Category Archives: New York Times

Hot Air

And The Winner Is….

Let’s talk awards.

The Pulitzers Prizes are the Oscars of the newspaper and scribbling biz. If I were to reveal one dream that I’ve harbored all my life, it’d be that I’d win the Pulitzer.

Pulitzer Prize winning author Big Mike Glab.

Trips off the tongue, no?

Maybe. But it won’t trip off the Pulitzer judging committee’s collective tongue. Not at this late date. And there, kiddies, lies the bare-bones moral of pretty much every novel that’s ever won the Pulitzer itself. Dreams die.

Sigh.

Anyway, Donna Tartt won this year’s fiction P.P. for her book, The Goldfinch. It’s about 16,000 pages long, which makes sense, considering it’s only the third book she’s had published in her so-far 22-year pro career.

Tartt

Donna Tartt

I haven’t cracked open The Goldfinch yet but I did read Tartt’s The Secret History back in the ’90s. It was quite good even though it was about privileged, over-the-top neurotic white college kids. See, I’m not a complete bigot.

I may read The Goldfinch when it comes out in paperback, although I wouldn’t bet the mortgage payment on it if I were you. I shy away from exceedingly long books and movies these days. The Goldfinch actually is 784 pages in hardcover. That translates to at least two weeks of reading time. I just can’t see myself making that kind of commitment anymore.

As far as movies go, my limit is two hours. If you can’t tell me a story up on the screen in two hours, you can’t tell me a story.

The big news, as far as I’m concerned, is that the Washington Post and The Guardian US jointly won the public service award in journalism for publishing the Edward Snowden revelations. Long-time readers of this space know I find Eddie to be a repulsive little character but, just to show what a big man I am, I do allow that he performed an absolutely invaluable and heroic service for this holy land.

I just wish he hadn’t run off to hide in one of the world’s most repressive states after he did it.

For those of you who fret that our great nation is slip-sliding into a fascist, tyrannical police state, take heart in the WaPo/Guardian‘s award. It’s part of a long tradition of American news gatherers winning praise for embarrassing the bejesus out of, well, America. Think back to 1972 when the New York Times copped the prize for printing the Pentagon Papers. It could reasonably be argued that the Times‘s actions harmed Murrica.

Certainly the revelation that our generals, Defense Department officials, and even the President himself had been lying through their teeth about our ill-conceived war in Southeast Asia helped hasten the general populace’s demand that we get the hell out of there. In other words, the publishing of the Pentagon Papers just might have prevented our great country from maintaining its perfect score in the Mighty Nations at War League.

Now, gosh dang it, Murrica’s got that tainted 12-1 mark (not including our record in little exhibition excursions like Grenada).

Anyway, the Buck Turgidsons of the Pentagon in 1972 would have given half the medals off their chests to prevent the NYT from publishing Daniel Ellsberg’s photocopied documents. Instead, the Times got laurels.

From "Dr. Strangelove...."

Bomb The New York Times!

If America was a fascist state back then, it was a lousy one. Old Adolf H. would have called us a bunch of pansies.

Funny thing is, it’s more likely that invertebrate publishers are more responsible for quashing the free press than all the iron-fisted generals, FBI agents, and presidents combined. In 1966 Harrison Salisbury was the only American reporter resourceful enough to slip into Hanoi. His subsequent series of stories revealed that US Air Force bombs were hitting hospitals and schools and killing civilians. The Pulitzer jury the next year voted to award him their prize. The Pulitzer board of directors nixed Salisbury’s award because they didn’t want to risk the ire of the Pentagon and President Johnson.

The same type of thing could have happened this year. The Far Right would have us believe the Obama Administration is chock-full of jack-booted Nazi lesbian abortionists. Funny, though, how that despotic gang let the Pulitzer committee recognize the Snowden articles.

They must have been too busy having sex orgies in the Oval Office.

And the Pulitzer peeps aren’t even cowering in fear of the Obama Reich.

Some fascist state.

Anyway, huzzah for the Pulitzer committees, for the Washington Post and The Guardian US, and for Edward Snowden (even if he is a weird little fker). I dig my press free.

Happy Tax Day

Here’s an item that ought to make your red cells sizzle this AM. Apparently, the extremely profitable National Football League does not pay federal taxes.

That’s right; the org. that administers a $10 billion-a-year operation and whose chief profiteer, Roger Goodell, makes a cool $44 million a year, does not turn over any of that lettuce to the feds. This despite the fact that many of the NFL’s franchises play their knee-breaking, cranium-shattering games in palatial stadia bought and paid for by you and me, the people.

Just to clarify: the individual teams do indeed pay taxes on their kingly revenues. It’s the NFL office that doesn’t fork it over to the taxman. Still, we’re talking some hefty scratch that could be going to things like rebuilding Interstate Highway bridges, say, or fixing the ACA online sign-up system. The NFL office’s yearly take amounts to nearly $200 million in dues from its 32 teams plus whatever cuts it gets from licensing fees and other squeezes of the avg. football fan.

Total US tax bill: zero.

Football

Money From Heaven — Tax-Free!

You may wonder why. The Florida Times-Union in Jacksonville explains: The NFL is a nonprofit. Yep. Just like Habitat for Humanity of Monroe County or WFHB’s parent, Firehouse Broadcasting. No lie.

