Things We YouTubed Today, October 16, 2014

Bloggingheads featuring Robert Farley and Tom Nichols talking about the changing culture of D.C. and the policy-making establishment.  That might not sound thrilling, but it was a good podcast. 






 That page links to this Ezra Klein piece about the rise of political science in media and policy circles in Washington.


I've been feeling vaguely pissed off at Leon Panetta, who just published a memoir where he dumps on President Obama for being soft and indecisive on Syria and other things.  Farley and Nichols conjecture that Panetta probably soured on the Obama White House the first time he was ignored in a meeting in favor of some 25-year-old with a PowerPoint.  Sounds believable. 

We're going to look back and realize that Obama's was the Moneyball Administration in some ways.  Barack was the Billy Beane figure, and people like Leon Panetta are the Art Howe figures.  (In other recent news, Billy Beane's Oakland Athletics have gone home without a pennant again this year.)

Taking a hike

Courtesy of my cousin Caskie on Facebook: A list of Virginia's best hiking trails, crowdsourced.  Lord knows when I will get around to these, I still have a lot in North Carolina I want to do, but here is the 411.