The vile filth coming out of Wall Street lately has my mind reeling. Both in the sheer amount of it and in the utter depravity that falls under the aegis of banking and investment. Today Greg Smith became the former executive director and head of Goldman Sachs' United States equity derivatives business in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. He explained his departure in the New York Times, of all places. He seems to be the lone big wig in the industry to have tired of the drive for short-term profits and the exaltation of greed as a cardinal virtue. Smith laments how the ethos of Goldman Sachs has deteriorated from serving the customer to screwing the customer.
I attend derivatives sales meetings where not one single minute is spent asking questions about how we can help clients. It’s purely about how we can make the most possible money off of them.
It makes me ill how callously people talk about ripping their clients off. Over the last 12 months I have seen five different managing directors refer to their own clients as “muppets,” sometimes over internal e-mail. Even after the S.E.C., Fabulous Fab, Abacus, God’s work, Carl Levin, Vampire Squids? No humility? I mean, come on. Integrity? It is eroding. I don’t know of any illegal behavior, but will people push the envelope and pitch lucrative and complicated products to clients even if they are not the simplest investments or the ones most directly aligned with the client’s goals? Absolutely. Every day, in fact.
Matt Taibbi's take on Smith's jeremiad just made it more depressing. According to him, no regulations, no lawsuits, and no Occupy protests could ever change what he calls the "screw-your-clients, screw-everybody, grab-what-you-can culture of the modern financial services industry". Instead, he says, "Real change was always going to have to come from within Wall Street itself." If true, then millions of people and their families are at the mercy of Wall Street even more so than they are now. Hell, billions. It means that We the People are powerless. It means that we live in a plutocracy and, if we are lucky, we may be the beneficiaries of a little noblesse oblige. If we're lucky.
I don't know what effect Smith's resignation will have. Maybe his former employer will take heed and change. Then again, maybe it won't. Perhaps other Wall Street firms will act on his admonition but, then again, maybe not. There are a lot of angry guys out there who are pissed because they're doing dishes by hand and Goddess knows we can't have investment banker types doing that. It's why Rome fell. (Where's Madge when you need her?) So, short of nuking Wall Street from orbit, there's not much we can do.
And what have they been up to? With the Attorney General foreclosure settlement terms having been made public as well as at least some of the results of the HUD Inspector General's investigation, we now know more of just what those pecunious gundyguts have done, continue to do, and will be able to do in the future.
Let's start with how "the mortgage settlement lets banks systematically overcharge you and wrongly take your home. According to Abigail Field, there is a threshold for error in loans so any fuck-ups on the part of the banks up to that threshold don't count and don't have to be reported. Furthermore only "reportable" errors get tallied.
Imagine your household income is $80,000. Imagine that at $80k the bank’s formula says you get a modification and thus you can keep your house. But the bank doesn’t use $80k in its math; it uses $77,000. So the computer rejects you, and you lose your home to foreclosure. Does law enforcement care about the bankers wrecking-your-life error? No, because the $3,000 error, while enough to deny you the mod, isn’t 5% of your income. So the error was too small to count.
It’s not enough for the B.O.B.s to make such a big mistake when they rejected you for a mod and foreclosed that the error is “reportable”. They have to make 5 reportable errors in every hundred files reviewed before they get in trouble! Since the B.O.B.s (Bailed Out Bankers)are dealing with millions of people seeking mods, that’s a lot of A-OK big mistakes–50,000 for every million mod applications.
She notes many more ways banks can screw over customers before suggesting that "maybe we should start asking if the banks as too big to be competent." The lesson here is that banks can overcharge and illegally foreclose on homes up to a certain point before our government will do anything about it.
Isaac Gradman, a lawyer, reviewed the settlement. He notes that it lays out the misconduct of the banks: providing false or misleading information to borrowers, overcharging borrowers and investors for services of dubious value, lying to borrowers about the reasons for denying their loan mods, signing affidavits without personal knowledge and under false identities, and so on. Yet banks don't have to admit guilt.
It also looks like very few homeowners will receive relief out of the $17 billion dedicated to that cause:
The first problem is that, as the Wall Street Journal recently noted, the actual amount of loan forgiveness isn’t large relative to the problem of underwater debt. The WSJ attributes to Ted Gayer, co-director of economic studies at the Brookings Institution, the estimate that the settlement’s complex set of requirements mean that about 500,000 borrowers, or 5% of those who are underwater, may be eligible for help.
He also mentioned how banks can get credit towards that $17 billion by modifying loans and a potentially unintended consequence.
It would be one thing if banks shared in the cost of modifying a loan in securitization, and the credit was proportionate to the cost they paid. But aside from transaction costs, banks absorb not one cent of a reduction of principal or interest on a loan held by investors. Thus, by giving banks the opportunity to pay their settlement amount with investors’ money, regulators may be encouraging banks to modify twice as many loans, but they are also encouraging banks to impose the costs of those loan mods on the investors who had absolutely nothing to do with these servicing atrocities. (Emphasis his.)
Matt Stoller reports that Wells Fargo continues to robosign. And worse:
But I think the most interesting parts of the document release were the HUD Inspector General reports on the five banks and the DOJ complaint. What these prove is what we’ve always known – the law enforcement community knew exactly what these banks were doing. DOJ simply chose not to prosecute.
I guess Eric Holder was too busy figuring out how Obama and the Cigarette Smoking man from X-Files chatting in a dark room counts as due process.
Stoller also says that "Bank of America would not comply with subpoenas."
Indeed, David Doyen wrote a post called ”Obstruction of Justice a Feature of Bank Interaction with Foreclosure Fraud Investigators” in which he details some of the ways the banks impeded the HUD investigation. He notes like Stoller that the DOJ sat on info of crimes and preferred, in his words, “to use it to negotiate a settlement than in a criminal inquiry.”
Wasn't it Obama who said, “What Wall Street did was immoral, but it wasn’t illegal”?
Dayen points out this doozy from the investigation:
We reviewed 36 affidavits for foreclosures in judicial States to determine whether the amounts of borrowers’ indebtedness were supported. Chase was unable to provide documentation for the amounts of borrowers’ indebtedness listed on the affidavits for all except four. When we reviewed the four affidavits, three were inaccurate. Specifically, the amounts of the borrowers’ late charges and accumulated interest did not reconcile with the information in Chase’s mortgage servicing system.
A 97.22% fuck up rate. And we bailed these douchbags out?
Lastly, American Banker began a multi-part series on Tuesday delving into how the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency is investigating JP Morgan Chase for issues in their credit card unit. The first part of the series is here and you can read blog posts about it from Matt Taibbi, Yves Smith, and David Dayen.
The upshot is thus. A whistleblower named Linda Almonte came forth accusing JP Morgan Chase of
1. Chase Bank sold to third party debt buyers hundreds of millions of dollars worth of credit card accounts. . .when in fact Chase Bank executives knew that many of those accounts had incorrect and overstated balances.
2. Chase Bank executives routinely destroyed information and communications from consumers rather than incorporate that information into the consumer’s credit card file, including bankruptcy notices, powers of attorney, notice of cancellation of auto-pay, proof of payments and letters from debt settlement companies.
3. Chase Bank executives mass-executed thousands of affidavits in support of Chase Banks collection efforts and those Chase Bank executives did not have personal knowledge of the facts set forth in the affidavits.
After a couple years or so it appears a regulatory agency is finally looking into the matter and, furthermore, it seems that these practices continue.
What chance do lower and middle class people have if Wall Street entities can basically make shit up and pass it off on someone else for a profit and only get a slap on the wrist from the Feds? We are fucked six ways til Sunday and sitting around hoping for more Greg Smiths to have an effect is the coldest of comforts.
14 March, 2012
The Ladies Just Don't Get No Respect
Considering that Julaine Appling and her ilk scored a victory yesterday when the Assembly passed a bill "that would ban abortion coverage from policies obtained through a health insurance exchange to be set up under the federal health care reform law".
But I suppose it could be worse. Take Kansas where legislators want to excuse doctors who refuse to tell women that their foetuses will be born with congenital birth defects.
This Get Out of Jail Free For Being an Asshole card is tucked away in in what is apparently called the No Taxpayer Money for Abortions Act. So taxpayer money can't be spent on abortions but can be spent on dropping bombs on children. I get it. Wait, no I don't.
Now I read that Arizona not only wants to make sure that employers of all stripes can deny insurance coverage for birth control to employees but is also looking to give employers the right to fire women who use birth control.
Arizona legislators know that whether or not her insurance covers it, a woman may get the prescription she needs to prevent an unintended pregnancy. They want to give her boss the right to control that too. The bill they are pushing would not only allow employers to take the insurance coverage away, but it would also make it easier for an employer who finds out that his employee uses birth control to fire her.
Apparently only women get to have this hanging over their heads. The article isn't totally clear on this point but I'm thinking that men who have a condom fall out of their pocket (unused, that is) in front of their bosses don't have to worry.
It can't be long before some state mandates that women view their foetus via an IMAX 3D camera used intravaginally before obtaining an abortion. And no taxpayer money for the camera either.
But I suppose it could be worse. Take Kansas where legislators want to excuse doctors who refuse to tell women that their foetuses will be born with congenital birth defects.
This Get Out of Jail Free For Being an Asshole card is tucked away in in what is apparently called the No Taxpayer Money for Abortions Act. So taxpayer money can't be spent on abortions but can be spent on dropping bombs on children. I get it. Wait, no I don't.
Now I read that Arizona not only wants to make sure that employers of all stripes can deny insurance coverage for birth control to employees but is also looking to give employers the right to fire women who use birth control.
Arizona legislators know that whether or not her insurance covers it, a woman may get the prescription she needs to prevent an unintended pregnancy. They want to give her boss the right to control that too. The bill they are pushing would not only allow employers to take the insurance coverage away, but it would also make it easier for an employer who finds out that his employee uses birth control to fire her.
Apparently only women get to have this hanging over their heads. The article isn't totally clear on this point but I'm thinking that men who have a condom fall out of their pocket (unused, that is) in front of their bosses don't have to worry.
It can't be long before some state mandates that women view their foetus via an IMAX 3D camera used intravaginally before obtaining an abortion. And no taxpayer money for the camera either.
Twitter: Now With More Gay Bashing
That Jonathan Franzen cat may be onto something when it comes to Twitter.
He may think Twitter merely "unspeakably irritating" but "100 Real Tweets from Homophobes Who Would Murder Their Gay Child" is just heinous. Nazi comparisons seem pretty apt here.
What the fuck does "mi ahh fi" mean? "Sleep in the oven". Nice. Do you think Storm Jones hangs out at Stormfront much? Here's another classic: "#ToMyUnbornChild if your a girl i will drown you in the bathtub, and if your a guy and your turn into a faggot ill kill you" Jeez. It's not enough to want to kill your gay son but you also can't stand the thought of having a daughter regardless if she turns out to be a breeder or not. Didn't mommy show you enough attention when you were little?
And, hey you knuckle-dragging half-literate fucks, learn contractions! "Your" is a possessive pronoun while "you're" = "you are". Get it? The apostrophe takes the place of the "a" and a space.
How many of these people are Christians, do you suppose?
He may think Twitter merely "unspeakably irritating" but "100 Real Tweets from Homophobes Who Would Murder Their Gay Child" is just heinous. Nazi comparisons seem pretty apt here.
What the fuck does "mi ahh fi" mean? "Sleep in the oven". Nice. Do you think Storm Jones hangs out at Stormfront much? Here's another classic: "#ToMyUnbornChild if your a girl i will drown you in the bathtub, and if your a guy and your turn into a faggot ill kill you" Jeez. It's not enough to want to kill your gay son but you also can't stand the thought of having a daughter regardless if she turns out to be a breeder or not. Didn't mommy show you enough attention when you were little?
And, hey you knuckle-dragging half-literate fucks, learn contractions! "Your" is a possessive pronoun while "you're" = "you are". Get it? The apostrophe takes the place of the "a" and a space.
How many of these people are Christians, do you suppose?
Stem the Tide
OK all you market-loving libertarians. If the market is so great as to be worshiped because it allows rational actors to fulfill their needs and desires, why is there a black market for Tide laundry detergent? Not Wisk, not All but Tide?
Law enforcement officials across the country are puzzled over a crime wave targeting an unlikely item: Tide laundry detergent.
Theft of Tide detergent has become so rampant that authorities from New York to Oregon are keeping tabs on the soap spree, and some cities are setting up special task forces to stop it. And retailers like CVS are taking special security precautions to lock down the liquid.
...
He and other law enforcement officials across the country say Tide theft is connected to the drug trade. In fact, a recent drug sting turned up more Tide that cocaine.
“We sent in an informant to buy drugs. The dealer said, ‘I don’t have drugs, but I could sell you 15 bottles of Tide,’ ” Sprague told The Daily. “Upstairs in the drug dealer’s bedroom was about 14 bottles of Tide laundry soap. We think [users] are trading it for drugs.”
Maybe Tide should be banned. That way no one can steal it from stores.
Law enforcement officials across the country are puzzled over a crime wave targeting an unlikely item: Tide laundry detergent.
Theft of Tide detergent has become so rampant that authorities from New York to Oregon are keeping tabs on the soap spree, and some cities are setting up special task forces to stop it. And retailers like CVS are taking special security precautions to lock down the liquid.
...
He and other law enforcement officials across the country say Tide theft is connected to the drug trade. In fact, a recent drug sting turned up more Tide that cocaine.
