In many respects, Ahmet Ertegun provided the soundtrack to my life. Ertegun, a Turkish ambassador’s son who started collecting records for fun, helped define American music as founder of Atlantic Records, a label that popularized Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, Cream, Sonny and Cher, and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. He also shaped the … [Read more...] about Thank You Ahmet Ertegun

I came across these reasonable comments from Paul Helmke, a former Republican mayor of Fort Wayne, Ind., and the new president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence:...Concerns for gun violence prevention and public safety should not be categorized as pro-gun versus anti-gun. What’s “anti-gunâ€? about wanting background checks to make sure that those with criminal … [Read more...] about Gun Management

You may have heard that there was another school shooting the other day. Shane Halligan, a teenager in suburban Philadelphia, came home with a bad report card and was ordered by his parents to buckle down. This camouflage-wearing Eagle Scout, who dreamed of joining the military, returned to his high school the next day with a sawed-off AK-47 semi-automatic rifle and fired … [Read more...] about Another All-American Tragedy

This isn't good news if the United States intends to aggressively compete in the new world economy:A bipartisan panel is warning that America's students are falling behind those in even some of the poorest countries, CBS News correspondent Thalia Assuras reports. "I am really worried about where this country is," says ex-Sen. Bill Brock, a former Secretary of Labor. "We've got … [Read more...] about International Education: American Children Left Behind?

Now you KNOW any hopes that some have that Al Gore will become President are doomed. Why, he's actually cracking jokes now that aren't calculated to run down opponents and generate authentic laughs. The setting: San Jose where he was meeting some of the world's top scientists:On the topic of how he's been adjusting to life outside of Washington: ``I flew on Air Force Two for … [Read more...] about Al Gore: King Of The One Liner

H/t to Black Prof.Com (which we are adding to the TMV blogroll under OTHER VOICES). Make sure you read the link to BP's post. And a special "thank yew" to our coblogger Dave Schraub for sending us the link. Remember to vote for Dave's blog The Debate Link in the Weblog Awards HERE. … [Read more...] about What Black Men Think of PSA

He apologized to NBC's David Gregory. Make no mistake about it. You don't often see White House press spokemen apologize. This will earn him some extra points with the White House press corps, although it won't stop them from asking tough questions of him and clashing with him in the future. … [Read more...] about White House’s Tony Snow Scores Some Points

Now that I have your undivided attention, some answers to some questions that have come up in a lot of emails: Where is TMV himself? Due to holiday-season travels in my other incarnation, I'm driving very long distances each day and barely have time to contribute to this site. So many thanks to this site's co-writers, new ones and longtime ones, for helping keep it … [Read more...] about Note To Readers

Yet another progressive, right-thinking action from Ambassador Bolton - it's just a shame he won't be around much longer to continue combating anti-Americanism and Islamofascism within the global scale. My blog has the full story plus commentary. (Note: Sorry for the quick pointer post - I hardly feel like I'm living up to the effort of my TMV cobloggers - but I've been up to … [Read more...] about Bolton: Ahmadinejad “Inciting Genocide,” Must Be Punished

Link Fixed! (Best comic strip? I have no idea where that came from....) Okay, so winning the Weblog Awards is rapidly spinning out of reach. But I would like to maintain my position in second. I would say that I'm currently comfortably in second...but I once said I was comfortably in the lead. That'll teach me to be optimistic. Votes for The Debate Link are … [Read more...] about Second Place is Good, Too

According to the WaPo … [Read more...] about Sen. Johnson in Critical Condition

An interesting read at CNN.What the hell happened? Where did we go wrong? How was Christianity co-opted by a political party? Why are Christians supporting laws that force others to live by their standards? The answers to these questions are integral to the survival of Christianity. While the current state of Christianity might seem normal and business-as-usual to some, most … [Read more...] about A Christian Message

Abu Kais at Michael Totten's blog:Senator Bill Nelson (D), the first in a group of at least 4 senators who want to try dialogue with Syria, has been dragged through the mud by dictator Bashar Assad. Over the next few days, John Kerry, Arlen Specter and Christopher Dodd will join him, in an attempt to "convince the Assad regime to "cooperate" in Iraq. As soon as they finish … [Read more...] about Nelson Visits Assad

I doubt you'll find anyone who's more passionate about the separation of Church and State than I am. But even I think the secular world can learn something, every now and then, from the debates inside organized religion, and vice versa. If you're wondering what I mean, try this quiz. The answer might surprise (or even delight) you. … [Read more...] about A Quiz for the Day

"How could I become something that everyone is scared of now? How could I risk becoming what scares me?" It's not a quote from Batman. It's a quote by a Black man from Queens on whether to become a cop. … [Read more...] about Profiles

The Angry Independent has been blogging for almost a year now at Mirror on America. If you haven't yet had a chance to check out his posts, you should. His extended treatise on where he stands on various issues is refreshing to read, whether or not you agree with him, because he hold trues to his intro ... "On some issues I tend to be a little more Conservative, while on … [Read more...] about A Familiar and Worthwhile Refrain

Despite the magnitude of the deaths — 28 here, 57 there and 210 somewhere else, 550 one week and 700 the next — the carnage in Iraq is so predictable that it has begun to numb my senses. Single-malt Scotch is too expensive, so the only way that I have been able to deal with this disconnect is to pretty much stop blogging on individual incidents such as the bomb … [Read more...] about Bob’s Mother & The Ghost of Iraq War Future

I tend to agree with Nancy Hanks' analysis: "fussin and fightin" is not the problem with politics today. Disagreement should always precede policy; it is in debate that we identify the poles, without which we could never find our way to the center. The problem is not with argument, but with the refusal of the arguing parties to eventually stop, breathe, and start … [Read more...] about Moderates Mischaracterized

The NYTimes reports today that the incoming House and Senate budget committee chairmen "said they would demand a better accounting of the war’s cost and move toward integrating the spending into the regular federal budget, a signal of their intention to use the Congressional power of the purse more assertively to influence the White House’s management of the war." It's … [Read more...] about Calling for Better Accounting on Iraq

The term Thirty Years' War, a reference to the 17th century bloodbath between the Catholics and Protestants and their royal proxies in what is now Germany, is creeping into the blogger vocabulary in the context of a region-wide consequence of the Mess in Mesopotamia. Will the mainstream media be using it next? Andrew Sullivan is the most recent to use the term: "History will … [Read more...] about Iraq & The Next Thirty Years’ War