I suppose there's no good system. Still, I think we should welcome all. Inscribed on the Statue of Liberty:

Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!

Whatever happened to that?!

^Hey, is there any need to insult me and aggrandize yourself? "But at least my comments on the matter involve more thought than yours." Jeesh.

I didn't miss his attempt to include the other guests -- however, that was way into the painful part and it wasn't the most scintillating topic. At that point, to me, the interview was way into Uncomfortable Land. Could Meg have expended more effort in playing into the vacuousness of that interchange? Yeah, she could have. I actually admire her for not doing so.

I take issue with how you characterize my description of his interview technique -- I did not say the things you ascribe to me. Rather than get into a back and forth with you, I'll just leave it at that.

My first post on this subject said that I thought that Part I showed a clash of cultures. I have watched some British talk shows and been surprised at how it appears that American celebrities can be ignorant of the nature of the shows that they are on. If you are correct that Parkinson typically does this kind of thing in an interview, I suspect that Ryan wasn't prepared for it.

I was a fan of Meg Ryan years ago -- her RomCom persona on-screen wore very thin over time. This interview, however uncomfortable it clearly was for both parties, has kindled my admiration for her. I liked how she discussed the characters, I thought she was pretty brave in her answers to his questions that clearly felt invasive to her. Yes, she was remarkably guarded and unprepared for his style of interviewing -- given that she started out behind the eight ball, I thought she hung in there really well and made some brave choices under the circumstances.

Well, this is all a tempest in a teapot. This happened years ago. And here we are discussing it as if it were Something Important.

Download Games from Steam... no subscription MMO = win.

Or, to ween yourself... play on a WOW EMU server, or run your own where you have GM powers. I've been playing on one, where its just me... I solo'd tempest keep last night, and yea... i got to keep all the loot. Much funner, as it is a huge and visually stimulating game to play... and fly without mounts at lightning speed around in.

http://img39.imageshack.us/img39/6286/wowscrnshot051509173232.jpg

Ha, and you can wear any gear on any toon... im a priest dual wielding phoenix claws... i feel as good as i look.

I disagree with Stellar about damn near everything, but I actually like cross-posting because then I can see what the buzz is about on the Sift without having to check every subsection.

This is no big deal. This is kind of what we do here. Throw out something that interests us, that we think will interest others, and talk about it.

I'm seeing a tempest in a teacup here.

WP, you are really failing at being a troll. Try to come up with something a little better than comparing the deadly urgency of 9/11 and Katrina to the teakettle tempest of AIG's .2% bonuses.

Seriously though, this was nothing less than an excellently made advert for christianity, and no one realises it!

Seriously! The first guy he met with a different cupboard? Horizontal black and white. That's right, he places BLACK (devil) and WHITE (god) on the same level! They both show up at Sanjeev's house wearing identical suits, clearly indicating overtones of the sterile perfection in "Equilibrium". He's got a microwave on his dressing table, clearly used to torture small animals. He tells Sanjeev that "if you want you can borrow my manual" and what does Sanjeev do? That's right, he flips out, starts talking in tongues, he's clearly possessed by some sort of demon.

He goes round to his uncle's and he sees a purple drawer. The colour of the tempest, bringing disarray and wild commotion into his life. It's clearly the colour of the dreaded gay. Calling up his nephew to play football? Sounds like a paedophile to me.

So he builds his own cupboard, and we see the inevitable result - he has become such a twisted terrible person that people are disgusted by his presence. Shunned by his own family and strangers on the street he takes to mindless acts of violence. He experiments with cupboards, makes a deformed monstrosity which the devil compells him to destroy and finally settles on a cupboard with all the colours OF THE GAY FLAG. He puts his own cupboard on a public walkway to try and advertise his travesty to others, and when someone trips over his cupboard, he kicks theirs into a river. Vandal. Probably raped one of those girls too.

Eventually the sad ending to the story, he begins to disregard and disrespect his parents even more, he's beyond help. They probably got him a little starter cupboard set from matalan but he didn't care. You can clearly see him locking them in a devilish prison made from their own cupboards at 6:56. They become old and die in this prison and never see the light of day again. He keeps a picture of them on his GAY CUPBOARD for ever more, torturing their restless souls which were never allowed to find peace.

Then he showed all of his gay friends.

Christianity, guys, it fucking works.

Clearly she meant to say "better". Tempest, teapot.

Blast them for their policies, not their poorly chosen words. That's stooping to their level.

