vacation vacation
I'm on break, so any updates will be sporadic and likely useless. I leave you with this excellent routine, from Billy Connolly (via Videosift). Wait for the punchline...
Later folks!
Sundry thoughts from the cluttered mind of Peter Chen on mostly news and politics, but also music, movies, books, art, the Cubs, sports and most importantly, random internet bullshit.
I'm on break, so any updates will be sporadic and likely useless. I leave you with this excellent routine, from Billy Connolly (via Videosift). Wait for the punchline...
Later folks!
Slapdashed by Peter at 11:25 AM 0 comments
"If people do want to engage in civil disobedience, there are consequences that come with civil disobedience.""Unusual and extreme tactics"? I am ordinarily an anti-establishment sympathizer, but the administration tactics don't strike me as particularly diabolical. No threats of physical violence, no cops. Yeesh, get over it.
"My worry is that 99 Ranch could be a steppingstone for [our community] to become all Asian," he said. "I don't want another Hacienda Heights."Translation: I liked it better when you were "diverse" window dressing, and white people were still in control. Also hilarious in the story, they cite as part of the "changing face" of the community... "a karate studio, a Chinese buffet and Thai restaurants." Gasp! Shock! I'm pretty sure you could find those almost everywhere in America. The real question is, how did Chino Hills avoid them for so long?
Slapdashed by Peter at 12:05 PM 0 comments
Tags: asian supermarket, attorneys, bread, campus speech, patriot act, protest, rudy giuliani
Kurt Vonnegut is dead. What a goddamn loss. What many don't realize without reading Vonnegut and only hearing of his "dark humor" and "morality" is that his books aren't really mean-spirited or bitter. Like the Midwestern charm that pervades his character, Vonnegut's books are tinged by a certain geniality, even in their profound pessimism, like some sort of demented tale out of Lake Wobegon populated by aliens and mad scientists. And despite the appeal of "Everything was beautiful and nothing hurt," Vonnegut's stories have an urgent message for us today. We live in darkening times, times where Vonnegut's moral directive that men must act is of paramount importance. Tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians are killed. So it goes. Scores were killed in suicide bombings in Algeria. So it goes. The American cult of Apathy gazes at its TV screens with a shrug. So it goes.
Today, Kurt Vonnegut is dead. So it goes.
Slapdashed by Peter at 11:02 AM 0 comments
So if you read the article yesterday, you know that Hillary hate across the entire political spectrum has to do with her presumed fence-sitting on every position she's ever held in order to get ahead. As a result of her personal and political evolution, however, she can be a target of every attack and every accolade that anyone can dig up. Yet, she is just doing what every self-proclaimed feminist of the 1970s said they would do: she's getting what she wants, what she believes she deserves. The Jack Hitt piece backs Hillary up on her feminist ambitions, but I think the root of Hillary hate is the route to power, not the movement she embodies.
I've got Hillary hate myself, not as much vitriol as most, but still enough to not want to vote for her. This will no doubt be her biggest liability as the Democratic candidate... everyone already has a pre-formed opinion of her. Even if she appears as the embattled woman fighting off chauvinism, she'll still have a tough time fighting preconceived public conceptions. At the same time, she won't have to go through the trouble of "defining" herself... she's already done it so many times that we know the refrain.
I find the Hillary hatred to be particularly notable in America, because of the Ségolène Royal phenomenon in France. I believe that if Royal loses, it will be because she's a woman. France is still chauvinistic but that's not why her sex plays such an important role. As a woman, she's had to define herself unusually to gain entry into male-dominated politics. Many see her, like Hillary, as a political opportunist, using the power of her husband, Socialist Party elder (well, life-partner) François Hollande, to take the Socialists by storm.
Her campaign has been defined by fending off attacks based on her femininity. How many men would have to do as much chest-thumping flag-waving as she has? Of course, her problem of indefinition is exactly the opposite of the Hillary problem. Still, note that both of them aren't known by their last names so much as their surnames. Ségolène's nickname is Sego; Sarkozy's is Sarko. Hillary and Ségolène have to take on all these multiple roles because society expects it. They have to be feminine and masculine, devious schemer and naive newbie, domineering and submissive, national mother and national father. With all these identities, it's no wonder that everyone can find something to hate.
