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Up to the minute notes on the current state of free thinking and free living: Kentucky moonshine - original analysis and reporting from MoreThings, and all round pop culture museum of sight and sound - photo galleries, mp3 and video downloads.
Al Barger and MoreThings - getting people's goats since 1998.
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April 12, 2003
Dutch's displaced humiliation
[Morethings index for The Shield]
Season 2, Episode 7 "Barnburners"
Air date: 2-18-03
Man, what a trip into Dutch�s headspace. I felt some anxiety that Dutch was going to take Vic's advice that sometimes you had to "make the evidence fit the crime." You could see how he's driven to the edge of foolish behavior by the professional pressure coming down through Aceveda, coupled with his own internal humiliation for having screwed up with Bob and Marcy.
Then watch how he displaces his own humiliation and social inadequacy, exorcising it and also using it to break down his suspect. "When was the last time you saw your own dick without a mirror?" Man, that's cold, if you have any empathy for the other guy- which Dutch totally does. Oh yes, Dutch understands this guy and his self-hatred only all too well.
The perp noted in passing that he worked at a rib joint. Of all the jobs in the world, what is someone like this whose life is TOTALLY dominated by weight issues doing working in a rib joint? It�s a perfect detail of his self-hatred.
A big part of what makes this series so good is the detail of the dialogue, such as here when Dutch explains exactly what happened- with all the suspect�s internal rage and despair over his weight issues. He sets up just that moment, where the gross fat guy is humiliating himself by making out with the gross fat blind date, then she has to get at that candy in her pocket even then. Yeah, his rage and self-hatred comes pouring out. His behavior has been very precisely explained, and all the shadings of personal meaning for Dutch just make it that much better.
The final spin on this storyline came when Dutch gave Captain Aceveda some hell about how he deserved �a little goddam respect� as an outstanding detective who breaks cases no one else in the division can. Damn straight.
posted by Al at 4/12/2003 10:11:00 PM
Richard Thompson offers "a Taliban's-eye view of the West"
As a middle aged white Brit and long time converted Sufi Muslim and one of the top dozen most brilliant composers and guitar players of the rock era, Richard Thompson would be expected to have something interesting to say in the current world situation. Oh, yes he does.
"The Outside of the Inside" is the next to last track of his new album The Old Kit Bag. I first heard it live at the 2002 Indianapolis Jazz Fest, where he explained that it offered "a Taliban's-eye view of the West." What jumped out at me standing in the blowing rain that day was the denunciation of Einstein and his "devious mathematics."
This song probably isn't his catchiest pop song, but the quiet drama of the tune will draw you in on repeated listenings, especially tied to the brilliantly bilous poetry of the lyrics, and the Middle Eastern/British folk tone of the ominous (yet largely acoustic) guitar interplay. The more you listen to it, the more interesting it will likely seem, very unique sound.
It's all quite emotionally effective in establishing the feelings of pious hatred of a Muslim radical. It's 10 times more musically interesting than Springsteen's mushy "Paradise" song, and 20 times more emotionally intense.
The Outside Of The Inside
God never listened to Charlie Parker
Charlie Parker lived in vain
Blasphemer, womanizer
Let a needle numb his brain
Wash away his "Monkey Music"
Damn his demons, damn his pain
What's the point of Albert Einstein?
What do we need physics for?
Heresy's his inspiration
Which side was he working for?
Curse his devious mathematics
Curse his deadly atom war
There's a message on the wind
Calling me to glory somewhere
There are signs too deep for the dumb
Like perfume in the air
And when I get to heaven
I won't realize that I'm there
Shakespeare, Isaac Newton
Small ideas for little boys
Add them to the senseless chatter
Add them to the background noise
Hard to hear my oratory
Hard to hear my inner voice
Van Gogh, Botticelli
Scraping paint onto a board
Color is the fuel of madness
That's no way to praise the Lord
Gray's the color of the pious
Knelt upon the misericord
There's a message on the wind
Calling me to glory somewhere
There are signs too deep for the dumb
Like perfume in the air
And when I get to heaven
I won't realize I'm there
I'm familiar with the cover
I don't need to read the book
I police the world of action
Inside's where I never look
Got no time to help the worthless
Lotus-eaters, mandarins, crooks
There's a message on the wind
Calling me to glory somewhere
There are signs too deep for the dumb
Like perfume in the air
And when I get to heaven
I won't realize that I'm there
This is not Thompson's first song about Muslim radicals, however. If you're up for buying one album, you might just download "The Outside of the Inside" and buy a copy of his classic 1982 album Shoot Out the Lights, most often regarded as his best.
