This week’s theme is Love at First Sight.

Burke was definitely smitten…

Holding Logan

So…it wasn’t first sight here, but the grin says it all. And seeing Burke with Cousin Petra confirms that he’s just such a loving kid!! (most of the time )

Debi hosts the Baby Picture Sundays. Hop on over there to see who’s playing, and join in too!

Recently in one of my classes, we read an article about vocational education written by Mike Rose, a professor in the School of Education at UCLA, entitled “I Just Wanna Be Average.” Through many first hand experiences, Rose explains how vocational education institutions do not encourage their students to be ambitious. When reading this article, I thought of Burke and how he would love the standards vocational education schools hold for their students because he also did not encourage ambition.

The main point of Rose’s article is that people can only float to, and not surpass, the mark that is set for them and that vocational education systems set the bar very low. Rose tells the story about how he tested into the vocational track of high school where he was not encouraged to succeed. In this poor learning environment, he “did what he had to do to get by, and did it with half a mind” (Rose 177). The article is composed of many anecdotes about the poor learning environment in a vocational education school. For example, one day in class the teacher asked one of the students their opinion about working hard and doing the best that one can do to achieve great things; the boy answered, “I just wanna be average” (Rose 178). The students in this education system were being taught to be content with mediocrity and to not even try to become something they might have once dreamed of being.

Burke would highly support an education system like the one Rose attended. In his “Reflections on the Revolution in France,” Burke expresses his belief that ambition is impractical; some people are naturally born unequal to others and unless they are an exceptional person (like himself and Rose) then they can’t change. According to Burke, ambition only applies to people like “distinguished magistrates,” and there are a limited amount of those exemplary people (Burke 507). Burke says that people need to be “taught to seek and recognize the happiness that is to be found by virtue in all conditions; in which consists the true moral equality of mankind” (Burke 504). In this statement he basically says that people need to be satisfied with what they are given and if they aren’t then they should be taught to be. He also says that “inspiring false ideas and vain expectations into men destined to travel in the obscure walk of laborious life, serves only to aggravate and embitter that real inequality which it can never remove” (Burke 505). Burke implies that regardless of ambition most people are destined to fail in their endeavors.

The education system that Mike Rose was enrolled in put into action what Burke believed. Burke thinks that ambition doesn’t apply to the average person so it shouldn’t be encouraged, and the students in the system that Rose attended were not encouraged. The system had very low expectations for its students, so the students could only rise to a certain mark and (with the exception of Rose) no further. Even if they wanted to surpass the low standard, they were at a loss of where to start. The students eventually took on the mindset that being average is fine. Burke would admire people like the boy who said “I just wanna be average,” and would encourage more people to think like that. He would give two thumbs up, three if he could, to vocational education standards.

When reading this article, I was not only struck by the similarities between vocational education standards and Burke’s ideas, but I also realized how I disagree with both of them. People can aspire to be anything that they set their mind to and they should not be discouraged in their efforts. Like Mill, I believe that autonomy should be encouraged. Although Mill believes, like Burke, that some people are smarter than others, he also believes that people learn something from the experience of failing.

Works Cited

Burke, Edmund. “Burke: Reflections on the Revolution in France.” Modern Political Thought: Readings from Machiavelli to Nietzsche. By David Wootton. 2nd ed. Indianapolis: Hackett publishing Company Inc., 2008. 502-21. Print.

Rose, Mike. “I Just Wanna Be Average.” Rereading America: Cultural Contexts for Critical Thinking and Writing. By Gary Colombo, Robert Cullen, and Bonnie Lisle. 7th ed. Bedford Books, 2007. 174-85. Print.

So recently I’ve taken to watching “Grey’s Anatomy”. And yes I know I’m slow given that it’s already into its 6th season but hey, better late than never!

For those of you who have no clue what “Grey’s Anatomy” is about, essentially, it’s a story of surgical interns and residents taking on life, love and heartbreak while training to become brilliant surgeons at Seattle Grace Hospital.

As of Season 1, though, I relate so much with Meredith – screwed up, confused, often in her own world, but at the end of the day, she’s there not to beat the other interns but to save lives (even if it means breaking boundaries at times) and to be a damn good surgeon.

The problem with many of us is that we get so caught up in competition that we forget what really matters. At the end of the day, after we’ve beaten everybody, what next?

Just tonight, too, I was having a chat with my mum and I was sharing with her that as I’m watching my own granddad deteriorate mentally and physically day by day, I’ve realized that money and status can never ever make a man.

So what if my granddad was a top man in Japan’s largest newspaper, now with my uncle following in his foot steps? At 85, other than his family, he’s so alone.

In direct contrast, a close family friend of ours was a teacher and later a principal for most of her life. She may not have been as prominent as my granddad but during her 40 years in teaching, she had impacted so many lives. Today, as she battles cancer in her old age, she’s surrounded with former students (many of whom are now highly successfully individuals) showering her with love and gratitude.

Most of all, she had reached out to these former students not when they were having everything going for them but when they had been lost, confused and hopeless in the eyes of many.

As many of these former students assumed key positions in society, they never forgot this one teacher who had believed in them when the rest of the world hadn’t.

And just as the hospital chief in “Grey’s Anatomy” was telling Dr. Burke, a driven doctor determined to be the next hospital chief, perhaps – sometimes, it’s not just about doing a smashing job, but about caring enough to go the extra mile even in the smallest of things.