“We sent in an informant to buy drugs. The dealer said, ‘I don’t have drugs, but I could sell you 15 bottles of Tide,’ ” Sprague told The Daily. “Upstairs in the drug dealer’s bedroom was about 14 bottles of Tide laundry soap. We think [users] are trading it for drugs.”
Maybe Tide should be banned. That way no one can steal it from stores.
"something's neither good nor bad but thinking makes it so"
Errol Morris is apparently making what promises to be a sequel of sorts to The Fog of War - a movie about Donald Rumsfeld.
“Errol has the magic of getting people to talk about everything,” says one studio chief who knows Morris well. “And they’ll sit until things go wrong.”
I wonder what lines by T.S. Eliot Rumsfeld will quote. "We are the hollow men/We are the stuffed men," perhaps?
“Errol has the magic of getting people to talk about everything,” says one studio chief who knows Morris well. “And they’ll sit until things go wrong.”
I wonder what lines by T.S. Eliot Rumsfeld will quote. "We are the hollow men/We are the stuffed men," perhaps?
13 March, 2012
Wisconsin Craft Brewers in Competition?
The State Journal recently published an article called "Wisconsin a hotbed for craft brewing". It was nice to see Tanner Brethorst and his soon to open Port Huron Brewing Co. in the Dells get some press along with other various craft brewers.
What caught my eye was this:
“We’re not going after each other. It’s about chipping away at that other 92 percent,” Brethorst said while seated in his still-unfinished tasting room. “I really don’t care how many breweries start up.”
I read this just after reading this Tweet at the Beer Wars Twitter feed. It gives the following statistics: "From 2009 to 2011, there are 22% more breweries, 25% more packages and only 3.6% more shelf space."
So while I can understand that the craft brewers in Wisconsin aren't intentionally going out to lure customers away from each other, there is a finite amount of shelf space. So I can see one craft brew pushing out another. I don't know that this has ever happened here in Wisconsin but it seems possible and more likely as more craft breweries start up.
What caught my eye was this:
“We’re not going after each other. It’s about chipping away at that other 92 percent,” Brethorst said while seated in his still-unfinished tasting room. “I really don’t care how many breweries start up.”
I read this just after reading this Tweet at the Beer Wars Twitter feed. It gives the following statistics: "From 2009 to 2011, there are 22% more breweries, 25% more packages and only 3.6% more shelf space."
So while I can understand that the craft brewers in Wisconsin aren't intentionally going out to lure customers away from each other, there is a finite amount of shelf space. So I can see one craft brew pushing out another. I don't know that this has ever happened here in Wisconsin but it seems possible and more likely as more craft breweries start up.
12 March, 2012
Gluttony at Czerwone Jabłuszko
The Dulcinea and I ate well in Chicago. Breakfast was at Tuxpan where we had lunch back in the fall. This time they had a large glass crock of escabeche. I noticed white blotches in it and found that they were cauliflower and onion. Holy crap did that look good.
Before heading home, we had dinner at Czerwone Jabłuszko (Red Apple).
It's an all-you-can-eat Polish buffet and I feared that I would lapse into a food coma while driving home on the Interstate. Since I am writing this, you know I avoided that fate.
The front of the house staff were all Polish women but luckily everyone seemed to be bilingual which was a big plus since the only Polish I know is "Tak" and "Dziekuje". The waitstaff were dressed in what looked like faux Polish peasant dresses.
They bill their coffee as the best in town. It wasn't all that but was certainly better than at most buffets. The waitress started us off with a choice of soup: chicken noodle or mushroom. I went with the former and The D with the latter. I was impressed. The broth wasn't made from prison base and had a goodly amount of kluski floating in it. The report on the mushroom soup was that it was mediocre. Tasted like canned mushrooms.
While other buffets have more square feet of buffet than Czerwone Jabłuszko, they made good use of the more than adequate space they had. Pierogi, blintzes, goblaki, roast chicken quarters, fried chicken, whole roasted turkey(?) you slice yourself, a ham for your slicing pleasure, and roast duck. Boiled potatoes, mashed potatoes, potato pancakes. Beef rolls, schnitzel, lamb, kielbasa...and so on. Here's my first plate:
That's meat pierogi, a potato pancake, beef tongue in horseradish sauce, sauerkraut, and a boiled potato. The tongue was very tender. The sauce could have used a bit more horseradish for my taste but I love the stuff. Unfortunately they only had 2 kinds of pierogi available, meat and strawberry. But I guess I can't complain since it's been a long time since I've had decent pierogi.
My second plate:
The cucumber salad was great. Next to it is a sweet cabbage salad made with oranges. Underneath that cheese blintz is a three or four bean salad. The big hoolie is a breaded pork cutlet while the smaller lump was billed as "schnitzel". The cutlet wasn't seasoned very much so I gave it a good dollop of pepper and lots or lemon juice. On the other hand, the wienerschnitzel was very well seasoned. It had salt and pepper and probably garlic and another seasoning I couldn't identify although it was familiar.
The D loves beets and she had them fried and pickled. Here's a bit of the latter still left on one of her plates:
There's also a piece of fried fish as well as some cucumber and tomato salads.
While the buffet was heavy on the flesh and starch, the salad bar was no slouch. In addition to the ones above, there was potato salad, cole slaw, a creamy pasta salad, and more that I cannot recall. I didn't have a lettuce salad but there were plenty of vegetables to be had for one. But I suppose even the salad bar had to have meat as I spied something that looked like Leberkäse.
I wondered if Polish buffets had chocolate pudding from a #10 can like Chinese buffets do and I can report that they do. And there was a goodly selection of fruit as well. (Plus ambrosia.)
For dessert our waitress offered ice cream: vanilla or vanilla with a chocolate swirl. The D got the plain variety and she also grabbed a couple slices of cake. The ice cream was serviceable. I sampled the cheesecake and it was very good. Polish cheesecakes tend not to be slices of solid cheese but rather have it mixed into a batter. It's still very light with the creaminess of the cheese sitting side by side with the fluffiness of the cake.
Despite the odd misstep, the food was very good. I'd been hankering for Polish food and it was nice to be able to sample a bit of this and a slice of that instead of committing myself to a particular dish. It reminded me that I should cook with dill more often. I also appreciated that there wasn't much in the way of concessions to American food. All I can recall is a pan of BBQ ribs.
It is $14.99 for dinner on weekends and there is a full bar.
Before heading home, we had dinner at Czerwone Jabłuszko (Red Apple).
It's an all-you-can-eat Polish buffet and I feared that I would lapse into a food coma while driving home on the Interstate. Since I am writing this, you know I avoided that fate.
The front of the house staff were all Polish women but luckily everyone seemed to be bilingual which was a big plus since the only Polish I know is "Tak" and "Dziekuje". The waitstaff were dressed in what looked like faux Polish peasant dresses.
They bill their coffee as the best in town. It wasn't all that but was certainly better than at most buffets. The waitress started us off with a choice of soup: chicken noodle or mushroom. I went with the former and The D with the latter. I was impressed. The broth wasn't made from prison base and had a goodly amount of kluski floating in it. The report on the mushroom soup was that it was mediocre. Tasted like canned mushrooms.
While other buffets have more square feet of buffet than Czerwone Jabłuszko, they made good use of the more than adequate space they had. Pierogi, blintzes, goblaki, roast chicken quarters, fried chicken, whole roasted turkey(?) you slice yourself, a ham for your slicing pleasure, and roast duck. Boiled potatoes, mashed potatoes, potato pancakes. Beef rolls, schnitzel, lamb, kielbasa...and so on. Here's my first plate:
That's meat pierogi, a potato pancake, beef tongue in horseradish sauce, sauerkraut, and a boiled potato. The tongue was very tender. The sauce could have used a bit more horseradish for my taste but I love the stuff. Unfortunately they only had 2 kinds of pierogi available, meat and strawberry. But I guess I can't complain since it's been a long time since I've had decent pierogi.
My second plate:
The cucumber salad was great. Next to it is a sweet cabbage salad made with oranges. Underneath that cheese blintz is a three or four bean salad. The big hoolie is a breaded pork cutlet while the smaller lump was billed as "schnitzel". The cutlet wasn't seasoned very much so I gave it a good dollop of pepper and lots or lemon juice. On the other hand, the wienerschnitzel was very well seasoned. It had salt and pepper and probably garlic and another seasoning I couldn't identify although it was familiar.
The D loves beets and she had them fried and pickled. Here's a bit of the latter still left on one of her plates:
There's also a piece of fried fish as well as some cucumber and tomato salads.
While the buffet was heavy on the flesh and starch, the salad bar was no slouch. In addition to the ones above, there was potato salad, cole slaw, a creamy pasta salad, and more that I cannot recall. I didn't have a lettuce salad but there were plenty of vegetables to be had for one. But I suppose even the salad bar had to have meat as I spied something that looked like Leberkäse.
I wondered if Polish buffets had chocolate pudding from a #10 can like Chinese buffets do and I can report that they do. And there was a goodly selection of fruit as well. (Plus ambrosia.)
For dessert our waitress offered ice cream: vanilla or vanilla with a chocolate swirl. The D got the plain variety and she also grabbed a couple slices of cake. The ice cream was serviceable. I sampled the cheesecake and it was very good. Polish cheesecakes tend not to be slices of solid cheese but rather have it mixed into a batter. It's still very light with the creaminess of the cheese sitting side by side with the fluffiness of the cake.
Despite the odd misstep, the food was very good. I'd been hankering for Polish food and it was nice to be able to sample a bit of this and a slice of that instead of committing myself to a particular dish. It reminded me that I should cook with dill more often. I also appreciated that there wasn't much in the way of concessions to American food. All I can recall is a pan of BBQ ribs.
It is $14.99 for dinner on weekends and there is a full bar.
A Woman in Trouble - Kill Me by WildClaw Theater
The Dulcinea and I went to see WildClaw Theatre's Kill Me over the weekend. The play was written by Scott Barsotti who also wrote The Revenants which WildClaw performed a few years ago.
The play concerns Cam (Sasha Gioppo) who is involved in a car accident and is thrust into a coma. Upon waking she is seemingly fine but is plagued by dreams and becomes convinced that she is immortal. Multiple failed attempts at shedding her mortal coil only serve to reinforce her conviction that she cannot die.
Caught in the maelstrom are Cam's lover, Grace (ably played by understudy Carly Ciarrocchi) and her sister, Wendy (Casey Cunningham). Both are pushed to their own limits by their loved one's behavior. For her part, Grace is mostly uncomprehending. She wants to help but is impotent to do so. One of her more revealing lines comes when Cam is paranoid that someone is out to get her and Grace can only plead "No one is coming for you" seemingly oblivious to the double entendre.
Wendy is a psychologist by trade and approaches the subject of her sister's illness from a strictly medical perspective. For her, Cam is simply suffering from mental illness and needs treatment. As Cam's behavior progresses from bad to worse, Wendy realizes that neither she nor Grace can handle her sister and suggests she be put into a mental health treatment facility. This profoundly irritates Cam who dredges up memories from their childhood that pierce Wendy's clinical facade.
In addition to being about the relationships that these three women have, the play also addresses Cam's interior states and does so in a very novel way. The front of the stage was open with three bare bulbs hanging down interrogation room style and this is where Cam, Grace, and Wendy spent most of their time. At the back was what looked like an old dungeon wall. Leaning against it were the guts of a piano - a soundboard and the strings. The Greek may have had three Fates but Cam has four Miseries: Paranoia, Dread, Angst, and Despair. These four characters alternately lurk in the shadows and tread or slither about the stage where they cozy up to our protagonists so as to influence their behavior. In a wonderful bit of staging, they'd often times play their infernal symphony on those strings propped up against the wall. The Miseries' costumes are also notable with Pinhead being an influence for Despair and a sinister ebony jester's outfit for Paranoia.
The Dulcinea gave praise for how the Miseries were omnipresent even if on the periphery. She also appreciated that the protagonists were all women. Gioppo, Cunningham, and Ciarrocchi deserve a lot of credit for their rapid-fire dialogue which was perfectly in sync. Both of Barsotti's plays that WildClaw have done are on the intimate side. He emphasizes small groups of protagonists and confined bases whether it be a basement as in The Revenants or the nebulous yet claustrophobic arena where Cam, Grace, and Wendy spill out their passionate madness.
My only complaint is that there were a few too many times when flashbacks were given to us via dialogue instead of being acted out. One scene depicted an incident from Cam and Wendy's childhood. The latter is at the front of the stage on her knees crying with a light shining up from the floor like Genesis used during "Mama" when Phil Collins would do that demonic laugh while the former is on all fours behind her with a look of pure evil on her face. Kill Me could have used a couple more scenes like this. Seeing a character's face in the throes of agony here is more potent than having her recount an event with the cold, even tone of a psychologist.
Despite this, Kill Me was an intense and often times moving experience.
The play concerns Cam (Sasha Gioppo) who is involved in a car accident and is thrust into a coma. Upon waking she is seemingly fine but is plagued by dreams and becomes convinced that she is immortal. Multiple failed attempts at shedding her mortal coil only serve to reinforce her conviction that she cannot die.
Caught in the maelstrom are Cam's lover, Grace (ably played by understudy Carly Ciarrocchi) and her sister, Wendy (Casey Cunningham). Both are pushed to their own limits by their loved one's behavior. For her part, Grace is mostly uncomprehending. She wants to help but is impotent to do so. One of her more revealing lines comes when Cam is paranoid that someone is out to get her and Grace can only plead "No one is coming for you" seemingly oblivious to the double entendre.
