Links/Thoughts for a Monday

+ “Yet Strang said he’s “more undecided than ever.” He said he was encouraged by Democratic pledges to reduce the number of abortions, but now worries the party is using abortion as a wedge issue by running ads sharply contrasting Palin and Obama on abortion rights.” …interesting…[Younger Evangelicals Split over Palin Choice as VP]

+ Writer David Foster Wallace committed suicide at age 46. I’m not familiar with his work, but it sounds like it influenced a lot of people. Andy Osenga wrote an impromptu poem, because DFW lived in his hometown. Joe Posnanski said, *He wrote so much about feeling alone. “The interesting thing,” he wrote, “is why we’re so desperate for this anesthetic against loneliness.” – funny, was just having this conversation with Erica and Kate F. the other day. How that seems to be common to everyone in every culture. No one wants to be alone…everyone wants to be loved and appreciated.

+ Not sure If I’m on the “cool” side of this or not, but I think the Jerry Seinfeld/Bill Gates ads are kinda funny. More so the second one than the first one (view the full 4-minute version here). I agree that this is about changing the perception of Microsoft…and selling the brand not the products…we’ll see if it works.

+ For 2 years now I’ve been planning on upgrading my living room entertainment center in the Spring of 2009. Would like to replace the 32″ Sony 4:3 TV with a nice 1080p widescreen (probably no bigger than 46″). I’d also need to upgrade my DirecTV DVR up to the HR20, or maybe even to this HR22.

+ Timothy Noah writes for Slate.com that the reason Sarah Palin was confused about what The Bush Doctrine was is that there is no “The Bush Doctrine”. But hey, Tina Fey did do a great Palin on SNL this weekend. I especially liked the line about her wearing “Tina Fey glasses”.

+ So the DOW dropped over 500 points today. Should I be worried about this?