Much as I love my granddad, I don’t ever want to be like him.

I know I can be emotional and downright screwed up at times, but at the end of the day, I think I’d rather be this way than to stop caring altogether. Most of all, I pray I’ll always remember that our lives can never be a sum of our status and achievements.

Rather,  our lives are measured by the number of lives we impact and the legacy we leave  behind -  as human beings.

There are two parts to this post. I am addressing two arguments that movement conservatism has deviated from traditional Burkean conservatism.

The notion that Edmund Burke is the father of conservatism is so deeply ingrained in the American intelligentsia that even liberals acknowledge it. Editor of the New York Times Book Review and author of The Death of Conservatism, Sam Tanenhaus admits that Burke was “the great originator of modern conservatism.”[1] The Death of Conservatism was met with widespread liberal acclaim, for obvious reasons. Tanenhaus argues that Obama’s election was the death knell for conservatism. He says that movement conservatives have strayed from their Burkean roots and have become “the heirs of the French rather than of the American revolution.”[2]

One of Tanenhaus’s arguments for movement conservatism’s deviation from Burkean principles is that movement conservatism has become an ideological “orthodoxy,” blindly followed by its adherents. Even when there is supposed evidence that the majority of Americans no longer desire conservative values, movement conservatives are unwilling to compromise. That unwillingness is antithetical to Burke’s politics of prudence. And because the present iteration of conservatism, movement conservatism, is no longer Burkean, it is no longer conservative. Therefore, conservatism, Tanenhaus argues, is dead.

Unfortunately for Tanenhaus, he has severely misunderstood not only the present situation but also the Burkean politics of prudence.  By calling conservative opposition to policies ideological and therefore anti-Burkean, Tanenhaus is ignoring the history of Burke’s political life and his views on representation in government.

Burke opposed all forms of abstractions and blind ideology, and prudence dictated his politics. According to Tanenhaus, Burke saw governing as “to engage in perpetual compromise… In such a scheme there is no useful place for the either/or of ideological purism.”[3] Movement conservatism, Tanenhaus asserts, is fanatically ideological. Movement conservatism has a set of ideological principles, “right reason,” Tanenhaus calls it, and if the public disagrees with this ideology, so be it, “because the public is so often wrong.”[4] Tanenhaus opines that “There is a fundamental difference between the two parties and the politics that guides them. The modern liberal worldview is premised on consensus. Movement conservatism emphasized orthodoxy.”[5]

Movement conservatives, such as Charles Krauthammer and Newt Gingrich, paint Obama as a socialist, opposing him steadfastly, ideologically. But, to Tanenhaus, the Burkean “politics of consensus would have required Krauthammer and Gingrich to acknowledge an inescapable fact: the public favored Obama’s proposals. But the politics of orthodoxy imposes no such obligation.”[6]

Applying Burke’s politics of prudence and compromise to this example shows an extreme misunderstanding of Burke’s political life.

Burke has a history of not being swayed by populist public opinion. Burke wrote that

It is said, that twenty-four million ought to prevail over two hundred thousand. True; if the constitution of a kingdom be a problem of arithmetic. This sort of discourse does well enough with the lamp-post for its second; to men who may reason calmly, it is ridiculous.[7]

This interpretation of Burke, as a man lacking principles, who placidly accepts whatever policy the public demands is utterly false. Why then would Burke go against majority public opinion in his efforts to reconcile with the United States of America?

When his constituents in Bristol did not like his opposition to the mercantilist policies regarding the colonies, Burke gave his “Speech to the Electors of Bristol,” where he said,

Certainly, gentlemen, it ought to be the happiness and glory of a representative to live in the strictest union, the closest correspondence, and the most unreserved communication with his constituents. Their wishes ought to have great weight with him; their opinion, high respect; their business, unremitted attention. It is his duty to sacrifice his repose, his pleasures, his satisfactions, to theirs; and above all, ever, and in all cases, to prefer their interest to his own. But his unbiased opinion, his mature judgment, his enlightened conscience, he ought not to sacrifice to you, to any man, or to any set of men living. These he does not derive from your pleasure; no, nor from the law and the constitution. They are a trust from Providence, for the abuse of which he is deeply answerable. Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion. [8]

To Burke, a representative should not conform his judgment to that of his constituents. He is instead elected on his own virtue and his own judgment. How then, is a loyal conservative opposition to President Obama’s policies ideological, and anti-Burkean, because it goes against public opinion, if Burke himself went against public opinion frequently and Burke thought the will of the majority meant little?  Aside from a few short intervals, Burke himself spent the vast majority of his career as a leader of the Loyal Opposition.

The answer is that the conservative loyal opposition is not ideological, is still prudently Burkean in its goal (to preserve American governmental values), and conservatism is still alive.

[2]Ibid. 19

[3] Ibid 18

[4] Ibid 23

[5] Ibid 21

[6] Ibid 23

[7] Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France

[8] Edmund Burke, “Speech to the Electors of Bristol,” 1774

            While Burke strongly advocates sticking with tradition and with what has worked for previous generations, Mill adopts a different approach.  In Mill’s opinion, a tradition is only legitimate if other ways of living have proved inferior.  Mill gives more trust to the ability of man to successfully reason, whereas Burke sees human innovation as disastrous.  Burke’s commitment to tradition limits the equality and autonomy of men, while Mill’s more discriminating view of tradition puts more trust into the hands of men to make changes.  Burke uses the idea of “tradition” and “nature” interchangeably, but Mill cautions us to challenge whether these are actually synonymous. 

