Paul Krugman: Playing Taxes Hold 'em (New York Times)
This is no time for a Grand Bargain, because the Republican Party, as now constituted, is just not an entity with which the president can make a serious deal. If we're going to get a grip on our nation's problems - of which the budget deficit is a minor part - the power of the G.O.P.'s extremists, and their willingness to hold the economy hostage if they don't get their way, needs to be broken.
George Dvorsky: The Great Filter theory suggests humans have already conquered the threat of extinction (io9)
It's difficult to not be pessimistic when considering humanity's future prospects. Many people would agree that it's more likely than not that we'll eventually do ourselves in. And in fact, some astrobiologists theorize that all advanced civilizations hit the same insurmountable developmental wall we have. They call it the Great Filter. It's a notion that's often invoked to explain why we've never been visited by extraterrestrials.
Susan Estrich: Chinese Food Jews (Creators Syndicate)
Orthodox Jews will think of us as hypocrites, and maybe we were. But we did it together, mother and daughter, feeling loved and not lonely. When I think back on my relationship with my mother, all those rocky years, all that pain and misunderstanding, my happiest memories are of the five years or so when we spent Christmas going to a movie in Peabody and then to Dave Wong's.
On the Eiffel Tower, seventy-two names of French scientists, engineers and some other notable people are engraved in recognition of their contributions. This is according to the design by Gustave Eiffel. The engravings are found on the sides of the tower under the first balcony. The engraving was painted over at the beginning of the twentieth century and restored in 1986-1987 by Société Nouvelle d'exploitation de la Tour Eiffel, a company contracted to operate business related to the Tower. The Tower is owned by the city of Paris. The letters were originally painted in gold and are about 60 cm high. The repainting of 2010/2011 restored the letters to their original gold color.
Source
Alan J was first, and correct, with:
72
Charlie wrote:
72 rather distinguished names, unfortunately excluding women. I looked also for the name Henri Poincaré, but couldn't find it. I think it must be that although there were some living people on the list in 1889, Poincaré (1854-1912) was too young to get that kind of recognition.
Jim from CA, retired to ID, responded:
On the Eiffel Tower, seventy-two names of French scientists, engineers and
some other notable people are engraved in recognition of their
contributions
Sally said:
72 names are on the Eiffel Tower.
Sacrebleu!
PS: Busted, by B2BB! Another wild Garden Club Christmas Luncheon! Plenty of food and wine, but the "group of sailors on liberty looking for a good time" were the frosting on our Spumoni!
Hubba, hubba!!
Adam answered:
72.
Hmmm...still here...damn Mayans.
Marian responded:
72
Dale of Diamond Springs replied:
72 men, no women. French National Football team! Wow, I survived another end of the world!!!! Did anyone else survive?
BttbBob answered:
I asked my wonderful daughter, Sarah - a Francophile and speaker - who has been to Paris and the tower, and she told me the answer is 72... Speaking of Paris, here's a trivia question fer ya: Who did Joni Mitchell (whom I adore) write 'Free Man in Paris' ( Joni MItchell - Free Man in Paris 1974 HQ - YouTube ) for and about? Here's a hint from the lyrics... he was famously "stoking the star maker machinery behind the popular song". The answer is at the bottom.
~~~~~
Hometown Coolness Item -
Local woman trains deaf Dalmatian to understand sign language ( Local woman trains deaf Dalmatian to understand sign language - WNEM TV 5 ) ... A Bay City woman has been busy training her dog to be a therapy dog. That in itself isn't strange, but what's out of the ordinary in this case is that the dog is deaf and is learning through sign language...
