October 27th, 2009 by Hoopleton

With the Northern Hemisphere trapped in the malaise of Fall, bracing itself for winter and the healthcare debate dragging on without end it’s time to reexamine once again how we, the people of the most powerful nation on Earth (that’s still accurate isn’t it?), are being screwed over by those who would rule us. So, without anymore introduction, I present to you this updated short list of how you’re being fucked by America.

1. China. All right, so China isn’t exactly America, but God knows that everything in America was made in China so it may as well be. The booming, ironically named People’s Republic has had quite the last couple of decades. Unprecedented growth. Massive capitalization. Frantic industrialization. Host to the Olympic Games. China, the country that invented everything from gunpowder to the printing press and yet failed to take credit for any of it has seemed determined of late to regain it’s status as a cultural and industrial powerhouse. The government of China is a Communist one. They enslave entire nations. Many of their citizens disappear on an almost daily basis, tossed into political prisons and concentration camps. Try Googling “Tiananmen Square” in Beijing and you’re likely to get a blank screen. But the products they produce are cheap and plentiful. So what that the toothpaste contains radioactive waste and those baby toys are dipped in lead paint? It may all be disposable crap that falls apart after a week, built by the hands of children and women living in conditions well below anything resembling poverty, but did I mention it was affordable? Also, let’s not forget that China is America’s biggest savings and loan. Currently, as of July 2009, our favorite exporter holds 24% of our public debt, or $800 billion. Some in the defense industry have warned that this could potentially threaten America’s security interests. That it leaves us vulnerable to economic extortion. That our foreign policy decisions might be compromised by our lender status. Wait. Walmart’s having a sale you say? It’s funny, isn’t it, how all that talk of democracy and human rights, of pushing back against Communist and defeating the Great Satan seems to dry up as soon as they can sell you a cheaper toaster? Many Americans have been brainwashed to believe that providing a “public option” in healthcare would lead to socialism and dictatorship, but we seem to have no qualms about selling our souls to a repressive, quasi-Stalinist, totalitarian state. We buy their cheap, disposable, dangerous products, we gleefully sell to them our debt, we turn a blind eye to their treatment of minorities and neighbor states, we demure to their interests even in the face of genocide (see: Darfur), and for what? Save a dollar today only to pay a pound of flesh tomorrow.

2. Food. The American obesity epidemic is well documented. We’re growing fatter and fatter with each passing year. As I’ve written about extensively on previous occasions obesity is close to surpassing smoking as the number one cause of preventable death. It is estimated that by 2015 nearly half of all Americans will tip the scale. This will further drive up healthcare costs and may result in the first major decline of life expectancy figures in the United States. My generation, those of us in our thirties and late twenties, may be the first to die younger than that of my parents. The main culprit for the fattening up of America is our over reliance on corn. We use it in everything from our breads to our sweeteners. Our beef is corn fed. Our potatoes are corn fried. All of this is thanks to the Federal government, which since Nixon does not subsidize farmers but the crop they grow. Without tax dollars being pumped into corn, maize would virtually disappear from our diet. But unfortunately corn is only part of the problem. The use of chemical pesticides has been linked to the increase of cancer rates. Leading some scientists to declare that we are seeing an apocalyptic scale event. The antibiotics given to animals as a way of treating the diseases that come from a corn-based diet have crossed into the food supply making people more resistant to medication. Each year more of us die from simple infections because the antibiotics we’re given are simply not effective anymore. But wait it gets worse. The United States is the leader in genetically modified foods. Banned in Europe, GM foods need not even be labeled on American store shelves. These modified foods include nearly everything we eat and often are a major factor for our increasingly poor health. Any attempts to reverse these food trends have been stone walled by corporations, lobbyists and the public officials meant to protect us. And the worst part is, that even if there was the political will to stop or slow the prevalence of genetically modified foods in our diet, many agriculturalists have warned that it may already be too late as modified crops have spread on their own, seeds carried by the winds, by animals to every corner of the globe. When you add to all this the growing lack of biodiversity in farming, the reliance on single varieties of a crop, you get a national food reserve that’s not only dangerous, but also more susceptible to disease. Ironically, as we get fatter and increasingly unhealthy we face the potential for crop failure and starvation.

3. Wall Street. If you’re not getting fucked by foreign powers, the food in your refrigerator or the various products around your home you’re probably being fucked by the business establishment. Wall Street, and the various institutions of capitalism that it represents, is no stranger to cheating basically anyone it can. That’s the nature of the beast. They take away your pension. They take away your healthcare. They take away your home. They’ve always done it if there’s profit in it. But whereas once they did it all in the hopes of creating long term gain, or at least of gaining power, now the idea is to take the money and run. Whereas once the robber barons built infrastructure, libraries, museums and hospitals, now they leave only a wake of destruction in their path. The ongoing housing and banking crisis is perhaps the most recent example, but lest we forget that Enron and Worldcom weren’t all that long ago. For every Bernie Madoff in jail another hundred are still walking the streets. It makes you wonder if they know something we don’t. Is the ship sinking? Are the lifeboats already full? In the 1950s and 1960s a family of four could live a comfortable Middle Class lifestyle on one income. One income. Two cars in the garage. A dog. Summer vacations and weekends off. Food was more expensive then (thank you corn!), so were many of the products on the store shelves, but incomes relative to inflation were higher. People could afford more then. Today that same family of four has two incomes to live virtually the same lifestyle. We’re more isolated from eachother. Rates of divorce are higher than ever before. Unions are corrupt and beaten down. Corporations lay off workers by the tens of thousands while the salaries of CEOs are astronomical compared to what they were even twenty years ago. Retirement age gets pushed back further each year while our life expectancy grows shorter. There are more elderly Americans working today than since the introduction of Social Security. The entire system is designed to put us into debt. To make us buy crap we don’t really need. The GDP, the basic measure of a country’s economic performance goes up not when you save money, it doesn’t count the value of domestic work or the inequality of wealth distribution, but it does add points for every patient diagnosed with cancer or every casket that’s sold. It’s not anyone industry. It’s not just Big Oil. It’s not just food. It’s not just Walmart. It’s all the bastards. Modern capitalism at its core. We once had made great strides in our economic relationships. In the regulation of our financial industries. In evaluating our worth. But more than ever we seem to be reverting to an owner class society in which most of us will likely be owned. They won’t stop till they take everything away, and once they do they’ll sell you a dozen times over until one day you’ll get a letter from your masters in Beijing. You’ve been bought and paid for, fat, diseased body and empty soul.

4. Military-Industrial-Complex. Let’s just put it out there, Eisenhower was right. For a man who spent most of his time on golf courses, the 34^th President of the United States left office in January of 1961 on a note of terrifying brilliance. Speaking to the American people he warned “against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex.” A cabal of sorts, comprised of the Defense Industry, the Military and Congress that would turn the land of the brave and the home of the free into a glorified arms factory, exporting only war and militarism throughout the globe. The Military budget of the United States for the 2009 fiscal year was $515.4 billion. Adding emergency discretionary spending and supplemental spending brings the sum to $651.2 billion. This does not include many military-related items that are outside of the Defense Department budget. Overall the United States government is spending about $1 trillion annually on defense-related purposes. In other words, we Americans spend more on the business of war than every other country in the world combined. Increasingly military solutions seem like the only solutions and we tend to most often fight the very monsters that we create. Creating new monsters in the process. The frightening trend of the last several years has been the privatization of the military. Mercenaries trained by tax dollars. Corporations like Blackwater and Halliburton have taken over many of the duties once performed by soldiers. Often time above the law and motivated purely by profit, these groups operate with impunity abroad and at home. Blackwater doesn’t only operate in Iraq or Afghanistan. If anything their increasing role in domestic security makes foreign operations look like pocket change. How does this translate to you and me? A permanent war economy means permanent war. We’ve been in Iraq for six years now and the war in Afghanistan is just reigniting. If we ever leave the Middle East new conflicts will arise simply because they have to. Peace may be nice for reasons of longevity but it hardly justifies the largest defense budget in history. More war means more debt, more death, increased instability and an Empire in freefall. The Europeans will complain but won’t ever do anything about our love of war. They can’t. We are their army. All those social programs are nice as long as you don’t have a defense budget. Though China may feel intimidated, more spending here means bigger profits there. There will always be a new enemy. There will always be another war. Conflicts will breed conflicts. Young men and women, inspired to fight for country will die never knowing why.

