Thunderbolt Fan

Shepard Fairey at the Warhol Museum

2009-10-31T19:07:00.001-07:00

The top floor of the Warhol is gorgeously hung with Search & Destroy, the Shepard Fairey retrospective. Walls glow with the red, black and yellowed white of his strongest work-- from screen-printed posters to mixed media collages, stencils and combinations of all three, creating a swirl of ironic emotions (mocking and sincere, logical and incongruous) as one glides through the galleries.

His jabs at culture, politics and iconography, all assembled in the same place for the first time by this traveling exhibit (originating at Boston's ICA; next stop, Cincinnati; cities after that TBD,) pack a visceral punch that I wasn't expecting and there's a power in numbers here that I never realized before.

The lower floor of the exhibit, however, centered around the now over-exposed Obama Hope poster, didn't continue the momentum for me and I walked through it at a steady clip searching for the sustained jolt of the top floor. The super-sized mural was overkill. Badly lit, sagging and shiny (unlike the matte of the screen prints), it was the last piece I looked at and by then the party was over and I was hungry for art again.

The guy in the gift shop tried to sell me one of the limited edition Search & Destroy prints for $45 ("They're selling on Ebay for $170") but for me the appropriate memento was a small metal button, for $1.40, with an image of Andy on it. Around the edge in small white lettering it read, "Your fifteen minutes are up."

(Air)Ship of Fools

2009-01-21T12:05:00.000-08:00

All aboard for Hell! First stop: Texas

As I read through this list of people who yesterday accompanied W. back at long last to Texas, my mind reeled at almost every name, conjuring a vertiginous trail of sharp, unpleasant and, at times, sickening memories of the past eight years, similar to the exhaust fumes spewing from the luxury jet's engines.

Jenna and Barbara, Karl Rove, Karen Hughes, Dan Bartlett, Josh Bolten, Joel Kaplan, Jared Weinstein, Mike Meece, Andy Card, Don and Susie Evans, Blake Gottesman, Clay and Ann Johnson, Ed Gillespie, Barry Jackson, Joe Hagin, Israel Hernandez, Jeanne Johnson Phillips, Margaret Spellings, Alberto Gonzales, Brad Freeman, Jim and Debbie Francis, and Roland and Lois Betts.

Good riddance.

Angeleno dispatches from the inauguration

2009-01-21T11:30:00.000-08:00

While LA Metblogs’ Sean Bonner is in DC blogging about the inauguration, I’m feeling a bit stranded here in Los Angeles as the pomp, ceremony and parties unfold, so I’ve been taking solace in my friend Kristin’s Facebook journal about her adventures in the nations capitol, as well as exchanging a slew of emails with her about what I’m missing.

Kristin is Kristin Bedford, the woman behind Kristin’s List, the LA cultural listing site. An Angeleno who worked on the Obama campaign at the Pasadena Democratic field office, she returned to Washington to spend the year end holidays with her family (she’s a DC native.)

When Obama won in November, she decided to stick around for the inauguration. And so, for the past few weeks, she has been tearing through the nation’s capitol in preparation.

As the LA Times had an article on Sunday about what certain notable Angelenos would be wearing to the inauguration, as well as the balls and parties to follow, I asked Kristin the same questions and how she would be getting around town.

She was concerned about staying warm in the early part of the day.

Obama is sworn in at 12 noon; we need to be there at 7:30 AM to get through security. The 4½ hour wait is stressing me out. Even if I layer every single American Apparel T-shirt I own, my L.A. wardrobe is not making the cut. I need to find a space suit or a bear costume to keep going.

I will be wearing two pairs of gloves with mittens over them. I have figured out that if I stuff the mittens with a half dozen hand warmers (those little packets) my fingers don’t freeze; 2 pairs of long johns under jeans; 4 sweaters; 4 pairs of socks (with more hand warmers in shoes;) and of course my new Obama scarf/hat set (priceless.)

And for the evening festivities:

I will be wearing a fitted, dark purple, up-the-knee knit dress designed by Carol Young (from her shop on Hillhurst in Los Feliz) — it is the sexy, classic, minimalist, architectural, “I’m too cool to wear a ‘gown’ to a Ball” look; a vintage camel hair Calvin Klein winter coat; a floor-length black wrap; black heels by Arche; nail color: “We will always have Paris” by OPI; hair: down; lipstick: a dark chianti.

Her plans are to hit the Bytes and Books Ball at the Folger Shakespeare Library and the Google/Youtube Ball, which bills itself as “the alternative” ball experience, followed by two parties.

Washington is less reliant on cars than Los Angeles; and with the day’s events curtailing driving, she’ll be going with the flow.

Everything during the day will be by foot. For the balls, who knows? You can’t drive. Its going to be butt cold wearing these party dresses, so I think most ball people will be on the Metro (the great equalizer) — can’t wait to see women in gowns using their MetroCard.

Thats the rundown. The day is as big and as complicated as Election Day, when I worked for 21 hours and with about 500 people.

Photo: Kristin Bedford searches DC for inaugural festivities.

Barneys get bitchy about Michelle Obama

2009-01-21T11:12:00.000-08:00

Fashion retailer Barneys New York is none too pleased about being scooped by anyone, even if it's First Lady Michelle Obama. After she appeared in an Isabel Toledo outfit for yesterday's inauguration, Simon Doonan, the store's creative director, got a phone call from a higher-up telling him to rush the designer's clothes into its NYC windows.

With what I'm sure was good natured bitchiness (Doonan is a friend of a friend and has seemed like a nice guy the few times I've been around him), he quipped, "I’m sort of annoyed that Michelle Obama has spring merchandise before us.”

The outfit will be available in March.

Just say NO to the bail out

2009-01-14T21:59:00.000-08:00

Print Liberation in Philadelphia weighs in with my sentiment regarding bailing out banks and the overeager they lent money to so they could buy houses they couldn't actually afford in the first place.

Yes, Pecan!

2009-01-11T15:43:00.000-08:00

Ben & Jerry's is honoring the inauguration of Barack Obama with their flavor, Yes, Pecan! Formerly (and boringly, but informatively) know as Butter Pecan, if you buy a scoop at a B & J shop, proceeds will go to Common Cause Education Fund.

America the Gift Shop

2008-10-29T18:32:00.000-07:00

Phillip Toledano worked in advertising as a creative director for a decade before shifting gears to become a photographer. While doing some plum editorial jobs for the NY Times, Vanity Fair and New York Magazine, the Londoner also wracked up impressive work for his ad portfolio, culminating in an Absolut vodka shoot.

Now, he makes art meant to induce squirming as much as reflecting on truths we try to ignore-- or maybe a combination of both. One of his latest ventures in that mode is called America The Gift Shop, an installation project that transforms US foreign policy from the past eight years into ostensibly buyable objects. In an America on the brink of becoming a total consumer environment (if it hasn't reached that point already,) his pieces can be as unsettling as they are on target.

Abu Ghraib coffee table, Phillip Toledano
Molded resin, plexiglass, 6', 2008

What I'm listening to

2008-10-27T19:21:00.001-07:00

1. My Roots Go Down - The Seedy Seeds/Count the Days
2. You Are My Wonderful... Flower - Day2K/The Rockets
3. Bad Man's World - Jenny Lewis/Acid Tongue
4. LIttle Bird - Angus & Julia Stone/Just A Boy
5. The Rip - Portishead/Third
6. The Windmills of Your Mind - Dusty Springfield/Dusty in Memphis
7. Keep on Walking - Jem/Down To Earth
8. Best For Last - Adele/19

Excuse me?

2008-10-22T23:30:00.000-07:00

Watch how Cindy flinches at the forbidden word. Ah, memories.

Change your underwear

2008-10-22T12:09:00.000-07:00

Obama boxer briefs, marked down from $29 to just $7.49 per pair. Change you can believe in, from Andrew Christian.

I Met The Walrus

2008-10-22T00:40:00.000-07:00

Jerry Levitan was 14 years old in 1969, when he snuck into John Lennon's hotel room in Toronto with a tape recorder and persuaded him to answer a few questions about peace. Lennon was, with Yoko Ono, his wife, to perform at a huge anti-Viet Nam War concert which was subsequently released as an album called Live Peace in Toronto.

Lennon and Ono were into heavy heroin use at that point, as Lennon revealed later. He recalled vomiting violently right before he went on stage, but he electrified the audience made up of worshipful Beatles fans who were also fervent anti-war protestors.

He gave Levitan the time and thoughtful answers at a time when the world needed people to look up to-- much like today and the message that Barack Obama is carrying to newer generations of minds hungry for ideas of promise, change and hope.

From the video's Youtube site:

Thirty-eight years later, Jerry has produced a film about it. Using the original interview recording as the soundtrack, director Josh Raskin has woven a visual narrative which tenderly romances Lennon's every word in a cascading flood of multipronged animation. Raskin marries the terrifyingly genius pen work of James Braithwaite with masterful digital illustration by Alex Kurina, resulting in a spell-binding vessel for Lennon's boundless wit, and timeless message.

Be prepared for zombies

2008-10-21T23:09:00.000-07:00

With November 4th just two weeks away, you don’t want to be unprepared should zombies prevail. These fine forged steel blades were designed with one purpose in mind: Killing zombies. We here at CreepyLA suggest you don’t mess around and order one today.

Even with the economy in its current state, now is not the time to cut corners. Zombie Tools snottily explains their rationale:

It’s been estimate that around 600,000 people were killed with agricultural-grade machetes during the Rwandan genocidal war in the ’90s. We’ve seen the machetes used in Africa. They’re thin, cheap, Asian-made tools designed to chop vegetation. So we’re fairly confident that our blades, which are twice as thick, made from quality steel, much sharper and designed to cleave, will have no problem with a decomposing walking corpse.

I'm listening to dOP

2008-10-10T12:58:00.000-07:00

More French electronica is washing up on my cyber shores in the form of dOP, a group whose members claim to be a former prison cook, an ex-pro soccer player and " a guy who sold stuff on the beach (cigarettes, condoms, drinks and chouchou). But now we only do music. And we're really happy about it."

Final question (from their recent RA interview:) Why do you sing in English?

To make more money.

Not to burst their bubble, but I scored Lighthouse, their EP released in March, as a download from Amie Street for 45 cents, but the price will undoubtedly rise as more people find them there. Their July release, I'm Just A Man, is only available on vinyl presently.

2008-10-10T00:27:00.001-07:00

Make your own.

‘Vote NO on Prop 8′ fund-raiser this Sunday

2008-10-09T23:40:00.000-07:00

Equality California and Love Honor Cherish are having a fund-raiser this Sunday October 12th aimed at defeating the anti-gay Proposition 8, a ballot measure this November that, if it were to pass, would deny same sex couples the right to marry in California by actually writing discrimination and bigotry into the California constitution.

The event will happen at the Mondrian Hotel’s Skybar in West Hollywood on Sunday from 6 PM to 9 PM. Tickets can be had for $100 and 100% of the ticket price goes to defeating Prop 8 on November 4th.

Money is urgently needed NOW. “Religious” conservative-backed Prop 8 supporters have far surpassed Equality California and other opponents of Prop 8 in fund-raising, pouring it into TV ads filled with outright lies and distortions aimed at appealing to ignorance and bigotry. ( Take a look at one of the ads.)

You can buy tickets here. And you can download a PDF of the invite here and see the long list of Angelenos, celebrated (you know, celebrities) and otherwise, who will be there.

If it’s at all within your means, it is a very worthwhile cause. I’m not saying everyone can afford it; but if you can afford $200 jeans and a $300 iPhone, then you can afford a donation to fight bigotry in California.

If a C-note is outside your budget, please give whatever you can at Equality California’s site or at No On Prop 8. We can’t allow victory to embolden backward zealots.

But whatever you do, VOTE NO on Prop 8 on November 4th.

Proposition 8 was placed on the ballot by the anti-gay “Protect Marriage” group, an affiliation of so called “religious” conservatives which claims to be seeking to “restore marriage” and “protect children,” according to the scant information on their web site explaining who they are. (There is no “about” link. Pretty telling, no?)

Their real intent is to deny basic rights to gay people. Marriage and children have nothing to do with the goal of these bigots.

Equality California is a civil rights organization that advocates for the rights of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people in California.

Love, Honor and Cherish is an independent, grassroots organization whose purpose is to defeat Proposition 8.

Standing up to bigots isn’t always cheap or easy (like me.) I’ll be there with the boyfriend in tow. Look for us and say “hello.” (He’s the cute redhead; I’m the silver-haired Slavic fox.)

Vote NO on Prop 8 Gala; Sunday, October 12, 2008, 6 to 10 p.m.; Skybar, Mondrian Hotel, 8440 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood. Tickets $100.

Cellcam Journal - Paris

2008-05-22T09:25:00.000-07:00

Early morning walk in the Marais...

Bike rental stations like this one are all over Paris. Pay at the kiosk, run your errands and return to any other station. The first hour and a half is free. Many major streets have dedicated bike lanes with raised barriers to keep cars out of them. It's an example of what $8.00-per-gallon gasoline can motivate in a city.

Getting ready for the breakfast crowd on Rue St-Antoine...

... and rotisserie chickens on the spits for the lunch crowd.

My hotel on Rue St-Paul had Hollywood-themed decor with movie posters from the '30s and '40s throughout.

Paris has a vibrant theater scene, comparable to NYC and London.

Product$

2008-05-06T09:28:00.000-07:00

As a recent convert to Google's Reader for keeping up with favorite blogs, feeds and general time-wasting, I'm almost too happy to have new enabling software to keep me sitting and not exercising my heart and lungs.
Times is being offered in a full-featured free 14-day trial version (then $30) that makes a reader look like an Apple-style version of Huffington Post without all of the celebrity crap that pollutes that still vital site (C'mon Arianna, elitists like me and my elitist friends don't care a wit about elitist celebs.)

Of course you can customize it to be whatever you want, even a celeb news feeding frenzy. But please don't.

Speaking of time-wasting and elitists, Stuff White People Like, the blog, makes the leap from viral to mainstream marketing with the publication of SWPL, the book, by Random House, no less. Self-lacerating, self-mocking criticism of and by liberals that is cringingly spot on has convinced me that we latte-sippers do NOT deserve political power. Which has already begged the question, are elitists the New Outsiders?

(Alternate question: Is SWPL, The Musical inevitable?)

In LA: Freewayblogger keeps rolling

2008-05-04T21:44:00.000-07:00

You can't tell there's a war going on in this country. But if you have one person in every city doing what I do, you wouldn't be able to drive anywhere without seeing protest against the war and the president. - Freewayblogger

A thought has been turning over and over in my mind lately about how invisible the Iraq War has become in this country, about how easy it has become to avoid and ignore it. It's still in the news and on blogs but major media has not made a sustained effort to keep it front and center, as always choosing instead to focus on non-issues like Obama's minister or Hillary's campaign style or the latest sex scandal involving politicians or, of course, celebrities.

Something struck me today in the print edition of the Post-Gazette that was quietly horrifying, a Dr. Strangelove-moment of an unsettling degree. On the weather page, I was reading through the temperature listings by city, a habit of mine, especially when I travel. What I noticed was the listing for Baghdad is in bold type, the only one that appears that way.

I thought of family members of those in the military and serving in Iraq and wondered how they felt each day as they looked at this information. I wondered what brought about the decision to do this at the paper. I didn't know whether to damn the Post-Gazette for reducing it to this or commend them for a quiet nod of empathy, as if they were saying, "We know you are worried" to the families.

The Bushies have succeeded in cowing the press and have made certain that the Iraq War remain their private affair. Media coverage of returning casualties is banned and what coverage there is of war protest is muted, if evident at all, as Jerome Sherman points out today in the Post-Gazette. But when I came across this Freewayblogger clip, it gave me hope that maybe the anti-war movement still has life in it, still has ways to carry their message to the public.

TOTH to Wooster Collective.

