An Explanation of The Debt Ceiling

Celebrity Friday: Emmy Award Nominations

The Emmy Awards nominations for excellence in television were announced on Thursday and the nominees are:

Best drama series: Boardwalk Empire, Friday Night Lights, Dexter, Game of Thrones, The Good Wife, Mad Men. 

Best comedy series: Modern Family, 30 Rock, Glee, The Office, The Big Bang Theory, Parks and Recreation.

Drama actress: Julianna Margulies, The Good Wife; Elisabeth Moss, Mad Men; Mariska Hargitay, Law & Order: SVU; Kathy Bates, Harry’s Law; Connie Britton, Friday Night Lights and Mireille Enos, The Killing.

Comedy actor: Steve Carell, The Office; Alec Baldwin, 30 Rock; Jim Parsons, Big Bang Theory;  Matt LeBlanc, Episodes, Louis C.K., Louie; Johnny Galecki, Big Bang Theory. 

Drama actor: Jon Hamm, Mad Men; Steve Buscemi, Boardwalk Empire; Kyle Chandler,Friday Night Lights; Michael C. Hall, Dexter; Hugh Laurie, House; Timothy Olyphant, Justified.

Comedy actress: Tina Fey, 30 Rock; Edie Falco, Nurse Jackie; Amy Poehler, Parks and Recreation; Laura Linney, The Big C; Martha Plimpton, Raising Hope; Melissa McCarthy, Mike & Molly.

Supporting drama actor: Andre Braugher, Men of a Certain Age; John Slattery, Mad Men; Alan Cumming, The Good Wife; Peter Dinklage, Game of Thrones; Josh Charles, The Good Wife; Walton Goggins, Justified.

Supporting comedy actor: Ty Burrell, Modern Family; Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Modern Family; Ed O’Neill, Modern Family; Eric Stonestreet, Modern Family; Jon Cryer, Two and a Half Men; Chris Colfer, Glee.

Supporting comedy actress: Julie Bowen, Modern Family; Sofia Vergara, Modern Family; Jane Lynch, Glee; Betty White, Hot in Cleveland; Kristen Wiig, Saturday Night Live; Jane Krakowski, 30 Rock.

Supporting drama actress: Archie Panjabi, The Good Wife; Kelly Macdonald, Boardwalk Empire; Christine Baranski, The Good Wife; Michelle Forbes, The Killing; Margo Martindale,Justified; Christina Hendricks, Mad Men.

The names highlighted in blue are the ones that I hope win while the other highlighted names are ones that I also like. I've only ever seen one episode of Mad Men in my life (on a plane) so I have no dog in that hunt. I just don;t get that show. I

NBC Loses Rights To Air Wimbledon

There is great rejoicing in the tennis blogosphere with the news that NBC has lost the rights to air Wimbledon to ESPN for the next 12 years.

Sports Illustrated covers the story:

All England Club officials achieved their goal of having the entire tournament televised live and by the same company in the U.S. under their new 12-year contract with ESPN. Tuesday's deal ends a 43-year run on NBC. 

It had become an annual tradition with Wimbledon - complaints about NBC not showing every match live in all time zones. The network would have started airing the entire tournament live beginning in 2014 under its bid.

"There is no question the sports viewer nowadays wants to see things live,'' All England Club chief executive Ian Ritchie said on a conference call. "Therefore, as far as we're concerned, undoubtedly one of the advantages with this arrangement was to increase the amount of live coverage of Wimbledon.''

ESPN had owned the rights to extensively televise early rounds of Wimbledon since 2003, with NBC picking up coverage as the tournament progressed, culminating with the "Breakfast at Wimbledon'' broadcasts of the finals.

NBC had acknowledged Sunday it was losing one of its marquee events, saying in a statement, "while we would have liked to have continued our relationship, we were simply outbid.''

Ritchie said organizers didn't want to split the tournament between two companies anymore. NBC's bid would have used Versus, its new cable partner after the Comcast acquisition, to air additional matches once ESPN's old deal expired in two years.

"I think if you have two separate organizations telling the story, inevitably there is a danger of it being confused,'' Ritchie said. "You want some consistency to it. You want to bring a combined and coherent promotional package to it as well.''

Quarterfinal matches will air on ESPN and ESPN2 at the same time so they can all be broadcast live. ESPN3.com will continue to show online additional matches that aren't on TV.

"We're getting dangerously close to 1,000 hours of live tennis during the two weeks,'' ESPN executive vice president John Skipper said.

NBC Sports treatment of the world's most prestigious and well-known tennis tournament was simply shameful. They aired tennis matches "at the same time in all time zones" which by definition means that the vast majority must be getting taped coverage. And when two great matches were going on at the same time (i.e. like with the quarterfinals) they would often try to do show one live and then show the other one taped. I'm not a fan of ESPN's solution it used this year: the spit screen, but they were using that on early round matches which were not really that important.

Both ESPN have problems in that they use on-air talent who are not former tennis champions. It's not clear these people even know the rules of the game. It's past time they have  a dedicated "tennis anchor" on ESPN. I really don't care too much who it is (even Mary Carillo would be fine) but they should be able to talk about men's and women's tennis knowledgeably.

True Blood Season 4 Starts TONIGHT!

HBO's Game Of Thrones Renewed For Season 2!

Excellent news! HB0 has announced they have renewed their new fantasy series Game of Thrones for a second season. Game of Thrones is an adaptation of George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series, which is a planned 7-book fantasy series in set in the fictional land of Westeros where seasons can last years and civilization is basically at the Bronze Age of medieval times.

