Legitmacy and the Supreme Court

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We started our discussion on the legitimacy of the US government here.

The basic argument is that a country or system can survive all sorts of attacks, mistakes, compromises and failures and still exist and move on.  But the elites of this or any country should not assume that they can just fail endlessly and cynically ignore the values on which that country was based. They should not think they are above the "judgment of heaven".  History is filled with examples where such a decadent system hollows out and experiences just one more shock and, to everyone's surprise, collapses into a puddle.  See the Ancien Regime of France in 1799 and Imperial Russia in 1917 for example but there are many others.

It is pride that comes before the fall.

 

The Republicans have accused the Democrats of legislating through the judiciary but of course what that really means is that it is the Republicans that plan to legislate through the judiciary.  Once their partisan justice drones were put on the bench then the Republicans knew that they didnt have to care about majority rule or democracy anymore.  They could count on their "originalists" to wildly violate jurisprudence and legislate away.

But if you are going to do this kind of stuff, then you had better be sure that your court is above reproach, and has been put in place with impeccable process. Its not just who is on the court, it is how they got there that matters, not to mention their arguments. The American People, had better believe in your integrity, boys and girls, because if they dont you are asking for trouble.  What is a justice system whose Supreme Court is seen as corrupt and partisan?  

So lets see what we have here and in no particular order.  First we have the court overthrowing the rightful winner of the 2000 election to put their right wing stooge in power even though we all know that had we kept counting the votes in Florida that Al Gore would have won the electoral vote as well as the popular vote.  Now, with George W in power, we get none other than Roberts and Alito on the court.  Then we get McConnell to refuse to evaluate and confirm Merrick Garland.  Then we have Trump, a known criminal, nominate not one, not two, but three right wing nuts to the Supreme Court.

Sorry guys, but you screwed it up.  The court is far from legitimate and now you have a failed justice system.  Well good luck with that, but it doesnt work for me.

Restoration of Dr. Strangelove and the Triumph of the Free Market

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Growing up in America, I have been trained to believe that the “free market” solves all problems. That the invisible hand will inevitably lead to an equilibrium position that will be the optimal use of resources. Like any good cult, we are also taught to disregard any data or example that contradicts the central tenets. Any such example must be shown to be invalid because the free market is always right.

I have an excellent example here where the free market is one more time proven to not only find the optimal solution, it actually finds the only possible solution that could be acceptable to a right thinking American. No disgusting socialism or wooly thinking for us! The free market is always right.

Once upon a time, Stanley Kubrick attempted to put together a new print of his classic Dr. Strangelove: Or How I learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964). The film is a classic of black and white cinematography and Kubrick was tasked to put together the best possible set of prints for a rerelease sometime long after the original release.

But he discovered that what should have been a straightforward task was not because the original negative of the film no longer existed. To explain this, I have to explain something about how distribution prints for film used to be made.

The way this used to work was this: when you have finished editing a film, you cut the various elements of the film together into an original negative. From this original negative, which you hope to touch as little as possible, you then create an interpositive (IP) and from that an internegative (IN). From the IN you strike as many prints as you need for exhibition.

Eventually the IN wears out, and then you strike another IN from the IP. In this way, you never touch the original negative any more than you absolutely have to. But this costs money you see, not much money, but money. So when the IN would wear out, instead of striking another IN from the IP, the studio (?) would save a few bucks by just cutting out the relevant parts of the neg and adding it to the IN and strike more prints. Which means that the original negative no longer existed, and the best that Kubrick could do was to go back to the IP.

In order to save a few thousand dollars, the original and best version of one of the classics of Western cinema was destroyed. As well it should have been. Nothing is more sacred than the profits issued to the shareholders. To even consider otherwise is sacrilage.

The idea that there are still morons out there who actually think that the profit-motive should have anything to do with cultural legacy or any other value driven topic, such as health care, education and justice, is clearly a person who has been driven mad by ideology and has nothing to contribute to the political process.

Rumors of War October 2016

Lets now move beyond the grim reality of the collapse of our political system, and lighten things up around here by considering whether or not we are on the brink of another serious regional or world war. Not only is this a very reasonable time to ask such questions, it also leads into the larger blog theme of “predicting the future”. In this case, no esoteric knowledge is necessary, we can rely on our own knowledge of history and what we can see of world events.

Whenever a war happens, there are always people who say that there were clear signs that the war was obviously going to happen and that either we should have been better prepared, or should have avoided it, or that the government knew it was going to happen and wanted it to happen, or any of a number of other opinions, some of them interesting, many of them completely out-of-their-mind crazy.

Hindsight is 20/20 but in the real world there are always tensions and conflicts that could explode into a major war. But it also the case that there are a variety of “indicators” that a war may be on the horizon. Here are a few drawn from recent history: (a) a nation is pursuing what it sees to be a goal of critical national importance and another nation executes economic sanctions (war) against it, (b) a nation is executing a rearmament of their armed forces as fast as they possibly can, (c) a nation executes an intense intelligence attack on another nation with whom they are at peace of a size that is unparalled in peacetime, (d) a nation insists that it controls another nation's territory or that a formerly public right-of-way is declared to be their sovereign territory, and always has been.

Do we see any of these four situations in the world today? In fact, we see all four of these.

