Not 70 minutes, just 18. Bonus examples drawn from Titanic and District Nine.

Parts one and two here.

I just finished up the first part, on to the second. I haven't seen Avatar, but I am enjoying how he breaks it down, some funny stuff, and some complimentary stuff about how Cameron tells a story.

UPDATE: this guy is really funny. I didn't really make it clear when I posted this, he isn't taking a pro or con position on the movie (unlike The Phantom Menace, which was decidely "this really sucks"). He's just explaining filmmaking again, and cracking me up while he does it.

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 04:54 PM | Comments (70)
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First the Himalayan glaciers, then the rain-forests and now mountain top ice.

In its most recent report, it stated that observed reductions in mountain ice in the Andes, Alps and Africa was being caused by global warming, citing two papers as the source of the information.

However, it can be revealed that one of the sources quoted was a feature article published in a popular magazine for climbers which was based on anecdotal evidence from mountaineers about the changes they were witnessing on the mountainsides around them.

The other was a dissertation written by a geography student, studying for the equivalent of a master's degree, at the University of Berne in Switzerland that quoted interviews with mountain guides in the Alps.

The revelations, uncovered by The Sunday Telegraph, have raised fresh questions about the quality of the information contained in the report, which was published in 2007.

Oh sure, we're enjoying a good laugh and maybe there were a few corners cut in the effort to save Gaia but let's be cereal, the science is settled and anthropogenic ManBearPig is real. Remember, pointing out the unscientific nature of this stuff just proves that you are, um, anti-science. Or something. Now shut up and pay more for everything.

Posted by: DrewM at 03:48 PM | Comments (165)
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Andrew Sullivan and other lefty idiots hit hardest.

WeÂ’ve been waiting, and waiting, and waiting for news to come down from the Justice Department on what might become of John Yoo and Jay Bybee, the two Bush administration lawyers largely responsible for authoring the famous torture memos.

Well, we finally have word. And it appears that the DOJ will largely let the pair go with little more than a slap on the wrist. Click here for the story from Newsweek, which broke the news; here for a followup from over the weekend from the Washington Post.

According to a forthcoming ethics report issued by the DOJÂ’s ethics-watchdog unit, the Office of Professional Responsibility, Yoo and Bybee will be wrist-slapped for exercising poor judgment but will not be referred to authorities for possible sanctions.

Unless I've missed it, no CIA officers have been brought up on charges in connection with any enhanced interrogation activities. One might start to think that the actions the Bush administration took after 9/11 were in fact legal. Or that Obama just doesn't have the guts to pull the trigger on this stuff since it would be incredibly unpopular. Mind you they aren't mutually exclusive concepts.

After spending 7+ years whining about the "abandonment of our values" and "lawlessness" of the Bush approach to national security, what exactly do the Democrats have to show for it in a legal sense? Nothing.

It's almost as if they spent all that time running down every effort to keep the country safe out of a desire to do nothing more than score political points with their base.

Yes, they may have reaped some short term benefits from it but one year after the supposed death of the Republican Party, it's not looking like such a great deal.

Perhaps now Obama can get around to actually putting into place a process for interrogating high value detainees.

Posted by: DrewM at 01:45 PM | Comments (121)
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In the GOP primary to fill the "Barack Obama seat."

Recent polls have Kirk easily swamping newcomer Hughes. Based on this... Kirk is... well, very meh, but this is Illinois.

One of the most liberal states in the union.

At least he has recanted his cap and trade vote.

More: Geraghty agrees with McCormack -- meh, but would be great to steal "Barack Obama's seat."

On the Other Hand... GOP gubernatorial hopeful Adam Andrzejewski seems like a stalwart, and might ride a Tea Party surge to the nomination.

Posted by: Ace at 12:41 PM | Comments (148)
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They did another one to open the show, but I didn't find it funny, or accurate. It featured Barack Obama, at the SOTU, lambasting Martha/Marcia Coakley as the worst Democratic candidate in history, but that wasn't really the problem in Massachusetts, was it?

Liberals want to believe that was the only problem here. But the problem was Barack Obama's socialist program for America. Leftists never admit the message was rejected; it's only the messenger.

Here's a so-so sketch (pretty much their standard of excellence) on Scott Brown. Note the theme continues -- the problem in Massachusetts wasn't Obama's program. No, the problem for the left was that Scott Brown was hot.

more...

Posted by: Ace at 10:00 AM | Comments (211)
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Would be nice...

Hawaii has no special primary elections, and all candidates run in the general election. A simple plurality is required to win. Currently, the HI-1 field features two well-known Democratic candidates (with another on the way in), and one competitive Republican candidate, Charles Djou...

The Djou campaign is taking nothing for granted and has a vote goal of 50.1%.

Charles Djou is prepared to take on a single major Democratic candidate. But we do note that the Democrats' ability to consolidate around a single candidate is clouded by the presence of two well-known Democrats from different factions of the party who are unlikely to drop out and endorse the other. In the Blue Dog corner is former 2nd District Rep. Ed Case, and representing the liberal base is State Sen. Colleen Hanabusa who has been resoundingly endorsed by organized labor and EMILY's List. A third candidate has recently emerged, State Sen. Will Espero, who is likely to further split the Democratic vote.

