Dark Knight. With it's comic-book metaphor for the war on terror and deep exploration of it's characters, I think it was the standout film of 2008.

My step-father has massive tumors throughout lower torso, stomach, colon, esophagus, etc... They are malignant and believed to be lymphatic (biopsy is apparently taking longer than normal). The surgeon, last week, removed most of it but not all. It does not look good. Other than a weak, general concern for what my mother is facing, I have a hard time mustering any feelings. I don't dislike Hugh. I've actually come to think quite well of him.

I sometimes wonder if I am just too apathetic. My apathy is a defense learned early, around the time my father left. If I don't care, nothing can hurt me. It's robbed me of ambition. Now I see it's also killing my emotional attachments.

Red. Ring. Of. Death.

Bill Gates can suck my ass.

regarding Obamethics from my earlier post: Ethics also = exceptions to the "strictest" rules (from Slate: "An Obama executive order bans lobbyists from working in jobs related to their work for their former employers. William Lynn, slated to be deputy defense secretary, was recently a lobbyist for Raytheon, a major defense contractor. Gibbs was unfazed. He said there needed to be exceptions to this new rule, and that Obama's rules amounted to the toughest ethical standards in history.") Got it. His ethical rules are the toughest for other people, but come on, He is the Messiah. He's infallible. It'll be okay. Trust Him.

Interesting tidbit: Executive orders within first 3 days by Presidents who started the job in my lifetime:

Ford: 0 (1st after 5 days - regarding export controls)
Carter: 1 (on 1/21 he pardoned all the draft dodgers)
Reagan: 0 (1st on the 28th of Jan. - deregulated oil prices)
Bush: 0 (1st on the 25th - established Fed Commission of Ethics Law Reform)
Clinton: 1 (requiring an Ethics pledge from his cabinet.)
Bush: 0 (on the 29th - regarding faith-based community initiatives)
Obama: 5 (2 on the 21st - the lets try GWB for war crimes EO and the I demand Ethics from everyone except those I deem are above ethics EO; 3 on the 22nd - close gitmo, waterboarding bad, and now what the fuck do we do with all these terrorists?)


Totalitarianism (from Wikipedia -not the most reliable source, but I like the gist - my comments in parentheses): Totalitarian regimes or movements maintain themselves in political power by means of an official all-embracing ideology (hope, change, yes we can) and propaganda disseminated through the state-controlled mass media (Matthews: I got a tingle up my leg; Brokaw - Take that, rednecks; Stefanopolous reportedly crying at the inauguration; Larry King - my son wants to be black, black is "in"), a single party that controls the state (what few conservatives we have left in the halls of power are painfully quiet), personality cults (oh come on, HE'S THE MESSIAH), control over the economy (thanks for getting the ball rolling George), regulation and restriction of free discussion and criticism (probably won't even bother with the "fairness doctrine" and just shoehorn in some restrictive legislation in the stimulus bill), the use of mass surveillance (an executive order-happy president could easily turn the patriot act inward), and widespread use of terror tactics (I guess we'll see what happens with His state-funded Black Panthers and with the Weathermen running the education system).

As of day 2

Hope= "This will get worse..." "...could last years." "Stimulus will not create jobs before 2010."

Change= Clinton's people in  the cabinet, FDR's failed policies expanded for the 21st Century, a reversal to pre-9/11/01 intelligence gathering and treatment of terrorists. "Ooh ooh, I'm just like Lincoln. No I'm FDR. Ooh, even better, JFK. Oh, no no no, I'm Reagan." (which is even more disconcerting considering the election is over and he still can't decide who the press should compare him to.)

Bringing ethics back to government= a tax cheater for Sec of Treasury, a Secretary of State bought and paid for by the Chinese, Saudis, and Koreans.

Uniting the nation: "Let Whites do right."

Uniting the world: well since SoState is a puppet of several regimes, this may work.....

Strong leader: who has to have his AG tell him what he's signing. I hope the AG's hands were warm, cause he was working that Obama-shaped puppet.