Cellcam Journal - Pittsburgh

2008-05-02T13:01:00.000-07:00

I'm Dead by David Shrigley at Carnegie International, opening Sunday May 4th. Carnegie Museum, Oakland.

Kandors by Mike Kelley at Carnegie International. Carnegie Museum, Oakland.

Think pink for November. Semple St., Oakland.

Spookily empty Pittsburgh Airport upon my arrival 9:30PM Saturday night. Thanks a lot, US Airways!

Pittsburgh sootier than Los Angeles

2008-05-01T07:48:00.000-07:00

The American Lung Association bestowed the title of nation's sootiest city upon Pittsburgh, pushing Los Angeles into the number two position. Today's Post-Gazette print edition has it as the main front page story with a suitably ominous photo of the pollution belching Clairton Coke Works, owned by US Steel.

The "State of the Air: 2008" report, which used U.S. Environmental Protection Agency air pollution data for 2004, 2005 and 2006, says aggressive emissions controls in the Los Angeles area have reduced year-round particle levels by about one-third over the last seven years, while Pittsburgh earned the top spot by making only marginal improvement.

County Health Dept. officials dispute the rating, saying it only pertains the Mon Valley due to the Clairton facility. The ALA says taking that out of the equation drops the Burgh's rating to 16th sootiest. Better, but no reason for celebrating.

The good news is that ground-level ozone levels continue to drop rapidly in Pittsburgh, from a ranking of 17 to 34 since 2005.

Clairton Coke Works, United States Steel Corporation; painting by Howard Fogg.

Savage observation

2008-04-30T20:03:00.000-07:00

After enduring endlessly salacious, quivering coverage from the cable news crowd about the FLDS Jail Bate Fuck Fest in Texas, finally a voice of reason emerges.

As much as I have a problem believing that self-proclaimed-unqualified sexpert, so-gay-I-married-a-dude-in-Canada-and-we-bought-a-baby Dan Savage is, no lie, IN FAVOR of the Iraq War, kudos to him for laying it out thick and hard about those wearers of pastel dresses and elaborate tresses and those who are strangely quiet on their predicament.

When two dudes marry, the marriage-is-between-one-man-and-one-woman brigades crap their collective pants, vomit up ten thousand press releases, and run in circles screaming about all the hurricanes and earthquakes and unattractive haircuts that Our Loving Father™ is gonna rain down on our heads if we don't pry Adam off Steve right fucking now.

Well, the one-man-and-one-woman crowd has been strangely silent about this polygamist sect in Texas that's been all over the news. It appears that the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has been organizing marriages/statutory rapes between one man and dozens or more women and/or girls.

"Where's the outrage?" writes a reader, which prompted me to go looking for some outrage at the website of Concerned Women for America. There are more anti-gay-marriage press releases packed onto CWFA's website than there is fudge packed into all the homos in all the Sodoms in all of North America. But there's not one single word that I could find about these straight men in Texas violating the holy and sacred one-man-and-one-woman rule. What gives?

I'll tell you what gives, Daddy Man. The FLDS scandal doesn't meet the outrage threshold that can only be met if it involves hot homo sex. We can only hope for a NAMBLA chapter within the compound that maybe has not come to light (yet, fingers crossed) and thus for CWFA's rage to be ignited.

Drink like a Man...

2008-04-30T09:50:00.001-07:00

As in Mansinthe, the new brand of absinthe "developed" by Marilyn Manson. I'm going to try to place an order with the PLCB for a case, just to see if it gets any sort of reaction.

A well-known absinthe enthusiast, Manson was very involved in the drink's development, constantly tasting samples and providing feedback.

Leave it to Uncrate to blow the horn on this one, as it were.

PLCB gets even more ridiculous

2008-04-26T22:25:00.000-07:00

The absurd heights that the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board can rise to never ceases to amaze and amuse me. Instead of bringing PA out of the Dark Ages (where it exists along with Utah when it comes to alcohol restriction) and allowing stores other than the ridiculous, government-run "state store" to sell wine and liquor, they have proposed putting wine vending machines in, as they put it, "grocery stores and malls."

Having just arrived in Pittsburgh after spending the past 6 weeks in Los Angeles, where virtually all supermarkets have a decent selection of wine and liquor, and even 7-11 Stores and Rite Aids stock the bare essentials in this respect--well, I guess I just plain forgot what it's like here.

In a Post-Gazette article worthy of The Onion, I guess this is the funniest part:

One of those briefed on the proposal was Wendell Young IV, president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1776, whose members include state store clerks. Mr. Young said the kiosk "looks like a giant institutional Sub-Zero refrigerator" with high-tech security identification measures such as fingerprints and biometric readings.

To be fair, this is a teensy step forward for making wine more readily available-- at the same inflated, overtaxed prices one would pay at a state store. But the antiquated, quaint, obviously politically well-connected union is an aspect of this state that makes it into a laughing stock across the country.

Where's Henry Frick when you need him?

Cellcam Journal

2008-04-23T20:11:00.000-07:00

Blek le Rat strikes; Sunset and Maltman, Silver Lake.

Form-follows-function bike rack; San Fernando Rd., Burbank.

Classic DIY emergency brake; Vermont Canyon Rd., Griffith Park.

Koonsian hydrant; East Palm Ave., Burbank.

Thunderbolt Fan goes green

2008-04-22T11:05:00.000-07:00

In Sunday's Los Angeles Times, Erin Weinger embraces the true goddess spirit of going green in our forward thinking town. This is not your hippie grandma's Earth Day.

Not to be cynical, but what is Earth Day but a retail opportunity? This Tuesday, you can recycle, shop and gawk -- and save the planet!

Taking my cue, I compiled a green list of my own:

1. Check Los Angeles gas prices. Yikes!

2. Drive to Keihl's at the Grove where I can hopefully snag one of the free logo-ed canvas totes being given to the first 50 paying customers. I'll be dropping $70 on my favorite anti-wrinkle cream. Coincidentally, it's GREEN-- the actual color, not the process by which it's made. For all I know and don't really care, it's made from baby seals and diesel fuel. But my free tote will create the perception that I care.

3. Drive to the Whole Foods nearest me in Glendale, which I was informed does the highest volume in the Southland. They used to have a BBQ smoker outside but a recent ordinance snuffed it out. People who lived nearby were up in arms about having to smell delicious, savory smoked meat most of their waking hours. Have they ever heard about closing their windows and turning on the air conditioner?

A while ago, I grabbed some grub there and sat at their outdoor patio tables to eat it. When I finished, I took my empty containers to the big green recycling bin that is divided into three sections. The plastics section was so full that I couldn't stuff mine in. A WF employee on a break told me that all three openings in the bin went into the same box inside and that I could dispose of my garbage in any one of the three sections. And people say it's too much of an effort to recycle.

Anyway, Whole Foods is doing away with plastic bags as of today-- you know, Earth Day. They could have done it sooner but I've learned when it comes to branding, one word: synergy.

4. Symbolically support " A Day Without Driving" by taking it a step further; as in, "A Day Without Driving Without Air Conditioning."

5. Attend Earth Day street fair on Wilshire if it doesn't take forever to find parking.

6. Drive to video store, rent An Unreasonable Man, An Inconvenient Truth and Walk Hard (the one I'll actually watch.)

7. Check local group blogs to gauge the smugness of the fingerwagging about carbon footprints,flatulant cows, "sustainability," etc. [I just checked; surprisingly there's barely any mention of it today. I assume there will be a few obligatory "photo essays" after the fact.]

8. Have friends over for "green-grilled" steak-- we're only cooking them medium rare. It uses much less propane.

Nikki teases about Geffen and LA Times

2008-04-18T13:50:00.000-07:00

I guess my OCD's radar is locked on the LA Times for the moment:

Nikki Finke, in her Deadline Hollywood column in this week's LA Weekly, thinks Geffen is still the owner-to-be of the dyspeptic (to some more than others) LA Times.

I’m told by a source that Geffen and Zell are back at the table. It’s all very hush-hush, but my source tells me, “Cash flow is not being met for the bankers, revenue is in free fall, and the potential liability on the [Sean] Combs story is huge. Sam feels he bought a bill of goods. Geffen is back in the mix, and he’s going to get it for a deep discount. They’re in serious discussions.”

But then she tortures with this:

Geffen, however, has been on his yacht, vacationing in the South Pacific, for weeks. And a Geffen insider insists that the DreamWorks partner and Zell haven’t spoken in months.

Stay tuned.

LA Times unsure of how to cover Zell?

2008-04-18T12:52:00.000-07:00

Speaking of Zell (in the previous post) and the differences between the print and online editions, there is an article that covers a rather sleazy story involving the Chicago magnate. It comes off as if the writer, Tony Perry, is trying not to piss off the boss and get his ass fired, nor that of Nicholas Goldberg, LAT op-ed editor.

Read it and wince at the contortions in the final paragraphs like I did. Is it just me or did he prove his contrary argument?

"We recognize that we have a responsibility to cover Sam Zell when he makes news -- which we have done on the opinion pages and elsewhere in the paper," Goldberg said. "But we also feel that we shouldn't give him excessive coverage.

". . . We asked ourselves whether we would publish this op-ed piece about a mobile-home-park owner's battle with the county of San Diego if it was not about Sam Zell, and we decided we probably would not."

In today's print edition, this article appeared in the California section at the bottom of page 3. In today's online edition, it is the NINETEENTH item in the California|Local link-- way, way down the page. In the online version of the print edition (follow that?) it is buried even further so as to be virtually invisible to the way most people use the Internets for news.

One thing seems certain to me: If a major media owner is accused of throwing elderly tenants out of mobile homes parks in SoCal that he also owns, it's news, especially to the city that his paper serves.

LA Times - Print vs. online

2008-04-18T12:00:00.000-07:00

I had a discussion with an LA Metblogger yesterday about our differing perceptions of the LA Times. He thinks it still sucks big time, I think it has improved over the past few months. The difference is, he only looks at the online edition whereas I only see the print edition via daily delivery (which is cheap by the way.)

After we parted, I looked at the online edition and found I would agree with him to an extent if it was the only version I saw too. What wrankles him is that the local coverage is sorely lacking. He's right; it often seems haphazard.

In a way, I can see this as an extension of how a lot of Angelenos regard their city and their place in it-- it's so damn big, who can keep track? (Answer: LAT.) The term "local" that LAT uses could be subdivided into specific areas and then mini-bureaus could be established that would cover them.

It would involve printing different versions for different areas. Other cities do it quite successfully but something tells me Zell, not of a journalism background to say the least, will not be ponying up for that sort of thing.

Sunset juncture?

2008-04-16T16:37:00.000-07:00

"Brentwood-ization," or some similar term, is what an article in the Los Feliz Ledger called what is going on in Silver Lake now, with the list of empty shops and restaurants growing weekly, it seems. (Metblog's Will Campbell is keeping track.) One of the used furniture stores had a sign that said, "Landlord won't even negotiate." It's the pack mentality of local commercial landlords driving these closures. They smell Pinkberry money, I'm sure.

Sunset Junction has always struck me as being a bit soul-less and I mean that in a good way. I like soul-less. I'm always amused when I see shopper flotillas on weekends looking a bit let down as it dawns on them that it's less than they expected in a total-consumer-environment kind of way.

One recent afternoon, I watched (and waited, and waited,) as a group of four women in front of me on the coffee line at the high-end Intelligentsia cafe and who were all dolled up west side style, made a snap decision to relieve there shopping-deprived frustration by impulsively running around the cafe and snatching T-shirts, coffee mugs and coffee makers off the shelves in the middle of paying for four lattes.

It was a sudden mini-orgy of consumer lust that built to a climax of competitive credit card waving as they vied for the opportunity to pay for each other. It got me sooo hard-- and I'm gay, godammit!

Anyway, there are a couple cute, very niche-specific shops, for the sneaker and comics obsessed for example, but the Junction has not been a vibrant, bustling place for many years now, according to what I've heard about bakeries and groceries gone missing.

Too bad about Eat Well but they closed at 3PM and the service was slow. (I miss that Buddha Bowl though.) I read that the original owner sold the chain a couple years ago so he could open trendy bars Downtown. It's all a sign of the times, I'm afraid. CBGB in NYC is now a boutique. Other examples abound throughout major cities.

This same scenario will be playing out in Boyle Heights in 10 years. Or less.

Train in Vain - LA Metro

2008-04-15T16:33:00.000-07:00

Where is everyone?

One recent weekday afternoon, my friend Rick, a born-and-bred Los Angelenista, took me on my first extended foray on the subway since I moved here. I met him at the Sunset-Vermont station and we took the red and gold lines to Pasadena (for tea, if you must know, and so he could show me his favorite secret courtyard.)

Being an ex-New Yorker, I was amazed at how clean and quiet the stations and trains were, as well as the frequency of trains. The trains were barely half full mid-afternoon, but he assured me that we would be coming back during rush hour when it would be "very crowded."

HA! During "rush hour" I kept asking him where everyone was and he kept saying, "In their cars," or, "This is busy! Look at all the people!"

I dryly observed, "Yeah, there are dozens of them."

"Why don't more people take the train?" I asked. He said, "Because a lot of people think it's only for poor people and everyone in LA is so class conscious. And insecure, at least the ones with money."

But really, the overriding reason is that the service areas are so small compared to the size of the city. I had to walk 30 minutes to get from my pad to the station.

Me thinks ongoing extension of the subway system would have a profoundly positive effect upon Los Angeles. It would provide that shared-social-sphere feeling, which exists in places like NYC or San Francisco, but is missing here because we are all in our own private little spheres-- you know, our cars.

Better mass transit would diminish the necessity for cars, tires and oil products. And it would finally thwart the oil and tire mega-corporations blindingly successful efforts to curtail, if not roll back further, any extension of the public transportation network.*

Yeah, like that's going to happen, but I can dream if I want to. And so can John von Kerczek, who's blog, Ditch the Car, Take the Metro makes it seem so plausible.

When I saw his map of proposed subway service for Los Angeles, I at first thought I was looking at one for London's Underground.

Wake up, Los Angelistadores!

*During our ride, Rick gave me a history lesson about tire companies and their role in ripping out the streetcar lines.

Cellcam Journal

2008-04-11T19:40:00.000-07:00

Signs of the times in Silver Lake. The one in the background says "Bank repo."
Paging Tom LaBonge: Idling buses belching fumes in front of Griffith Observatory seem to be a regular feature these days. Why can't they stay in the parking lot with their engines off?
Subhuman species immortalized in plastic at Arclight shop.
Bush-wipe in window at Wacko.

Art-a-palooza!

2008-04-10T13:00:00.000-07:00

Ø Since the growing perception is, at least among certain hopeful Angelenos, that Los Angeles is ascending to the top of the heap in the art world, I would expect this weekend's unimaginatively entitled Los Angeles Art Weekend event to come up with a snappier name that would befit that designation. (My suggestion is the title of this post.)

LA Times gave it a major nod by putting it on the cover of today's The Guide section but the article inside amounted to little more than a copy/paste of information on the event's site.

Ø The Downtown Artwalk happens today, noon to 9:00PM. It covers the galleries on the circle of Spring, 2nd, Main and 9th Streets, as well as few others nearby, including MOCA (free 5 to 8:00PM, closes at 8.) Too bad it doesn't include any of the Chinatown galleries. It should.

Ø LAT has gotten better at covering galleries that aren't on the west side, notably last week's twin features on Black Maria Gallery's Hollywood Apocalypse exhibit in Atwater Village and today's review of manipulated found photography by Nicole Belle at Found Gallery in Silver Lake.

Ø Chimera Frontiera opens on Saturday night at Junc/Giant Robot on Sunset in Silver Lake.

Untitled, from The Rev Sanchez Series by Nicole Belle/Found Gallery

From the pen of Charlton Heston

2008-04-09T17:21:00.001-07:00

The LA Times ran a selection of excerpts from letters they had received over the years from Charlton Heston. He sounded off on topics mostly dealing with entertainment and politics.