Russia has a centuries long relationship with Ukraine and Crimea. They see that relationship differently than we do. For them, Crimea is the ice-free port that Russia strategically requires. For them, Ukraine is a slavic territory that has been part of Russia for centuries. The very origins of Moscow and Russia can be traced to Kievan Rus in what we might now call Ukraine. The west has imposed sanctions on Russia for the events in that part of the world. Right or wrong, these sanctions are certainly hurting Russia.

Both Russia and China are extensively rearming and reconfiguring their armed forces. The Russian army, navy and air force seem to be rebuilding at a vastly increased rate. China is doing something similar.

For the last decade, China has executed a cyber-attack against the United States of unprecedented scope. The only people who do not know it at this point are people who are really not paying attention (or don't want to know). The US Government has given every indication that it knows and that it wants it to stop. We know that something has been going on in part because our country has begun an immense investment in offensive and defensive cyberwar.

China's actions in the South China Sea are about as aggressive as a nation can be in times of peace. It is a setup for a hot war, and they are arming for it. They want it, they need it, they have to have it. And if we don't like it, we have to fight for it. The problem is not what we want, the problem is what all China's neighbors want and we are in a mutual defense alliance with those neighbors. Probability of war? High, about as high as war between India and Pakistan, for example.

Oh, did I forget to mention India and Pakistan?  Or India and China?  Or Vietnam and China? Or Pakistan's financing of terrorist groups? The war in Syria and the refugee crisis? Russia's blatant cyberwar against America? N. Korea and its nuclear weapons? Russia and Chechnya (what's left of it)? Or the Congo? Or Somalia? Or Sudan? Or Libya?

So are we headed to world war? Not necessarily. After all, even a hot regional war does not imply a world war.  But if we do end up in a major world war, there will be people who say that there was plenty of evidence that it was on the horizon.

This topic continues here.

The Superiority of the Marvel Universe over the DC Universe Explained

Any all-encompassing theory that attempts to explain why the Marvel CInematic Universe is in fact a valid metaphor and framework for expressing the nuances of our civilization must also explain why the MCU appears to be so much better than the DC Extended Universe. I believe that there are three fundamental reasons why this is so and will expound on this today.

But first lets discuss where the differences do not lie. Films in both universes have to contend with world-threatening villains who plan to destroy all humanity, that goes without saying. Films in both universes also have to balance these terrifying cataclysms with threats that are closer to home, thus we see cruel intergalactic forces threatening school buses filled with innocent children or civilians in both movies, in which the occupants are saved in the nick of time. No cheap exploitation of the emotions of the audience here.

Nor does the difference lie in a sometimes bewildering network of plotlines of various meta-human, mutated and/or intergalactic good or bad guys or gals. This sort of thing naturally comes with the territory and both of these universes deal with the narrative implications in an adequate fashion.

And it is not in the quantity or quality of the visual effects per se that we see our major differences. Both of these universes have their share of chair gripping, physics defying, perfectly conceived and choreographed disasters that involve entire cities and thousands of innocents in a narrative of alien hatred or world dominating conspiracy.

Wherein lies the differences between the two cinematic universes?

1. The DC Universe is grim and the Marvel Universe is not.

In the latest Superman and Superman vs Batman films, I counted exactly two jokes in both films. Let me go over that again in case I was vague. There were only two jokes in the entire second film and none in the first, although it is possible that there was a 1/2 joke in the first film. Whereas in the Marvel films, there actually is some humor in the dialogue, and some of it is actually quite funny. For example, doing this from memory.

Dr. Banner: (referring to Loki) You can smell crazy on him.

Thor: Be careful how you speak, he is my brother.

Natasha: He killed 80 people in two days.

Thor: He is adopted.

2. The sheer mayhem of the visual effects in the Marvel Universe is without equal.

Sure DC has a huge quantity of stupid visual effects, like everyone does today. But I felt that these effects, although well designed, and sometimes even innovative (see for example the krypton / machine interface in the first Superman movie) they lacked the sheer exuberant madness of the visual effects of the Marvel films, or at least some of them. Consider these frames from one of the fight climaxes of the Age of Ultron monstrosity. I bet you can not even figure out how many good or bad characters are fighting, let alone who is decapitating whom. I think that it is this out of control mayhem combined with the humor mentioned above that lends a certain quality to the Marvel films.

3. We have seen the DC films before and we will see them again.

The greed obsessed studios behind the DC films have made it clear that sequels and reboots of previously examined properties will continue into the future over and over again. How many times will we see a reboot of Batman and Superman? They will be endless, they will be infinite. We will see Superman's father explain to Superman that he is not from Earth again. We will see the young Bruce Wayne witness his parents getting murdered and be horrified, again.

Whereas the Marvel films give the impression that they are actually going somewhere with their different phases and do not plan to revisit the same old material repeatedly.  At least not yet.

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Notes

1. In Batman v Superman: The Dawn of Justice (2016) there may be two jokes.  One, when Batman rescues "Martha", Superman's mom, he says "I'm a friend of your son".  She says: "I could tell by the cape.". Not too bad. Better still is when Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman are preparing to take on the horrible monster at the end, there is some references to this critter being from another world. Wonder Woman says, "I have killed creatures from other worlds". Batman looks at Superman and says, "Is she with you?" Superman says, "I thought she was with you." I may have this backwards, I am doing this from memory.  These are both pretty reasonable moments of humor but that is it, that is all there is.  Its not enough, IMHO, to alleviate the endless grimness. Yes, comic book superhero movies are important, God knows, but important does not have to mean unrelieved grimness. We are not talking about genocide here, you know.