~~~~~
Hometown Confession Moment - Ah, yes... Bay City, MI... my hometown... and to my everlasting shame it is also, in fact, the namesake of the Scottish band 'Bay City Rollers' of 70's teeny-bopper fame (Egad... I'm sorry). They even came here and were given the 'Key to the City' by the local provincial nabobs that ran things here at that time. Oh, it was 'Roller-mania' here for a while, I'm tellin' ya. Murals on building walls and whatnot. Ack! Thankfully, I was living elsewhere when that occurred. Oh, those same na-boobs later shunned Madonna, who was born here, when she hit it big with 'Material Girl'. Seems she had too risque an attitude for the rubes. Madonna has reciprocated by never having had an 'official' public visit here despite returning numerous times to visit family still in the area. A few years ago she was here very privately for her beloved grandmother's funeral...
~~~~~
My 'Free Man in Paris' trivia-within trivia question answer - David Geffen, head of Asylum Records... David Geffen ~ Film Outtake: 'Free Man In Paris' Interpreted | American Masters | PBS
MAM wrote:
72 ~ The engravings are found on the sides of the tower under the first balcony. The letters were originally done in gold and are about 60 cm high. The list contains no women!
The location of the names on the tower.
And, Joe S answered:
Well, heck. We're still all here. I didn't answer yesterdays trivia because I figured, " what's the point." There wouldn't be anyone around to see the answer anyway. Boy did I get fooled, probably not as badly as those people building the arks or survival pods though.
So okay, today's question: The answer is 72.
Jana Mashonee - O Holy Night (Sung in Navajo) - YouTube
Normally this time of year it's more clogged than Pigboy's arteries, but parking was no problem and there wasn't much hustle or bustle.
Tonight, Saturday:
CBS begins the night with a FRESH'Made In Jersey', followed by another FRESH'Made In Jersey', then '48 Hours'.
NBC opens the night with the chestnut 'Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol', followed by the FRESH'WWE Tribute To The Troops', then a cut-down version of last Saturday's 'SNL' (Martin Short & Paul McCartney).
'SNL' is a RERUN, with Bruno Mars, hosting & providing the music.
ABC starts the night with 'Disney's Prep & Landing 2: Naughty Vs. Nice', followed by 'A Chipmunk Christmas', then the RERUN'CMA Country Christmas'.
The CW offers an old '2½ Men', followed by another old '2½ Men', then an old 'Family Guy', followed by another old 'Family Guy'.
Faux has 'Cops', another 'Cops', and a RERUN'Kitchen Nightmares'.
MY has an old 'Burn Notice', followed by another old 'Burn Notice'.
A&E has 'Storage Wars', another 'Storage Wars', still another 'Storage Wars', yet another 'Storage Wars', followed by a FRESH'Parking Wars', then another FRESH'Parking Wars', followed by yet another FRESH'Parking Wars', and another 'Parking Wars'.
AMC offers the movie 'Miracle On 34th Street', followed by the movie 'Miracle On 34th Street', again, then the movie 'Miracle On 34th Street', still again.
BBC -
[6:00AM] RAMSAY'S KITCHEN NIGHTMARES REVISITED UK - Season 2 - Ep 1 - La Riviera
[7:00AM] RAMSAY'S KITCHEN NIGHTMARES US - Season 1 - Ep 10 - Dillon's
[8:00AM] GORDON RAMSAY'S ULTIMATE CHRISTMAS-Episode 1
[9:00AM] GORDON RAMSAY'S ULTIMATE CHRISTMAS-Episode 2
[10:00AM] RAMSAY'S CHRISTMAS COOKALONG
[11:00AM] THE BRIT LIST: THE DOCTOR WHO ULTIMATE LIST OF LISTS
[12:00PM] TOP GEAR: BEST OF 11-12-Episode 3
[1:00PM] TOP GEAR: BEST OF 11-12-Episode 4
[2:00PM] TOP GEAR - Season 10 - Episode 7
[3:00PM] TOP GEAR - Season 10 - Episode 8
[4:00PM] TOP GEAR - Season 10 - Episode 9
[5:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - Season 3 - Ep 1 - Evolution
[6:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - Season 3 - Ep 2 - The Ensigns of Command
[7:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - Season 3 - Ep 3 - The Survivors
[8:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - Season 3 - Ep 4 - Who Watches the Watchers
[9:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - Season 3 - Ep 5 - The Bonding
[10:00PM] THE GRAHAM NORTON SHOW - Season 12 - Ep 8 - Martin Freeman, Dawn French, Lee Mack, Girls Aloud NEW
[11:00PM] THE SHINING
[2:00AM] THE GRAHAM NORTON SHOW - Season 12 - Ep 8 - Martin Freeman, Dawn French, Lee Mack, Girls Aloud
[3:00AM] DOCTOR WHO - Season 6 - Ep 7 - A Good Man Goes to War
[4:00AM] DOCTOR WHO - Season 6 - Ep 8 - Let's Kill Hitler
[5:00AM] DOCTOR WHO - Season 6 - Ep 9 - Night Terrors (ALL TIMES EST)
Bravo has the movie 'Meet The Parents', followed by the movie 'The Family Man', then the movie 'The Family Man', again.
