Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Saturday, March 28, 2009
They don't hate us for our Freedom Tower
I always thought it was an atrocious idea to name the new, 1776-foot-tall building at the Ground Zero the "Freedom Tower," which was why I was overjoyed to hear they were going to call it "One World Trade Center" instead.
"Freedom Tower" conjures up the worst, whiniest, reactionary days of the Bush administration, when anybody who thought twice about bombing Iraq to the Stone Age was a freedom-hating surrender monkey.
The idea was completely wrong-headed: The namers thought they were showing defiance in the misguided belief that terrorists hated us for our freedom, as our dumbass president constantly insisted.
But terrorists don't hate us for our freedom. If we're going to name our buildings so as to antagonize terrorists with what enrages them the most, we should name them stuff like "The We're Israel's Bitch, and Proud Of It, Tower."
No, naming our buildings something calm and measured like "One World Trade Center" is the real fuck-you to the terrorists: It tells them we're not rattled by their crimes.
Of course, some people will never have their big-boy pants on when it comes to all of this. George Pataki, for example, is still in diapers:
"The Freedom Tower isn't going to be One World Trade Center, it's going to be the Freedom Tower," he said in comments broadcast on NY1 television. [And he'll stamp his feet and hold his breath until it's so!]
"I think One and Two World Trade Center are sacred names which should never be used again," said Pataki.
Fucking spare me.
Friday, March 27, 2009
Geithner, pulled back from the brink
What a difference a 13-day, 21% rally on the Dow makes when you're an embattled Treasury Secretary.
Clusterstock points out that Intrade's measure of the likelihood of Geithner deciding to spend more time with his family by June have been cut in half during this rally, from 20% to 10%.
Clusterstock points out that Intrade's measure of the likelihood of Geithner deciding to spend more time with his family by June have been cut in half during this rally, from 20% to 10%.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Roubini's Thundering Meh-dorsement of the Geithner Plan
This is hardly a rip-roaring endorsement.
As Felix Salmon points out, however, this is about as full-throated as it gets.
As Felix Salmon points out, however, this is about as full-throated as it gets.
Monday, March 23, 2009
Festival O' Geithner Plan Reax
So, who likes the plan?
Wall Street obviously likes it. Because, hey, free money!
Brad DeLong seems to like it. He agrees with the central premise, that toxic assets are undervalued.
Kevin Drum thinks the same thing, only more convincingly and a great deal less dickishly than DeLong (dickishness is DeLong's default approach to any issue; it doesn't serve him well).
And that's all I've found so far in favor.
Updated: Also Mark Thoma. And these guys (all of whom have some skin in the game).
And James Surowiecki.
The "Nays" are legion.
Paul Krugman.
Dean Baker.
Nemo.
Atrios.
Felix Salmon.
Calculated Risk.
Yves Smith.
Robert Waldmann.
Henry Blodget.
Ezra Klein.
Roger Ehrenberg.
Steve Waldman.
Matthew Yglesias.
Christy Hardin Smith (and others at Firedoglake).
Wall Street obviously likes it. Because, hey, free money!
Brad DeLong seems to like it. He agrees with the central premise, that toxic assets are undervalued.
Kevin Drum thinks the same thing, only more convincingly and a great deal less dickishly than DeLong (dickishness is DeLong's default approach to any issue; it doesn't serve him well).
And that's all I've found so far in favor.
Updated: Also Mark Thoma. And these guys (all of whom have some skin in the game).
And James Surowiecki.
The "Nays" are legion.
Paul Krugman.
Dean Baker.
Nemo.
Atrios.
Felix Salmon.
Calculated Risk.
Yves Smith.
Robert Waldmann.
Henry Blodget.
Ezra Klein.
Roger Ehrenberg.
Steve Waldman.
Matthew Yglesias.
Christy Hardin Smith (and others at Firedoglake).
Geithner
I think Geithner's brief term is just about over. Any Treasury Secretary who's defending his credibility is no longer an effective Treasury Secretary.
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Thoughts on the Battlestar Galactica finale
Like all good series finales, the Battlestar Galactica finale is still churning up some controversy. I'm of three minds about how they ended a show that I feel like I could have loved a lot more, but that ended up just being a guilty pleasure:
Getting Off Too Easily
First, everything wrapped up just too neatly for me -- a suicide mission into the cylon colony succeeds in grabbing Hera. (For what purpose, who the fuck knows. I mean, could somebody please explain to me, without resorting to mystical mumbo jumo, why the hell everybody had to risk their lives to go and get Hera? If we needed a cylon/human hybrid, why couldn't Gaius and Six and/or Helo and Eight have just gotten it on in the peaceful confines of earth? There seemed no point to the snatch-n-grab aside from fulfilling some goofy "prophecy.")
Then Gaius, the least-credible person in the universe, manages to talk the extremely unsentimental Cavil into ending a milennia-long war for civilizational survival with a speech heavy on more of this destiny and God stuff.
Then, oops, a dead Racetrack's hand slips and launches the nukes she'd conveniently loaded, which are enough to destroy the entire cylon colony, which apparently was prepared to defend itself against anything but that. Right.