             Through his critique of tradition, Mill calls for an end to the subjection of women and says that the system of male dominance “rests upon theory only; for there never has been trial made of any other” (654).  Mill makes the distinction between a proven institution and one based solely on theory.  He asserts that a tradition just based on theory and custom, and when there seems to be no proven basis for its application, is not worthy up being upheld.  However, regardless of the foundation of a certain tradition, Burke advocates that it is better off left alone than altered.

             In addition, Mill uses his distinction between “unnatural” and the “uncustomary” to challenge the subjection of women: it may have been against tradition for women to be treated as equals, but not necessarily against nature.  However, Burke claims that we are “working after the pattern of nature” when we are following a tradition.  He says that “it is with infinite caution that any man ought to venture upon pulling down an edifice which has answered in any tolerable degree for ages the common purposes of society” (514).  Burke describes custom as nature, but Mill argues that not all traditions are rooted in what is natural. 

               As Burke sees it, “a spirit of innovation is generally the result of a selfish temper and confined views” (503).  According to Burke, innovation proves disastrous because we are limited by the “fallible and feeble contrivances of our reason” (503).  For this reason, Burke opposes innovation of any kind. Burke warns against making any change, arguing that the lifetime of one man is not long enough to discern the effects of a specific societal alteration.  On the other hand, Mill not only rejects Burke’s idea of accepting all traditions, but also supports incurring changes.  He not only opposes the subjection of women but goes as far as to suggest a solution: the legal equality of men and women in a relationship of marriage. 

            Burke and Mill’s differences in view of how stringently we should adhere to tradition creates a disparity in their ideas of freedom and government.  Resting in his commitment to tradition, Burke thinks that government is not created for the purpose of ensuring individual rights and that “a perfect democracy is, therefore, the most shameless thing in the world” (519).  In contrast, Mill is a strong supporter of equality and rights.

William Albert “Billy” Burke (born November 25, 1966) is an American actor. He is best known for his roles as Charlie Swan in the 2008 film Twilight and as Gary Matheson in the second season of 24.

Buy this Title on DVD

Burke was born in Bellingham, Washington. His television credits include roles in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (in the episode “Second Skin”), Party of Five, Gilmore Girls, Karen Sisco, Fringe, Monk and The Closer (Season 4, episode 13, “Power of Attorney” playing the attorney Phillip Stroh). He also plays Detective Eric Box in the movie Untraceable.

His motion picture credits include Jane Austen’s Mafia!, Along Came a Spider, Final Jeopardy, Flashpoint and Ladder 49. His upcoming film credits include The Fallen, Forfeit, Fracture and Retirement. He also appeared in Feast of Love (2007), co-starring Selma Blair and Morgan Freeman. In 2008, Burke appeared in Twilight, based on the best-selling novel by Stephenie Meyer, playing the role of Charlie Swan.  He also plays Bobby’s brother Jack on the show My Boys. Burke reprised his role as Charlie Swan in Twilight’s sequel, New Moon.

Burke is one of the “famous faces” on the online poker website Hollywood Poker, which is run in conjunction with Ongame Network.

The trendy streets of Vancouver’s Yaletown aren’t exactly unknown to the brightest of Hollywood’s stars, but even the usually unflappable Hamilton Street hipsters would have done a double take seeing the stars of Twilight sneaking a quick cigarette outside the Blue Water Cafe Friday night.

Celebrating the impending end of the New Moon shoot, Pattinson and Stewart chatted up a storm with co-stars Dakota Fanning, Taylor Lautner, Rachelle Lefevre and series scribe Stephanie Meyer.

Pattinson, looking ultra-casual in a checked shirt with black jeans, with a rolled-up script wedged into a pocket,

The Blue Water Cafe + Raw Bar has been Yaletown institution for years with its wooden interiors and expansive patio, and just about every film crew worth its salt has ended up there at some point in the production.

The Twilight kids reportedly didn’t make an all-nighter of it, despite Pattinson’s birthday being just five days way, with most enjoying a few quick bevvies before hitting the limos and scorching out of Dodge.

Meanwhile, Pattinson’s latest film, Little Ashes, in which he plays Salvador Dali, is being panned by most critics.

I’m sure he’ll deal.
© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

The Twilight Saga: New Moon, like last year’s Twilight, is critic-proof. We film critics don’t get it, this film isn’t for us, and the fans will love it. However, none of that means New Moon isn’t worthy of humorous derision or concerned analysis of the disturbing subtext. New Moon is a bad movie which fails on nearly every level, but that doesn’t mean it’s not fascinating. The series is one of the most popular young adult stories of the last decade yet the movie, which wouldn’t dare make radical changes to the book, lacks so much: a strong female protagonist, subtlety, joy, a positive message to young women, and above all, shirts. The men of New Moon need shirts.

