The Village Idiots

I’m going to suggest a way that we could achieve a utopian society. First, let me say that I don’t really believe a utopian society is possible. Next, let me explain what I mean by “utopian” society. I’m mainly thinking about society where poverty, war and injustice are all but eliminated. Everyone is not left wanting–in terms of health care, food, employment, education, etc. (OK, that’s not exatly a precise definition, but hopefully that will do.)

Now, even though I don’t believe such a society is possible (besides when we get to heaven), I’d like to suggest a way that I wouldn’t rule out. (more…)

That’s the title of this Atlantic article. I basically agree with everything the author wrote. What do you think?

Here’s to another year of great books, magazine articles, blog posts, and whatever!

Here’s to another year of great films AND whatever Reid’s watching.

I’ve got a few more to add later, but I thought I’d share this now. These aren’t necessarily my best shots (some of them are pretty bad, actually), but for one reason or another they all make my list of the year’s favorites.

Here’s the list:

1. Jerry Rice
2. Jim Brown
3. Lawrence Taylor
4. Joe Montana
5. Walter Payton
6. Johnny Unitas
7. Reggie White
8. Peyton Manning
9. Don Hutson
10. Dick Butkus
11. Ronnie Lott
12. Anthony Munoz
13. Joe Greene
14. Sammy Baugh
15. Deacon Jones
16. Otto Graham
17. Barry Sanders
18. Ray Lewis
19. Bronko Nagurski
20. Brett Favre
21. Tom Brady
22. Gale Sayers
23. John Elway
24. John Hannah
25. Dan Marino
26. Bob Lilly
27. Merlin Olsen
28. Emmitt Smith
29. Jack Lambert
30. Dick “Night Train” Lane
31. Bruce Smith
32. Jim Parker
33. Sid Luckman
34. Deion Sanders
35. Chuck Bednarik
36. Raymond Berry
37. Jim Thorpe
38. Lance Alworth
39. Gino Marchetti
40. O.J. Simpson
41. Rod Woodson
42. John Mackey
43. Alan Page
44. Mel Blount
45. Tony Gonzalez
46. Roger Staubach
47. Ray Nitschke
48. Red Grange
49. Mike Haynes
50. Terry Bradshaw
51. Bart Starr
52. Eric Dickerson
53. Willie Lanier
54. Forrest Gregg
55. Earl Campbell
56. Gene Upshaw
57. Mike Singletary
58. Steve Van Buren
59. Mike Ditka
60. Jack Ham
61. LaDainian Tomlinson
62. Randy White
63. Jim Otto
64. Herb Adderley
65. Randy Moss
66. Willie Brown
67. Kellen Winslow
68. Mike Webster
69. Bobby Bell
70. Marshall Faulk
71. Paul Warfield
72. Jonathan Ogden
73. Ozzie Newsome
74. Marion Motley
75. Darrell Green
76. Art Shell
77. Tony Dorsett
78. Bruce Matthews
79. Emlen Tunnell
80. Troy Aikman
81. Steve Young
82. Ted Hendricks
83. Norm Van Brocklin
84. Joe Schmidt
85. Marcus Allen
86. Willie Davis
87. Elroy “Crazylegs” Hirsch
88. Ed Reed
89. Ernie Nevers
90. Kurt Warner
91. Fran Tarkenton
92. Michael Irvin
93. Sam Huff
94. Lenny Moore
95. Larry Allen
96. Mel Hein
97. Derrick Brooks
98. Lee Roy Selmon
99. Michael Strahan
100. Joe Namath

I’ve been watching some youtube videos of Tim Tebow highlights, and I must say that the feelings that rise up while watching this make me think of Rocky. I mean, most experts–and I agree with them–have been saying that he can’t succeed by playing this way; that he’ll have to develop into a pocket passer. Most of you guys know that I’m a firm believer in that–that I don’t really care for running QBs, unless they’re good pocket-passers, first. But there’s something different about Tebow. Let me go into that. (more…)

Barnes and Noble email book recommendations to me, and Julie Otsuka’s Buddha in the Attic, a finalist for the 2011 National Book Award, caught my eye. But when I learned that book follows several Japanese picture brides in “eight incantory sections,” I felt deflated–and then annoyed. Basically, the book sounds like another Joy Luck Club, which isn’t necessarily terrible. However, what annoys me is the feeling that writers/filmmakers and their readers/viewers can’t seem to get beyond these Oriental immigrant stories–especially portrayed in an exotic, bordering on the mythic. (The “incantory” makes me suspect that’s what’s going to happen in this book.)I admit the fable-like quality can be appealing to some degree, but it also feels a little false–i.e., only in the movies.