Wendy is a psychologist by trade and approaches the subject of her sister's illness from a strictly medical perspective. For her, Cam is simply suffering from mental illness and needs treatment. As Cam's behavior progresses from bad to worse, Wendy realizes that neither she nor Grace can handle her sister and suggests she be put into a mental health treatment facility. This profoundly irritates Cam who dredges up memories from their childhood that pierce Wendy's clinical facade.
In addition to being about the relationships that these three women have, the play also addresses Cam's interior states and does so in a very novel way. The front of the stage was open with three bare bulbs hanging down interrogation room style and this is where Cam, Grace, and Wendy spent most of their time. At the back was what looked like an old dungeon wall. Leaning against it were the guts of a piano - a soundboard and the strings. The Greek may have had three Fates but Cam has four Miseries: Paranoia, Dread, Angst, and Despair. These four characters alternately lurk in the shadows and tread or slither about the stage where they cozy up to our protagonists so as to influence their behavior. In a wonderful bit of staging, they'd often times play their infernal symphony on those strings propped up against the wall. The Miseries' costumes are also notable with Pinhead being an influence for Despair and a sinister ebony jester's outfit for Paranoia.
The Dulcinea gave praise for how the Miseries were omnipresent even if on the periphery. She also appreciated that the protagonists were all women. Gioppo, Cunningham, and Ciarrocchi deserve a lot of credit for their rapid-fire dialogue which was perfectly in sync. Both of Barsotti's plays that WildClaw have done are on the intimate side. He emphasizes small groups of protagonists and confined bases whether it be a basement as in The Revenants or the nebulous yet claustrophobic arena where Cam, Grace, and Wendy spill out their passionate madness.
My only complaint is that there were a few too many times when flashbacks were given to us via dialogue instead of being acted out. One scene depicted an incident from Cam and Wendy's childhood. The latter is at the front of the stage on her knees crying with a light shining up from the floor like Genesis used during "Mama" when Phil Collins would do that demonic laugh while the former is on all fours behind her with a look of pure evil on her face. Kill Me could have used a couple more scenes like this. Seeing a character's face in the throes of agony here is more potent than having her recount an event with the cold, even tone of a psychologist.
Despite this, Kill Me was an intense and often times moving experience.
08 March, 2012
Mumbo Jumbo by Ishmael Reed
Ishmael Reed's Mumbo Jumbo is one of the most difficult novels I've read in a long time. I suppose you can label it post-modern or avant-garde by virtue of his use of different typestyles to offset certain passages of text, the use of cardinal numbers instead of words (e.g. – "1" instead of "one"), footnotes, quotes from other texts, and even asides signed by the author himself. In addition to the mish-mash of stylistic elements, the book pulls in a lot of history and mythology making it a dense read despite being only about 220 pages long.
The story starts in New Orleans in the 1920s with the mayor enjoying a glass of bootleg gin along with the company of a floozy when he gets a call giving him some bad news. The city is ground zero for the Jes Grew plague in America. With this prelude over, the book then acts a bit like a movie with the copyright and title pages following.
What is "Jes Grew"? Well, it's black culture and cultural identity, generally. It manifests itself in jazz, blues, ragtime, &c. A page of quotes just before the dedication page explains the origin in a quote by James Weldon Johnson: "The earliest Ragtime songs, like Topsy, 'jes grew.'" People struck with Jes Grew dance, sing, speak in tongues, &c. They act like they're possessed. The most proximate patient zero of this plague is basically the collective population of Haiti and it spread to New Orleans, made its way to Chicago, and is now threatening to take over New York.
Directly at odds with Jes Grew are the Atonists, white folk who act as guardians of mores and propriety in the name of preserving their staid, puritan hegemony. Their "aesthetic is thin flat turgid dull grey bland like a yawn." (Reed doesn't go for serial commas.) And they are pissed. The higher ups enlist the Wallflower Order to stamp out Jes Grew. Leading the Wallflowers is Hierophant 1, i.e. – the Pope. Opposing them is PaPa LaBas. He is a Houngan Voodoo Priest who keeps the old ways alive from his Mumbo Jumbo Kathedral.
During the 1920s the United States occupied Haiti and this not only forms certain plot elements, but also stands as a good high-level summary of the conflict, of whites lording over blacks. Reed has a long digression late in the book in which he utilizes mythology to explain the background of Jes Grew. Back in ancient Egypt you had Osiris and Isis in conflict with Set. At this time Osiris demonstrated his dances which helped preserve the fecundity of the land and ensure healthy harvests to Thoth who captured them in The Book of Thoth. Osiris, Thoth, and their ilk were eventually banished leaving Set in charge. He established his own religion based around Aton, "the sun's flaming disc". The old ways of linking people to nature as set out in The Book of Thoth went underground and Christianity arose. Jes Grew needed the book lest it "be mistaken for entertainment". As Reed asks, what good is a liturgy without a text? (He references Helena Blavatsky in this section whom I read about recently.)
One Hinkle Von Vampton brought the book to the United States in the 1890s. Von Vampton is immortal and a Knights Templar. Although he and the KT were turned away and persecuted by the Church back in the dim and distant past, he fought Jes Grew then and continues his battle. He sets up the Benign Monster, a magazine, although populated by the writings of black authors, is actually a set-up. It's real purpose to devalue the Harlem Renaissance and halt the spread of Jes Grew into New York.
And so you have two sides, the pro-Jes Grew and the anti-Jes Grew, out looking for The Book of Thoth for their own purposes.
As a satire, I thoroughly enjoyed Mumbo Jumbo. You've got some Dashiell Hammett thrown together with a mythological backstory which would make the writers of LOST proud, and some great, funny elements such as a group of men liberating non-European art from the Center of Art Detention, i.e. – art museums, and returning them to their native countries. As satire, it was fantastic stuff and ranks up there with similar works that I love such as Dr. Strangelove.
But I finished the book not quite knowing what Reed was saying. Did he really think that black culture was predicated on emotion and entwined with Nature while white culture was staid and artificial? In terms of his critique of how the white majority deals with blacks and black culture, I think I get it. White attitudes perceive black culture as lewd and unrestrained. It's "primitive". The book was written in the late 1960s and/or early 70s so is Reed promoting a kind of Black Nationalism? Is he trying to get all Marcus Garvey/Stokely Carmichael on our asses here?
My guess is that he is. Reed's critique doesn't seem to simply be one of America. He describes a prelapsarian paradise in ancient Egypt which permeated the globe. And then came along Set and Christianity. Humanity distanced itself from nature and thought itself above it. Slavery saw the white man not only subjugate the black man but also grind the culture of the slaves into the ground; white men assumed the burden of divorcing blacks from their native culture and traditions. The book talks about how Jes Grew's gleeful aspects were transmogrified into defects by Freud. Ecstasy became hysteria, for instance. Reed takes some swipes and capitalism such as when LaBas dismisses the Atonists as being another species - Home economicus - which lays down another critique: whites are individual while blacks are communal. There's just too much history involved for this to be a narrow attack. Reed's not lobbing guided missiles, he's dropping an atom bomb.
My Get Out of Jail Free Card
If anyone at work complains today about their computers not working, I am just going to tell them there's nothing I can do because of these:
The Earth is being bombarded with plasma! It's like something out of a Roland Emmerich movie.
The biggest solar storm in five years is battering our planet right now, and may cause disruptions to satellites, power grids and communications networks over the next 24 hours, space weather experts say.
Two strong solar flares erupted from the surface of the sun late Tuesday (March 6), blasting a wave of plasma and charged particles toward Earth. After speeding through space at 4 million mph, this eruption of material — called a coronal mass ejection (CME) — should be hitting Earth now.
Even here down south we may get some nice auroras out of the deal. Keep any eye out tonight.
The Earth is being bombarded with plasma! It's like something out of a Roland Emmerich movie.
The biggest solar storm in five years is battering our planet right now, and may cause disruptions to satellites, power grids and communications networks over the next 24 hours, space weather experts say.
Two strong solar flares erupted from the surface of the sun late Tuesday (March 6), blasting a wave of plasma and charged particles toward Earth. After speeding through space at 4 million mph, this eruption of material — called a coronal mass ejection (CME) — should be hitting Earth now.
Even here down south we may get some nice auroras out of the deal. Keep any eye out tonight.
07 March, 2012
Justice in America
I saw this linked to over at Boing Boing's post about a great speech by Bryan Stevenson that he gave at TED about race and justice in this country.
05 March, 2012
It Takes a White Person
By now everyone knows that Rush Limbaugh spewed his venom at Sandra Fluke, a Georgetown law student who testified before a House panel in favor of the government mandating that private insurance companies cover contraception. Limbaugh went on the air and after Fluke:
What does it say about the college coed Susan Fluke [sic], who goes before a congressional committee and essentially says that she must be paid to have sex? What does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex.
...
Can you imagine if you're her parents how proud of Sandra Fluke you would be? Your daughter goes up to a congressional hearing conducted by the Botox-filled Nancy Pelosi and testifies she's having so much sex she can't afford her own birth control pills and she agrees that Obama should provide them, or the Pope.
And so on.
All of this insulting invective got Limbaugh in trouble and he issued an apology, of sorts:
For over 20 years, I have illustrated the absurd with absurdity, three hours a day, five days a week. In this instance, I chose the wrong words in my analogy of the situation. I did not mean a personal attack on Ms. Fluke.
I think it is absolutely absurd that during these very serious political times, we are discussing personal sexual recreational activities before members of Congress. I personally do not agree that American citizens should pay for these social activities. What happened to personal responsibility and accountability? Where do we draw the line? If this is accepted as the norm, what will follow? Will we be debating if taxpayers should pay for new sneakers for all students that are interested in running to keep fit? In my monologue, I posited that it is not our business whatsoever to know what is going on in anyone's bedroom nor do I think it is a topic that should reach a Presidential level.
My choice of words was not the best, and in the attempt to be humorous, I created a national stir. I sincerely apologize to Ms. Fluke for the insulting word choices.
But this hasn't quelled the popular uproar nor stopped advertisers from withdrawing their support for his program. As of today, seven of them have chosen to put their money elsewhere.
Good on the people threatening to stop buying the products and services of companies who advertise on Limbaugh's program and good on the companies who have withdrawn their advertising. Limbaugh's presence on the airwaves puts the lie to the notion that the radio spectrum is owned by the public.
But I feel compelled to ask: WHAT TOOK YOU SO FUCKING LONG?!
Where was all the outrage when he told a black woman who had called his show “Take that bone out of your nose and call me back"? Or when he said, "Let the unskilled jobs that take absolutely no knowledge whatsoever to do — let stupid and unskilled Mexicans do that work"? You can find more of his racist comments here and here.
He goes on polluting the airwaves for years and years saying everything short of calling black people niggers and Latinos spicks yet it isn't until now that people really get angry. Apparently his stream of racist bloviating is tolerable but calling a young, attractive white woman a slut, well, that's just stepping over the line.
“Look, let me put it to you this way: the NFL all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons."
“The NAACP should have riot rehearsal. They should get a liquor store and practice robberies.”
“They’re 12 percent of the population. Who the hell cares?”
Deriding people like this because of the amount of melanin in their skin: acceptable.
Calling this person a "slut": That means war!
Yeah, these are post-racial times alright.
ADDENDUM: I just found this statement from the CEO of Carbonite, a company that pulled its advertising from Limbaugh's show:
“No one with daughters the age of Sandra Fluke, and I have two, could possibly abide the insult and abuse heaped upon this courageous and well-intentioned young lady. Mr. Limbaugh, with his highly personal attacks on Miss Fluke, overstepped any reasonable bounds of decency.
Get it? Calling a white woman a slut is beyond the bounds of decency. Saying "The NAACP should have riot rehearsal. They should get a liquor store and practice robberies" is not.
What does it say about the college coed Susan Fluke [sic], who goes before a congressional committee and essentially says that she must be paid to have sex? What does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex.
...
Can you imagine if you're her parents how proud of Sandra Fluke you would be? Your daughter goes up to a congressional hearing conducted by the Botox-filled Nancy Pelosi and testifies she's having so much sex she can't afford her own birth control pills and she agrees that Obama should provide them, or the Pope.
And so on.
All of this insulting invective got Limbaugh in trouble and he issued an apology, of sorts:
For over 20 years, I have illustrated the absurd with absurdity, three hours a day, five days a week. In this instance, I chose the wrong words in my analogy of the situation. I did not mean a personal attack on Ms. Fluke.
I think it is absolutely absurd that during these very serious political times, we are discussing personal sexual recreational activities before members of Congress. I personally do not agree that American citizens should pay for these social activities. What happened to personal responsibility and accountability? Where do we draw the line? If this is accepted as the norm, what will follow? Will we be debating if taxpayers should pay for new sneakers for all students that are interested in running to keep fit? In my monologue, I posited that it is not our business whatsoever to know what is going on in anyone's bedroom nor do I think it is a topic that should reach a Presidential level.
My choice of words was not the best, and in the attempt to be humorous, I created a national stir. I sincerely apologize to Ms. Fluke for the insulting word choices.
But this hasn't quelled the popular uproar nor stopped advertisers from withdrawing their support for his program. As of today, seven of them have chosen to put their money elsewhere.
