Researchers discover a future home for humanity

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Well, we're fucking up our own planet so badly, maybe we can move here if we don't first destroy ourselves along with it:

Astronomers may have identified one of the richest planetary systems yet.

The discovery of a seventh planet around the dwarf star KIC 11442793 could be a record, according to two separate teams of researchers.

The system bears some similarities to our own, but all seven planets orbit much closer to their host star, which lies some 2,500 light-years from Earth.

*****

The new planet is the fifth furthest from its parent star, orbiting with a period of nearly 125 days.

With a radius of 2.8 times that of the Earth, it fits into a family that now includes two roughly Earth sized worlds, three "super-Earths" and two larger bodies.

Perfect. Set the controls to Warp Factor 9.2, minimum.

Going where the right-wing thinks you've always been

By Richard K. Barry

We all know the right wing loves to talk about government waste, as if all we need to do is cut the fat and Bob's your uncle as far deficits are concerned. It's always bullshit, but they never tire of saying it.

Apparently, just for the hell of it, the IRS decided it would be a great idea to spend $60,000 on a Star Trek parody with some kind of a tax theme, and call it a training video:

The six-minute "Star Trek" video made in Maryland was shown to agency employees at a conference in 2010. In the video, IRS workers are meticulously dressed as characters from the popular TV show and are flying a staged space craft towards the planet "Notax."

I don't know what I find sillier, that they spent so much money on something so bad or that someone sought out William Shatner, aka Capt. Kirk, to ask him what he thought about the whole thing.

For the record, he was appalled and thought it was a waste of money. Great.

And thank you, IRS, for giving the right wing something to talk about for decades. We already loved you anyway.

Battle of the stars

By Mustang Bobby

Galactic entertainment news for nerds: 

Star Trek director J.J. Abrams will be helming the next Star Wars movie. "It's done deal with J.J.," a source with knowledge of the situation told Deadline today. Argo director Ben Affleck was also up for the gig, the source says. Despite saying publicly that he didn't want to direct a new Star Wars, Abrams was courted heavily by producer Kathleen Kennedy to take the job. Expected in 2015, Episode VII will be the first new Star Wars movie since 2005's Episode III: Revenge Of The Sith. 

The last Star Wars movies — the "prequels" — sucked out loud, and the reboot of Star Trek by J.J. Abrams in 2009 was actually pretty good, so this match-up should be an improvement.

And speaking of match-ups, here's a sneak peek at what would happen when worlds collide. 


(Cross-posted at Bark Bark Woof Woof.)

Happy New Year from The Reaction

By Michael J.W. Stickings

I can't speak for everyone here, but I must say I don't much care for New Year's. It's probably my least favorite "holiday" of the year (with Valentine's Day being my least favorite faux "holiday"). But, well, a day off's a day off, and it's been a pleasant holiday season so far, so who am I to complain?

Besides, tonight we followed tradition by bringing some good Indian food and then watching movies: first the always-amusing Despicable Me (for, like, the 1,453rd time) with the kids, then the incredible Rashomon (the Criterion Blu-ray version, of course). And then flipping through some truly awful TV, Canadian and American alike, before finally landing on CNN (Anderson Cooper, looking helpless, and the astoundingly unfunny Kathy Griffin?) for the usual anticlimax. And now I'm watching the rather underrated Ghostbusters II -- because, why not, and it's the best thing on.

All this after seeing The Hobbit in IMAX 3D this afternoon. I wasn't exactly looking forward to it -- though I did like the LOTR trilogy quite a bit -- but... wow. Awesome, awesome movie. (Though the highlight of that experience was the incredible extended preview for Star Trek: Into Darkness, which plays more like a short film than a trailer -- possibly the best movie preview I've ever seen.)

Anyway, we'll be back with the political blogging soon. Thanks to Richard for holding down the fort during my break the past several days.

