Happy Halloween

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
`'Tis some visitor,' I muttered, `tapping at my chamber door -
Only this, and nothing more.'

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow; - vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow - sorrow for the lost Lenore -
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating
`'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door -
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; -
This it is, and nothing more,'

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
`Sir,' said I, `or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you' - here I opened wide the door; -
Darkness there, and nothing more.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before
But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, `Lenore!'
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, `Lenore!'
Merely this and nothing more.

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
`Surely,' said I, `surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore -
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore; -
'Tis the wind and nothing more!'

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door -
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door -
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
`Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,' I said, `art sure no craven.
Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the nightly shore -
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning - little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door -
Bird or beast above the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
With such name as `Nevermore.'

But the raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only,
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered - not a feather then he fluttered -
Till I scarcely more than muttered `Other friends have flown before -
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before.'
Then the bird said, `Nevermore.'

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
`Doubtless,' said I, `what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore -
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore
Of "Never-nevermore."'

But the raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore -
What this grim, ungainly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking `Nevermore.'

This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o'er,
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er,
She shall press, ah, nevermore!

Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.
`Wretch,' I cried, `thy God hath lent thee - by these angels he has sent thee
Respite - respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this lost Lenore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil! -
Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted -
On this home by horror haunted - tell me truly, I implore -
Is there - is there balm in Gilead? - tell me - tell me, I implore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us - by that God we both adore -
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels named Lenore?'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!' I shrieked upstarting -
`Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! - quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted - nevermore!

-Edgar Allen Poe, The Raven, 1845

Colbert For President!

Stephen's presidential bid has become international news! One million strong for Colbert!

On Memorials

"After I'm dead I'd rather have people ask why I have no monument than why I have one."

-Cato the Elder (234-149)

Experience

I like Barack Obama. He is intelligent, charismatic, and capable. As much as I prefer to remain aloof from this absurdly premature presidential race, I have to say that he's my preferred candidate.

But there are some who argue that he lacks experience. He's young - if 46 can be considered young - and he's 'only' a first-term senator. Thus some say that he lacks the worldly political knowledge necessary to be president.

The flimsiness of this critique becomes apparent when one consults recent history. In the past twenty years, two presidents have emerged as icons: Reagan for the right wing, and Clinton for the left. Both of these men had only been state governors before assuming the office of president; they hadn't even had any federal government experience, let alone experience in foreign policy! And yet each man continues to enjoy the reputation of a very successful presidency.

But if you're still concerned with experience, perhaps you should consider the resume of one of the most experienced presidents in our history. The son of a blacksmith, he had pulled himself up by his own bootstraps, attended Stanford University, and made his wealth as a mining engineer. He served as a humanitarian administrator who oversaw food and disaster relief to millions of people inside and out of the US, for which actions the New York Times named him one of the Ten Most Important Living Americans. He then served as US Secretary of Commerce, and he was so good at the job that he often overshadowed the sitting presidents he was serving. He was, thus, a natural choice for the presidency, to which he was elected in a landslide election. That man's name was Herbert Hoover, and his presidency is regarded as one of the most disastrous in US history.

So much for experience.

Tough Call

Christian Science Monitor: Religious Right's Tough Call

WASHINGTON - After two days of wooing by all the Republican presidential candidates, religious conservatives appear no more in agreement on whom to support than they did going in.

The good news, said some of the 2,500 attendees at the Values Voter Summit organized by the Family Research Council, is that most of the GOP candidates share their views on the bedrock issues of the movement: opposition to abortion rights and support for traditional marriage. The bad news is that the strongest Republican in national polls, former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, is not with them on those issues.

It looks like the so-called 'values voters' are having trouble finding a candidate who is popular but also sufficiently homophobic and strong against women's rights. Shame that Brownback's out of the race. His 'values' were certainly backward enough.

What about God? Is he available for a presidential bid? Or is He too busy preparing to rapture all of those values voters? I hope he does so soon - then those of us who are 'left behind' can elect a worthy president according to rational criteria.

"Clean"

I've pointed out before (here and here) how quotations can be misused with tragic results.

I say again: quotation marks do NOT add emphasis (that's what italics, boldface, underlining, and capital letters are for). Quotes are used to quote someone (is that so hard?), or to make a sarcastic joke, which is what this unfortunately punctuated sign ends up looking like.

Too bad they don't teach that kind of thing anymore in this nation's public "schools".

Stalling for time

CNN: Craig appeals judge's ruling in sex sting case

Keep stalling, Larry. (Get it? Stalling?) And thanks for all those Democratic votes you're winning over for next year!

