should have sent a poet

There are no words. No words at all.



This is just outstanding stuff, and there's so much to parse here -- although we know that within the week, Gingrich will give us more -- but a couple things stick out. I'm just not sure what is most striking about two minutes in the abyss.

• Maybe it's the fact that his hair doesn't move, 
• Or that he smiles -- grimaces, really -- at completely inappropriate moments, 
• Or that a 1.4 percent decrease in unemployment -- a statistical margin of error -- is supposed to be significant when he wants it to be, 
• Or that he can claim ownership of economic bona fides while Speaker of the House, and then turn around an claim that "No One Man" can turn everything around, 
• Or that a serial adulterer asserted the need for honest, straightforward talk, 
• Or that there were some nasty veiled threats towards the enemies of whatever he's actually proposing. 

But actually it's none of those things. Nope, not a one. The most striking thing about that video? Definitely the fact that he just uttered a two-minute-long paragraph that consisted of a single sentence. Fantastic.

[Newt.org <-- This is a real thing now.]

[af(sw)] Dear potential sponsor:

Hey, temporary Advertising Firm Intern:

Yeah, you. I see you sniffling over your desk there, inconsolable. You came to the big city with big dreams the summer before your senior year in college, and you were going to make your mark. "Watch out, World," you said (to the World), "here I come. TO MARK YOU."

You arrived for your first day at the ad agency of That Guy Who Your Dad Knows at the Country Club, and he brought you back into the cubicle farm, introduced you around. "This is The Intern," TGWYDKatCC said, "show him the ropes this summer."

You realized it should have been a bad sign that he had forgotten you were coming. You should have taken note that he needed some prodding before recalling your father's name correctly.

In your youthful exuberance, you thought it didn't matter, because you were making it happen.


And so now, here you are, sniffling over your thirteen-dollar-lettuce salad, wondering how you're going to eat for the rest of the weak, while front and center in your mind, the minions of the cubicle farms had looked you over, Fresh Meat, and decided the only thing to be done with you was to shove the most disgusting, unappealing, low-paying and impossible account squarely into your lap.

"Only way to learn is by throwing the babe into the deep end of the pool," Tormentor Number 1 (of who knows how many) had said, before clapping your a bit too hard on the shoulder and stalking off, hopefully never to be seen or heard from again.

But here you are, trying to decide how on the Lord's Good Green Earth you're going to sell Dr. Stinkfoot's Rectal Cream and Herpetic Powder.

Fear not, brave soul (and open the salad dressing, it had valuable calories, you'll need those)! Even though you think no one would want to come within fifty yards of that execrable product, you're wrong -- oh, how you're wrong, child!

We do. All's Fair (Six Western) would happily embrace Dr. Stinkfoot's balm and the $7.16 that comes with our endorsement! For another $0.75, the playwright will even work in some product placement.

That sound? Oh, that's the current cast storming out the door, but don't you worry. That was before they heard about the lifetime supply of the stuff you'll offer. They'll be back.

[af(sw)]

real estate Rorschach

I try keep this blog well-insulated from my all-abiding interest in baseball -- and compulsive obsession with the Los Angeles (nee Brooklyn) Dodgers -- but sometimes things are too good to keep to myself. Dave Zirin's Edge of Sports blog had an excellent take on MLB's repossession of the LA Dodgers last week that I devoured when it was written, and am only now getting around to sharing:

Two years ago, Michigan's then-Gov. Jennifer Granholm described automakers as "a healthcare provider that happened to make cars." For a generation now, baseball has been a highly leveraged real estate urban development plan in which men happen to play a game.

The unravelling of the Dodgers is equal parts delightful (as they deserve every misery they encounter west of the Rockies) and heartbreaking (if I had couple billion dollars, I'd spent it all on bringing them home).

But Zirin's insight is relevant to the theater industry, because it challenges our perspective on what, exactly, baseball is. One assumes that the incentive for owners is to sell as many tickets and official merchandise as possible -- but in the age of television advertising revenue, this isn't necessarily so. For theater practitioners, it's good to remember that the empty space we need to practice our art can look quite different if you flip the picture on its head -- and we must make sure to make a partnership with those who control space as appealing to them as possible. It's harder than ever to find affordable performance/rehearsal space, and that's a situation that's likely to get worse before it gets better.

