Weekend Anomalies with an AXE

Anomalies and the AXE

Earlier this week, on some medium somewhere, I read that a local entrepreneur was holding open auditions for proposed Christian videos, TV shows and Movies. My initial reaction was, By Bless Tiffany’s left tit, what a joke. However, turns out it’s real, and Crusader Axe is going to cover this as an unpaid staffer for the Crossroads of Opportunity’s Alternative Newspaper, the Mojave Free Press. This will be my first foray into true Gonzo journalism, so we’ll see how this plays out. I’ve seen some “Christian” stuff, and what they lack in aesthetic quality, they make up in perky white-anglo evangelical zeal and nonsense. So, I’m curious as to what is going on here – Why Barstow? A lot of things are filmed around here; for example, Clint Eastwood used the cave systems in the local mountains to film “Letters from Iwo Jima” and I think there are some local shots at various points in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. But, the average Barstonian is neither Biff nor Muffy  and doesn’t conform to the traditional California image. It’s a small, poor, grungy blue collar town that depends on a couple of military bases, a lot of fast food restaurants and hotels, and the Burlington Northern to continue existing. So, this is either some local who spent too long in the sun or it’s a scam.

Next, I was somewhat surprised to discover this morning that it had taken this long for the Lindsay Lohan spread to leak from Playboy. I was more surprised when I followed the link on HuffPo to the pirated material. Frankly, I wouldn’t be surprised if  Playboy’s editorial and marketing staff figured they  could get more of a bump from publicizing her and the leak as opposed from waiting for the reviews of the spread, so they leaked it all.  I feel sorry for Lohan in some ways – she is kind of pathetic. She had lots of potential I guess, as a American Hailey Mills 40 years later. However, we need to remember that the old studio system prevented a lot of nonsense from the child stars. They may have had problems later, but when Walt ran the place, the kids didn’t get into lots of trouble as soon as they were old enough to drive. And, despite obviously dysfunctional situations—Jackie Coogan, Jackie Cooper, Mickey Rooney, Judy Garland, Danny Bonaduce, Patty Duke and so on – for the most part these people hit 21 with livers, brains and bank balance more or less intact. Lohan’s situations have been weirder by far than her films; and, she doesn’t seem to get it. The Star System in Hollywood has been gone for a long time; what sells now is bad press.

Anyway, the Playboy spread might have been considered sexy and titillating back in the mid-60s. While Playboy is still less graphic than Penthouse, it’s long since started showing public hair and related anatomy. While there are people still who claim to read the damn thing to read the articles, not so much these days. I suspect that Ms. Lohan might have been willing to show more and do more for more money although maybe she has finally gotten some advisors who realize this could degenerate quickly. Her career is teetering; appearing at times like a meth-addled hag with an absolute inability to control her behavior, desires or bodily functions combined with the spoiled diva sense of entitlement that puts a lot of people’s teeth on edge. The pictures are lifeless, continuing her Marilyn Monroe meme and while more risqué than the Vanity Fair shoot, she doesn’t work as well as she did in those photos. So, if I’m Playboy, my thoughts looking at these thing s would have been how tosqueeze the most value out of these things…frankly, she looks embalmed. So, stage an act of piracy of intellectual property and raise hell without ever getting anywhere. Perhaps there’s more stuff, better stuff in the magazine; possibly not. But, this will amp up their sales and possibly the positive impact on her career.

Perhaps she should come to Barstow for the open audition.

Another striking bit of weirdness this week revolves around Karl Rove and the Republican establishment. Rove's disinformatia  operation, American Crossroads decided to go all in on the Scott Brown re-election bid, and ran an ad  in Massachusetts 12 months before the Senatorial election trying to portray her as some kind of progressive reformer in league with the Regulators and OWS and probably the Illuminati and the Communist Internationale to encourage violence, disruption and scare away the “Job Creators.” Well, the complaints were very much over the top – Dr. Warren was a Harvard Professor at Harvard Law and was asked to come into government to administer and regulate TARP. She did and then began lobbying for a consumer protection agency focused on protecting those of us who are buying the financial products the banks and brokerages are dealing. The idea that Massachusetts is populated by tea-sipping, chardonnay bathing, Pekinese sodomizing commie pinko fags is actually pretty funny. Get past Newton, and you’re in pure rustbelt, redneck country. However, it’s a well-educated and pretty smart bunch of rednecks, who may not be politically correct but are pretty savvy. The sole reason that Scott Brown won the special election to replace Ted Kennedy was that the Democrat ran a wretched campaign based on a sense of electoral entitlement. After all, it was Teddy’s seat, so the voters would give it to the anointed Dem…not hardly. Teddy Kennedy always campaigned and campaigned fiercely. So, given the choice between a guy identified as a favorite of the Hedge Fund Managers and somebody who gives the Hedge Fund Managers nightmares, and Dr. Warren has a tremendous following. It helps that she can explain this crap in plain English. So, Rove’s over the top attack ad didn’t have the desired effect. It improved her standing in the polls.

So, they next roll out some bizarre thing about how she’s buddy-buddy with the bankers. Yeah. That will work well – in this age of new media, social networks and a nascent political uprising of progressives united with a pissed off middle and working class, attacking Warren and then being identified with Rove is not terribly helpful. Saying things that are factually absurd is even more damaging. I suspect next, to Dr. Warren’s and her husband’s surpise, Rove will accuse her of either being gay or being anti-gay. We can only hope…

Karl, if you’re listening, Jon Stewart cocking an eyebrow and calling this bullshit will hurt Brown more than this ad could ever help.

Then there was the shock about Albert Pujols not signing with the Cardinals or the Nationals or the Marlins but with the Angels. How could he do that? Fairly simple – he’s an excellent defensive first baseman but I watched the play where he broke his forearm this summer. He’s not stupid, the Angels are in the American League, and they have the designated hitter as an option. They also are in a huge media market and have the money, a quality manager who has National League roots and pretty decent team in a fairly weak division. He could have signed with the Cardinals at any time, but they either didn’t pursue him or they didn’t realize that the guy had alternatives. I’m wondering where Prince Fielder goes, but batting him fourth with Ichiro and Dustin Ackley in front of him would probably give the Mariners another ten or so wins with no other improvements.

Finally, I must say I’m really tired of these “Gambling in Casablanca? I’m shocked, shocked. Arrest the usual suspects…”We’re sending drones over Iran and this is a surprise? To whom? Rick Perry? Michelle Bachmann? John Boenher? Katarina van der Heuvel? A drone malfunctions and the Iranians recover it and try to make it a big deal.

Hell, this is where our media’s occasional lack of historical context and limited attention span come into question. Of course, it was over 60 years ago, but the USSR were able to shoot down a U2 and capture the pilot. Eisenhower caught hell from the nonaligned nations and the world’s press, and the poor CIA contractor-pilot, Francis Gary
Powers was vilified for not following the Geneva convention and breaking under interrogation.  But seriously, the shock was that the Soviets had the capability to engage high altitude air craft. If we had the capability to collect intelligence and didn’t then we’d have been wrong.

I’d rather they played this newest iteration of the great game with drones and technology than with human beings. Got enough problems on that front already.

 

 

Comments

[avenue 5 consulting]

Shocking. I wonder how the settlement is.