What, you wanna argue with that? You think nonprofit status should only apply to crunchy, goo-goo, liberal-socialist outfits that, y’know, help people?

Pshh. What country do you think you live in?


Hot Feline Air

…By Any Other Name…

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I love — love! — the fact that NPR anchors and reporters have to say the words Pussy Riot.

These are people, the stereotyping section of my brain has concluded, who’ve never uttered the P-word before in their lives. Whereas it’s my fave appellation for a woman’s business — a pussy is, after all, warm, snuggly, and comfortable. Rather like a de-clawed cat, no?

Kitten

Now, the C-word. Uh uh. That’s bad sauce, babies. It’s a harsh, hateful word. Yet, even some feminist-y women occasionally drop it when referring to a dame they particularly detest. I strive never to use it because of its hard-edge and insulting connotation.

It’s a word I imagine frat boys bandy about while sitting around and philosophizing. If frat boys use it, I have to eliminate it from my vocabulary. I’m also thinking of refusing to use the word the in my speech, which I suspect will be a tad more problematic.

In fact, if you want to distinguish between, say, odious porn and glorious erotica, simply use my handy C-word system. If the book or video uses the C-word in its title or the term is used liberally (eek, such an unfortunately choice of a word) in its content, the work likely will not be of art at all but rather a crushing, repulsive, quasi-violent put-down of the female sex.

O'Keeffe/Jack In The Pulpit

Anyway, I’ve been wondering how media outlets like the New York Times, the Christian Science Monitor, or the Rush Limbaugh radio flatulence-fest refer to the two erstwhile jailed Russian members of the punk group.

Well, let’s find out, shall we? The Grey Lady (an antiquated nickname for the NYT which, in its historical stuffiness, largely eschewed photos) seemed fairly itchy when first called upon to name the band. In the story dated August 17, 2012, telling of the band’s conviction and sentence on charges of hooliganism (which, itself, is a fave word of mine), the paper waited until the second graf to even mention PR’s name and even then acted all peevish about it. “[M]embers of a punk band called Pussy Riot…,” the copy read, as if to plead, Hey, don’t blame us.

As the fairly long story continued, the paper seemed at pains to avoid mentioning the name again, only doing so three more times, once to huff, “But while the women became minor celebrities, Pussy Riot is far more political than musical: Its members have never commercially released a song or an album, and they do not seem to have any serious aspirations to do so.”

In case anybody doesn’t get the gist of that graf, the Grey Lady is saying, Good heavens, no proper young ladies who employ such déclassé verbiage should ever be taken seriously!

Guaranteed the editors of the NYT are, at this very moment, on their knees praying Pussy Riot will disappear from the Earth forthwith so subscribers can safely return to the reading of more refined topics like sub-Saharan genocide or teenage rape in Ohio.

Despite bannering a variation on the name of one billion people’s lord and savior in its very name, the Christian Science Monitor went full Pussy Riot within the first nine words of its article on the band’s conviction and sentence in 2012. And the funny thing is, as I type this, the CSM page is still up on another window and its auto-play ad is running a faux doc on meterologists, air force commanders, and other scientists and officials tracking Santa and his reindeers’ flight over this holy land. Hehe; I love funny juxtapositions, natch.

Now then, how about the troggiest of all Oxycontin-head troglodytes, Rush Limbaugh? A casual google search shows — get this — absolutely no mentions of Pussy Riot by the King of Blowhard Kings. Imagine that. Here was his chance to either slam Vladimir Putin and the hated Russkies for being such stone-headed tyrants or to savage a band of slutty sluts who had the temerity to desecrate the Orthodox home of Jesus H. Christ himself. Yet Rush couldn’t even bring himself to address the issue. Who knows? Perhaps he digs their music and is torn. Or maybe he feels young women should be allowed to make the occasional public mistake without being ripped to shreds by porcine conservative commentators?

As they used to say in my old neighborhood, Whaddya, stupid?

I’m betting Rush and his merry band of keyboard clackers were paralyzed by Pussy Riot’s very name. You know the scene in the movie The Big Lebowski where Maude asks the Dude what his feelings are on the word vagina?

Maude: Does the female form make you uncomfortable, Mr. Lebowski?

The Dude: Um, is that what this is a picture of?

Maude: In a sense, yes. My art has been commended as being strongly vaginal, which bothers some men. The word itself makes some men uncomfortable. Vagina.

Scene from "The Big Lebowski"

“Vagina.”

The Dude: Oh yeah?

Maude: Yes. They don’t like hearing it and find it difficult to say….

I can see ol’ Rush reading about the Pussy Riot story the first time and then dashing off to the lavatory to scrub his hands and face.

My feeling is Rush et al would be far more comfortable had the Russian performance artists named themselves Cunt Riot.

Now, that’s a name they could get behind.

Merry Christmas!

Punk Prayer

The Pencil Today:

THE QUOTE

“Let there be work, bread, water, and salt for all.” — Nelson Mandela

SAHARA IN THE HEARTLAND

Your lawn just took a ten count.

Your trees and bushes, too.

The City of Bloomington has instituted a watering ban, beginning Monday and lasting through October 13th.

Pat Murphy’s Utilities Department water plant pumps are running at about a million gallons a day over capacity, upping the odds that one or more of them will burn out. Not only that, some strains of algae have been observed collecting in the pumps, adding to the risk of failure.