More importantly, I don’t feel like I can relate to these stories–especially not depicted in these ways. I suspect my grandparents can relate to these stories (although I’m not sure their experience was “incantory”), but hasn’t this story been told enough times? That’s not to say that we can’t have any more Asian-American immigrant stories, but I’m feeling dismayed that Asian-American artists don’t seem to be moving beyond this–or the audience is not interested in moving beyond this.

There’s another issue that I associate with stories like Joy Luck Club, namely, the self-conscious treatment of culture. The stories seem to be as much about Asian culture–specifically educating readers about it–as they are about the characters and story. Personally, I’m tired of that, and I’m more interested in good stories and good characters that happen to be Asian-American. (Btw, this is what I loved about Charlotte Sometimes.)

My sense is that we’re getting close to a point where Washington politics is purely about political warfare first, and solving the nation’s problems second.

Then again, maybe when the Republicans gain control of the Congress, things will change. Maybe they’ll begin to negotiate in good faith and take some significant steps to solving our biggest problems.

That’s what I said over a year ago in the thread, Daydream of a Radical Centrist (second to the last post). By now, most of us would agree that Congress has dashed these hopes. Indeed, since this summer I’ve been thinking more about the ideas I mentioned in that thread, with some modification, which I want to discuss in this thread. Instead of a creating a third party (made up of incumbents from either party), I want us to consider something else–namely, a pledge that politicians can agree to sign or not.

The Pledge
Here’s the general idea. Instead of creating a new party, incumbent politicians and new candidates running for office would pledge to support certain principles and promises. Before I go into that, a word on the name of the pledge. The “purple” comes from a mix of red and blue, signifying bipartisanship. “Purple patch” has several meanings: 1) it refers to the a good streak in someone’s career; 2) “patch,” because signers could wear actual patches signifying their commitment. It’s also pretty catchy.

Here are some ideas that the pledge would include:

1. Candidates will make a general commitment to compromise that will substantively address serious problems and when not compromising would lead to greater harm. They acknowledge that effective solutions can contain policy ideas they don’t agree with and even strongly dislike, but a compromised deal should contain policy ideas that they do agree with and even strongly support.
2. Candidates acknowledge that most substantive solutions to the country’s most serious problems will involve compromise–namely, the likely solution will be a mix of policy ideas from the left and right. At the same time good compromise doesn’t have to precisely be a 50-50 split, but it should probably be closer to a 50-50 split than a 90-10 one.
3. Candidates will not forgo compromise a) just because compromising won’t give the candidate 90% of what he/she or his/her party would like or; b) just because a compromised settlement will harm the party–even if it substantively helps the country. When a compromised deal will hurt one party a lot more than the other, singers will agree to mitigate this harm and/or give more concessions to the party being hurt. In other words, signers will put solving problems over political warfare.

In addition to these general principles, signers would recognize a handful of serious problems the country faces—problems that grow harder to solve with each passing year we ignore them. Countries like China and India continue to advance economically and gain a competitive advantage, so we can ill-afford to inadequately address these problems, let alone ignore them.

Because of this, the signers will make a commitment to apply the principles above to the following issues (although there could be more): federal debt/deficit (particularly for the long term); federal entitlement spending; health care (i.e., controlling costs while expanding coverage and maintaining or improving quality); climate change; energy policy (i.e., becoming less dependent on foreign countries and developing renewable energy sources).

