December 19, 2011
— Ace Nolan seems to have -- presciently? -- crafted a movie questioning private property and its distribution.
This doesn't necessarily means it leans left (thought it might); he explored tough questions about liberty and privacy vs. security and safety in the Dark Knight.
I have to say, though, that I didn't love The Dark Knight, largely because he seemed to be making a movie about a political issue using Batman, The Joker, and Two-Face as props to ask various questions about the issue, and seemed less interested the characters of Batman et al.
His filmmaking style is cerebral and very formalistically dialectical. In every movie he sets up a tension between one thing and the other, using characters as avatars of that thing. In Batman Begins, it was fear/insanity(Scarecrow) versus self-mastery/self-control (Batman) and vengeance (R'as) versus justice (again Batman). In The Dark Knight it was order and state control (albeit -- a quasi-state control imposed by a vigilante) versus chaos and anarchy.
The Dark Knight actually got absurdly formalist, depicting Two-Face as a synthesis of thesis Batman and antithesis Joker. Come on. There's nothing wrong with adding some intellectual themes into a movie but please don't push them into the foreground. Subtext shouldn't become text.
He's got good points, too, but where he falls down it's because he's overintellectualizing something that really isn't intellectual.
Based on what I see here, Catwoman is being shoehorned into the role of Economic Anarchist, someone who has a philosophical objection to private property. She says to Wayne, "When it's all over, you'll wonder how you all could have thought you could live so large while leaving so little for everyone else."
Catwoman has never, AFAIK, been depicted as a revolutionary, or as having some philosophical commitment to bringing down the capitalist system. What she is is a thief who, while she's not stealing from the very rich, likes mixing socially with the very rich.
She's always been a bit comical in her larceny -- she's shameless about it. She just likes stealing. Maybe she actually considers herself an elite capitalist with he skill set of "taking the capital of others."
But I never got the vibe that she wanted to end private property, or lead the poor in a revolution against the rich. She likes the rich. (And, she likes stealing their money.) Without the rich, she wouldn't be rich herself.
This is what annoys me about Nolan-- jamming square-peg human beings into the round holes of his pretty scheme of dialectical inquiry.
I'm not seeing movies for this. I'm particularly no seeing Batman movies for this. I might see a minor, low-budget European movie where the main characters stand in for philosophical questions, but I'm looking for a Batman movie to be a Batman movie.
Even if I were seeing a movie for this -- that's not Catwoman.
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— Ace PPP's results, which seem crazy, have it Paul 23%, Romney 20%, Gingrich 14%, and Perry, Bachmann, and Santorum each with 10%. It seems less than likely.
The Republican Party can't really be defended as "not racist" when it's insisting on ignoring this old crank's past work. Or his long time association with Truther paranoiac Alex Jones (and Paul's own dog whistles to that group, such as suggesting that Bush lied when he said the AUMF for the use against force was for the purpose of getting bin Ladin). Or his minions constantly using the left's tactic of shouting down speakers as "war criminals" at this past CPAC.
I doubt this poll is accurate. But multiple polls show Ron Paul with alarming levels of support in Iowa.
Gingrich's fall seems to be due to questions about his conservative credentials, the barrage of intensely negative ads Ron Paul is running against him.
Meanwhile, 60% of likely Iowa caucus-goers are undecided or not firm about their tentative decision.
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09:09 AM
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— andy This is like the bat signal.
Ace posts something in 3 ... 2 ...
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08:42 AM
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— Open Blogger A top-secret experiment at the Large Hadron Collider has captured footage of the reaction of Democrats all over the United States to President Obama's unexpected! loss in the 2012 Presidential election: more...
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— Monty
The death of Kim Jong-Il may mark the beginning of North Korea's slow climb out of abyssal misery...or it may mark the beginning of a chaotic meltdown of this dysfunctional "Hermit Kingdom". (This has been a bad year for crazy villains, hasn't it? Khadaffi, Osama bin Laden, and now Kim Jong-Il.)
Knock me over with a feather: the ability to delay gratification is a hallmark of responsibility and probity; the lack thereof is a good sign of irresponsibility. I've often thought that many people deep in credit-card debt ought to have to go about wearing a POOR IMPULSE CONTROL sandwich board.
Fitch to seven global banks: BAM!
A good primer on terminology and relationships in the securities trading business, if youÂ’re interested in that sort of thing. ItÂ’s written in regular-person language, not finance-geek language.
You what chicks really like? Toilets.
more...
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— Gabriel Malor In case you missed it over the weekend:
The President's Christmas trip and vacation will cost the taxpayers at least $4 million.
Ron Paul claimed that Michele Bachmann hates Muslims.
Gingrich has some odd ideas about the separation of powers.
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02:58 AM
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December 18, 2011
— Maetenloch
At least according to twitter reports.
Update: It's now official - according to the AP:
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- Kim Jong Il, North Korea's mercurial and enigmatic leader, has died. He was 69.Kim's death was announced Monday by state television from the North Korean capital, Pyongyang.
