Multi Medium

Random B&W Pittsburgh Photoblogging

Up next: Boston!

Add comment September 2nd, 2010 at 11:36am Posted by Eli    Permalink

Quote Of The Day

From Politico’s story about the GOP’s reform plans if (when) they retake control of the House:

They make clear that they plan not only to change the top-down management style of Speaker Nancy Pelosi but also to pare back the excesses and power plays that occurred during the 12 years of Republican control under Newt Gingrich, Dennis Hastert and Tom DeLay.

A-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!  Ha.

Right.  “We’ve learned our lesson, we promise we won’t be dicks anymore.”  That sounds totally plausible, on account of the Republicans are so much more moderate and reasonable now.

This is totally going to suck for Obama and the Democrats, but, well, they’ve kind of earned it.  Unfortunately it’s going to suck for the rest of us too, and we didn’t.

Add comment September 2nd, 2010 at 07:14am Posted by Eli    Permalink

Wednesday Why-I-Love-The-Weekly-World-News Blogging

This week in history, 219 BC:

Experimental surgery on a fire-breathing dragon was a roaring success – doctors successfully made it so the beast misted cool water instead of blowing burning fire.

Demand for the dragon went through the roof for wedding receptions, large parties and outdoor events.

Experts carried out the project during the Qin Dynasty in China in an attempt to propel them to higher power and more prominence.

Shi Ro Chen, the operating surgeon, was given full credit for the amazing reversal.

“We have taken a terrible, terrible beast and turned him into a kind creature who breathes nothing but goodness,” he said.  “He will always be remembered, and with such, so will we.”

Yet another example of just how technologically advanced China was compared to the rest of the world.

Add comment September 1st, 2010 at 08:28pm Posted by Eli    Permalink

Arena Construction Nocturnal Photoblogging

Fun with night photography.  Man, those ducts really look cool in the dark.

Add comment September 1st, 2010 at 11:37am Posted by Eli    Permalink

Palintology

What more appropriate publication to write about Sarah Palin than Vanity Fair?  Michael Joseph Gross has a long but amazing profile of Herself in the latest issue.  Adjectives that come to mind include: thin-skinned, vindictive, secretive, manipulative, callous, angry, selfish, greedy, and phony.  There’s also some interesting nuggets about her nasty sockpuppety supporters and use of suspiciously ephemeral shell PACs to launder her speaking fees.

And then there’s this:

There’s a general consensus in town that, at least since the start of the 2008 campaign, Todd has been shouldering the bulk of the parenting and that Sarah’s relationship with her children has grown more distant. The children did not, as Sarah has claimed, have a chance to weigh in on her decision to run for vice president. She did not even deliver the news to them personally; as has been reported, she asked McCain’s campaign manager, Steve Schmidt, to do it for her. Todd reportedly told Sarah that, if the children spent too much time on the campaign trail, they would pay a price: grades would tumble and discipline would fall apart. When she agreed to serve as McCain’s running mate, one of her children was already failing in school, according to campaign aides. But Sarah, these aides say, seemed comforted by having the children around, and she seemed lonely when they were gone. An aide overheard conversations between Sarah and Todd in which Sarah tried to make a self-serving argument sound selfless, holding that the campaign was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, one that she could not deny the children. “I don’t care what it costs,” she said. “I want them here.” Although the couple hired a nanny to help the children with their homework, little homework got done.

On the road, aides say, Sarah spared the rod. When one child refused to sign autographs unless she was provided with pink or purple Sharpies that had been custom-printed with her name, the staff tried to argue that black Sharpies—the only kind they had—would do just fine. But Sarah ordered them to do what the child said, and personalized pink and purple markers were produced. Another time, when one daughter wanted to have her hair and makeup done by Palin’s campaign stylists (the children’s grooming was not part of their job), Palin’s initial response seemed like an old-fashioned lesson in manners. According to an aide, Palin told the daughter that, since she was seeking a favor from the stylists, she should ask them nicely herself and see what they said. When the stylists apologetically told the girl they didn’t have time that day, Palin, incensed, sent the child back to give them a message: “Tell them they don’t have a choice. They have to do it.” And so they did.  Despite railing at the press for invading her family’s privacy, Palin showed little ambivalence during the campaign about making some aspects of the childrens’ private lives public to serve her interests. Soon after her nomination, she brought up with McCain aides the subject of Bristol’s out-of-wedlock pregnancy by Levi Johnston: “Would it be good for the campaign if they got married before the election?” she asked, and went on to wonder whether one weekend or another would be more advantageous for media coverage.