Mayor Mark Kruzan says the ban has some teeth after violators get a first warning: second violations earn $100 fines, three-time losers will be smacked with $250 fines and subsequent violations will lighten scofflaws’ wallets to the tune of $500 each.

By the way, don’t even think about washing your car.

Nope

THE THRILL OF VICTORY

Ya gotta love Cynthia Plaster-Caster of Chicago. She’s made her mark upon this world in large part (often, very large part) by reproducing rock stars’ cetrioli in plaster castings.

So, it’s no surprise she’s got a fine eye for bulges. The London Olympics is providing her a treasure trove of manly salutes.

Here, she points out the pride and joy of American rower Henrik Rummel as he receives his bronze medal in the heretofore ignored sport:

Henrik Rummel, Front And Center

Rummel’s isn’t the only full mast in Jolly Old this week. Plaster-Caster also spied Portugal’s Nelson Évora, gold medalist in the triple jump, packing heat.

Nelson Évora, Ready To Go

If these pix indicate how fab the whole Olympics experience is, it’s no wonder kids work night and day for years trying to get there.

SHE DOESN’T GET IT

Camilo Gonzalez of Chicago points out that Olympian LoLo Jones is bragging that she’s a virgin.

Jones, the American track and field celebrity, is a flamboyant product endorser. Apparently, one of those products is her heretofore-unseen-by-other-human-eyes genitalia.

She feels the world needs to know how untouched her stuff is so she has tweeted about it.

Oddly, she sometimes adopts seductive poses in her ads. She’s the spokesbody for crap products like Red Bull and planet-rapists like BP

Professional Virgin

Jere Longman wrote Saturday in the New York Times: “… Jones has received far greater publicity than any other American track and field athlete competing in the London Games. This was based not on achievement but on her exotic beauty and on a sad and cynical marketing campaign. Essentially, Jones has decided she will be whatever anyone wants her to be — virgin, vixen, victim — to draw attention to herself and the many products she endorses.”

Natch, right wingers and religious fetishists think she’s the greatest thing since the cast stone.

Gonzalez, though, doesn’t think much of it. He writes: “[B]eing a virgin at 30 is weird and pathological. Sexual development is an important part of becoming a grown-ass human being…. We don’t fawn over toddlers who refuse to be potty trained, yet we have respect and some have admiration for someone who is similarly infantile.”

If you’ve heard her on any talk shows, you know there’s more than one organ she refrains from using. Jones appeared on the Tonight Show about a month ago and clearly has a child’s brain as well as a child’s vagina.

Fortunately, Louis CK sat on the couch next to her as she bleated to Jay Leno. Jones has hinted she’d like to date fellow god-maniac Tim Tebow. Louis CK suggested the two should make a video. “That would sell,” he said. He didn’t need to explicate precisely what kind of video it would be.

LIKE A VIRGIN

As if she needs me pimping for her, here’s Madonna.

Better yet, here’s Weird Al Yankovic.

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 ChartsLife as seen through charts.

I Love Charts: From PhD Comics

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

SkepchickWomen scientists look at the world and the universe.

IndexedAll the answers in graph form, on index cards.

I Fucking Love ScienceA Facebook community of science geeks.

I Fucking Love Science

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

Flip Flop Fly BallBaseball as seen through infographics, haikus, song lyrics, and other odd communications devices.

Mental FlossFacts.

Caps Off PleaseComics & fun.

SodaplayCreate your own models or play with other people’s models.

Eat Sleep DrawAn endless stream of artwork submitted by an endless stream of people.

Big ThinkTapping the brains of notable intellectuals for their opinions, predictions, and diagnoses.

The Daily PuppySo shoot me.

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

B-Line TrailBloomington Community Band 5K Musical Fun Run/Walk; 7:30am

Muddy Boots Cafe, Nashville — Don Ford; 6-8:30pm

Tibetan Mongolian Buddhist Cultural CenterWorkshop: Buddhism in Everyday Life with Ani Choekye; 6:30pm

Monroe County Public LibraryVolunteer call for Bloomington bike rack inventory; 6:30-8:30pm

Max’s PlaceOpen mic; 7:30pm

Boys & Girls Club of BloomingtonContra dancing; 8pm

The Comedy AtticBloomington Comedy Festival, audience vote for funniest person in town; 8pm

The BluebirdMain Squeeze; 9pm

The BishopStagnant Pools, Mike Adams at His Honest Weight, Kam Kama; 9:30pm

◗ IU Kirkwood ObservatoryPublic viewing through the main telescope; 10pm

Ongoing:

◗ Ivy Tech Waldron CenterExhibits:

  • “40 Years of Artists from Pygmalion’s”; opens Friday, August 3rd, through September 1st

◗ IU Art MuseumExhibits:

  • 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 GalleryExhibits:

  • 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 LibraryExhibit, “Translating the Canon: Building Special Collections in the 21st Century”; through September 1st

◗ IU Mathers Museum of World CulturesClosed for semester break, reopens Tuesday, August 21st

Monroe County History Center Exhibits:

  • “What Is Your Quilting Story?”; through July 31st
  • Photo exhibit, “Bloomington: Then and Now” by Bloomington Fading; through October 27th

The Pencil Today:

THE QUOTE

“Toys of fate; it’s kismet!” — Curly Howard

THIS OLD, ELECTRON-STAINED WRETCH

How long do you think it’ll be before local papers like the Indy Star and the Herald Times cease coming out, well, on paper?

