Baron Dave Romm
Michael Steele
By Baron Dave Romm
Shockwave Radio Theater podcasts
GOP Arrogance: The Gift That Keeps On Giving
After spending energy listening to and reviewing "Barack the Magic Negro" in last weeks column, spurred on by Michael Dare's brave defense of right-wing attempts at humor, I wake up last week to find that the Republican National Committee has chosen Michael Steele as Chairman.
I have no idea whether he's the right person for the job or how he was picked. But geeze, that's funny. Sad, but funny.
At the Republican National Convention in August, I met with William Owen, Jr., author of Obama, Why Black Americans Should Have Doubts. In any other venue, in any other part of the world, Owen would be laughed out of town. At the RNC, he was doing brisk business. The 2008 Republican convention was the whitest on record; perhaps there was some "conservative guilt" going on. Whatever.
The upshot of the GOP's outreach program to minorities for the 2008 election: 4% of blacks voted for McCain, with less than a third of Hispanics and Asians on board.
Clearly, the selection of a black man to head the Republican National Committee is not playing to strength. If Steele doubles the percentage of blacks who vote for Sarah Palin (or whoever) in 2012 to 8%, goppies will take it and be happy. And Democrats will win by a landslide.
All the foofaraw about the dumb jokes used by Rush Limbaugh on hate radio, all the sneering arrogance of candidates for the RNC who wanted to play to the mean-spirited "base" of the party, comes down to this: We can safely laugh at them.
With the selection of right-wing African-American Republican Michael Steele to head their party's fund raising efforts, the extremists will hold the party by the balls for that much longer. Instead of showing some personal responsibility and admitting they were wrong, Republicans have clenched their sphincters and backed themselves into a corner.
And I'm going to laugh at them for doing so.
Crusoe, Gilligan's Island and Man Friday
NBC's Crusoe is a lush production. Gorgeous island photography worthy of Lost, an extensive arboreal abode that's pushed like the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse at Disneyland. Solid acting, good costumes, smart scripts.
Yet Crusoe fails, not just as an island adventure, or as a reimagining of the 1719 Daniel Defoe novel. For an island in the middle of nowhere, that Crusoe has spent six lonely years broken up by meeting Friday, it's awfully crowded. Like Gilligan's Island, the castaways spend a great deal of time interacting with people who come and go with ease. The tv show averages more than one ship per episode. Indeed, both Crusoe and Friday keep running into people they know. People trying to kill them. The banter between Crusoe and Friday has some humor, but the show is high drama. Yet all too often Crusoe seems as lost as George of the Jungle and Friday comes off as super-competent like.... well, like Barack Obama.
I've seen all 12 episodes from the first season, which ended Saturday 1/31/09. The finale was even more disappointing than the rest of the season. The plot was dumb and the twist on the background story took us further out of the original.
After a few shows, I added Man Friday to my Netflix queue, and the DVD arrived a few days ago.
Man Friday is a marvelous movie. Not a great movie, perhaps, but a really good one and deserves to be better remembered. It tells the story of Robinson Crusoe mostly from Friday's perspective, playing up the First Contact elements of the book. Peter O'Toole is great as the half-mad Bible-thumping high-born Englishman desperately trying to stave off loneliness and keep remnants of civilisaion in his domain. Richard Roundtree give a very affecting performance as a cannibal with high moral values, staving off death by the mad Englishman while trying to understand his culture and imparting some of his own. For 1975, the mentions of casual sex (and gay sex) were uncharted territory; not dwelt upon, just briefly touched upon as a way to distinguish the cultures.
On the Shockwave Scale of 9 to 23, with 23 being top, I'd give Man Friday about a 20. Adult themes and violence, but no bad language or nudity; a real 70s family movie. The tv show Crusoe gets about a 14, almost all for production values. A treat for the eyes, but ultimately doesn't do anything good.
Superbowl
By the time you read this, you will know who won the Superbowl and which commercials were best and whether Springsteen had a Wardrobe Malfunction or was as great as his hype.
My predictions: Steelers, PETA non-aired ad gets the most mentions, yes.
I wonder if I can get a pair of 3D glasses in time...
Baron Dave Romm is a conceptual artist and a noble of Ladonia who produces Shockwave Radio Theater, writes in a Live Journal demi-blog, plays with a very weird CD collection and an ever growing list of political links. Dave Romm reviews things at random for obscure web sites. You can read all his music recommendations from Bartcop-E. Podcasts of Shockwave Radio Theater. Permanent archive. More radio programs, interviews and science fiction humor plays can be accessed on the Shockwave Radio audio page.
