Saturday, December 31, 2022

The best and worst movies at the box office for New Year's Eve 2022

For my final retrospective of 2022, I'm posting a bonus follow-up to Beyond The Trailer and WatchMojo look at the top movies and TV shows of 2022 instead of this year's version of WatchMojo rewound YouTube again, Google's Year in Search, and top memes for New Year's Eve.* Watch as Grace Randolph of Beyond The Trailer presents 2022 Box Office BREAKDOWN - Avatar 2, Top Gun Maverick, Marvel MCU, Warner Bros Discovery.

Top Ten 2022 Movies today! Beyond The Trailer's box office breakdown for 2022! Domestic and worldwide! Disney, Warner Bros Discovery, Universal!
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Top Ten Movies 2022 today, at the box office! Beyond The Trailer host Grace Randolph's breakdown and review of 2022 movies at the box office, including Disney, Warner Bros Discovery, Universal, Sony and Paramount! Where Avatar The Way of Water, Top Gun Maverick, Jurassic World Dominion, Doctor Strange 2, Black Panther Wakanda Forever, Thor Love & Thunder, Black Adam and more stood on the domestic and worldwide top ten lists! Beyond The Trailer host Grace Randolph gives you an inside look at the weekend box office with an industry perspective! Be sure to make Beyond The Trailer your first stop for movie and entertainment news here on YouTube today!
I begin my reaction by recycling part of my response to The highest grossing speculative fiction films of 2018.
All but one of the top ten by domestic box office as of the end of last year are speculative fiction films of one sort or other except "Mission Impossible: Fallout." Even that one is a genre film (action), so it would be one I would vote on at this year's Saturn Awards.
All of this is true of this year's top ten, except that the action film is "Top Gun: Maverick," also a Tom Cruise movie. Hmm. Despite the pandemic, which has accelerated a lot of changes already in progress, Americans' taste in movies has remained the same.

Two of 2022's top ten at the box office also appear in Grace's Top Ten WORST Movies of 2022, which the preview image more properly calls the "Top Ten 2022 Career Killers."

Top Ten Worst Movies of 2022 today! Beyond The Trailer's top picks from Hollywood! After breakdown of trailers, how'd full movies rank? Box Office!
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Top Ten Worst Movies of 2022 today! Beyond The Trailer host Grace Randolph gives a review of the WORST Movies of 2022 at the box office including a breakdown as to why each one made the cut! Find out where Don't Worry Darling, Thor Love & Thunder, Babylon, Strange World, Black Adam, Amsterdam, Lightyear, Morbius and Fantastic Beasts Secrets of Dumbledore land on this list! And share your own worst movies of 2022 now that you've seen some full movies and not just the trailers! Be sure to make Beyond The Trailer your first stop for movie and entertainment news here on YouTube today!
My wife and I watched four of these, "Don't Worry Darling," "Thor Love & Thunder," "Morbius," and "Fantastic Beasts: Secrets of Dumbledore." As Grace said, "Don't Worry Darling" was actually good if flawed. It delivered even more science fiction content than the retrofuturistic trailer and posters promised. The problem, as Grace pointed out, was in the paradoxically behind-the-scenes yet very public drama involving the cast and director. That poisoned the film. Too bad. I found "Thor Love & Thunder" fun but a little too silly. Conversely, "Morbius" took itself way too seriously. Its creators shot and acted it as a dramatic character study, not a comic book movie. That wasn't what the audience wanted, except to laugh at it. Finally, neither my wife nor I liked "Fantastic Beasts: Secrets of Dumbledore." My wife said it was cruel and I agree.

WatchMojo uploaded its own Top 10 Biggest Box Office Bombs of 2022. Watch to see which movies made its list and how it's different from Grace's.

Another year, another bunch of box office dumpster fires! For this list, we’ll be looking at 2022 films that got significant theatrical releases and failed to recoup their production budgets through box office alone. Our countdown includes "Amsterdam", "Bros", "Morbius" and more!
"The Northman" stands out on this list while not being on Grace's. It may have been a disappointment at the box office, but it apparently made its money on streaming. Also, it probably didn't ruin any careers, so it didn't meet that criterion.

By the way, I expect to see a lot of these movies nominated at the Razzies, especially "Morbius" and "Bros," the former because Jared Leto already has the Razzies electorate's attention and the latter because there is nothing unfunnier than a bad comedy.

Since it's New Year's Eve, I'm sharing a drink recipe from Common Man Cocktails, How To Make The Champagne Cocktail / New Years Eve (NYE).

We're going to show you how to make a proper Champagne Cocktail for New Years Eve this year, it's tasty, it's bubbly, it's gonna be a winner.
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The champagne cocktail is a classic design with a bit of history, a bit of class and a bit of an easy build. You can make it in a variety of ways, with different garnishes like Wild Hibiscus flowers, different bitters like Angostura or citrus bitters, or with different champagnes (or the addition of brandy/cognac).
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New Years just isn't right without a champagne cocktail so try the original "Champagne Cocktail" and see what you think.
The guys behind the bar are having a little too much fun, but that's appropriate for New Year's Eve. They made this the most fun Common Man Cocktails video I've ever watched.

That does it for 2022. Stay tuned for this year's version of My favorite bands in the 2022 Rose Parade for New Year's Day. May 2023 be better than 2022, although I'm not holding my breath. See you next year!

*WatchMojo didn't create its own rewind this year and YouTube said it will never create another rewind, so I just lost enthusiasm for the idea. Instead, I'm recycling an old concept for National Science Fiction Day a couple days early. I have something else planned for that day.

Friday, December 30, 2022

Vox, Time, and WatchMojo look back at 2022

It's nearing the end of the year, so it's time, pun intended, for me to post the 2022 version of Vox, TODAY, and ABC News look back at 2021. I begin, as I did last year, with Vox recapping 2022, in 7 minutes.

Running up that hill with 8 billion people.
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In 2022, the world population crossed 8 billion people — and we felt the scale of this monumental milestone in hundreds of ways. After over two years of lockdowns and quarantines, people eagerly restarted their lives, but there were certainly growing pains. Weddings and travel skyrocketed, but so did lost luggage and global inflation rates. Taylor Swift broke Ticketmaster. Cryptocurrency was headed toward a great year until it really, really wasn’t. 2022 tested the world population as we tested out life in a new phase of the pandemic.