(I would consider drawing up specific solutions for each issue–solutions that could satisfy, to some degree, Democrats and Republicans. A consensus among independent experts would agree that the proposed solutions would substantively address the issues. Politicians would not necessarily commit to adopting the specific proposals, but they would commit to adopting proposals within the same ballpark. In other words, they would support and vote for any proposal close to the solutions listed here.)

What is the Pledge Supposed to Accomplish?

The pledge attempts to separate politicians who are a) willing to compromise to reach substantive solutions to big problems and; b) willing to put the country’s interest ahead of one political party or one individual’s ideological purity. The idea is to separate the pragmatic, country-first, politicians–either Democrats, Republicans–from the hyper-partisans and ideological purists (again, either Democrats, Republicans or anyone else). Finally, the pledge underscores principles that not only transcend political ideology, but are fundamental to the way our democracy works. These principles are diminishing and sometimes face hostile attack. The pledge attempts to make these principles and voting issue which support and strengthen the politicians who believe in these principles, while rejecting and ousting those that don’t. This is something that we desperately need in Washington right now.

Umbrella Man is a six minute film playing on the New York Times website. It’s about a suspicious man holding an umbrella in Dealey Plaza (Dallas) the day President Kennedy was shot. Yes, the film appeals to conspiracy buffs, but like many other Morris films, it’s really so much more than what you think.  I’ll go into that in the next section, but watch the piece first. (more…)

Dir. Andrew Niccol
Starring: Justin Timberlake, Amanda Seyfried, etc.
64/100

I’d cautiously recommend this to Grace, Chris, Mitchell, Penny, Marc  Jill and Tony. My guess is that Joel and Don would think this is alright, but they could like it a little more than that, too. Larri would probably think this was OK or mildly like it.

**
Niccol directed Gattaca, Lord of War, S1mone, and he also wrote the screenplay for The Truman Show. Like these other films, In Time has thought-provoking ideas and concepts behind what is essentially a Hollywoodfilm. The film takes in the future where people live up to the age of twenty-five—after which they are given a limited time to live (I think it’s one year.) Now, the next bit I’m going to explain is the most interesting part of the film’s premise, so if you know nothing of the film, and you want to go in blind, I’d forgo the next section.

The time people have to live replaces money. People work to earn more time to live, while purchases take away time. The story follows Will Salas (Timberlake) who finds a way to accrue a lot of time and seeks to overturn the system. I’ve heard others describe the film as a combination between Logan’s Run and Bonnie andClyde, which is a good description, imo. (more…)

It’s got a lot of names. Wikipedia calls it “alternative dance,” some of the music magazines I read in college called it “alternative progressive dance,” and most of the friends I knew who were devotees called it simply “progressive.”

And Reid calls it his least-favorite kind of music. (more…)

Wall Street Posters Ignore Legitimate Gripe” is Bloomberg article about the “Occupy Wall Street” movement. I thought I’d post a link to kick off a thread about the movement. (More later.)

Another article: Occupy Wall Street Comes to DC But Can it Take Root?

Dir. Robert Altman
Starring: a huge cast
94/100

Mitchell had a lukewarm reaction, but I’m going to recommend that he see this again and spend some time thinking about it–for I’m sure he’ll find many interesting things about the film. I’d highly recommend this to Penny, Kevin and Chris–if they haven’t seen this. I would recommend this to Grace, too–but somehow I don’t think she would really like this. I also want to recommend this to John and Tony. Again, I’m not sure they’ll like this, but if they analyzed this or discussed this with others, I’d bet they’d find this film rewarding. I almost want to say the same thing about Marc, although I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t enjoy this. I wouldn’t recommend this to Don, Joel or Larri. Jill would probably be in that bunch, but she might find it interesting.

**
As always in this section, I’m going to briefly describe the film and offer details to help people decide if they want to see this or not. I’m also going to suggest various ways to approach and watch the film. First, let me say that this is an incredibly dense film–there are many characters, sub-plots and ideas in the film. To give you an idea of what I mean, let me say that I think this film is about America–or to be more specific America circa 1975. What the heck does that mean? America is a complex nation–and the film actually attempts to capture much of that.

