Ever since Barack Obama was elected, a lot of pundits have asked: who will run against him in 2012? They do that because they’re paid to of course, but as the election draws nearer perhaps we should take the matter a little more seriously. Here, therefore is an E-Z cut out n’keep list of possible Republican candidates for next year’s presidential race. [Read more →]
Rapture is postponed. Good thing. Not that I was going anywhere, but I assume a good fraction of the tough guys who make the toilets flush and the internets flow would have been gathered at the Final Call. They’re here. We’re queer. Let’s get started.
Fresh Air…. what an insipid and presumptuous bit of condescencion that logism contains. You know these skunks; their position in so-called Public Broadcasting and Murphy’s Law assures that, wherever you drive, the subsidized voices of liberal salvation will always come through the radio clearer than anything but the spanish stations. These cats are defininitely Left Behind under any recognized scenario. They are as adamantly against rapturees as they are for perfectly modulated saccharine tumbling out of their oh-so-well compensated pie holes.
The doof on the pyre today is the unlikely named Dave Davies, although really, he is of little consequence except as an exemplar. And his fulfillment of that duty pales compared to the object of his recent interest; a pair of Registered Genii, financial reporters for the New York Times no less. They have written a book, well titled Reckless Endangerment that explains the hows and whys of our financial meltdown.
Let’s go to the audio. [Read more →]
The first rule of timetravel is don’t touch anything, not so it would show, anyhow. Sure strangling the infant Hitler would be fun and make for some great souvenirs but your dream vacation will raise a Super-Hitler who does NOT helpfully off himself in the storeroom. Therefore when you return, things will be different; horrendously different if The Twilight Zone has taught us anything. You yourself may just go pop! like a soap bubble or if you haven’t kept your parents from meeting you will find other disappointments; Hansen was a boy band. You just said, no. And that night when you realized in the nick of time? Sorry, now it was a bit too late.
Timetravel, like salt and cooking oil, is hazardous, so must be used sparingly and responsibly. Like these commodities it should be and is controlled by the federal government. [Read more →]
Walter Cronkite was a towering figure of the media for many decades. His catchphrase was in his sign-off. And that’s the way it was on whatever date. It is somewhat curious that he seems to be addressing archivists of the future rather than his live viewers of the evening but there you have it. He declared the first draft of the day’s history done and in the can. A not-young Dan Rather was groomed to replace him and no doubt he took it seriously, especially as the years passed and Cronkite proved remarkably durable both in his ability to show up and read the news and his prominence in the public mind. Rather was certainly prominent himself, anchoring every electi0n and hurricane. He became known for folksy, cryptic aphorisms supposedly drawn from his Texas youth. If a frog had side pockets he would carry a handgun. That sort of thing. Once Cronkite did actually relinquish his chair Dan searched for some time for his own tagline. One experiment was a single, solemnly intoned word. Courage.
Whether he was observing Courage, practicing Courage or pleading for Courage was never clear. And while that might have been appropriate for a newscast absorbed with war, famine or plague it didn’t quite fit when the last story of the night was a human interest fluff piece about a skydiving shar pei or somesuch. Courage, Wrinkles. Courage. [Read more →]
Ah, Obama, our muddle-headed philosopher-king. He strains valiantly, but he is deeply confused by the rupture between dream and reality. Take all that stuff about closing down Guantanamo, ending extraordinary rendition and so on. He meant it at the time, I’m sure, but never having had a real job or been responsible for much, he just didn’t understand how the world works. So later, he had to back down, and admit, confusingly, that all that Bush stuff he once hated was kinda cool after all. Or at least unavoidable.
Then there is his bizarre foreign policy which largely consists of pissing off allies and sucking up to enemies. Consider Iran (our enemy) for instance — riots for democracy over there and it took him over a week to say anything much, and it wasn’t much, and was loaded with unctuous references to the Supreme Leader. Consider Egypt (our ally) on the other hand — riots for democracy and it was: Mubarak go now, followed by — well maybe not now, followed by — oh alright then, if you have to.