Russia invaded Ukraine, and aid relief flooded into the war-torn country. Refugees were welcomed into surrounding countries, and those who stayed behind inspired people around the world. Global protests cried out for justice in Iran. Football teams stood up for migrant workers and the LGBTQ+ community at the World Cup. Cuba legalized same-sex marriage. The world froze for a moment when England’s longest-reigning monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, died. And we all watched a lot of TikTok.

As we head into 2023, take a moment to look back at the events that defined this year.
The other year in review videos I watched did not even mention the human population passing 8 billion, yet Vox made it the first and organizing story. This is yet another reason I subscribe to Vox on YouTube and why it's one of my favorite sources for news and analysis.

Time Magazine had a more conventional take in 2022: A Year In Review.

Following years of uncertainty—and a global pandemic that has proven to be one of the most challenging events in history—we forged on, prepared to tackle what lay ahead. And as we continued to extract the possible from the impossible, this year taught us, above all, that our voices—no matter how big or small—can change the world.
That's a much more conventional year in review than Vox's, as is WatchMojo's Top 10 Breaking News Stories of 2022.

These events were the most significant, culture-shifting, and/or shocking moments from 2022. For this list, we’ll be looking at the most impactful news items from the year. Our countdown includes Elon Musk Acquires Twitter, Johnny Depp & Amber Heard Trial, The Death of Queen Elizabeth II, and more!
I have three comments on this video. First, it did a good job of selecting and explaining its top ten stories. Second, that gave me more insight into the Depp and Heard civil trial, which I dismissed by writing "'SNL' also has 'I can't be all DOOM all the time' moods and needed some escapism" in Weekend Update compares this week's headlines to 'Mad Max' on last night's 'SNL'. It turned out to be a more significant story than I thought at the time and yet another example of a future blogging topic. Finally, this is yet another example of WatchMojo producing "high-quality, well-researched clickbait" that is worth sharing.

I close by returning to Time telling its viewers to Watch: A Tribute to Those We’ve Lost in 2022.

As 2022 comes to a close, we take a moment to reflect on Sidney Poitier, Olivia Newton-John, Queen Elizabeth II, and many more who left us in the past year.
R.I.P.

Stay tuned for one final retrospective on New Year's Eve.

Thursday, December 29, 2022

Beyond The Trailer and WatchMojo look at the top movies and TV shows of 2022

I'm leaving science for entertainment with an updated and expanded version of last year's The best TV series of 2021 according to WatchMojo and IGN by adding movies to television, beginning with Grace Randolph of Beyond The Trailer listing her Top Ten Best Movies of 2022.

Top Ten Movies of 2022 today! Beyond The Trailer's best movies from Hollywood! How do full movies rank like Top Gun Maverick, Avatar 2?
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Top Ten Best Movies of 2022 today! Beyond The Trailer host Grace Randolph gives a review of her Top Ten Movies of 2022 including a breakdown as to why each one made the cut! Find out where The Woman King, Puss in Boots 2 The Last Wish, Glass Onion A Knives Out Mystery, Nope, She Said, Black Panther Wakanda Forever, Top Gun Maverick, The Batman, The Black Phone and Avatar 2 The Way of Water land on this list!
Not a bad top ten. Now, how many of them are on WatchMojo's Top 10 Best Movies of 2022 and which movies make its list that didn't make Grace's?

2022 was an incredible year for film! For this list, we’ll be looking at feature films that captured the zeitgeist in 2022, standing out as the year’s best examples of pure cinema. Our countdown includes “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”, “Avatar: The Way of Water”, “Top Gun: Maverick”, and more!
I'm not surprised that "Banshees of Inisherin" "The Fablemans," "Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio," "RRR," and "Everything Everywhere All at Once" beat out "She Said," "Puss in Boots 2: The Last Wish," "The Black Phone," "Nope," and "Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery." WatchMojo gave "Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery" an honorable mention, while Grace justified her decision in a pinned comment to the video: "While I certainly respect Everything Everywhere All At Once, I didn't love it myself. So while I voted for it for Best Picture for Critics Choice, it's not on my list here." Fair enough.

Follow over the jump for Grace's and WatchMojo's picks for the year's top TV shows.

Wednesday, December 28, 2022

2022 in climate and weather from NBC News, DW News, and ABC News

After looking back at science and space during the year about to end, it's time to examine the year in climate and weather. NBC News included most of what I wanted to cover in Our Planet’s Future: Combatting Climate Change, which the network uploaded on Festivus.

2022 was another catastrophic year of extreme weather events fueled by climate change. NBC News correspondent Jacob Soboroff takes a look back at the impacts of those events and looks forward as the world rallies to fight climate change.
Jacob Soboroff and NBC News covered some general environmental news, like cleaning up plastic pollution, in addition to the climate, weather, and energy news. That segment also reminded me of what I wrote in WatchMojo rewound YouTube again, Google's Year in Search, and top memes for New Year's Eve last year.
[T]he host of Mr. Beast looks familiar, even though I didn't know his channel name. The channel I most want to watch of all of them is Mark Rober. His videos look both fun and educational.
Thanks to NBC News covering their #TeamSeas challenge, I finally subscribed to both of their channels.

Soboroff mentioned that the year wasn't over after listing the major U.S. and global weather events, indicating that there could be more in store during the final eight days of the year. He was right. DW News opened Extreme weather events in a changing climate with the winter bomb cyclone that hit over Christmas weekend before recounting the rest of the global natural disasters this year.

Human-made climate change is increasing the frequency and intensity of severe weather. 2022 continued the trend of recent years being the warmest on record. Extreme heat and water events affected many parts of the globe, with the greatest increases in temperature not where you might expect.
Winter Storm Elliot hit me, too, as some of my pipes froze on Christmas Eve. Fortunately, none of them burst and they all thawed out on Christmas. I consider my wife and myself lucky.

Enough doom and gloom. Time for hope as ABC News listed other good news beyond the Inflation Reduction Act in Major milestones in battling climate change seen in 2022.

While saving the climate may be decades away, 2022 saw some major advancements in the battle against climate change.
Good news, everyone, but still not good enough to post Professor Farnsworth. There is still too much bad climate news.

Stay tuned as the retrospectives continue through New Year's Eve.

Tuesday, December 27, 2022

2022 has been another great year in space

I closed 2021 in space from NASA, ESA, and Reuters with "Here's to 2022 being another great year in space for all participants!" It was. Watch NASA 2022: A Year of Success.

