Ripping Into The War Profiteers

One hell of an intense indictment on the private contracting in the 'war on terror':

"And just maybe, reviewing this appalling history of invoicing orgies and million-dollar boondoggles, it's not so far-fetched to think that this is the way someone up there would like things run all over -- not just in Iraq but in Iowa, too, with the state police working for Corrections Corporation of America, and DHL with the contract to deliver every Christmas card. And why not? What the Bush administration has created in Iraq is a sort of paradise of perverted capitalism, where revenues are forcibly extracted from the customer by the state, and obscene profits are handed out not by the market but by an unaccountable government bureauc­racy. This is the triumphant culmination of two centuries of flawed white-people thinking, a preposterous mix of authoritarian socialism and laissez-faire profit­eering, with all the worst aspects of both ideologies rolled up into one pointless, supremely idiotic military adventure -- American men and women dying by the thousands, so that Karl Marx and Adam Smith can blow each other in a Middle Eastern glory hole.

It was an awful idea, perhaps the worst America has ever tried on foreign soil. But if you were in on it, it was great work while it lasted."

The full report from Rolling Stone is here.

National Guard Cheers For Iraq Withdrawal

A meeting this past weekend for the National Guard Association in Puerto Rico heard an earnest plea from the Governor of the island state which resonated loudly with the Guard's leadership:

"The war in Iraq has fractured the political will of the United States and the world,” he said at the opening of the 129th National Guard Association general conference. “Clearly, a new war strategy is required and urgently.”

Acevedo said sending more troops to Iraq would be a costly blunder.

“By increasing the number of National Guard and reserve troops, we put our soldiers in danger for the umpteenth time since the beginning of the global war on terrorism,” said the governor, adding that U.S. territories and states need Guard reserves in the event of natural disasters and domestic disturbances.

Acevedo, a Democrat, has called on Washington to withdraw troops from Iraq in the past, but has not been a vocal critic of the war.

Col. David Carrion Baralt, the Guard’s top official in Puerto Rico, said Acevedo received a standing ovation.

“Maybe the [officers] were not expecting those kinds of comments, but having a dialogue is the point of conferences like these,” Carrion said by phone."

Report from the Army Times.

The Return of Ted Haggard & Other News

Poor troubled quasi-evangelist Ted Haggard says he is so poor that he need you to give him money each month for the next two years, and then he'll be financially fine.

Despite receiving a settlement salary this year of $138,000 and owning a house worth $715,000, he says he needs your checks and cash for the next two years - which he says will bring you rewards in Heaven - as he goes to school to learn to be a counselor for a facility which has a dubious reputation.

"[The families With A Mission in] Colorado Springs mailing address is the same one to which Haggard is asking people to send donations. However, Secretary of State records show that Families With a Mission was administratively dissolved earlier this year, on Feb. 23. And the man who is listed as the president of Families With a Mission, Paul Gerard Huberty, appears to be the same Paul Huberty who was convicted in 1996 of having sex with a 17-year old girl while he was a Lieutenant Colonel in the Air Force stationed in Germany, and who later registered as a sex offender in Hawaii. The organization Family Watchdog, which tracks sex offenders, currently lists Huberty at the same Monument address that was the principal address of Families With a Mission."

The report from Colorado Confidential is here.

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Even though some strippers at Nashville's Deja Vu club were faking their erotic interests (with some possibly fake body enhancements) for a customer, it turns out he was faking them out too - with home-made $100 bills.

Smyrna resident Damon Armagost found out the Secret Service will investigate fake bills. Erotic fakery is no crime, however. It may be an art form.

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Forget changing with the times -- Time itself is being changed in Venezuela, which is also no longer the actual name of the nation, it's now the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. And now they are moving their clocks forward by half an hour by command of Hugo Chavez.

He has also announced a plan to build a group of artificial island-cities to claim sections of the Caribbean as his own.

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Tired of waiting for new episodes of the intermittent TV show appropriately called "Lost"??

Thanks to Todd McFarlane and his company of creators, a new series of "action figures" (NOT dolls, dammit) is on the way to a store near you. You can force them to act out your vision of the TV show.

Also available - The Hatch Play-Set. You get to decide what they do now! Make them build a raft and just go home!!