Thoughts and Ends

Our wills and fates do so contrary run
That our devices still are overthrown;
Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of their own.

-The Player King, Hamlet, III.ii

The Idiot

"As yesterday's positive report card shows, childrens do learn when standards are high and results are measured."

-George W. Bush, September 2007

"My job is a decision-making job, and as a result I make a lot of decisions."

-George W. Bush, October 2007


This man is the President of the United States of America. That fact, by itself, is the strongest case against democratic representation I've ever heard.

Ghosts, Witches, Pumpkins... and Santa?

You know what they say about Christmas: it comes only once a year. For four goddamned months.

The above photographs were taken in a Costco store on September 29. That's more than a month before Halloween. And sure enough, three aisles away there was a stack of Halloween candy. Halloween treats and Christmas decorations should never, ever meet in the same store.

These obtrusive and unseasonable decorations were accompanied by the loud, odious chords of electronic Christmas music. Hearing a bad adaptation of "Deck the Halls" is depressing in the first place; hearing it in a wholesale retailer in September is enough to make one suicidal.

This perverse extension of "the season to be jolly" will make Scrooges of us all. Bah! Humbug!

The Call of the Puffin

What sound do you think this cute little unassuming birdy makes? A chirp? A squawk? Perhaps even a melodious song?

Guess again. Try a terrifying chainsaw-like roar!

This too.

(These unsettling authentic bird sounds brought to you by http://www.audubon.org/bird/puffin/questions.html.)

The trial of a polygamist 'prophet'

CNN: Polygamist 'prophet' found guilty of aiding rape

Polygamist sect leader Warren Steed Jeffs was found guilty Tuesday of being an accomplice to rape for using his religious authority to push a 14-year-old girl into a marriage she did not want.

Wall [the victim] spent three days on the stand, frequently sobbing as she described how she felt trapped in a marriage she did not want, to a man she did not like.

She said she repeatedly told Jeffs that she did not want to be married and was uncomfortable with her new husband's sexual advances. Jeffs advised her to pray and to submit to her husband, learn to love him, and bear his children -- or risk losing her "eternal salvation," she said.

Thus spake the prophet Jeffs: submit to rape and turn over control of your life to a man you despise, or you won't go to heaven. What could anyone say in defense of this repulsive fraud?

The defense countered that authorities were persecuting Jeffs because of his religious beliefs, which include practicing plural marriage as the way to heaven. "His church, his religious beliefs is what's on trial here, and it's being dressed up as a rape," attorney Walter Bugden argued.

Absolutely right. Ignore this defending attorney's apparently tenuous grasp of grammar and syntax for a second, and consider what he's saying. Warren Jeffs's religious beliefs are being put on trial for rape.

It's true. But his defending attorney says that like it's a bad thing.

Of course this reprobate's religious beliefs are being put on trial. The defending attorney is right about that, but here's the specious turn in his argument: he makes it seem that the beliefs are on trial BECAUSE they are religious.

The beliefs are not being assaulted because they are affiliated with a religion. They are being assaulted because they have led to degenerate and malicious behavior that is patently unacceptable in a free and lawful society.

Notice, though, that it is not the religious beliefs themselves that are being prosecuted, but the actions that the beliefs inspired. This is a free country, and you can believe whatever you want, however outrageous, but it is foolish to expect amnesty for acting on those beliefs. To use a more secular example, take the KKK; they can think and say whatever they want about minorities, but they can't cite the freedoms of belief and expression when they go lynch someone.

This trial is reminiscent of another that took place some eighty-two years ago. In the Scopes trial, the religious beliefs of anti-evolution America were taken to task - not because they were religious, but because they were ignorant, because they supported stultifying the education of our children, because they favored ancient myths over scientific fact.

Is it right that reprehensible, outrageous, or idiotic beliefs take on a sacrosanct aura of legitimacy simply because they are associated with a religion? Should we tolerate things like statutory rape or rejection of scientific knowledge because the 'sacred' preachings of ancient texts and a few sanctimonious frauds in long robes claim it's what god wants?

In a free society such as ours, such beliefs will inevitably come into conflict with reason. And they will lose.

One fewer god

"I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours."

-Stephen Roberts

Horowitz

YouTube: David Horowitz Accuses UCSC of Being Too Un-American (and gets totally shot down by Alan Colmes)

For once, Alan Colmes pulls his weight.

Or perhaps David Horowitz is just so cretinous that he can be nailed by Sean Hannity's effete liberal counterpart.