Good on the people threatening to stop buying the products and services of companies who advertise on Limbaugh's program and good on the companies who have withdrawn their advertising. Limbaugh's presence on the airwaves puts the lie to the notion that the radio spectrum is owned by the public.
But I feel compelled to ask: WHAT TOOK YOU SO FUCKING LONG?!
Where was all the outrage when he told a black woman who had called his show “Take that bone out of your nose and call me back"? Or when he said, "Let the unskilled jobs that take absolutely no knowledge whatsoever to do — let stupid and unskilled Mexicans do that work"? You can find more of his racist comments here and here.
He goes on polluting the airwaves for years and years saying everything short of calling black people niggers and Latinos spicks yet it isn't until now that people really get angry. Apparently his stream of racist bloviating is tolerable but calling a young, attractive white woman a slut, well, that's just stepping over the line.
“Look, let me put it to you this way: the NFL all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons."
“The NAACP should have riot rehearsal. They should get a liquor store and practice robberies.”
“They’re 12 percent of the population. Who the hell cares?”
Deriding people like this because of the amount of melanin in their skin: acceptable.
Calling this person a "slut": That means war!
Yeah, these are post-racial times alright.
ADDENDUM: I just found this statement from the CEO of Carbonite, a company that pulled its advertising from Limbaugh's show:
“No one with daughters the age of Sandra Fluke, and I have two, could possibly abide the insult and abuse heaped upon this courageous and well-intentioned young lady. Mr. Limbaugh, with his highly personal attacks on Miss Fluke, overstepped any reasonable bounds of decency.
Get it? Calling a white woman a slut is beyond the bounds of decency. Saying "The NAACP should have riot rehearsal. They should get a liquor store and practice robberies" is not.
It's the Time of the Season for Drinking
Chris Lohring of Notch Brewing recently penned a screed decrying how seasonal beers are no longer seasonal. “Brewers have jumped an ENTIRE season ahead of when seasonal beers should be released,” he complains. The root of his dissatisfaction stems from a very practical problem.
I released my BSA Harvest in late September. You know, that time of September when Fall actually begins? Something about an equinox, I think. The BSA Harvest is a result of a program where Notch prepays a Western Massachusetts farmer for that year’s barley crop as in incentive, which in turn encourages local agriculture. The barley is harvested in August, malted a few weeks later, brewed in the beginning of September, and hits retail fresh on September 21st. A real harvest beer in the season we should drinking it.
And the response by an overwhelming percentage of retailers? They claim a September release is too late for a Fall beer, as they are making room for the Winter beers that will be in any day. This is the hand retail has been dealt, and it is certainly not their fault. So, a real Fall beer, the BSA Harvest, born of the change of the seasons that yields a barley harvest, is deemed too damn late.
The announcement that Leinenkugel's Summer Shandy would be released in February is the latest such absurdity I've noticed here in Wisconsin. (It was previously released in late March?! It's now two seasons early. And, if you read the article, it says that “shandy” is short for shandygaff “as it's called in England and Germany”. Really? I thought Germans called a mixture of beer and lemonade or soda a “radler”.) I became aware of the trend of seasonal brews appearing on store shelves before their traditional time mainly through seeing Capital's Oktoberfest earlier and earlier. I'd swear that at some point in the past it didn't leave the brewery until September but now you see it when it's still blazing hot outside in August and I fully expect it to be available for your 4th of July soiree within the next few years.
Lohring asks consumers to revolt by refraining from buying ostensibly seasonal brews out of season. Personally, I don't buy Oktoberfests until after Labor Day because it's too fucking hot in August to be drinking that style. I'm still quenching my thirst with Potosi's Steamboat Shandy. (Leine's shandy is for shite.) For me, the early arrival of seasonals isn't a burden. I don't suffer much loss and my well-being isn't really hurt by a summer brew hitting shelves while it's below freezing with snow on the ground, except for my sense that there are some traditions worth saving and adhering to. Perhaps the worst to come out of it is wanting to buy some Capital Oktoberfest but finding that Winter Skål has all the shelf space. Lohring, on the other hand, saw his business take a blow and presumably so too for one purveyor of local agriculture.
The thing is, I'm sure that most beer lovers who take offense at tradition being thrown to the wayside by the inanity of having Summer Shandy released in February have no qualms about eating out of season. Who among us only eats corn in August and refrains from apples until the autumn harvest?
Plus tradition is relative. I may look forward to heavier beers in September and October as the weather gets cooler but beer drinkers in the southern hemisphere are enjoying spring. Even here in the States, while I'm raking leaves in the October chill, it may still be in the 90s down in Tuscon. As far as beer goes, tradition comes from Northern Europe for the most part.
There's nothing objectively wrong with, say, drinking a pumpkin ale in July. I would wait until the autumn to drink one because I like to recognize the changing of the seasons and the traditions that go along with them. It's purely personal preference. I don't live in an agrarian society that throws big harvest festivals because we've spent the summer foraging for berries after we watched the last remaining vestiges of the previous year's bounty disappear. Those days are long gone for us and supermarket shelves are overflowing with foods of all kinds year round, something that our ancestors would have killed for. We have it good. Better than the vast majority of humanity had it through most of history.
I've read a few blog posts about this phenomenon but am still not sure why seasonals are so early these days. Lohring seems to point at Sam Adams and other large craft brewers. They started the trend to essentially get a jump on the competition who, in turn, followed their lead. How much of this is true, I don't know. Plus no one wants to have beer sitting around in a warehouse waiting for an arbitrary date to arrive whether it's the brewer or a wholesaler.
Other than seeing Capital's seasonals hitting the shelves earlier and earlier, it seems like New Glarus' beers always appear before they're supposed to. Their website may give a month but, from my glances at Woodman's shelves, their beers are available earlier. Cherry Stout was scheduled for March but was available in mid-February. Early but not hyper-early. I know it's not a seasonal but it's their most recent release. It just seems like when I get my expectations up for one of their beers and am eagerly awaiting the month of its release, I'll read a review of it by Robin Shepherd where he says that it's been out for a couple weeks already.
Any observant Cheeseheads out there that can testify as to how early other Wisconsin brewers put out their seasonals? Are Wisconsin brewers really bringing their seasonal beers out early because of Sam Adams?
I suppose the hope for us more tradition-minded drinkers is that the beers will come out earlier and earlier until they're finally being released when they had been in the past. Even a broken clock is right twice a day.
A couple diversions:
First, I noticed that Notch brews session beers and session beers only. If you look at their brews, the biggest weighs in at only 4.5% ABV. From what I can tell, the brewery is doing well. Good on them for not jumping on the big beer bandwagon. In this day and age it seems like every beer is an imperial something or other and that 6% ABV is the low end of things. I wish more brewers would brew “true” session beers like Notch.
My guess is that it's harder to brew a tasty beer of 3.8% ABV than it is to brew one at 8%.
Lastly, I found this post by a gentleman named Jack Curtin on the whole issue of seasonal beers. He gives his opinion on the matter and closes by saying “For those of you who just want the next over-hopped, high alcohol, unbalanced mutation of a real IPA, none of this matters, of course. You gave up on beer a long time ago.” (Emphasis his.)
I released my BSA Harvest in late September. You know, that time of September when Fall actually begins? Something about an equinox, I think. The BSA Harvest is a result of a program where Notch prepays a Western Massachusetts farmer for that year’s barley crop as in incentive, which in turn encourages local agriculture. The barley is harvested in August, malted a few weeks later, brewed in the beginning of September, and hits retail fresh on September 21st. A real harvest beer in the season we should drinking it.
And the response by an overwhelming percentage of retailers? They claim a September release is too late for a Fall beer, as they are making room for the Winter beers that will be in any day. This is the hand retail has been dealt, and it is certainly not their fault. So, a real Fall beer, the BSA Harvest, born of the change of the seasons that yields a barley harvest, is deemed too damn late.
The announcement that Leinenkugel's Summer Shandy would be released in February is the latest such absurdity I've noticed here in Wisconsin. (It was previously released in late March?! It's now two seasons early. And, if you read the article, it says that “shandy” is short for shandygaff “as it's called in England and Germany”. Really? I thought Germans called a mixture of beer and lemonade or soda a “radler”.) I became aware of the trend of seasonal brews appearing on store shelves before their traditional time mainly through seeing Capital's Oktoberfest earlier and earlier. I'd swear that at some point in the past it didn't leave the brewery until September but now you see it when it's still blazing hot outside in August and I fully expect it to be available for your 4th of July soiree within the next few years.
Lohring asks consumers to revolt by refraining from buying ostensibly seasonal brews out of season. Personally, I don't buy Oktoberfests until after Labor Day because it's too fucking hot in August to be drinking that style. I'm still quenching my thirst with Potosi's Steamboat Shandy. (Leine's shandy is for shite.) For me, the early arrival of seasonals isn't a burden. I don't suffer much loss and my well-being isn't really hurt by a summer brew hitting shelves while it's below freezing with snow on the ground, except for my sense that there are some traditions worth saving and adhering to. Perhaps the worst to come out of it is wanting to buy some Capital Oktoberfest but finding that Winter Skål has all the shelf space. Lohring, on the other hand, saw his business take a blow and presumably so too for one purveyor of local agriculture.
The thing is, I'm sure that most beer lovers who take offense at tradition being thrown to the wayside by the inanity of having Summer Shandy released in February have no qualms about eating out of season. Who among us only eats corn in August and refrains from apples until the autumn harvest?
Plus tradition is relative. I may look forward to heavier beers in September and October as the weather gets cooler but beer drinkers in the southern hemisphere are enjoying spring. Even here in the States, while I'm raking leaves in the October chill, it may still be in the 90s down in Tuscon. As far as beer goes, tradition comes from Northern Europe for the most part.
There's nothing objectively wrong with, say, drinking a pumpkin ale in July. I would wait until the autumn to drink one because I like to recognize the changing of the seasons and the traditions that go along with them. It's purely personal preference. I don't live in an agrarian society that throws big harvest festivals because we've spent the summer foraging for berries after we watched the last remaining vestiges of the previous year's bounty disappear. Those days are long gone for us and supermarket shelves are overflowing with foods of all kinds year round, something that our ancestors would have killed for. We have it good. Better than the vast majority of humanity had it through most of history.
I've read a few blog posts about this phenomenon but am still not sure why seasonals are so early these days. Lohring seems to point at Sam Adams and other large craft brewers. They started the trend to essentially get a jump on the competition who, in turn, followed their lead. How much of this is true, I don't know. Plus no one wants to have beer sitting around in a warehouse waiting for an arbitrary date to arrive whether it's the brewer or a wholesaler.
Other than seeing Capital's seasonals hitting the shelves earlier and earlier, it seems like New Glarus' beers always appear before they're supposed to. Their website may give a month but, from my glances at Woodman's shelves, their beers are available earlier. Cherry Stout was scheduled for March but was available in mid-February. Early but not hyper-early. I know it's not a seasonal but it's their most recent release. It just seems like when I get my expectations up for one of their beers and am eagerly awaiting the month of its release, I'll read a review of it by Robin Shepherd where he says that it's been out for a couple weeks already.
Any observant Cheeseheads out there that can testify as to how early other Wisconsin brewers put out their seasonals? Are Wisconsin brewers really bringing their seasonal beers out early because of Sam Adams?
I suppose the hope for us more tradition-minded drinkers is that the beers will come out earlier and earlier until they're finally being released when they had been in the past. Even a broken clock is right twice a day.
A couple diversions:
First, I noticed that Notch brews session beers and session beers only. If you look at their brews, the biggest weighs in at only 4.5% ABV. From what I can tell, the brewery is doing well. Good on them for not jumping on the big beer bandwagon. In this day and age it seems like every beer is an imperial something or other and that 6% ABV is the low end of things. I wish more brewers would brew “true” session beers like Notch.
My guess is that it's harder to brew a tasty beer of 3.8% ABV than it is to brew one at 8%.
Lastly, I found this post by a gentleman named Jack Curtin on the whole issue of seasonal beers. He gives his opinion on the matter and closes by saying “For those of you who just want the next over-hopped, high alcohol, unbalanced mutation of a real IPA, none of this matters, of course. You gave up on beer a long time ago.” (Emphasis his.)
04 March, 2012
The Good Doyle Is in the Lodge
Sadly, it didn't occur to me immediately that the Mark Frost who wrote this book was the same Mark Frost that co-created Twin Peaks with David Lynch. Knowing this I wondered whether there would be any surreal scenes involving dwarfs, giants, owls, or creamed corn. While (spoiler!) there weren't, The List of 7 was a blast.
It's Christmas Day of 1884 and Arthur Conan Doyle is at home skeptically reading the theosophical treatise Isis Unveiled by Helena Petrovna Blavatsky. The surgeon has more than a passing interest in the occult. Some is most certainly bunk, to his trained mind, but some may not be. The trick is to separate the wheat from the chaff. Suddenly he notices an envelope has been slipped under his door. It's an odd letter that implores him to attend a séance the following night. He recognizes the writing as being in the hand of a woman – a damsel in distress.
Intrigued, Doyle decides to attend but gets to the address early and positions himself across the street where he watches as the other attendees arrive. The Boxing Day extravaganza is to include two couples. The first is working class, a brawny man and his pregnant wife while the second arrive in a private carriage. Doyle determines that they are Lady Nicholson and her brother. His reconnoitering done, he approaches the door which he finds to be open, beckoning him inside.