In effect, the HI-1 special can be likened to NY-23 in reverse, with Ed Case occupying the unenviable "Scozzafava" position and Hanabusa representing the base of the party. Like Scozzafava, Case has depended on crossover Republican votes to win elections in the past, support that is likely to evaporate once voters know there is a real, electable Republican candidate in the race.

Let it be done.

About Djou:

Charles represents the area from Waikiki to Hawaii Kai on the Honolulu City Council. Before entering the City Council, Charles served in the Hawaii State House where he was the Minority Floor Leader. Charles has spent most of his life in Hawaii. Charles graduated from Punahou School and earned both a B.A. in Political Science and a B.S. in Economics from the University of Pennsylvania, Wharton School of Finance and Commerce, graduating magna cum laude with distinction. Charles earned his law degree from the University of Southern California law school.

Outside of the City Council, Charles serves as an officer in the U.S. Army Reserve. Charles also practices as an attorney specializing in business law and teaches at the University of Hawaii's William S. Richardson School of Law.

Bonus: His middle name is Kong. Kong. How can you not?

According to his issues page, at least, he seems like a mainstream conservative (enough) candidate. He's not pitching himself as a liberal or anything.

And here's where to contribute, if you're so moved.

Posted by: Ace at 09:44 AM | Comments (48)
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Good read.

Central thesis: Obama represented a departure from normal politics. The American public was invited to do something they either never have done before or have done so only once or twice (Washington, FDR): Join a cult of personality, where policy is only secondary to a quasi-religious faith in a single man.

The curtain has come down on what can best be described as a brief un-American moment in our history. That moment began in the fall of 2008, with the great financial panic, and gave rise to the Barack Obama phenomenon.

The nation's faith in institutions and time-honored ways had cracked. In a little-known senator from Illinois millions of Americans came to see a savior who would deliver the nation out of its troubles. Gone was the empiricism in political life that had marked the American temper in politics. A charismatic leader had risen in a manner akin to the way politics plays out in distressed and Third World societies.

There is nothing surprising about where Mr. Obama finds himself today. He had been made by charisma, and political magic, and has been felled by it. If his rise had been spectacular, so, too, has been his fall. The speed with which some of his devotees have turned on him—and their unwillingness to own up to what their infatuation had wrought—is nothing short of astounding. But this is the bargain Mr. Obama had made with political fortune.

He was a blank slate, and devotees projected onto him what they wanted or wished. In the manner of political redeemers who have marked—and wrecked—the politics of the Arab world and Latin America, Mr. Obama left the crowd to its most precious and volatile asset—its imagination. There was no internal coherence to the coalition that swept him to power. There was cultural "cool" and racial absolution for the white professional classes who were the first to embrace him. There was understandable racial pride on the part of the African-American community that came around to his banners after it ditched the Clinton dynasty.

The white working class had been slow to be convinced. The technocracy and elitism of Mr. Obama's campaign—indeed of his whole persona—troubled that big constituency, much more, I believe, than did his race and name. The promise of economic help, of an interventionist state that would salvage ailing industries and provide a safety net for the working poor, reconciled these voters to a candidate they viewed with a healthy measure of suspicion. He had been caught denigrating them as people "clinging to their guns and religion," but they had forgiven him.

Mr. Obama himself authored the tale of his own political crisis. He had won an election, but he took it as a plebiscite granting him a writ to remake the basic political compact of this republic.

Mr. Obama's self-regard, and his reading of his mandate, overwhelmed all restraint. The age-old American balance between a relatively small government and a larger role for the agencies of civil society was suddenly turned on its head. Speed was of the essence to the Obama team and its allies, the powerful barons in Congress. Better ram down sweeping social programs—a big liberal agenda before the people stirred to life again.

Progressives pressed for a draconian attack on the workings of our health care, and on the broader balance between the state and the marketplace. The economic stimulus, ObamaCare, the large deficits, the bailout package for the automobile industry—these, and so much more, were nothing short of a fundamental assault on the givens of the American social compact.

Read the whole thing.

Posted by: Ace at 09:39 AM | Comments (108)
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Kind of over, I think (but don't get cocky, kid, etc.).

Posted by: Ace at 09:34 AM | Comments (36)
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Open Bloggers and TrollBusters should re-contact me. I am creating fresh passes and passwords. I'd contact you guys directly, but at this point, I really forget who had which. It's like 40 Open Bloggers and 15 TrollBusters.

Posted by: Ace at 08:39 AM | Comments (72)
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I seem to remember a lot of people making that same argument during the process. Some called them Tea Baggers, others called them citizens trying to stop their government from screwing them.

One of the under reported bits from Obama's Q&A with Republican House members on Friday was his admission the haters were right.

If you look at the package that we've presented -- and there's some stray cats and dogs that got in there that we were eliminating, we were in the process of eliminating. For example, we said from the start that it was going to be important for us to be consistent in saying to people if you can have your -- if you want to keep the health insurance you got, you can keep it, that you're not going to have anybody getting in between you and your doctor in your decision making. And I think that some of the provisions that got snuck in might have violated that pledge."

Just snuk in there, eh? Must have been by magic or something, as opposed to say by design. But no worries Obama was just about to 'scrub' them out before those rightwing nut jobs in Massachusetts elected Adolf Hitler Scott Brown to the Senate.

It's funny how people who have been screaming about this for a year were vilified by Democrats but when Obama (who I believe is a Democrat) says the same thing it's not even worth a mention.

Posted by: DrewM at 08:25 AM | Comments (70)
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