Dear (very specific) Marxist Academic

I'm not writing this because I disagree with the worldview which informs how you see our current situation and what led to it. I'm cut from the same coarse fiber, and yes, I too see systemic and structural failures wherever I look. That's not the issue.

I'm writing because you are an unmitigated, diseased, treacherous, flamingly poor excuse for an asshole. Calling you a straight-up asshole would actually be paying you a compliment, as assholes do serve a vital purpose. You, on the other hand, are a boil to be lanced.

I see you writing that you opposed the recently passed economic stimulus package, not because it didn't go far enough in providing the help that is so desperately needed, but because it delays the revolution you so desperately desire, possibly because you maintain the childish fantasy that then the masses will recognize your genius and rally around like some latter-day Che.

They won't.

Fuck you.

Fuck you for sitting around and taking a paycheck and an education paid for by the taxpayers you'd see fucked over to exacerbate the "crisis" which you seem to think portends your glorious revolution.

Fuck you for looking down your nose and saying "fuck you" to the people who produce the surplus which allows you to pretend you have all the answers, if only the people would listen.

But most importantly, fuck you for sitting around and doing nothing. Fuck you for not organizing. Fuck you for alienating all your students with your holier than thou bullshit attitude. Fuck you for thinking that your paper about how fucked up shit is is actually a solution. Fuck you for pretending to care about the people for whom you profess to speak, but really, inside you're a hollow, misanthropic piece of shit who'd rather say "I told you so" than do the hard work, make the hard choices, and experience the hard landings from failure that are actually necessary to make this world a better place.

Fuck. You.

Absolutely Essential Viewing

A highlight of 2009: CNBC's Rick Santelli on the floor of the NYSE, confusing himself and his trader colleagues with "regular folks."

Robert Gibbs' recent reference to the Santelli blast's also a hoot:

Gibbs gleefully went after Drudge's favorite CNBC reporter at today's briefing, casting his position as the view that "the adage that if it was...good for a derivatives trader it was good for main street."

Paul McCartney - Monkberry Moon Delight

Wondering where my head is? Right here. Where's yrs? 'TBSOWFMU has turned me on again. I need a copy of RAM asap.

Obama meets with who????

so I read that the Obama's had a sit down with progressives, and asked them to help support "big progressive" ideas, and I liked the first part.....

“The gist was, `We’re gonna need people out there telling the story of the stimulus and telling the story about how much we need big health care reform and clean energy and green jobs,’” the attendee says.

but then I spit coffee all over my computer at this:

Among those on the guest list: Labor leaders Jimmy Hoffa, Gerry McEntee and Andy Stern; MoveOn’s Eli Pariser; Sierra Club’s Carl Pope; Planned Parenthood’s Cecile Richardson; and Joe Solomonese of the Human Rights Campaign.

Maybe Eli and Joe could be characterized as progressive, but Carl, Jimmy, and Andy???

on the question of what is a freakin progressive, I recommend this piece by nate silver @ 538...he discusses two distinct strains in progressive thought, what he calls rational and radical progressives:

...Rational progressivism tends to be trusting, within reason, of status quo political and economic institutions -- generally including the institution of capitalism. It tends to trust these institutions because it believes they are a manifestation of progress made by previous generations. However, unlike conservatism, it also sees these institutions as continuing works in progress...
Radical progressivism is more clearly distinguishable from "conventional" liberalism and would generally be associated with the "far left" -- although on a handful of issues such as free trade, it may find common cause with the "radical" right. Radical progressivism embraces the tradition of populism and frequently adopts a discourse of the virtuous commoner organizing against the corrupt elite. It is much more willing to make normative claims than rational progressivism, and tends to view conservatism as immoral and contemporary American liberalism as amoral (at best). Its project is not reform but transformation.Rational progressives sometimes regard radical progressives as impractical, self-righteous, shrill, demagogic, naïve and/or anti-intellectual. Radical progressives, in turn, regard rational progressives as impure, corrupt (or corruptible), selfish, complacent, elitist, and too quick to compromise.