The participants huddle around the table with the medium and the séance begins. A white mist materializes as does an image of a young boy which Lady Nicholson recognizes as her missing son. A fanfare trumpet then appears to the gasp of “The horn of Gabriel!” Doyle spies the filament which suspends the trumpet and, out of disgust, throws his chair at the “unearthly daguerreotype” which shatters and the wires stream down. Then all hell breaks loose as cloaked figures appear from the shadows and start slashing throats.
Things are looking mighty perilous for Doyle when he receives aid from an unknown figure who applies his derring do along with his muscle to defeat their pursuers. The anonymous man identifies himself as a professor at Cambridge. Back at home, Doyle discovers that his apartment has had some unwelcome visitors who have left it is total disarray and with a layer of what appears to be ectoplasmic slime. He then discovers that his upstairs neighbor has been murdered. To add Pelion upon Ossa, a woman was disemboweled nearby and, Doyle being a surgeon, is made a suspect. He goes on the lam and heads to Cambridge to seek out the professor.
After a close encounter with some stone gargoyles that mysteriously have life breathed into them, Doyle finds out that the man who saved his skin is actually Jack Sparks, a private investigator in the employ of the queen. Together they seek out Lady Nicholson's murderers and the fate of her son. Also on the job are Barry and Larry, two rogues that turned away from the dark side with Jack's help. What follows is a romp around England and eldritch encounters which lead to a list of seven names as well as a nefarious plot to commandeer the fate of England.
There are pleasures aplenty to be had in The List of 7, not the least of which is the story itself. Being a fan of Twin Peaks, this was hardly surprising. Frost deftly doles out clues which lead his protagonists into peril. The book captures an immersive feeling of Victoriana and Frost writes gripping action scenes that had me on the edge of my seat and were as good as anything Michael Bay have ever committed to film. Two really stand out for me.
The first involves our heroes paying a visit to Lord Nicholson under the guise of attending one of his grand galas. Frost lets on that something is amiss as their carriage goes down the lengthy lane from the main road to the mansion. It is lined with trees but, at one point, the sides of the road are bare with only fresh stumps to remind visitors of the arboreal splendor that once was. As they approach the mansion, they discover what happened when a wall surrounding the building comes into view. The barrier was hastily erected to keep something out. Or was it to keep something in? Someone had taken an ax to a section of it to allow entrance and so Doyle and Sparks investigate. The genius here is that, for most of this scene, little happens. It is eerily quiet and the estate seemingly lifeless. You know that the mysterious cloaked figures will come to try and put an end to Doyle and Sparks but when? The emptiness of the estate and the knowledge that a wall was built in a hurry ratchets up the tension until it's so thick you can cut it with the wrong side of a knife.
Another great scene involves the discovery of a tunnel beneath a publishing company. Doyle and Sparks are accompanied by Larry here and the companion descends into the dark first. (It was nice to read of someone investigating a dark passage with a candle instead of a 400 watt MagLite which everyone on TV and in the movies seems to have these days.) Traipsing around with only a candle is spooky enough but then the trio hears something or multiple somethings approaching. They find a door locked tight. Who or whatever gets closer and closer as Larry does his level best to pick the lock. They get through the door and lock it behind them whereupon they find themselves in a storage room of the British Museum. The creatures banging on the door are ancient Egyptian mummies which have been reanimated. Despite knowing that Doyle and company would escape, I was glued to the page scared witless.
Aside from the great fun of the game being afoot, it was also neat to read how Jack and his adventures with Doyle prefigure Sherlock Holmes. At the end of the book Doyle is sworn not to divulge what he and Jack did so he creates Holmes so that he can do so indirectly. There's a cocaine addiction, a nemesis – for Jack it's his brother Alexander, and even an incident at Reichenbach Falls. Bigger Holmes fans than me will surely pick up on other things.
Having finished the book I decided to see if any of the characters here other than Doyle were real. It turns out that Helena Petrovna Blavatsky was indeed a real person and Isis Unveiled a real book. It turns out that she rhapsodized about the existence of a White Lodge, which will be familiar to Twin Peaks fans. It would seem that Frost is responsible for much more of TP's mythology and weirdness than I had known.
While the first few chapters elucidate upon theosophy a bit, I wish that Frost had delved into it more. His look at the philosophical underpinnings of the subject quickly ends up being relegated to motive for the bad guys. It's enough to provide atmosphere and explanation but it would have been fun had the book kept running with it. One thing it would have done would have been to fill in more details of the age – an age when Darwin and many other scientists were unlocking the secrets of nature and soon a wave of technology based on the knowledge they uncovered would transform the world. Frost sets up tension between science and reason vs. nature and mystery both within Doyle himself and amongst various characters. It's an interesting subject and it would have been neat had Frost developed the theme further.
Despite this, readers are left with one helluva story.
02 March, 2012
1973 Oil Crisis
I saw earlier today that gas prices in Madison have reached $3.80/gallon and then stumbled upon some photos from the oil crisis of 1973. I remember the energy crisis of 1979 but was too young recall this stuff. Check the pictures out here.
01 March, 2012
The Atom Bomb Blues Blues
I hesitated briefly when it came to cracking the spine of Atom Bomb Blues because it is the last 7th Doctor PDA. Then I remembered that there were dozens of Virgin New Adventures so I have plenty of Seventh Doctor literary goodness ahead. It was written by Andrew Cartmel who was Doctor Who's script editor during Sylvester McCoy's tenure on the show and the namesake of the so-called "Cartmel Masterplan" which involved adding more mystery to the character of The Doctor and also making him a bit darker and more manipulative. Would Cartmel stick to the tried and true formula or would he give us a more enigmatic portrayal of the Time Lord we all know and love?
The story takes place in America in 1945 at the Los Alamos National Laboratory where J. Robert Oppenheimer and his fellow scientists are concocting the first atomic bomb. Cartmel threw me for a loop by beginning the story in media res with Ace seemingly under the influence of sodium pentothal and being interrogated by a psychologist named John Henbest and Major Rex Butler. After spouting some very odd tales, Ace is rescued by The Doctor.
We then jump back three days to when The Doctor and Ace first arrived at Los Alamos. The former is posing as the physicist John Smith while the latter is pretending to be Acacia, Smith's assistant. They are picked up at the side of the road by Butcher who is head of security at Los Alamos and here he is pretending to be your average joe chauffeur. Once his cover is blown, however, The Doctor talks about the wonderful crime novels that Butcher has written which include The Hawk of Gibraltar and Shadow Man which are a fun play on Dashiell Hammett.
Once at Los Alamos, The Doctor and Ace head over to the Oppenheimer residence where everyone is cocktailing and smoking cigarettes like there was no tomorrow. Here we are introduced to Ray "Cosmic Ray" Morita who dispatches with the Wagner and cranks up Duke Ellington instead. Morita is a jazz-loving proto-Beatnik who says things like "Forget it, man" and of Ace's misplaced wardrobe selection "Dig Annie Oakley!" He loves Ellington so much that it seems like he does precious little mathematics and instead listens to his records on his phonograph which utilizes cactus needles.
The Doctor informs Ace that something is wrong with Cosmic Ray. The real Morita was right-handed while the one at Los Alamos is left-handed. Plus this one is much too smart as the Morita that he knew was a high school teacher. Something is definitely amiss. The Oppenheimer's housemaid, Rosalita, makes a mean chili but it turns out that the batch she prepared for The Doctor and Ace was poisoned. And, since the poisoning plot was foiled, Rosalita instead tries to send our heroes to an early grave with a .38.
For some reason after Cartmel reveals that Rosalita is the would-be assassin, her story, her motivation, etc. just ends. I don't recall the book every explaining why Rosalita wanted to kill The Doctor or how Rosalita fitted into the larger conspiracy at play. You see, Morita is from another dimension, a parallel 1945 - the dimension from which Ace hails. He has teamed up with some baddies who look to take advantage of his mathematical genius. Morita devised quantum equations which allowed for travel between dimensions but, when put into play in a particle accelerator, they can bring about other particles which are "highly volatile". So, volatile, in fact, that they could, in Morita's words, "destroy the Earth baby." In a meta twist, Morita's equations would actually bring those doomsday particles into existence. I guess writing the equations is like observing and thusly collapsing a waveform.
The bad guy and gal – Imperial Lee and Lady Silk – heard about Morita's work and got him to ally himself with them. They are keen on altering the course of the Manhattan Project so that the whole universe is destroyed while Morita just wants to get a hold of Duke Ellington recordings from 1942-1944 when, in his dimension, there was a musician's strike and no studio recordings of Ellington from that time.
I give Atom Bomb Blues credit for being fun. Considering the story involves atom bombs, racism directed against people with epicanthic folds, and the destruction of the universe, Cartmel is surprisingly light-hearted. He gives us Cosmic Ray's Beatnik dialogue, the titles which parody Dashiell Hammett, and a really odd side trip involving The Doctor pretending to dose Butcher with peyote and then taking him for a ride in an alien spacecraft.
So, although fun, the story has its weaknesses. In addition, to the dead end that is Rosalita's story, the whole Beatnik thing seemed woefully out of place to me. I didn't hate it, but it did make me cringe occasionally. The bellicose nature of Oppenheimer's relationship with Edward Teller here is, as far as I know, true to life and I found myself wishing Cartmel had expanded upon that as well as the racism of the day which surely would have made life for Morita and the German scientists there less than perfect. I think I would have found this more interesting than having The Doctor and his alien friend Zorg screw around with Butcher.
Atom Bomb Blues also keeps the DW tradition going of portraying American poorly. All too often DW portrays Americans as being loud, brash, and single-minded. Here Butcher is a bit like Buck Turgidson from Dr. Strangelove. His character revolves around the premise that there are Jap traitors and spies everywhere. He was just too clichéd and caricatured for my taste.
And then there's the nerdy Professor Apple who develops a crush on Ace. On the one hand, The Doctor's translations of Apple's letters are amusing but it also comes off as a cheap attempt at some laughs by making fun of Apple, who is severely lacking in social skills. His pursuit of Ace is unnecessary for the plot to advance and just doesn't go anywhere or add much.
As for our heroes, they are basically the ones out of the TV show. The Doctor doesn't tell Ace that they're in an alternate dimension until late in the book but he's not really a manipulator here. As far as Ace goes, the emphasis here is on the fact that she is a teenager. Apple's crush is essentially "icky" to her; she whines that she is supposed to get to know Morita while The Doctor goes out on his own. She's not the more mature woman that some of the previous PDAs gave us.
Overall Atom Bomb Blues was a fun read but some things were just distractions. At the very end The Doctor spins the light-hearted tone around and laments how Edward Teller would go on to promote the production of more and more of the deadliest weapons mankind has ever invented. I appreciated the gesture but wish this recognition of the story's more serious elements got more play.
A rather anti-climactic end to the PDAs.
This Guy Needs Some Time in the Total Perspective Vortex
Poor Andrew Schiff. The director of communications and marketing at Euro Pacific Capital Inc. is finding that his $350,000 salary just isn't cutting it these days. Without his big bonuses, life is hard.
Paid a lower bonus, he said the $350,000 he earns, enough to put him in the country’s top 1 percent by income, doesn’t cover his family’s private-school tuition, a Kent, Connecticut, summer rental and the upgrade they would like from their 1,200-square- foot Brooklyn duplex.
“I can’t imagine what I’m going to do,” Schiff said. “I’m crammed into 1,200 square feet. I don’t have a dishwasher. We do all our dishes by hand.”
Woe betide the family that has to manually wash dishes! We don't have a dishwasher either so now I feel like I'm stuck in some Dickensian nightmare. He can't imagine what he's going to do? Well, maybe instead of paying $32,000 a year for your daughter's education you can send her to a $25,000 a year prep school and buy a dishwasher with the difference.
The article makes a point of showing that suffering because of loss of income is relative. An accountant is quoted as saying:
“If you’re making $50,000 and your salary gets down to $40,000 and you have to cut, it’s very severe to you,” Dlugash said. “But it’s no less severe to these other people with these big numbers.”
In other words, that losing income causes suffering is universal. OK. Schiff and the other 1%ers in the article definitely had their lifestyles altered because they didn't receive big bonuses. But is it really suffering?
The one rich person I've ever known in my life was a great uncle of mine. I don't know how many millions the guy had. But he didn't bitch when business was bad or an investment went south. In fact, none of my relatives of his generation complained about their lot in life and none of the others were rich. Would they have liked to have had more? Probably. But they all were happy with what they had even if it wasn't six figures.
This is because they had perspective that transcended a range of low six figures and high six figures. These people grew up during The Great Depression and were poor. Before that great uncle became wealthy, he grew up in a big family with parents who didn't speak English and a father who busted his ass in a coal mine for who knows how many hours every day. Then it was off to fight in World War II as a tailgunner on a B-17.
Even when things were on the glum side for my great uncle and his brothers and sisters, they could be worse. They still had indoor plumbing and electricity; there were no Jerries in Messerschmidts trying to kill them; there was food on the table, beer in a bottle, and cards for pinochle; the kids were in school; no one was slaving away in a coal mine; and everyone was in good health.
I don't want to romanticize the lives of my grandparents and great aunts/uncles but Schiff and the others like him in the article need to get a perspective that goes beyond a $350,000 lifestyle vs. a $1 million lifestyle or whatever they were leading prior to their bonuses being cut. This narrow view is demonstrated by M. Todd Henderson, a University of Chicago professor who got his fleeting moments of infamy by whining that he was "just getting by" with his $250,000+ a year salary. The article quotes him:
“Yes, terminal diseases are worse than getting the flu,” he said. “But you suffer when you get the flu.”
