MightierThan.com

A Must Listen

Chas Danner — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 05:33:45 +0000

From This American Life. One of the best episodes they have ever done, the perfect mix of fascinating, funny, unbelievable, and just enlightening enough that at the end you feel like you know a little bit more about something important.

Episode 402: Save the Day

Originally aired 3/10/2010
Stories about one person single-handedly taking charge of a situation gone wrong – including one man’s mission to rescue two kids who were kidnapped by alleged murderers and taken to Mexico, and another about a professor’s mission to keep the educators of a liberal arts college from extinction.

Getting It Right : Ackerman

Chas Danner — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 19:01:49 +0000

Spencer Ackerman, reporting this morning on the Obama administration’s decision to approve the targeting (for assassination) of Anwar al-Awlaki, an American citizen who is a key figure in the Yemeni faction of Al Qaeda:

We at least have the right to know the legal basis the Obama administration reached to order the extra-judicial killing of an American citizen, and so I’ll be spending my morning filling out FOIAs.

(emphasis mine)

Immediate boring paperwork, sometimes an essential part of getting it right.

Getting It Right will be a reoccurring segment on MT featuring examples of good journalism and creative non-fiction

Advantage: New Media

Chas Danner — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 20:51:04 +0000

Today’s health care/insurance summit, as framed by The Sunlight Foundation in their live coverage..

Iran, Ashura, in a Nutshell

Chas Danner — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 16:52:58 +0000

Long Live the Muppets

Chas Danner — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 06:02:14 +0000

This new Muppet Studio channel is as of right now the reason YouTube was invented.

Naming Books

Chas Danner — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 17:57:38 +0000

Couldn’t help but chuckle a bit at the new HuffPo list of “writer’s writers” in (negative) response to Sarah Palin and her ghost writer’s new page roguer. Not because of the writers included or not included (a “writer’s writers” list that omits John McPhee??) – but because of the titles… Book titles, art titles, even song titles are always a fascinating glimpse into how an artist (or an artist’s agent) brands their work, or in a way, themselves. I just keep thinking of all the various people referring to the fictional masterpiece Arsonist’s Daughter in Wonderboys like it was some treasured member of their extended family. With that in mind, a bad poem made from book titles:

Our Story Begins
a distant episode
This Boys Life
Airships
Everything That Rises Must Converge
Dance of the Happy Shades
Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?
A Good Man is Hard to Find
Runaway
The Tunnel
Cathedral
My Sister’s Hand in Mine
a bad man
George Mills
In Persuasion Nation
Two Serious Ladies
Loving, Living, Party Going
A Sheltering Sky
Geronimo Rex
Civilwarland in Bad Decline
Omensetter’s Luck

My favorite titles:
Civilwarland in Bad Decline (that’s wholly original)
Everything That Rises Must Converge (could be a book about garden gnomes and it would still sound worth reading with a title like that)

Least favorite:
a distant episode

Thoughts From This Week

Chas Danner — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 04:05:16 +0000

Terrorists are criminals. They are not soldiers, or enemy combatants, or any other term we’d like to use that might somehow remove the rights they deserve. They are criminals. Criminals are dealt with through our justice system, treated fairly and humanely, and then put in prison if they are convicted in a court that respects our rule of law. The prison must also be in a place where that rule of law is respected. Treating a criminal like this is what makes America America. And if acting this way as a nation somehow makes America more of a target, bring it on. It is not an act of weakness but of strength, and better we be targeted for that than for black sites, torture, or for hateful rhetoric.

If a politician or pundit wants to suggest otherwise, then they are, literally, un-American.

(And no terrorist should ever face the death penalty. The unique mindset of terrorists that celebrates death as it does should forbid us from anything they might feel is a reward.)

Also, we are fighting 2 wars right now, asking men and women to die for the freedom we hardly ever remember to enjoy. There is often a bunch of explanation that usually diffuses that but at it’s core that’s exactly what our armed services protect. And this past week between the murders at Fort Hood and the always overdue retrospection around Veterans/Armistice Day it was hard not to think about this price we pay for freedom.

One hears this word far too much these days here in the US. It’s Bravehearted by the questionably informed (and questionably sane) at “tea” parties, on vaudeville political talk shows, and with staged passion on the floors of congress. But it’s important, this word, this idea, this ideal. It supersedes nationalism or other bullshit expressions of patriotism, it supersedes the theater of the marginalized or fearful, and it especially supersedes the idea that we can pick and choose who is or is not entitled to our rule of law – a system which defines what freedom actually means outside of a dictionary or rhetorical flourish.

How can we choose to narrow the very thing our service members are still dying for, every single day…

The Ponz

Chas Danner — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 03:59:20 +0000

Who would have believed that an address marker from one of Bernie Madoff’s residences would go for $2K on auction. I wonder if someone convinced the buyer it would be a good investment…

Being a Decent Person is Often Unglamorous

Chas Danner — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 03:54:28 +0000

The second act of this episode of This American Life is probably the best story I have ever heard that ends with a man crying in bed.

It starts at 18:58..

Rooftop Project – back in action

Chas Danner — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 20:40:06 +0000

I’ve been bogged down with the kinds of profound life changes that (hopefully decent) literature is based on, therefore TRP has been out of date for a while – but happy to report that Iran is still going strong regardless of my updating or not, and I found a bunch of rooftop videos to get up from the last month – some which people haven’t seen yet as far as I can tell – and while I am still missing tonight’s video (and I’m sure there will be dozens after such large and indicative protests today) – it is as up to date as I could get it – please let me know if you’ve seen any I’ve missed.

Stay Green Iran..

http://www.mightierthan.com/rooftop