Month: December 2003 (Page 6 of 7)

The party line

So Hillary Clinton was on “Face the Nation” this morning, spouting the party line that she was for civil unions but against gay marriage. When John Roberts asked her why she was against gay marriage, all she could come up with was “That’s an idea that’s not supported by a lot of Americans” or some such. Well, so was desegregation, Hillary. Did that make it the wrong thing to do? Was it not worth doing because it was politically dangerous?

In order to help Hillary Clinton, Tom Daschle, Howard Dean and others deal with this issue, I’ve written up a little sample rhetoric on gay marriage for them to use. They don’t even have to credit me! It’s for the greater good, I say. Here it is:

I think what’s important here, Tim, is to understand the difference between civil and religious marriage. Religious marriage is a sacrament, and I don’t believe the government has any business telling any religion who they can and cannot marry. But civil marriage is a legal contract that’s enforced by the state, and that confers rights on the citizens that enter into that contract. I believe Americans are a fundamentally fair people. And this is about fairness – allowing people who want to enter into committed relationships, relationships that strengthen the society, to get the rights conferred by civil marriage.

There’s a lot of talk about civil unions these days – trying to create a system alongside civil marriage that would involve the same rights. But why create a new system, a new bureaucracy, to try to simulate something already in place? Is that fair? I don’t think it is. “Separate but equal” didn’t work in the civil rights era, and it doesn’t work here. I know there are a lot of Americans who are uncomfortable with homosexuality. But that unease shouldn’t be enough reason to deny basic rights to citizens of the United States of America.

Not that they’ll ever in a million years use this sort of argument. But they should. And if it only took me five minutes to come up with, I bet their high-priced speechwriters and message-makers could do an even better job. I’d like to see them at least try.

Signs of the apocalypse

Have you seen the ads for the Gizmo grater on TV recently? This thing looks like an ordinary box grater. But it oscillates up and down, so instead of moving the cheese up and down over the grater blades, you hold the cheese in place and the blade moves for you. So the slight motion of moving the cheese has been replaced by holding the cheese perfectly still.

Oh my sweet lord.

Now this is funny

Try this: go to Google’s home page. Type “miserable failure” into the search box, and then click on “I’m Feeling Lucky.” Go ahead, I’ll wait.

Ha!

Listening to…

“Tomorrow Night,” Patty Griffin

Have you heard Patty Griffin? If you haven’t, you should. I need to thank David for introducing her to me. Thanks, David. 🙂

Air Force One Fable, Version 3.0

What is with these people?

Before Night Falls

Watched this biography of Cuban writer Reinaldo Arenas last night. Lots of people had recommended it to me, and I finally put it on my Netflix list. While the photography was beautiful, there was good acting throughout and Javier Bardem was extremely easy on the eyes, as a biography I think it failed. I didn’t really understand much more about this man’s life after watching the movie than I did before it started. And the structure was so fragmented and dreamlike that at times it became more irritating than illuminating.

Still, it was atmospheric and interesting throughout, which is more than you can say for most theatrical releases these days. And how can you fault a movie that has Johnny Depp as a prison transvestite?

A sidenote: Is anyone actually interested in me reviewing movies that aren’t in theaters now? I don’t normally do reviews of stuff I see on video.

20 Most Annoying Conservatives 2003

I thought we could all use a laugh this morning.

Turkey Accomplished

I don’t much care that President Bush carried around a prop turkey during his photo-op visit to Iraq on Thanksgiving Day. It was a fake event, so a fake turkey doesn’t really bother me.

But then there’s the latest lie, about the British Airways pilot spotting Air Force One. This story has changed more than Michael Jackson’s face already. And it’s strange, because it’s such an inconsequential thing. They had a wildly successful PR stunt, but they had to goose it just a little bit more, and now it’s biting them on the ass. (Well, just a nibble of course, as usual.)

This British Airways thing reminds me of the “Mission Accomplished” sign, that Bush laughingly denied was the work of his staff. Well, it was. And I’m baffled that the administration would go out of its way to tell tiny falsehoods that could be so easily discovered.

Some say they’re pathological, that they don’t know the difference between a lie and the truth. Well, I don’t buy that. I think they are so drunk with power, realizing they can literally do or say anything they want, that it becomes fun. Remember the “Twilight Zone” episode where the small boy could turn anyone in the town into anything he liked? Kind of like that.

What really scares me is that so few people care about these lies, big or small. And when the President is caught stabbing a small child in the neck on the White House lawn, don’t come crying to me. 🙂

Average Joe

What fascinates me most about this show is its intense Darwinian quality. A beautiful woman holds the fate of 16 “regular guys” in her manicured hands. She has all the power, and they are her willing lapdogs. They jump through her hoops until they are eventually cast aside. The show’s producers even added to Melana’s power this week by letting her spy on the guys as they talked behind her back about her fat cousin – who was (and get ready for a shocker if you’ve never seen a television show before) actually Melana in a fat suit!

The best thing about this week’s show was the elimination of the evil bully Zach, who was headed for the winner’s circle had he not dissed Melana-in-fat-suit as the DUFF: “Designated Ugly Fat Friend.” Nice. Plus, his kiss-off on the show was a profanity-laced diatribe about how “Guys talking to guys is always different.”

Memo to Zach: blow me.

Now that Melana’s gotten rid of Zach, she’ll probably pick the last “average joe,” Adam. She even got a little weepy talking about him this week. And let’s face it – do you really think they’ll let her pick a model on a show called “Average Joe”?

Here’s what I really want to see: the anti-Darwin dating show. Let someone like the late lamented Dennis from earlier in this show be the star, and have 16 beauties compete for his attentions. No money, no other incentive for the women than the average joe’s basic attributes. Give the schlub the power, for once. Would any of the women feel anything for him? Would they just want to compete to win against the other women, or compete to stay on TV? Now there’s a show to get excited about.

Shattered Glass

I think there’s an entertaining movie to be made from the story of disgraced New Republic reporter Stephen Glass. “Shattered Glass” isn’t it.

Basically this movie is Hayden Christensen painting a picture of the most unctuous kiss-ass in history, until you yearn for his inevitable spanking. The spanking part, free of anything all that interesting or unexpected, takes up about 2/3 of the movie. We just see in agonizingly slow detail how Glass’s lies finally got the better of him.

And then it’s over. There’s almost no background, no motivations explored, no context at all, really. And interestingly in a movie about fabricated people and events, few of the characters or situations rang true for me. Glass, as portrayed by Christensen, would have been despised by most of the journalists I’ve known; they’re a cynical lot who don’t put much stock in fawning flattery. And I would have liked to know how a story containing absolutely no real people, places or things made it through the New Republic’s supposedly fanatical fact-checking process.

Plus, Glass’s fellow reporters are portrayed as either ciphers with no personality, or as whiny insecure office gossips. I have trouble believing this depiction of the group of young hotshots supposedly running “the in-flight magazine of Air Force One.”

Maybe that’s the way it really was. But hey, that doesn’t make for a very entertaining or involving movie. Maybe they should have punched it up a little.

Not recommended.