An apostate leftist, Horowitz has become something of a conservative celebrity for his strident criticisms of academia as an institutional hive of leftist indocrination. He's essentially a Joe McCarthy for the modern academy, and brings with him all of the charm, wit, and credibility of his 1950s predecessor.

His books, such as The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America and Indoctrination U, are full of hysterical shriekings about the left's stranglehold on our colleges, and the conniving communist professors who pour red poison in the ears of innocent college students. His books are plagued with errors and deliberate lies (see for instance the Horowitz fact checker), but Horowitz is, after all, an analyst for Fox News; facts are clearly not high on this man's list of concerns.

Peace, friendship, and death to the Jews

CNN: Amadinejad: Iran can help secure Iraq, Israel is 'cruel'

(CNN) -- Iran wants "peace and friendship for all," the country's president said Wednesday while again denying Western assertions his nation is pursuing nuclear weapons and trying to destabilize Iraq.

But Mahmoud Ahmadinejad took a hard line against Israel, calling it "an invader" and saying it "cannot continue its life."

So, "peace and friendship for all," but Israel must die?

One of three things is going on here.

1. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad does not know what "peace" means.
2. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad does not know what "all" means.
3. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is a raving anti-semitic lunatic whose position as the leader of a potential nuclear power is not a little disquieting.

I'll give you three guesses.

Fire Water!

AP: Radio Frequencies Help Burn Salt Water

John Kanzius happened upon the discovery accidentally when he tried to desalinate seawater with a radio-frequency generator he developed to treat cancer. He discovered that as long as the salt water was exposed to the radio frequencies, it would burn.

The discovery has scientists excited by the prospect of using salt water, the most abundant resource on earth, as a fuel.

Rustum Roy, a Penn State University chemist, has held demonstrations at his State College lab to confirm his own observations.

The radio frequencies act to weaken the bonds between the elements that make up salt water, releasing the hydrogen, Roy said. Once ignited, the hydrogen will burn as long as it is exposed to the frequencies, he said.

The Meaning of Religious Freedom

"The meaning of religious freedom, I fear, is sometimes greatly misapprehended. It is taken to be a sort of immunity, not merely from governmental control but also from public opinion. A dunderhead gets himself a long-tailed coat, rises behind the sacred desk, and emits such bilge as would gag a Hottentot. Is it to pass unchallenged? If so, then what we have is not religious freedom at all, but the most intolerable and outrageous variety of religious despotism. Any fool, once he is admitted to holy orders, becomes infallible. Any half-wit, by the simple device of ascribing his delusions to revelation, takes on an authority that is denied to all the rest of us."

-H.L. Mencken, in his coverage of the Scopes Trial, 1925

Scandalous

About a year ago, Mark Foley, a Republican congressional representative from Florida, resigned because it was discovered that he had sent sexually explicit electronic messages to teenage boys.

And now, not to be outdone by his erstwhile colleague, Republican Senator Larry Craig has utterly shamed himself by allegedly soliciting sex in an airport bathroom.

Big surprise: these politicians, who are members of the party that considers itself the American model of moral probity, are also enormous hypocrites. But there's a disturbing trend that emerged in the media coverage of both of these stories. With both the Foley scandal and the current Craig scandal, the media have put too much emphasis on the question of whether or not these men are gay.

Being gay shouldn't be the issue here; the issue in both of these stories should be that these men are violating the law and exhibiting moral depravity. But by the way the media cover the scandals, they often make it seem like being gay itself constitutes the entire scandal.

Who cares if Mark Foley is gay? He was sending sexually explicit messages to teenagers! Isn't that awful regardless of whether the teenage victims of his perversion were male OR female?

And again, with Larry Craig: he, a married man, was cruising for sex in an airport bathroom. Isn't that reprehensible whether or not the complete stranger he wanted to proposition was a man OR a woman?

The homosexual leanings of these men should only enter the story insofar as to expose the hypocrisy of their conservative positions against gays. When the media make it seem like being gay is a scandalous issue in and of itself, they're simply contributing to the same damaging national atmosphere of homophobia that these hypocritical Republicans and their colleagues have worked so hard to perpetuate.

Read A Fucking Book

CNN: Poll of US Reading Habits

One in four Americans read no books last year.

That reminds me of something Mark Twain once said: that the man who does not read has no advantage over the man who can't.

Gonzales

Alberto Gonzales has resigned!

Asked what his most meaningful experience was during his two years as Attorney General, Gonzales replied, "I... don't recall."

Impiety

Impiety, n. Your irreverence towards my deity.

-Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

Lessons

BBC: Bush Compares Iraq to Vietnam

President George W Bush has warned a US withdrawal from Iraq could trigger the kind of upheaval seen in South East Asia after US forces quit Vietnam.

Is this man serious?

When I think of the phrase "Lessons of Vietnam", I have to say that the first thing that comes to mind isn't that we should have stayed there longer.

No - when I think of the Vietnam War, I think of a war begun in a land far away, with an enemy we knew nothing about, for reasons that represented a total lack of understanding of that part of the world and its relationship to us. I think of a war in which the costs were severe and the rewards nonexistant. I think of a war in which we had trouble telling friend from foe. I think of a war in which we floundered for years with no objective and a scattered, ad hoc strategy. I think of a war that sapped the morale and tarnished the international reputation of the United States. I think of a war that went down in history as a military disaster, a governmental error, and a national tragedy.

There are indeed lessons to be learned from Vietnam's place in American history. But President Bush has not learned from our country's past mistakes; he has repeated them.

Jet Lag

Probably the only fun thing about the primary campaigns starting so damn early is that we get to see all of the candidates' sundry mistakes, gaffes, and blunders lampooned on the Daily Show. Until the primaries close enough to become actually relevant, Jon Stewart is going to be my only source of news on the subject.

Bill Richardson has, for the most part, escaped the mockery that Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert heap on much of the other candidates. But recently, he did something extraordinarily stupid, which I think deserved even more derision than it received.

The event in question, which was lambasted last night on the Daily Show, involved a gay TV Station Democratic debate in which Melissa Etheridge asked Richardson if he thought homosexuality was a choice. First he said yes. Then he said that he's, well, "not a scientist". Meaning, of course, "yes but I don't want to sound homophobic".

But that's not even the outrageous part. Apparently, in a clumsy attempt to backpedal, he now attributes his statements to not understanding the question because of jet lag.

Come now. Even if you had not slept for days, it's pretty clear what's being asked if Melissa Etheridge is the one asking the question and it includes the words "homosexuality" and "choice".

Richardson's excuse is an absurdity on several levels. First, of course, it simply insults the intelligence of anyone who hears it. But on a deeper level, we are considering this man for the office of President of the United States - a job that carries with it significant stressors and probably a lot of travel-related fatigue. If he "didn't understand" such a simple question due to a bit of jet lag, what kinds of awful mistakes would he make as President, at, for instance, international summits? Would he get us into a war with North Korea because he didn't get a nap on the plane?

Bad move, Governor Richardson. You'll have to do a lot better than that - or else the only place you're going to be popular is on late-night satire.

"Sales Event"

Since when did selling cars turn into an 'event'?

Most car commercials you see on TV have a sentence that never deviates from this formula: "The (insert corporate name here) sales event: on now at your local (insert corporate name here) dealer." I suppose 'sale' doesn't sound exciting enough anymore.

And that's not all. Lexus, who seem to have a peculiar knack for pompous indulgence in their advertising, apparently now find the 'sales' part of the formula too pedestrian; I saw a Lexus commercial recently that simply announced "The Event."

"The Event"? How nauseatingly pretentious. I guess this is what marketing executives are paid for, though: to make selling cars sound like a black-tie ball at the royal palace.

Life Imitates Art

In the episode "HOMR" of the twelfth season of the Simpsons, Homer finds out via a doctor's X-Ray that, when he was a child, he shoved a crayon up his nose and into his head. The crayon had stayed lodged there throughout his entire life, and the pressure it put on his brain accounted for his characteristically low intelligence.

Haha. Ah, the world of animated fiction. Surely nothing like that would ever happen in real life...

BBC: Pencil removed from German's head

A woman in Germany who has spent 55 years with part of a pencil inside her head has finally had it removed.
Margret Wegner fell over carrying the pencil when she was four. It punctured her cheek and part of it went into her brain, above the right eye.

The 59-year-old has suffered headaches and nosebleeds for most of her life.

Life really does imitate art.

Naive

It's sometimes said that if you're a conservative when you're twenty, you have no heart, and if you're a liberal at fifty, you have no head. A gross oversimplification, perhaps, but - so some think.

But indeed, political liberals in America have more of a reputation than conservatives of having their heads in the clouds. Whenever conservative pundits aren't making the case that liberals have actively malignant designs against our country, they're arguing that liberals are naive and out of touch with reality. (The potential incompatibility of these two portrayals - self-consciously subversive elements versus hapless, bumbling fools - is not discussed, and it's usually assumed that liberals somehow embody both caricatures.)