Oh wait, in the first movie, Man of Steel (2013), we are talking about genocide.  Ok, maybe they should be grim.

Is Austria Overtaxing Its Sausage Stands?

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Any right thinking American, upon reading the baseless Austrian complaint against those pillars of American Industry, Starbucks and Amazon, must wonder if Austria is not indeed demanding too much taxes from its sausage stands.

You may read their horrible accusation here in Reuters.

In America, we know to never tax our corporations, from which everything good in our society originates, but instead we put the burden on the worthless people, even those who do not work. These are the scum that should pay taxes. And if they do not work, then they should pay *more* taxes, not less, it seems to me, to make up for their indolence.

Indeed, we know that when the corporation takes out its most virtuous Sausage it will bring forth blessings and goodness that will “trickle down” onto the heads of all of us, both politicians and citizens. To tax the corporation is a sin, because it restricts this flow of corporate goodness.

All politicians in America know this, and so they wait anxiously by the trough of the corporations, yapping like newborn birds for their nourishment directly from this All-Beneficent Sausage. We call this most healthy flow “the political donation” but which might better be called the “Food of the Gods”, the very life-blood of our political system and the American Way..

Therefore let Austria learn from us, and learn the wisdom of freeing the corporation from this pernicious burden, these so-called taxes, which if left unchecked might affect shareholder value.

Posts of Ultimate Futility

This post is to describe the immediate future of posts on Global Wahrman so that my regular readers will not be too surprised or disappointed.

This blog has many topics including but not limited to discussion of the aesthetic and ethical failures of computer animation, the importance of comic book superheroes to our civilization, the role of the esoteric knowledge and forgotten wisdom as applied to stupid user interface design on the Internet, the aesthetics of modern espionage, and other related and critical topics.

But certain events have preempted these important discussions and replaced them (or failed to replace them as the case may be) with essays in progress on a number of political and economic topics. These topics have accumulated and are trying to work their way into print and are doing so with agonizing slowness. In the four years of writing this blog, I have never had such a backlog of mostly written posts that are not yet published. The problem, or rather, one of the problems, is that I am more than a little aware of how completely, insanely futile it is for me to have opinions on any of these topics.

I am well aware that no one, not even my best friends or family, could give a “hoot” what I think about these topics in economics, civic governance, international trade and so forth. If the Bureau of Labor Statistics fails to report on unemployment in a way that could be seen as even minimally accurate that is not for me to say or others to care. No one in government, or in politics, or on the right or on the left could possibly think that I have anything to contribute to the ongoing debates about whether this country is doing enough to impoverish Americans and disenfranchise the poor just to name two of the important initiatives.

Sure we have been successful at destroying opportunity for the poor, but are we doing enough to see that our society is completely corrupt and disingenuous?

So if you do me the incredibly courtesy of actually reading my notes on Globalization and the overt corruption and failures of our government and institutions, please be patient with me as I am quite aware what a complete waste of time this all is.

If there is any value at all in this exercise is that it lets me blow off a little steam and may help others form their own opinions on some of these topics.

We will return to our regularly scheduled programming soon.

Google Mail Uses Esoteric Knowledge to Create Your Avatar

Things move ever swiftly on the Internet, that bold new paradigm, in order to maintain valuation and return maximum value to the shareholders. In the never ending efforts to achieve these worthwhile goals and with all the advanced and esoteric technology being used, it is reasonable to expect that mere users may be confused by what they see and foolishly and incorrectly believe that they are witnessing bugs and mistakes. It is incumbent on all of us to keep up and be aware of these misperceptions and help the future-challenged user to understand that the system is without flaw. 

For example, in the process of receiving and processing email with Google Mail, I was unaware that it helpfully creates a visual avatar of all the people who send me mail and does so flawlessly and automatically without needing to review its results with the mere sender of the email. It is not permitted for the user to be aware of the clever, neural network based, deeper learning informed, higher-level consciousness algorithms that Gmail uses to implement this miraculous new feature because we are uninitiated in the Mysteries.  Still some of us have speculated that Gmail might look out on social media, or perhaps remember attachments that the sender has used in the past.

I suspect it does nothing so simple. I think it is probable that Google is using the esoteric knowledge associated with the ancient Hermetian Mysteries themselves. Many have tried to use these Mysteries for practical purposes in the modern world, but I believe that only Google has had the resources and intellect to actually accomplish this difficult task.

Are Consecrated Masters using Esoteric Knowledge to create your Gmail avatar?

Alas, my sister in law did not realize the perfection of these esoteric algorithms and so when I made a comment about the nice picture of the dog that Google had used for her avatar, she tried to rip my head off.

I think it is important to remind the users that they are indeed "mere users" and that they should not attempt to understand the ways of the Illuminated Masters.  They should accept that their life is an open book, not just to the FBI but to the world at large and anything they use or say on the Internet may be repurposed for their own good.  Google Mail may choose all or none of these ephemera to represent you to your friends, to your family, to your clients, in fact, to anyone. You have no control over it, nor should you.

You should have faith that the Illuminated Masters working in secret shrines will use these Mysteries to create your new image and that the result will be as perfect as the spheres with which the celestial bodies orbit our planet.

