Details Derails

Awhile back when I ordered a pair of shoes online, I was offered a free subscription to a magazine and the choices were rather limited. I chose Details because I used to enjoy flipping through it when I was younger. They would always have cute guys in various states of undress featured in either articles or advertisements.

I'm not sure why I didn't simply pass on the offer because I was quite happy with no magazine subscriptions. Through the past few years I'd managed to rid my life of all of them.

Now that I've had 4 or 5 issues sent here, I am about ready to tell them to stop sending it. Cancel the free subscription. It's almost nothing but advertisements, many of them for fragrances which I detest, and there are several fragrance samples in each issue. I really don't want that stinky shit in my house.

The issue which I received this week is 164 pages and it took me all of about 5 minutes to flip through prior to discarding it. Pages 120-121 have a piece titled "63 Signs You May Be A PRETENTIOUS TOOL."

#7: You think about the lighting at restaurants.

Well, yeah, I do. Sometimes it's too harsh and sometimes it's so dark I can't read the friggin' menu. So yeah, lighting is kind of important. If that makes me a "tool," well, so be it.

#31: You've ever tasted notes in a beer.

You mean, something besides piss & water? Yeah, sure. I drink good beer. One of my favorites has a note of banana.

#38: You have a thing for typefaces.

Well, yeah, because some of them are pretty cool, and some of them look like crap. And this magazine is too full of them, all clashing against one another on page after page after page.

But seriously, they forgot to include one sign that you may be a PRETENTIOUS TOOL.

#64: You have a subscription to Details magazine and you PAY for it.

Another Icon Has Died

Walter Cronkite at 92. Beats the hell out of 50.

He was so widely known that in Sweden anchormen were once called Cronkiters.

Yet he was a reluctant star. He was genuinely perplexed when people rushed to see him rather than the politicians he was covering, and even more astonished by the repeated suggestions that he run for office himself. He saw himself as an old-fashioned newsman — his title was managing editor of the “CBS Evening News” — and so did his audience.

Those were the good ole days. Minus the racism and shit. The beginnings of the media fame curse. And Reagan should have had similar "astonishment." Not that Reagan was a "newsman," mind you.

That would have solved many of our current day problems.

In Memoriam

Yesterday was the worst day for American troops in Afghanistan in nearly a year as seven died in fighting.

Of seven United States soldiers killed Monday, said Capt. Jon Stock, an American military spokesman, four died along with two Afghan bystanders in a roadside bomb explosion in the northern Kunduz Province, and two American soldiers were killed in an explosion in southern Afghanistan.

One new president, two old wars, and no end in sight. Change we can believe in.

But in an uplifting sign of concern, tens of thousands turned out in Los Angeles today to pay their respects.

How sweet and fitting.

Cher Gets a Double Whammy

Cher didn't take the news so well when Chastity told her mom she was a lesbian a few years ago. Now that "Chaz" Bono is transitioning from female to male, maybe mom will be a little more supportive than she was the first time around.

Seriously though, I'm more concerned with how the media is going to play around with this, and whether they will deal with this seriously, or turn it into a comedy strip.

I agree with Pam's opening statement:

This has to be the highest profile transition in recent memory. Let's see what the MSM does with this story as it unfolds; one can only hope that journalists will be fair and accurate and bring some rational perspective to transgender issues.

One can only hope. But I doubt it. Rational perspective would be nice for a change, on a variety of fronts. And especially when it comes to the transgender issue which rarely gets any seriously informative and educational media coverage. Unfortunately, rational perspective gets in the way of sensationalism, viewership levels and ratings, and all that shit.

We'll soon find out.

Oh, and to what kind of people does the media pander when they feel the need to sensationalize an issue? I'll give you a couple from the Daily News blog comments:





Now's there some intellectual discourse of the highest caliber! And since when did "penis" become a dirty word needing to be replaced with *****? I hope these two people are not over the age of 14. Seriously.

So, Here's the Deal

I did my Rush post before Colbert did his exclusive. So I'm a day ahead of him on that one.

And I wish my eye doctor would examine my prostate since he expressed such an interest in the health of it.

And I sincerely hope everything is going to turn out OK for the nation. We're all feeling a bit Bushwhacked at the moment.

That's apparently not going to change during the next 6 months. But after that, the stupid fucker will be history, and history shall not judge him well.

I thought Colbert cut 'em a bit short. Rush I mean. Who gives a flying fuck about Bush?

The Pefect Antidote for the 4-Hour Viagra-Induced Hard-On

Since dicks seem to be today's theme, it would have to be Time Magazine's Person of the Year. Thanks Petulant. That's as refreshing as a cold shower in December.

Nauseating.

Putin, 55, whose party recently won a big victory in parliamentary elections, is riding high on an oil-fueled economic boom and soaring popularity from a no-nonsense approach that has restored national pride with a big military build-up and verbal attacks on the West reminiscent of the Cold War.

We'll see where this is going soon enough.

Graphic source: FreakingNews.


Crossposted at Big Brass Blog

Merry Christmas, Media Conglomerates!

Media CEOs and other highly paid suits can pop those champagne corks early this year. The vote was 3-to-2. (Who says one vote can't make a difference?)

Michael J. Copps, a Democratic commissioner who has led a nationwide effort against relaxing the media ownership rules, said the rule was nothing more than a big Christmas present to the largest conglomerates.

“In the final analysis,” Mr. Copps said, “the real winners today are businesses that are in many cases quite healthy, and the real losers are going to be all of us who depend on the news media to learn what’s happening in our communities and to keep an eye on local government.”

All the news they want you to hear or read. Great. Go ahead and start shaping the outcome of the 2008 presidential primaries while you're at it.

Oh, I'm a bit late on that one.

Nobody for President

Tuesday night we watched another great documentary on the Documentary Channel called Anarchism in America. It was a real eye-opener in terms of destroying my incorrect view of anarchists as a bunch of black-clad youths hurling molotov cocktails at cops.



Blogcritics.org has a review.

The documentary blends together in-depth explanations of anarchism from experts, stories from veteran native-born and immigrant American anarchist activists, political arguments from politicians within the United States Libertarian party, and the anarchist leanings of the everyday American worker to show the ways in which the ideas of anarchy have manifested themselves throughout the history of the nation and continue to in the present day.

It should be noted that Anarchism in America does more than tell the history of the philosophy. A strong case is also made for anarchism as the proper path for the United States. Though Anarchism is preachy at times, the viewer is still given room to come to his own opinions, and the comparisons and contrasts between American Libertarianism and Anarchism are particularly interesting.

Indeed.

In an era when votes no longer seem to count and elections can be easily rigged, this movement might be due for a resurgence.