Turn on the TV! Quick! You’ve already missed more than ten minutes of President Barack Obama reminding us of how amazingly spectacular he is!

I would say it’s ridiculous how often President Obama is on TV. I’d say it’s still more evidence of his narcissism, and has provided no logical support for all the standard hippie crap he’s hocking. But in his defense, he’s competing with a vicious press corps that wants nothing more than to make him look bad.

It makes me want to murder someone.

To this point, the season 2 finale of Chuck is great. Googling for answers about season 3 I found a Chicago Tribune interview with Captain Awesome. And apparently there were rumors on Twitter over the weekend that season 3 had been confirmed: not so, says GiveMeMyRemote.

While the medium is hardly to blame, let me take this opportunity to say Twitter is retarded.

So what are they going to do with the final few minutes? No terrible cliffhangers yet. I won’t lie, if the episode ends with ambiguity I will assume:

1. Sarah and Chuck live happily ever after.
2. Whoever may or may not have died in tragic fashion will pull through.
3. John Casey spends the rest of his days gleefully assassinating terrorists of various shapes and sizes.

[Update: Such a good finale!! Producer Josh Schwartz was clearly bluffing when he said this would make for an unsatisfying end to the series. They avoided both things I was afraid of - this season ended well, and the twists could easily be developed into 13 great season 3 episodes!]

I contributed my first review to Amazon over the weekend when I noticed none had been posted for Mark Steyn’s recently published Lights Out: Islam, Free Speech, and the Twilight of The West. Maybe that’s because, unless you order from the Steyn Store, the book is not shipping yet… but I’ve been a fan of Steyn’s work for several years so I wanted to take the time to write a review. Though I’m a nerd of many hobbies and a short attention span, I cracked open Lights Out as soon as it arrived in the mail. Despite the fact I noted with my order that no dedication was necessary, Steyn took the time to add a funny comment with his autograph. For a frothing xenophobic hatemonger, he seems like a nice enough guy.

My Amazon review:

In “Lights Out: Islam, Free Speech And The Twilight Of The West,” Mark Steyn details his recent misadventures with Canada’s laughable “Human Rights” Commissions. After Maclean’s, a Canadian news weekly, printed an excerpt from Steyn’s America Alone: The End of the World As We Know It, the Canadian Islamic Congress sued Maclean’s for their “flagrant Islamophobia,” demanding space in the privately owned magazine to print a response. Two of three Commissions agreed to hear the case, despite the plaintiff’s arguments being written by five of Canada’s least literate law school students.

Lights Out is primarily a compilation of Steyn articles from the past several years, with a fair amount of new commentary related to the “human rights” trials. The Maclean’s articles cited as justification for legal action by the plaintiff are reprinted in full, followed by the plaintiff’s complaints, followed by Steyn’s concise destruction of said complaints. Far from the obnoxious partisan your average multiculti-cultist dismisses him as, Steyn relates international headlines and demographic stats in a way that’s thoughtful, worrying, and humorous. There are Muslim populations in Western countries that are hostile to Western culture and laws. These populations are growing rapidly, while native birth rates hover at unsustainable levels. Are these issues we’re allowed to discuss?

Steyn’s stated purpose is repeal of the Canadian law that created the freedom-suppressing Human Rights Commissions. An ambitious goal, to be sure, but one that will gain momentum after a few hundred thousand Canadians have read Lights Out. If you care about free speech, order this book.

So far I’m batting a thousand: 1 of 1 people found the review helpful. Ahh, the sweet taste of a stranger’s acceptance.

If you’re a regular Steyn reader, you may have already read many of the articles featured in Lights Out. If you’re a regular Steyn reader, I don’t have to tell you the book’s worth your time anyway!

From the Edmunds Inside Line on Thursday, a rumor that Pontiac is getting the axe:

According to a source at General Motors, the company will announce next Monday its new “faster, deeper” reorganization plan, which will likely include a death sentence for the Pontiac brand.

I’m sure friends and family tired of my grumbling each time a Pontiac commercial came on during March Madness. I’ve been saying for months that GM would have to be insane to drop Saturn and keep Pontiac. Rebadge the Solstice, G6, and G8 as Chevys, and call it a day. Is there anything else remotely interesting in the Pontiac line that isn’t already sold as a Chevrolet?

Seriously though, not a rhetorical question; I tried to check Chevrolet.com to refresh my memory and the site is throwing a “Generic failure in middleware” error. Maybe when GM gets that fixed they can come to their senses and instead of killing Saturn stop selling GMC as anything but fleet vehicles. I’ve never understood the GM “strategy” of so many identical models under multiple brands.

I feel obliged to mention that  the first car I bought was a ’99 Grand Am GT coupe. Black. Sunroof. Felt like climbing into an F-14 compared to the ’84 Tempo I had driven in high school. I bought it with around 30,000 miles on it, and loved it for the ~30,000 miles before things started breaking right and left.

