writer

div class=”dkimg-c”img src=”http://images1.dailykos.com/i/user/1054/Gothic_Owl_550px_TEXT.jpg” alt=”Open Thread for Night Owls” height=”100″ width=”550″ //div At emEsquire/em, Charlie Pierce reviews emGame Change/em, the movie based on the book based on the true-story nightmare of a href=”http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/game-change-movie-review-7186191#ixzz1oeenLxcU”that thing we all lived through just a few short years ago/a:br / blockquoteWhen John Heilemann, and the utterly inexcusable Mark Halperin, published

div class=”dkimg-c”img src=”http://images1.dailykos.com/i/user/1054/Gothic_Owl_550px_TEXT.jpg” alt=”Open Thread for Night Owls” height=”100″ width=”550″ //div At emEsquire/em, Charlie Pierce reviews emGame Change/em, the movie based on the book based on the true-story nightmare of a href=”http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/game-change-movie-review-7186191#ixzz1oeenLxcU”that thing we all lived through just a few short years ago/a:br / blockquoteWhen John Heilemann, and the utterly inexcusable Mark Halperin, published

The views expressed in this piece are solely those of the writer and don’t represent any organization he serves. This piece originally appeared as an op-ed on JTA in response to a piece by a new group called, “Jews for Palin.” When President Obama took office last year, our country seemed to be teetering. Eight years of war, monstrous deficit spending, a breakdown of diplomacy and a disdain for science and civil liberties welcomed the new President into office.

THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. — Tiger Woods has withdrawn from his own golf tournament after citing injuries from a car crash near his Florida home. Woods said in a statement on his Web site Monday that injuries won’t allow him to play in the Chevron World Challenge. He said he would return to competition next year. “I am extremely disappointed that I will not be at my tournament this week,” Woods said.

David Letterman acknowledged on Thursday’s show that he had sexual relationships with female employees and that someone tried to extort $2 million from him over the affairs. During the taping of his CBS late-night show in New York, Letterman discussed receiving a threat to either pay $2 million or risk the relationships being made public. In a release from the show’s production company, Letterman said he referred the matter to the Manhattan district attorney’s office and that an investigation ended in an arrest Thursday.

The great mystery is still why President Barack Obama would whiplash obstructionist GOP congresspersons with Rush Limbaugh. A guy who a big majority of Americans don’t like and who rates lower than any other political figure. That was the finding of the Greenberg-Quinlan-Rosner poll taken back in late October. The poll released by a Democratic leaning polling firm may well be politically partisan and tainted, and Limbaugh and company loudly screamed that it was. But he is America’s long time great polarizing talk show gabber, and it’s a role he relishes.

2008 was kind of a rough year for American publishers, culminating in the bloodbaths of November and December which saw hundreds of firings, major restructuring at Random House, and a crisis at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt which may yet prove fatal. Industry professionals are understandably looking for a silver bullet to reverse the trend: a new blockbuster from Dan Brown? A trilogy of teen sorcerer novels from Jhumpa Lahiri? Saddam Hussein’s memoir, written from beyond the grave?

ELECTION junkies in acute withdrawal need suffer no longer. Though the exciting Obama-McCain race is over, the cockfight among the losers has only just begun. The conservative crackup may be ugly, but as entertainment, it’s two thumbs up! Over at Fox News, Greta Van Susteren has been trashing the credibility of her own network’s chief political correspondent, Carl Cameron, for his report on Sarah Palin’s inability to identify Africa as a continent, while Bill O’Reilly valiantly defends Cameron’s honor.