Comedy Central has 'Tosh.0', another 'Tosh.0', 'South Park', 'Beavis & Butt-head', 'South Park', 'Beavis & Butt-head', 'South Park', and 'Beavis & Butt-head'.
FX has the movie 'Night At The Museum: Battle Of The Smithsonian', followed by the movie 'Alvin & The Chipmunks', then the movie 'Alvin & the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel'.
History has 'Mankind The Story Of All Of Us', followed by another 'Mankind The Story Of All Of Us', still another 'Mankind The Story Of All Of Us', 'Pawn Stars', and another 'Pawn Stars'.
IFC -
[6:00AM] Bookies
[8:00AM] Hope Springs
[10:00AM] The Three Stooges-Hula-La-La
[10:25AM] The Three Stooges-Husbands Beware
[10:50AM] The Three Stooges-Listen, Judge
[11:15AM] The Three Stooges-Merry Mavericks
[11:40AM] The Three Stooges-Mutts to You
[12:05PM] The Three Stooges-Of Cash and Hash
[12:30PM] Whitest Kids U'Know
[1:00PM] Whitest Kids U'Know
[1:30PM] Whitest Kids U'Know
[1:45PM] Bookies
[3:45PM] Layer Cake
[6:00PM] Narrow Margin
[8:00PM] Rambo
[9:45PM] Fight Club
[12:45AM] Rambo
[2:30AM] Fight Club
[5:30AM] Comedy Bang! Bang!-Paul Rudd Wears a Red Lumberjack Flannel Shirt (ALL TIMES EST)
Sundance -
[6:00A] Le Donk & Scor-zay-zee
[7:30A] MAN SHOPS GLOBE - Italy (Episode 6, Season 2)
[8:00A] FREAKS AND GEEKS - Noshing and Moshing (Episode 15, Season 1)
[9:00A] FREAKS AND GEEKS - Smooching and Mooching (Episode 16, Season 1)
[10:00A] FREAKS AND GEEKS - The Little Things (Episode 17, Season 1)
[11:00A] Eclipse
[11:15A] Flame & Citron
[1:45P] Le Donk & Scor-zay-zee
[3:15P] Say Anything
[5:00P] High Fidelity
[7:00P] ICONOCLASTS - Jamie Oliver + Paul Smith (Episode 5, Season 6)
[7:30P] THE MORTIFIED SESSIONS - Actor Adam Goldberg (Episode 5, Season 2)
[8:00P] The Quiet American
[9:45P] Next Floor
[10:00P] Broadcast News
[12:15A] The Exterminating Angels
[2:15A] Love Crime
[4:05A] Cass (ALL TIMES EST)
SyFy has the movie 'Star Trek: Generations', followed by the movie 'Star Trek: First Contact'.
Indian Sitar maestro Ravi Shankar's daughter and singer Nora Jones, leaves after a memorial service for Shankar in Encinitas, Calif., Thursday, Dec. 20, 2012. Shankar was a master of the Indian sitar who collaborated with and influenced George Harrison, John Coltrane and other Western music icons. He lived in Encinitas for two decades and died last week at age 92.
