UConn James

Indeed. Now, this is Butler's choice and it's a free country.... But, to quote Otto in A Fish Called Wanda, "DISAPPOINTED!" Continuing to draft, develop, then lose players is a surefire way to get to where the Bills are. Butler wasn't the best, but he sure wasn't the worst. Another hole to plug.

Ebert is still ticking.

Doc Jensen's post-ep write-up Some bits and pieces... Hmm! Totally cool note about Hurley. And in the second graf bold is is something I've been saying since last season. As much as Smokey has parasitically taken over Locke's body, there's something left of the host (or his memory/will). Gotta agree. Sawyer has always had a soft spot for kids. From abandoning that con (and leaving the $) when the kid came in the room, putting the reward $ into an account for Clementine, saving Young Ben even tho he turns out to be Ben... and all this owes to his own experience. Sawyer is none too keen on anyone who would hurt children. "Hell yes" was a complete lie. ----- Also, Maggie Grace (Shannon) will be making an appearance this season, after all.

= New heights of futility! Yah!

A note on that.... On the S5 DVDs, there is a featurette in the bonus section where Michael Emerson visits in the LA studio. The part with Lindelof & Cuse goes into the writers' room, where there are several large white-erase boards. On screen-caps of one from the finale, which they were finishing up on at the time, it did all the scenes from "The Incident" as we know it. The white blast. There was another entry right below that said something like 'POV shot of Richard witnessing the blast.' So, that was evidently the scene he referred to when he said in the 2007 timeline, "I saw them all die." And as I've written before, Richard has seen people vanish right in front of him --- Locke, twice --- so he should know the difference b/w vanishing/time-travel jump and pure, unadulterated death. They decided to leave it out of the final product. Alpert seeing this c 1977 would have led to a war, according to the terms of the truce b/w the Others and Dharma. It was why the Swan construction was so secret. What exactly happened with (and following) the Incident that put the island under water is totally up for grabs.

For Ben and Ethan, that's something yet to be seen. We don't know what the event was that submerged the island, how sudden it was, or when exactly it happened. Note that the island is not on the bottom of the Pacific. The top of the statute's foot was slightly beneath the surface, as were the Barracks houses. So the island is maybe 30 feet underwater.

According to Lostpedia, Littleton and Straume are crossed off in the cave. Tho, neither Claire, Aaron or Miles are dead.

Per Lostpedia:

