Category Archives: Barack Obama

09/13/2012
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2012 US Embassy Attacks, Barack Obama, Baywatch, Bleacher Preacher, Chicago Teachers Union, David Hasselhoff, Frank Zappa, Gay Marriage, Jerry Pritikin, John Mellencamp, KFC, Khloe Kardashian, Mitt Romney, Moon Unit Zappa, Paul Ryan, Rahm Emanuel, Ranker.com, Roots on the Square, Rudy Giuliani, Rupert Murdoch, Siam House, Slim Whitman, Ted Turner

The Pencil Today:

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THE QUOTE

“Rupert Murdoch is the most dangerous man in the world.” — Ted Turner

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PAY ‘EM: DAY 4

Jerry Pritikin, who’s also known as the “Bleacher Preacher” (he sermonizes on the religion that is Chicago Cubs fandom), lives across Wells Street from Walter Payton College Prep School, one of the jewels of the Chicago Public Schools.

His high-rise window gives him a front row seat to the daily picket line outside the school’s front door. He snapped this shot early yesterday morning:

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And yesterday Rupert Murdoch sloshed out of the primordial ooze that is his natural habitat to throw his support behind the intransigent Mayor Rahm Emanuel in negations with the Chicago Teachers Union.

Murdoch joins a roster of Emanuel’s anti-labor backers that already includes Romney, Paul Ryan, Rudy Giuliani, and everybody else who favors a for-profit, corporate-run educational system.

In case corporate school management doesn’t alarm you, keep in mind it is the private, for-profit sector that has given us global warming, job-outsourcing, the financial meltdown of 2007-08, monster SUVs, Khloe Kardashian, and KFC’s Double Down.

Oh, and another thing:

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YOU WORK WITH WHAT YOU’VE GOT

As repugnant as Willard Romney’s lightning-quick politicization of the embassy attacks was to all serious-minded, concerned, right-thinking people — and even some members of his own Republican Party — his finger-pointing might have been a smart political move.

I reacted strongly on Facebook yesterday to his fatuous charge that President Obama “sympathizes” with the attackers:

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Upon reflection, though, it occurs to me that Romney’s remarks might not have been as ill-considered as many wags and experts seem to think.

It’s becoming clear that Romney’s ceiling is 50 percent of those likely to go to the polls in November. As in, that’s the best he can hope for. If he wins, it won’t be because his party loves him to pieces nor because he inspires passion among the so-called independents.

In fact, his core constituency, whether he likes it or not, are those who are still scared to death of the brown “outsider” they consider Obama to be.

That’s whom he was speaking to yesterday. Desperate times call for desperate measures.

Obama said that Romney shoots before he aims. Maybe, but not in this case. Romney was aiming directly at the limbic brains of people who already think Obama is an Arab plant in the White House. Romney and his strategists know that they have to get those folks out in bunches on Election Day.

Romney’s Opponent

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You know as well as I do that plenty of people will be telling each other that Obama is cozy with Muslim extremists — and as proof they’ll repeat Romney’s slander.

Get ready for more of this: the election is only 54 days away.

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WHY, MOM AND DAD, WHY?

Bloomington’s own John Mellencamp tops Ranker.com’s list of celebrity parents who’ve saddled their heirs and heiresses with absurd or grotesque names.

And just to show how preposterous the mania for baby-naming “creativity” has grown among those whose lives are devoting to begging for our attention, Frank Zappa’s decision to dub his daughter Moon Unit only ranks No. 6 on the list.

Here are Ranker’s top ten Most Ridiculous Celebrity Baby Names:

  1. Speck Wildhorse Mellencamp (parents Mellencamp and Elaine Irwin)
  2. Moxie CrimeFighter Jillete (Penn Gillette and Emily Zolten)
  3. Pilot Inspektor Riesgraf Lee (Jason Lee and Beth Riesgraf)
  4. Little Pixie Frou-Frou Geldof (Bob Geldof and Paula Yates)
  5. Pirate Houseman Davis (Jonathan and Deven Davis)
  6. Moon Unit Zappa (Frank and Adelaide Zappa
  7. Fifi Trixibelle Geldof (Bob Geldof and Paula Yates)
  8. Jermajesty Jackson (Jermain Jackson and Alejandra Oaziaza)
  9. Audio Science Clayton ( Shannyn Sossamon and Dallas Clayton)
  10. Kal-El Coppola Cage (Nicolas Cage and Alice Kim)

Moon Unit Zappa Managed To Avoid Committing Patricide

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Lest you think Nic Cage’s kid was named in honor of some hero of the Arabic-speaking world, “Kal-El” was actually the name of the kid from Krypton who eventually grew up to be Superman. In the comics, Nic.

Check out the list for 40 more names guaranteed to earn the average child daily beatings in the schoolyard. Some teasers: Larry King named his son Cannon and Bob Geldof makes the list a third time and Paula Yates a fourth.

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HOLY MATRIMONY

Thanks to Deanna Goe-Truelock of Roots on the Square and the Siam House for pointing these cogent arguments out:

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THE WISDOM OF THE OUTSIDE WORLD

Many people think the rest of the world possesses a wisdom and sensitivity that we in this holy land lack. That may be, but there are some powerful arguments to refute the claim.

To wit: the world beyond these shores has embraced the likes of Slim Whitman as well as “Baywatch” and David Hasselhoff.

It follows, then, that the non-US world concerns itself with a sport that’s almost as scintillating as living through a coma.

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From XKCD Via I Love Charts

(Note: The “Football” in green is soccer. The “Football” in, um, vomit-after-a-night-of-drinking-cheap-wine red is American football — y’know, the sport of traumatic brain injury.)

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09/09/2012
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A Home of Her Own, Alex Straiker, Ann Romney, Antimatter, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Chicago Teachers Union, Hubble Space Telescope, Hustler, James Webb Space Telescope, Jerry Falwell, Jim Wager-Miller, Labor Unions, Larry Flynt, Magic Underwear, Michael Snow, Mitt Romney, Moscow Times, Nancy R. Hiller, Rick Perry, Russia, Science Cafe Bloomington, Vladimir Putin

The Pencil Today:

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THE QUOTE

“It was the labor movement that helped secure so much of what we take for granted today. The 40-hour work week, the minimum wage, family leave, health insurance, Social Security, Medicare, retirement plans. The cornerstones of the middle class security all bear the union label.” — Barack Obama

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PAY ‘EM!

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TOP OF THE HILLER

Congrats to Pencillista Nancy R. Hiller for earning state kudos on her fab tome, “A Home of Her Own.”

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The Hiller opus was named a finalist in the Best Books of Indiana: Nonfiction 2012 beauty contest this week.

Hey, I ain’t the only guy who can write around here.

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GEEK LOVE

A quick reminder: Bloomington’s Science Cafe fires up again Wednesday, September 12th.

IU experimental nuclear physicist Michael Snow will deliver the first presentation on Antimatter.

Physicist Michael Snow

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Brain scientist Alex Straiker, who’s organizing this latest incarnation with lab-mate Jim Wager-Miller, says the shebang will begin at 6:30pm at Rachael’s Cafe.

This fall’s science topics will also include “The First Americans,” “Climate Change and Bloomington,” and “Brain-Machine Interfaces: Eye Tracking.”

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FLYNT HUSTLES MITT

Hustler was among the worst porn I’ve ever seen in my life.

I say was because I haven’t seen the mag in years. Maybe even decades.

So I have no idea what unflattering poses its intentionally half-witted looking models are being put into these days. Suffice it to say I recall them reclining akimbo to such an extent that were I so trained, I could proffer them instant cervical exams from afar.

That is, were I moved open the mag’s pages.

I just never found the thing arousing. I consider my tastes in unclad women fairly, um, progressive. I mean I don’t need my pix of naked ladies to feature impossibly long-legged and wasp-waisted, vacant-staring, “hotties” with plastic half-cantaloupes on their chests.

That’s me. Apparently the vast majority of American male-dom (male-dumb?) digs that look. Hustler had it in spades.

Duh

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The mag’s circulation stands at around half a million these days, down from a high of 3 million per month in its pre-Interwebs hayday.

Larry Flynt, the visionary behind Hustler, long has been a scourge to the Right, specifically its self-appointed plaster saints like the late Jerry Falwell and the regrettably still-respiring Gov. Rick Perry. That alone earns my grudging respect for him even though I hold my nose while stating it.

And now Flynt has flopped a million bucks on the table, calling for anyone in this holy land to produce Mitt Romney’s tax records.

You know, those things Ann Romney, hands on hips, jaw set, has refused to allow us to see. She says she and her special guy have nothing to hide, therefore they’re hiding the returns.

We’ve Given ‘You People’ Enough!

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If someone does come through with the docs that’ll tie Romney in with an arch-criminal, global, underground, crushing tyrannical corporate syndicate looking to addict the world population to dangerous chemicals, financial “instruments,” and magic underwear, then a million bucks’-worth of the dough Flynt made portraying woman as DNA receptacles will have done some good.