From feeling threatened by Spike Lee to lamenting an unnamed female star's feeble grasp on the translation of "e pluribus unum" to gloating over how he "helped get Ice-T fired" after the rapper released Cop Killer, it's an interesting glimpse into his personality. Heston's reasoned rants humanized him for me, even though I deplored his politics.

The cultural and social fabric of the country is fraying around the edges... A while ago, I was at one of those silly "A-list" parties and fell into conversation on all this with a stunningly beautiful, famous star (not a bad actress, either) who said, "Well, look what it says on the dollar bill: 'e pluribus unum.' From one, many."

"Actually, you've got the Latin backward," I replied. "It translates, 'From many, one.' As in one nation . . . indivisible?" "No kidding?" she said, amazed. "Well . . . whatever." And there you have it. We live, increasingly, in a "well, whatever" nation. God help us all.

"Another Day in LA" by Joe Girandola, 2008
Duct tape on paper/image courtesy of Black Maria Gallery, from the current exhibit "Hollywood Apocalypse"

LA Times delivers free Starbucks

2008-04-08T23:11:00.000-07:00

Today I got a present from the Seattle coffee behemoth tucked into my daily delivery of the LA Times: A card entitling me, every Wednesday through May 28th, to a free cup of Pike Place Roast, their "new daily brew" that they roast and grind fresh everyday.

No, I'm not shilling for Starbucks but a daily roasted and freshly ground coffee is a beautiful thing. And it's free. So to everyone who makes a habit of hating on the LA Times, Starbucks and puppies and kittens-- back off!

NYC report: Ouch, CBGB is now a boutique

2008-04-08T12:06:00.000-07:00

Maybe I'm outing the consumerist side of myself by steering you to this sick, sad, sorry news on Uncrate, a site which, at times, is like cyber-crack to me.

315 Bowery is a well-known address to a lot of New Yorkers, as it was the location of iconic rock club CBGB for over 30 years. Now fashion designer John Varvatos is using the space as his newest boutique.

It reminds me of the time I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC to see the Rock Style exhibit at the Costume Institute a number of years ago. The two shocks I encountered there were: (1.) They had a pair of jeans that Bruce Springsteen wore on his Born in the USA tour-- and they were from Fiorucci. And (2.) the striped boat neck T-shirt that Patti Smith wore early in her career that I had assumed was a thrift store find was actually brand-spanking-new Dior Couture.

I could ramble on about branding, commodification, CBGB T-shirts being sold at Target and recently deceased owner Hilly Kristal's plans to relocate the club to Las Vegas, but I won't.

Feet fete

2008-04-07T12:13:00.000-07:00

Fools for Feet, the current exhibit at Antebellum is all about the erotic nature of feet for some. If that's you and you're unaquainted with the surfeit of cultural contextualization available, this may be a starting point for you.

One could find a certain anti-synergy here with the recent poll question on LA Metblog asking, as part of their 64 Worst Things About LA campaign, which is worse, Starbucks or the ubiquity of year round flip-flops.

Maybe to the chagrin of those coming down hard on flip-flops, there is a blog, FLIPFLOPEROTIC, dedicated to the erotic angle of the revealing footwear. And they even have their own poll question for you to weigh in on.

I found myself continually staring at his feet. The flip-flops he was wearing drew attention to them. His feet were tanned and, I had to say, looked amazing plus the flips were cool. I had never thought of myself as a "foot guy" but I felt seriously turned on. I found myself wanting to get my hands, even my mouth on them...

Antebellum will be screening O Fantasma on Thursday, April 10th at 7:00PM. From Portugal, the film is a lurid journey of anonymous sex in mostly public places. Ho hum, welcome to LA. And should I mention that George Michael's tour passes through in June?

Photo by Miguel Angel Reyes

Dem bums

2008-04-06T12:48:00.001-07:00

I was having an email chat today with my Met's-loving New Yorker gal pal Sue. I asked her what her take was on Brooklyn's beloved Dodgers being $tolen away by Los Angeles in 1958, in light of all of the news lately about this being the 50th anniversary of their move west. Notice how her disdain for that other NY team won't even allow her to capitalize their name.

It was a sad day in Brooklyn when the Dodgers moved. Dodger fans did all they could to keep them in Bklyn (got petitions signed, protested, etc). My mother sat outside the local supermarket getting signatures so she could send them to Dodgers management to try and keep the team in Bklyn.

The Dodgers were very loved and were a huge loss to NYC. That's why so many Met fans originated as Dodger fans. The Dodger fans were heart broken to lose "dem bums" (the teams nickname) and couldn't force themselves to cheer for the dreaded yanks so when the Mets came into town, they had their new team.

The Dodgers played a significant role in baseball history due to Jackie Robinson. They were the first team to have a black guy and Jackie's number (42) is posted in all stadiums today. He was responsible for breaking the color barrier in baseball and he is honored in all team's fields to date.

1955 was a great year as it was the first time that the Dodgers beat the yanks in an incredible series so you can imagine the devastation when fans were told they were moving to LA. Ebbets field was a beloved stadium and was to be torn down when the Dodgers left. The new Shea stadium is being modeled after Ebbets.

So much history...

Go Mets!

Another reason for expanding LA's subway: more street art opportunities

2008-04-04T21:11:00.000-07:00

Maybe I'm just psyched for the Blek le Rat opening tomorrow night (see previous post) but here's some rather ingenious street art from NYC courtesy of the Wooster Collective site.

Every time we start to think that street art is starting to get a bit tired and boring, along - out of nowhere - comes something that reconnects us with why we fell in love with street art in the first place.

The story we heard at dinner tonight is that there's an artist who's been making these animals out of discarded plastic bags. He (or she) ties the bags to the ventilation grates above the subway lines so that when the subway rushes through underneath, the animal jumps up and springs to life.

Eastside Art Smart

2008-04-03T21:45:00.000-07:00

Ø Subliminal Projects on Sunset in Echo Park has the first US solo exhibit by French graffiti artist Blek le Rat, opening on Saturday night.

How do I put this... hmm-- oh yeah, I know: This Is Huge.

A pioneer of graffiti writers in Europe, Blek le Rat was one of the first people to use stencils to make public art on the street using icons instead of writing his name.

So when you saw that iconic Rambo 12 ad on the side of every friggin' bus in SoCal a few months ago-- and you did, didn't you?-- know of the trail between Blek and Sly. He's the Warhol of graffiti.

Before this exhibit, the best way to see his work, aside from flying to Paris and a handful of other international cities, was on the exhaustively comprehensive Wooster Collective site, which has been documenting graffiti art from around the globe for several years.

Ø The Brewery Art Walk is this Saturday and Sunday. Not to be missed, bring your favorite LA naysayers, pour a few beers down their throats at the central cafe/water hole and then push them toward that '80s punk art street-trash/dress gallery, just past that really good used bookstore.

Ø Black Maria Gallery in Atwater Village, the little gallery that could, is all of a sudden busting out all over. Owner Zara Zeitountsian is passionate about her artists and her hard work over the past three years is finally coming to fruition with the Hollywood Apocalypse exhibit currently on display. It is a juried show of works based upon a prophetic painting that has only existed in the imagination of readers of the Nathaniel West novella, The Day of the Locust.

Yeah, there's the 1975 film version's Boschean-by-way-of-Munch rendering of the painting, but it's only the starting point for what's on view. Curated by writer and 3D artist Ray Zone, who came up with the concept for the exhibit, actress Patricia Arquette, La Luz de Jesus Gallery owner Billy Shire and actor and comic book publisher Thomas Jane will comprise the panel of judges.

The LA Times' "The Guide" section seemed positively giddy over the fact that it took a rather disdainful view of our savage town. But hey, the mirror has two faces, ya know what I mean?

Griffith Park is turning green

2008-04-03T11:38:00.000-07:00

After last May's devastating fire that scorched over 800 acres, the hills were a palette of blacks, browns and grays. Now, almost a year later and after a few good rainfalls, nature is taking its course in transforming the bleak peaks with sprouting spring growth. I took the above shot from the Observatory parking lot.

So grab your hiking shoes or bike and come see the baby...

The $9 Cup o' Joe

2008-04-03T10:53:00.000-07:00

Intelligentsia, the cafe at Sunset Junction, now has a daily selection of coffees by the cup that range from $2.50 to $9. I met my favorite LA blogger there a couple days ago and we both had the medium priced brew ($3.75.) It was every bit as good as the Moka Java I've grown fond of from Trader Joe's.

Intel (it's what the trendomorphs call it, I hear) has "tasting events" for the beans they've bought at auction-- only in LA... and other coffee savvy metrosexual havens too before long, I bet. It sounds pretentious and ridiculous, I know, but this is what a life of denial during wartime is like, early 21st century.

I'm all for a well made cup of coffee. I even consider myself a coffee snob. But I feel that how you make your coffee, as well as the lightness of the roast (as opposed to the darkness) has as much to do with it as the pedigree of the beans. It's no secret that a strong cup of Folgers will rival any high end coffee-- at least in my book, so maybe it is a secret.

Here's how much of a nut I am: I grind my Folgers to a finer grade before I pop it into my individual cup size Melitta cone and voila, a perfect cuppa when you're stranded in a trendy coffee deprived locale.

'Burgh pins hopes on donuts

2008-03-20T01:11:00.000-07:00

Things must be pretty grim downtown when the Post-Gazette gets excited about a Dunkin Donuts going into Market Square, along with two other cafes, in addition to the Starbucks that's already there.

And a new bar "will serve French wines, cheese and pastry-type desserts." (When is a pastry not a pastry but only like a pastry? Are they referencing Claes Oldenburg?) According to the P-G, "the bar will be 'very upscale' with a 'definite Paris feel to it.'" This I've got to see.

The gays have landed... in Pittsburgh!

2008-03-15T21:05:00.000-07:00

The good news in Saturday's Post-Gazette is that homosexuals are inundating Pittsburgh. The bad news is, that report was delivered by some homophobe congresslady from (get this) Oklahoma who seems to have stumbled upon some old episodes of Queer As Folk on LOGO. See what happens when you subscribe to the digital preferred tier on Comcast?
Who's going to break the news to Queer Eye for the Straight Girl candidate Rep. Sally Kern that Andy Warhol, the most influential artist of the 20th century, and a gay man to boot, was from Pittsburgh? More importantly, who will explain to her who Andy Warhol was?

Nixed visionary idea of the past

2008-03-14T06:19:00.000-07:00

At the Carnegie Museum yesterday I came across an architectural drawing by Frank Lloyd Wright and Allen Lape Davison for a proposed twin bridges project for the Point in 1947. It was breathtaking in it's ambitions to re-envision and reinvent the defining feature of Pittsburgh.

Unfortunately, it met with what have now become all to familiar results in this city-- unless it involves yet another redundant sports facility or a certain casino project and the looming parking garage that will tower over it.

Twin Bridges Project for Point Park, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

This drawing reflects Frank Lloyd Wright's plan to redesign the Point, where the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers converge to form the Ohio in downtown Pittsburgh. At the heart of Wright’s Point Park project was a civic center connected to the North and South sides of the city by bridges across the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers. Each bridge had three levels: the lowest for trucks, the next for automobiles, and a garden for pedestrians on top. A tall concrete tower rising from the civic center anchored the "stayed cable" for the cantilevered bridges and served as an antenna for radio and television transmissions.

Pittsburgh department store owner Edgar Kaufmann, Sr., paid Wright $25,000 to rethink the Point. Between 1946 and 1948, numerous drawings flowed from Wright's office to Pittsburgh, many executed by the talented Allen Lape Davison, who had grown up in Pittsburgh, studied at Cornell, and then joined Wright's Taliesin Fellowship in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Wright's plan was visionary, and the presentation drawings were seductive; but city officials rejected the project. They concluded that the experimental nature of the technology was too costly, the traffic plan too segregated, and the proposal failed to reflect the historical significance of the Point as the site for both French and English outposts in the 1750s.

Clinton and Obama opening campaign offices

2008-03-06T21:11:00.000-08:00

As to be expected, both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are opening campaign offices in Pittsburgh. Of the two, Obama seems more in touch with the area by opening his in East Liberty. But for some odd reason, Clinton has chosen to open hers Downtown, which is a pretty dreary, desolate and uninteresting place. A much better choice would have been...well, just about any other place in the city limits. She could have gotten gutsy (and hip) and chosen, say, Lawrenceville or The Strip.

Culturally vulturally yours....

2008-03-05T09:59:00.000-08:00

Ø WYEP's Third Thursdays continues tomorrow at their Southside studios. This month it's Pittsburgh brother duo Br'er Fox.

Ø On Friday, the Andy Warhol Museum's Good Fridays has Akron/Family, four self-proclaimed “extremely nice, sincere and well-mannered young men from rural America who moved to NYC in 2002 to make music,” whose sound falls into the vague freak-folk category.

Go a little early to see the Ron Mueck sculptures, by turns mesmerizing and creepy. A video monitor on the top floor of the exhibit has a cool documentary showing his process for making the pieces.

Ø If you want a taste of what it was like to go to the movies before the advent of multiplexes, stadium seating, obnoxious ads and blockbuster culture hijacked the cinema and drove it over the cliff of appeasing shareholders of major corporations, AND you still haven't seen Juno, which won the Oscar this year for best original screenplay, here's your chance.

The Oaks Theater in Oakmont is running Juno again, due to its winning the naked little gold man and also owing to its ongoing popularity. The Oaks was renovated a few years back to its original 1938 splendor. It's like stepping back in time and you'll be glad for the existence of this venerable theater.

Ø Andre Previn returns to conduct the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra this weekend. On Friday and Sunday, he brings his Harp Concerto written for the PSO's Gretchen Van Hoesen for his return to Heinz Hall. On Saturday, the performance is at Scottish Rite Cathedral in New Castle.

And while I'm on the subject, tickets for the PSO's June 26th performance with Isaac Hayes are on sale for the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra's 5th Annual Community Partners Concert.

The Community Partners Concert is an annual collaboration with other greater Pittsburgh non-profit organizations. When you purchase a ticket, you designate an organization to receive the revenue.

Ø LAST CHANCE: Closing Sunday, March 9th at Pittsburgh Center for the Arts is Bedazzled: Stars, Pagans and the Cosmos by Suzie Silver.

Working primarily in video and performance, Silver explores themes of obsession, mythology, gender, pop music, desire, and ritual in the eight videos presented in this show. They include live action and animation.

Ø On Sunday, Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest screens at Pittsburgh Filmmakers' second installment of "Hooray for Screenwriters!" at the Regent Square Theater.

And now for some good news...

2008-03-05T08:32:00.000-08:00

After being rocked by Pittsburgh's low ranking in a Pitt gender-equality-in-pay study yesterday, I was glad to see some positive news about the city in today's P-G. Patricia Lowry's forward-looking Places column is always a good source for stories about Pittsburgh moving forward.

Rothschild Doyno Architects recently moved their offices to Penn Avenue in the Strip, taking advantage of a new program that encourages businesses to "go green"

It's the first project to take advantage of a new low-interest Urban Redevelopment Authority loan for LEED buildings and is striving for LEED-Gold certification. The loan's interest rate decreases as the LEED certification level increases.

"There are a lot of concrete block industrial buildings around the city," Rothschild said. "If as a small business we can pull off a LEED-Gold, we could be an example for other small businesses."

Green features include natural light and ventilation, individual lighting controls, soy-based concrete stain, carpet tiles and windows of spectrally selective glass, which minimizes solar heat gain.

Without rewriting Lowry's entire column here, she also mentions the innovative direction taken by EDGE architects founder Dutch McDonald, as well as the grass-root advocacy group Preservation Pittsburgh's search for a board of directors. In all, it's promising news for the area.

Comcast vs. Verizon

2008-03-04T08:51:00.000-08:00

Did anyone see this report on KDKA.com?

Have any stories to share about bundling phone, cable TV and Internet?