Slapdashed by Peter at 4:14 PM 0 comments
Slapdashed by Peter at 3:44 PM 0 comments
Tags: BeeGees, Bush, Cole Porter, Iraq war
Short answer: because there's so many of her identities to hate.
More on this tomorrow. But right now it's late-ass, and I'm hittin the hay.
Slapdashed by Peter at 3:29 AM 0 comments
So a few days ago I linked to this piece on Joshua Bell's subway performance in L'Enfant Plaza.
Well, David Marchese, music critic at Salon, thought the whole piece was another salvo of elitist bullshit surrounding classical music. Since I linked to it first, I obviously think otherwise, so let me engage a few of his points.
1.) The apathy of the public comes as a surprise to Weingarten (the writer of the original piece). Not so to Marchese, who notes the obvious: "hello, they had jobs to get to." Still, if Jasper Johns was painting, or Wynton Marsalis was playing trumpet, I'm not sure it would've gotten people's attention either. I don't think the piece was as condescending as Marchese does, but then again, maybe I'm one of those elitist snobs of classical music that Marchese decries. Rather, I feel that the apathy of the public to great rough art (not necessarily classical) was the point. The note about the children (who, as Marchese notes, are as fascinated by eating their boogers as listening to Joshua Bell) needing to be dragged away by parents isn't just a re-hash of the old "kids are innocent, great engines of awesomeness!" argument. Instead, it's an indictment of our collective loss of curiosity. Wouldn't you at least give it a passing glance? A thought? "Who is that?" But we all just file past.
2.) Yes, the primary hurdle of classical music is its high-brow attitude. Skyrocketing ticket prices, a lack of interpretation for new listeners, and the prevalence of the Josh Grobans and Il Divos of the world have turned classical music into an ossified genre of tuxes and snores. Instead of reading this as a patronizing display of scoffing at lesser folks, the Joshua Bell experiment was an attempt to strip down classical music of its pomp and bring it free to people who wouldn't necessarily normally hear it. If anything, it shows how much classical music needs more shows like this, rather than less.
3.) I understand Marchese's contention that shaming people into paying close attention to street musicians won't actually help the ailing classical music industry, which is bucking itself up with those airy assholes I listed above. I'm not sure what will, and at least part of the blame belongs at the feet of a recording industry that demands megahits. I think people really do want to listen to classical music; it's just hard to access it in a non-pretentious way (or a non-schlocky way... the Fur Elise ringtone comes to mind...). For example, I think IU does a great job of spreading the appreciation of classical music: tons of free concerts, cheap opera tickets, etc. Yeah, I know IU's a special case, but as Charles Rosen said in his Patten Lecture dinner, classical music has plenty of audience, and terrible P.R. I'm inclined to agree. The reason for Bell's failure to garner attention was the lack of proper framing, as the article duly notes. I'm talking about getting booked at major eclectic music festivals, better marketing of public performances, lower ticket prices at major symphonies, etc.
Anyways, I agree that Weingarten does have his fair share of elitist snobbishness, as do I. But I don't think the "experiment" was an attempt to humiliate the passersby. Rather, it was a gauge of art's importance without context, and in a world drenched in context upon context, seeing Bach's unaccompanied violin sonatas stripped bare as the lowest of ignored arts was a valuable lesson. Or at least, a more valuable one than this one.
Slapdashed by Peter at 11:32 PM 1 comments
Tags: again, Joshua Bell
USAToday reports on the NFL's new discipline policy, or at least discussions about it.
Maybe we should call it the Pacman Jones rule? The whole damn Cincinnati Bengals rule (no team shall have more wins than arrests)? In any case, new NFL disciplinary policy is on the horizon. Will the backlash be anything like the NBA anti-thug dress code?
I think we can all agree that forcing players to stop looking like thugs and forcing them to stop being thugs are two different things, and that the latter is far more important. It's nice to know that they're getting player input though.
