Friday Batman

One of the many, many things that went terribly, terribly wrong with the Batman film franchise following Tim Burton's first endeavor was the utter decent into the unfathomable depths of inane soundtrack choices. But hey, it was the '90s and who didn't love Seal....right?

Spoofed Reloaded

Earlier I linked to a video spoofing Wes Anderson, John Woo, and Kevin Smith showing how it would be if they were hired to direct a McCain campaign ad. Well, the sequel is up this time taking on M. Night Shamalamadingdong, David Lynch, and Jason Reitman/Diablo Cody (of Juno fame) to hilarious effect. Salud:

The Price is Fail

I Wonder What Steve Perry Thinks

Joe Perry, of Aerosmith fame, is a life-long "hardcore" Republican (who knew?) and has come out in public support of John McCain.

That's kind of awesome. Heres the dope:

Aerosmith has generally left the politics to bands like U2 and the Dixie Chicks, but axeman Joe Perry says national security and economic woes have prompted him to split from the rest of the entertainment world and throw his support behind John McCain.

“We pretty much stay out of it, but seeing so many people come out for Obama, I just felt like ‘What the hell, I might as well raise my hand for this side,” Perry said from his Duxbury home.

The Bay State rockers have done a few fund-raisers for the Kennedy family over the years, but Perry’s endorsement of McCain marks a first for the platinum-selling guitarist/songwriter.

…“I’ve been a hardcore Republican my whole life,” he told the Herald. “My mother and father drilled into me from the very start that if you work hard and be positive, you’ll get what you’re working for. I guess I’m living proof of that.”

…“I’m an optimist. It ain’t over till its over,” he said. “I think that he’s got a chance.”

(h/t Michelle Malkin)

Hear that Andrew, even Joe Perry knows it ain't over.

Cheezy

I must admit, if you hadn't noticed already, that I quite enjoy lolcats...and all things "lol" in general (as evidenced by my predilection for posting lolcats in my headings).

I'm a fan of cats, and some of the pics are down right hilarious. If you don't care for cats, they have dogs, celebrities, politicians....whatever. A lot of times they are incredibly stupid, I realize this, but the phenomena is nevertheless an interesting occurrence to witness. The internets never cease to amaze.

However, even I think things have gone too far when you have lolcat artshows. Observe:

Share the Load

The White Man's Burden
by
Rudyard Kipling

Take up the White Man's burden--
Send forth the best ye breed--
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk and wild--
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half-devil and half-child.

Take up the White Man's burden--
In patience to abide,
To veil the threat of terror
And check the show of pride;
By open speech and simple,
An hundred times made plain
To seek another's profit,
And work another's gain.

Take up the White Man's burden--
The savage wars of peace--
Fill full the mouth of Famine
And bid the sickness cease;
And when your goal is nearest
The end for others sought,
Watch sloth and heathen Folly
Bring all your hopes to nought.

Take up the White Man's burden--
No tawdry rule of kings,
But toil of serf and sweeper--
The tale of common things.
The ports ye shall not enter,
The roads ye shall not tread,
Go mark them with your living,
And mark them with your dead.

Take up the White Man's burden--
And reap his old reward:
The blame of those ye better,
The hate of those ye guard--
The cry of hosts ye humour
(Ah, slowly!) toward the light:--
"Why brought he us from bondage,
Our loved Egyptian night?"

Take up the White Man's burden--
Ye dare not stoop to less--
Nor call too loud on Freedom
To cloke your weariness;
By all ye cry or whisper,
By all ye leave or do,
The silent, sullen peoples
Shall weigh your gods and you.

Take up the White Man's burden--
Have done with childish days--
The lightly proferred laurel,
The easy, ungrudged praise.
Comes now, to search your manhood
Through all the thankless years
Cold, edged with dear-bought wisdom,
The judgment of your peers!

Sock the Vote

When I was a young college student in the months following the 2004 presidential election, I was assigned a research paper in which I had to tackle some recent issue from the aforementioned election. I chose voting, and proceeded to write an astoundingly brilliant piece (my teacher said so, not I...and she was a super-lib FemiNazi to boot) that articulates to a minor degree the problems I believe are inherent to our current democratic process.

Well, we are a week away from another election, and the same issues persist, and have worsened. Thus I feel it is appropriate to post here that essay from four years ago that is still painfully relevant today, if not more so. I have gone through and amended slightly so as to update some of the references and where I have done so I have denoted with brackets. Enjoy, and let fly with your own thoughts afterward:

SOCK THE VOTE by JOHN MILTON

The United States government was conceived generations ago in the British Empire, nurtured by the Enlightenment, and deposited upon foreign soil to raise itself through the fire and blood of war. The end result was a system completely new to the world. Born of England, a constitutional monarchy, came the Republic that was America. Over centuries it evolved through trial and error into the most stable of all governments known to man. One tenet of this hybrid democratic republic was, and remains the vote: the single most treasured of all democratic rights. Does one person out of millions count enough for individual votes to be significant? In today’s time that question frequently arises, and it deserves examination. The vote has changed as America herself has changed, and by today’s time everyone of the age eighteen and up has the right to vote, with few minor exceptions. However, everyone who can vote does not choose to, prompting innumerable campaigns mainly focused towards young people, women, and blacks. These campaigns, often led by stars of the screen or airwaves, encourage people to vote, but do not encourage voter education. The question logically arises at a time such as this: Should everyone, of age at eighteen, vote? Many think so, even so far as to propose emulating the Australian system of fining voters who do not vote. Voting, by the mere assumption that everyone should do it, has now been trivialized to a point almost as dire as the apathy of the voters themselves. The fact of the matter is that everyone should not vote, and moreover, greater restrictions need to be put in place to ensure such is the case.
The problem with such an argument arises when the time comes to write a research [article]. Few people with the same point of view have been published, which makes it outrageously difficult to find a documentable source for support. However, with diligence, and a will to endeavor to persevere, a few articles of interest can be found to shape a cogent statement. Most sources available concerning voting rights are either historical pieces regarding civil rights, or proponents of lowering the voting age to sixteen (youthrights.org). There are even a few pieces floating amidst the sea of opinion that propose mandatory voter registration. Age and voter registration are the easiest targets, because in a world run rampant with political correctness to even mention the words civil rights with the wrong inflection of voice can cause a storm. The general idea regarding voting in the United States is that voting itself is a freedom, and therefore a right. Those who support this idea make their point by stating that the political state of America is degrading from lack of participation and needs a boost. The “boost” proposed is a mandatory vote. The first steps have been taken towards this goal by canceling class in public high schools on elections day [Presidential candidate Obama himself recently urged everyone to stay home]. The fact that some high schools also serve as polling places has nothing to do with the cancellation of classes, for an equal number of private high schools also serve as polling places but do not cancel class [to include the private high school I attended]. In essence however, the vote is not a right; rather it is a privilege. Indeed it is true that voter participation is down historically, but one must consider the conditions surrounding the issue. Voters turn out in droves when there are serious issues at stake such as World War II, Korea, Vietnam, the Cold War, energy crises, and so forth. From the Nixon presidency onward the world began to stabilize, and after the Reagan administration the United States was free from any visible enemy. Voters came less to the polls because they were less compelled by world events. Voter turn out in 2004 spiked again up from the previous election because there was the issue of the Iraq war. One could almost argue that voter participation is proportional to the importance of the election outcome.
The system of voting as it stands today is in need of change. The vote has been abused in recent elections by ill informed voters who have been goaded into thinking they have to vote. One infamous campaign in recent memory perpetrated by the rapper Sean Combs went so far as to say on television “Vote or Die!” Such propaganda smacks of totalitarianism, but Sean Combs more than likely is not familiar with the word [and that there are actually black people in Alaska, though maybe not crack heads]. The idea behind the campaign, and countless other like it, is to get people to the polls for any reason. A [2004] television ad had the actress Jennifer Aniston asking women “Would you want someone else to choose your clothes or your hair? No? Then why let someone else choose your president?” The extent to which Mrs. Aniston trivializes the presidency with such a statement is almost inconceivable. This is the manner in which the youth of America are being raised to regard voting.
Perhaps the problem with the youth [and I would ad ignorant mass majority] of America is that too many people other than themselves are making their decisions for them concerning voting [and day to day life, thanks Big Brother!]. The truth is, even if every person who turned eighteen in [2008] flocked to the polls on Election Day, it is mathematically improbable that their votes would make a difference. Voting by itself, just for the sake of voting, is futile. Even the actual votes of the Electors in the Electoral College do not matter; apparently they do not even vote until a month or so after the election. The only real way to make a vote count is to cause a victory. The [people] of America need to be aware of this reality and understand that if they do not want to vote, and they have no good reason to vote [Obama being black doesn’t count], they should not vote.
New campaigns encouraging political education need to be enacted. The problem is not that people are not voting. Rather, the problem is that too many people are voting without knowing the reason for which they are voting. Anecdotal case in point, a young man I know personally in the [2004] election went in to vote because he had just turned eighteen. On the ballot were five amendments with check boxes for “yes” or “no”. The young man voted no to all of the amendments despite the fact that one amendment proposed that widows retain the Stephens Day tax exception. When confronted on why he did this he answered “I don’t know. It doesn’t affect me so I don’t care.” The attitude the young man had is a prime example of why he should not have been voting in the first place. Voters need to know what they are voting for, why they are voting that way, or simply not vote at all. For this reason the voting age should be raised to at least twenty five. College age students are far too inexperienced in the world to be trusted with the fate of the nation. Though not true for all, eighteen to twenty-one year olds lack essential wisdom that in many cases can only be earned through years of independent living apart from the college campus. Raising the voting age would benefit the voting system far more than would lowering the voting age. Raising the voting age means condensing the number of people who vote; this thereby increases the power of the vote itself and bolsters each individual’s significance.
However, raising the voting age alone will not condense the voter base enough: still more measures need to be taken to counteract the flood of ignorance that pours into the polling places thanks to MTV and Hollywood. There need to be stricter voting restrictions: first and foremost being a mandatory literacy test. If an individual cannot read then he or she is less likely to be able to research candidates and issues, and thereby make an informed decision. Politicians realize that American’s are stupider than ever before, and they welcome this. Politicians know that an ignorant mind is easily influenced, hence smear campaigns and 527 television ads. The theory is that as long as one candidate looks bad, the other has a greater chance of getting the vote. Voters who can read, and do not easily believe everything they hear on television, are more likely to discern the truth and vote based on why they feel a candidate is qualified. The literacy test would be mandatory for all voters, regardless of age, sex, or race.
Such implementation of literacy test will never come to fruition, mostly due to the stigma attached to said tests by a sordid history. The problem with literacy test is that they were primarily used to foil Blacks and Indians at the polls after the passage of the 15th Amendment and the subsequent Snyder Act in 1924. The usage of literacy tests today would not be to combat minorities, but ignorance in general, for which Americans of all race and ethic background are guilty. To prove this point I would go so far as to propose permitting special Spanish ballots, as long as the Spanish-speaking individual could pass a test on basic knowledge of the American Government.
Of course, the argument can be made that plenty of ignorant people can still read. The idea, however, is not to turn away generally ignorant people, but politically ignorant. This could not be accomplished to one hundred percent satisfaction, for human beings are fallible, but a significant dent could be made. Many people would simply not vote because it would be too much work to take a test, stand in line, and actually use their minds. Voting is a practice exercised once every two years at the most, and the majority of Americans, in their infinite laziness, would not care enough to vote if there was a stricter filter to pass through.
In the end it is clear that dramatic changes in policy and perception regarding voting need to take place. The American people need to understand that they have the freedom to vote, but not the right. A screen must be erected to shift out the elements of society that would seek to make a mockery of the system, and thereby allow on the most qualified of persons into the voting booth.