Enjoy!

Add comment September 1st, 2010 at 07:45am Posted by Eli    Permalink

Random Photoblogging

One construction photo plus some random stuff:

Add comment August 31st, 2010 at 11:25am Posted by Eli    Permalink

Selective Lone-Nuttery

Stanley Fish had a nice column in yesterday’s NYT pointing out the cynical inconsistency of right-wing reaction to terrorist attacks, depending on the perpetrator:

In the brief period between the bombing and the emergence of McVeigh, speculation had centered on Arab terrorists and the culture of violence that was said to be woven into the fabric of the religion of Islam.

But when it turned out that a white guy (with the help of a few of his friends) had done it, talk of “culture” suddenly ceased and was replaced by the vocabulary and mantras of individualism: each of us is a single, free agent; blaming something called “culture” was just a way of off-loading responsibility for the deeds we commit; in America, individuals, not groups, act; and individuals, not groups, should be held accountable. McVeigh may have looked like a whole lot of other guys who dressed up in camouflage and carried guns and marched in the woods, but, we were told by the same people who had been mouthing off about Islam earlier, he was just a lone nut, a kook, and generalizations about some “militia” culture alive and flourishing in the heartland were entirely unwarranted.

(…)

It is wrong, we hear, to regard the proposed mosque or community center as an ordinary exercise of free enterprise and freedom of religion by the private owners of a piece of property. It is, rather, a thumb in the eye or a slap in the face of the 9/11 victims and their families, a potential clearinghouse for international terrorist activities, a “victory mosque” memorializing a great triumph of jihad and a monument to the religion in whose name and by whose adherents the dreadful deed was done.

But according to the same folks who oppose the mosque because of what it stands for, Michael Enright’s act doesn’t stand for anything and is certainly not the product of what Time magazine calls a growing “American strain of Islamophobia.” Instead, The New York Post declares, the stabbing is “the act of a disturbed individual who is now in custody,” and across the fold of the page columnist Jonah Goldberg says that “one assault doesn’t a national trend make” and insists that “we shouldn’t let anyone suggest that this criminal reflects anybody but himself.”

The formula is simple and foolproof (although those who deploy it so facilely seem to think we are all fools): If the bad act is committed by a member of a group you wish to demonize, attribute it to a community or a religion and not to the individual. But if the bad act is committed by someone whose profile, interests and agendas are uncomfortably close to your own, detach the malefactor from everything that is going on or is in the air (he came from nowhere) and characterize him as a one-off, non-generalizable, sui generis phenomenon.

How many violent homicidal right-wing crazies do we have to see before we see some conservatives start to admit that maybe, just maybe, that DHS report was right about the dangers of right-wing extremism, not to mention all the provocative teabagger rhetoric about 2nd Amendment remedies and watering the tree of liberty?  Or are murder and incitement okay as long as you pretend that they’re motivated by patriotism?

Add comment August 31st, 2010 at 07:48am Posted by Eli    Permalink

Return To Arena Construction Photoblogging

…Aaannnd we’re back to the arena.  Hooray!

Add comment August 30th, 2010 at 11:30am Posted by Eli    Permalink

Monday Media Blogging

Criminal forensics sure have come a long way.

“Sometimes I think the whole advance into stone technology’s been a bit of a double-edged sword.”

Add comment August 30th, 2010 at 06:59am Posted by Eli    Permalink

B&W Airport Photoblogging

Various airport photos on the way to and from New Jersey.