Gender pay gap embarrassment

2008-03-04T08:08:00.000-08:00

A lot of the news about Pittsburgh's economic woes are local stories that don't travel far. But when the results of a major national study on gender-based pay inequity is released, it's a national story.

I heard it yesterday on NPR news but I didn't catch the numbers until I read today's Post-Gazette. It's bad:

Women make up 48 percent of the Pittsburgh area work force, yet female managers earned just 58.3 percent of local men and 89.5 percent of what women around the country made, according to the 2000 U.S. Census. Women in management positions at local nonprofits fared only slightly better, earning 64.3 percent of their male counterparts.

This disparity can be attributed to a sluggish economy, stagnant population growth and a legacy of heavy industry, argued study co-authors Chris Briem and Sabina Deitrick of the University of Pittsburgh's Center for Social and Urban Research.

Whatever it is, it's a saddening, deeply institutionalized indication of the backwardness of this once great city.

As Pittburgh gazes into its mirror searching to recognize its flaws, it must understand this is a BIG problem. It repells rather than attracts people to the area.

That damn casino

2008-03-03T07:14:00.000-08:00

I wish I could think of something nice to say about... that... That THING, but I can't. As I was reading of the ongoing shifty machinations by Barden over the behemoth parking garage that will loom behind it, I was thinking instead of forcing him to scale back on size or put two stories underground as was specified in the original plans that were approved, why not DOUBLE the size of the garage. Make it as ugly as possible and teach Pittsburghers a lesson about giving an asset as valuable as prime waterfront location over to something as tacky as a casino.

PGH's Prodigal Sons & Daughters

2008-03-01T20:00:00.000-08:00

There was an interesting piece in Saturday's Post-Gazette about a native's return to Pittsburgh. There are some parallels with my situation, the main one being "what is it about this place?" Growing up here, it gets under your skin. For me, however, getting out was a priority from the age of nine. At nineteen I moved to NYC and lived there for over two decades before moving to LA four years ago.

Now I'm back, more or less, with a wealth of perspective that could only be gained by living in a larger, more cosmopolitan city (or two.) And Pittsburgh is cool. Not in an easily identifiable way if you are looking for parallel experiences of places like NYC or LA or even Austin or Seattle.

It has many unique aspects that are peculiar and indigenous to the area, tied to its specific history. What's different here is there is no national media commodifying its cultural and social attributes. Local media and word of mouth are the conduits for this information, and they are pretty good at it too. But it stays local, giving it a certain cache, although a true Pittsburgher would never think of it in that way. (That's my innah Big City Perspective tawking.)

People don't flock to PGH "to make it big." But if you're looking for a liveable, low-key, ideally located medium-to-small city where, as the writer of the above mentioned article states, "normal" people can afford to own a home, then PGH is for you.

Of course it has its challenges too and it's still reeling from the steel industry's exodus a generation ago.

What's great to see is that the local blogosphere is thriving.

Burgh Blog, 2 Political Junkies, Burgh Diaspora, Angry Drunk Bureaucrat, Pop City and Pittsburgh Dish have got it covered.

However, the Pittsburgh edition of Metroblogging (a fairly heavily visited site in larger cities) seems to be a bust here.

Hey, Osama! Hands off Amtrak!

2008-02-19T16:29:00.000-08:00

Faster than a speeding bullet train (you know,in Japan) Amtrak, the nation's leading passenger rail line (okay, it's the nation's only passenger rail line) issued notification that they are clamping down on possible terrorist attacks on their trains. Armed guards with bomb-sniffing dogs will patrol platforms and trains in Washington, DC's Union Station, performing random searches on passengers and their baggage.

Remember, it was little more than six years ago (that's only 72 months!) that terrorists used jumbo jets to bring down the World trade Center.

Amtrak officials said the rapid response was necessary to ensure they're dozens of passengers that their security and safety were of utmost importance.

Of growth and gangs in PGH

2008-02-19T08:15:00.000-08:00

Ø In today's Post-Gazette biz section, David Murdoch writes about a possible joint venture between PGH and the cities of Cologne and Wuppertal in North Rhine Westphalia, Germany. A lot of cautionary hypotheticals and "what-ifs" are offered up in the article. The impression I was left with was what a slow process it will be for PGH to pull itself up to becoming a city with the reputation of, say, Austin or Seattle.

Innovative business, creative culture, hard work, excellent marketing and personal relationships are indispensable elements in Pittsburgh's quest for post-Renaissance development and growth. The dual economic objectives of direct foreign investment and greater exports require the additional involvement of Pittsburgh's cultural and educational community. Neither of these elements is sufficient of themselves; they also require long-term fortitude, major investments of time and energy, and frequent follow-up.

While Murdoch mentioned the role of cultural life in PGH, he stressed the business development angle as key. What struck me is that it's hard to know if the momentum of economic deterioration here is even being slowed, let alone reversed. The next few years are crucial in this regard.

Ø I'm curious to see the effects of the new Children's Hospital once it is open. Will the surrounding area see real estate values rise as professionals seek nearby housing? Will new retail businesses open nearby to cater to them? What about businesses like movie theaters, restaurants and newer life-style type shops-- things that provide "livability" to those with ample disposable income? Will local businesses be pushed out in favor of those who can pay higher rents? How would all of this affect long time residents if it came to pass?

Ø A sobering counterpoint to all of this is evident in another article in today's P-G about gang violence throughout the city. While it points out that it is small compared to major cities like NYC or LA,

Pittsburgh Police have been dealing with gangs for decades, with gang activity peaking in the '90s, and Sgt. Mona Wallace, head of the Pittsburgh Police Intelligence and Crime Analysis Unit, predicts a lengthy struggle.

"They're not going to go away anytime soon," she said. "It's something we're going to have to deal with far into the future."

The Sushi-Trader Joe's continuum

2008-02-18T21:33:00.001-08:00

One thing that has kept me sane during my transition back to PGH from LA has been regular visits to Trader Joe's in East Liberty. In light of the teeth gnashing on a few of the local blogs about "superior sushi" in PGH being a "semi-serious" indicator of quality of life attractive enough for the talented who may deign to relocate to this bright little city, it occurred to me that TJ's may hold the same panache as raw fish.

Of course, in Cali you can buy wine, beer and booze just about anywhere-- Rite Aid, 7/11 and TJ's of course. It might be worth considering that the alcohol restrictions here in Pennsyltucky are a bigger shiny red flag to the talent crew that some are hoping, pleading, begging please! to lift this city unto Yuppie Wet Dreamland than a plate of fab fluke.

And I guess I could pile on the failure to implement a smoking ban in restaurants and bars. Trust me, it matters a lot.

Btw, I saw one of my favorite affordable Chardonnays (Meridian) at my local Wine & Spirits Shoppeeess. At the TJ's near me in LA (in trendy Silver Lake, no less,) the price is $5.99. The price at the W & S Shhopppeee? $10.99.

I have questions about...

2008-02-17T10:05:00.000-08:00

... death.

Why did the Post-Gazette start calling it's web version "Post-Gazette Now" and then give such prominence to the obituaries?

I even saw a banner ad for a subscription service (free trial!) that would track the obits that are "important to you!" It was called something like, ObitTracker or Obit-a-palooza.

Is death big news here?

Sunday cavil

2008-02-17T09:10:00.000-08:00

Ø I'm not sure why the Post-Gazette gives high profile, front page prominence in Forum to today's opinion piece by Tasso Katselas about US Airways abandonment of PGH International Airport and then, on their web site, pushes it way down the page. (Can you find it?)

Anyway, it's an infuriating article that tells how the city designed the airport, specifically addressing US Airways concerns, and also how congressional leaders from the area worked to secure a billion-dollar federal bailout for the airline in the wake of the post-9/11 nosedive in air travel.

And then US Airways moved it's hub out of PGH, opting for Philadelphia and Charlotte, even though both are fraught with problems when it comes to air travel, none of which exist at the new airport. Kinda makes you wonder, or at least consider passing over US Airways when booking your next flight, not that there's much to choose from as far as PGH is concerned.

Ø There is some grumbling on the local blogs about PGH's future, in terms of potential for growth and its ability to attract commerce. Some are worrying about or pondering how PGH can be more like Austin, NYC, LA, SF, Boston or Paris (!) when it comes to tech industry, sushi and Downtown's street level retail. (Okay, on the last one I'm referring to my reaction to the Paris to Pittsburgh initiative. Anyone else want to weigh in?)

And then there's the camp I'm in, along with PittGirl, who loves PGH for what it is/isn't.

In the words of Stuart Smiley, "Sometimes it's easier to wear slippers, rather than carpet the entire world."

PGH: Culturally sophisticated or provincial backwater? (Both.)

2008-02-10T18:07:00.000-08:00

Ø This tacit question was posed by Patricia Lowry in her op-ed article in today's Post-Gazette, entitled "Lost Art." She writes about the dilemma surrounding public art that was commissioned for the PGH International Airport in the early 1990s. Most of it has been eliminated or compromised in some way. One piece left untouched, "Silver Grid Wall" by Peter Calaboyias, was on the verge of being replaced with advertising, the powers that be deeming that move necessary to offset the huge drop in revenue (and 50% drop in air traffic since 1992) due primarily to US Airways major withdrawal from the airport in the past few years-- a virtual economic Katrina for the PGH area.

Oh, and none of the artists are in or from PGH.

Whether or not any conclusions can be drawn about PGH's level of sophistication as is indicated by the situation at the airport, the question of sophistication vs. provincialism could be extrapolated to the city and surrounding area. As a native recently returned to the area, I have been wrestling with the notion of what PGH has become during my 30-year absence. The progress it has made and the evolution that has occurred, coupled with setbacks and deterioration, is by turns enthralling and dispiriting, accompanied by lump-in-the-throat pride and how-could-they-let-this-happen bewilderment.

I see it everywhere.

Ø The Good, the Bad and the Casino - Two incomplete lists:

First, the Bad: The dreaded casino that will soon sully the North Shore; the new transit tunnel under the river, in practice really only to serve the casino and the two sports facilities that really could have been one facility doing double duty like Three Rivers easily did; the transit bus route cutbacks; the raping of Uptown and the Hill for yet another superfluous sports facility; the recent, laughable "Paris to Pittsburgh" cha-cha that sounds like a subplot in a Christopher Guest movie; the limping "Cultural District" that is akin to running a gauntlet between parking garages and the handful of theaters it comprises and then driving back to the 'burbs; the Parkway; downtown's parking rates that drain what little appeal the area has left in it.

The Good: Carnegie Museum (although overpriced when compared to other cities and the corresponding depth of their collection;) the Strip District; Squirrel Hill and its amazing ability to not allow Murray and Forward Avenues to become the charmless bore that Walnut St. in Shadyside has become; Bloomfield for its unshakable ability to remain a small town with a big heart; the State Stores in Monroeville and Fox Chapel and their extensive selection of wines that can calm the increasingly vocal criticism of the rightfully pilloried PLCB for even existing; Kennywood (jury convening to ascertain nuevo owners actions after the next season;) the rivers for their potential to enliven the area, this time from the points of view of recreation and natural beauty instead of their advantages of transport in service to industries of past eras; the potential of downtown to rise again and thrive (probably a generation away;) the music clubs of the Southside (special kudos to Club Cafe.)

As I've written before, PGH doesn't need to become like another city. All of the needed components are here. What has to take place must be in the form of leadership, vision, commitment and self-confidence as a city. These are the elements that shaped the area in the past, enabling it to grow into the mighty metropolis it once was. It can happen again.

On returning to PGH

2008-02-06T22:32:00.000-08:00

Ø Re. today's editorial in the Post-Gazette entitled "State of Antiquity:" I was born and raised in PGH but have lived for the past 25+ years in NYC and Los Angeles. Having spent the last two and a half months here due to a family matter, I have had some time to observe what has and hasn't changed in my beloved hometown.

Yes, the PLCB is an embarrassing relic from the past, similar to state laws institutionalizing racism in the Deep South, although obviously not as onerous. In discussions with aquaintances here, I have heard evidence that some people have been flouting the legal stranglehold the LCB has on wine distribution. It involves having friends in states with a more enlightened attitude about, well, just about everything else. A bottle or two or more is carefully wrapped and shipped via any one of several shippers, from the USPS to Fed Ex,UPS, etc. I say, drink up, the spirit of the Whiskey Rebellion lives on.

Ø Another curious thing I've observed is the so called "rebirth" of Lawrenceville. Being used to sticker shock prices for real estate in NYC and LA, the allure of buying an early 20th century townhouse for $20K to $90K is tempting. The drawback is the vast amount of work it would take to renovate and restore a lot of them. A good deal, if not most of them, have been butchered over the years. Hideous wall-to-wall carpeting (Is there any other kind? No.); botched rewiring and plumbing; original windows ripped out and made smaller so prefab versions can be thrust in with mismatched brick calling attention to the savaging; exterior eyesores added over the years, ranging from metal awnings to aluminum siding to plastic and fake-looking stone face, sometimes all at the same time-- the list goes on.

The owners making these changes meant no harm. In their eyes, they were performing routine upgrades and maintainence to affordable housing for underpaid laborers working in the long-gone mills and factories. Preservation was less on their minds than survival. This was and still is a poor-to-middle-class community that exudes a unique charm with its unpretentious and unselfconscious ways. It doesn't need hipsters moving in and "rediscovering" the area, although there is the appearance of that happening with the meager scattering of boutiques and art galleries that fleck Butler St.

Hopefully Lville will not morph into another frat boy bar crawl strip like East Carson Street, but given the number of bars that have been there for ages, it wouldn't come as a surprise. What Lawrenceville needs is to remain as it is. PGH is not saturated with sophistication like NYC or DC or even Philadelphia. (And yes, I know I left Los Angeles off of that list, because even though I learned the truth in the cliche, "LA is not what it seems," if there is one thing it is not, it's sophisticated. I don't mean that in the pejorative; it's just the truth. But I digress.) The lack of pretentiousness and the rough urbanity that PGH possesses is what gives it its great charms. It's a vibrant, unique and glowing culture if you know where to look for it.

Ø This article in the Post-Gazette, about trying to "instill a bit of Paris?" Look, I know Wonder Boy's heart is in the right place but come on. PGH is not going to draw people looking for The Paris of Southwestern PA. It doesn't need to try to be something it's not. For starters, downtown needs better mass transit and cheap or free parking, because without either, it doesn't matter if you turn it into Sodom on the Mon, nobody will show up. (Except maybe me.)

Dot 1992-2008

2008-02-04T22:19:00.000-08:00

Dot passed away peacefully this evening in Los Angeles. Steve was with her at the time. We are very sad. She was a good girl.

All this loss...

Kelly in London

2008-02-04T11:20:00.000-08:00

My friend Kelly is spending a semester in London and she just started blogging about it. Her first post is about the weekend she spent in Barcelona. Check it out here.

Feathers: a eulogy

2008-01-10T19:46:00.000-08:00

My mother was born on February 20, 1926 and grew up in Hersheytown. In 1929, she was living in a house on Tilford Road with her mother and her father, Victor and Mary Krancic, and her baby sister, Dorothy, who was two years younger.

In December of that year, on a cold, rainy night, the nearby house that her grandparents, the Seamans, and her mother's eight younger brothers and sisters were living in, caught fire and burned to the ground.

My great Aunt Helen recently told me the story about the fire and how at the age of nine she escaped with nothing but the clothes on her back.

The ten displaced members of the Seaman family stayed with friends in the area for a few days but before long they all were welcomed to move into Victor and Mary Krancic's house on Tilford Road. My mother's brother, Eddie, was born in 1932, which brought to fifteen the number of people living together in the small two bedroom house.

Grandma Seaman died in 1936 and the fourteen remaining family members lived together for many years under the same roof through the Great Depression, World War II and beyond. They all worked different shifts around the clock so that when someone was working, someone else was sleeping. There was always food cooking on the stove and constant activity in the house. It must have been tough, but the stories my mother told me always made it sound like fun too.