This is amazing to me, considering that many conservatives believe that:

-it is unimportant to have an intelligent, or even functionally literate, person occupying the office of President of the United States

-evolution is false, because a book written two millennia ago says so

-abstinence education actually works on teenagers

-homosexuals choose to be gay (but somehow, heterosexuals don't have to choose to be straight)

-if everyone is armed, then society will be safer for it

-our Founding Fathers were evangelical Christians

-the ninth amendment doesn't exist

-the first half of the second amendment doesn't exist

-the environment's capacity for abuse and exploitation is limitless

-we don't need to understand anything about a country in order to invade it and set up a new government

-we can keep doing what we're doing in Iraq and somehow everything will turn out swell

Now, of course, liberals aren't without their fair share of mistaken theories and unrealistic notions, but how do they get labelled as the head-in-the-clouds party, while by contrast the conservatives can bill themselves as worldly pragmatists? Sounds a little naive to me.

Irony

Irony is using Lisa Simpson as a promotion for Burger King.

"Support free speech," eh? You know what Lisa Simpson also supports? Protesting obtrusive corporations that abuse the environment and kill billions of animals. But I suppose that's a minor detail.

Kwik-E-Mart, Manhattan, NY

Simpsons, eh?

Warning: Spoilers Below.

After nearly twenty years of animated brilliance, The Simpsons finally have a movie. Matt Groening no doubt had many opportunities to write a movie that was guaranteed to cash in on a wildly successful series, but it is to his credit that he waited. The result is a fine movie indeed.

Of course, there's nothing entirely new; the movie essentially feels like a 90 minute episode (which is a decidedly good thing, since it was made for the millions of us who love the episodes). But you can tell that the writers and animators had fun trying some techniques and tricks that wouldn't work in a normal TV episode. First of all, it's the first time we've ever seen the Simpsons in widescreen, and seeing Springfield projected on the big screen feels odd after watching it for so long on TV. Also, the cinematography is different; they played more with sweeping camera shots and panoramic views. You could tell that the style was slightly dressed-up for the big screen, but they didn't change anything drastically, which is why it worked so well.

They also pushed the envelope in the realm of obscenity, but again, just enough to try a couple things they wouldn't do on TV. I've certainly never heard Marge use the expression "god damned..." in a sentence before, and there's a scene with Bart-- well, I won't give that one away.

A couple things, though, kept it from being the "Best.. Movie.. Ever." Lisa's crush on the kid from Ireland, for instance, was fairly pointless; the writers don't go anywhere with it, and we don't even really see any substantial humor come out of it.

But mainly, I would like to have seen more of peripheral characters like Krusty, Groundskeeper Willie, Principal Skinner, Snake, Apu, Police Chief Wiggum, Ralph, and especially Mr. Burns. One of the strengths that the Simpsons has always had as a show is that it develops these characters as much as the family itself, so that each person in the town has a distinct identity that adds to the mosaic of Springfield as the American Everytown. On the other hand, I can see how trying to fit as many characters as possible into the movie would have diluted the plot and made the movie into a pointless (albeit funny) string of one-liners and cameos, so I don't hold it against them. Maybe Mr. Burns simply needs his own movie.

It was nothing short of amazing, though, to hear Green Day sing the Simpsons theme at the beginning. And the Itchy and Scratchy cartoon was sheer genius.

All in all, an excellent movie that draws on all of the absurd, topical, high-brow, low-brow comedy that has long made The Simpsons the perfect satire of the American Family. Go see it!

What a piece of work

Shakespeare was not only the greatest poet who ever lived; he had more direct influence on the English language than any other single person in history. We owe an amazing number of commonly used words and idiomatic expressions to his pen.

If you have never read Hamlet - and if you haven't, you should - you'll be amazed at how many lines are already familiar to you.

Idioms and expressions first coined in Hamlet:

In my mind's eye

Foul play

Murder most foul

Far gone

Method to his madness ("Though this be madness, yet there is method in it")

What a piece of work

In my heart of heart

It smells to heaven

Cruel to be kind

Hoised with his own petard


Famous dramatic lines from Hamlet:

Neither a borrower nor a lender be

To thine own self be true

Brevity is the soul of wit

The play's the thing

To be or not to be

Get thee to a nunnery

The lady doth protest too much, methinks

Alas, poor Yorick

A hit, a very palpable hit

Good night, sweet prince

Oftentimes a classic work of literature has one famous line that everybody knows, e.g. "Call me Ishmael," or "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." Hamlet has at least ten such lines - and it's only 100 pages long! Is there any other work of such short length that has made so many lasting contributions to our language?