Bits and Pieces

This is odd, assuming it’s accurate. Glenn Beck made a piece of parodic ‘art’ which has a figure of Obama in what is supposedly urine, a play on the famous Piss Christ work by Andres Serrano. Problem is that this can’t function in the way Beck seems to think it will, i.e. enraging Democrats and US liberals. It’s simply not the same dynamic – one would presume few would consider Obama as being equivalent to a deity (and truth is I’ve often wondered how many people were genuinely upset by Piss Christ in the first place – how many even heard about it? Sr. Wendy Beckett had kind words about it as a piece of art and formally it is pretty good, albeit a little pretty in a, to pick another cultural reference, sort of Vaughn Oliver, late 1980s early 1990s way) – perhaps not even the same import given that it is essentially unserious (and Beck seems to say that it beer not urine). Still, it is oddly interesting as an example of pretty poor trolling (I’d say on an epic scale, except somehow although that might be the intent it is not the actuality). You’d have to worry about the man. Sort of.

House of Cards, the US version, produced by NetFlix, of all people, is about to be released. Here’s the trailer for it, and who’s that in the leading role, why none other than Kevin Spacey. Got to say his particular brand of dead-eyed sociopathy is probably as good a fit as one will find short of the original British TV incarnation. So… looks good.

And speaking of TV here’s Canadian production Arthur, which is oddly entertaining – and along with Ben 10 (another much better than might be expected programme) and – ahem – My Little Pony, is sort of popular with some around where I live. It’s a clever and in parts surprisingly tough-minded little show – though it took me a while to get the hang of it… like, trying to determine which species the individuals were, aardvarks, and rabbits and whatever… This one here references another (very) famous children’s cartoon character.

This is brilliant. Some of you will know I’m fascinated by pseudo-science, and this is a great example of same. Funny thing is that it was started by a quite respectable Soviet scientist back in the 1970s. There’s been no end of efforts to ascribe alien attributes to various natural satellites – Phobos, one of Mars two moons also gets that treatment too from time to time.

Libertarian mention? From SF author John Scalzi, an – ahem – overview, of Atlas Shrugged:

…a totally ridiculous book which can be summed up as Sociopathic idealized nerds collapse society because they don’t get enough hugs. (This is, incidentally, where you can start your popcorn munching.)

Is that a little harsh? Why yes. But it gets harsher…

Indeed, the enduring popularity of Atlas Shrugged lies in the fact that it is nerd revenge porn — if you’re an nerd of an engineering-ish stripe who remembers all too well being slammed into your locker by a bunch of football dickheads, then the idea that people like you could make all those dickheads suffer by “going Galt” has a direct line to the pleasure centers of your brain. I’ll show you! the nerds imagine themselves crying. I’ll show you all! And then they disappear into a crevasse that Google Maps will not show because the Google people are our kind of people, and a year later they come out and everyone who was ever mean to them will have starved. Then these nerds can begin again, presumably with the help of robots, because any child in the post-Atlas Shrugged world who can’t figure out how to run a smelter within ten minutes of being pushed through the birth canal will be left out for the coyotes. Which if nothing else solves the problem of day care.

And there’s more…