Re: That Tired, Tiresome 'Both Sides' Con

As my friend Paul Loop explained, regarding false balance: "Explaining Politico (and CNN, the news networks, the Sunday shows, the punditocracy in general, all major corporate-owned news sources): When you assert that 'both sides' are equally to blame, and they are obviously NOT equally to blame after a simple objective analysis, you are essentially covering for the side that deserves all the blame. In Politico's case, it's beyond obvious by now that putting lipstick on the conservative pig is an essential part of its mission."

If Hitchcock did Batman...

Well, if Alfred Hitchcock directed a Batman movie, it would be something like The Batman.  Bart and I just returned from seeing it, and I like it better than any of the Christopher Nolan movies. Like the superb Daredevil TV show, it takes familiar figures from the comic books and moves them several degrees closer to reality without sacrificing their essence (the cast includes an unrecognizable Colin Farrell). 

The movie offers actual mystery and suspense, and builds in its three-hour running time to a spectacular, exciting finish. Robert Pattinson makes an excellent Batman (he certainly has the jawline for it).

As with Zorro (a name Batman is called, ironically, at one point in the movie), the film gives us a somewhat credible reason why Bruce Wayne must dress up. Virtually the entire city of Gotham is corrupt. Only a man in a mask may act freely there.

Why We’re Wrong Without Writing

 

“In today’s world we come to neglect the habit of writing because so many other media of communication have taken its place,” wrote Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience. 

“If the only point to writing were to transmit information, then it would deserve to become obsolete. But the point of writing is to create information, not simply to pass it along. 

“In the past, educated persons used journals and personal correspondence to put their experiences into words, which allowed them to reflect on what happened during the day. The prodigiously detailed letters so many Victorians wrote are an example of how people created patterns of order out of the mainly random events impinging on their consciousness. 

“The kind of material we write in letters and diaries does not exist before it is written down. It is the slow, organically growing process of thought involved in writing that lets ideas emerge in the first place.”

“(W)riting gives the mind a disciplined means of expression. It allows one to record events and experiences so that they can be easily recalled, and relived in the future. It is a way to analyze and understand experiences, a self-communication that brings order to them.” 

All Fall Down

Talking heads peddle

sports bets, beer and penis pills

while it all falls down.

How to Control the Trolls

Right wing trolls always seem to think that you work for them, and are forever demanding that you supply them a variety of carefully researched answers that they will reject out of hand if you were to be so foolish as to bother to answer them. I like to remind them to shove all that up their ass.

Mock them and then block them. Done.

Patricia Highsmith: The Prize Is Privacy

Jim Hampton just gave me this massive volume by one of my favorite authors.

“Privacy,” wrote Patricia Highsmith in September 1957. “An expensive thing in the modern world. How many young writers give themselves a chance? It is considered eccentric to like to be alone. 

“Yet for such a short time, either a stay at a country cottage, or absolute quiet for six hours a day produce more than the trouble costs.

“Take yourself seriously. Set a routine. Once you are alone, relax and behave as you will. 

“Stand still for a moment and relish the novel sensation of knowing that you are utterly alone and will not be disturbed by a ringing telephone, a baby’s cry, an order from a boss, a groan or a whine from a spouse.

“Privacy is expensive. Perhaps it costs somebody else something. Relish it. But don’t feel guilty about having it. Take it as your due.

A Swift Sighting of Sonder

Painting by Michael Rimbaud

Behind the windows

Of that passenger train are

Others vivid, gone.