Shorter House Republicans

George Bush taxed the rich too much.

No wonder they believe Obama's a socialist. They apparently believe that George W. Bush demanded too much of billionaires.

Rockbox Again. And Better

Rockbox is coming along well (I've long been a fan). I'm eagerly anticipating when they have software ready for the amazing Sansa Clip -- soon I hope!

Also, it appears that Apple keeps pilfering ideas from Rockbox and implementing them -- partially -- in their fantastically overpriced and partially crippled players.

Rockbox has had speech - support for years. It's a heartening thing about the software. I've been choked up more than once due to blind users writing to express their pleasure in being able to use an MP3 player.

I'm glad the blind will have an off-the-shelf player now. But I'm pretty sure Rockbox implements it better, cheaper, and with much more leeway to do what the user actually wants (rather than what Steve Jobs likes).

Since I last wrote about it, in the link above, the Rockboxers have done some amazing things. A much more flexible and robust installation program. Best of all, a fully usable USB stack. Video in almost all players. Even more sound formats. Rockbox does nearly everything better now.

It's a thing of beauty. Rockbox: now more than ever.

How Fey can Wes Anderson get?

I enjoyed Rushmore. The soundtrack helped greatly.

I just saw about 15 minutes of The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. It was awful.

Wes Anderson repeatedly tries to make something as naive and evocative as the novel The Young Visiters [sic] and fails.

From what I've seen, Wes Anderson can get infinitely fey. He probably will, though his credit card commercial isn't totally fey.

Wes Anderson is five+ years gone bad, and I just noticed. I'm almost as bad as Wes Anderson--except I'm not infinitely fey.

Talk Radio Party

Tomasky::

"One presidential mention has exposed to public scrutiny something that only political insiders have known for a long time. Limbaugh is the emotional leader of the GOP. We – we Beltway intellectual types – have talked up figures who give conservatism a face that is, to one degree or another, respectable. It's David Brooks, or it was Irving Kristol, or Norman Podhoretz, or Leo Strauss.

We have done this because, well, because at various points it may have been sort of true. But we also did it because we want to think that we've been engaged in a war of ideas conducted on a high intellectual plane.

That notion, unfortunately, is fatuous."

He's not just a propagandist-- he is emotionally in line with the Republican base. Resentment, ridicule, hatred, and bigotry (especially against blacks and women) are his prime tools, and they really are the emotional heart of Republicanism.

The fact that he's an oxycontin junkie and thrice-divorced are somehow not relevant.

Dreher-eck

Roy Edroso pointed to this insanity from rightwinger Rod Dreher:

The question, though, is not whether the Sixties (or the Enlightenment) were good or bad, but whether on balance the Sixties (or the Enlightenment) were good or bad. I answer in the negative.

There's a lot wrong with that Rorschach blot. What's with that crazy guy? Why is he still considered credible enough to have a slot even at beliefnet?

I wrote a comment over there but doubt it will appear. I'll paste it here:

Dreher: "We are free -- but for what?"

Well, before the Enlightenment, most people in Europe could not read or write. Most couldn't own land. Most had to worship at a specified church where the scriptures weren't even read in their native tongue. Most had to pledge fealty to their (regional) King and (local) Lord, were conscripted to fight in whatever battles the authorities wanted one to undertake. They had little to no freedom of speech. Physics and chemistry didn't exist (and no, alchemy doesn't count). There was no such thing as democracy. Etc. etc.

And that was just the males. Things were even worse for women.

Other than that, the bulk of people were free to scrabble their whole short lives for whatever maggoty scraps the Baron would let them have.

Perhaps there was some dolt in the Dark Ages who thought that society had lost so much since the Stone Age. He may have even said "We are free: but free for what?"

A religious person who would value pre-Enlightnment religion over later practice has to me an extremely frighteningly positive view of forced religion. The Taliban aren't called "medieval" because of their mode of dress.

Governor Jindal

Jindal's cadence sounds just like Jack McBrayer.

UPDATED: It appears we're not the only ones who figured that Jindal = Kenneth the Page from 30 Rock.

My Late 2008 Movie List

I watch a fair number of movies so I thought I'd put together a list. Better late than never.

Fave Movies of 2008 -- in no particular order.

• 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (Can't say enough good about this movie.)


• Doubt (Not ideally directed but has so much else good about it.)


• Wall-E


• Man on Wire (A documentary that does a bit more than tell a story.)


• Encounters at the End of the World (A documentary that again gives Herzog some room to ruminate. Includes Henry Kaiser.)


• Frost/Nixon (Much better than I anticipated. In all likelihood it'll be another fifteen years before Ron Howard makes another movie I like.)


• The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (Especially the first half or so.)


• Tropic Thunder (A decent Hollywood comedy!)


• In Bruges (Small movie about low-life criminals. Moves quickly, great dialogue: uproariously funny at times, very dark at others, and skillfully done.)


• The Visitor (Off-kilter slice-of-lifer. Another good small movie of an entirely different sort.)


• Hancock (An attempted blockbuster with a few feints that move it out of standard-issue territory.)

Haven't seen but really should:
Synecdoche, New York (Generally love Charlie Kaufman.)
I served the King of England (Czech cinema returns!)

Overrated by others in my estimation:
The Wrestler (A melding of two weak po-faced melodramas with a smattering of a few good behind-the-scenes wrestling bits. Rourke doesn't pull it off IMO except in the physicality of the wrestling.)
Slumdog Millionaire (Liked it ok but the raves seem overdone.)
Vicky Cristina Barcelona (By-the-numbers. Saddens me to say it because I've liked Woody Allen films that nearly no one else can stomach, and I consider him my kind of genius.)
Be Kind Rewind (A wretched mess, and not in a good way.)
Changeling (Yuck. Amateurish in script, direction, and much of the acting. Also made the true story it was based on less compelling due to hyper-sentimentality, clunky writing, and staid direction.)

Good things I saw late.
[Though these are pre-2008, they were among the most memorable flicks I saw last year.]

Young Children (2006. A first-rate drama.)
Michael Clayton (2007. Not quite what one expects, pulled off with grace.)

Not Quit a Glyph

How about this for a name: The War Profiteers Formerly Known As Blackwater?

Oligarchs

No shit!

Let's have every power-suited American Psycho who signed off on Credit Default Swaps get charged with fraud (no matter what they claim the CDS were, they weren't really what was claimed).

Confiscate their homes and accounts like we do with drug dealers. Have their families fend for themselves and make common cause with Henrietta Hughes.

And have these scumbags breaking rocks in the hot sun. For years. Ideally until all the banks are fully recapitalized plus 20 years.

"Entitlements" and the Left

To quote Atrios, in full:

I believe this is what we in the professional blogging biz call "trolling," but I'll bite. The Left, including yours truly, will create an epic 360 degree shitstorm if Obama and the Dems decide that cutting Social Security benefits is a good idea.

See also:

Matthew Yglesias , quoted in part (read the whole post):

I’m not sure what the administration’s thinking is, but certainly I wouldn’t be silent if he were to propose draconian cutbacks in Social Security and Medicare. On the other hand, if Obama wants to get the long-term public fiscal situation in check by tackling its main root cause—runaway cost inflation in the health care sector—I would applaud that

Hilzoy, also quoted in part (read the whole post):

Or, in short: once Obama comes out with specific proposals on entitlements, I will say something about them. Until then, my little piece of the Silence of the Left should not be taken to reflect anything more than not knowing what, exactly, he proposes. (It's certainly not that I am "afraid to express concerns", as Rep. Jim Cooper suggests in the Politico piece.) Some things that go by the name of "entitlement reform" are fine. Others are not. If Obama proposes the latter, there will be no "honeymoon" or "breathing room". But until I have some idea what, exactly, Obama proposes to do, I don't really see much point in speculating.

And if my failure to comment on this has "buoyed the spirits of reformers who would like to see drastic changes in the way Social Security works", they have a surprise in store for them.

My sentiments reflect those above.

Fortunately, I'm pretty sure Obama doesn't believe most of the patent bullshit that spews from Politico.

Deep Thought

It's too bad that the steady thoughtful hand of George Bush can't lead us blandly through the horrific suppurative minefield he led us into.

Concentrate the Mind

The US economy lost a job every five seconds in January.

+ While some reporter asked Robert Gibbs a 20-second question, four jobs were lost.

+ While James Inhofe blathered for a minute, 12 jobs were lost.

+ During an episode of Hardball with Chris Matthews, 720 jobs were lost.

There is no indication the economy has hit bottom yet.

[Calculations: January has 2,678,400 seconds (31 days x 24 hours x 60 minutes x 60 seconds). 598,000 jobs were lost in January. 2,678,400 seconds divided by 598,000 is 4.48 seconds per each job lost. I rounded up to five seconds per job lost. This doesn't count holidays, weekends, or non-office hours.]

Chris Matthews: Still an Idiot

I'm watching Chris Matthews question some Illinois state legislators about the Blagojevich ouster. It's amazing such an utter fuckup is on a national cable network.

Matthews apparently can't compute what quid pro quo means. I realize he'll say he's playing devil's advocate, but he's not elucidating anything himself nor is he allowing others to elucidate. He repeats the same question to guest after guest for the whole program and never tries to understand the distinctions that each guest makes repeatedly. He listens then repeats the same question to a guest later, again ignoring any distinctions and not even trying to think through what they are saying. It's obvious he doesn't know what he's talking about and doesn't really care: the contempt for the viewer is pretty palpable ("The rubes will eat this "pox on pols" grandstanding!")

He interrupts constantly without adding anything, just to hear his own voice it seems. Interrupting is bad enough but it's even worse when it's done with remote interviewees, as Matthews does routinely. Chris, you friggin' idiot, people you are interviewing via satellite-- especially standing in an boomy government lobby of some sort--can't process your time-shifted echoe crosstalk as one can in person. I'm astounded people will appear via remote on Matthew's program, so incompetent is he.

Matthews does that kind of mechanical time-wasting shit CONSTANTLY, after years of broadcasting. Many episodes he wastes five or ten minutes of airtime with sloppiness an average community-college communications major would iron out in the first 2 video lab sessions. Matthews: don't interrupt people every second sentence, especially during a remote! (If they're filibustering that's one thing, but usually these people can't even finish a friggin' sentence.) If you occasionally have to interrupt, don't just rephrase your lame question du jour for the umpteenth time.

Clinically, Matthews is an idiot. He doesn't know the current politics of this country. He relies on his seriously out-of-date gut for analysis that was tiredly erroneous decades ago. He views politics almost solely as theater. He's incompetent as a broadcaster. He is lazy, apparently doing zero preparation for his shows, sometimes stumbling over the intros that others have written for him. (Calling your friends for gossip and chat you can't repeat on air is not preparation for a show-- it's just calling your coffee klatch for a pick-me-up.) He's politically juvenile. He's a puerile little twit.

Anyone who watches Matthews comes away knowing less about politics and policy than they did before.

Please, MSNBC, get rid of this guy. BBC America is stealing eyeballs from you with their national news broadcast because they don't radiate contempt for their viewers.

This is another in an ongoing series of screams about how awful Chris Matthews is.

Two "Lesser" Inaugural Songs

1) At Last (the song to which the Obamas performed their "first dance" at various balls.

Written in 1941 for a mostly forgotten musical "Orchestra Wives" and performed by Glenn Miller's Orchestra.

The version that strikes me as the version is Nat "King" Cole's 1957 recording. It was another time where Obama reminded me that the "mainstream" has long included African-American performers. But I recall, as maybe Obama does but probably most don't, that Cole was a very good straight-jazz pianist before he became known as the great singer we know him as now.

It's great that he's reminded me of not only Sam Cooke and Charlie Parker, but Louis Armstrong and now Nat "King" Cole.

Thanks, Obama.

2) In his inaugural address, Obama said: "Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America."

And that reminded me of a very old song I associate mainly with happy white-bread Depression-era tunesmiths: Start All Over Again.

To quote from the lyrics:

Nothing's impossible I have found,
For when my chin is on the ground,
I pick myself up,
Dust myself off,
Start All over again.

It's one of those keep your chin up Depression-era songs like "Pennies from Heaven," or "We're In the Money," or "Life is Just a Bowl of Cherries."

If Obama were an old-style Democratic politician, he might have referred to "Happy Days are Here Again." A good song in context, but there are other contexts to attend to.

I realize that some black performers have recorded "Start All Over Again," but to me, as a white guy who was born far past the Great Depression,that song is a mainstream white USA tune that speaks to the essence of what Obama is talking about:

• the current situation is as serious as a heart attack.
  
• We will have to perservere.
  
