Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Ooh! Ooh!

I can see the farworks on the 16th Street Mall bringing in the new year for the throngs of drunken peasants. Too lazy to set up a tripod and try a pic. There'll be another show at midnight; maybe I'll try then.

Last year, by the way, I was one of the peasants (non-drunken, sadly). I remember how half the city crowd-control ginks had alcohol on their breaths. Kiss me, you fool.

Freddie Hubbard

Yeah, late to this, so I'll just post some vids. It was surprisingly hard to find good, full length stuff. Here he is with Art Blakey and His Jass Messenherrs in 1962: "Moanin'" Basically just the intro and his solo, which is cut off, but what are you gonna do?



Same deal, same TV show. "Children of the Night."




Then, much later, Freddie doing "I Remember Clifford" (1984) with another Messenherrs lineup:



With Chick Corea and other fusionistas (Return to Forever!): "Straight Life," from the 1975 Downbeat Awards show:



I'll keep looking as I gets the chancet.

New Year's Eve at the Radio!

The Great Gildersleeve: "New Year's Eve" (12-31-44).

From the same date, Jack Benny: "New Year's Eve"

Vic and Sade "Invoice Preparation" (27 December 1943).

Gunsmoke: "The Bottle Man" (1 January 1955).

Phil Harris and Alice Faye: "Concert Stage" (1 January 1950).

Denver Pally rally

Didn't even know it was happening until I got an e-mail from Codestink about 3:00 yesterday afternoon telling me the rally started at 5:00 p.m. Had to be doontoon anyhow, so I stopped by. West steps of the Capitol and along Lincoln, like always. Honk if you hate Jews!


Lots of kiddies at this one. No, that's not a pair of underwear he's holding to show his mega-weight loss after using the Palestinian Starvation Diet™.



Yeah, peace.






Mass production.



Who'da thunk: Apparently the answer is the U.N.



Just liked the cloud in one corner and the big fat haid in the other.



Another kid.


No.



Lots of "this + this = this" signs. (Didn't quite catch this one right, obviously.)



Merry Christmas!



Awwwww.



There were signs lying all over the place for the taking.






Oh, I see. Artist at work.



Somebody lost a contact.



Or maybe praying.



Nope, lost contact.



Long live Palistine: She's a better speller than this gink, anyway.



Funny, I won an earthquake in a box of Cracker Jack once; oh wait, maybe it was a bad box, and it just felt like an earthquake in my stomach.



Pally babes.



Peekaboo!






Better listen to the deranged Santa.



Hackneyed.



Poor Abe. He's getting put to a lot of uses these days he probably wouldn't appreciate.






Don't cry for me, collective punishment.



Always gotta get a shot of this guy in.

One little dose of controversy. A guy walking by was handed a leaflet and threw it contemptuously to the ground, saying something like, "Which group is dedicated to the destruction of the other?" The Pally enablers smirked and asked (smirkingly), "Who?" as if they didn't know. He said, "Read your history! Read the Hamas Charter!"

Good luck with that.

Update: Originally the penultimate graf was accompanied by a pic of the guy, but a reader e-mailed asking if I knew it was such and so. Of course, I had no idea but called the guy for a comment. He didn't even ask, but it turned out his position was such that being exposed as a rational if annoyed human being might cause him real problems, so I volunteered to take it down. What the hell. It's a fucking blog (didn't I just say that?).

Sunday, December 28, 2008

Catching up with: the Revolutionary Anti-Imperialist Movement

They're festering about Israel's (utterly unprovoked) attacks in Gaza. Support Gaza:
The Israeli Zionist state and U.S. imperialism does [sic] not have the right to commit mass murder against the Palestinian or any other people The bombings of December 26 are another example of the true face of Israel and the the United States. We call on the world’s people to condemn this and all other forms of imperialist aggression. Only through peoples’ resistance and revolution can U.S. imperialism and Zionism be overthrown and a new world built.

Down with U.S. Imperialism
Down with Zionism
Defend the Palestinian People’s Right to Self Determination
Of course, I'm probably the only member of "the world's people" (marginally) who reads their silly crap. The post before is somewhat more direct: "Fuck I$rael Hard! Fuck Amerikkka Harder!"

Pervs.

Update: Snaps notes that the latter post has disappeared. Pulling a Benjie on us, I guess. It's just a fucking blog, man.

New funding appeal for Churchill lawsuit

From SpeakOut:
Support Ward Churchill's Trial

The Ward Churchill Solidarity Network announces their new website, www.wardchurchill.net. At this site, you can read updates of his trial, support the legal fund, and learn about the intersections between the many issues that this case represents.
The "new" WCS Network, of course, has been around for months, though it hasn't had any new content in, again, months, and even failed to follow through on its threat of new writing from the fat man hisself. Continue:
Churchill was stripped of tenure because of his critical response to 9/11/01. The University of Colorado then scrutinized Churchill's scholarship, challenged his academic integrity, and fired him from a tenured position. He responded with a legal case based on his 1st Ammendment [sic] rights; the trial to examine CU's actions is set for March 9, 2009.

Why fight this particular injustice? Ward has become of symbol of [sic--h/t Anon] what academic freedom and the right to political dissent mean in this country, in these times. Every week we hear of professors being fired, or intimidated into changing what they teach, and of students who believe everything they hear on the TV "news."

The chilling effect of CU's actions are [sic] very real. If rightwing forces don't encounter resistance to this firing, they will consider it license to constrict freedom of expression even more.

In this case, CU has come up with claims of "research misconduct" to fire Ward for speech protected by the First Amendment. Simply put: . . .
You know the drill, though this run-through of Churchillian lies is more sketchy than most. Here's the interesting part:
However, justice doesn't always prevail. CU has apparently endless resources to throw at this case, while Ward and his wife are responsible for covering all the direct costs of bringing the lawsuit – deposition transcripts, plane tickets for witnesses, expert witness fees, trial transcripts. They need to raise about $50,000.
That's all? David Lane must be taking a hell of a hit. Good deal.
Every $25 helps, but we hope you'll consider donating a plane ticket for a witness, or sending $125 to transcribe a
deposition. . . .
SpeakOut, as you may have surmised, is a speakers bureau. A huge, progressive speakers bureau. Among the usuals like Noam Chomsky, "parecon" bore Michael Albert, Codestink's Medea Benjamin, commie scum Angela Davis and Luddite fool and Wart-pal Derrick Jensen, are some funny ones, including hip-hoppers Black Panther F.U.G.I.T.I.V.E.S. (Future Under the Guidance of Intelligent True Individuals who Visualize Every Struggle) and "Bitch" ("Songstress, Educator, Activator and Prophetess"). Scroll through and find your own faves.

Billy Ayers on education

The disgusting hypocrite and liar posted this yesterday:
Vote “Me” for Secretary of Education

Of course I would have loved to have seen Linda Darling-Hammond become Secretary of Education in an Obama administration. She’s smart, honest, compassionate and courageous, and perhaps most striking, she actually knows schools and classrooms, curriculum and teaching, kids and child development. These have never counted for much as qualifications for the post, of course, and yet they offer a neat contrast with the four failed urban school superintendents–Michelle Rhee, Joel Klein, Paul Valas, and Arne Duncan–who were for weeks rumored to be her chief competition.

These four, like George W. Bush’s Secretary of Education, Rod Paige of the fraudulent Texas-miracle, have little to show in terms of school improvement beyond a deeply dishonest public relations narrative. . . .
Billy, of course, knows all about having little to show in terms of school improvement, beyond a deeply dishonest public relations narrative. While he's at it, Ayers picks the rest of Obama's cabinet:
So I would have picked Darling-Hammond, but then again I would have picked Noam Chomsky for state, Naomi Klein for defense, Bernardine Dohrn for Attorney General, Bill Fletcher for commerce, James Thindwa for labor, Barbara Ransby for human services, Paul Krugman for treasury, and Amy Goodman for press secretary. So what do I know? . . .
Absolutely nothing except radical politics, Billy. After dissing Arne Duncan for a few grafs, Billy goes into his trademark vague maundering in describing what schools should do and be:
What makes education in a democracy distinct is a commitment to a particularly precious and fragile ideal, and that is a belief that the fullest development of all is the necessary condition for the full development of each; conversely, the fullest development of each is necessary for the full development of all.