Chose the Stocks to the Gallows

I went today into the jungle of downtown Atlanta to the Fulton County Government building to do advanced voting. I went with my friend Brent and we both skipped a ridiculously long line (not on purpose) to end up in a little room filled with geriatric Black folk. Not only were we the only two people under 45 (at least) but we were two of only four white people, and likely the only two McCain votes in the entire building.

Anyway, I did my civic duty and cast my vote for every Republican on the ballot except for Saxby Chamblis, who is a traitor to the tax-payer and given to agribusiness croneyism. In his place I voted for the much more fiscally conservative Libertarian Alan Buckley. I saw Buckley take Chamblis and Martin (the Democrat candidate for senate)to task on the televised Georgia Senatorial debate, and he was fiety bloke...and right. He likely won't get elected, but he should.

Lots of Obama votes out there in Fulton county to be sure, but I have a solid feeling that the rest of Georgia is McCain throughout (except that pocket in Chatham still voting on race and cigarettes).

Also of note are the three Constitutional amendments proposed and on the ballot. All three aim to give the government more control and money to promote state parks, project housing, and "community development." Suffice to say, I put a big fat X next to "NO" on all three. As I have been saying, the less government the better.

Haunting

A friend of mine posted a video last night on my Facebook page that has infiltrated my dreams, and turned them into nightmares. I now pass on the favor....


There is no explanation for this travesty. Obviously these people want to let us all know that their tight with the Savior, which is cool, but their methods are bafflingly retarded. The way the lyrics of the song literally degenerate into the ravings of a madmen is enough to make me want to scrub my ears with pine cones. The singer even admits that his song is retarded in the song itself!

People like this really hurt Christianity by making us all look like buffoons. Except for that guitar player, he's really rockin' it and he doesn't care what you think.

Obama Backwards is Amabo!

Keeping with today's theme of presidential election spoofs I present the facts about Obama:

Fight the Smears! from Olde English Comedy on Vimeo.

The Obvious Difference

Okay, so apparently SNL the other night did have a sketch with Obama in it. However, he and Michelle are portrayed straight without a singal iota of satrical jabbing. If anyting, the SNL crew tried to make Obama even more appealing. The only person really spoofed in the skit was Bill Clinton. Obama remains untouchable.

I will give them props for the Jeremiah Wright/Bill Ayers dig, but it was about as tame as the Mark Wahlberg skit, and half as funny.

Equal Opportunity Riffing

Thankfully SNL, while making their truly funny sketches lampooning Palin and Bush (i.e. the previous post) have taken time to skewer (if only lightly) some of the Left.

Just not Obama. Oh well, I'll take what I can get.

"Picture this face, America"

If the Truth Mattered...

...then people would listen to Obama and realize that his intentions for a Socialist state are blatant and are more far-reaching than I think can be ignored. A lot of people no doubt (aside from voting for him because he is black) are holding their noses and hoping that all the radical stuff coming out about BHO is simply right-wing propaganda.

This interview, posted right now as the headline on Drudge, is not propaganda...and it scares the crap out of me to think that people are going to hear it, ignore it, and vote for Obama anyway.


Just in case you didn't stick with the video, here is the main point:
Barack thinks the Civil Rights movement failed to force the courts to, in his terms, loosen the strictures placed on the Constitution by the Founding Fathers to allow for "redistributive economic change" for Blacks. Essentially, he thinks the courts failed to give money to poor blacks and he feels that the mistake can be corrected through legislation.

Biden Time

First, to the middle class: Do you feel devastated? Do you hold George Bush and John McCain personally accountable for all the problems you have faced economically over the past eight years?

Joe Biden said just that; Bush and McCain "devastated" the middle class. If that were the case, then the middle class would no longer exist (having been devastated) and would be in turn the lower class. We would be a two class society....Eduardian England perhaps, or any Third World county you care to name.
Biden is a fool.

Continuing, in the following interview, when asked point blank if Barack is likable to Marx in his "spread the wealth around" ideology Biden first dodges the question than proceeds to say that Obama won't "spread the wealth up." I'm sure Joe, like you or I, is aware that "up" is only one possible direction that can emminate from a single orign in this three dimensional world of ours. But then again, maybe when Obama is president he will collapse time and space to simplify things.

Here is the interview:

What Makes America Great

College Football, that's what. Great line-up of games today, and my pics for victory:

Go Noles!
Roll Tide!
and finally.....LSU (just cause Georgia needs a good wompin', you know like that Bama game)

I don't really think LSU can pull it out, but we'll see.
And a special shout out to all you Tech fans out there. I hope they beat Virginia, but the Jackets sure looked like crap against Clemson last week. Bon Chance!

Friday Batman

Spoofed

I braved the wild, wintry wastes of the liberal movie blogosphere this afternoon and dug up a little gem. Below is a vid (h/t cinematical) of what it would be like if the McCain campaign hired three famous auteurs to direct his campaign ads: John Woo, Kevin Smith, and Wes Anderson are all poked fun off. Good stuff, check it:

Kristol Ball

The thought of an Obama presidency makes me ill, but I'm not one of these people who have conceded the belief in a "landslide" because of some ridiculous polls and (as one friend supersaturated in FoxNewsiness--who knows who he is his-- believes) Obama still has a lot of money to spend.

I first of all am distrustful of the news media period, and think that because I never watch network news, or cable news, or read syndicate newspaper publications that I have a more honest perspective. I get my news from the source, the AP wire, Reuters, Drudge....in short, the Internet (I like talk radio, and love Rush, but never really listen anymore because I simply don't have the time). I have no problem with Fox News, I just simply never watch it because of the sensationalized nature of infotainment in general, of which they are perpetrators like the rest. When I catch O'Reilly on, I do stop and watch, but mainly for Dennis Miller.

