drat fink

skipping stones

"Oh dear. I can see I'm going to have to go pedagogical on everyone's ass. Just when I was enjoying my Saturday, what with the Orioles bopping the Red Sox and the new CBGB's book in my satchel. But blog duty is blog duty.

Jeff Jarvis, who ought to know better and probably does(nt), writes:

"Conspiracy nutjob, has-been, and bad filmmaker Oliver Stone is making the first movie about 9/11."

No, no, this will never do. "

sigh oops

"Washington and London did not trust the peoples of their democracies to come to the right decisions," Gardiner explains. Consequently, "Truth became a casualty. When truth is a casualty, democracy receives collateral damage." For the first time in US history, "we allowed strategic psychological operations to become part of public affairs... [W]hat has happened is that information warfare, strategic influence, [and] strategic psychological operations pushed their way into the important process of informing the peoples of our two democracies."

unsound and the furies

EXTRAVERSION: 1 (Low)
Friendliness: 7
Gregariousness: 8
Assertiveness: 1
Activity Level: 1
Excitement-Seeking: 4
Cheerfulness: 1

AGREEABLENESS: 18 (Low)
Trust: 42
Morality: 11
Altruism: 5
Co-operation: 11
Modesty: 35
Sympathy: 82

CONSCIENTIOUSNESS: 1 (Low)
Self-Efficacy: 1
Orderliness: 33
Dutifulness: 28
Achievement-Striving: 1
Self-Discipline: 0
Cautiousness: 64

NEUROTICISM: 99 (High)
Anxiety: 88
Anger: 88
Depression: 99
Self-Consciousness: 89
Immoderation: 68
Vulnerability: 99

OPENNESS TO EXPERIENCE: 88 (High)
Imagination: 72
Artistic Interests: 60
Emotionality: 65
Adventurousness: 58
Intellect: 79
Liberalism: 99

marx my words

"Which brings me to something like a serious point about those old Marxist days. Is DTN suggesting that after the fall of Communism, cultural critics should give up on trying to understand the historicity of works of art, and that people who persist in asking such questions are secretly longing for the gulag? What a strange suggestion that would be. And you know, I’ve always been puzzled about why there is so little “conservative” historicism in the humanities. Why, exactly, should the division of intellectual labor have fallen out this way, in which the intellectual left says, “let’s try to understand how feudalism, mercantile capitalism, industrial capitalism, post-industrial capitalism, etc. inflected the production and reception of works of art,” and the intellectual right says, “no! works of art are timeless, timeless, timeless”? And then the intellectual left says, “but aren’t you curious as to why some works of art survive and remain powerful for centuries, whereas others gradually drop out of sight, and still others are acknowledged only long after their creators are dead?” And the right replies, “there’s nothing to be curious about! Some authors are great and some aren’t, that’s all.” In this as in other schools of cultural criticism, the intellectual right hasn’t brought anything to the table in decades. Instead, they’ve met each new school of criticism and theory since the advent of structuralism by singing that immortal Groucho Marx tune from Horse Feathers, “I’m Against It.” Why they think this suffices as a mode of intellectual exchange, I’ll never know. But as far as I’m concerned, if we’re going to use terms like “modernism” and “postmodernism”—or, indeed, if we’re going to talk about historical periods at all—it only makes sense to try to determine what makes one period distinct from another, and how art responds (and contributes) to historical change."

dock of the baseball

"One day last month, Ellis walked into the Victor Valley penitentiary, where, for the past two years, he's worked as a drug counselor. He said he had a surprise for his class. HBO Sports was doing a piece on him, and they'd dug up an old black-and-white videotape of that June 1970 game against the Pirates. To that point, Ellis swore that no tape of the game existed, and he'd never seen himself pitch high on LSD. And this would be the first time he was watching it. As the game enters the ninth, it gets to two outs, three balls and two strikes, and then the tape cuts straight to a postgame interview.

"I remember getting that last out," Ellis says. "And turning around and saying, 'A fucking no-hitter!' It didn't really hit me until the next morning, when I was less high, and I got a live phone call from CBS or ABC or something wanting to interview me. They kept telling me to turn the TV down. Too much feedback.""

because i have to, allright?

***Frank Sinatra - Satisfy Me One More Time
***Herbie Hancock - Keep On Doin' It
***The Toppers - (I Love to Play Your Piano) Let Me Bang Your Box
***Johnny Cash and Willie Nelson - Me and Paul
***Henry Mancini - Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head
***Winston Francis - Fools Fall In Love
***Gerry and the Pacemakers - How Do You Do It
***Bill Monroe - Stay Away From Me
***The Cars - Double Life
***Tom Waits - Spare Parts II and Closing

terrycloth lined

"Q Yes. Is there any idea how long a 'last throe' lasts for?"

can a' corn

im not particularly anxious to watch M*A*S*H but im glad to see canned laughtracks removed from sitcoms.

"And now, thanks to DVDs, you can watch "M*A*S*H" minus its laughtrack. You can see what Gelbart and Reynolds wanted to do all along, and it makes the show even better. You can actually hear and enjoy the wordplay, and the mood is much much subtler. I always enjoyed the early "M*A*S*H", but not to this degree. Without laughter it's a superior show."

down (ing) stre et memo rex

"Whether that same potential exists with the Downing Street memo story isn't clear. Actually, strike that -- it's perfectly clear, but only if the focus is widened to include the entire policymaking process that led up to the invasion. The memo itself may be the smoking gun, but the story is the crime, or crimes rather -- the manipulation of the intelligence, the deliberate efforts to sabotage a diplomatic solution, the use of strategic disinformation (i.e. lies) against a domestic audience, the possible forging of evidence, and, perhaps most importantly of all, the cover up afterwards, which is still in progress."

got dem home depot blues

as far as i can recall i have encountered nothing in my life nearly as moronic as home depot locking up access to exacto knives and their blades and then requiring a photo id to purchase. their concern has nothing to do with the possibility that they might be used to steal from the store because they are not at the register, and theres access to any number of more lethal weapons that are not under lock and key. so, essentially, this policy was put in place as a knee jerk reaction to a 9-11 story which may itself have been a fabrication. i should add that no record of your id is affixed to your purchase, so even if you were to, say, hijack an airplane with the intention of using it for purposes of terror, i cant imagine how they could link the two. i suppose it could be some cabal of lawyers idea of protecting home depot from some sort of liability claims but that makes it no less absurd that an orange cloaked clerk still struggling with the english language can deny me access to blades because my id doesnt meet some arbitrary standard.