My guess is the Herald Times has five years left. Maybe fewer.

The Star? Five years as well. Seven max.

By 2020, the only paper newspapers remaining will be big-time, national publications like the New York Times, USA Today, the Wall Street Journal, and one or two others.

The rest? Done.

The Indianapolis Star today runs a FAQ column on its new online subscription policy. The reality is “you get it on your iPad, on your Android phone, on your desktop, in print, on social media or countless other platforms.”

Newsprint is nothing more than another “platform.”

At the Book Corner, only one person under the age of 60 or so buys newspapers. That’s some guy who works for Opie Taylor’s; he’s about 35. I have no recollection of anyone in her or his 20s ever plopping down the 75 cents for an H-T — or any other paper, for that matter.

Wanna know a secret? I get all my news online. And remember, I’m a 30-year veteran of writing for newspapers and magazines.

I won’t cry over the death of the papers.

BAD NEWS, BOYS

Ya gotta love it when our elected officeholders display a sense of humor. Especially, when the humor verges on truth.

For instance, after the Me Party-ists and right wingers, who took over the universe in the 2010 elections, decided to roll back women’s access to abortions and contraception to pre-11th Century levels, a few female pols shot back.

Writer Beth Baker penned a sidebar to her main article “Fighting the War Against Women” in the Spring/Summer edition of Ms. magazine. Entitled “What’s Good for the Goose,” the sidebar lists four tongue-in-cheek actions either proposed or approved recently.

Here they are:

  • The “spilled semen” amendment — Introduced by Oklahoma State Senator Constance Johnson, it calls for any semen deposited outside a woman’s vagina to be considered “an action against an unborn child.”
  • Egg and sperm personhood — Passed by the Wilmington, Delaware, city council, it declares all human ova and spermatazoa “eggs persons” and “sperm persons.” They will be protected against “abuse, neglect, or abandonment by the parent or guardian.”

Emily (L), Meet Zach (Leading, R)

  • Erectile dysfunction treatment testing and counseling — Introduced by Ohio State Senator Nina Turner, it would call for mandatory psychological testing, a cardiac stress test, and sexual counseling for any man who wishes to get a prescription for Viagra, Cialis, or other branded boner pills. Additionally, such patients would be required to show the doctor a signed agreement from his sex partner. He then would be directed toward celibacy counseling.
  • Mandatory priapism video — Introduced by Illinois State Representative Kelly Cassidy, this bill would require men seeking boner pill scrips to watch a video on priapism, the most common side effect of such meds, and its treatment, which is awfully gory. (Boys, cover your eyes — it involves a scalpel.)

AAAAARRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!

Funny? Sure. But none of these laws or declarations is any more ridiculous than the roadblocks to reproductive freedom the right loves to throw in front of women.

NO FUN

You can’t have missed this. Is nothing sacred?

A woman in Galesburg, Illinois told police last week that her home had been burglarized and a collection of her most precious possessions had been snatched.

An unknown intruder or intruders, the woman reported, had taken a pink bag filled with $1000-worth of sex toys.

Industry!

Her sex toys.

Man. That’s really hitting below the belt.

The beauty of the story is the reaction of Galesburg Police Captain Rod Riggs (okay, now I’m beginning to think this whole thing is a gag — Rod? Riggs?)

Anyway, Riggs told reporters, “There are a lot of odd ducks out there.”

Knowing cops as I do, it’s an even bet as to whether he’s referring to the criminal or the victim.

Or might he be talking about some of the contents of the pink bag?

And Why Not?

DEDICATED TO TIARA LIKES

Yep. That’s the name of the poor woman who had her sex toys swiped. Come on, Tiara Likes? Rod Riggs? Odd ducks?

Iggy Pop would have to love this story. “No Fun” was released on the Stooges’ eponymous first album in 1969.

According to legend, Iggy called Moe Howard of the Three Stooges to ask the great man for permission to borrow from the slapstick trio’s name. The legend has it that Moe indicated he didn’t care one way or the other. There is no evidence he finger-poked Iggy in the eyes through the phone.

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 ChartsLife as seen through charts.

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

SkepchickWomen scientists look at the world and the universe.

IndexedAll the answers in graph form, on index cards.

Indexed: Note To Hoteliers

I Fucking Love ScienceA Facebook community of science geeks.

Present and Correct(New Listing) Fun, compelling, gorgeous and/or scary graphic designs and visual creations throughout the years and from all over the world.

Flip Flop Fly BallBaseball as seen through infographics, haikus, song lyrics, and other odd communications devices.

Mental FlossFacts.

Caps Off PleaseComics & fun.

SodaplayCreate your own models or play with other people’s models.

Eat Sleep DrawAn endless stream of artwork submitted by an endless stream of people.

Big ThinkTapping the brains of notable intellectuals for their opinions, predictions, and diagnoses.

The Daily PuppySo shoot me.