Democracy, after all, is geared toward participation and engagement, and it’s based on a common faith: every human being is of infinite and incalculable value, each a unique intellectual, emotional, physical, spiritual, and creative force. Every human being is born free and equal in dignity and rights, each is endowed with reason and conscience, and deserves, then, a sense of solidarity, brotherhood and sisterhood, recognition and respect.

We want our students to be able to think for themselves, to make judgments based on evidence and argument, to develop minds of their own. We want them to ask fundamental questions—Who in the world am I? How did I get here and where am I going? What in the world are my choices? How in the world shall I proceed? — and to pursue answers wherever they might take them. Democratic educators focus their efforts, not on the production of things so much as on the production of fully developed human beings who are capable of controlling and transforming their own lives, citizens who can participate fully in civic life.

Democratic teaching encourages students to develop initiative and imagination, the capacity to name the world, to identify the obstacles to their full humanity, and the courage to act upon whatever the known demands. Education in a democracy should be characteristically eye-popping and mind-blowing—always about opening doors and opening minds as students forge their own pathways into a wider world. . . .
Blah, blah, feckin' blah. Of course, we know what kind of education the "small 'c' communist" really wants, but is too cunning to say straight out. Read whole thing if you can stand it. God, I hate this guy.

Saturday, December 27, 2008

Global warming buries mountain town

Der Posten:
The storm that whipped winds and heavy snow into blinding blizzards across parts of the San Juan Mountains on Christmas Day and today really had its sights set on one high-mountain town.

Silverton residents are calling the Christmas weather "a storm to remember." It dumped 4 feet of snow there, plunged the wind chill to minus 35 degrees and brought 60 mph winds screaming down from the peaks, making it impossible to see from house to house. The storm piled 8-foot-high drifts around town.
There was so much climate instability they had to close the ski areas:
Kendall Mountain — a small, town-operated ski hill — was closed because an ambulance wouldn't be able to get out of town in the event of an accident. Silverton Mountain, an extreme-terrain area frequented by hard-core skiers and boarders, was closed because the road out of Silverton to the area is impassable and the avalanche danger too high. . . .

Lawrence said the southwest part of the state, which has had an unusually snowy December, will begin to see some blue skies this weekend. But cold temperatures, a few more snow showers and winds will stick around for a few more days.

Seven mountain passes remained closed today. Besides the passes around Silverton, Wolf Creek near Pagosa Springs, Lizardhead near Telluride, and La Manga and Cumbres south of Alamosa are closed until they can be ploughed and avalanche-control work is done.

The next system is expected to roll in just in time for New Year's celebrations.

(Photo from Silverton Mountain and the Post.)

Friday, December 26, 2008

Abstract of the Week!

Anthropological Quarterly:
Mahjong Agonistics and the Political Public in Taiwan: Fate, Mimesis, and the Martial Imaginary

In this article I examine high-stakes mahjong in Taiwan as a ritual mode of male agency fraught with political significance. I show how men divine fate by conjuring estranged game forces, while disavowing the "abeyance of agency" by deploying strategy and style to control fate's fickle flip-side—luck. Through "combat" with luck, men reanimate an officially orchestrated male totality, or martial imaginary, that reproduces idealized masculine values and patterns of citizenship. By further situating mahjong within a socially and politically encompassing play-ritual framework, I argue that mahjong mimesis generalizes a pathos of "sympathetic agonism" that blurs gender boundaries and that preserves a space for a plural democratic agôn.
Update: You know, "male totality" and "sympathetic agonism" and all that garbage aside, there is some truth here. Any halfway decent backgammon player (to choose a different but similar game) knows that a big part of the thing is managing luck, aka probability. Mahjong mimesis forever!

Wednesday, December 24, 2008

Christmas Eve at the Radio!

Jack Benny: "Pencil Sharpener for Jack" (18 December 1949). Note Mel Blanc as the store clerk--"Mule Train!"; interesting, in light of the Walmart trampling last month. Nothing new under your Son . . .

By the way, even the first time I hung out with the Drunkawife's fambly for X-mas, her father gave me a present. Usually, as I subsequently found out, he gives everyone a hundred bucks. But he didn't know me from any other rent boy the D-A-W had consorted with, so just in case I was (yet another) drug addict or alcoholic or something (I was), he didn't want to give me money. But he knew I was an editor. And what does every editor, no matter how dissolute, need?

A stapler! And that's what I got. And not no fancy one, neither. Your basic $3.95 plastic Swingline. I tried to pawn it.

The Great Gildersleeve: "Christmas Eve Program" (24 December 1944). Heart, as they say, warming.

Fibber McGee and Molly: "Searching for a Christmas Tree" (21 December 1943).

Winston Churchill: "White House Christmas" (24 December 1941). Very short, and the first few seconds are in bad sound, but good stuff.

BBC (what in God's name happened to them?): "Christmas with the 8th Army" (19 December 1942).

And, of course, Vic and Sade: "Christmas Present Money" (December 1941).

How many?

In a review of Denial: History Betrayed, in the Aussie conservative mag Quadrant, William D. Rubinstein addresses a question I've often wondered about:
One fundamental point which might be made about ["black armband" history debunker Keith] Windschuttle’s central claim about the catastrophic decline in the population of Australian Aborigines, that direct killings and massacres played a surprisingly small role in this process compared with other causes, is closely paralleled elsewhere. In the United States, the best estimate of the decline in American Indian numbers is that they decreased from about 2.2 million at the time of first contact to about 350,000 at their nadir around 1900. How much of this decline was the result of killings by whites? An 1894 estimate by the US Bureau of the Census claimed that “about 30,000” Indians had been killed by whites between 1775 and 1894. Recent historians have raised this figure to about 53,500 (and 19,000 whites killed by Indians). Many regard the American frontier as synonymous with gun violence and the philosophy that “the only good Indian is a dead Indian”, and this figure—about 450 Indian killings a year—will surely seem surprising. As Steven T. Katz pointed out in his history of genocides, less than 4 per cent of the decline in American Indian numbers can be attributed to killings by whites; all of the other deaths were due to other causes, especially the spread of virulent diseases to which Indians had no immunity.
Can that be? "Only" fifty-three thousand Indians killed by whites between 1775 and 1894? Putting aside Rubinstein's extreme low estimate (isn't it?) of the North American Indian population in 1492 (the unfailingly accurate Ward Churchill always claims 18 million, give or take, and some estimates go as high as 100 million for the Americas as a whole, which is bollocks), it seems to me an estimate of Indian casualties since the U.S. was formed would be much more readily quantified. Still, I have trouble believing there were so few.

Update: Merry Christmas, you boot-faced, towser-faced totem poles on a crap reservation! (And if you identify the quote, I'll give you a big sloppy kiss with my herpes-raddled lips.)

Monday, December 22, 2008

DNC cops off the hook

At least so far as an independent Denver police monitor is concerned:
Monitor Richard Rosenthal said today there is no evidence to support a complaint alleging officers lied about whether they gave an order to disperse before arresting more than 100 people.

The American Civil Liberties Union complaint also contended a police officer pretending to be a protester created a tense atmosphere when he confronted another officer. Rosenthal said the undercover officer acted appropriately.

The ACLU did not immediately return a call.
We're still waiting for those lawsuits against the city, too.

Update: The Rocky has more, including a couple of comments (w/links to lefty sites) claiming that Rosenthal, in his previous monitor work in Portland, was a pig tool.

Update II: Remember "Cow tools"?

Ward Churchill joins Facebook

The fake-Indian ex-professor is a happenin' dude, ain't he? I actually joined the wretched thing myself to see his profile, but it turns out I have to be his "friend" too, and I can't bring myself to do it. He'd probably (poorly stifled sob) turn me down, anyway. It also looks like it might be a Wart Churchill Stolidarity Network production, and certainly Tommy "Tater Trot" Mayer wouldn't let me on.

You can, however, see his list of already accepted "friends." Though several others will be worth a google if I ever get the chance, I recognized only three names: Leonard Peltier, Naomi Klein, and the noted revolutionary and Tribune of the People, Leonardo DiCaprio.