The film opens with the 18th birthday of Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart), one of the most vapid and irritating protagonists in recent memory. While most teenagers would be happy to be hitting their 18th (guns and voting!), Bella can do nothing but sulk and quiver in the presence of her dreamy, pale-skinned, cold vampire love-muffin, Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson). In a vain attempt to make Bella smile for at least a second, her best friend Jacob (Taylor Lautner) gives her a dream catcher and must explain to her what it does because the film considers her that freaking stupid, although she certainly is. Bella and Edward whisper to each other during class and he tells her how he wish he knew how to kill himself. Happy Birthday.

The Twilight Saga New Moon movie image Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson 1.jpgLater that night, rather than spend any time celebrating with her father or her human friends, Bella enjoys (which means she sulks a little less) the company of the Cullen family, all vampires and not blood related other than they all live together and suck animal blood to survive. Unfortunately, Bella becomes the first person in human history to get a paper cut from unwrapping a present and one of the Cullens goes nuts and tries to attack her, Edward protects her by accidentally throwing her into furniture thus giving her an even worse injury. Dr. Cullen, the family’s patriarch, patches her up and Bella mentions that they wouldn’t have to worry about this if Edward changed her into a vampire. Dr. Cullen remarks that he and his family are damned and that changing her would make her soulless. Remember kids: when Bella says she wants Edward to “change her” it is a metaphor for an 18 year old girl wanting her boyfriend to take her virginity. Edward, who looks like he’s either going to or coming from a GQ photo shoot, protests. In fact, the following day Edward (after breaking into her room while she’s not at home), says he’s leaving in order to protect her and that he never wants to see her again.

Bella then shuts down completely and her break-up causes her to become catatonic interspersed with night terrors. This is odd because not only do teenage break-ups rarely cause such extreme reactions (at least in healthy, well-adjusted teenagers), neither Twilight nor in this movie do we see what Bella is missing. What makes Edward special other than his looks and brooding demeanor? There’s nothing substantial to miss and what Twilight and New Moon fail to do is convince us that infatuation is love. But infatuation isn’t love; it’s a negative manifestation of a fantasy. I understand the teenage love thing when your emotions are so strong that you feel like there’s nothing more important in the entire world. But New Moon keeps mistaking that for true love and that Edward and Bella are a modern-day Romeo and Juliet. I know this because at the beginning of the film, Bella’s reading Romeo & Juliet and she’s supposed to write a paper on Romeo & Juliet and Edward’s birthday-downer-suicide monologue is during a class where the teacher is showing a movie adaptation of Romeo & Juliet. Subtlety, thy name is anything other than New Moon.

Director Chris Weitz brings three skills to New Moon that Twilight director Catherine Hardwicke sorely lacked: the ability to shoot a movie without a blue filter, well-shot action scenes, and convincing special effects as far as the animals are concerned. But Weitz makes Hardwicke look like Bergman when it comes to subtlety. There are moments in New Moon where I laughed out loud because I thought I was supposed to. I thought Weitz was mocking this overwrought teenage love story by using the cheesiest and clichéd images imaginable like running through fields and laying in a meadow. But he’s playing it completely straight and while Twilight fans are eating it up, the rest of us are trying to balance slack-jawed amazement with hysterical laughter. Those moments are at least a reprieve from the Bella’s unrelenting misery.

The Twilight Saga New Moon movie image Kristen Stewart, Taylor Lautner (1).jpgAfter five months of dealing with a break-up that should’ve caused hospitalization, Bella finally drags herself out of the house only to discover that the only way she can see Edward is if she behaves recklessly, because before Edward left he told her not to be reckless. But when she does behave recklessly, Edward tells her that she promised him she wouldn’t and she stops because Bella Swan can’t think for herself or do anything which does not relate to a dominant man. Also, when she sees Edward, he appears as a cheesy ghost effect which, again, I could not believe they were using. I understand that they need a way to keep Pattinson around despite his character’s absence for the majority of the film, but reappearing as ghost mist? Did Weitz think his audience was so dense that they would think a non-misty Edward would actually be there? And this audience has read the book so they already know he’s not really there!

Thankfully, Bella discovers that she can cling to the other hot man in her life, Jacob. The beginning of their relationship is one of the few bright spots in New Moon as the two flirt, joke around, and have personalities. Furthermore, Lautner has charm and charisma which is more than I can say for Pattinson whose performance consists of pensively looking at the ground, sadly looking down at the ground, and bashfully looking down at the ground.

But soon the film realizes the horrible abomination of having a likable character and soon Jacob joins up with the bad boys who don’t wear shirts. It turns out Jacob and the shirtless bad boys are werewolves. The shirtless wolf pack is the film’s best unintentional running gag. No matter the weather, location, or situation, these men will not wear shirts. I know these guys want to show off their pecks and washboard abs, but you don’t have to show them off all the time. There’s a scene that takes place in a torrential downpour where Bella is pleading with a shirtless Lautner to stay with her and not go off with the bad boys. It’s really quite an amazing scene as you can actually see Lautner developing pneumonia.

The Twilight Saga New Moon movie image Kristen Stewart (4).jpgBella’s absolutely dependence on men is where I leave the silliness of New Moon behind and begin to actively loathe the property and what it stands for. This past summer, I dropped my unnecessary hatred toward Twilight fans because their infatuation with cute guys is harmless and nothing new to contemporary American culture. I accepted the following of older fans because I assumed they recognized the series as harmless fantasy and nothing more. But I didn’t lose my hatred of the books and the message they give to young women and New Moon pushed me to start questioning what was appealing about this fantasy.