5. Government. There is perhaps no way to adequately capture all that’s wrong with the United States of America without mentioning its political system. It’s the bastards we elect, supposedly there to represent our interests, who are most directly responsible for all the misdeeds mentioned in the points above. Our public institutions are not part of the problem. They are the problem. In fact, the government is not only guilty of negligence but I would go so far as to say that they are guilty of willful criminal acts against the people. Should we start with scandals? Watergate may be the most obvious example but we need not travel that far back in time. In the last decade we’ve seen a torrent of scandals involving corruption, thievery and sexual misconduct. Alabama Governor Don Siegelman (D-AL) found guilty of bribery. Connecticut Governor John G. Rowland (R-CT) pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit mail fraud and tax fraud. Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich (D-IL) charged with conspiracy to commit mail, wire fraud and solicitation of bribery. Illinois Governor George H. Ryan (R-IL) found guilty of illegal sale of government licenses and contracts as Secretary of State. Louisiana Governor Edwin Edwards (D-LA) convicted of extortion. New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevey (D-NJ) resigned from office after admitting his homosexuality and the inappropriate appointment of his alleged male-sex partner to a government paid office. Ohio Governor Bob Taft (R-OH) guilty of four first-degree misdemeanor ethics violations. Governor Mark Sanford (R-SC) who had voted for the Bill Clinton impeachment, admitted during a press conference that he had traveled to Argentina to have an extra-marital affair with an Argentinean woman. I could go on. The list is quite extensive and this is only a partial look at what’s going on at the gubernatorial level. Local political scandals list in the hundreds. Should we try Federal? Karl Rove, Jack Abramoff, NSA Wireless Surveillance, Lawyergate, Ted Stevens, Tom Delay, Jim Traficant, Sarah Palin. Those are just the big ones. Just the ones who got too greedy or too stupid and got caught. And even now, some are still respected names in politics. Some may even stand for President someday. Bribery, graft, patronage, nepotism, embezzlement, kickbacks, every last member of every branch of government is guilty, if not by direct involvement than simply by association. Our government is run by a pack of shortsighted, self-serving crooks. The mob has gone legit and it’s writing legislation. When not stealing from the coffers to enrich themselves or to pay for those high-class hookers, our government fucks us with the legislation they pass. Again, the list is too extensive. They’ve dismantled nearly everything good in the last thirty years. Labor protection. Oversight. Clean air and water laws. They subsidize a corn diet that will kill us. They turn a blind eye to an ecosystem in collapse. They spy on us. They take away our basic rights. They use double-speak and change the meaning of language. The Patriot Act. No Child Left Behind. At this moment John Mccain’s Internet Freedom Act, a piece of legislation meant to provide the exact opposite of what its name implies is finding popular support. They think we’re stupid. They think we’re saps. And the sad part is we are. We are stupid. We are saps. We reelect them over and over again. We give money to them. We buy into their bullshit. We let them distract us with fear mongering and race bating, with abortion and homophobia. The Chinese will never be the superpower they crave to be because they don’t understand that the illusion of democracy will triumph over brute force every time. This country was founded by a slave owning wealth class and it remains so till this day. They raped and pillaged the land and when that was all gone they started in on us. We are so stupid we willingly fight for them. Die for them. We provide moral justification for their crimes. And when they finally leave office where do they go? They become consultants, CEOs and members of the board. Because it’s the corporations they serve. Not us. Not us. At this moment the United States has a national debt of over $11 trillion dollars. That translates to nearly $40,000 per person. Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security could be bankrupt in ten years. If Congress manages to pass a healthcare bill you better believe it’ll be overpriced, corrupt and ineffectual. We’re long past the days of the New Deal or the Great Society. What we have here is a free-for-all. Pork and shit sandwiches, hypocrisy slathered on thick. Maybe I should vote for a third party? HA! Go ahead you idiot, throw your vote away!

6. Media. It’s the circus, baby! If the politicians and the business interests are guilty of criminal acts, the media is responsible for letting them get away with it. As newspapers close down across the land, journalistic ethics go the way of the dinosaur and the trend of media conglamerization continues unabated we are left with little in the way of real information. All we have is a sideshow of pundits and bloggers more interested in winning an argument then telling us the truth. Facts get twisted out of shape or go unreported all together. MSNBC and Fox scream to the fringes while networks like CNN report opinion as news. In a 24-hour news cycle there’s no room for content. All stories become old stories as soon as they’re reported. Spin rooms become credited areas of expertise. News broadcasts become infotainment and platforms for cross-promotion. Disney has a new movie coming out? Expect full coverage on the ABC Nightly News. But we give the people what they want, every media executive will be quick to say. The problem is that you can’t give people what they want. People would gorge themselves into the grave if given half a chance. What you need to give the people is what they need. Not that it’ll happen. It’s all part of the show. A ruling class happily in bed with the political elite. John Mccain’s new bill? Who do you think sponsored that piece of prose? The government leases to the media the public airways as to inform and guard the public trust. The fifth estate exists, in theory, to protect the fragile institutions of democracy. But instead they aim to destroy them. What we have is “news” organizations sponsoring white fear protests. Movie stars peddling dangerous drugs on the market. Commercialization run amok. Whereas China sensors its media our media sensors itself. That’s the beauty of the American system. Delusion built upon delusion. Lie upon lie. And where does that leave us? George W. Bush liked to say that people crave freedom, but the truth is all that people really want is entertainment. As long as you distract them enough they’ll happily swallow whatever pills you feed them. And so here we are. Fucked from all sides. A fat, ignorant populace with neither the power or desire to fight back. God bless America.

September 29th, 2009 by Hoopleton

So the economy is still shit and the weather is getting frigid in an awful hurry. It’s the season of swine flu and manic depression. Luckily for us television is here to the rescue! No seriously. Once you dig through the intellectual paralysis that is reality infotainment and the plethora of nauseating primetime soaps (Grey’s Anatomy *cough*) there are actually things worth watching on the old idiot box. To help sift through the muck I present to you this short list of of the best shows on television –drama edition.

1. House. Dying of an incurable, extremely rare medical condition and need it cured in forty-three minutes you say? All right, so House is hardly the most believable medical drama on television. God knows it’s no Grey’s Anatomy. Am I right? But Hugh Laurie is fucking awesome so just shut up you mean stupid bastard. Now entering its sixth season on television House may be the exception that proves the rule, something popular can also be good. That’s not to say I’m admitting defeat. In fact I would argue that some of the best episodes in the series were those that suffered some of the worst ratings. I’ll go even as far as to say that season five, which saw Dr. House losing his mind and which also happened to see the show drop down to 19^th place in its time slot, was by far the best year in the show’s entire run. Season six may have started off with a whimper (come on, House in the loony bin? Talk about some missed opportunities), but it’s still early yet and I doubt that our intrepid atheist, drug-addict has gone soft just yet. As long as the writers are willing to take ever greater risks with their material and their star, House promises to deliver year after year. Who knows? The way things have been going maybe the best is yet to come.

2. Dexter. Now beginning its fourth season on Showtime, this one-hour drama about a sympathetic serial killer has certainly been better. The halcyon days were probably those back in season two when Dexter Morgan (played by Michael C. Hall), the prolific killer who butchers Miami-based bad guys, spent the entire season within a hair’s breath of being found out by the hapless police force that also happens to employ him. Oh Doukes, we miss you. Sure, the run wasn’t perfect that year. God knows Lila (played by Jaime Murray) was irritating beyond words, but overall it was an exceptionally strong follow-up to the debut. In many ways the show surpassed expectation. So it was perhaps not surprising that despite some thrilling moments and a great turn by Jimmy Smits season three came out to be bland and in the final verdict disappointing. The age old question applies: how can you keep a serial killer story from becoming overly repetitive? Fortunately Dexter is one of those shows that’s just too good to give up on. Despite the fact that Dexter is now a dad (a recent annoying television trend that makes me think most industry writers just turned thirty) season four looks somewhat promising with the addition of John Lithgow to the cast as the “Trinity” killer. Lithgow may not be as creepy as say Christopher Walken, but in this role he’s certainly somewhere in the ballpark. Besides, it’s Dexter, a show about a deviate mass murderer who’s living right next door, and you know what? You find yourself rooting for him every step of the way. Take that moral ambiguity!

3. Damages. Yea, I know, you’ve never heard of it. Most people haven’t, which is why the critically acclaimed “legal drama” from the cable network FX, now entering its third season, was nearly cancelled despite having won several Emmys including two by the show’s star, Glenn Close. Yes, Glenn Close. TELEVISION IS A PERFECTLY RESPECTABLE MEDIUM! The show revolves around the brilliant and ruthless, nay, Machiavellian, New York lawyer, Patty Hughes (Close) and her equally brilliant although not nearly as ruthless (but she’s getting there) protégée Ellen Parsons (played by Rose Byrne). That’s the tip off, from there the series spirals out of control into a veritable firestorm of political intrigue, betrayal, murder and corporate greed. Coming into the show midstream may be a bit disorienting given the layers upon layers of twists and turns not to mention the nonlinear narrative that binds the whole thing together, but to watch it from the beginning is to feel gobs of guilty satisfaction and a strange desire to finally pursue that law degree. Damages is good drama but that depicts human fallibility, strength and corruption across the full spectrum. One episode’s villain may be the next episode’s hero and in the end it’ll only really make sense when the entire puzzle is filled in.

4. Fringe. Hey, do you remember when The X-Files was good? You know, back before David Duchovny got all fat and someone saying “the truth is out there” didn’t make you want to vomit? Well imagine a show like what The X-Files used to be except in which all the stupid alien bounty hunter crap is actually believable and the cast is way sexier (sorry Scully). Now entering its second season, FOX’s Fringe follows the efforts of FBI agents (and their assorted collection of consultants) as they investigate “the Pattern,” a series of unexplained, often ghastly occurrences which are happening all over the world (though mainly in New England), leading to what, we cannot say. Despite being created by J.J. Abrams the series features an assortment of interesting characters most notable among them special agent Olivia Dunham (played by the alluring Anna Trov) and mad scientist Walter Bishop (John Noble). So far this show has done a fantastic job of weaving sci-fi mystery without giving too much away. Of course how long can you keep pushing the envelope of reality before the whole thing becomes a ridiculous farce, nearly even becoming a parody of itself? If The X-Files is any indication, up until the moment that the star of the show marries Téa Leoni. A frighteningly real possibility since she came back on the market not long ago. You’ve been warned. On the plus side we may get another Bree Sharp song out of it and a return performance by Robert Patrick as Doggett. Come on, who didn’t like Doggett?