Update: ex-CU instructor Benjie Whitmer is also on Facebook. His "About Me"? "A Denver horseshit artist, with a couple of writing projects on the way."

Yeah, forthcoming. But "horseshit artist?" Talk about ego inflation. "Horseshit apprentice" is more like it.

Update: Hartsel's only Somali pirate (a pirate in a landlocked state? Go figure. Now!) notes that Billy Ayers is a friend of Wart's as well. Ward's just not, you know, the guy who taught him how to make bombs.

Friday, December 19, 2008

Doesn't this thing go to "11"?

BBC:

Decades after a notorious experiment, scientists have found test subjects are still willing to inflict pain on others - if told to by an authority figure.

US researchers repeated the famous "Milgram test", with volunteers told to deliver electrical shocks to another volunteer - played by an actor.

Even after faked screams of pain, 70% were prepared to increase the voltage, the American Psychology study found. Decades after a notorious experiment, scientists have found test subjects are still willing to inflict pain on others - if told to by an authority figure.

US researchers repeated the famous "Milgram test", with volunteers told to deliver electrical shocks to another volunteer - played by an actor.

Even after faked screams of pain, 70% were prepared to increase the voltage, the American Psychology study found.

They probably got paid for participating, too.

(via JuddCo; hit the link for their brief review of Darius Rejali's Torture and Democracy),

Thursday, December 18, 2008

Abstract of the Week!

From Textual Cultures: Texts, Contexts, Interpretation:

The Psychic Link

This essay explores the role of rupture in the editorial process. Drawing on Wordsworth and Freud, it proposes that the editor's labor, specifically the preoccupation with the restoration of textual connections, may reflect an unconscious desire to heal non-textual wounds. Part autobiography, part elegy, the essay reminds us that the labor of editing is contingent and transient.

Klaatu MIMada Nikto

Maoist Internationalist Movement (the definite article is silent!) on The Day the Earth Stood Still. But first, a new warning from the Marxist-Leninist-Maoist theoreticians:

If this website shuts down for any reason, blame the Democrats. If I were the Democrats, I would be working hard to make sure the leader of the oppressed and exploited stays in business and fascism does not return. . . .

I didn't even know it was gone.

The Luddite, back-to-earth anarchist theme is not our favorite. Nonetheless, the film confronts death, including
species-death. . . .

Not species-death!
The acting of Keanu Reeves enters a new niche, most closely resembling that of the character "Data" in "Star Trek" and Reeves' own previous roles.
A new niche, closely resembling his previous roles. Flawless dialectical logic.
Producers will be wondering if the strategy of opening with a female mother character given the lead role in the government as a scientist (Helen Benson) and then generating another female character heading the Pentagon will change consumer demographics of sci-fi movies. MIM would guess not, especially not in just one film. It's the same argument about what Palin added to the Republican presidential ticket in 2008.
Precisely.

The film gets in some good barbs at Amerikkkans [you knew Security Minister would dig that]. Helen Benson has to tell the lead alien that the U.$. government is not the real government of the world. It's a scene reminiscent of the leadership question on global warming. . . . Despite Reeves, this movie is not the "Matrix," but that is an impossible comparison. We would go so far as to say that such a film should be produced under the dictatorship of the proletariat, not just hailed for now under capitalism.

Risky statement, Security Minister.

Monday, December 15, 2008

Re!c!reate 60: How the mighty are fallen

CBS4:

City leaders in Centennial are considering aggressive action against coyotes which are growing in numbers around the community. One political action group is threatening to sue if the city takes action.

One woman told CBS4 five dogs and nine cats have been killed by coyotes since mid-August in her Willow Creek neighborhood. . . .

"When our council is hearing stories of people having to fend off coyotes, children having to fend off coyotes with lacrosse sticks, we ask ourselves, 'what if those lacrosse sticks weren't handy at the moment?'" said Mayor Pro Tem Rebecca McClellan.

Recreate 60 [sic!] is threatening to sue Centennial.

"A student has a bigger chance of being hit by a car, being bit by a domestic dog or being struck by lightning than they do of being attacked by coyotes," said Glenn Spagnuolo of the political action group. The group said people have to learn to live with nature.

Glenn "Nature Boy" Spagnuolo, living close to the wild in suburban Highlands Ranch (scroll down to the update). I bet he's never set up a pup tent in his life. Was it really just a few months ago that this gink bent the ear of national media at will? Well, at least CBS4 spelled his name right.
Centennial will hold a public meeting on the coyote issue Monday in the city council chambers.
Update: Commenter "sheepherder" links to Fox's report on the Centennial City Council meeting, at which Glenn threatened injunctions and "direct action" and all that lame krep. Oh, and the reporter calls him "Glenn Spagnulo."

Israel sends UN "special rapporteur" packing

Ward Churchill defender, 9/11 troofer and anti-Israel cretin Richard Falk, the UN "special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian Territories," has been kicked out of Israel. Goddamn nazis.

Update: That first link is to a PDF that seems to be missing the first page. You'll get the idea. And somebody should tell the National Post they have a big honkin' typo in their headline. I'm too tired.

Update II: LGF had it hours ago. Curse you, LGF!

Update III: In other anti-semite news, David Irving was invited to try out for Celebrity Big Brother last October, but didn't quite make the cut. What's George Galloway got that he hasn't?

(via Deborah Lipstadt, who notes that Irving was recently featured on a C4 show on freedom of expression (gag) called "An Independent Mind" (retch).

Update IV: Self-hating Jew (and frequent Tim Blair target) Antony (the "h" is silent) Lowenstein links to a video of Palestinians complaining of the (note scare quotes) "torture" they underwent at Israeli hands.

Rocky writers launch website to save paper

From the site, "IWantMyRocky.com":
Ever since Denver was a collection of shacks and gold miners’ tents, the Rocky Mountain News has been here to chronicle each day of our state's life. We covered the Civil War, Colorado statehood, the Ludlow Massacre, two world wars and the Great Depression, six Broncos Super Bowls, two Stanley Cup championships, two national political conventions, the tragedy at Columbine, the fires of 2002, the Iraq war's home front, and all of Colorado's booms and busts.

This latest bust could be our last. The owners of our paper have put us up for sale and hinted at shutting us down if they can’t find a buyer.

We are prepared to fight that. We are the reporters, editors, photographers, web producers and everyone who brings you the Rocky. We take pride in what we do for our readers, our community and our industry, just as our predecessors William Byers, William A.H. Loveland, Damon Runyon, Mary Coyle Chase and Gene Amole.

Unless we can make something happen by the middle of January, our owners could close the Rocky. Colorado deserves better.

So we’re taking our case to you, our readers, our friends, our neighbors. Through this Web site and other efforts, the staff of the Rocky wants to:

Preserve and protect the editorial voice of the Rocky in our community.

Preserve and protect the legacy of the Rocky and its historical archives, which provide a window to the infancy of our state and the city of Denver.

Fight for the jobs of more than 200 Coloradans and the many others that would be affected by the newspaper's closure.
It's gonna take a (Christmas) miracle. Mary Coyle Chase, of course, wrote the imperishable Harvey.

Sunday, December 14, 2008

How cold?

It's four below zero right now in Denver. Or maybe seven below.

Or maybe 15 below.

Those are the current readings at the Weather Channel, the Post, and the Rocky, respectively.

According to the Post, we already set a record of -15 degrees today, but apparently they take their measurements from Denver International Airport, which, as everyone knows, is in New Hampshire.

We've also gotten a fair amount of snow already this season (about four inches last night in this part of town) and the mountains have been repeatedly massacreed with several feet, with more on the way.

Global warming. Five-hundred-year drought. I spit me of them.

Update: In comments from his fortress of desuetude in the mountains above Hartsel, JWP (icy-handed a**pats be upon him) links to a classic piece of GW hysteria from AP "reporter" Seth Borenstein. I got your "tipping point" right here, Seth.

Update II: "Ski areas face big challenges in globally warmer world, study says."

Update III: "Skier in Aspen dies in avalanche."

Update IV: Denver breaks old low temp record by 13 degrees (again, DIA); homeless freezing their asses off. Climate, er, instability (yeah, that's the ticket).

