| January 11, 2006 Web Wire Editor’s Note |
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| Written by Josh Nathan-Kazis | |||||
| Thursday, 12 January 2006 | |||||
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Not Just Any Old List I have a theory. In these cold dark weeks, as our gentile friends stack their wilted Christmas trees in fragrant piles on the sidewalk, I believe that all magazine writers leave these frigid climes and head south. How else to explain the insipid lists that fill every single glossy page printed during the first three weeks of January? Whether it be breeding or conditioning, it seems that the delicate constitutions of those otherwise-diligent scribes at Condé Nast, Time Warner, and Wenner Media are unable to survive the harsh northeastern winters. When they flee, unpaid interns are left to man their keyboards. These interns, unsupervised, do as best they can to put in as little effort as possible. Invariably, they produce lists. The Fifty Best Albums of 2005, the Fifty Worst Albums, the Five Best Restaurants, the Eight Best Nail Salons, the Nine Best Public Restrooms, the Eight Worst Lists, etc., etc., etc. While I’m still braving the cold with the rest of you, my inner magazine writer flew south weeks ago, leaving my inner unpaid intern to run things for a while. So, in true mid-January form, here’s the New Voices Web Wire list of the Top Ten Things That You Probably Saw (But if You Didn’t You Should Definitely Take a Look At) in 2005. 1. President Bush’s troubling “P.S.: No more public scatology” note to former Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers. 2. Jonathan Safran Foer’s brilliant "A Beginner's Guide to Hanukkah". 3. The ubiquitous “Lazy Sunday” clip. 4. Bob Novak cursing and walking off the set of CNN’s Inside Politics. 5. Jack Abramoff dresses up Orthodox. 6. In the days after Hurricane Katrina, Shepard Smith and Kanye West get angry. 7. Nightly News anchor Brian Williams directly addressing me on his blog. (Scroll about halfway down the page. I’m Josh in Connecticut. And yes, this totally belongs on the list.) 8. Pat Robertson finally loses it. Or demonstrates a lot of times in a few months just how lost it is. 9. Christo and Jean Claude say they spent $21 million putting up their Gates exhibit in Central Park. Where did all that money go? Nobody knows. 10. Truthiness. In this issue of the Web Wire: Orthodox Rabbis support Intelligent Design, American Zionists gear up for the 2005 World Zionist Congress, and one Brandeis junior reports on the Rosh Hashanah she spent in a Jesuit chapel. Plus, a review of Sarah Silverman’s Jesus is Magic.
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