Unqualified Successes 2006
Our sixth annual orders of merit and scorn. New categories are asterisked. Previous installments: 2005, 2004, 2003, 2002, 2001.
Least Dispensible Weblog - American Footprints
Hawk of the Year - Newton’s First Law of Motion
Dove of the Year - Tie: Justin Logan; Ned Lamont
*Dove of the Year, Posthumous Division - Gerald Ford
Penpal of the Year - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
Pseudohistorical Dipshit of the Year - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
Turning Japanese Award for the Best Case of the Vapors - Joel C. Rosenberg for warning America of Iran’s plans for a cataclysmic strike - on August 22, 2006.
*Bildungsroman Award for Best Coming of Age - Matthew Yglesias, now America’s best foreign-policy writer
Best Non-Libertarian in a Libertarian Role - Jon Tester
Best Libertarian in a Neoconservative Role - Jon Henke, George Allen’s web guy
Velvet Underground Award for Beginning to See the Light - Senator Gordon Smith
Best Libertarian in a Libertarian Role - Who Is IOZ?
Least Annoying Liberal - Belle Waring
Least Annoying Conservative - Steven Taylor
War is the Health of the State Award - Hassan Nasrullah and the Lebanese Party of God
*War is the Health of - Oh Shit! - Donald Rumsfeld
Tagline of the Year - Green Lantern Theory
Jumped the Shark Award - The Ticking Bomb Scenario
Fanboy Movie of the Year - X-Men: The Last Stand
*Fanboy TV Series of the Year - Doctor Who, Seasons 1 and 2
*Fanboy Video of the Year - Justice League Season Two and Justice League Unlimited Season One
Blog Trend of the Year - Legacy-media sites start a hundred blogs apiece
Dubious Blog Trend of the Year - Videoblogging
Baleful Blog Trend of the Year - Bad Youtube music-video wars
Preemption Award - Inactivist, for starting a group blog with my guestbloggers before I did
Brilliant Mistake - “Liberaltarianism,” by Brink Lindsey
Food of the Year - Fat-Free Chocolate Milk
Whine of the Year - Lee Siegel, “Blogofascism”
“It’s Chinatown, Jake” Award - Captain Jamil Hussein
Special Achievement Award - Spencer Ackerman, for getting fired by The Non Republic
Like a Phoenix Award - Tie: The Democratic Party; Joe Lieberman
Spouse of the Year - Mrs. Offering
Comment by Avram —
January 1, 2007 @ 4:10 am
What’s the difference between Justice League and Justice League Unlimited?
Comment by Jim Henley —
January 1, 2007 @ 10:22 am
Avram, JLU is essentially third-season Justice League. In Season Three they expand the roster to essentially every hero DC has. Huntress, The Question, Captain Atom and Green Arrow/Black Canary all play key roles, frex. Vixen, Vigilante and others get speaking slots in various stories, and literally dozens of heroes get drawn into confrontations (Shining Knight, Atom Smasher, Vibe, you name it).
Comment by Jennifer —
January 1, 2007 @ 10:53 am
Booster Gold is hilarious in the new Justice Leagues. I only became interested in this comic stuff recently, because of my comic-geek boyfriend, so I don’t know the back history but I love the idea of a guy from the future who’s a complete loser in his own time, so he goes back a few centuries to where he can be Somebody Special thanks to his advanced technology.
Oh, Jim? You forgot the “best bitchy redheaded softcore libertarian blogress” category. (Ahem.) (Cough.) (Gazes into distance with determinedly modest facial expression.)
Comment by IOZ —
January 1, 2007 @ 1:14 pm
You like me, you really like me!
The Velvet Underground Award for Beginning to See the Light. Oh. My. Emmeffing. God. A-mighty.
Comment by Jim Henley —
January 1, 2007 @ 3:32 pm
Don’t sweat it, Jennifer. Most years these awards pass unnoticed anyway. I would add, “But rest assured, when I think of ’softcore’ I think of you,” but that would jeopardize my streak as The Libertarian Guy Who Doesn’t Constantly Try to Flirt Wtih Jennifer. Straight libertarian guy, I mean. (Tips hat to IOZ.)
Comment by Jacob T. Levy —
January 1, 2007 @ 11:49 pm
“Last Stand?” Kidding, surely. Lame, lame. V was far from perfect but it was much, much better. But the real fanboy movie of the year was Clerks II.
Comment by Leonard —
January 2, 2007 @ 9:20 am
It’s worth noting that the Green Lantern theory, although conceived as a tool for mocking those advocating state actions in foreign places, works just about as well for national politics too. All you need to do is sub out “military” power for “legislative”.
Adapting Yglesias’s words:
Lots of chunky libertarian goodness here.
Comment by Eric Martin —
January 2, 2007 @ 10:17 am
Most years these awards pass unnoticed anyway
Jim,
Unnoticed???
I printed out this post, framed it and mounted it on the wall of AmFoot’s luxurious Madison Avenue office complex. It might actually become our tagline…
Comment by Eric Scharf —
January 2, 2007 @ 3:49 pm
What’s more, this theory can’t be empirically demonstrated to be wrong. Things that you or I might take as demonstrating the limited utility of the law to accomplish certain kinds of things are, instead, taken as evidence of lack of will.
This lack of Popperian falsifiability is what makes the Green Lantern Theory a form of conspiracy theory; it’s just that in this case, we’re supposed to be the Illuminati.
See you on the grassy knoll in Caracas!
Comment by Madeline F —
January 3, 2007 @ 4:12 pm
Jacob T. Levy: Word. “Last Stand” wasn’t much good. I’d suggest “A Scanner Darkly” as the best movie in genres fanboys like, though it didn’t rake in a lot of views.
While we’re suggesting categories and winners:
Most Deliciously Debunked Pseudo-Science - Louann Brizendene’s “The Female Brain.”