Anyway, all that having been said, I think that one of the pundits I would watch on a regular basis would be Bill Kristol, and though I don't share his defeatist mentality in the following clip, I do think he rightly takes McCain to task for sucking:

Marx My Words

A few days ago I was engaged in a conversation with a friend when it came out he intended to vote for Barack Obama, to which I promptly (after sighing) asked, "Why? Don't you realize he is a neo-Marxist?" (This was before the "spread the wealth around" comment.) My friend came back, "So?"
My friend is in college, and he spent a good deal of time overseas recently in Europe (Germany specifically) and his brain is so imprinted with the amazing belief that, despite all of history to the contrary, Socialism is not a bad thing. He isn't religious, so he didn't get Acts II on me, but that is another frequent stumbling block for the less enlightened.

The fact that Obama wants to take money from one group of people (who earned it through whatever means, be it hard-work, ingenuity, or mafia tactics) and distribute it to any other group of people who didn't earn it (by any means other by simply existing) must seem like a decent enough move to the apparent majority of this country that vastly misunderstood The Adventure of Robin Hood (Disney version no doubt) and have not been given the benefit of a history class....but then that's no exuse because the internet is easy to use, so are books, but I digress...

What simpletons like my friend (and most Obama supporters who try to justify their voting decision outside of one-dimensional reasons like BDS, race, or plain ignorance) forget is incentive.
If you work only to have your money given to someone who doesn't work, are you inclined to work harder? Are you inclined to feel good about the people who are being given your money? Is it really better for the country to reinforce or foster class hatred based on the redistribution of wealth? This all goes back to the less government argument, but I challenge any of you Obama supporters who may through happenstance come across this blog and put in the requisite time to finish this post to consider how you would feel if (insha'allah) you make over 250,ooo dollars and are immediately punished for such an accomplishment by having forty percent of that money taken and given to someone else for no other reason than Barack Hussein Obama thinks it is a good idea. Consider then how that person who is given your money is going to react. If they are handed a check from the government for doing nothing, are they going to give that up by trying to actually earn their own money, and God forbid, reach the level you occupy only to have their money in turn taken and given to their cousin who dropped out of high school to dedicate more time to not seeing his illegitimate children?

Ask yourselves these questions....and if you can't come up with any answers, I will glady help you along.

The Hemingway to Write

Hemingway is known for his terse style and his radical expatriate lifestyle, but not for his poetry. His use of language does not lend itself to verse, but he gave it a shot. Most of it is poor, and cynical, but I like this one:

Montparnasee
by Ernest Hemingway

There are never any suicides in the quarter among people one knows
No successful suicides.
A Chinese boy kills himself and is dead.
(they continue to place his mail in the letter rack at the Dome)
A Norwegian boy kills himself and is dead.
(no one knows where the other Norwegian boy has gone)
They find a model dead
alone in bed and very dead.
(it made almost unbearable trouble for the concierge)
Sweet oil, the white of eggs, mustard and water, soap suds
and stomach pumps rescue the people one knows.
Every afternoon the people one knows can be found at the café

The System is Down

Over at Threedonia.com (an excellent blog that mixes important issues with in depth discussion of pop music, zombies, and odd news stories) a link was posted to an incredibly insightful article by a gentlemen named John Stossel discussing the inherent failure of governmental central planning.

The article is well worth a read (don't worry, its not very long) and illustrates in a pithy manner the core of my political beliefs--the less government the better. Here is a taste from Stossel:

"The only times we have shortages in America are after governments intrude, like when President Nixon appointed an energy czar to regulate gas prices, and this year, when some states' anti-"gouging" laws prevented gas stations from raising prices after storms. Despite the repeated failure of central planning, the political class acts as if politicians can direct our lives. When there are problems, politicians will solve them. They're going to give us prosperity and cheap health care, fix education, lower gas prices, stop global warming and make us energy "independent.""

READ THE WHOLE ARTICLE HERE.

Having read the article, I was excited to thought...which led me to comment on Threedonia....which led to that comment being posted on the site.

READ MY COMMENT POST HERE.

October is Austraila Month #5--Humpday Humor Edition

Tomorrow evening I am going back to my home in the pirate den of Savannah, and the prospect has me filled with anticipation that inversely causes this week to.......drag..........on.

Thus, I present a little humor to pick things up. First, something I swiped from those silly lolblogs:The rest of these are political cartoons from Australian newspapers that my uncle sent me compiled in a recent email. Cheers Mates:

Ann Rice Light?

What is this Twilight crap? Are these books popular or something?

Seems like the movie coming out is a big deal (from what I gather from my sources in the internets) but I personally have no idea what all the hullabaloo is about. The trailer looks terrible, Disney Chanel movie quality at best.
Don't believe me? Well, I'm not going to post it here, but you can take a look elsewhere....If you dare.

One a sidenote, I'm not a huge fan of Halloween. In fact, I guess I would say that I am anti-Halloween, but not for any religious purpose. The whole concept of people dressing up in costumes and cutting pumpkins and eating candy and haunted houses seems ridiculous to me. I also hate the color orange, especially in conjuction with black (or blue....or purple).

I think if we must fill the holiday void this time of year, it should be with a festival to celebrate Samhain (pronounced sowen for you non-Celts) the traditional way, with bonfires and slaughtered cattle.

My idea of a good time.

Good News

Here at the Free-Lancer, I deal with a lot of tough issues, like pirates, pictures of cats with funny captions on them, Batman's conquest of Friday, and Australia. Occasionally however, I like to take a break from the hard-hitting pieces to revel in the happy side of life.

Gas is cheaper. That ought to make most folks happy. National average is below $3.

Guy Ritchie came to his senses and is parting ways with Madonna, albeit in an increasingly absurd manner.

And probably the coolest story of all, legendary Bluegrass musician Eddia Adcock had a revolutionary brain surgery to stop his hand tremors and restore his gift of banjo-amazingness. Watch the video HERE, its just incredible.