Bush's Use of History 'Perverse'

The speech this week from our President on the war in Iraq and previous warfare in US history left me, as usual, utterly confused as to the point and the methods used in his deductions. Historian John Dower of MIT heard the President reference a book by Dower on the reconstruction of Japan following World War 2 and was pretty angry at said usage:

"They’re desperately groping for a historical analogy, and their uses of history are really perverse.

"In the case of Iraq,” Dower said, “the administration went in there without any of the kind of preparation, thoughtfulness, understanding of the country they were going into that did exist when we went into Japan. Even if the so-called experts said we couldn’t do it, there were years of mid-level planning and discussions before they went in. They were prepared. They laid out a very clear agenda at an early date."

Notable as well is the recent history - a 2002 editorial by Dower - in which he outlined 10 reasons why the success in Japan could not be applied to Iraq in any way. The interview with Dower is here.

A spokesperson for the White House responded to Dower's outrage:

"While professor Dower may disagree with the applicability of the quote, the president in no way endorses his view of Iraq."

Wha??

This careful picking and choosing of words and historical meaning is a disservice to our current deployment of troops and our hopes for success in Iraq. Instead, what I am constantly seeing, is a policy in search of a strategy, actions which go in search of meanings after the action has occurred.

Distorting the past, the present and fumbling for the future - is this the best the White House can do?

Camera Obscura - The Lookout; Sunshine; Lynch's Empire: and Finally Some Real Kubrick on DVD

It's time for some movie recommendations, meaning good movies, and only partly obscure. Also some fantastic news for fans (like me) of the late, great Stanley Kubrick.

I was eager to see "The Lookout" from writer/director Scott Frank, a highly praised screenwriter responsible for the stories in "Get Shorty", "Out of Sight" and "Minority Report." Those scripts were just first-rate work and showed a film noir style with modern settings, somehow both easy-going and taut at the same time. Characters are vividly captured in such works.

"The Lookout" does not disappoint, though it easily could have. The story follows Chris Pratt, played in an Oscar-worthy performance by Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Chris was a hot-shot high school athlete from a very wealthy family until a senseless, random car crash scrambled his brains. Now he can just barely make it on his own, working as a night janitor, sharing an apartment with a blind friend (Jeff Daniels in an excellent supporting performance) and forced by his mental incapacities to keep a notepad with him at all times to remind him of what to do and when to do it.

Chris can remember his glorious past and yearns for it desperately - which plays perfectly into the plans of a group of violent thugs who want to rob a bank where Chris works. The story is carefully told from Chris' viewpoint and the details of his past and present are revealed in layers and through great writing and acting. It reminded me of the work of John Huston and other great crime-caper directors and writers.

As the movie reached it's final scenes I was almost cringing, fearing where and how the conflicts would be resolved. It is so carefully constructed and based in realism, it needed an ending true to the characters and not the needs of a Hollywood ending. Frank does end the story well, much to my surprise, and stays as real as the characters and the tale being told. It's one of the best films of 2007.

I also watched one of the highly praised films of 2006 this week, "Little Miss Sunshine". The reason, despite it's acclaim, that I was reluctant to watch is some shoddy marketing. I could not tell what the movie was really about and what I could tell did not interest me. The story of how the movie had to travel far and wide to reach production and distribution must be linked to the fact that it is so hard to easily summarize into a type. So let me first say - just watch it!

The movie follows a dysfunctional and comical family -- Dad (Greg Kinnear) is a bumbling and somewhat offensive wannabe Self-Help Expert, Grandad (Alan Arkin) has been kicked out of a home for the elderly because he's often snorting heroin ("I'm old! I can do what I want!!), Mom (Toni Collette) is patient and caring for all the loose ends of her family, and has just brought home her suicidal brother (Steve Carell), and her teenage son (Paul Dano) reads Nietzsche and has decided not to speak until he can get accepted as a fighter pilot, and young daughter Olive (Abigail Breslin) is suddenly given a chance, amidst all the family chaos, to participate in the Little Miss Sunshine beauty pageant. (See, very hard to make all that into an advertising headline!)

Very sharp and simple writing brings all the characters into hilarious life, matched by excellent acting by all the cast. The trio of Arkin, Kinnear and Carell is just brilliant. These three are at the top of their game, though Toni Collette manages to keep them all in line and remind them they are a family.

