December 29, 2009
Health Care: Taxing High-End Plans
Bob Herbert, writing in the New York Times, thinks the “Cadillac” tax on high-cost health care plans, a primary financing mechanism contained in the Senate health care bill, would eventually hit the middle class hard:
“The tax on health benefits is being sold to the public dishonestly as something that will affect only the rich, and it makes a mockery of President Obama’s repeated pledge that if you like the health coverage you have now, you can keep it.
“Those who believe this is a good idea should at least have the courage to be straight about it with the American people.”
End-of-the-Year Blogging: 2009 Lists | Losses and Closings
Today in 2009 lists: losses and closings.
- MSNBC covers the nine occupations that took the biggest hit in 2009’s Great Recession, from construction to architecture.
- Add to that list the top 100 media companies, which saw revenues drop this year (Adage.com, via Advertising Age).
- Washington Post’s stand-alone book section, Book World, closed in 2009.
- On the magazine front, according to a Media Finder press release, 275 new magazines launched in 2009, but 429 folded, including the venerable Gourmet Magazine, founded in 1941. (Hat tip, Huffington Post media page.)
- Lambda Rising, D.C.’s iconic gay bookstore, will shutter (via NPR).
- People spent less time reading online newspaper Web sites in 2009, according to an exclusive report by Editor & Publisher, which announced this year that it may itself fold.
- The New York Times’ “The Medium” column and blog — a well-written, funny, and informative weekly piece that managed to distill the Internet — sadly went bye-bye this year. That one hurt. 🙁
Yuck! On to the Tens!
December 28, 2009
End-of-the-Year Blogging: 2009 Lists | Television
Today in 2009 lists: television shows and moments.
- Tom Shales looks at the best television moments of the decade.
- TV.com’s most popular television shows of the decade.
- Paste Magazine’s 20 Best TV Shows of the Decade (2000-2009). Clocking in at 19 and 18, respectively, are two of my favorites: “Dexter” and “Breaking Bad.” Other favs, “Curb” and “30 Rock,” also made Paste’s list.
- Maureen Ryan of the Chicago Tribune was allowed by her editors to choose 15 tops for 2009; choosing 10 was just too darn hard.
- Mike Hale’s (New York Times) list is here, but before he announces his picks, he feels the need to say this:
- “Before we get to the list: There are a lot of perfectly well-made, intelligent, but essentially lifeless shows on television that get great reviews and end up on Top 10 lists. People like these shows because they feel that they flatter their intelligence, and because they confuse surface realism with some kind of deeper truth. I don’t (like them, that is), so don’t look for “Breaking Bad,” “Damages,” “Dexter,” “Mad Men” or their like here.”
<Whatever that means. “Breaking Bad,” “Damages,” and “Dexter” are lifeless? To me they are, quite simply, very entertaining.>
December 25, 2009
Merry Christmas!
Science Friday: Distilled Spirits
Make your own Christmas spirits. Below and here.
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