Anyway, that's the happy stuff, now back to the serious issues:

Once a Liar....

The entire Ayers/Obama episode has been painful to watch. Painful because of how easily Obama has gotten away with bald-face lies while the liberal media has given him a pass. "Oh, Barack was only a kid when Ayers bombed the capital building" or as Obama said himself, "we just happened to live in the same neighborhood"...blah blah blah...as though those bits of circumstantial argument have any bearing on Barack's extensive relationship with the un-repententant terrorist. The McCain campaign took way too long to question Obama on this, and as a result the good Senator has been able to lie his way through it. One of those lies is that Obama never served with Ayers on an educational committee, and never favorably reviewed Ayers, book. You know, like this newspaper clipping would suggest:

FAIL

A Holey Solution

Coming off the train today in downtown Atlanta I heard through my earbuds someone calling out "free coffee!" I paused, silenced my listening device, and turned my attention to two young people manning a coffee cart. Noticing me, the male of the duo asked brightly,
"Want some free coffee?"
"Cool beans." Was my terribly clever and on point reply, knowing full well the coffee wasn't truly free.
"What are you guys peddling?" I inquired as the gent filled my cup.
"We represent the UN initiative nothingbutnets.com that hopes to prevent the spread of malaria in Africa by providing families with mosquito nets."
"The UN, as in the United Nations?" I said while raising my eyebrows quite unnoticeably behind my sunglasses.
"Sure thing. "
"Sugar or Splenda?" Now the female of the duo was talking to me as the male turned his attention to someone new.
"Neither, I'm good. So mosquito nets, huh?"
"That's right, all it takes is $10 to buy a bed net, distribute it to a family, and explain its use. Would you like to donate or sign our email list?"
"I'm sorry, say it one more time for me, mosquito nets?"
"Yes, treated with a little insecticide--"
"DDT?"

All of a sudden her eyes got big.

"No, no of course not! Just a harmless little insecticide--"
At this point the male joined back in with,
"Yes, insecticide--"
"He's asking about DDT!" The female quickly whispered.
"Oh..." He turned away. The female returned her attention to me,
"Not DDT, we don't want to cause birth defects or--"

"I'm sorry, but do you realize that the inventor of DDT won the Nobel prize because of how many lives it saved by stopping malaria? Before it was banned in the seventies, there were 17 reported deaths from Malaria a year on average. After it was banned that number jumped to 2 million. It wasn't even banned for birth defects, but rather because hypothetically it could reduce bird populations, ospreys I think were the test case."

Because, you know, birds matter more than people.

"But....doesn't it cause cancer?" The female stammered.
"No, not in any conclusive way. Do your research. The UN would have you out here soliciting money for mosquito nets which, God knows the Africans probably have a good grasp on the concept of by now, rather than actually do something useful like un-ban a Nobel prize winning insecticide that can save millions of lives."

At this point both the guy and girl were simply starring at me.

"But thanks for the coffee."Retards.

A Little Advise...

I was riding in the car the other day with my aforementioned friends, Brent and Shane, when one of them popped in a disk of old Western classics. They immediately skipped to this song. Stick around for the whole thing....its a shocker!

The Three B's

Saturday I headed over to visit my good friends Brent and Shane. They both have, in the past, been instrumental in not only scoring my short film projects (the best example being the excellent soundtrack for Das Oedland--post-apocalyptic folk baby!) but both have acted at times to various levels of success (Brent is extremely camera shy.) Shane can be seen in all his rugged post-apocalyptic glory, again in Das Oedland. Brent pops up in nearly all the old pieces and most prominently as the skalliwag Conrad in the more recent Carrying.

The three of us go way back, and part of our friendship together has centered around music. We each love the dulcet twang of a banjo, the versatility of a fiddle, and the swinging drone of an accordion on top of everything else. Thus, we could think of no better way to spend a Saturday afternoon then walking on down to the first annual Sandy Springs Bluegrass and Blues festival. We had low expectations (lured in no small part by the promise of BBQ--which was decent, not the best, but no bad either) but after shelling out a 5-spot we were treated to the most amazing and eclectic collection of musicians we could have imagined. In short, the festival was fantastic.

There was the promises bluegrass to start in the form of a group called Cedar Hill which not only played some classics, but bluegrass covers to include "Man of Constant Sorrow" from O Brother Where Art Thou with the lead singer singing as Donald Duck...for the whole song. It was indescribable. Not only were these guys amazingly talented musicians, but they were excellent showmen as well. Worth the five buck right there, especially when they ended their set with a beat-box, "rap-grass" version of the Beverly Hillbillies Theme. Can't imagine that? I don't blame you, because I can't even begin to describe it. There was another bluegrass group we caught that was more traditional, and mixed more country into their set. They were good, dressed on stage in suits and all four being portly fellows, the guitarist joked that they were "pound for pound the best bluegrass group around."

As far as the blues went, the star of the show was a lone singer and his guitar/banjo named Joe McGunniess. He was white, over six feet, had long dreadlocks, and generally looked nothing like you would expect....but he was amazing. He had us all in a trance with his soulful voice and insanely deft picking. HERE IS THE LINK to his myspace page, but realize that he was one hundred times better live than the recordings. The highlight of his set was the blues rendition he did of the Beatles "All You Need is Love." Brent was near tears by the end of it.

The last act was a probably the craziest mix of sound and personality you can come up with. Geoff Achison was the man's name, and he was a true blue Aussie that played the guitar like a madman and sang with a bluesy, deep Bowie-esque voice then turned around and spoke like a fair dinkum lariken. He started off solo on his acoustic doing classic American blues cuts then brought out his band to get things loud and funky. One song was called the "Holland Shuffle" which he wrote after touring Holland, saying it took him all of an afternoon to do.
It was a show alright, well worth trying to see him again before he ships back over to the Land Down Under.