The title song tells the first person tale of a sniper in the hillside, shooting at the highway. It does not specifically address Muslim related issues, but it was inspired by the desperate mujahadeen resisting the Soviet occupation. It's real curious how he gets such expression from his guitar of the mental state of the sniper, without playing blues or going into any real frenzy. Indeed, live bootlegs of the song demonstrate how well he can sell the song solo with an acoustic guitar.
Just for a change of flavor, after the heavy emotional tone of these Richard Thompson classics, you might want to cool out with a DOWNLOAD of something a touch lighter in the way of a judgmental God: "My God Don't Take No Crap" This little gutbucket country stomp probably isn't as emotionally profound as Richard Thompson, but it sure is catchy.
Your god's so kind and loving
Your god's just makes me sick
I slap him in the face
He turns the other cheek
He says that he forgives me
I say, man you're a freak
I think I ought to kick his ass for being such a geekLabels: god, julie andrews
posted by Al at 4/12/2003 01:12:00 AM
April 11, 2003
Ayn Rand, BSD
Sending this classic out to Jacques Chirac and Nancy Pelosi:
"The question isn't who is going to let me; it's who is going to stop me."
-Ayn Rand
posted by Al at 4/11/2003 04:20:00 AM
April 10, 2003
South Park: It's Schoolhouse Rock with cussing
Sometimes South Park seems to be Schoolhouse Rock with cussing. I mean that in a good way. There are way too many potty jokes and smutty remarks to ever be pious edutainment- which is the best groundwork for real useful social analysis. Wednesday, 4-9-03, Comedy Central broadcast "I'm a Little Bit Country," the 100th episode of South Park. And an excellent civics lesson it is.
The title comes from the jingoistic country singing pro-war side of the debate, countered by the even considerably more ridiculous bigots of the anti-war side who presume to speak for the children and are, naturally, a little bit rock and roll. Is the titling of the episode Parker/Stone's discrete endorsement of the war effort? Of course, they are singing the goddam Donny and Marie theme song throughout the whole episode. South Park again earns it reputation for spreading obscenity.
Damn, but this episode was excellent, and nuanced. In a way, it represents a cynical take on our republic's way of doing business, but yet not really. It shows the system set up in an adverserial manner that legitimately works out the concerns of hawks and doves- and makes us look nice even when we decide that we have to kill people.
In a sense, you could describe the show's take on our system of government- going all the way back through Cartman's flashback to the signing of the Declaration of Independence- as an excercise in proper, healthy cynicism. It doesn't represent cynicism about the result, but presents the the construction of our system of governance as based on making properly skeptical expectations about human nature in order to mesh together clashing interest groups in a workable manner that functions optimally.
We don't want to be at war all the time, and we don't want the rest of the world to hate us, so we need people to resist going to war. But we can't be a bunch of pansies who won't stand up for ourselves, or we'll be run over by terrorists or the Chinese. The founders' genius was in the intricately involved mechanisms they created for shaking out and meshing these differing interests in a manner that will get the best and most balanced result. That's not really cynicism at all.
Also, South Park actually should rate considerably higher than Schoolhouse Rock in educational value. Schoolhouse Rock did a good job in presenting some basic facts in a memorable manner. I don't mean to take anything away from it.
However, South Park really represents a more sophisticated level of trying to understand the bigger picture of why and how the system works. They do this week after week at this point, dissecting public issues and social expectations in useful and thoughtful ways. It's just amazing. They're doing more to actually educate young people than the federal Department of Education.
And they don't require a multi-billion dollar hoseline from taxpayers to do it.Labels: south_park
posted by Al at 4/10/2003 08:36:00 PM
Death of a hooker
[Morethings index for The Shield]
Season 2, Episode 6 "Homewreckers"
Air date: 2-11-03
One particularly dramatically satisfying aspect of the whole series comes from how continuing secondary characters are deployed. The series has already killed several recurring characters. The cool thing is how many characters have been built up and explored over multiple episodes before being killed.
It means a lot more that way. We get to consider the history of the character leading up to their death. We get more emotional investment- which comes as a direct result of the thought and effort the writers put into developing the intricacies of a rounded human personality. Did they die as they had lived? Did they deserve what they got?
