DRW50

I'd forgotten about how hilarious this fandom is. If you see an article where, for instance, they go on and on about the new brotherly bond between Dean and vampire Benny, you will get: - a slew of comments about how Sam is being pushed off the show - comments in response to those comments saying the show had been all about Sam, had become terrible because Dean had been neglected, and Dean would now have the prominence he deserved. - fear and fright that this Dean/Benny bond is a way to make people forget about Dean's "profound bond" with Castiel, and that Castiel will be pushed off the show. A fan claims that Misha Collins said at a meet and greet that Dean and Castiel share a love and that everyone at the show knows it. This leads to: - celebration that Dean and Castiel are now "canon" - fervent hopes that Dean and Castiel will now be a true romantic couple - Sam/Dean fans responding that the true love story on the show will always be Sam and Dean and everyone knows it I'm not sure I can remember any long-running fan war over two couples who, in-jokes aside, will never actually be romantic onscreen in any way, or even declare love for each other in a way besides friendship or brotherhood. But this has probably kept the show on for eight years, so it works.

I'd probably enjoy seeing the whole story again (especially since it's all gone now from Youtube), since the acting (mostly) and writing (mostly) were of a good to very good standard. The show was in a good place. I'm sorry that The City was so unfocused in comparison. Geoffrey Ewing deserved more from soaps than he got. I remember how happy I was when he was cast on GL, only to see him given stories more offensive than I ever could have imagined. He was then dumped, with a whimper, and wasn't too happy about it.

Brenda Epperson is great in this scene. So is Diana Barton. This episode also has one of the last appearances of a very sedate, possibly sedated Flo. And the last Jack story I cared about. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpqsTylyddw&feature=autoplay&list=ULcaZkdOlG-kQ&playnext=6

Thank you to saynotoursoap. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bb84BapzPp8

Gallup hasn't been accurate in years. They got a number of key elections very wrong, including 1996 and 2000. They are now claiming Romney has a huge lead in early voters, which I don't think anyone else is saying. One of the "unskewed polls" sites is calling Nate Silver gay. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/us-election/romney-supporters-pick-a-new-target-statistician-nate-silver/article4723460/

I don't think there's a real tipping point in an election. Look at 2000. That was supposed to be an easy Bush win and clearly was not in the end. If you meant something I said in the post you quoted, my apologies. They don't get anything out of that. They only work for what gives them money and power. They wouldn't keep telling us Romney has momentum and is now a moderate hero if they wanted him to lose.

Norm Coleman, former "moderate" senator and veneers pitch person, booted out of office by Al Franken after months of court action, is letting us know that Romney won't go against Roe v Wade. He's lucky this is coming out when no one will be focusing on it, as this will make the social conservatives flip. http://2012.talkingp...-roe-v-wade.php Meanwhile, out of nowhere, Bob Kerrey, who was left for dead in the Nebraska Senate race, and will probably still lose, is now only a few points behind Palin-backed GOP nominee Deb Fischer, who has been having big ethical scandals. http://www.thedailyb...enate-seat.html http://www.omaha.com.../710289933/1101 Rove is throwing money in so they must be worried.

I didn't mean to discount the racism of the last few decades, but more to mention that there were some butt-covering efforts in 2004 or 2006, trying to say that it was a big tent as long as you were with them on social issues, pledging immigration reform, etc, pushing media hype candidates like Michael Steele. There was a huge backlash to the immigration reform plans in 2006 and then Obama got the nomination in 2008, so everything seemed to fall into place for very in-your-face racism.

Considering they were trying to find money they didn't even have, I'm not too surprised. They probably just saw him as a former AMC actor who wasn't even brought back at the end (which I still don't get).

LaMura was lucky compared to many soap actors, as the character seemed to have good to very good writing for most of his tenure on the show. I do wonder about working on AMC in the 80s though. Sometimes it sounds very difficult and not something to have fond memories of.

They did in the past, but have notably stopped in recent years. Compare how President Bush (II) spoke about immigration policy to how the current GOP slate of candidates have spoken. Or how Karl Rove tried very hard to get the Latino vote whereas now the most you get between "build a fence" is that Hispanics should vote for the GOP because of Jesus and the economy. Compare the efforts at courting the black vote in 2004 and 2006 to going on about welfare queens and having Sarah Palin go on TV talking about shuck and jive. I think the GOP made a very calculated decision in 2008 and 2010 to abandon minority voters, and they are pushing forward on that path unless they can convince minority voters that Allen West, Marco Rubio, Herman Cain, and David Rivera actually care about them in any way. They are counting on the angry white vote.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9IAvIRZVoyM 5-6 more clips of the first part. Second part starting: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKEblca1Q9c

Bleh, never a big fan of this story (and kind of out of character for everyone involved). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ceLrJtI2ZfE&feature=channel&list=UL http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gon9NCv6Py4

Christine Tudor auditioned for GH's Alexandria Quartermaine.

