Yesterday marked the bi-centennial of Charles Dickens' birth. Dickens is one of the few writers that I read as a kid that I still read, which either means I was a child prodigy or I'm now an old fart or both.
Anyway, I'd like to pose a mid-week question: what's your favorite Dickens novel, film based on one of his novels and teevee adaptation? It's a hard one for me because not only did the great man write so many brilliant books but his work adapts so well to both the big and small screen.
I'm going to cheat and list a favorite as well as a runner-up. It's hard y'all.
Novel: Great Expectations. Runner-up: David Copperfield. The latter is my first Dickensian love but I re-read Great Expectations at least every other year.
Film: David Lean's Great Expectations (1947,) which is on my list of the greatest films ever made. I've seen this one at least 15 times. Runner-up: the 1934 version of David Copperfield is a sentimental favorite because of WC Fields as Mr. Micawber and Basil Rathbone as the cold hearted blaggart Mr. Murdstone.
Teevee; Dickens and the mini-series were made for one another and Martin Chuzzelwit (1994) is my favorite. Tom Wilkinson as the slippery Mr. Pecksniff steals every scene he's in. Runner-up: Bleak House (2005.) The endless litigation of Jarndyce v. Jarndyce tells you everything you need to know about why "the law is an ass."
I don't usually post news related vids on Sunday BUT this is a helluva interesting story by NBC's Mike Taibbi about Mitt Haircut's Mexican roots; one of many things he doesn't like talking about.
A boozy epiphany: It's the first day of the Carnival season, which will be mercifully shorter than 2011. There's a new Carnival related product out that I am NOT eager to sample:King Cake Vodka. Sounds totally vomitorious to me since I don't care for either vodka or sweet likker. It has come to my attention that unlike a *real* King Cake there will not be a plastic baby inside the bottle. If someone offers me a shot of this shit, I'll try it but until then I'll rely on NOLA food writer, Todd Price's tweets.
ESPN meets Andrew Jackson: Unless you're a sports hater or live in cave, you probably know that the BCS national championship game between local faves the LSU Tigers and their arch-nemesis the Alabama Crimson Tide is taking place at the Superdome next Monday. You may not, however, be aware that ESPN has erected a stage in Jackson Square right across from my shop to broadcast College GameDay. The stage was built in time for the Sugar Bowl. I have to give ESPN credit, it's the least hostile takeover of the Square ever. So far so good. Haven't seen Lee Fucking Corso yet but I'm working...
As to the game itself, I think this Tiger team is too loose to lose. Les Miles may not be an intellectual titan but he doesn't have a permanent stick up his ass like Nick Saban. Some call Saban intense, I call him uptight. I call the game LSU 24 Alabama 21.
The Saints are playing the Detroit Lions tomorrow and are likely to devour them. Drew Brees has been on a tear and the offensive unit is even better than in 2009 when the Saints went on to win the Super Bowl. We appear to be on a collision course with the Packers, which means that it will be family sports feud time here at First Draft. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the weather in Green Bay won't be too beastly. The record of warm weather teams playing outdoors in the frozen North is not good so I won't shed any tears if the Pack are upset in their game. Sorry, Athenae, Doc and Scout. I'm not sure where Jude stands since he's originally from Biloxi but I can take the heat. I do, after all, live in New Orleans...
Geaux Saints. Geaux Tigers. Time for me to, uh, go.
And because Athenae tweeted this, and I couldn't agree more,
some thoughts on the effectiveness, or non-effectiveness, of profanity. Best of all, one of the commenters links to this video, which, getting back to ruining children by exposing them to reality, contains one of my favorite bits ever from Fry & Laurie, at 0:45 seconds.
Newt Gingrich has said a lot of stupidly outrageous things over the years but his "round up activist judges" rant is a new low. So much for separation of powers. It's only aimed at librull judges but could apply to several wingnut Supremes: come on down, Justices Scalia. Thomas and Alito.
If the Gingrich plan is ever implemented, there's a US Marshall who would be perfect other than the fact that he's fictional, sort of like Newt's whole idiotic scheme. That would be, of course, Raylan Givens of teevee's Justfied.The only flaw with *my* plan is that Raylan is apt to shoot first and ask questions later.
Above is a classic sideshow banner by Fred G. Johnson but it also describes the current state of the GOP race. We've had the Bachmann wingnut overdrive surge, the Gov Package Check surge, the Cain surge and subsequent Gingery wreck. Now it's Newt-mentum. Newt Fucking Gingrich: are you fucking kidding me? The same guy who once suggested that the children of welfare recipients be sent to orphanages? Same asshole. The Obama campaign people must be pinching themselves over their luck right now. Newt Fucking Gingrich?
