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This is an aside titled 'YouTube: President Reagan Prays to the Aliens' dated 3/18/08

Ronald Reagan addressed the UN in 1987 praying that aliens invade so we could militarize the planet. He also asked high school students to volunteer for Ender’s Game.

Posted by Joanne on Mar. 18, 2008

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Asides
- Don't look at the DOW, from Slate's The Big Money, explains why the TED Spread is the number to watch for signs of recovery.
- "I’m in Venice now, which used to be a financial center and is now a tourist center. And the nightmare is that a crisis of this magnitude will turn New York from a financial center into a tourist center. The good news is that London seems to be handling this crisis slightly worse than New York. My sense is that the great financial crisis we’re living through will fundamentally tilt the balance of the world from West to East. Sovereign-wealth funds will matter much, much more because they’ve got the money and we haven’t. New York isn’t quite Venice yet, but I certainly am quite relieved that I don’t own a large block of real estate in Manhattan right now." - Niall Ferguson, author of The Ascent of Money (via.)
- Why was the debate last night instantly forgettable? Why did neither candidate stray far from his respective stump speech? Because both candidates gain from a format designed to minimize gaffes and specifics. More from Lindsay Beyerstein: "If the debates are to add value, they must push the candidates out of their comfort zones and force them to engage answer questions that their handlers won't let them tackle on the campaign trail. The best way to do that is to have debates on relatively narrow topics...This time around, we should have had debates exclusively devoted to energy, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the economic crisis."
- "Plastic surgery is a specialty that, unfortunately, always makes significant advances in wartime" -- Colonel Thomas Crabtree, MD, ASPS Member Surgeon.
- Expect to see a lot of Wall Street-inspired art this spring like Fred Tomaselli's Guilty, 2005. And here's the Washington Post on Laura Gilbert's "Zero dollars." (via.)
- I can't remember when I first heard about it, but a few google results suggest that back when JFK was running, people painted red nail polish Cardinal skull caps on quarters. "Kennedy quarters" were to remind (and frighten) others of his Catholic faith.
- The most beautiful thing I've seen in weeks is this photograph: Oil Sands by Yann Arthus-Bertrand. (More here.) Next spring, his exhibit "Earth From Above" will be on display outside the World Financial Center Plaza.
- Wired on Boston's shorter red light initiative. "The results, released last week, show that shorter red lights will help Boston's drivers regain 135,000 hours each year that would normally be wasted waiting for a light to turn. Traffic delays during the 60-intersection trial decreased 29 percent, while vehicle emissions decreased almost ten percent."
- So what is a conservative now? Most remarkable about this election, Obama is smashing the electoral college. In the comments of an post on Georgia's quite possibly Obama win, someone points out how the English Tory party outgrew its social platform. The shocking lack of diversity we saw at the Republican national convention is proof the party message has got to change. By 2042, minorities will be the majority. Already, Asians, Hispanics, and African-Americans overwhelmingly favor Democratic candidates. The world is also increasingly urbanizing. The GOP can't keep ignoring people in cities (let alone calling us unpatriotic, elite, etc.) Great post on BLDGBLOG about this here. Bless her heart, Sarah Palin does show a glimmer of hope that the GOP is moving toward a modern image: "full civil rights equivalent to marriage" for gays, redefining gender roles, and sorta! pro-civil liberties. Right now, typically divided-government loving libertarians largely support Obama. Now it's up to the GOP to decide whether they are going to put up Mike Huckabee (left economically, social conservative) or a libertarian (free-market, culturally liberal) in 2012. Guess which of the two can win. UPDATE: Hrag comments: "I think you misunderstood Palin’s endorsement of full civil right for gay couples. She said she thought they should be able to go into contracts…that’s not the same thing. Gwen Ifill didn’t clarify that and you’re the third person/blog I’ve heard misquote that. The gov’t has no role limiting personal contracts. What some of us in same-sex relationships want is a law that ensures that our partners are covered by our health insurance and that covers issues like immigration. What Palin said was nowhere near to ANY of that, on the other hand Biden supported equal rights under another name (civil unions)." UPDATE II: pretty good thread here on why Bobby Jindal will really have to tone down his biblical literalism to be considered in 2012. More on that here.
- Why Are Literary Readings So Bad? (via.) Readers and writers, are, almost by definition, introverts. Less charitably: extremely shy. I've never meet anyone at readings and I probably never will, but it's always an odd experience gawking at the people who may have loved a book as much as I did. It surprises me authors so infrequently play with the format. Elements of theater could be implemented on a budget. Play some music as they talk...nothing too much, Stars of the Lid or something.
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