Possibly The Creepiest Thing I've Seen In My Life
And I've seen some pretty creepy shit.
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And I've seen some pretty creepy shit.
Ninety-five Democrats and 133 Republicans voted no.
I was disappointed last week when I read that Brazilian President Lula was 'not exactly' cheerleading for the bailout.
"They want to help the banks and not help the poor." Lula said late on Saturday in Sao Paulo during a campaign rally ahead of Oct. 5 municipal elections. "Why give $700 billion to the banks and no money to the poor guys who lost their houses."
"Why" indeed? I love Brazil but 'poor' is a relative term here. 'House' is another relative term. 'Dwelling' may be more appropriate for most Brazilians. The United States has been a shelter for foreign capital as well as foreign human capital for a long time. Maybe it's time to let China lead. They might even beat us back to the moon.
For a taste of what that might be like one could do worse than read Peter Hitchens' latest from Africa, where China has large and growing presence.
Update: Dow closed down -777 to 10, 365 or about 7%. The Brazilian BVSP out of Sao Paolo closed down -4,754.84 to 46,028 or about 9.36%.
Pelosi gave an angry partisan speech right before the vote in which she showed she didn't give a damn about Republican votes (like she's been bitching about for the past week) and couldn't hold her party together. Some leadership.
I'll quote some more from Lula:
Brazil was in a better position to withstand the crisis than it was years ago, the former union leader said."I don't want to say we're at ease but ... today we depend less on the United States for our exports," Lula said.
When I was in Brazil a couple of years ago the real traded roughly two for a dollar and was on its way up to a high of around 1.55 for a buck this past August. Today it's back down to around two for a buck. Shopping is good in Sao Paolo for Americans right about now. Maybe that trip to Rio?
Hope everybody's happy.
The first time I paid anything like real attention to the day-to-day crap the government was doing was when I noticed that Frank Zappa was upset with the PMRC. The Parents Music Resource Center was Tipper Gore's pet project that ultimately succeeded in forcing the entertainment industry to put those little warning labels on popular music packages. You remember Tipper Gore don't you? She's Al Gore's wife, the chubby fellow who's currently selling snake oil of the global warming variety.
In a nutshell, for those of you that did not pay attention or who weren't around, here is the raison d'être for the PMRC from the wiki:
The PMRC claimed that popular music, and especially hard rock, punk rock and heavy metal music, was partially responsible for the perceived contemporary increase in violence, rape, teenage pregnancy, and teen suicide.
Most amusingly John Denver testified in front of congress mentioning that classic teenage drug ballad "Rocky Mountain High."
I think of Tipper and her crew of "Washington Wives" (no wonder she was so jealous of Hillary) whenever I hear one of my many liberal friends talk about how conservatives are natural censors—in so many spittle-flecked words, of course. This is usually followed by how the liberal candidate of the moment will save us from this scourge. The record tends to show a different story.
In our current tussle for the top spot our liberal savior is engaged in another jack-booted endeavor largely flying below the radar.
Obama campaign cracks down on misleading TV ads
September 23rd, 2008
The Barack Obama campaign is asking Missouri law enforcement to target anyone who lies or runs a misleading TV ad during the presidential campaign.
Here is a link explaining a bit of what is going on in case the TV station web site moves the video (The link is to the partisan National Review Online, but nobody else seems to be on top of this at the moment).
While this may send another thrill up Chris Matthews' leg, it sends a shiver down my spine. Who needs the FEC when the local sheriff is just down the road? The Obama Truth Squad indeed. Insert appropriate vulgarity [Here].
Gov. Blunt Statement on Obama Campaign’s Abusive Use of Missouri Law EnforcementWhat Senator Obama and his helpers are doing is scandalous beyond words, the party that claims to be the party of Thomas Jefferson is abusing the justice system and offices of public trust to silence political criticism with threats of prosecution and criminal punishment.
More from Missouri's Governor at the link.
I like Bette Midler, always have. She's one of those feisty, outspoken, smart-aleck chicks I've always viewed as a challenge as well as pure entertainment. You can just feel the life they've lived and the unspoken, well, sometimes spoken taunt, "Can you keep up with me honey?"
When the mask slips though it can be such a disappointment. I read today that she's decided, Bette that is, to quit touring to help save the planet. It seems she took a look out the back window of the bus and found there were too many trucks full of her stuff following to support the show. "Fourteen trucks. That's a lot of gas," says she.
So she's going to take a gig in Vegas and let the fans come to her. I don't know, maybe some math wiz can do the numbers but, isn't getting one person to an arena filled with a few thousand other people slightly cheaper and easier on the planet than getting those few thousand people to Vegas, even if that one person would have used fourteen trucks?
For one thing, Vegas is in the middle of the desert and unless you're coming from a population center in California and have the time to drive out (in your Prius, of course) you're going to take a plane to get there. That's just the blazingly obvious part but a host of other economic considerations come into it, not the least being Bette has decided the thirteen million bucks she'll earn per year will be sufficient to live on. Here's just one.