I've never seen anything like this: every campaign shifts into freak show mode from time to time but this is never ending. The latest freak show twist is reality teevee show host Donald Trump moderating a debate. Donald Fucking Trump? Really: the no truth telling, net worth lying motherfucker Donald Trump? I've gotta give Ron Paul and Jon Huntsman props for telling this bad hair shitbird that they're not playing in his sandbox. The rest will likely go along because it's all freak show, all the time.
Where does it end? Just imagine the reality teevee themed debate possibilities:
Sing for Simon Cowell. Super Freak would be a good numbah for these bozos.
Eat bugs for Jeff Probst. Who among us wouldn't get a kick out of seeing Mitt Haircut spend 30 days without shaving or hair gel?
Cook with gummi bears and warthog for Chopped's Ted Allen.
Strut the runway in drag for Mad Fashion's Chris March and the Project Runway judges. I bet Michael Kors would have a few good zingers for the candidates. I'd pay good money to see Newt in stiletto heels...
The variations are infinite. Any suggestions, y'all?
This week's video was inspired by this comment by Athenae on the Martha-Snoop Dogg vid, "My favorite Martha video is still the one where she teaches Ludacris how to do origami, and it turns out he already knew how and was better than her at it."
Since Thanksgiving is all about the food, it's a holiday I'm fond of. Here's my favorite weirdo holiday food video of all time wherein Martha Stewart teaches Snoop Dogg how to make mashed potatoes:
A recent episode of Boardwalk Empire showed an incubator baby place on the, uh, boardwalk. That, in turn, made me think of this swell segment from History Detectives as reported by the fabulous Tulane alum, Elyse Luray:
I'm sorry, after years of hearing about how John Kerry would have been a terrible president because he is some kind of Parisian fairy, I am now staggered to learn that one of conservatism's archetypes of manliness is Jean-Luc Picard.
(Otherwise known as my second TV crush, after Hawkeye Pierce. Is there an equal opposite to cradle-robber? Because whatever that is, I've always been it. When I was 13 I had a thing for Adam on All My Children, Adam who was old enough to be my mother's grandfather. WTF, subconscious?)
Let's get back to Frenchy McBaldness. Picard, okay, read books, drank tea and spent like eleventy-billion years not banging the hot, seriously-into-him redheaded doctor down the hall. He came from a family of winemakers. His best friend was a black woman played by Whoopi Goldberg. He had a foreign accent! I don't have a problem with any of this (unf), but how exactly does it fit in with the ideal of Conservative Manhood being about smashing things and keeping the bitches down? Does whipping some Borg ass now and then make up for stuff like this?
They're mostly wrong, actually: Indiana Jones taught at a university and preferred museums over profit, and the Holy Grail is about the dangers of religious fanaticism. The A-Team is about helping people who have nowhere else to turn, who should probably just be shoved away with a lecture about bootstraps. I can't speak to the wrestler up there, but he seems to be treating that woman with affection (at least, she's not barefoot in the kitchen).
Trying to shoehorn pop culture into modern politics usually ends up stupid for this reason: Any good character is complex, and modern politicking needs things simple and dumb.
Before the 1980s, there were different masculine characters, but today, they are conspicuously absent. Men are shown either as thuggish degenerates, or as effete androgynes.
I will admit to impatience with actors young enough to be my legal kids being the new sex symbols, but that's not to do with them or the culture or masculinity, it's to do with how I am now old as fuck. Luckily, there is Ben Daniels for me, and Robert Lindsay, and Idris Elba, and yes I watch a lot of British TV I can't help it they're all so amazing, with the voices and hands and such. Even on the basic non-cable TV there are men who look like adults doing doctor and lawyer and detective things. If you're not finding sufficient masculinity in the world, it's probably a better idea to look in the mirror than to keep changing the channel.
This is the first time, I've embedded a video from Hulu. That means it involves a few commercials BUT it's worth it to see this classic season-2 episode of Modern Family.
Yes, it's just a stupid tv show and I get that there are traditional aspects to the art form but over and over, week after week, this is about some invisible rigid construct of "pretty" and "feminine" and "sexiness," one single recognized standard for the "natural sexiness" of a woman.
It's time for a new feature here at First Draft. It's my busy season so I'll have less time for long posts. (Of course, every time I say something like that I post a long un.) So, I'll be posting quick items under this rubric from time to time. I also like using the cool elpee cover with the Who in football helmets. Rock on, readers.
--> The Gret Stetwide election was a snoozer but David Vitter was a loser. The two statewide candidates he endorsed-Billy (300 pounds of shit in a 200 pound bag) Nungesser and Jim Tucker-lost their races. The talk is that Vitty wants to run for Governor in 4 years. Sheeee-it.
--> The New Orleans Saints channeled the LSU Tigers last night and blew away the Indy Colts 62-7. I'm not sure why the Colts defense has collapsed as badly as their offense. The last I heard, Peyton Manning didn't play both ways. Where have you gone Bronko Nagurski?