This may be a correlation to when Claire couldn't feel kicking for a while and thought something must be wrong. Then, when Aaron did, she put Jin's hand on her belly. ----- 2004 Locke is somehow with Helen in the sideways flashes. And for me, at least, it seems like his obsessive anger is gone. Doesn't mean he's not frustrated at little things, but it's like he's taken the "let it go" advice oft given to Jack. With the sprinkler scene, it was like his "communion with the island"/knowing exactly when it would rain was utterly lost. He is not the person he was on the island, and that's not a cheap crack at the disabled, b/c it's not entirely owing to his being in the wheelchair. There is a certain meekness to him... as Sawyer says, scared. Helen mentioned Locke's father when they were talking about the wedding while he was in the bath. What did she say? Sideways Hurley. "Randy Nations is a total douche, man." Rose, a temp office manager, still has cancer. Ben is a European History teacher --- and there was a flash of recognition, after a Felix Unger-style tirade about maintenance of the coffeemaker. Looks like coolie Hurley's getting the band back together. That might be fitting in the sideways world, as it was Hurley who "opened the box" originally. I missed it. Did Helen rip up the business card? ----- 2007 -Cool perspective shot on how the monster moves around the island. -Check out Sawyer's bender! Complete with dirty wife-beater and white boxers. I don't think the alcohol was DHARMA-labeled, was it? That was something that puzzled me about the bottle of McCutcheon's he had in his stash (that Charlie and Hurley used to get Desmond drunk). Where the hell did that come from? We've been promised that there will be an answer re: the food drops this season. -Ben lies, naturally, and Ilana picks up some of Jacob's ashes. Flock is "recruiting." And shortly, Ilana reveals that MIB, once he possessed it, is now stuck in Locke's body (except when reverting to smoke monster). Which begs the question of whether MIB ever possessed Christian's body. -Found out what a "candidate" means. Is it safe to presume that the blond boy apparition is Young Jacob? "You know the rules. You can't kill him." Does that mean Richard (who couldn't see him), Sawyer (who could) or ....? To which, Flocke shouts Locke's sig line, "Don't tell me what I can't do!" I had left it open that MIB went off-island and possessed Locke's body near birth. Wrong. MIB is looking to leave the island. So he downloads minds/memories? Apparently Locke never read "Of Mice and Men." -As Lapidis said, weirdest funeral ever! Interesting that they trekked him all the way over to the original burial ground (the statue was at least half a day's sail from the camp). Going back to the painting on the hatch door, there were writings that marked graves of certain people, etc. Do all of the 815ers or at least "candidates" need to be buried there? - A little bit of 4th wall conversation from the execs to us viewers: "If you want to shoot me, shoot me! But you are so close. It would be a shame to turn back now!" - And then we get to the meat of the episode. A climb and fall down the coastal ladder, and we're evidently in (Jacob? /) MIB's office. White and Black stones on the balance --- Flocke casts the white one into the ocean as an "inside joke." There are rocks of other colors as well. Thinking it's some kind of judgment room. Here, I want to make note of an original posit of mine. When they crashed, the main characters wore distinct color shirts, etc. They have since changed colors with some frequency. Perhaps the rocks, alongside Jacob's 'penchant for numbers' are like board pieces for each character (i.e. in Life, each player chooses a different color car). 4 - Locke 8 - Reyes 15 - Ford 16 - Jarrah 23 - Shephard 42 - Kwon (Jin, Sun, or baby Kwon Is there any indication that the numbers are re-used? In a few screen captures, I didn't see any. And there aren't any more names to be crossed off. This is the final group of "candidates" to find a new protector of the island... that job title according to Flocke. What about Desmond's 108? No word on what role the Constant plays. Posit this: Richard is the constant for Jacob/MIB's game. Again, we get the rant that they're all puppets controlled by Jacob, similar to Locke's rant that they were puppets to the computer. "[Jacob] was pushing you to the island." And we revisit the question of what the nature of all of this is. Locke's assertion that the island needed to be protected, Jack saying, "It's just an island!" in the S4 finale. Three choices: - Do nothing. Until your name is crossed out. - Take over Jacob's job. What exactly this job entails... Would the successor have to start more games? - Leave the island. Before I learned that Ilana had said MIB now can't possess another body, I was thinking that MIB meant that he would possess Sawyer. Evidently, that's not an option. If they could all leave and nothing would happen, that would be such a cop-out. Seems to me that this protector's job might be to keep MIB on the island... to contain him here so he can't be unleashed on the world. Keeping this entity (can we call him a god?) at bay is how the world is saved.

It's 5 years, so they're free to change. Need to inform the league of intent to change a year in advance.

As someone whose brother deployed last week for the 'stan, I more than understand the desire of the athlete to do this. Beating a foreign enemy b/c no other diplomacy/communication has worked, is decidedly political. Hence, "Support our troops" is decidedly political. During the competition of the Olympics is not the place for it. As KD wrote, that's a very slippery slope. There is ample opportunity for athletes to speak during interviews, they can go on USO tours after the Games, etc. The Olympics is historically not a venue for such speech, and they do enforce it. Also, those advertising marks are part of the funding that allows the Olympics to take place. Advertisers and sponsors expect some form of remuneration for the material help they give, the clothing they provide, etc. ... Damned capitalists!

U.S. goalies ordered to remove slogans from helmets

AP | Unruly passenger took a swing at Romney

And at this point, in a better world, someone would give the Arnold Vinick answer: "From now until the end of this campaign, I'll answer any question you've got about government. But if you've got a question about religion, please, go to church." And again, it also seems to play into the very early strategy of "skipping the South." If the zealots there won't vote for the single issue of his religion, then largely, just bypass it and hope that a Southern state or two still swings your way. To my knowledge, while governing, Mitt Romney did not put Books of Mormon in every athlete's room during the Olympics, nor did he force Mormon conversions, faith did not direct his governing choices, or make any kind of a deal about it in Massachusetts. Mitt seemingly has (and has had) higher hurdles to jump than JFK. That said, I think '12 may be the right time for him... when religion doesn't mean nearly as much as "Who can pull us out of this $ slump?"

