or Why I Stopped Watching Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader, Reason 227 I wanted to open this blog with the actual clip from Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader, episode 107 (S01E08), but I could not find a copy anywhere on the Internets. This was way back when that show was brand spanking new and I thought I’d watch a few episodes to see how it was. This was the last one I ever watched. Awful show. Anywho, I’ll have to describe it. The second contestant of the episode, a man, even­tually got asked the following question: In the Southern Hemisphere, the vernal equinox occurs in which month? [ . . . ]

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I just saw this ad on telly: The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, in conjunction with the Ad Council (both orga­ni­za­tions about which I have nothing positive to say), has funded and produced an adver­tisement featuring religious figures endorsing and promoting government programs. No mention of the featured anthro­po­morphic vegetables’ religious affil­i­ation is mentioned. Something about using explicitly religious char­acters to encourage children to follow government health advice strikes me as something less than neutral to religion, despite the secular purpose. But because promoting the health of children is a “legit­imate secular purpose”, this kind of thing doesn’t violate the [ . . . ]

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Kathy Griffin co-​​​​hosted New Year’s Eve at Times Square with Anderson Cooper on CNN last night. And she claims to be D-​​​​List. That’s a squarely C-​​​​List activity. Kathy tried her hardest to get Anderson fired, at one point asking him who, in the current admin­is­tration, he would most enjoy water­boarding. Of course we all know Anderson’s position on water­boarding (even though he never really comes out and says it), so he was quite perturbed, refused to answer, and accused Kathy of “crossing the line.” To which Ms Griffin responded by looking at the camera and saying, “That’s what I’m here for!” [ . . . ]

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