Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Thugs on The Wire
So far I'm about half way through the second season of the HBO series, "The Wire." Not bad, not bad at all. Here's what street thugs have to say about this year's (the 5th) season. I only get to them once they are released on DVD, though, so I won't be viewing season 5 for a bit, and thus can't comment on it yet.
A theme running throughout the first couple seasons, however, deals with how local cops trying to bust criminals also have to go head-to-head with the Feds, and also how career-driven mindsets -- judges, lawyers, and cops -- interfere with good police work.
Parts 2-4:
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Mughniyeh Goes Out With a Bang
Journalist Terry Anderson, a former Associated Press chief Middle East correspondent who was held captive by Mughniyeh for six years:
"I can't say I'm either surprised or sad," Andersen told the AP by phone from the Caribbean island of St. Lucia, where he was sailing. "He was not a good man — certainly the primary actor in my kidnapping and many others," he added. "To hear that his career has finally ended is a good thing and it's appropriate that he goes up in a car bomb."
The BBC version.
"I can't say I'm either surprised or sad," Andersen told the AP by phone from the Caribbean island of St. Lucia, where he was sailing. "He was not a good man — certainly the primary actor in my kidnapping and many others," he added. "To hear that his career has finally ended is a good thing and it's appropriate that he goes up in a car bomb."
The BBC version.
The JJ Rudy strategy
Run, Hill, run. No wonder she's in Texas. JJ must give her some precious advice.
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
MFT is Vegas Bound, Call Me Doubledown!
Alright, the wheels are in motion. The mandatory two week notice is in. I'll be on my way to moving to Las Vegas at the end of the month (or the first week in March). I'm so looking forward to moving back to a part of America.
Our Wonderfully Mongrel New World...
The big question this article raises is whether the U.S. Census needs to change it's out-dated, racist question about whether we are from the Caucus Mountains or not. I remember during a phone survey (I believe from the Census, perhaps a political campaign) telling the surveyor on the other end that, yes, I've been told my ancestors are from the Caucus Mountains of eastern Europe, but I've never been there and I don't know any descendents still living there. She laughed. She got it.
I understand the anti-intellectual politicalization of it all, but more objectively I don't see why the wedding of different European and New World ethnic groups is anything decidedly "new" in Western Civilization, from Columbian contact (I don't think the Vikings mingled in buffalo robes with any of the Newfoundland Natives) until now.
Off hand, I can list my ethnic origins as mostly Swedish, but with plenty of English, Scottish, German, French, Bohemian, Italian, Norwegian, and Lapland stock, not to mention trace amounts of Native American. That's why I often just declare that I'm all Burleigh County, North Dakota.
I know where you fellahs hail from, but I can't imagine your ancestors stayed within the present day geopolitical borders of your respective country or state from generation to generation to generation, since time immemorial. Alright, give me a run down of your ethnic origins as you understand them, from Romania to Portugal to the New World.
I understand the anti-intellectual politicalization of it all, but more objectively I don't see why the wedding of different European and New World ethnic groups is anything decidedly "new" in Western Civilization, from Columbian contact (I don't think the Vikings mingled in buffalo robes with any of the Newfoundland Natives) until now.
Off hand, I can list my ethnic origins as mostly Swedish, but with plenty of English, Scottish, German, French, Bohemian, Italian, Norwegian, and Lapland stock, not to mention trace amounts of Native American. That's why I often just declare that I'm all Burleigh County, North Dakota.
I know where you fellahs hail from, but I can't imagine your ancestors stayed within the present day geopolitical borders of your respective country or state from generation to generation to generation, since time immemorial. Alright, give me a run down of your ethnic origins as you understand them, from Romania to Portugal to the New World.
Monday, February 11, 2008
When The Shark Jumps You
Shaw and Schneider, the crew is down to one....and the great white hears the music for his encore performance. Ain't no escaping the White Devil, Death
To our friend in Leeds
I think my arguments were stronger in my mail, but Hitchens hates religion. I don't.
JJ's Kind of Girl?
I didn't catch the Grammys. It's hard for me to work up enough care to watch them. Still, this Amy Winehouse chick's voice sounds like she'll suck you off in between songs and hits off her crack pipe.
The spectacle continues, and Winehouse does look mighty attractive. Her lyrics, at least, are a nice break from that psycho Britney.
Art Heist: make-work for Scotland Yard
Valued at $163.2 million. Well, we know they are still somewhere on earth here.
You Know You're Having a Bad Week When...
Your new bride dies in your arms during the first dance at the reception...
Dakota Duckbilled Hadrosaur
Here's another Jesus Horse. This is kind of a rarity, that is, finding dino skin in tact (fossilized, of course, and in tact).
This duck-billed hadrosaur was located around Marmath, North Dakota (in the furthest southwestern part of the state, in the Badlands). Here are a couple pics pulled from National Geographic's piece on it.
Milking Chavez's National Socialist Utopia
Tickets are cheap and we're not too sure how long this circus is going to last, so keep your eye on the three rings. Maybe this is what Chomsky and Pepe had in mind? Maybe National Socialism will work in this century...
A new tack
"OK, now here's the deal. If ya'll don't vote for Hillary, I ain't leavin'," the former president said as he loudly downed a pulled pork barbeque sandwich, hush puppies, slaw and a jumbo iced tea in under 45 seconds. Sounds good to me.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
The view from Canuckia
It was the women who put Trudeau in power, and kept him there: the women’s vote in English Canada, plus the Liberal fiefdom in Quebec. It is the ditzier range of women in the borderline Red States that could elect President Obama: lonely women, and to some extent, their weak, “sensitive” men. What is ditz? Canuck for Paris Hilton??
The Doldrums of MFT's Winter
Perhaps it's a return to what I interpret as all too Normal here on the upper Plains. Certainly the wintry feelings are spilling over to MFT's increasingly apathetic attitude towards Mitt Romney. I'm certain it's more interesting when in Boston. The canned clam chowder and canned sockeye salmon I had for lunch today cannot compare to what is offered on the Atlantic seaboard.
To counter the doldrums, I've decided to check out a contemporary of Robert Musil, Hermann Broch's essay, "Hugo von Hofmannsthal and His Time: Art and Its Non-Style at the End of the Nineteenth Century" (1947-48) in Geist and Zeitgeist: The Spirit in an Unspiritual Age" this afternoon.
There is consolation in shitty Premium Grainbelt, and also at the bottom of the silver Mongolian vodka drinking dish (see pic). And in the warm melancholy of cloudy, wintry days. It's likely I'll be moving from the upper Plains later this month, for reasons geographic, monetary, and, most important, for more lived-experience. I'll let you fellahs know where after I inform work. Keep on keepin' on. Back to the sub-zero Dakota temps, and mean arctic windchills.
A collage for fellow FCP'ers.
~mft
Playing the age card
So how will McCain respond when Obama damns him with faint praise? Is he gonna hit the pinata, or just fold?
Saturday, February 09, 2008
Coandaboom!
Surge is more than a bunch of boots on the ground--it's also more (and better) aircraft, and more flyboys. By the way, read here about the Osprey: Use of Coanda technology to redirect exhaust. Powww!! Hey, JJ, where is my Louis Roed?
Huckaboom!
"I didn't major in math. I majored in miracles, and I still believe in them." Hmmm... So OK, Huck doesn't know how to add, but can he multiply the loaves?
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