Add comment August 29th, 2010 at 05:44pm Posted by Eli    Permalink

Sunday Mr. Deity Blogging

Mr. Deity may in fact be in need of a green card…

Add comment August 29th, 2010 at 01:38pm Posted by Eli    Permalink

Shadowy B&W New Jersey Photoblogging

More New Jersey photos, with an emphasis on shadows:

Add comment August 27th, 2010 at 12:05pm Posted by Eli    Permalink

Friday Quote & Pug Blogging

This week’s quote is from the hilariously over-the-top trainwreck Myra Breckinridge, in which Rex Reed gets a sex change and becomes Raquel Welch…

An actor can learn from everything, including a tree. You must learn to experience the truth of a tree, to make it work for you. To use it, to know its beauty. This tree, god-dammit!

And, of course, there’ll be other people’s pugs…

If “cutewrong” isn’t a word, it probably should be.

Add comment August 27th, 2010 at 09:05am Posted by Eli    Permalink

New Jersey B&W Photoblogging

Some quasi-abstract photos from New Jersey:

Add comment August 26th, 2010 at 11:43am Posted by Eli    Permalink

Wednesday Why-I-Love-The-Weekly-World-News Blogging

Perhaps even more terrifying than Sharktopus!

“I was inspecting the derricks when two of my riggers, Cass and Hob, came ripping over the dunes in a jeep with a crazed look in their eyes,” veteran wildcatter Wiley Gordon told Weekly World News.  “They breathlessly gasped that some ‘thing’ was after them and that I should hop in.  The only thing I could see was a dust devil whirling haphazardly in the dry Arizona desert.

“‘That ain’t no devil,’ Cass howled, straining to be heard over the wind.  ‘That’s some kind of giant monster!’

“I grabbed my binoculars but didn’t see a thing,” Gordon said.  “Suddenly, a terrible roar bellowed from within the earth!  The white sands erupted high into the clear sky as a vast tentacle launched itself upward followed by another and then another!  Slowly, the rest of the creature emerged, a hideous abomination more than one hundred feet tall with eight spindly limbs attached to the head and the torso of a snarling prairie dog.”

It was the part cephalopod, part gopher that the world would fear as Octopheron!

“The thing started yanking on oil derricks with its tentacles, snapping the structures like they were made of ice cream sticks,” Hob added.

“Octopheron was a bit slow moving in the hot sun, but he sure was determined to cause trouble,” Gordon said.  “He kept slithering and yanking down derricks as pools of oil spilled onto the desert floor.

“I told the boys to drive on, that I would find a way to deal with this menace,” Gordon said.  “Evading those deadly tentacles was tough because they were so darn big!  But I knew we were gonna go bust – and possibly be killed to boot – if I didn’t stop the thing.  That was when I remembered the oxyacetylene torch in my tent.  If I could ignite those oil slicks, we’d stop the threat and be eating fried calamari in no time.”

Gordon plodded through the sands as the lumbering behemoth closed in.  The wildcatter ducked into his tent and grabbed the torch.

(…)

“I emerged in the dust storm kicked up by the colossus and charged,” Gordon said.  “I lit the torch when I was near enough to hit it with the flame, but the land-going sea-thing had a surprise for me: a thick spray of black ink came shooting from somewhere deep in its belly.  I couldn’t be sure if it was ink or oil, and it didn’t much matter.  Once it hit, I couldn’t see anything but black.

“I dropped to the sand, scooping it against my face to try and absorb the gunk,” he went on.  “When I could finally blink my eyes open, much to my amazement, Octopheron was nowhere to be seen!  He hadn’t slithered off nor had he burrowed some place else.  He had simply disappeared – as if he had never existed, except for all this mess he’d made.”

Technically speaking, calamari is squid, not octopus.  Other than that, this story seems perfectly plausible.

1 comment August 25th, 2010 at 07:03pm Posted by Eli    Permalink

New Jersey Photoblogging

As promised, some photos from when I was in New Jersey for my sister’s wedding:

Add comment August 25th, 2010 at 09:25am Posted by Eli    Permalink

Last Arena Construction Photoblogging Before Brief New Jersey Photoblogging Interlude

Just a last couple of shots before I get to the New Jersey photos I took before and after my sister’s wedding… last September. (I did process the wedding photos themselves right away – I don’t completely suck…)

Add comment August 24th, 2010 at 11:36am Posted by Eli    Permalink

Still More B&W Arena Construction Photoblogging

And the beat goes on…

Add comment August 23rd, 2010 at 06:32pm Posted by Eli    Permalink

Monday Media Blogging

Just keep watching.  Trust me on this.