That’s what we should put on GM’s tombstone if the billions upon billions in taxpayer bailouts aren’t enough to save the company: “We loved it, before things started breaking right and left.”

IMAO.us is a frightening place inhabited by frightening people. Not only do they talk regularly about guns – as if modern man has any right or need to own a firearm! – they have a tendency to discuss dinosaurs. As you may know, science will soon progress to the point where we can put together just about anything given a few strands of DNA. When this happens wild men like those at IMAO will be at the forefront, clamoring for giant genetically engineered lizards to strap lasers and rocket launchers upon.

Before we’ve hurtled off that precipice, it is our responsibility as Americans to bring IMAO into the mainstream by nurturing an ongoing and constructive dialogue. If there is one thing the first two months of this majestic and historifical presidential administration have taught us, it’s that offering bewildering platitudes is the way to win friends and influence people. To that end, I would like to present IMAO.us with the inaugural edition of the Prettier Than Olbermann award:

They may not literally be Prettier Than Olbermann, but it would probably be close if you took away Keith Olbermann’s hair and makeup crew. And assigned that hair and makeup crew to the IMAO.us team. And knocked back a few cheap cold ones.

Let’s hope this works, because if bad people who disagree with us can’t be silenced with lip service then we’ll have to call them racists, and then pretend they don’t exist while our allies harangue / sue them.

[Update: Typo in the second paragraph. Begone, improper tense usage!]

Yesterday FrankenKerry emerged from the dank seclusion of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to wreak havoc in an interview with USA Today:

Just back from a visit to Pakistan, Sen. John Kerry says the Obama administration’s plan for that volatile country, rolled out last month with great fanfare, “is not a real strategy.”

“Pakistan is in a moment of peril,” Kerry, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said during a session with USA TODAY reporters and editors. “And I believe there is not in place yet an adequate policy or plan to deal with it.”

The problem with talking, and talking, and talking, and talking is that sometimes people record what you’re saying. And, with most of your talking coming directly from your hind-quarters, it’s only a matter of time before you contradict yourself so glaringly that others notice.

Kerry’s comments amounted to one of the sharpest appraisals by a Democrat of one of Obama’s signature foreign policies. They marked a change from his initial reaction to Obama’s announcement of his plan for the region in a speech March 27, when Kerry issued a statement calling it “realistic and bold.”

Realistic but not real. Like Senator Kerry’s hair! Or President Obama’s cooperative attitude!

Kerry also criticized… something about a Pakistani military operation.

“The army went in, they expended a lot of energy for us, some lives, and you know, nothing came in underneath it – absolutely nothing. So you’re going to wind up with a bunch of folks who are going to hate you.

“If the army’s going to take the risk of going in there, for God’s sake you have the civil component coming in, so you win something for it,” Kerry said.

“Nothing came in underneath it” — is Kerry calling for deployment of America’s long-secret MoleBot Middle East Peace Drones? No, that would be silly. What Kerry wants is $1.5 billion in aid for Pakistan, with no requirement that Pakistan renounce terrorism. Note also how Kerry seems to assume the Pakistani army is a branch of the United States military, with America responsible for any internal strife. In Pakistan. Caused by Pakistani military operations.

I’m so relieved that when we got rid of Cowboy Dubya we didn’t have to forfeit our right to be represented around the world by John Kerry.

People are flipping out about the news from earlier this week that Khalid Sheik Mohammed, admitted planner of the 9/11 attacks, was waterboarded a lot:

CIA interrogators used the waterboarding technique on Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the admitted planner of the September 11 attacks, 183 times and 83 times on another al Qaeda suspect, The New York Times said on Sunday.

Generally I’m opposed to torture, but I have to admit there’s little we could do to known terrorists that would bother me. Used only in the most extreme circumstances, I see no problem with an effective practice that causes little to no physical harm. Heck, it doesn’t even have to be all that effective as far as I’m concerned, given the amount of carnage that the smallest piece of information could prevent. Vice President Cheney, Emperor or the Nether-realm, has claimed the CIA possesses documents proving that waterboarding yielded results:

“I haven’t talked about it, but I know specifically of reports that I read, that I saw, that lay out what we learned through the interrogation process and what the consequences were for the country,” Cheney said.

I hope Cheney’s being straight with us here, and I hope what he’s referring to is declassified. That may be too much to ask, since President Obama generally only releases information that lets him treat others like a puppy who needs his nose rubbed in some mess or another. More from the Reuters story -

The Senate Intelligence Committee is investigating the CIA interrogation program, which under President George W. Bush also included slamming prisoners into walls, shackling them in uncomfortable positions and depriving them of sleep.

