http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/books/la-ca-john-farrell-20110626,0,4503692.story

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036789/#43393077

I’ve quite enjoyed the first two e-books I purchased. I read them on my iPhone on the subway.

I like them so much that I wish I had bought them as hardbacks.

The First was “Empire of the Summer Moon,” the story of Quanah Parker and the Rise and Fall of the Comanches, the Most Powerful Indian Tribe in American History, as author S. C. Gwynne puts it. A terrific book, in the mold of “Son of the Morning Star” by Evan Connell or “Lonesome Dove” by Larry McMurtry.

Next up was “The Big Short,” by Michael Lewis, another absurdly talented writer, about the great crash of 2007-08 and the small group of iconoclasts and misfits that saw it coming and made gazillions going short. It is more than just the best book that I’ve read about the crash. It is one of the best books written about modern-day America, and American values. I hope Lewis got some movie money, and that Hollywood is not spending it all on “Too Big to Fail.”

As good as these books were, and as rich was the experience in reading them, there is definitely someting missing when you finish an e book, and you don’t get to give it an affectionate rub, sigh with regret that you’ve come to the end, and place it fondly in just the right place on your book shelf.

Books become friends. E books just shadows.

War is hell, as they say, and Joe the Plumber, in an ongoing campaign to earn his place as the most famous idiot in history, has just come forward with a solution for dealing with this irksome little fact. Ban war coverage.

Joe, who until his adoption by the McCain campaign’s after-school outreach effort was known as Samuel Wurzelbacher, recently touched down in the Middle East to begin a 10-day stint covering the conflict in Gaza for a conservative web site. He’s only been there a day, but what a day he’s had. According to CNN, Wurzelbacher, an unlicensed plumber-cum-foreign correspondent (who needs government re-training programs?), had this to say about media coverage and what he sees as its anti-Israel bias:

“I think media should be abolished from, you know, reporting. …if you’re gonna sit there and say, ‘well, look at this atrocity,’ well you don’t know the whole story behind it half the time, so I think the media should have no business in it.”

Coverage, of course, may vary from publication to publication. And some of it is certainly biased. Joe need look no further than his own employer for proof of that. But an out-and-out news black-out? Looks like Joe might have more in common with another famous censor from history who just happened to share his fake name. For future reference, may I suggest “Uncle Joe the Plumber” as a more appropriate moniker?

The Shat

By Robert Schlesinger

I have a theory about William Shatner: 10-15 years ago, he had an epiphany. Either he could go on being an unintentionally farcical B-actor or he could embrace it and by doing so transcend it. He could go from being Shatner and instead accept his clownsish reputation and become … Shatner.

The Priceline commercials followed and then Denny Crain in the late, great “Boston Legal.” James Tiberius Kirk was a great leader and Denny Crain a clownish figure, but as a friend of mine observed to me tonight, Captain Kirk never won an Emmy.

With today’s signing of the elite first baseman Mark Teixeira, the New York Yankees had their Shatner moment.

The Yankees have long since been universally reviled as big spenders, and with good reason. But they still struggled against it in their own way. People forget it, but for a long time the Yankees made a point of not signing the biggest contracts in the game. They let the Rangers sign A-Rod to his absurd deal; they let the Dodgers ink Kevin Brown to a ridiculous deal. The Yankees signed big deals, and a lot of them, but never the biggest ones.

And while another friend of mine suggested to me on Facebook today that “the yankees *always* get the guy. ALWAYS,” the fact of the matter is they didn’t. They would choose a Mike Mussina over a Manny Ramirez, a Randy Johnson over a Carlos Beltran. One, but not both. They had their limits, even though they caught crap for not having them.

No longer.

Limits? Bah. Why have limits when you can … not have limits. Why sign the best free agent on the market when you can sign the three best free agents on the market? Today the Yankees embraced their caricature, and are a better team for it. And … the Sox and Angels are worse. (For the record, the O’s are an irrelevancy anyway, while the Nats would have been fools to devote a quarter of their payroll to a corner infielder.)

I’m big on similes, metaphors and the like.

One of my favorites involves, depending on the telling, a good Samaritan and a poisonous creature of some sort — a snake, a scorpion, what have you.

The serpent asks the samaritan for help — crossing a river, getting up or down a mountain, etc.

Samaritan: If I pick you up you’ll sting me and I’ll die.

Creature: Nonononononono, of course I won’t. I need your help and won’t hurt you.

You know what’s coming, right? The creature stings. With his dying words the Samaritan asks how the creature could break his word. You knew what I was when you picked me up, the fault is yours. Creatures cannot change their nature.

Alternately, if the story involves crossing a river, the final question-and-answer takes place as the pair drown.  Then the moral of the story has the added message of: A creature can’t change its nature, even if its life is on the line.

I might be developing a journo-crush on Shepard Smith.

Here’s his latest act of professional heroism (which could only be improved upon by dismissing the notion of the “mainstream media” as the absurd artificial construct that it is):

Then there’s this one, previously, where he dismantles “Joe the Plumber:”

And this one, where he tools on the jumped-the-shark-so-long-ago Ralph Nader:

Best line:”You were reduced to complete irrelevance here, you weren’t able to play spoiler, will you run again?”

President-elect Obama’s first press conference just wrapped up, and I’m still reeling.

I could understand everything he said.

He spoke in clear, concise English (I had almost forgotten what it sounded like), and when a word occasionally escaped him, he paused to search for a coherent substitute. There were no new details. He addressed the direness of the economic situation and the need to “set politics aside for awhile.” He reiterated his desire to see a second stimulus package and tax cuts for middle and working-class Americans, and acknowledged the morning’s gloomy economic news: 240,000 more jobs shed in the month of October alone. As for cabinet appointments, they would be announced in the coming weeks, he said. He talked about his transition team and the choice of Rahm Emanuel as chief of staff. 

Most stricking was the personal transformation wrought by his election. He seemed tougher, more commanding, more direct than he has on previous occasions. The phalanx of middle-aged economic advisers behind him paled in his presence. When he didn’t want to answer a sensitive question, he said forcefully: “I’m going to skip that.” 

Still, Obama retained hints of humor. Asked by a reporter if he’d consulted any ex-presidents for advice, he said that all had been helpful, the living ones, that is. ”I didn’t want to get into a Nancy Reagan thing about, you know, doing any seances,” he joked. (Update: Obama’s reportedly already called to apologize to the former first lady, who was once widely mocked for consulting an astrologer during her husband’s presidency.)

Of course, he also addressed the “major issue” of what sort of dog he’d be buying his daughters Sasha and Malia. Malia is allergic, he said, so the future White House dog would have to be a hypoallergenic breed.

“Our preference would be to get a shelter dog, but, obviously, a lot of shelter dogs are mutts like me,” he deadpanned.