Where did this come from?  No one knows but my sister-in-law was not amused.

Foolish mortal! Give up that illusion of control, abandon yourself to your fate and accept that the Adepts of the Mysteries have your best interests at heart.  

Proof of An Unspeakable and Conscious Evil

I believe that there is an implacable evil in the universe, a conscious evil that exists between life and death and which constructs for each of us a personalized living hell with which it torments each and every one of us.

For some people, this living hell may be an eternity on Facebook. For others it may be an ex-girlfriend or boyfriend or both who has reappeared and wants to renew the relationship. For some it will be that email out of the blue from an old colleague explaining how much he has always hated you and all the things that he or she has done behind your back to damage your career. Each one of us is different, each one of us will be made to suffer.  We will all have to face his or her own Room 101 and rot in our own individualized hell. ⁽¹⁾ 

This conscious evil will wait, it will bide its time, it will prepare, and then when you let your guard down it will strike. I know this because I have gone before, I have faced this evil. It happened like this.

Apparently, and without meaning to, by going into "computer animation" I had become a "starving artist" and so decided to see if I qualified for state assistance.  This was with great reluctance because I still had a residual self image of being self-supporting in spite of our modern globalized economy.  I have not been very good at bureaucracies in the past, nevertheless I persevered and became qualified for what we used to call “food stamps” but now goes by other names.

It is a good program, by the way, and we should support it. In fact, were I actually an artist who cared about the poor in our society, it would certainly be a good thing to discover just how these sorts of programs work and who is eligible. In this case it is only for those who are truly poor, without income and without savings. But if you are in that category, it will allow you to eat. It wont pay your rent, or keep the power on, but you will eat.

I had not been careful with my paperwork, and I had to go get my Social Security papers and return to the social welfare office and present it. It took a day to get the paperwork, and then I knew it would be most of the day to present the Social Security card and deal with that requirement.

And as I sat, alone, in that dreary office, and waited, penniless, for four hours, this pitiless evil of which I have spoken struck without warning. For there, on the LCD monitors was a “cartoon” to engage the children who waited with me, and there over and over again was a Pixar movie about some cars in the desert.

The Devil's tool ?

Oh cruel fate! Oh despicable evil. To wait until I was down and then force me to watch this movie over and over again while I, a pioneer of computer animation, had been unable to make a living at his craft. To gloat at my (economic) failure, to laugh at my defeat.

Recall that in America, success and failure is judged exclusively by the size of one's bank account.

See, it seemed to be saying, see how worthless you are.

Immediately after this incident, a project started and I no longer qualified for this program.  But even so, I know now that this evil is out there, waiting. I believe it waits for you as well. It waits for all of us. 

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Notes:

1. "Room 101" is a reference to George Orwell's 1984.

The Old Religion and Story Structure in Superhero Movies

As we are all aware, the modern cinema has moved beyond the giant robot to embrace a far richer and more diverse metaphor to better represent the totality of our civilization, that of comic book superheroes. I have recently taken it upon myself to review the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe of 12 films (so far) in order to prepare myself to analyze both the text and subtext of this pillar of popular culture and in so doing was surprised that there were actually some very entertaining movies in this torrent of cinematic excess in the service of art or at least commerce.

Among these 12 were numerous films that fulfilled all the best expectations of the graphic novel whether that involved destroying entire worlds or the threat to life in the galaxy and managed this intense mayhem without being overly burdened by humor, character development or any of those other old-fashioned story elements. But even in the most excessive of these there were moments that were really well done in a non-kinetic fashion, that is, well written, or well acted, or clever. There were four films in particular that had actual humor including Iron Man (2008), Thor (2011), Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) and Ant-Man (2015). 

It was Thor (2011) in particular that completely surprised me. This is the film which is, of course, loosely based on the pre-Christian religion of northern Europe, as documented in the Icelandic Poetic and Prose Eddas as well as other sources. In particular, the film's lead character is the eponymous Thor of Asgard who was said to wield a hammer that destroyed his enemies and would make the sound of thunder when it was used.

There are two movies in one in Thor (2011), one that takes place in Asgard which is boring and stupid and one which takes place on Earth, or Midgard, which is very entertaining. This essay discusses some of the elements that the filmmakers used to achieve their aims: a brilliant director, excellent casting especially of the lead, an appealing and classic story structure, and a story itself that incorporates humor and human values but fails to rely on digital visual effects (how could that be?!)

Thor after his shower and without his shirt....

makes quite an impression on the research assistant.

The fundamental reason that I believe that the “Midgard/Earth” portion of this movie works so well is that it is based on a classic story structure that is sometimes called “setup and payoff”. In “setup and payoff” the audience knows something early on that the other characters in the drama do not know. So as the story proceeds we know that there will be a time when the truth is revealed and that can be very entertaining. "Setup and Payoff" is used on a regular irregular basis in the West as a fundamental element of storytelling and especially of comedy.  One movie that comes to mind is Galaxyquest (1999) which makes very good use of this technique.

In this case, the setup is that we know that the homeless person who seems deranged *is* actually Thor, at least in a modified Marvel Cinematic Universe sort of way, that he is from Asgard, and that he has been banished for his irresponsible behavior. We know this, but *they*, the mere mortals of earth/Midgard, don't. When he saves the lives of his friends at the expense of his own we share in the tragedy yet we know that still all may be well, and indeed, being worthy, his mighty hammer, Mjornir, is restored to him, with his armor, and in full view of everyone he defeats evil.