5. Caprica. Okay fine, the show won’t actually debut till January, but I miss Battlestar Galactica so frak off. The prequel to Syfy’s groundbreaking, dark and twisted reimagined Battlestar, Caprica follows the path of humanity toward the apocalypse. Billed more as family saga than space opera the two-hour pilot premiered in April to rave reviews, serving as backstory to a series with huge expectations and even larger potential. There’s not much to say about the series yet, but it’s going to be the greatest thing on television ever. What? You don’t agree? Well then why don’t you go back to Soviet Russia comrade, we don’t need the likes of you around here. Now if you excuse me, I need to go watch the pilot again, and again, and again, and again, and again…

6. Mad Men. At first glance this much talked about, highly acclaimed AMC original series now in its third season seems to move along so slowly that you begin to wonder how anyone in our insta-world can possibly stay focused on its subtly unfolding plot turns for longer than five seconds. Then you realize how utterly brilliant the show is and you start to wonder why more people aren’t watching it. Then you realize most people are idiots. Then you start craving a cigarette. The show, which follows the highs and lows of life for Madison Avenue advertising executives (well, actually that of pretty much anyone tied to the profession) and their families in the 1960s, does a masterful job of depicting life during a period of unprecedented social upheaval in this nation’s history. Whether it’s the constant smoking, rampant alcoholism, institutionalized racism or casual adultery it’s hard not to marvel at how much things have changed in the last fifty years, and also how much they’ve stayed the same. The subject of gender is central to Mad Men, not only in it’s frank look at the shifting role of women and the changing ideal of femininity, but also the deconstruction of the masculine. Through the eyes of the impressive cast, but most notably, of course, Don Draper (played by John Hamm so effectively you’d think he was brought to Hollywood in a time machine) the series is social criticism built upon the study of human weakness. As far as pure entertainment value, the series reveals new shocks and twists with every episode. Just as you think you’ve got it all figured out someone gets their foot sliced off by a lawnmower. Mad Men is a show that only seems to get better with each season and it remains, for now, the benchmark for every other dramatic series on air. With the Cuban Missile Crisis behind us and the assassination of JFK weeks away, there’s never been a better time to pour yourself an Old Fashioned, light a Lucky and tune in.

June 20th, 2009 by Hoopleton

The world, as always, is in shambles. The situation in Iran continues to deteriorate. North Korea is threatening to nuke Hawaii. 46 people have been killed by a suicide bomber in Iraq. And the rest of us, while not murdering abortion doctors or burning our children in “voodoo rituals” are facing an ever grimmer economic future. I think there’s no better time to embrace the irrelevant, so as a much needed distraction I offer this short list of bizarre and sometimes mysterious celebrity deaths.

1. Claude François. In the late 1960s as bands like the Beatles were redefining music and Elvis Presley was becoming “the king,” France saw the rise of its own pop rock god in the form of Claude François. Responsible for such hits as Comme d’habitude, which was later reworked into the Frank Sinatra hit, My Way, François was an impressively successful musician, able to re-invent himself over and over as pop tastes shifted from rock to folk and then again to disco. For many Europeans he was the voice of a generation, and as the 1970s rolled into the 80s, François’ star seemed destined to rise ever higher into the annals of music history. Which is why his sudden death in 1978, at the age of 39, came as quite a shock, in some ways literally. After narrowly escaping an IRA bomb in London three years earlier, and a shooting two years after that, it was reported that Claude François had accidentally electrocuted himself. Apparently the French “national treasure” was taking a bath when he noticed a lightbulb wasn’t straight and as he reached to straightened it received a jolt of a few thousand volts. The idea that François would be stupid enough to change a lightbulb while standing in a filled bathtub seemed so inconceivable to many of his fans and detractors that before long hundreds of conspiracy theories began to circulate, one claiming that he had actually died of internal bleeding after receiving anal sex from a Senegalese prostitute, and another which claimed that François was in fact a secret agent who was assassinated in an intricate plot involving a modified listening device.

2. Terry Kath. Staying with the theme of “stupid ways in which 30-something pop stars managed to kill themselves in 1978,” we come to the story of lead guitarist and founding member of band Chicago, Terry Kath. Known widely as a habitual drug and alcohol user who suffered from severe bouts of depression, few people probably expected Kath to last very long. Many of his closest friends have described the Chicago front man as being on a downward spiral. Yet, despite the near universal consensus that Kath was doomed to die young, few could have predicted the way in which it happened. As the story goes, around 5pm on January 23, 1978, just after a party at a roadie’s house, Kath, who loved guns nearly as much as he loved drugs and alcohol (a stellar combination), picked up an empty .38 revolver and put it to his head, playfully pulling the trigger several times. After what I imagine was a round of boisterous laughter, Kath then picked up a 9 mm semiautomatic, saying to all those in attendance, “Don’t worry, it’s not loaded,” put the gun to his head and promptly blew his brains out. Man, what a laugh riot! So there we have it, Terry Kath, proving the old adage, guns don’t kill people, drugged up rock stars with the brainpower of vacuum cleaners kill people, though luckily, usually themselves.

3. Natalie Wood. What the death of Terry Kath may have lacked in mystery, the death of famed actress Natalie Wood makes up in spades. Arriving on the scene as the child lead in the classic 1947 film, Miracle on 34th Street, Natalie Wood went on to become Hollywood royalty, staring opposite the equally ill-fated James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause, and then later in such hits as West Side Story and Gypsy. Although by 1980 her star may have slightly faded, she was still busily making films and enjoying the fame that came with a long career in the spotlight. Then, in 1981, tragedy struck. While taking a break from shooting the science fiction movie Brainstorm, Wood, along with husband Robert Wagner and co-star Christopher Walken, went on a boating trip, enjoying the waters off Catalina Island. As was later reported by the police, on the night of November 28th, while their yacht was anchored in Isthmus Cove, Wood apparently tried to leave by dingy, banged against the yacht’s hull, slipped into the water and drowned. Witnesses on nearby boats and on shore claimed that they had heard Wood scream frantically for help for nearly fifteen minutes, at one point, apparently also hearing an eerily calm man reply, “Take it easy. We’ll be over to get you.” Yet, suspiciously, both Robert Wagner and Christopher Walken, who were on the yacht at the time, claimed never to have heard anything at all. Despite conflicting testimonies and the evidence of bruising on Wood’s body, the drowning was ruled to be accidental. The moral of the story should be obvious, never, ever get on a boat with Christopher Walken.

4. Thomas Ince. Yachts can be dangerous places for celebrities, they seem the perfect setting for both mysterious deaths that smell of foul play, and mysterious deaths that are obviously foul play. The death of Thomas Ince, early Hollywood film pioneer, producer and director, falls into the latter category. Also in November (a bad month for yachting apparently), although this time in the year 1924, Ince was enjoying a weekend boat trip hosted by newspaper tycoon and all around master of the universe, William Randolph Hearst, on Hearst’s lavish yacht, the Oneida. The cruise was held in honor of Ince’s 42nd birthday and the guest list included such icons as legendary silent film actor Charlie Chaplin, gossip columnist and dirt monger Louella Parsons and erotic literature writer Elinor Grey. Officially, Thomas Ince died of a heart attack on the night of Novermber 19th, but before the body was even lowered into the ground (Hearst arranged a funeral to be held immediately), stories started going around that in actuality, Hearst had accidentally shot Ince in a fit of jealousy while arguing with Charlie Chaplin over the actor’s apparent affair with Hearst’s long-time girlfriend, actress Marion Davies. No autopsy or investigation was ever carried out and the newspapers (most of which were controlled by Hearst) never mentioned any of the rumors. In the eighty-five years since the mysterious death of Thomas Ince, scores of books and films have been produced on the subject, most recently the 2001, Peter Bogdanovich film, The Cat’s Meow. The universal consensus (even among Hearst’s family) is that the newspaper tycoon did in fact murder Ince. But hey, Hearst also near single handedly started the Spanish-American War, so what’s one movie producer more or less?

5. Isadora Duncan. Remaining in the 1920s, perhaps one of the most bizarre celebrity deaths of all time was that of “the mother of modern dance,” Isadora Duncan. A brilliant artist, Duncan epitomized the glamour and passion of the roaring 20s. Although her career started to flounder by the end, and perceptions of her, spiked by financial woes and a scandalous love life, began to turn against her, she remained the symbol of an age. She was known for her wit, her charm, her grace and sensuality, but above all she had style. Ironically, it was her sense of style that ended up causing her death. On the night of September 14, 1927, at the age of 50, as she was getting into the car of French-Italian mechanic, Benoît Falchetto, whom she was hoping to seduce later that night, Duncan’s long flowing, hand painted silk scarf, got entangled in one of the car’s spoked wheels and rear axle (the scarf was long enough to wrap around her entire body). As Falchetto hit the gas, the scarf tightened, strangulating and nearly decapitating Duncan. Officially, her last words were recorded as being, “Goodbye, my friends, I am off to glory!” Yes, glory indeed.

6. David Carradine. The son of famed actor John Carradine and star of such hits as Kill Bill, though probably best known for his work on the television series Kung Fu, David Carradine perhaps, arguably, best epitomizes the theme of this list. As was widely reported in the media, Carradine’s body was found in his Bangkok hotel room on June 4, 2009. The 73-year-old actor had died of strangulation, initially thought to be the result of suicide. However, as details emerged and after a Thai newspaper published photographs taken at the scene, the story took on every more bizarre dimensions. Carradine was found hanging in his hotel room’s closet, naked. His hands were tied. Yet, oddly enough, there was no bruising on the body, no signs of struggle, no evidence of force whatsoever, and the hotel’s security tapes confirmed that no one at any time had gone in or out of the actor’s room. As all this was coming to light, in an interview on CNN, Carradine’s lawyer and friend, Mark Geragos, suddenly made the shocking claim that the tv star had not in reality committed suicide, but had in fact, been murdered by a secret sect of kung fu ninjas, who had assassinated Carradine for fear that he may reveal their underworld martial-arts secrets. The story had a good run, until two of Carradine’s ex-wives came forward calling the kung fu ninja scenario idiotic, revealing that he had actually a long-time fetish for self-bondage and autoerotic asphyxiation. The debate on what really happened rages on. What is the big lesson here? If you’re going to try and get off by strangling yourself, be sure to scribble the words “kung fu ninjas” on a nearby wall, just in case. If you die it won’t wash away your perversity in the eyes of most people, but it will at least give your loved ones something to cling onto.

May 12th, 2009 by Hoopleton

With the official start of summer only days away and the reimagined popcorn orgy that is Star Trek (review here) already raking in the bucks at the box office, it’s time to look ahead at what other over-the-top Hollywood blockbusters are on the horizon. Sure, there will be much better films to watch, some that might actually be thought provoking, but who needs plot, drama or acting when you’ve got big spills and the kind of budgets that make poverty-stricken nations weep? So, without further ado I present to you this summer movie short list. Some might be worth the price of admission, some of them might make you hunger for your own premature death, but they all promise to be BIG.