Throughout America's story, there are defining days. Days when minds change, hearts fill and imagination soar.

NASA’s mission is to explore the unknown in air and space, innovate for the benefit of humanity, and inspire the world through discovery.
In addition to the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), the video featured DART and Artemis, the three subjects of NOVA PBS's Three Major Space Stories of 2022.

From rocket launches, to dazzling new images, and even planetary defense, 2022 was a big year for space discovery.
These are also my choices for the three top space stories, which appeared again in An Astronomical and Historic 2022 – What We Did This Year @ NASA.

In 2022, we launched our mega Moon rocket for the first time – sending the uncrewed Orion spacecraft around the Moon, we kicked off a new era in astronomy with record-breaking new imagery from the Webb Space Telescope, we moved an asteroid in humanity’s first ever planetary defense demonstration and much more. Here’s a look back at those and other things we did, this year @NASA!
This video shows that some of NASA's most important, if less spectacular, work takes place on Earth, not up in space.

Follow over the jump for videos from ESA, Reuters, and SciShow Space.

Monday, December 26, 2022

James Webb Space Telescope is the top science story of 2022

It's the last week of 2022, so it's time for me to look back at the year about to end with retrospectives until New Year's Eve. I'm changing up the order from previous years and beginning this year's series with the year in science. As I have all those years and more, I start my examination with Science Magazine's 2022 Breakthrough of the Year: JWST's golden eye sees the universe anew.

Not many telescopes get introduced by the president, but JWST, the gold-plated wunderkind of astronomy built by NASA with the help of the European and Canadian space agencies, deserves that honor. It is the most complex science mission ever put into space and at $10 billion the most expensive. And it did not come easy.
Science Magazine has more at 2022 Breakthrough of the Year on their website, including nine runners-up and three stories in a category I don't remember seeing before, Breakdowns of the Year. Those include the failure/discontinuance of Zero COVID in China, international conflicts and tensions affecting science cooperation among the major powers, and the war in Ukraine causing an increase in carbon dioxide emissions. I agree; none of these are good news.

WatchMojo compiled their own list of the Top 10 Biggest Scientific Discoveries of 2022.

These scientific discoveries will blow your mind! For this list, we’ll be looking at the most amazing things we learned through scientific research this year. Our countdown includes Brain Cells Playing Video Games, Footprints from the Ice Age, A Detailed View of the Distant Universe, and more! What do you think is the most significant discovery here? Are there any we missed? Tell us in the comments.
WatchMojo added an obvious top ten story in the comments and pinned it.
The discoveries keep coming! On December 13th, researchers announced that they'd managed to produce more energy from a fusion experiment than they'd put in, a groundbreaking step towards abundant clean energy!
That was only one day after WatchMojo uploaded the video. There is such a thing as being too soon. Just the same, I doubt nuclear fusion would have displaced the JWST from the top of either list.

Speaking of the JWST, this post makes for a second installment on the space telescope after Time introduces the 2022 Nobel Prize winners plus the Innovator of the Year for Nobel Prize Day. I plan on covering it again tomorrow for 2022 in space, along with the successful DART mission that made both Science Magazine's and WatchMojo's top ten. Stay tuned.

Sunday, December 25, 2022

Merry Christmas 2022 with songs from Broken Peach and a drink from Tipsy Bartender!

Merry Christmas with songs from Broken Peach and a drink from Tipsy Bartender! I begin with this year's holiday selection, Broken Peach - It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas (Christmas Special).

"It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas" is a Christmas song written in 1951 by Meredith Willson. The song was originally titled "It's Beginning to Look Like Christmas". The song has been recorded by many artists, but was a hit for Perry Como and The Fontane Sisters with Mitchell Ayres & His Orchestra on September 18, 1951. Bing Crosby recorded a version on October 1, 1951, which was also widely played.

This video was recorded in Pazo di Libunca, in Narón, Galicia (Spain).
Like last year's video, this is a new addition to the band's Christmas repertoire. So would have been the song teased in Broken Peach - Noche de Paz (A Christmas Story).

PEACHES! Sunday, December 18, 2021... New Christmas Special! Stay tuned
I'm looking forward to Broken Peach actually singing "Silent Night" for a future Christmas Special.

I close the musical portion of this post with Broken Peach - Santa Claus Is Coming To Town (TV Peachformance), a live performance of the band's favorite Christmas song.


Here's to Broken Peach keeping their performances of this song as fresh as when they first performed it eight years ago.

To complement the candy cane motif in Broken Peach's costumes, I'm sharing Candy Cane Vodka - Tipsy Bartender



It's Candy Cane Time!

Finally, as Broken Peach themselves wrote eight years ago, "¡Feliz Navidad! - ¡Bo Nadal! - ¡Bon Nadal! - Eguberri! …. Merry Christmas!"

Saturday, December 24, 2022

The histories of Christmas trees and Poinsettia from Vox for Christmas Eve

I changed my mind since I wrote Festivus history, song, and drink for the rest of us; instead of two weeks of holiday material from "Saturday Night Live" for Christmas Eve, I'm sharing two videos from Vox about the history behind two of the plants used as holiday decorations, beginning with How Christmas trees stopped being just a German thing.

It's a local custom that became a worldwide tradition.
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The Christmas tree tradition as we know it today has a long and varied history.

It is believed to have roots in ancient cultures, where trees were decorated as part of celebrations.

In the 1500s and 1600s, the Christmas tree became a Germanic custom, with fir trees being a popular choice.

In the 1840s, the practice of having a Christmas tree in the home became more widespread, thanks in part to the influence of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, who were both of German descent. The Christmas tree also gained popularity in the United States during this time due to a large influx of German immigrants. The tradition was further popularized through the mass media, such as The Illustrated London News, and the publication of Christmas cards and books like Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. Today, Christmas trees can be found in homes around the world and can even be spotted from satellite images of Christmas tree farms.
Why am I not surprised that Christmas trees became more widely popular through the British royal family, which is originally German, intermarrying with their sometimes not-so-distant cousins from Germany at least twice, and then from German emigration to the U.S. and elsewhere? Then again, I shouldn't complain, as I'm one-eighth German and one-eighth English, so I wouldn't exist without German immigration into the U.S.*

The other video Vox uploaded on the general subject was The case to rename this famous Christmas plant.