All in all the best sort of afternoon five dollars can net you (well, add in food and beverage costs and things get a little more pricey) but something I hope gets put back on next year for sure....if I'm Atlanta around to enjoy it.

October is Australia Month #4

Unfortunately, the movie Australia doesn't actually come out until November. Baz apologized to me profusely for this timing error, but I let him off the hook for promising to never make another Shakespeare adaptation.

A Triumphant Failure

David Letterman may have been funny in the past. I wouldn't know, because in my life time he has been about as funny as a colon polyp, and about as worthwhile. On top of his complete lack of comedic abilities, he is also just plain, flat-out mean. His counterpart, Jay Leno, is about as politically oriented Left as Letterman, but in his bias he isn't vehement. Letterman is antagonistic to the point of venom---when his guest is a conservative/Christian/Republican/Muppet. I can watch Leno and be entertained (refer to my previous post where he hosts Miller recently and the two play ball quite nicely) but Dave is a punk.

Last night McCain went on Letterman, having canceled an appearance a few weeks ago, and the result was the highest rated episode of "The Late Show" since '05 when Oprah came on. I'm not sure what that means exactly, but out of interest I took a look...and it's everything you'd expect. Letterman literally badgers the daylights out of McCain, attacking him left and right--not jokingly mind you--but full on partisan pugilism a la MSNBC. McCain rightly states at the outset in the best joke of the night, "I had so much fun since my last interrogation..." It's just sad to watch really, because Dave is such a tool he doesn't even play ball with McCain.
Take a look for youself. The best I can find is this heavily edited "highlight" reel from last nights show:

We'll Do It Live! (In Miniature)

See more funny videos at Funny or Die

Friday Batman

Plumber and Plumberer

Well now, this is interesting.

Apparently Joe Plumber owes back taxes (big whoop) and doesn't actually make more than $250,000 a year...thereby falling into the bracket that Barak proposes would get a "tax cut."

Could someone have turned the tables and lied to Obama? We shall see.
The interesting thing to me is how Politico is quick to claim the McCain campaign hung to much on this guy on the fly for the last debate. Quite clearly they missed the point, whether Joe Plumber is telling the truth (and is indeed a plumber to begin with) is entirely irrelevant. What Obama said about wealth redistribution is the point, which I think the McCain campaign clearly demonstrated in the ad I showed you last post.

So, sure Joe Wurzelbacher got famous on false pretenses, but the truth he extracted remains.

Plumb and Plumber

In case any of you missed the debates last night because, you know, they're pointless and if you are intelligent enough to read words than you've already made a decision, I'm here to bring you up to speed on all this "Joe Plumber" talk.

First, here's what it allowed McCain to do:


Get the problem? Obama explicitly said outloud what I, and everyone else you don't listen to, has been trying to get across: Obama is a socialist with plans for wealth redistribution. His plan and intentions, now vocalized to "Joe Plumber" (he has a real last name but its some kind of crazy Polish or something) is designed mostly to ensure that any thinking Black person with go ahead and vote for him. Most already will soley based on half of Obama's ethnicity (the dark half, to clarify). Don't believe that? Well, Howard Stern is no conservative, and not someone I listen to period, but he did have the guts to do a little social experiment to prove once and for all that Black people (at least in Harlem) are going to vote for Obama regardless, based on his Blackness.


Anyway, here is the full footage of Joe Plumber. Cheers.

Fish in the Hole!

Today I worked on a shoot as a production assistant/fish wrangler.
Yes, I got paid to wrangle fish; catfish to be precise.

I had to find the fish (which was a more complicated task than you might think), transport the fish to our location on the Chattahoochee, keep the fish alive, cue the fish to their positions in an Indian Fish weir I helped to build, then "wrangle" them for the shot which involved a semi-nude Cherokee man fishing with a spear.

One fish was speared through four times on four different takes....and was still alive.

More on this adventure when I have the photos....

More Literally Singing

The hilareniousness continues with the best band ever!

See more funny videos at Funny or Die

You Bwana Read A Story?

"Now he would never write the things that he had saved to write until he knew enough to write them well."

I just read The Snows of Kilimanjaro for the first time tonight and have decided to reevaluate my opinion of Hemingway's writing (my opinion of his person stands.) I am ashamed to say I've never seen the classic film, and at this point I'm glad I didn't until I had read the source material because I honestly cannot imagine how they pulled it off. As a writer, the story struck me as particularly poignant, and almost seemed a call to action....time to pick up the pen so to speak.

Somehow I managed to escape high school, countless college lit and creative writing classes (I minored in English for heaven's sake) without reading any of Hemingway's novels and only a handful of short stories. I had assessed that he was overrated and that his shorts were better than his novels...now I'm not so certain.

Next up is The Sun Also Rises.

Happy Columbus Day

The way events in America have progressed over the past few centuries have left Senior Cristóbal Colón in a position far less favorable then in 1792 when Columbus Day was first celebrated, or even in '34 when FDR made the day a government holiday.

Revisionist history and political correctness have driven the more retarded among our nation to completely discount Columbus as a white, foreign oppressor who invaded a land of peaceful natives and ruined the utopia of the Brown Man. Case in point: Berkley, California replaced Columbus Day with "Indigenous People's Day" which they celebrate with a pow wow and "Native American" market.

Yet, despite the animosity and plain stupidity of California (and most of the Latin American world) Columbus' achievements are still recognized, studied, and admired. In 1992, two high profile biopics were made, one by Ridley Scott. He is a literally sung-about hero in a great deal of American Music, talked about HERE on THREEDONIA. His memory is regarded still, almost as much as despised...and thankfully that means we still have a day to honor him.

Columbus was a man of God, and a man of men. Though he believed until the day he died that he was right about the passage to India he hoped to discover (and almost did on his fourth voyage and trek across Panama), he was able to recognized the enormity of his actions in bringing Western Civilization and Christianity to a world and a people who were yet ignorant in their heathenry. Columbus' story is a fascinating one (the wikipedia entry only barely scratches the surface) and we should all take a moment to consider the man and his accomplishments.