I've got more of these, but you get the picture. The show didn't get famous for tying up plot lines this simply. This was all well-executed and exciting, but only satisfactory on a surface level and not true to the show's history.
Techmology. What Is It?
The most interesting thing to me about the finale was the decision for all to abandon technology forever and melt into a pre-verbal human race on earth. Being a Luddite (who has a blog?), this has a certain appeal to me. But I'm also a Luddite who enjoys arch support in my shoes, heating and air conditioning systems in my home and the ability to take an Advil when I've got a headache. Killer robots suck, I think we can all agree, but not all technology is so bad. Couldn't they just have agreed, ixnay on the iller-robots-kay?
Again, from the standpoint of working the show into our actual mythology, this was a really cool plot decision, and I'm OK with it. But from a logical standpoint, from the characters' perspective, this makes no fucking sense, and I doubt all 38,000 survivors would have gone along with it. I sure as hell would have fought it.
What might have been cooler to me is if they'd dropped the characters a little later into our history, had the earth people actually notice them (and they probably weren't easy to miss, even for the pre-verbal people of 148,000 BC) and worship them as some sort of gods. Our heroes would succumb to the flattery but would also help instill their own theology into earth humans, warn against techno-worship, build pyramids and such. Probably stupid, too, but it seems a little easier to believe, from a motivation standpoint.
Enough With the Deus
Finally, speaking of motivation, what a cop-out to have everything be directed by God and angels. These guys say it a lot better than me.
This sort of mumbo jumo has bothered me about this show for a long time (it's a beef I have with "Lost," too). Why do we all have to be pushed around by a big spooky sky man somewhere? Isn't it more interesting if we get shit done on our own? Why couldn't Kara have figured out the coordinates to earth without having to be pushed their by the ghost/angel of her father, for example? Why, for that matter, did she have to be an angel?
And why did the Heads Gaius and Six have to be angels wandering around giving advice all the time and, most irritatingly, tut-tutting our modern foibles and techno-worship at the end? Wasn't there a more-subtle way to imply we're on the slippery slope toward killer robots without this sledgehammer of divine intervention?
All in all, this was an entertaining two hours of television, but a real let-down for what could have been a truly great series.
Getting Off Too Easily
First, everything wrapped up just too neatly for me -- a suicide mission into the cylon colony succeeds in grabbing Hera. (For what purpose, who the fuck knows. I mean, could somebody please explain to me, without resorting to mystical mumbo jumo, why the hell everybody had to risk their lives to go and get Hera? If we needed a cylon/human hybrid, why couldn't Gaius and Six and/or Helo and Eight have just gotten it on in the peaceful confines of earth? There seemed no point to the snatch-n-grab aside from fulfilling some goofy "prophecy.")
Then Gaius, the least-credible person in the universe, manages to talk the extremely unsentimental Cavil into ending a milennia-long war for civilizational survival with a speech heavy on more of this destiny and God stuff.
Then, oops, a dead Racetrack's hand slips and launches the nukes she'd conveniently loaded, which are enough to destroy the entire cylon colony, which apparently was prepared to defend itself against anything but that. Right.
I've got more of these, but you get the picture. The show didn't get famous for tying up plot lines this simply. This was all well-executed and exciting, but only satisfactory on a surface level and not true to the show's history.
Techmology. What Is It?
The most interesting thing to me about the finale was the decision for all to abandon technology forever and melt into a pre-verbal human race on earth. Being a Luddite (who has a blog?), this has a certain appeal to me. But I'm also a Luddite who enjoys arch support in my shoes, heating and air conditioning systems in my home and the ability to take an Advil when I've got a headache. Killer robots suck, I think we can all agree, but not all technology is so bad. Couldn't they just have agreed, ixnay on the iller-robots-kay?
Again, from the standpoint of working the show into our actual mythology, this was a really cool plot decision, and I'm OK with it. But from a logical standpoint, from the characters' perspective, this makes no fucking sense, and I doubt all 38,000 survivors would have gone along with it. I sure as hell would have fought it.
What might have been cooler to me is if they'd dropped the characters a little later into our history, had the earth people actually notice them (and they probably weren't easy to miss, even for the pre-verbal people of 148,000 BC) and worship them as some sort of gods. Our heroes would succumb to the flattery but would also help instill their own theology into earth humans, warn against techno-worship, build pyramids and such. Probably stupid, too, but it seems a little easier to believe, from a motivation standpoint.
Enough With the Deus
Finally, speaking of motivation, what a cop-out to have everything be directed by God and angels. These guys say it a lot better than me.
This sort of mumbo jumo has bothered me about this show for a long time (it's a beef I have with "Lost," too). Why do we all have to be pushed around by a big spooky sky man somewhere? Isn't it more interesting if we get shit done on our own? Why couldn't Kara have figured out the coordinates to earth without having to be pushed their by the ghost/angel of her father, for example? Why, for that matter, did she have to be an angel?
And why did the Heads Gaius and Six have to be angels wandering around giving advice all the time and, most irritatingly, tut-tutting our modern foibles and techno-worship at the end? Wasn't there a more-subtle way to imply we're on the slippery slope toward killer robots without this sledgehammer of divine intervention?
All in all, this was an entertaining two hours of television, but a real let-down for what could have been a truly great series.
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