Why the story of the poinsettia is a troubling one.
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Depending on where you live, there is one plant that you can spot anywhere during the winter holiday season (outside of, well, Christmas trees): poinsettias. It was named for the first US minister to Mexico: Joel Poinsett. In Mexico, Poinsett saw the plant — called cuetlaxochitl by the Aztec and with a long history of use in the region — and shipped some cuttings back to the US.

Many around the world started calling the plant “poinsettia” to celebrate Poinsett’s legacy. But that legacy is a troubling one. Poinsett was a slave owner, a firm believer in American expansion, and during his tenure as secretary of war he oversaw the displacement of thousands of Native Americans. In his role as minister to Mexico, he meddled so much in local politics that he was asked to leave the country.

Because of that history — and the fact that the US still corners the lucrative poinsettia market while restricting their imports from Mexico — many people today reject the name poinsettia in favor of the plant’s Native name, cuetlaxochitl. Check out the video above for more on how the US got the poinsettia.
While I will still say that any day I learn something new is a good day, learning about Poinsett's key role in The Trail of Tears is enough to make me want to change the name I use for the plant. I take that fact a bit personally for reasons I described a decade ago.
My wife, my ex-girlfriend, and my ex-wife all have Native American ancestry. At least two of them would qualify as Native Americans under U.S. government policy, and one of them is enrolled as a Cherokee...
Now to choose between cuitlaxochitl and flor de noche buena. Decisions, decisions.

Follow over the jump for two drink recipes for the holiday.

Friday, December 23, 2022

Festivus history, song, and drink for the rest of us

Happy Festivusfeats of strength, airing of grievances, and maybe a Festivus pole! National Day Calendar has the history of the day in Festivus | For The Rest Of Us | December 23.

Daniel O’Keefe, Reader’s Digest editor and author, created the holiday in response to family tension. One of its central practices is the “airing of grievances.”

He first celebrated the day in February of 1966. But later, the day was recognized as it is now, on December 23 in honor of O’Keefe’s first date with his future wife. O’Keefe’s son wrote the Seinfeld episode featuring the celebration.
That's the history with all the essential elements, including something mundane as a Festivus miracle.

Now for some music, O Festivus by Paul Westbrook.


I forgot to include a drink in my two previous holiday posts, Monstrum on 'The Wicked Feline Murder Floof, a Yule Cat Story' for Yule/Winter Solstice and A merry drum corps Christmas from March or Die and DCI — I blame the stress of grading for my oversight — so I'm making up for it by including Festivus Drink Recipe - theFNDC.com.

This drink is a Festivus for the rest of us! Learn how to make the Festivus in three easy steps and you and your guests will be consuming it in less than a minute. For the Festvus cocktail, you'll need citrus vodka, gingerbread liqueur, and cranberry juice.
This video is from eleven years ago, so it's about time I used it.

Stay tuned for two weeks of holiday material from "Saturday Night Live" for Christmas Eve and Eggnog Day and Christmas songs from Broken Peach.

Thursday, December 22, 2022

A merry drum corps Christmas from March or Die and DCI

I promised to "See you tomorrow with more holiday content," so I'm sharing DCI Christmas-Amazing Drum Corps Christmas moments from March or Die TV.

Thank you all for a fantastic year. I can not wait until next year. Here is a collection of Drum corps Christmas songs from across the years. There are many amazing moments. I hope you enjoy and thank you!
I expressed my gratitude on a comment.
And an early Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you and the rest of your viewers, too. Thank you for this early Christmas present. I've already saved this in my blogging notes as "A merry drum corps Christmas from March or Die." I plan on sharing the link to the blog entry in the Facebook group when I post it next week.
And I will, too.

Drum Corps International (DCI) uploaded the entire Phantom Regiment at the Winter Palace with Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite yesterday, so in case March or Die TV's upload goes away for any reason, I'm embedding it, too.*

"Songs From the Winter Palace – Phantom Regiment brings highlights from Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's "Nutcracker Suite" to the field of Camp Randall Stadium in Madison, Wisconsin during the 1987 DCI World Championship Finals.
The complete version is even more festive than the clip March or Die selected, so I'm glad DCI uploaded it to celebrate the holiday.

Stay tuned as I celebrate Festivus tomorrow — feats of strength, airing of grievances, and maybe a Festivus pole!

*This is a real possibility. In addition to unofficial uploads like this being taken down, accounts could disappear. This already happened to March or Die's previous account. So, as I've written before about drum corps in general and unofficial uploads in particular, enjoy it while it lasts.

Wednesday, December 21, 2022

Monstrum on 'The Wicked Feline Murder Floof, a Yule Cat Story' for Yule/Winter Solstice

Happy Winter Solstice and Yule! I just finished grading, so I'm in a cranky mood, but not a doomy one, so I'm sharing The Wicked Feline Murder Floof, a Yule Cat Story | Monstrum.

Christmas isn’t just a time for presents, cookies, and holiday cheer, but the hunting period of Iceland’s murderous monster feline, the Yule Cat. This giant, fluffy cat towers over buildings, roaming the snowy countryside for human victims who have yet to receive new clothes before Christmas.

Although at first glance this monster may seem random, in this episode you’ll learn how the importance of wool production, the absence of Santa Claus, and a respect for cats drove Icelandic folklore to create such a gruesome Yuletime critter.
That's an appropriately bloodthirsty video for my mood. So is my next activity, logging onto Star Wars: The Old Republic to defeat some mobs with my guildmates. That should relieve my stress.

See you tomorrow with more holiday content. Until then, enjoy these seasonal greetings.

Tuesday, December 20, 2022

Aaron Judge, Time's 2022 Athlete of the Year

It's time to finish my series about Time's People of the Year with Aaron Judge: TIME Athlete of the Year 2022.

When Aaron Judge stood in the Yankee Stadium batter’s box in late September, he couldn’t quite shake the silence. Some 45,000 voices hushed, as if they were at a basilica, not a ball field. As fans anticipated a landmark moment in sports—the breaking of a revered home-run record—they refused to peep as the pitcher wound up.

“I never noticed the crowd until they stopped cheering, which was one of the craziest things in my career,” says Judge, 30, sitting in the leafy courtyard of his luxury New York City apartment building, about a week after the end of a monumental campaign in which he set a new American League home-run mark, with 62. “That’s when I started to kind of realize, ‘Oh boy, there’s something special going on here.’”
Judge's story about gum serves as a good example of the usefulness of superstitions, as irrational as they are. Then again, humans are not completely rational, so we need to be able to use our irrationality.

