While "True Blood" bowed to just 1.4 million total viewers for its initial run, the overall audience tally had grown to 5.4 million once several weeks' data measuring other viewing options had trickled in. HBO renewed the show for a second season.

As audiences increasingly watch original series through encore runs, DVRs and video-on-demand, the lesson is to not judge a show by its overnight numbers. Wait at least a week or two.

It's a logic proliferating among cable networks on the basic and premium side of the spectrum. Perceptions, they say, aren't in sync with reality.

TV shows taking time to grow - Variety

Nominal Second stage cut off (SECO) - Falcon 1 has made history as the first privately developed liquid fueled launch vehicle to achieve earth orbit!!!!!!

Spacex Falcon 1 has made history as the first privately developed liquid fueled launch vehicle to achieve earth orbit!!!!!!

Venture Hacks header image 2
Our top 10 term sheet hacks
September 23rd, 2008

Venture Hacker Naval Ravikant recently presented our top 10 term sheet hacks at Startup2Startup:

(Here’s a pdf of the presentation if you don’t see the slides embedded above. Or read it on Slideshare).

Naval’s slides are a must-read—and a great summary of our detailed hacks.

Slideshare has a transcript of the slides on a single page if you don’t want to flip through the presentation (scroll to the bottom of the page). Mike Speiser has put up his notes from the presentation. And finally, here’s a video of Naval describing his investment criteria:

Venture Hacks — Our top 10 term sheet hacks

The political left always aims to expand the permeation of economic life by politics. Today, the efficient means to that end is government control of capital. So, is not McCain's party now conducting the most leftist administration in American history? The New Deal never acted so precipitously on such a scale. Treasury Secretary Paulson, asked about conservative complaints that his rescue program amounts to socialism, said, essentially: This is not socialism, this is necessary. That non sequitur might be politically necessary, but remember that government control of capital is government control of capitalism. Does McCain have qualms about this, or only quarrels?

...

Conservatives who insist that electing McCain is crucial usually start, and increasingly end, by saying he would make excellent judicial selections. But the more one sees of his impulsive, intensely personal reactions to people and events, the less confidence one has that he would select judges by calm reflection and clear principles, having neither patience nor aptitude for either.

It is arguable that, because of his inexperience, Obama is not ready for the presidency. It is arguable that McCain, because of his boiling moralism and bottomless reservoir of certitudes, is not suited to the presidency. Unreadiness can be corrected, although perhaps at great cost, by experience. Can a dismaying temperament be fixed?

George F. Will - McCain Loses His Head - washingtonpost.com

Russian navy sails to Venezuela
Russia's Peter the Great warship.

Russian warships have set off for Venezuela for joint exercises unprecedented since the Cold War.

If there's another cold war, maybe spy novels will get good again!

Russian navy sails to Venezuela | BBC NEWS | Americas |

If a Democratic administration were proposing this plan, Republicans would realize that having Connecticut Democratic senator Chris Dodd (the largest recipient of political funds from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac) as chairman of the Banking Committee guarantees that the Obama-Reid-Pelosi-Paulson plan that will emerge will be much worse as legislation than it started out as the Paulson proposal.

If this were a Democratic proposal, Republicans would remember that the Democrats wrote a grotesque housing bailout bill this summer that paid off their left-wing allies with taxpayer money, which despite its price tag of $300 billion has apparently failed as of last week, and could expect even more damage in this bill.

But because this gigantic power shift to Washington and this avalanche of taxpayer money is being proposed by a Republican administration, the normal conservative voices have been silent or confused.

It’s time to end the silence and clear up the confusion.

Newt Gingrich sounding... reasonable?

WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON!?

The Corner on National Review Online

“In February 1995, working in conjunction with nutritionists at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, I adopted a super fiber-rich diet which allowed me to successfully produce a single extruded excrement the exact length of my colon: 26 feet. I documented the extrusion at the Cranbrook-Kingswood High School Bowling Alley, Bloomfield Hills, MI, which offered a length of floor suitable for the process and measuring the results. The cathartic diet was supplemented by a high intake of Metamucil fiber substance. The weeklong endurance prior to the event was ensured by the employment of a plug specifically designed to curtail any premature excretions.”

I'm filing this under Arts.

Poor Mojo Newswire: World's Longest Shit - 26 Feet

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMU-wXsgyR8

Oh man this is great!

YouTube - Sesame Street - How Crayons Are Made

“They say there are no atheists in foxholes.   Perhaps, then, there are also no libertarians in financial crises.”

Quote of the Day

Were the financial crisis to end today, the costs would be painful but manageable.... Unfortunately, however, the financial crisis is far from over, and it is hard to imagine how the US government is going to succeed in creating a firewall against further contagion without spending five to 10 times more than it has already, that is, an amount closer to $1,000bn to $2,000bn.....

It is hard to predict exactly how and when the mega-bail-out will evolve. At some point, we are likely to see a broadening and deepening of deposit insurance, much as the UK did in the case of Northern Rock. Probably, at some point, the government will aim to have a better established algorithm for making bridge loans and for triggering the effective liquidation of troubled firms and assets, although the task is far more difficult than was the case in the 1980s, when the Resolution Trust Corporation was formed to help clean up the saving and loan mess.

Of course, there also needs to be better regulation. It is incredible that the transparency-challenged credit default swap market was allowed to swell to a notional value of $6,200bn during 2008 even as it became obvious that any collapse of this market could lead to an even bigger mess than the fallout from subprime mortgage debt.

It may prove to be possible to fix the system for far less than $1,000bn- $2,000bn. The tough stance taken by regulators this past weekend with the investment banks Lehman and Merrill Lynch certainly helps.

Yet I fear that the American political system will ultimately drive the cost of saving the financial system well up into that higher territory.

naked capitalism: The Great Unwind Has Begun