I really like my Kindle Fire. I am not much into comics, but I did try out a few on the comic reader app that comes with it. It automatically zooms in to each panel in a way that worked for me. I think you can also configure it to just go page by page and choose your own level of zoom. I enjoyed the comics I read, but they're so expensive when you compare them to books at dollars/hour.

My favorite "feature" is the kindle daily deal. You can sign up for this and every day there is a new offer for a book, usually 99 cents. Quite a wide range and I probably buy about a book a week. I'm pretty sure I already have several lifetime supplies of books to read, so I'm good if I'm ever trapped on a desert island that has a power source with standard 110 V plug-in and wifi...

Can't say this video made me happy, but I had no problem with Casey's reaction. We can talk about "effecting positive social change" all we want, but in the meantime the Casey's of the world are being repeatedly punched in the face and that social change ain't coming fast enough to stop the pain. I am a hippy dippy liberal, but I've told my kids (who are very peaceful sorts) that if anyone physically assaults them, they are free to respond with all necessary force -- I don't care if the school says both parties are equally to blame, I will stand behind them. Luckily none of them have encountered bullying anything near this level (hooray for hippy dippy liberal schools!) and I hope they never will. I hope all the bullies leave Casey alone as well.

I hope the media will listen to Jon Stewart and stop doing these stupid analogies. The financial melt-down is complicated and you can't make it simple by talking about used cars or poisoned sandwiches. If you want to know more (without having to be an econ major, yet without being talked down to) go here: http://www.propublica.org/feature/all-the-magnetar-trade-how-one-hedge-fund-helped-keep-the-housing-bubble
or listen to the highlights of the story on "This American Life:" http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/405/inside-job

I can't believe Jon Stewart didn't take the opportunity to make fun of the name "Magnetar!"

Mal is great, but I don't believe I care for this "Kimmel" fellow. I love Firefly AND the theme song. I knitted myself a Jayne hat and wore it all winter. A grand total of three people recognized it.

*beg

I'm not sure this guy could be any more stupid. Here's the comment I tried to leave on his site, but it's "pending approval" and approval doesn't seem likely:
"Using YOUR numbers, the abuse rate of priests is STILL higher than that of teachers (.52% priests, .43% teachers) . Per hour, a kid is SEVEN TIMES more likely to be abused by a PRIEST than a TEACHER! This is assuming your own numbers are correct (with an average 23 hours per week with a teacher and 4 hours per week with a priest) Please tell me about school administrators covering up for and moving around their pedophile employees. Oh, that's right, that's a job for catholic bishops. Catholic FAIL!"
Also, I love the way he implies that priest abuse is all gay, which makes it the fault of the evil homos, even showing a little rainbow flag under a priest collar. I think the many girls abused by priests would beg to differ. I'm not even sure what point he's making with the abortion stuff: abuse is the fault of Planned Parenthood? Wha.....????? Is it okay to abuse and impregnate a girl as long as she has the baby??? Okay, I'll stop. GRRRRRR.

>> ^alien_concept:

I completely agree with most everything he says, most of the time; but it really annoys me when he goes on about "the children" like he is in it for them and not to prove his stance on atheism right


I don't think he claims that he is in it for the children. He simply points out the cold hard fact that children have been horribly abused and that apparently the catholic church cares more about its own reputation and about protecting priests than it does about protecting children. Christopher Hitchens isn't in a position where people expect him to actively protect children, but many people do expect their church/religion/religious leaders to be very directly involved in protecting children.

The title is misleading. Franken is just, somewhat unsuccessfully, brushing off an annoying teabagger. I guess the point of the video is supposed to be that it is ridiculous to spend federal tax money on infrastructure that encourages children to be healthy and ridiculous to require employers to give breastfeeding mothers time to nurse or express milk for their babies.
I strongly disagree that either of these things are bad. I guess I could see some argument that infrastructure should be paid for at the local level, but I'm not sure it's a bad idea for that to be at a higher level. I live in a wealthy area that has lots of parks and playgrounds (and high local taxes) and this is also a very healthy and fit place to live. I would like to see kids in poorer areas have access to the same kinds of healthy living. (Though there might be more important problems to solve first, but that's a separate argument). As for breastfeeding, the US is behind other western countries in breastfeeding rates, even though this is clearly the best and most healthy way to feed babies (not in all circumstances, but usually). I think making employers give women this minimum level of support really is the very LEAST we need to be doing to encourage more women to breastfeed longer.
I think tax dollars spent to make our children healthier is good for us as a country and I'm not sure what Jason Materra's argument is, that this is a bad idea or a bad use of tax dollars.

I'm never sure how seriously to take these things. Yes, the knowledgeable interviewer shows that these particular people are idiots, but do we know that they represent the tea party as a whole? I'm a liberal, so I suspect they do, but that may just be my own bias. Penn & Teller had a clip showing all the dumb liberals they convinced to sign a petition outlawing water (by referring to it as "dyhydrogen monoxide" and listing some of its dangers). Another conservative interviewed black people who were voting for Obama, but couldn't give any real reason why (with the implication that they were voting for him only because of his race). So, this is interesting and I do like that the interviewer talks to his "victims" more in depth than these people usually do, but it shouldn't be taken as any kind of proof that the tea party is comprised mostly of idiots.

That poor little girl. The whole thing is disturbing from her sitting on the interviewers lap in the beginning (!!!) to the average (at best) singing/dancing skills with the sexed up moves drawing the most audience response. So wrong.

I wonder if digital publishing and ereaders might help solve this problem. Colbert doesn't go into it, but it seems like one reason Texas has such power is because it is expensive to print books in limited runs. At any rate, I guess this is why my kids' schools don't use many text books.

Changed to the better quality video--thanks!

I saw Billy Squier in concert in the mid 80's. I'm sure I must have seen this video back then, but apparently I blocked it from my memory. It must have come out on the heels of Flashdance.

I cannot even imagine what must have been going on in woman's head when she surely though her baby was dead through her own stupidity. I wish the video had shown how the baby was rescued. I'm curious if they stopped the train from continuing on and someone crawled underneath or if the train just took off before anyone "official" knew what was going on.

Hmm, Bill O'Reilly claiming Amsterdam has a lower percentage of pot users because they have a smaller population. This is very reminiscent of his claim that Canada had a higher life expectancy because the US has 10 times the people and thus 10 times the accidents, 10 times the crime, etc. (Or something like that). Is his grasp of statistics really that bad, or does he just hope to befuddle the audience by saying it in a way that makes it sounds like he believes it?

Anyway, this guys defense of Amsterdam videos are nicely done. I've always thought of Amsterdam as a nice European city that I might like to visit some day, so I guess I'm not the intended audience.