North Korea defied international warnings of censure and further isolation on Friday, launching a rocket that the United States and its allies called a provocative pretext for developing an intercontinental ballistic missile that might one day carry a nuclear warhead.
But in what was a major embarrassment to the North and its young new leader, the rocket disintegrated moments after the launching, and American and Japanese officials said its remnants fell harmlessly into the sea.
Maybe if you didn't starve your people with famines they'd have the energy to actually make your rockets work.
I'm sure the Obama campaign was saving this video for just this moment when the last viable challenger to dropped out and Millionaire Mitt would be just itchin' to Etch-a-Sketch his way to being perceived as a "centrist." But just in case anyone forgets, here comes the hostile branding:
This kid shows so much ingenuity, smarts and just plain good character...is it any wonder that the filmmakers have set up a Facebook page to raise money for his college scholarship?
Maybe I was too harsh back in 1997, teed off at James Cameron's ferocious ego and the success of the picture. Maybe the new 3D -- and IMAX, in which I saw it -- has added a layer of depth that's actually psychological in nature. Maybe it's just that no one has spent that kind of money successfully making a huge epic Hollywood movie that isn't a science fiction or superhero movie since then.
No matter what it is, I found Titanic to be a revelation in re-release when viewing it yesterday.
It's long and towards the end it may seem to drag a little, but the movie is the full meal, something so rare these days. It has touches of David Lean in scale, John Ford in Irish spirit and Stanley Kubrick in technical audacity. It not only holds up very, very well, but it puts current movies to shame. When you look at Academy Award Best Picture winners of the past several years -- The Artist, The King's Speech, The Hurt Locker -- good as they may be, none is in the same category of majesty. Cameron may have made the last great Hollywood epic the way they used to make 'em. Except bigger.
Here's the joys:
The Actors: Not only are Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio completely believable together in the movie, but both have used their fame wisely since, moving on to artistically significant careers. DiCaprio has become Martin Scorsese's first new muse since Robert De Niro, and Kate Winslet has won an Oscar and an Emmy, notably for her fine turn as Mildred Pierce.
The Historical Detail: Cameron did a fine job of weaving history and fiction, from the knowing touches regarding John Jacob Astor to a simple scene with a young boy playing with an old-fashioned wooden top on the deck. Like the best historical fiction, fidelity to these real-like details make the made-up story palatable, and Cameron was no slouch, particularly with regard to how each of the two men responsible for building the ship made different choices when their masterpiece was going down.
The Shooting Style: My greatest pet peeve is the over-cut movie (i.e. Michael Bay), made more egregious when combined with handheld camerawork (from what I have heard, The Hunger Games). Both are generally for the lazy director who can't visualize in advance, just wants endless "choices" in the cutting room and hence shoots coverage rather than masterful shots, or tries to create energy from shaking the camera like an episode of NYPD Blue. Sometimes this is justified as "documentary style." But if I want to see a documentary, I'll see one; when I go to see a big budget feature, I expect artfulness.
The Present-Day Wraparound Story: By this is should say, The Sense of Time's Passage. While the teenage girls who enjoyed repeat viewings may have pined most for Rose and Jack in the past, it's the moment when the aged Rose, played so well by Gloria Stuart, sees the drawing of herself on television and ignites the plot that choked me up. Maybe it's being a decade and a half older than when I first saw the picture, but it is rather glorious in how it captures the painful shades of history as we each live it, the massive tragic scope of human existence, defined for every one of us by birth and death, and for those of us who live long enough to experience it, those lost times gone by. And how about that footage of the real-life decayed Titanic itself? Amazing.
The Class Consciousness: Like the best novels and, yes, movies, Titanic, shows all walks of life, from First Class to Steerage, and is clearly conscious in depicting the caging of the lower class by those working for the upper class as the lower decks fill with water and the lifeboats fill with the wealthy. The sense of class is felt in the engine rooms as well, where strong men toil in the furnace-like heat -- and are the first to drown after the iceberg is hit.
