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Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Currently: binding our very best in hardcoverToday’s Feature: “Bright Inaugural Day, Washington” by Lauren Frey
Latest in Digest: Lincoln Logorrhea
Watching • Determining the Best Thing
This vs That. Lobsters vs Godfather II. In this video, some architects, as part of their work with the Counter-Intuitive Comparison Institute of North America, ask us to think about the relative advantages of McDonalds, seahorses, English people. They contend that thing-literacy is important to designing the places we live and understanding why things are as they are. They are utterly convincing. In terms of really getting down to the nitty-gritty, NCAA inspired brackets force you to choose the best quality, not by abstract criticism but by simple direct comparison! We do it everyday, these guys have just spent a lot of time thinking about it. Democracy or Heated Seats? What is the best thing? A thing that helps create or facilitate other things, or something that just works, everytime? Those crazy architects. —Mike SmithSHARE THIS • EMAIL THIS • FILE UNDER: Things NCAA
Watching • Cube! Defender of the Polyverse!
As much as I like video-games, it’s always better to be outside. This trailer for video game CUBE offers the technology that “makes calculators look like the cotton gin.” It makes a compelling case to avoid the computer, and instead, as I do, try to beat the 50 mph barrier on my racing bike. It’s worth thinking whether video games are broken; CUBE tries to do this.You are now CUBE, Defender of the polyverse! Collect the diamonds & reach the goal! Every goal leads to another color level… the fun cannot be halted.
Games are fun, but this video may be their essence boiled right down.
This review of Outside from a gamer’s perspective notes, “Outside is remarkably high in sex, violence and challenges to traditional values, despite the strong child-focused marketing it receives,” but ultimately, “Outside is overrated, and many gamers will find themselves forced by friends and family to play it against their will, but it still deserves a high rating.” Yes, it’s of a coherent and critical review of the world—something philosophers have been struggling to do for millennia; it’s the sort of perspective that’s only possible after months of immersion in a fantasy world. —Mike Smith
SHARE THIS • EMAIL THIS • FILE UNDER: MMORPG
Watching • Urban Wakeboarding
Until climate change becomes climate changed, until the ice surrounds us, freezes the waves, the surfers, and the sharks in place until spring, we’ll have urban wakeboarding. Badly designed and function-less moats tried to dull the shock of aging concrete towers, but now they provide an impressive location for a photo shoot opportunity when you combine wakeboard and winch. Expect more as climate change renders coastal cities uninhabitable. Oh!, in 50 years time the skyscrapers will just be obstacles for the supersonic jetski races. That is, if we have recreational time as the sea starts to come in. And in. And in. —Mike SmithSHARE THIS • EMAIL THIS • FILE UNDER: climate change, extreme sports, wakeboarding
Watching • The Making of the Presidents
As an almost lifelong observer of presidential politics—which I have come to view as the American quadrennial carnival of democracy—I sadly assert that the once energizing and redemptive spectacle of Americans choosing their president has become a pallid, limpid specter of democracy. This observation began with the Adlai Stevenson-Dwight Eisenhower campaign of 1956 and was ramped up by Theodore H. White’s The Making of The President 1960 (he went on to write three more volumes) and Sen. Eugene McCarthy’s nomination speech for Stevenson in Los Angeles at the 1960 Democratic Convention.I have in other places claimed and, hopefully, argued well that that scoundrel of mid-century politics and disgraced president, Richard Nixon, had much to do with the degradation of American democracy—though it was inevitable that advertising and marketing would become the lingua franca of our political process. And elsewere I have bemoaned the virtual disappearance of those singular journalists and reportorial voices with original points of view—the journalism of the pack (which often includes feeble references to the existence of such a thing) having become the current rising tide. Mailer, Izzy Stone, Jules Feiffer, Murray Kempton, Hunter S. Thompson, Tim Cruise, Michael Thomas, Michael Ventura—where are they?
But that’s grist for another grinding.
Thankfully there are now easily accessed alternatives to the gibberish and blather of the television world. (Can someone explain to me what CNN’s claim of being the number one election center means and why Wolf Blather needs to repeat such claims endlessly?) Anyway, I came away from the last (so-called) presidential debate (less candidates Bob Barr and Ralph Nader) dismayed. John McCain continued to expose his lack of impulse control and made his desperation frighteningly prominent. Really, does he believe that Barack Obama (a United States senator, like himself) is a terrorist? Either way one answers that, does it put McCain in a favorable light? And, as Obama succinctly pointed out (at 37 minutes and 20 seconds in), this line of attack says more about McCain than about Obama.
A few exceptions to note:
- Donna Brazile, Al Gore’s 2000 campaign manager and Democratic party operative
- Comedian Sara Silverman’s savvy and very amusing political strategy
- And an interesting follow-up to the Great Schlep
SHARE THIS • EMAIL THIS • FILE UNDER: Adlai Stevenson, Barack Obama, Bob Barr, Colin Powell, Donna Brazile, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Eugene McCarthy, John McCain, Ralph Nader, Richard Nixon, Sara Silverman, Theodore White
Watching • Human Rights School, Gossip Girl Endorsement, Joe the VP
A human rights PSA delivered in a quasi High School Musical fashion is strangely compelling. There are no colorful songs about the status quo—it’s a boring gray reality of in-school cops, and CCTV—but we can enjoy the same ratio of school-yard hunk to out-cast girl to feelgoodness, and it’s educational!In these strange times even 24’s fictitious President Palmer endorses Obama. His message is slightly dulled on second read as he credits himself for all the side-changing Obama-cons as he drops subtle hints of a run.