Having to squeak by on $250,000 or $350,000 is not equivalent to having the flu. It's like getting a paper cut. It's a paper cut because you're still enjoying the fruits of a First World lifestyle and, compared to the vast majority of humanity, you have the riches of Croesus. I don't think that the Hendersons or the Schiffs have to walk outside to a hole out in the street to take a dump. And I'll bet they're not getting by on gruel. Their faucets still give potable water.
Unfortunately I don't think any of these people will see just how incredibly good they have it.
Perhaps we need to throw a benefit concert for them.
Paid a lower bonus, he said the $350,000 he earns, enough to put him in the country’s top 1 percent by income, doesn’t cover his family’s private-school tuition, a Kent, Connecticut, summer rental and the upgrade they would like from their 1,200-square- foot Brooklyn duplex.
“I can’t imagine what I’m going to do,” Schiff said. “I’m crammed into 1,200 square feet. I don’t have a dishwasher. We do all our dishes by hand.”
Woe betide the family that has to manually wash dishes! We don't have a dishwasher either so now I feel like I'm stuck in some Dickensian nightmare. He can't imagine what he's going to do? Well, maybe instead of paying $32,000 a year for your daughter's education you can send her to a $25,000 a year prep school and buy a dishwasher with the difference.
The article makes a point of showing that suffering because of loss of income is relative. An accountant is quoted as saying:
“If you’re making $50,000 and your salary gets down to $40,000 and you have to cut, it’s very severe to you,” Dlugash said. “But it’s no less severe to these other people with these big numbers.”
In other words, that losing income causes suffering is universal. OK. Schiff and the other 1%ers in the article definitely had their lifestyles altered because they didn't receive big bonuses. But is it really suffering?
The one rich person I've ever known in my life was a great uncle of mine. I don't know how many millions the guy had. But he didn't bitch when business was bad or an investment went south. In fact, none of my relatives of his generation complained about their lot in life and none of the others were rich. Would they have liked to have had more? Probably. But they all were happy with what they had even if it wasn't six figures.
This is because they had perspective that transcended a range of low six figures and high six figures. These people grew up during The Great Depression and were poor. Before that great uncle became wealthy, he grew up in a big family with parents who didn't speak English and a father who busted his ass in a coal mine for who knows how many hours every day. Then it was off to fight in World War II as a tailgunner on a B-17.
Even when things were on the glum side for my great uncle and his brothers and sisters, they could be worse. They still had indoor plumbing and electricity; there were no Jerries in Messerschmidts trying to kill them; there was food on the table, beer in a bottle, and cards for pinochle; the kids were in school; no one was slaving away in a coal mine; and everyone was in good health.
I don't want to romanticize the lives of my grandparents and great aunts/uncles but Schiff and the others like him in the article need to get a perspective that goes beyond a $350,000 lifestyle vs. a $1 million lifestyle or whatever they were leading prior to their bonuses being cut. This narrow view is demonstrated by M. Todd Henderson, a University of Chicago professor who got his fleeting moments of infamy by whining that he was "just getting by" with his $250,000+ a year salary. The article quotes him:
“Yes, terminal diseases are worse than getting the flu,” he said. “But you suffer when you get the flu.”
Having to squeak by on $250,000 or $350,000 is not equivalent to having the flu. It's like getting a paper cut. It's a paper cut because you're still enjoying the fruits of a First World lifestyle and, compared to the vast majority of humanity, you have the riches of Croesus. I don't think that the Hendersons or the Schiffs have to walk outside to a hole out in the street to take a dump. And I'll bet they're not getting by on gruel. Their faucets still give potable water.
Unfortunately I don't think any of these people will see just how incredibly good they have it.
Perhaps we need to throw a benefit concert for them.
29 February, 2012
Bully Stuck with R Rating
Since my youngest stepson is being bullied at school I was happy to hear about a new movie which looks at the problem - Bully.
Last I'd heard the filmmakers were appealing the decision by the MPAA to give it an R rating. Well, I now read that they lost that appeal.
Last week, the Motion Picture Association of America dealt the film a serious blow by upholding the film’s R rating, making the documentary less accessible to its target audience. For the MPAA, the problem with “Bully” stemmed from a scene in which a student was harassed and the f-word was said seven or eight times by various accosters.
You have got to be shittin' me. Kids can go see PG-13 Transformers movies which feature "fuck", "shit", "son of a bitch", "pussy", and "bitch ass", teases them with Megan Fox's panties, and are full of violence but to see real life reflected back at them from the silver screen, well, that calls for restrictions.
If the kids wants to see this, I will take him. The article notes that the "Cincinnati school district had arranged to bus over 40,000 students to see documentary, but will have to cancel the plans because of its rating." Too bad.
The MPAA sure has some screwed up criteria for rating movies.
Last I'd heard the filmmakers were appealing the decision by the MPAA to give it an R rating. Well, I now read that they lost that appeal.
Last week, the Motion Picture Association of America dealt the film a serious blow by upholding the film’s R rating, making the documentary less accessible to its target audience. For the MPAA, the problem with “Bully” stemmed from a scene in which a student was harassed and the f-word was said seven or eight times by various accosters.
You have got to be shittin' me. Kids can go see PG-13 Transformers movies which feature "fuck", "shit", "son of a bitch", "pussy", and "bitch ass", teases them with Megan Fox's panties, and are full of violence but to see real life reflected back at them from the silver screen, well, that calls for restrictions.
If the kids wants to see this, I will take him. The article notes that the "Cincinnati school district had arranged to bus over 40,000 students to see documentary, but will have to cancel the plans because of its rating." Too bad.
The MPAA sure has some screwed up criteria for rating movies.
My Netflix Demarche
Recently Salon asked "Is it OK to steal 'Downton Abbey'?" I was rather happy they did because I'd had more than one person recently tell me that they've been watching it and I walked away from those conversations wondering "What the hell is 'Downtown Abbey'?" Now I know.
The article says the show has a significant American following but the programme's second series wouldn't air here on PBS until late this month – a few months after it is shown in the UK. It presents a lot of anecdotes. There are frustrated viewers who don't want to wait and so download the show arguing that it's going to be on free TV anyway, so what's the hassle? Then there's one of the show's actors who expressed profound irritation at an American interviewer who admitted to downloading the show. “That’s really pissing me off. Shame on you. Be ashamed," he scolded. The PBS producer seemed sympathetic to frustrated American fans but she really made it sound as if it was out of her hands.
The point is that, in this day and age with satellites, the Internet, and the decline of delayed gratification, it seems inexcusable for producers and distributors of entertainment to stagger releases in different countries. U.S. fans of Downton Abbey who wait for the show to air here not only are left in the dust by the delay but also by the fact that they have access to commentary about the show as it airs in the U.K.
The comments section was interesting, for a short while, anyway. Fans justified their downloads by noting that there is not technological reason for making American fans wait and, furthermore, Doctor Who now airs the same day in the U.K. as in the States so the same kind of deal can be struck for their show. One commenter chided these folks by decrying their childishness. Delayed gratification is the mark of an adult and so whining about a four month delay and instead downloading is simply immature behavior.
This article came to mind in a recent bout of frustration with Netflix. We have the streaming service only. I wanted to watch some Scandinavian crime fiction and thought "How about the second season of Forbrydelsen?", the Danish TV show which was remade here in the States as The Killing and shown on AMC. Netflix had the American version listed as coming soon and today has the DVD's available but no streaming. As for the Danish show, it's never heard of it. Then I thought about Wallander. Not the BBC remake with Kenneth Branagh but the original Swedish films. Netflix had the remake available - on DVD only – and also had a listing for the Swedish series but it wasn't available in any way, shape, or form. (To its credit, Four Star Video has at least some of these for rent on what I presume are Region 2 DVDs. No Forbrydelsen, though.)
So, how about some Doctor Who? (Classic series, that is.) Well, of the 120-130 stories available, less than 20 could be streamed. Mostly 4th Doctor stuff. No Sixey, unfortunately. And only about half of the Key to Time series. Why so few? (Four Star is really weak in this department too.)
OK. I had just finished listening to a college lecture about The Crusades and thought that I'd watch Kingdom of Heaven. Nope. DVD only. This is not a foreign TV show, it's a big budget Hollywood movie yet I can't stream it.
If your business model and advertising are about the ability of the consumer to "instantly watch thousands of movies and TV episodes", it seems like you should have a big fucking library to choose from. It may be big now but it's not big enough. No wonder their stock value is dropping. They want their customers to move to the streaming service so they can ditch physical media yet the selection of the former is really spotty. Plus I've occasionally found myself at the mercy of Netflix's vagaries in other ways. For example, I read Smila's Sense of Snow and then streamed the movie just before the Netflix gods made it available on DVD only. Why is it "not available to watch instantly" when it used to be? If the movies I want to stream are can simply disappear in an instant, then your service declines in value for me.
I presume that the mercurial availability of various movies on Netflix is due to what that Salon article noted – producers, distributors, and exhibitionists not having their shit together. I recently discovered that Music Box Films will be distributing the Swedish Wallander shows come May. Perhaps this is why Netflix acknowledges that it exists but doesn't have it available. It was waiting for the issue of distribution rights to be settled. Hopefully I'll be able to stream it this spring.
Truth is though, Netflix does much right. I have watched 2033: Future Apocalypse which Four Star doesn't seem to have. And it was nice to be able to watch Severed Ways - The Norse Discovery of America on whim one night. My guess is that the company is, to one extent or another, at the mercy of distributors and, likely, others with a stake in the matter. If some company won't sign a contract with Netflix or if they want more than Netflix can pay, so it goes. If a company says Netflix can rent out the DVD but can't stream it, so it goes. I as a consumer am at the mercy of these big companies.
I was thinking that perhaps it's just my taste. But, when I look, I find out that the only Ridley Scott film available for streaming is Black Hawk Down. Orson Welles? Only The Third Man and Jane Eyre. Kubrick. Just two. Oliver Stone? Four but only 2 are narrative films. And World Trade Center used to be streamable but is no longer. Terry Gilliam? Time Bandits stands alone. And there's not one single David Lynch movie for me to stream.
It is great that Netflix offers the likes of The Saragossa Manuscript and Werckmeister harmóniák on DVD but, seriously, no Citizen Kane on streaming? No Dr. Strangelove? No JFK? No Blue Velvet?
What I find most frustrating is that Netflix does a horrible job of setting customer expectations. Why is Smila's Sense of Snow no longer available for streaming? I don't know and don't think Netflix has ever said. Will it be available again at some point in the future? Who knows? Why is a movie for rent as a DVD but not streamable? It seems to me that, if you want to stem the tide of illegal downloading, keeping customers in the dark and forcing them to suffer your capricious whims is not a great business model.
Did anyone drop a Netflix service when they split the DVD and streaming services? Anyone out there know of good Netflix alternatives?
ADDENDUM: Here's a list of movies and TV shows that went bye-bye today.
The article says the show has a significant American following but the programme's second series wouldn't air here on PBS until late this month – a few months after it is shown in the UK. It presents a lot of anecdotes. There are frustrated viewers who don't want to wait and so download the show arguing that it's going to be on free TV anyway, so what's the hassle? Then there's one of the show's actors who expressed profound irritation at an American interviewer who admitted to downloading the show. “That’s really pissing me off. Shame on you. Be ashamed," he scolded. The PBS producer seemed sympathetic to frustrated American fans but she really made it sound as if it was out of her hands.
The point is that, in this day and age with satellites, the Internet, and the decline of delayed gratification, it seems inexcusable for producers and distributors of entertainment to stagger releases in different countries. U.S. fans of Downton Abbey who wait for the show to air here not only are left in the dust by the delay but also by the fact that they have access to commentary about the show as it airs in the U.K.
The comments section was interesting, for a short while, anyway. Fans justified their downloads by noting that there is not technological reason for making American fans wait and, furthermore, Doctor Who now airs the same day in the U.K. as in the States so the same kind of deal can be struck for their show. One commenter chided these folks by decrying their childishness. Delayed gratification is the mark of an adult and so whining about a four month delay and instead downloading is simply immature behavior.
This article came to mind in a recent bout of frustration with Netflix. We have the streaming service only. I wanted to watch some Scandinavian crime fiction and thought "How about the second season of Forbrydelsen?", the Danish TV show which was remade here in the States as The Killing and shown on AMC. Netflix had the American version listed as coming soon and today has the DVD's available but no streaming. As for the Danish show, it's never heard of it. Then I thought about Wallander. Not the BBC remake with Kenneth Branagh but the original Swedish films. Netflix had the remake available - on DVD only – and also had a listing for the Swedish series but it wasn't available in any way, shape, or form. (To its credit, Four Star Video has at least some of these for rent on what I presume are Region 2 DVDs. No Forbrydelsen, though.)
So, how about some Doctor Who? (Classic series, that is.) Well, of the 120-130 stories available, less than 20 could be streamed. Mostly 4th Doctor stuff. No Sixey, unfortunately. And only about half of the Key to Time series. Why so few? (Four Star is really weak in this department too.)
OK. I had just finished listening to a college lecture about The Crusades and thought that I'd watch Kingdom of Heaven. Nope. DVD only. This is not a foreign TV show, it's a big budget Hollywood movie yet I can't stream it.
