I think this quote is doing the rounds on the Net, but it's worth putting it here anyway: 

Here’s the thing. When we talk about race relations in America or racial progress, it’s all nonsense. There are no race relations. White people were crazy. Now they’re not as crazy. To say that black people have made progress would be to say they deserve what happened to them before.... So, to say Obama is progress is saying that he’s the first black person that is qualified to be president. That’s not black progress. That’s white progress. There’s been black people qualified to be president for hundreds of years.

Chris Rock

"In Conversation" in Vulture

Roosevelt the speed reader

In the Wikipedia entry on Teddy Roosevelt, the following line appears: Roosevelt was also an avid reader, reading tens of thousands of books, at a rate of several a day in multiple languages.

I'd checked up on his biography because in a tweet that came through an hour ago the writer stated: Teddy Roosevelt wrote 150,000 letters in the White House - and read 1-3 books PER DAY as president.

The 150,000 letters while in the White House seems a common statement about Roosevelt, but 1-3 books a day let alone several a day in multiple languages seems to be pushing the bar just a little far...

There's no doubt the man had extraordinary energy, (it sounds in fact as though he was on some kind of hgh) and it's possible that in his time as President, the job wasn't quite so pressured as it is now, but that many books a day? To what extent was he skimming them? And when did he actually find the time to read that much? A person without a job would be doing well to get through that many books a day.

Does it sound as though I'm a little skeptical? I'd really like to have some more detail about this amazing ability to speed read.

Vantage Point

There’s something really annoying about downloading a YouTube video, at least as far as doing it on my computer is concerned. The initial download stops and starts, the sound is often just behind the action, and in general you have to go off and make a cup of tea while it gets its act together.
It’s taken me three attempts to download it, and I get about half a second at a time. So I’m writing this while I’m waiting for it to finish the job. Then maybe I’ll be able to watch it as it ought to be watched. Instead of in bits.
Anyway, the trailer I’m trying to get at is for Vantage Point, a film that’s been mentioned twice today in emails that arrived in my inbox, and which is obviously one of those action-packed pieces that barely stops long enough for you to get your breath.
James Berardinelli (whom I regard, in general, as being an astute critic) said the film ‘fails the “reality test”, but maintains a certain intensity for its entire running length.” Someone else compares it to watching the tv show 24. (That’s always a bit of an endurance test, especially if you’ve missed an episode!)
Anyway, I’ve now picked up the full trailer and it goes like a bat out of hell. Dennis Quaid, an actor I like to see in movies (he always comes across with integrity) is in the lead, by the look of things, and the premise is pretty basic: eight people see eight different aspects of the assassination of the President, and the pieces have to be joined together. Looks fast and furious, with car chases, crashes and lots of explosions. Bet it’s noisy too!
Forest Whitaker is also in it, and the lead actor from that very strange series, Lost (the one in which the scriptwriters appear to be the most lost people of all). Bruce McGill, who used to be MacGyver’s occasional offsider many moons ago, turns up again in a McGill-type role (they’re thick on the ground), and William Hurt plays William Hurt with his usual elegance.