And that is the best line in this thread.

Secondly, rather than allow for a plot of nuance, J. J. Abrams keeps things black and white. Or, with the number of antagonists: Black, Dark Grey, Not as Dark Grey and white.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn picks up years from the end of the original episode, and had plenty of nuance. Kahn's vendetta against Kirk is due to a broken promise. They were supposed to check up regularly on Kahn and his penal colony; they did not. The technology stolen from the Federation is not intended as a superweapon, but a miracle of terraforming.

Kirk in the original is the protagonist, forced to deal with his own previous mistakes and oversights at great cost. He is less the angel as he is in the new one. Sure, new Kirk breaks the rules or makes rash decisions, but he does so for good reasons and it turns out mostly well.

I'm of two minds of this film --

Taken on its own, it's a fun film with excitement aplenty. The liberal nods were to be more or less expected. Star Trek in general has something of Progressive bent even at the beginning of the original series (that Original and Next Gen series tend to contradict each other at times is more an indication of the ever-changing nature of Progressivism), so yeah, I more or less can expect to see more of that. Cumberbach even compared the films plot to Bush-Cheney policy ...

However, rather than divest the film reboots from the original series, it seems it's more and more wedded to the original. As a result, I constantly see Abrams taking up old things and redoing them as he sees fit, rather than diverging into an entirely different direction as the supposed alternate timeline established by the original film would permit.

True enough. My brother - big Obama supporter - posted an article from the Economist stating that this is not Obama's fault. It's all the fault of the Bush administration who appointed those in the IRS and the fault of those wasically Wepublicans for making budget cuts that reduced the amount of staff in the IRS.

He, like others of his ilk, are constantly looking for anything that justifies whatever the president does.

Exactly. The CBO also projected Obamacare to be deficit-neutral, if I recall correctly.

I'm always suspicious about "Projections" too. They are basically making a prediction and whether it's correct or not depends on how accurate their data is and how accurate their interpretation of said data is. I suspect the latter is severely lacking.

I was born on Dec. 22nd. My lovely wife Amanda was born on Dec. 21st. Neither of us got a lot of parties when we were children. As far as we are concerned, our birthday is a big deal and one where we won't be giving each other combination Christmas/Birthday presents and cards.

Committee Chair: Madame Secretary, you told us you'd give us the truth about Benghazi, but you lied and obfuscated during your entire testimony!

Clinton: Yes, but when I promised to tell the truth, my fingers were crossed behind my back.

Committee Chair: Oh! Well that's okay then.

I think what bothers a lot of people I talk to is that as Jeffries states things, if you shop there he wins; if you don't shop there he wins; and all the buzz from these outrageous statements are like free publicity. It looks like win-win-win. That tends to get under a lot of people's skin.

My lovely wife's stated preference for how to deal with Abercrombie & Fitch was to gather as much 'uncool' people as possible and all go browsing in the store together at the same time.

It's a funny solution, at least.

This will also destroy small businesses, especially those that depend on internet sales. This isn't fair at all.

This move is so Ayn Randian I can't even believe it's happening sometimes.

I swear, the Libertarians are right about us Republicans.

I've gone mostly to podcasts, primarily because of the various problems I've had with radio.

First, in an office building, if you have a cheap radio, you get a terrible signal sometimes.

Secondly, in my last office, listening to the radio and streaming radio was frowned upon, so I started listening to podcasts.  I listen to the radio while I drive, but that's less than an hour a day.

That scene I remember depicted in The Quest of the Holy Grail. That was a book I enjoyed and appreciated greatly.

Ricochet was one of the few sites I actually use my real face.  Count yourselves lucky. Usually I go with a cow. It's an involved pun.

The picture here is one of my favorites when my lovely wife Amanda and I were still dating. We'd had a day at the beach near Bodega Bay. The wind was blowing and Amanda wanted a picture of us both. Here we are, smiling and thoroughly enjoying out time together before she had to go back to Utah.

I'm the one with the beard.

Okay, I'd grab that issue.

13 out of 13 and I never finished college.  In your face graduates!

Also, don't sweat the common gas question, most people miss that one.  Alternatively, be terribly, terribly ashamed you didn't know the answer.

Cat pictures almost make me feel something. Almost.