TIME recorded a second video, How to Hit a Home-run like Aaron Judge.

Now, Judge, TIME's 2022 Athlete of the Year, is sharing some of his best tips for knocking home-runs out of the park.
Nice apartment building! Also, good advice, except I played football not baseball in high school and I'm far too old to ever use it. May someone younger pay heed to Judge's coaching.

I conclude with Judge's TIME cover.


That's it for this series. Stay tuned for a post celebrating Winter Solstice and Yule tomorrow.

Previous posts about Time's People of the Year

Monday, December 19, 2022

Celebrating Hanukkah on Sesame Street

Happy Hanukkah! I'm continuing with songs for children with Sesame Street: Happy Hanukkah from Elmo and his friends!

Charlie, Elmo, and their friends are learning about Hanukkah! Hanukkah, also known as the Festival of Lights, is a Jewish holiday that lasts eight days and nights and celebrates joy and pride in your beliefs. And of course, they get to enjoy some yummy treats during their celebration too!
That was cute. As I wrote last year, "No serious educational content about the holiday today!"

I close with this image from Dean Obeidallah on Twitter.

Sunday, December 18, 2022

'SNL' snickers at Trump's NFTs in its cold open and on Weekend Update

I couldn't resist recapping last night's episode of "Saturday Night Live" for the Sunday entertainment feature today.* Last week's news deserves being laughed at, beginning with Trump NFT Cold Open.

Donald Trump (James Austin Johnson) gets help from Donald Trump Jr. (Mikey Day) and Kimberly Guilfoyle (Cecily Strong) to announce his collection of NFT digital trading cards.
There is nothing I can say about The Former Guy selling NFTs that Weekend Update didn't already say better, so watch Trump Launches NFT Trading Cards, FTX Founder Sam Bankman-Fried's Arrest.

Weekend Update anchors Colin Jost and Michael Che tackle the week's biggest news, like Marjorie Taylor Greene complaining that people can buy sex toys at Target.
Once again, mocking Kanye West makes this entry worthy of being an entertainment update. As for MTG, I suspect she's attacking Target on behalf of Walmart as much as for her own political career. As a loyal Target shopper, I'm not positively impressed.
I'm one of those who call Target "Tar-zhay" and shop there regularly, helping contribute the demise of both Sears and KMart. As I wrote once on my Facebook page, "between Walmart and KMart, I shop at Target."
The next segment had some science news, along with more about TFG: Weekend Update: Nuclear Scientists Achieve "Ignition", Trump vs. DeSantis GOP Civil War.

Weekend Update anchors Colin Jost and Michael Che tackle the week's biggest news, like a humpback whale traveling 3,000 miles with a broken spine.
My thought and feeling about TFG vs. DeSantis is that I wish they would both lose, one in the primary and the other in the general election.

Weekend Update continued on from there, including the first of two farewells to Cecily Strong, but I'm planning on saving those for a Christmas post. Instead, I'm going back to last year's cast for NFTs to conclude this entry.

A group (Jack Harlow, Pete Davidson, Chris Redd) performs a rap explaining cryptocurrency.
Hahaha, I've never liked Pete Davidson as much as when he's doing an Eminem parody.

Stay tuned for my annual celebration of Hanukkah.

*Besides, it makes for easy blogging so I can return to grading final exams. Four classes down, one to go!

Saturday, December 17, 2022

Michelle Yeoh is Time's 2022 Icon of the Year


After lots of buildup, I'm finally posting about Michelle Yeoh: TIME Icon of the Year 2022.

Since making her debut in Hong Kong action films in the mid-’80s, the now 60-year-old Michelle Yeoh has battled Jet Li in The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, flung herself onto a moving car driven by Jackie Chan in Supercop, and jumped off a skyscraper with Pierce Brosnan’s James Bond in Tomorrow Never Dies. She had major roles in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; Memoirs of a Geisha; and Crazy Rich Asians. She’s done Marvel, Star Trek, Kung Fu Panda, Minions—Avatar, Transformers, and The Witcher are next. But, until Everything Everywhere All at Once, which premiered in March, she had never been No. 1 on a Hollywood call sheet.

She’s clear about why: Asian actors have long been given stereotypical or inconsequential roles, and rarely top billing. “It shouldn’t be about my race, but it has been a battle,” she says, golden baubles on her jacket clanging as she mimics elbowing her way through a crowd. “At least let me try.”

Which is why the role of Evelyn Wang in Everything Everywhere All at Once was such a revelation. In the hit art-house film directed by Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (known as Daniels), Yeoh is an overworked, over-burdened immigrant wife and mother facing an IRS audit of the family laundromat when, suddenly, everything changes. She learns that there are multiple versions of the universe, and they’re all facing a threat that only she can stop—if she can figure out how to jump between different realities and pick up skills possessed by different versions of herself. Yeoh has the opportunity to showcase all of her talents—as a martial artist but also, in portraying Evelyn’s deep love for her family, even as she struggles to communicate with them, her abilities as a dramatic actor. It’s a shift for the actor, who toggles between wacky sequences, like a world where humans have hot dogs for fingers, and intimate moments. “She usually plays masters, tough fighters,” says Jet Li. “The action—I know she can do it. But really acting from the heart, believing the part, makes the movie very special.”
Congratulations! It's about time Yeoh got the recognition she deserves. Now to see if she wins at the Golden Globes and Critics' Choice Awards and gets an Oscar nomination for "Everything Everywhere All at Once."

Yeoh had more to say about her stunt work in The Biggest Lesson Michelle Yeoh Learned Early in Her Career in Hong Kong.

Before Michelle Yeoh became a celebrated Hollywood star, she was an action star in the rough-and-tumble world of Hong Kong action movies.

Those roles were incredibly physically demanding and could even be dangerous, she recalled Thursday at TIME’s 2022 Person of the Year reception in New York City. The experience taught her to take risks and not be afraid of failure. And she credits that for her success now.
I was thrilled to see Yeoh in the first two episodes of "Star Trek: Discovery" and was disappointed to watch her prime universe version die. However, I was thrilled enough to see her Mirror Universe version appear and return to the series, enough so to vote for her in Best Guest-Starring Performance on Television at the Saturn Awards. I was even more impressed to watch her do her own stunts in a fight scene. I don't care if its for show; I would not ever want to get in a fight with her, even if I'm twice her size!