--> I've tried to root for the Texas Rangers in the World Series but simply cannot. Why? Ron Washington is from NOLA and I dislike Cardinal manager Tony LaRussa's incessant overmanaging. BUT every time the cameras show former President Beavis they lose me. I'm also a National League kinda guy so what I can I tell ya?
--> I'm avidly watching season-2 of Work Of Art on Bravo. My favorite artestant is the Sucklord. Can't say I care that much for his toy art but I love hearing the uber-elegant Simon de Pury say his name. Repeat after me: Sucklord. He's actually a pretty nice guy who reminds me of one of my closest NOLA blogger friends. Any guesses from those in the know?
I couldn't find a clip of Monsieur de Pury saying Sucklord but here's a sample of his fabulousness for those of you who haven't seen the show:
All right - excuse me for getting out of my box, but I don't see this anywhere else on the interwebz. It made me choke on my ham, onion, and jalapeno omelette.
(Gregory) There’s this issue of”Governor Romney is a Mormon”, this has become an issue in the campaign, pastor Robery Jeffress introduced Rick Perry and said the following:
(clip runs)
(Jefferson) “So we want a candidate who s a good, moral person? Or do we want a candidate who is a born-again follower of the lord Jesus Christ? Mitt Romney is a good, moral person – but he is not a Christian. Mormonism is not Christianity, yet it’s always been considered historically to be a cult by evangelical Christians,”
(clip ends)
(Gregory) Has Governor Perry satisfactorily distanced himself from this pastor in Governor Romney’s mind?
(Pawlenty) Well, in my view, David, it’s disappointing that Governor Perry and others who didn’t denounce pastor Jeffress and those comments more directly, We have a country where we don’t have prohibitions on a particular church attendance for public office. In fact, it’s prohibited in the U.S. Constitution.
(Gregory) Governor Jindal, are you disappointed in Governor Perry? Have you told him he should more formally denounce…
(Jindal) I don’t think it’s for any of us to judge somebody else’s religious views, their relationship with God. The Bible is very clear, that’s up to God, not us. (…) It’s not for any of us to judge somebody’s faith, relationship to God, I think that would be inappropriate. The Bible is very clear, that’s not our role.
OK.
Pawlenty says that religious tests are against the Constitution, and Jindal says the answers are RIGHT THERE IN THE BIBLE!!!
Even Perry has to be doing a facepalm over this one.
Doc's post about the spunk serving malaka got me thinking about the first episode of the Mary Tyler Moore Show wherein Lou Grant said: "You've got spunk. I hate spunk." Here's the scene:
The roaring Twenties have come roaring back in a big way on the small screen. I'm pretty knowledgeable about the era but I learned a plethora of new details from Ken Burns' Prohibition. I knew how important women were in getting the damn thing passed but didn't know how instrumental they were in its repeal. Let's hoist one for the ladies. I already knew how much Al Smith rocked before he became embittered by his defeat and FDR's enacting his his Noo Yawk programs nationally without giving as much credit as Smith thought he was due.
I keep meaning to blog about Boardwalk Empire but the first episode of Season-2 left me uninspired except for the bits about Chalky White. Episode-2, on the other hand, was a grand slam and once again it was the mesmerizing Michael Kenneth Williams as Chalky who made the episode crackle with excitement. I fully expect Nucky Thompson to make a comeback aided by Chalky's "colored" gang and the IRA, of all people.
Finally, I couldn't write about the prohibition era without mentioning my favorite Jimmy Cagney movie, The Roaring Twenties. Cagney plays Eddie Bartlett, a basically decent guy who stumbles into bootlegging, becomes a big shot but his fortune craps out along with the stock market. It's great stuff and features a fine supporting performance by Humphrey Bogart as Cagney's sleazy, venal and vulpine partner.
If you've never see the movie, check it out. Here's the trailer:
Time to introduce a new, for First Draft, weekly feature. I've been doing this at my blog-city blog for years but have essentially moved over here lock, stock and kitties. I'm not sure if Jude and Riot the cranky ferret approve but if they don't tough you know what. I have the awesomeness of Della Street on my side.
I usually post comedy bits or other odds and sods so let's start off with some MST3K:
I watch a lot of television, less than I used to but still more than a lot of grown-up type people would consider seemly. I love great, meaty, meaningful groundbreaking TV, but I also have a weakness for the crap stuff. When I first read about Canadian scifi/fantasy series Lost Girl, I figured it would be crap but I thought I'd give the first episode a shot. Eight hours later, I'd watched the entire first season.
Now, don't get me wrong, Lost Girl is no Masterpiece Theatre either. First and foremost, it's just fun. I'd go so far as to say delightful even, which is a good thing for series about a badass and snarky (Canadian) bisexual succubus named Bo.
In spite of its too-short first season, the show picked up a cult following, along with a 22-episode second season, which starts on Canadian TV this Sunday. The good news stateside is that Syfy has picked up both seasons. The bad news they still haven't announced a start date. That shouldn't be too much of a problem for anyone with an internet connection. The entire first season is on YouTube and I doubt it will take long for season 2 eps to show up.