Saturday, December 13, 2008

Cost to prosecute DNC protesters: $19,000

The Post:
The city and county of Denver has spent more than $19,000 and used 316 hours of police officer time to prosecute people who were arrested during a protest on the first night of the Democratic National Convention.

The estimate does not include time and costs for 10 trials held this week and last week, said Brian Vicente, executive director of the People's Law Project, who requested the data from the city and provided it to The Denver Post. . . .

Of 33 convention cases that have gone to trial for clients represented by the People's Law Project, 27 cases were dismissed or the defendant was acquitted, five people were convicted and one person pleaded to a deferred judgment, Vicente said.
Five convictions? Given Denver juries' record for (not) convicting even people who clearly try to stop others from exercising their First Amendment rights (Columbus Day protests), that's not bad. And as a commenter points out, Denver got $50 million for the DNC; they can probably afford to throw some spare change at these prosecutions.

Update: The Rocky's Bill Johnson interviews a jury member for one of the trials:

It was time to chat with a juror. Past due time, actually, since I believe that outside of the judges overseeing these convention-protest trials, no one's time has been more wasted. . . .

What most surprised me was that he was on one of the Democratic National Convention trials at all. Over the past dozen years, he has called often, regaling my voice mail with stories of his social activism and generally giving me his take on what I have written on a particular day.

"I have been in numerous demonstrations," he said Friday, the first time in all those years that we have actually chatted. Included in them was the "small act of civil disobedience" at an AIDS conference in San Francisco in the early '90s where he and others actually blocked an entrance. . . .

Given his background, the defense "saw me as sympathetic to its cause," he said. "What saved me with the prosecution was my saying civil disobedience has its place, but you need to be prepared to face the consequences."

The consequences for the three cases his jury decided on? One conviction, two acquittals. Very weird.

Kopel: Bias not killing newspapers

The News' (conservative) media critic:

'Final Edition." The words that could appear on the Rocky Mountain News in a few weeks. After nearly 150 years, what has brought the oldest business in Denver to the brink of destruction?

Some words I've never written before, but they are apt now: Mike Littwin is right. The notion that media bias is the main cause of the newspapers' troubles is ludicrous.
The real reasons? Nothing surprising: Subscription price (way up), ad revenues (way down), people too lazy to read--check out this kind and gentle graf:
More and more people are so intellectually lazy that reading one romance novel per year is too much effort. It's a stretch to imagine that the reason such cretins don't subscribe to the Rocky is that, for example, they noticed its science coverage is too credulous about environmental panic-mongering.
Well. But the "real killer"? Craigslist, of course. Read whole thing, but I still think bias should be in the mix.

Update: From two papers to none? Post owner: we need to cut $20 million, now:

The Denver Post Publisher William Dean Singleton on Friday asked unions at The Post and Denver Newspaper Agency to reopen their labor contracts immediately, saying he needs to slash expenses by $20 million.

"We all know the financial situation is not good in the newspaper industry - he referenced that and requested we begin bargaining (next week)," said Tony Mulligan, a spokesman for Denver Newspaper Guild Local 37074. . . .

Singleton's request comes a day after Moody's Investors Services said his MediaNews Group faces an increased risk of defaulting on its loans, and a week after E.W. Scripps announced it was putting the Rocky up for sale and seeking an exit to the DNA's Joint Operating Agreement. Moody's downgraded almost $1 billion of MediaNews debt.
Update II: Funny, the Post doesn't seem to have the story.

Thursday, December 11, 2008

Shake, MIMie! Shake!

The Maoist Internationalist Movement (aka Henry Park) on dogs' preference for Marxism:

Karl Marx said socialism operates "to each according to her work," while communism has the distributional principle of "to each according to her need." A study shows dogs perform tricks according to pay, thus proving they prefer socialism.

Logical, logical.
"In treat-heavy conditions, the dogs give their paws for nearly every trial. When neither dog was given rewards, the dogs only gave their paws 20 out of 30 times and they required more verbal prompting to do so. But, when one animal was rewarded and the other was not, the unrewarded dogs only shook 12 times and displayed considerably more agitation than in either of the other tests."

The study's situation where one dog gets the reward for the other's trick is an indication of what happens under parasitism. Dogs don't like it.

From my own observation, dogs love parasites. Yum.
Capitalism is parasitism, rewards for owning things instead of working.
So just like any communist state, I make sure Billy Bob works for every Kibble and Bit.

Update: Mmmmm, treat-heavy conditions.

The Day the Earth Flopped

Rotten Tomatoes has the initial reviews of the remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still. They add up to a whopping 15 percent on the the ol' tomatometer. In other words, a galactic loser. Favorite shot so far:
Since Keanu Reeves has all the expressiveness of a toaster, why is he starring in the new The Day the Earth Stood Still as human-looking alien Klaatu rather than giant robot Gort?
I know, not that good, but it's early yet.

Blagojevich!

There, I said it. The Sun-Times has a piece in which psychologists (actually a psychologist) say Blag's hair is a sign of Narcissistic Personality Disorder:

Gov. Blagojevich's glossy locks -- perfectly sculpted in rain or snow -- may be an indication of a sickness beneath his scalp, said one local psychologist.

"It's all part of managing his image, managing his image of being without a blemish, without a flaw," said Scott Ambers, who has practiced clinical psychology in the city for more than two decades. . . .
Without blemish or flaw. Just like Moe. This calls for a Separated At Birth!

Tuesday, December 09, 2008

Keanu Barada Nikto

"Why did you come to our planet?"

"Your planet?"

Don't remember if that's in the original, but it tells you what we're in for with the remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still: A Hollywood browbeating. Keanu Reeves seems suitably robotic (it comes naturally) and the special effects look spectaculous, but please, just leave me alone.

The only thing I wonder is, what will the mix of anti-war and pro-environmenton sentiments be? My guess: 60-40.

For some reason I'm reminded of the late, unlamented band Kansas:



We've strangled all her trees and starved her creatures.

There's poison in the sea and in the air.

But worst of all, we've learned to live without her,

We've lost the very meaning of our lives!

And now she's gonna die!

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah!

Yeah. I always liked the comment by the director of the original, Robert Wise, who said the movie should have been called "The Day the Electricity Went Off for Half an Hour," because, well, that's basically what happens. Spectaculously!

Police blotter!

Via Yourshlub:
WOMAN FEELS VICTIMIZED

A suspicious incident was reported in the 2400 block of Kalmia Street on Dec. 4. A woman told police she found pictures from a Victoria's Secret catalog taped to the outside of her front porch window. The woman said she thought this might be a way for burglars to determine whether or not people were at home and was concerned about being victimized. This case is closed pending further information.
Bonus blot!
TRESPASSER RAKES PINE NEEDLES

At about 11:30 a.m., a woman reported someone was trespassing at her residence on the 0-99 block of Hern Lane in Castle Rock. The homeowner said a neighbor was in her yard, raking pine needles. The homeowner asked the other woman to leave, but she did not respond and continued raking. The neighbor said she was having an open house and wanted her neighbor's yard to look good. She was issued a summons for trespassing.

Monday, December 08, 2008

Abstract of the Week!

Yearbook of the Association of Pacific Coast Geographers:

"Berkeley School” Genius: Musings on a Feng-shui Perspective
Exotic feng-shui practices are an increasingly popular form of applied geography in Anglo-America today. Hardly scientific, feng-shui is, however, systematic, complex, and profound in the context of its own cosmology and symbolism. In this article, I muse on the provenance of “Berkeley School” genius at the UC Berkeley site in relation to its “power of place,” using a simplified feng-shui model. My examples introduce and elaborate on the propitious synchronicities found at the site perhaps responsible for the flowering of three prestigious “Berkeley Schools” of creative endeavor following WWI: Carl Sauer’s Berkeley School of Cultural Geography; Alfred Kroeber’s Berkeley School of Cultural Anthropology; and John Haley’s Berkeley School of American Scene Landscape Painting. I muse over some auspicious peculiarities in the common ground at the UC Berkeley site from which these three landscape schools emerge. A general feng-shui cosmological model describes how creative arrays of primal natural forces might converge at the campus site, creating a cosmic force field that generates and shapes the successful thoughts, visions, and creative output of certain of the site’s inhabitants. The founding fathers of these three Berkeley Schools, although unbeknownst to them, are perhaps beneficiaries of UC Berkeley’s excellent feng-shui site. The model provides a provocative alternative understanding of forces responsible for the longevity and continuing vitality of the “Berkeley School” tradition of cultural geography.