Bella is a reactive character and her every action is based on what either Edward or Jacob does. She behaves recklessly, not as a way to escape from her pain, but so she can keep seeing ghost-Edward. Later, she tries to kill herself and then cover it up with the excuse she was cliff-diving. But even that isn’t as disturbing as when Jacob confesses to Bella that now because he’s a werewolf, just a split second of anger could cause him to lose control and seriously hurt her. Her response: “That will never happen because I will always tell you how special you are.” This is a girl who will never argue or even question a man she loves because otherwise he may lose control and beat her to within an inch of her life. It won’t be his fault; he just has a monster inside him he can’t control. And why does Edward leave? Because he’s afraid his presence will hurt Bella. Of course, his big realization is that by leaving Bella, he put her in more harm.

Here are six words you will never hear Bella Swan say: “I can take care of myself.” This is the protagonist of one of the best-selling books today. I know author Stephanie Meyer is a Mormon and I find her belief system provides a sickening subtext to her work. While Mormonism isn’t the only religion to promoted abstinence, I find it an absurd and counter-productive response to burgeoning sexuality. It’s blatant religious patrimony to tell young women that all sex before marriage is wrong, even if she wants to, is over 18, and her boyfriend isn’t pressuring her. If a couple wants to wait until marriage to have sex, I have no problem with that. I have a problem with painting an ideal man as an asexual protector who treats his girlfriend like a child and that if they have sex before they get married, “changing” her will make her lose her soul.

The Twilight Saga New Moon movie image Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson (2).jpgAnd that’s not even what I find most offensive! I am appalled that there’s not even a hint of a moment where Bella has an interest of her own other than whether or not a man can protect her and what she can do to serve him. I find it offensive that Bella is so selfish that she doesn’t care if she hurts her kind and devoted father or pulls away from people who were supposedly her friends. Parents, is this really the kind of role model you want for your child? And women who see this as fantasy, is this really what you find exhilarating? I understand attraction to hot guys but plenty of other movies and stories offer that without the repulsive moral values.

There are moments I don’t hate New Moon. I like the action scenes, the cinematography, the werewolf CGI, Taylor Lautner (when he’s not brooding), and that they made up an action movie called “Face Punch”, which I would totally see based on the title alone. But two questions about the movie remain at the forefront of my mind: how troubling it is that this movie will most likely gross over $200 million while having such repulsive messages; and why won’t someone give these hot Native Americans some shirts?

from http://www.collider.com/2009/11/19/the-twilight-saga-new-moon-review/

Come and visit us at www.twilightnewmoonreviews.com !
Here you can rate and comment on the new movie to let others know what they missed out on!!!
Check it out!! It wont hurt!! Have fun !! Love the books the movies were…. well, not that impressive but still, it is awesome seeing them in “real life” !

I think my 2nd All Freakin Night truly solidified my love for Olympia.  Drinking tepid rum and cokes out of Dasini bottles while leaning forward to throw trash off a 2nd floor balcony, all the time attempting to slur out a quip at a theater screen (as loud as fucking possible), which is playing a movie about space slugs that turn people into zombies; I even turned down taking mushrooms that night.  The funny thing is that there were at least four more movies afterwards.  What I’m trying to expertly transition into is my love for Night of The Creeps.

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This is one of those movies I always saw sitting up on the rack at the local video/liquor store when I was a kid.  I’d go into the stagnant shop once a week with my Dad to rent a NES game and if I’d been good that week I could maybe get a movie too.  When my Dad would browse the “walk-in closet” sized section of ever so fine spirits (always coming out with rum) I could be found gawking at whatever creepy or crazy VHS caught my eyes.  Some of my favorites that I can still remember today are:  Dead Alive, Evil Dead 2, and Nightmare On Elm Street 3. Of course I was never allowed to rent any of these movies and probably didn’t see most of them until I was 18.  My Mom told me about seeing The Exorcist in theaters when my oldest brother Andrew was a toddler (he just turned 40).  The movie fucked with my Mom so bad that she sped home right when the end credits started to roll, convinced my brother was most likely speaking in tongues and telling the babysitter that his/her mother sucks cocks in Hell (he does love Motorhead).  Anyways, it makes sense that I wasn’t priviliged these gems as a child.

Sci-fi horror is the basis of many of my nightmares growing up.  Once Andrew blossomed into the old brother that wished to enlighten/terrify his uncultured sponge of a sibling, I found – very bluntly – the ingredients to being frightened via film.  Let’s all give a hand for John Carpenter at his cinematic raping of the senses: The Thing. Even to this day I can’t think of a movie that hucks bundles of dynamite at the caveman side of human nature as his remake did.  I know at some point in my youth Andrew threw on what would become a film that rests comfortably in my top ten favorites and I couldn’t shit right for a week.  No joke; my Dad had to sit in on all my bathroom endeavors for a bit because I was afraid of Charles Hannahan’s detached spider fuck-me-I-never-ever-wanna-see-that-thing-whether-in-real-or-fucking-Oz head.

