I'm Not Big on Body Art

OK, I understand the need some people have for some kind of tattoo. It's like anal sex, or so I'm told, you got to try it once. But after three or four tattoo's...or is it 6 or 8....and you then go in for gastric bypass.....well, there's something wrong. Sorry, but it's one thing to mutilate your outside, but to then progress to mutilating your inside? Did they grab that unused appendix, and the seldom needed but troublesome spleen while they were in there? Somethings I will never understand.

Good Night, and Good Luck, and I'm Sorry

First, let me apologize to the local cinemas whom I badgered about getting "Good Night, and Good Luck" into their theaters. I never did get to see it on the big screen, the nearest cinema that carried it was about 40 miles away, and I figured I could wait for the DVD. I had somehow thought that the "big screen" treatment of Murrow would be even better than the made for cable movie in 1986, titled "Murrow" and starring Daniel J. Travanti. Boy, was I wrong. The Clooney version, though still very good, is disappointing in every way that Murrow was great. First, it's only 90 minutes long, including credits. Second, there must be at least 30 minutes of vintage Joe McCarthy footage in there, meaning we are only talking about 1 hour of actual acting. Third, when we pull out the waste of time subplot of an "against company rules" marriage between two of the characters, and constantly returning to some singer in a bar, you probably got less than 30 minutes of the famous Murrow/Friendly stuff left, and only a few minutes of the Paley/Murrow/Friendly interaction which is what made the whole McCarthy attack possible in the first place! Hint to George Clooney - if you want to do a documentary, do a damn documentary. This topic is important, damnit, especially in this day and age. Instead we get two minutes of Murrow talking about the importance of TV news, and the difference between censorship and "not stopping you." Those two minutes are what I expected the movie to be about! Murrow was, and still is right....."this instrument...can inspire...otherwise it's just wires and lights in a box." Congrats George, you just contributed to the "lights in a box" movement.

Wingnuts and Moonbats

There is a discussion about Constitutional amendments over at http://www.rightwingnews.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt-tb.cgi/5264 and it's amazing how quickly it centered on gay marrige, adoption etc. Yes, there are mentions of balanced budget amendments, line item vetos and the like, but most of the more virulent discussion is on the Christian Fundamentalists agenda. I've been checking out some of the more popular blogs on both sides of politics, from DailyKos to StopTheACLU. And the one thing in common between them all is that no matter how reasonable the intial point is, the discussion goes to the extreme. Checkout the HBO Real Sports community boards about Bryant Gumbels rant about racism in the Olympics, and what you will find is that over half of the posters would have been members of the KKK or in a lynch mob not too many years ago.
I've never understood the use for Wingnuts and Moonbats in political movements. They get most of the press and just polarize the discussion, and destroy any chance of civil discourse. Tomorrow, Tavis Smiley will be hosting the 2006 version of "The State of the Black Union" it will be televised on CSPAN, and they generally have the videos on their website by Monday. I urge you to watch it. You will hear reasoned, logical discussion about how to correct the state of affairs in the Black community. You will also hear ranting and raving and so much hatred towards whites that it will get uncomfortable, and stir anger. What parts of the panel discussions do you think will make the news? What parts do you think the audience will applaud for? And better yet, what parts will simply play into the Wingnuts racism, and the Moonbats yahooism? The net result will be the status quo remains, and nothing gets better.
Oh well, the beat goes on.

Causal or Correlational: Part 2 - History Repeats

I will never forget an interview in the early 80's with Vladimir Posner, the Soviet talking head of choice back then. That's unfair, the man was (and is) a brilliant debater, a fine historian, just overall damn smart. At any rate, he was being lambasted by some one about the lack of freedoms in the USSR, a fairly thorough Fisking of some recent press release. Finally, Posner asked "Our nation is barely 70 year years old, do you know what your nation was doing when it was 70? It was fighting the Civil War. Keep that in mind when you criticize us." Of course, after the Civil War, we bagan the long climb to universal freedom and liberty, and sure enough, a few years later the USSR became Russia, the Ukraine, and all the others, with liberty and justice for most, if not all. It made me wonder if we ARE condemned to repeat history.

Flash to 2005. The Islamic faith is some 1500 years old. What were Christians doing in 1500AD (oops, I mean CE)? Driving Jews and Moslems out of Europe, the Spanish Inquisition was in full swing, and oh yeah, we traded smallpox to the "New World" for gold and slaves. Are we seeing the beginning of that same cycle? Will Islam rise and conquer the world the way Christianity did up through the 60's? Is there nothing but bitter religious war and battle ahead?

Hopefully, all this date nonsens is just a correlational thing, and not causal, because otherwise, I'm going to have to teach my 5 year old son how to become a global warrior, a profession I had hoped was retired when the wall came down.

Cartoon Servitude

While the rest of the world debates, riots and, in general, goes nutso over some cartoons of The Guy Who Waited For The Mountain (saying his name may be a capital offense too...) I'm amazed we passed by THE cartoon story of the month. A man, yes MAN, was traded for a cartoon!!! Does this not reek of indentured servitude? Shocking, shocking. And the fact that is is Al Michaels ,makes it even worse. He's been traded to NBC for a cartoon, 4 golf tournaments and some sporting events to be named later. ABC made it clear, it was the cartoon they were after. Shame, Shame on the media for such a demeaning move.

Causal or Correlational: Part 1

Ok, if the book Freakonomics teaches anything, it's that discovering whether a relationship between two events is causal or correlational is damn near impossible, and can result in some wild theories. The increase in abortions versus the decrease in crime 15 years later is a prime example. Well, I got two relationships I think need the Freakonomics check.

First relationship, as the number of gods in the pantheon has decreased, scientific and technological advancement has exploded. Back when every bush was worshipped, there was little technology, and even less science. Now we are at less than 93% of Americans who believe in god, giving us .92 gods left in the pantheon. And look all around, medical miracles, computers, the Internet, space sciences, the list goes on and on. Think where we will be if we get to .50 gods!

Second relationship, as the number of strong, national poltical parties has declined, the gridlock and partisanship has increased. Whigs, Federalists, Democrats, Bull Moose, Republicans, the list goes on and on, but as we ended up with just Democrats and Republicans, and their centralized national comittees, political debate has degenerated to a "I know you are, but what am I" type discussion. Whenever there has been a "strong" thirdparty, we ended up with some pretty good leaders, even if they were less than perfect presidents (Anderson gave us Reagan, Perot gave us Clinton). Again, not really a theory yet, just a hypothesis, an intriquing one. Maybe we need to convince John McCain to run as a 3rd party and get us a worthy leader in 2008!

Can You Help Me Out With This?

Why do many pro-life folk support the death penalty? Why do freedom loving Democrats feel entitled to my wallet? Why do the Republicans all think the SOTUS was a thing of awe and wonder, and the Democrats thought it was a declaration of war on our freedoms, and I thought it was a waste of oxygen? Why do the Democrats all think the response by the VA Governor to the SOTUS was a thing of awe and wonder, and the Republicans thought it was a declaration of war on our freedoms, and I thought it was a waste of oxygen? Is it possible to be fiscally conservative (ie low taxes good) and socially liberal (ie it's my life, let me do what I want, so long as I don't hurt anybody)? Must I love one party and hate the other? I guess it's time to rethink how we do things in this country.