16 Tuesday Feb 2010
Posted in Europe, General Foolishness, Science, World Affairs
Tags
climate change, climategate, environmental science, global warming, melting ice caps, Phil Jones, polar bears, Ragnarok, Science, University of East Anglia
Let the healing begin.
Deniers & Adherents can both read it here: Climategate U-turn: Astonishment as scientist at centre of global warming email row admits data not well organised | Mail Online.
16 Tuesday Feb 2010
Posted in Middle East, World Affairs
11 mysterious Europeans are suspected in killing of Hamas bad guy Mahmoud al-Mabhouh.
Dubai Police have passed on the identities of the 11 to Interpol. This is apparently in hopes that the crack team of Israeli badasses who patiently waited to extract a brutal vengeance on this guy were careless enough to use their real names.
Intrigue here: BBC News – Dubai seeks ’11 Europeans’ for Hamas killing.
Update: Apparently the suspects’ passports were fraudulent. Those sneaky devils–they’re always one step ahead of us.
12 Friday Feb 2010
Posted in Art, Culture, General Foolishness, National Politics, Politics
Tags
billboard, Bush, George W. Bush, I35, Interstate 35, Minnesota, miss me yet?, Wyoming
Most people have seen the image and read the story:
The Zen Koan Of Our Times
The press quickly revealed that the advertisement was the work of a group of small business people, apparently in protest against the current administration. But for the short time the sign’s origins and intent were in doubt, it was possible to debate the greater meaning behind those three words.
Was Bush, with his snarky grin and cocky stride, supposed to remind us of the divisive eight years that began the century, in effect telling us that things could be worse? Or as it turned out, was it a snipe at the current administration by invoking time-softened nostalgia for the former president, still widely reviled in many quarters? The Decider or the Divider?
Given the polarized nature of political discourse today, it’s likely that many people are in no ways nuanced in their feelings on this issue. When asked, “Miss Me Yet?” , they will no doubt respond in a loud affirmative or an equally bombastic negative. But for a smaller group, the question eludes such pat answers.
By nature, the news media couldn’t let the message speak for itself–or rather, speak to individual interpretation. A mystery is an irritation for a journalist–a puzzle or riddle to be solved. This compulsion is by all measures a good thing. No one who values his or her liberty would have it any other way. However, the greatest strength of the 4th estate, this need to untie knots, can have unfortunate side effects. As in this instance, sometimes light kills the magic.
For just a short moment, with the curtain down and the inner workings still a mystery, this prosaic amalgamation of metal, paper and ink became something akin to art. Then, in no time at all, the exotic mystery lifted up her veil and revealed to all the world what she was: plain old politics.
Too bad.
11 Thursday Feb 2010
Posted in Culture, Food, General Foolishness, Reality Television, Television
When I saw the headline: Celebrity Chef Arrested, I knew–KNEW–it was gonna be THIS guy.
You got away this time, Guy Fieri. But we’re watching you.
11 Thursday Feb 2010
Posted in Politics, Science, World Affairs
Tags
anti-semitism, enriched plutonium, fission, Iran, Israel, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, mutually assured destruction, nuclear war
Prickly Iranian president and great friend of America, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is claiming that Iranian scientists have enriched plutonium to a fissionable level. Hopefully the little dictator is talking out of his Ascot.
09 Tuesday Feb 2010
Posted in Constitutional Issues, Culture, Political Correctness, Politics, Religion
Tags
24 Hour Church of Elvis, appeasement, athiesm, burka, burqa, Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, cross, equality, fascism, forced secularization, France, ghettoization, Islam, It Can't Happen Here, liberty, Morroco, muslims, Pat Robertson, Politics, religiosity, religious freedom, religious intolerance, religious liberty, religious symbols, Scientology, secularism, securalism, Sikh, Star of David, turban
Recently, France has escalated its ongoing assault on religious displays and symbols, most recently manifested in the official denunciation of the burqa worn by some muslim women. The French government is winning the war of forced secularization, outward signs of religion–the crucifix, turbans, the burqa and more–are quickly becoming anathema in French culture.
09 Tuesday Feb 2010
Tags
2008 Election, Dick Morris, Elizabeth Edwards, Game Change, Hillary Clinton, Hillbuzz, John Edwards, Michelle Obama, Nancy Pelosi, piranha, revenge, Tim Russert, water buffalo
Call it the Clinton Curse: A creepily fun piece from Hillbuzz. The Michelle Obama paragraph was unnecessary, and from everything I’ve heard, Tim Russert was apparently a thoroughly decent gentleman, but I found much of the rest (including the riff on Dame Edwards; I recently read Game Change, and if you believe the authors’ allegations–as I do–Elizabeth Edwards is not a nice lady) to, if not spot-on (I lack Hillbuzz’ confidence that a Pelosi-takedown is coming any time soon), definitely funny.
