Wow. Is some sort of hairy-chested filter kicked in when a piece of comment spam shows up, or something? I tried about 5 times to post a joke regarding working empowerment and [the subject of comment sp*m above], but I keep getting "Your comment was denied for questionable content" no matter how many euphemisms I used.
I resist the notion that the software had determined the joke was so entirely lame that it couldn't possibly allow me to post it.
Lucy Kemnitzer says in re: Alan: I don't care about his bonafides right now...
Well, I only mentioned them to correct moe99's misapprehension that Alan was a "representative of the right". I don't think they're particularly relevant at any other level of the discussion, and, in fact, I only used the term as a kind of jokey way of saying it.
Uh, there's no way, by any stretch of anybody's imagination, that Alan Bostick can be considered part of "the right". I've "known him" (as in, "online") for years, and I can testify he has his Lefty Bona Fides in very nice order, tenkyewverymuch.
DrBB, your memory is precisely correct. How do I know this? Because after posting about Clockwise last night, I went out and rented the DVD.
The farce is more gentle than I remembered it. I always think the Headmaster will be portrayed as succumbing to the hilarious violence of Basil Fawlty, but he isn't. It always surprises me how gentle and earnest he is. And I'd completely forgotten about the little band of ladies from the Hospital.
Oh, it's a very funny movie. Chuckle-funny. If one is in the mood.
JamesG says: I'm tired of fighting with these jackasses. You argue and argue and the minute you start making valid points to debunk their bullshit, you can practically see their eyes glaze over. They don't want to hear anything that might jostle the little protective bubble that they put in place to ensure that their narrow minded views stay intact. Sadly, I just can't see a change coming in my lifetime. I have (had) great hope, but it is on a steady decline.
I was pondering just today the fact that none of us will ever live in the world we really want to live in. I want to live in a world that, I surmise from the above, is probably about like the one you would like to live in. Dr. Dobson would like to live in a world that would look like Hell to most of us who hang out in here, I'll bet.
There's a great moment in the movie Clockwise when John Cleese -- a prissy headmaster traveling to receive some sort of teaching award, encountering endless catastrophes along the way which threaten to make him miss the ceremony -- comes up against some disaster at the end of a long chain of disasters and he sits there in complete despair. But wait! Something happens, can't remember what, that offers the slimmest bit of hope. This shtick has been repeated over and over in the movie... And you can see him sitting there, exhausted, trying to summon the energy to try to keep going... and he finally cries out, desperately, to his traveling partner:
"Oh, it isn't the despair, Polly! It's the hope!"
Which totally cracked me up, because it's true... it isn't the despair that kills you. It's the hope. It's the struggle. It's the trying to talk sense to these assholes... again and again and again... uselessly.
But, you know... What can you do? None of us will ever live in that world where we no longer have to resort to hope. It's our lot to be tortured by The Hope.
I'll be long dead by the time the world ever becomes anything like the way I want the world to be. The same is true of you. It's true of everybody.
Go rent Clockwise. You'll laugh at that moment I described. It's a classic Cleese moment and there's no way I could properly describe it. And then every time you feel that voice in your gut saying to you "It isn't the despair, Polly! It's the hope!" you will chuckle a little bit, which should give you just enough of a kick in the ass to keep on fighting and hoping.
Remembering that moment, and laughing at the memory, has got me through a motherload of crap in my life. Here's hoping it does the same for you.
I'm afraid I've been -- er, I mean -- It seems I've been stuck at "Be Pissed. Be Very Pissed" for quite some time now. Which is better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick, of course, but it's kind of wearing me out. I don't intend to "be less pissed, be very less pissed", but I feel like I've got to mix something else in with it. Maybe... Colicky? Intrepid? Enterprising? Ambidextrous? Well-groomed?
I think maybe... Nimble.
"Be pissed and nimble. Be very pissed and nimble."
Yeah, that'll do. For a while.
... I’d say that if you plan to hang giant ads off of your landmark high-rise commercial building, you might want to not cover the windows of the exact part of the building where your tenants’ biggest of corporate wigs all have their offices.
I wonder if the landlord attended a talk on "Strategies that Get Results".
PiscusFiche says: That said, I'm kinda curious as to how much power General Franks has over a situation when...
Assuming you can bear up under the incredibly tedious writing (I confess, I could only get 1/2 way through the book), all your questions (well, most) will be answered by reading Woodward's Plan of Attack. A lot of time is spent on the relationship b/w Franks & Rumsfeld.
My post referred to what Cheem calls the "ding dong, the witch is dead" reaction, which strikes me as being both in poor taste and politically counterproductive.
This, I think, is my first comment on the subject of JPII following his demise (with the exception of my show tunes enquiry above), so I don't believe I've indulged in the "ding dong" reaction as yet. I actually don't have much desire to indulge in it, as it happens.
