While I was home for the holidays, Pat and I got into an unexpectedly heated debate about the ongoing Hollywood writers’ strike. I’m not sure we’re that far apart, really. We both agreed that the writers got screwed on profit-sharing from DVDs, and now they deserve a fair cut of online distribution (and some renegotiation on the DVD deal).

But one thing I’m really liking about the strike: The Daily Show and The Colbert Report are both totally ad-hoc. Without writers, Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert are doing a lot of off-the-cuff comedy with B-grade graphic effects and the occasional lapse of uncomfortable silence. It’s so much better: random, sometimes poorly edited, and incredibly funny.

Because Hollywood refuses to show their faces to a camera, all their interviews are with politicians, economists, and other people who generally have something intelligent to say. That has always been the draw for me–not only are these two men incredibly funny comedians, they are also very smart. I think the strike is giving them the right environment to bring those strengths back to the fore. Keep it up, guys.

To Congress and the White House:

I am not afraid of terrorism, and I want you to stop being afraid on my behalf. Please start scaling back the official government war on terror. Please replace it with a smaller, more focused anti-terrorist police effort in keeping with the rule of law. Please stop overreacting. I understand that it will not be possible to stop all terrorist acts. I am not afraid.

From the I Am Not Afraid petition at Downsize DC.

I heard a great commentary on the radio today on Public Radio’s Marketplace: A good candidate connects the dots. It’s short and quick to read, but very powerful.

Robert Reich advises voters against treating today’s hot issues as individual checkboxes, to be ticked off for each candidate in a list of pros and cons. A good president will see the connections between all of these, and will have the intelligence to understand how solutions to one problem could affect the others.

I couldn’t agree more. I think this also applies to people who are hyper-focused on a single issue, and plan to vote for a candidate because of a single policy stance. And regardless of where you stand on the issues, you have to be willing to ask yourself if the candidate you support is really going to be able to make hard decisions when a policy he promised turns out to be unachievable.

J.P. pointed out a cool link the other day: a graphic depiction of the potential asteroid impact on Mars. Let’s hope it doesn’t hit the Spirit probe, which has been operational for four years as of today. Awesome stuff.

So here’s my question: If a 90-day rover can survive four years in a giant dust bowl, why is my video card crapping out after six months?