The plan is for each season of the HBO show to be based on each of the books. The first book in the series is called A Game of Thrones (click to see MadProfessah review). The second book (which is even better than the first) is called A Clash of Kings (click to see MadProfessah review) and immediately follows the events of the first book.

Overall, I have been very impressed with HBO's television adaptation of George R.R. Martin's work, for the most part. The books depict the fight for control of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros between members of several major houses. Martin analyzes many topics in thee very long books, among them the nature of gender in a feudal society, the irrationality of hereditary government, and especially the meanings of political power in a society where everyone carries a sword and "might makes right" is a generally accepted ethos.

The TV series has done an excellent job of animating these concepts by actually improving on Martin's plotting by adding scenes and interactions between characters which do not appear in the original text.
What the TV series has not done well is depict people of color. There is an important subplot in the series which involves action on a far-away continent (across the Narrow Sea from Westeros) called Essos where the Dothraki people like. The Dothraki are a war-like, nomadic people who have "copper skin and almond eyes." In the books, Martin is able to fully explain their specific cultural traditions and motivate their harsh and violent actions. In the HBO series the head of the Dothraki Khal Drogo is portrayed by a massively buff Jason Momoa who speaks in a  rough guttural tongue. The Dothraki are depicted as wild-eyed savages for the most part, without the  descriptive context the book supplies them. This is unfortunate, because the chapters of the books which involve the Dothraki and the blonde refugee from Westeros named Daenerys Targaryen who becomes their Queen (Khaleesi) are some of the best sections of the story. Martin won a Hugo award for a novella about Daenerys.

In the series there are some epic scenes involving Daenerys, the Dothraki and her dragon eggs which, if depicted badly, could ruin the entire series for me. Daenerys and the Dothraki are incredibly important characters, and it is disturbing that, so far, they have not been depicted as effectively as the other, predominantly white, characters. It's no coincidence that the upcoming fifth book is called, A Dance with Dragons. Hopefully, the series will make that far.

Get Ready! Season 4 of True Blood 4 weeks away!

HBO's True Blood is one of the best things about Summer. Season 4 is starting in four weeks, on Sunday June 26th.

CNN Weekend Anchor Don Lemon Comes Out!

Don Lemon, CNN's Weekend Anchor, is revealing in a new book coming out this week that he is a gay man. The 45-year-old African-American television celebrity reveals in Transparent that he was abused as a child and never knew his father.

The New York Times reports:

Few national television news anchors or hosts have publicly acknowledged being gay. Rachel Maddow is perhaps the best known. Her MSNBC colleague, Thomas Roberts, has also come out as gay.

Mr. Lemon has not made a secret of his sexual orientation in his work life; many of his CNN co-workers and managers have long been aware that he is gay. But he still acknowledged that going public in his book carries certain risks.

“I’m scared,” he said in a telephone interview. “I’m talking about something that people might shun me for, ostracize me for.”

Even beyond whatever effect his revelation might have on his television career, Mr. Lemon said he recognized this step carried special risk for him as a black man.

“It’s quite different for an African-American male,” he said. “It’s about the worst thing you can be in black culture. You’re taught you have to be a man; you have to be masculine. In the black community they think you can pray the gay away.” He said he believed the negative reaction to male homosexuality had to do with the history of discrimination that still affects many black Americans, as well as the attitudes of some black women.

How long does Anderson Cooper think he can stall before affirmatively answering the question that everyone already knows the answer to?

Celebrity Friday: Julianne Moore as Sarah Palin

Julianne Moore is one of my favorite actresses, and should have won an Oscar for her work in Far From Heaven years ago. According to the Hollywood Reporter, she is going to be starring as Sarah Palin a.k.a. "Moose Mess" in the upcoming HBO film, Game Change, based on the 2010 best-seller Game Change: Obama and the Clintons, McCain and Palin, and the Race of a Lifetime on the 2008 presidential race by John Heileman and Mark Halperin. She looks amazing!

HBO's Game Of Thrones: Episode 1

HBO's new television series, Game of Thrones, an adaptation of George R.R. Martin's A Game of Thrones debuted last night. Having read the book (see review) so I eagerly watched the first episode. My first reaction is that the producers have done a very faithful job of adapting the text.

The casting is interesting. Particularly good(looking) are Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as Jaime Lannister, Richard Madden as Robb Stark and Kit Harington as Jon Snow. There are very important female roles, namely Catelyn Stark (Michelle Fairey), Cersei Lancaster (Lena Headey) and Deanerys Taegeryen (Emilia Clarke) and the jury is out whether the actresses are up to the parts.

The depiction of the geography and setting of the story, i.e. the continent of Westeros is impressive. Winterfell, the Wall, and the shots of the Iron Throne demonstrate a brilliant approach to art direction and reflect the prodigious budget for the series, estimate at nearly $60 million.

I most definitely intend to tune in to every episode, and expect Game of Thrones to hold my attention until Season 4 of True Blood begins this summer.

Fringe Renewed For 4th Season!

Ending weeks of suspense, the low-rated but interesting science fiction show Fringe co-created by J.J. Abrams has been renewed for a fourth season. Fringe airs Fridays nights at 9pm on Fox. It's really just an update of The X-Files with better writing and special effects, but I do like it.

Especially with pseudo science fiction badly done like NBC's The Event likely to be cancelled and SyFy's Stargate: Universe already cancelled, Fringe is one of the few treats for a science-fiction fan to watch on TV.

However, coming soon (Sunday April 17th, to be exact) HBO will start airing Game of Thrones, which is based on the acclaimed and best-selling fantasy series by George R.R. Martin. True it's not sci-fi, but it is looking really really good (and a faithful adaptation).