The litter in littérateur. Ricky Opaterny on Books, Music, Art, and Sports

• Why President Obama should have never said that he "hated the bank bailout": http://bit.ly/cuINEI #
• I would trade legislative transparency for a health care bill. I've read Eating Animals. I don't want to see how it's made! bit.ly/9CgSCc #
• Thinking about social media as a return to a pre-literate and not desirable age. #
• Getting ready for game time—Let's go, Team Canada! #
• Know any students interested in journalism and technology? We're looking for an intern: http://colligy.com/s/jobs/ed-intern/ #
• Pulling the goalie with a one-goal deficit just seems stupid to me. I've seen it fail three times in the Olympics and succeed none. #

As anyone who discussed Obama’s State of the Union address with me knows, I absolutely hated the speech’s opening in which Obama expressed his own hatred for the bank bailout. I hated it because Obama’s words seemed to me so, so untrue—or at least they should be untrue if he’s at all listened to the economists who surround him—so full of populist pandering. I was glad to hear David Frum echo this point on Marketplace a few days ago, arguing that it the problem isn’t just a lack of conviction but the fact that that absence of conviction will handcuff the government when it comes to pushing any sort of difficult, currently unpopular long-term policy.

• Why underdogs risk more in competition: http://bit.ly/98Eum4 #
• "[GDP] measures everything . . . except that which makes life worthwhile." -R.F.K. #
• Getting ready for South Africa: "A World Cup is the sort of common project that otherwise barely exists in modern societies." #
• I think I'm going to read Patti Smith's "Just Kids" and Edmund White's "Rimbaud" as a pair. #
• Listen to the new K's Choice single, "Come Live the Life": http://bit.ly/diNf26 #

• Of course, pubs stagger release dates. If you want the cheaper, more portable edition, you gotta wait. Why should ebooks be any different? #
• Why would I ever vote for a gubernatorial candidate who wants to run California like a business? #
• "In what way do technological systems have moral characteristics?" http://bit.ly/d9unn1 #
• Anyone know how to search tweets from only people you follow? #
• Techies, pay attention: "…our greatest challenge now is the decision not to do what it is in our power to do." –Jedediah Purdy #

• Why isn't the Twitterverse reviving the #amazonfail chorus over the bookseller's dropping all Macmillan titles? #
• Is Amazon nudging people to do the right thing and buy from independent bookstores?! http://nyti.ms/b0RKgS #
• Amazon/Macmillan standoff is over. Now, stop licensing eBooks to readers and start selling them! #
• Why haven't many people pointed out that the iPad can handle epub, PDF, and Kindle–all the ebook formats! #
• An excellent, long interview with DFW: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iP9TWD5QaRY #
• "…sending and getting…updates to and from dozens…of people every few minutes is an image from information hell." http://bit.ly/beXIaB #
• "Any journalist who cheerleads uncritically for Twitter is essentially asking for his own destruction." http://bit.ly/cWGnkf #