Not long after the family has decided to drive from New Mexico to California so Olive can compete in the pageant, the cheery yellow VW van they drive blows out the transmission. The only way they can drive it is to push it so Kinnear can get it into 3rd gear and the family then has to run from behind the van and jump in while it's moving. It's a funny scene, but clearly shows that despite all their anger and frustrations with each other, this family is a solid, unified unit. And it tells you that as the journey progresses, they'll find themselves firmly united. For all the weird elements here, this is a nice little family film, though it is for adults and not the kiddies to watch.

Now on to the more obscure recommendation of the day -- David Lynch's newest movie, "Inland Empire". I traveled through two counties to find a copy to rent, and found just one, which of course no one else bothered to rent or even notice. My good fortune!

"Inland Empire" is a three hour dream/nightmare and the companion disc is even longer, chock full of behind the scenes info. What's the movie about? Well it's kind of like stretching Lynch's subconscious musings over your own brain, raiding someone else's dreams and never being sure if you'll ever find your way out. Mysterious or meaningless, it all depends on you.

Actress Laura Dern plays an actress, who is cast in soap-opera style movie, which, it turns out is based on a script which has been cursed by Polish gypsies. And yeah, that makes me laugh to just write that down. As with most all of Lynch's work, there is mystery and character doubling and even a symbolic family of rabbits added for ... well, I'd have to watch it a few more times to figure that out.

I suppose you could say the movie is about the abuse of women (with the subtitle "A Woman In Trouble"), but it's also about how Lynch uses the screen as a canvas for abstract expression. On the extras disc, there is a fascinating behind the scenes collection of Lynch overseeing the large and the tiny elements to this movie, one of the best examples ever of how he works. He absolutely has this movie as a finished product in his mind, even though it may seem to be nothing more than a collection of his abstractions. Still, he certainly knows how to make his imaginings find life on the screen.

It was all shot on digital video, so at times the movie has the intimacy and immediacy of a news report or a home movie, sometimes so close it becomes claustrophobic, all blended together. Yes, I like the movie, though non-Lynch fans will think it dull and pointless. It isn't. It's a major mark from a truly cinematic composer.

Which brings me to the best DVD news I've heard in a long time. Warner Brothers is releasing both boxed-sets and individual DVDs for Stanley Kubrick's movies: "2001: A Space Odyssey", "A Clockwork Orange", "The Shining," "Full Metal Jacket", and "Eyes Wide Shut." These double discs are loaded with extras, like commentary from Malcolm McDowell for "Clockwork", and the movies are finally remastered in widescreen. And also, "Eyes Wide Shut" will be offered in the unrated and rated versions, so those digital additions made to the orgy scene for the US release will be gone!!

I've been waiting for decent and original presentations of these classics, which hit the stores in late October.

UPDATE: Dennis Lim at Slate pegs the intentional look and feel of "Inland Empire", created by digital video:

"Watch Inland Empire on the DVD that came out last week and you sense that this lurid, grubby fantasy springs from deep within the bowels of YouTube as much as from inside its heroine's muddy unconscious. The DV that Lynch has come to cherish is the medium of home movies, viral video, and pornography—the everyday media detritus we associate more with television and computer monitors than movie theaters, more with intimate or private viewing experiences than communal ones. And not only does Inland Empire often look like it belongs on the Internet, it also progresses with the darting, associative logic of hyperlinks."

What the Heck is a 'Booze Belt'?

Some church folk and some business folk appealed to City Council members about where beer can be sold in the wee city of Morristown. The council approved a smaller boundary limit, from 500 to 150 feet. But the headline on the WBIR-TV report had me scratching my head:

"Booze Belt Loosened In Morristown"

It sounds kinda lewd. Sure hope Morristown has it's Booze Boxers (or Briefs) on. Please, oh please, no Booze Speedos.

The decision got the local comment boards rolling, and I thought this recent entry was most interesting:

"Two weeks ago when the ordinance was first read and passed, Mayor Barile stated that no matter the outcome of this ordinance, we must remember that as a community, we live together, we work together, we play together, and we WORSHIP together. Behind me, one of the ministers grumbled, "No, I won't worship with her."

