• Sirius
  XM to carry new Glenn Beck channel
  (Not enough hate radio available) Sirius XM has struck a
  deal to carry a new channel produced by Glenn Beck's media company
  'theBlaze', featuring conservative talk shows and news programming that
  begins airing on Monday.
• United States Wants to
  Attract Hackers to Public Sector
• Your Phone vs. Your Heart
  
  By BARBARA L.
  FREDRICKSON
  The more face-to-face time you spend, the healthier you and your
  children are.
• The
  Senate vote to eliminate National Science Foundation funding for
  political science

• Computer
  Algorithms Rely Increasingly on Human Helpers
• The
  Sequester, Budget Policy, and the Future of U.S. Innovation
• Pope
  Cancels Newspaper Delivery Back Home in Argentina

More cat-based wisdom from Jon
Carroll

Daniel Dern writes:
(Per
discussions criticizing the media for including women's looks and
attire in news stories more, and more critically, than
men's). 
From the Boston Globe: "Martha
Stewart testifies in retail suit" (Actually, this one's
legit, it's in the biz section, deck :"Macy's at odds with J.C. Penney
over her brand" )
Daniel also found The
Best Book Trailer Ever.

Dan Grobstein File

• On
  George W. Bush: the 'Decider' Who Didn't Decide?
• When The International Herald Tribune is rebranded as The
  International New York Times this fall, one of the great names in
  American journalism will go away.
• Op-Ed Columnist
  As
  Time Goes Bye
  By MAUREEN DOWD
  A reverie about the newsmagazine?s days of roast beef, Scotch and
  snazzy adjectives.
• Op-Ed Columnist
  Repent,
  Dick Cheney
  By MAUREEN DOWD
  This just in from the former vice president: Everyone else is wrong.
  Yes, Condi, he's talking to you.

A friend of mine is chairing an interesting looking MIT event, Drones – The
Commercial Era takes off…

Neal Vitale notes that the Academy Award winning Disney cartoon
Paperman is available
on line.

The good news: Arrested
Development is coming back. The bad news: probably only one
season.

Behind the curve: I am apparently the last computer-literate person on
Earth to have heard of the  Harlem
Shake. Innocent fun or vicious racism? You be the judge.

Dan Grobstein File

You know, if I ran the ACLU, I'd find me a third generation Coptic
Egyptian who would sue for his second amendment right to acquire
Stinger surface to air missiles.

And I'd go, state by state, and sue for the right to have concealed
carry/open carry regulations apply to all citizens attending
legislative sessions, committee hearings, office meetings with
officials and local legislative offices.
———–end quote———

Jewel in the Crown
and Brideshead Revisited
producer dies.

Daniel Dern sent me a link to some of the most amazing video I have
ever seen, taken, supposedly, by Russian
Dashboard Cams.

Dan Grobstein File

• Barnaby
  Conrad, Bullfighter and Novelist, Dies at 90 (he was also a San
  Franciscan)
• Now Hear This:
  Library of
  Congress Issues Plan to Preserve Recordings
• Open
  States: search legislative data in all 50 states
• 
  Soledad O’Brien is on her way out at CNN  Not a
  good sign
• Blowback
  is an ugly thing. Maybe
  "they" don't really hate us because
  of our freedom. Maybe it's something we did…
• The 3-D
  Printer May Be the Home Appliance of the Future

Daniel Dern finds Westminster
Dog Show pictures, and notes, "And I love how this coverage
is in the Times "Sports" section."

Kevin Sullivan forwarded a batch of funny headlines (too many
jpgs to print here); I searched for one and found a
similar collection.

Dan Grobstein File

• A
  Skeptical Take on Harry Reid's limited filibuster options
• "Chase
  just handed over all our assets" (And it could happen to you too.)

If you're enjoying the Netflix series House of Cards (and
I know I am) you might enjoy this House
of Cards rap.

Daniel Dern's nephew found this amusing
fake Avatar 2 trailer.

Dan Grobstein File

• Dr.
  Seuss Himself Was a Cat in the Hat
• Why Lincoln by
  Day-Lewis had pierced ears. 
• John
  E. Karlin, Who Led the Way to All-Digit Dialing, Dies at 94
• About
  the drone war: The problem
  that I have with this is that like every other conflict, eventually
  cooler heads will want to negotiate and stop the bombings and
  reprisals. It finally happened in Ireland. The people living in the
  area being targeted eventually will say enough is enough and stop
  hiding terrorists. At that point somebody with enough bona fides will
  be able to change things. If you keep
  killing any perceived leader you will never get a leader who has enough
  clout to agree to negotiate.