The Sinking: It's spectacular. I can't think of another movie that has done such a great job devoting such massive resources to recreating a true-life, real-time disaster. In a sense, the sinking of the Titanic was made for the cinema. With the brilliant juxtaposition of the tender lover story comes the almost unbearably ominous and terrifying sinking of the luxury liner. I had forgotten how intense it is -- my nine-year-old had to leave the theater for a few minutes. What freaked him out the most was when Jack was handcuffed to the pipe as the lower deck around him vacated and the water rose. My favorite shots are when the stern goes perpendicular to the ocean and people start to fall, but what's so striking now after 9/11 is watching some passengers choose to jump from the insane heights, so many dropping to their deaths, one we see hitting the water and not coming up.
The 3D: I've seen less than half-a-dozen movies in 3D that were at all memorable for that reason, including Kiss Me Kate, Avatar and, best to date, Hugo. Creating 3D effects after a movie is shot with 2D cameras is a much maligned process, by Cameron himself, usually creating a "cut-out" effect that doesn't happen when you shoot with 3D cameras. Well, Cameron must have supervised every frame, because this 3D transformation is gorgeous. It's not overdone but draws you it, less clearly important in the action scenes than in the dramatic ones, and (in our screening) without any obvious loss of luminosity. The worst thing about 3D is how it darkens the image, but this one seemed just as bright and vibrant as you'd want from a movie. Maybe the IMAX projection helps. It just feels very justified, and gives a good reason to return to the theater to see the movie.
Ultimately, it's a successful marrying of scale and human story, for all the reasons listed above. The spectacle never overwhelms the actors. In fact, like the best old Hollywood movies, each of the two leads gets a brilliant reveal for their entrance -- Winslet under her grand chapeau, DiCaprio from the back in his fateful poker game, both with the camera moving just so to give them power within the frame. And when they look into each others eyes, when they talk to each other, unlike so many failed big-budget pairings, they seem to actually be listening and reacting to each other.
I'm sure in a more picky mood I'd find the flaws. But to me the scene that will always endear me to the movie is when DiCaprio, having saved Winslet's life when they met, is invited to dine with her party in First Class, handles the dinner with aplomb. As I always tell me kids, learn your manners and you can dine with kings and queens. My favorite line maybe sums up how I feel about life at it's best: "Just the other night I was sleeping under a bridge and now here I am on the grandest ship in the world having champagne with you fine people."
Consider Titanic raised by this 3D release and, for some of us, rehabilitated.
Settling is still, at the end of the day, unsatisfying:
But if you listen to Joe Scarborough, Republicans have basically given up on winning in November. He's not the first person to say it (George Will suggested a month ago that the time to give up on the presidential race was coming), but we haven't heard anyone of his prominence say so vociferously that Republicans are all thinking this one's over, as Scarborough did on today's "Morning Joe":
"Nobody thinks Romney's going to win. Let's just be honest. Can we just say this for everybody at home? Let me just say this for everybody at home. The Republican establishment -- I've yet to meet a single person in the Republican establishment that thinks Mitt Romney is going to win the general election this year. They won't say it on TV because they've got to go on TV and they don't want people writing them nasty emails. I obviously don't care. But I have yet to meet anybody in the Republican establishment that worked for George W. Bush, that works in the Republican congress, that worked for Ronald Reagan that thinks Mitt Romney is going to win the general election."
President Barack Obama took on the Paul Ryan GOP budget, which defunds services to the middle class and needy Americans to fund still more tax cuts for the rich without specifying where budget deficit reduction will actually come from, in a strong speech today:
Chiding Republicans for not learning anything from the failure of trickle-down policies that defined the last decades, Obama attacked the GOP budget head-on. “They have proposed a budget so far to the right it makes the Contract for America look like the New Deal,” he said. “In fact, that renowned liberal, Newt Gingrich, first called the original version of the budget radical. He said it would contribute to right-wing social engineering. … This is now the party’s governing platform. This is what they are running on. One of my potential opponents, Gov. Romney, has said he hopes a similar version of this plan from last year would be introduced as a bill on Day One of his presidency.”
...
“There’s oftentimes the impulse to suggest that, if the two parties are disagreeing, they’re equally at fault and the truth lies somewhere in the middle,” Obama cautioned the room full of reporters. “And an equivalence is presented, which reinforces people’s cynicism about Washington in general. This is not one of those situations where there is an equivalence.”