(Hey, did you know America went over the fiscal cliff? No? Seems like nothing happened? Uh, yeah, that's because there's no fucking fiscal cliff. It's just an invention of the media, the fiscal scolds, and various Republicans who are trying to scare the country shitless so as to score some political points. So, yeah, whatever. A deal will get done, likely very soon, and it'll be a deal done mostly on President Obama's terms (because he has the leverage now that the Bush tax cuts have expired), which, while hardly perfect, will be way better than a deal done on strictly Republican terms.)

In the meantime, I may not much care for New Year's, but I do love this...

Happy New Year, everyone. Make it a happy and safe one, and best wishes for 2013.

Clintonian ethics, a case study: When you're losing, change the rules

By Michael J.W. Stickings

How utterly pathetic is the Clinton campaign? How utterly noxious has it become? And what utter loserdom. Having not won a contest since Super Tuesday, and after yet another drubbing yesterday in Wisconsin and Hawaii, Clinton is now seeking not to win the race by playing by the rules -- that is, by actually beating Obama -- but to win it by changing the rules:

This morning brings the news that the campaign of Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-NY, has launched a new
website where they are announcing how they are officially preparing to make the case that the rules of the Democratic nomination process should be changed.

Among many "facts" they declare are some accurate ones, such as the idea that superdelegates, which in true nomenclatural dexterity they now term "automatic delegates" "are expected to exercise their best judgment in the interests of the nation and the Democratic Party."

But then comes this juicy non-fact:

"FACT: Florida and Michigan should count, both in the interest of fundamental fairness and honoring the spirit of the Democrats' 50-state strategy."

That's not a fact, that's an opinion.

And it's clear evidence (not that there was any mystery about it) that the Clinton campaign is trying to change the rules in the middle of the game.

Come to think of it, the Clinton campaign has a point. Why play by the rules when you can change the rules at any time? This is where Belichick and the Patriots went wrong. Sure, they were 18-0, but they went ahead and played the Super Bowl by the rules. And so they let Eli Manning drive the Giants down the field for the winning TD near the end of the game and then failed to score on a last-minute drive that went nowhere. What if the Patriots had simply changed the rules? What if, on that play where Manning scrambled and found David Tyree for one of the greatest catches ever, the Patriots had changed the rules so that touching the QB was a sack? Or what if, at the end of the game, they had simply changed the rules of mathematics so that 14 was worth more than 17?

Okay, that's crazy, I know. The rules are the rules, whether in football or mathematics.

But this is the sort of crazy coming from an increasingly desperate Clinton campaign these days. Is it any wonder that so many of us are coming more and more to despise the Clinton campaign? I am an Obama supporter, yes, but I didn't want that support to mean anything other than situational opposition to Clinton. Which is to say, I didn't support Obama because I was against Clinton in any deeply negative way but rather because I liked him more and thought he would make the better president.

This has changed. I am now genuinely opposed to Clinton and her campaign, over which she must be held responsible. It is a campaign that is losing, that is desperate, that is looking for any way to get back on top, no matter what, that is hurling attacks at Obama from all sides, that is, as we can now see, trying to change the rules.

As Steve Benen points out, Clinton still has options and hasn't yet lost the race. This is true. But it also seems that the Clinton campaign has given up trying to win the race legitimately. Indeed, as Jason Zengerle remarks, it might simply be "incapable" of doing that. It's all about the bullshit now, as Matthew Yglesias notes.

And so the attacks will continue, as will the excuses, as will these efforts to change the rules.

In Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Adm. Kirk admits to Lt. Saavik that, when younger, he beat the unwinnable Kobayashi Moru test by reprogamming the simulator -- that is, by changing the rules, by cheating. Hillary Clinton is no James T. Kirk, of course, and Kirk had good reason not to believe in "the no-win scenario," but Clinton's last-ditch efforts to change the rules reflects a similar outlook, a similar arrogance, however ignoble.

It is time for Democrats to say NO to Hillary Clinton.