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Moving right along, normally our Friday columns open with a bit of lighthearted news roundup, which is where I'd point out things like what Donald Trump is up to (always good for a laugh), and then move on to mutant butterflies in Japan due to radioactivity from their power plant disaster, which would end with a joke about Mothra.
Mitt Romney's selection of Paul Ryan for his running mate is already worrying some in Republican circles. These unnamed sources (most of them refused to publicly put their name to such worries) aren't just concerned that Mitt Romney may lose the election to Barack Obama, they are also raising the possibility that Ryan's choice may put at risk many "down-ballot" seats in the House of Representatives. Which leads to the obvious question: if their fears are true, could it mean Democrats have a much better chance at taking the House back in the upcoming elections? To put it another way, will we see "Speaker Nancy Pelosi" again next year?
Love is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it flips over, trapping you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come.
Since it's the day after a mid-week holiday, we're going to take it easy today, and run a photo sent in by one of our faithful readers, for everyone's enjoyment.
After losing a bet made in these very pages, "Michale" humbly wore the following shirt all day long at his place of business:
Wear it with style, [...]
All kidding aside, though, it certainly has been fun to see the other side spin. As a child's reader might put it: "See GOP spin. Spin, spin, spin! So sad, the spinning."
As is my wont, I'm going to circle the edges of the political bombshell John Roberts just flung into the arena. Maybe by tomorrow, it'll have percolated through my brain enough to intelligently attack the main issue, but I just haven't reached that point yet, so you'll have to forgive me.
For political wonks, this has been a week of waiting. Starting last weekend, we've all been waiting for Mitt Romney to address the issue of Barack Obama's new immigration policy. This waiting has been fruitless, and will continue for some time to come, apparently. Picture a phone ringing endlessly with nobody there to answer it... but we're getting ahead of ourselves.
Where are the grand messages of the campaigns? Being held in reserve for the post-convention season, perhaps? That's at least an understandable answer, but ultimately not a very satisfying one. Neither Obama nor Romney has yet clearly articulated what their big ideas are for the next four years, and both of them are missing the chance to pound their message into the American psyche for the next two or three months.
Jimmy Kimmel is right... sort of. In this past weekend's schmooze-fest between media organizations and the president (and, for some inexplicable reason, Hollywood), Kimmel performed a comedy routine for the president and the assembled crowd. Towards the end (around 19:40 on the video), Kimmel made a few marijuana jokes. He started by directly asking the president "What is with the marijuana crackdown?" Of course, being a comedian, a few punchlines followed. But the most notable one -- like all good comedic roasting -- had a kernel of truth in it: "You know, pot smokers vote too. Sometimes a week after the election, but they vote."
We begin by saying we certainly hope we can live up to such an exuberant headline. You will have to judge for yourself whether all those exclamation points were justified or not.