The estimable Peggy Noonan takes kindly to Berry's rambling, and she has some valid points:
Well, Ms. Berry didn't quite open the door. America finally did, as America finally does. But Ms. Berry passed through it, and that is cause for joy.It's worth a read, if only for the first half, by which she relates a story of watching Kevin Costner steal Raisa Gorbachev's dessert. Truth as always is more absurd than fiction. ¶ 8:43 AM 0 Comments
Sometimes it's nice to know that no matter where you go in the world, you can find completely crazy people. ¶ 7:07 AM 0 Comments
This column by Robert Samuelson in the Washington Post gies you a good briefing on why John McCain and Russell Feingold should be recalled from office, tarred, feathered, placed in a burlap sack and beaten with reeds. ¶ 8:54 AM 0 Comments
You thought getting caught in the showers in boarding school was bad. It doesn't get much worse than this. On second thought, yes it does. ¶ 2:13 PM 0 Comments
This seems like a perfectly reasonable idea to me. Maybe they should come up with a wearable version of this for the altar boys. ¶ 1:45 PM 0 Comments
Political speech is now illegal, but thankfully pornography can still be purchased from a variety of local and national sources. This is what Jefferson had in mind? Well, perhaps Willam Jefferson Clinton. ¶ 1:37 PM 0 Comments
EarthLink co-founder admits bilking millions from investors tells part of an interesting story of the underside of the 90's financial bonanza. What I find interesting is how small the differences are between what Slatkin pleaded guilty to doing, versus what Amazon, AOL, and EToys all did or continue to do, legally. What's the difference between pro-forma earnings and giving investors "phony statements showing they were achieving above-market returns?" ¶ 1:35 PM 0 Comments
It seems Yahoo! likes to change its slideshow links every so often, so in case none of my Witty Comments below make sense, try going back or forward a few frames. If that doesn't work, then I don't know what to do. Perhaps you just don't appreciate my sophisticated sense of repartee and badinage...
¶ 5:37 PM 0 Comments
Musings on Oscar
I knew it was all downhill when Tom Cruise opened the show with, "What about a night like tonight? Should we celebrate the joy and magic movies bring? Dare I say it? More than ever." My magic Bullshit Detector went all the way to 11 and I reached for the clicker. Anything, even scrambled porn, beats five hours of Hollywood assholes pecking each other on the cheek and reminding us just how important they really are. But ahh, the Internet. Rather than actually watching the damn show, I can just scroll through slideshows and highlights, and make witty comments like, "And after the party, we're going to eat her!".
First off, Julia Roberts has the biggest teeth I've ever seen. If you look closely I think you'll see small children stuck in there, right next to Lyle Lovett's ego. I just don't get her. Sort of like Renee "Oh God my dress is eating me!" Zellweger, who practically defines the term mousy. Now who was it that ever said Ricky Martin is gay, hmm? And after all these years, wasn't it nice to see Alfred E. Neumann win? Especially after his top-secret hair-teleportation experiment went terribly wrong. Anyway!
Congratulations Halle, Now Please Go Away
It all started going wrong for Halle when she looked down at the stauette and saw that the Academy mistakenly spelled her name as "Jada Pinkett Smith." But seriously, somebody please unplug this annoying woman before she really gets on my nerves. Listen, there's nothing wrong with noting that she's the first black woman to win Best Actress, but to compare her to Jackie Robinson or even Sidney Poitier slanders the present and belittles the past. Consider the following choice snippets:
This moment is so much bigger than me... It's for every nameless, faceless woman of color who now has a chance because this door tonight has been opened... I am so honored, I'm so honored, and I thank the Academy for choosing me to be the vessel from which this blessing might flow
That's right folks, right now in Mobile Alabama, there's a single black mom about to leave her job as a waitress and pack her three kids up and take them to Hollywood, where thanks to Halle Berry, she'll now be able to star in movies just like all of us white folk.
Let's see: Halle Berry is famous, rich, beautiful, successful, and a terrible victim of prejudice. Isn't it obvious? I bet this woman has a personal trainer, chauffeur, Mexican gardener, chef, and at least two bodyguards. If she can be a victim, who can possibly be an oppressor? Oh yeah, just whitey, right? Well, you've got your Oscar now, you poor little rich girl, so will you please quit lecturing us?
No Man's Oscar
Hollywood takes itself sooo seriously, every once in a while it's nice to see something legitimately weighty come along just to expose them for the bunch of dopey minstrels they really are. So it was with No Man's Land, a film that took a couple billion, ten years, and a few hundred thousand dead to produce. It's well and good to make movies to remind us of the holocausts of the past, ostensibly to ensure that "it never happens again." Funny then, that H'wood never made a movie about Bosnia, Rwanda, Kosovo, Afghanistan, or the Iraqi Kurds while present-day Holocausts went on right under our nose, when a movie might have spurred public opinion to react. No, they prefer making schlock like Erin Brockovich which they market as "daring" and "subversive" in its message. Pardon me while I disregard everything anyone named Baldwin says. Especially Alec, who I believe promised he'd move to France if Bush was elected. I mean what the fuck! I voted for Bush just for that reason. I suspect there are at least 500 people like me in Florida... "Hmm, now that Gore fella seems right smart, but Alec says if Dubya gets in he's leaving, and that little rat makes my stomach turn. Shee-it, how bad can Bush be, I mean, he did okay eight years ago..."
¶ 3:47 PM 0 Comments
