Diana West’s The Death of the Grown-Up, has received a handful of notices: William Grimes mocked it and The New Criterion‘s Stefan Beck was less dismissive, pointing to the Grimes Defense (“If an argument has been exaggerated a little bit for effect, we can throw it out—baby, bathwater, and even the soap scum of lingering doubt.”). Beck appears to be unaware that Grimes’s diluted form of reductio ad absurdum has existed long before Grimes. Indeed, it’s in use by many of today’s critics. And while many bemoan this rhetorical tactic, it is nevertheless a valid form of argumentative response. The problem with Grimes’s review in question isn’t his stance, but the flitting manner in which he declares West “Wrong. Totally wrong.” on the subject of Islam without citing specific textual examples. A good editor would have called Grimes on this and demanded that he strengthen his argument. Grimes really should have been permitted to write a 2,000 word essay instead of having his argumentative column inches diminished. Alas, the days where essays could be expanded to meet their argumentative requirements (as opposed to advertising demands) appear to be long over.
More demonstrative proof that Katie Couric has all the journalistic prowess of a Vegas cocktail waitress. The CJR‘s Curtis Brainard, however, thinks that such a limp line of questioning is fair game.
This year’s Orange Broadband Prize celebrity dunce jude? Lily Allen. Presumably, Allen will call at least one of the Orange Prize finalists a “cunt” and find a way to blame her slur on Amy Winehouse.
Bloglines appears to be seriously messed up. I’ve noticed that many blogs have lost scores of subscribers overnight. Between this, the delayed text, and the recurrent appearances of the Bloglines Plumber, I think I’m switching over to Google Reader or something else.
Alas, I was too swamped in deadlines to offer a few thoughts for this, but January Magazine has released its holiday gift guide.
Is it possible that the grand horror film company Hammer is using MySpace to make a comeback? (They will be releasing Beyond the Rave, the first Hammer film in 30 years and Ingrid Pitt is in the cast.)
Nicolas Cage and Alex Proyas are teaming up. I thoroughly loathed Proyas’s cinematic bastardization of I, Robot and have hoped since then that the guy who gave us the startling and underrated Dark City isn’t washed up.
It’s pretty depressing losing the Post in the town where Clear Channel’s radio division was… hatched?
For newspapers, it’s gotten bad. In addition to the Post and Enquirer, you used to be able to get the Indianapolis Star, Dayton Daily News, and Louisville Courier-Journal at any BN or Fountain Square News if you wanted perspective.
The Star, DN, and CJ have long since stopped distributing here, except on the fringes, and the Star doesn’t even bother with the casino boat towns over the border in Indiana anymore.
With the death of the Post, we’re left with the dogmatically conservative Enquirer. Our only alternative is the weekly City Beat, which is against anything the Enquirer is for.
New Year’s Eve will be a sad day in Cincinnati.
Man, that Post head was really tasteless, even for the post.
Sorry you’re having trouble with Bloglines. I had lost all my feeds, but I attributed that to the new Firefox Christmas skin I installed. Once I dumped it and emptied my cache, they all came back.
Now, for some reason, Bloglines is feeding mee up to 200 posts from some people, forgetting I had already read them.
Still, I’ll be sticking with them. I’ve tried Reader twice and found it exceptionally clumsy. Bloglines throws up the posts much faster on my dial-up.
I switched from Bloglines to Google Reader about a year ago and have never regretted it.
It’s pretty depressing losing the Post in the town where Clear Channel’s radio division was… hatched?
For newspapers, it’s gotten bad. In addition to the Post and Enquirer, you used to be able to get the Indianapolis Star, Dayton Daily News, and Louisville Courier-Journal at any BN or Fountain Square News if you wanted perspective.
The Star, DN, and CJ have long since stopped distributing here, except on the fringes, and the Star doesn’t even bother with the casino boat towns over the border in Indiana anymore.
With the death of the Post, we’re left with the dogmatically conservative Enquirer. Our only alternative is the weekly City Beat, which is against anything the Enquirer is for.
New Year’s Eve will be a sad day in Cincinnati.
Man, that Post head was really tasteless, even for the post.
Sorry you’re having trouble with Bloglines. I had lost all my feeds, but I attributed that to the new Firefox Christmas skin I installed. Once I dumped it and emptied my cache, they all came back.
Now, for some reason, Bloglines is feeding mee up to 200 posts from some people, forgetting I had already read them.
Still, I’ll be sticking with them. I’ve tried Reader twice and found it exceptionally clumsy. Bloglines throws up the posts much faster on my dial-up.
I switched from Bloglines to Google Reader about a year ago and have never regretted it.