So Bette and the casino (whichever one it will be) have done the math and found the answer to be good, but what of the math for her fans? That answer would be of the 'let them eat cake' variety. Let's say you live in Kansas City with a spouse and couple of tax deductions. Bette is coming to town so you get a baby sitter for the night and blow some of that money you've been saving for the new plasma. What the heck? Once in a lifetime and all that. You can still bring the family to the lake for vacation.
You can do your own math about going to Vegas. Forget the plasma, forget the lake and forget the new school clothes. Multiply that by even a small number of fans. The better off fans will still be going to the lake that year so Ms. Midler's planet-saving scheme has just been dumped down her ultra low flush toilet.
I've got nothing against Vegas. I love Vegas. It's fun and flashy and is the ultimate iconic American expression of excess and decadence. They never turn the lights off and the air conditioning never stops. I think Bette Midler and Vegas belong together. And as long as we have Vegas and Bette Midler together crushing some poor desert tortoise atwixt their collective foot and carbon footprint there is hope for America. I just wish these entertainers could keep their feet out of their mouths.
Gawker just published the contents of Sarah Palins' Yahoo email account including her contact's addresses. I'm looking at it right now. According to Gawker:
I guess we'll have to blow up the internet now?
Very funny.
Sometimes you need to know what side somebody's on and what they really think.
Gawker is not on my side, your side or on privacy's side. They are not Democrat, Republican, Libertarian or Green. Again, they are not on your side. Their actions have spoken no matter what other cute crap spills from their lip-sticked mouths.
They have just thrown in with the spammers. I hope somebody goes to jail.
Most personally disappointing to me is that Ken Layne seems to be ok with it. He writes:
Oh hey, like every other Republican official in America, Sarah Palin tried to hide her dirty work (and stupid family pictures) by using free Yahoo email accounts.
Ken? I finally get it. I'm a little slow, but I finally realize that Republicans are Hitler and Democrats pure as the driven snow. With bunnies. Because of this anything that anyone does is ok as long as it's used against a GOP candidate. I hope you sober up soon.
Way to go assholes.
By the end of the day on September 11 of this year I hadn't finished with this so I didn’t post. I can't prepare these things, I have to write in the moment and sometimes that moment passes. But I've changed my mind, and, I've decided to backdate this entry and make it look like it was published on the eleventh for archival purposes.
Today is September 15.
Seven years. I've done a lot of stuff in seven years. I remember figuring out that I wasn't just watching some awesome special effects thing on some morning show. The first tower was down by the time I got my coffee fixed.
If there's one thing I've learned about myself in the time since is that no matter how much I want to express my feelings about what happened and what I want to happen is that it comes out all gibberish. Prose is not enough and I do even less well with poetry. But I still need to try.
The rest is after the jump.
The attack was profound. We understood immediately that it was symbolic and that we could never respond in kind. Technically, we could pave over Afghanistan, but that might actually be an improvement. We could fuse the sands of the entire Middle East into glass with a small portion of our nuclear arsenal, but then getting oil out of it would be difficult. To respond we needed a symbol, and we settled on one: "You will become democracies, and we will help you whether you like it or not."
It was the only move we could make, but ultimately not satisfying. Our wounds persist. We are bruised, our feelings are hurt, our pride suffers. We can see our enemies pointing to a sickly man in a cave outside of our reach singing, "Yes we can!" We know that if 'that man' dies of natural causes our humiliation will be complete and our cause may well be lost.
Our freedom will be shown to be a chimera, our bravery not enough. A land based on an idea will become a parody of itself. A people made up out of whole cloth to transcend the old world of the petty wars of kings and tyrants dragged back to the medieval. A people of self-sufficiency, peace and prosperity in turn subjected to endless personal scrutiny and security measures for our own 'safety.'
Of those twin towers of Babylon, symbol of the engine that feeds us, we never had any doubt of building again- higher and more proud. Of the esoterically shaped Pentagon, symbol of our strength, we only needed to set them on a task. Of the third target, symbol of our government; it was protected by our actual government- a group of "people" on a plane, from all walks of life, realizing just in time what was at stake, voting with their lives.
And we find ourselves now at election time, with the responsibility to elect again our symbolic government. Who are we going to choose as a symbol of ourselves? Who captures our spirit? Who makes us proud again and offers us hope of redemption? As luck would have it, and we are as a nation lucky, we have a surfeit of choices.
An American of African ancestry, a person who would symbolize our desire for redemption, that one of those that were our slaves could lead us as a nation. He is a symbol of voluntary service, not involuntary servitude.
A true war hero that suffered at the hands of our enemy and who afterwards sought reconciliation and healing with them. One who welcomed into his family a child not of his own that was a victim of great deprivation and neglect. His is a family that has roots of service to our country reaching back to its beginnings.
Another American who kept his promise of service through personal tragedy and family sacrifice is offering his service again. He wasn't chosen as the top of his ticket, but has humbled himself after a lifetime of striving—to be the backup, an assistant, or helper toward a possibly historic moment.
