Saddening thoughts on democracy, economics, and the future, all via a webpage that usually cheers me up, Arts & Letters Daily. First, if you’re looking for rhyme and reason in the way people vote, don’t. Studies show not only that many, many voters don’t understand the main issues, and have no real opinions, but that the weather actually affects how this type of person votes. The weather. I’m not joking, but you can read the article by Louis Menand to see for yourself. Second, Cornel West says that we face three major problems: plutocratic, imperial forces are imposing free-market fundamentalism, …
Month: August 2004
Gaaaa. Hellboy, Nazi Occulstism, and The Mythology Crutch
Okay, so I had a nice long review of Hellboy written out and then I lost it. Sometimes digital life sucks. Anyway, the gist was something like this… I saw Hellboy a few days ago but I waited to review it until I could watch a related documentary that was slowly downloading onto my computer. What was the documentary? It was, as it turns out, a somewhat underwhelming piece called The Occult History of the Third Reich: SS Blood and Soil, a poorly done voiceover-with-crap-footage piece which attempted to encapsulate the more credible bits of the Nazi Occult Mythology. That …
Women Lynch Accused Rapist in India
A group of angry women lynched a man accused of rape as he was being escorted into a courthouse in the city of Nagpur in the central Indian State of Maharashtra. Well, if they got the right guy, I can’t say I see any problem with this. Maybe it’ll cause the next guy to think twice before doing the same. via Katolik Shinja.
Franklin’s Passage by David Solway and Tim Lilburn’s Kill-site
While I was in Canada, I took the chance to pick up work by several poets whose work I enjoy, as well as the latest works by people I know and whose work I like and respect. This includes two books of poetry by previous teachers I studied with, David Solway and Tim Lilburn, and it makes sense to talk about both books together because they both deal with that weird, bleeding-edge interface (in the old sense, not the new) between man and “nature” whatever that means. David Solway begins this book of poetry with—among other things—a quote from Henry …
Cory Doctorow’s Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom
Cory Doctorow is more than just an SF figure. He’s famous online for reasons other than his novels, which you can observe just by checking out how many webpages link to the blog he coauthors, BoingBoing. He’s a worldhopping Canadian, a volunteer activist, a freelance journalist, a mad cyclist (like me!) and a generally cool guy. Except for the fact he lives in America, I wanna be like this guy when I refuse to grow up. Ooops, he’s only 32. Gee. Now I feel a little inadequate. Ah well. There’s always hope, right? Anyway, I finished his novel, Down and …