Photo by Jae C. Hong
British actor Hugh Grant has accepted a "substantial sum" after settling his phone-hacking damages action against the publishers of the now defunct News of the World, his lawyer said on Friday.
The actor, a strident critic of Britain's tabloid newspaper culture, will donate the money to 'Hacked Off', a pressure group that helped bring about a public inquiry into press practices.
Grant, who gave evidence to the Leveson inquiry into British press conduct in November 2011, was one of several high-profile figures who launched legal action against the British arm of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp.
"Settled hacking suit with NI (News International). 100 % of money plus more goes to #HackedOff coffers. Just in time for Christmas, Rupert," Grant tweeted on Friday.
A traditional coal miners choir sings "Der Steiger ruft" ("the head miner calls") during the closing ceremony for the coal mine "Bergwerk West" in the western German town of Kamp-Lintfort near Duisburg December 21, 2012. After more than 100 years of underground coal exploiting the mine will be shut down by the end of the year.
Photo by Wolfgang Rattay
A dentist acted legally when he fired an assistant that he found attractive simply because he and his wife viewed the woman as a threat to their marriage, the all-male Iowa Supreme Court ruled Friday.
The court ruled 7-0 that bosses can fire employees they see as an "irresistible attraction," even if the employees have not engaged in flirtatious behavior or otherwise done anything wrong. Such firings may be unfair, but they are not unlawful discrimination under the Iowa Civil Rights Act because they are motivated by feelings and emotions, not gender, Justice Edward Mansfield wrote.
An attorney for Fort Dodge dentist James Knight said the decision, the first of its kind in Iowa, is a victory for family values because Knight fired Melissa Nelson in the interest of saving his marriage, not because she was a woman.
But Nelson's attorney said Iowa's all-male high court, one of only a handful in the nation, failed to recognize the discrimination that women see routinely in the workplace.
"These judges sent a message to Iowa women that they don't think men can be held responsible for their sexual desires and that Iowa women are the ones who have to monitor and control their bosses' sexual desires," said attorney Paige Fiedler. "If they get out of hand, then the women can be legally fired for it."
South Korean rapper Psy's infectious viral hit song, "Gangnam Style," made history on Friday as the first ever video on YouTube to reach 1 billion views, adding yet another record to the song's juggernaut journey into mainstream pop.
The song, first posted on YouTube on July 15, clocked the 1 billion milestone at 10:50 a.m. EST (1550 GMT) and YouTube marked the occasion with a dancing Psy doodle next to their logo.
The song also became YouTube's most watched video last month, overtaking Justin Bieber's "Baby" video, which previously held the title.
The video shows the outlandishly dressed Psy rap in Korean while performing an invisible horse-riding dance, which has become a pop culture trend, spurring many copycat and parody videos.
Actress Kathleen (Koo) Stark leaves Isleworth Crown Court in London December 21, 2012. Stark, who dated Prince Andrew in the 1980s, attended the court in connection with an alleged theft, local media reported.
Photo by Neil Hall
Disney says it has completed its acquisition of Lucasfilm Ltd. for $4.06 billion in cash and stock.
The company said Friday that it issued 37.1 million shares and made a cash payment of $2.21 billion to buy the maker of "Star Wars" from its sole owner, George Lucas.
The total transaction value was based on Friday's closing price of $50 for Disney shares.
The deal includes special effects giant Industrial Light & Magic, video game maker LucasArts and sound studio Skywalker Sound.
The pope took his opposition to gay marriage to new heights Friday, denouncing what he described as people manipulating their God-given gender to suit their sexual choices - and destroying the very "essence of the human creature" in the process.
Benedict XVI made the comments in his annual Christmas speech to the Vatican bureaucracy - one of his most important speeches of the year. He dedicated it this year to promoting family values in the face of vocal campaigns in France, the United States, Britain and elsewhere to legalize same-sex marriage.
In his remarks, Benedict quoted the chief rabbi of France, Gilles Bernheim, in saying the campaign for granting gays the right to marry and adopt children was an "attack" on the traditional family made up of a father, mother and children.