Kim is believed to have suffered a stroke in 2008 but appeared relatively vigorous in photos and video from recent trips to China and Russia and in numerous trips around the country carefully documented by state media.
Reports are that Kim died from "physical fatigue during a train ride". I'm not kidding.
And I guess this blog won't be updating much in the future.
And apparently the slow motion North Korea collapse is even beginning to affect the military which until the last few years had been treated much better than the average people:
It was recently revealed that last month eight North Korean soldiers fled across the China border (near the west coast). The fleeing soldiers were armed and two were killed by other soldiers during the escape across the Yalu River. The six soldiers are still being sought by Chinese police. The escaped soldiers are believed to have bribed the Chinese border guards on the other side of the river to look the other way. This is the largest escape of armed North Korea soldiers and is but one of many reports of poor discipline and plunging morale in the North Korea security forces. From the conscripts in the infantry to the elite secret police there is a feeling of unease and disbelief at how the North Korea police state is falling apart.
Update: To honor Jong-Il North Korea has announced that all lights will be turned off.
Oh wait that's how North Korea looks every night.
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06:09 PM
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— Maetenloch Welcome to the ONT party at the weekend's end. Only 6 shopping days left before Christmas and don't forget about the open-all-night-including-xmas-eve Rite Aid.
Love on the Rocks: The Decline of Marriage
We're not getting hitched like we used to:
Earlier this week it was reported that the number of married people in the U.S. has nosedived--from 72% of the adult population in 1960 to just over half (51%) today.And Pam from GoRetro gives some reasons for why young people are forgoing getting married unlike their parents and previous generations.
Fundamentally it's because women no longer need to get married for financial reasons and guys no longer need a wedding to get access to regular sex (as all predicted in Logan's Run). As Insty likes to point out we've gradually taken away many of the social benefits of being a married couple and only added to the burdens (particularly for men).
But Pam does identify one recent development that's a typical example of the extra costs and burden that marriage has these days - the 'expected' expensive super-wedding:
Weddings used to be simpler and more affordable--a church ceremony followed by a reception at the local VFW, restaurant or country club. During the 80s and 90s, around the time people started buying McMansions and charging everything to their credit cards with abandon, we started to see wedding celebrations get bigger and more lavish.Now I imagine the number of couples choosing to keep living together rather than getting married over the cost of a wedding is a relatively low percentage, but still when you relentlessly shift the cost/benefit ratio of marriage towards the cost side, it's not really surprising that people would alter their behavior accordingly.
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05:11 PM
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— Dave in Texas Two days earlier the Germans mounted an offensive against the Allied forces in the Belgian Ardennes forest. They hoped to split the British and American line, to surround 4 armies, and negotiate a separate peace.
It had no prayer of success.
The German army was under-equipped. Limited fuel, food, ammunition, it was a last desperate stab at holding off the Allies in the west, to marshall forces against the Russians in the east.
Today, 67 years ago, we were taking a pounding from a not-yet-done enemy in the field. Bitter cold, snow and mud and horror. When it was done, 19,000 American soldiers were killed, almost 50,000 wounded. We took the brunt of it. By the 23rd of December, fair weather favored the Allied armies, with Patton's 3rd Army driving north. By the 24th, Christmas eve, the German offensive had been stalled.
An account from wiki (yeah, I know, still)
Gen. Eisenhower, realizing that the Allies could destroy German forces much more easily when they were out in the open and on the offensive than if they were on the defensive, told his generals, "The present situation is to be regarded as one of opportunity for us and not of disaster. There will be only cheerful faces at this table." Patton, realizing what Eisenhower implied, responded, "Hell, let's have the guts to let the bastards go all the way to Paris. Then, we'll really cut 'em off and chew 'em up." Eisenhower, after saying he was not that optimistic, asked Patton how long it would take to turn his Third Army (located in northeastern France) north to counterattack. Patton replied that he could attack with two divisions within 48 hours, to the disbelief of the other generals present. However, before he had gone to the meeting Patton had ordered his staff to prepare three contingency plans for a northward turn in at least corps strength. By the time Eisenhower asked him how long it would take, the movement was already underway.[70] On 20 December, Eisenhower removed the First and Ninth U.S. Armies from Gen. Bradley's 12th Army Group and placed them under Montgomery's 21st Army Group
By the 7th of January, Hitler agreed to pull his forces back, having been beaten and demoralized. It was over.
67 years ago today, that outcome was in doubt.
UPDATE: Some more pics and and article link from Maetenloch.
Posted by: Dave in Texas at
03:23 PM
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— Ace
Brady is 8 for 13 with three smitings.
Tebow called a trick play in which he turned the ball into a serpent.
Earlier in the game, there was an Elevated level of gay-bashings, mosque-burnings, and immigrant deportations, as the Broncos were leading the Patriots and making Brady look pretty average.
But the Broncos have fumbled thirty-seven times in a row (estimated), and now trail by 11.
So, if you're a gay Muslim, you have a limited opportunity to run out to the grocery without a high threat of ecstatic bloodletting.
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02:14 PM
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