"And that my friends, is the scariest problem of all, scarier than if one person has a beer or two with their meal...That's the problem of HATRED which made me, a citizen of Morristown and Hamblen County extremely ashamed and saddened of how our religious "leaders" reacted to this and ashamed that they are unable to see things differently. No one has to agree, but that's the beauty of being an American. You can be Baptist, Catholic, or even Jewish and still have the same rights and freedoms as each other."

Now where did I leave my Booze-Mobile?

It's Working, Eventually, Maybe

First, we were successful.

Yesterday, it was like Vietnam.

Now, Tennesse's senators say the "strategy is working" although the U.S. needs to adopt the bill from Alexander to change the strategy. He also added that the US should not interfere with who is leading the Iraq government.

????

The Defense From Rep. Davis - Everyone Does It

Fudging the facts about campaign contributions, or just eliminating them from WikiPedia, as Congressman David Davis' PR Chief did, gets a fairly lame defense - everyone does it:

"Moreover, we have learned that editing of Wikipedia files is a relatively common occurrence among many government and private sector offices."

Tom Humphrey's full report in the KNS is here.

Boy Suspended For Sketch That Kinda Looks Like Gun

Imaginary doodle or sign of insane violence? Maybe it's a teacher and principal who are already far too stressed out to remain in the public school system.

"An East Valley eighth-grader was suspended this week after he turned in homework with a sketch that school officials said resembled a gun and posed a threat to his classmates.

"Chandler district spokesman Terry Locke said the school is not allowed to discuss students’ discipline records. However, he said the sketch was “absolutely considered a threat,” and threatening words or pictures are punished.

"The school did not contact police about the threat and did not provide counseling or an evaluation to the boy to determine if he intended the drawing as a threat.

"The sketch was one of several drawings scratched in the margins of a science assignment that was turned in on Friday. The boy said he never meant for the picture to be seen as a threat. He said he was just drawing because he finished an assignment early."

Full story here.

Baking South

If you have a pulse and live in the South, this isn't news. But the weather is definitely making headlines and leaving many dead. A current round-up of the truly dire conditions in the Southeast was made by R. Neal at Facing South:

"Ninety-one percent of Tennessee has been parched by extreme drought, suffering major crop and pasture losses and widespread water shortages or restrictions. A growing area of the state, particularly the southern agricultural counties, is now in an exceptional drought emergency, facing devastating crop losses and widespread water emergencies as reservoirs, streams and wells dry up.

"It's so hot, TVA had to shut down a nuclear power reactor at Browns Ferry due to unacceptably high water temperatures in the Tennessee River caused by intake water used to cool the reactor core being discharged back into the river."

House Ethics Committee Probes Rep. Davis Aide

The U.S. House Ethics Committee will investigate the actions of Congressman David Davis' PR man, Timothy Hill over his malicious edits to WikiPedia, according to MensNewsDaily:

"Timothy Hill is the congressional press secretary working for U.S. Representative David Davis (R, TN-1) in Washington, D.C.

This news story originally broke as an article appearing within the August 11, 2007 edition of the Knoxville News-Sentinel (Tennessee) in which Hill first denied any personal involvement in the "blanking" vandalism of the Wikipedia articles David Davis (Tennessee politician) and Matthew Hill (Matthew Hill is a Representative within the Tennessee General Assembly and older brother of the press secretary) during a first interview with a KNS reporter. Hill later called back the KNS reporter for a second interview in which he reportedly admitted to using a government computer within the Washington, D.C. congressional office of U.S. Rep. David Davis to "edit" both the David Davis and Matthew Hill Wikipedia articles .

Hill repeatedly blanked six to eight paragraphs of reference text at each article pertaining to both U.S. Davis' and Tennessee Rep. Matthew Hill's political lobbying and/or campaign finance connections to Altace, Hoechst AGand former King Pharmaceuticals, Inc. CEO John M. Gregory. Hill's Wikipedia article edits were then linked through the article histories back to Rep. Davis's congressional office via an IP (internet protocol) number to the U.S. House of Representatives Information System."

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"There is also an IP number indication that U.S. Rep. David Davis' congressional office has also been anonymously "shadowing" online blogs with at least one blog (The Tennessee Waltz) originating in East Tennessee with content that was critical toward Rep. Davis for his voting against the federal 2007 Animal Fighting Prohibition Act."