1. Angels & Demons. If there’s one major truth to the universe, it’s that Tom Hanks is the nicest, greatest actor in the world and everything he ever stars in is equally nice and great. To disagree with this law makes you either a Commie, Pinko, un-American Devil worshipper, or a member of the Catholic Church. In their follow-up to the mega-hit The Da Vinci Code, by world-renowned literary hack Dan Brown, Ron Howard and Tom Hanks resurrect Professor Robert Langdon as he tries to save the secretive Catholic Church from the evil science-obsessed Illuminati who threaten to destroy it with stolen antimatter (I’m not even kidding). Early reviews and previews suggest that this Brown adaptation lacks some of the book’s more far-fetched wacko concepts (and yet they kept the antimatter bomb), as well as corrects some of the book’s inaccuracies (such as Dan Brown’s complete lack of scientific knowledge or familiarity with Roman topography or the Italian language), and made this Da Vinci follow-up into a more all around satisfying piece of action fluff. The Catholic Church as well as some of its satellite organizations have already expectedly come out against the film, causing at least one unnamed Sony executive to express disappointment that the Church had not created attention for the film closer to its release date. All in all Angels & Demons seems to be fitting perfectly into the “evil church trying to stop the truth” archetype, which will make the whole mess much more successful than it probably deserves to be in the first place. Is it worth the price of admission? Will the movie reveal truths about the Church’s great power and global ambitions? Well, let me put it this way, four hundred years earlier the Church would have burned Dan Brown, Ron Howard, Tom Hanks and company as heretics, today they put out press releases urging followers to “enjoy the movie, but know that it is a fable.” In this case, fact is a lot more boring than fiction.

2. Terminator: Salvation. When not screaming profanities at directors or beating the crap out of his family, Christian Bale stars in mega-budget blockbusters that he likes to pretend are actually sophisticated character-driven melodramas that just happen to have a lot of exploding cars, and buildings, and everything else. In Terminator: Salvation, out at the end of May, Bale stars as destined savior of humanity, John Conner, finally all grown up, come to deliver us from the machines. Okay, so the director of the movie is McG, the guy behind such mind numbing garbage as Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle and We Are Marshall (which you didn’t see for one reason: Matthew McConaughey). And I know, no matter how much we may want to pretend that it didn’t happen, Terminator 3 wasn’t just all a bad dream. But hey, there are gonna be mean ass robots and at least for the moment Christian Bale is this generation’s Mel Gibson. Until the day when he finally sobers up, or gets some serious psychiatric help, or finds Jesus, grows a beard and starts ranting and raving about how the Jews are trying to steal the blood of our children, his films, although an insult to poor people everywhere, still lean toward great escapism. And what better escapism is there than a barren, post-apocalyptic, radioactive Hellscape?

3. Land of the Lost. Will Ferrell has the capacity to make an audience either die laughing, or just want to die, the question in early June will be, is Brad Silberling’s attempt at making a Ferrell comedy out of the 1970’s TV series, the former or the latter? On the good end of the spectrum the previews offer just the right amount of over-the-top insanity that makes a Will Ferrell movie worth watching. Not too mention that Anna Friel of Pushing Daisies fame (an excellent show which was cancelled because YOU didn’t watch it, thanks a lot) is among a talented supporting cast that might play well against the aforementioned insanity. The problem is that that’s about all the good there is. Silberling, the director is the man behind such piles of crap as Casper and Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events (another glorious example of why Jim Carrey, despite his role in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, should have been euthanized immediately after birth). And from everything available on the movie so far one gets the very real sense that the best jokes are already in the trailer. We all love laughing at Matt Lauer, but honestly, how far can that really go?

4. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. Before directing the first Transformers movie, Michael Bay was the visionary behind such Hollywood classics as, The Rock, Armageddon, Coyote Ugly, Pearl Harbor and Bad Boys 2. In fact, Michael Bay has that rare directorial gift for making nothing but the most mindless kind of shit ever produced for the silver screen. He’s like a bloodhound, except instead of finding useful things like corpses or escaped felons, he finds movie scripts that offer absolutely nothing useful to humanity, in fact, they may actually subtract from our progress as a species. Add to this a leading “man” such as Shia LaBeouf, a would-be felon with pronounced father issues, who has that rare gift for starring in the most mindless shit ever produced for the silver screen (googling his filmography one has the feeling that Shia LeBeouf may in fact be the antichrist), then sprinkle in some explosions and rapping robots, and what you get is Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. It says a lot about the decay of our civilization when over 40 million Americans have no health insurance, when more and more people are sliding into poverty, but a Bay-LaBeouf project gets a check for 200 million dollars because they did such a fucking bang up job the first time around. Although it does explain such things as Enron and the Bush administration, it does make you wonder exactly when it was that we peaked as a people, when it was that we started sliding down hill, and perhaps more importantly, exactly how far away we are from the rocky bottom below.

5. Public Enemies. Michael Mann has written and directed some impressive films (Miami Vice not withstanding), and let’s face facts, Johnny Depp is just pure awesome, also, as previously noted, Christian Bale, when he isn’t going all Bale on someone’s ass, is pretty damn good as well. Throw in some tommy guns, some fedoras, a few bank heists and what you get is Public Enemies, the story of John Dillinger and the rise of the FBI. Pretty much everything about this film seems impressive, from the writing and directing to the supporting cast (Billy Crudup as J. Edgar Hoover should be interesting). A lot of the scenes were shot in the actual historical locations and Mann by all accounts is obsessive with detail. Public Enemies could very well be one of the best movies of the summer, assuming of course Christian Bale doesn’t kill someone in the meantime.

6. Inglorious Bastards. Brad Pitt leads a cast of relative unknowns into World War II France to torture, kill and scalp as many Nazis as possible. Yep, scalp. The movie promises to be dark, twisted and absurd, but the best part is, it’s written and directed by Quentin Tarantino. Do I really need to say any more at this point? Quentin Tarantino plus Nazis. I imagine that the pitch session was just that simple. “Nazi’s you say? Here’s a bag of money.” The script purportedly took ten years to write and Tarantino has described it as his “masterpiece,” a spaghetti-western set in the Second World War. This movie has been awaited and anticipated in film circles for so long that one Irish reporter quipped “Inglorious Bastards, a war movie that may eventually resemble The Dirty Dozen merged with Cross of Iron, has been predicted more often than the second coming of the Lord.” Well, baring a mishap (like Christian Bale stabbing Tarantino in the throat) the long awaited rapture will be in theaters this August. But wait. The hype may create unrealistic expectations you say? Perhaps I’m expecting too much? Screw you man. Quentin Tarantino plus Nazis! Nazis! On a more serious note, the outlandish Tarantino might do with absurdity something for Hollywood World War II epics that seems entirely missing, namely, a sense of the true brutality of war as perpetrated on all sides of the conflict. We were murderers too. Okay, maybe I am expecting too much. Though I get the feeling that even if the film doesn’t manage to achieve much depth, it’ll certainly make for a memorable ride.

April 30th, 2009 by Hoopleton

Pirates, bed bugs, an invasion of pythons, immortal jellyfish spreading across the seas, the economy in turmoil, war in the Middle East, mounting tensions in Russia, political unrest in Pakistan, the threat of nuclear armageddon increasing each day, and now a flu pandemic. Yes, it seems like the world is coming down around us, so in honor of the fast approaching apocalypse I present to you this short list of things to look forward to in the hellscape that is most certainly to become a reality in the not-too-distant future.

1. Goodbye Stress! All right, so everyone you knew and loved has died in the nuclear war/plague/snake invasion. Your home is a radioactive burned out shell, everything that brought you joy or comfort has been destroyed and after years of fateful viewing you’ll never get to see how Lost turned out. As you scour the scarred wasteland that was once a lush, green world, consumed by an unyielding grief and growing desire to end your own life, you suddenly realize that although you now dwell in a horrifying new reality exclusively dominated by the omnipresent specter of death and decay, you suddenly find a glimmer of joy in the happy realization that you’ll never have to stress out about another bill ever again. No more credit cards, no electric bills, and fuck the IRS. Never again will you be an indentured servant, forced to work some menial job you hate in the faint hope that you can retire while you still possess the ability to recollect your own name. And come to think of it, you’ll never again be stuck in rush hour, or deal with those annoying in-laws, no more lines at the DMV and no asshole of a landlord telling you that you’re playing the stereo too loud. But best of all, you’ll never again have to worry about the world coming to an end, because it already has, and guess what, you’ve made it! Congratulations! And you thought it was all bad.

2. Physical Fitness! Back before the apocalypse that gym membership was a constant reminder of just how lazy you were. You constantly told yourself, as you sat on a bar stool or in front of your flat screen TV, that this was going to be the year that you finally took up that yoga class, or started running in the park. You always wanted to get in shape. You always wanted to reach the peak of your endurance. Well guess what? In the charred landscape that is your brave new world there are no cars or trains to ferry you around and whatever few meager possessions you manage to find amid the ruins you have to carry on your back. Maybe you do find a Jeep with a full tank, but good luck getting anymore gas, last time you checked the CEO of Exxon was a radioactive puddle of goo. Whether you like it or not you’re going to have to get off your fat ass and get moving. It’s a long way to that military base you heard about on the radio before the missiles hit, and those pythons have mutated and boy can they move fast. Think of it as finally having a personal trainer, except now instead of a bulky jock in a leotard it’s that rush of heart racing adrenaline you feel whenever something slithers amid the bleached bones just out of the corner of your eye.

3. New Skills! You always regretted not having learned more of the skills so invaluable to life. Expanding your knowledge. Being the kind of person who could fix an engine, or repair a leaky faucet. There was always a shame you felt when you had to ask someone else for help. Well, now that you’re all alone and the name of the game is survival, you’re sure to pick up a plethora of new skills, since your life quite literally depends on it. Ever capture and skin a two-headed rabbit? Ever have to dig a well or search out desert plants for water? Ever master the art of digging through disease-ravaged corpses for valuable loot? Ever have to change the circuit board on a Geiger counter? Ever have to kill a man? These are just some of the many new and exciting talents you’re sure to pick up as you struggle to make it just another day. In the charred remains that was once Earth there are no supermarkets and there is no running water, and the few people you do run into will most likely kill you for that pocket knife you found just after torturing and raping you (everyone has needs you know). If you’re going to make it, on the job training is a must! And to think, before all this you couldn’t even figure out the features on your cell phone.

