“When he wants to be, the president is a brilliant and moving speaker, but his stories virtually always lack one element: the villain who caused the problem, who is always left out, described in impersonal terms, or described in passive voice, as if the cause of others’ misery has no agency and hence no culpability.”
Lucille Ball was born 100 years ago today, and Google is celebrating with a clever video Doodle that reminds us how much we all hated her. It reminds *me* of that, anyway.
The long-awaited first photo of Anne Hathaway as Catwoman has been released. Let us glory in it:
“‘The Change-Up’ is one of the dirtiest-minded mainstream releases in history. It has a low opinion of men, a lower opinion of women, and the lowest opinion of the intelligence of its audience. It is obscene, foulmouthed, scatological, creepy and perverted. As a bonus, it has the shabbiest low-rent main titles I’ve seen this side of YouTube.”Roger Ebert lowers the boom.
The great NEIL ARMSTRONG was born on this day in 1930.
Barack Obama turns 50 years old on this very day. Question: How many other U.S. presidents have turned 50 while in office? Take a guess, and we’ll give you the answer after this roll call.
New York magazine explores the question.
Ever think to yourself as a kid, “Gee, I wonder where I’ll be when I’m 50?”If you’re Barack Obama, the answer to that question turned out to be: “In the White House, at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, as the duly-elected President of the United States.”
French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson died on this day, August 3rd, in 2004. He was 95 years old. One of the great post-war photographers, Cartier-Bresson had been a prisoner of the Nazis from 1940 to 1943.
The FBI has released the mugshots of Boston crime boss James “Whitey” Bulger: