I Call This Move The 360

I still love a good old fashioned photo essay.  The Atlantic has some very good ones, including this series on the protests that were breaking out everywhere before the weather just turned too darned hot.  Looking through them, I wonder if protesters have always been this way: for many, protesting seems to be mostly about exhibitionism and free stuff.

1)  Quiet and dignified.  The way a protest should be.
2)  Sparky!  Notice head protection is getting more elaborate.
3)  So much for that smart diplomacy.  Notice the center guy.  Even in Africa it is all about the Joooooos!
4)  You know, that's kinda artistic.
5, 6, 7)  I didn't even know there were protests in Bulgaria.
8)  Do people even know who Guy Fawkes is, or what he did?  So often protests look more like the trendy thing to do.
9, 10)  My absolute favorite photos.  Bet you didn't know Anderson Cooper puts on a spray tan and goes to Europe to beat up hippies, did you?
11)  Students.  Righhht.  After a certain amount of time, a middle aged "student" should be forced to get a job and pay into the system he despises.
12)  That's a good shot.  Don't cross the water cannon.

Let's start speeding through this.  Flames, bloody shirts, and riot police.

19)  Try for a little more dignity with your anger, like 13.
21)  Again, a big helping of dignity helps your cause with Chris.  The Buddhists seem to be more rational in their protests, but then we get 43.
23)  You ride naked to "highlight the dangers".  No you don't.  You want an excuse to be naked in public.  Having someone else pay for your bike lane is secondary.  At least you aren't 25.
25)  Trying to justify some serious problems by linking it to animal rights.  This group are the last people I would allow around animals.  Or children.
44)  Egyptian protesters.  I have to say I'm surprised.  I never thought anyone in the Middle East would rise up against an Islamic government.  I guess Egyptians know the problems they face can't be solved with a degree in Islamic studies.
36)  The worst problem that the progressive left has today is the view that if you don't get your way, you are entitled to be disruptive.  The heckler's veto isn't democracy in action.  When your freedom of speech interferes with someone else's freedom of assembly, you are in the wrong.
37)  Some artist should put together a photo book of people being hit by water cannon.
39)  This is such a great shot it must be staged.  Sinister and appealing at the same time.  Love the browns and yellows.  The untied sneaker is a nice touch.
40)  Brazilians protesting against a soccer stadium.  That's more radical than Arabs protesting an Islamic government.



Super Cooper

The Fine Art Of Squeezing Blood From A Turnip

For sale:  One 1990 Pontiac Bonniville.  Needs a mass airflow sensor, ball joint, rack and pinion.  Probably needs new mounts while you are at it.  Has an even quarter million miles.  Worst thing about it has to be the sharp spring in the seat which jabs the unsuspecting square in the butt.
No, I take that back.  major flaw of this fine automobile which sold for $19,000 back in the day has to be the crack in the windscreen which runs across the glass exactly at eye level.

But you still want it.  Because it's Texas, and it's July.  The one thing this car has that it's rival in the driveway across the street doesn't have is a fully charged one year old air conditioner.  And to assist that refrigerated air on it's way to your face is a brand new fan.  The drivers side power window also goes up and down.

I'm actually sorry to see the old girl go.  I know it's probably survivor bias, but the modern cars with their poo-poo'ed electronics sure seem to be more reliable than any of the vehicles I rode in through the 80's.  However, the last trip to the mechanic ended with him saying "DON'T SPEND ANOTHER DIME!" (Before charging me $44 dollars to say that, of course.)   I stuck with it through the hundred dollar blues, but we're starting to move into the thousand dollar blues stage.

Be a fine car for putting around town in though.

So I Saw The Preview For "Kick Ass 2" Today

And was all "Hooray!"  Then I saw Jim Carrey and was all "Uhhhh..."
Carrey is one of those actors who has played the same manic character over and over again his whole career, and it never really jibed with me.  He can be good at it, but sometimes for the wrong reason.  The Cable Guy really terrified me; Carrey can be unsettling with his crazy.

I thought about it more and remembered that Carrey has some experience in comic book movies and felt a little better about it, then realized that the good thing about The Mask was Cameron Diaz and the good thing about Batman Forever was Tommy Lee Jones.  On the other hand, Kick Ass was the superhero movie Nicolas Cage should have been making all along, so fingers crossed.

For Reals?

Although it's a retail giant, the company I work for operates on the smaller scale like the others of it's type which took the place of the old five and dime stores: the Dollar Tree, Dollar General, Family Dollar, $-Mart, Walgreen's, etc.  Because they have so much in common, what affects one will happen to the others quickly. One can thus imagine my rapt attention when I read that the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission was suing Dollar General for..  wait for it...

Conducting criminal background checks.  Yeah, can't check to see if that guy or gal you leave alone with a safe full of money or easily transported merchandise has a criminal background because that might be...  wait for it...

Racist.  Now no one, not even the administration says that Dollar General is using the background checks as an excuse to exclude people because of race.  They maintain that such checks have a disproportionate impact on the African-American community, therefore shouldn't be done.  Just when you thought there could be no more madness.  Some random thoughts:

• African-Americans aren't going to get that job anyway.  I imagine Dollar General would like the abolishment of any sort of border control or check of immigration status.  The cost of labor sticks in the craw of these companies and they would all dearly love to see a flood of cheap workers all willing to drive wages down.  That itself is nonsensical, because if your own workers can't buy your stuff (which is being manufactured as cheaply as possible) who can?  It's Dollar General.  It serves a certain socioeconomic level.  Come on.
• On the other hand, if you want the government to do something for you, better be prepared to give his  ne'er-do-well constituency something in return.
• Even if the lawsuit fails, and it very well could, it's still a huge waste of time and money for all involved.    Stop wasting money!
• You know, I don't think this administration really understands what money is.  Even those who funded it made their billions on paper, so they think it can be conjured out of the digital aether. The Chicago machine is funded by shaking down companies and that cash never seems to run out.  It's just a lowly clerk.  A few hundred a night won't hurt anything.
• God help us if the EEOC wins.  Imagine if it were illegal to check the record of a teacher, or a nurse, or the lady cleaning your house.  Whoever hired them would still be responsible for their actions though.  Just the price of doing business.  You've got unlimited funds to share.  The government says so.

From Those Who Brought You Smart Diplomacy

We present Smart Spying.

Every secret we possess seems to waltz out the security equivalent of a wide open screen door with a hole in it.  The only saving grace is that the Russians and Chinese must think we are playing them for fools.  Or are we?  A high school dropout abandons his $200,000 job, life in Hawaii, and super hot stripper girlfriend to seek asylum in...  Hong Kong?  I have no idea what to think.  Authoritarian governments probably don't either.

Some Late Nite Shat

I guess by this time everyone has seen the Spocklore rich Audi ad with Nimoy and Quinto.  I guess that the viewership of "The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins" has also been steadily ticking upwards on YouTube. I think I first heard it on the Doctor Demento show back in '87 or thereabouts, and it's a nice novelty song.  I've checked out the rest of Nimoy's discography and my reaction is a kind of "blech".  Not horrible, but not great either.

Now if one talks about how Nimoy's ego led him astray, you are almost obligated to then discuss the many songs of William Shatner and wonder what on earth the man was thinking.  Not I.  I actually like a lot of his musical work, including "Mr Tambourine Man".  I have a suspicion that 1968's The Transformed Man will be what future generations remember about William Shatner (if they remember him at all) and they will wonder why he wasn't appreciated in his own time.  Ok,  that may be a bit of a stretch, but he is worth listening to with an open mind.

It must be good, because "spoken word" usually means "pretentious crap" as far as I'm concerned.

Ray Harryhausen

So Ray Harryhausen has passed at the respectable age of 92.  For a long time, he was special effects.  I know that even today special effects is still a tedious time consuming process, but old timey stop motion animation takes a very special kind of person.

To be honest, I always thought his work looked a little jerky and flat, even if I admired the effort put into it.  I think Harryhausen tended to be a little ambitious; living statues, skeletons and things that you imagined as moving stiffly from articulated joints looked well, but he had to overdo it and constantly animated birds and flying reptiles.  Not good.

Credit also had to be given to the actors who mastered the almost impossible task of crossing swords with something that wasn't there and making it look like they were fighting for their lives.  I know you may have starved yourself down to 80 pounds or earned your quadruple blackbelt with sash and tassel for your art, but that doesn't make it good acting.

The movies themselves were also good.  Old fashioned escapist fiction set in exotic locales.  You couldn't make a Sinbad film like that today without some heavy handed moralizing about Arab and Islamic virtues, probably made to the uncouth and ignorant Sir Bubba d'Rednec.