“I still, even after three seasons into ‘The Unit’ playing Sgt. Maj. Jonas Blaine, I’m still asked by people on the street to run.”Main Street, we can only presume. And knowing their expertise in the world of international finance system and political affairs, they’ll certainly indulge my 2016 wish: Ex-fictious attorney Fred Thompson vs ex-fictious-President Palmer vs fictitious-plumber Joe, please.
Though, if a plumber did run for office, we’d be up to our necks in strangely persuasive analogies regarding refitting, unclogging the piping in Washington—to which we, in conventional style, would nod, ponder, weigh in unconvincingly, eventually agreeing with his expert analysis and handing over our money. We would only realize two months after the election that dependable, really smart politicians are essential when a country needs saving. Not cowboys…or cowgirls. —Mike Smith
SHARE THIS • EMAIL THIS • FILE UNDER: 24, Barack Obama, Fred Thompson, Gawker, Gossip Girl, Human rights, Joe The Plumber, John McCain, President Palmer
Watching • Chromeo & Juliet
Intimate relationships with computers can get a little too much, even for your most progressive electro band. Chromeo, below, take part in a strangely familiar reality show, complicating matters. P-Thugg and Dave 1 share their experiences, as the digital Juliet gets between them. “I’m just in love with the hottest piece of hardware on the East Coast,” Mr P-Thugg shares in a vocodered voice I wouldn’t wish upon anyone. Dave 1 calls a band meeting and tries to get to the root of the problem. Juliet would be better off with HAL, her motherboard insists. —Mike SmithSHARE THIS • EMAIL THIS • FILE UNDER: Chromeo, The Hills
Watching • Wasilla City Council: A Reading
“Can’t we just say it was everybody plus Linda?”A dramatic reading of a transcript of a Wasilla, Alaska City Council, by actor Chris Schneider.
What’s most remarkable about this meeting isn’t the cartoonish bickering about refreshments and writing instruments, nor is it that that bickering takes up most of the time. What’s remarkable is that despite all the other back-and-forth, the Wasilla City Council accomplishes all of its goals and wraps up the meeting in a little over five minutes. Of course, it’s easier to be efficient when you have one item of new business, but considering most of the meeting is spent on the subject of the unofficial refreshment fund, the councilmembers deserve some credit for pulling it together.
In contrast, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, where you can have spent tens of thousands of dollars to get elected; you can conduct your meetings with the assistance of computers and microphones and human aides; you can adopt a formality of speech similar to all big, (self-) important legislative bodies; and you can talk uninterrupted for six minutes, and when your motion “dies for lack of a second,” stomp out of the meeting like a big baby.
SHARE THIS • EMAIL THIS • FILE UNDER: Chris Schneider, San Francisco Board of Supervisors, Wasilla City Council
Watching • Tippecanoe and Tyler, Too!
In the 1840 presidential campaign, William Henry Harrison and John Tyler of the Whig party ran against Democratic party founder and President Martin Van Buren (our first president born a U.S. citizen, and the only one—thus far!—speaking English as a second language). An Ohioan jeweler named Alexander Coffman Ross wrote clever lyrics celebrating Harrison’s military victory at Tippecanoe in 1811, and knocking Van Buren as “Little Van.” The song spread like wildfire across the country, eventually acquiring a dozen verses, and significantly outlasting Harrison’s monthlong and Tyler’s one-term presidencies. This video features They Might Be Giants’ 2004 cover of “Tip and Ty.” —Meave GallagherSHARE THIS • EMAIL THIS • FILE UNDER: Alexander Coffman Ross, John Tyler, Martin Van Buren, They Might Be Giants, Tippecanoe, William Henry Harrison
Watching • Anyone Else but You
First lady of France Carla Bruni and Nouvelle Star 2007 winner Julien Doré sang the Moldy Peaches’ “Anyone Else But You,” a.k.a. the ultimate love song for the socially awkward. Coming from French Elle’s Sexiest Man of 2007 and the world’s most beautiful first lady, though, it’s a lot hotter than when Kimya Dawson and Adam Green first wrote it to strangers passing them by on the street. Most notable about Bruni and Doré’s version here, however, is the inclusion of the last verse, the one no other movie or commercial or television show to date has ever allowed you to hear. Mme. Bruni sings it, and as she is fluent in English, you can bet she knows exactly what it means. Do you suppose it makes her think of Président Sarkozy? [via Kimya Dawson’s livejounal] —Meave GallagherSHARE THIS • EMAIL THIS
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Don't Call It a Bailout; Punk Ghandi, Aragorn's Pax Americana, Palin the White Witch; Nailing It; Kucinich for the Win; The Holocaust Section; A School Daze Refresher; Do the Swiss Dream of Post-Apocalyptic Rap Battles?; Getting Literacy Dun, the Rendition of Bamboozled Pandas With Chinese Accents; Raising the Bar
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