The whole thing is worth a read.

 [Edge of Sports]

Charlie Sheen has taught us something after all:

Charisma is a lot easier to manufacture on film than it is on stage.

[EW, image via BBC News]

Noooooooooo

After I was handicapping the Republican primaries, someone said I sounded like I was talking about baseball. It's just as well baseball season opens today, because this is some depressing stuff, as far as I'm concerned:

In an unusual move, the coveted first debate of the 2012 presidential primary season is being rescheduled. The Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation announced that it is moving its "Reagan Centennial GOP Presidential Primary Candidates Debate" from May 2 to Sept. 14, 2011.

But where can I find a televised train wreck that is as excruciating as it is pleasurable to watch this Spring?

Oh, wait... never mind.

[CBS News and Meet the Mets, Meet the Mets...]

question

As a Western nation engaging in its third concurrent war in a Muslim country -- and clearly leery of any more open-ended engagements -- do we really want to call this "Odyssey"?

something about chickens and roosts

One wishes this was surprising. As it becomes clear that the wave of democratic movements sweeping the Middle East was little more than a narrow window of opportunity, it's equally clear that leaders in the West might be more than a little relieved:

The son of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi has alleged that his country helped finance Nicolas Sarkozy's 2007 presidential election campaign. "We funded it and we have all the details and are ready to reveal everything," Saif al-Islam said.

This makes the Economist's chronicle of European leaders' moral equivalency make all the more sense:

IMAGINE your awkward neighbours across the street. You befriended them, drew them into the neighbourhood-watch scheme and even made some nice trades. All of a sudden they are exposed as criminals, or maybe brutes with women enslaved in their basements. Would you feel guilt about your friendship? Remorse about having ignored the telltale signs? Or would you feign outrage, like Captain Renault’s in “Casablanca”: “I am shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!” Such are the emotions that Europe’s leaders feel as their friends across the Mediterranean are toppled by long-suffering subjects. True Europe has had little choice in its neighbours. Good relations were a necessity of life, particularly for countries with oil and gas, or those that guarded against terrorists and illegal migrants. Yet some European actions now seem craven indeed. Remember Gordon Brown’s dissimulation about the release of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, the Libyan jailed for life in Scotland for his role in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing? Or the sight of Silvio Berlusconi kissing the hand of Muammar Qaddafi? In the grab for a share of Libya’s oil wealth, many others have been stained. Libyan petrodollars, moreover, have found their way into companies and institutions across Europe, from the Juventus football team to the London School of Economics.

Understandable, if still shamefully craven. And no wonder Sarko has been so eager to lead this operation -- beyond just trying to purge the nasty taste of Tunisia's collaborationism -- he's trying to clear his election debt!  [BBC, Economist]

why politics matter

Take the time to read this article. It explains in excruciating detail why the closing of Guantanamo Bay matters; why policy decisions taken on the highest level need to be considered for its minutest consequences; and why we thought we were voting for Barack Obama -- so that callous dismissals of stories like this as inevitable collateral damage ("stuff happens") was an inexcusable disregard for the sanctity of universal human rights.

Eight years ago, an [REDACTED] Afghan kid—some say he was [REDACTED] years old, others say he was 12—was grabbed in a Kabul marketplace after a grenade attack on two American soldiers. He was interrogated, [REDACTED], and then taken to Guantánamo. He spent his teenage years there, seven in all, confined in a [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED] with the supposed "worst of the worst." But then, thanks ot the superhuman efforts of his defense team and one intense [REDACTED] military lawyer, the government's case against him disintegrated. Now he's back in Afghanistan, free as a badly damaged bird, in a [REDACTED] country he barely recognizes, wondering where you go when you grew up nowhere

[GQ]

Where is Equity?