Aliens is right there with The Thing when it comes to a movie that caused me to always run and jump on my bed when it was lights out.  How was I to know there wasn’t a facehugger under the box spring;  didn’t fuck about.  It also spawned my HATE for Paul Reiser even though I know Burke was just a character, but I don’t care.  Every time I watched Mad About You (don’t even ask me why, I don’t even know) I would stare at Reiser and think, “You lied to Ripley and so many good people were killed because of it.  I wish I could have punched you to death before that alien got you… prick.”  Guilty by association:  I hate Helen Hunt too.  Whatever, she sucks.

So when my parents would leave me home alone I’d dig through the pile of copied VHS tapes (my favorite had The Great Mouse Detective, Wayne’s World, and Addams Family on it) and usually end up with Aliens because The Thing disappeared once Andrew left for college.  Between the releases of these two sci-fi horror titans I was missing out on the teen/college equivalent:  Night of The Creeps.

Doofy college freshmen – whose best friend has polio – attempts to take out his dream girl for the formal, but of course zombie jocks/bros who are afflicted with space brain slugs derail the evening.  Solution?  A shotgun, flamethrower, revolver, lawnmower, and Tom Atkins.  I know for a fact I would have grown up to be a better person if I had this movie in my possession as a youngster.  I probably would have been nicer to people with disabilities too, but my parents insisted I play t-ball.  Thus it’s not my fault that I love Christopher Reeves jokes, but Mom and Dad’s.

Horror is the genre that I can’t get tired of and am always willing to watch.  If I wanna have trouble sleeping I’ll put on The Changeling (I’m actually a little uneasy right now just thinking about it) and keep thinking I see something just out of my peripherals.  How about bad people getting exactly what they deserve?  Then it’s Sleepaway Camp, just make sure no one spoils the ending for ya.  What keeps horror fresh is the blending of genres.  I’m trying to stay on the subject of sci-fi horror, but what makes a film watchable over and over again for me is the humor.  Re-Animator is a rare title that I could easily watch every day because it’s funny as shit.  A roommate justifies hiding a dead cat in his mini-fridge because he didn’t wish to leave a sticky note that read “cat dead, details later”.  Dr. West is a gentleman and don’t you forget it.

I’ve heard “splatter comedy” tossed around when talking about movies like Creeps, but The Return of The Living Dead was the first movie to be labeled by this sub-genre to my knowledge.  Without going off the deep end about it, they’re films that use gore and violence – not just funny dialogue – to heighten the comedic qualities as the story pans out.  To someone who isn’t big on horror it can sound perverse that laughter can come from someone being blown up, but with the right line delivered, piece of music used, or sometimes even the lack of both, humor can come spilling out in bloody abundance.

The real appeal in Creeps is writer/director Fred Dekker’s stew of a tale that involves so many aspects in cinema.  You got two buddies who are bumbling around a college campus and all they really want is some lady-loving, which leads to partying.  Apparently getting into a frat gets you laid, so just like any “sex comedy” whacky antics need to ensue; a prank.  The prank brings us to a previous flashback of the cliche 50’s that is familiar as Hell because of old throwback black and whites.  An object jettisoned from an alien craft streaks over make-out point and of course it lands nearby; it MUST be investigated.  It’s a perfect catalyst to the ridiculousness that object – a singular space slug – will cause years later.

Once bursting heads start spurting out legions of wiggly-jiggles that dart across tile floors looking for an open orifice (my God that was fun to type) we need a hero and we get one:  Tom “Thrill Me” Atkins.  His character Detective Ray Cameron easily sits alongside dudes like Reggie, Peter, and Ash at the big boy table for bad asses in horror.  He’s full of one-liners, a fucked up past, and finishes every sentence with a shotgun blast (I’m on a God damn roll).  That’s the issue I have with many hero characters these days, is that they can’t be fun and kooky.  The ones that are a little odd-ball are typically very young characters, but rarely are they the old-timers with age in their face and stories to tell.

And don’t let me forget J.C. played by Steve Marshall (he was also on 21 Jump Street, so you know this guy is big time).  Now I always say he had polio in the movie – even though there’s no mention of it – so maybe I’ll just switch to “handicapped”… even though I wanna say “cripple”.  Having a character with a disability for no good God damn reason does add some realism to a film that is so far passed the limits of normality.  I hate when every actor in a film looks like they just got done tanning in the OC and are on their way to getting frap-a-fucking-chinos at some coffee shop before they zoom off to blow each other while watching Friends. The characters in this movie look like normal to partially awkward people, just like every other random you pass on the street.  Dekker threw in a guy who should easily be a shut-in, but J.C. turns out to be one of the better characters in the movie.  He pushes his buddy Chris (the actor Jason Lively was also on 21 Jump Street; P.I.M.P.) to actually talk to a woman and not be such a pussy that bitches about everything wrong in his life, but actually assists him in fixing all the bullshit.

I don’t think I ever wanna have kids.  I’m already too damn selfish as it is and if I have to fork out cash to some free-loader that can’t even walk or talk; don’t think so.  But if I ever become “responsible” and “stop peeing in the sink” which – God forbid – leads me into parenthood, my kid would get a VHS tape (yup, just because I’m an adult doesn’t mean I’m NOT poor) with three titles on it:  The Thing, Aliens, and Night of the Creeps.  Because isn’t the whole point of having kids so as not to be your parents or do I have that backwards?  I really don’t know.  Well I’m off to get a vasectomy; wish me luck.