Follow over the jump for my commentary on the categories won by "Everything Everywhere All at Once" at the Saturn Awards.

Friday, December 16, 2022

Meet Donnel Baird, Time Magazine's first-ever Dreamer of the Year


I'm postponing blogging about Time Magazine's Icon and Athlete of the Year because Time uploaded Meet the First-Ever Dreamer of the Year yesterday.

Meet the First-Ever Dreamer of the Year: Donnel Baird, CEO of BlocPower. Donnel's story demonstrates how the pursuit of one dream can empower the dreams of thousands. His company BlocPower, a clean energy tech company generating climate resilience and community wealth, is changing lives one building at a time.
Hey, look, another Crazy Eddie! I approve!

While this video is the first time I've heard of Donnel Baird, it isn't his first time being covered by the media. The Weather Channel told his story in Faces of Change: Donnel Baird almost two years ago.

Learn about Donnel Baird's tech start-up, which replaces old, wasteful heating systems with modern, green technology.
I appreciate showing both the graphic of how much of global carbon dioxide emissions come from heating buildings and the heat pump installed at St. Bartholomew's Episcopal Church. Numbers, technology, and solutions — yay!

Time covered Baird earlier this year as one of the guests in Sara Menker and Donnel Baird: Climate Change Is a Crisis, But It's Solvable.

The world is facing a climate crisis, and parts of the U.S. energy system are collapsing at this very moment, ecopreneurs Sara Menker and Donnel Baird warned the audience at the TIME 100 Summit during a panel discussion moderated by Simon Mulcahy, the President of Sustainability at TIME.
Ecopreneur — now that's a word that I should not only read more often, but use more often. Thanks, Time, for expanding my vocabulary.

I'm looking forward to seeing future Dreamers of the Year. In the meantime, stay tuned for Time Magazine's Icon of the Year. Speaking of Time, it's time to grade final exams. See you tomorrow!

Thursday, December 15, 2022

PBS NewsHour and CNN report on nuclear fusion breakthrough

I mentioned that "nuclear fusion passed an important milestone" and "I plan on writing more about that in the near future." Watch PBS NewsHour report on the achievement in Breakthrough in nuclear fusion technology could dramatically alter clean energy landscape.

For the first time, scientists have produced a fusion reaction that created more energy than was expended, a breakthrough to tap into the same kind of energy that powers the sun and stars. It could have huge implications for potentially creating clean and limitless energy. Science Correspondent Miles O’Brien joined Judy Woodruff to discuss what was achieved and what still needs to happen.
Miles O'Brian saying that nuclear fusion has been twenty years away for as long as he's been following the topic is more optimistic than the thirty to thirty-five years I cited a decade ago.* However, I think that optimism is actually warranted now. Also, while the U.S. can claim this milestone, we are not alone, as Stephen Dean pointed out. Researchers from other countries could beat us to making nuclear fusion a practical source of energy. While that doesn't bother me as a scientist, it worries me as an American.

Bill Nye echoed those concerns on CNN in Bill Nye explains why nuclear fusion breakthrough is a big deal.

For the first time in history, US scientists at the National Ignition Facility at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California successfully produced a nuclear fusion reaction resulting in a net energy gain. Science educator Bill Nye explains why this is such a big breakthrough.
Everything you say, Bill, I agree.

Stephen Colbert's monologue Tuesday night prompted me to write this, so it's only appropriate I return to his show for There Were Many Attempts To Achieve A Fusion Reaction Before The Breakthrough.

Considering nearly 200 lasers were used, someone could have probably seen this coming.
Meow. BOOM!

I probably will include this advancement in a planned 2022 year in science post. Until then, stay tuned for Time Magazine's Icon and Athlete of the Year.

*The couple who sold my ex-wife and I our first house in Ann Arbor worked for a company working on fusion power that went under. That was thirty-one years ago. I wonder what they think of this announcement.

Wednesday, December 14, 2022

Colbert begins his monologue covering Biden signing the Respect For Marriage Act

I haven't blogged much, if at all, about marriage equality since I posted Good news from the Supreme Court this week more than seven years ago. However, the overturning of Roe v. Wade put marriage equality and even interracial marriage in jeopardy. I can stop worrying, as Stephen Colbert called yesterday A Great Day For Love! Biden Signs Respect For Marriage Act | GOP Traitors Wanted “Marshall Law”.

Drag queens were in attendance at The White House today to celebrate the signing of the Respect For Marriage Act, and leaked messages reveal 34 GOP members of Congress texted Mark Meadows about plans to overturn the 2020 election.
Not only is the Respect For Marriage Act now law, but nuclear fusion passed an important milestone. I plan on writing more about that in the near future. In the meantime, I'm celebrating with Professor Farnsworth.


Good news, everyone!

Tuesday, December 13, 2022

Blackpink is Time's Entertainer of the Year for 2022

Finally, after all the promising, I'm following through on blogging about Time Magazine's Entertainer of the Year. Watch Blackpink: TIME Entertainer of the Year 2022.

Normal as they may be, their 2022 has been anything but. They appeared at the VMAs in August, performing their hit single “Pink Venom,” and onstage during their latest blockbuster world tour, which kicked off in October and will hit 27 cities over nine months. Shows sold out in minutes and were attended by tens of thousands of fans, including celebrities like Selena Gomez and Usher. The foursome released its highly anticipated second studio album, Born Pink, in September, which notched a record as the best-selling album by a Korean girl group, with over 2 million album sales. It continues to dominate on YouTube, where Blackpink is the biggest musical act with over 83 million subscribers.
Congratulations to Blackpink for this honor. Not only are they Entertainers of the Year, their video is the most viewed, beating Volodymyr Zelenskyy's for Person of the Year. Once again, Americans and others priorities are on display. That's the good news. The bad news is that, unlike Olivia Rodrigo, 2021's Entertainer of the Year, Blackpink has no Grammy nominations. They did have two People's Choice Award nominations for The Group of 2022 and The Music Video of 2022, but they lost the first to BTS — at least another K-Pop group won — and the second to "Anti-Hero" by Taylor Swift. Both of the winners have Grammy nominations. Maybe next year.

As consolation, I'm sharing the nominated video, BLACKPINK - ‘Pink Venom’ M/V.


I plan on blogging about the actual Grammy nominees later. In the meantime, stay tuned for the Icon and Athlete of the Year to close out this series.

I leave my readers with Blackpink's Time cover.