The president noted that a similar theme has played out on other key issues, including cap-and-trade and Obama’s own health care law, both of which were first proposed as conservative alternatives to liberal approaches to environmental and health care reforms.
“Suddenly, this is some socialist overreach,” Obama joked.
“It is important to remember that the positions I’m taking on the budget and a host of other issues, if we had been having this discussion 20 years ago, or even 15 years ago, it would have been considered squarely centrist positions,” Obama said. “What has changed is the center of the Republican Party.”
A local Planned Parenthood clinic was targeted Sunday night in Grand Chute, Wis. No motive was immediately known, and though Wisconsin hasn’t played a central role in the debate over women’s access to contraception, the approaching GOP primary and the heated recall fight in the state have elevated tensions there.
Also appalling:
State Rep. Michelle Litjens (R), who represents Grand Chute in the state legislature, is a member of Wisconsin Right To Life and a strong critic of Planned Parenthood. She cautioned against associating the bombing with her fellow anti-abortion advocates and complained that the bomber, whatever his or her motivation, may tar the opposition to Planned Parenthood with the crime.
Can this and the murder of Dr. George Tiller really be separated from the violent rhetoric?
Abortion opponents have a long history of using violent rhetoric to attempt to justify their crimes and incite others to violence. They regularly refer to abortion providers as “murderers” in interviews and articles and utilize imagery associated with murder such as “wanted” posters and “hit lists” in their campaigns to end legal abortion. Unfortunately, instead of marginalizing these extremists, other opponents of abortion have picked up on this dangerous rhetoric to advance their political agenda.
The devastation this rhetoric can cause has been keenly experienced by the abortion provider community. In late 1992, Michael Griffin, who had no history in the anti-abortion movement, became involved with a local anti-abortion leader who took him under his wing and mentored him by showing him graphic anti-abortion videos and involving him in efforts to target a local clinic where Dr. David Gunn worked. Earlier that year abortion opponents had distributed western-style "wanted" posters featuring a picture of Dr. Gunn, his home phone number, and other identifying information. In 1993, Dr. Gunn became the first abortion provider to be murdered; shot to death by Griffin in Pensacola, Florida.
Following the murder of Dr. Gunn, anti-abortion extremists publicly advanced the idea that the murder of abortion providers was “justifiable.” Paul Hill appeared in media outlets, including the nationally televised Donahue show, calling for the execution of abortion providers. In fact, he was so well-known for making such inflammatory statements that reporters often asked him, “If you believe so strongly in killing doctors, why don’t you do it yourself?” One year later, Hill acted on the violent words he had been preaching when he shot and killed Dr. John Bayard Britton and volunteer escort Lt. Col. James Barrett, and injured June Barrett, in the driveway of a Pensacola, Florida, abortion clinic. Hill’s ideas were carried forward by others including James Kopp, who unsuccessfully attempted to use a “justifiable homicide” defense during his trial for the 1998 murder of Dr. Barnett Slepian in Buffalo, New York.
Scott Roeder, convicted last year for the murder of Dr. Tiller, also testified in court that his actions were justified and made repeated unsuccessful attempts to use a so-called “necessity defense.” Prior to murdering Dr. Tiller, Roeder had been in contact with others who advocated using violence against abortion providers, and was influenced by the media and what he watched on TV. He testified in court that he converted to Christianity as an adult after watching conservative programs like “The 700 Club.” Roeder stated that he believed Dr. Tiller was a murderer, a belief advanced by Bill O’Reilly, who repeatedly referred to Dr. Tiller on national TV as “Tiller the Killer.”
I'm all for free speech, but take responsibility for it. Right?
Loved the first episode of the second season of Game of Thrones and I'm grateful they aren't spending any time explaining who everyone is who's survived from last season. The recap at the beginning went by like lightning so if anyone is new to the show, they probably are still mystified.
In fact, I'm not sure if I'd be adrift in this new episode without having read the books in the interim -- and would love to know if anybody who reads this was -- but HBO has done a service by providing the following introduction to the new characters, some of whom we've met tonight:
The show is huge and the story even more vicious than the first season. And much more viciousness to come...
