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The Podcast Profile III: Malcolm and Melissa Posted: 09 Jul 2012 09:59 PM PDT Podcast: Malcolm and Melissa (web link / iTunes link) Length: One hour Frequency: Bi-weekly (mostly), usually on Fridays but occasionally on Mondays or Thursdays. Rating: PG When I set out to do these Podcast Profiles, I resolved that I would only share with you the shows that update on a regular schedule. There is nothing more frustrating to me about a podcast than a slapdash “we’ll do one when we feel like it” schedule and I have unsubscribed from otherwise very good shows because of it. I can’t in good faith ask you to commit to listening to a podcast if the hosts can’t commit to giving you regular shows. Of course there are good reasons why broadcasters to fall off a regular release schedule, especially if their shows aren’t a part of their full-time jobs. But there are plenty of hosts who are diligent in their work and they, I believe, deserve your commitment. Malcolm and Melissa is my first, and perhaps only, exception to that resolution. The show is good. It is entertaining, smart, funny — all the stuff you want in a podcast — and worth getting whenever you get it. The first thing you’ll notice when the show gets rolling is how well Andrew Malcolm, veteran journalist, and Melissa Clouthier, veteran social media strategist work together. They aren’t simply two radio hosts who get together once in a while to make a show, but honest to goodness friends. Their friendship enriches the show, makes even the most contentious disagreement between them (which doesn’t happen often) interesting instead of uncomfortable, and gives it real substance. Each episode of Malcolm and Melissa is a conversation between two smart and funny friends who like to talk politics. Don’t let their casual banter fool you into thinking their political analysis is amateurish, however. Both Andrew and Melissa are keen political observers and they often see things in a story that most of us miss. That takes a great deal of patience and skill and would-be pundits would be well advised to listen to a few shows and try very hard to emulate what they hear. Honestly, I’d be pretty happy if Malcolm and Melissa found a nice little home on a radio network that could put them in a two-hour slot between the big morning show and the mid-day Limbaughesque heavy hitter. If that happened, I’d get a show every day, and that would suit me just fine.

Clearing the Browser Tabs – The Backlog from Heck Edition Posted: 09 Jul 2012 09:32 AM PDT Okay, so I had no internet at all for a week, which meant that I couldn’t really crank out the blog posts the way I wanted. Or at all. What I could do, when my phone had solid 3G service, is drop links of interest into Instapaper so that when my internet service did come back, I could spend a couple days on blog posts and, eventually, get all the way through the links I had archived over the past three weeks. Yes, I’ve been that far behind. At least that was the plan Friday night when Verizon bestowed on me the gift of Internet. Saturday was to be the Great Day of Catching Up, at least until my standing game night gathering in the evening. You know the saying about how God laughs when we make plans? Yeah. I had reason to remember that saying early on Saturday morning. I won’t go into the details, but I lost another day of writing due to circumstances that were, at least at that moment, beyond my control. Things are better now, but I still have a  whole host of links in front of me about which I simply don’t have enough time to write. So, here they are. Enjoy! And now, links! Behold! The Tyranny of (TED) Cliches. When the President’s economic team sallies forth to explain to us why they’re great, they often teach us lessons they never intended. The Reagan Revolution didn’t fail; the Republican Party failed to learn that it wasn’t about aggregating power but returning that power to the people who rightfully own it. Are you a member of a union? Did your union lobby to block a law that would allow your employer to give you a raise or bonus based on the good work you do? You should probably check, then vote to throw out every leader who cheated you. If you’ve wondered why small businesses aren’t hiring, here’s as detailed and useful an answer as you will find. I know Mitt Romney doesn’t make conservatives very happy, but let’s take heart. The Democrats’ bench is utterly bereft of good candidates for 2016 and beyond. Won’t you please give to Barack Obama’s re-election campaign? Any amount will help — $5, $10, all your wedding gifts… While everyone, including me, was talking about the Obamacare SCOTUS ruling, the Knox case may prove the more important one decided this month. Here is a very good analysis of how it hampers the ability of public sector unions to line their pockets, and the pockets of their Democratic friends. This story right here is why conservatives need to take the word “bipartisanship” out behind the barn and club it to death like it was a ravening zombie. How often do you see “bipartisan” agreements in Congress — or bills passed that get the biparsian label from the lickspittle media — that do anything but spend increasingly larger amounts of our children’s money or hamstring individual freedom. One reason that Europe is doomed is that it is largely run by idiots. Free vacation? That’s as insane an idea as spending $10 billion to create 355 jobs per year because you really, really like the sector in which the jobs are created. Apparently, it is official: Homestar Runner is no more. Well, not exactly “no more” in that the site is still there and you can watch all the stuff you want, but the Brothers Chaps aren’t doing anything new. The Canadian group That Choir recently released its debut CD. I’ve listened to a couple of the samples — the songs are pretty standard choral fare, but they’re done very well. The group has a very substantial sound from top to bottom and they blend exquisitely.  If you like choral music, especially a cappella choral music, check out the CD and pick it up! R.I.P. Ernest Borgnine, one of Hollywood’s finest actors and a throwback to the days when male leading actors were men.

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