Michael B. Duff

"Of course that takes leadership, that takes vision, that takes courage. Maybe that takes more than two comedians, one funny the other not so, can deliver. Maybe I expected too much. Maybe I expected a marashino cherry on my tapioca. Maybe that'll come on Tuesday."

This is what the Onion does best. A perfect snapshot of this moment in American culture.

Started with a 40 minute musical number. Seems to be full of moments that should have been funny but weren't. First impression is that it wasn't very political and thus wasn't very funny or particularly relevant. I was particularly bummed out when Colbert interrupted "Peace Train." His shtick is getting really, really old.

Have this year's negative political ads really "taken dirty to a whole new level, as CNN's Anderson Cooper frets? Is a "return to civility…a relic of a bygone era," as President Barack Obama laments? Er, not exactly.

Blue state QOTD: "I want to see real change — not Obama change," she said. "We need a clean slate and start over with people really working together." Ouch! That quote is so good, either this lady has been using it forever, or the reporter made it up.

I really don't have a problem with this, but I'm curious if we'd hear objections if the situation were reversed. This is starting to feel like a "Remember how cool Obama was?" rally. Will the President roll back the stone and appear reborn at the end of it? Or is this just a wake.

I don't think the average person understands the sheer volume of regulations business owners have to comply with every day.

"Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula is an organization of several hundred individuals that are dispersed throughout the country," presidential counterterrorism advisor John Brennan told reporters Friday. "They are murderers and they are determined to carry out attacks on innocent lives, whether they be Yemeni, Americans, Westerners or others."

Blue state QOTD: "Excuse me–we've got an anti-feminist, anti-choice, anti-sex, anti-LGBT, gay-baiting, half-witted, anti-everything-we-hold-dear Christofascist wingnut who would cheerfully wipe her ass with the Bill of Rights and put progressives in a concentration camp, if she could get away with it; and you're upset because she got dinged? This is why we progressives get their ass kicked so often–we refuse to bring a gun to a knife fight. We didn't make these rules; the thugs on the other side of aisle drafted them. It's the height of hypocrisy to whine when they get smacked across the head with the Big Fish of Nasty Politicking."

Republicans seem certain to take the House but to take the Senate they would have to win 5 out of 6 "toss up" races. Pundits are projecting such a blowout for the GOP, anything less than that will spawn a thousand stories about how "surprisingly weak" the Tea Party turned out to be. Whatever happens next week I expect the Democrats to take it back in 2014, maybe even in 2012.

As many, many of my fellow geeks will observe, "Witches" are not technically a damage type.

Former President Bill Clinton tried to persuade Florida Democratic Rep. Kendrick Meek to drop out of his U.S. Senate race and support Gov. Charlie Crist's independent candidacy in hopes of thwarting a victory by Republican Marco Rubio.

Facebook is desperately trying to monetize its popularity right now; scrambling to cut deals with advertisers and leverage the value of all this personal information we’ve given them — hopefully without losing our trust in the process.

Surnow has described himself as a supporter of the Republican Party, donating money to the campaign of Rick Santorum and expressing particular admiration for former President Ronald Reagan. He is also a close friend of conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh. However, Surnow is a self-described "isolationist" and has stated that he has "no faith in nation building." He is the owner of an American flag that flew over Baghdad during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, which was sent to him as a gift from one of the regiments stationed there.

"Without Obama's and Oprah's fingerprints on it, the rally might have looked like a semi-spontaneous uprising by moderate-as-hell Americans sick and tired of the extremists. Now, it'll appear to be a Democratic Party event, through and through – appearing to opponents every bit as "Astroturfed" as the biggest Tea Party events seem."

This article does a great job debunking some of the common misconceptions about libertarianism. Here's a couple just to get you started: Corporations do not want unfettered capitalism. Libertarianism is not corporatism. Most regulations are sponsored by big businesses trying to do damage to their competitors. And finally, Libertarianism is not merely "an extreme form of conservatism."

