interesting things
It was a summit of the previously pervy pols Wednesday night when Anthony Weiner and Eliot Spitzer crossed paths. Spies saw the duo dining at…
via NY Post: Page Six http://www.nypost.com/p/pagesix/shamed_pol_summit_GdKMNc7fMWGkyEYpWMSWkN?utm_medium=rss&utm_content=%20%20%20%20%20%20Page%20Six
Screenwriters saw their stock soar with the advent of the spec market—all of which burst in 2008. Will it revive itself?
via The Latest from VanityFair.com http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2013/03/will-spec-script-screenwriters-rise-again
Motorcyclists 60 and older are three times as likely to be severely injured in a crash than younger riders.
via NYT > Most Recent Headlines http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/02/08/aging-easy-riders-beware/
A spot on the yearly scroll of recently deceased movie luminaries has become one of the most hotly contested honors of the Oscar show.
via NYT > Most Recent Headlines http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/08/movies/awardsseason/even-the-oscar-memorial-list-is-a-focus-of-campaigning.html
OK, remember when The West Wing was on TV and everyone thought this was liberals’ way of having a fake president to console and tide themselves over until Bush was out of office? Well, at least The West Wing had snappy dialogue and good acting. Bill Whittle’s Mr. Virtual President has — well, go look. If you can’t bear the video, which rather reminds me of Rupert Pupkin’s basement broadcasts, you can read the transcript of Whittle’s Inaugural Address, in which he alludes to Louis C.K.’s “Everything’s amazing and nobody’s happy” bit and then proceeds to give us the upshot  that LCK was too busy being funny and interesting to reveal:
We’re not happy, because everyone knows that the giant mushroom cloud of debt that hangs over this country will eventually destroy our economy and the world’s economy… And we’re not happy because we’re told time and time again by the people here in Washington, that we are not entitled to individual happiness. We’re not happy, because more and more, every day, this magnificent experiment in the power of the individual is being remade into yet another giant collectivist, faceless, mindless, soulless state…
Later he tells us “we’re not allowed to be prosperous anymore,” and compares citizens in our welfare state to captive animals. I tell ya, Mr. Virtual President needs some new virtual speechwriters.
Whittle has now been responsible for alt-wingnut movie studio Declaration Entertainment, alt-wingnut fantasy community Ejectia, and this. He should enlist the guys working on that gun nut planned community The Citadel, PopModal (“the conservative alternative to YouTube”), PJ Lifestyle and other such simulacra, pick up Rod “Benedict Option” Dreher while he’s at it, and they can all fuck off to some remote land where they can recreate a new paradise far, far, far from us. They can start here.
via alicublog http://alicublog.blogspot.com/2013/02/than-schmuck-for-lifetime.html
Officials found 106 firearms and more than 8,000 rounds of ammunition inside a prison after a riot last month, the country’s top prison authority said Thursday.
via NYT > Most Recent Headlines http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/08/world/americas/arsenal-found-inside-prison-in-venezuela.html
The production company that made the Hobbit convinced the government of New Zealand to suspend its labor laws and tax laws. Now the NZ Labour Party is asking for the details of the deal that the company struck with the government to be disclosed, and the production company is fighting it, saying that if the government tells the voters of NZ what sort of sweetheart deal they were handed, no one will want to make movies in New Zealand any more.
Radio New Zealand applied for the documents in November 2010 under the Official Information Act but ministers refused on the grounds they were commercially sensitive.
The broadcaster appealed the decision and on January 31, Ombudsman David McGee ruled 18 documents, including emails between Hobbit director Sir Peter Jackson and government officials, must be released.
In his 29-page ruling McGee said the information in the documents didn’t pose serious commercial risks.
But New Line warned this would affect future relations, objecting in a statement included in the ruling.
“If the government is not willing to adequately protect this sensitive information from disclosure, this will operate as a major disincentive to motion picture studios as well as local and foreign talent – to utilise New Zealand as a location for future productions.”
Threats fly over Hobbit document release [NZ Herald/Cassandra Mason]
After gaining access to the personal email accounts of Dorthy Bush, George W. Bush’s sister, and several friends close to the Bush family, a hacker apparently obtained Bush family photos, cell phone numbers, security codes, information about George H.W. Bush’s health, a post-election email from Fox New’s Brit Hume, and, most amazingly, pictures of George W. Bush’s in-progress paintings, which are just as awkward and simple as you’d hope. All told, six accounts were hacked, including emails for Barbara Bush’s brother, family friend Willard Hemingway, and CBS sportscaster Jim Nantz, another friend of the family.
A large number of the stolen emails, which dated from 2009 to 2012, dealt with George H.W. Bush’s recent stay in the hospital. One email from Jeb Bush noted H.W.’s friendliness toward Bill Clinton, noting “how kind he was with President Clinton and he helped restore his sordid reputation. A very tough thing to do but with kindness, dad probably helped Bill Clinton than anything he himself has done.” He added, “Might be tough to say it that way in a eulogy with President 42 there.”
On December 26 of last year, George W. Bush emailed his siblings to say he was “thinking about eulogy” and to ask for advice: “since the feeling is that you all would rather me speak than bubba, please help.”
After the election in November, Brit Hume, sad faced Fox News political analyst, emailed Hemingway, writing, “Election outcome disappointing, but there are many silver linings.”
But the truly remarkable parts are the photos. The picture above is obviously excellent, but it’s nothing compared to George W. Bush’s attempts at painting, pictures of which he apparently emailed to his sister two months ago. The paintings, both self-portraits, are…well, just judge for yourself.
There are also pictures of the family with Ralph Lauren.
And Bubba himself.
But really, let’s just go back to those paintings. Here is the master, at work on a picture of a nearby church.
As for the hacker, Guccifier, he claims he’s not worried about the inevitable Secret Service investigation. “i have an old game with the fucking bastards inside, this is just another chapter in the game,” he told The Smoking Gun. He also said the “feds” started investigating him “a long time ago” and that he had hacked “hundreds of accounts.”
A major New York retrospective of Jean-Michel Basquiat’s work comes 30 years after Larry Gagosian first presented the late artist in Los Angeles
via WSJ.com: Weekend Journal http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323951904578288292008570324.html?mod=rss_Weekend_Journal
Harvard Prof: GOOGLE Ads Discriminate Against Black People…
via DrudgeSiren.com – All Stories http://www.drudgesiren.com/allhl.php?id=159434&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+drudgesiren%2FoGpG+%28DrudgeSiren.com+-+All+Stories%29#h159434
