You are looking at posts that were written in the month of July in the year 2008.
Posted on July 31st, 2008 by Mark.
Categories: Entertainment, Movies.
Yeah I know, it was a pretty strange movie and most people don’t get the attraction but when I was a kid there were two movies that inspired computer geeks everywhere. One was Wargames and the other was Tron. Now comes this leaked footage of the long awaited Tron sequel TR2N from ComicCon. Notice, Jeff Bridges is back… also notice how damn cool the effects look! Hang in with the video, it clears up pretty nicely at about 39 seconds in. This is obviously footage from some geek’s handheld. Speaking of geeks, listen to the shouts of glee when it hits all of these nerds that this is TRON! I can’t laugh too hard… I was cheering at home!
Enjoy!
Posted on July 30th, 2008 by Mark.
Categories: News, Television.
Not just a suspect journalist (always looking for the “gotcha” moment) but also an unrepentant political lapdog of the left, I’ve brought back “Most Annoying Person” in order to bestow the honor upon this arrogant carnival barker. From the cocky grin to the shellacked hair is there anybody that can turn the stomach within the nanosecond it takes to flip through the channels to get to some REAL news? I dare say, no. Just a glimpse of this hack is enough to send me running for the Zantac.
Mr. Shuster, I dub thee ”Most Annoying Person”, congratulations. Take a bow. Smile big and pretty now… we need to see those bottom teeth of yours. That’s a good boy.
Posted on July 30th, 2008 by Mark.
Categories: Editorials, News, Politics.
Is there any stopping Barack Obama? Considering the open mouthed, slack jawed and wide-eyed adoration of the masses it seems less and less likely that the reasoned and measured people of this country stand a chance against the pop idol throngs that support this guy. The only thing that can stop Obama now… is Obama. Thankfully, he seems to be a willing accomplice to his own demise. He’s so high on his horse that he cannot even see that he is slowly becoming a caricature of self importance and arrogance. He’s spewed the vapid rhetoric so often that he’s actually come to believe that he’s the one the world has been waiting for. Nonsense.
Press releases that sound like they’ve been issued by the White House, meetings with world leaders in which he deigns to tell them how to be better at their jobs, proclamations of likely victory… all of it is the stuff of a boorish nightmare. Barack Obama is acting more like a spoiled prince than a president. Somebody better reel him in fast, or this whole thing could turn ugly for him in a hurry. John McCain is nothing but humility and humble pie and Americans respond to that. We as a country are off put by the strutting home run king or the showboating wide receiver. Poor Barry needs to learn the first lesson of sport, ACT LIKE YOU’VE BEEN THERE BEFORE.
This country needs a leader, not a pop culture sensation. I can only hope that Obama continues to drink his bath water and that watching it day in and day out rouses the masses from their sycophantic slumber. This man is not fit to be the President of the United States. Hell, he wasn’t fit to be a Senator. He should be running a Boys and Girls Club somewhere. Children need the kind of affirmations he spews, not adults dealing with REAL WORLD ISSUES. Obama said to members of the House, “This is the moment . . . that the world is waiting for,” adding: “I have become a symbol of the possibility of America returning to our best traditions.” Excuse me? And this guy doesn’t have a messiah complex? Uh huh. If we elect this fellow, ladies and gentlemen we deserve everything we get… we did it with Mr. Bush and now we’re going to follow it up with another daydreaming neophyte. Brilliant. Change? Hardly. We’ve had enough daydreamers… Bush was going to make the world right through war. Barry will make it right through peace and platitudes. How about we DEAL WITH AMERICA for a change so that we’re in a position to help the world? Charity and change has to start here. The Cult of Barry, much like his campaign… is overreaching.
Posted on July 25th, 2008 by Mark.
Categories: Editorials, News, Politics.
I kept my mouth shut. I allowed this travesty of American politics that is Obama to go about his world tour acting the part while not having been elected to it. I suppose you have to respect the fact that the man has to appear presidential. For that reason, I just begged off of the whole Obama World Tour 2008 figuring that you had to give the guy the benefit of the doubt. Would I not want to appear presidential if I were running for the highest office in the land? I surely would.
It wasn’t until the speech in Germany that I finally decided enough was enough. It’s one thing to placate the mouth breathing sycophants of this country but it is surely another to take that message of nothingness abroad. It’s the real world out there, a world that is full of people that are not looking to make nice with us, to tear down walls and to erect bridges akin to those that have been built across the Atlantic between Europe and the US. The level of naiveté contained in this one Obama speech was astounding. Earth to Mr. Obama, whether you like it or not there are people out there that want to kill us. There are people that could give a damn about unity and your desire for universal acceptance. I’m a “live and let live” kind of fellow. I don’t want to be subjected to the beliefs and cultures of Islam anymore than they want to be beaten about the head with my Christianity. All of this “yes we can” that we hear about seems more like a cultural blending than an effort to respect one another… AND THAT is why it is doomed to failure. While we can all potentially learn to live with one another, we better understand that we’re DIFFERENT. What we have to come to understand is that there are WALLS BETWEEN US that are inherent and IMMOVABLE and once we accept that premise we can truly come to respect the differences and eventually one another.