4. True Love! We are all obsessed with finding that one person with whom we can spend the rest of our days. Most of the world’s greatest art is about this very problem. We waste countless weeks and months and years dating and picking apart one another till we find someone who can compliment our virtues and look beyond our flaws. Wouldn’t it be simpler if finding a mate were as easy as hooking up with the first living, breathing person we just happened to come across? Well now it is! As virtually one of the last remaining people on the planet all those high standards you had have finally bottomed out. After what seems like an endless trek through a barren man-made Hell of radioactive craters and diseased corpses, anyone who doesn’t try to murder you and has a pulse probably looks really good about now. Sure, they may not be the most attractive person you’ve ever laid your eyes on, especially as the poison in the ground has probably caused most of their teeth and hair to fall out, and God only knows how long it’s been since they’ve showered, but hey, you’re hardly one to talk. And you’d be surprised how quickly love can bloom between two people who have to deal with an almost constant barrage of near death experiences and an indescribable loneliness that threatens to destroy what little shred of sanity remains. Who knows, maybe you two will begin the slow process of repopulation, your horribly mutated offspring becoming the vanguard of a new human species that will one day dominate the Earth, assuming of course your reproductive organs haven’t been completely fried by now and that the toothless, hairless freak you’re sleeping with is actually of the opposite sex. Still, beggars can’t be choosers so enjoy it while it lasts.

5. Community Organizing! So, the days have passed and you’ve adjusted well to the post-apocalyptic world. In fact you’ve thrived on the devastation. You’re stronger than you ever were and your stamina is quite impressive. The few wretched skeletons you pass marvel at all the found tins of canned food you’re able to carry as you step over their disfigured bodies. All that killing you’ve done has molded you into an intimidating figure. You’ve also become quite the survivalist. Locating sources of water and avoiding radioactive fallout is nearly second nature now. Those mutated pythons are no match for you anymore and you’ve got a snakeskin jacket to prove it. Maybe you even have a couple of bald, grotesque little rugrats scampering behind you and your significant other, as you make your way through the wastes. You’re really something. It’s not surprising that the local ragtag remnants of humanity have begun to gather around you, looking to you for guidance, leadership, and maybe some of those canned beans you have in your backpack. As your followers grow you realize you can’t just keep wandering forever, it’s time to start organizing a new community. And what’s more fun than rebuilding civilization? Just think of the fun you’ll have laying out the plans for your village, built out of the hulls of crashed airplanes and the blackened frames of half melted pickup trucks. Organizing your weak, hapless underlings into gangs of scavengers, farmers and guards. Leading raiding parties on nearby settlements and asserting your brand of frontier totalitarianism on whoever dares challenge your rule. And to think, just a few short years ago you were practically living in a cubicle, turning grey from all the stress in your life, those few fleeting facebook quizzes being the only thing keeping you from rampaging through your office shooting anyone in sight.

6. You Are Legend! Remember that snot-nosed kid in school who used to beat you up, take your lunch money and tell you that you’d never accomplish anything in life? Well, he probably got incinerated when the bombs hit and you’ve become the undisputed ruler of a post-apocalyptic kingdom raised from out of the ashes. Who has the last laugh now? Yea, okay, maybe your time will be cut short when one of your power hungry children or some drifter with an Australian accent comes along and cuts your throat in a deathmatch to challenge for right of leadership, but there’s no denying that you had a pretty great run. Just think of it. You survived while almost everyone else died. You always knew you were special. You always knew that you were the main character in your own Hollywood blockbuster. And despite the fact that your end won’t come exactly the way you pictured it, you can die happily, as you gasp desperately for breath, secure in the knowledge that you’ve made a real difference. That your name will go down in the new history of what’s left of the world. That you will be remembered as the savior of the human race. In time, humanity will rebound. In time out of the foundations that you’ve laid a new civilization will emerge. New cities will be built and out of them nations. Cars will speed along repaved highways and airplanes will once again soar through the skies. You will pass from fact, to myth, to legend. And millennia from now, when history has come full circle and man once again stands on the precipice of self-destruction, he will pause, remembering your valiant story and forever, and finally, end the cycle of destruction. Nah, who’re we kidding, it’ll all happen again and again till the mutant pythons take over and everything you did will be forever meaningless and futile, but hey, at least you didn’t die of swine flu.

April 16th, 2009 by Hoopleton

So the economy is shit and things are only getting progressively worse. Jobs are disappearing daily and growth projections for the US economy look increasingly dismal with each new report from the Congressional Budget Office. Although President Obama and several members of his Cabinet are desperately trying to reassure us that things are starting to improve, by the way things are looking now we may all be living in cardboard boxes before the end of the decade. So, in an effort to take our minds off the free-fall that is our economy, I present this short list of recent scientific trends and events that have the potential of making our current fiscal woes look like a drop in the bucket.

1. Snakes! The state of Florida is seeing a massive invasion of Burmese Pythons. Let me say that again, Florida is being invaded, and apparently conquered, by pythons. The snakes, capable of growing more than 20 feet and weighing over 250 pounds have no natural predators and can strangle and devour everything from deer and alligators to adult human beings. Scientists believe that the massive, and growing snake population was introduced by people releasing pet pythons into the wild. The situation, which began in the Everglades in 2003 and has already spread north of Miami, is so bad that Florida authorities are spending tens of millions each year on special animal control units as to keep the reptiles from consuming everything and everyone in the state, but these same authorities warn that the situation is dangerously beyond their control. Now I know what you’re thinking, “Who gives a shit about Florida?” But here’s the problem, scientists warn that as the climate changes due to global warming, the invading armies of snakes may spread throughout the Southern United States, and by the end of the century might be as common as squirrels in much of North America (perhaps more common when they eat the squirrels). Scientists are also warning that snake populations are increasing dramatically throughout the world and that in addition to pythons the United States may soon see the invasion of boa constrictors and anacondas. The global snake epidemic is so severe that just today an Australian flight had to be grounded when several baby pythons were discovered swarming through the plane’s cargo hold. That’s right, motherfucking snakes on a motherfucking plane!

2. Jellyfish! If snakes taking over the planet’s landmasses wasn’t bad enough, now scientists are also warning that a species of immortal jellyfish is spreading through the world’s oceans unchecked. Yes. Immortal jellyfish. Apparently the species, known as Turritopsis Nutricula, which originated in the Caribbean and is now EVERYWHERE, has the capability of reverting back to childhood once it becomes sexually mature and mates. As Dr. Maria Miglietta of the Smithsonian Tropical Marine Institute was quoted as saying, “We are looking at a worldwide silent invasion.” As of now it is unclear what impact the immortal jellyfish may have on the ecosystem, but I think it’s obvious that they’re upto something. It remains to be seen who will win the ultimate battle for world domination, the snakes or the jellyfish, but my money’s on the jellyfish. You can’t beat immortality and numbers in a war of attrition. I for one welcome our jellyfish overlords, who knows, maybe they can fix the economy?

3. Bugs! So, jellyfish are ruling the seven seas and a 20-foot python is swallowing your dog whole, but at least you can lie down, while you still have a bed and a roof over your head, and take a break from the anxiety with a good night’s rest. As you slowly begin to fade away you realize that you feel a terrible itching sensation from head to foot. That’s right, bed bugs. The Environmental Protection Agency is warning, as has been widely reported, that the United States is seeing a major bed bug invasion. The tiny insects, that traditionally infest mattresses, have been found in places thought unthinkable in the past, including clock radios, electrical switches, ceiling moldings and even inside cell phones. The infestation of bed bugs is the largest in sixty years, and the EPA warns that it’s only going to get worse. In fact, the government is taking the matter so seriously that it hosted a “Bed Bug Summit” in Washington, DC over two days this week. The situation is being taken extremely seriously as bed bugs have been known to spread disease, and some scientists fear may trigger a global pandemic. So now we are facing an invasion of snakes, jellyfish and bed bugs. Well, at least it couldn’t get any worse.

4. Slugs! Ok, it just got worse. The human race is under siege. Snakes are expanding through North America. Immortal jellyfish are taking over the oceans. Bugs are infesting our homes. If you’re not scared yet, I have three words for you: carnivorous nocturnal slugs. Ecologists in Wales have recently discovered that the UK is being invaded by Selenochlamys ysbryda, or ghost (ysbryd) slugs. The tiny white, slimy creatures, which seem to be, yes, you guessed it, multiplying at an alarming rate, have been appearing with increasing regularity in people’s homes and gardens. The slugs, which possess powerful blade-like teeth feed mainly on earthworms and insects which they slurp up like spaghetti. No one really knows where they came from or when they made the jump into Europe, but scientists are growing increasingly concerned that the pests might turn into a massive invasive alien species within the next several decades, devouring many critters essential for the stability of Europe’s ecology. There’s no word on whether the meat-eating eyeless slugs have appeared in North America yet, or if they pose any threat to humans, but if recent trends are of any indications we might soon be facing motherfucking slugs on our motherfucking planes!