Slapdashed by Peter at 1:42 PM 0 comments
If you have time to burn, read the Mark Bowden (of Black Hawk Down fame) article in the new Atlantic about how the U.S. military hunted down al-Zarqawi. It's a remarkable story of an operation that worked in Iraq, and makes you wonder how we couldn't and still can't catch Osama bin-Laden. The article shows post-Abu-Ghraib military interrogators working within boundaries and getting key information, with at least a little bit of luck. Rather than traditional Bowden fare of commando raids and firefights, this reads like a police procedural, Law & Order: Baghdad. Riveting stuff.
Clearly, though, our military is not incompetent, nor is the local population entirely indifferent to the insurgents. The problem lies in politics, organization, and public relations, and in all those respects, this administration has utterly failed.
If you don't have an Atlantic subscription... uh, tough luck. But they only cost $15 a year at the special rate found here, and the internet login lasts forever (as Schmidtty and I discovered). Not to mention that it's the best monthly (ok, 10-issue) magazine in America. (Sorry, National Geographic.)
Slapdashed by Peter at 1:13 PM 0 comments
Just like the title says, ten minutes of reading + five minutes of writing = this post.
Slapdashed by Peter at 6:43 AM 0 comments
Slapdashed by Peter at 5:29 PM 0 comments
So, already taking a few suggestions into account, I'll try to separate the content into smaller chunks, for easier digestion. Here's some of my morning reads, newspapers and MSM stuff that's worth your time. It'll change daily. NYTimes & WashPost one day, ChicagoTrib and CNN the next. Maybe I'll do one newspaper, one of CNN or MSNBC, and one French? I dunno. I kind of worry that this will end up too much like Slate's Today's Papers.
NYTimes:
Slapdashed by Peter at 11:41 AM 0 comments
Slapdashed by Peter at 12:29 AM 0 comments
So much for two posts a day. Yeah, no such luck. Although, maybe one long post a day is preferable to two. As this blog is still in its nascent stages with (I imagine) very few readers, I'll keep fiddling around with format and whatnot. Any suggestions from my meager readership are encouraged.
So, in actual French news, Royal has taken a hit in the latest Figaro poll. Not that French polls are a decent metric of French public opinion. Still, Sarkozy still holds comfortably onto the biggest chunk of the public with a sizeable lead. I'll write more about the actual election later, as actual Election Day draws nearer.
In the meantime, here's a neat piece from Figaro (in English) about how Internet video is affecting French politics. I'll note that it's still way behind the impact of, say, "macaca" in 2006. The bulk of gaffes and public appeals have been distributed in papers and television. Still, the rise of Bayrou in the last few weeks may have as much to do with his Internet blitz as traditional French indecision.
Disney OKs gay marriage. Good for business = Good for America.
A symbolic reminder of the culture we inhabit. If you have time, you should definitely give it a read and consideration. Would you stop and listen? I'm honestly not sure I would. We're all fixed on our goal to just get through the day that we miss works of unimaginable beauty around us, even when they're right in front of our faces. In other Joshua Bell news, that down-home Indiana boy has gone and won himself the Fisher Prize... a prize that no one has won in three years.
On the topic of cultural expression, here's a NYTimes piece about heckling culture. As criticism has become art sometimes superior to the art itself, have we become so callous that we're more willing to pan than exult? Has the internet turned us into this? I chew on this one quite a bit, because honestly, I'm exactly the snarky, ironic, critical asshole that may be killing creativity, or at least, making a caustic environment for new art. Is there such a thing as smart heckling and dumb heckling? Is the defensive response to heckling simply the result of coddled artists who need a cold dash of reality?
Heckling has a storied history (The Rite of Spring comes to mind), and we need strong criticism to keep established acts in check. Yet, that's exactly the opposite of how heckling works. We heckle no-name bums in comedy clubs, not Dane Cook (though we should). No one who pays hundreds of dollars (or more) to see the Rolling Stones is going to boo them for not playing "Wild Horses." Yet, during this time of unbearable peanut gallery displeasure, creativity seems fertile as ever. The Internet and cheap editing software, which have spawned idiocy on a mass scale, have also spawned a new wave of mash-up culture and small masterpieces. Who's to say that more voices aren't degrading the cultural water, so much as they are creating adversity necessary for any great art? Then again, if Emily Dickinson had posted her weird poetry on LiveJournal, she'd probably take hell for it. (I can see the comments now... "Jesus, more emo poetry bullshit. Cheer up or slit your wrists.") What if it stopped her from going on? Anyways, something for us wise-ass bastards to think about.