Thanks to everyone who has sent me music to play on the air.
The Weekly Poll
The New Question
The 'All American?' Edition...
Actor/Producer Tom Hanks said at the LA premier of the Mormon polygamy themed HBO series 'Big Love', "The truth is a lot of Mormons gave a lot of money to the church to make Prop-8 happen. There are a lot of people who feel that is un-American, and I am one of them." A few days later he gave a qualified recantation by saying, "Last week, I labeled members of the Mormon church who supported California's Proposition 8 as 'un-American,'" I believe Proposition 8 is counter to the promise of our Constitution; it is codified discrimination. But everyone has a right to vote their conscience; nothing could be more American. To say members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints who contributed to Proposition 8 are 'un-American' creates more division when the time calls for respectful disagreement. No one should use 'un- American' lightly or in haste. I did. I should not have."....
This week's poll has two questions...
Should Mr. Hanks have made that recantation?
and...
If banning gay marriage is discrimination isn't it the same to ban polygamy (or polyandry) between consenting adults?
Send your response, and a (short) reason why, to
Results tomorrow
Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Elayne Boosler: Jews Agree with Holocaust-Denying Bishop, We Can't Believe the Holocaust Happened Either (huffingtonpost.com)
Bishop Williamson finds no "historical evidence" to prove the Holocaust happened, yet he has no trouble believing that God had a son on earth by immaculate conception who returned from the dead.
David Latt: Bush Punk'd Us Again (huffingtonpost.com)
Michael Isikoff reported for Newsweek that while many of us were fomenting about Bush preemptively pardoning at-risk members of his administration, he and his lawyer Fred Fielding (White House Counsel) were concocting one last expansion of executive privilege. Four days before he left office, Mr. Bush authorized Fielding to write letters to Harriet Miers and Karl Rove giving them "absolute immunity" from Congressional inquiry and prosecution. Preemptively. In perpetuity. Absolute and irrevocable.
Scott Burns: If You Play the Odds, It's Time to Buy (assetbuilder.com)
The question started coming in last summer: "Is it time to sell?" Many are still asking. But the right answer, then and now, was the same: "No, it's time to grit your teeth and hold." Why? Easy. It's a lot easier to blow a market call than...
Your Favorite Band Sucks: The Bullz-Eye staff targets bands they just "don't get"
Every music lover has been there - in front of the television or a set of speakers, listening for the first time to the work of a critically revered artist whose songs are supposed to change the way you look at the worldŠonly to come away wondering what all the hype was about.
'If you could kiss anyone in the world, who would it be?': Francesca Gallio, 11, interviews Simon Cowell (guardian.co.uk)
I was always pretending to be ill and my favourite trick was getting a cup of tea in the morning and I used to put the tea on my head for about 30 seconds, and then I'd call my mum and dad and say, "I'm not feeling very well, Mum, can you feel my head?" and it would always be hot. And that's how I used to get off school because I hated school.
'Which animal has the stinkiest poo?': Katie McKenzie, 5, interviews David Attenborough (guardian.co.uk)
DA: Golly. Well, that's a very good question. Quite a lot of animals make a stinky poo, because they want to show other animals that that's where they've been and that's where they live. And so they have stinky poo that says, "Poo: get out of here!" It says, "If you don't like this, you go away." And, er, let me see. Lions have a stinky poo.
'Who do you like best, José, Avram or Big Phil?': Oscar Witt, 5, puts John Terry on the spot (guardian.co.uk)
JT: My little boy likes football, so I play in the garden with him. My little girl, she likes doing my hair and sometimes spikes it up for me. And she puts make-up on me and things like that, and we play hide and seek, but I can never find them because kids are good at hiding, aren't they?
'Do you like any girls?': Jack Stott, 6, interviews Theo Walcott (guardian.co.uk)
Jack What was your best Christmas present?
'Are your favourite animals hamsters?': Kirsty Stark, 7, interviews Richard Hammond (guardian.co.uk)
Kirsty: I wanted to interview you because you make me laugh so much I fall off the sofa.
'Do you like wormy spaghetti?': Holly Matthews, 10, interviews Quentin Blake
QB: I don't know whether you want to be like me, but if you want to be an illustrator, it's important to read books. And then you have to draw a lot. It's like learning the piano. You have to practise.