She told me about the the yearly ritual of raising and then slaughtering a pig. They would hang it from it's hind legs and slit it's throat, catching the blood in a pot for making sausage. Everyone pitched in and every part of the pig was used to help sustain the family through the winter. Some years were less plentiful than others and my mother said she would always remember the tough winters when they got by on little more than potato soup for long stretches.

They grew fruit and vegetables and raised chickens and ducks. They ate them and their eggs and used their feathers for pillows and comforters.

My mother told the story about how they were sitting around one day stuffing feathers into pillows. Now, there wasn't supposed to be any movement or talking when they did this because the air currents their voices and moving bodies generated would cause the feathers to start floating around. Of course, someone would get the giggles, which would cause someone else to get the giggles and before long everyone would be laughing uncontrollably and the room would fill up with swirls of feathers floating all over the place.

She went to elementary school in Universal and from there went to Seneca High School. Always as slim as a toothpick (in fact her nick name was Toothpick) she blossomed into a beautiful young woman who made her own clothes in the style of the times. She listened to Big Band singers on the radio and became a big fan of Frank Sinatra, whom she saw perform early in his career at the Stanley Theater in Downtown Pittsburgh.

An enduring memory for me, and I'm sure for my brother, Joe, and my sister, Marilee, is of my mother's singing around the house when we were kids. She had a rich, powerful voice, an acute sense of pitch and she was clearly talented enough to sing professionally. In fact, she told us how she had considered trying to pursue a singing career.

She told me how she would go for walks in the woods to a stream and stand beside it and sing her favorite songs. One day, unbeknown to her, a friend was hiding in the woods and listening, and forever after when he saw her he would say, "Betty, you should be a singer." It encouraged her and she knew some musicians, but as she told me, "I didn't have the guts."

Instead, after graduating from high school, she got a job at Westinghouse. A little more than a week ago, I asked her how she got the job. She said, "All my friends got jobs right away after high school except me, so I felt lonely. I complained to my mother and she took me on the bus to Westinghouse to apply for a job. They gave me some tests in typing, dictation and shorthand. And then they hired me on the spot. I started the next day."

She moved up quickly from the secretarial pool to personnel and then on again from there. She stayed with the company from 1944 until I was born in 1957. Westinghouse had it's own bus that she would take to and from work. She said she was the only woman on the bus in her early years at Westinghouse.

One memorable story from that era that she told me was about how she dealt with what we now call sexual harassment. The way she told it, this guy, who was one of her superiors, and who was married, would always make unwelcome advances and grab at her, trying to drag her into a cloakroom or a closet.

She said, "So one day, I took a big hat pin to work. And when he came after me, I took out the pin and I let him have it. Then I told him 'And next time, I'm telling your wife.' He never came near me again." Today, we hire lawyers and sue over this sort of thing; my mother's approach seems to be more effective in getting the point across.

During her Westinghouse years, she had an active social life. She went out at night in what was then a bustling Downtown Pittsburgh to hear live jazz and popular singers and even female impersonators.

She traveled to New York City and Florida for vacations with her sister and her friends. And my cousins Butch and Shorty still love to talk about the time when they were teenagers and my mother took them to New York for a vacation.

She bought fashionable clothes from Sak's Fifth Avenue that were sold at Gimbel's Downtown. She told me how upset her mother would get over the money she spent on clothes and shoes. She said, "But I was working and I always gave her part of my paycheck, so I did what I wanted. She would get so mad at me."

In 1955, she married my father, a good looking, local, young entrepreneur who had a few dry cleaning shops in the area. They had been dating for a couple years, going out to dinner, horse races and such.

She became friends with Carol, one of my dad's younger sisters who worked at his shop in Universal near Previc's. My mother told me stories about the fun they had when they would go out together.

Carol recently told me her memories of going to the house that my mother still lived in with her sprawling family on Tilford Road. She said, "Everything was as neat as a pin in your mother's room. Her clothes, her shoes, even her make-up was laid out just so."

In 1959, my mother and father moved with me and my sister, born that year, to the house on Saltsburg Road. My brother arrived in 1961.

We were a fairly normal family in many respects, with a mosaic of victories, disappoints, accomplishments, set backs, and lessons learned and sometimes not learned along the way. We were close-knit and isolated; together and solitary. Through it all, it somehow felt like life's delicate and sometimes scary balancing act always had my mother as a living and breathing safety net.

My mother and father struggled and persevered, and they got really lucky. My dad was driven and my mom, with her thirteen years of Westinghouse experience, managed the all important details like book keeping and accounting and was the sounding board for his efforts. I remember, as a kid, falling asleep to the sounds of their conversations at the kitchen table late at night about my father's ongoing business endeavors.

At times, he sounded unsure of where things were going. But my mother knew how to listen and when he sometimes just needed her to sit and be there with him as he talked his way through his thoughts and frustrations and hopes and desires.

She fiercely defended her children and expected loyalty. She got angry sometimes like we all do, but she was truly forgiving. She was quick to call us on any BS and championed us in our efforts. She did it right up until the end.

She visited my sister when she was in Los Angeles going to college and she visited me in New York and recently in LA too.

I always took my mother to a lot of music concerts. We went together to my first rock concert when I was 14. When she came to New York, I took her to the great rock club, CBGB's, to see the B-52s. A couple years ago we went, along with my sister, to see the Rolling Stones at PNC Park.

In New York, we went to Broadway musicals and Little Italy, museums and botanical gardens, art galleries and Rockefeller Center. We rode subways, buses and in taxis.

At Kennywood, we rode the Steel Phantom, the Racer and the Jack Rabbit together. But she drew the line at the Thunderbolt and refused to go on it.

Two of the great joys in her life were her grandchildren, Alex and Ryan. Despite each of their mounting health problems, she and my dad seemed to spring back to life with their arrivals.

I remember when my dad passed away eleven years ago, on the night that he died, Joe and Ardis came over with the boys. My mom got down on the kitchen floor and played with them like she was a kid too, smiling and laughing. They lifted her up from her sadness and she seemed for a moment untouched by the grief from my father's sudden, irreversible absence.

An ongoing passion that my mother and Marilee shared was traveling to gambling hot spots-- Las Vegas and Atlantic City, especially. They saw dozens of shows-- Tom Jones, Debbie Reynolds, Tina Turner, Engelbert Humperdink and Phyllis Diller, to name a few-- as they bounced from one casino to the next, searching for that elusive, cooperative video poker machine.

In her later years, she would tell me how much she enjoyed watching a movie every night on the Lifetime channel. I asked her why she liked them so much and she said, "Because they're about people with everyday problems that I can understand. I like to watch them work things out."

She also became a fan of Emeril and Nancy Grace. And one of my best and last memories of her occurred a few nights before she went into the hospital. She had been feeling badly since I had arrived earlier in the week and I was worried. But I watched her sitting in her chair that night, smiling and giggling like a school girl as she watched Jay Leno. She was bouncing around, happy and unburdened by her slowly failing body.

The laughter seemed to transform and heal and lift her from her suffering. I kept my eyes on her, wondering if I would ever witness it again, seeing, somehow, a part of her that was still young and vibrant.

The girl in the room with the swirling feathers was laughing again and they rose up and drifted down all around us.

Mom

2008-01-05T08:22:00.000-08:00

My mother passed away yesterday. She was 81, just shy of her 82nd birthday next month. Despite the success of the heart procedure performed on her on January 1st, she wasn't able to bounce back. Her heart was too weak to take advantage of the three stents the cardiologist was able to implant in the arteries around it. Insufficient blood flow to her vital organs caused multiple complications that escalated alarmingly over the following two days. She never regained full consciousness after the cardiac arrest that occurred two days prior to the procedure.

We managed to have minimal communication with her in the ICU but she was unable to speak because of the respirator tubes inserted in her mouth and nose. When we talked to her one day she indicated she could hear us by cracking her eyes open and slightly turning her head toward us. A few other times, as her condition worsened, she managed to squeeze our hands. Yesterday morning, when I talked to her she wrinkled her brow and scrunched her eyebrows, which spoke volumes to me about how she felt about her situation.

Days earlier, when she was still lucid and prior to the cardiac arrest, she was aware of the possibilities of the coming days. While she said she wanted to get better and go home to start working on her taxes and maybe even plan a trip to Atlantic City, she also said she was "ready to go" and had "had enough of this," referring to her many health problems that were increasingly making her day-to-day life miserable.

The hospital doctors made several attempts to help her, but each one had fleeting benefits or did nothing for her. Her kidneys were shot due to multiple problems, advanced diabetes among them. Dialysis was the last option that offered a slight hope for a turnaround in her deteriorating condition. But it proved to be unsuccessful.

My sister, my brother and I made the difficult decision to withdraw life support. She was slowly weaned off of the numerous IV drugs she was receiving, as well as the respirator. The respirator was finally turned off completely at 1:00 PM. At 1:05, her tired, damaged, but unshakably loving heart stopped beating.

Mending a broken heart

2008-01-01T17:51:00.000-08:00

On xmas morning, my mother had a heart attack and was rushed by ambulance to West Penn Hospital/Forbes in Monroeville (pronounced an inferior hospital by just about everyone I spoke to about it.) After stabilizing her there, she was transferred on Thursday to UPMC/Shadyside Hospital, an esteemed hospital known for its superior cardiac unit.

On Sunday morning, she suddenly went into cardiac arrest and was moved to the ICU. Her heart rate had dropped to 17 bpm and her blood pressure had plummeted to 60 over something.

Finally, today she underwent heart catheterization and had three stents inserted in the arteries around her heart. Her cardiologist said that the procedure went "superbly" and "beautifully," and said that he expected her to see "a life extension benefit." That's doctor lingo for "she'll probably live longer."

My mother has advanced diabetes and consequently her kidneys are taking a hit. Also the heart attack and cardiac arrest both weakened the kidneys, along with today's procedure due to the dye she had to have injected to facilitate the imaging necessary to perform the catheterization. There is a likelihood that she will need dialysis for the rest of her life but her cardiologist said, after today's surprisingly successful procedure, "maybe another miracle."

My brother, my sister and I finally could walk out of the hospital with a sense of relief after seven long days of uncertainty. She still has several days of recovery to get through, but she has managed to dodge the most fearsome bullet.

Bodies and Corsets

2007-12-23T06:34:00.000-08:00

I went to see the Bodies exhibit at the Carnegie Science Center in Pittsburgh yesterday, even though I had seen it (or something similar) a couple years ago in Los Angeles. It's still creepy, fascinating and depressingly humbling, kind of like strolling through a human meat locker with museum lighting.

But the real treat was at the Andy Warhol Museum. The Warhol keeps getting better and better over the years (as admission keeps rising; when it opened it cost $5 to enter, now it's $15.) I've never seen the place crowded. Sometimes I've had an entire floor to myself.

The Ron Mueck exhibit is THE thing to see now. Monumental and miniature sculptures in lifelike mixed media are the perfect counterpoint to the Bodies exhibit.

Also, Warhol's gold leaf adorned drawings from the 1950s are on view, as well as a Sargent-like portrait of Jean Michel Basquiat that I had not seen before. Several of Warhol's corsets are displayed too, in a couple galleries and in a rainbow of colors.

NYC>PGH: A trail through two cities

2007-12-19T08:02:00.000-08:00

So I'm in Pittsburgh, after two weeks in NYC. The changes to both cities is worth noting. Manhattan is now, at least below, say, 110 St. give or take, an increasingly charmless high-end shopping bazaar. I don't know which I found more disheartening: the Juicy Couture shop on Bleecker St. or the Juicy Couture billboard in Times Square.

Uptown, east or west of Central Park still has areas untouched by elements of the tourist trade contibuting to the mall esthetic. The Metropolitan Museum continues to delight with it's seemingly ever growing galleries and re-appraisal of its collections. The current Rembrandt exhibit and the new Greek and Roman wings are spectacular.

Broadway, for all of it's middle brow offerings for the bumpkins, still packs a wallop. Staight plays are creating the most excitement with August: Osage County and The Homecoming both receiving rapturous reviews. (I saw August, hope to catch the Pinter when I return in January.)

The lovely little Waverly Inn has been turned into a celeb-magnet sty, with limos and paparazzi clogging the narrow west village streets like so much portable shrubbery that trails those types as they waddle to the trough. Plainly horrible.

More on NYC and PGH soon. The hunt for the xmas ham starts today.ø

Back in NYC

2007-12-08T21:25:00.000-08:00

NYC has turned some sort of corner since I left four years ago. Tourist trap T-shirt and trinket shops that years ago replaced neighborhood sustaining businesses like hardware stores and laundries are now giving way to upscale shops and restaurants. One sad change to note is that the space formerly occupied by Strawberry Fields, my local grocery in the West Village, is now a hideous eurotrash men's boutique. Also, a Juicy Couture shop appearing anywhere is a vile notion, let alone on Bleecker St. but then again that western stretch of Bleecker has been going high-end-mall for a number of years now so why be surprised?

But really, two Coach shops, two Ralph Laurens, two Marc Jacobs (down from three since the accessories shop moved to 4th and Perry;) enough already. I see it all heading in the direction of 8th St in a couple decades.

The good news is that the food purveyors block of Bleecker between 6th and 7th Aves. once again has a fresh seafood shop, a welcome return. Also, Murray's Cheese moved across the street to much bigger quarters four years ago and has an expanded selection along with prepared food too. It's odd to note that the old Zito's bakery is still boarded up and empty. What gives?

The meat packing district is almost completely vegan now, if you catch my drift. It has become encrusted with boutiques and restaurants that have it feeling like London a bit, to me anyway. Talk about a complete re-invention of a neighborhood. I haven't been through that area at night yet on this visit but I hope the trannie hookers are still around and able to take advantage of the money flowing into that area now.

On Friday afternoon, a line of people, bundled up and enduring the snowy weather, stretched down 14th St. from 9th Ave. in anticipation of the 6 PM grand opening of a shiny and new Apple Store. Yet another place for me to check my email and update this blog since I decided to travel sans laptop this time. ø

GOP overrreaches in campaign against Hillary

2007-11-30T12:50:00.000-08:00

Some crazy ass Republican has strapped a bomb to his paunch and taken hostages at Hillary Clinton's campaign headquarters in Rochester, New Hampshire.

From the Washington Post:

An armed man claiming to have a bomb strapped to his chest took several people hostage Friday afternoon at Sen. Hillary Clinton's Rochester, New Hampshire office and demanded to speak to the presidential candidate, according to witnesses and police.

Is this the best strategy conservatives can come up with? Sounds a bit desperate.

Republicans Youtube Debate - America, meet your dark side...

2007-11-29T13:16:00.000-08:00

If last night's dinosaur display didn't scare most viewers into voting for a Democrat last night, then I don't know what will. The dark beast of the American electorate raised it's many heads in the form of hatred for illegal immigrants, gays and abortion and its throbbing lust for guns, the confederate flag and the Bible.

What struck me most was that Romney's principles are as changeable as necessary to get conservative votes. He never met a lie he couldn't unblinkingly tell about his "changing" views or being "wrong." I used to think his phoniness was just on the surface; after last night I feel he's that way to the core. He's got that perfect game show host persona, brimming with vacuous sincerity.

Romney's futile, squirming attempt at dodging Anderson Cooper's question about whether he still, as he said in the past, "looked forward to the day when gays and lesbians could serve openly in the military" was a cringing, embarrassing moment for everyone-- except him, of course. I'm not sure if the booing was for his lame answer or for the subject entirely. My hunch is it was the latter, given the crowd.

Duncan Hunter was the most unabashed and comfortable with his homophobia. Huckabee and McCain tried to sound reasonable in tone but it came off like they were saying, "Bigots have rights too."

Why didn't Anderson Cooper (a gay man) let Paul and Guiliani weigh in? It's common knowledge that their views differ from the Neanderthals flanking them.

