Right, so, Part 3 … CamCam and the Girl With the Smudge are watching the video of Prophet Guy. The tape has him speaking in Hebrew, but CamCam remembers hearing him speak in English. This ought to be worth a second look. CamCam after all, doesn't understand Hebrew, yet he remembers exactly what the man told him. It would be a simple matter to translate the Hebrew on the tape and to confirm that it was the same message CamCam... Read more
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A bit of housekeeping: Since the most recent LBFriday installment was three days late and wound up getting derailed by a long Aristotelian tangent about acting, ethics and Mike Seaver, I intend to revisit Part 3 of LBTM tomorrow. From what I've seen of the comments thread in the previous entry, many of you have already begun responding to that part of the movie. I'll try to catch up with you tomorrow. * * * Here's a bit more from... Read more
I was halfway to work one night in a bona fide blizzard, fishtailing along in my old Civic, when they announced on the radio that roads were officially closed. Any non-essential non-emergency personnel crazy enough to be out driving would be ticketed. So I called my then-boss — an old-school newspaperman named Dave Hale — and asked him if the First Amendment qualified us as essential personnel. "Sure," Dave said, "you just show 'em your newspaper ID and they'll give... Read more
As we begin Part 3 of the movie, CamCam is back at GNN space command central, editing his footage of the mysterious man in the prophet costume. But this time, Mr. Fake Beard and Bathrobe is speaking in Hebrew. "What's he saying?" CamCam asks. "I don't know, it sounds like Hebrew," the mystery girl from Part 1 says. Several days have passed since we first saw her (I think), and she's wearing a different outfit, but she still has that... Read more
We cut to Chicago, a series of fades beginning with an aerial shot of downtown and ending in the interior of the Steele's suburban bathroom, where Rayford is looking at himself in the mirror. The soundtrack blares the title song, "Left Behind," by Bryan Duncan, which is worth mention here since it's a near-perfect introduction to the frustrating Mr. Duncan: great pipes, capably derivative but dated musical style, insipid lyrics. This song, recorded in 2000, is not intentionally retro or... Read more
Call me a square, friend, I don't care … "Baby Baby," The Swirling Eddies"Baby Game," Daniel Amos"Baby I'm a Star," Prince"Baby It's Cold Outside," Ray Charles and Betty Carter"Baby, Just Be Yourself," The Pipettes"Baby on Board," The Be Sharps"Baby Plays Around," Elvis Costello"Baby Watch Your Back," Nellie McKay"Baby, What's Wrong With You," Crooked Still"Baby Why?" Green Bonus: "B-A-B-Y," Carla Thomas I appreciate Prince's touchiness on the subject of copyright — once you lose your own name in a legal battle,... Read more
Over on Christianity Today’s Politics Blog, Sarah Pulliam asks “Can Obama Call Himself a Christian?” The asking, and particularly the answering, of that question is — to borrow a phrase — way above Pulliam’s pay grade. Here, I think, is the relevant passage from Matthew’s Gospel: The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field. But while everyone was sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away. When the... Read more
Thanks for the feedback on the previous post. My guess is that once the situation gets to the point that Citigroup is at, planning to lay off 53,000 workers, then it's too late for any kind of union — labor, shareholder or otherwise — to make much difference. The larger difficulty is probably that I'm looking for a shortcut to the kind of democratic management one might get from employee-ownership and that shortcut may not actually exist. Still, building alliances... Read more
I'm asking for the assistance and indulgence of the hive-mind of the blogosphere here. I'm trying to figure out whether this is a new idea with potential or an old, flawed one with obvious difficulties that I probably should have recognized before wasting our time with this post. So anyway, I'm posting this story last night for the paper, and idly wondering how the 53,000 layoffs announced by Citigroup — 15 percent of its workforce — compares in size to... Read more
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