As Keith Olbermann notes on FOK News Channel, when AFTRA -- "not the most belligerent nor plugged in of outfits" -- is stirred up, you know you've gone too far.

Welp, I've found someone yet milder, Mr. O.

In the Wisconsin conflagration, we have heard from every corner of the union movement in terms of news releases and messages to membership. I haven't heard much from my union, Actors' Equity, but I was able to dredge this up from their website, in the form of an open letter/monologue/diary entry from President Nick Wyman:

I can understand why Governor Walker and thousands of employers around the country would like to get rid of unions. They usually make employees more costly by negotiating salaries and benefits employees wouldn't be able to achieve on their own. They mandate work rules that not infrequently add to the costs of doing business. They limit flexibility by insisting on a say in or approval of changes in working conditions. We unions can be a pain in the butt.

Forgive me, however, if I shed no more than crocodile tears for the poor, put-upon employer. Unions exist to redress what is historically and consistently an imbalance of power between those who hire and those who do the work. We have moved beyond the most egregious abuses of the late 1800's - dehumanizing sweatshops with their if-you-don't-come-in-Sunday,-don't-come-in-Monday attitude - but the constant pressure to improve the bottom line leads to coal mining companies ignoring safety protocols and school districts putting sixty students in a class. The cards are still stacked in favor of management, and that disparity will only get worse as a result of the "Citizens United" ruling giving corporations the ability to give unlimited funds to candidates. Unions are the best and nearly the only

zzzzzzzzzzzz...hmm? Wuzzat?

Are you kidding me? We have the occupation by citizens of a public space for weeks on end, half a state legislature flees across state lines, phone stings where elected officials admit to totalitarian shenanigans, physical altercations between protesters and right-wing media, and the best my union president can do is come kind of mealy-mouthed history essay.

I have more vociferous debates WITH fellow union members ABOUT Equity. A clear existential crisis has galvanized the entire labor movement, and my union parks this shit on their homepage -- without even a red TAKE ACTION label, because, hey who cares about Wisconsin?

Disgraceful.

speaking truth to power (from the seat of power)

Dear (Former) State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley: Fucking Good On You.

Debate over the controversial treatment of alleged WikiLeaks source Bradley Manning apparently has cost State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley his job.

[...]

Manning’s treatment since being arrested last May and charged with providing thousands of classified documents – many of them diplomatically embarrassing – has been the subject of considerable debate.

He’s being held in solitary confinement 23 hours a day in a windowless 6-by-12-foot cell, and for a time he was stripped naked at night – due to concerns about the possibility of suicide, according to defense officials.

If only someone with the government was willing to put morals above their career when it came to Guantanamo Bay.

[CS Monitor]

more about Clarence

Sharing because, clearly, we hate our readers:

Congratulations to Lillian McEwen, that woman who was finally able to overcome years of terrible embarrassment about having sex with Clarence Thomas to write a book about it. D.C. Unmasked & Undressed is the title of this newly released memoir, because the people who write tell-all memoirs are weirdly terrible at this part of marketing. Obviously this book should be entitled What Clarence Thomas’ Dick Looks Like and How He Uses It, as that’s the only reason why anyone would buy it.

Want to know exactly how he uses it? Read on.

[Wonkette]

you say potato...

Representative Peter King wants to hold hearings about Un-American Activities Amongst the Mohammedans on these shores. Does the fact that he supported the IRA make him a hypocrite? Maybe

For Representative Peter T. King, as he seizes the national spotlight this week with a hearing on the radicalization of American Muslims, it is the most awkward of résumé entries. Long before he became an outspoken voice in Congress about the threat from terrorism, he was a fervent supporter of a terrorist group, the Irish Republican Army.

But more importantly, as we've pointed out before, the search for domestic enemies gets real messy, and real fanciful, real fast.

[NY Times]

money stuff

Hmm:

Any television executive knows that the big money is in reruns: Hit shows like “Seinfeld” and “Star Trek” keep raking it in long after the writers penned their last scripts. Now a group of theater producers is putting a twist on that business model, taking long-running Broadway hits and moving them Off Broadway to test if they can live on in rerun mode, where costs are lower and the profit potential is significant.

