George Alexander Louis?

George Alexander Louis.

"Seinfeld" would have been shorter.

And maybe it's all a coincidence.

Rays, Tigers, Cabrera, Zobrist (because I can)

The red line is the inside edge of the batting box. Big yellow circle indicates the batter's head. The small yellow circle indicates the baseball.

Yes, the images are potentially misleading because there's no guarantee that both pictures show the baseball at the same point in its approach to the plate.

"I don't care about throwing inside, but I don't like it up there," Leyland said. "We will not tolerate that."

"That's part of baseball. Guys get hit in baseball games," Leyland said.

Pakistan, umbrellas, Jeffrey Osborne and R.E.S.P.E.C.T.

Back in the day, journalists could plausibly stand in awe of President Obama's great attention to detail on foreign policy.  He pronounced Pakistan the way Pakistani natives pronounce it.  It was about respect.

His aides know that this is an area where the president wants to be right. In Obama’s view, pronouncing someone’s name or hometown correctly is a simple way of showing respect, they say. It’s a sort of baseline diplomacy. That’s particularly so in foreign relations, where aides say the president will privately practice pronouncing a leader’s name a number times before saying it publicly.

It's this frame that makes some of the president's actions troublesome.  Take Mr. Obama's decision to direct attending Marines hold hold umbrellas as he and a visiting diplomat spoke on a recent rainy day in Washington D.C.

We have a commander-in-chief concerned about pronouncing Pakistan correctly but not concerned about respecting Marine tradition.  It's about respect.

The president's defenders tried to flip it around:

So what was the grave transgression? It seems that Marines (except, bizarrely and somewhat patronizingly, female Marines) are not supposed to carry umbrellas, according to military tradition. Fine, but in fact, they weren't carrying them in the sense that they weren't holding them over their own heads – they were protecting the president (which, in fact, is part of their job while at the White House). Also, the president is the commander-in-chief, and while that is not strictly a military rank, he does outrank the servicemembers there to protect him. That's the point.

The president outranks the U.S. soldiers attending his functions.  That's the point.  He can have them bend and shine his shoes on the spot if he chooses.

No, that's not the point.  It's about respect.

More recently, Mr. Obama repeatedly referred to British dignitary George Osborne as "Jeffrey."  The president apologized, offering that he was confusing the dignitary with his favorite R&B singer, Jeffrey Osborne.

Pakistan.  Umbrella.  Jeffrey Osborne.

It's about respect.  Who and what does the president respect?  He's either very careful about showing respect or he is not.

One of my favorite tunes by Andy Timmons: "Deliver Us"

Now I'll try to figure out why it took me so long to run across this video.

Gosnell inspired by Galactic Cowboys song?

Kermit Gosnell, the abortion clinic doctor on trial for murder and other charges in Pennsylvania, may be able to blame his behavior on the mass media.  Gosnell could argue he was compelled to act based on the song "If I Were a Killer" by the Galactic Cowboys.

Sample lyrics:

If I were a killer
I'd hide behind a doctor's door
If I were a killer
I'd scrape you off my office floor
If I were a killer

The song contained a scarcely-concealed anti-abortion message, yet garnered some MTV airplay on the Headbanger's Ball program.




No, I don't think Gosnell was inspired by the song. Just in case somebody thinks I'm serious about that.

Nifty Music: Alpha Rev

I became acquainted with the singer for Alpha Rev through his work with the supergroup Flying Colors.  I checked out a few Alpha Rev songs last year and none of them particularly grabbed me.  But then I caught this video version of the new single from the album "Bloom" and Whoa.

Great song.  Enjoy.

Slate with must-read article on enhanced interrogation and waterboarding

The article does much to clarify certain issues that very many people continue to get wrong, such as the notion that waterboarding was used as an attempt to directly acquire intelligence information.

Did “enhanced interrogation techniques” help us find Osama Bin Laden and destroy al-Qaida? Were they torture? Were they wrong? Yesterday, three former CIA officials grappled with those questions in a forum at the American Enterprise Institute. The discussion was supposed to be about Zero Dark Thirty. But it was really a chance to see in person the thinking of the people who ran and justified the detainee interrogation program. It’s also a chance to examine our own thinking.

Read it.

Nifty Music: "The New Collisions"

Okay, so I'm late with the "discovery" and the group has already changed its name (not as memorable or I'd remember it), but this is good rockin' pop music.

2012 music faves III

I listened to British pop group "The Contrast" quite a bit this year, though they didn't release an album in 2012. Picture a more muscular REM and you've got an idea of the sound before even starting the video. I featured "I am an Alien" earlier this year, so I'm posting a 2008 video for the song "Caught in a Trap."

2012 music faves II

Surprise favorite Frankie Rose hooked me with her retro girl-group jangly pop sound. The vocals carry extra pop because it sounds almost like, well, the acoustics for a serious church choir. The whole album is solid, and "Night Swim" is suitably representative.