David Heimann is traveling to 365 Catholic churches in 365 days. He blogs about it here. A remarkable journey of faith. Worth the read during Holy Week, even for us heathens.
In more hilarious Easter stories... SOYLENT GREEN IS PEEPS. It's the Washington Post Peep Diorama competition. And since it combines three things that I love (the Washington Post, Peeps, and dioramas), it is officially a bag o' dimes. Look at them all, but Soylent Green is #17. Sorry, no direct link.
Giuliani's presidential candidacy better implode soon. He's driving me crazy. Quote to remember:
If America's Mayor becomes America's President, seriously, I quit.As for Iran, Mr. Giuliani said that “in the long term,” it might be “more dangerous than Iraq.”
He then casually lumped Iran with Al Qaeda. “Their movement has already displayed more aggressive tendencies by coming here and killing us,” he said.
Slapdashed by Peter at 8:54 PM 0 comments
Tags: critics, Disney marriage, Joshua Bell, peeps, Ségolene Royal, Trejo
Short entry today:
Damn that's scary. SomethingAwful got a hold of this picture. Needless to say, goons are going hog wild. Pretty funny Photoshop Phun.
Some neat photos, particularly the smoke pics.
If you haven't read Slate's series on African oil, you should.
Rundown of the year's American music fests, via Rolling Stone (No Rock The Bells, though... could that lineup be any more ridiculous?).
Man, O'Reilly comes off pretty awful in this video... but I kind of wish Geraldo and Bill O'Reilly will fight each other and destroy each other in a blinding flash of idiocy... but I don't got that kinda luck. I guess all we can do is bask in the retardation of this glorious clip. O'Reilly seems to be taking most of the online heat (because, of course, lefty nerds always want an excuse to hate O'Reilly), but come on, Rivera doesn't exactly make himself that admirable.
Yes, bringing up the illegal immigrant part is silly of O'Reilly, but the sensationalizing of the incident at all depends solely on the guy being an illegal immigrant. Not that Geraldo has any problem with sensation.
After forgetting that the attorneys scandal exists, Time magazine puts out a scathing piece on the "epic collapse" of the Bush Administration. Talk about making up for lost time.
No screaming on the Screamer. Kinda makes me think of this.
In closing, Live Free or DIE HARD. BRUCE WILLIS SAVES A MAC. This trailer is so ridiculous... I don't even know what the fuck. I will probably still watch it despite god-awful reviews. Yippee-ki-yay.
Slapdashed by Peter at 10:19 PM 0 comments
God bless this kid. Enthusiastic people deserve to win the Price is Right.
A small collection of links...
Bob Barker's retiring... so YouTube's having a tribute to him. None that worth seeing yet, but I really like the concept. Mad props, Bob. Mostly for punching Adam Sandler.
What if the Washington Post remade its website both as a wiki and to unify with the print edition (unlike its unfortunate new makeover)? Have to admit that it looks quite a bit more aesthetically pleasing than the current one. The side-by-side comparison really brings the point home. (via journerdism)
It's OK if you go to Syria and negotiate with evildoers, and kowtow to evil Islam in fashion statements, as long as you support the Iraq War. So spake Mitt Romney. The only thing worse than this cockamamie garbage that the Bush Administration spews is that the major news outlets buy it. War supporters in headscarves? Republicans in Syria? Eh, that's cool.
A few thoughts on Iran/Britain sailors... I feel a little bit like the Independent. Still, I think one thing we can learn from this is that diplomacy can still trump war-cheerleaders, and that having an embassy in Teheran is preferable to, you know, not. Clearly, the most important outcome was to get the sailors home. Period. Ahmadinejad can have all the showboating he wants, but I strongly disagree with the Andrew Sullivan assertion of "humiliation." A blowhardy standoff with Iran raises Ahmadinejad's hard-line nutcasery to a new level. Yes, Britain doesn't come out of this smelling like a rose, but the guys are home.