Sunday, December 07, 2008

Sunday Night at the Radio!

Sunday, December 7. What should I play? Okay, here's CBS's World News Today from December 6, 1941. Good stuff, including John Daly on the battle for Moscow ("The invaders are more the victims of cold than our bullets,' assert the Russians, who refer to the weather as 'our December frost'"); Bob Trout reporting from London; Ford Wilkins in Manila ("Preparations for war in this area have reached a new high level"); and Albert Warner in Washington on the diplomatic outlook.

"New York Philharmonic Broadcast Interrupted By Attack On Pearl Harbor." Interestingly, it starts with a report on the torpedoing of a U.S. ship carrying lumber before they even get word of the Pearl Harbor attack (December (checking notes here) 7, 1941.)

Part one of a Jack Benny: "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" (30 November 1941); and part two, w/news bulletin interruptions (7 December 1941).

Saturday, December 06, 2008

NYT runs Ayers op-ed

As Snaps points out in comments to the previous post, Saturday the rapidly failing Old Grey-Underweared Lady gave space to the mutant: "The Real Bill Ayers." It's the same spiel he's given since the election, in more or less the same words--I was cast as "the terrorist" to get Obama, we weren't terrorists, we were an anti-war group, we never hurt or killed anybody, but gosh, my youthful idealism may have crossed a line here and there and I have vague "regrets"--you know the drill. Read it if you enjoy loathsome things (as I do).

Speaking of loathsome things, the tape-like unspooling of Ayers' "thinking" reminds me of no one so much as, yes, Ward Churchill, in particular his story about how the Dutch, after stealing Manhattan Island from the natives, massacred same when they protested, then played kickball with their heads right where the Twin Towers would later rise. (Geddit?) I've heard him tell that one at least four times (once live) and it is, natch, a lie in almost every particular, told to make a political point. We know Ayers and Churchill have never met, but they're like twins.

Update: And remember, Vote Love!

Update II: Patterico: "The Real Charles Manson":
Over the years, I have been cast in the role of “1960s-era mass murderer.” Now that the election is over, I want to say as plainly as I can that the character invented to serve this drama wasn’t me, not even close.

Here are the facts:

I never killed or injured anyone. I did join the civil rights movement in the mid-1960s, and became a big fan of the Beatles. I was a songwriter and admittedly a bit of a drifter. In the late 1960s, I founded the Manson family.

The Manson Family crossed lines of legality, of propriety and perhaps even of common sense. Our effectiveness can be — and still is being — debated. We did carry out symbolic acts of extreme vandalism directed at monuments to war and racism, Roman Polanski’s front door, Leno LaBianca’s refrigerator, and Sharon Tate’s and Leno LaBianca’s abdomens. The attacks on property, never on people — unless you consider the pigs we slaughtered to be people, ha ha — were meant to respect human life, by repeatedly taking it.

CU executive committee recommends end of post-tenure review

The not-yet-dead Rocky:
We hope the full faculty assembly at the University of Colorado at Boulder has better sense than its executive committee, which has recommended that CU dispense with post-tenure review.

"It's redundant, and it has no teeth," biology professor Jeff Mitton told the Boulder Daily Camera.

Well, if that's true (and we believe he exaggerates), whose fault is it? As it happens, we can't think of a worse time than right now to get rid of post-tenure review, considering the message it would send to the public.

There are two reasons we say this. The first can be summed up in a single name:
I won't spoil the surprise.

Friday, December 05, 2008

The Princess Di gay Bible

I'm about as religious as a horse, but this is just silly. The Guardian:
A gay version of the Bible, in which God says it is better to be gay than straight, is to be published by an American film producer.

New Mexico-based Revision Studios will publish The Princess Diana Bible – so named because of Diana's "many good works", it says – online at http://www.princessdianabible.com/ in spring 2009. A preview of Genesis is already available, in which instead of creating Adam and Eve, God creates Aida and Eve.
Not even Adam and Steve.
"And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Aida, and she slept: and he took one of her ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; and the rib, which the Lord God had taken from woman, made he another woman, and brought her unto the first. And Aida said, 'This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of me. Therefore shall a woman leave her mother, and shall cleave unto her wife: and they shall be one flesh.' And they were both naked, the woman and her wife, and were not ashamed."

The film studio said it would also adapt and direct the revised Bible as a two-part mini-series, The Gay Old Testament and The Gay New Testament, once it is completed.
Starring Kate Winslet as Moses, Tom Cruise as Jesus (I know: typecasting) and Harry Dean Stanton as Mary Magdalene.
"There are many different versions of the Bible; I don't see why we can't have one," said Max Mitchell, who directed the science fiction comedy Horror in the Wind, in which an airborne formula invented by two biogeneticists reverses the world's sexual orientation.

"I got the idea for the Princess Diana Bible from Horror In The Wind," he added. "After the world becomes gay, religious people create The Princess Diana Bible, which says that gay is right and straight is a sin. Then they burn all the King James Bibles."

The move has already provoked upset among Christians, with the blogger Douglas Howe at the Idol Chatter site describing it as "inspired by a political agenda and one person's desire to contort not only the text but the very context of it to suit his own perspective".

There was also criticism on Mitchell's Princess Diana Bible site, where one commentator said the choice of title was "very disrespectful to the late Princess Diana … It's just one more thing to link her to what many people believe is immoral. Sad, very sad indeed."

But Mitchell said: "There are 116 versions of the Bible, why is any of them better than ours?"
(via the Brothers of Judd; h/t to the Olleroid for the photoshop)

Simpson being sentenced

After he was convicted of kidnapping and armed robbery in October. His own lawyer, Yale Galanter, says to the judge, "Stupidity is not criminality."

Simpson is speaking now: I'm stupid. I didn't mean for anyone to get hurt. I love Las Vegas. His voice is shaky and small. I didn't come here intending to do this. Thank you, Judge.

Lawyers all apologizing to the judge and telling her what deep respect they actually have for her, even though they were, er, extremely argumentative during the trial.

Coincidentally, I was just re-reading Triumph of Justice, Daniel Petrocelli's account of the civil case against Simpson for the murders of his wife and Ron Goldman, which proved far beyond a reasonable doubt that Simpson was guilty (those ugly-ass shoes).

Various lawyers pleading for leniency for various of Simpson's henchpersons. It was O.J.'s fault. My client has health problems. My client didn't have a gun. Nobody was hurt. My client was getting a cake. He supports his whole family. He likes to try to help people.

Clarence Stewart, minion: I didn't know what was going on. I love everybody, respect everybody. I've never been convicted of a crime before. Always provided for my extended family. I've lost everything because of this case. I've survived my incarceration through faith and prayers. Judge looks to be listening hard.

Judge: I didn't know whether Simpson was arrogant or ignorant. During the trial I found it was both. You (Simpson) thought you could do in Las Vegas what you couldn't do elsewhere. The tapes in this case show you didn't want these (sports memorabilia) items to fall into the hands of the Goldmans, whom you called the "Gold-diggers." Your own words can be heard on those tapes, and they brought you to this courtroom. They said to me and the jury that the evidence was overwhelming. Overwhelming. It was a very violent event, all on tape. Guns were brought, at least one gun was drawn. The potential for harm was huge. If a gun had gone off, and bullets started flying, people besides those in the room could have been hurt. You cannot do that. But you did.

I heard Mr. Galanter say, oh, he was just stupid. When you go to take something by force, that's not just "gimme my stuff back."

After the event, you called people (minions) to say "there was no gun." Then, at the party (after the incident, there was laughing, joking, "did you see the look on his face? Ha-ha!" That was not just stupidity.

You went to the room, you took guns, you used force, you took property. In this state, that is robbery with a deadly weapon.

I told the jury earlier, if they wanted to punish Simpson earlier (the murders), they shouldn't be here. I'm not punishing Simpson for what happened before. . . .

There's nothing more that's going to happen here except sentencing for what's happened in this case. No retribution or payback for anything else.