See how confusing that is? [Read more →]
White House silent. Does it sound silent to you? What the Posties mean is that the Administration has gone silent on the facts. Can you blame them? Even that sizeable crowd willing or even enthusiastic to believe every exhalation from the West Wing have knocked their heads on a very hard glass ceiling. Without a dedicated T-1 line an interested patriot has no hope of keeping up with just the official revisions, much less the larger media response, regarding the public secret of Osama bin Laden’s last minutes and final resting place. The nation at large trots along gamely, then sprints trying to catch the flying missives pouring out of the Obama motorcade. But the fastest dog has no hope of biting that bumper. A kind driver will immediately speed up and leave the barking mutts quickly in the dust. The vindictive type will troll along at the pooch’s top speed for a few minutes before proceeding onto their business. Which has occurred? [Read more →]
What’s the Hillary Special at Popeye’s? Two large thighs, two small breasts and a left wing. If that doesn’t take you back, brother, you were never there. Yes, the grizzled Secretary of State now enamored of Assad Jr as a “reformer” as well as the spontaneous human combustion of anonymous goatherds in Afghanistan (and Pakistan, too!) was once far more true to the politics of her loopy commencement address at Wellesley that received a Stalin-esque ovation from that crowd lasting seven minutes. The crowning glory of her political career (before she was elected to shit) was to be Hillarycare; a massive overhaul and expansion of Medicare/Medicaid that would inundate medical delivery systems as we knew them in the barbaric days of 1993, leaving that segment of our economy socialized in all but name. Sound familiar? But Hillary became the Centrist once a certain Senator from Illinois maneuvered into that sliver of atmosphere existing between her Left and the outright commies. Hillary had sought total control through the doctors: the practice of medicine outside the embrace of Hillarycare was to be a criminal offense. Obama stole a march by making criminals out of any patients escaping, however fitfully, the smothering grasp of Obamacare. Of such distinctions are great careers made. [Read more →]
Last weekend, the pay cable channel Starz ran the three “Toy Story” films back-to-back. Watching them one after the other provided roughly the same experience as when you’re forced to sit through an hours-long corporate meeting at which a compelling, entertaining, but ultimately hollow speaker hectors you about how much more you could be doing to help the corporation succeed. And then telling you that, for your efforts, you should expect nothing more than the personal satisfaction of knowing you’d helped the CEO make an extra $20 million. Oh, and you’re supposed to find the entire proceeding poignant.
The “Toy Story” trilogy is a perfect encapsulation of anxiety in the post-modern world. Corporate anxiety. The films promote groupthink, and the acceptance of the purveyors of mass entertainment and consumables as benevolent entities never to be questioned. In a world in which new technology is giving consumers more control over how they consume their entertainment, the big corporations want you to remember who it was who gave you your Woody.
[Read more →]
In Charles Willeford’s great novel The Burnt Orange Heresy
Only twenty-five full-time art critics in America, out of a population of more than two hundred million! This is a small number, indeed, of men who are able to look at art and understand it, and then interpret it in writing in such a way that those who care can share the aesthetic experience.
Clive Bell claimed that art was “significant form.” I have no quarrel with that, but he never carried his thesis out to its obvious conclusion. It is the critic who makes the form(s) significant to the viewer!
The critic occupies a rarefied place. At least, the paid critic does. The man or woman who commands pages in publications such as, oh, let’s say The LA Weekly, or, to choose another publication totally at random The Washington Post, is automatically looked at with unique authority because those particular publications have history, prestige, and money behind them. [Read more →]
Was anyone else at first baffled by the koran-burning mob attack? As far as anyone outside Jones’s congregation knew, the koran burning was proposed then cancelled weeks ago. So what happened? He thought about it and went ahead and did it a few days ago. Had you heard? Hell naw. There was a total news blackout on it. No “responsible” media wanted to foment… oh, I don’t know, a mass attack on a UN compound that might result in some good old-fashioned kaffir beheading. Of course some malefactor with a vested interest in foment informed the ass-up praying crowd at the next opportunity. Was this Ossama or some other renegade mufti we are trying to paint with a laser sight? Nope, it was Harmid Karzai, the “President” of A-stan and now that Mubarak is on the unemployment line he is the highest paid employee on the US payroll. [Read more →]
Well, Winning The Future! I thought the war was over, if not won, weeks ago. But now there is a new front with new antagonists. Though churlish these bad actors had been keeping pretty well to the rules; well enough at least to leave them alone in their primitivism. But now with little warning their longtime reclusive leader comes out swinging, declaring guerrilla war and sabotage. I refer of course to the War on Fox by David Brock and his curious creature Media Matters.
What to make of this lithesome, bespectacled fellow’s explicit, public declaration of war? This was not the Moral Equivalent of War, not a Media War nor any other modifier to the term except of course “guerrilla”, which while it does paint him and his as the plucky ill-armed underdogs, does nothing to make his “war” metaphorical. So is David Brock expecting shipment of a Barrett .50 that he will turn down Park Avenue? This seems unlikely. As Reagan said of protestors declaring “Make love not war”, Mr. Brock seems lightly equipped to do either. So a metaphorical war it is then. And in a snap, as Mr. Brock is among the most passionate architects of the Giffords-inspired era of moderate rhetoric, that eight weeks of cruel discipline is officially over. [Read more →]
Some time ago I got heavily into crime. Not big or interesting crime mind you, like serial murder or death camps, but rather tiny crime, rubbish crime – the kind of thing unusual enough to fill 150 words in a newspaper, and then disappear forever.
My interest in this inglorious subgenre started in Russia, where the mind-bendingly dull Moscow Times would very occasionally publish something readable, strange one- or two-paragraph stories from around Russia, often featuring an element of crime. I vividly recall the tale of some kids who were found playing soccer with a human head near Smolensk. [Read more →]
Let’s retrace our steps a little. First the US wasn’t going to do anything in Libya because according to President Obama ‘organic’ revolutions are the most successful revolutions.