Hoist the Colors.

I love Pirates. Not real maritime criminals like the Filipinos you hear about every so often hijacking freighters and what-have-you, no...I'm talking about mythological Pirates....I'm talking about Jack Sparrow.
A lot of people are with me on this, just look at the box office for the three Pirates of the Caribbean movies, but a lot of those same people hated on the two sequels. I personally love them, and last night had the opportunity to re-watch the last half of At World's End while doing my cardio, and was utterly moved--almost to tears at moments. Sure the movie was overly long (but I don't think that's a bad thing in general) and sure all the double, triple, and quadrupel crosses got to be a bit much, but the movie still has at its heart a great story with great characters. And its just plain entertaining.

This all brings me to the following scene where one of the two weakest characters from the film (Will and Elizabeth) gives an insperational speech that makes me want to go out and do battle right now with anybody and everybody that would stand in my way.


Elizabeth and Will's story was one of the plot lines that really made the last two films drag a bit, but the pay off in the climax of At World's End is beautiful. The wedding in the middle of the battle with Barbossa preciding is one of the most inspired (albeit absurd) weddings in movie history, and the emotional bang of Jack saving Will by having him stab Davy Jones' heart is pitch perfect.

I'm excited that Pirates 4 is in the works, without Bloom and Knightley, but with Depp firmly in place. Jack is the star of the show, and the fourth movie has a boatload of potential.

Friday Batman

I Can Has....Catzburger?

I always new Peruvians weren't to be trusted already housepets.
Apparently, there is a "cat eating" festival in some backwards hamlet outside of Lima ever year.
Watch the video (I can't embed). At the end you can laugh along with images of (mostly) dudes chowing down on catburgers and fried cat legs.

WATCH THE MADNESS HERE.

The Darkhorse or When Presidents Weren't Socialist Windbags

Remember this man? That's right, its James K. Polk. He was unpopular because of a war....with Mexico! He literally commanded US troops to invade Mexico (and congress overwhelmingly support the declaration). We did invade, captured Mexico City, and then....inexplicably gave it back. But not after acquiring HALF of Mexico's land mass (granted, we could have had it all). The ole Darkhorse had the right idea on how to deal with illegal immigration.

Look at all the land we took! Awesome!

Oh, and he tried to buy Cuba from Spain, and was actually successful in running the British out of our Northwest corner, now known as the States of Oregon, Washington, and Idaho.

More land for us, Huzzah!

October is Australia Month #3

I made some changes on the blog chronically my Australia journey, and plan to update it some more to make it a smoother read. I even have plans to adapt it into a screenplay. I've got Christian Bale in mind for the lead.

In other Australia news, those intrepid Aussies have discovered "hundreds" of new marine species in the Southern Ocean, 100 nautical miles off Tasmania.

"A total of 274 species of fish, ancient corals, molluscs, crustaceans and sponges new to science were found in icy waters up to 3,000 metres (9,800 feet) deep among extinct volcanoes."

Here is a related video. Listen for the obligatory "global warming" nonsense.

New Species on Australian Reefs from NTDTV on Vimeo.

Debatoraide

It became painfully clear to me after watching last nights Presidential debate that ultimately we lose no matter who wins. That isn't to say that it doesn't matter which candidate gets elected; it certainly does. I have demonstrated on this blog (or attempted to), and so have many wiser than myself, how Barak Obama is a Neo-Marxist and would do everything in his power to make the situation for rank-and-file, specifically working, White, middle-class Americans even more taxing (literally) and unbearable.

The main problem is that John McCain will not make things better because he refuses to take a position of true reform that would be stripping our national government back down to its roots and return a hefty portion of responsibility back on the states themselves.

The problems with our nation, beyond the obvious crises at hand, are socialist policies and a huge Federal government that over the last two centuries has become bloated and unrecognizable from the Lockian, constitution based hybrid that was brought into being following the ratification of the Constitution in 1787. To get historical, the Confederacy (contrary to what you no doubt here on television or read in history survey textbooks) was established and then fought specifically to avoid the kind of government we now suffer under (a second War of Independence it was called at the time) and as a result of losing only added to the problems by giving Lincoln the opportunity to assume vast amounts of control for the Federal Government from the states. (Oddly enough, the humor site Craked.com gets it right in THIS list. Warning, language.)

Why do I bring this up first?
Listen to the debate again, specifically when the two candidates begin discussing healthcare reform. One of the first things Obama mentions is how he would make healthcare even more of a Federal initiative and not make it so people "have to take their money" "across state lines." McCain immediately came back with his belief that there is nothing wrong with giving States the option to enforce their own employer-based healthcare initiatives (an issue that is, in all reality none of the governments concern). When it was Obama's turn again, he even more vehemently attacked such a notion. Such a belief is indicative of Obama's biggest problem--he wants to grow the already overblown Federal Government to control every aspect of our lives while in the process removing what little rights States have left continuing the legacy of his heroes: Licoln, FDR, Clinton.

The United States Government should not, and was never intended to be, a social-wealthfare state. Yet every "issue" Obama is running on, and the reasons people will vote for him, are adding to or creating new social wellfare programs (wealth-redistribution, health care for everyone as a "right", government ensured retirement-housing-education, etc.) Obama wants the government to take care of you, because he (like all Democrats) believe they know best, and he'd be sitting right there at the top calling the shots.

McCain too is on board with a lot of the same retarded promises Obama is making, only he is making them differently. When healthcare came up, McCain as a true republican should have brushed the question off as irrelevant to the Presidency. Last night he proposed his plan to buy bad mortgages and sell them bad at the current value of the home. I about threw-up when I heard him say that. Nowhere in the constitution is the government given that kind of power, or incentive. Yet the "bailout" bill both candidates supported (and continue to laud) gives Washington just that ability--and far more. At least McCain didn't go so far as to call healthcare a "right."