Toni says she correctly predicted death of capitalism. Angela incredulous. "it's cowering!" Toni says. A: "how do we speed up the demise?"

By the age of 18, the average TV viewer has seen businessmen and businesswomen attempt more than 10,000 murders and countless lesser offenses ranging, from extortion and bribery to kidnapping and dumping of toxic waste, according to a survey by the Media Institute, a Washington-based group that studies media and business.

"The new UK government – a paragon of 'small government and fiscal austerity'? Only when compared to even more profligate governments elsewhere, but certainly not on its own merits. Krugman really doesn't have all that much reason to worry – unfortunately."

The big point missed by those who think elevated public debt doesn’t matter is that these periods of excessive debt utterly crippled the UK economy. Indeed, Britain’s decline through the twentieth century as an economic superpower directly correlates with increased indebtedness. Fighting wars is not good for economic health.

"There was criticism of the American policy of monetary easing, or creating more liquidity," Bruederle said after a meeting in South Korea of finance officials from the Group of 20 economic powers. I tried to make clear in my contribution to the discussion that I regard that as the wrong way to go," he said.

Researchers have discovered that different targeted advertising is being sent to users’ accounts if they have described themselves as gay or straight. The discovery could mean that people who wish to keep their sexuality private may be sharing it with advertisers without their knowledge.

Halloween and geek conventions have one awesome thing in common: They give women an excuse to wear outfits that their own sense of modesty and dignity would otherwise never allow them to leave the house in.

What's been stimulated? Not jobs in Michigan. What's been stimulated has been commodity markets and emerging markets. Because the liquidity just leaks out, and that's why another round of stimulus would not stimulate in the promised way. It would stimulate the wrong things. And those things, commodity markets and emerging markets, are already overstimulated to the point of being nearly bubbles.

Gotta see the pic to get this: "Keanu Reeves, he goes where he is needed."

Blizzard is getting downright Victorian with the Worgen stuff. I want spectacles and a stovepipe hat now.

So far, that sounds like a lot of people. There isn't a shortage on people who are best friends with the salt shaker and hate bitter vegetables. The next test knocks most of those out of the running, though. Supertasters, as a population, are thinner than the average joe. They aren't just put off by bitterness, they don't like things to be overly sweet or fatty, either.

"Hey do you like my iPod, my bank gave it to me…"

A fitting end for the 111th Congress. But not quite. Colbert will return to the scene of the crime on Oct. 30 as the leader of one of two mock rallies on the National Mall. Comedian Jon Stewart leads the other. At a time of near-10 percent unemployment, a difficult and draining war abroad, and widespread disgust with government overreach and incompetence, they will light up the TV screens as the hip face of the new liberalism — just three days before the election.

In what is being described as the largest release of secret U.S. military documents ever, whistle-blowing web site WikiLeaks has released a trove of classified reports about the war in Iraq, including a secret U.S. government tally that puts the Iraqi death toll between 109,000 and 285,000, according to news sources that received advanced copies of the documents.

The best way to avoid these conflicts is to remember what’s at stake. If you’re a 50-something adult with a family and a mortgage, your primary goal should be to preserve your dignity.

According to the Center for Responsive Politics, Democrats in the most competitive House races have raised an average of 47 percent more than Republicans. They have spent 66 percent more, and have about 53 percent more in their war chests. According to the Wesleyan Media Project, between Sept. 1 and Oct. 7, Democrats running for the House and the Senate spent $1.50 on advertising for every $1 spent by Republicans….

Thankfully, Truman ignored the Keynesians. Government spending plummeted by nearly two-thirds between 1945 and 1947, from $93 billion to $36.3 billion in nominal terms. If we used the “multiplier” of 1.5 for government spending that is favored by Obama administration economists, that $63.7 billion plunge should have caused GDP to fall by $95 billion, a 40 percent economic decline. In reality, GDP increased almost 10 percent during that period, from $223 billion in 1945 to $244.1 billion in 1947. This is a rare precedent of a large drop in government spending, so its economic consequences are important to understand.