As I said, the film has many characters and sub-plots, but one main plot-line provides the backbone of the film. Two campaign managers for a third party presidential candidate work to set up a political rally in Nashville. To set up the event, they plan to recruit various country musicians (and one rock-folk group) to perform at the event. Many of the characters and sub-plots involve the musicians and their families. A few characters and sub-plots don’t involve musicians–such as a soldier, a female hippie visiting her uncle and aunt, a young man and an older woman with musical aspirations.

However, the movie isn’t about the story(s). Instead, the film is more like a documentary–an avant-garde documentary using fictionalized characters and scenes–including some involving a BBC filmmaker making a documentary about America–and country music–to communicate different ideas about America–racism, religion, the tension between the younger and older generation and, most of all, politics. The film is extremely ambitious and Altman, imo, successfully realizes his ambition. One of the great films about the 70s. One of the great films, period.

***
In the third section, I usually interpret the film and talk about specific scenes. Nashville has many interesting ones, but I don’t have the time to go over them now, but I’ll try to talk about specific scenes and themes later on.

A lot of commentary has naturally arisen from the President’s recent Jobs Bill and his recommendations to pay for it. I want to talk about the appropriateness of the praise and criticism–not in specific reference to the President’s proposal, but more generally towards the analysis of evaluating a politician’s speech and actions. To my mind, there are three categories for a politician’s behavior–one involving politics, the second involving policy and, finally, the third involving negotiations. (more…)

In the first part I expressed my disgust at the Republican party, and I ended the post with some despair:

In light of these comments, does the merit of the President’s ideas matter? Will his willingness to make concessions to what the Republicans want in exchange for getting what he and his party wants matter? No, these things really don’t matter–which means that the game is over.

I did offer a tiny ray of hope (key word being “tiny”), and I promised to share some of this in this thread. Let me start by responding something to Don asked, namely whether the President should attempt to cooperate and compromise with the Republicans. The think here is that by doing this, the President appears weak and that has all kinds of negative consequences–from losing face with voters to being taken advantage of by Republicans and not getting what he would otherwise by able to if he adopted a “tougher” approach. Let’s examine this together. (more…)

This is going to be the first part in a two part series of threads. In this thread, I want to express my frustration and disgust at the Republican party. In the second part, I want discuss the ways the President should deal with Republicans given what seems to be their obstructionist position. Let me start with my disgust.

There’s a quote from “Obama’s Lonely Middle Ground”, blog post by Marc Ambinder that really got to me, in a bad way–in a way that made me angry and sick to my stomach. Let me set up the quote. The post quotes a Democratic pollster saying that the public credits Obama with being reasonable, but they prefer crediting him with turning around the economy. Ambinder follows that with this:

…And it’s especially difficult when the opposition Republican Party has based its organizing philosophy around a determination to completely discredit government at every turn. Getting things done–anything–means that government is doing something. And that’s bad. So the worst thing that can happen is for anything associated with the president to pass cleanly, or even at all. If you’re a Republican member of Congress, there is no real incentive to compromise.

The GOP has created a political feedback loop that is calculated to destroy President Obama’s credibility as a change agent. They’ve figured out that when government is gridlocked and sclerotic, even silly and absurd, no one in Washington comes out smelling like a rose. No one seems reasonable, because nothing gets done. The reasonable man just looks weak.

Now this is only one reporter, and we shouldn’t put so much stock in one reporter. But prior to reading this post, I read one by James Fallows where he cites an article by a former Congressional staffer (who worked for Republicans for thirteen years) and presents emails from other Congressional staffers.

I’m not sure about the accuracy of Ambinder’s description, but if it’s true–and based on what I’ve read and seen, it’s not hard to believe–how can any American not be disgusted and upset by this? I have to believe that even reasonable Republican voters would strongly object to the approach above. It is flat-out wrong–if not unpatriotic and treasonous. Basically, the Republicans choose to sabotage the effectiveness of government–harming the economy and who knows how many average citizens–in order to weaken the President and Democrats politically; they’ve chosen their party over their country in the most reprehensible way.