I don't think I've read an article about the show that didn't mention Buffy, so let's get that over with. Yeah, it definitely owes a debt in that direction, but in a good way, a very old-school S1-S3 monster-of-the-week way. Except with hardly any vampires, less moral philosophy, and a lot more grown up sex. Female-centric girl-power-yay! show? Check. Badass but vulnerable heroine trying to find her way? Check. Cheeky sidekick who gets all the good lines? Check. Broody non-human love interest? Check. Wise mentor with a mysterious past? Check. Love triangle? Check...sort of. There IS a love triangle with Bo in the center. The aforementioned broody dude, Dyson (a policeman who's also a shapeshifting wolf) is on one side. On the other is a woman, Lauren, a human doctor.
The coolest thing about the Bo/Lauren (aka Doccubus) ship, aside from the fact of a canon same-sex relationship for a lead character in a hit show, is the total absence of anything remarkable. Bo's got a boyfriend and a girlfriend. No big. All the angst and drama, and there is plenty on all sides, is about other more important plots and monsters stuff. That said, there was a lot more Dyson/Bo in season 1 than Lauren/Bo. Not surprisingly, gay lady fans made their voices heard, and TPTB have already answered just as loudly, promising to balance things out with more Lauren/Bo this season. Go dyke geeks!
That response isn't surprising. Show creator Michelle Lovretta is a self-described fangirl, and it shows:
The amazing thing about genre fans is that they take ownership of a series, create their fanfics, their compilation vids, debate lore amongst themselves, come to panels etc. Genre fans tend to be a creative and inquisitive bunch, so in a pretty unique way — if you’re lucky enough to create a genre show that fans embrace, and we’ll have to wait and see if we fall in that category — your stuff will mutate and expand and be out there in the universe beyond the ways you yourself have created. It’s trippy and fun and what i love as a writer AND a viewer of this stuff. Yeah, I’m the starting point: I created something in my head. But it ceases to be a one man show the moment you’re in development: then there’s the writers, actors, producers, directors, crew, network, website/motion comic peeps etc, creating something new. …and now, it’s finally over to those fans who choose to feel some sort of ownership of the world and make it their own.
I was David Simon's handler for Rising Tide 6. It was my pleasure: he was friendly, courteous and totally professional. He also gave a very interesting speech centered around the concept of standing. It's most familiar to me as a legal term as in standing to sue. The speech *almost* gave me law school flashbacks but I reeled that reaction in.
Anyhoo, here's Simon's speech with an introduction by moi. It's a bit hammy but, hey, you gotta work the room, y'all:
Project Runway gave me this earworm. I'm not quite sure who I'm rooting for this time around but I cannot stand Anya the beauty Queen or Oliver, the kid with the fake British accent. I should say slipping accent since it's all over the place, which makes sense because he lived in the UK ever so briefly. Henry Higgins would be appalled:
Utah Senator Orrin Hatch is another pol who belongs in the malakatude hall of fame and now he's compounded this status by dragging Thurston Howell through the mud:
How dare you drag America's favorite fictional millionaire into this? Mr. Burns? Sure. But the only fictional magnate whose voice was inspired by Franklin Roosevelt? Have you no decency, sir? At long last, have you no decency?
Gret Stet Fuhrer wannabe David Duke must be low on cash. How do I know that? He may be running for President in 2012 and every Duke campaign is all about the money.
The rematch involves current GOP candidate, and former Louisiana Governor, Buddy Roemer, the guy who Duke beat out in the 1991 open primary. Duke went on to lose to the King of Bizarro World, Edwin Edwards, the most lovable corrupt politician in American history. The 83 year old Edwards is now free of house arrest and is rumored to be considering doing a reality show with his new 30 something girlfriend. Sounds like a real table flipper of a show to me, y'all.
I swear I am making none of this up. That's the end of today's episode of How Bizarro World Turns.
Last week's History Detectives had a story about Fort Sumter and a cannon called "Old Secession."The name of NOLA's own General Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard came up, of course. Talk about one long named motherfucker...
America loved Peter Falk, who died today at 83, as the rumpled and deceptively brilliant teevee detective Columbo. I remember Falk most fondly for the string of art house classics he did with his buddy, John Cassavetes.
Falk was popular in my house when I was a tadpole. My mother loved mysteries and my father was convinced that Falk was Greek and he liked all Greeks; especially successful ones. His stock line: "He's Greek. He's doing very well you know." He was absolutely convinced that Falk was Greek. I tried telling him that Falk's close friend and colleague John Cassavetes *was* Greek but that Falk was not. He was sure they were both Greek and eventually I gave up arguing even though he wouldn't have known a Cassavetes film from a Michael Bay blow stuff up flick.