This of course makes use of another important trope of storytelling one that has been called "He's Back!" and goes by other names as well.  (1) 

The elder scientist tries to convince Natalie Portman that no one will believe her theory without evidence, when Thor's friends arrive to Midgard by way of the Bifrost.  Setup and payoff.

It helps that the main characters are cast so well. In particular, Chris Hemsworth both looks the part, looks great in armor and a pair of jeans, and can play the part straight yet with a touch of humor.  It also helps that the film is directed by Kenneth Branagh slumming here for his first superhero movie. An entertaining script, good actors, well directed, and very few digital effects that do not serve the story.  No wonder Hollywood finds it difficult to make an entertaining movie.

Its a shame they did not emphasize the human sacrifice which is so a part of indigenous European religion, but this is a comic book, after all.  Maybe the sequel of the sequel will make more use of "kennings".

A classic text on the Old Religion

http://www.amazon.com/Myth-Religion-North-Ancient-Scandinavia/dp/0837174201/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1460974181&sr=1-1

Marvel Cinematic Universe

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvel_Cinematic_Universe

Kenneth Branagh

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Branagh

Thor (2011) on IMDB

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0800369/

1, There are several extensive lists of storytelling tropes on the Internet, almost all of which are aimed at popular culture, but they could also be applied, with some modification, to classical culture as well.

See http://tvtropes.org/

The TransPacific Partnership and the Inalienable Rights of the Corporation

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When will American's wake up and realize that it is the noble corporation, the keeper of all that is right and just, that must be the focus of all our laws and institutions? By enabling and encouraging the large corporation, mere freedom and liberty is transcended by providing greater profits to the shareholders. America is based on this fundamental principle in spite of the whining of little groups of failed so-called upholders of liberty. They should realize that the only liberty that matters is the liberty of the large corporation.  It is from these corporations that all the good in our world originates.  Our entire political system is dedicated to empowering the large corporation.

As the movie, Network (1976), so presciently puts it, in putting words into the mouth of the Chairman of the Board of the eponymous network,

A lecture on Globalization

"You have meddled with the primal forces of nature, Mr. Beale, and I won't have it! Is that clear? You think you've merely stopped a business deal. That is not the case! The Arabs have taken billions of dollars out of this country, and now they must put it back! It is ebb and flow, tidal gravity! It is ecological balance! You are an old man who thinks in terms of nations and peoples. There are no nations. There are no peoples. There are no Russians. There are no Arabs. There are no third worlds. There is no West. There is only one holistic system of systems, one vast and immane, interwoven, interacting, multivariate, multinational dominion of dollars. Petro-dollars, electro-dollars, multi-dollars, reichmarks, rins, rubles, pounds, and shekels. It is the international system of currency which determines the totality of life on this planet. That is the natural order of things today."

And so, with this so clearly expressed back in 1976, why do we have to listen to mere Noble prize winning economists like this Joseph Stiglitz who is running down the Trans Pacific Partnership? Who is he to say that this is the "worst treaty every negotiated"?  President Obama had the interests of all Americans at heart when he tried to steamroller this treaty through congress without discussion.  Sure this treaty was negotiated in secret without the input of the citizens of the various nations but so what?  Look at what Globalization has brought to all the citizens of this great nation: poverty, the destruction of organized labor, the exploitation of enslaved people around the world.  Shouldn't that be enough to establish a little trust here?

Joseph Stiglitz going on and on about economic inequity again

In America, our entire political system is dedicated to empowering the large corporation. As it has always been. As it will always be.

Its for our own good.

You can read about Dr. Stiglitz's rant here:

http://www.cbc.ca/beta/news/business/joseph-stiglitz-tpp-1.3515452

The IMDB page for Network (1976) is here:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0074958/?ref_=ttqt_qt_tt

Will Sex Workers Rush to Silicon Valley to be Sodomized?

Concerns have been expressed that one result of the law suit against Michael Goguen of Sequoia Capital may be a glut in the availability of aspiring sex workers and entrepreneurs trying to cash in on the extravagant prices paid by senior executives in Silicon Valley for sexual services. As the news of the $10M fee received by litigant Amber Baptiste for sodomic services has spread worldwide it has resulted in many new and current sex workers announcing their intent to move to the area. Ms Babtiste is suing Mr Goguen for failure to pay the remaining $30M of her agreed upon fee of $40M.

Sex workers both self-employed and those held in slavery expressed admiration for Ms Baptiste for her lawsuit and for actually receiving the first $10M. “People all over the world get butt fucked for a dollar but Amber got 10 million! She is my hero” said one sex worker who wants to remain anonymous because she is currently an underage sex slave in a middle-eastern country.

Others expressed concern that a sudden influx of sex workers from all over the world to Silicon Valley offering to be sodomized might depress the market. “We dont want them here, they should stay home and get fucked there” said Gloria Standfast, a prominent Silicon Valley sex worker and industry advocate.

Although controversy surrounds the lawsuit everyone that this reporter talked to seemed of the opinion that Ms. Baptiste got a pretty good deal. “Lots of people get fucked up the butt by venture capitalists, but not all of them get as well paid as Ms Baptiste” said one entrepreneur at the Game Developer Conference.