The problem is, I can't ignore that the crime was reckless, the potential for harm was great, you're fortunate nothing happened. And now I'll sentence you.

Judge tells Stewart and Simpson to stand. Goddamnit she's reading too fast. Stewart is nailed.

Simpson is going away for 15 years, six before parole eligibility. Everything "enhanced" because of general egregiousness. Simpson is 61.

Now Court TV or whatever it's called is saying a minimum of seven and a half years. Reporter also saying the judge imposed a less severe sentence than the presentencing report recommended--18 years total--perhaps because of Simpson's statement ("I was stupid").

Fox: Simpson was sentenced 13 years to the day after he was acquitted at the murder trial. Whoa, karma (as Geraldo de Rivera y Bronx said).

Update: Can't hang around too much longer, but Fox is going to have Mark "N-word" Fuhrman on to comment.

Fuhrman: Watching OJ over the years, it was inevitable that something like this would happen. The judge certainly put it in a nutshell: ignorant and arrogant. What we saw over the last 14 years is who he is, a street thug.

Thursday, December 04, 2008

For sale: newspaper, some wear

Not exactly a surprise. The Rocky:
The Rocky Mountain News, Colorado’s oldest newspaper, has been put up for sale by its parent company.

Citing worsening financial conditions and an expected loss at the paper of roughly $15 million this year, the E.W. Scripps Co. said it would seek a possible buyer in the next 30 days.

Scripps CEO Rich Boehne, who took the helm of the company in July, made the announcement to the newsroom this morning. He told the editoral staff the decision “would have been unthinkable just a few months ago.” . . .

“But the operating conditions have become increasingly difficult in Denver, as is the case in all major metropolitan newspaper markets, Boehne said in a statement. Our 50 percent of the cash flow generated by the Denver Newspaper Agency is no longer enough to support the Rocky, leaving us with no choice but to seek an exit.”

Cincinnati-based Scripps has owned the Rocky since 1926. The paper, founded in 1859, is Colorado’s oldest, as well as the state’s oldest continuously operated business. Since 2000, the Rocky has won four Pulitzer Prizes for journalistic excellence. . . .

The sale of the Rocky would mark the end of more than 100 years in Denver for Scripps. The company’s founder, E.W. Scripps, started The Denver Express in 1906. The Express was folded in the late 1920s when Scripps focused all its efforts on building the success of one title in the morning, the Rocky Mountain News.

“This is a day I never wanted to see come,” Rocky Editor John Temple told the staff. “Clearly, you’re not responsible for what happened.”
Except Mike Littwin.

The Rocky has faced many challenges in its history. The story goes that Editor Jack Foster was sent to Denver to close the paper at a time of newsprint rationing during World War II. He converted it into a tabloid, or magazine style, newspaper in 1942 and the paper doubled its circulation over the next five years. During the final years of the newspaper war, it annually boasted that it sold more than 5 million classified ads and had a daily circulation of more than 400,000.

Today, its daily circulation is about 210,000, the same as the Post’s, and its Saturday circulation is 457,000. The paper is delivered to subscribers of both the Rocky and the Post on Saturday. On Sunday, under the JOA, subscribers to both papers received the Post.

Scripps said it will consider offers for the Rocky and its interest in the agency through mid-January of next year. If no acceptable offers arise, the company said it will examine its other options.
Gulp.
“Some will be tempted to immediately write the obituary of the Rocky, but we’re hoping this step will open the way for a creative solution to the financial challenges faced by Denver’s great newspapers,” Boehne said in the news release. “The loyal readers and advertisers of Denver deserve the best, and we’ll work hard to find a solution that benefits this great city.”
Sheet.

Update: Newsroom reax; Rocky at 150 (lots of cool old stories and page facsimiles--but they don't actually turn 150 until April. Why are they running it now?).

Don't stop, she clamoured

Literary Review's Bad Sex Awards for 2008 have been out for a week, but I've been distracted. Ibn Warraq at New English Review attended the investiture and quotes great spurting gobs of loamy prose, but my favorite is still Normie's posthumous winner from last year, which Warriq also quotes:
The Castle in the Forest by Norman Mailer (Little, Brown) p67-68:

'Are you all right?' she cried out as he lay beside her, his breath going in and out with a rasp that sounded as terrible as the last winds of their lost children.

'All right. Yes. No,' he said. Then she was on him. She did not know if this would resuscitate him or end him, but the same spite, sharp as a needle, that had come to her after Fanni's death was in her again. Fanni had told her once what to do. So Klara turned head to foot, and put her most unmentionable part down on his hard-breathing nose and mouth, and took his old battering ram into her lips. Uncle was now as soft as a coil of excrement. She sucked on him nonetheless with an avidity that could come only from the Evil One - that she knew. From there, the impulse had come. So now they both had their heads at the wrong end, and the Evil One was there. He had never been so close before.

The Hound began to come to life. Right in her mouth. It surprised her. Alois had been so limp. But now he was a man again! His mouth lathered with her sap, he turned around and embraced her face with all the passion of his own lips and face, ready at last to grind into her with the Hound, drive it into her piety.
Read the rest, of course, but they should have interred the award with Normie.

Tuesday, December 02, 2008

Anti-boosterism

The Post's Bill Husted on 5280 magazine's Denver restaurant issue:

It's a given that city magazines are boosterish, but this story takes a pretty stern look at our town. Here's a quote: "The city doesn't sit on the cutting edge [sic] of anything — not art, not music, not architecture, not politics. We possess few corporate headquarters, we're not a technology hub, and by the time fashion trends work their way here from the coasts, the same clothes are often found languishing on the clearance racks in New York and Los Angeles."
Life is not worth living. Or, as Bill Husted puts it:
Ouch.
Yes. Ouch. Oh, here's Booster-baiter Bill on a few of the restaurants mentioned in the piece:
The top eats tier hails the precious [precious?] Beatrice & Woodsley, Bistro One, The Counter, D Bar (Denver's first celebrity chef, Keegan Gerhard) [now that's progress!], Fuel Cafe (try to find it at Taxi), Marco's Coal-Fired Pizzeria (everyone's favorite), Masterpiece Delicatessen (sandwiches for swooning) [God] and Q Worldly Barbeque and Jazz Lounge (my favorite
neighborhood musical Q).
Joke I just made up: Husted's desk at the Post has a booster chair. Ha! Call the waaaaahmbulance!

Update: Originally had Husted working at the Rocky. Fixed. (h/t the ever-watchful eye of former Rockyite Linda Seebach).

Monocultural

At Minding the Campus, Roger Kimball on academic free speech (and, oh yeah, the newly revised edition of his fun but aged book, Tenured Radicals):
When the first edition of Tenured Radicals appeared lo, these many years ago, around the time movable type was coming into vogue, the American university, when it came to the humanities and social sciences, anyway, was essentially a left-wing monoculture gravely infected by the stultifying imperatives of political correctness, specious multiculturalism, and an addiction to a potpourri of intellectually dubious pseudo-radicalisms.

Well, that was then. In the meantime, some very talented people have weighed in on the problem. They have written articles and books about the university; they've organized conferences, symposia, and think-tank initiatives; they even managed to place scores of good people in various colleges and universities as a counterweight to the various intellectual and moral depredations I chronicle in Tenured Radicals. Today, two editions and nearly two decades later, we can look at the American university and what do we discover? That it is, essentially, a left-wing monoculture gravely infected by the stultifying imperatives of political correctness, specious multiculturalism, and an addiction to a potpourri of intellectually dubious pseudo-radicalisms.

One reason is that that left-wing monoculture I mentioned is simply too deeply entrenched for these initiatives, laudable and necessary though they are, to make much difference. For the last few years, I have heard several commentators from sundry ideological points of view predict that the reign of political correctness and programmatic leftism on campus had peaked and was now about to recede. I wish I could be share that optimism. I see no evidence of it. Sure, students are quiescent. But indifference is not instauration, and besides faculties nearly everywhere form a self-perpetuating closed-shop. . . .
Didn't really need to include that graf; just wanted to make you look up "instauration."
Let me mention a couple of distinctions that I think we have lost sight of in recent years. The first is the distinction between academic freedom and free speech. Every time some wacko like Ward Churchill comes along shouting about the evils of American capitalism and the beneficence of Castro, Ho Chi Minh, Native American Indians, or whoever, his defenders rally round and say, "Well, I may not like what he says, but he is simply exercising his right of free speech."