Back to Falkophillia. One of my favorite high school teachers, Gus Hassapakis, resembled Falk and occasionally wore a trench coat and did a fine Falk as Columbo impression. Mr. Hassapakis was Greek and knew that Falk was not. Perhaps that's why my father decided that a Jewish kid from Noo Yawk was Hellenic to the core or maybe he was just stubborn.
Anyway, adieu Mr. Falk: he was a swell actor and I always enjoyed seeing him onscreen. And he's still not Greek...
One of my dreams as a Rising Tide organizer has come true: Treme honcho David Simon will be speaking at the conference this year. If you can stand the heat and humidity of a NOLA summer, mark your calendars for Saturday August, 27. For more information, please click here.
Forgive me for the post title. It shows, however, why the Weiner Tweeter Tube story has legs: his name. The Washington press corps is easily bored by stuff like budget numbers and Medicare: they'd much rather be making juvenille jokes about the honorable member from Noo Yawk's, uh, member.
The most ridiculous part of this is that Andrew Breitbart is back on cable teevee peddling this dumbass story. Has this fucker ever been right about anything in his life? Not that I know of. I recall a time when this schmuck would have been laughed off the national stage instead of being recycled like what he is: the turd in our national punch bowl. Drink that, MSM.
My hunch is that Mr. Weiner's account was hacked and that someone hoped that this would turn into a new craigslist Congressman-type scandal. (FWIW, I've been hacked. My personal email account sent out viagra spam awhile back and after a few bad jokes at my expense, I changed my passwords and moved on.) It's probably no coincidence that it happened not long after the special election to replace that putz. It's also no coincidence that it got picked up when the MSM got bored with the nitty gritty details of government and was ready to bite into a juicy faux scandal featuring a man with a punnable name.
It's true that Weiner hasn't helped his cause with some of his public comments BUT turning this tempest in a twitter teapot into a national scandal is preposterous. It's time for everyone to move on and start roasting weenies and stop roasting Weiner. Yeah, he's a hot dog but he's not a dumbass, so let's get back to debating important shit like whether or not Snooki's trip to Italy will result in a diplomatic incident or, even better, a proposition from Prime Minister Berlusconi. That would take us full circle from hot dog to horn dog...
Here's Weiner giving an account of this mishigas in more than 140 characters to Rachel Maddow:
Two major signs of malakatude are pomposity and rampant self-love: Oprah Winfrey is the Queen of both. This week has been the long goodbye to her long running chat show and all I can say is: how can we miss you when you won't go away?
I'm not sure when Oprah went from being a fairly interesting talk show host with a moving life story to the megalomaniac that she's become. I know one thing for sure: her ratings are half what they were when her show was at its peak. Some have speculated that it was caused by her new agey spirituality or political campaigning for President Obama. I have my doubts as to the latter: how many hardcore Republicans were ever Oprah-heads? As to the former, I think that her OTT egomania and messiah complex led to her ratings tanking.
Adding to Winfrey's malakatude is the astonishing sycophancy she inspires. This week's Oprahfest featured celebs grovelling and kissing Winfrey's papal ring. I understand why Dr. Oz and Dr. Phil are her lackeys but why on earth is Tom Hanks on bended knee before the Daytime Queen? I can only stand small doses of Oprahness so I tuned in briefly to the penultimate show but I saw Dr. Oz and Rosie Frakking O'Donnell doing some sort of goofy musical number. I was in dire need of an adult beverage and only bourbon would do. I also changed the channel: I'd rather put up with Tweety than the Exalted O.
I did, however, view the last half hour of the final show knowing that Oprah would devote her time to her favorite subject: herself. As I've said before, I can only stand small doses of Winfrey self-love but fortunately my frenemy, Michael Homan is made of sterner stuff. Here's a sample of his tweeter tube commentary from Oprah's last gasp:
If Oprah claims that we have taught her more than she ever taught us, why does she keep talking? Now back to God is love and life crap.
Oprah reminds me of Elvis. Insulated ego unrestrained, hoarding celebrity, feeling betrayed, believing Jesus brought her fame.
Now Oprah kissing and hugging people in the audience. Has there ever lived a more remarkable woman? So humble, so gracious, so spriritual?
Yeah, I know, Oprah has done a lot of good things and helped many people BUT it was always done with cameras blazing and relentless bragging. I was taught that good works should be done quietly and with some modesty. Modesty is, of course, something Oprah doesn't do. She's an expert, however, in malakatude.
Finally, another thing I've always disliked about St. Oprah is how she appropriated the name of one of *my* heroes, Harpo Marx, for her company. (Harpo is Oprah backwards, how fucking cute is that?) I know it's too late to change this but if I ever encounter Ms. Winfrey, I plan to hand her my leg and honk a horn very loudly in her face. She, of course, won't get the joke: malakatude and humorlessness go together like peas and carrots...