I think the media can do more than they are. The problem is the media wants bigotry. They love it. They release the wild animals and then as they watch the carnage, they can shake their head, sigh Aaron Brown style, and act above it all.

They don't just get coverage in their own echo chamber. They endlessly go to the media, which is more than happy to repeat these comments, with a minimum of tut-tutting from empty suits. Besides, it is very dangerous for people who have so much power and such a public voice to say things like "go back to Kenya." We shouldn't just accept this because they're speaking to a rally.

I think there is a mix of cynical efforts to stop any Democratic-leaning voters, and genuine racism. There have long been two camps in the GOP - the Rove and Lee Atwater types who harness hatred for gain, and the true believers, who loathe and detest all the "others". I'd say the latter have now taken over more and more, and you are getting more and more people who are skilled manipulators as well as probably not faking their prejudices and bigotries (Jim DeMint, Rick Santorum). There's also an effort out there which focuses on stopping college kids from being able to vote - a New Hampshire legislator early this year essentially said he was pushing to stop college kids from voting because they were too young and too stupid to know they shouldn't vote for Democrats.

Of course they care about black voters. If they didn't they wouldn't have spent so many years disenfranchising them in every way possible.

John Sununu's comment is not in isolation. People have been saying this type of comment about Obama for five years now. Day after day after day of the media giving a megaphone to people who say: - Obama only gets support because he's black along with - Obama wasn't born in the US - Obama needs to go back to Africa - Obama hates America and plots to destroy it - Obama is lying to the public about his evil past - Obama is a secret "race hustler" who is only in office to ruin the white man. This isn't some Tea Party heckler, this comes from people who command national media attention, and adoration. Michelle Bachmann. Donald Trump. John Sununu. Ann Coulter. The families of prominent politicians like Romney and Tommy Thompson. There's a basic derision and dehumanization which overtakes almost all the coverage of Obama, whereas any support for Obama is usually just dismissed as being based on race, or being part of a fading cult. There's often this idea that people who object to these comments are too "PC", too "shrill," need to get over it, make things worse. But these comments, when all lumped together, for years on end, become part of the public consciousness. It's an adult version of the ugly slurs that often line the school hallways, one that, if anyone ever complained, all they got in return was, "If you bring it up you'll just make it worse."

Comments like Sununu's aren't just isolated. They all go together as part of a deliberate attempt to push a racist view on the public. And it tends to work. http://www.dallasnews.com/news/politics/national-politics/20121027-ap-poll-majority-of-americans-harbor-prejudice-against-blacks.ece

The media is definitely pushing that he still has a great chance in Ohio, and even giving him tips. http://www.politico....2961.html?hp=l2 I'm also annoyed by the whole "Is Todd Akin still capable of winning?" It feels like a forced narrative, their sudden discovery of close polls, so they can be awed at his comeback. He was never really out of it. Polls showed him competitive from relatively soon after the rape comments. Sadly, many voters won't care.

I just took that scene where she says she's a professor now as sort of a goodbye, although I do think there is still material left to mine (especially if they get away from her talking about being too old and damaged and so on). Matt Smith and Alex Kingston have such fantastic chemistry together. From the first scene they had when she flew into the TARDIS (which was one of the first scenes he filmed), they've had chemistry. Could you believe that at a bookstore yesterday I saw a display of Doctor Who keychains, shirts, games, mini-action figures, mugs, magnets, talking plushies, toys, etc. etc. I never imagined I'd see something like that in the US. Perhaps they have before and I've just missed it. I knew the show was BBC America's biggest show but I'd never seen marketing like that - usually all I see is the magazine on the rack and a few DVDs for sale in the DVD section.

This is a great start. I like all the character details on Paolo and her daughters. I got a little confused about who was Nikki and who was Giselle. Their conversations seemed to have a good feel and I could hear them in my head. I think paragraph breaks would help make the read easier.

That last story sounds very good. So Pete was with mother and her two daughters. That's one of those wonderful soap records I can never remember how many others have reached.

So, on a somewhat sad Youtube trek watching clips of Castiel the fallen angel of Supernatural, I saw the origin story of his "vessel" - a very devout husband and father, Jimmy Novak, who gave up everything when he was asked to let Castiel possess him. Those angst-ridden, earnest faces: finally reminded me of everyone's favorite Medicare savior: Now if they'd said that Paul Ryan, husband and father, had given up his soul to let Ayn Rand possess him, or if they just offered to replace him on the ticket with Misha Collins, I would be very very very very very slightly more tempted to vote for him. (OK, not really, but they could have at least tried).