If his office is tracking ALL the blogs/bloggers who have been critical of his actions in office, how busy will Davis and his staff be? And what is the point of such activity other than intimidation?

Kudos to The Editor for calling out Rep. Davis office for some questionable behavior.

(hat tip to ACK at Volunteer Voters for this report)

UPDATE: The KNS reports that Tim Hill will have to take some "Ethics Classes" for his stunt, though further disciplinary action is unlikely.

You Said It, You Own It

A bizarre rant/opinion from State Rep. Stacey Campfield (of which there are many to pick from) has brought national attention. And ridicule.

His response -- "the Left" are crazy "loons" who have no civil discourse.

Look, you said it all, Mr The Rep, word for word, and posted it proudly on your blog. It made no sense. It brought ridicule. No one made up your words for you. (No one spell-checked it either.)

You said it, you own it.

UPDATE: Snikta takes Mr The Rep to the mat with facts, not insults.

We Don't Need No Stinkin' Elections

I'm starting to wonder what the function of a county election commission might be -- counting the votes, yes (or these days running a computer program to tally votes), but insuring proper ballots seems low on their list of duties.

In Hawkins County last year the election commission failed to make a proper ballot (they blame the city for not telling them there was a need for an election of school board members.) Bill Grubb's headline is simply "Oops!"

Are residents to assume the election commission knew nothing of vacancies? Did the outgoing members just stay quiet? Did potential candidates just stand back all helpless, never bothering to mention an election was needed?? How do you just forget an election is ahead?

Since it was forgotten, now the city mayor and alderman will just appoint two people. Was that the intention all along, carried out with the help of some willful ignorance? And if voters don't bother to seek information or require adherence to rules, then are they to blame as well?

And over in Knox County, it has taken half a year, thanks to a KNS lawsuit, for the highly dubious back-room dealmaking which led to the appointments of 8 commissioners and 4 countywide offices to get some type of correction. But now what? A "do-over" by those who made the original decisions makes less than no sense. A special election should be mandatory, given the fact voters had been cut out of the election process for so long.

The public was quite vocal about the shoddy and dubious 'appointments' in Knox County in Jan. of 2007, but when will it (if ever) be corrected?

A change in Knox County's charter for term limits went unnoticed by the election commission there for 18 years, which led to the last-minute, post election appointments.

Instead of election commissions waiting to be told what offices should be on the ballots, they need to be the authority for notifying one and all which offices are up for consideration.

On Blogging and Media

Traditional media seems to be at a loss as to this whole blogging/online world - what does it all mean and is it journalism or news or online gossip or what?

The best way I know to describe it is -- an online, real-time (though sometimes not) on-going discussion of news and events and personal accounts of the day-to-day world and public presentation of ideas and thoughts, all shared and broadcast outside the traditional media. No radio signals or publishing or televising traditions are followed.

Some who participate intensely follow the news, some share recipes for cupcakes, share pictures of kitties, detail their personal agonies and ecstasies, rant and rave or cheer and praise any and every thing imaginable. There simply is no nailing down of this mercurial online blob of activity. What I do know is the online world is really starting to bother the typical media outlets. As noted here on this post from MCB.

What I have found is that many (like me) read both online news sources and other blogs and we write and discuss those things, often linking readers directly to what we have read. Some folks do report on activities they have seen or participated in themselves. Some simply satirize or just insult and deride the various topics of the moment or the day or rail against pet peeves. There are many, many opinions offered. Finding validity or importance to any of it is a rather personal thing. In other words, the traditional yardsticks used to determine worth just do not apply.

The online world is a new and constantly evolving world, often the subject of stinging criticism from the same media sources it both by-passes and utilizes. I often wonder if the news and magazine or radio/tv sources will decide to stop providing free links to info and start charging high fees or mandatory and closed memberships. Some news media outlets, such as CNN, now offer a daily or minute by minute update from online users who capture images and information via cell phones or video cams. The recent YouTube presidential debate is a good example of finding free sources for news outlets and businesses.