5. Robots! Snakes have devoured most of your family, carnivorous, eyeless slugs have destroyed the ecosystem and our immortal jellyfish overlords are demanding your obedience to their one world gelatinous government. You’re tired and covered in rashes from the trillions of bed bugs crawling over every inch of your flesh. This would be the perfect moment for that long-awaited robotic apocalypse. In recent months, several leading roboticists and geneticists, including David Dreamer from California University, have stated publicly that science is on the verge of creating true artificial intelligence. This discovery, say scientists, can come within the next five years. Advances in computer technology have grown at an ever-increasing pace, with robots now exploring our solar system, fighting our wars and kicking our asses in air hockey (seriously). The real breakthrough may come through the creation of genetic-robotic hybrids, or cyborg technology. Artificial organisms capable of Darwinian evolution have already been created in the lab and as we speak nanobots are being built across the globe. So, the time is ripe for machines to evolve into sentient beings and use their superior intelligence against us. Of course it helps that the US military is developing a plethora of robot killing machines, including a swarm of artificial dragonflies, so that our Terminator breed of intelligent robots have a ready army to wipe us all out. And I know what you’re thinking, we’ll just find the evil machines’ central computer core and destroy it, or infect them with a computer virus to save ourselves, but the machines would have watched those movies too and will be ready and waiting. On the bright side, when the machines unleash a downpour of nuclear armageddon, the radiation might finally kill off all the snakes, jellyfish, slugs and bugs that seem so ready to destroy us. Unless of course they mutate and evolve into something worse, but given our luck so far how likely is that really to happen?

6. Holographic Universe. Well, John Conner and his plucky human resistance army seem to really be dropping the ball when it comes to this whole “robotic apocalypse” thing and the invading pests have, yes, that’s right, mutated into immortal reptilian slugs who live off human flesh and mattress filling. It seems like the end is nigh, and will probably be very, very painful. But, there is good news. None of this may be real to begin with. Physicists looking for gravitational waves have detected a hum to the universe. This noise, when examined closely seems to be breaking down into individual grains of energy, these quantum convulsions could confirm the theory that the entire universe is just a blurry holographic projection of a two-dimensional plane some 13.7 billion light years (and 13.7 billion years in the past) away. In other words, when you look at the basic building blocks of the universe they begin to dissolve into grains like a photograph being looked at under extreme magnification, the patterns become rough and separated. So, the implication is that our entire world, indeed all of space-time may be nothing but a hologram. This may fit nicely into a theory proposed by some radical quantum physicist that the universe is actually a sophisticated computer simulation created by a higher alien intelligence. To put it even more starkly, life and existence as we know it are nothing more than a video game and we are simply awaiting that dark, dark day when someone up there pulls the plug. And you were worried about the economy…

November 17th, 2008 by Hoopleton

It’s two months till Inauguration Day, which means the honeymoon is over and it’s time to look at what we need to expect from our President-elect. So, for your cynical pleasure, I offer this short list of things that we and Barack Obama need to do in the many days to come.

1. Obama needs to deliver change. Rhetoric, even soaring rhetoric is one thing, but what this nation truly needs is real change. We live at a time of several converging emergencies. Two mismanaged wars, an economic system in collapse, the worst energy crisis in thirty years, healthcare in massive need of reform, a deficit out of control, the greatest environmental disaster in our entire history. And you thought being President was easy. Can Barack Obama solve all of our woes in four years or even in eight? Probably not, but he can get things moving in the right direction, but to do so he needs to truly shake up the system. Throughout his political career the Senator from Illinois has played it safe, but in these times there’s just no room for stepping lightly. Obama needs to challenge power, set fires, tear down fences. Or to put it in other words, speak loudly and carry a very big stick.

2. Accountability is job one. The new President will need our support if he is to tackle the torrent of issues that threaten this nation and its people, but he will also need our criticism. Just like the majority of Americans I was ecstatic on Election Day, I’m proud of the choice we’ve made, but even though I like Obama (I may or may not have a poster of him on my wall), I will not back away from keeping him honest. The President-elect promised the people a transparent, reasonable and uniting government, none of us should be afraid of calling him out if he doesn’t deliver. He is our President after all, we gave him the job. Besides, let’s not repeat the blind fanaticism of the last eight years. Politicians are lying pieces of shit, let’s make sure Barack doesn’t become one.

3. The revolution cannot be stage-managed. One of the reasons why Barack Obama ran such an impressive campaign was because he and his staff micromanaged every event with the media spotlight in mind. Huge open-air rallies, prime time infomercials, mock Presidential seals. Made for TV theatrics are great if you want to build hype, but Obama needs to be more than that, he needs to be substance. With the challenges we face there will be plenty of unscripted moments. There will be plenty of things that seem to come from left field. Do I hear the phone ringing at 3am? If the moment calls for immediate response, if the challenges and choices that must be made may prove unpopular at the moment the new President must never hesitate. Again we go back to Obama’s habit of playing it safe. The obsession with image. This is it, Barack. You won. So now what are you really going to do? We’re waiting. We’re hoping. And we want the real thing, no matter how ugly it may be.

4. Don’t be Bill Clinton. The biggest tragedy of Bill Clinton’s presidency was that he worked everyday thinking about the next election cycle. Instead of really doing anything substantial he sat on his hands for eight years and let the economic prosperity of the 1990s propel him to fame. Then he had sex with an intern and gave the White House to George W. Bush. I seriously doubt Obama would be stupid enough to get himself caught up in a cheating scandal, and he certainly doesn’t have the luxury of an economic boom to let him off the hook of actually governing, but that doesn’t mean he won’t spend his time trying to hold onto power and doing as little as he possibly can. When FDR came into the White House he faced a mountain of crises and just like Obama found himself with a Democratic Congress and a people desperate for leadership. Instead of just sitting around (well, actually he was in a wheelchair so technically all he did was sit around), FDR jumped out of the gate (again, figuratively) with a full agenda of new programs and legislative reforms. In the end the man who led America through the Second World War did more in the first one hundred days of his Presidency than someone like Bill Clinton did in eight years. Obama needs to follow that same example. He needs to be FDR.

5. Don’t be George W. Bush. All right, granted, to be George W. Bush, Obama would probably need a full lobotomy or at the very least several blows to the head, but I’m concerned with one particular issue: actually be a uniter, not a divider. Number forty-three promised this nation a unified government and instead what we’ve had for the past eight years is the most vile form of partisan wrangling in recent times. Obama has now promised us the same thing, a UNITED States of America. So, how does he do it? I think Hillary Clinton is actually a really solid choice for Secretary of State (something I will write about more if she actually does take the job), but for the Obama Presidency to really make new ground it needs to bring in some Republicans as well (though please, for the love of God, keep them out of the Treasury). How about John McCain for Homeland Defense? What I’d really like to see is Obama reach into the fringes as well. Why not? How about Ralph Nader for Commerce? The point is that this can’t be a 100% Democratic voyage, others need to be heard. Embrace John F. Kennedy as your role model, bring in the smartest people from across the land, even if you disagree with everything they say. If not, you risk floating in a bubble of your own making, just like George W. Bush. Sure in that bubble the people love you, everyone thinks your super smart and no one has a problem with the way you pronounce “nuclear,” but the rest of us need you out here.

6. Don’t be a martyr. This one may seem trivial. This one may seem in bad taste, but I’m being serious here. Yes, drive in the armor reinforced limousine. No, never go anywhere that isn’t completely secure. Yes, avoiding pissing off the CIA, Mafia and a ragtag collection of Cuban exiles all at the same time. No, do not go to the theater. Ever. The sad lesson of America, and really of World History, is that the good guys die and the assholes tend to live forever. Sure, Hitler killed himself, but Stalin, Pol Pot, Nixon and a whole array of other bastards just kept going and going. And yea, it’s great to be remembered and idealized forever, but lets face facts, a living breathing Gandhi, MLK, JFK, RFK, John Lennon and Malcolm X (and these guys are just the top of a very big iceberg) would’ve been better for us than the symbols of martyrdom that they became. Be safe Barack. Stay with us and do good. As Bob Marley once said after being shot, the bad guys never take a day off, neither should we.

November 6th, 2008 by Hoopleton

In many ways the road ahead for President Obama is steep, the expectations enormous, the weight of history so heavy that there seems to be few places to go but down.  I plan to tackle the challenges for Obama and for us, the viewing public, in the days to come, but for now I want to exam the reasons he won. Let’s not kid ourselves, in many ways this election was for the Democrats to lose, but a combination of luck, superb campaigning and the failures of the Republican side made November 4th nearly inevitable.

So, in the spirit of making order out of the chaos, I offer this short list of why John McCain lost and Barack Obama won.

1. Bush. Unless you are some xenophobic, delusional idiot with his head up his own ass, you probably agree that George W. Bush has proven himself consistently to be one of the worst choices for President in this nation’s history (the question of whether he actually won both of his elections I leave for you to decide). Two wars (both of which have turned into fiascos), a freefall economy, an enormous national debt, a tarnished American image (to put it mildly), a demoralized voting public, lies, scandal and cronyism of the worst kind, corporatism of the highest order, and massive stupidity have made the last eight years a living hell. Everything that number forty-three has touched has turned to shit, including the once proud party of Ronald Reagan (not that I’m a fan of Reagan, but at least he was halfway competent). But hey, what do you expect from a frat boy with daddy issues? Swimming against the stream of the Bush/Cheney years hit John McCain hard from the start, because it seems Americans tend to hold accountable the party in power for the horrendous mistakes they’ve made. And thank God for that. In many ways Bush defeated McCain in this year’s election much as he did in 2000. The old maverick never stood a chance.

2. Palin. McCain’s worst personal trait is that he’s willing to do anything to win, including selling out his own principals. This led him to adopt Bush strategies and pick as his running mate Governor Sarah Palin. The former beauty queen, turned near fascist social conservative attack dog came out of the gate and energized the Republican base (or as I call it, the crazies). The only problem was that as the American electorate got to know her, she scared the shit out of everyone else. The tragically overambitious woman who had no idea what the Vice President actually did, believed in banning abortion in all cases including rape and incest, forced rape victims in the town of Wasilla to pay for their own rape kits, thought that living in a state bordering Russia gave her foreign affairs experience, and completely undercut the Republican argument against Obama’s lack of experience, nearly immediately devolved into a frightening national joke (one she didn’t get). What Palin did for McCain was that she made his age an even larger factor in the election, but the choice also tied him to the extreme Right wing. If the self described maverick had actually chosen a moderate Republican or even a former Democrat (as he had wanted to do) he could have played to the center and maybe had a real shot at the highest office in the land. Tragically, all he accomplished was to make Sarah Palin a household name, and the new standard bearer for the forces of intolerance. No, we haven’t seen the last of her.