Monday, December 12, 2022

Twenty-one years of gingerbread houses from Haunted Mansion Holiday for Gingerbread House Day 2022

Happy Gingerbread House Day! I celebrated the day three years ago in Walt Disney World's gingerbread houses for National Gingerbread House Day. This year, I'm traveling from Florida to California with Fastpass Facts' The Evolution of Haunted Mansion Gingerbread Houses.

Because you asked for it, today we'll be revisiting the Evolution of the Haunted Mansion Holiday's Gingerbread Houses, adding the ones that we were missing since 2019!
Welcome to the "scary Christmas house," the perfect place to celebrate Creepmas (hat/tip to Infidel753 for introducing me to the concept).


I will return with more holiday posts after I fulfill my promise to blog about Time Magazine's Entertainer of the Year. Stay tuned.

Sunday, December 11, 2022

SNL's 'Weekend Update' recaps the news from the first full week of December 2022

I know, I promised I would cover Entertainer of the Year as the Sunday entertainment feature three times, but I couldn't resist last night's episode of "Saturday Night Live." Besides, looking back at the year meant I was ignoring last week's news after Raphael Warnock won re-election in Georgia and there was a lot of news to cover. Watch Weekend Update: Trump Claims Constitution Should Be Terminated, Brittney Griner Freed - SNL.

Weekend Update anchors Colin Jost and Michael Che tackle the week's biggest news, like Kyrsten Sinema leaving the Democratic party.
I was going to blog about Colbert, Meyers, and Kimmel ridiculing The Former Guy calling for the termination of the Constitution so he could be re-instated, but I wasn't feeling it, so I posted MSNBC's Steve Kornacki examines today's Senate runoff election in Georgia instead. I guess I couldn't avoid the topic any more.

Speaking of avoiding things, Kyrsten Sinema becoming an independent means she will avoid a Democratic primary that she was likely to lose. It also means I will have to create a new version of the following image and write new commentary about the first independent female U.S. Senator.

By the way, Manchin and Sinema are the two most moderate/conservative Democratic U.S. Senators as the above chart from Voteview shows. The blue dots to the left of their names shows their ideological positions according to DW-Nominate, the same source I used to rank Democratic presidential candidates from left to center. Just to emphasize the point, Manchin's page calls him "the most conservative Democrat of the 117th Senate" and Sinema's page describes her as "more conservative than 97% of Democrats in the 117th Senate." Sinema was also the most conservative Democrat in the 115th Congress when she left the House of Representatives in 2018. Neither were ever true liberals, despite Sinema being a member of the Green Party.
From now on, Voteview will plot Double-Doctor Sinema's ideological position with a black dot, just as it does for Angus King of Maine and Bernie Sanders of Vermont. Also, the second most conservative/moderate Democratic Senator is now Mark Kelly, the other Senator from Arizona. At least that distinction hasn't left the Grand Canyon state.

Enough of that aside. Here's the second segment of Weekend Update, Chris Christie’s Niece Attacks Latino Family, France Gives Out Free Condoms.

Weekend Update anchors Colin Jost and Michael Che tackle the week's biggest news, like a woman leaving 3 buckets of human waste at a police station.
I haven't mentioned Chris Christie on my blog for more than two years, so leave it to his relatives to get me to do that. Also, the R. Kelly story is enough to qualify this as an entertainment update. Finally, apologies to my French readers about the deodorant joke. I want you to keep reading.

Last night's episode had lots of Christmas content and I expect next week's episode will as well. I plan on compiling them into a holiday post like I did for Halloween content in David Pumpkins returns as 'Saturday Night Live' celebrates Halloween 2022. I will also post Time Magazine's Entertainer of the Year after I blog about Gingerbread House Day tomorrow. Stay tuned.

Saturday, December 10, 2022

Time introduces the 2022 Nobel Prize winners plus the Innovator of the Year for Nobel Prize Day

As I promised twice, I'm covering the Innovator of the Year for Nobel Prize Day today, but I'm saving that for after I feature the this year's prize winners themselves. Watch Meet the 2022 Nobel Prize Winners from Time Magazine.

The Peace Prize is one of six awards established by Swedish chemist (and inventor of dynamite) Alfred Nobel in 1895. The prize is considered the most expansive in its recognition, given that it awards people “who have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind.”
As I wrote last year, "The Peace Prize recipients generally piss people off and I'm O.K. with that as long they piss off the right people. I think this year's prize qualifies." So does this year's and I'm O.K. with that.

If one counted the categories carefully in the first video, one would have noticed Time Magazine only covered five, the ones actually created by Alfred Nobel himself. The sixth prize recognizes economics; it was created decades later by the Bank of Sweden, named in honor of Nobel, and is administered by the Nobel Foundation.* The Economic Times reported on the announcement in Former Fed Chair Ben Bernanke along with two academics awarded the 2022 Nobel Prize in Economics.

Douglas W. Diamond, economist at the University of Chicago, and Philip H. Dybvig at Washington University in St. Louis won the prize alongside Mr Bernanke for the role banks play during financial turmoil.
While I had fun with Bernanke when he was Chairman of the Federal Reserve, calling him Helicopter Ben, I have the same opinion of his winning this award that I did when Robert Shiller won the economics prize in 2013 — he deserves it and it's about time.

Speaking of time, pun intended, here is the recognition I've been telegraphing for two days: The James Webb Telescope Team: TIME Innovator of the Year 2022, which might contribute to future Nobel prizes.

The James Webb telescope has come to represent something larger and grander than all of us. The long effort to get the spacecraft built, the mission it was assigned—searching for clues to the very origins of the universe—have worked a certain transcendent good. From the hands of a team of thousands of researchers, engineers, and factory-line workers came a ship that, if it doesn’t exactly kick open the doors to the secrets of the cosmos, at least parts the curtain. “This beautiful machine,” says senior project scientist John Mather, “has worked in every way that it was supposed to work.”
Consider this a down payment on the entry about the James Webb Space Telescope I promised in 2021 in space from NASA, ESA, and Reuters. I expect to write the rest of it when I recap the year in space for 2022. In the meantime, congratulations to all the winners and stay tuned for the Entertainers of the Year as the Sunday entertainment feature.

*A more literal translation of Sveriges Riksbank is Swedish Royal Bank, but the official translation is Bank of Sweden, so I'm going with that.