I say, No he is not. He is violating his obligation as a teacher to eschew politics and impart knowledge. There is an important distinction between the right of free speech--our rights as citizens in a free society to peaceful political dissent--and academic freedom, the more limited privilege accorded to suitably enfranchised members of a college or university to pursue knowledge. . . .
Kimball makes the same mistake here the "it's about Ward's free speech" proponents (fewer and fewer as time goes on--where are the Dean Saittas of yesteryear?) do. Churchill isn't just a "purveyor of intellectually dubious pseudo-radicalisms" who's violated rules of academic discourse--he's a liar, a cheat and a fraud. And he's far from the only one--just the nastiest. Anyhow, read whole thing. Kimball is not all that hopeful, which seems appropriate. Oh, one more tiny graf:
A cartoon now making the rounds dramatizes my point: Question: What's more disturbing than William Ayers, terrorist and family friend of Obama. Answer: William Ayers, educator.
Update: I could have done without Kimball's recounting of his friend's joke about reforming universities with tanks. Not funny, dumb.

Update II: In my abscess, er, absence (not funny, dumb), De!mocracy No!w posted the second part of Amy Goodman's interview with this year's "It" couple, Bernie 'n' Billy (part one here). The usual lying, self-aggrandizing nonsense. Just one example as Bernie peroratates:
I want to say one last thing. The best of the new Left and the best of the social struggles of today have at their core the valuing of human life. All human life. You have to say both parts of that because people in the United States have to find our place in the world. And in some ways get off the necks and the backs of people of the world. We have to live differently. We have to live, and I say this with all humility too, you know. We have to all together learn to live differently so that others may live. So that core notion that animates social justice movements is really the valuing of all human life.
Remember, that's Bernie "Dig it" Dohrn talking there. Question: What's more disturbing than William Ayers, educator? Answer: Bernardine Dohrn, educator.

Update III: I said Wart was the nastiest of the bunch. Wrong-o. At most, he's only third.

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

MIM goes to the MIMovies!

"'Changeling' is surprisingly good":
The opening scene shows a working class mother named Christine Collins lose her child to an abductor. The child was alone, because the father had left at birth and because the mother was overworked. This vulnerability turned Christine Collins into a gender oppressed persyn, unable to own children like normal adults. . . .

The rest of the film is how various professionals connected to the LAPD seek to control Christine Collins, including by the use of a psychiatric hospital. The gender oppressors (men) including adult psychiatric professional females seeking to control Collins all come to no good end. "Fuck them and the horse they rode in on" is appropriate for Collins's response to the institutions of social control and other similar political situations outside the movie.

Clint Eastwood will be ecstatic.

"'Body of Lies' is Amerikkka":

CIA agent Roger Ferris kills many Arabs, gets many on his side killed and carries out a fake terrorist operation to attract attention. Then at the end of the movie he concludes his path does not work.

Ferris just quits the CIA. The end result is petty-bourgeois escapism, the privilege of the rich. . . .

Despite the conclusion, it may end up being yet another recruiting film for the CIA. Most of the dialogue is stupid Amerikkkan war on terror stuff.

The upshot may be that more Amerikans will decide to fight for the CIA for a while and then quit.

British court blocks extradition of alleged Holocaust denier

Saw this on a spinoffenzee linken at LGF:
Germany will continue to pursue a well-known Holocaust denier even after a British court ruled against his extradition and set him free, a German state prosecutor said Monday.
And it's not D-blog pal David Irving!
Gerald Fredrick Toben is wanted on charges of denying the Holocaust for articles posted to his Web site, said Mannheim prosecutor Andreas Grossmann. Toben was arrested Oct. 1 on the German warrant at London's Heathrow airport while traveling from the United States to Dubai.
Didn't recognize the name, but I googled it with Irving's and found this in the Telegraph from October 3:
Historian Irving has offered a place at his home in Windsor, Berks, for German-born Australian national Gerald Toben who faces extradition to Germany on a European arrest warrant.
That Irving. What a sweet guy.
The German authorities claim Toben launched a campaign between 2000 and 2004 in which he posted anti-Semitic claims on the internet that "denies, approves or plays down" the mass murder of the Jews.
Toben's (or "Töben's") wiki (though not the papers) details the kind of shit he spews, on his own and as founder of the Adelaide Institute:
Töben has indicated that he considers the Holocaust to be a "lie" ostensibly perpetuated by "the Holocaust Racketeers, the corpse peddlers and the Shoah Business Merchants"; he has further asserted that "the current U.S. government is influenced by world Zionist considerations to retain the survival of the European colonial, apartheid, Zionist, racist entity of Israel."
The Australian had details of the British court's ruling:
[W]estminster Magistrates Court district judge Daphne Wickham ruled the extradition could not go ahead because the warrant contained only "sparse" details about Dr Toben's alleged offences, including exactly what they were, as well as where and when they took place.

"This judgment makes no determination as to whether the (alleged) conduct (of Toben) ... amounts to an extradition offence," Judge Wickham said.


"But I do find the particulars in the warrant are vague and imprecise. Therefore I don't find it to be a valid warrant and I can discharge the defendant."

Granting Dr Toben bail, the judge laid down a set of strict conditions including that he come up with pound stg. 100,000 ($247,465) in cash as security. He had to reside at a specific address approved by British authorities and report daily to police but not use the internet, speak to the media or attend public meetings.

As with Irving, who spent a year in jail in Austria for Holocaust denial, it's nice to contemplate Toben behind bars (or, even worse, denied use of the internet), but still: thank God for the First Amendment. First they came for the Holocaust deniers, and I laughed. Then they came for the Canuck Muslim-mockers . . . and I laughed again. But you get the idea.

Two quotes from "historian" Irving, by the way, the first from the Telegraph story, before Toben was released:

However, Irving claimed outside court that the case showed that living in England was like being in Nazi Germany.
Of course it is! Isn't that why Irving lives there? (Mein Fuehrer!). The second quote, however, is from the Australian, after Toben's release:
When Dr Toben was released, Mr Irving said: "We defeated Germany again; we've defeated Europe in fact. We've always believed in freedom of speech in this country, no matter how crazy people's views are."
Yeah, crazy. Have another drink, Davey.

Tree murder


Goodbye, Sumac! Bwahahahahah--look out! Big branch!

Monday, November 24, 2008

When interns go bad

Hadn't noticed this one anywhere. TwinCities.com:
An intern for KSTP-TV did not take well to being fired. She began hurling threats at an executive producer and kicked out the glass of a conference room door in an attempt to get at her, according to a criminal complaint filed Monday.

Jennifer Nicole Anato-Mensah, 21, a University of Minnesota student, was told about 7:15 p.m. Oct. 13 that things weren't working out for her.

"This is a young girl who was not understanding concepts in a television newsroom," said Danielle Prenevost, 33, executive producer of the station's early evening newscasts. "I said, 'I don't think your level of college experience is enough for this job.' "

At that point, Prenevost said, Anato-Mensah "just lost it." . . .

Several newsroom employees heard Anato-Mensah shouting, yelling obscenities and threatening Prenevost, saying, "You don't know where I'm from. I'll mess you up, b ——-."

Prenevost attempted to walk away from Anato-Mensah, but the intern followed her. A male employee stepped between her and Prenevost, who went into a nearby conference room. The male employee tried to get Anato-Mensah to calm down and pack up her things, but Anato-Mensah left her desk and again tried to get to the conference room, the complaint said.

Several male employees then stood at the conference room door as Anato-Mensah continued to yell and swear and try to push her way in. At one point, she kicked at and broke a window in the conference room door. She had to be restrained to keep her out of the room, the complaint said.

"The whole situation was very scary," Prenevost said. . . .

Anato-Mensah was charged with criminal damage to property and disorderly conduct. Both are misdemeanors.
(via Romenesko)

Hungry hungry Santa

Reuters:
Wanted: Cheerful, chubby men, preferably with fluffy white beards and no criminal record, ready to work hard for one month.