Finally another American was plucked out of, virtually if not quite literally, nowhere, to serve. This one strikes a certain chord we are familiar with. She is a reminder too of our past, though she is young. In her case it is a past not of shame or suffering or sacrifice; but of discovery, determination, self-sufficiency and progress. As symbol, she describes us as we want to be described.
She gives us energy, unreasonable energy. Frightening energy. Hers is an appeal beyond. She is a hunter, and if there is anything we yearn for right now it's a hunter. A Diana, bow in hand, with an unwavering and patient eye, on a certain cave, with a certain prey. She is beyond our reason, appealing to our sense of survival. She is the archetype of the eternal maternal, the perfect enemy of our enemy.
A moment in time is upon us.
It seems painfully obvious that Microsoft has dug themselves into a hole and they need some help getting out of it. The Mojave Experiment was so transparent that heads should roll, and considering the stakes, maybe literally. Telling people they are stupid for not buying your product may not be the best marketing strategy. The second smartest computer guy I know tested Vista in Beta and warned me off of it. (The first smartest guy was raised on Unix.)
That said I think the Seinfeld/ Gates commercial was a real work of art.
Aside from its entertainment value it tells the story of Bill Gates and Microsoft and their history with Apple and Steve Jobs. Let's break it down:
Shoe Circus (Quality shoes at discount prices) is a barely hidden reference to the Apple Store at the mall. Gates is a PC user (think Wintel) trying out a much-hyped product for fit (The Conquistador=latest Apple Product), "They run very tight." Jerry sees how nervously Bill is bending the shoes and says, "Ever wear clothes in the shower Bill?" "Never." "You're dressed, and you're clean. Open the door and go about your business." That would be the Apple sales pitch 'See how easy it is to switch to Apple?' The latest version is that Windows users can bring their computer into the store and the techs will make the transition for you. "Open the door and go about your business."
Jerry represents the Apple fanatic, stepping in front of the actual salesperson. I've seen that happen. "Is that Conquistador?" the woman pressing her nose against the glass asks her husband in English. But her Latina accent is subtitled just the same- in English- not Spanish. Very funny. The husband repeats the 'they run tight' marketing line, this time in Spanish, reinforcing the smart (bilingual) woman/ lazy (can't bother to learn English) man that our culture loves so much.
The 'Gates as PC user in an Apple store' argument seems to go off the rails at this point when the cashier asks Bill if he's a "Circus Clown Club Member?" and he answers in the affirmative. "Platinum," he says while showing his card with a very youthful photo. But here is where the Jobs/ Gates history comes in. The Circus Clown (Apple) customer is known today as a Geek. A too cool for school geek (think Jobs) as depicted in the Apple commercials, but a geek nevertheless. But Gates was a geek from day one.
Geeks hated Apple from the beginning because you couldn't modify the OS and you couldn't build a 'box' from parts like you could build a DOS machine. This scene is also a soft reference to Microsoft building Windows in response to Apple with all that implies. Gates is no dummy. "What do you get with that card?" "Big Top points." Bill understands marketing, and that Apple has finally eaten Microsoft's lunch in that department after all these years.
"You know I imagine over the years you've mind-melded your magnum Jupiter brain to those other Saturn ring brains at Microsoft." "I have." This says that as much as Apple = Steve Jobs, Microsoft = Bill Gates.
"Give me a signal, adjust your shorts." The geeks have always gone cross-eyed trying to anticipate the next product coming out of both Apple and Microsoft, but now with virtually everyone using a computer for everyday purposes, not to mention a plethora of PDAs, anticipating the next computing product has entered the public zeitgeist.
I'm sure more people will find more things buried in the ad, and probably argue against the things I think I've found. But that's why I'm thinking of it as a modern, sophisticated marketing art piece. Gates and Seinfeld, both icons in their respective industries, are coming out of semi-retirement to play.
I get the feeling that this has nothing to do with Vista or the next operating system from Microsoft, at least not in the sense that we've become accustomed to thinking about it. It brings to my mind the Tom Waits track "What's He Building In There?" We will see.
Somebody that I've always considered a phony, Dr. Phil, took on the role of defending Sarah Palin on Dave Letterman's show the other day. Well played Doc. You are a gentleman. I don't know what's happened to Dave.
Perhaps not so surprising, Oprah, Dr. Phil's benefactor, has refused to interview Palin on her own show. This, after showcasing Obama to much hoopla. A show for and about women is shutting out perhaps the one woman in America that women want to know more about.
I'm not her audience, but it sounds like she doesn't think much of who is. If Ellen DeGeneres had any balls she'd step up.
Good stuff.
Caught a bit of Fred's speech and Lieberman's shtick. Newt Gingrich is big time pro Sarah. Republican pooh-bas are still lukewarm except for Bill Kristol who was an early Sarah advocate. Through all of it, the base, the Republicans on the floor, especially the women on the floor, are going cross-eyed while waiting to hear from Sarah. Unless she burns a cross on the stage and offers her teenage daughter's unborn child up for a pagan sacrifice they're going to have to repair the roof on the joint.