'Do any of you have, like, annoying habits?': Lydia Roxburgh, 11, interviews Girls Aloud (guardian.co.uk)
Nadine: I was so stupid one time, I bought this coat. I thought it was £500, but they rang it up and it was five grand!
'How would you punish paedophiles and murderers?': James Harrington, 12, interviews David Cameron (guardian.co.uk)
DC: Look at this! This is the evidence I always like to show people - I am taller than Arnold Schwarzenegger. Now how about that? He's the governor of California, and he loves smoking big cigars and you can't smoke anywhere in California, so he's had to build a tent in the middle of this lawn.
Rohan Preston: Poet Nikki Giovanni writes of a love supreme (Minneapolis Star Tribune)
You expect a writer to deal with tragedy with a rush of words. There are many searing, searching and somber books born of grief.
Nikki Giovanni: Ego Tripping (Poem; 1973)
I was born in the Congo.
I walked to the Fertile Crescent and built the sphinx.
I designed a pyramid so tough that a star
that only glows every one hundred years falls
into the center giving divine perfect light.
Hubert's Poetry Corner
Paladin of the Playground?
An adult lesson NOT learned in childhood?
Charlie was first, and correct, with:
Winter turtle...
answered:
Reader Comment
Re: Boy Scouts
Quite an article from Michelle in AZ. Looks as if they could add a badge for "Hating Forests".
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
A beautiful summer day in the middle of winter.
"Kung Fu Panda" Sweeps
Annie Awards
"Kung Fu Panda" pulled out all its martial arts moves at the 36th annual Annie Awards, where it was named best animated feature.
The DreamWorks Animation feature dominated Friday's awards ceremony at UCLA's Royce Hall in Los Angeles, presented by ASIFA-Hollywood, the Los Angeles chapter of the International Animated Film Society.
"Panda" won the top prize over such other nominees as the critical favorites "WALL-E" and "Waltz With Bashir" and swept the feature film categories with 10 trophies, topping Pixar's "Ratatouille" run last year, when it earned nine Annies, including best feature.
ShadowMachine's "Robot Chicken: Star Wars Episode II" was honored as best animated TV production, while Nickelodeon's "Avatar: The Last Airbender" won the prize for best TV production produced for children.
"Futurama: The Beast With a Billion Backs," from the Curiosity Co. and 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, was victorious in the home entertainment category, and Duck Studios' "Heart" ad for United Airlines was the TV commercial prize winner.
Annie Awards
`Slumdog Millionaire' Wins
DGA Awards
"Slumdog Millionaire" continued its rags-to-riches march through Hollywood's awards season as its filmmaker, Danny Boyle, won the top honor Saturday from the Directors Guild of America.
The win puts Boyle on the inside track for the same prize at the Academy Awards on Feb. 22, since the guild recipient almost always goes on to win the directing Oscar.
"The Office" won the top honor for television comedy, "The Wire" took the award for TV drama and "Recount" won for TV movie.
Ari Folman's "Waltz With Bashir" won the documentary award. The film, which is nominated in the foreign-language category at the Academy Awards, is director Folman's animated study of an Israeli soldier struggling to recall suppressed memories of his involvement in the war with Lebanon.
Chicago Sun-Times film critic Roger Ebert was honored with an honorary life membership in the guild.
DGA Awards
Jenny's Number For Sale
867-5309
After five years fielding thousands of calls to one of rock 'n' roll's most celebrated phone numbers, disc jockey Spencer Potter is hanging up on Jenny.
Her seven digits are familiar to anyone who paid attention to pop music in the early 1980s: 867-5309, immortalized by the band Tommy Tutone.
Potter and his roommates requested the number on a lark for their home phone in northern New Jersey. They got it, along with about 30 to 40 calls a day.
The 28-year-old Potter says he's selling his business, A Blast Entertainment, and moving to New York. The business and the phone number are for sale on eBay, where the high bid was about $1,000 by Sunday morning.
867-5309
Chefs Of The Sea
Dolphins
Dolphins are the chefs of the seas, having been seen going through precise and elaborate preparations to rid cuttlefish of ink and bone to produce a soft meal of calamari, Australian scientists say.
A wild female Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphin was observed going through the same series of complicated steps to prepare cuttlefish prey for eating in the Spencer Gulf, in South Australia state.
"It's a sign of how well their brains are developed. It's a pretty clever way to get pure calamari without all the horrible bits," Mark Norman, the curator of molluscs at Museum Victoria and a research team member, told the Canberra Times newspaper.