Of course, it’ll be just as good if the elusive tax returns simply reveal the Romneys to be richer than the spooky god they worship.

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I CAN SEE FOR MILES AND MILES AND MILES….

Here, thanks to I Fucking Love Science (or, for the more skittish among us, Science Is Awesome) is a comparison of the mirror sizes of the Hubble Space Telescope and the proposed James Webb Space Telescope.

Is there an “edge” to the Universe? Maybe, the JWST will allow us to see it.

From NASA: James Webb vs. Hubble — How Do They Compare?

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From The Moscow Times we learn that Russkies are dying to sound like bossman Vladimir Putin.

Apparently, Putin is the most accomplished of Russian leaders when it comes to prevaricating in the language of his land.

Silver Tongues

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In that, he’s like our very own Bill Clinton.

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09/07/2012
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Ann Romney, Aretha Franklin, Barack Obama, Blue Moon, Franklin D. Roosevelt, James Thurber, Labor Unions, Liberace, Michelle Obama, Mitt Romney, Neko Case, The Daily Mirror, Twitter

The Pencil Today:

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THE QUOTE

“You can fool too many of the people too much of the time.” — James Thurber

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LOOK TO THE SKIES!

Looks like that big fist of rain up around the Chi-town area is getting ready to come down upon us.

We’re still not ready to complain about another washed-out weekend, though.

NOAA Satellite View, 9:15am, EST

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STRAIGHT FROM HIS LIPS

In the category of People Will Believe Any Bullshit Anyone Tosses At Them, this book cover has to rank among the top ten:

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And just to show how bizarre Homo Sapiens sapiens is, a London-based gossip columnist in 1956 described Milwaukee’s greatest piano player thusly:

“… [A] deadly, winking, sniggering, snuggling, chromium-plated, scent-impregnated, luminous, quivering, giggling, fruit-flavored, mincing, ice-covered heap of mother love.”

Ice-covered?

Upon reading this, Wladziu Valentino Liberace sued the gossip columnist and his newspaper, The Mirror, for libel. And won!

Liberace on the witness stand swore he wasn’t a homosexual (even though the columnist had not explicitly accused him of being gay) and said — I remind you, under oath — that he’d never had a homosexual experience.

And you wonder why some people believe Barack Obama was born in some terrorist madrasah in Kenya run by Karl Marx’s heirs, abortionists, and pedophiles.

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INTELLIGENT LIFE?

And then there’s this from I Fucking Love Science. Many people were sorely disappointed the other night when the moon did not, as advertised, turn blue.

See, there was supposed to be a blue moon a week ago today. The Twitter-verse went full-tilt apopolectic when our celestial nightlight did not shine in the wavelength range of 475 nanometers.

Colors On The Electromagnetic Spectrum

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Anyway, tons and tons of deep thinkers flooded the hell that is Tweet-ville with irate complaints that the moon was, well, still white.

To wit:

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And you wonder why some people believe it was Barack Obama who crashed the economy.

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CRUST OF BREAD AND SUCH

Still wondering if the Romneys understand what it’s like for the rest of us? That is, those of us who didn’t grow up uber-wealthy?

Read this:

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This is not to say a rich guy can’t have empathy. Franklin Roosevelt never missed a meal in his life but he had a feeling for those who had.

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TRADING PLACES

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RUNNIN’ OUT OF FOOLS

Originally recorded by Aretha Franklin, this version was done some 30 years later by Neko Case, perhaps the only woman who could do justice to it other than the Queen of Soul.

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Here’s how I waste my time. How about you? Share your fave sites with us via the comments section. Just type in the name of the site, not the url; we’ll find them. If we like them, we’ll include them — if not, we’ll ignore them.

❏ I Love Charts — Life as seen through charts.

From I Love Charts

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❏ XKCD — “A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.”

❏ Skepchick — Women scientists look at the world and the universe.

❏ Indexed — All the answers in graph form, on index cards.

❏ Science Is Awesome (formerly I Fucking Love Science) — A Facebook community of science geeks.

❏ Present/&/Correct — Fun, compelling, gorgeous and/or scary graphic designs and visual creations throughout the years and from all over the world.

❏ Flip Flop Fly Ball — Baseball as seen through infographics, haikus, song lyrics, and other odd communications devices.

❏ Mental Floss — Facts.

Click For Full Article

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❏ Sodaplay — Create your own models or play with other people’s models.

❏ Eat Sleep Draw — An endless stream of artwork submitted by an endless stream of people.

❏ Big Think — Tapping the brains of notable intellectuals for their opinions, predictions, and diagnoses.

❏ The Daily Puppy — So shoot me.

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09/06/2012
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Al Gore, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Fox News, George W. Bush, Hank Williams, Hank Williams Jr., India, Indira Gandhi, Iwo Jima, Joe Biden, Jon Stewart, Mark Owens, Matt Bissonette, No Easy Day, Priapism, Ryder, Ryder Film Series, Urban Cowboy, US Navy SEAL Team 6

The Pencil Today:

THE QUOTE

“My father was a statesman, I am a political woman. My father was a saint. I am not.” — Indira Gandhi

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POL IN CHIEF

Natch, I’m heavy on liberals and progressives in my Facebook friends list. They were all abuzz over Bill Clinton’s speech at the Democratic National Convention last night. Here it is, in case you missed it:

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Hindsight is 20/200 (yes, 20/200 — no typo there), of course, but even while it was happening I knew Al Gore was blowing the 2000 election by not having Clinton campaign for him. Damn you Al Gore — we could have avoided eight years of the Bush League!

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HOW MANY WAYS CAN THEY SAY THEY HATE HIM?

Barack Obama has never been tempted to run and hide from Clinton simply because old Bill suffers from his peculiar form of priapism.

Guess What I Have Under This Desk

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In fact, the Prez frustrates the bejesus out of the Right because he, apparently, has no sex skeletons in his closet. Oh, how the GOP and its mouthpieces would love to tear down Barry with some juicy sexual misconduct charges.

Can you imagine the barely-coded racial messages we’d be getting if Obama couldn’t keep Little B under wraps in his Fruit of the Looms?

You know how newspapers have obituaries pre-written for celebrities while they’re still alive? Guaranteed, the Fox News squealers and other pathological snarlers have headlines pre-written for the Obama sex scandal of their wet dreams.

Once you go Barack, you never go back.

or

Barack the Buck

Yeesh. And if his correspondent party or parties would be white, female? Heavens, pasty men would be roaming the streets carrying assault rifles.

Fear Of A Black Presidential Penis

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Oh wait, they already do.

Anyway, nothing seems to satisfy the anti-Obama crowd. If Obama was a nail-biter, they’d figure a way to condemn him for it. As it is, that deep thinker Hank Williams, Jr. recently upped his topple-the-Nazi-dictator rhetoric by proclaiming his conviction that Obama hates cowboys and cowgirls.

This latest episode of Right Wing projectile verbal vomiting proves Jon Stewart’s point that “There is a President Obama that only Republicans can see.” It’s been many years, Hank, since any fraction of the population could write Cowboy or Cowgirl on the Occupation line of the their tax forms.

Perhaps Hank has inside info that Obama is not partial to secretaries and plumbers by day wearing cowboy drag at night. And isn’t even that a dated demographic? Urban Cowboy is now a +30-year-old meme.

I Thought This Movie Was Made Before The Invention Of Cameras

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And line dancing went out soon after the Zoot Suit, didn’t it?

Even soldier boys can’t seem to resist getting a jab in on the CinC.

Among the spate of new Obama-is-the-antichrist books being released this late summer, is the tale of the Osama bin Laden raid writen by a Navy SEAL team member who participated in the operation. The book, “No Easy Day,” is bylined by someone named Mark Owens, who doesn’t exist. That’s the nom de plume of one Mark Bissonette, who swears he’s doing nothing wrong by blabbing the raid’s secrets even though he thought it wise to assume an alias.

Bissonette writes that neither he nor the rest of his SEAL confreres has ever liked Obama. Joe Biden, either. Which must be important to his narrative — just don’t ask me how.

How weird is that? I mean, can you imagine the boys in that famous Iwo Jima photo telling reporters, “Yeah, taking the island was a tough job but we did it. And by the way, none of us likes that FDR. He’s a socialist and a jerk. And Truman? He’s like someone’s drunken uncle at Christmas dinner.”

Down With The President!

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WHAT TO DO? WHAT TO DO?

If you’re having withdrawal pains for The Pencil’s GO! events listings, just keep your shirt on.

I’m told now that the rollout for the Ryder magazine’s new website — which will carry the EP’s events listings — may come as early as today. Which probably means sometime next week.

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JAMBALAYA

The old man was 72 times better than the kid anyway.

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Here’s how I waste my time. How about you? Share your fave sites with us via the comments section. Just type in the name of the site, not the url; we’ll find them. If we like them, we’ll include them — if not, we’ll ignore them.

❏ I Love Charts — Life as seen through charts.

❏ XKCD — “A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.”

❏ Skepchick — Women scientists look at the world and the universe.