Hmmm. Definitely off to a start.....

THIS is the Punisher I wanted Thomas Jane to be. Thanks to Lexi Alexander and Ray Stephenson for giving me a Frank Castle who didn't go around making mobsters think their wives were cheating and henchmen had betrayed them. This is the Frank that walks into a room and fires shotguns pointblank into the faces of the bad guys. This Frank does not fuck around trying to get the bad guys to kill their loved ones and advisers. Guns don't kill people. Frank does.  

It's far from a perfect movie and it's starkly apparent just how much the Punisher and his world was/is influenced by that of Batman (especially in light of The Dark Knight, a vastly superior film) but it is very fun and very violent, somewhat cartoonish (which sometimes works and sometimes doesn't ). There are some genuinely good moments with real heart (Frank in the cemetery) and some almost good moments that get lost in translation (Frank in the church). The gore, largely cgi enhanced, is somewhat distracting (as much as it was in the latest Rambo movie). But I'm just glad someone got the Punisher, as a character, right. Stephenson is great as Frank and is a living embodiment of the Tim Bradstreet vision of the character. I'm going to have to go back and re-read all the Garth Ennis books from the beginning, now.

I swapped my PS3's 40G hdd for a Samsung 500G hdd and am in the process of moving all my music and video over to the new drive. I am very entertained by my own excitement. Though I am not a envirofascist, I do believe in the old adage, "waste not, want not" and have thus purchased a 2.5" SATA hdd portable casing and am now using the original PS3 drive as a nifty, 40g FAT32 external backup.

( Instructions for swapping out the PS3 drive.... )

Martin's Song of Ice and Fire (perhaps the best fantasy series of the last 50 years, if not ever) is being optioned for a pilot for HBO.

It's definitely got my geek up. And since it's up, I'm going to work it:

Casting thoughts

Jaime Lannister - Luke Goss:  his performance as Prince Nuada showed his grace and power. I think he'd be perfect.
Cersei Lannister - Anna Walton: iffy since she already played the sister of Luke Goss, but doesn't change the fact that she looks the part of Cersei.
Ned Stark - Gerard Butler: Not as long-faced as Ned, but definitely has the presence.
Tyrion Lannister - Peter Dinklage: definitely can pull off the whole harshly sardonic wit. I really hope they go with Dinklage for Tyrion.

A guy I work with, a friend and Obama supporter told me I should give the man a chance to see what he's going to do. Well, Obama has posted his administration's agenda for his first term in office at Change.gov. I do not hold much hope that Obama's "change" will be good for America, but I wanted to take a look and decide for myself. Here's what I found (behind a very long cut):



( cut.... )

Now that I'm all bummed out, I'm going to go watch Bruce Campbell beat up bad guys and make me smile. (Thank God for Netflix.)

The messiah will pay my gas, rent and student loan. I won't have to worry or think for myself. It's going to be sunshine and rainbows forevermore. As long as I don't try to make too much money. Then I'll just be another rich white person (ie. a target). Welcome to Amerika.

I thought only American bureaucrats were this stupid. Glad to know we're not alone in the world and ignorant douche-bagginess (yes "douche-bag" is my favorite new insult, you a douche that's got something to say about it?) is universal.

1. Barak Hussein "Dumbo Ears" Obama - for being a socialistic authoritarian with notes of fascism while trying to pass himself off as a man of the people (much like Castro when he overthrew Batista). For letting it be known that we are not allowed to mention his associates and friends, his college years, his middle name, his big ears, his socialism, his plans to let the Bush tax cuts expire thus raising my taxes too even though I don't make 250k (no now it's 200k, whoops now it's 150k). For doing his damndest to divide us even further by race and Socio-Economic Status. Stop trying to make us hate each other you fucking prick.

2. John Sidney McCain - for being a spineless non-conservative Republican more willing to cross the aisle and sell out his own party than to look bad in the press (where's the love now John? They dropped you pretty quick, didn't they?), for co-authoring one of the biggest infringements of the 1st Amendment ever, for buying in to the man-made global warming snake-oil and planning to make us pay for it.

