A Few Things to Keep You Busy, and Probably Irritated for Good Measure

No real time to write anything substantive right now; I’m in the middle of a fairly serious crunch at work, cutting together footage from what was the most complicated shoot I’ve done to date. We shot Thursday and Friday of last week, and ended up losing a day of postproduction (pesky travel-time allowances), so we’re scrambling to get a rough cut edited together by this Wednesday. Given that ridiculously compressed timeline, I’ve resigned myself to not having time to discuss a number of items I’d wanted to cover, so I’m going to have to satisfy myself with making a few snide comments and letting my references speak for themselves.

First, a fantastic editorial by Keith R. Taylor in the Post really struck close to home. Entitled The Untruth Hurts, Even Online, it makes comment on the rampant spread of falsehoods via e-mail. I’ve been the victim of a surprising amount of it, usually sent by ostensibly well-meaning friends who have completely swallowed whatever urban legends, virus warnings, or right-wing tirades some weasel just slapped together. As I once mentioned, I spend a good deal of time debunking these myths, and am glad to see someone else finding justification for doing the same.

Next, a letter-to-the-editor which succinctly makes a point I’ve been trying to convey: In all the fuss over the Ten Commandments monument down in Darwin’s waiting room — i.e., Alabama — nobody’s questioning the assertion that these commandments are the basis for our current law. And I don’t buy it for a second. While the commandments do, in part, concern themselves with secular societal behavior, none of the relevant commandments (at least as far as I can tell) presented anything original in that arena, being predated by both Greek and Roman law. (And by the way, don’t hold your breath waiting for an apology for that “Darwin’s waiting room” comment — I stand by it 100%.)

Also worth noting is the addition of several new words to the latest edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, including personal favorites “bada bing,” “muppet,” “prairie-dogging,” “egosurfing,” and “blog” (guess it’s time for me to remove my habitual apostrophe at the beginning of that last one).

And finally, a column by Fred Hiatt on Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean. I’ve got nothing specific to add, but I am starting to like this guy more and more each day; I’m particularly impressed with his efforts to stop John Ashcroft’s latest abomination, the so-called “Victory Act” (i.e., victory over anything resembling civil rights). I am disappointed that I missed his local rally, but I’ll be checking his campaign blog periodically. It’s a little premature for the editorial staff of Prometheus Unleashed (i.e., me) to make an official presidential endorsement, but we do have a front-runner.

That wraps up the news coverage, but on a lighter note, I had an opportunity to receive a five-dollar coupon from CaféPress for referring five friends (each of whom would receive a similar coupon). They would each get an e-mail message detailing my latest purchases, and encouraging them to buy the same. Not wanting to contribute to the sending of unsolicited e-mail, I asked permisison of a couple of friends first, but the deal required me to submit five e-mail addresses. So what the hell — I added little George, Dick Cheney, and John Ashcroft to the list. I certainly thought they could each use one of these...