• We will have to try a few approaches before one ultimately works
  
• we have to recognize that common people are resilient but we are not a stepping stool for the well-heeled.

Much like his embedded and unheralded inaugural allusions to Lincoln, Martin Luther King, Jr. and countless others, the songs he chooses say something about this country and about this western world.

And this tune is not a "white-bread American tune." It's merely an American song. An American tune.

These songs are good tunes. But they are not just good tunes-- they're more than that.

Welcome President Barack Obama. Godspeed to you and to us all.

George W Bush: Republican. Good Riddance.

Initially I thought I'd write a post detailing similarities between Count Arthur Strong and George W. Bush (believe me, there are plenty: hubridity, vainglory, near-Tourette's, utter lack of insight, meanness, idiocy, and more). But I like Count Arthur and do not want to sully him with the taint of Bush.

Instead, it's time to not only celebrate Bush leaving the Presidency, but to point out how much will not be leaving us: modern Republicanism. Bush is the distilled essence of Republicanism. (Even more than sainted Ronnie: Reagan raised taxes, for instance, and Bush held firm to his Republican roots and didn't.)

Bush will be soon be gone, thankfully. Republicans will blame him and not their philosopy for the stench he left over the country. But, in reality, he did mostly what they wanted, and got the country that we get from doing mostly what Republicans want.

• Shovel money to the rich.
  
• Do nothing to increase middle- and lower-class incomes.
  
• Continue to lower taxes even when the deficit explodes.
  
• Only worry about the deficit when the entire economy is on the line and we need to spend money to dig us out of the hole.
  
• Don't think through foreign crises with the brain: instead apply shibboleths about "toughness."
  
• Find some trivial culture war bullshit to yell about so you can whip up the base.
  
• Call a stupid person's stupidity "authenticity." Elevate that "authenticity" to a homespun instinct for dealing with big issues. (The fact that so many Republicans still revere Sarah Palin and Joe the Plumber shows how deep this strain runs).

We will be rid of Bush very soon, thank God. We will have to deal with Republicanism for years to come. It's a pox on our country and I doubt we'll eliminate it. There's a good chance we won't even survive it.

Good riddance to bad rubbish, Bush. Republicanism: same tomorrow as it ever was.

Count Arthur Returns!

I must note that BBC Radio 4 has begun a new series of Count Arthur Strong's Radio Show!

There are few things better.

When My Daughter Loved Me

In searching for a video of Randy Newman's song "When She Loved Me" from Toy Story 2, I found that someone had put together a youtube video of unrelated fuzzy-good images over the audio of the song. The youtube version didn't do much for me, especially since the person who put it up called it a "love song," which largely misses the point of the tune, especially in the flow of the movie.

But at least one commenter, motherseer, didn't forget the song's power in context of the movie.

Thank you for posting this beautiful video. My daughter and I saw Toy Story 2 together when she was little. It made both of us cry then, so sad for the little doll in the movie. Now that she's a teenager, this song still makes us both cry, for the loss of those little girl days. I've stayed the same, but she's moved on. And even though she loves me it's not the same total, uncritical, unconditional love; and oh, how I miss that sweet little girl. :o(

The multi-faceted pathos in that comment reflects in an Escherian way the song itself as part of the movie.

Thanks motherseer. And thanks, Randy Newman.

Ho-ho-homeopath joke

I know a homeopath-- he was very down, very depressed.

He tried to commit suicide with a massive underdose.

It seems like it must be an old joke but I first heard it today (and adapted it a bit) from Graeme Garden on the The Unbelievable Truth Christmas special.

Please note that I do not wish any homeopaths to take their own lives.

Fantasies of the Onion Staff

From recent issues of The Onion

• Bush Passes Three-Pound Kidney Stone
  
• Crocodile Bites Off Bush's Arm
  
• Bush Tumbles Wildly Down Washington Monument Staircase
  
• Bush's Eyelid Accidentally Nailed To Wall
  

President Bush is resting comfortably in Bethesda Naval Hospital.

More to come, probably, until President Dumbass Disaster is gone.

And, as a salute to The Onion's clairvoyance, a piece from 2001 about Bush's first inauguration, the amazingly prescient Bush: 'Our Long National Nightmare Of Peace And Prosperity Is Finally Over'

Lion's Den