Do you mean phony in his personal life and how he projects it publicly? Or the tweaks in his social policy positions over the years? I'd remind you that Reagan had many of the same changes, socially. I'd remind you that many people come to see things differently as we grow and experience the world. Mass. voters are above all worried about a change to Roe v. Wade. They don't want government telling them what to do on social issues, but they are fully willing to elect fiscal-conservative Republicans as a check to Democrat control. But, to run there and have any chance of winning, you have to take a pledge. Much like Scott Brown did. It goes something like... 'I respect the established law of the right of a woman to chose. [Even though I personally disagree with abortion, I will make a contract as this state's representative to vote how the majority of the state wants me to vote on the issue.]' Include that second line if you must, at your own peril. Is it a little disingenuous? You bet. But this pledge is about the only way to get elected there (and in much of the Northeast) when you have an R after your name. On the health care initiative, Romney had a choice to either be uninvolved and it would pass in the legislature without input from the minority party, or work with the Mass. Democrats and since it was going to happen anyway, try to push it a little more toward reality. At this point (year 3) it has achieved high coverage rates, but it hasn't been a glaring success at cutting costs. This is the same chicken/egg problem as at the national level. Extend coverage first, or try to control costs first? I think the Mass experiment has shown, as national Republicans have said, that costs must come down first. Hasn't worked perfectly, but it's still relatively early in the life of this thing. I'm not sure how it's been administrated under Deval Patrick. Might take some solace that, as the article said, Romney was a major (unseen until election night) force behind Brown, who opposes a similar coverage-first, cut-costs-later plan nationwide. One hopes that some lessons have been learned.

Did you read the "Skipping the South" section of the article? That's not set in stone, but as a strategy, it is wisest to not spend money where it didn't produce results before. Taken as a broad indication of governing philosophy, he's already smarter than 95% of other pols. The rest of the country seems much more accepting of the individual, rather than pinning him to antiquated, extremist elements of a religion. The South largely votes socially, not fiscally. But that could change if Obama's economy keeps tanking or doesn't do anything but crater-plateau... which is a distinct possibility. I don't subject candidates to a religious test. The issue should be who can run the government bureaucracy most efficiently and get business going again. Frankly, to echo the it's sad that some people's precious votes are bought so cheaply.

Link Ahead of releasing his book, titled No Apology, comes a pretty fair assessment of Romney from the "Boston Phoenix." That Romney should and would emphasize his pragmatist Mr. Fix-It background and step back from the social issues. As someone who voted for Romney in the 2008 primary, I thought he was the best of the candidates out there (how much is that saying, though?) for a situation that many didn't want to see, hear or talk about... and that has now slapped us in the face. Interesting read about the warts-and-all of the past, and some of the very early talk and stratagem for '12. America needs a businessman who has directed a corporation to actual profits. America needs someone who entered an Olympics full of graft and scandal and scrubbed Salt Lake City down in short order and pulled off a decent Games. America could use someone who came into the final stages of the Big Dig and called it the bondoogle it was and started to get the department back into public control from it's "Authority" mess. I'm sure buftex will make some remark on "Republican Hair."

Per the Jensen write-up: ----- Also wondering about the marshal's briefcase. Kate was so hot for it (the toy plane, as it turned out) on-island, yet in this sideways-flash it's right there and she doesn't even glance at it. Hmm.

Still trying to fit that stuff together. In the original timeline, (baby) Ethan stayed on the island even when the woman and children were evacuated. He then became a Ben acolyte... and was evidently a part of the Purge that killed his father, Horace. I don't think we know whether the Left-Behinders changed things when Miles said to get the women and children off the island. Was Ethan included in the evacuation c. '77? By his appearance here, it looks like he was. Or, how he got into this spot could be something entirely different. ----- Question: what happened to Faraday's journal after they removed the bomb core? Did Jack take it with him or did Eloise Hawking still have it? ----- Very interesting theory here. ----- Doc Jensen's recap of "What Kate Does." I'm just getting into reading it....

