• How did the building of a mosque two blocks from Ground Zero go from "More power to ya" (on FOX-News in December) to "AAUUGGHHHHHHH!"? Two words: Pamela Geller. Salon has the full history here.
• Nicholas Kristof, meanwhile, says those who object to the mosque are basically taking the Osama bin Laden position. Money quote: "It is mind-boggling that so many Republicans are prepared to bolster the Al Qaeda narrative, and undermine the brave forces within Islam pushing for moderation."
• So how dangerous is Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf? FOX-News plays the guilt-by-association game and says "dangerous." Jon Stewart plays that same game and answers: less dangerous than Rupert Murdoch, owner of FOX-News. 
• Finally (on this subject), Noah Millman says what I've been saying all along: "Any debate should be about who we are, not about who they are or what we want them to think of us." Exactly. Which path brings us closer to the American ideal? To First Amendment rights? Then you move on to more important matters. As I thought we did last December.
• Here's a more important matter: Who counts as rich? James Surowiecki asks the question everyone, particularly everyone on Capitol Hill, should be asking. If the top tax rate is for the richest one percent, and the richest one percent include anyone making more than $250,000 a year, then it's time to parse this one percent. Tax those making $1 million at a higher rate, and tax those making $10 million at a higher rate, and those making $100 million at a higher rate. And on and on, world without end. Then let Republicans claim that upping the tax rate on the top .1% is hurting "small business owners."
• Speaking of. How insane has the right become? The black helicopters for Colorado's Republican gubenatorial candidate aren't black helicopters. They're bicycles.
• This is fun. Illustrator Christopher Nieman in the New York Times on taking a red-eye from New York to Berlin.
• And this is laugh-out-loud funny: Allen Gamble (Will Ferrell) makes a recuitment video for the NYPD.
• I can't believe I haven't linked to this yet. Masato Akamatsu of the Hiroshima Toyo Carp makes one of the great catches of the year, maybe of the decade, maybe further. I love the way he tries to nonchalant it but his emotions get the better of him and he breaks into a smile as he throws the ball in. I love the emotions of the announcers. I love the way Akamatsu seems to go "Wow" at the end. They call it a "Spider-Man" catch but that's Griffey territory to me. This is almost a parkour catch.
• Finally, R.I.P, Bobby Thomson. The opening of Don DeLillo's novel, "Underworld," was originally published as a novella in, I believe, Harper's, and it's all about Thomson's Shot Heard 'Round the World on October 3rd, 1951 that gave the New York Giants the pennant over the Brooklyn Dodgers. DeLillo called it "Pafko at the Wall," which is a great title. Russ Hodges, the Giants' announcer, never used that phrased. He used others. Touch 'em all, Bobby.

October 3, 1951

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