I'll tell you what's starting to work my last nerve, though: all the encomiums to his record as a Great Advocate of Human Rights. For gay people, this is a bit like being forced to listen to Gov. George Wallace praised as a great defender of freedom.
"In the name of the greatest people that have ever trod this earth, I draw the line in the dust and toss the gauntlet before the feet of tyranny... and I say... segregation today... segregation tomorrow... segregation forever."
I don't doubt that there are many who feel JPII is being rightly praised as a great advocate of human rights. Probably the vast majority of mankind, come to think of it. The claim is still fraudulent, as far as I'm concerned.
People have the right to hate gay people, or to believe they choose their lifestyle, or to believe they are sinful, or what-all. They can even find homosexuality disgusting. This is permitted. This is freedom. This is their right.
And I don't think who people who hold those beliefs, even if they act on them, should be forbidden the legal protections that come with being able to marry the person they want. That would be wrong. So I guess all that makes me the Great Advocate of Human Rights, not JPII. I still don't want to be Pope, though, so don't try to make me.
As for whether saying any of that is somehow politically inexpedient, frankly, what difference does it make? I can't see how not telling the truth as I see it gets me anywhere different than were I am now. May as well tell the truth, as far as I can tell. It eases some of the burning in that last nerve of mine.
And as for the question of taste, well, I always thought Gov. George Wallace was in poor taste (until his late-in-life conversion), and since all this praise for JPII puts me in mind of Wallace, I call it a wash.
There's a lot about the Catholic Church I don't understand -- especially when it comes to selecting Popes -- so I will try to keep my questions brief and to the point.
Can Ding-Dong, the Witch Is Dead truly be considered a "show tune"? I always thought that term applied to Broadway musicals as opposed to movie soundtracks.
How come they use smoke to let us know what's going on? Is this the origin of the phrase: (I'm not even going to say it cuz you already know what I mean)?
Signed,
Well Shut My Mowf.
Wehole?
I've finally signed on to the abusive names dreamed up for me by my schoolyard tormentors. Apparently you can go home again.
Heh. I would just like to mention that it's awfully hard to find meaningful search engine results on a forthcoming book called Up even when the author and/or editor has a three part harmony name all parts of which I can correctly spell. :)
I do think younger readers are as a rule more interested in stories that tell them interesting and empowering things about how the world works, which is one of SF's specialties overall, and less interested in stories that sensitively probe the confusions and ambivalances of people in middle age.
Ah. Of course. Obvious when I think about it for one moment.
Judith Berman had some pointed things to say about this in her 2001 essay Science Fiction Without the Future, a piece that made me want to stand up and cheer.
I've only had a chance to quickly scan Berman's essay, but I have to say I laughed out loud when I read her description of the contents of the October-November 1999 of Asimov’s. Heh. Point taken.
This is fascinating. Since most teen SF fans seem to read the genre widely -- or so it seems to me -- I'm curious what criteria you used to select the particular stories. What would make one story suitable for a collection aimed at teens, and another story not suitable? Or would that information be contained in the Introduction? Or perhaps my perception that teen SF fans read the genre widely is wrong?
Corniness is not necessarily a bad thing in communicating with teens. It's okay for them to feel slightly superior to the mesage and the messenger -- it's being lied to that is bad for them.
I think this is very smart.
I'm dubious the people who came up with the ad are actually as smart as that, but I think you are right nevertheless, so I guess I'm happy they were lucky enough to do something that might accidentally work.
Keith says: "Shaver claimed to have visited the center of the Earth through a Being John Malkovitchesque tunnel in his basement. From Wikipedia...."
Thank you so much for the link to that fascinating article. I'm really intrigued now and hope I can find some of his art and his photographs of the "rock books".
I tell ya'. It takes all kinds to make a world.
Richard Shaver, for years the editor of Amazing, believed that malign "disintegrant energy robots" hidden in caverns beneath the Earth were using ancient pre-human technology to control the planet's surface dwellers and make war on one another.
Well, that certainly explains a lot. A lot of what, I don't know.
Anyone ever figure out, I wonder, how he first discovered the existence of these energy robots? Came to him in a dream? The inescapable conclusion given the facts to hand? "Messages" of one variety or another?
The show was good & fun. I do, of course, wish that Mr. Drummer had been there. Not because the show was somehow unenjoyable on account of his absence, but because you sort of want to see people's work the way they intend for you to see it. But I presume Mr. Drummer will be back soon and that will give us all a chance to catch Whisperado the way they intend for us to catch them, so that difficulty is cleared up.
Oh, and just for the sake of Accuracy In Travel Directions... the actual name (and therefore location) of the deli is the Second Avenue Deli which is at the corner of 2nd Avenue and 10th Street. It's pricey but very good.
| Year | Number of comments posted |
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| 2005 | 27 |
| 2004 | 15 |
| 2003 | 6 |
| 2002 | 2 |
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