Huckabee let it be known that he welcomed gay votes, just don't expect anything in return from him if it doesn't involve banning abortion, "protecting marriage," defunding social programs, cutting taxes, etc.

WGA's Big Mistake

2007-11-29T11:36:00.000-08:00

Most of TV is crap and hack-y.
- Michael Patrick King (audio commentary on DVD release of The Comeback)

First, the writers (and, to be fair, the producers) dumb down the culture, reducing the vast majority of TV and movies to a bunch of crap. And now they show their disregard for the political process in this country (you know, things that actually matter) by playing the pivotal role in the canceling of the CBS Democratic presidential candidates debate scheduled for Dec. 10th in Los Angeles. The WGA wouldn't agree to not picket the event. Candidates said they would not cross the picket lines. And so CBS pulled the plug.

Do the writers really think what they do is that important? And the sick thing is that most of them probably fancy themselves liberal Democrats.

Psst, producers: Outsourced writing

2007-11-27T12:48:00.000-08:00

From a letter in today's Santa Barbara News-Press:

What if all of those Hollywood writers' jobs were outsourced to other English-speaking parts of the world, like so many other kinds of jobs have been? Would the public care if the offering were of higher quality and cost less?

Anything for better programming.

Anderson, your conscience has a question for you.

2007-11-26T11:14:00.000-08:00

Regarding "the CNN selection team," I wonder if Anderson Cooper is a pitcher or a catcher.

The ruse known as the CNN Youtube "debates" happens again on Wednesday for Republican candidates. After browsing through some of the submitted questions and noticing a lot of them dealt with sexual orientiation, HuffPo's Marty Kaplan notes that the deciders at CNN consider any questions about gay rights to be icky.

David Bohrman, CNN's Washington bureau chief and executive producer of the debate, told the NY Times' blog The Caucus that posts "asking the candidates to defend their opposition to gay marriage" are "'lobbying grenades' [that] would be disqualified by the CNN selection team... There are quite a few things you might describe as Democratic 'gotchas,' and we are weeding those out'... CNN wants to ensure that next Wednesday's Republican event is 'a debate of their party.'"

Pre-turkey Update

2007-11-21T13:57:00.000-08:00

Ø Really? Former WH press secretary Scott McClellan says in his forthcoming book that he was fed lies about the Valerie Plame case to convey to the media by the everyone from the president on down? Shocking.

Oh, but now his publisher is backpedaling, saying he "did not intend to suggest Bush lied to him." Problem is, it's exactly what the excerpt from his book says, at least for now.

Ø Since reports from Iraq are emphasizing the downturn in violence compared to a few months ago, coupled with the determination of Democrats in Washington to choke off funding for military operations, one would hope that the stasis of the Iraqi government would end.

But this, from an LAT article about reigning in and prosecuting murderous, rogue private security contractors in Iraq, leaves little hope for that.

Attempts to prosecute could prove problematic because Iraqi law grants immunity to foreign contractors under an order issued by U.S. officials in 2004.

After a September shooting that involved guards from Blackwater USA, the company that provides security to U.S. Embassy officials, and that left at least 17 Iraqis dead, the Cabinet of Prime Minister Nouri Maliki last month proposed a law that would repeal contractors' immunity. The Iraqi parliament has not yet acted on the measure.

Ø Low Standards Report: The acoustically challenged, sight line-deficient Kodak Theater is being thrown to the tourists, becoming the home for a "permanent" show by Cirque du Soleil.

According to LAT,

Shaul Kuba, founder and principal of the Kodak's owner, CIM Group, said the Hollywood themed production will be a tourist attraction, like Universal Studios or Disneyland, rather than a Broadway-style experience. "It's one more thing that the tourists can do that will be a little bit different," he said.

Wow, his excitement is contagious, innit? Zzzzzzzz...

Ø Secret shame of closeted scab writers revealed!

Several agents have asserted that their clients will quietly work away on their open projects but wait until a strike's end to turn them in.

One writer pointed out that, hypothetically, anyone could finish a script during the strike, then sit on it for a few weeks after the strike's end and claim it was written then. Even the guild's Script Validation Program couldn't police that maneuver. "I don't know how you get around that," this writer says. "Are you gonna seize the computers?"

A mordant joke at one agency has it that the desperation of a strike will provoke the kind of mind-blowing original scripts that writers only seem to turn out when they are starving.

Ø Don't piss of Liz: Elizabeth Taylor thinks that striking writers

...wouldn't dare hold up her AIDS benefit performance of A.R. Gurney's play Love Letters next month. Taylor insists striking TV and film writers will put down their picket signs on the Paramount Pictures lot as a mark of respect to the aged actress.
But the 75-year-old star says she won't cross picket lines if they are still up around the Paramount lot.

She wants strikers to put down their signs for the night of December 1st, World AIDS Day, so that she and her celebrity friends can raise money for AIDS research "with a clear conscience."

Hmm, self-interested entertainment types vs. a worthy, important charity headed by an internationally loved star-- shouldn't be too hard to figure out who will win this on a PR level.

Black Maria suggests skipping the mall

2007-11-20T13:25:00.000-08:00

Black Maria Gallery in Atwater Village has their second annual holiday exhibit up, called Skip the Mall. Owner Zara Zeitousian sees the show as a reaction to the rampant consumerism typical during the Christmas holidays.

I live across the street from the Glendale Galleria. It's crazy all the time but during the holidays it's depressing-- such madness. To observe it everyday made me realize I could offer an alternative to mass produced products.

Art makes a wonderful gift. We have pieces by several artists from under $100. Some of them are right out of art school and the young energy in their work is great to see.

The group show, featuring 27 artists, is arrayed as a twist on the shopping experience. Art is suspended on clothing hangers, displayed in shoe boxes and presented on display stands. Buyers can leave with the work they purchase.

Zeitousian is poking fun at the shopping experience but she also is serious about the spiritual rewards of appreciating and owning great art.

A painting can be as satisfying as wearing a sexy dress or owning a feature-laden barbecue, except there is an actual, sometimes life-changing meaning waiting to be derived from a work of art.

Skip the Mall is up through January 5th at Black Maria Gallery, 3137 Glendale Blvd., Atwater Village.

Meghan Daum is kidding, right?

2007-11-19T14:44:00.000-08:00

I'd love to think Meghan Daum is being sarcastic by non-judgementally writing about what she calls "fauxstessing," the practice of women buying a prepared meal at a restaurant or a gourmet grocer, transferring it to their own serving dishes and then presenting it as their own culinary creation, especially when one example is about a woman trying to win over a male co-worker.

Do women still feel the pressure to make it look like they can perform "women's work" to prove to men that they're, well, women? Or is MD merely chronicling yet another aspect of LA life that is more about artifice than the truth?

The surge is working, except for the deaths.

2007-11-19T14:00:00.000-08:00

Ø Lest we swayed by reports from the administration that the surge is working, the news out of Iraq is still bleak. LA Times calls Sunday "Iraq's most violent day in weeks" reporting at least 20 deaths.

A convoy of American soldiers opened fire on unarmed motorists in Samawah in an unprovoked attack that, according to the US military, killed two civilians. The US soldiers also set fire to a truckload of sheep in the incident, killing all of the animals.

After the Samawah shooting, Muthanna Gov. Ahmed Marzouq said he couldn't understand the behavior of the U.S. forces who, he said, acted inhumanely in firing on motorists who posed no threat and setting the truck of sheep ablaze. He said the troops had entered without notifying local officials, violating protocols laid down when the southern province took over responsibility for its own security in July 2006.

In Baqubah... three U.S. soldiers were killed Sunday in an assault involving a suicide vest, the military said.

In another incident, a roadside bomb in Baqubah killed three children.

In Baghdad, a car bomb killed 10 bystanders.

Ø Contrast this information with an excerpt from today's delusional resignation letter from White House Homeland Security Adviser Fran Townsend to the president:

In 1937, the playwright Maxwell Anderson wrote of President George Washington: There are some men who lift the age they inhabit, till all men walk on higher ground in their lifetime.
Mr. President, you are such man.

How would Jesus divvy up New Media revenue?

2007-11-17T12:06:00.000-08:00

Confirming clichés about the nuttiness of Tinseltown long suspected valid, the San Jose Mercury News has an AP story about a Christian group in Hollywood praying for divine intervention in the writers strike.

"We pray that both groups would feel your supernatural guidance to stop blaming and posturing and start peacefully listening and negotiating," prayed Geriann McIntosh, senior vice president of administration for Warner Bros. Television. "We pray that you keep everyone that is affected by the strike in your loving care."

The Hollywood Prayer Network is a group of more than 5,000 Christians who pray for celebrities and provides "mentors" for struggling actors. It's an effort to reform what many Christian believers view as an unholy Hollywood culture.

Do they know Highway to Heaven has been canceled?

Hollywood conservatives are pussies

2007-11-16T13:38:00.000-08:00

Truthdig points to an article in the conservative Washington Times about the unwillingness of certain Big Stars to talk about their political leanings.

It seems like Kevin Costner, Mel Gibson, Terry Hatcher, Adam Sandler, Kelsey Grammar and Bo Derek, among others, will not comment on their support for Republican presidential candidates. Hatcher even went so far as to forward an interview request on the subject to her lawyers.

While Democrats enjoy very public support from Hollywood's top actors and musicians, who often hold lavish events for their favorite candidates, Republican supporters in Hollywood try hard to keep their political views quiet.
"They learn very quickly, if they know what's good for them, to donate to the Democratic Party," said Andrew Breitbart, [conservative] co-author of "Hollywood, Interrupted." "If they were to donate to the Republican Party, they would be exposed to career-ending ridicule, period."
One high-profile celebrity, when asked about her political views, even had her lawyers declare “our client’s rights of privacy and other legally protectable intangible rights” and warn that she should not be labeled a Republican.

Stories like this keep me smiling for days.

Don't mess with Thanksgiving

2007-11-16T12:11:00.000-08:00

Ø Turducken? Thunderbolt Fan is anything but a shopping guide... usually. But sometimes I just have to mention an aspect of consumer culture lest I be branded a communist, not that it's such a bad thing. But then again , an item like Turducken strikes at the heart of an iconic staple that will grace the majority of dinner tables next Thursday, so maybe I do harbor latent radical tendencies for overthrowing the government, at least until Hillary and Bill are running things again.

According to Uncrate,

For those not in the know when it comes to edible fowl, the Turducken is a holiday masterpiece that includes a semi-boneless turkey stuffed with a deboned chicken that's stuffed with a deboned duck breast. Triple-bird-alicious.

Ø One note of interest regarding the Los Angeles Times: Having lost their recent War on Halloween and just beginning to pick up the cudgel and go after Christmas, they are allowing time for a love-fest for Thanksgiving. Yeah, it's a little bit like being in high school again with the singling out of what's-cool-what's-not-cool aspect of those thankfully distant years; but at least their taking a break from the holiday whining.

Ø Intelligentsia cafe in Silver Lake had a party last night for their Esmerelda coffee, an artisanal coffee from Panama that they recently bought at auction for something like $130 per pound. (Yeah, I know, a party for expensive coffee; but it was fun.) They were passing out tastes (it tasted like coffee!) but also had wine and hors d'oeuvres on hand for the crowd that turned out. Doug Zell, Mr. Intelligentsia, was on hand and talked about the eco-fair trade practices of his company and the coffee they sell.

Ø Was it just me or did last night's Democratic presidential candidates debate from Las Vegas seem like a love-fest (that hyphenate again) compared to the last one in Philadelphia? For all of the attempts at jabbing at one another, candidates were quick to emphasize a sense of unity among them.

Hillary's responses started out like regular answers but often finished as mini-campaign speeches in stentorian tones to cheers from the audience. The other candidates did their best to measure up to her, but it was a lost cause. She's unstoppable and Republicans must be quaking in their jackboots.

And is Joe Biden even really running? He came off like a guy just along for the ride and the media exposure. He could bring the teeth-bleaching down a notch.

The recent caving by Clinton on allowing undocumented workers to get driver licenses was a disappointment. The issue is still being driven by bigotry and fear-mongering over terrorism; rather than trying to find real answers to the problem of illegal immigration.

Conservatives' have manufactured near-hysteria over the issue; it speaks to their talent for finding resonant cultural bogeymen. They understand the ignorance of Americans and don't hesitate to exploit it, rather than dispel it. (You could argue that liberalism is about dispelling ignorance, and conservatism is about emboldening and institutionalizing it.) It worked for same-sex marriage and falsely justifying the oil war, so why not apply it to a defenseless portion of the population with different skin coloring? One would hope the public would start seeing through the tactic.

To the OMB: A theological position against homosexuality is institutionalized bigotry.

2007-11-15T12:28:00.000-08:00

The lead editorial in today’s LA Times rightly champions the recent US House bill outlawing discrimination based on sexual orientation for employment while noting the uncertainty it faces. Not surpassing the veto-proof threshold in the House and with an uncertain future in the Senate where a threatened filibuster looms, the bill was also criticized on several points by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) in what the Times called a “spurious” manner, in one case raising religious objections as an excuse to oppose the legislation.

What’s odd is that the bill even included a bill exempting religious schools, obviously a politically pragmatic concession to anti-gay religious conservatives.

The agency also nitpicked the language of an exemption for religious schools with a theological position against homosexuality.

With long-mounting evidence of the politicizing by conservatives of areas of government once deemed non-partisan, such as the Departments of Justice and Education, just to name two, as well as yesterday’s revelation of the State Dept. inspector general’s ties to the Blackwater security contractors firm accused for the wrongful deaths of 17 Iraqi civilians and his alleged attempts to politically shield the administration from the fall out, the argument that behind-the-scenes political machinations of those opposed to gay rights extends to the OMB seems sadly plausible.

Even though a Times front page article today declares that religious conservatives’ influence is shrinking in the GOP, at least on the level of party-affiliated preachers, their presence at top levels in government is undeniable. Their power to improperly steer policy befitting their cultural-political views is a reality evident in such instances as Dept. of Education chief Margaret Spelling’s order that a PBS children’s program positively depicting a gay character not be broadcast; and of course the Dept. of Justice’s politically motivated actions targeting district attorneys who weren’t doing the administration’s bidding under former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, which forced him to resign.

That the OMB has become infected with a similar strain of influence is all too familiarly disheartening.

How will returning vets scenario play in California?

2007-11-14T19:57:00.000-08:00

I recently wrote about the Marlboro Marine two-parter that ran in the LA Times on Sunday and Monday. It told the story of James Blake Miller, a 22-year-old Marine suffering with post-traumatic stress disorder after seeing combat in Iraq.

Some experts predict 30% of returning soldiers who have seen combat will suffer from PTSD.

Now, AP (via Santa Barbara News-Press) is running a story about a soldier arrested today in Watertown, NY, for going AWOL because the military's mental health facility at Fort Drum couldn't provide proper care for him in his condition.

At a news conference hours before his arrest, Sgt. Brad Gaskins said he left the base in August 2006 because the Army wasn't providing effective treatment after he was diagnosed with PTSD and severe depression.

''They just don't have the resources to handle it, but that's not my fault,'' Gaskins said.

At the time, the Fort Drum mental health facility had a staff of a dozen caring for approximately 17,000 troops, Ensign [his attorney] said.

Gaskins said he hasn't been able to get a job because of his PTSD, and that he and his wife have separated. He said he has only supervised visitation rights with his two children.

With the majority of military personnel deaths in the Iraq war coming from California, and most of them from the Los Angeles area, it's a safe guess that there are more soldiers serving in Iraq from this state and metropolitan area than from any other area in the country.

Will California and the federal government rise to the Herculean task of providing for our returning soldiers? It looks like a disaster in the making.

In a separate article, AP reported on homeless veterans.

Veterans make up one in four homeless people in the United States, though they are only 11 percent of the general adult population, according to a report to be released [last] Thursday.

Younger veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan are trickling into shelters and soup kitchens seeking services, treatment or help with finding a job.