(h/t Freya)

1 comment August 23rd, 2010 at 12:31pm Posted by Eli    Permalink

Still More B&W Arena Construction Photoblogging

I threw in a construction vehicle for variety!

2 comments August 22nd, 2010 at 12:19pm Posted by Eli    Permalink

More Arena Construction Photoblogging

Yeah, there’s going to be a lot of this.  Get used to it.

Add comment August 20th, 2010 at 05:54pm Posted by Eli    Permalink

Friday Quote & Pug Blogging

This week’s quote is from American Hot Wax, yet another movie that I apparently saw and have no recollection of, although it should be noted that Jay Leno plays someone named “Mookie”…

You know, for your information, you do not put cold cream ‘all over yourself,’ you just put it on your face, which just goes to show how little you know about what girls do when they’re alone at night.

And, of course, there’ll be other people’s head-tilting pugs…

Hilarious.

Add comment August 20th, 2010 at 10:50am Posted by Eli    Permalink

B&W Arena Construction Photoblogging

In case you’ve forgotten, I am objectively pro-black-and-white…

Add comment August 19th, 2010 at 10:34am Posted by Eli    Permalink

The Return Of Arena Construction Photoblogging

The sad thing is that the arena is actually finished now.  These photos are from almost a full year ago, that’s how long my photo-processing hiatus has been.

Add comment August 18th, 2010 at 12:10pm Posted by Eli    Permalink

Wednesday Why-I-Love-The-Weekly-World-News Blogging

Best. UFO. Explanation. Ever.

Two nights ago, hundreds of cruise passengers were distracted from an evening of dancing and drinking when thirty-year-old financial advisor Dianne Rimsky started screaming and wildly pointing to the waters off the starboard side.

“The way that woman was carrying on, I thought she had spotted an iceberg,” said vacationer David Willis.  “But when I looked where she was gesturing, I almost dropped my cocktail.”

Half a mile from the luxurious Marco Majestic, Rimsky had seen what turned out to be an ‘Unidentified Submerged Object.’

“It was large and gray,” said a still-shaken Rimsky, “and covered in multi-colored flashing lights.  And it was moving very fast.  I thought it was going to hit us – but then, suddenly, it turned and went in a different direction.”

Virtually everyone on the ship reported hearing a high-pitched burbling sound, like a porpoise on helium.  The strange object was only visible for a few minutes, during which time everyone on the ship watched in fascination.

“We had a number of theories as to what it was,” said banker Jason Green.  “Some thought it was a new type of submarine.  Others imagined that it was an alien vessel of some kind.  But based on careful study of some cellphone images I managed to grab, I believe it was simply a whale tangled in Christmas lights that had washed away in a hurricane the year before.  That seemed the most logical explanation.”

There was more, but it was really all downhill from there…

Add comment August 18th, 2010 at 07:59am Posted by Eli    Permalink

Priming-The-Pump La Jolla Photoblogging

Turns out I left off of the La Jolla photoblogging a little prematurely last year; I still had a handful of photos left.  And since I’m flying back out there tomorrow, it seemed like this would be a good time to get them out of the way…

Add comment August 17th, 2010 at 06:18pm Posted by Eli    Permalink

Programming Note

I’m on vacation for the next week or so, so posting will probably be light.  But I’ve started processing photos again, so there will be some photoblogging.  Whoo!

Add comment August 17th, 2010 at 01:15pm Posted by Eli    Permalink

Monday Media Blogging

Who among us does not love Taiwanese CGI news re-enactments?

That is exactly how it happened.