“This is the kind of behavior that made America great and it shows how the free market works to help ordinary workers” said Rep Nelson Freeport (R-CA).

For more information on the relationship between Mr. Goguen and Ms. Babtiste, click here.

Los Angeles and Architecture in Die Hard (1988)

Many years ago, I was driving down Santa Monica Blvd late at night and ahead of me in Century City was a new building that created a fabulous National Socialist light sculpture on top of one of the new buildings that seemed to extend the building into the sky at each corner.

The night was particularly foggy which no doubt enhanced the effect.

It looked fabulous and yet I never saw it again.

Then I heard it was for the movie Die Hard (1988) which I had never seen.

So I downloaded this seminal and important film and I still did not see what I saw that night.

Oh the building was there just fine. And there were even clearly lights on the top of the building for certain important scenes near the end. But that transcendent and inspiring architectural idea that I had seen and been so impressed by was not there. It did not exist. It was an artifact, no doubt, of shooting some of the movie at night and the atmospheric conditions and not intended by the filmmakers, or the architects, at all.

Yes, one more time, I had given Los Angeles and Hollywood, each in their own way, too much credit. This building was and is intended for studio executives, lawyers and accountants. No inspirational pillars of light needed here. No striking architectural innovation. Nothing controversial at all. Just a well-made building for rich people and former presidents.

Once again, Los Angeles is true to its values.

Die Hard (1988) on IMDB

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095016/

Why I Always Say Nice Things About My Clients

Could it be that American business is so terrified of having their crimes exposed that they would refuse to hire someone who wrote a blog?

A highly respected colleague from long ago who will remain nameless here has advised me to be aware that by writing a blog I have condemned myself to a life of poverty. There is absolutely no way, he avers, that any *real* company could take the chance that their dirty laundry would appear one day in my blog, there for all to see, exposed naked as it were to the whole world.

How very, very pathetic. How sad that a hypothetical business that would be terrified of a little blog, or even worse, that people would go around and live their lives scared that they might say something that would offend the corporation.

Sorry, but I just don't buy it.  I refuse to believe that companies and people are so terrified of a little blog. I sincerely hope my friend is wrong.

But they really have nothing to worry about on my account.  Assuming that they have paid me and people are not jerking each other around, I am incredibly discreet.

Here is some of my philosophy on the subject.

1. I believe in the “mutual appreciation society”. That means that I say good things about you and you say good things about me. It cuts both ways and it is to everyone's advantage.

2. In general, nothing bad about someone is put in writing (and email is writing).  

3. I sincerely adore my clients for the most part and want them to think that hiring me is one of the best things they have ever done. Therefore I do everything in my power to help them be successful and obviously dissing them in public would not be helpful.

4. In the long run, I believe that we live in a very small world, and whenever possible I try to remember this and say nice things. I may not be perfect, no one or company is perfect, and I try not to spread malicious gossip or be the subject of same.  Of course this can be difficult to do in this world given the tendency of people to say nasty things about each other and nuke their bridges, but I try to take the high road whenever possible and that has been my policy for over 20 years.

5. Finally and perhaps most important, I respect the confidentiality of my sources and when requested I keep sensitive information out of my blog, respect the request to be anonymous, and also respect that some information can only be for background only. Unlike the sensationalist press, we are in this for the long run. Besides lets face reality here, who exactly reads my blog that anyone would care what I published in it anyway?

But one does have to wonder if people are not being a little paranoid here in their concern.

Why are people so worried?

Could it be, could my friend be suggesting, (oh my god) that most companies are cesspools of crime and work every day to violate the law and work with government to hide their misdeeds? That in fact they are guilty of the worst offenses and desperate to keep their vile crimes out of the public eye? Is that what my friend is actually saying?

No, that could not be!  Not in the free market system!  Not in America!

When Neil deGrasse Tyson Spoke at the Virginia Military Institute

Recent events have conspired, one more time, to paint the Southern United States in a bad light. People are so negative and instead of lauding the fabulous cuisine (grits, cornbread, Smithfield ham), for example, they always emphasize the same old negative stuff. You know, racism, slavery, segregation, separate but unequal schools, that sort of thing.

So much for tolerance of cultural diversity.

But I am here to testify to you that at least parts of the South has changed in recent years and I have an example that is pretty amazing, and very specific to Virginia.

A few days ago, while throwing away my life while surfing the Internet, I came across an article on the AAAS website (American Association for the Advancement of Science) about science education that featured Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson who was a speaker at a conference on the subject. You can find this article at the following URL and I have provided some screengrabs of it at the end of the post.

http://membercentral.aaas.org/blogs/stemedu/neil-degrasse-tysons-battle-cry-stem

Neil deGrasse Tyson is, of course, the very eloquent spokesperson for Astrophysics at the Hayden Planetarium of the American Museum of Natural History. A PhD in astrophysics, a graduate of the Bronx High School of Science, an author of many books, the star of the recent Cosmos reboot, and so forth, Neil is very entertaining and is very well known in the New York area and now because of Cosmos is also well known nationally.  I worked with Neil for a few years as a consultant on the Hayden Planetarium rebuild and the NASA Digital Galaxy project and Neil was very entertaining even when he was not in public.  He is also, apparently, a nice guy.  Or at least he was with me.