Norman and study co-author Tom Tregenza, from the University of Exeter, said the behaviour exhibited between 2003 and 2007 was unlikely to be a rarity.
Dolphins
He Inhaled
Michael Phelps
Olympic great Michael Phelps has acknowledged "regrettable" behavior and "bad judgment" after a photo in a British newspaper showed him smoking marijuana.
In a statement released to The Associated Press, the swimmer who won a record eight gold medals at the Beijing Games conceded the authenticity of the exclusive picture published Sunday by the tabloid News of the World.
Phelps said: "I engaged in behavior which was regrettable and demonstrated bad judgment. I'm 23 years old and despite the successes I've had in the pool, I acted in a youthful and inappropriate way, not in a manner people have come to expect from me. For this, I am sorry. I promise my fans and the public it will not happen again."
Michael Phelps
Warns Diplomats, CNN, BBC
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka warned Western diplomats, foreign journalists and aid groups Sunday that they would be "chased" out of the country if they appear to favor the Tamil Tiger rebels.
Defense Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa singled out the ambassadors of Switzerland and Germany, and television networks CNN, BBC and Al-Jazeera in his criticism of foreigners, accusing them of being biased.
Rajapaksa said certain foreign media reports were damaging the security forces at a time they were "dealing the final death blow" to the Tigers.
His ire appears to stem from concern expressed by the international community that the government is not doing enough to extricate civilians trapped in the fighting between the military and the Tamil rebels in the north.
Sri Lanka
Wreck Found In Channel
HMS Victory
Deep-sea explorers who found $500 million in sunken treasure two years ago say they have discovered another prized shipwreck: A legendary British man-of-war that sank in the English Channel 264 years ago.
The wreckage of the HMS Victory, found below about 330 feet of water, may carry an even bigger jackpot. Research indicates the ship was carrying 4 tons of gold coins when it sank in storm, said Greg Stemm, co-founder of Odyssey Marine Exploration, ahead of a Monday news conference in London.
So far, two brass cannons have been recovered from the wreck, Stemm said. The Florida-based company said it is negotiating with the British government over collaborating on the project.
Thirty-one brass cannons and other evidence on the wreck allowed definitive identification of the HMS Victory, 175-foot sailing ship that was separated from its fleet and sank in the English Channel on Oct. 4, 1744, with at least 900 men aboard, the company said. The ship was the largest and, with 110 brass cannons, the most heavily armed vessel of its day. It was the inspiration for the HMS Victory famously commanded by Adm. Horatio Nelson decades later.
HMS Victory
You Are Your Blood Type
Japan
In Japan, "What's your type?" is much more than small talk; it can be a paramount question in everything from matchmaking to getting a job.
By type, the Japanese mean blood type, and no amount of scientific debunking can kill a widely held notion that blood tells all.
In the year just ended, four of Japan's top 10 best-sellers were about how blood type determines personality, according to Japan's largest book distributor, Tohan Co. The books' publisher, Bungeisha, says the series - one each for types B, O, A, and AB - has combined sales of well over 5 million copies.
As defined by the books, type As are sensitive perfectionists but overanxious; Type Bs are cheerful but eccentric and selfish; Os are curious, generous but stubborn; and ABs are arty but mysterious and unpredictable.
Japan
Weekend Box Office
'Taken'
Liam Neeson's CIA thriller "Taken" bumped off "Paul Blart: Mall Cop" at the weekend box office, raking in $24.6 million and helping fuel the first $1 billion January in Hollywood history.
North American box office revenues were up nearly 20 percent in January over the same period last year, reaching a record $1.03 billion for the month. Attendance was up 16 percent over last year, said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box-office tracker Media by Numbers.
"Gran Torino," directed by and starring Clint Eastwood as a bigot who becomes a reluctant neighborhood hero, has now earned more than $110 million, making it Eastwood's highest grossing film.
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Media By Numbers LLC. Final figures will be released Monday.
1. "Taken," $24.6 million.
2. "Paul Blart: Mall Cop," $14 million.
3. "The Uninvited," $10.5 million.
4. "Hotel for Dogs," $8.7 million.
5. "Grand Torino," $8.6 million.
6. "Slumdog Millionaire," $7.7 million.
7. "Underworld: Rise of the Lycans," $7.2 million.
8. "New in Town," $6.7 million.
9. "My Bloody Valentine 3-D," $4.3 million.
10. "Inkheart," $3.7 million.
'Taken'
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