By all rights, the dude should be on our Wingnut Watch: “There is an infiltration of the Sharia practice into all of our operating systems in our country as well as across Western civilization. So we must be willing to recognize that enemy.” But no, he still just bores us. [ThinkProgress]

“Austerity is the theme of Boehner’s ascendancy to House speaker this week, placing the start of this new Congress in stark contrast to the more lavish festivities that accompanied Democrat Pelosi’s swearing-in four years ago.” [WaPo]

“In his defense, I’ll say that sometimes, when you’ve been out to sea for a while, cut off from everything, you start to think things that you would never normally do are actually a good idea,” he said. “You do stupid stuff to stay sane.”

A U.S. Navy sailor aboard the Aircraft Carrier U.S.S. Enterprise, commenting on homoerotic training videos filmed and broadcast on the ship’s closed circuit video system by then XO and current Ship’s Captain Owen Honor.

(Via Andrew Sullivan)

Distinguished character actor Pete Postlethwaite, best known for his roles as Daniel Day-Lewis’s father in In the Name of the Father and as Kobayashi in The Usual Suspects, died Sunday of cancer.  Steven Spielberg once described him as “the best actor in the world.”

[ Flash video not available. ]

[NYT/AP]

Boomers start turning 65 this year, meaning a larger portion of America will consist of lawns you are advised to get off of.

Baby Boomers Projected to Drain Medicare [ABC]

As we now embark upon, well, whatever the hell it is that John Boehner is planning, it is time to introduce a new feature: The Psychometer.  It is intended to serve as a chronicle of the House’s descent into The Crazy.

The concept, in its purest form, is simple.  Every time somebody in the GOP Caucus in the House of Representatives says something stupid, or insane, or wildly false, it gets logged on a purpose-built Twitter account.  With a running count, we can track how crazy things are getting, from day to day — thus educating the world as to where things stand.

But, almost instantaneously, the concept runs full-speed into the brick wall of reality.  The latest example of the problem came this morning, with Michelle Bachmann’s performance on Face The Nation.  Bob Schieffer (probably nursing a huge hangover after TCU’s win in the Rose Bowl yesterday) picked a good day to be away, as Michelle was dropping one bomb after another.  So, how does one score that?  Does the appearance count as one event, or does each wild-eyed statement?

Statements on the House floor pose similar problems.  There are one-minute speeches at the beginning of the day, and special order speeches at the end.  In the official record, this is where nutjobs come to party — the province of the Steve Kings of the world.  Do those count once, or many times?  And what about statements on actual legislation?  A floor manager can speak many times over during the course of debate, giving him or her a fresh opportunity to become totally unglued every few minutes.

Then there is the more practical matter of actually doing this.  I, like many of you, have a real job.  Spending two hours every night logging every instance of insanity would be simply exhausting.

It was suggested that the Psychometer start off with no rules, with the standards evolving as things go along.  But, as just shown, that is unrealistic.  And, since I’m going to need a lot of help from all of you, some guidelines are necessary.  So, if you want to play, follow me post-jump for The [proposed, provisional] Rules.  Suggestions are most welcome, also.

Read more »

My favorite historian:

Sadder, wiser, those of us gathered on the Washington Mall in the freezing morn of Mr Obama’s inauguration can see now that of all the brave, unsustainable hopes uttered by the new young president, the most unsustainable of all turned out to be his Biblical plea to “put away childish things”. He might as well have tried to legislate the word “dream” out of American public discourse. Dreams? Reality? It’s not even close, is it?

And if you haven’t seen Schama’s A History of Britain, shame on you.

An America Lost in Fantasy Must Recover its Dream [Financial Times]