See if you can spot a familiar name in the Orinda
Chamber of Commerce newsletter.

Dan Grobstein File   

• On
  the D.C. Circuit Reading the Recess Appointment Power Out of the
  Constitution
• Brain
  Aging
  Linked to Sleep-Related Memory Decline
• Warren C yo! RT @mattyglesias Kerry confirmation historic
  moment.
  Many of us too young to remember the last white male secretary of state.
• Garrett Epps (@Profepps) 1/27/13, 7:09 PM Say, GOP
  governors: who do you believe, John Jay or Reince Priebus? Atlantic column on the
  congressional district scam
• GuardianData (@GuardianData) 1/31/13, 4:05 AM
  Every (London Underground)
  line becomes a circle line: a new way to see the tube map 
• Religious
  Incorrectness: Why conservative evangelicals have no trouble with
  double standards
• Rick
  Scott not willing to share his sweet health insurance deal
• Cable
  Internet Will Slowly But Surely Turn Us Into a Third World Nation.
  In terms of speed, we're
  number 34 in the world.

  (Ed.
  note: for an Alice-in-Wonderland analysis, that says that everything is
  fine and the 10,000 analyses of America's sucky internet are
  delusional, check out Jeffrey
  Eisenach
  on the remarkably right-wing American Enterprise Institute site. I
  assume there is no author picture because, considering the location of
  his head, it would be considered pornographic in some states. Talk
  about living in a bubble!)

• Adventures
  in Google
• Desolation:
  Coming soon to a Western/Southern city near you
• Stefan Kudelski, Inventor of
  the Nagra Professional Recorder, Dies at 83
• The
  right increasingly talks to itself
  

Daniel Dern finds the Columbia
Journalism Review asking, "Is
the home page dead?"

We
thought she was a goner. The latest Jon Carroll
cat column.

Barry Surman sents quotes and a conclusion:

An anonymous blogger I read has fulfilled my dream of  Yelling
at David Brooks. The blogger added some commentary in an
e-mail: "Ah, thanks for noticing. I'm not sure why Brooks irritates me
so much, except that his reputation as the sane and sensible
conservative that liberals can love seems to me entirely unjustified.
What he says is largely nonsense; he just says it in a calm and
reasoned tone rather than ranting about libtards and Kenyan socialist
muslims and the coming of the Antichrist. But his arguments are as
unconnected to fact as anything you'll hear from Russ Limbaugh or Sean
Hannity.

One quick political brief: Obama:
Election reform!

Dan Grobstein File

• The
  Meaning of the Capitol Dome with specific reference
  to the Obama second inaugural
• Pointed satire of a world without high-capacity
  ammunition magazines.
• Republicans
  Might Be Outsmarting Themselves on the Electoral College
• Dick Cavett: Back
  when I was packing (heat)
• 15,000
  crocs escape
• Mississippi
  governor: Everyone in America has health care

Baffled by Mali? This Washington
Post article explains it well.

Daniel
Dern Writes: "What do Harrison Ford and Orson Scott Card have in
common?
Answer: Ender's Game. Card, of course, wrote it. Ford is starring in a
movie that's in
production! 'Nuff said! "

He
also wrote: "In case you don't watch The Daily Show regularly and on a
timely basis (we typically see shows) the following evening, make sure
you check out the middle segment from last night's (Mon Jan 14) show,
where, as part of a (pre-produced) documentary on CNN's backing away
from investigative  journalism, they go to… well, just find
and
watch it, it's
short."

Dan Grobstein File

• History
  Is More Than Two Days Ago
• Being
  buddies is overrated
• Matt
  O'Brien (@ObsoleteDogma) 1/14/13, 5:11 PM Bernanke: "I read blogs.
  Blogs have become pretty important source of intellectual exchange."
  #fordschoolbernanke
• Greg Mitchell (@GregMitch)  1/14/13, 8:53 PM
  Amazing: Clarance Thomas spoke
  at Sup. Court today for first time in 7 years. And it was a joke, in
  every way. 
• RT @KagroX: Duh! Who cleans a loaded gun? Here, here, here and here.
• From Dan's son: The
  best Aaron Swartz rememberance
• Web
  Hunt for DNA Sequences Leaves Privacy Compromised