Also, the EU didn't exactly leave Britain "in the lurch." What were they supposed to do? Impose sanctions? That would've made matters far worse. If the waters weren't disputed (they are) and if we had any moral high ground left (we don't), we could correctly fight back with conviction. As Sullivan correctly points out, though, it is Bush's Iraq policy that has led us here. The greatest thing we have lost in our Iraqi adventure, greater even than the thousands of soldiers who have died and billions of dollars lost, is our principles. We have always been a pragmatic nation, but even the most utilitarian among us must realize that reputation is a useful tool to have, and the most potent one we have lost.
OK, last note, an amazing retrospective on Obtusity about the many videos of Michael Jackson. Worth a watch if you've got a couple hours to burn. Or just watch your faves. Hearing Jackson say "your butt is mine" is more than a little disturbing, though.
Slapdashed by Peter at 11:03 PM 0 comments
Tags: iranian hostages, michael jackson, spayed or neutered, syria hypocrisy, washpost wiki
(via digg):
It's inexplicably funny.
Slapdashed by Peter at 4:53 PM 0 comments
On the issue of the sale of the Chicago Cubs, Zell confirmed that he may seek to sell Wrigley Field separately. He acknowledged that Wrigley, because of its landmark status, is a tricky, single-use piece of property.
That's scary... a Cubs without WGN TV, Pat & Ron, or Wrigley Field? That's hard to imagine, and even harder to stomach.
"Division III athletics features student-athletes who receive no financial aid related to their athletic ability and athletic departments are staffed and funded like any other department in the university. Division III athletics departments place special importance on the impact of athletics on the participants rather than on the spectators."We've forgotten that these athletes must be students first, and that education should be the primary goal of a university. People claim that athletics raise a university's profile and raise booster cash. That's crap. So many schools have money-losing athletics programs that it's crazy, and the marketing (of Indiana hats, jerseys, oven mitts, etc.) wouldn't just stop because IU sports would be on a smaller level.
Slapdashed by Peter at 1:01 PM 0 comments
First thing: The Left Behind series, which has now sold upwards of 65 million copies so far, is finally coming to a close (although with the franchise it has built.... not really). Whether or not it's truly over, the sixteenth final installment of the series, "Kingdom Come" is ready to ship. After detailing all-American pilot Rayford Steele's (yeah, I know... he sounds like a tv private eye) battle against dashing foreign-ass secretary general of the UN Nicolae Carpathia, and the installment of Jesus in his thousand-year reign, the breathless thriller-style telling of the Book of Revelation is over.
Having read but two of them, I can't say I'm a total expert on the series. Nevertheless, I found its formulaic thriller tropes to be a bit too familiar. When you're retelling arguably the coolest book of the Bible (when the writers go absolutely mystical bonkers with wild visions), you should probably try to give it a bit more polish than a tossed-off frivolity populated by characters named Buck Williams and Mac McCallum (seriously). Left Behind demonstrates the danger of turning the Bible into pop culture, like Christian rock and The Omega Code. In doing so, the reverence for the original material is lost, just a momentary fad in a wave of "Jesus is my homeboy" pop Christianity, but with a hint of apocalyptic milleniarianism.
Maybe I don't have much of a say on this topic, not being a Christian and all, but I can tell you that this genre of pop Christianity doesn't exactly make me want to rush to church. May the Left Behind series rest in peace. Hopefully, its passing marks the end of an era of evangelilcal hysteria and not the beginning of a longer trend... but I'm not holding my breath.
OK, on with the bullet points:
What I AM saying is that without clear and consistent principles, there is no chance for trust, and without trust, you’ve got nothing — or worse still, the downside can exceed the upside. So, yeah, it’s great that blogging software has empowered so many people, but with power comes responsibility. If bloggers want Journalism to get down off its high horse and take them more seriously, they need to demonstrate that they can first, do no harm.
Slapdashed by Peter at 10:23 AM 0 comments
Tags: iranian hostages, journalism/blogging, mahdi army, my humps, oprah for cubs' owner, paying for college, rayford steele, the sandman
Bullet points in the morning:
Two of the three leading Republican candidates for President either embrace or are open to embracing the idea that the President can imprison Americans without any review, based solely on the unchecked decree of the President. And, of course, that is nothing new, since the current Republican President not only believes he has that power but has exercised it against U.S. citizens and legal residents in the U.S. -- including those arrested not on the "battlefield," but on American soil.What kind of American isn't just instinctively repulsed by the notion that the President has the power to imprison Americans with no charges? And what does it say about the current state of our political culture that one of the two political parties has all but adopted as a plank in its platform a view of presidential powers and the federal government that is -- literally -- the exact opposite of what this country is?