Of course that’s utter bollocks, and I’m assuming Mr. Obama skipped his elementary American history lessons. Because as everybody knows- the American Revolution, that is to say the most successful revolution of all time – well George Washington and his buddies kinda got some help from the French. Y’know. Like, a lot. And the Russian Revolution- well, it wouldn’t have got very far if the Germans hadn’t granted Lenin safe passage across military lines. And the Iranian Revolution? It sure helped Khomeini that Saddam Hussein was willing to let him broadcast his toxic blather from a safe position in Najaf. And so on. [Read more →]
10. “I just thought she was the silent type.”
9. “It was a female corpse; I’m not a pervert or anything!”
8. “The mortician did such a good job, she wasn’t just ‘lifelike,’ she was ‘hot!’”
7. “I thought she was exaggerating when she said she was ‘dead on her feet’.”
6. “It was like she was holding her breath in anticipation.”
5. “My buddies insisted I dig up a date for the senior prom.”
4. “I’m really into recycling!”
3. “After a hard day at work, there’s nothing more relaxing than coming home and cracking open a cold one.”
2. “All those flowers put me in a romantic mood.”
1. “I just love a girl who can’t say ‘No’.”
Bob Sullivan’s Top Ten Everything appears every Monday.
In the episode of “The Simpsons” entitled “Bart’s Comet,” Bart Simpson discovers a comet is heading straight toward Springfield. All the town’s inhabitants cram themselves into Ned Flanders’ bomb shelter; however, there isn’t room for everyone. As the citizens try to decide which of them will leave the shelter to die in the catastrophe, Krusty the Clown pleads his own case, and says,
“OK, OK, let’s figure out who should stay. The world of the future will need laughter, so I’m in.”
Or, put another way,
“That’s what comedians do!!! We react to tragedy by making jokes to help people in tough times feel better through laughter.”
That is a tweet from comedian Joan Rivers, in defense of another comedian, Gilbert Gottfried. Comedians are humor specialists who could be doing other more lucrative work, such as plumbing, but have instead decided to sacrifice themselves for the good of us all– to make us laugh in difficult times. [Read more →]
It didn’t take long for the rhetoric swirling around the current NFL/NFLPA tiff to remind me of how fast and how tired I became of the rhetoric that accompanied their 1987 tiff. It also emphasized that some players would be better off to let their actions on the field do their talking, rather than engaging their mouth. Back then, it was Tony Dorsett in the parking lot at Cowboys Stadium … this time it’s Adrian Peterson in a Yahoo Sports interview.
[Read more →]
Five years ago I flew into Texas, not knowing how long I would be here. Although I am generally bad with dates, I remember my arrival in the Lone Star state because it coincided with Austin’s South by South West music/media/film festival, which is running this week. And I recall that on that fateful plane journey I met a woman who was chaperoning a teenage rock band from Wales. They hoped to be “discovered” at the festival; their parents were concerned that their ambitious offspring would self destruct in a maelstrom of coke-snorting and whoring. [Read more →]
I reconnected with an old friend in Japan late this week, and gained a greater appreciation for what might be possible through social media … even for old dinosaurs such as myself, who use Twitter, Facebook, et al., for work purposes, yet never get around to making our own, personal foray into that world. Now here I am, re-thinking that stance in light of a connection I made this week, with someone who is, himself, a newbie to Facebook.
[Read more →]
Strange things happen to your mind when it’s transplanted to a foreign culture. Events and ideas that would have once appeared outrageous become very normal, and before long you accept them without batting an eyelid. It takes a serious jolt for you to realize how normal the hitherto abnormal has become.
Recently I had one of those jolts, when I read that the Texas State Legislature was about to pass a law forcing college campuses to permit students to carry concealed weapons on their persons. There is already a law that says Texas colleges can decide for themselves if they want students to wander around with secret firearms. None permit it; that’s why state lawmakers want to force them to grant students their 2nd Amendment rights. [Read more →]
You might have heard about the Huffington Post being sold to AOL for around $315 million. The internet was “virtually queefing” about it yesterday. Unfortunately, now that the vaginal farts have stopped and the dust has settled, we’re getting slavery metaphors.
Huffington Post runs its organization like an “antebellum plantation.” Now, I can’t take credit for that particular bit of wordsmithery — that comes from the mighty keyboard of a man named Tim Rutten who works for a real news organization, The Los Angeles Times. In an editorial with the cutesy-poo title AOL ♥ HuffPo. The loser? Journalism, Mr. Rutten isn’t afraid to risk looking completely stupid as he lays it all on the line:
The other partner to this dubious arrangement is the Huffington Post, which is a new-media marvel of ingenuity, combining a mastery of editing geared to game the search engines that stimulate Web traffic and overhead that would shame an antebellum plantation. The bulk of the site’s content is provided by commentators, who work for nothing other than the opportunity to champion causes or ideas to which they’re devoted. Most of the rest of the content is “aggregated” — which is to say stolen — from the newspapers and television networks that pay journalists to gather and edit the news.