I don't suppose there were too many "radical progressives" invited....

The Prophet Speaks

Look, that's all it is in life: you just find yourself a way to have a grand old time.

Zing!

Wonk-Wank Two-Fer Horn

1. Who's Afraid of Jake Tapper? - The Daily Beast
2. Ben Smith's Blog: McAuliffe, Trippi exchange brickbats at Virginia dinner - Politico.com Only the strong will survive when "ClamHands" Trippi and" Ex-Paul Williams sideman" Terry McAuliffe throw down in Virginia! Tale of the Tape: Trippi ran Edwards' and Dean's campaigns, etc., and McAuliffe is a DNC shill most recently associated with HRC's failed primary charm offensive. Check this post out: there's video!
   

The Friends of Eddie Coyle and 70s Crime Films As Such

{Statement of Dexter, Lips. Recorded After the Rains and Before the Lorry.}

as I may or mayn't've mentioned already, George V. Higgins' NOVEL "The Friends of Eddie Coyle" is one of my five fave crime novels, ever! Higgins' dialogue is bleeping awesome, and deserves mention alongside Hemingway/Carver when it comes to pulling off a weird, oafish, shrewd, "less is more" brand of emotionalism, if not melodrama, if not sentimentality.... all the while telling a fascinating, pretty macabre and hilarious story.

anyway, THE FILM is something else entirely. a slow, dry crime thriller made in the 1970s. in other words, this is among the filmic stuff i worship (or at least watch) THE MOST. sometimes these films are so obsessed with their pursuit of "documentary realism" that they end up in weirdly formalist, weirdly mannerist cul de sacs that'd make Hitchcock yawn, then blush. honestly, i won't rest until my nightly dreams resemble these oddly operatic, gun-deal-in-supermarket-parking-lot treatments. won't you come along on this expedition with me?

also, we should acknowledge the willingness of the "New Hollywood" establishment at Paramount, etc., to allow filmmakers to, like, practically rub dirt on to their film stock and generally use the camera to get in the way of the storytelling that we'd come to expect from these genre films...that's meaningful to me. the movies are all so slow, dry, technical and clumsy at certain times, we really have to teach ourselves anew how to live in 'em every damned time we see 'em. in a dramatic sense, however, the films DID provide a lot of space for character-based, partially improvised acting performances. but, maybe my passion is simpler than all this and i'm really just a hand-held camera fetishist? we'll never know until you watch these movies and talk to me about 'em, so organize some grievances and play the tapes!

in the slooooow dry 70s crime genre, you'll also do well to encounter Straight Time, The Seven-UPs. Chinatown (boom!), The French Connection and my personal favorite of the moment, The Long Goodbye.

on the artier wing, we got The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, Mean Streets, etc..

on the "Hard PG Comedy" side, you NEED redford + george segal in THE HOT ROCK, which's directed by Peter Yates of Eddie Coyle (see trailer) and BULLIT. (Incidentally, Peter Yates' commentary track is featured on the fancy new Criterion Collection DVD version of EDDIE COYLE.

there're plenty of places to go, really. you just need to buy yourself a brown leather waistcoat and begin this journey.

Stupid with an S

Anyone else watch Fox News' Trillion with a T? I tuned in for the promised Andy Stern action, but there was very little of it. He got in two sound bites, one supporting the S-CHIP expansion and one about the funding of NCLB. The program was the expected propaganda job, with little pretext to fairness or balance, but I'm not bitchin', I knew what I was in for.

I did like this guy though. I mean, not as a human being or anything, but as a Republican who is young, can speak to a microphone without looking like a jackass, and is a sweet piece of meat, if that's your thing. He's extremely conservative and from Arizona so I guessed he was Mormon (not that there's anything wrong with that) and, of course, I was right. Does this hurt him for president or will Mitt's failed bids pave the way?

The answer is yes.