silencing Olbermann?
Greewnwald discusses the broader implications of this NY Times article that revealed the role of General Electric (through senior management at NBC Universal) and the News Corporation in ending the feud between Bill O’Reilly and Keith Olbermann. The most shocking part of this (addressed by Greenwald and some of the commenters on the piece) is that the NYTimes reports this story as if it was fit for the entertainment or lifestyle section, and not something that touches on censorship and journalistic freedom. As one commenter said,
“The sad truth is that what Olbermann and O’Reilly were doing in this particular instance was one of the rare examples of good journalism on these types of shows. Olbermann was holding O’Reilly’s feet to the fire about his repeated falsehoods and embarrassing positions. In turn, O’Reilly was giving the public accurate and disturbing information about General Electric, including extensive technology dealings with Iran. In my personal opinion, this was one of the rare useful pieces of information O’Reilly ever presented to his audience, and Olbermann was there to show how lousy the rest of O’Reilly’s information was. Though it was in the context of a bitter feud, the two men were actually engaging in real journalism, at least in this case.”
Posted on August 1, 2009