It's the 50th Anniversary of the civil rights freedom rides. If you haven't seen the fabulous American Experience documentary yet, it's a must see instant classic. I knew the story and was still on the edge of my seat, which was hard because Oscar was clinging to my legs for dear life. Ouch.
On to the post title. There was a excellent front page story in the Sunday Picayune by Katy Reckdahl about the reverse freedom rides. It was a scheme cooked up by one of Leander Perez's lackeys. Perez was the uber segregationist ultra-racist political boss of two, count 'em two, South Louisiana parishes. Anyway, Perez's henchman came up with a plan to "flood the North" with poor Southern blacks as payback for the Freedom Rides.
They even dispatched some folks to Hyannis Port hoping to embarrass President Kennedy. It didn't work. And the whole thing was forgotten, until now, that is.
Atrios wonders when advertisers are going to catch on to the fact that women watch sports.
Which reminds me that Shakesville regularly wonders when advertisers are going to catch on to the fact that women are people.
Which reminds me of this Klondike bar commercial, seen most recently at the in-laws' this weekend during some marathon or other of a crime show. The theme of these commercials is, natch, WHAT WOULD YOU DO? for a Klondike bar, and this slobby, John Belushi-looking guy's supreme sacrifice was "listen to your wife." No, seriously, he had to listen to her speak for a full 5 seconds. When the clock hit 5, confetti and balloons and hotties appeared. And an ice cream bar.
Marriage SUCKS, y'all. You have to be all listen-y to stupid bitches all the time! I bet this commercial is a continuation of a movie in which this guy gets married because of a hilarious contest involving women fighting over a ring or something, since Furry McSweatynuts here is such a prize. And I'm sure there could be an equally hilarious version in which a girl has to do something like go to a Monster Truck rally and sigh because her husband is such a child. It is the height of married life, after all, to do what your partner wants, but only with such Herculean effort that the other person notices and feels guilty for wanting anything at all.
Look, I get sometimes you have to do stuff you don't like when you're married. That's not the point. The point is that the mainstream portrayal of marriage is always this punishing bullshit ritual of man vs. woman, Mars vs. Venus, that makes me yell at the TV, "Just get DIVORCED already! It doesn't take an act of Parliament anymore! If you are with someone whose voice makes you break out in hives, that is a SIGN FROM GOD that you should leave this person and go out and find your own way in the world."
I wonder why anybody gets married at all, I really do sometimes, since this is the kind of recruiting poster we lawfully wedded folks are slapping up everywhere.
My favorite YouTube comment:
Did Klondike make Mark's wife marry the biggest prick in the universe for a Klondike bar? Because that would explain their relationship.
I have an ugly secret: I watch more trash teevee than I should. I watch and riff on it so at least I haven't gone completely to the dark side from the snark side. Crap teevee brings out my inner Crow T. Robot.
Until this season, I'd never watched the Trump Ego ShowCelebrity Apprentice but the extreme weirdness of the "celebs" led me to jump on the hellbound train and watch this trainwreck of a program. Real Atlanta Housewife NeNe Leakes, Professional Jackson, LaToya and Gary (Brain Damage) Busey have had me rolling on the floor. There, I said it.
The latest installment featured Trump and his toup talking about running for President. He asked the "celebs" if they'd vote for him, there was mostly silence; most noticeably among the African American celebtestants. Trump answered his own question and said: "Of course you would. You're not stupid. I'd fire you otherwise."
This preposterous exchange made me nostalgic for the fairness doctrine that pre-Reagan would have required NBC to give others equal time with the Donald and his toup. It was all part of the "deregulation" agenda, which has grown corporate political power in the name of freedom. Sound familiar?
It has been one year since the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded, killing 11 workers. That, in turn, led to the 87 day oiltastrophe in the Gulf Of Mexico. The marshes in South Louisiana remain oliy, BP has played rope-a-dope with the seafood industry, many claims remain unpaid and Gret Stet politicians remain in the pocket of big oil. End of thumbnail sketch.
Here's a story from WWL-TV's Bill Capo on what he found during a trip to the marshes. Here's a hint: it starts with O:
"The Straight Dope." Bill Moyers talks to David Simon Go read it.
Bill Moyers: Do you really believe, as you said to those students at Loyola, that we’re not going to make it?
David Simon: We’re not going to make it as a first-rate empire. And I’m not sure that that’s a bad thing in the end. Empires end, and that doesn’t mean cultures end completely, and it doesn’t even mean that for nation-states. If you looked at Britain in 1952 and what was being presided over by Anthony Eden and those guys, you’d have said, “Man, what’s going to be left?” But Britain’s still there, and they’ve come to terms with what they can and can’t do. Americans are still sort of in an age of delusion, I think. A lot of our foreign policy represents that. And this notion that the markets were always going to go up, and that once we had invested stocks to death, we could create some new equity out of nothing.