If your business model and advertising are about the ability of the consumer to "instantly watch thousands of movies and TV episodes", it seems like you should have a big fucking library to choose from. It may be big now but it's not big enough. No wonder their stock value is dropping. They want their customers to move to the streaming service so they can ditch physical media yet the selection of the former is really spotty. Plus I've occasionally found myself at the mercy of Netflix's vagaries in other ways. For example, I read Smila's Sense of Snow and then streamed the movie just before the Netflix gods made it available on DVD only. Why is it "not available to watch instantly" when it used to be? If the movies I want to stream are can simply disappear in an instant, then your service declines in value for me.
I presume that the mercurial availability of various movies on Netflix is due to what that Salon article noted – producers, distributors, and exhibitionists not having their shit together. I recently discovered that Music Box Films will be distributing the Swedish Wallander shows come May. Perhaps this is why Netflix acknowledges that it exists but doesn't have it available. It was waiting for the issue of distribution rights to be settled. Hopefully I'll be able to stream it this spring.
Truth is though, Netflix does much right. I have watched 2033: Future Apocalypse which Four Star doesn't seem to have. And it was nice to be able to watch Severed Ways - The Norse Discovery of America on whim one night. My guess is that the company is, to one extent or another, at the mercy of distributors and, likely, others with a stake in the matter. If some company won't sign a contract with Netflix or if they want more than Netflix can pay, so it goes. If a company says Netflix can rent out the DVD but can't stream it, so it goes. I as a consumer am at the mercy of these big companies.
I was thinking that perhaps it's just my taste. But, when I look, I find out that the only Ridley Scott film available for streaming is Black Hawk Down. Orson Welles? Only The Third Man and Jane Eyre. Kubrick. Just two. Oliver Stone? Four but only 2 are narrative films. And World Trade Center used to be streamable but is no longer. Terry Gilliam? Time Bandits stands alone. And there's not one single David Lynch movie for me to stream.
It is great that Netflix offers the likes of The Saragossa Manuscript and Werckmeister harmóniák on DVD but, seriously, no Citizen Kane on streaming? No Dr. Strangelove? No JFK? No Blue Velvet?
What I find most frustrating is that Netflix does a horrible job of setting customer expectations. Why is Smila's Sense of Snow no longer available for streaming? I don't know and don't think Netflix has ever said. Will it be available again at some point in the future? Who knows? Why is a movie for rent as a DVD but not streamable? It seems to me that, if you want to stem the tide of illegal downloading, keeping customers in the dark and forcing them to suffer your capricious whims is not a great business model.
Did anyone drop a Netflix service when they split the DVD and streaming services? Anyone out there know of good Netflix alternatives?
ADDENDUM: Here's a list of movies and TV shows that went bye-bye today.
S.E.C. Chairwoman Needs to Bust Out the Great Books
That's Mary L. Schapiro. She's the chairwoman of the Securities and Exchange Commission and this article is astounding. In it she defends the S.E.C.'s practice of slapping Wall Street firms on the wrist and absolving them of wrongdoing.
The chairwoman of the Securities and Exchange Commission defended the agency’s record of settling fraud cases with Wall Street companies, saying on Wednesday that she believed the agency’s practices “clearly have deterrent value,” even though firms were often charged repeatedly for violating the same securities laws.
Mary L. Schapiro, the S.E.C. chairwoman, added that repeat offenders remained a problem because “people have short memories” on Wall Street. That forces the commission to bring many of the same types of cases “so that people don’t forget that they have these obligations and that somebody is watching and somebody is willing to hold them accountable.”
"Clearly have deterrent value" for whom?
According to a New York Times analysis of enforcement cases, nearly all of the biggest Wall Street firms have settled fraud cases by promising never to violate a law that they had already promised not to break, usually multiple times. In addition, the Times analysis showed, those settlements also repeatedly granted exemptions to the biggest Wall Street firms from punishments intended by Congress and regulators to act as a deterrent to multiple fraud violations.
Matt Taibbi has a couple blog posts about federal Judge Jed Rakoff putting the kibosh on a fraud settlement the S.E.C. was making with Citigroup.
Here, Citi similarly told investors a package of mortgages had been chosen independently, when in fact Citi itself had chosen the stuff and was betting against the whole pile.
Judge Rakoff balked at the settlement and particularly balked at the SEC’s decision to allow Citi off without any admission of wrongdoing. He also mocked the SEC’s decision to describe the crime as “negligence” instead of intentional fraud, taking the entirely rational position that there’s no way a bank making $160 million ripping off its customers can conceivably be described as an accident.
If you take Citi’s $160 million profit on the deal into consideration, what we’re talking about then is a $125 million fine for causing $700 million in damages. That, and no admission of wrongdoing.
Just imagine a mugger who steals $70 from some lady’s wallet being sentenced to walk free after paying back twelve bucks.
Going back to the S.E.C.'s excuses:
Ms. Schapiro said that she believed recidivism among Wall Street firms was so common “in part because these firms are enormous.”
Isn't there some pithy phrase about doing the same thing and expecting different results? Why are my taxes still paying this woman's salary? There's this wonderful American intellectual tradition called pragmatic liberalism. The foundations were laid by Charles Peirce, William James, and John Dewey. Former UW prof Charles W. Anderson is a proponent. Here's how Anderson introduced the concept to the class of his that I was in: If something doesn't work, do something different.
If slapping these enormous firms on the wrist doesn't deter illegal behavior, then try something different. Maybe if the consequences of repeatedly committing the same offense over and over after saying that they'd never do it again were enormous, then something might stick in the institutional memories of these big firms. Perhaps multi-billion dollar fines and/or hauling C.E.O.s out of their offices in handcuffs before TV cameras might help jog their collective memories.
27 February, 2012
Memorial Union to Remain Bus Terminal For Four More Years
Earlier this month I noticed several intercity buses parked in front of Memorial Union. I've not heard of any plans to construct a bus terminal and it appears that the Union will remain Madison's de facto terminal at least for the next few years.
Intercity buses will continue to pick up and offload passengers on Langdon Street for the next four years. However, the city is going to designate four bus stalls and then charge bus companies to use them to recoup lost parking meter fees. The bus lines have to opt into this plan so it's possible that one or more carriers will choose to find another location to service passengers.
I presume this is at least partly in response to the upcoming construction in the area. The Union is getting some remodeling done while work will be done on the utility tunnels that emanate from Science Hall. Concomitant to this the Historical Society's balustrade along Langdon will be repaired and an ADA-compliant entryway will also be installed at the same time.
But what happens after four years? Is the city actively engaged in planning for a bus terminal? Or looking at spreading out curbside loading points?
Tangentially, the BBC posted an article called "The American bus revival" yesterday about intercity buses rising from the ashes. Statements like this one make me doubt a bus terminal is in the works:
But the fact that they offer free wi-fi and pick up passengers on the kerbside - rather than bus terminals which are seen as dirty and intimidating - is also a factor, helping to make them popular with more affluent passengers and women travelling alone, according to the DePaul research.
The appeal of curbside pick-up and the likelihood that intercity passenger rail in Madison is dead for at least a generation greatly lessens the chances of some kind of intermodal station being built. The Union doesn't offer ticketing and isn't always open. I wonder if any other cities are faced with this situation.
Public transit planning consultant and blogger Jarrett Walker was quoted in the piece. He was here in Madison last year and I highly recommend his blog.
Intercity buses will continue to pick up and offload passengers on Langdon Street for the next four years. However, the city is going to designate four bus stalls and then charge bus companies to use them to recoup lost parking meter fees. The bus lines have to opt into this plan so it's possible that one or more carriers will choose to find another location to service passengers.
I presume this is at least partly in response to the upcoming construction in the area. The Union is getting some remodeling done while work will be done on the utility tunnels that emanate from Science Hall. Concomitant to this the Historical Society's balustrade along Langdon will be repaired and an ADA-compliant entryway will also be installed at the same time.
But what happens after four years? Is the city actively engaged in planning for a bus terminal? Or looking at spreading out curbside loading points?
Tangentially, the BBC posted an article called "The American bus revival" yesterday about intercity buses rising from the ashes. Statements like this one make me doubt a bus terminal is in the works:
But the fact that they offer free wi-fi and pick up passengers on the kerbside - rather than bus terminals which are seen as dirty and intimidating - is also a factor, helping to make them popular with more affluent passengers and women travelling alone, according to the DePaul research.
The appeal of curbside pick-up and the likelihood that intercity passenger rail in Madison is dead for at least a generation greatly lessens the chances of some kind of intermodal station being built. The Union doesn't offer ticketing and isn't always open. I wonder if any other cities are faced with this situation.
Public transit planning consultant and blogger Jarrett Walker was quoted in the piece. He was here in Madison last year and I highly recommend his blog.
The Road Chosen
Since two-thirds of my household are struggling with math homework, I dared not let on the title while I was reading it. Luckily actual knowledge of mathematics beyond my ken was not required to enjoy this book. The penultimate 7th Doctor PDA, The Algebra of Ice promised the return of the Brigadier, presumably still reeling from the events of Battlefield.
The tale begins with the TARDIS going all funny. It brings The Doctor and Ace to various moments in time which don't quite go as the history books say they do. Edgar Allen Poe doesn't die in quite the same manner as he should, the fate of Pompeii becomes slightly altered, and a sign at a certain junkyard well-known to DW fans reads “I.M. Forman” instead of its familiar spelling with an E. The Doctor figures out that these blips in time somehow revolve around a young mathematics genius named Ethan Amberglass. Our intrepid investigators pay the recluse a visit only to find that he's mastered the crotchety thing and moved beyond it.
The Doctor heads over to UNIT where the Brigadier enlists his help with investigating an eldritch pattern in a field in Kent. No mere circle, the pattern consists of a series of geometric shapes and is encased in layer of super-cold ice, as if all the molecules of the ground had suffered a mighty blow at the hand of entropy and lost all energy. Also interested in this strange phenomenon is one Adrian Molecross, the publisher of a Fortean online magazine called Molecross's Miscellany of the Mysterious and Misunderstood.
Meanwhile another math genius, Pat Unwin, is in the employ of Sheridan Brett. Brett is a twisted, sadistic bastard with a preternatural affection for entropy. With a nihilistic temperament, Brett is keen on destroying the universe. This makes him a refreshing villain as he has no lust for power. A thirst for self-aggrandizement is replaced by a total indifference to, well, pretty much everything. He simply wants to bring an entropic end to life, the universe, and everything several billion years early. As Unwin says to Ethan at one point, ”I think entropy is the problem, don’t you? I mean, what’s the point of all the rest of it if we’re only going to end up cold toast?” The crop patterns are portals to another dimension and opening them would allow some being hell-bent on destruction through to our universe.
Rose also makes good on the potential of the books to give a more adult spin on DW with Brett. At one point he kidnaps Ethan and locks him in his basement. There Brett viciously tortures Ethan by stubbing cigarettes into his cheek, the sole of one of his feet, and other body parts. It's a brutal scene and much more shocking than the usual hooking up people to electrodes and giving them a shock routine that is familiar to DW viewers.
After reading Mike Tucker & Robert Perry's story arc wherein Ace matures and becomes more independent, I was wondering what Rose would do with the character. She portrays the companion in a way that is a mix of the brash teenager of the television show and the more adult figure that has been carved out by other authors of the series. For most of the book she is the companion that we know from TV. However, she is attracted to Ethan and they verbally spar with one another not unlike Walter and Hildy in His Girl Friday before consummating their brief relationship.
There's nothing new in Ace bestowing her carnal favors upon a strapping young lad. Instead it's The Doctor whose character is twisted in a new direction. In a moment of desperation, The Doctor tries to convince Ethan that his – Ethan's – death would put things right.
‘What are you trying to do – persuade me to kill myself and save you the trouble?’
‘It’s one life against the whole of existence.’
‘It’s my life, and I’m not going to do it.’
‘The universe!’ cried the Doctor, anguished.
‘You’re trying to take it off you – murder without murdering. You think I’m going to make it easy?'
It was a rather shocking scene for me as I'm used to The Doctor volunteering his own life to save everyone else only to have some other character step up and make the ultimate sacrifice. Here, not only is The Doctor pleading with someone else to die, it's also someone for whom Ace has feelings. But we do get a scene where a subsidiary character sacrifices himself: Molecross takes one for the team by stepping between Brett and the TARDIS' Artron Energy Capacitor. (I never knew the TARDIS had one of those.) I thought the scene with The Doctor trying to get Ethan to sacrifice himself made Molecross' death even more poignant. Molecross is dismissed by the Brigadier as a crank and is basically brushed off by The Doctor and Ethan. He comes across as being rather timid. While neither a natural born leader nor blessed with an abundance of confidence, he does thrust himself into the fray on more than one occasion. He is the perpetual underdog and you can't help but cheer for him.
While Ethan survives the final confrontation with those beings who seek to enter our universe, his body eventually gives out. The book's final chapter is a very touching farewell to him. The Doctor enters his mind and explains to him that he has a brain tumor and that he knew about it the whole time. Although it would prove fatal, the tumor also kept the aliens from possessing his mind. The Doctor also admits that his attempt to get Ethan to sacrifice himself was wrong both morally and practically as it was through Ethan that The Doctor figured out that the aliens had hacked into the TARDIS. He says, “I make terrible choices, and I can’t be sure of the ends. It’s the road I’ve chosen.” A wonderfully contrary statement to The Doctor we have gotten to know lo these many years.