So for several months now I have been working my first real job as a server for an undisclosed national company. My job has its perks, for instance; good food at a discounted price, interaction with random people (always entertaining), pretty decent money for doing nothing at all, and i have the pleasure to defile whoevers food I please. Now don’t be alarmed not every waiter will screw with your food, just most of them. And its not everyones food who gets messed with, just rude and disrespectful people. Being the great guy I am, I have devised a plan for everyone to follow in order to avoid unknowingly eating dried apendages from the human body.

Make eye contact with all persons that may possibly come in contact with your food. Talk to them and interact with them. Make these people feel like they ARE people and you are one step closer to avoiding dandruff on ur mashed potatoes.

READ THE MENU…Unless you are blind your server should not have to read it for you. If it comes with sides it will say so…if you ask what sides you have to choose from without reading the section entitled “Sides” your taco will be seasoned with pubic hair.

If your server says “Can I grab you something to drink” never ever reply with “What do you have”…its a restaurant with a full bar, if you want it we have it. The menu, once again, is a great source of refference in order to determine what you will be drinking. While we are on the subject, never order an ice water with “lots” of sugar and a “ton” of lemons. Do this, and your lemons will touch my testicles before they touch your water.

When your server asks you if you are ready to order, for the love of all that is holy, only respond yes if you ARE READY! Nothing makes the waiter more apt to taint your burger with their taint (Section of hairy sweaty skin located between the scrotum and the anus) than an indecisive menu browser. “Yes I am ready to order…lets see here, I will have theeeeeee….hummmmm is this good, oh wait it has onions i don’t think I like onions, but wait it does say pasta….hmmm can I have this without the onions, I don’t really care for onions….oh does this come with bread, I like to clean my plate with the bread, so I would prefer if it could come with bread….oooooo 50 cents! just for bread! at some restaurants they just give you the bread for free…do you guys do that?” This lady ^ will be enjoying a hot steaming snot rocket in her pasta sauce.

When your beer is empty holding it into the sky and waving at your waiter from across the room is a fantastic way to get a floating whitehead in your stella artois.

Send a steak back because it is not WELL done enough, and the cooks will smear it on the floor and hapily season it with rat shit.

Tip well! if you don’t and chose to return to the establishment all of these disgusting and easily avoidable meal enhancments will be bestowed on your appetizer sampler.

There you have it! The keys to a successful dining experience. There are other minor annoyances that may get your food touched with an unwashed hand, but those are for you to debunk on your own. Follow these guidlines and your meal will be clean and enjoyable, fail to do so and recieve “food” poisoning in return.

B-Burke Out

Another satisfied customer!

It’s raining dollars!  What would Frederic Bastiat have to say about this if he could speak to us from 1848?

As government regulations grow slowly, we become used to the harness – Judge Robert Bork

Frederic Bastiat

NEWS FLASH!

We interrupt our regular programming.  The President bans windows in order to benefit candle makers; candle production, he says, will stimulate the economy as long as candles aren’t melted by sunlight.  The administration also announces it will nationalize candle manufacturing, allow greedy wax suppliers only 10% of the money they are owed by the candle makers, plus grant a 30% share of Acme Candles, Inc.  to the UCMDWU (United Candle Mold Delivery Workers’ Union).   New York Times White House correspondent asks Press Secretary Roberty Gibbs what enchanted moment inspired this economic epiphany.

OK, I’ve got the facetiousness out of my system.  I wish I could take credit for this prescient concept.  I’ll admit to only my personal sarcasm in tying the philosophy of that remarkably witty proponent of freedom and liberty: Frederic Bastiat, (see link to Wikipedia entries from the pictures on the sidebar) to our current state of affairs.  Frederic Bastiat was a member of what was known as the French Liberal School in the 1840s (liberal as in the classical/original free market definition), warning of the folly of government intervention in the marketplace.  His parable of a fictitious petition by candle makers to the French government to eliminate windows in order to prevent candles from melting – thereby increasing economic prosperity by insuring the success of the candle industry (at the expense of the window industry…oops) – is a hilarious anecdote.  It also unfortunately illustrates the genesis of the president’s belief system.

Obviously above, I make reference to the bailout of GM, the perversion of the rule of law in throwing Chrysler bond holders to the wolves, and the artificial propping up of the UAW rather than normal bankruptcy pecking order.  Bastiat’s fable of altruistic but ultimately damaging marketplace intervention, is echoed consistently by the current administration’s adherence to this paradigm of unlimited spending by fiat justified by its immediate/short term effects on various and sundry interest groups.  In fact, Friedrich Hayek (see my previous two posts) said in a review of Bastiat that, according to 1930s economist John Maynard Keynes, the assumption of a multiplier effect (simply meaning a belief that the government can stimulate the economy by spending, producing a return greater than the cost of the stimulus; thereby increasing employment) on general economic prosperity would precisely mimic the argument of the candle makers!

Cash for clunkers (and maybe the upcoming Stimulus II cash for “cluckers” chicken farm bailout?) would most certainly fit neatly into these fallacies: money will do more good in the hands of the government, and it is the duty of government  to see that all get what they “deserve”.

