Wednesday, January 24, 2007

State of the Union

Not film criticism, alas, but rather Presidential speechifying. My first sustained (and repeated) reaction during the speech was, "9/11 AGAIN? Let it go already! The vast majority of New Yorkers have moved on. Okay, it was the defining moment of your life. To the rest of us, it's your pathetic excuse for aggression against Saddam Hussein and, soon, Iran." My second thought was, "At last you are admitting failure in Iraq. What took you so long to notice?"

The "war on" terrorism should properly be fought by intelligence, doing their jobs honestly and fully, and by diplomacy backed by foreign aid. Waiting until someone is actually lobbing missiles at us is irresponsible governance.

He referred, once, to global "climate change", which presumably is more acceptable to the right wing than "warming", not that there's a material difference, and his main thrust of that portion of the speech was to recommend Americans weaning themselves, not from reliance on oil, but from reliance on imported oil - let's expand drilling in the US!

What may have been most telling was the dog that barked in the night - he didn't mention stem cell research, rights for the preborn, sanctity of marriage, or any of the "culture of life" issues. Throughout much of the speech it was apparent that he is aware of the Democratic Congress he now must deal with; more subtle was his recognition-by-omission that the fundie base to which he has long pandered is not a true representation of the country's opinions.

Balancing the budget - 'twould be a lot easier without this war of choice that's costing us trillions of dollars.

No mention of Mars. Maybe we already got there?

Boomtown: Pilot

(originally published 01/23/07)

*SPOILER*
*SPOILER*
*SPOILER*


At 29:50, Joel and Fearless enter Cantrell's apartment, and the grandfather whacks Fearless below the knee with a cane. Fearless grabs his leg and drops to the floor. A third detective enters, shouts "Drop the weapon," and fires a shot into the ceiling, then shouts "Officer down!", a cry that is repeated by a uniformed cop calling it in. Fearless, leaning on a footstool, says, "Officer down?... Officer KNEELING -- not that that didn't HURT, Granddad."

I love that moment, replay it two or three times, laughing aloud, every time I watch this episode.

At 39:10, when we have seen Cantrell's backstory, and how he got to that point, to that ledge, we learn that the detective's ceiling shot is what caused Cantrell to fall. The very moment that I am replaying, that I can't get enough of, Fearless's "Officer KNEELING," is the moment Cantrell's head hits the sidewalk.

This is a perfect show.

How much longer are they going to make us wait for Season Two?

Blog for Choice

(originally published 01/22/07)

Ever since I started my first blog, I have been looking for, or attempting to create, a "No Coat Hangers" sign, with the red "ban" symbol superimposed over a coat hanger. My skills are on a par with my software; that is to say, pretty low level. But I will keep trying until I've succeeded.

Headlong into Chaos

(originally published 01/14/07)

Is it really so impossible to learn from history? Or perhaps one needs to know a little history in order to learn from it. Sending "another" 20,000 troops into the quagmire that is Iraq is the worst of all possible tactics. That's not enough to quell the various factions, and too many to have coming home in body bags. Furthermore, a significant portion of that 20K will be troops forced to stay longer than planned, not actually new troops. Imagine the morale. As well as the increase in PSTD and other problems for those who do finally return home.

The flip-flopping by Bush and cohorts on the subject of the war is as baldfaced as the false slanders they have spread about their opponents in the past. "I listen to the advice of my commanders on the ground" - no matter how many I may have to fire in order to get some who agree with me.

It will take more than one term in office for the next President to begin to fix this and all the other messes. I hope we can survive that long.