3. George Walker Bush - for letting Dems re-write his ideas into shitty legislation (thanks Ted, don't you have another pregnant girlfriend to drown?) and then taking the blame for it all, for showing us all his true stripes for helping to push the godawful "bailout" which is so far beyond "corporate welfare" into socialism it's not even funny (and then the kicker of the downright fascist idea of the government buying controlling interest in banks).

4. Matt Damon - for being a condescending little prick.

5. Tina Fey - y'know her Palin is dead on and funny. But the fact that she won't even make eye contact and has to get as far away from Palin as possible on set is indicative of someone who has absolutely no class. I like Fey and it really bothered me that she was so bitchy. I mean even Alec Baldwin had enough class to acknowledge Palin's presence. What a cunt.

6. Kevin Pereira (G4 host of Attack of the Show) - for calling someone who questioned a politician a douche just because the politician is one he supports. Did he call Natalie Maines a douche when she questioned Bush? This two-faced cunt-bag nonsense is getting on my fucking nerves.

7. The Obama-worshipping press - the stats are amazing on this. From Matthews' tingling pants when he hears his messiah's voice to the blatant suppress-the-Republican-vote-"might as well give up now cause it's in the bag" stories to the "well-if-you're-not-voting-Obama-you-must-be-a-degenerate-racist" stories.

8. Bill Maher - see Matt Damon.

9. Mike Huckabee - for being a self-righteous little prick and a bad talk-show host to boot.

10. All the Democrats who aren't going to vote for Obama because he's black. There's LOTS of reasons to not vote for the man, but the melanin content of his skin isn't one of them. My personal "favorites" are my sister's mother-in-law (lifelong Dem) who said "Well I guess I'll have to vote for McCain becuase we can't let the blacks get into power" and an old bastard I work with (part-time) who said "What's it going to be, chitlins in every pot?" Dumb motherfuckers.

11. Anyone voting for Obama because he's black. If you can't see how this is a perversion of King's dream that each man be judged on the content of his character and not the color of his skin, then you're as blind as those douche-bags in #10.

12. Palestinians, Germans, Iranians, Iraquis, etc. You don't get to vote in our election. Your opinions don't matter. Shut the fuck up.

13. Alan Greenspan - for blaming the free market for the crash (when it was the absence of the free market and direct governmental interference that caused it) and showing how much of a syncophantic little douche-bag he is.

14. Me - for bothering to point this out and expecting anyone to read it and/or care what I fucking think.


Edit: Another one I left out - Congressman John Murtha for calling his constituents racist rednecks. Way to represent dickwad.

it sucks living in Tennessee.


Screw you Fandango! Screw you in your stupid face!

Please, God, tell me I'm not the only one frightened by the notion that a private citizen can have his/her life ripped open for publicly questioning a political figure. Every Obama supporter who is in hate with George Bush over his terrorist surveillance programs should be seriously looking at a man who's organization and/or supporters are investigating those who disagree with him. It's a small step from what we've seen started in editorials (calling someone "socialist" is racist) to declaring all criticism "hate speech". We've already got the template for hate crime legislation, which is basically criminalizing intent as opposed to action. How far will we have to go from here to the possibility that I could be questioned by authorities for posting this very blog, as it is quite evident that I am a rabid right-wing nut job racist myself. Slippery slope? Maybe. But I am not relishing the thought of this "Chicago thug" (as Bill Clinton called him) with the full weight of the morally ambiguous Patriot Act in his right hand.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article5009293.ece

I guess I should go on Netflix and take back every bad thing I've said about Alexander ... Olly might sue me.

Steel Magnolias. Absolutely chilling. Though, I must say About Schmidt with it's Kathy-Bates-nudity is pretty frightening, too.

Urban has got McCoy down cold judging by this pic.

BSG is back on 01/16/09. Prepare, bitches....

....I'm actually getting excited about a Star Trek movie.



How geeky am I?