It was the second time in a week that Benedict has taken on the question of gay marriage, which is dividing France after proponents scored big electoral wins in the United States last month. In his recently released annual peace message, Benedict said gay marriage, like abortion and euthanasia, was a threat to world peace.
Church teaching holds that homosexual acts are "intrinsically disordered," though it stresses that gays should be treated with compassion and dignity. As pope and as head of the Vatican's orthodoxy watchdog before that, Benedict has been a strong enforcer of that teaching: One of the first major documents of his pontificate said men with "deep-seated" homosexual tendencies shouldn't be ordained priests.
Artists from a shadow puppet play troupe wait for a performance at 7th China Beijing International Cultural and Creative Industry Expo December 21, 2012. The troupe is constituted of 43 adult dwarf artists, with an average age of 22 and a height of 1.24 meters. The group has around 10 actors perform shadow puppet plays all year long at China shadow puppet culture and art city near the old summer palace in Beijing.
Photo by Petar Kujundzic
The Big Ten isn't talking about the future of the Suzy Favor Athlete of the Year Award, named after three-time Olympian who revealed this week she lived a double life as an escort in Las Vegas.
Favor Hamilton, who runs a realty firm in Wisconsin, posted her confession on her Twitter account Thursday after a report on The Smoking Gun website detailed her life as a prostitute.
A spokesman for the Big Ten conference, which hands out the award named after the nine-time NCAA champion, had no comment about the news Friday. Neither did a spokesman from the University of Wisconsin, where Favor Hamilton competed for the Badgers and won 23 conference titles.
Country star Randy Travis has pleaded not guilty to simple assault and faces trial March 11 in a Dallas-area municipal court.
Travis on Friday appeared in a Plano courtroom with his attorneys and asked for a jury trial.
Plano police cited Travis following an Aug. 23 incident in a church parking lot in which he allegedly intervened in an argument involving a woman he knows and her estranged husband. Nobody was hurt.
Travis, when asked Friday by WFAA-TV to comment about his recent legal troubles, said people shouldn't believe everything they might hear or read.
A man rolls a joint during the 4th Marijuana Festival outside the Senate building in Mexico City December 20, 2012. Social organizations and left-wing political parties are proposing to convene a national debate next year on the legalization of marijuana consumption in a series of public hearings, to open the debate on a new paradigm for the war on drugs and the regulation of banned substances and implement programs for the prevention and care of addictions, according to organisers.
Photo by Tomas Bravo
The studio that made "The Godfather" movies has settled a lawsuit with the estate of author Mario Puzo, who created the Mafia family saga.
Paramount Pictures Corp sued in February in an attempt to block a new book in the "Godfather" series, which it said was being published without its permission and in violation of copyright agreements.
Notice of the settlement was filed in the U.S. District Court in New York on Thursday, but terms were not disclosed as the "parties have agreed that the terms of the settlement are confidential," said Richard Kendall, a lawyer for Paramount, a unit of Viacom Inc.
"We're very pleased with the settlement," said Bertram Fields, a lawyer for the Puzo estate.
Human skulls deliberately warped into strange, alien-like shapes have been unearthed in a 1,000-year-old cemetery in Mexico, researchers say.
The practice of deforming skulls of children as they grew was common in Central America, and these findings suggest the tradition spread farther north than had been thought, scientists added.
The cemetery was discovered by residents of the small Mexican village of Onavas in 1999 as they were building an irrigation canal. It is the first pre-Hispanic cemetery found in the northern Mexican state of Sonora.
The site, referred to as El Cementerio, contained the remains of 25 human burials. Thirteen of them had deformed skulls, which were elongate and pointy at the back, and five had mutilated teeth.
A number of skeletons also were found with earrings, nose rings, bracelets, pendants and necklaces made from seashells and snails from the Gulf of California. One person was buried with a turtle shell on the chest. It remains uncertain why some of these people were buried with ornaments while others were not, or - another mystery - why only one of the 25 skeletons was female.