- Our ABC station was running an obnoxiously large school cancellation widget that took up the bottom 1/3 of the screen through the whole show. F--kers. One had a message below it where they usually list length of delay info, replaced to a "We're sad we won't see you tomorrow :-/". Seriously? An text emoticon on a school cancellation notice? Grow up, people. - There's been some nice moments of Arzt at LAX. Tonight: "I'm walkin' here! I'm walkin' here!! - This ep. centered on the Kate-Claire connection. What formed on the island is replicated in LA. Claire is still preggers in the sideways flash. The adoptive parents have split up (how did the psychic not see that that coming?!? Or maybe, again, he did) and Claire has labor pains much earlier than on the island, 36 weeks... then doesn't. Then the shoe drops. Dr. Goodspeed?!!?? So, when Oceanic doesn't crash, 3 years later, Ethan just happens to be in LA. Nope. As I wrote last week, I'm getting the feeling that all of this since the S3 finale was the desired/known effect of the "Secondary protocol." - Aldo fell for the "Wookie prisoner gag" in S3, and now, to prove how good he is, he gets owned by Kate and shot by a very Rousseau-like Claire. - As Miles said, Hurley's in charge now? We've got Sawyer blaming himself for Juliet's death... b/c it all started when he talked her out of taking the sub in '74 "Because I didn't want to be alone." We've got Jack saying, "I don't trust myself!"... enough to be making decisions, b/c he's made a lot of bad ones lately. As Doc Jensen wrote, there's a crisis of leadership among the group. Jack and Sawyer both acted for selfish reasons which led to their current situation. Sawyer had a ring hidden underneath the floorboards, and throws it, Desmond-style into the drink. Anybody with Tivo and the DVD for "Flashes Before Your Eyes"... Am I mistaken or did that look like the same ring? Again, the conceit of the mysterious box with unknown contents appears. As I linked to in last season's thread, this is a favorite device of JJ Abrams. Video link that is well worth watching. Speaking of JJ... tgreg, for a little insider info, is it definite that he's still hands-off of the series now that it's down to the wire? Do he and Lindelof/Cuse talk? - Dogen and Lennon don't seem to have many friggin' translations for the most important things we want to know. Again, we get "infected" and now, we get that Sayid has been "claimed" apparently by the smoke monster side. And they try to kill him. Not cool, Dogen & Lennon. Not cool at all. Claire too, they say. Speaking of leadership issues before, Dogen has some of his own. Explains that he uses the language barrier to "distance" himself from his people when they don't like his decisions. Jack wouldn't know anything about that, man. Slightest thing happens, he's there with a speech. Interesting baseball connection b/w the two (it is evidently Jack's favorite game, per his conversation with Lapidis in S4). Their test of Sayid looked pretty familiar, no? At least the electrocution part. I don't know where we are in the curve, but it's continuing to follow the pattern of general themes happening backward/mirrored. What happened b/w Jin's flashes on the French team... (or afterward)? Did Rousseau learn how to test for the "sickness" from the Others? Perhaps she was she diagnosed the same way?

Guide Listing

Len Dawson looked pretty uncomfortable on that walk. Not how it should have been. As with the Stanley Cup, the Captains (or at least the coach or owner) should be the first to touch it. It's a show of respect. But it's also a show of respect that they should've all been on the same level rather than a small dais like that. Why couldn't they have brought that large NFL platform one out that was used for the anthem?

Time had run short and my guess is that CBS wanted to get right into showing that undercover CEO show.

True, that. Currently, the favored term is back to "black." I think that transition happened not too long after the media called a French youth rioter an "African-American." I guess the absurdity of that phrase reached a tipping point there, after years of building up with the fact that not all blacks are American, not all blacks have (at least, recent) origins from Africa, some white people could be called African-American i.e. Charlize Theron, etc. And so, the bending over backwards resulted in a full somersault. I don't see anything really wrong in Pelosi's choice of words, other than the "whatever the name was in those days" that seems a bit callous to say out loud. But even that is understandable.