❏ Indexed — All the answers in graph form, on index cards.

❏ Science Is Awesome (formerly I Fucking Love Science) — A Facebook community of science geeks.

❏ Present/&/Correct — Fun, compelling, gorgeous and/or scary graphic designs and visual creations throughout the years and from all over the world.

❏ Flip Flop Fly Ball — Baseball as seen through infographics, haikus, song lyrics, and other odd communications devices.

❏ Mental Floss — Facts.

❏ Sodaplay — Create your own models or play with other people’s models.

❏ Eat Sleep Draw — An endless stream of artwork submitted by an endless stream of people.

❏ Big Think — Tapping the brains of notable intellectuals for their opinions, predictions, and diagnoses.

❏ The Daily Puppy — So shoot me.

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08/30/2012
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2012 Republicn National Convention, Al Gore, al Qaeda, Ann Romney, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Chris Christie, Dr. Strangelove, Gen. Buck Turgidson, George W. Bush, Isao Hashimoto, Leading from Behind, Michael Kinsley, Mitt Romney, Nuclear Weapons, Obesity, Osama bin Laden, Richard Miniter

The Pencil Today:

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THE QUOTE

“I’m not saying we wouldn’t get our hair mussed, Mr. President, but I do say not more than ten to twenty million dead depending on the breaks.” — General Buck Turgidson in “Dr. Strangelove: Or How I learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb”

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A RAIN OF RUIN

This is both stunning and terrifying.

Isao Hashimoto of Japan has created a CGI video depicting every nuclear explosion on Earth since the first one in the New Mexico desert in July, 1945. The first few years plod along but then, by 1962, when Hashimoto’s vid becomes a perverse symphony, it’s as though we’re trying to blow the planet to smithereens.

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Z-Z-Z-Z-Z-Z-Z

In the days and weeks leading up to the Republicans’ self-love orgy going on this week in Tampa, people asked me how excited I was to have this glorious opportunity to spout off even more than I usually do about them.

Whatever “It” Is

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The answer: Not much. And a correction: the opportunity is not glorious.

Funny, huh?

As in ironic.

As I wrote yesterday, all politics is theater. And the convention on Florida’s west coast is the GOP’s big showbiz opening.

What am I going to write? That they’re liars and alarmists? I may as well recycle any of dozens of posts I’ve already written about that.

What have we learned thus far that we didn’t know already? That Ann Romney still has a schoolgirl crush on her big boy?

He Lights Up My Life

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Wake me up when it’s over.

Oh, and I’ll have another fine opportunity to take a well-earned beauty nap when the Dems convene in Charlotte next week.

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FAT CHANCE

There never was any chance Chris Christie of New Jersey would be tabbed by Willard Romney to be his running mate. The fact of the matter is Christie’s too fat.

Chris Christie

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Last fall when the idea of a Christie run for the White House was floating around, some op-ed writers danced around the topic of his belt size. Pseudo-liberal blowhard Michael Kinsley even suggested that a Christie presidency would set the wrong example for the nation, as if tens of millions of folks would suddenly start scarfing down entire Tombstone pizzas in a sitting (hey, wait a minute — that is happening already.)

His girth precluding him from coming within a couple of blocks of the White House is both an insult and a rather reasonable proposition.

It’s insulting because most people have a prejudice against fat people. The thin harbor within themselves the notion that fat people are greedy pigs who are swallowing too much of the Earth’s resources, primarily Wavy Lays and Sara Lee frozen cakes.

People are fat, the svelte among us believe (whether they admit it or not), because they are lazy cows.

Choose whichever round animal analog you wish, the comparison is never praise.

Not A Bull, Not A Bear, Not A Lion

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Republicans might love Christie’s stances but they’d hate to look at him for four or eight years. The fat, we’ve decided, are unsightly. And can you imagine how Dems would jump all over President Christie for his width? He’d be the poster boy for the rapacious rich in progressive cartooning and editorializing.

As wise policy, keeping Christie out of the Oval Office merely insures that we won’t have to suffer the grief of burying him a year and a half into his presidency due to his heart exploding like a water balloon. I mean, even Bill Clinton was thought to be too corpulent when he was first elected. He had to lay off Big Macs and pretend to exercise a bit before the nation felt comfortable that we weren’t an infarct away from a Gore Administration. Still, Clinton twice had to have his cardiac plumbing Roto-Rootered to keep him alive.

Even though we’ve become the fattest nation on Earth, we just don’t like fat people.

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WRONG FROM RIGHT

Really, you’ve got to love the Right Wing. They give us so much to laugh at.

For instance, there’s a new book out about the raid to find and kill Osama bin Laden. It’s written by a guy named Richard Miniter and it’s called “Leading from Behind.”

Miniter argues that Barack Obama spent years screwing up the hunt for Obama. Which is odd, considering the fact that the president ordered the raid to get the al Qaeda leader. And it worked.

That is, Obama accomplished something in his first term that George W. Bush failed to do for seven and a half years. Yet Obama screwed up. Miniter so far is silent on Bush telling us the mightiest military in the history of the planet was doing everything it could to round bin Laden up even as the number one terrorist traipsed at will from Afghanistan to Pakistan.

Actually, No

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See, that’s the way it is with today’s Republicans and their various Tory pals. Nothing a Democrat does can be praised, even tepidly. Especially Barack Obama. In fact, the Republicans told us early on in his term that their sole raison d’etre until 2012 would be to bring down the president.

Nice patriotic gang, eh?

By the way, those who dared criticize Bush’s handling of Afghanistan and his Family Honor War in Iraq were immediately branded traitors by the same bunch that’s ravaging Obama today.

I’d laugh out loud but too many people buy into the Republican line.

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Here’s how I waste my time. How about you? Share your fave sites with us via the comments section. Just type in the name of the site, not the url; we’ll find them. If we like them, we’ll include them — if not, we’ll ignore them.

❏ I Love Charts — Life as seen through charts.

❏ XKCD — “A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.”

❏ Skepchick — Women scientists look at the world and the universe.

❏ Indexed — All the answers in graph form, on index cards.

Indexed

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❏ I Fucking Love Science — A Facebook community of science geeks.

I Fucking Love Science

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❏ Present/&/Correct — Fun, compelling, gorgeous and/or scary graphic designs and visual creations throughout the years and from all over the world.

❏ Flip Flop Fly Ball — Baseball as seen through infographics, haikus, song lyrics, and other odd communications devices.

❏ Mental Floss — Facts.

❏ Sodaplay — Create your own models or play with other people’s models.

❏ Eat Sleep Draw — An endless stream of artwork submitted by an endless stream of people.

❏ Big Think — Tapping the brains of notable intellectuals for their opinions, predictions, and diagnoses.

❏ The Daily Puppy — So shoot me.

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Electron Pencil event listings: Music, art, movies, lectures, parties, receptions, games, benefits, plays, meetings, fairs, conspiracies, rituals, etc.

Thursday, August 30, 2012

◗ Kinsey Institute, Morrison Hall — Volunteer docent training; 3-4:30pm

◗ Monroe County Public Library — It’s Your Money series: Free, confidential session with a financial expert; 4:30pm

◗ Bear’s Place — Music: Jamey Aebersold All-Star Quintet; 5:30pm

◗ Muddy Boots Cafe, Nashville — Music: 220 Breakers; 6-8:30pm

◗ City Hall, Showers Plaza — Women’s Bike Ride; 6pm

◗ The Player’s Pub — Music: Below Zero Blues Band; 6:30pm

◗ IU Cinema — Film: “Little Otik”; 6:30pm

◗ Brown County Playhouse, Nashville — Music: Jeff Nelson & Sylvia McNair host a presentation of performances by Jacobs School of Music students; 7:30pm

◗ The Comedy Attic — Best of the Bloomington Comedy Fest; 8pm

◗ Bloomington Playwrights Project — Drama: “Working”; 8pm

◗ IU Memorial Union, Whittenberger Auditorium — UB Films: “Magic Mike”; 8pm

◗ Serendipity Martini Bar — Team trivia; 8:30pm

◗ Max’s Place — Music: Americana showcase; 9pm

◗ The Bishop — Music: Outdoor Velour; 9pm

◗ IU Cinema — Film: “Conspirators of Pleasure”; 9:30pm

◗ IU Memorial Union, Whittenberger Auditorium — UB Films: “Magic Mike”; 11pm

ONGOING

◗ Ivy Tech Waldron Center — Exhibits:

  • “40 Years of Artists from Pygmalion’s”; through September 1st

◗ IU Art Museum — Exhibits:

  • “A Tribute to William Zimmerman,” wildlife artist; through September 9th

  • Willi Baumeister, “Baumeister in Print”; through September 9th

  • Annibale and Agostino Carracci, “The Bolognese School”; through September 16th

  • “Contemporary Explorations: Paintings by Contemporary Native American Artists”; through October 14th

  • David Hockney, “New Acquisitions”; through October 21st

  • Utagawa Kuniyoshi, “Paragons of Filial Piety”; through fall semester 2012

  • Julia Margaret Cameron, Edward Weston, & Harry Callahan, “Intimate Models: Photographs of Husbands, Wives, and Lovers”; through December 31st

