Hey Wisconsin Dems, I Feel Your Pain

Last updated on: June 6, 2012 at 9:38 am By Jeremy Lott

Washington state Republicans and fellow independents have a pretty good idea how bad Wisconsin Democrats are feeling today after their bid to recall Governor Scott Walker came up snake eyes. We know because we’ve been there. In 2004, Republican Dino Rossi won the governorship of our great state only to have it clawed back from him by opponent Christine Gregoire through a combination of selective recounting and outright voter fraud. We viewed her as an illegitimate governor, much as Wisconsin... Read more

Good News of Great Joy

Last updated on: June 6, 2012 at 9:32 am By Jeremy Lott

Very few people remember where they were on this day in 1989, but I’ve got a pretty good recollection. I was in Tacoma, in the big family house on 42nd Street. I woke up along with my younger brother Andrew. Our parents were not there. Instead, a friend of my mother’s had come. She told us Mum had gone into labor in the middle of the night. Dad had rushed her to the hospital. Everything was OK, she assured us,... Read more

Dilly Dilemma

Last updated on: June 6, 2012 at 9:33 am By Jeremy Lott

If they do not have Dairy Queen butterscotch dilly bars in hell, I do believe I shall not go. Read more

Hail to Nat Hentoff

Last updated on: June 4, 2012 at 1:11 am By Jeremy Lott

This weekend I did the heavy lifting for both Real Clear Books and Real Clear Religion, the latter so that RCR deputy Nick Hahn could celebrate his latest birthday in relative peace. When Mark Judge sent in a column celebrating the great critic Nat Hentoff of course I led with it. Judge argues that Hentoff has fallen out of favor with liberals because he has gone over to the dark side and condemned abortion. There’s something to that, yet Hentoff... Read more

Thanks a Lot, Netflix!

Last updated on: June 4, 2012 at 1:00 am By Jeremy Lott

Zonad is a movie from 2009 currently streaming on Netflix. It is as low budget as you get. The concept is dumb, the application dumber. Users on imdb.com give it a collective rating of 4.7 out of 10 stars and it’s hard to argue with that judgment. I can find nothing to speak for this movie — morally, aesthetically, or in any other way — except for the fact that the folks in the Casa de Lott just spent the... Read more

So Sick of Sermons

Last updated on: June 3, 2012 at 2:00 pm By Jeremy Lott

Thought I had timed it right this morning but no. Fr. Flapdoodle* still had some wind left in his sails as I entered the World’s Ugliest Catholic Church. Fr. F. is a particularly awful homilist — so bad that for a few weeks I brought my Kindle to church to read during his meandering talks — but, to be fair, it’s not just him. He also has my Baptist past working against him. Most of us can duck the occasional... Read more

Fat, Females and Philosophy

Last updated on: June 3, 2012 at 1:01 am By Jeremy Lott

“I wrote a whole paper about that question for a philosophy class,” my colleague, the mad Real Clear Science editor Alex Berezow, told me over the phone. We were discussing a post here, “Yes, That Dress Does Make You Look Fat.” Alex explained the paper a bit more and I finally asked him to send me the whole thing, if he still had it. Turns out, yes, he did, and it’s a doozy. It’s on the long side, so I’m... Read more

Guess I Take After My Mother

Last updated on: June 2, 2012 at 7:23 pm By Jeremy Lott

Since it’s unexpectedly turning into Spiritual Saturday here on Jeremy Lott’s Diary, let me commend to you a song. As the person who posted it to YouTube wrote, “[Here’s] City and Colour’s ‘The Grand Optimist’ from Little Hell.” Note, however, that you’ll want to check the lyrics on that page against the vocals of Dallas Green. The lyrics have him opening with “I fear I’m dying of complications /complications due to things that I’ve left undone.” To me it sounds... Read more

Not Exactly Livin’ on a Prayer

Last updated on: June 3, 2012 at 1:07 am By Jeremy Lott

While searching for items for the weekend Real Clear Religion update, this piece on prayer by Jessica “Jess” Edgerton caught my eye. “I am really bad at praying,” she begins in the evangelical magazine Relevant. (Yes, seriously, it’s called Relevant.) The ADDish Edgerton tries to give us some idea of what happens when she sits down and attempts to pray. A stray thought possesses her and she ends up repeating the word “bosom” and giggling. “And thus,” she writes “my... Read more

Snow White and the Seven Jokes

Last updated on: June 2, 2012 at 9:27 am By Jeremy Lott

Question for those who’ve seen Snow White and the Huntsman: At what point did you realize that this was all an expensive joke? For me, it was the part where the jackalope appeared. Read more