Unsought Input

Ron Paul has been adopted by the internet masses. Just look at the home page of Reddit or even worse, Digg. Go ahead and look, I’ll wait. How many stories about Ron Paul did you see? Paul has even set an online fundraising record, raising $4.2 million dollars in one day.

It’s not surprising that he’s turned a lot of heads, especially considering the Republican debates so far - while Rudy Guliani, Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson and company fought over who could bury their heads furthest in the sand, Paul showed actual knowledge of how the world works and why the U.S. was attacked.

Ron Paul is a great candidate. Without him, the most pithy statement about the war you would hear would be Guliani saying “9/11″ every 60 seconds. He’s also the only one trying to remind the conservative party that they are supposed to be financially conservative.

That said, it’s important to note that Ron Paul would make a terrible president.

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Before we answer that question, take a look at the video below. This is Jon Stewart interviewing Chris Matthews about his new book, Life’s a Campaign: What Politics Has Taught Me About Friendship, Rivalry, Reputation, and Success:

This is very different from most interviews with authors touring news and talk shows in support of their new book. The most obvious difference is that Stewart has a strong opinion and actually takes Matthews to task for what in the book. Most interviews consist of fluffy questions like, “so what inspired you to write this book” followed by 60 seconds of uninterrupted marketing while the interviewer casts loving gazes the author’s way.The most shocking thing for me, though, is that Stewart has actually read Matthews’ book and come up with his own, very informed, opinion about it. It sounds disgusting, but I don’t think I’ve gotten this impressions from any “real news” shows in the past.Take a look at The Daily Show interview with Alan Greenspan:

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Many years ago, I got a bachelor’s degree in journalism. After considering a few $20,000 per year job offers, I decided to work in web development instead. For a few years, I would read the paper or check out the news and wish I was writing instead of coding.

Not so much any more. I don’t think I could put up with the crap. Much like Mika Brzezinski from MSNBC, who just couldn’t stomach reporting about Paris Hilton any more:

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I don’t think I can add anything to this. George W. Bush busts a move with some African dancers, via the Daily Show:

More video of the move-busting…

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Just last year I wrote a little bit about why YouTube works. Since then, two major things have happened: YouTube was bought by Google, and large copyright-holding corporations finally noticed it. The almost inevitable result? Billion-dollar lawsuits.

I’ll let The Daily Show explain the situation better than I can:

But really, who cares?  Two multi-billion dollar companies duking it out in court surely doesn’t effect you or I.  But there are at least two reasons why it does matter.

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Lewis Black is an angry, shouting comedian. You might recognize him from his appearances on The Daily Show. He took some time to review the major issues of 2006 and grapple with Christmas.

I’m not sure if this counts as yet another salvo in the ongoing War on Christmas (he hates it) or a brave flanking maneuver from an unlikely ally (he hates the rampant commercialization of it). Perhaps if he had read our guide to fighting the War on Christmas, he would be able to make less ambiguous pronouncements.

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Many, many Americans have been wondering - how can we win the War in Iraq? Up until recently, the President was not one of them. He knew exactly what needed to be done. But times have changed. The President is officially in listening mode.

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A few days ago news broke that Comedy Central had requested YouTube take down a bunch of video clips from their shows, including The Daily Show, South Park, and The Colbert Report. They have the right to do so under copyright law and the DMCA, of course, but the fact that they hadn’t bothered for such a long time made me think that maybe they understood why YoutTube works.

Did the takedown notice mean they didn’t get it after all? Were their lawyers just procrastinating? It looks like they do get it, after all - YouTube and Viacom have reached a licensing agreement.

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