Since the days of the Clinton Administration, I’d mostly regarded Hillary Clinton as something of a political automaton; a beltway shark forced to remain in constant motion to maintain her alpha-predator status. After reading Game Change I won’t go so far as to say I’ve been disabused entirely of this long-held impression, but find it easier these days to view the Senator in a more nuanced light.
Moreover, as several sources have indicated, Clinton’s friends and allies in the Democratic party served her poorly in the 2008 campaign, swarming her like piranha on a sick water buffalo. It’s nice to see some comeuppance, even if as Hillbuzz points out, it’s all coincidence.
America loves a second–or even a third act. Even Hillary-Haters are waiting to see how the New York Senator uses hers. Personally, I’m holding out for the paroxysm of political violence and mayhem that, were it a film, we’d call Hillary III: The Bloodening.
Check it out: WHAT HAPPENED TO PEOPLE WHO BACKSTAB THE CLINTONS – UPDATE « HillBuzz.
08 Monday Feb 2010
Posted in Constitutional Issues, Health, Politics, Science
Tags
abortion, autism, celebrity, drugs, Jenny McCarthy, Jim Carrey, Mother Jones, nanny state, Science, Thalidomide, vaccination
Actors Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey are taking a drubbing in the press for maintaining their stance that certain vaccinations promote autism in children now that the publication that originally published the allegations has distanced itself from them. This is something of a change from the more mixed press coverage McCarthy received before these latest revelations.
The suggestion seems to be that Hollywood celebrities like McCarthy and Carrey have no scientific expertise. This would hold more weight if some of Hollywoodland’s more ridiculously non-scientific beliefs were examined more closely.
07 Sunday Feb 2010
Posted in Culture, Literature, Movies
Tags
Anthony Hopkins, Cider House Rules, Fellowship of the Ring, Godfather, Hannibal Lecter, hobbits, homoeroticism, Jaws, Jodie Foster, Lord of the Rings, Manhunter, Mario Puzo, Peter Benchley, Red Dragon, Return of the King, Scarlet Letter, Silence of the Lambs, Ted Levine, Thomas Harris, Tolkien, Two Towers, Watchmen
It’s axiomatic that a film is never as good as the book which spawned it. The cinematic dustbin is jammed with book-to-movie abominations such as Watchmen, The Scarlet Letter and Oscar-winner, The Cider House Rules.
Occasionally, however, a certain confluence of creative people (producers, directors, actors, etc.) conspire to create a film that is in every way superior to the sum of its parts. Following are a few examples of films which are superior to the written work which spawned them.
06 Saturday Feb 2010
Tags
Battlefield Earth, cinematic douchebaggery, Elmo, Freddy Got Fingered, Gigli, I Know Who Killed Me, Movies, Razzies, Richard Simmons, Rwanda, Simmons v Elmo, Swept Away, Tom Green, Worst Film of the Decade
In His Magnum Opus, Green Explores Brave New Heights Of Douchebaggery.
Freddy Got Fingered is finally getting the recognition it deserves as one of the worst movies ever made. Recently, the folks who run the Razzies have declared FGF, along with such cinematic classics as Battlefield Earth, Gigli, I Know Who Killed Me and Swept Away, in contention for the distinction of the “Worst Film of the Decade.”
Admittedly, the only film of the five that Promethean Times has seen (or is likely to see) is FGF. You might think this would preclude us from commenting on this issue, but Promethean Times has never shied away from talking out of our asses, and never will.
It is our opinion that no other cinematic offering can plumb the wretched depths of inane, vulgar excess with the same degree of panache as the estimable Tom Green. FGF rewards the brave viewer with cinematic delights heretofore unknown in mainstream movies. Where else can you see a deranged slacker swing a newborn baby around a bloody hospital room while its mother wails for him to stop? Is there any other movie where the protagonist beats his paraplegic girlfriend’s legs with a stick as a form of foreplay? Have you ever seen a man use an elephant’s penis as a gun, shooting his father with pachyderm ejaculate? Freddy Got Fingered offers all these things and more. It is not simply the worst movie of the decade, but one of the lowest points in the long history of cinema.
If Freddy Got Fingered loses to any of these other minor turkeys as “Worst Movie of the Decade,” the resulting violence will make 1994 Rwanda look like a slap-fight between Richard Simmons and Elmo.
Promethean Times 
