BruceH

'Morning Joe'? Ya gotta be kidding.

Man, you said it!!! Not always true, but often enough to give one pause...

I saw him in Boston once, at the Copley Hotel. He was great. I very much hope he returns to full health.

I was one of the few people on the planet who thought No Country For Old Men was overrated, though at least they were trying to break out a bit from their usual giggling-irony mode. From the reviews it's been getting I don't think the new one is worth my ten bucks.

Good point, matey.

Thanks for that! The performances were so...lively! Why can't there be TV shows like that now?? (And I didn't know Gilbert Seldes had a TV show!)

That's all?

Amen.

I think you're being silly by suggesting that the solution to the crisis is to turn to the Libertarians, the one group who would remove any and all regulation immediately. This problem was brought upon us in large part due to the wonderful Republican "free enterprise solution" of removing "unnecessary" regulation. Now that this has been discredited, I don't think you'll convince many (other than Berigan) that we should carry this approach even farther... Moose, let me make a couple of points regarding the bipartisan nature of the problem and the Libertarian view. 1) My understanding is that this this sub-prime lending mess was started by Bill Clinton. For political (not economic) reasons, his administration pressured the banks to lend money to the poor (read "blacks"), with the threat of penalties if they didn't. This continued under the Bush administration. The banks would not have made the loans in the first place if they had not been pressured to by the government. Your understanding is incorrect and borderline racist. The root cause of the problem is not subprime loans. If it we're we'd see Countrywide go out of business, but would not be staring major financial catastrophe in the face. The problem is that the free market was allowed to securitize these loans, repackage them, and trade them, making it impossible for those trading in them to have any understanding as to their actual worth while they a) gamed the ratings agencies to pat them on the head and tell them they weren't risky and b) bought and sold them at crazy margins . No government forced Merrill Lynch to trade in these opaque CDOs against their will; they made this an integral part of their investment strategy. Yes. I'm no financial wizard but that sounds reasonable. Frankly, the fact that they were able to securitize loans, "repackage them and trade them" just boggled my mind. Didn't that decouple the loans from any sense of the underlying RISK involved?

Yet another company that's "too big to fail." Where does it all end? Seems to me that the people screaming "Private profits, socialized losses," have a point.

So Greenspan holding interest rates way down year after year after year had absolutely NOTHING to do with it?

THIS album is a trip! A true classic of it's kind.

I hate that shit too. Some of that pop-up program advertising is actually animated too, which is to say that you'll see some guy in the bottom third of the screen actually moving around while he gets in the way of your image. It's maddening. Yeah, I love to be in the middle of watching a murder scene or something, only to have Frank Caliendo and Bill Engvall's big fucking heads pop up and dance around to remind us of a new show next week. Afterwards, your like "what the fuck just happened?" "I'm here, watching and I and I still missed"! Just shows the contempt they have for the viewers. You'd think it would be enough that they load up an hour's worth of programming with 25 or 30 minutes of commercials. But no, then they've got to give you commercials WHILE YOU'RE WATCHING THE SHOW.

A government bailout of AIG is very BAD news.

Time to bring back Glass-Steagall.

I hate that shit too. Some of that pop-up program advertising is actually animated too, which is to say that you'll see some guy in the bottom third of the screen actually moving around while he gets in the way of your image. It's maddening.

Yep, looks like purely a "paycheck" movie.

As for the banks, they made their bed, now we have to sleep in it. (Serves them right, and serves US right for not regulating them.)

Great! I wish you luck in your exploration of Dick. THE WORKS of Dick. Philip, that is. Philip K.

Read about this yesterday and was really shocked. There must have been some real problems he was wrestling with.

I like that West Coast Jazz book.

Alexandria Theater--wow, you live close to me. I'm right through the park in the Sunset. You are still walking distance to Green Apple Bookstore--one of my favorites! And for big trees, you have Golden Gate Park of course. I agree that it could rank higher... Woah. Yeah, my wife and I walked to Green Apple last weekend, but at 18 blocks it's a bit of a hike. I'd like a decent bookstore within 5 or 6 blocks, ideally. (I used to live in Brookline, MA, where I was really spoiled---the Brookline Booksmith (a truly terrific little bookstore) was just 3 1/2 blocks away, and the Coolidge Corner Theater was across the street from the Booksmith. There was an excellent video store too...and shady trees everywhere! Ah, New England!)

Didn't know he was a Massachusetts man! Russell, you could probably get all the other Fletch books used online. Try "Abebooks.com".

Glad you've picked a picture that looks like you, Niko. I always find it a bit disconcerting not to know whether or not I'm looking at an image or near-image of the poster. I mean, does Allen Lowe really look like one of Richard Nixon's seedier henchmen? Or does medjuck look like Clarence Williams - or is that a photo of someone else? Tiny Parham actually. I'll try to attach a picture. If it works, I'm the old guy. The others are my family. I do have a beard though only for the last 35 years. What a nice family, medjuck!