My big gripe about this story is that the Brigadier is woefully underused. He adds a bit of color here and there and puts UNIT's resources at The Doctor's disposal but he was far from being an indispensable part of the story or even a major element. A beloved character gone to waste.
The Algebra of Ice is a very dark story. There's torture, the death of Molecross, and Ethan's fate to be in a coma until his body gives out. Plus The Doctor's intuition that Ethan's death would thwart the villains. Brett is a thoroughly repugnant sociopath while the aliens are only seen via a sort of virtual reality world and there we see one of them in the form of a snake. The enemy is defeated but not everyone lives happily ever after.
At Least He's Better Than Mr. Pink
What a douchbag. Some banker decided to demonstrate just how big of an asshole he is to a waitress in California.
An arrogant banker has done all in his power to enforce his position as the ‘one per cent,’ all the while reminding everyone else they’re not.
After dining on a meal at a boutique Newport Beach, California restaurant, the banker left only $1.33 on a $133.54 tab.
Adding insult to injury, he gave the server, Breanna, another tip: ‘Get a real job.’
The banker’s belligerent behaviour at True Food Kitchen was documented by his dining companion, who posted a photo of the receipt to Twitter, alerting Eater’s Receiprocity blog.
The post - and corresponding blog - was later deleted.
FutureExBanker, wrote in a now-deleted post: ‘I work in the corporate office of a major bank for a boss who represents everything wrong with the financial industry.’
The blogger said that his boss will tip exactly one per cent of the bill ‘every time he feels the server doesn’t sufficiently bow down to his Holiness.’
He didn't even have the courtesy to round up to $1.34. It'd be a real shame if this guy's name and face got around to other restaurants and there was some kind of accident where fecal matter ended up in his foie gras. Yeah, a real shame.
EDIT: Thankfully I discovered today (28 Feb) that this is hoax.
An arrogant banker has done all in his power to enforce his position as the ‘one per cent,’ all the while reminding everyone else they’re not.
After dining on a meal at a boutique Newport Beach, California restaurant, the banker left only $1.33 on a $133.54 tab.
Adding insult to injury, he gave the server, Breanna, another tip: ‘Get a real job.’
The banker’s belligerent behaviour at True Food Kitchen was documented by his dining companion, who posted a photo of the receipt to Twitter, alerting Eater’s Receiprocity blog.
The post - and corresponding blog - was later deleted.
FutureExBanker, wrote in a now-deleted post: ‘I work in the corporate office of a major bank for a boss who represents everything wrong with the financial industry.’
The blogger said that his boss will tip exactly one per cent of the bill ‘every time he feels the server doesn’t sufficiently bow down to his Holiness.’
He didn't even have the courtesy to round up to $1.34. It'd be a real shame if this guy's name and face got around to other restaurants and there was some kind of accident where fecal matter ended up in his foie gras. Yeah, a real shame.
EDIT: Thankfully I discovered today (28 Feb) that this is hoax.
The Owls Are Not What They Seem
Those talons are just downright menacing. I feel badly for any small rodents scurrying about underneath the flight path of one of these creatures. Nature's very own drone.
17 February, 2012
About barley...
77 Square has an article today called "The demand for heritage grains explodes".
It's pretty interesting and I take it that any grain that isn't wheat is considered "heritage". I can personally vouch for the tastiness of the spelt flakes breakfast cereal at the Co-op but the piece's entry for barley is a bit odd.
Barley: Familiar to many, this is an unusually hardy ancient grain that's at least 4,000 years old. It's used in baked goods, soups and hot cereals.
First, is barley really a "heritage" grain? I mean, most Wisconsonians consume barley everyday. And what else is barley commonly used for besides, baked goods, soups, and hot cereals? How could a Wisconsin journalist neglect to mention that barley is familiar to many people because it is an ingredient in beer? Hello?! McFly!
Buckwheat. Mmmm...you don't need to grind it up. You do have to cook the groats for a long time, though. Very tasty stuff. Hey 77 Square - it's also a staple in Eastern Europe as well. We Slavs love the stuff.
It's pretty interesting and I take it that any grain that isn't wheat is considered "heritage". I can personally vouch for the tastiness of the spelt flakes breakfast cereal at the Co-op but the piece's entry for barley is a bit odd.
Barley: Familiar to many, this is an unusually hardy ancient grain that's at least 4,000 years old. It's used in baked goods, soups and hot cereals.
First, is barley really a "heritage" grain? I mean, most Wisconsonians consume barley everyday. And what else is barley commonly used for besides, baked goods, soups, and hot cereals? How could a Wisconsin journalist neglect to mention that barley is familiar to many people because it is an ingredient in beer? Hello?! McFly!
Buckwheat. Mmmm...you don't need to grind it up. You do have to cook the groats for a long time, though. Very tasty stuff. Hey 77 Square - it's also a staple in Eastern Europe as well. We Slavs love the stuff.
Party With Pączki
Celebrate Fat Tuesday (Fat Thursday was yesterday) with pączki! Scott's Pastry Shoppe in Middleton carries them.
15 February, 2012
The Heartland Institute: Climate Change Denial & "Operation Angry Badger"
The Heartland Institute is a conservative think tank that promotes conservative causes, among them being climate change denialism. Phil Plait, the Bad Astronomer, has a post summarizing the leak of what is supposedly a cache of the HI's internal documents. (They can be found here.) One of them is the organization's "2012 Climate Strategy" which includes this line:
[Dr. Wojick's] effort will focus on providing curriculum that shows that the topic of climate change is controversial and uncertain – two key points that are effective at dissuading teachers from teaching science.
"dissuading teachers from teaching science"?!
Read Plait's post. There are links to more discussion of the documents as well as his take on the HI's egregious hypocrisy regarding its views and the Climategate scandal that was nothing more than a tempest in a teapot.
I was poking through the fundraising plan document and found that HI, which is based in Chicago, is developing a stratagem for Wisconsin. It's called "Operation Angry Badger":
Wisconsin was the focus of national attention due to recall campaigns waged in 2011, and campaigns are taking place in 2012 against Gov. Scott Walker, Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch and three Republican senators who voted for Act 10, the landmark collective bargaining reform legislation adopted in 2011. We have been following the Wisconsin debate closely, reporting on it in Budget & Tax News, commenting in op-eds and LTEs and on blogs, doing television and radio interviews, and sending research and commentary to elected officials in Wisconsin and nationally.
The recall elections of 2012 amount to a referenda on collective bargaining reform at the state level, making them of national interest. Successful recalls would be a major setback to the national effort to rein in public sector compensation and union power. Heartland is the largest and most influential national free-market think tank in the Midwest, so we are in the right place and with the right resources to help defend and secure Wisconsin’s recent gains.
We are contemplating five projects:
1. Recruit and promote superintendents who support Act 10
2. Explain the benefits of Act 10
3. Document the shortcomings of public schools in Wisconsin
4. Expose teacher pay in key districts
5. Create blogs that shadow small town newspaper coverage of the controversy
We anticipate that this project will cost about $612,000. Maureen Martin, Heartland’s legal counsel, with be the chief researcher and writer for this project. The anonymous donor has pledged $100,000 toward this project. We are circulating a proposal to other potential funders.
Beware any press releases bearing the name "Maureen Martin". I wonder if any shadow blogs have been created yet. Which of their propagandists have been out on radio and TV pushing their agenda? Surely Charlie Sykes knows. I can just hear David Blaska's blathering now, "I, for one, welcome our new FIB overlords." Bears fans 4 Walker!
The HI is also looking to fund their Center for Transforming Education. Presumably the Center wants to transform science education so that, you know, science isn't actually taught in the brave new world of public schools gone for-profit. Will Allen Ruff be able to link Kaleem Caire to the Heartland Institute? Only The Shadow knows...
[Dr. Wojick's] effort will focus on providing curriculum that shows that the topic of climate change is controversial and uncertain – two key points that are effective at dissuading teachers from teaching science.
"dissuading teachers from teaching science"?!
Read Plait's post. There are links to more discussion of the documents as well as his take on the HI's egregious hypocrisy regarding its views and the Climategate scandal that was nothing more than a tempest in a teapot.
I was poking through the fundraising plan document and found that HI, which is based in Chicago, is developing a stratagem for Wisconsin. It's called "Operation Angry Badger":
Wisconsin was the focus of national attention due to recall campaigns waged in 2011, and campaigns are taking place in 2012 against Gov. Scott Walker, Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch and three Republican senators who voted for Act 10, the landmark collective bargaining reform legislation adopted in 2011. We have been following the Wisconsin debate closely, reporting on it in Budget & Tax News, commenting in op-eds and LTEs and on blogs, doing television and radio interviews, and sending research and commentary to elected officials in Wisconsin and nationally.
The recall elections of 2012 amount to a referenda on collective bargaining reform at the state level, making them of national interest. Successful recalls would be a major setback to the national effort to rein in public sector compensation and union power. Heartland is the largest and most influential national free-market think tank in the Midwest, so we are in the right place and with the right resources to help defend and secure Wisconsin’s recent gains.
We are contemplating five projects:
1. Recruit and promote superintendents who support Act 10
2. Explain the benefits of Act 10
3. Document the shortcomings of public schools in Wisconsin
4. Expose teacher pay in key districts
5. Create blogs that shadow small town newspaper coverage of the controversy
We anticipate that this project will cost about $612,000. Maureen Martin, Heartland’s legal counsel, with be the chief researcher and writer for this project. The anonymous donor has pledged $100,000 toward this project. We are circulating a proposal to other potential funders.
Beware any press releases bearing the name "Maureen Martin". I wonder if any shadow blogs have been created yet. Which of their propagandists have been out on radio and TV pushing their agenda? Surely Charlie Sykes knows. I can just hear David Blaska's blathering now, "I, for one, welcome our new FIB overlords." Bears fans 4 Walker!
The HI is also looking to fund their Center for Transforming Education. Presumably the Center wants to transform science education so that, you know, science isn't actually taught in the brave new world of public schools gone for-profit. Will Allen Ruff be able to link Kaleem Caire to the Heartland Institute? Only The Shadow knows...
14 February, 2012
Scott Walker's Teleological Flip Flopping
Wisconsin is looking at a $140 million chunk of the $25 billion mortgage fraud settlement. Of that $140 million, $31.6 million will be going directly into state coffers. And of that $31.6 million, Governor Scott Walker is intending to use $25.6 million of it to close the state's budget deficit.
Per the structure of the payment plan set up in the mortgage settlement, each state government is to receive a direct portion of the money for the purpose of funding future law enforcement efforts, providing additional relief to borrowers, paying civil penalties, funding of foreclosure relief programs and to compensate the state for its losses from the crisis.
As I review the list of intended uses, I simply don’t see paying down state budget shortfalls as meeting the purposes and intents of the agreement.
What happened to Walker's reforms as laid out on his campaign website?
If taxpayer revenue is collected for a specific purpose such as building and maintaining roads, it should be used for that purpose and that purpose only.
Hey, Walker - the extrinsic finality of that money will be exhibited when it is used for its intended purposes and those purposes only, i.e. - foreclosure relief programs and whatnot. I guess reforms are only good in theory. When it's politically expedient, then they go out the window.
Walker likes to say he eliminated the state's deficit and is running commercials saying as much yet we're looking at a $143 million shortfall. It all depends on what accounting method you use and Walker likes to use both.
Per the structure of the payment plan set up in the mortgage settlement, each state government is to receive a direct portion of the money for the purpose of funding future law enforcement efforts, providing additional relief to borrowers, paying civil penalties, funding of foreclosure relief programs and to compensate the state for its losses from the crisis.
As I review the list of intended uses, I simply don’t see paying down state budget shortfalls as meeting the purposes and intents of the agreement.
What happened to Walker's reforms as laid out on his campaign website?
If taxpayer revenue is collected for a specific purpose such as building and maintaining roads, it should be used for that purpose and that purpose only.
Hey, Walker - the extrinsic finality of that money will be exhibited when it is used for its intended purposes and those purposes only, i.e. - foreclosure relief programs and whatnot. I guess reforms are only good in theory. When it's politically expedient, then they go out the window.
Walker likes to say he eliminated the state's deficit and is running commercials saying as much yet we're looking at a $143 million shortfall. It all depends on what accounting method you use and Walker likes to use both.
Bust Out That Stange
Point has a new spring seasonal - Three Kings Ale.
It's a Kölsch style ale which I gather was released earlier this month. I haven't had it so I'm not sure if it's top-fermented and lagered like a Kölsch should be or if they just use the requisite yeast. It features Hallertau Mittelfrueh and Northern Brewer hops. Anyone know what hops are used in Cologne by Reissdorf, Gaffel, Sunner, etc.?
Point is doing well for themselves. Their sales have increased and last year they built a new warehouse and added brewing capacity. The fully armed and operational brewhouse can now brew 100,000 barrels annually.
It's a Kölsch style ale which I gather was released earlier this month. I haven't had it so I'm not sure if it's top-fermented and lagered like a Kölsch should be or if they just use the requisite yeast. It features Hallertau Mittelfrueh and Northern Brewer hops. Anyone know what hops are used in Cologne by Reissdorf, Gaffel, Sunner, etc.?
Point is doing well for themselves. Their sales have increased and last year they built a new warehouse and added brewing capacity. The fully armed and operational brewhouse can now brew 100,000 barrels annually.
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