Has it occurred to anyone else that the intolerable things that we do to some of the world’s worst villains wouldn’t look out of place in a high school bully’s daily routine? It’s so pathetic that we’re worrying about who should be prosecuted for violating the poor terrorists’ rights — instead of who should be thanked for keeping Americans safe.

[Update: Fixed a typo in the last paragraph.]

Politico reports that those wily scoundrels in the GOP are using disputed data to scare people about how much utility costs could increase if Congressional Democrats and the EPA have their way:

GOP Conference Chairman Mike Pence is defending Republican use of a widely disputed cost estimate on a Democratic global warming proposal, even after an outcry from media, environmentalists, and climate change experts.

Undisputed is the fact that the planet’s warming at such a rate that the United States and other developed countries should tax the pants off their inhabitants to make modest reductions in CO2 output. No matter that amid the heaps of research supporting global warming (most submitted by, shockingly, researchers whose careers are dedicated to “climate change” as a going concern) we occasionally see a story like the recent one from Australia:

Australian Antarctic Division glaciology program head Ian Allison said sea ice losses in west Antarctica over the past 30 years had been more than offset by increases in the Ross Sea region, just one sector of east Antarctica.

“Sea ice conditions have remained stable in Antarctica generally,” Dr Allison said.

Politico also notes how inconsistent GOP policymakers have been with regard to climate change…

The GOP’s scattershot messaging on climate change threatens to distract from the party’s primary attack on the Democrats’ global warming plan: that the cap-and-trade system will dramatically raise prices on business and consumers.

It’s past time for the GOP to realize that, accurate or otherwise, the Democrats take a party line and repeat it until it’s… well, undisputed. Every Republican misquote will be used as evidence the Democrats know what they’re talking about, precluding any need for actual debate. And instead of arguing whether regulations that are guaranteed to harm America’s economy are a reasonable response to computer models, you know the fight will be over the timeline, severity, and fluffy verbiage of whatever terrible bill is enacted. Happy earth day, suckers!

Everywhere in this administration is the “progressive” notion of American citizens as children waiting for Washington to pat us on our heads and send us on our way. The Associated Press reports on a bill President Obama will be signing today dedicating $5.7 billion to Americorps:

The legislation provides for gradually increasing the size of AmeriCorps to 250,000 enrollees from its current 75,000. It outlines five broad categories where people can direct their service: helping the poor, improving education, encouraging energy efficiency, strengthening access to health care and assisting veterans.

Let’s be blunt: this is bullshit. Is there not enough for the federal government to spend our money on? I don’t need broad categories defined by Ted Kennedy and Orrin Hatch to tell me how I can be a good citizen. If I want to help the poor, I’ll volunteer at a soup kitchen, or donate clothes & non-perishables, or look up the local Habitat for Humanity office. If I want to improve education, I’ll tutor kids at one of the dozens of elementary schools in my city. High energy costs do a mighty fine job of encouraging energy efficiency (eeewwww, markets!), so that’s covered. If I want to commit negligent homicide and walk away scot-free, maybe then I’ll consult Ted Kennedy.

Local non-profit groups need help and regularly advertise to that effect. A fair percentage of Americans are literate. So what’s the need for this $5.7 billion expenditure?

Bolstering voluntary public service programs has been a priority of Obama, who credits his work as a community organizer in his early 20s for giving him direction in life.

Right. Bad news for us: President Obama’s formative years were spent among a bunch of lefty nutbags.

That’s my review of tonight’s episode of Chuck.

To use several more words: Yvonne Strahovski. Yikes. Adam Baldwin sets a high bar of badassery, and then hurls himself right over it. The past several episodes the story has been interesting, the writing has leaned towards action while bringing well-timed laughs, and the stars continue to be great at what they do. If you’ve missed it – Hulu has not.

Then you get to the preview for the next episode (and season finale). Are we headed for a cliffhanger? It looks cliffhanger-ish, but let’s face it… most of the commercials feature some combination of Chuck with a gun to his head and Sarah in her underoos. Again I thought, “Have they renewed Chuck? Because it’s been great and they better not ruin it.”

I turned to The Internets. And wouldn’t you know it, the New York Times Arts Beat posted an interview with Josh Schwartz, one of Chuck‘s creators, this morning. The gist of the interview is that renewal or cancellation have still not been announced, which understandably sucks for everyone involved in making the show. They asked Schwartz about the season two finale, and his response was as far from what I was hoping for as a response could be:

If, in two weeks, that is the last episode of the show to ever air, it will be one of the least satisfying finales of all time.

Times like these I’m glad I have no power or influence! Should Chuck end in a miserable cliffhanger? Or should the show get another 20-some episodes, more than half of which are likely to be tired rehashes of old episodes mixed with on-again-off-again nonsense?