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

Monroe County FairgroundsDay 3, 2012 Monroe County Fair, Carnival begins at 4pm, Music: JackLegg, Sheila Stephen and the Rodeo Monkeys; Noon to 11pm

City Hall, City Council Chambers — Bloomington Food Policy Council quarterly meeting, open to the public; 5:30-7pm

The Player’s PubSongwriter Showcase: The McKibben Bros., Chris Little, Terry Turley, Tom Marshalek; 8pm

The BishopDJ Mikey Kapinus; 8pm

◗ IU HPER, room 107 — Ballroom dance lessons; 8:30pm

The BluebirdDave Walters karaoke; 9pm

Ongoing:

◗ Ivy Tech Waldron CenterExhibits:

  • John D. Shearer, “I’m Too Young For This  @#!%”; through July 30th

◗ IU Art MuseumExhibits:

  • 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 GalleryExhibits: Bloomington Photography Club Annual Exhibition; through August 3rd

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

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

◗ IU Mathers Museum of World Cultures — Closed for semester break

Monroe County History Center Exhibits:

  • “What Is Your Quilting Story?”; through July 31st
  • Photo exhibit, “Bloomington: Then and Now” by Bloomington Fading; through October 27th

The Pencil Today:

THE QUOTE

“The belief in a supernatural source of evil is not necessary; men alone are quite capable of every wickedness.” — Joseph Conrad

THE STRONG CAN BE LAID LOW

Sarah Sandberg commandeered her sister’s Facebook account last night at about 9:30pm to pass on some alarming news and to issue a warning.

I’m hoping Sarah’s prediction that Susan will be back to work soon is a lot more than wishful thinking.

Susan Sandberg is royalty among Pencillistas. Join me in hoping her doctors have a lot of tricks in their black bags.

Pencillista Queen

MY GUY ROGER

America’s best movie reviewer and an incisive cultural observer in his own right, Roger Ebert, has weighed in on the Aurora, Colorado atrocity.

Check his take in the Chicago Sun-Times. Here’s a quote from that piece:

“The hell with it. I’m tired of repeating the obvious. I know with dead certainty that I will change nobody’s mind. I will hear conspiracy theories from those who fear the government, I will hear about the need to raise a militia, and I will hear nothing about how 9,484 corpses a year has helped anything.”

Or you can read his New York Time op-ed piece. Here’s another quote, this one from that piece:

“Should this young man — whose nature was apparently so obvious to his mother that, when a ABC News reporter called, she said “You’ve got the right person” — have been able to buy guns, ammunition and explosives? The gun lobby will say yes. And the endless gun control debate will begin again, and the lobbyists of the National Rifle Association will go to work, and the op-ed thinkers will have their usual thoughts, and the right wing will issue alarms, and nothing will change. And there will be another mass murder.”

This ain’t no movie, kids. This is life. Guns are designed to take it.

TRUTH IN HUMOR

Toles Cartoon From The Washington Post Syndicate

DOWN WITH JOE

Penn State University is doing the right thing.

Workers Tear Down The Paterno Statue At 9:30 This Morning

Now, maybe the people who run the institution can refocus on something novel: the development of students’ minds.

Joe Paterno made a lot of dough at the school. He signed a three-year contract in 2008 that called for an annual salary of a half million dollars a year. He made piles more — several times that amount per year — from ancillary sources.

The late unindicted co-conspirator was responsible for nothing more than the likes of instructing running backs on which way to turn when linebackers were approaching. It seems to me that particular aspect of the education of young men can be done by any number of “teachers” who’ve studied football (read: “have sat in front of the TV on Saturday and Sunday afternoons”).

Me? I’d spend half a million bucks on five teachers of a different sort, say:

  • Lynda Barry, creative writing and cartooning — The creator of “Ernie Pook’s Comeek”, “The Good Times Are Killing Me” and other works of reality-based fiction and visual art, Barry has transformed the struggles of an outsider into brilliantly funny and therapeutic entertainment. Think of what a role model she’d be for geeky, self-deprecating teenaged girls.

  • Rebecca Watson, general science — The founder of Skepchick, she works tirelessly to upgrade the status of brainiac girls and female scientists around the world.

  • Tariq Taylor, Humanities, black studies — As a Morehouse Collage grad student, Taylor visited Thailand after having never traveled in his life before. His experiences in that country were documented in the video “The Experience,” which reveals how travel can profoundly affect young black men who’ve been cloistered in racial and economic ghettos their whole lives.

  • Amy Goodman, journalism — The boss of Democracy Now!, Goodman digs deeper than just about any reporter alive.

  • Harriet Hall, MD, philosophy — The SkepDoc, Hall strips away the masturbatory bullshit that passes for curiosity and inquiry in the New Age and alternative medicine worlds today.

Wouldn’t you think a hundred G’s a year would be good pay for each of five individuals whose words and guidance might affect literally thousands of students a year? Oh, and none of those students would have to be winners of the gene pool lottery wherein they’d have been born bigger/faster/stronger than 99.9 percent of their peers.

Call me a dreamer.

WHERE THERE’S SMOKE…

As if anybody needed more proof that Tony Robbins is a con artist:

Or that people who buy into his brand of fraud are dopes?

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 ChartsLife as seen through charts.

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

“What If?” From XKCD

SkepchickWomen scientists look at the world and the universe.

IndexedAll the answers in graph form, on index cards.

Flip Flop Fly BallBaseball as seen through infographics, haikus, song lyrics, and other odd communications devices.