Add comment August 16th, 2010 at 11:55am Posted by Eli    Permalink

We Get E-Mails

Well, I don’t – or at least not this one, because I cancelled my OFA membership in disgust after Obama and the Democrats sold out on the public option.  But I know progressives who did:

Eighteen years ago, shortly after graduating from law school, I helped lead a voter registration campaign in Chicago that generated record turnout on Election Day.

That experience taught me one of the most important lessons I ever learned as a community organizer: When people promise that they’ll do something — like voting — they are far more likely to do it.

That’s why one key part of our Vote 2010 plan this year is to get folks like you from across the country to commit to vote, to make sure we get as many people as we can to cast their ballots this fall.

But getting the commitments we need starts with your own promise to make it to the polls and cast your ballot.

Will you please commit to vote in the 2010 elections?

Over the next 82 days, volunteers across the country will spend countless hours calling voters and knocking on their doors, asking them the same question.

And you can bet that I am counting on you to join them in talking to voters in your community.

This election offers a stark choice. We Democrats are hard at work trying to move America forward, repairing a decade of damage and growing an economy based on the Main Street values of hard work and responsibility.

We’ve fought for and won historic reforms to our health care system, a victory 100 years in the making, and to Wall Street, the most sweeping overhaul of the financial system since the Great Depression.

But after years of policies that landed us in the worst recession since the 1930’s, the Republicans who got us there have not come up with anything different from the policies of George W. Bush.

We simply cannot afford to go backwards or let them repeal our reforms. And making sure we can continue moving forward starts with your own promise to cast your ballot in these elections.

Please commit to vote this fall:

http://my.barackobama.com/Commitment

Thank you,

President Barack Obama

Aw.  Isn’t that nice.  I guess the “P.S. I hate your liberal guts, you pot-smoking dirty hippie retard” at the end must have gotten cut off by an e-mail glitch or something.  That’s okay though, we all got the message anyway.

3 comments August 13th, 2010 at 11:20am Posted by Eli    Permalink

What Lessig Said

In his reaction to the White House’s latest progressive-bashing fiasco, Professor Lessig nails what makes Obama so deeply frustrating:

It’s certainly not fair to criticize Obama for not being a Lefty. He wasn’t ever a Lefty. He didn’t promise to be a Lefty. And there’s no reason to expect that he would ever become a Lefty.

But Lefties (like me) who criticize Obama are not criticizing him for failing our Lefty test. Our criticism is that Obama is failing the Obama test: that he is not delivering the presidency that he promised.

When Candidate Obama took on Hilary Clinton, he was quite clear about what he thought about the way Washington works. And he was quite clear about why he was running for President. As he said:

[U]nless we’re willing to challenge the broken system in Washington, and stop letting lobbyists use their clout to get their way, nothing else is going to change. And the reason I’m running for president is to challenge that system.

Read it again: “The reason I am running for president is to challenge that system.”

(multiple similar Obama quotes follow)

Since coming to power, Obama has pushed just one piece of legislation that would have any effect at all on the power of lobbyists over Congress. That bill has not passed, and even if it had, it would have changed nothing in the lobbyists’ power. He has not even indicated that he would support the only substantial reform of lobbyists power with support in Congress today — the Fair Elections Now Act. Indeed, “congressional reform” doesn’t even merit a mention on the “Additional Issues” page of whitehouse.gov (though “sportsmen” does).

Obama’s strategy as president has not been to “change the way Washington works.” Rather, he has pushed reforms in the same old way, with the same old games….

(…)

[Obama] promised to “take up the fight.” His failure to deliver on that critical promise — the promise that distinguished him from his main primary rival — or even to try, is a failure that everyone, Lefties included, should be free to complain about without suffering the rage of Gibbs.

Of course, Obama has always been careful to couch his capitulation to the will of corporate lobbyists as some kind of principled pragmatism, as necessary compromise in order to achieve his noble objectives, but the reality is that President Obama has demonstrated little or no desire to oppose or reduce the power of corporate lobbyists and corporate money in our political system, which is rapidly approaching absolute.  And I think that’s a pretty damn fair and reasonable complaint to make after he made such a show of being Mr. Clean during the campaign.

Add comment August 13th, 2010 at 07:19am Posted by Eli    Permalink