Lastly, Frederic Bastiat’s landmark book: The Law has remarkable parallels to the economically damaging entitlement philosophies of the current congressional majority.  For example Bastiat says in the section The Results of Legal Plunder, “No society can exist unless the laws are respectable to a certain degree.  The safest ways to make laws respected is to make them respectable.”  This quote illustrates the current congress’s path towards a society in which greater than 50% of workers pay no taxes, and receive payments in the form of the Earned Income Tax Credit.  Therefore, this non-tax paying majority – the receivers of public services and governmental largess – are able to award themselves through the ballot ever increasing free goods and services from the minority: the tax payers/suppliers of public services and governmental largess.  I see no end to this increase in receivers, to include the resulting unconstructive inertia towards manufactured dependence.

So to bring my polemic to a close, I quote Bastiat one more time: “Legal plunder is identified as “… the law takes from some persons [what] belongs to them, and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong…The person who profits from this law… will claim that the state is obligated to protect and encourage his particular industry…”

— Or nationality, ethnicity, income demographic, religion, color, blue collar, white collar, government employee, Woodstock museum, first time home buyer, union member, sexual preference, illegal immigrant, home in foreclosure, Wall St., Main St., small business, large business, self esteem damaging tatoo removers (I didn’t make this one up: see   http://www.mcclatchydc.com/226/story/63697.html), “green” energy producer, municipality, farmer, auto parts supplier, environmentalist, “too big to fail” bank and insurance companies, student, teacher, cop, mechanic, ethanol producer, the bicycle spoke hooker-uppers’ guild, donut shop owners’ amalgamated, and last but not least……….Acme Candles, Inc.

Comments on the blog con or pro most welcome.

SOOO, over the weekend was the BBC Switch live which is a yearly thing now hosted at the Hammersmith Appollo they had plenty of acts performing over the weekend (line up is below)…Check out all the interviews and performances by clicking the link below to whatever artist you want to see. It’s good stuff, One of my fav artists on there is Pixie lol you have to check her new ‘game’…ENJOY!

Black Eyed Peas

The Saturdays

N-Dubz

Pixie Lott

JLS

Alexandra Burke

Shaheen Jafargholi

MG

Burkes stance on the necessity of “pleasing illusions” to a successful government is particularly interesting when examined. He explicitly states that it is crucial that the government be run from the inside, with very little transparency, by those worth to run it. He sees humanity as incapable of individual judgement; his lack of faith, to some, could be seen as demeaning to the general public. Most people would like to believe that they can aspire to be more than a “swinish multitude” — this ideal of aspiration is central to the foundation of the American Dream.

Despite the negative picture his assertion paints of humanity, I am tempted to agree with the basis of what Burke presents; there is a multitude in America that needs to be told what it wants to hear, that should view the government from behind a veil, and that relies on an illusion of happiness. Citizens that deny the presence of these illusions in our present government are not looking hard enough, and those that would venture to argue they should be removed should prepare for chaos. This viewpoint may look like a path to dystopia, and understandably so; however, I think it is fair to assume that a good number of my peers would agree that not everyone is fit to govern — is only a step away from my thinking. Furthermore, not all the “decent drapery of life” are inherently wicked. As Burke ventures (which I feel he is correct in doing), religion is among these and of paramount importance. Religion is well-intentioned and does not aim to deceive, but does act to pacify the general public. It gives people a sense of security and community, and is subsequently used to the advantage of many politicians.

The view I hold is easily misconstrued; I do not see it as black and white or as harsh as Burke does, and I do have concessions. While I do agree that the general public is not fit to govern and not all are meant to learn, I do not agree with the way Burke distinguishes between the governed and those fit to govern. There is a middle-ground that he does not acknowledge; people exist that do not fit their circumstances and, if it seems rational to try, can learn and surpass their standing. I realize that this retracts a good portion of Burke’s theory about the people, but I feel it is a necessary concession. In short, a person should be under the illusions Burke sets forth, unless that person has the power to remove it. Only when people reach the seat of governance should they see the other side of the veil.

This is how I feel at the present; however, I welcome criticism and would like to the opportunity to look at the issue from my fellow classmates’ perspective.

Yup – another Dragonfly post.

We had a GORGEOUS day today…so out came the grandaddy of all dragonflies. Daddy helped catch it, but Burke’s the one who decided to let it go after a while. And all of that Makes My Monday.

Cheryl over at Twinfatuation hosts this one. Head on over to see what else makes people’s Mondays (there are always some really good ones!)

These two quotes by Edmund Burke (1970) remind me of a large, but particular group of people. When one simply replaces “They” with “The Liberals and the NDP” or “The American Democrats”, it suddenly becomes a paragraph that could have been written by a number of conservative bloggers – provided they have a thing for 18th century english.

They see no merit or demerit in any man, or any action, or any political principle, any further than as they may forward or retard their design of change: they therefore take up, one day, the most violent and stretched prerogative, and another time the wildest democratic ideas of freedom, and pass from the one to the other without any sort of regard to cause, to person, or to party.

…

This sort of people are so taken up with their theories about the rights of man, that they have totally forgot his nature. Without opening one new avenue to the understanding, they have succeeded in stopping up those that lead to the heart. They have perverted in themselves, and in those that attend to them, all the well-placed sympathies of the human breast.

One has to wonder if his words will ever die out against the test of time.

Everyones working hard this 4th quarter! Alexandra smashed it with this performance…
MG

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