Mental FlossFacts.

Caps Off PleaseComics & fun.

SodaplayCreate your own models or play with other people’s models.

Eat Sleep DrawAn endless stream of artwork submitted by an endless stream of people.

Big ThinkTapping the brains of notable intellectuals for their opinions, predictions, and diagnoses.

The Daily PuppySo shoot me.

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

Twin Lakes Recreation CenterAmerican Softball Association Slow Pitch State Tournament; all day

◗ IU Wells-Metz Theatre“The Taming of the Shrew”; 2pm

◗ IU Willkie AuditoriumCultural fair: Silk Road Bayaram Festival; 3-6pm

The Player’s PubBenefit for Margery Sauve; 6pm

Bryan ParkSunday Concert: Steel Panache, steel drum band; 6:30pm

Bear’s PlaceRyder Film Series: “Oslo, August 31”; 7pm

Buskirk-Chumley TheaterBig Brothers Big Sisters fundraising gala; 7:30pm

◗ IU Wells-Metz TheatreMusical, “You Can’t Take It with You”; 7:30pm

◗ IU Auer HallSummer Arts Festival: Pipe organ faculty recital; 8pm

The Root Cellar at Farm Bloomington — The Size of Color, Minus World; 9pm

The BishopDaniel Ellsworth & the Great Lakes, the Shams Band; 9pm

Ongoing:

◗ Ivy Tech Waldron CenterExhibits:

  • John D. Shearer, “I’m Too Young For This  @#!%”; through July 30th
  • Claire Swallow, ‘Memoir”; through July 28th
  • Dale Gardner, “Time Machine”; through July 28th
  • Sarah Wain, “That Takes the Cake”; through July 28th
  • Jessica Lucas & Alex Straiker, “Life Under the Lens — The Art of Microscopy”; through July 28th

◗ IU Art MuseumExhibits:

  • 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 GalleryExhibits:

  • Kinsey Institute Juried Art Show; through July 21st
  • Bloomington Photography Club Annual Exhibition; July 27th through August 3rd

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

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

◗ IU Mathers Museum of World Cultures — Closed for semester break

Monroe County History Center Exhibits:

  • “What Is Your Quilting Story?”; through July 31st
  • Photo exhibit, “Bloomington: Then and Now” by Bloomington Fading; through October 27th

The Pencil Today:

THE QUOTE

“I started being really proud of the fact that I was gay even though I wasn’t.” — Kurt Cobain

NIXON’S THE ONE

Cynthia Nixon became a sorta-star appearing in that late 90s-early 00s paean to heterosexuality, “Sex and the City.” Thus it was ironic that at the very end of the show’s fabulously successful six year run on HBO, Nixon’s romantic involvement with Christine Marinoni became known.

Christine Marinoni And Cynthia Nixon

I don’t know the precise chronology of Nixon’s affair with Marinoni and how it meshed with the producers’ plans for the show, but a suspicious soul might conclude that her lesbian side only “coincidentally” came into view when it was learned S&TC would end its run in 2004.

It just wouldn’t do for one of the leads in a program that celebrates blatant, flamboyant straightness to be identified as homosexual. I mean, would the great John Ford cavalry triology of the 40s and 50s have become so iconic had it been revealed John Wayne was in love with Victor McLaglen?

Hmm….

Since the ending of S&TC and Nixon’s coming out party, she’s been busy acting on the Broadway stage and making appearances here and there on network TV dramas. The disclosure of her current sexual preference clearly has not destroyed her career.

On the other hand, her sig-oth is not someone who could charitably be described as a lipstick lesbian. When, for instance, Ellen Degeneres fell publicly head over heels in love, it was with a couple of stunning actresses, Anne Heche and Portia de Rossi. Ergo, Middle America could deal with her alternative lifestyle.

Mom & Pop Approved

Nixon, though, gazes dreamily into the eyes of a woman who pretty much reinforces the frat boy stereotype of a lesbian. It’d be like Johnny Depp falling in love with RuPaul — it wouldn’t play in Kokomo.

Now, That’s Going Too Far!

Anyway, Nixon doesn’t give a good god damn what Kokomo thinks and that’s cool. Here’s something she told the New York Times not long ago (via Curve magazine):

“I gave a speech recently, an empowerment speech to a gay audience, and it included the line ‘I’ve been straight and I’ve been gay and gay is better.’ And they tried to get me to change it, because they said it implies that homosexuality can be choice. I understand that for many people it’s not, but for me it’s a choice, and you don’t get to define my gayness for me.”

That’s the most refreshing thing I’ve heard in years on the subject of gayness. For far too long the gay community has been pandering in a way to the closeted Republicans and the pious celibates of this holy land.

Gays & Lesbians Want To Justify Themselves To These Simians?

First it was the ten-percent thing, with gay rights activists trumpeting that highly-iffy figure in order to show there are millions and millions of their brothers and sisters, as if there’s safety in numbers.

The first problem is the ten-percent number is about as unscientific as Sen. James Inhofe’s outlook on climate change. Does the figure represent all the DL guys with wives and kids in suburban Indianapolis? How about all the guys who loiter around interstate truck stops and then dash back to the bar to tell their pals they were trolling for chicks? For that matter, did every 22-year-old boy who allowed himself to be seduced by another guy after a keg party own up to his sexuality?

