Interracial Marriage ... Gay Marriage ...

... what's next? Polyamorous marriage.
(I'm not sure if I used the right word)

Foreign advertisements with Domestic Celebrities

After realizing I left this tab open for the last week or so I decided to pass the site along to you: "12 Best Foreign Celebrity Ads." Let me explain, since editors at The Daily Beast, with whom I have taken issue before, apparently don't care that the title could be taken to imply that the celebrities are foreign. In actuality it is US celebrities making a quick buck in super-foreign commercials. My favorite (below) is Snoop Dogg as a German folk singer.

Obama Thus Far: 1.5 Thumbs Up

I would call this a sufficiently good summary of Obama's first 10 or so days.

A few quick links.

Let's get the blogging week started with a few interesting pages to check out:

• Nate Silver's writeup of "So Just Who Did Vote For The Bailout?" - A lot of interesting stuff in this one, including a statistical analysis of factors contributing to voting patterns on the first bailout bill last year and a brief discussion of the implications of writing one's own definitions of terms like Progressive.
• The Daily Beast - "The Best of Blago" - He is not only crazy; he has the ability to take legitimate literary quotations and warp them to suit his purposes. Wonderful spin, Rod.
• Bit.ly - An alternative to the Tiny URL service, Bit.ly has all of the same features, but is also copying (in their entirety), cataloging, and organizing all sites that users create shortened URLs for. It will take a while or the benefits to pan out (beyond the link-shortening, that is), but it should be interesting to see what researchers can pull off with that amount of information.
• Red Bull Snowscrapers - On February 5 a bunch of professional snowboarders will be jumping off a 90' ramp built in East River Park. Carly and I drove past this last week and saw the main ramp being built. The ramp is pretty cool, with the main support being provided by stacked shipping containers (see photo below). I kind of want to figure out a way to see this from afar so I don't have to hang out with a bunch of snowboarders to see one person jump this. Check out this site for more pictures of the actual ramps.
  

• Update: I also meant to include the fact that Texas dealt a blow to creationism in a recent schoolboard ruling.
  

Opinions on Barack's Speech

I would like to see the speech again before giving my review, but I really enjoyed reading some of the Daily Beast correspondents' reactions to Barack's inaugural address.

The more things change, the more they stay the same

As always, I really liked this Christopher Buckley article in The Daily Beast. My favorite line was "the fugitive." I stared at that French phrase at the beginning for a long time trying to translate it ... once I was quite satisfied with myself I read the line that follows, only to have one of those Homer "doh" moments.

Joe the Annoyer

He may still be getting publicity for the wrong reasons, but at least he is lowering his own credibility in the process.

Better version of our gameshow...

Well, I think this may be the death knell of Bush, Kennedy, or Other, our fantastic quiz show. Who (Allegedly) Said It? asks contestants to who said each phrase, Rod Blagojevich or Tony Soprano. Well done, Beast.

The train Nazi (Not the Nazi train)

Here's a pretty entertaining article by Christopher Buckley about how it feels to have public enforcer responsibilities fall to you. Damn free-rider problem.

I also recommend everyone check out at least a book or two of Buckley's, as the tend to be fluffy fiction with some fun laughs along the way. Thank You For Smoking is the best of his book that I have read.

Beards!

I highly recommend everyone check out the slightly disturbing Daily Beast article that includes a gallery of Obama with beards of different styles.

And for those of you uninformed on the matter of beards I submit The World Beard and Moustache Championships.