I just finished watching Clubhouse, one of CBS’s several promising new dramas for this season. I’m enthusiastic about it. Fine writing and a solid cast. Dean Cain has proven he’s capable of holding down a leading role in a weekly series with Superman. Veteran actors Mare Winningham, Christopher Lloyd, and Cherry Jones lend gravitas to the production. Can Jeremy Sumpter, the young lead, hold down an hour-long drama for a whole season? Or multiple seasons?

Sports-themed shows have a mixed record on network TV. The White Shadow never really caught on. Lucas Tanner and Bay City Blues tanked. Coach was a hit but it was a half-hour sitcom not a full hour drama. Can Clubhouse kick the curse? CBS must think so or they wouldn’t have given it a shot.

To be honest I like to see TV and movies telling baseball stories. There’s a an air of healthy introspection to them. America getting back to its roots.

On September 26, 1960 70 million viewers tuned in to see the first-ever televised presidential debate. The debate took place in Studio One in the CBS studios in Chicago. For the full text of the debate see here (also contains a link to RealAudio of the debate). For a RealVideo documentary on the debates see here.

In this first debate John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon debated each other on domestic issues. The candidates were pretty well-matched on substance. But while radio listeners proclaimed Nixon the winner of the debate TV viewers decided that Kennedy had won the debate by a substantial margin. Kennedy’s poise, charisma, good looks, and good grooming won the day.

A new era in Presidential politics had begun.

As you may or may not already be aware, members of the Watcher’s Council hold a vote every week on what they consider to be the most link-worthy pieces of writing around… per the Watcher’s instructions, I am submitting one of my own posts for consideration in the upcoming nominations process.
Here is the most recent winning council post, here is the most recent winning non-council post, here is the list of results for the latest vote, and here is the initial posting of all the nominees that were voted on.

Brad DeLong has written an interesting post in which he contemplates causes, reasons, and the theory of the mind:

Matthew Yglesias argues that we have a moral duty to take the reasons that people advance seriously. I wish to dissent in large part: we do have a transcendental and practical duty to take the reasons that people advance seriously only under certain conditions: when those reasons form part of a coherent structure of thought that is stable and consistent over time. When those reasons are not stable and consistent over time, then we are dealing not with a Mind but with a deceptive simulacrum of a mind, and it is a waste of our own powers–it is disrespectful to ourselves–to try to take these reasons seriously […]

He goes on to present examples of inconsistencies—inconsistency over time using Andrew Sullivan as an example and inconsistency between writing and deed using Robert Nozick as an example.

I think Mr. DeLong is being a little harsh and, ultimately, self-defeating.
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The Carnival of the Recipes is being hosted this week by Jennifer at Mellow Drama. More than a score of recipes from some of the best cooks in the blogosphere!

Zachary Taylor was our 12th President and from the looks of him (left) he was a pretty tough customer. He had various nicknames—“Old Rough and Ready” and “Old Buena Vista” since he was the hero of the Battle of Buena Vista in the Mexican-American War. It was at this battle that he wisecracked to his men “Trust in God and keep your powder dry” (although apparently Oliver Cromwell had said it first).

Taylor was pretty upset when President James K. Polk sent Gen. Winfield Scott to capture Mexico City instead of him. He said “the battle of Buena Vista opened the road to the city of Mexico and the halls of Montezuma, that others might revel in them.” (in case you were wondering where the phrase in The Marines’ Hymn came from).

When running for President his campaign slogan was “a President for the People”.

He was born in Orange County, Virginia, on September 24, 1784.

Why do so many government programs fail? We’ve seen it time and time again. A need is identified, a program is formulated and put into place, everything starts out well enough, and then, perhaps over time, something happens. The program doesn’t achieve its goals. Or the amount of resources needed for it to achieve its goals are vastly more than expected.

We’ve seen this in Social Security, Medicare, the Great Society programs, and the public school system. Is it waste, fraud, and abuse (those favorite whipping-boys of legislators)? Welfare cheats? Incompetence? Just needs a little fine tuning? We’re not spending enough (no matter how much we seem to be spending)?
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(and a recipe for Mulligatawny)

The most useful trick I ever learned in a cooking class was how to poach a chicken breast. Here’s what you do:

1. Place a skinless, boneless chicken breast in a pan.
2. Put enough water in the pan to cover the chicken breast.
3. Bring the water in the pan up to the boil over medium-high heat.
4. Simmer for two minutes.
5. Turn the heat off.
6. Let the chicken breast sit in the hot water for twenty minutes.

That’s it. So what do you do with the chicken breast once you’ve got it?
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William Holmes McGuffey, author and compiler of the McGuffey’s Eclectic Readers series, was born on September 23, 1800. He wrote his first readers in 1836. By the time he died in 1873 his books were being used all over the United States.

In addition to reading the McGuffey Readers taught the moral and intellectual virtues of integrity, honesty, kindness, temperance, true patriotism, courage, and politeness. Forgive me but I think we could use a lot more of all of these.

In accordance with his contract, Mr. McGuffey received only $1,000 for his work. If he had received one penny for each book sold, he would have received $1,220,000. He wasn’t interested in money. He wanted to educate kids. And that’s what he did.
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