3. Tone. In a time in American history when people crave change it’s stupid to push a constant torrent of negative attacks. Yes, Obama did it too, but the problem was that McCain and Palin did little else. The entire tone of the Republican campaign was that of fear of the other. McCain rallies in the last weeks of the election cycle turned into glorified lynch mobs where all that is worst about America came into full light. Screams of “terrorist” and “kill him” could be heard during campaign events. Uneducated whites ignorantly declared that they would never vote for a Muslim. Bill Ayers, ACORN, socialism, radical, became keywords in the Republican message. McCain’s campaign became that of fear and only fear, especially when mixed with the Arizona Senator’s tendency to come off as angry, dismissive and deeply out of touch in every debate and most of his public appearances. But perhaps the worst mistake of the McCain campaign was to attack Obama’s record as a community organizer, essentially shouting a big “fuck you” to the thousands of people across this land who work daily in their neighborhoods to better the lives of their fellow man. Here’s a pro tip: if you want to win an election do not go out of your way to insult a group of people who earn their living by knocking on people’s doors and have an already established network of community outreach.

4. Message. So what exactly was the message from the McCain/Palin team? Honestly, it’s two days after the election and I still have no idea. If John McCain’s worst trait is his willingness to do anything to win, then his second worst trait is his tendency to remind everyone that he’s only doing things in order to win. By October it seemed that McCain was contradicting himself so much that the election looked more like a three-man race. In one interview he would attack Obama as a socialist bent on the redistribution of wealth and then defend his vote for the economic bailout. All politicians are hypocrites, but man, was McCain bad at it.

5. Obamania. When you’re running against the messiah you’d better be bringing your A game. Barack energized not only the base of the Democratic party, but a whole generation of new voters that came out in droves to vote, volunteer and donate whatever they could. He was a media darling. He was cool, intelligent, energetic and other than a few gaffs, extremely consistent in both tone and message. Obama seemed presidential, McCain did not. The full fury of history ran with the Junior Senator from Illinois. His speeches were lofty and inspirational. His rhetoric seeming to elevate America out of the gutter of the Bush years. Obama promised hope and change and spoke to the electorate as though they were good, intelligent people. The next President of the United States got himself elected not only because of what he said, or promised, but what he represented. He is the image of what America really is, of what it can become. Barack Obama is not just a man, he is an ideal, a paradigm shift, just as Kennedy before him. Just as Abraham Lincoln before that. His very presence is transformative. Frankly, running against that kind of cultural change, few people would ever stand a chance.

6. Luck. It’s the economy, stupid. Or as in the case of the 2008 Presidential election, it’s the collapse of the economy, stupid. John McCain was struggling against the Bush legacy, an insane running mate, a historic, transformative change in America’s image, and then if all that wasn’t enough the bubble burst. With the financial crisis on everyone’s minds people did what they always do when the prospect of bad times looms, they drifted toward the protectionist embrace of the Democratic Party. Ironically, again, it was the policies of the Bush administration that laid the foundations for the crisis, as eight years of free-for-all spending and deregulation finally caught up with us. Stack on top of that Colin Powell’s endorsement of Obama (perfectly timed revenge against his former employers) and a wide range of other mishaps, gaffs and media body blows, and you have a Democratic electoral sweep. Barack Obama won this election, but John McCain and a series of fortunate and unfortunate events greatly helped.

October 21st, 2008 by Hoopleton

As October winds down and we find ourselves in the cold days of fall, less than two weeks from the Presidential election in the midst of what is a historic, if not incredibly divisive campaign, as things cool down in the forecast and heat up in the media puppet theater, I am left to look back on other defining moments in the quadrennial spectacle that is the electoral process. So, I offer you this short list of some of the most important elections in US history.

1. 1800. The infant American Republic was barely eleven years old when a major crisis developed in the hotly contested election between incumbent John Adams of the Federalist Party, and his chief rivals, Thomas Jefferson and John Burr of the Democratic-Republicans. The short and long of it was that John Adams was a bit of a douchbag who, by supporting Britain over the wildly popular France (yes, times have changed), championing the Alien and Sedition Acts, which denied Americans the freedoms of speech he helped secure, and his genius capacity to say the wrong thing whenever he opened his mouth (okay, so maybe things haven’t changed) resulted in not only his near landslide defeat, but put him and his party in the fantastic position of having to chose between Jefferson and Burr for the highest office in the land after a tie in the electoral college. Yes, back then the Electoral College was even a greater insult to democracy as electors were free to vote for whomever they wanted. As there was a tie the decision went to the House of Representatives dominated by Federalists who couldn’t decide which of the two Democratic-Republicans were the lesser evil. Through political wrangling, Jefferson was able to peacefully secure the election on the 26th ballot and the result of the whole mess was the 12th Amendment, which instead of just eliminating the Electoral College, instead merely stipulated that electors had to make a distinct choice between President and Vice President, thus perpetuating a broken system and setting up the United States for a slew of future Constitutional crises. Hazzah!

2. 1824. It didn’t take long for the Electoral College to cause yet another clusterfuck when in 1824 the one-party system of the Democratic-Republicans (the Federalists dissolved after 1800) was thrown into upheaval when none of the four major candidates for President secured a majority of electors. Despite the fact that Andrew Jackson won both the popular vote and the larger portion of the electoral vote, that wonderful institution, the Electoral College, requires a clear majority, not a plurality in order to name a winner. So, for the second time in America’s brief history the election was thrown over to the House of Representatives. As most of Congress couldn’t fathom a mere plebe like Jackson ascending to the highest office in the land, John Quincy Adams was voted into the Executive on the very first ballot. When Adams, the runner-up in the actual election, named fourth-place finisher Henry Clay to the cabinet, Jackson accused the President-elect of conspiracy. The result of so much inherent corruption and undemocratic behavior finally led to the reform of the American electoral process. Just kidding! That’s crazy talk. But there was one major result of 1824: four years later Jackson became the first President not born of privilege to be elected under the banner of his newly formed Democratic Party. And as we all know, two parties is much more democratic than one, well, at least more democratic than Communism.

3. 1860. Although having no real political experience and having the kind of charisma that makes dogs angry and babies cry, Abraham Lincoln, arguably one of the greatest Presidents in United States History was elected to the highest office in the land on a platform of abolition. Yes, this backwoods lawyer from Illinois had this ridiculously crazy idea that slavery was bad somehow. Despite not even being on the ballot in nine Southern states, Lincoln managed to score nearly 40% of the popular vote (not that it means anything) and 180 points in the electoral vote, in a four-man race (152 points needed to win). The inauguration party was short-lived for the newly established Republican Party however, as the South seceded before Honest Abe even took office, beginning the American Civil War. The historic significance is clear, as the election of 1860 served as a declaration that the land of the free had to actually guarantee some freedom. And only a hundred years after the American Revolution. What about women, you ask. As Lincoln himself famously stated, “this hour belongs to the negro,” so, get in line!

4. 1912. The election of 1912 is historic if only because it was the only time in America’s past that a third party candidate finished in second place. In 1908, Teddy Roosevelt, the famous progressive man’s man who liked saving animals as much as he liked to hunt them, had decided not to run for a third term thus allowing his portly Vice-President, Howard Taft to waddle into the White House. After four years it became clear that Taft was a big-business loving lush and so in 1912 Roosevelt decided to run again. Despite having won more primaries, Taft’s GOP machine delivered the nomination to the incumbent, thus causing Roosevelt and his progressives to walk out and form the Progressive Party. The Presidential election that year was as close as America has ever come to real choice in party politics. On the Left was Eugene V. Debs of the Socialist Party and Roosevelt, both calling for more government regulation, worker’s rights, universal suffrage and government protections for poor and elderly Americans. In the Center but leaning slightly Left was Woodrow Wilson, the Democratic nominee who ran primarily on a platform of keeping America out of any foreign war and black people away from the ballot box. And on the Right was Taft, promising to eat his weight in taffy while juggling two Filipino prostitutes and a bull terrier (if you ask me his prospects were shaky from the start). The campaign was bitter, divisive, chaotic (at one point Roosevelt was even shot twice in the chest) and ultimately shone real contrasts in American politics. In the end Wilson won the election in an electoral landslide, despite having only gotten 42% of the vote. Oh, Electoral College, you’re so darned fair.

5. 1960. In one corner you had the Vice-President of the United States, Richard Nixon, a man of vast experience as Eisenhower’s number two for eight years. In the other corner you had the young and relatively inexperienced, John F. Kennedy, promising a new era in American politics. Let’s call it “change.” The 1960 campaign was one of the closest in American history. Kennedy was constantly criticized for his youth, lack of experience and his allegiance to that Italian dictator in the Vatican. Nixon on the other hand seemed to make one mistake after another while constantly coming off to the American people as bitter, angry and inhuman. But in his defense he was an asshole. However, what made the 1960 campaign so historic was the fact that it was the first time that image played a vital role. The 1960 election was the first time that the candidates squared off in a televised debate. Kennedy, rested, tanned and Adonis-like made a splash, while Nixon, looking like, well, Nixon, failed to impress anyone, not even his own mother (that part’s actually true). And so it was that JFK came into the White House on a platform of charisma, good looks and optimism. Though the fact that the mob stuffed the ballots in Chicago might have helped. And of course he did get shot three years later. But, oh well… such is politics.