Last night on American Idol, a rock star was born. If you haven't been following, meet 20-year-old Elise Testone originally of Kinnelon, New Jersey:
She's twelve years older than the youngest female contestant and not only has a woman not won for the past five years straight, the oldest woman to win was Carrie Underwood at a mere 22-years-old. What chance does Elise have against all the young and old female votes for the male cuties?
On the other hand, like Haley Reinhart, Elise could win by losing. She builds the core fan base that's all the more adamant due to any injustice in the voting and gets the make the record she wants. Like Haley, she does so many interesting things with her voice, makes great choices, and records just as well as she performs live. Like Haley, she's got the blues in her and a rock & roll heart.
Because I'd be hella surprised if people aren't paying to see her sing within the next 24 months.
Could it be his plan (now on hold) to put a car elevator (I kid you not) in his new mansion?
Could it be his pretzel logic on Leno regarding what he'd replace the Affordable Care Act with, seemingly come up with in the moment, making little to no sense?
At the outset of the call, Romney said he has some connections to Wisconsin.
“One of most humorous I think relates to my father. You may remember my father, George Romney, was president of an automobile company called American Motors … They had a factory in Michigan, and they had a factory in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and another one in Milwaukee, Wisconsin,” said Romney. “And as the president of the company he decided to close the factory in Michigan and move all the production to Wisconsin. Now later he decided to run for governor of Michigan and so you can imagine that having closed the factory and moved all the production to Wisconsin was a very sensitive issue to him, for his campaign.”
Romney said he recalled a parade in which the school band marching with his father’s campaign only knew the Wisconsin fight song, not the Michigan song.
“So every time they would start playing ‘On Wisconsin, on Wisconsin,’ my dad’s political people would jump up and down and try to get them to stop, because they didn’t want people in Michigan to be reminded that my dad had moved production to Wisconsin,” said Romney, laughing.
Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli Jr. should be grateful to the Supreme Court for refusing to allow cameras in the courtroom, because his defense of Obamacare on Tuesday may go down as one of the most spectacular flameouts in the history of the court.
Stepping up to the podium, Verrilli stammered as he began his argument. He coughed, he cleared his throat, he took a drink of water. And that was before he even finished the first part of his argument. Sounding less like a world-class lawyer and more like a teenager giving an oral presentation for the first time, Verrilli delivered a rambling, apprehensive legal defense of liberalism's biggest domestic accomplishment since the 1960s—and one that may well have doubled as its eulogy.
Justice Elena Kagan wouldn't have screwed it up when she had the job.
So if America gets rolled back on health insurance reform, it''ll be partially due to Verrilli's poor preparation, and will be seen as such. But people need to see the big picture, that Republicans are causing a moral crisis in America, per Katrina vanden Heuvel:
It’s hard to point to a single priority of the Republican Party these days that isn’t steeped in moral failing while being dressed up in moral righteousness. This week, for example, they are hoping the Supreme Court will be persuaded by radical (and ridiculous) constitutional arguments to throw out some or all of the Affordable Care Act. Sure, you could argue that it’s really nice to make sure 31 million people who didn’t have health care can get it. Sure you could make the case that lifetime limits are a bad thing, that women shouldn’t have to pay more for health insurance just because they’re women, that the United States shouldn’t be a country where you die because you lost your coverage when you lost your job. But then again, liberty. Let’s not forget liberty. Also, freedom.
It is a very strange thing that the people who lecture most fervently about morality are those who are most willing to fight for policies that are so immoral. They watch Wall Street turn itself into the Las Vegas strip, take the economy down and destroy people’s lives and livelihoods. To that they say, “By God we need less regulation. Get me the hose, I have things to water down!” They see a CEO of a bank or a corporation, someone who passed off all of the risk and took on all of the reward, and they say, “Get that man a bigger bonus! In fact, get him two!”
The Supreme Court will issue their ruling in a few months, likely in June. Should they declare the mandate Unconstitutional but allow severability, a problem as it was not written as such in the entire 2000 page bill, then the bill may survive while insurance companies go mental.