Writing here on this blog is often a perplexing act -- I am one of literally billions of online voices, a small wave in a thousand-mile whirl of a hurricane racing across the planet. I may have some impact on a wave right next to me, but none on the waves miles and miles away.

Still, I peck away on this keyboard and inject it into the blogosphere, like everyone else, not knowing for certain where it will land or if it will land at all.

And your perception of whether the online talk is a billion jabbering ones and zeros signifying nothing or a vital new world of human interaction all depends on what point you perceive from. Reading online is a participation, not an outside peeking-in, because the reading requires a technology which you must engage and disengage in order to read it at all. It's a new thing.

But the value of it all -- that remains mostly a decision you must make. And as this activity continues to grow and expand, I think that critical viewpoint of determining value or worth is also now being turned toward the traditional media, and what many have found is how lacking said media has been.

Your thoughts and mileage may vary.

UPDATE: Press releases today are heralding a first-of-its-kind World Bloggers Convention this fall in Las Vegas... except bloggers not attached to a media company can NOT attend.

Nonsense

I have been wondering what it is that eludes some people about the crime of dogfighting. It isn't an act of Fine Southern Culture or a Basic Right of Southern Life.

The problem and confusion over the crime stems (possibly) from some deep-seated confusion over what dogfighting is and what it isn't. State Rep. Stacey Campfield provides a glimpse into the confusion with this statement:

"Dog fighting is cruel and inhumane. But if Vick could have figured out a way to pit two unborn babies against each other in a fight to the death, maybe we'd outlaw killing children as quickly as we rushed to enhance penalties for crimes involving our pets."

Honestly, what the hell does the above even mean? It's pure crap.

Try sticking to the issue at hand rather than playing a miserable game of bait-and-switch politics. Shameful, really shameful Mr. The Rep.

(hat tip to Aunt B. for pointing out Campfield's nonsense)


SEE ALSO: The dogfighting in Morristown takes place in the middle of town, less than half a mile away from the Sheriff's Dept.

Is Morristown Talking?

Noodling about on the internets, I've been searching for other bloggers and blog-keepers in Hamblen County and haven't really found anyone. I thought that was most curious. There are many, many folks connected via Charter Communications (like me) but where are they talking/writing/commenting about the world around them?

There are some MySpacers, to be sure, but that wasn't what I was looking for.

Then I ran across the many forums for Morristown and Hamblen County at Topix.net.

Not a pretty thing, I'm sad to say.

It's a free-wheeling, wild west, guns a'blazin, anything goes, nothing held back host of discussions and debates. And while that appears to be fairly normal on the necessarily open internet, some of the comments and debates can be pretty intense or wildly ridiculous.

Having overseen some public discussion via my old talk radio show, I do consider the open public discussions are still a new and developing habit locally. While the locals (on Topix) are willing to share info and argue, I do hope the discourse improves with time.

Some intense debates currently are about local problems with dogfighting, concerns about the Sheriff's Dept. and the Humane Association, concerns about immigrants (legal and not) and more happy talk on the news about the Morristown Girl's Softball World Championship.

So on one hand, I am delighted to see/read all the online activity. On the other, I hope some of those involved find a higher degree of civility -- but that will arrive with more use and practice.

Camera Obscura - Boll Madness, Directors as Actors, and DVD Super-Collections

ABC has a new show, "iCaught", which spends an hour playing videos from YouTube. Lame, lame, lame. It is just short of an admission that the entertainment available on the internets is far better than what is on television. Oh sure, there have been "reports" asking "How do you make a video which will get millions of hits?" but let's be honest ABC. The reason the show is on is that it costs almost nothing to make, needs little writing, and is little more than filler infomercial for YouTube. I wonder who this appeals to? Other than people who never go on the internets. What's next? The LOLcats Adventures Hour? (Please note that idea is mine and if a TV station uses it, I'm suing.)


The Ed Wood of the 21st Century, director Uwe Boll, fresh from fighting (no really fighting) in the ring with his critics, held a preview for his latest ... um ... "masterpiece", called "Postal." Wired magazine sent a writer to the show and he offers a hilarious take on the event: (via Cinematical)

" ... Chris Kohler describes the film's story as being about "a guy shooting a bunch of people in order to stop Al Qaeda and a religious cult let by Dave Foley from unleashing on the world a batch of avian bird flu hidden in a shipment of penis-shaped children's toys voiced by Verne Troyer (pull the string and it says 'only my father and my priest can touch me there!')"