The necklacing torture deaths of a couple of bangers in �The Quick Fix� was kind of nasty, but not that meaningful to us. The first we saw of them was standing there with tires around their necks. They were more plot markers demonstrating what this Armadillo guy is about rather than any kind of characters.
It meant a lot more when Tio got the same treatment at the climax of �Dead Soldiers.� I, for one, had built a particularly strong attachment to this highly likable character since back in the spring. The image of his burnt corpse jarred me more than about anything else in the show�s history. Knowing now what they meant, the cries of �Mackey!� coming over Vic�s cell phone are incredibly terrifying on repeated viewings.
The hooker Connie had been in probably a majority of the shows since the pilot. She had a history and some reservoir of emotional investment built up for this character among regular fans of the show. Then tonight some psycho jackass casually kills her just to make a point to Vic. Damn. It means something. Her ghost will haunt the air of the show.
She died good, though- at least in a literary sense. That is, she exited in an interesting and ambiguous dramatic moment- yet without any indulgent trumped up death speech, or contrived last words. Jerk shot her, she fell down dead.
Importantly, she didn�t go out as a doped up hooker killed by a john or beat to death by a pimp. No, she was not hooking, and she was off the dope. She was actually clean, and working a more or less legitimate useful job as a CI.
Yet she wasn't quite martyred for her great altruism. She got herself killed because she got greedy reaching for a $5K bonus for capturing this mass murderer of women. Still, she got killed helping Vic take down a mass murderer.
I kind of hate to say it, but she seemed somehow more empathetic as a strung out hooker than as the responsible citizen she had become in her final appearances. Perhaps the desperation of her depths made it easier to forgive her character flaws, such as the grasping for cash that got her killed.
Was this a "good death"? Did she redeem herself before she died?
posted by Al at 4/10/2003 12:49:00 AM
April 09, 2003
Good ol' reliable Hanoi Jane
It's comforting to know that there are some things in life that are constant. Presidents come and go, fashions change, we've got different bad guys to worry about.
But Hanoi Jane always stays committed to America-hating asinity. For example, she recently told an audience of Canadians "I don't know if a country where the people are so ignorant of reality and of history, if you can call that a free world.'' Ah, the familiar sense of smug superiority, totally unearned, that confidence that she and her commie elite alone properly understand the world. Nobody who has any knowledge of history would support taking out a brutal dictator. What fools we all are, slaves to our imbecility, certainly not free people- not if we're ignorant enough to disagree with the star of Barbarella.
"I think the entire world is going to be united against us.'' Well, of course they will. You know that everyone hates a winner- especially one that tries to do good. There are always playa haters. Everybody will hate us- except maybe the Iraqis already dancing in the streets, thankful that we have knocked down the monster who has dominated and destroyed their lives these many decades.
Even her heroes, the Vietnamese communists, seem to like us pretty good now. Her top comrade hero, the mass murdering Ho Chi Minh is long dead. So I can understand how she feels a little alienated and alone. Obviously she is unemployable in American cinema, due to her unending and avowed disgust with the American public who would have to buy the tickets to underwrite a career.
It's alright, though. We can afford a few traitorous little ingrate rich kids. We survived her treachery in Vietnam back when she was actually a movie star. She certainly can't really do us any harm now. She's a living nostalgia act, always good for bringing a smile to a patriot's lips.
posted by Al at 4/09/2003 10:25:00 PM
Tiresome conscience
[Morethings index for The Shield]
Season 2 finale, Episode 13 "Dominoes Falling"
Air date: 4-01-03
"Results don't excuse bad behavior." Claudette -the shows' official voice of conscience- says this to Vic. As a general philosophical comment, most of us would naturally agree. Particularly considering that we're talking about cops and civil liberties, a long time member of the Libertarian Party such as myself would vigorously concur.
It sounds a lot different in the context, though. Consider what exact bad behavior and what exact results, and Claudette starts to sound like an ingrate.
The "Johnnies" gang, attempting a comeback, has just revived an old April Fool's day tradition (note the original broadcast date) which involves a random killing for each of their homies killed over the past year, in this case three. "Johnnie says 'April Fools'" and BLAM.
The first random schmuck to get snuffed happened to be Claudette's ex-husband, out in a car with their daughter. Vic, whom Claudette strongly resisted from having any part in the investigation, quickly figured out the gang connection, and the gist of what was going on.