"Anything can happen in the next half hour"
(YouTube) Gerry Anderson's third SF supermarionation saga told the adventures of the WASPs (the World Aquanaut Security Patrol) as they explored the oceans and kept the world safe from a variety of perils. The WASP's main weapon was Stingray, a super-sub under the command of Troy Tempest. Troy's copilot was Phones, and they were often joined on missions by Marina, a princess of the undersea kingdom of Pacifica.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerry_Anderson
http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/anderson/stingray/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stingray_(TV_series)
*wings

I think alot of Americans misunderstand the roots of the criticism.

I am not American, but I believe in the idea and ideals that lie behind America as a nation expressed through the Bill of rights, the Constitution and in the countless writings of the founding fathers who have tried to address almost every possible problem that might befall the nation, if only all their words were taught more thoroughly in schools rather in universities.

It's the fusion of many ideas of liberty and democracy, starting with perhaps with Rome, the Magna Carta in Britain right up to the French revolution and so on.

I criticize the US not from a blind hatred towards its foreign policy or corporate hegemony but because it is perhaps the strongest beacon of individualism and democracy that remains in our world, almost every nation regardless of its personal views strives to achieve what America allows for it's people, the idea that any man or woman can achieve progress through hard work, that they can influence the course of government, that they essentially have a voice. A fundamental idea that still has to take stronger roots elsewhere in the world, especially now with a rise of a new neo-despotic capitalism taking place in Russia and China.

This is not to say that America has perfected the idea or it's execution, no not at all but is has come close, but it has hit obstacles, corporate control has replaced population control and the vote of the people only because the people have slowly forgotten their civil liberties over the liberties of the dollar and the corporate sector.

In this way America sets the standard for the rest of the world, this is why seeing the War on terror, Iraq and Afghanistan was so heart breaking because the thinking goes if America can do it... so can any one else, the moral high ground of being against torture has been lost. That's why the criticism is so harsh, the world wants America to be better, in fact it wants it to be the best. I think its like that perhaps to the wide spread of it's culture, the fact that its in reality the representation of many populations of the world coming together.

This is my personal belief. I think developed from reading these words for the first time when I was younger.

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Emma Lazarus, 1883

"The New Colossus" is a sonnet by Emma Lazarus (1849-1887), written in 1883 and, in 1903, engraved on a bronze plaque and mounted inside the Statue of Liberty.

These words, that essential idea is something all Americans need to remember. There is such richness of ideas in American political and constitutional history with regards to liberity, that really makes me happy inside. Like reading about liberty for someone who has known only the shackles of jail all their life.

Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door...

Tempest 2000 FTW! Jeff Minter's greatest game!

As a Jaguar owner I was very pleased with it. Cybermorph was alot of fun and Doom was better than on the Playstation.
The only problem was Atari were a woefully underpowered and amateurish outfit. The last game I got was Tempest 2000 - what a swansong!

Exactly what the host says at the end: MAME is great and we're lucky to have such things, but it's just not the same. When I saw the Tempest high scores screen, I got a dizzying warm fuzzy. Everything about the old arcades, the darkness, the neon, the black screens with bright flashing colors... I hope the retro arcade catches on and spreads.

While we're on the topic, maybe someone knows: I was told years ago that there is supposedly some 5-floor mega arcade, possibly in NY state. Supposedly it has everything from the 80's hits to the most recent VR simulators. Flat fee paid at the door lets you play all day. So far I haven't succeeded in finding any info. Does that ring a bell for anyone?

ou have come to a place mute of all light, where the wind bellows as the sea does in a tempest. This is the realm where the lustful spend eternity. Here, sinners are blown around endlessly by the unforgiving winds of unquenchable desire as punishment for their transgressions. The infernal hurricane that never rests hurtles the spirits onward in its rapine, whirling them round, and smiting, it molests them. You have betrayed reason at the behest of your appetite for pleasure, and so here you are doomed to remain. Cleopatra and Helen of Troy are two that share in your fate.-
-Dante
Here is one of the many fabulous hells awaiting you in one of several afterlives, now what'll it be, you hungry ghost??! Door #1....Door#2...or door#3...OR....You can chose the world of pleasure AND torment, behind veil # six hundred and sixty-six!!

I owned a Jaguar and I loved Cybermorph. Now it looks like crap but it remained a good game. The system's version of Doom was also better than that which appeared on the Playstation.
The pad did feel cheap but I felt it was pretty comfortable. And then there was Tempest 2000, ah awesomeness.