Cinematical also features a report this week on famous film directors who performed as actors in movies, and notes, of course, Orson Welles in "The Third Man" and John Huston in "Chinatown." (Huston as Noah in his version of "The Bible" is a true comedy gem, by the way.) I would add a few to their list, like Martin Scorcese's terrifying turn as an angry boyfriend spying on his girlfriend from the back of Robert De Niro's cab in "Taxi Driver" and David Cronenberg as the only good part of the Clive Barker movie "Nightbreed", where he plays a nasty serial killer. And though brief, Croneberg does have some fun in "Jason X". Do you know some other director-as-actor movies worth noting?

As of this weekend, we now have four versions of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers", the newest is a bona fide disaster-behind-the-camera starring Nicole Kidman called simply "Invasion." And while the 1970s version from Phillip Kauffman is an eerie and creepy Nixonian nightmare, the 1950s original take on Jack Finney's novel just can't be beat. It follows Finney's story the best and has a slowly building sense of terror which is most impressive. Even the tacked on 'studio ending' does not harm the movie.



The original version also has a short performance by Sam Peckinpah as a plumber. So there's that. But the acting, the music and the careful build of paranoia as pod-created aliens take over everyone is simply so well done, that there is no need to re-invent it.

And since I'm talking about multiple versions of one movie, director Ridley Scott wins that award, hands down, as he releases a massive 5-disc ultimate collection of his movie "Blade Runner," which comes with it's own shiny, futuristic briefcase. The movie(s) in this collection will give you a headache as you try and keep up with new version after new version. The set includes the 'brand new' cut of the movie, for which Scott actually filmed new scenes and dialog last year, the original theatrical cut, the international cut, the first Director's Cut from Scott and even a working cut which has even more changes.

Ridley, dude -- stop. Just stop. Put the movie down and walk away.

Remaking a movie might perhaps be left to Jack Black and Mos Def, who play video store owners who decide, after accidentally erasing their entire stock of movies, to go ahead and remake some famous films themselves and rent the new versions to their customers. Based on this preview of Michel Gondry's "Be Kind, Rewind", out early next year, I will make every effort to see this:

Revealing the Inner Oatney?

Kat has noticed it. So have I.

It refers to some apparent blind spots in the vision of certain GOP supporters/bloggers, namely Dave Oatney.

Maybe it's just that he sees his fave political party as incapable of error. Like excusing Rep. David Davis for protecting criminals engaging in dogfighiting 'cause the good old boys like it and seeing Biblical justification for Rep. John Duncan's legislation regarding credit.

This isn't just a knock against Oatney for it's own sake - rather that, to me and Kat, it seems he wants to eat his cake and have it too.

Thompson Still Ducking the Law

The Coy Candidate, aka actor Fred Thompson, is raking in campaign contributions while avoiding campaign finance laws, thanks to the help of a lot of familiar folks in Tennessee.

The Knoxville News-Sentinel breaks down the dominant players, and includes this quote from Thompson made on talk radio:

"[Thompson] compared his current efforts to “an old duck on a pond — calm on the surface, but paddling like the dickens underneath.”

Sure sounds like he's doing more 'ducking' than duck. Maybe he'll formally announce a campaign in September, maybe he won't. The money is flowing in, the accountability is avoided. This end-run on the legal edges indicates the precise kind of problem the country does not need, as R Neal pointed out last week at Facing South:

" ... what does it tell you about Fred Thompson, the candidate? One would have to wonder about all the secrecy, the working around the margins, and the off-the-books financing through a shadow campaign finance organization. One might also wonder, haven't we had enough of that?"

The Souring Rove

Don Williams offers a letter to the soon-to-depart hatchet man from the Bush administration, urging him to seek redemption.

"The self-serving praise you heaped on George W. Bush as you announced you'd be leaving him--praise for putting the country on a military footing, for making history, for winning those stolen elections and so on--will sour the longer you utter such things."

I doubt he's ready for a confession, Don. More likely he has plans for more string-pulling and nefarious plots in his hopes of making America a nation ruled by a tarted-up fantasy.