This is crap news in the big picture for performers. But given that Equity's all-or-nothing stance on any tier other than Broadway contracts, life below the elite level of contracts was crap, and they've done less than everything to give producers more options (cough -- showcase code -- cough). Now, the zero-sum game between producers and performers kicked into high gear, and there's no room for maneuver.

/end rant

[NYTimes]

kids, lawn, etc.

Goodness, I knew I was old, but if blogs like this one are becoming obsolete:

Blogs were once the outlet of choice for people who wanted to express themselves online. But with the rise of sites like Facebook and Twitter, they are losing their allure for many people — particularly the younger generation.

What does kind of dinosaur is our podcast?

[NYTimes]

great/horrible

You decide which.

first they came for the public sector unions...

The first gauntlet has been tossed in the pending labor war -- and no, I'm not talking about the NFL. The Governor of Wisconsin has proposed ripping up contracts with public sector unions and starting over with new rules that will ensure collective bargaining doesn't get in the way of balanced budgets.

Is this terrible? You bet it is. But let's keep in mind how we got there -- the hard-line mentality of unions going back more than 30 years that viewed management as nothing but an enemy to be battled, instead of a collaborator. Despite the fact that alternative models were available (looking at you, Germany).

So now, instead of presenting alternative models for businesses, they used an opt-in or opt-out model, and now that times are tough enough, the excuse is primed to scrap collective bargaining altogether.

Problem is, if this sticks, the abandonment of collective bargaining in the private sector is close behind. Hard models are brittle and break easily. Flexibility is the key to survival.

You listening, Equity?

[NYTimes]

if you're not going to donate to our fall production...

Felipe Ossa has some key insight as to where you can send that disposable income.

 (hint: it's all about the kitty.)

SUCH a bad idea

DID THEY NOT SEE LOGAN'S RUN?

This never ends well...

oh, don

Apparently McNamara II -- er, Donald Rumsfeld -- has seen fit to write a book.

Mr. Rumsfeld condemns what he describes as [L. Paul Bremer III, the civilian director of the American occupation of Iraq]'s heavy-handed, top-down approach and his decision to delay the transfer of authority back to Iraqis. Those actions, he writes, “inadvertently stoked nationalist resentments and fanned the embers of what would become the Iraqi insurgency.”

Interesting theory, Don. I have another -- maybe it was the arbitrary invasion of their country that lit those insurgency fires. But I guess it's just another known unknown, eh?

throwing up the hands

The idea -- I think -- is that we want more representative theater and film not because it's ethical, or reparations for past sins, or because it's a good business decision -- the argument I like to put forward is that more diverse stores simply make better stories.

So I find it to be a bit counter-productive when works featuring white casts are re-made with minority casts, as though (a) minority audiences couldn't understand the lines when they're read by white people, or (b) the stories from one group are basically interchangeable with the other group (although maybe you need to tweak someone's day job here or there).

Photo-negative racial remakes argue simultaneously for an exclusionary and universal principles that I find unpersuasive -- even if they weren't mutually contradictory.

And then we get this:

Will Smith, Jay-Z team to remake "Annie"

Overbrook Entertainment partners James Lassiter, Ken Stovitz, Jada Pinkett Smith and Will Smith are partnering with Jay-Z to release movies.

One of the first projects they're discussing is a remake of the Broadway classic "Annie," in which the Smiths' daughter, Willow, 9, would star.

You know that scene in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid when Paul Newman is kidding-but-not-kidding about seducing Katharine Ross on the bicycle while Robert Redford's sleeping, and then Redford catches them, and is all like What are you doing? and Paul Newman figures he might as well be honest and says Stealing your woman, and Redford scratches his ass saying Take her...take her and walks away?

Yeah, I'll kinda feel like that if they make a black Annie. Whatever, black Hollywood people.You're terrible.

[Of course, maybe they just need to make an all-minority Butch Cassidy because I CAN'T UNDERSTAND WHAT WHITEY IS SAYING.] (Happy February, America!)