Slapdashed by Peter at 12:44 PM 0 comments
Tags: cards in last place, france-africa, green text, silly democrats, tancredo, tribune
Oh damn. It's here. Baseball. For real real. Not for play play. Five thoughts:
1.) Predictions for my Cubbies
Realistic Predictions: Cubs finish 84-78, 2nd place behind dominant offense, mediocre pitching and disastrous defense, miss playoffs. Hendry still loses job.
Dream Predictions: Cubs finish 101-61, best record in baseball, win World Series (preferably defeating White Sox, but any team will do). Derrek Lee wins the MVP that escaped him in 2005. Albert Pujols injures self in combination sneezing/hot-tub/deer-meat accident.
2.) Since everyone is picking the Brewers to do some damage in the Central...
I will predict another 3rd place, near-.500 finish.
3.) Japan Leagues
With the high-profile arrival of Daisuke Matsuzaka and others (Kei Igawa, Akinori Iwamura, etc.) some in Japanese baseball lament that their greatest players abandon the island for America. In fact, the Japanese leagues, unlike the American ones, have never been profitable on the whole, and are unable to put up the ridiculous salaries that even lower-tier American clubs can (see: Iwamura's signing with the Devil Rays). Yet, the relationship between American and Japanese baseball currently produces the obscene posting fee system, and washed-up Americans in Japan (i'm lookin at you Jose Macias...).
So, here's my idea: have MLB buy the Central and Pacific Leagues in Japan. They could be just like the American and National Legaues pre-inter-league-play. They've always been more advertising ornament than stand-alone institution in Japan, so let's make'em real teams. There'd be revenue-sharing just as in the American system, and no arcane posting fee bullshit. American players would be as free to go to Japan as vice versa. Or, the Japanese Leagues could act like a second-tier to the American teams, like the tiers in European soccer leagues. Of course, the Japanese with all that "honor" crap probably wouldn't sell in any situation, but it is worth thinking about.
4.) Farm system blues
The Cubs farm system has slowly slinked into the bottom half in baseball, having been raided in trades and having a number of solid young pitchers no longer eligible for minor leaguer status (too many innings in the majors). Home-grown talent is obviously important (Carlos Zambrano anyone?) and the Cubs' win-now strategy has forced the off-season buying bonanza. If my prediction holds true, and this is the end of the Hendry era, I think it's time to seriously dump money into the farm system, not in scouting (which the Cubs have always been good at) but in the actual development. After the K-orey Patterson debacle, over-cautiousness has led to "over-seasoning" if you will. A happy middle path will do all these guys a lot of good.
5.) Baseball blogs vs. "real" sports journalists
There's a lot of hate towards baseball bloggers as cold mechanical stat heads who hate the actual playing of the game or untrained partisan hacks who simply enshrine their own team and rain hate upon any disagreement, most of the time from guys like Murray Chass at the NYTimes, or Shaughnessy at the Boston Globe, or any number of "old-school" sportswriters who see bloggers as a threat. That's crazy. Blogs are just a different medium, like any medium. These reporters act as if the blogs are isolated nutjobs in their parents' basements, but the fact is that reporters are increasingly more isolated than the bloggers, reading less sources, watching fewer games, believing groupthink conclusions like "A-Rod needs to become a true Yankee" or "Statistics that I can't physically count during a game don't matter." Rather than write off sports blogs as lower-class competition, maybe these guys should start considering just why these blogs are popular, especially those that rag on old-school sports analysts. This change in medium just means that sportswriting is no longer the realm of ivory-tower AP-approved writing, but the down and dirty reporting and opining that made sportswriting an exciting genre.
Last thing: is this the LATimes April Fool's story? Or is this for real? Cuz seriously, I could SO be a butler.
Other April Fool's gags, Wikipedia, and Google. Hee!
Slapdashed by Peter at 2:24 PM 0 comments
Tags: baseball, cubs, japan, poisson d'avril, sports blogs