Barack Obama was sounding every bit the naive community activist yesterday but he sure wasn’t sounding presidential. He came to speak as a citizen of the world. Ah, how trite. Humble Barack with his simple message. His beautiful mind and his eloquent tongue are all that is left to save us from ourselves. Is this guy for real? Moreover is the cynical media actually buying this load of nonsense? Yes they are. It’s shameful, if Obama were a preacher these same media types would be mocking the 200,000 plus idiots that turned out to hear a huckster perpetuate the fable that is religion.
I have said it for a long time and I will say it again, the United States is in trouble and I don’t see how this neophyte with a combined total of somewhere in the neighborhood of 150 days in actual service within the government gets us out of it. America deserves to feel good about itself and to feel hopeful. We’ve suffered long enough with a diminished world opinion, an economy in tatters and a military that has been spread too thin with personnel asked to do too much. Do I believe that Barack Obama is the answer to that? I do not. I do not see how a naive individual like this, that makes such speeches and changes opinions depending upon his audience has the fortitude for the position. Where Bush has been far too stubborn and resolute to the point of stupidity, this guy is a blade of grass in a swift wind.
We can say that we want peace, equality and a world without hate and divisions born of ideologies and religious zealotry. There is nothing wrong with espousing such grandiose notions. However, it should be tempered with some acknowledged GRASP OF REALITY. Barack Obama seems to lack that in the entirety. There is nothing wrong with being a dreamer as long as you’re not recklessly naive while engaged in such a flight of fancy. The world and the nations that comprise it must first come to respect the differences before we can appreciate the similarities. It took war before the United States and Britain formed their enduring union. Sometimes respect must be earned with blood. I don’t know that Barack Obama for all of his pontification on history has learned that lesson yet.
Iran, North Korea, Venezuela, China, Russia, Syria, and a whole host of other nations out there have little interest in the fairy tale that is the world according to Barack Obama. For them, I imagine a character such as Barry is the stuff of their dreams. A United States run by a naive idealist that just a few years ago was rabble rousing inner city folks and instructing them on how to get something for nothing could be the leader of the free world! They must be high fiving from Caracas to Beijing! Woe are we and woe is the whole of the west if Barry Obama is elected president.
Posted on July 19th, 2008 by Mark.
Categories: Entertainment, Movies.
I couldn’t resist, I was going to hold out for Imax but the hype was just too great and I didn’t want to be spoiled as to plot details… so I had to see “The Dark Knight” this afternoon. Is it the greatest superhero movie ever made? Yes. Why? In a word, consequences. Sure there have been other superhero movies that have made attempts at the whole consequences thing, but none have ever dared to tread this deep. I know it sounds absurd considering we’re talking about a movie based on a comic book but the prices paid by the “heros” (not just Batman, but his less showy sidekicks like Gordon and Dent as well) are absolute. Their pursuit of justice at any cost bites back at them and exacts its toll.
Taking down a bunch of mob goons and a dope pushing Scarecrow is the order of business in Gotham when the movie starts and Batman and his merry band of accomplices have an easy time of it. They’re hitting the bad guys where it hurts, their wallets. Why engage in a life of crime if you’re not even going to get to enjoy the spoils? Eventhough the prosecution of the lead man of the crime syndicate goes south, it still seems like things are actually heading in a positive direction where it concerns Gotham. That is until the Joker shows up.
I cannot say enough good things about Ledger’s performance. The guy took the character and made it his own. The Joker is not cartoonish, he’s psychotic… but he’s anything but nuts. On the contrary he’s brilliant playing both the mob and law enforcement (Batman included) for chumps. He’s always a few steps ahead but his motives aren’t singular. He’s not just about beating you, he’s about making you give up every principle you’ve ever claimed to hold dear. To his credit, The Joker manages to bring everybody down to his level, including the noble Harvey Dent and Batman himself.
The action sequences are not overblown. For the most part you believe that a lot of the stuff happening in the movie could happen in a world only slightly darker than our own. What is it about the last two Batman movies, both have included some of the best chase scenes ever filmed. Still it’s all about the people in this movie and the scene where Batman interrogates The Joker is excellent. They are mirror images and that’s the thing that you have to understand to truly embrace the movie. The Joker is no more impressed with the mob than Batman is. He just has a different way of dealing with all of them, choosing to dismantle them from within. He’ll destroy them through the exploitation of their greed. He’s all about making losers of everybody and he manages that in the end. There are no winners when this thing ends and I think that might be the one thing that distinguishes this superhero movie from all of the others. There is no happy ending. In fact, like “No Country For Old Men” there really isn’t an ending at all. Heroes are made villains… and we’re left to wonder, what’s next?