I’ve been really trying to be more even-handed when it comes to Republicans–not wanting to get carried away and see them as villains. The Democrats are not above putting their party ahead of the country, but this just crosses the line. In light of these comments, does the merit of the President’s ideas matter? Will his willingness to make concessions to what the Republicans want in exchange for getting what he and his party wants matter? No, these things really don’t matter–which means that the game is over. (Well, not quite. More in Part 2.)

In this thread, we discussed the way businesses may moving to more shared platform and information-based approach. In this thread, I wanted to explore the premise behind these changes–namely, the desire to give people what they want as soon as they want it. I believe this is one of the main drivers of the new technologies we see today (Or do people disagree with this? I’m not implying that this is the only driver, btw.)

Now, if this is true, I want to explore this. Is this a good goal to have–or does that seem like a ridiculous question? What are some of the benefits and drawbacks to reaching this goal or getting closer to it? I want to explore these questions in this thread.

Let me start with this. (more…)

“Do More, Own Less–A Grand Theory of the Sharing Economy” is an excerpt from Lisa Gansky’s new book, Mesh: Why the Future of Business is Sharing. Gansky believes that information revolution will start disrupting physical goods:

That’s possible because of our GPS-enabled mobile devices move in real space and time with us. The network can connect us to the things we want exactly when we want them. We can increasingly gain convenient access to these goods, greatly reducing the need to own them. Why buy, maintain, and store a table saw or a lawn mower or a car when they are easily and less expensively available to use when we want them?…We need a way to get the goods and services we actually want and need, but at less cost, both personal and environmental.

Seems to make sense. Gansky believes that companies can do this in two ways: 1)moving to a share platform; 2) integrating information technology and processes into their operations. She uses netflix as an example–a share platform that also utilized customers preferences to better serve them and recommends that big-box retailers use the same model:

Most of Walmart’s business, of course, is selling stuff. It sells a customer the cheapest TV or toaster today, expecting her to come back in a few years to again buy the new model of cheap TV or toaster….What if, instead, Walmart guaranteed a customer the best-priced TV and toaster way into the future? If the TV breaks in three years or five years, Walmart repairs it, or offers upgrades that are less expensive than buying a new one. At the end of its life, the company reclaims the old TV, upcycles the parts and materials, and offers the customer a discount on a new one.

Members of a “Walmart Share Club” could be given a special password to a daily online auction on used equipment certified to be in good working condition. The auction would include many items that other customers traded up–customers grateful for a way to deal with unused consumer electronic devices that they don’t know what the hell to do with. REI, for example, has had success with offering a discount on new skis when people return their older ones. REI then refurbishes the old skis and offers them as rentals.

Her ideas about Wal-Mart selling TVs reminds me of William McDonough’s ideas from his book, Cradle-to-Cradle. I believe he recommends a subscription fee for electronic equipment, where customers could trade in their equipment everytime upgrades occurred. This idea definitely appeals to me (especially with computers and other electronic devices). But can Wal-Mart do this at a reasonable price and still make a profit? That’s the question for me.

This Atlantic blog post covers the way urban planning and design can affect the lives of children and the nature of community in children. Here’s a quote from the piece (really short, and check out the comments) that really resonated with me:

For a child, having increasing opportunities to navigate the world around them, explore, invent, fall down, scrape knees, make decisions, screw up, get into — and solve — conflicts and, ultimately, achieve a sense of personal identity and self-sufficiency is a good thing. The right thing.

But you can’t do it easily just anywhere. Place matters. It matters in the design of the streets and the things they connect to. It matters in the variety of uses, opportunities and activities. It even matters in the diversity of housing types. After all, smaller homes or accessory units end up housing people who appreciate, and want to be able to afford, the prospect of being a stay-at-home parent. Or seniors offering options for drop-off babysitting. Not because it’s their corporate value proposition and you’re paying them a thousand bucks a month but because they’re your neighbors and they care about you . . .

Talk of how it takes a village to raise a child sounds — and feels — good but, to make it work, you need a village to start with. Which means you need politicos willing to push it, and developers willing to build it.