Some advocates say the early presence of veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan at shelters does not bode well for the future. It took roughly a decade for the lives of Vietnam veterans to unravel to the point that they started showing up among the homeless. Advocates worry that intense and repeated deployments leave newer veterans particularly vulnerable.

"We're going to be having a tsunami of them eventually because the mental health toll from this war is enormous," said Daniel Tooth, director of veterans affairs for Lancaster County, PA.

Cloning the Abbey; Intelligentsia, the Un-Starbucks; More on rising gas prices

2007-11-14T12:11:00.000-08:00

Ø Out magazine's December issue has an article about Abbey-owner David Cooley's efforts to find locations around the US to build a "chain" of Abbeys, a term that riles him. Technically, the string of gay bars won't be franchises but wholly owned by his partnership with Sam Nazarian's SBE Entertainment Group, which is speculated to have paid $20 million to Cooley for a 75% stake in the business. But semantics are important to him.

"This is not T.G.I. Friday's," he sniffs... Cooley prefers to describe his current project as "taking the Abbey national" or "replicating the soul of the Abbey."

Right. He's had mixed results so far in cities like New York, San Francisco, San Diego, Miami and Atlanta. The first of the cloned souls is planned to open in Chicago sometime next year.

According to the article, the "newly ambiguous" Abbey (in their minds anyway) seems to be dancing around the option of partially shedding its "gay" image.

Cooley believes the Abbey, as a national brand, could reinvigorate gay nightlife-- and his strategy for doing so appears to involve toning down the avowedly gay part of that experience. But how straight-acting does gay nightlife need to be in order to survive?

Sam Nazarian says,

I think the Abbey is very,very important to the gay community in our city. But I think the Abbey is not just a gay bar. Twenty to 30% of the clientele is non-gay, and we try to offer the best service to everyone who walks in our door.

To me, that sort of posturing is past its shelf-life. It's not a stretch to imagine a national chain of gay bars as the right wing continues to loses its battle against gay rights due to the growing numbers in the current and future generations having grown up in a culture that accepts sexual orientation as just another facet of identity.

Ø Speaking of chains, Intelligentsia, the Chicago-based coffee company, opened their first cafe outside of the windy city at Sunset Junction in August.

Waiting in line one of the first times I went and unaware of their Chicago roots, I remarked to a friend, as I was noting the expensive-looking, high-design aesthetic of the place, that I smelled corporate money mixed in with the aroma of freshly roasted coffee. I postulated that maybe it was owned by Starbucks with the intent of marketing premium-priced coffee to those who consider themselves too cool for the Seattle stalwart.

Grasping for a reason to chat up the cute barista, I told him my theory. His sexy smile faded to a look of concern that I would think such erroneous thoughts about the place. He told me about Doug Zell, the owner, and his straight-up eco-politics, adding that he was the nicest guy he ever worked for.

A quick perusal of their web site confirmed his story. But the REALLY important thing is how good the coffee is. Even if you're ordering regular coffee, it's ground and brewed to order, and strong enough even for me. They also sell Chemex coffee makers.

Ø The LA Times had a front page article about soon-skyrocketing gas prices and an opinion piece about the merger of Zipcar and Flexcar.

The first points out that gas prices still aren't reflecting the 40+% price-rise for crude oil since August. And they soon will.

Analysts warn that gasoline prices soon will rise by as much as 20 cents a gallon -- which would put California's average at nearly $3.50. And it's not just gasoline. High oil costs are trickling through the economy, pushing up the price of food, airline flights and cruises as well as retail prices for a host of products derived from crude oil and its byproducts.

The opinion article is about the car-sharing revolution gathering steam in other more walkable cities. Fellow car-prisoners of Los Angeles, wrap your brains around this:

Car-sharing, however, offers a new and seductive form of freedom, one based on the refusal of direct ownership and the liability that entails. The key to the Zip-Flex business model is that the actual car is not all that important. It is really just a means to an end. It's a transportation appliance, a node in a system made possible by the Internet.

Understandably, Zipcar and Flexcar have found the most success in places where walking is still an important feature of the transportation grid -- Washington, Boston, San Francisco and university towns such as Ann Arbor, Mich.

All of those years I lived in NYC without a car have taken on a new luster.

Rising gas price, jailed bloggers, etc.

2007-11-13T20:42:00.000-08:00

Ø KPCC's Larry Mantle did a segment this morning on Air Talk about dropping the names of southern California freeways and exclusively using numbers in their place. The sentiments were most impassioned on the side of keeping the names, even in light of the initially confusing nature of their application. Callers seemed to like the idea of going with numbers if they were relative newcomers to the area.

Ø If you think gas is expensive now, just wait. The LA Times opinion page has a piece about Venezuala President Hugo Chavez's imminent ability to "tip the world into a recession" on Dec. 2nd, the date of that country's next election.

On that day, if Venezuelan citizens pass the dozens of constitutional amendments on the ballot, Chavez will essentially be granted dictatorial powers -- an elected strongman reminiscent of Spain's Franco, Italy's Mussolini and Orwell's Big Brother. The day could easily deteriorate into one of violence, martial law and suspension of oil production, the latter calculated to inflict maximum damage on the U.S. economy.

Ø Is the media tiring of the presidential campaign already? Either that or Huffington Post is spreading it a little too thinly for my tastes with their obsession over whether the Clinton campaign forgot to tip an Iowa waitress recently. Sam Stein writes about it to the exclusion of mentioning any real issues in her campaign. He interviews the waitress and she tells him much the same thing but it doesn't stop him from pushing her for details about the meaningless episode. Priorities, people...

Don't get me wrong, I read their political coverage everyday; I just miss when it was only about politics and didn't even mention celeb gossip crap (Olbermann, this applies to you too.) Now I feel a bit assaulted by how the mindless glitz is moving more to the top center, crowding out the real news.

Do people who read HuffPo really care that an actor paid a lot of money for a painting? Does that "story" really deserve to be tucked between one about the Guiliani-Kerik story and it's developing News Corp angle and another about Blackwater?

Oh well, at least they took the TMZ link off the front page. Still, almost the entire right column is flooded with mindless drivel.

A feed from Al Jazeera would be a worthy addition to the HuffPo home page, putting a different POV of the world in front of their readers instead of distracting them with the latest celeb antics.

Ø Speaking of Al Jazeera, it's got a story about Yahoo's undisclosed settlement with the families of jailed dissidents in China. The California-based internet company has agreed to pay their legal fees.

A statement released by the World Organisation for Human Rights (WOHR) USA said Yahoo had decided to settle the case following fierce criticism at a US congressional hearing last week.

Shi Tao, a business journalist, and Wang Xiaoning, a pro-democracy blogger, are serving jail sentences of 10 year each.

According to their families' lawsuit, which was backed by WOHR, their imprisonment was a direct result of information provided by Yahoo to Chinese authorities.

Yahoo has previously defended its actions, saying it had to comply with Chinese laws in order to operate in the country.

Shi was jailed in 2004 for divulging state secrets after he forwarded a Chinese government order forbidding journalists from marking the anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown.

Police identified him using information provided by Yahoo.

Wang was jailed two years earlier after he was linked to emails and political essays posted online via information provided by Yahoo.

Think about that the next time you check your email on Yahoo or look at photos on Flickr.

Ø The Jim Lehrer News Hour is doing a series of reports this week on Las Vegas' rising profile in national politics and it's still-booming growth (5,000 new residents every month.) It's a big union town due to the casinos and hotel workers presence, along with a large and growing Latino population, and both major parties are competing for their votes.

Veterans Day redux

2007-11-12T11:37:00.000-08:00

Ø Yesterday was Veterans Day. It's a personally important holiday for me because I have a lot of family members who have served or are currently serving in the military. I have two great uncles who were in combat in Europe during WWII, a cousin who fought in Korea and two cousins in Iraq now.

My father wasn't drafted but enlisted in the Army Air Corps. and trained as a nose-gunner, the soldier who sits in the front tip of a plane and fires the massive gun at targets. He narrowly missed being sent to combat because WWII ended just as he was being given orders to ship out.

My family, while being staunchly Democratic politically, has always been supportive of the military. Back when there was draft, the general population had empathy for those who were called to or chose to serve.

Today, the public numbs itself out with celebrity gossip and the like. The local Los Angeles blogs, a group that could stand to be more politically-minded, have mostly paid lip service to the holiday if they mention it at all.* It seems like they mean well, but plainly their hearts aren't in it; a reflection of their readers, I suppose. A couple of posts have mentioned the Veterans Day Monday federal holiday as a reason to celebrate the light traffic, bringing life to the Lala Land clichés many blanch at hearing from former New Yorkers like me.

It would be nice, noble even, if the local bloggers, since they have the platform, took the lead in raising awareness about the war. I'll even give them an angle: There have been more military personnel deaths in the war in Iraq from California than any other state in the union.

Ø The Los Angeles Times has a powerfully moving two-part series that ran yesterday and today about the "Marlboro Marine." It tells the story of Blake Miller, a 20-year-old Marine who fought in the bloody battle of Fallouja, Iraq, in November 2004. After being photographed by Luis Sinco, an embedded Times staff photographer, the picture was picked up by 150 newspapers the next day, inspiring news stories that turned the young soldier into a celebrity.

People who saw the photograph sent him care packages; the president sent cigars and candy.

A major general made a special trip to see him, shook his hand and told him "We can have you home tomorrow" because "nobody wanted to see him wounded or dead." He balked at leaving his buddies behind in combat and stayed. Fourteen months later he was kicked out of the Marines for having post-traumatic stress disorder.

He moved back to his native Kentucky and married his girlfriend, only to separate from her ten days later and file for divorce as symptoms of PTSD escalated.

Sinco, feeling responsible for catapulting Miller into becoming a temporarily mythic figure and all that it led to, spent the following two years flying back and forth between LA and Kentucky to help Miller get treatment, even driving him to Connecticut to enroll in a Veterans Administration program for PTSD sufferers.

It's been a rough road for Blake Miller, and he's not out of the woods yet. He is not alone in his harrowing condition. As Sinco notes in the article,

Some experts estimate that 30% of the troops who have seen combat in Iraq will suffer from PTSD.

*LA blogs that mentioned Veterans Day: LAist and Metroblogging LA; those that didn't: LA Observed and Losanjealous.

A tip for striking writers

2007-11-09T21:32:00.001-08:00

All signs indicate this is going to be a long strike for the WGA, so at some point lower-echelon writers may be forced to look for alternate sources of income if they haven't been socking enough money away into savings.

I realize a meager $2500 per week (starting pay for an entry-level TV writer) is not very much money-- okay, I don't realize that. But I'm trying to be helpful.

If financially vulnerable writers are loathe to flipping burgers or waiting on network executives at the Ivy to sustain themselves during the strike, I've got a suggestion: Porn.

Think about it; what's your biggest complaint about porn? Some of you probably said, "Not enough money shots, " or "Better camera angles on the money shots," or even "Better camera angles on money shots and more of them,"-- well, fine, I'll pass those suggestions along.

I'm talking about better scripts. Strike-idled writers could work under the table (figuratively) using assumed names to punch up, or maybe a better term is fluff, the scripts, applying their talent to an area of porn much in need of their expertise. There's only one place in porn that I want wood and it's not in the dialogue.

Imagine the possibilities if a Jon Robin Baitz, say, or an Alan Ball were to write porn. Dysfunctional families populated with self-absorbed, hot, well-lit characters navigate choppy emotional waters trying to find ways to connect with each other. Just like regular TV, except now they have a new way to connect and the climax could even include, well, a climax.

I realize writing for porn may not give the same satisfaction as learning to appreciate the little things, like the difference between medium-rare and medium-well; and it may not have the dignity of making an honest dollar by refilling Jeff Zucker's coffee; but at some point your hands are going to start cramping up from waving that picket sign.

An article on CNN.com in February talked about how hedge fund managers are rushing to the brave new frontier of adult entertainment, mentioning one respected investor "who's been going after companies he sees as ripe for turbocharged growth." It sounds like they're thinking about it in the appropriate terms, and I may have enjoyed reading that a bit too much.

Also, let me point out, the AVN Awards (dubbed the Oscars of porn) held annually in Las Vegas have become more star-studded with each passing year. They've even been called by one news outlet "the only exciting awards show," although that could have more than one meaning.

Hollywood movies took in almost $9.5 billion in theaters in 2006 while the adult entertainment industry made $12 billion. Considering those numbers, along with HBO's new, not-so-soft core trial balloon, Tell Me You Love Me, finishing up it's first season tonight, who knows where audiences' tastes and television is headed? If possibly big, carnal changes are coming to TV programming in the near future, surreptitiously boning up on a new genre during the strike might be worth considering.

And have you ever heard about a strike in the adult entertainment industry?

LA Times highlights...

2007-11-08T12:25:00.000-08:00

My biased report on stand-outs from today's LA Times. Odd that the war in Iraq doesn't merit mentioning until page five...

Ø Sticky fingers at the Reagan Library - More than 80,000 items have likely either been lost or pilfered by employees due to a "near universal" security breakdown at the Simi Valley institution. The problem stems from understaffing due to insufficient funding and isn't confined to just the Reagan facility but to many, if not most, presidential libraries.

But, investigators said, they encountered the most serious problems at the Reagan library, a finding that may mortify fans of the late president, who often inveighed against government inefficiency.

National Archives spokeswoman Susan Cooper said the agency welcomed the audit and was taking its findings very seriously. Part of the problem, she said, is that presidential libraries originally did not have the same strict preservation guidelines used by most museums. That has been corrected, she said, but funding for the libraries is still an issue.

Ø Patt Morrison has a dream - She looks back to TV programming in the wake of the 153-day strike by the WGA in 1960.

...Old movies... "Wrecks Galore on Destruction Derby," and on one desperate evening, two channels ran simultaneous previews of the Ice Capades.

And yet strike-time prime time was also chockablock with travelogues, like a journey to Shakespeare's London, and an adventure documentary by Charles Darwin's great-grandson. Channel 4 aired "Startime," a remarkable hourlong "anthology" series that mixed documentaries, dramas and comedy. It aired an episode during the strike with Richard Nixon, John F. Kennedy and Adlai Stevenson telling Americans why they should vote.

And then she offers suggestions for the current strike like Paddy Chayevsky's Marty, Jack Parr, Steve Allen...

Even the comparatively lowbrow comic black-and-white offerings like "Your Show of Shows" and "Burns and Allen" come off like Aristophanes against contemporary claptrap like "Viva Laughlin" and "America's Next Top Model."

Viewers in the ideal TV demographic delight in the cool, retro, smart TV fare... They blog about it, Facebook about it, reddit and Digg it.

TV studios... pander to this audience's wishes. Writers who had powered down their gifts to produce brainless fare for TV's recent race to the bottom suddenly find themselves begged to write smart.

Alas, dream on, Patt.

Ø Yahoo, Google, Microsoft and Cisco help China jail dissidents - Talk about disgusting, outrageous and deplorable actions, Peter Navarro writes a column about companies assisting China's totalitarian regime in squelching pro-democracy content on the internet.

Yahoo Inc. helped send a reporter to prison by revealing his identity to the Chinese government. Cisco Systems Inc. helps send thousands of Chinese dissidents to prison by selling sophisticated Internet surveillance technology to China.

Skype, an EBay Inc. subsidiary, helps the Chinese government monitor and censor text messaging. Microsoft Corp. likewise is a willing conscript in China's Internet policing army, as Bill Gates' minions regularly cleanse the Chinese blogosphere. Google Inc.'s brainiacs, meanwhile, have built a special Chinese version of their powerful search engine to filter out things as diverse as the BBC, freeing Tibet and that four-letter word in China -- democracy.

Ø Jennifer Delson writes about Santa Ana teenagers rediscovering son jarocho, a 400-year-old Mexican music genre that "blends indigenous, African and Spanish styles into foot-stomping, hand-clapping songs often with ad-libbed lyrics." Why isn't this in the Calendar section? Answer: Because they don't have a publicist.

