"Movers and shapers" is the phrase... while popularity favors "shakers", I think it's important to stress the "shaping" of policy, and civilization.

Caligula could "shake" but, fortunately, didn't shape our moral view of what is appropriate.

Apart from that cavil:

I'm hoping readers will bring to our attention more journalism that is in the mainstream media that is as high a caliber of insight and eloquent expression as is Obama's. Pour encourager les autres.

Posted at August 18, 2008 10:03 PM in response to Blogging The Future

Site Admin: we've been reporting posting problems rather continually, yet my post, which was marked in reply to another, did not appear as such. Out of context, my response to the delight in the new-to-them term "Faux News" made no sense.

It's a real disservice to commenters, and it may be the deciding factor for participation in the future.

Just sayin'...

Posted at July 30, 2008 10:22 AM in response to Memo From A 'Troop': Don't Place Too Much Credence in the Opinion of a 'Troop'

... and it's pronounced "foe"... rhymes with "apropos"

Posted at July 30, 2008 10:16 AM in response to Memo From A 'Troop': Don't Place Too Much Credence in the Opinion of a 'Troop'

Ah, but Bush IS using the military leaders for political cover; you may recall that he kept firing everyone who did not agree with him.

Posted at July 29, 2008 4:34 PM in response to Memo From A 'Troop': Don't Place Too Much Credence in the Opinion of a 'Troop'

Great thanks - I prefer the facts. I sit corrected.

Posted at July 24, 2008 11:12 PM in response to Ellison Slams von Spakovsky Over Disenfranchised Nuns and U.S. Attorneys

Excellent! Thank you for featuring this testimony.

Readers may recall that Keith Ellison is Muslim, and took his oath of office on the Koran. It didn't matter then; it doesn't matter now, and I bring it up for its utter irrelevancy, just to emphasize its irrelevancy.

Gotta go...

Posted at July 24, 2008 7:32 PM in response to Ellison Slams von Spakovsky Over Disenfranchised Nuns and U.S. Attorneys

"Emanates" - not "eminates"...

Trudeau had a lot of fun in Doonesbury with the "clean and articulate" Biden-speak.

"Terrorist fist-bumps" for everyone!

Posted at July 14, 2008 2:02 PM in response to Joe Biden: Military Commanders Want Obama To Visit Iraq

What surprises me here is that previous iterations of this have been voiced by pols from constituencies hundreds of miles from the alleged scene. Alabama's the closest, I expect.

Posted at July 4, 2008 12:43 PM in response to Yet Another Republican Has Pushed China-Cuba Oil Myth

Thank you, yes!

Posted at July 2, 2008 10:18 PM in response to Happy 100th Birthday, Thurgood Marshall

I'm reasonably confident that I read in The New Yorker, in an interview about his imminent retirement, his response to a question about his replacement being black: it was to the effect that you could have a white snake, or a black snake... the inference being that character transcended racial considerations. Skipping forward to the confirmation of Thomas, it was easy to hear what Marshall meant - Thomas was quoted as saying things that were acutely familiar to me, having to work in a building with someone similarly predatory.

One of the tragedies associated with Marshall was the controversy of his final marriage to a woman who was not of African ancestry. We're moving past that, but we haven't seen the last of that grief.

Posted at July 2, 2008 4:18 PM in response to Happy 100th Birthday, Thurgood Marshall