  • “French Printmaking in the Seventeenth Century”; through December 31st

◗ IU SoFA Grunwald Gallery — Exhibits:

  • “Media Life,” drawings and animation by Miek von Dongen; through September 15th

  • “Axe of Vengeance: Ghanaian Film Posters and Film Viewing Culture”; through September 15th

◗ IU Kinsey Institute Gallery — “Ephemeral Ink: Selections of Tattoo Art from the Kinsey Institute Collection”; through September 21st

◗ IU Lilly Library — Exhibit, “Translating the Canon: Building Special Collections in the 21st Century”; through September 1st

◗ IU Mathers Museum of World Cultures — Reopens Tuesday, August 21st

◗ Monroe County History Center — Photo exhibit, “Bloomington: Then and Now” by Bloomington Fading; through October 27th

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08/25/2012
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Aurora Colorado Mass Shooting, Barack Obama, Bill Maher, Chris Matthews, Climate Change, Colbert Report, Cracked.com, David Wong, Elena Kagan, Empire State Building Shooting, Global Warming, Guns, Louie Gohmert, Men's Rights, Misogyny, New York Times Magazine, Reddit, Rush Limbaugh, Sandra Fluke, Sean Hannity, Sharia Law, The Daily Show, Todd Akin, US Supreme Court

The Pencil Today:

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THE QUOTE

“Republicans would like to pretend like Congressman Akin’s substitution of superstition for science is a lone problem but it’s not: they’re all magical thinkers, on nearly every issue. They don’t get their answers on climate change from climatologists, they get them from the Book of Genesis. Hence Sharia Law in America is a dire threat, and global warming a hoax.” — Bill Maher

▲

COWBOY UP

After the Aurora, Colorado, shootings at least one Republican (duh!) pol spewed the lunatic opinion that had the patrons of the theater been permitted to carry artillery into the place, they could have shot the shooter up like a swiss cheese and thereby become heroes forever. Oh, and they could have saved a life or two.

Gohmert: “…Was There Nobody That Was Carrying…?”

✍

Because, you know, 19-year-olds attending a midnight showing of a superhero movie in a darkened (natch), packed theater are nothing if not crack shots.

Apparently, that conceit took a hit yesterday when New York cops (who are trained to shoot pistols) opened fire on that guy in the suit who’d killed his former boss at the Empire State Building. So far as we know, the cops did most of the damage to the innocent bystanders, nine of whom caught lead.

One Down, Nine To Go

✍

So, yeah, they killed the guy with the gun but in the process did far more damage than the shooter ever intended to do.

Now, what was that about 19-year-olds with artillery in a darkened theater after midnight?

▲

THE NEWS IS A JOKE

Remember a few years ago how the punditocracy was wringing its hands over the fact that a majority of young people were getting their news from comedy programs like “The Daily Show” and “The Colbert Report“?

Me? I figured standup comedians and improvisational comics couldn’t do much worse interpreting the day’s events than cerebrally flabby blow-hards like Sean Hannity or Chris Matthews.

A Mighty Wind

✍

Anyway, what passes for today’s current affairs debate has devolved to the point where Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert are elderly statesmen. In fact, if one really wants to get to the meat of a pressing issue these days, one has to click on Cracked.com.

Swear to the god I don’t believe in.

For instance, take a recent Cracked post entitled “5 Ways Modern Men Are Trained to Hate Women.”

(And, honestly, could you imagine any broadcast or cable news outlet even touching that topic? With the recent verbal assaults on Sandra Fluke and rape victims, it’s clear — isn’t it? — that too many men hate the hell out of women around this holy land. Someone’s got to be teaching them how to do it!)

Fluke Took A Beating

✍

Post author David Wong (oy, I hope that’s his real name) liberally sprinkles the piece with perceptive gems. He begins by recalling Rush Limbaugh’s attack on Fluke. Limbaugh, Wong rationalizes, “is paid to say outrageous things.” It’s the chimps who follow Limbaugh that scare the bejesus out of Wong: “If you really want to feel all dead inside, you need to listen to what the regular folk were saying.”

He quotes commenters on Right Wing sites who described Sandra Fluke in terms that made it look as though Limbaugh were trying to coo into her ear.

“My Darling Slut”

✍

“Now go to the front page of any mostly male discussion site like Reddit.com and see how many inches you can browse before finding several thousand men bemoaning how all women are gold-digging whores (7,500 upvotes) and how crazy and irrational women are (9,659 upvotes) and how horrible and gross and fat women are (4,000 upvotes). Or browse the ‘Men’s Rights’ section and see weird fantasies about alpha males defeating all the hot women who try to control them with their vaginas.”

No, neither Sean Hannity nor Chris Matthews has touched that one yet.

Wong says movies teach us that it’s a man’s right to be awarded a hot chick after he accomplishes some feat. “When the Karate Kid wins the tournament, his prize is a trophy and Elisabeth Shue. Neo saves the world and is awarded Trinity…, the hero in ‘Avatar’ gets the hottest Na’vi, Shrek gets Fiona, Bill Murray gets Sigourney Weaver in ‘Ghostbusters,’ Frodo gets Sam, WALL-E gets EVE… and so on.

“Hell, at the end of ‘An Officer and a Gentleman,’ Richard Gere walks into the lady’s workplace and just carries her out like he’s picking up a suit at the drycleaner.”

Cleaned And Pressed

✍

Yeesh!

Wong concludes, “From birth we’re taught that we’re owed a beautiful girl…. It’s why every Mr. Nice Guy is shocked to find that buying gifts for a girl and doing her favors won’t win him sex. It’s why we go to ‘slut’ and ‘whore’ as our default insults — we’re not mad that women enjoy sex. We’re mad that women are distributing to other people the sex that they owed us.”

I doubt if one in twenty Gender Studies classes comes close to hitting that nail on the head.

Want more? Wong’s got it. He quotes from a Right Wing site where men were discussing the merits of then-US Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan. One man said the Kagan is, “So fugly, I’d say ‘Don’t even look’!!!” Another man agreed: “This person is disgusting and I would never trust ‘it’s’ [sic] opinion on ANYTHING!”

Oh, Why Couldn’t Obama Have Nominated A Babe!

✍

Wong writes that a woman’s “role in society or level of accomplishment doesn’t matter. Even if she’s a damned candidate for the Supreme Court, the female always has a dual role: to function as a person, and to act as decor.

“And we get pissed if she doesn’t do her job…. She owes it to us to be pretty.”

Man.

Wong has plenty more to say about American misogyny. Go there and read the piece for yourself. After doing so, you’ll understand a lot more about men than if you’d studied a hundred “serious” articles in the New York Times Magazine.

▲

Here’s how I waste my time. How about you? Share your fave sites with us via the comments section. Just type in the name of the site, not the url; we’ll find them. If we like them, we’ll include them — if not, we’ll ignore them.

❏ I Love Charts — Life as seen through charts.

❏ XKCD — “A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.”

❏ Skepchick — Women scientists look at the world and the universe.

❏ Indexed — All the answers in graph form, on index cards.

Indexed

✍

❏ I Fucking Love Science — A Facebook community of science geeks.

I Fucking Love Science

✍

❏ Present/&/Correct — Fun, compelling, gorgeous and/or scary graphic designs and visual creations throughout the years and from all over the world.

❏ Flip Flop Fly Ball — Baseball as seen through infographics, haikus, song lyrics, and other odd communications devices.

❏ Mental Floss — Facts.

❏ Sodaplay — Create your own models or play with other people’s models.

❏ Eat Sleep Draw — An endless stream of artwork submitted by an endless stream of people.

❏ Big Think — Tapping the brains of notable intellectuals for their opinions, predictions, and diagnoses.

❏ The Daily Puppy — So shoot me.

▲

Electron Pencil event listings: Music, art, movies, lectures, parties, receptions, games, benefits, plays, meetings, fairs, conspiracies, rituals, etc.