Friday, December 9, 2022

The Women of Iran are Time's Heroes of the Year for 2022

After recognizing Volodymyr Zelenskyy named Time's Person of the Year for 2022 yesterday, it's time, pun intended, to acknowledge the Women of Iran: TIME Heroes of the Year 2022.

Younger women are now in the streets. The movement they’re leading is educated, liberal, secular, raised on higher expectations, and desperate for normality: college and foreign travel, decent jobs, rule of law, access to the Apple Store, a meaningful role in politics, the freedom to say and wear whatever. They are quite unlike those who came before them; sometimes they feel more like transnational Gen Z than Iranians: they are vegans, they de-Islamicize their names, they don’t want children. I’ve often wondered what has made them so rebellious, because their ferocious character was evident well before 22-year-old Mahsa (Jina) Amini, arrested at a metro station by the morality police who enforce the dress code, died after being held in their custody on Sept. 16, setting off the most sustained uprising in the 43-year history of the Islamic Republic. The average age of arrested protesters is notably low—Iranian officials estimate as young as 15. I can only conclude that when a generation’s aspirations for freedom appear tantalizingly within reach, the more humiliating the remaining restrictions seem, and the less daunting the final stretch of resistance feels.
Just like Vaccine scientists being named Time Magazine's Heroes of the Year, the women of Iran were being considered for Persons of the Year, but earned this recognition instead. I think it makes for an apt and fitting consolation prize.

Time Magazine uploaded a second video about this honor, Angelina Jolie Interviews Activist Roya Piraei.

TIME Contributing Editor Angelina Jolie interviews activist Roya Piraei, whose mother, Minoo Majidi, was was killed in Iran in September. Thousands continue to protest the repressive regime there. The protests began in September, when 22-year-old Mahsa (Jina) Amini died in police custody, after being arrested for not wearing her hijab properly.

The Women of Iran are TIME's 2022 Heroes of the Year.
I found that moving and personalized the movement well. Also, I didn't know that Angelina Jolie is a contributing editor for Time. It's always a good day when I learn something new.

I plan to return tomorrow with the Innovator of the Year for Nobel Prize Day tomorrow and Entertainers of the Year as the Sunday entertainment feature. Stay tuned. In the meantime, here is the Time Magazine cover image for Heroes of the Year.

Thursday, December 8, 2022

Volodymyr Zelenskyy named Time's Person of the Year for 2022

It's time, pun intended, to begin my look back at the year about to end with the Today Show's reveal that Volodymyr Zelenskyy Is Time's Person Of The Year For 2022.*

Edward Felsenthal, editor-in-chief of Time, exclusively reveals on TODAY the magazine’s pick for its 2022 Person of the Year: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the spirit of Ukraine.
I'll get to the Women of Iran as Heroes of the Year tomorrow. In the meantime, watch Time Magazine's own video, Volodymyr Zelensky and the Spirit of Ukraine: TIME Person of the Year 2022.

Zelensky’s success as a wartime leader has relied on the fact that courage is contagious. It spread through Ukraine’s political leadership in the first days of the invasion, as everyone realized the President had stuck around. If that seems like a natural thing for a leader to do in a crisis, consider historical precedent. Only six months earlier, the President of Afghanistan, Ashraf Ghani—a far more experienced leader than Zelensky—fled his capital as Taliban forces approached. In 2014, one of Zelensky’s predecessors, Viktor Yanukovych, ran away from Kyiv as protesters closed in on his residence; he still lives in Russia today. Early in the Second World War, the leaders of Albania, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Greece, Poland, the Netherlands, Norway, and Yugoslavia, among others, fled the advance of the German Wehrmacht and lived out the war in exile.

There wasn’t much in Zelensky’s biography to predict his willingness to stand and fight. He had never served in the military or shown much interest in its affairs. He had only been President since April 2019. His professional instincts derived from a lifetime as an actor on the stage, a specialist in improv comedy, and a producer in the movie business.

That experience turned out to have its advantages. Zelensky was adaptable, trained not to lose his nerve under pressure. He knew how to read a crowd and react to its moods and expectations. Now his audience was the world. He was determined not to let them down.
I think Zelenskyy is an excellent choice and I hope this honor ages better than Elon Musk as Time Magazine's Person of the Year for 2021. That's not looking as good now as it did then. On the other hand, Lizzo as Time's 2019 Entertainer of the Year still holds up well three years later.

Speaking of Entertainer of the Year, I'll get to them for the Sunday entertainment feature after I write about the Women of Iran as Heroes of the Year tomorrow and the Innovator of the Year on Saturday for Nobel Prize Day. Stay tuned.

*I'll be frank; I selected this video and placed it first as much for its preview image as for its content. I'm not above such petty considerations in my blogging.

Wednesday, December 7, 2022

MSNBC reporting on Warnock winning the Georgia Senate runoff

I closed MSNBC's Steve Kornacki examines today's Senate runoff election in Georgia by telling my readers "'Trevor Noah asked 'Who Is Herschel Walker?' The answer may turn out to be someone enough Georgia Republicans won't vote for that Raphael Warnock gets re-elected. Here's to that happening tonight. Stay tuned." It happened. Watch BREAKING: Warnock Defeats Walker In Georgia Senate Runoff, NBC News Projects.

Jason Johnson, politics professor at Morgan State University reports live amid a jubilant crows of Warnock supporters explaining, "The feeling here isn't just elation, they think they just saved the country."
Wow! That's quite the sentiment, but I feel they may be right, at least for now.

Listen to the winner speak and his audience respond in Warnock Celebrates Win: 'The People Have Spoken'.

Sen. Raphael Warnock thanks supporters and reflected on his mother's history in a speech after his projected win the in Georgia Senate runoff race.
That is one happy crowd!

I conclude with an analysis of Warnock's win in Steve Kornacki: Changing Demographics In Atlanta Area Helped Warnock's Campaign.

Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock defeated Republican football star Herschel Walker on Tuesday in Georgia’s Senate runoff election, NBC News projects, handing President Joe Biden and his party a key win. Warnock’s victory will give Democrats an outright majority in the Senate after two years under a 50-50 divide, with Vice President Kamala Harris casting tie-breaking votes. Steve Kornacki discusses Warnock's win.
As I usually write about awards shows, electorates matter and the electorate in Georgia is changing to favor Democrats over Republicans, although it only helped determine the winner in this particular contest this year. That's not to take anything away from Senator Warnock and his campaign. Congratulations to Senator Warnock and his campaign staff and volunteers!