I cannot wait for the next one. I don’t know how they’ll manage to dig themselves out of this hole they’ve all been put into. The saddest thing though is when the credits start to roll and you realize that Ledger is gone and we’ll never see him as The Joker again. It’s a damned shame.
The direction is great, the movie crisply shot. The writing is excellent with enough twists and turns to keep you guessing eventhough you know some of the characters are doomed from the start. The soundtrack continues where “Batman Begins” left off with additional themes for The Joker and Harvey Dent. I really liked the manic menace of The Jokers theme, “Why So Serious?”. It starts the entire movie off with a bang. Watch some footage and listen to a bit of the theme here:
I’m not just recommending this movie, I am demanding that you go and see it. Yes, it’s that good.
Posted on July 15th, 2008 by Mark.
Categories: Music.
In an effort to keep you people aprised of what constitutes “good” music, I’m posting Interpol’s “Narc”. Just a great overall song, even if it is a couple of years old. How can you not appreciate a song about love and betrayal? Well that’s at least as close as I can come to deciphering the lyrics, anyway. My favorite line… “Cuz it’s just you, me and this wire”… you also have to love the campy keyboards and bass that bring up mental images of a smoke filled nightclub trapped hopelessly in the mid 1970s. Maybe that’s what I like about the tune… it just paints so many pictures in my head.
Bah… whatever… I’m outta here. Click on the image to hear “Narc”.
Posted on July 15th, 2008 by Mark.
Categories: Just Dumb, My Life.
Last night the wife and I decided to take a walk around the neighborhood. One street over there are farms with cows, horses and chickens… so we headed out in that direction to see if any of the “critters” were out. There were some cows chomping away on one guy’s parcel but they ignored us. The horse that’s usually out was tucked away in his barn… so the whole thing was pretty much a bust even if we did get the blood moving. It wasn’t until we were walking up our own driveway that we actually saw something cool, an owl swept across the trees that line the creek behind the house. We see them pretty rarely… but we hear them all the time. It’s the same way with the family of hawks that live back there… but anyway, this guy was perched on a tree in the middle of the yard about ten feet over our heads and didn’t seem the least bit intimidated by the humans pointing from below. Here are a couple of pictures that we managed to take (I can’t believe the sucker WAITED for his close up!). Forgive the focus, it was dusk and the autofocus threw a fit.
Now, if the hawks would just be so kind as to cooperate… we could have a whole section on birds of prey!
Posted on July 12th, 2008 by Mark.
Categories: Uncategorized.
Hopefully Bobby was greeted by Munson at the gates and the two of them are having a beer and talking ball. Rest in Peace.
Posted on July 11th, 2008 by Mark.
Categories: Just Dumb, News.
Remember how I just posted that Martin County was the greatest place to live in the entire state of Florida? Well, here comes a story that proves the rule… NO PLACE IN FLORIDA IS SAFE FROM NUTTERS.
INDIANTOWN — He pelted her with an orange, but she came after him with a steak knife, and deputies arrested both Thursday afternoon, according to arrest reports.
The incident occurred in the 14900 block of Southwest 173rd Avenue about 5:30 p.m. when 18-year-old Quandaries Cornell Kerr took his live-in girlfriend’s car keys and refused to return them, according to the reports. Kerr then threw an orange at the woman, 22-year-old Joythia Rena Wallace, striking her in the face, and she retaliated by grabbing the knife and trying to stab him.
Kerr managed to take the knife from Wallace, but he accidentally cut his own hands doing so, according to the arrest reports. He refused treatment from rescue personnel.
Ah, love… it’s a many splendor thing. I feel sorry for their 5 month old kid.
But hey… have you heard? WE’RE NUMBER 11!
Posted on July 11th, 2008 by Mark.
Categories: My Life, News.
Well now… I keep telling people that I live in the only decent place in Florida… and now Forbes goes and proves me out! Go figure.
Martin County is one of the best places in America to raise a family, according to Forbes magazine.
Using school scores, graduation rates, per capita income and other statistics, the magazine judged every county in the country with more than 65,000 residents. Martin County ranked 11th in the nation.
We’re number 1… uhrmmm, I mean 11. Not too shabby now is it? I am glad to be a resident of this great county. It’s really the last place in the state that I have deemed livable. From here, I’m off to Idaho to build my fortress of solitude. *Rubs hands together maniacally*… Armageddon THIS!