Saturday, August 25, 2012

◗ Twin Lakes Recreation Center — IU Bloomington Cricket Club, Hoosier Cup 2012; 7:30am

◗ City Hall, Showers Plaza — Farmers Market; 8am-1pm

◗ Rogers Elementary School — Kappa Kappa Sigma Garage Sale & Bake Sale; 8am-noon

◗ IU Jordan Avenue Parking Garage — Fall Bike Auction; 9am

◗ Tibetan Mongolian Buddhist Cultural Center — Mind Training through Pain & Disability series, presented by Ani Choekye; 10:30am

◗ WonderLab — National Dog Day Celebration: Greyhounds; 1-4pm

◗ IU Mathers Museum of World Cultures — “The Arms of the Shire of Mynydd Seren,” demonstration by members of Bloomington’s Society of Creative Anachronism branch; 1:30-4pm

◗ Monroe County Public Library — Session 3, Basic Literacy Tutor Training; 1:30-5pm

◗ IU Cinema — Film: “Shane”; 3pm

◗ IU Cinema — Film: “Hannah Takes the Stairs”; 6:30pm

◗ Ryder Film Series — “The Well Digger’s Daughter” at IU Fine Arts; 6:45pm

◗ Oliver Winery, Creekbend Vineyard — Music: Jenn Cristy; evening, call for exact time

◗ Muddy Boots Cafe, Nashville — Music: Kevin Bruener; 7-9pm

◗ Brown County Playhouse, Nashville — Music: Carrie Newcomer; 7:30pm

◗ Ryder Film Series — “Take this Waltz” at IU Woodburn Hall; 8pm

◗ Cafe Django — Music: Post Modern Jazz Quartet; 8pm

◗ The Player’s Pub — Music: Pet Monkey; 8pm

◗ The Comedy Attic — Garfunkel & Oates; 8 & 10:30pm, Both shows sold out

◗ IU Memorial Union, Whittenberger Auditorium — UB Films: “The Avengers”; 8pm

◗ Ryder Film Series — “The Pigeoneers” at IU Fine Arts; 8:45pm

◗ Bear’s Place — Music: Cooked Books, Energy Gown; 9pm

◗ Max’s Place — Music: White Lightning; 9pm

◗ The Bluebird — Music: Main Squeeze; 9pm

◗ IU Cinema — Film: “LOL”; 9:30pm

◗ The Root Cellar at Farm Bloomington — Queen & Bowie dance party; 10pm

◗ IU Memorial Union, Whittenberger Auditorium — UB Films: “The Avengers”; 11pm

ONGOING

◗ Ivy Tech Waldron Center — Exhibits:

  • “40 Years of Artists from Pygmalion’s”; through September 1st

◗ IU Art Museum — Exhibits:

  • “A Tribute to William Zimmerman,” wildlife artist; through September 9th

  • Willi Baumeister, “Baumeister in Print”; through September 9th

  • Annibale and Agostino Carracci, “The Bolognese School”; through September 16th

  • “Contemporary Explorations: Paintings by Contemporary Native American Artists”; through October 14th

  • David Hockney, “New Acquisitions”; through October 21st

  • Utagawa Kuniyoshi, “Paragons of Filial Piety”; through fall semester 2012

  • Julia Margaret Cameron, Edward Weston, & Harry Callahan, “Intimate Models: Photographs of Husbands, Wives, and Lovers”; through December 31st

  • “French Printmaking in the Seventeenth Century”; through December 31st

◗ IU SoFA Grunwald Gallery — Exhibits:

  • “Media Life,” drawings and animation by Miek von Dongen; through September 15th

  • “Axe of Vengeance: Ghanaian Film Posters and Film Viewing Culture”; through September 15th

◗ IU Kinsey Institute Gallery — “Ephemeral Ink: Selections of Tattoo Art from the Kinsey Institute Collection”; through September 21st

◗ IU Lilly Library — Exhibit, “Translating the Canon: Building Special Collections in the 21st Century”; through September 1st

◗ IU Mathers Museum of World Cultures — Reopens Tuesday, August 21st

◗ Monroe County History Center — Photo exhibit, “Bloomington: Then and Now” by Bloomington Fading; through October 27th

▲

08/20/2012
1 Comment
Al Jazeera English, Barack Obama, Dave Mustaine, Hank Williams Jr., HL Mencken, Human Reproduction, Indiana University, Jane Mayer, Koch Brothers, Mitt Romney, New Yorker, Rape, Republican Party, Ted Nugent, Todd Akin, US Geological Survey, War on Science

The Pencil Today:

THE QUOTE

“There has been no great political movement in the United States since Jefferson’s day without some purely moral balderdash at its center.” — H.L. Mencken

▲

GO!

OUR TOWN’S BEST EVENTS LISTINGS — SCROLL DOWN

▲

MY CALENDAR IS STOPPED ON AUGUST

It’s Fall today.

At least it is according to the Indiana University calendar. Fall semester classes begin this morning.

▲

QUACKS

Now, how about this dangerous goof, Todd Akin? The Senate candidate from Missouri has said “legitimate” rape does not generally result in pregnancy.

She’s Asking For It; Ergo, She’ll Get Pregnant

✍

Akin — a Republican, as if you had to ask — claims doctors he knows have informed him that women’s bodies have an internally-produced magic elixir that makes pregnancy in such instances nearly impossible.

Let’s take Akin at his word — not, of course, about anything having to do with the human reproductive process; he’s an idiot on that subject — but about him having spoken with doctors.

Medical doctors, presumably.

If so, each and every one of them should have his medical license revoked forthwith.

BTW, folks, here’s yet another chicken coming home to roost thanks to the Republican War on Science.

BTW II: Fox News online at 8:15am EDT has not even mentioned the story.

▲

SUDDENLY, I’M THIRSTY

How cool is this?

The Earth’s Water

✍

The image is from the US Geological Survey;the blue bead represents all the water on the Earth.

According to the USGS, that bead also includes all the “groundwater, atmospheric water, and even the water in you, your dog, and your tomato plant.”

Yikes!

So all our deepest lakes, seas, and oceans make up the flimsiest skin of H20 hugging our planet’s surface.

Of course, when your boat’s going down in the middle of Lake Monroe, it doesn’t feel that way.

Nevertheless, this is just another illustration of how insignificant we are.

You know how people who want to persuade you to accept Jesus or Allah or Zoroaster hit you with the You have to give yourself over to something bigger than you are line?

Well, guess what — everything‘s bigger than we are.

▲

FLAT NOTES

Seems as though musicians are going hog wild these days, oinking about Barack Obama. First it was Dave Mustaine, then Hank Williams, Jr., and now Ted Nugent jumps into the slop.

My lefty and lib friends are all aflutter that Nugent was quoted as saying, “…Obama represents everything bad about humanity….”

Okay, that’s pretty deranged but it’s got nuffin’ on the line that followed: “…and Romney pretty much all that is good. It is really that stark.”

Willard Romney represents all that is good about humanity?

Honestly, Ted?

Really?

The Best Our Species Has To Offer?

✍

You know, Nugent also commented after the Supreme Court decision on the Obama health care reforms, “I’m beginning to wonder it it would have been best had the South won the Civil War.”

So really, can’t we can stop pussyfooting around and say it like it is? Ted Nugent not only spouts a controversial political opinion or two, but he’s a racist jerk.

▲

AMERICAN MASTERS

Al Jazeera English takes on the Koch boys.

A Couple Of Kochs

✍

Read it. If a media outlet targeting the Arab world scares the poo out of you, then read Jane Mayer’s New Yorker piece on the Billionaire Boner Boys from a couple of years ago.

Of course, you may think all Arabs and liberals are against good, rich American boys like Davey and Chuckie who pretty much own the nation. If so, I ask you this: after studying their positions and their tactics, do you really want to be on their side?

And are you certain they’re on yours?

▲

Here’s how I waste my time. How about you? Share your fave sites with us via the comments section. Just type in the name of the site, not the url; we’ll find them. If we like them, we’ll include them — if not, we’ll ignore them.

❏ I Love Charts — Life as seen through charts.

I Love Charts

✍

❏ XKCD — “A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.”

❏ Skepchick — Women scientists look at the world and the universe.

❏ Indexed — All the answers in graph form, on index cards.

❏ I Fucking Love Science — A Facebook community of science geeks.

I Fucking Love Science: Closeups Of A Leaf And Human Blood Vessels, And A Satellite View Of The Amazon Basin

✍

❏ Present/&/Correct — Fun, compelling, gorgeous and/or scary graphic designs and visual creations throughout the years and from all over the world.

❏ Flip Flop Fly Ball — Baseball as seen through infographics, haikus, song lyrics, and other odd communications devices.

❏ Mental Floss — Facts.

❏ Sodaplay — Create your own models or play with other people’s models.

❏ Eat Sleep Draw — An endless stream of artwork submitted by an endless stream of people.

❏ Big Think — Tapping the brains of notable intellectuals for their opinions, predictions, and diagnoses.

❏ The Daily Puppy — So shoot me.

▲

Electron Pencil event listings: Music, art, movies, lectures, parties, receptions, games, benefits, plays, meetings, fairs, conspiracies, rituals, etc.