Larry L. King, a writer and playwright whose magazine article about a campaign to close down a popular bordello became a hit Tony Award-nominated musical "The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas" and a movie starring Burt Reynolds, died Thursday. He was 83.
His wife, Barbara Blaine, said King died after battling emphysema at Chevy Chase House, a retirement home in Washington where he had been living the past six months. "One of the things that I will always remember about Larry is that he remained funny all the way through this illness," she said.
He wrote in a good ol' boy vernacular style similar to other Southern authors such as Roy Blount and Charles Portis. King wrote two musicals, five plays, 14 books, a few screenplays and hundreds of magazine articles, for which he won an O. Henry Award in 2001.
His books include "None But a Blockhead" about the act of writing, and a children's book called "Because of Lozo Brown," about the fears children have of meeting others. Collections of his essays were also published, including "The Old Man and Lesser Mortals," which began as an article about his father.
His "Confessions of a White Racist" - he called it "a gratuitous admission of guilt on behalf of all white racists past and present, malignant and benign" - was a finalist for a National Book Award. He won an Emmy for his 1982 television documentary for CBS, "The Best Little Statehouse in Texas." He taught at Princeton and was a fellow at Duke.
King came to Washington in 1954 to work for a newly elected Congressman from El Paso. A journalist from West Texas, he had planned to remain on Capitol Hill for about three years and then go to work for a newspaper.
He wound up staying in politics as an aide in Washington for 10 years. His experience produced a best seller in 1978, "Wheeling and Dealing: Confessions of a Capitol Hill Operator."
He said President John F. Kennedy's assassination caused him to reevaluate his life. King quit politics and headed to New York where he taught, worked on books and free-lanced for magazines.
King was not shy about his battles with alcohol and kicked the bottle decades ago. "If you're not out getting drunk, and waking up with hangovers and having fights with people, there's a lot of time to write," he said in an interview with The Associated Press in 1987.
King wrote his most famous piece about the Chicken Ranch brothel in 1974 for Playboy magazine, took the $3,000 and thought no more about it. But Peter Masterson, a Texas actor, saw the article and thought it would make a great play. He and King got together with songwriter Carol Hall, another Texan, to create the smash musical. Tommy Tune was the director and in charge of musical staging.
The movie version starring Dolly Parton and Reynolds was less than a smash with critics, including King, who thought Hollywood had ruined the story and turned it into a sex romp.
King was one of a group of journalists who spent 1969-70 at Harvard University and his 8,000-word account of the year, "Blowing My Mind at Harvard," appeared in Harper's magazine. He also wrote for The Texas Observer, Life and Texas Monthly, among others, and penned a biography of former Harper's editor Willie Morris in 2006.
King has three grown children by his first wife. His second wife died in 1972. He also had two grown children with his third wife, Blaine. A private funeral was planned and King would be buried at the Texas State Cemetery in Austin, she said.
"I'm of the belief that sad endings, or bad endings, make for better drama than happy endings," King told the AP in 1986. "And life really works more that way anyhow for most people."
Lee Dorman, the bassist for psychedelic rock band Iron Butterfly, has died at age 70.
Orange County sheriff's spokeswoman Gail Krause says Dorman was found dead in a vehicle Friday morning. A coroner's investigation is under way, but foul play is not suspected.
Krause said Dorman may have been on his way to a doctor's appointment when he died.
Iron Butterfly was formed and rose to prominence in the late 1960s. Its second album, "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida," sold more than 30 million copies, according to the band's website. The title track's distinctive notes have been featured in numerous films and TV shows including "The Simpsons," ''That '70s Show" and in the series finale of "Rescue Me."
Douglas Lee Dorman was born in September 1942 and had been living in Laguna Nigel, a coastal city in Southern California, when he died.
A message sent through the band's website was not immediately returned.
Orang-utang Rosa carries her cub Sayang in their enclosure at the zoo in Frankfurt December 20, 2012. The cub of orang-utangs Rosa and Charly was born late night on November, 29 in the zoo.
Photo by Lisi Niesner
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