Germany is running out of qualified Santa Clauses and needs to recruit and train them fast, a leading job agency says.

Germans are trying to shut out the financial crisis by taking comfort in traditional festivities, and there is an acute shortage of Santas to entertain children at shopping centres, Christmas markets and private parties.

"Being Santa is not an easy job," Jens Wittenberger, in charge of Santa Claus recruitment at the Jobcafe Munich, told Reuters on Monday. "To be honest, not many people have what it takes to be a good Father Christmas".
And you know what happens when you hire substandard Santas:


Tragedy. (Isn't this the most convincing photoshop you've ever seen?)

The story concludes:
Recruitment sessions are being held in cities across the country, and while the job may be stressful, it's better than being jobless, Wittenberger said.

"Santas can make up to 60 euros ($75) an hour," he said. "That's not bad, is it?"
Ho Ho Ho! Ho Ho Ho! Ho Ho (chomp) Ho!

Saturday, November 22, 2008

Here's to moo, Denver!

On this date (one more famous for another incident, but I disremember what) 150 years ago, the city of Denver was founded, right down the hill from the Drunkablog manse at the confluence of the Platte River and Cherry Creek.

Both papers have a bunch of stories, gathered here in the Post und here in the News. Both mention the city's alleged "cowtown" fixation, though only the News has a whole story about it. Neither has much to say about the Indians, who, oral tradition has it, were here first, though Bill Gallo is the more PC in the News' overview: "Pioneer Denverites once slaughtered American Indians with no thought for their humanity"--which draws a comment from one "davehughes":
First of all, the assertion by Gallo that Colorado Territorial "Pioneer Denverites once slaughtered American Indians with no thought for their humanity" utterly ignores the reality that both the Cheyenne and Arapaho Indians managed to 'slaughter' hundreds of settlers who came west. And even sealed off Denver from the east by their continual attacks on travellers. Which even Col Chivington following the clear orders of General Curtis to 'punish' both tribes at Sand Creek, did not stop their depredations. In fact right on our family ranch on Comanche Creek east of Kiowa the Arapahoe killed and mutilated Henrietta Dietemann and her 5 year old son. And killed and mutilated three young boys right here where Colorado Springs now stands. Both after Sand Creek. So some of us who are also 3 and 4 generation Coloradoan's don't buy into the 'politically correct' version of history that makes all the settlers bad and all the Indians good.

Revisionist history is the fad these days. Sorry to see the Rocky Mountain News be a party to it.
Both papers have slideshows of old photos, the News' far superior to the Post's, including pics not only of the city but of people like Baby Doe Tabor and the Unshankable Molly Brown, as the heroine of the Titanic was known during her prior stint in the Denver City Jail (hey, look at me, I'm a revisionist historian!).

Only one paper, thank God, has an essay by John Temple, who apparently believes it his duty as editor to write such things: "A song of praise for you, Denver":

Yes, you are still a village, or maybe a town, when I compare you to Chicago or New York, Tokyo or London.

But I am glad, yes, glad when I arrive home from a trip and slip into your easy ways.

Last Saturday I was driving west on Hampden Avenue toward the glistening peaks.

It was then that the word glorious came to mind. I have been carrying it with me and rolling it on my tongue ever since as I think of how to mark this special day, today, your 150th birthday.

Oh, Denver.

Oh, John.

Friday, November 21, 2008

Friday Night at the Radio!

Bill Stern's Sports Newsreel! Paul Harvey stole his entire schtick from this guy. "Rudy Vallee" (24 January 1945). I'll always love Vallee for his role as a rich fop in "The Palm Beach Story," in which he uttered the immortal line: "It's a tragedy of this world that the men most in need of a beating up are always enormous."

Okay, one more line from that movie:

Wienie King: I'm the Wienie King! Invented the Texas Wienie! Lay off 'em, you'll live longer.

X Minus 1: Robert Heinlein's early classic, "The Roads Must Roll" (4 January 1956).

A wartime Duffy's Tavern: "War Bond Drive With Boris Karloff" (1943). Karloff, "America's favorite pin-up ghoul."

Suspense! A Dashiel Hammett story (my, ain't we literary tonight): "Two Sharp Knives" (30 September 1942).

Thursday, November 20, 2008

Abstract of the Week!

Dance Research Journal:
Re-orienting Dance and Migration Studies

Like dance studies, the interdisciplinary field of migration studies is interested in theories and methods for understanding patterns of individual and mass human movements across the world's stage, the policies governing human im/mobility, and the social experiences that such movements engender. Both dance and migration studies privilege movement and process as categories of analysis. As such, dance studies is uniquely poised to contribute to migration studies and the foremost topics within its terrain: citizenship and statelessness, territory wars, labor refugeeism, border wars, religious and political occupation, and environmental and epidemiological displacement. Recent scholarship in the fields of music, theater, art, architecture, and literature has persuasively insisted upon the importance of the fine and performing arts to exploring the experiences and conditions of global migration. To date, no volume has investigated the impact of migration studies in relationship to dance. . . .

Paging Paul Campos

The Rocky op-ed columnist, who writes frequently about "food fascists," will blow a gasket over this story. AP:
A little less "I'm Lovin' It" could put a significant dent in the problem of childhood obesity, suggests a new study that attempts to measure the effect of TV fast-food ads.

A ban on such commercials would reduce the number of obese young children by 18 percent, and the number of obese older kids by 14 percent, researchers found.

They also suggested that ending an advertising expense tax deduction for fast-food restaurants could mean a slight reduction in childhood obesity.

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Wednesday Night at the Radio!

One of the last of the old-time radio writers has died. AP:
Irving Brecher, who wrote vaudeville one-liners for Milton Berle and scripted Marx Brothers movies, the TV and radio hit "The Life of Riley" and the Oscar-nominated musical "Meet Me in St. Louis," has died. He was 94. . . .

Brecher was a teenager in New York when he got his first comedy writing credits as columnists Walter Winchell and Ed Sullivan named him when they used jokes he sent them on postcards.

At 19, he and a friend began a comedy-writing service for entertainers, promising jokes so bad even notorious gag-stealer Milton Berle wouldn't use them.

Berle was their first customer, then took Brecher along when he moved into radio and the movies and went to Hollywood, where Brecher got a contract with Mervyn LeRoy, head of production at MGM.

He was an uncredited script doctor on "The Wizard of Oz" and wrote screenplays for the Marx Brothers movies "At the Circus" and "Go West."

"If I were any drier, I'd be drowning," Groucho Marx says while caught in the rain in 1939's "At the Circus," which was filled with puns and other wordplay.

In another scene, Marx exclaims: "I bet your father spent the first year of your life throwing rocks at the stork."

He and Fred F. Finklehoffe were nominated for an Academy Award for the screenplay of the 1944 Judy Garland picture "Meet Me in St. Louis."

Brecher created the long-running radio series "The Life of Riley," about a common man whose missteps cause endless trouble.

Chester Riley, voiced by William Bendix, frequently used the tag line "What a revoltin' development this is!"

Another character, undertaker Digger O'Dell (obviously based on Boris Karloff), had the once famous tagline: "I'll be shoveling along now." Brecher was a union man to the end:
He made a video in 2007 during the writers' strike, urging the union not to settle, The New York Times noted.

"Since 1938, when I joined what was then the Radio Writers Guild, I have been waiting for the writers to get a fair deal; I'm still waiting," he said in the video. "As Chester A. Riley would have said: 'What a revoltin' development this is.' But he only said it because I wrote it." . . .

Brecher created, wrote, directed or produced several other movies, including the 1941 feature "Shadow of the Thin Man" and 1963's "Bye Bye Birdie."
Nobody's perfect. Anyway, as far as I know the only real old-time radio writer left, believe it or not, is Herman Wouk, who, like Brecher, sent jokes to comedians as a teenager (and wrote for Fred Allen for several years in the late 30s and early 40s.)

Never was a big fan of "Life of Riley," but it's okay. Here's a wartime Thanksgiving episode: "Turkey Hunt" (19 November 1944). Good war-bond plea at the end.

And one more: "Bread Shortage" (13 April 1946).

Update: Don't know how I always screw these things up. Here's "Bread Shortage." The one just above is "Riley Finds a Fur Coat" (6 April 1946)