Here is a picture of Neil.

I don't know if you noticed, but Neil seems to be an African American. Well I am not sure what the whole story is, but no doubt Neil is definitely a person of color, we might say. Or maybe a scientist of color. I dont know, whatever.

Now we get to the point. I can prove to you that Virginia, at least, has come a long, long way since the war, even if it may still have a long way to go.

The conference on science education (STEM) where Neil was a speaker was held at the Virginia Military Institute (VMI) in Lexington, VA.

(pause for reaction)

Well, I can tell that you are not from Virginia, because if you had been from Virginia and I had just told you that Dr. Tyson had spoken at VMI and your jaw did not drop, or your eyes bug out, or you fell out of your chair, then that is a pretty clear indication that indeed you are not from the Old Dominion.

Its a long story but it goes something like this. VMI is considered to be a bastion of Virginian aristocracy. It was said for many years that if you wanted to become Governor of the Commonwealth of Virginia, that it was helpful to have attended VMI. Many famous people have been alumni of VMI including Gen. George Marshall who was the Chief of Staff of the US Army during WW 2, George Patton's grandfather, who died in the War Between the States defending liberty and grandson, the third George Patton, and the one they made the movie about, attended VMI before he left to go to West Point.

There are many other colorful stories one might tell about VMI that would help to illustrate how tightly VMI is tied into the self-image of Virginians. Here is the well-known story behind a famous Southern nickname, not of a student, but of one of the early VMI professors. It seems this professor of Philosophy from VMI got his nickname during the very first battle of that destructive and stupid war between the states when he refused to retreat from the field and the commander of a Texas regiment, exhorting his troops, said “There stands Jackson like a stone wall”, although some people think he was saying that Prof. Jackson was dumb as a rock.

In other words, no less than the Country Club of Virginia, and maybe even more so, VMI is a part of the established order of the very aristocratic would-be aristocracy of Virginia who are still pissed off about the whole slavery thing.

That a black man, however famous, spoke at VMI is not to be sniffed at.

At the very least it surprised me and I grew up there.

Should I want you to conclude that there is racism in Virginia? Of course there is racism in Virginia and I wish it would go away. But things do change slowly for the better. A few years ago there was actually a black governor of Virginia which is a pretty amazing situation right there.

At least many Virginians realize there is racism present which is more than I can say about most of my friends in Southern and Northern California who seem to be in complete denial of the racism in their own communities.

Here are some scans of the article and quotes from Neil that prompted this post.

Virginia Military Institute

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Military_Institute

Cosmos (2014) on IMDB

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2395695/

Bronx High School of Science

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bronx_High_School_of_Science

Stonewall Jackson on Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonewall_Jackson

Stonewall Brigade on Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonewall_Brigade

A Case Study Where the Free Market is Proven to Help the Poor

The following post is only for adults and those who are not free market libertarians.

I have received some criticism from a few readers who believe that I have been harsh, too harsh, on the holy free market in this blog. They say that I know very well that the free market can, in many circumstances, set prices in a way that correctly assesses value in a distributed fashion. And furthermore, that it is the free market that has the best chance and a track record of helping the poor.  They request that I correct this imbalance by giving an example that shows this and I have decided to comply.

Let us take the example of a family in Great Britain, the land of Adam Smith, during the enclosure period. The rich have used their control of the political process to seize the common lands and the small farmer can no longer use the commons as their traditional rights provided. They are of course impoverished and thrown off their farm. The husband and father is killed in a foreign war defending the privileges of the rich and the mother has to support the family by working in a mill for 16 hours a day 7 days a week.

But her child gets sick and will die without an operation she can not afford.

That is only fair of course, as only the rich should be able to get competent health care. The poor, who can not afford it, do not deserve to have decent health care because they do not have the money.  That is the way the pure free market works.

The owner of the mill comes to the rescue by offering to pay for the operation and save the life of her child if she will allow him to sodomize her many times and allow his friends to do so as well.

Now I wish to reprimand those readers of this blog who are jumping to conclusions that I mean that the wealthy here wish to literally sodomize our young working woman.  They may only wish to figuratively sodomize her.   You must rise above your base understanding of the world and think metaphorically, I implore you.

Getting back to our heartwarming parable about how the free market elevates the downtrodden, how will this working woman whose services are so sought after set the price for being sodomized by the rich? This is where the free market comes to the rescue. We can examine what impoverished women sell their bodies for based of course on supply and demand and the “special requests” such as our factory owner has. Then a fair price can be set by the free market, which is not distorted by inefficient government regulation, and society as a whole is made better by this efficient solution.

Thus this poor woman has received all the benefit that the free market has to offer the poor.

Clearly, we should set all our policies for society and make decisions on health care, employment, education, access to the political process, access to opportunity and so forth based on what the free market for services and products determines. I can not imagine that we would consider anything else given the obvious advantages this system naturally provides.

Michael Morell on Ed Snowden's Motives

I am not trying to convince anybody.  Everyone I know has already made up their mind about Ed Snowden and related matters.  This post is only for those who are probably cynical or worse about Mr. Snowden's motives.  If you are not, if you believe he is a saint, then move on, this is not for you.

The first comments I have found on the probable damage of the Snowden disclosures, what it will cost now and in the future, how he did it and why he did it are in an excerpt from a book by Michael Morell, former deputy director of the CIA and a member of the President's commission to analyze what happened and make recommendations.

