Oh, Good. Christmas Music Has Started.
Monday, November 29, 1999
- "With the Hillary Rodham Clinton Rodham …" There was a great deal of discussion over the latter half Thanksgiving week, that the entire "Is it yes or no?" deal at Mrs. Clinton's appearance at a New York teacher's union meeting was anything but spontaneous. In fact, it was thoroughly rehearsed. For an un-retouched photo of Hillary's Hair click here.
- "The Kodak moment …." The Megillah is the story of the of the Jewish celebration of Purim which more or less is contained in the Book of Esther in the Bible. This story relates the downfall of Haman, prime minister of ancient Persia, who sought to murder all the Jews of that land, but whose designs were defeated by the famed teacher, Mordechai.
Purim, generally, celebrates the ability of the Jewish people to sustain themselves against anti-Semitism through the ages.
The idiom (which Buchanan misused) is "the whole Megillah" which refers to the length of the reading of the Book of Esther which, according to Jewish law, is to be read twice during the holiday. Because the custom is for the congregation - especially the children - to make noise every time the name "Haman" is mentioned, this can take up to 90 minutes. The Megillah, as a RealAudio file from the internet is over 4.5 megabytes to download and takes one hour, 18 minutes, 47.3 seconds. That's the whole Megillah.
- "Buzz Lightyear is a better …" Buzz Lightyear is the space ranger toy in the story who's battle cry is "To Infinity … and Beyond!" Denise Richards plays a nuclear physicist named "Dr. Christmas Jones" who's battle cry should be "To Acting Class … and No Further!"
- "So is Barney Rubble." Barney Rubble was Fred Flintstone's sidekick but this is an homage to a great movie, "Night Shift" which was an early Michael Keaton vehicle. At one point he says, "That Barney Rubble. What an actor." Too true.
- "This is why he won a Pulitzer …" The most extraordinary thing I ever heard Breslin say came right after he had been to the home of serial killer David Berkowitz (the Son of Sam). He was interviewed as he came out and, explaining that Berkowitz' room was in turmoil, said, "the inside of his room looked like the inside of his head." As I said, extraordinary.
- "… the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principal." German Physicist Werner Heisenberg (1901-1976) won a Nobel Prize for Physics in 1932 for his study of quantum mechanics. The basis of the Uncertainty Principal is the notion that, in the quantum physical world it is impossible to measure both the exact position and the exact momentum of a particle at the same time. The more precisely one of the quantities is measured, the less precisely the other is known.
- More apropos to this discussion, is the notion that the act of observation changes the system being observed. In this case, the fact that TV stations put their trucks at the airport to observe traffic flow, changed the flow of traffic at the airport.
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