Should their ruling kill the bill entirely, rolling back rights and programs already in place, then will that demoralize the Democrats...or give them the fire they need to not only hold the Presidency and Senate, but also flip back the House?
As for tonight's unprecedented two-hour season opener, after an extra year away, I found it promising. I had expected 1966, given the amount of time off, and any further you're in the most amazing year, 1967, Summer of Love, the moment before the fall.
Best line of the night was Roger's wife. He says, "Why don't you sing like that?" and she replies, "Why don't you look like him?"
Yet again on Mad Men, like in Citizen Kane, nobody gets what they really want.
An extraordinary week on American Idol - the theme was The Billy Joel Songbook, and it didn't end up feeling dated. Several contestants really made the songs their own, including my three top favorites.
Elise Testone is the oldest contestant -- 28 -- and easily the most sophisticated. She's my favorite for her bluesy rasp, her unbelievable musicality, her range and passion, and her tremendous sense of rhythm. And watch/listen how beautifully she works her voice with the piano -- seamless, touch of swing -- to make the best-ever version of "Vienna":
Phillips Phillips is just so his own, excellent man. At age 19 his voice sounds eight to twelve years older, but his energy and edge is for real. His radical re-making of "Movin' Out" is the coolest this song has ever, ever been:
At age 16, Jessica Sanchez is a phenom. Yes, she has crazy range, (clearly) great training and God-given vocal chords, but she also has a surprising bluesy/urban strain in her and it belies her age. She's clearly the most marketable of the three, ready to be a young fashion icon as well as a musical one. Will the pop world accept a young Filipino-Mexican American in the footsteps of Celine and Whitney? She does wonders with "Everybody Has a Dream"?
Sorry, haters. It's an incredibly gifted cast of contestants this year, #11. And any of the Top Ten Finalists this year would have knocked out all but winner Kelly Clarkson in Season 1. Justin Guarini would have been lucky to be #8. And it's a tribute to the show that they can have a performer as individual as Phil or Elise on the show, making it so their own.
If there was ever any -- any -- remaining doubt that Mitt Romney is a joke candidate with no core convictions (other than love and respect of wealth), then this statement from his campaign spokesperson, Eric Fehrnstrom, has made it clear that he's the emptiest of empty suits:
Is it a gaffe if all you're doing is revealing the truth behind your campaign curtain?
I think this one is going to stick, especially coming on the heels of a big Primary win (Illinois) and repeating his snatch-defeat-from-victory pattern of following wins with gaffe's. There's already a website up with Mitt's Etch-a-Sketch position changes -- just click on the words to see yet another example. Both Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich brandished an Etch-a-Sketch today, and the political ads just write themselves.
Here's Romney (a terrible candidate to begin with) trying to put the genie back in the bottle later in the day:
You have to bet that his approval ratings will fall further, and maybe this is the big opening that Santorum needs to scoop Romney in the upcoming state contests.
BTW, I love the Etch-a-Sketch product and have since childhood. I love that it's been owned by the same company that created it for over 50 years. I love the statement they put out today and, most of all, hope their sales rocket skyward...as the Romney campaign tumbles towards hell.
Which brings me to the question of Mad Men, returning with Season Four this upcoming Sunday, one week prior to the HBO show season premiere. I understand creator Matt Weiner's ironclad refusal to give spoilers, but there's no new footage in any of the trailers released for this season thus far. Will that hurt viewership?
Yes, the HBO series is based on a series of published novels the spoiler issue isn't the same, but they sure are giving fans what they want -- and building to a fever pitch. Just this past weekend, at WonderCon in Anaheim, they put my head on a spike:
I like the song "When a Man Loves a Woman" as much as the next guy, but I've never loved it like I did when Joshua Ledet performed it on Idol this past Wednesday night:
He took it to church, but when he drops his jacket, it's Jackie Wilson, Sam Cooke, Percy Sledge all rolled up in one extremely powerful, soulful, gospel trained voice. It's the right kind of throwback -- same training, lots to draw on both gold and contemporary.
Want to see what Josh does next. Because I've never seen that song done so well as that young man just did.