Then there was the medical-psychological argument. Activists showed slides of brain tissue taken from gays and straights and pointed to some missing or extra microscopic structures, proving that homosexuality is an innate trait, much like skin color or the ability to laugh at Kathy Griffin‘s “jokes.”

Like Hemophilia Or Crohn’s Disease

All of it seemed a desperate attempt to prove to the headmasters and nannies of the world that really, honestly, gays and lesbians aren’t bad boys and girls.

There was almost a sense that they couldn’t help being what they were, that they were victims of biology and fate.

Nixon throws a huge F.U. at all that.

For my money, I don’t care if there’s only one gay man or lesbian in these Great United States, Inc. That one human being deserves all the rights, privileges, and respect all the other 300 million or so American folks do.

And another thing. If incontrovertible evidence was found that every single gay man and lesbian merely decided at some point to sleep with someone of the same sex, that wouldn’t change my feelings about same-sex adoptions and gay marriages one little bit.

You Tell ‘Em!

So, go on Cynthia, tell the world you wanted to be a lesbian. And to hell with what the people in Kokomo say.

ISN’T CONSERVATIVE SUPPOSED TO MEAN CAUTIOUS?

Alright, climate change deniers: this past March was the warmest on record. By far.

Now, it may have been random chance. There has to be one month that’s the warmest on record; there’s no reason why can’t it be this month or last.

Still, wouldn’t you want to at least make sure it isn’t 200 years of burning fossil fuels that’s messing up our weather?

That’s all I’m saying.

Could It Be?

YOU’RE THE ONE THAT I LONG TO KISS

We all agree that Oprah Winfrey, although admirable in a lot of ways, has a remarkably high opinion of the woman in the mirror, no?

Her initial-ly eponymous magazine features a huge picture of her on its cover every single issue. And, when she was still running her TV talk show, if she happened to, say, get herself a good foot massage, bang — she’d have three experts on the next day advising half the population of America that they must have daily foot rubs or else they’d risk sudden death.

Oprah is arguably the most powerful woman in America, which probably frustrates her because the issue is still in question.

Anyway, take a look at her latest magazine cover and try to convince me Oprah hasn’t really gone off the deep end. The woman is crazy in love — with herself.

Yikes!

Now just one Oprah isn’t good enough for the cover. This Photoshopped May-December romance probably has every psychologist and psychiatrist in the nation running for a copy of the DSM-IV.

Perhaps the soon-to-be-released DSM-V will have its own section on Oprah’s auto-mania.

Here’s a thought: would anyone be surprised if Oprah Winfrey took a run at the presidency in 2016? And how about this fever dream: not only does Oprah run for the Dem nom, Sarah Palin seeks the GOP tab? And they both make it!

I don’t care how madly in love with herself Oprah falls, I’d still vote for her.

I ONLY HAVE EYES FOR YOU

Dedicated by you-know-who to you-know-who.

The Pencil Today:

THE QUOTE

“I got my head bashed in at a demonstration against the Vietnam War. Police were losing control because they were up against a world they really didn’t understand.” — Terry Gilliam

AND THEN THERE WERE TWO

Gotta tell ya, folks, I hate to see Little Rickey Santorum go, for the loss of his entertainment value alone.

Now the presidential race is down to two politico-economic fraternal twins, each of whom is about as exciting as a can of beige paint.

Definitely Not Beige

If it wasn’t for guys like Santorum, I’d have to actually take the Republicans seriously and you know how disconcerting that prospect would be for me.

Digging the Santorum campaign was like having a daredevil hobby — bungee jumping off tall bridges, say, or rowing across an ocean. Exciting, sure, but if things go wrong, you’re screwed.

In this case, the worst-case scenario would have been a Santorum presidency

So, bye-bye Rickey. We knew you all too well.

A SIMPLE QUESTION

Does it surprise anyone that the first media creature George Zimmerman has spoken with is Fox News’ Sean Hannity?

Sympathetic Ear

DANIEL ELLSBERG, PATRIOT

I missed this. Saturday, April 7th was Daniel Ellsberg‘s birthday.

You want a hero? You got him.

Ellsberg

Here’s the story of Ellsberg’s heroism as told by Howard Zinn in his compelling graphic narrative book, “A People’s History of American Empire.”

Zinn and Ellsberg became friends in 1969 during the anti-war movement. Ellsberg earlier had worked for  the RAND Corporation, which was assigned by the US Department of Defense in 1967 to write up a history of the Vietnam War. Ellsberg actually did much of the grunt work researching this nation’s involvement there.

He learned that President Harry Truman authorized the funding of France’s colonial war against Vietnam independence fighters as far back as  the 1940s. President Dwight Eisenhower in the 1950s threw US support behind Vietnam strongmen who opposed free elections in that country.

Throw in a pile of other falsehoods, exaggerations, forgeries, and intentional inaccuracies on the parts of generals and politicians executing the slaughter in Southeast Asia, and Ellsberg understood that our stated aims there were a colossal sham.

Thanks to the study, Ellsberg saw that President Lyndon Johnson’s assertion that the North Vietnamese had started a war just for kicks in the summer of 1964 was an out and out lie.