Monday, August 20, 2012

◗ Muddy Boots Cafe, Nashville — Creek Dogs; 6-8:30pm

◗ IU Cinema — Film: “Surviving Life”; 7pm

◗ Cafe Django — Bloomington Short List, hosted by Marta Jasicki, ten-minute variety acts; 7-9pm

◗ Buskirk-Chumley Theater — John Hiatt & the Combo; 8pm

◗ The Bishop — Pomegranates, The Broderick; 9pm

◗ The Player’s Pub — Songwriter Showcase: Russ Baum, Jenna Epkey, La Jeder, Monika Herzig; 8pm

◗ The Bluebird — Dave Walters karaoke; 9pm

ONGOING:

◗ Ivy Tech Waldron Center — Exhibits:

  • “40 Years of Artists from Pygmalion’s”; through September 1st

◗ IU Art Museum — Exhibits:

  • “A Tribute to William Zimmerman,” wildlife artist; through September 9th

  • Willi Baumeister, “Baumeister in Print”; through September 9th

  • Annibale and Agostino Carracci, “The Bolognese School”; through September 16th

  • “Contemporary Explorations: Paintings by Contemporary Native American Artists”; through October 14th

  • David Hockney, “New Acquisitions”; through October 21st

  • Utagawa Kuniyoshi, “Paragons of Filial Piety”; through fall semester 2012

  • Julia Margaret Cameron, Edward Weston, & Harry Callahan, “Intimate Models: Photographs of Husbands, Wives, and Lovers”; through December 31st

  • “French Printmaking in the Seventeenth Century”; through December 31st

◗ IU SoFA Grunwald Gallery — Exhibits:

  • Coming — Media Life; August 24th through September 15th

  • Coming — Axe of Vengeance: Ghanaian Film Posters and Film Viewing Culture; August 24th through September 15th

◗ IU Kinsey Institute Gallery — “Ephemeral Ink: Selections of Tattoo Art from the Kinsey Institute Collection”; through September 21st

◗ IU Lilly Library — Exhibit, “Translating the Canon: Building Special Collections in the 21st Century”; through September 1st

◗ IU Mathers Museum of World Cultures — Closed for semester break, reopens Tuesday, August 21st

◗ Monroe County History Center — Photo exhibit, “Bloomington: Then and Now” by Bloomington Fading; through October 27th

▲

08/19/2012
Leave a comment
2012 Presidential Election, Adolf Hitler, Apollo 11, Barack Obama, Chicago Cubs, Hank Aaron, Hank Williams Jr., Islam, Kenny Holtzman, Linda Wertheimer, Lovable Losers, Miriam Makeba, NPR, Racism, WASP, Woodstock

The Pencil Today:

✍

THE QUOTE

“I look at an ant and I see myself: a native South African, endowed by nature with a strength much greater than my size so I might cope with the weight of a racism that crushes my spirit.” — Miriam Makeba

▲

THE COLOR OF FEAR

NPR’s Linda Wertheimer this morning on Weekend Edition Sunday pointed out that this year’s presidential election will be the first in our history in which no one on the major parties’ tickets is a WASP.

Perhaps that explains why so many people are freaked out — still — about Barack Obama.

See? See? That’s The Nazi Salute!

✍

The world that every American once knew and too many are terrified to leave, is gone.

And speaking of terrifying, yet another music star has blown verbal chunks about the Prez. Hank Williams, Jr., who last year compared Barack Obama to Hitler (natch, they were both half-black men who studied at Harvard Law), now ups the ante. Yesterday, the man who once asked Are you ready for some football?, declared the President of the United States to be a Muslim who not only hates the military but the rest of the nation, for good measure.

Proof!

✍

Williams, Jr. sings something called “Take Back Our Country.” He needn’t add, …From all those scary brown people.

▲

LET’S GO TO INDIANA!

Lauren Spierer’s disappearance last year raised a puzzler.

Why do so many Indiana University students come from suburban New York City?

IU’s Prep School Attendance Boundaries

✍

With a record 7590 freshmen expected to attend IU this semester, many of them will come from  the tri-state area including New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut. The Spierer family hails from Edgemont, north of the big city.

Edgemont is a part of the town of Greenville in Westchester County, a tony enclave that through the years has been home to the likes of Linda McCartney, Bugsy Seigel, Walter Winchell, and Billy Collins, the former US poet laureate.

It’s funny how certain campuses become desirable destinations for specific matriculate populations. For instance, it was well-known in my old Chicago area that the University of Wisconsin in Madison drew a disproportionate number of northwest suburban Jewish kids.

I suppose the Madison thing makes sense because it falls into that Goldilocks zone for college students: far enough away from mom and dad to not worry that they can drop in at a moment’s notice but near enough to dash back home for a laundry run and a good warm meal, PRN.

Bloomington, Indiana seems an odd choice for Eastern Seaboard kids and their megalopolis classmates who might want to run back home in a six-hour or less drive.

Any ideas?

▲

GLEE

Indulge me for a moment. Today is the 43rd anniversary of the most exciting moment I’ve ever experienced as a rabid Chicago Cubs fan.

On the afternoon of Tuesday, August 19th, 1969, my fave Cubs pitcher, Kenny Holtzman, tossed a no-hitter against the mighty Atlanta Braves.

Bliss

✍

The Braves that afternoon were led by one Henry Louis Aaron, who’d go on to become baseball’s all-time home run king.

The sun was bright, a pleasant lake wind blew in from the northeast, and the Cubs were in first place, on their way to their first World Series since World War II and — fingers crossed — their first championship since the Peloponnesian War.

In a summer during which two human beings had stepped on the moon and nearly half a million people jammed Max Yasgur’s farm just to be able to brag to their grandchildren that they’d attended Woodstock, the Cubs racing for a World Series was the most jaw-dropping miracle yet.

And the high point of the season was Kenny’s gem.

Basking In The Glory

✍

I watched that game from a bleacher seat under the centerfield scoreboard at Wrigley Field.

I was 13 years old.

Even now, nearly half a century later, I still believe had I died that afternoon, I’d have gone happy.

Have pity on this aching soul: don’t ask me to recount the ensuing weeks. Nor, for that matter, the ensuing decades.

▲

Here’s how I waste my time. How about you? Share your fave sites with us via the comments section. Just type in the name of the site, not the url; we’ll find them. If we like them, we’ll include them — if not, we’ll ignore them.

❏ I Love Charts — Life as seen through charts.

❏ XKCD — “A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.”

❏ Skepchick — Women scientists look at the world and the universe.

❏ Indexed — All the answers in graph form, on index cards.

❏ I Fucking Love Science — A Facebook community of science geeks.

❏ Present & Correct — Fun, compelling, gorgeous and/or scary graphic designs and visual creations throughout the years and from all over the world.

Click Image For Full Article:

Present/&/Correct: 44 Old Typewriter Instruction Manuals

✍

❏ Flip Flop Fly Ball — Baseball as seen through infographics, haikus, song lyrics, and other odd communications devices.

❏ Mental Floss — Facts.

❏ The Universe — A Facebook community of astrophysics and astronomy geeks.

❏ Sodaplay — Create your own models or play with other people’s models.

❏ Eat Sleep Draw — An endless stream of artwork submitted by an endless stream of people.

Eat Sleep Draw: Illustration by Rachel Sanson

✍

❏ Big Think — Tapping the brains of notable intellectuals for their opinions, predictions, and diagnoses.

❏ The Daily Puppy — So shoot me.

▲

Electron Pencil event listings: Music, art, movies, lectures, parties, receptions, games, benefits, plays, meetings, fairs, conspiracies, rituals, etc.

Sunday, August 19, 2012

◗ Oliver Winery — Creekbend Vineyard tour; Noon-2pm

◗ Monroe County Public Library — Basic Literacy Tutor Training, session 2 of 4; 1:30-5pm

◗ IU Wells-Metz Theatre — Drama, “Solana”; 2pm

◗ IU Bill Armstrong Stadium — Hoosier women’s soccer vs. Ohio; 2pm

◗ Bryan Park — Outdoor concert: O2R Blues Band; 6:30pm

◗ Bear’s Place — Ryder Film Series: “The Well Digger’s Daughter”; 7pm

◗ IU Cinema — Film: “Beasts of the Southern Wild”; 7pm

◗ The Bluebird — BoDeans; 8pm

◗ The Bishop — Jamaican Queens, Fly Painted Feathers; 9pm

ONGOING:

◗ Ivy Tech Waldron Center — Exhibits:

  • “40 Years of Artists from Pygmalion’s”; through September 1st

◗ IU Art Museum — Exhibits:

  • “A Tribute to William Zimmerman,” wildlife artist; through September 9th

  • Willi Baumeister, “Baumeister in Print”; through September 9th

  • Annibale and Agostino Carracci, “The Bolognese School”; through September 16th

  • “Contemporary Explorations: Paintings by Contemporary Native American Artists”; through October 14th

  • David Hockney, “New Acquisitions”; through October 21st

  • Utagawa Kuniyoshi, “Paragons of Filial Piety”; through fall semester 2012

  • Julia Margaret Cameron, Edward Weston, & Harry Callahan, “Intimate Models: Photographs of Husbands, Wives, and Lovers”; through December 31st

  • “French Printmaking in the Seventeenth Century”; through December 31st

◗ IU SoFA Grunwald Gallery — Exhibits:

  • Coming — Media Life; August 24th through September 15th

  • Coming — Axe of Vengeance: Ghanaian Film Posters and Film Viewing Culture; August 24th through September 15th

◗ IU Kinsey Institute Gallery — “Ephemeral Ink: Selections of Tattoo Art from the Kinsey Institute Collection”; through September 21st

◗ IU Lilly Library — Exhibit, “Translating the Canon: Building Special Collections in the 21st Century”; through September 1st

◗ IU Mathers Museum of World Cultures — Closed for semester break, reopens Tuesday, August 21st

◗ Monroe County History Center — Photo exhibit, “Bloomington: Then and Now” by Bloomington Fading; through October 27th

▲

08/10/2012
Leave a comment
Allen Texas, Animal Planet, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Creationism, Finding Bigfoot, Football Concussions, Goldman Sachs, Hillary Clinton, Human Evolution, Human Growth Hormone, Lisa de Moraes, Lloyd Blankfein, Mermaid: The Body Found, Organized Crime, Performance Enhancing Drugs, Robert A. Heinlein, Smokey Robinson & The Miracles, Socialism, Steroids, Sub-prime Loans, Tears of a Clown, US Department of Justice, Washington Post, Welfare Reform

The Pencil Today:

✍

THE QUOTE

“Never underestimate the power of human stupidity.” — Robert A. Heinlein

♢

A NOTE TO MY READERS

If I seem a little cynical today (okay, a lot cynical) don’t blame me. I’m only the messenger.