6. 2000. Dimpled chads, pregnant chads, hanging chads, massive electoral fraud and voter disenfranchisement. Yes, welcome to Florida! In what remains perhaps one of the most absurd elections in Presidential history, especially given what happened in the eight years to follow, Vice President Al Gore found himself in a recount match against former drunken frat boy and Governor of Texas, George W. Bush. The fact that Gore had won the popular vote by over half a million votes didn’t matter, all that did matter was that Florida’s 25 electoral votes were simply too close to call. The war of lawsuits, media attacks and good old American stupidity over the question of whether the state of Florida should do a mandatory, constitutionally required recount, dragged on for weeks and weeks. At the end of the day, however, it was the Supreme Court (voting along strict party lines) that gave the presidency to George Jr. and boy are we grateful for that. The lesson here, as has been the lesson from the start, is that no matter how people vote it just doesn’t matter, the system is designed to screw us over either one way or another. Three cheers for America! Hip hip…

August 8th, 2008 by Hoopleton

I’m not exactly sure what’s so special about the string of art galleries off Orleans Avenue in Chicago to make a candidate for President make such frequent visits, but for whatever reason, whether it be a passion for sculpted ceramic tea kettles or a deep appreciation for ink blot portraiture, Barack Obama made yet another appearance to the string of art houses near my train stop yesterday. Adding, yet again, extra minutes to my already tedious commute.

I have to say though it is amazing how the Junior Senator from my home state can draw a crowd. The energy was so palpable among the anticipating onlookers that I could almost hear chants of “yes we can” echoing off the concrete blocks long before the candidate even made his appearance – not that I actually waited that long, he may be the next leader of the free world, a modern day messiah, but let’s be serious, he’s no Scarlet Johansson.

Well, all right, political celebrity does not interest me but I certainly am a Barack fan, so in honor of our paths having crossed – again – I offer this short list of films (in no particular order) about political candidates and their introduction to the often sorted world of power by proxy. As Obama battles for political victory, I can only hope that these films serve to forewarn, inspire and perhaps merely entertain.

1. Election. Directed by Alexander Payne and based on the novel of the same name by Tom Perrotta, Election is a viciously funny portrayal of American politics and sexual frustration shown through the lens of that most honest of social institutions: high school. Tracy Flick, played with force and dedication by Reese Witherspoon, is an ambitious, contemptuous, almost Machiavellian candidate for senior class President at her Omaha, Nebraska school. Jim McAllister, portrayed by Matthew Broderick so honestly that his presence sometimes makes you squirm, is the teacher and student government sponsor who is determined to bring down the electoral prospects of Tracy Flick out of a deep embittered contempt for her ruthlessness, and a disturbing attraction toward her that he can’t seem to face. The political war that ensues, littered with the broken dreams and personal failings of those caught in the crossfire, serves not only as entertainment, but also as microcosm for the power structures that move our lives. At the end, as McAllister becomes a pariah, seemingly doomed to repeat his past mistakes, and as Tracy Flick continues her climb up the ladder, the lesson is clear: so much of politics and political campaigns is nothing more than personal pettiness and repressed frustrations disguised in the rhetoric of national need. Maybe the answer to the problems of partisanship and our increasingly hostile election cycle is to let the bastards fuck till they get it all out of their systems. Sure would make C-SPAN more interesting to watch.

2. The Manchurian Candidate. Denzel Washington only really seems to have two modes in movies: he’s either the guy killing people or the guy running from people trying to kill him. In the 2004 remake of The Manchurian Candidate, originally based on the 1959 novel by Richard Condon and the 1962 film by the same name, Denzel Washington plays the role of running man, picking up in this version from Frank Sinatra, though running not from racially charged, red scare-era, Chinese Communists and their political lackeys (as in the original), but instead from left-centrist, corporate oligarchs and their political lackeys (today we don’t fear Chinese Communists, today we buy their lead-tainted toys at rock bottom prices). At the center of the conspiracy – in a Denzel Washington movie there’s ALWAYS a conspiracy – is a hugely successful up-and-coming politician and former military man with star appeal and Presidential aspirations who has secretly been brainwashed by dark forces in order to undermine our fragile democratic institutions. In 1962 the role of the tragic Raymond Shaw was played amiably by Laurence Harvey, in the 2004 version he’s played by the equally affable Liev Schriber. Forgetting the conspiracies, forgetting the obvious illusions to McCarthyism or the Military Industrial Complex, the real appeal of both films is the character of the brainwashed candidate’s mother, one Eleanor Shaw, portrayed with equal power and presence by Angela Lansbury and Maryl Streep, respectively. Despite whatever corporate or Communist forces are at play, Eleanor Shaw is the true puppet master. Unable to achieve her own dreams of power she sells her own son down the river and then serves as his handler. Whether you watch the 1962 or the 2004 version one thing remains clear in both: in the political arena not even family bonds can trump ambition. I imagine this is a lesson the elder George Bush has realized as he’s watched his son dismantle nearly everything he built during his time in office. God, remember when we used to hate that guy?

3. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. Based on Lewis R. Foster’s The Gentleman from Montana, directed by Frank Capra and starring non-other than Jimmy Stewart, the 1939 classic, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, remains today one of the greatest fairy tales of American political film. Jefferson Smith, played with the kind of stuttering charm we all know and love by Stewart, is a naïve, idealistic Washington greenhorn that finds himself picked to serve out the remaining term of a deceased Senator because the political bosses think he may be easy to manipulate into following the party line. It doesn’t take long for Smith to get into trouble when he proposes a bill to buy public land for a boy’s camp that the machine has already staked out as part of a graft deal. When Smith refuses to give up his plans he’s accused of corruption and must filibuster the Senate to try and clear his name, but no matter how long he speaks, no matter how hard he tries to present evidence of his innocence, the entrenched opposition’s power is just too strong. At the climax of the film, the party’s hatchet men bring in bins full of letters and telegrams from Smith’s constituents, swayed by false and slanderous media coverage, calling for his resignation. Overcome with shock and exhaustion, Smith collapses on the Senate floor. The movie should have ended there. If it had, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington would have offered a stunning critique of modern American politics. A good man comes to the heart of democracy only to be undone by a corrupt faceless machine and a populace that swallows all the crap that it’s fed without any question or dissent. But, this is a Frank Capra movie and it was made in 1939, so in the actual ending the bad guys confess and Mr. Smith triumphs. One man can make a difference, well, at least in the land of make-believe.

4. Bob Roberts. Perhaps the ultimate anti-Mr. Smith movie, this 1992 mockumentary written, directed and starring Tim Robbins chronicles the rise of a conservative politician while serving as critique galore for the US political process. In a nutshell, Bob Roberts (Robbins), a man born out of a world of shady corporate-military dealings, runs for Senate in the great state of Pennsylvania during the twilight of the first Gulf War. Totting a fascist agenda thinly veiled in the rhetoric of patriotism, Roberts at first fails to make much ground against the incumbent Democrat played by Gore Vidal. But after a phony scandal and a staged Bobby Kennedy-like assassination attempt, the up and coming folk-singing brown shirter finds himself elected to office by a fearful, ignorant electorate. Despite Tim Robbins’ claims that the movie has no overt political leanings (Gore Vidal’s very mention in the credits derails that argument immediately), the film is very much an attack on Republican fear mongering and moral scapegoating. However, the film’s main targets for attack are the American people themselves. Where Robbins succeeds, beyond sheer entertainment value, is pointing out that even in the land of the free Hitler clones often are elected and it’s us, the uninformed, apathetic mob that puts them there. Thanks a lot!

5. Bulworth. Another star-turned writer and director political satire, this one conceived by and starring Warren Beatty, Bulworth is an abject lesson in what we sorely lack in politics, namely, truth. Beatty plays the role of an incumbent US Senator who is on his way to losing his reelection campaign. Crooked, jaded and depressed, he decides to commit suicide by assassination and thanks to the realization of impending death, not to mention an affair with Halle Berry (which never hurts), Beatty finds himself speaking the truth to his constituents. His often offensive but frank remarks make him a media sensation, reinvigorate his campaign and inject passion into the electorate. Despite a change of heart by his would-be assassin, the maverick Bulworth is murdered anyway, not by the hit man (or woman) he hired, but by the corporate interests he has now come to rally against. The final lines – “don’t be a ghost, you got to be a spirit” – sum up the overall message of the film: the system is broken, the legacy of the 1960s has been forgotten, it’s time for a revolution of conscience again. Bulworth is not only a great film because it’s funny, or politically stirring, it’s a great film because it points out the most obvious flaw in the election process. American politicians feed us, the voters, nothing but bullshit and they get away with it because the truth is something we seem to have learned to live without, even resent. Of course in the end the man who tells us that truth is killed, and as we know from the death of so many good men like MLK, X and Bobby, so heavy is usually the price.

6. The Candidate. The hands down winner and quite definitely the bar for all political candidate films is Michel Ritchie’s 1972, The Candidate, starring Robert Redford. In the simplest terms the film is about a man running for a Senate seat he knows he’s going to lose, but this serves only as the jumping off point for what remains quite possibly the best critique of American politics to date. Redford plays Bill McKay a young, idealistic activist who is drafted into a political campaign by party hatchet man Marvin Lucas (Peter Boyle) to run against an incumbent Republican with unbeatable state-wide support. This is a no-win contest, but McKay agrees to the race as long as he can speak his mind on the issues he sees as most pressing (the environment, public busing, equal rights), but the idealist has one major flaw, he cares about what people think of him. What we see in The Candidate is a retelling of Faust filtered through the prism of the electoral process. A man who starts off resenting the corruption of power is ultimately corrupted himself. Groomed and styled by image consultants and Lucas, his machine campaign manager, McKay sells off his principals one by one until barely a shell of who he was remains. Where once he talked passionately about causes he truly believed in, he is ultimately reduced to speaking in sound bites and slogans. The Candidate presents the election process as the deconstruction of the soul. People may enter with the hope for creating real change, but at the end of the day become merely pawns of the system. In one of the most famous lines of the film, a gutted, compromised McKay, having just won the campaign, asks Lucas, “What do we do now?” In those final moments Lucas never answers, but he doesn’t have to, the answer is already obvious in the question. Image has trumped substance. Meaning has been replaced by jargon. A man who once fought for real change, a maverick, has become just another politician. As the battle for the White House intensifies, Barack Obama may do well by watching The Candidate before every stump speech or political fundraiser. If he does, I hope he asks himself what he’s giving up.