Johnson, see, had said some North Vietnamese in a little motorboat had attacked a couple of American cruisers just sitting in the waters of the Gulf of Tonkin and minding their own business. Johnson parlayed this whopper into getting Congress to sign him a blank check and the next thing you knew, a half million American soldiers were fighting for who knows what in Southeast Asia.

Johnson, Finally Grasping What Vietnam Had Become

Ellsberg and some other RAND researchers privately agreed that they had to say something to the American public about our country’s shenanigans in Vietnam.

They figured Middle American folks would trust them, sub-contractors to the Pentagon with 7000 pages of damning documents in their hands, rather than wild-eyed hippies carrying peace placards.

So they sent a letter to major newspapers around the country calling for an end to the war. The New York Times and the Washington Post both published the letter, but nobody really gave a damn about it.

Meanwhile, the United States military went on happily killing and bombing in Vietnam. Then there was a Green Beret murder scandal and the My Lai Massacre. Ellsberg already was wracked with guilt for his country over what he knew and these atrocities only pushed him over the edge.

Destroying The Town In Order To Save It

He contacted another former RAND colleague and together they photocopied the 7000 pages with the goal of releasing the classified documents. The two agreed it was worth going to jail for exposing government secrets if it might shorten the war somehow.

Their hope was the release of the papers would turn even the most die-hard patriots against the war. They contacted the offices of a few congressmen and found no one willing to touch their hot docs.

Finally, they went to the New York Times with their bundle of papers. After a few months, the Times went ahead and published what would become known as the Pentagon Papers. Ellsberg was charged with theft and violations of the Espionage Act. He faced 115 years in prison. He turned himself in to the FBI in Boston on June 28, 1971, after having run off many more copies of the Papers and distributing them to other newspapers.

Setting The Type For The New York Times Pentagon Papers Edition

While Ellsberg was on trial, it was learned that the Nixon White House had ordered mugs to burglarize his psychiatrist’s office in hopes of finding incriminating notes against him there, and other mugs to harass him at public appearances. The federal judge declared a mistrial in Ellberg’s case due to these government interferences.

He was lucky.

He was also, as I mentioned earlier. a hero.

FOR WHAT IT’S WORTH

The Buffalo Springfield played this song on the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, February 26th, 1967.

The Pencil Today:

THE QUOTE

Duh.

BIG NEWS

Yes, it’s true. I’ve been missing from these parts for a couple of days.

This is a business, after all, and I’ve been in intense negotiations with a fairly well-known media outfit to invest in this local treasure.

Representatives of that company met with me Thursday night at a fine Bloomington restaurant, the name of which which they’ve requested I not disclose. Suffice it to say that if a native Italian speaker passed the place by, she might reflexively respond, Siete benvenuto (you’re welcome).

The company reps didn’t want their presence in town to become known because they fear other local bloggers and website operators might pester them to invest in their less fabulous internet endeavors.

Let’s be honest. Nobody in town can touch The Electron Pencil for perspicacity, brilliance, journalistic integrity, and overall sex appeal on the part of its operator.

Sexy

No, these deep-pocket investors want to sink their dough into the best South Central Indiana has to offer, and who can blame them for choosing The Pencil?

They are, IMHO, wise and prudent investors.

This influx of money will mean huge changes around here.

First, content. The Your Daily Hot Air feature will remain, of course. It is the core of The Pencil, the reason virtually tens of thousands of folks from all four corners of the globe begin their day with a click on this icon:

Many have claimed they find it impossible now to get through the day without Big Mike’s philosophical and practical guidance.

We’ll be adding daily installments from the previously unpublished manuscripts of Kurt Vonnegut. The Vonnegut estate yesterday graciously and happily inked the deal with The Pencil. We’re looking forward to starting that feature by mid-month.\

The Late Kurt Vonnegut

Additionally, we have lured Will Shortz, puzzle editor of the New York Times and puzzle-master for NPR’s Weekend Edition away from those august positions. His crosswords and word games will appear in The Electron Pencil exclusively beginning tomorrow.

Will Shortz

Because Bloomington is such a sports oriented town, The Electron pencil will partner with ESPN to present The Hoosier Sports Center, online and on TV. Keith Olbermann, recently ousted at Current TV, will return to his sports roots to host the program.

Keith Olbermann

Politics, naturally, is a constant topic in these parts. Accordingly, we will bring aboard a spectacular triad of investigative reporters. The team of Amy Goodman, Matt Taibbi, and Barbara Ehrenreich will leave no stone unturned in the coverage of local malfeasances.

The EP News Team: Goodman, Taibbi, & Ehrenreich

In keeping with our higher station in this wireless world, The Electron Pencil will now accept ads. Small 3″x3″ spots interspersed throughout our daily posts will cost $5,000 for a minimum of six appearances in in a given seven day stretch. A single day’s top banner ad will cost $16,000. For the economy-minded advertiser, we offer discreet mentions of your business within our posts for a mere $100 per placement. Those wishing to be mentioned in Kurt Vonnegut’s manuscript installments will be charged an additional $50 premium. Contact Big Mike at glabagogo@gmail.com for more information.

So, please excuse my absence these last few days. I’ve been striving to make The Electron Pencil even more of an Indiana treasure than it is.

See you tomorrow, Monday, April 2nd.

WHY DO FOOLS FALL IN LOVE?

Why, indeed.

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