People do have certain inalienable rights according to the men who fashioned this great nation, and unless I'm mistaken healthcare, education, retirement, and housing are not among them.

The Sun Rising

My favorite poem from my favorite metaphysical poet.

THE SUN RISING by John Donne

BUSY old fool, unruly Sun,
Why dost thou thus,
Through windows, and through curtains, call on us ?
Must to thy motions lovers' seasons run ?
Saucy pedantic wretch, go chide
Late school-boys and sour prentices,
Go tell court-huntsmen that the king will ride,
Call country ants to harvest offices ;
Love, all alike, no season knows nor clime,
Nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.

Thy beams so reverend, and strong
Why shouldst thou think ?
I could eclipse and cloud them with a wink,
But that I would not lose her sight so long.
If her eyes have not blinded thine,
Look, and to-morrow late tell me,
Whether both th' Indias of spice and mine
Be where thou left'st them, or lie here with me.
Ask for those kings whom thou saw'st yesterday,
And thou shalt hear, "All here in one bed lay."

She's all states, and all princes I ;
Nothing else is ;
Princes do but play us ; compared to this,
All honour's mimic, all wealth alchemy.
Thou, Sun, art half as happy as we,
In that the world's contracted thus ;
Thine age asks ease, and since thy duties be
To warm the world, that's done in warming us.
Shine here to us, and thou art everywhere ;
This bed thy center is, these walls thy sphere.

You've Got the ID10T Error

I have a day job, like many Americans. Contrary to popular belief, my life isn't all moviefilms and magic (only about a third is, actually.) Nine to Five (roughly) Mon-Fri I work as an IT Tech for Systems Support at the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies. It's an easy job, which is good because I'm a temporary employee that's been here for two and a half years (yep, low pay and no benefits.)

Anyway, you deal with stupid problem in Systems Support....really stupid problems. Even in today's technologically advanced world, people are still mystified by PCs....but apparently, tech problems have been going on since way before computers were even invented.
At least, according to this documentary I found:

Literally Singing

This is hilarious, and genius. Hilarenius.

See more funny videos at Funny or Die

Go West Young Conservative

This weekend I sold a kidney and went to the cinema twice to check out two very different, but very exciting offerings. The first was the new spoof-esque, conservative satire An American Carol from David Zucker (Airplane!). Zucker is a Hollywood Jew who comes from a super-Lib entertainment family and was a Leftist himself until a self-proclaimed conversion following the 9/11 attacks.

The movie was the first real conservative comedy in ages, taking direct shots at the ACLU, the university system, anti-war hysteria, etc. I went opening night with a friend because we both wanted to support such a cause, but we weren't expecting much.

Well, suffice to say the movie exceeded my expectations. It was incredibly funny, and full of resoundingly true satire that exposes the Left and its varied agendas as empty, un-American tripe. Unfortunately in a business sense, the best jokes were the most "conservative" based, the rest of the bits being straight slap-stick which is hit or miss in the best of comedy's, but is mainly miss in Carol. I support this movie, and think that just about anyone, even self-styled Liberals (Mr. Craft) can find a great amount to enjoy. However, as good as the picture turned out to be for me, it really is not going to do very well (current Box Office has it just above Mahr's Religulous at the nine spot with around 4 million.) For most conservatives who would go see this sort of thing--I'm talking the family, main-stream, Christian sort--its going to come off as too offensive in the language/content department (there is a child whose shtick is saying "ass" and "asshole" repeatedly...he also appeared in Hancock doing the same thing.). As with Airplane, Naked Gun, and other films like it, Carol is aimed at the male twenty-somethings who don't really take comedy seriously unless there are a few profanities inserted strategically. It's a shame, because I think the film could have done very well had it been toned down a little for the sake of its core, middle-American audience.

For a good, over-all review check Dirty Harry's take HERE.


The second film I saw was the new western APPALOOSA, directed by and starring Ed Harris. By far this is the best film I have seen since The Dark Knight, and the best western since The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford last year. Like Assassination, Appaloosa is an intensely realistic film, both in its depictions of period life (down to minute detail) and the speech of its characters. However, unlike the remake of 3:10 to Yuma (another great recent western) the violence is not stylized. Don't get me wrong, the gunshots in the film are visceral, but not super-bloody and overblown. Like I said, realism is the key and Appaloosa strikes the perfect balance.

Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen are excellent as the leads, which is important because the film is essentially a buddy picture with western tropes. I was reminded of Peckinpah's transcendent classic Ride the High Country. Like Randolph Scott and Joel McRae, Harris and Mortensen were born to be in westerns, and Jeremy Irons as the villian is pitch perfect. The way Irons is able to turn off his accent but still growl in that gravelly basso never ceases to impress. Renee Zell-whatever is the love interest, and the fulcrum on which the balance of the story rests, and as such she is serviceable...but not great. She thankfully doesn't descend to much into her Cold Mountain character, but she never is very convincing.

I was worried at the outset that I was in for a "modern"or "revisionist" western along the lines of Unforgiven (an excellent film, don't get me wrong) not knowing what to expect from Harris. My fears were in vain however, because Appaloosa turned out to be very classical in its story, with clear cut good guys vs. bad guys. There was even a little cowboy vs. Indian action thrown in. Also worth mentioning is the soundtrack. All of the recent westerns (The Proposition, Assasination, Yuma) have been outstanding in regards to music, and Appaloosa is no exception. The score is reminiscent of classic westerns, spiced up with a bit of period flare (banjo, baby). Although the Tom Petty song over the end credits was a bit odd...

Ultimately, Appaloosa is the film I'm must recommend (and thankfully its making some money, currently 5th at the BO). The story is engaging, the acting fantastic, and the action is beautifully staged and quite understated (not bombastic like Yuma, but not as laconic as Assassination.)

Go see Appaloosa.