Brian Gongol
Conan O'Brien says he's not moving for Leno
NBC really painted itself into a corner with the decision to re-shuffle late nights again. They gambled that Jay Leno could draw his late-night audience into prime time. He couldn't. Or at least, he couldn't move enough of it. But in announcing plans to migrate him back to late-night, they issued a slap in the face to O'Brien by telling him he would have to move over to make room for the old boy. It's hard to blame O'Brien for turning them down. Related: Craig Ferguson makes some hilarious comments on the situation in a recent monologue.
Debate question: Is Dubai a bad idea?
(Video) The BBC and affiliated groups put on a one-hour televised debate on the proposition that Dubai is a bad idea. A fascinating discussion results; both sides argued deeply flawed cases, but the argument was still worth having.
The pyramids of Egypt might have been built by free men
It's always been legend that they were built by slaves, but the location of some workers' tombs suggests that they might not have been slaves after all. Regardless, the colossal expense involved in constructing the pyramids was a titanic waste of resources, whether built by slaves or free people. Egypt would have been far better-off with any number of other uses of that time, energy, and capital.
Anyone with a website should be working overtime to make it mobile-friendly
When the iPhone came out two years ago, there was a rush to build iPhone-friendly sites, but as was mentioned on the "WHO Radio Wise Guys" at the time, mobile-friendly sites should be open to all mobile browsers, not just one platform (like the iPhone). And as mobile broadband access becomes a reality for ever-growing numbers of users, the demand for websites that look good on small screens is growing as well.
The Condition of the State of Iowa: Not very good, fiscally
But Governor Culver, instead of acknowledging the problem thoughtfully, offers a speech that is mediocre at best and not especially attuned to the needed solutions. When Culver says, "We face some real challenges. Ones we did not create, but ones we will overcome," he seems to ignore the fact that Iowa's biggest challenge is a state budget deficit that is precisely his fault and the fault of the Legislature. Nobody else created the problem, and they've been making things worse for years on end. And Governor Culver seems deeply intent on spending every dollar he can find to "create jobs", even though that's not government's role in a free society -- nor an efficient goal. The utterly nonsensical approach Iowa has taken with tax credits and state-funded incentives to all kinds of businesses has been a serious problem, and it's well past time that problem was addressed.
Private equity attracted very little money (by recent standards) in 2009