No, Glenny hasn't joined the hippies. The stoner in question is James Stoner who is chairman of the Poli Sci department at LSU. He's also listed as a "faculty member" at Beck's "online university." He claims he's doing it to encourage moderation.
Stoner said he doesn't watch Beck or any of the other "talking heads," but feels Beck and Stewart are similarly "renegotiating the boundaries of news and entertainment."
After speaking to local Tea Party groups last year, Stoner said he was surprised at the number of people with a genuine interest in learning the rights and reasons within the Constitution.
"I figured this is the same audience (as the Beck University audience) and they really want to hear about the constitution. It is going to sound silly, but it almost sounded like a civic duty to speak about the constitution to these folks who want to learn about it."
Stoner said he feels there is a movement for the people to "take back ownership of the Constitution" with both the Tea Party and the democratic appeal to the youth.
"The constitution is about moderation," Stoner said. "I had a lot of friends who were really critical of my speaking to this. Pardon me, I'm teaching moderation to the Tea Party, or teaching moderation to people who might consider themselves extremists, and that is wrong?"
I suspect that Beck's Stoner is doing it for the money. No sum is mentioned in the article by the wonderfully named Xerxes A. Wilson but I have a hunch it's not enough to risk one's reputation over.
I rarely blog about the paranoid ravings of the Beckatollah BUT it's amazing to me that a department chairman at a state university would want his name associated with a lying anti-semite. Doesn't sound very moderate to me.
Lord help me, I think Lady Gaga is a stitch. She had a big Sunday: an interview with Anderson Cooper on 60 Minutes wherein he outprettied her but I loved it when she quite accurately described herself as a performance artist. Then she showed up at the Grammy's in an egg:
Eggsactly.
I may burn in lowbrow hell for getting such a kick out of this but what can I tell you? Lady Gaga's showchickship reminds me of a good old fashioned NOLA drag queen getting decked out for Fat Tuesday. It wouldn't surprise me if some enterprising New Orleanian copies the egg shtick or even last fall's MTV VMA meat dress. I expect to see eggs and meat worn somewhere along the parade route. They should probably, however, wait until *after* Barkus rolls...
The best bit of the Anderson Cooper-Gaga gabfest, for me at least, was when AC mentioned Queen. I think Freddie and Queen should be mentioned early and often in all civilized households. This could, in fact, be my motto: "all we've got is radio gaga, radio goo-goo, radio blah blah."
Institutional malakatude can be the worst kind. It seems like ages since CNN was one of the best news organizations in the world. They've gone from Bernie Shaw and Judy Woodruff as their lead anchors to Wolf Frakking Blitzer. Anderson Cooper is okay but who on earth came up with the idea of teaming up Eliot Spitzer and Kathleen Parker? The one time I tuned in I kept expecting him to proposition her. Oops. I forgot he prefers to pay...
The latest and clearest example of CNN"s malakatude was its decision to present Michelle Bachmann's SOTU response after Paul Ryan's gloomy bummer of a response. The loopy diva of the great white north's views were even more apocalyptic than Ryan's. Do the Goopers really think that doing a wingnut variation on Jimmy Carter's malaise speech will lead to victory in a higher turnout election like 2012? Sure it worked when only habitual voters and the teabaggers went to the polls last fall but in a Presidential year? Not bloody likely.
Anyway, back to CNN. Its fall started when Ted Turner stopped being a hands-on owner and sold his broadcast mini-empire to the suits at Time Warner. But what really seemed to accelerate CNN's decline was the advent of Fox News. They've spent years alternating between attacking the Fox model and emulating it. In the end, CNN has no clue as to what its identity is and what the fuck they're doing. Confusion is the essence of malakatude and CNN doesn't know if it's coming or going.
Rachel Maddow had a great segment on CNN's Bachmann debacle so I'll let her have the last word:
I'm sure most of you have already heard that Keith Olbermann was fired by MSNBC. The network suits are claiming that it wasn't a firing and had nothing to do with Comcast's purchase of NBC but if you believe that there's a domed stadium on Poydras Street I'd like to sell you. Business Insider isn't buying it either:
But now that we've had a few minutes to contemplate a MSNBC world without Olbermann let's indulge in some speculation.
Why now?
Bill Carterreports at the NYT that Olbermann "came to an agreement with NBC’s corporate management late this week to settle his contract and step down."
"Late this week" suggests yesterday or today.
If that's the case there has to be some buyout arrangement because Olbermann signed a four year contract back in 2008. Update: Bill Carter just told Anderson Cooper that part of whatever deal they struck will likely keep Olbermann off TV "maybe not for two years" but for an extended period of time.
There has been speculation dating back to Olberman's suspension in October that the powers that be might not be that comfortable with the amount of unquestioned clout Olbermann wielded at MSNBC (even with somewhat diminished ratings it was a lot).
Combined with his legendary ego and unreliable temperament (anyone who follows him on Twitter can attest to both) it's quite possible Olbermann's strong ratings looked slightly less appealing. Especially with Rachel Maddow and now Lawrence O'Donnell in the wings, both of whom make strong showings in the ratings.