The "bad behavior" was that Vic let his new team member Tavon put a gun to the head of the Johnnie's leader and convince him that he was willing to blow his brains out if he didn't tell him who was involved. Most importantly, they needed to know who the other two shooters were supposed to be before they killed anybody. [This was the most compelling one scene to watch in this episode.]
Granted, they violated the hell out of the Johnnie's civil rights. They might have taken their time with interrogating him properly, and with a lawyer present as far as it concerned finding the guy who murdered Claudette's husband.
However, there were known to be two more Johnnie jackasses set to kill random civilians within the next several hours. Would it have been better to let two more people be killed in order to say that you were ethical and constitutional?
I'm not entirely sure what to think here, which is good. It means I HAVE to think, to parse out the right and wrong not just in the nice platitudes of political philosophy, but in how it really applies in practice.
On one hand, I see the dangerous allure. Well, yeah, this was a special case, but then there are always LOTS of special cases. Turn a blind eye to clearly illegal behavior by cops, and you're asking for a police state. We're already halfway there just on the special needs of fighting the drug war.
On the other hand, Vic saved two innocent citizens from getting whacked. He did so at the expense of terrorising a murdering gang-banger. The guy badly needed terrorizing.
Claudette's immediate and complete refusal to give Vic credit strikes me as pigheadedness. Having a strong conscience, a sense of right and wrong, is good. However, maybe your conscience isn't always on the right settings. All that "morality" and "ethics" and "integrity" and all those other things have to be judged by how they work in the real world. Otherwise, they can degenerate into mere smug self-satisfaction.
In this case, there's no two ways about it: Tavon and Vic were acting in a highly illegal manner. Also, knowing the facts of the case, if I were on a jury trying them for crimes against the banger, I'd vote for acquital.
posted by Al at 4/09/2003 10:20:00 PM
The evil Andy Griffith
In 1983, Andy Griffith and Johnny Cash starred in a true-crime made-for-tv movie Murder in Coweta County. They played sheriffs from adjoining counties.
Andy Griffith plays the villain, a chillingly wicked and heartless man. Years of seeing him as the gentle Sheriff Taylor calming Barney Fife down does not prepare you for the cold-bloodedness of this performance. Even as they're strapping the bastard into The Chair, he's stone cold.
This production was not a big deal at the time, and it is rare now. If you're any kind of Andy Griffith fan, you should definitely lay hands to a copy of this if you can find it.
posted by Al at 4/09/2003 12:49:00 AM
April 08, 2003
Where are the bodies?
Something very important is missing from American broadcast coverage of the war in Iraq: dead bodies. Blog buddy Alex Frantz at Public Nuisance pointed out to me several days ago the lack of bodies on the news, and it's bugging me more each day. My confidence in the quality of our news coverage shrinks by the day
Don't get me wrong: I have no pleasure based desire to look at corpses. I don't get a boner from looking at dead bodies (although I AM a major Alice Cooper fan).
However, WE are at war. WE need to see just exactly what WE are actually doing. That's the only way a democracy works. The US government has killed tens of thousands of people on our behalf. I haven't heard very many specific numbers, but some talking head at Fox News suggested in the range of 50 - 80 thousand.
The various networks have hundreds of reporters embedded with our troops. They're spending tens of millions of dollars on every kind of technology to have theoretically the best, most comprehensive live reporting in the history of warfare.
So where are the bodies? That's the central fact in any war, yet we're not really seeing the carnage at all. It strikes me increasingly as surreal that we're having these many thousands of hours of intense, up close war coverage with almost no dead bodies being seen.
I do not recall seeing even one dead body from this war on any of the news networks, broadcast or cable. Now I have to think that there have been a few, just because it seems inconceivable that there wouldn't be ANY. I just know that I am not seeing them.
The only dead bodies I have seen were on Fox News. However, they were not even from this war. When word of the demise of Chemical Ali was breaking, they showed file footage supposedly of dead Kurds gassed on his orders years ago. The network had no trouble showing that- in prime time with no warning about the pictures being disturbing, or any such.
I have supported this war effort from the beginning. I think this war is a necessary evil. So far as I can tell, President Bush and the military have done a pretty extraordinary job in taking out bad guys while harming as few innocents as is humanly possible.
How do I know, though? Fox News tells me all is going great, and they have pictures of Iraqis thankful that we've come to lift the boots off their necks. That's great. They've got retired military guys with fancy screenwriters breaking down our smashing success into bite sized chunks for us to digest. They've got reporters out with the troops showing their progress.