Five years ago, several Santa Ana High School students formed the band Son del Centro after becoming intrigued by a genre that even their immigrant parents knew little about.

Since then, Son del Centro has become one of a handful of bands in Southern California to specialize in the son jarocho style, giving the musicians a part in preserving a Mexican tradition that has struggled to survive outside the rural sections of Veracruz.

"We really like playing the music, but for us, it's also about activism, educating people about our culture. It really is a bond between us," said Jesus Gutierrez, an engineer who began performing with the band because he wanted to be part of community activism.

Juan Ruiz, 21, a student at Cal Poly Pomona, recently learned to play the jarana at the suggestion of a friend.

"I just never stopped coming," he said. "I fell in love with the whole package. It was the music, a lost art form and a community."

Ø The Guide thinks there's something "highbrow" about Las Vegas. No, really. They actually think there are things like highbrow and lowbrow versions of Elvis impersonators, casinos, ad hoc wedding chapels and soft-core bump-and-grind shows, along with regular shows, restaurants, nightclubs, shopping, etc.

About the only thing Vegas has failed at is making the city a family destination... "People want an adult town." Well, they've got it, in both its traditional permutations: high (expensive, often tasteful) and low (relatively cheap, often entertainingly tasteless). Whether you're on the glitzy Strip or Fremont Street, with its old-school patina of seediness, you will find something to engage your imagination.

Agreed (except for the "often tasteful" part,) but high-cost is not the same as highbrow. They need to spend a week in New York and then revisit this subject, maybe celebrate LV for the enjoyably lowbrow spectacle that it is, no matter how much you're spending.

Radiohead download figures begin to emerge

2007-11-07T00:09:00.000-08:00

Sixty-two percent of the people who downloaded the new pay-what-you-like album from Radiohead, In Rainbows, in October paid nothing at all, including one Ann Powers, chief music critic of the Los Angeles Times, who said in an article in the paper that she didn’t have the credit card needed for the transaction.

I read her account about downloading it for free in the print edition but it seems to have disappeared from the LA Times site. Did someone at LAT, the Recording Industry Assn. of America or Radiohead's management have a problem with Powers making this information public?

An admirer of Powers’ writing since her days at the Village Voice and later the New York Times, I was a little surprised to read the story, thinking that it seemed like a questionable (although plainly legal) action for her to publicly disclose, given her stature and also in light of the story running the same week about Minneapolis single mom Jammie Thomas being sued $222,000 for "illegal file-sharing" by the RIAA.

It didn't help that Powers also wrote a story ridiculing Thomas' music tastes.

In all fairness, in the account I read, Powers said she had fully intended to pay for the download until she discovered she didn't have the appropriate card.

Anyway, paidcontent.co.uk had the figures on Monday and also the cryptic statement about “an unattributed source… saying 1.2 million albums had been shifted.”

The first concrete analysis of Radiohead’s innovative pay-what-you-like plan for latest album In Rainbows shows thirty-eight percent of those who downloaded the title indeed chose to pay something, while 62 percent kept their change in their pocket.

The average price paid was $6 (£2.88) on a globalised basis but Americans were more generous, coughing up $8.05 (£3.87) - factor in the freeloaders, however, and it’s more like an average $2.26 (£1.08) on a worldwide basis and $3.23 (£1.55) from Americans. The most common amount offered was below $4 (£1.92), but 12 percent were willing to pay between $8 (£3.84) and $12 (£5.77), around the typical cost of an album from iTunes.

Late Morning Glow

2007-11-06T09:31:00.000-08:00

ø Plume-Noire, the LA-based English/French web magazine, is blogging the AFI Film Festival, employing their decidedly non-Hollywood take on the usual shenanigans.

If [it] was up to me I would classify Southland Tales as Torture Porn, for how painful this 140mn film was to me – fortunately I was able to sleep through parts of that mess, courtesy of the Absolut bar on the rooftop.

ø Hollywood Joe has a post about bold-face names spotted on the WGA picket lines.

The writers strike already has some big-name support with Julia Louis-Dreyfuss, America Ferrera, Marg Helgenberg and Tina Fey (also a writer on "30 Rock") joining writers on the picket lines Monday in a show of solidarity. Jay Leno brought Krispy Kreme donuts to the writers outside NBC while William Baldwin served coffee outside Paramount studios.

ø Patrick Goldstein bemoans the art-house slump in today's LA Times. Of course, this being LA, he's not talking about the artistic qualities of recent releases, but (you guessed it) the box office numbers. He claims there are just too many good shows on TV now anyway, so why not skip the cinema and stay in to catch, say, Pushing Daisies or The Closer. And whatever you do, don't watch anything icky like the news or PBS.

These new series not only have the kind of alternative vibe you get from indie movies, but they also seem more in sync with the mood of the country than the bleak dramas tanking in the theaters. At a time when many Americans are depressed about the horror of Iraq, brooding over the economy and worried about America's place in the world, they seem less eager to embrace movies that offer more grim tidings.

ø Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa was asked blunt questions by LA Times editorial pages editor Jim Newsome on LA36's Zócalo recently. (I caught it last night but it can be streamed on their site.) It was a one-hour interview (and Q & A with audience members) with the salacious questions first before moving onto the struggling LAUSD, traffic congestion and other quality-of-life issues. Newsome didn't hold back or play nice and Villaraigosa, ever the smooth politician, was confident and held his ground when giving what could have been uncomfortable answers for others. The mayor even managed to take a few swipes at the troubled LA Times, saying it was "a paper that's losing its soul and doesn't know that it's in LA."

ø Gridskipper has begrudgingly supplied a limited and poorly researched map of Pasadena bars, all along or just off a three-block stretch of Colorado Blvd. Then they go on to confuse it with the east side of LA.

Cine Sin Fin: 13th Annual East LA Chicano Film Festival

2007-11-06T02:25:00.000-08:00

Various venues on the east side of LA, including Echo Park Film Center and Pico House at Placita Olvera, will be presenting over 40 films for Cine Sin Fin, the 13th Annual East Los Angeles Chicano Film Festival, running November 5 - 13.

A La Brava, a non-profit organization, started the film festival in 1995 as a way of fostering artistic achievement and cross-cultural understanding:

At the time, there were few, if any, venues available for Chicanas/os to showcase their film making talent. The film industry was not receptive to Chicano filmmakers and the few films which were being produced for the mainstream market usually depicted our community life as broken and undesirable. Chicano characters rarely amounted to more than thieves or gangsters. There were many other stories about the Chicano community which needed to be told.

A complete list of films, including workshops and award ceremonies, is available on their website.

fauxreel's $300 Lobotomy

2007-11-06T01:53:00.000-08:00

Writers sounded the alarm about the radical right in the '30s and '40s

2007-11-05T20:06:00.000-08:00

As the WGA digs in for who knows how long, a recent article by Ed Rampell at Truthdig.com brings to light that this year marks the 60th anniversary of the Hollywood Blacklist and the House Unamerican Activities Committee's efforts to intimidate "left leaning La-La Land."

In the 1930s and'40s, it was the guild unions in Hollywood that initiated efforts to gain rights and protections for their members. In addition, writers, directors and actors were attempting through their work to sound the alarm about the growing fascist tendencies of the Republican Party and its politically motivated efforts to scare the American public into thinking a "red menace" actually existed and that the Communist Party was plotting to overthrow the U.S. government. Sound familiar?

Talking pictures also spurred the creation of Hollywood’s Left. Unlike silent films, the talkies needed dialogue writers, so studios recruited playwrights from Broadway, including radicals such as John Howard Lawson and Clifford Odets. They “brought to Hollywood the dissatisfaction of Dramatists Guild enlightenment and union tradition,” Nancy Lynn Schwartz wrote in “The Hollywood Writers Wars.” As a playwright, it troubled Lawson that screenwriters had fewer rights and didn’t receive appropriate credits.

(snip)

The Hollywood Left brought the war for social and economic justice home to the movie colony. Lester Cole called writers “the niggers of the studio system,” grousing that “1 percent of what American movie-goers pay for their entertainment is allocated to ... screenplays.”

(snip)

“We organized the guilds and unions—they have all these benefits we fought for—and went out on strike for the medical, pensions and what young people today take for granted,” noted Norma Barzman, who wrote “The Red and the Blacklist: The Intimate Memoir of a Hollywood Expatriate.” The ex-Communist added, “During the Roosevelt years, the CP was responsible for Social Security, unemployment insurance legislation. ... We got the teenage Latinos off for the Sleepy Lagoon murder [in L.A.]. ... We fought racism against the Japanese [and other minorities]. ... "

Photo: Dalton Trumbo leaves the HUAC witness stand after refusing to answer questions, saying, "This is the beginning of an American concentration camp."

Regarding the writers strike...

2007-11-05T18:53:00.000-08:00

At Antebellum Gallery's opening for Dia de los Muertos ¡Erotica¡ on Friday, I had an interesting chat with a friend who has been writing sitcoms for the past fifteen years. He was bemoaning the bad faith on the part of the producers, of course, and their insistence that making shows viewable on the internet constituted "promotion" and therefore should not pay any royalties to writers, even though money is being made from advertising inserted into that format.

I was hoping to move him onto a happier topic, or at least some of the free mezcal that was flowing in the garden behind the gallery, so when he mentioned working on the show Two of a Kind with the Olsen twins when they were in their early teens I asked him about working with them.

He said, "You know, one of them was really nice and she was actually very funny."

"Which one?" I asked.

He paused, and then said, "I don't remember."

Help drive a stake through the heart of a record label

2007-11-05T18:38:00.000-08:00

With Radiohead the highest profile band lately to wreak havoc with the major labels by not relying on them for distribution, it could be turning into a feeding frenzy.

Uncrate.com tipped me off to a free download of a new album called The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of Niggy Tardust from hip-hop artist Saul Williams, courtesy of Nine Inch Nails überlord Trent Reznor. It's kinda great.

Described by Williams as "ghetto gothic... hard-core dance," the album is available for free in 192kbps MP3 format or for $5 in 320kbps MP3 or lossless FLAC format.

Ann Coulter, the board game

2007-11-05T17:55:00.000-08:00

Joel Stein had a funny column in Friday's LA Times wherein he got every lefty's favorite harpy to supply a list of "adjectives, verbs and European cities" for an Ann Coulter Mad Libs™ that he came up with.

To his imperfect delight,

She also gave the essay... that little something extra that only she can provide. (For "male Democrat" she filled in "Hillary Clinton," for instance.)

I guess all of those "Man Coulter" cracks drove her to that one.

Halloween, we hardly knew ye

2007-11-05T11:21:00.000-08:00

A holiday rises from the dead for me...

Halloween was a holiday I had become weary of from my many years of living in the thick of it in NYC's West Village. Hell, everyday was Halloween on Christopher St. It's not so much that I didn't appreciate the effort and ingenuity of the drag in which people garbed themselves as a way of life, and I don't mean "drag" in the usual sense.

I'm talking about it in the way that k.d. lang alluded to when, years ago, she solemnly (and pretentiously, I first thought, but no longer) pronounced, "Clothing is just something we drape on our souls." Our costumes of who or what we see ourselves as- you know: fashion, or style- have always been a source of fascination for me, and I know I'm not alone in that respect. There's a type of person who enjoys endulging in layman's cultural anthropology. That would be me.

The LA costume is very different from the NYC costume, as is so much of the peculiarities of place that distinguish the two cultural behemoths separated by almost three thousand miles and, sometimes it seems, a universe of sensibilities. One person's Juicy is another's Jil Sanders.

LA Halloween benefits from it's proximity to Dia de los Muertos. The two holidays bleed into each other and create several days of observation.

For me, it kicked off the preceding weekend with Hollywood Forever Cemetery's Dia de los Muertos event; gained momentum with Festival de la Gente (and the Dia de los Muertos car show) in Boyle Heights; and then sprinted through Halloween as a night of pure lunacy at the Mayan Theater in downtown LA for Lucha VaVoom; followed with a relaxed jog through Dia de los Muertos as the victory lap.

So when I signed on with David Markland (of blogging.la) to blog for CreepyLA.com, I saw it as an opportunity to dig under LA's surface, which is thicker than the earth's crust in some spots and as thin a cellophane in others. But it's always there...

It's all Creepy all the time...

2007-10-05T00:29:00.000-07:00

Things are going well at Creepy LA, the new site about Halloween in Los Angeles. Our traffic is up more everyday as other bigger sites discover what we're doing and link to us.

I'll be going to Shriekfest, a festival devoted to indie horror films, at Raleigh Studios this weekend, so look for a post on Creepy about that early next week. Plus some fairly under-reported news about a certain highly anticipated new series coming to premium cable.

And still more, all in the name of Halloween...

As a reminder, I'm posting at Creepy LA under the name It Came from New York.

Creepy LA

2007-09-19T14:29:00.001-07:00

I've spent the last week posting to a new LA-focused Halloween blog called Creepy. David Markland at Metroblogging LA is captain of the ship, which set sail this past Monday.

We'll be covering all manner of Halloween hi-jinks in the Los Angeles area: events, movie screenings, must-have items for the season, yard haunts, interviews with notable Angelenos about their traditions, habits and fetishes as they pertain to the matter at hand... and more. We're adding to the site throughout the day, so check it often to see what we've found.

I'll be posting under the name, "It Came from New York." Boo.

Effete Campaign Chronicals 2

2007-09-12T12:04:00.000-07:00

I can't improve on Chris Matthews on Hardball yesterday:

It’s unimaginable that Petraeus came before the Senate and spoke. Imagine what this is going to sound like on Armed Services Radio tonight and television when they watch the commander say they don’t know whether they’re making America safer or not.

And he’s asking them to go into battle every day. It’s maddeningly stupid. And this president seems to be hiding behind a guy he gave the orders to and then is expecting him to defend the policy, and he admits it’s beyond his pay level to defend the policy.

We're Going Mars!

2007-09-12T10:37:00.000-07:00

The recent joint study by UCLA and NYU suggesting that liberals are more adaptable thinkers than conservatives only illustrates what is apparent.

To explain, a test was performed on subjects who identified themselves as either liberal or conservative. They were then given a test wherein they were instructed to tap on a keyboard when an M appeared on a computer screen but to refrain from tapping when a W appeared. Test subjects were also monitored during the test by an electroencephalograph which showed liberals had higher levels of brain activity than conservatives. Not a big surprise.

Conservatives mistakenly tapped more often than liberals when the W appeared, leading researches to a conclusion that "provided an elegant demonstration that individual differences on a conservative-liberal dimension are strongly related to brain activity." It also leaves one to ponder if, in 2003, conservatives thought the president was pushing the US into going to Mars, rather than going to war.

"I read the news today, oh boy..."

2007-09-08T10:41:00.000-07:00

Schwarzenegger thinks the whole time he's been governor he's really only been playing one in a movie .

Pope visits Holocaust memorial in Austria, heads straight to gift shop. Oh, and then he mentions that Europe without Christianity would be, like, a total drag.

Morrissey starts Christmas at the Palladium run early this year.

New LA Times column to explain on a regular basis why Angelenos are gluttons for punishment. No mention of low standards and cold, dark hearts.

Marriage is for Fags! GLAAD communications director "carefully" outs himself as straight; family shamed.

Surprise! Lucinda Williams is neurotic, refuses to leave El Rey Theater until she plays every song from every album in exact order. (Not a telethon.)

Right before a massage and a nap, Fred Thompson says he hates gay marriage and is "100 percent" against abortion, now that he's not being paid to lobby in favor of it.

Phil Spector stubbornly refuses to change wigs for deliberations.

2,200-year-old Roman play sexed up and musicalized, opens at Getty Villa. No word on Broadway transfer yet.

50 Cent to star in hip-hop remake of This Is Spinal Tap.

Effete Campaign Chronicals

2007-09-06T11:32:00.000-07:00