Next question: Is Comcast cleaning house? And if so, will Olbermann enabler MSNBC president Phil Griffin be next? And if so who will replace him?
Update:NBC execs tell the NYTBill Carter that "the move had nothing to do with the impending takeover of NBC Universal by Comcast." No. All just a big coincidence.
Keith could be irascible and even petty but if he was a sumbitch at times, he was our sumbitch. He also did a lot of good work on Countdown; especially in covering the bottomless pit of venality and mendacity that was the Bush administration. It was good to have someone openly progressive and willing to take on the powers that be on cable teevee. The good news is that Rachel Maddow is still standing and her show is part of KO's legacy at MSNBC. He'll be missed but he's been fired before so I suspect that he'll be back. Here's his sign-off:
Okay, so someone at a conference asked Baltimore Police Commissioner Frederick H. Bealefeld what he thought of The Wire. Watch the video below and see if you can tell exactly when the Commissioner makes his first mistake:
If you answered "As soon as he opens his fuckmook mouth," you'd be right.
Bealefield says he knows David Simon. If so, then he was probably not surprised by this:
Publicly, let me state that The Wire owes no apologies—at least not for its depiction of those portions of Baltimore where we set our story, for its address of economic and political priorities and urban poverty, for its discussion of the drug war and the damage done from that misguided prohibition, or for its attention to the cover-your-ass institutional dynamic that leads, say, big-city police commissioners to perceive a fictional narrative, rather than actual, complex urban problems as a cause for righteous concern. As citizens using a fictional narrative as a means of arguing different priorities or policies, those who created and worked on The Wire have dissented.
Commissioner Bealefeld may not be comfortable with public dissent, or even a public critique of his agency. He may even believe that the recent decline in crime entitles him to denigrate as "stupid" or "slander" all prior dissent, as if the previous two decades of mismanagement in the Baltimore department had not happened and should not have been addressed by any act of storytelling, given that Baltimore is no longer among the most violent American cities, but merely a very violent one.
Others might reasonably argue, however that it is not sixty hours of The Wire that will require decades for our city to overcome, as the commissioner claims. A more lingering problem might be two decades of bad performance by a police agency more obsessed with statistics than substance, with appeasing political leadership rather than seriously addressing the roots of city violence, with shifting blame rather than taking responsibility. That is the police department we depicted in The Wire, give or take our depiction of some conscientious officers and supervisors. And that is an accurate depiction of the Baltimore department for much of the last twenty years, from the late 1980s, when cocaine hit and the drug corners blossomed, until recently, when Mr. O'Malley became governor and the pressure to clear those corners without regard to legality and to make crime disappear on paper finally gave way to some normalcy and, perhaps, some police work. Commissioner Bealefeld, who was present for much of that history, knows it as well as anyone associated with The Wire.
Watching the notoriously humor impaired former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown on The Daily Show was an out of body experience for me. He's on a book tour plugging his tome Beyond The Crash and had a moderately interesting chat with Jon Stewart. But when Stewart asked if "we're all Socialists now," Gordon dropped the ball and didn't say "I was a Labour PM and what's wrong with a bit of socialism?"
The Labour Party *used* to be a Social Democratic party until Blair and Brown fell in the love with "the markets." That dalliance led to an economic boom from 1997 to 2008 but then came the crash. Brown performed better than most national leaders during the crisis but ended up taking the fall anyway. It was primarily due to the strange uncharm of the man.
Watching him feebly banter with Jon Stewart made me think of the slogan for Ernst Lubitsch's great 1939 film Ninotchka: Garbo Laughs. Greta, however, was much funnier than her fellow diva Gordon Brown. Perhaps prima donna is a better phrase. I noticed that TDS had Brown's good side facing the camera: he lost one of his eyes as a wee lad in Scotland, which many UK pundits believe is the cause of his extreme awkwardness and insecurities. I'm not sure if I buy it but what's a bit of psycho-biography among friends.
Anyway, here's the clip. Notice how Gordon laughs whenever he *thinks* Stewart is trying to be funny.
Even aside from fan squee (I was so loud the cat looked at me funny), this resonates. THIS is what I want from my government when the going gets tough. Fight like hell and if you have to sacrifice, make it worth it.
One of the first blog-based books, the anthology Special Plans examines Feith's role in misleading America into war. Buy from Amazon and William, James & Co.
These are stills captured from video shot March 2006 in the Lower 9th Ward of New Orleans specifically the area between N. Claiborne, Florida Ave, Tupelo and Tennessee.
These are photos and stills captured from video taken August 2006 of the Lower 9th Ward specifically the area between N. Claiborne, Florida Ave, Tupelo and Tennessee.
One of the first blog-based books, the anthology Special Plans examines Feith's role in misleading America into war. Buy from 