♢

MEET YOUR BOSS

Make no mistake now. There is no longer any argument.

This holy land is not led by a president or a Senate or House. Nor is it run by Democrats or Republicans. Not even the combined forces of the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines rival the most powerful entity in the United States today.

Kids Stuff

✍

These Great United States, Inc. are ruled by the investment banking firm and criminal enterprise known as Goldman Sachs.

And that would make the emperor of this nominal democratic republic an unindicted hoodlum by the name of Lloyd Blankfein.

Dear Leader

✍

The capo Blankfein and his underlings yesterday got a huge return on their investments in political bribery and economic blackmail when the Obama Justice Department announced it won’t be pursuing charges against them.

See, Goldman Sachs had been engaged in the selling of subprime mortgage securities for years, earnings ungodly amounts of money. Only Blankfein’s syndicate then went out and bet against the performance of those securities.

In other words, Goldman Sachs sold its clients — including retirement funds, states and municipalities, hospitals, and the like — a pile of shit and then went out and set up a sham insurance safety net protecting itself against the shit smears that would inevitably follow.

The original “Mob” used to have this scam down to an art. A couple of crooked-nosed Charlies would visit a restaurant owner and advise him he needed “insurance” should, god forbid, anything calamitous happen.

Aw, D’at’s Too Bad. Y’See What Can Happen?

✍

The only flaw in the Mob’s plan was its inability to hold off the dogs of justice indefinitely. By and by, some squeaky clean prosecutor would slap the bracelets on the big boys and their underbosses.

But Lloyd Blankfein won’t be a guest of the state any time soon. In fact. the state is now his guest.

This is, after all, his country. Lock, stock, and barrel.

♢

PROBLEM SOLVED

You know how Barack Obama is a socialist? And the Clintons before him?

Real red-underwear-wearing types, right?

✍

At least that’s what the Right would have us believe.

So why is it that the number of people receiving cash assistance from government social welfare programs has fallen a full two-thirds since Bill Clinton’s 1996 welfare reform? And the number of American families who get government subsidies for trivial things like food and heat has fallen by a half?

✍

The answer, if you believe the Right, is they’ve all gone from the lazy poor to the self-sufficient middle class. Because, after all, it was their own fault they were poor.

The great thing about living in these United States is the fact that we don’t need complicated solutions to baffling problems. The answers, my fellow citizens, are simple.

Oops. I mean simplistic.
♢

ANOTHER SIGN OF THE COMING APOCALYPSE

Everybody and anybody who had a hand in making this monstrosity a reality should have the living shit kicked out of them:

✍

This is the brand spankin’ new high school football stadium in Allen, Texas.

You read right: High-freaking-school.

The new home of the Allen Eagles cost $60M. It seats 18,000. It has a 75×45-foot video screen scoreboard.

The story about this crime against humanity in Time magazine’s online newsfeed quotes some little bastard defensive back as saying, “We just have to [be] blessed and humble and not take it for granted.”

Go Eagles!

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Yeah. Like the god that doesn’t exist gave it to you in lieu of doing anything about the flooding in India.

Texas, by the way, last year cut $5B from the state public schools budget..

Anyway, the best part of the story is the little teaser in red about halfway down: “MORE: Catastrophic Brian Injuries at All-Time High in High School Football.”

Nothin’ like seeing your boy’s cerebrum concussed into so much gray goo down on the field in a shiny new stadium, is there?

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LIFE LESSONS FROM FOOTBALL

Yep. Football’s back.

Remember when Ma & Pa America were all aflutter over teenaged athletes using steroids and human growth hormones to build muscle mass?

The Horror

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Heaven forbid our precious scions should risk the devastating side effects of performance enhancing drugs. Like acne.

No. It’s much better for them to suffer permanent disability due to head injuries suffered on the gridiron.

Oh, and thanks to our changing climate (which, I’d bet, plenty o’Texans think is the liberal bunk anyway) more and more high school football players are suffering serious injury and death from practicing in full pads through the August heat.

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SCIENCE TAKES ANOTHER HIT

We don’t have cable anymore at Chez Big Mike but if we did, Animal Planet would be on all the time. The Loved One digs critters and I’m partial to two or three species myself.

The bad news is, Animal Planet is slipping and sliding away from real animals this coming season and becoming more about, well, bullshit.

Two of the cable networks big shows will be “Finding Bigfoot” and “Mermaid — The Body Found.”

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According to the Washington Post’s TV columnist Lisa de Moraes, critics pounded Animal Planet reps when the network held its pre-season news conference. One asked if AP “had run out of real animals.”

When it comes to TV, though, no one can argue with the numbers. AP’s audiences love shows about creatures that don’t exist.

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THE POWER OF MYTH

Great. As if I’m not discouraged enough by the direction in which this nation is headed, this poll comes out:

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The site I Fucking Love Science opines: “Well, this is a little bit scary. Come on America, sort it out. You just landed on Mars!”

To borrow a term from the god-fetishists, Amen!

♢

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Here’s how I waste my time. How about you? Share your fave sites with us via the comments section. Just type in the name of the site, not the url; we’ll find them. If we like them, we’ll include them — if not, we’ll ignore them.

❏ I Love Charts — Life as seen through charts.

From I Love Charts

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❏ XKCD — “A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.”

❏ Skepchick — Women scientists look at the world and the universe.

❏ Indexed — All the answers in graph form, on index cards.

❏ I Fucking Love Science — A Facebook community of science geeks.

❏ Present and Correct — Fun, compelling, gorgeous and/or scary graphic designs and visual creations throughout the years and from all over the world.

❏ Flip Flop Fly Ball — Baseball as seen through infographics, haikus, song lyrics, and other odd communications devices.

❏ Mental Floss — Facts.

❏ Caps Off Please — Comics & fun.

❏ Sodaplay — Create your own models or play with other people’s models.

❏ Eat Sleep Draw — An endless stream of artwork submitted by an endless stream of people.

❏ Big Think — Tapping the brains of notable intellectuals for their opinions, predictions, and diagnoses.

❏ The Daily Puppy — So shoot me.

Tiny, From The Daily Puppy

♢

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Electron Pencil event listings: Music, art, movies, lectures, parties, receptions, games, benefits, plays, meetings, fairs, conspiracies, rituals, etc.

◗ The Venue Fine Art & Gifts — Opening reception: “Articulture” by Marco Zehrung; 6-8pm

◗ Lake Monroe, Paynetown SRA — National S’mores Day celebration, recipe competition and other activities; 6-10pm

◗ Tibetan Mongolian Buddhist Cultural Center — Workshop: Depression and Buddhism, presented by Ani Choekye; 6:30pm

◗ IU Fine Arts Theater — Ryder Film Series: “Kumaré: The True Story of a False Prophet”; 7pm

◗ Muddy Boots Cafe, Nashville — Mizfitz; 7-9pm

◗ IU Cinema — Film: “To Rome with Love”; 7pm

◗ Bloomington Speedway — Sprint cars, UMP super stocks, UMP modifieds; 7pm

◗ IU Woodburn Hall Theater — Ryder Film Series: “The Pigeoneers”; 8pm

◗ Cafe Django — Sad Sam Blues Jam; 8-10pm

◗ The Comedy Attic — Tim Wilson; 8 & 10:30pm

◗ IU Fine Arts Theater — Ryder Film Series: “Polisse”; 8:30pm

◗ Bear’s Place — Chris Wilson & Planet Earth, Charlie & the Groove Factory; 9pm

◗ The Bluebird — The Revivalists, Three Story Hill; 9pm

◗ Max’s Place — Phoenix Down; 9pm

◗ Muddy Boots Cafe, Nashville — Amanda Webb; 9:30pm

◗ Max’s Place — Head Bread; 10:30pm

Ongoing:

◗ Ivy Tech Waldron Center — Exhibits:

  • “40 Years of Artists from Pygmalion’s”; through September 1st

◗ IU Art Museum — Exhibits:

  • Qiao Xiaoguang, “Urban Landscape: A Selection of Papercuts” ; through August 12th
  • “A Tribute to William Zimmerman,” wildlife artist; through September 9th
  • Willi Baumeister, “Baumeister in Print”; through September 9th
  • Annibale and Agostino Carracci, “The Bolognese School”; through September 16th
  • “Contemporary Explorations: Paintings by Contemporary Native American Artists”; through October 14th
  • David Hockney, “New Acquisitions”; through October 21st
  • Utagawa Kuniyoshi, “Paragons of Filial Piety”; through fall semester 2012
  • Julia Margaret Cameron, Edward Weston, & Harry Callahan, “Intimate Models: Photographs of Husbands, Wives, and Lovers”; through December 31st
  • “French Printmaking in the Seventeenth Century”; through December 31st

◗ IU SoFA Grunwald Gallery — Exhibits:

  • Coming — Media Life; August 24th through September 15th
  • Coming — Axe of Vengeance: Ghanaian Film Posters and Film Viewing Culture; August 24th through September 15th

◗ IU Kinsey Institute Gallery — “Ephemeral Ink: Selections of Tattoo Art from the Kinsey Institute Collection”; through September 21st

◗ IU Lilly Library — Exhibit, “Translating the Canon: Building Special Collections in the 21st Century”; through September 1st

◗ IU Mathers Museum of World Cultures — Closed for semester break, reopens Tuesday, August 21st

◗ Monroe County History Center —Photo exhibit, “Bloomington: Then and Now” by Bloomington Fading; through October 27th

♢

08/09/2012
Leave a comment
ABC News, Achy Obejas, Al Jazeera English, American Family Association, Barack Obama, Bryan Fischer, BuzzFeed, Department of Homeland Security, Dr. Seuss, FBI, George Wallace, Guns, Hate Groups, Jack Webb, Jenna Jameson, Mitt Romney, Nixonland, Pornography, Ralph Nader, Republican Party, Richard J. Daley, Rick Perlstein, Ron Jeremy, Sikh Temple Shooting, Silent Majority, Spiro Agnew, Theodore Geisel

The Pencil Today:

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THE QUOTE

“Turn on to politics or politics will turn on you.” — Ralph Nader

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JENNA WANTS MITT TO LICK BARACK

Retired porn star Jenna Jameson has endorsed Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

Don’t you love it?

“When you’re rich,” Jenna reasons, “you want a Republican in office.”

Family Values

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To balance things out, the incomparable Ron Jeremy is behind the President. Poor Barack.

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WHOSE SIDE ARE THEY ON?

If this doesn’t scare the bejesus out of you I don’t know what will.

In a piece on the radical right in America, al Jazeera claims that Republicans quashed a 2009 Department of Homeland Security report suggesting hate groups began to proliferate in the United States after the election of Barack Obama.

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Not that the groups weren’t proliferating before that, mind you. Only that their rate of proliferation was bumped up dramatically by the presence of a brown man in the White House.

I’d say the GOP has some ‘splainin’ to do.

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HATE IS ENOUGH

We still don’t understand the meaning of hatred in this country. ABC News ran this online headline yesterday:

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Still No Motive?

Does the swastika have different meanings for different people even at this late date?

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THE NEW MACHINE

Many years ago, even the most polarizing figures in this holy land were permitted to have nuanced and even seemingly self-contradictory viewpoints. They didn’t run in fear from the Thought Crime authorities within their political parties or the punditocracy.

For instance, one of the heroes of the hard-hat, blue-collar, bungalow-belt Silent Majority was Mayor Richard J. Daley of Chicago. He ran a highly disciplined political machine. He tolerated little in the way of dissent. He was a tough guy.

The Boss

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He’d called for his police to shoot to kill arsonists and shoot to maim looters during race riots. He turned his police force loose on demonstrators during the 1968 Democratic Convention. By the early 1970s he ranked just below George Wallace, Spiro Agnew, and Jack Webb in the law and order pantheon.

Yet he was a staunch opponent of the Vietnam War and, even more surprisingly, guns. According to Rick Perlstein in “Nixonland,” Daley was in Washington, DC testifying before a congressional committee in the summer of 1972. “Take the guns away from every private citizen,” he said.

Can you imagine any darling of the right even suggesting private citizens should be limited to possessing several dozen assault rifles these days?

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A NEW UNDERGROUND RAILROAD?

Author and journalist Achy Obejas (say it, AH-chee oh-BAY-hahss) spent a few years at Indiana University before she dropped out and went to work covering politics, GLBTQ issues, night life, and a host of other beats.

Obejas

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Achy points out the latest lunatic pronouncement from a member of the holier-than-thou gang. It seems Bryan Fischer, one of the paid squealers for the American Family Association, has called for good, god-fearing citizens to save children being raised by same-sex couples.

Well, perhaps the word save isn’t quite right here. How about kidnap?

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Achy’s got a horse in this race. Her wife, Megan, gave birth to a son last year. Achy swears she’s never been happier.

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IN YEARS AHEAD, HE WOULD NOT BE TED

Here a sample of some graphic ad work a then-unknown artist named Theodore Geisel did back in the 1930s and 40s:

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Recognize the style? Geisel later became Dr, Seuss.

See more at “25 Advertisements by Dr. Seuss Before He Was Dr. Seuss” on BuzzFeed.

♢

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Here’s how I waste my time. How about you? Share your fave sites with us via the comments section. Just type in the name of the site, not the url; we’ll find them. If we like them, we’ll include them — if not, we’ll ignore them.

❏ I Love Charts — Life as seen through charts.

❏ XKCD — “A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.”

“What If?” From XKCD

✍

❏ Skepchick — Women scientists look at the world and the universe.

❏ Indexed — All the answers in graph form, on index cards.

❏ I Fucking Love Science — A Facebook community of science geeks.

❏ Present and Correct — Fun, compelling, gorgeous and/or scary graphic designs and visual creations throughout the years and from all over the world.

❏ Flip Flop Fly Ball — Baseball as seen through infographics, haikus, song lyrics, and other odd communications devices.

❏ Mental Floss — Facts.

❏ Caps Off Please — Comics & fun.

❏ Sodaplay — Create your own models or play with other people’s models.

❏ Eat Sleep Draw — An endless stream of artwork submitted by an endless stream of people.

❏ Big Think — Tapping the brains of notable intellectuals for their opinions, predictions, and diagnoses.

❏ The Daily Puppy — So shoot me.

♢

✍

Electron Pencil event listings: Music, art, movies, lectures, parties, receptions, games, benefits, plays, meetings, fairs, conspiracies, rituals, etc.

◗ Bear’s Place — Jazz Fables: Mr. Taylor and His Dirty Dixie Band; 5:30pm

◗ Muddy Boots Cafe, Nashville — Americana Showcase; 6-8:30pm

◗ Monroe County Public Library — Monthly meeting, Bloomington Transportation Options for People; 6:30pm

◗ IU Cinema — Film: “To Rome with Love”; 7pm

◗ Cafe Django — Jeff Isaac Trio; 8-10pm

◗ The Comedy Attic — Tim Wilson; 8pm

◗ Serendipity Martini Bar — Team trivia; 8:30pm

◗ Max’s Place — Wake the Dead; 9pm

◗ The Bluebird — Apollo Quad; 9pm

◗ The Bishop — Home Blitz, Bloody Mess, The Tsunamis; 9:30pm

Ongoing:

◗ Ivy Tech Waldron Center — Exhibits:

  • “40 Years of Artists from Pygmalion’s”; through September 1st

◗ IU Art Museum — Exhibits:

  • Qiao Xiaoguang, “Urban Landscape: A Selection of Papercuts” ; through August 12th
  • “A Tribute to William Zimmerman,” wildlife artist; through September 9th
  • Willi Baumeister, “Baumeister in Print”; through September 9th
  • Annibale and Agostino Carracci, “The Bolognese School”; through September 16th
  • “Contemporary Explorations: Paintings by Contemporary Native American Artists”; through October 14th
  • David Hockney, “New Acquisitions”; through October 21st
  • Utagawa Kuniyoshi, “Paragons of Filial Piety”; through fall semester 2012
  • Julia Margaret Cameron, Edward Weston, & Harry Callahan, “Intimate Models: Photographs of Husbands, Wives, and Lovers”; through December 31st
  • “French Printmaking in the Seventeenth Century”; through December 31st

◗ IU SoFA Grunwald Gallery — Exhibits:

  • Coming — Media Life; August 24th through September 15th
  • Coming — Axe of Vengeance: Ghanaian Film Posters and Film Viewing Culture; August 24th through September 15th

◗ IU Kinsey Institute Gallery — “Ephemeral Ink: Selections of Tattoo Art from the Kinsey Institute Collection”; through September 21st

◗ IU Lilly Library — Exhibit, “Translating the Canon: Building Special Collections in the 21st Century”; through September 1st

◗ IU Mathers Museum of World Cultures — Closed for semester break, reopens Tuesday, August 21st

◗ Monroe County History Center —Photo exhibit, “Bloomington: Then and Now” by Bloomington Fading; through October 27th

♢

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