Yet every minute I'm watching I am increasingly aware that we are absolutely NOT getting the whole story. They are shielding us carefully from the most central purpose and reality of war. What else are we being shielded from? And why?
It might upset Grandma to see true coverage of a war. Fine, then watch some damned Andy Griffith Show reruns. If you don't want to know what's really happening, then don't watch the news.
What would be the effect of showing the true blunt carnage of the war? Answer: don't know, don't care. Do it anyway. Maybe it will cause more people to turn against the war and the Bush administration when they see a field with hundreds of charred remains of Iraqi soldiers. Maybe seeing Americans blown apart by a suicide bomber at a checkpoint will stiffen our collective backbones, and increase support for being as tough as we have to be.
Put out the information, then let the people decide for themselves how they're going to interpret the facts. Fox News has the motto "We report. You decide." Well, then do the reporting so that we CAN decide for ourselves. You do your job so that we can do ours.
posted by Al at 4/08/2003 11:41:00 PM
Big mistake
Ninety years ago today, on April 8, 1913, the 17th amendment to the US constitution was ratified. It changed the way US senators are selected from being picked by the various state legislatures to being selected by direct popular election.
This constitutes one of the worst mistakes in the history of the republic, screwing up a very important constitutional design point of having one side of the congress once removed from popular whim. Now with the direct popular election of both sides of congress, the process of voting themselves bread and circuses runs unimpeded. More free stuff for everybody!!!
This change also hugely hurt the idea of federalism, of states having some control over the actions taken by the federal government. The selection of senators was the main way for state governments to have input into the actions of the federal government.
All in all, the 17th amendment represents the elevation of cheap egalitarian sentimentality over the carefully balanced social construct of our founders.
posted by Al at 4/08/2003 12:34:00 AM
April 06, 2003
Merle Haggard, American Badass
Born this day in 1937 hailing from Bakersfield, California: Merle Haggard is 66 years old today. Happy birthday, ya cussed old coot!
Mr. Haggard certainly rates as one of the top half dozen greatest recording artists in the history of country music. Him and his ex-wife wrote tons of totally kick ass songs. His tough-minded Bakersfield sound with the Strangers was harder rockin' than most of the pussy rock bands. Merle certainly rocked the mic harder than any Grateful Dead candyasses. He had more to say in 155 seconds of the "Working Man Blues" than any 30 minutes of Deadhead wankery.
The most important thing, though, other than Brian Wilson, I can think of no songwriter to emerge from California in the '60s that was Haggard's equal as a songwriter.
Haggard has been known as some kind of hardcore right-wing character, largely on the basis of just a couple of songs. It's worth noting, however, that his outlook was always rather more complicated than that. "Okie From Muskogee" started out as something of an inside joke on square country folk- until he caught flak for it and began presenting it seriously. Also, especially cool is the pre-Travis Bickle/Tim McVeigh character study in right wing looniness "I'll Be a Hero (When I Strike)." Note also that even as the beautifully belligerant rebuke to anti-war protesters "Fightin' Side of Me" reigned at #1, he was in the studio very enthusiastic about recording "Irma Jackson", the commercially hopeless tale of a mixed-race love affair.
He has a box set Down Every Road that kicks much ass. He also recorded an absolutely essential double-album tribute to Jimmie Rodgers Same Train, Different Time.
And if you want a real spokesman for the working man, it would certainly be Merle WAY before Springsteen.
Here the line-up for my own custom mixed Merle Haggard CD, which would be one of the best country CDs in your collection were you to compile one just like it:
MERLE HAGGARD, AMERICAN BADASS
Working Man Blues
Okie From Muskogee
(My Friends Are Going to Be) Strangers
Fightin' Side of Me
I'll Be a Hero (When I Strike)
Swingin' Doors
Tonight the Bottle Let Me Down
Sing Me Back Home
The Son of Hickory Hollers' Tramp
The Legend of Bonnie and Clyde
Today I Started Loving You Again
Mama Tried
In the Good Old Days (When Times Were Bad)
California Blues (Blue Yodel #4)
I Take a Lot of Pride in who I Am
I Can't Hold Myself in Line
Mama's Hungry Eyes
Silver Wings
Huntsville
Waiting for a Train
Jimmie Rodgers' Last Blue Yodel (The Women Make A Fool Out Of Me)
If We Make It Through December
If We're Not Back in Love by Monday
Pancho and Lefty
I Wish a Buck Was Still SilverLabels: country_music
posted by Al at 4/06/2003 03:21:00 AM
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