I highly recommend that anyone interested in this topic should read the entire excerpt as it will go over some background concerning the recommendations made.

http://cryptome.org/2015/05/snowden-morell.pdf

I further think we should all read the entire report which was made public, and whose link can be found here. I have not read it yet.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/docs/2013-12-12_rg_final_report.pdf

Michael Morell's book on Amazon.com is at

http://www.amazon.com/The-Great-War-Time-Terrorism-From/dp/1455585661

I also found interesting the discussion on the responsibility of the media in interpreting the releases, and their cavalier, irresponsible and simply wrong presentation of the facts. None of this is too surprising, the media is famously stupid about intelligence matters. I thought it was entertaining that he would include Glenn Greenwald in the list of journalists, because Mr. Greenwald is anything but a disinterested journalist.

I also appreciated his discussion of the theory that Ed Snowden thinks very highly of himself and felt that his genius had not been acknowledged by the CIA and NSA. I sympathize with that as I also feel very highly of myself and feel that my genius has not been acknowledged by the CIA and NSA as well. I hope that they come to their senses and acknowledge my genius before it is too late. Anything might happen and this time it will be all their fault.

This is the discussion about Ed Snowden's motives. If you are a Snowden lover, so convinced of your righteous indignation and of Saint Snowden's innocence, it will make hard reading and I recommend not reading it.  What would the point be of just annoying people?

Ok so I will hopefully avoid this topic as much as possible in the future.  Its no fun having strong opinions that cut you off from your friends, but that is what we have here.

Should We Abandon the "Rational Actor Model of Filmmaking"?

Is there too much bad computer animation in today's movies?  Is that even possible?

I continue to see people out in the world, on Internet forums and blogs, complaining piteously about the alleged overuse of bad computer animation in film. Here is a recent example pointed out to me by the people at www.io9.com.

Six Reasons Modern Movie CGI Looks Surprisingly Crappy

http://www.cracked.com/blog/6-reasons-expensive-films-end-up-with-crappy-special-effects/

Is it possible that there is too much CGI, particularly bad CGI, in modern filmmaking?

No, of course not. Everything done with computer graphics in visual effects is exactly as it should be and the audience should agree if they know what is good for them. But sadly, some among the audience, a pathetic few, have not gotten the message. Two messages in fact.

The first message that these whiners have missed is that the modern art of filmmaking is all about the bad use of computer graphics: that is its very raison d'etre. That is its highest goal, second only to maximizing shareholder value, of course. When the audience sees computer generated garbage, that so-called garbage is nothing less than the manifestation of the new art which demands new artists and perhaps new audiences as well. Some of these filmmakers, like Michael Bey, may be far ahead of their time. But it is the duty of the real artist to lead and society will follow along eventually.

The second thing to realize about the tsunami of shit that we see in computer-generated visual effects is that it is not merely a lack of skill on the part of the effects providers, although that is often true as well.

Those who kvetch must look further into the heart of the madness itself and realize that it is almost certainly the filmmaker's vision that is up on the screen. If it is ugly, it is the ugliness that the client wanted. Bad computer animation has been incorporated into the filmmakers body of work and sensibility: it is an element of their style made manifest.  Admittedly, sometimes unconvincing or sub-par work is the result of a lack of skill on the part of the VFX supervisor or facility, but even then it may be that this apparent lack of skill is why these specialists in the computer arts were chosen. Their aesthetic matched that of the filmmaker's and a perfect harmony was found in stupid visual effects. It is not accident that things look the way they do.

To paraphrase a gem of wisdom from our friends in Communist China, “The fish stinks from the head”. In other words, when something smells bad to understand why it smells bad, you must look at who is running things because what you are seeing (or smelling) is probably what they asked for or represents who they are in some manner.

Yes, there are details in this vision that we can be critical of. It does seem that many do not realize that a camera must act like a real camera or it will cause the failure of the suspension of disbelief. The failure to embody the characters with appropriate gravity or weight is often cited, although that is but one example of the bad animation which we are regularly exposed to. The failure to realize that visual effects is about sleight-of-hand, it is about making the audience see what you want them to see and not about number of pixels or “photorealism”. The failure to realize that too much of anything is counterproductive.

But in our new Globalized and virtual Hollywood, nothing succeeds like excess. There is something about visual effects done with computers that can cause a producer and/or director to lose all sense of proportion and just throw 3D computer generated shots at their movie in lieu of thinking.  Perhaps this is a way to compensate for their own sexual inadequacy?  Perhaps the filmmakers have developed an anxiety disorder associated with working with a writer?  In the future, will 3D animation be classified as some sort of dangerous drug that causes the victims to peck without restraint at the lever that releases a 3D CGI pellet to the drug-crazed pigeon-filmmakers?

Should we now abandon the "rational actor" model of filmmaking, which says that those who are making this expensive entertainment product are reasonable and talented human beings doing what they think is best for the kind of entertainment they are trying to make?  Have our artists been driven mad by the opportunities which 3D animation have revealed?

Or is it something else.  Could it be that our overly-critical audience swine, who the Germans refer to as negativenpublikumschweine,  must look within themselves to find the real problem?   Perhaps it is not "bad" computer animation per se that they are reacting to, but their own provincial point of view that is not sophisticated enough to understand the director's vision?