Originally posted 3.17.08 and re-posted each St. Patrick’s Day. I...
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Translating Newt Gingrich’s CPAC comments into plain English
Newt Gingrich addressed the Conservative Political Action Conference today and, as is his habit, had some interesting things to say. This session doesn’t seem to have been as much fun as the 500 Racist Hillbilly Over the Top Rope Battle Royale we had yesterday, but credit the far right with understanding the value of offering up [...]
S&R Honors: military historian John Keegan democratized the study of war
When John Keegan died on August 2, 2012, it escaped me — I’m embarrassed to admit that I was unaware of his existence. Keegan, a lecturer in military history of the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst and later military affairs editor at the Telegraph, wrote influential books on military history designed to appeal to the [...]
TunesWeek: ’90s video and Spike Jonze
Part 4 in a series. It sometimes seemed like MTV in the 1990s was little more than a video résumé for one Adam Spiegel, aka Spike Jonze. He seemed to be the guy directing all the damned videos, and some of the era’s most inventive concepts were his. Here’s a sample. Up first, let’s watch some [...]
Coming out as a male lesbian
Last week I flew to California. A middle-aged lesbian couple disembarked ahead of me. Looking at them, I suddenly realized we were dressed exactly alike—tee shirt, Patagonia fleece, baggy Levi’s, Merrill slip ons with a backpack (complete with carabiners) and a ball cap. When I remarked on this to my son, he shrugged, “This is [...]
TunesWeek: the artistic side of ’90s video
Part 3 in a series. Our first couple of installments in the series where characterized by rage, I suppose. So today let’s step away from the anger and look at videos of a more artistic bent. First up, the video I’ve always sort of regarded as the best ever: “Dirt,” by Death in Vegas. Avant gardiste [...]
The papal conclave IS a political event
As the cardinals and priests filed into the Vatican for the impending conclave and new Pope-picking, a few things caught my attention in MSNBC’s coverage of the event: The organ music that they use in their commercial bumpers sounds a lot like Percy Sledge’s “When A Man Loves a Woman.” Which, if you think about [...]
TunesWeek: ’90s video goes political
Part 2 in a series. The Reagan/Thatcher years were marked by an utterly bizarre shiny/happy pastel sheen spread liberally across a decidedly apocalyptic doom. Listen to songs like “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” and “Forever Young” and “It’s a Mistake” (and watch the videos). The aesthetic seemed to be “we’re all going to die [...]
Google Glass: welcome to the end of privacy
If you haven’t yet seen Mark Hurst’s piece on Google Glass over at Creative Good, you need to. You really, really need to. A lot of times cool new gadget and service roll-outs mainly just affect the manufacturers and the people with the cash to buy them. Sure, there can be collateral damage – World of [...]
TunesWeek: our favorite videos of the 1990s, pt. 1 (NSFW)
Part 1 in a series. In the 1980s, video killed the radio star. In the 2000s, MTV, Millennials and a whole new wave of mobile technology killed video. In between, though, we had the ’90s, the golden age of the form. While the ’80s were about pioneering a new genre of short film built around pop [...]
ESPN FC asks: Can you call yourself a soccer fan if you don’t support MLS? Yes I can.
The American soccer sphere has been abuzz these last couple of days thanks to a question that first popped up on Alexi Lalas’s Twitter feed: Last night this was discussed: If you live in the U.S., can you call yourself a “soccer fan” even if you don’t support @MLS? The question gets a thorough working [...]
S&R Poetry: “Before there were headscarves.” by Margarita Prokofyeva
They were sorcerers, bringers of sunshine, gypsy queens shimmying down the hills of the pregnant earth, budding with life, crashing through the tunnels that once contained them. Minds like baby dragons trapped in acorn caps, unraveling and spilling over edges of a dark stage into an audience Nothing but empty chairs draped with dust and [...]
Emphasis added: the foreign policy week in pieces
Emphasis, as always, added. The UN Temperance League “We make the modest proposal that the negotiating rooms should in future be an inebriation-free zone,” Joseph Torsella, deputy U.S. ambassador to the United Nations for management and reform, told the General Assembly’s budget committee. “While my government is truly grateful for the strategic opportunities presented by [...]
Hardball odyssey
by Chip Ainsworth The long stretch of interstate highway between Tampa and Naples is a straight and boring haul past billboards, construction cranes and strip malls. I was bound for Hammond Stadium in Fort Myers, the winter home of the Minnesota Twins since 1991, one of the few remaining Grapefruit League venues I’d yet to [...]
Rand Paul filibuster: If a Senator talks to an empty chamber, does he make a sound?
Rand Paul is still talking after almost 8 hours. One wonders how he has managed to not leave the floor for the Senate lavatory in all that time. It’s ok to dislike Rand Paul and still think he’s currently doing a public service. It’s probably not correct to suggest that this was prompted by standard [...]
Alvin Lee
By now most of you have heard the news reports: the incendiary guitarist Alvin Lee of Ten Years After died unexpectedly of complications following routine surgery. He was 68. It’s fashionable now to dismiss the classic rock musicians – they’re old now, some have retired and, truth be told, others should have long ago. Ten Years After flared like [...]
Two reasons why the new CREDO Action petition to limit CEO salaries wouldn’t work
There’s a new petition going around – maybe you’ve seen it on Facebook. It points up our growing rich-poor gap and asks Congress to cap CEO pay, which is obscene in many cases. The ratio of CEO pay in the United States has ballooned to 380 times that of the average worker. Pass legislation to [...]
