The future starts now?

Obama has won. Putting aside my animosity towards Hillary Clinton for a minute, I think all Americans, regardless of who you support, should take a second to realize how historic this moment is. For all the controversies about race that have flared up (sweet lord I hope those rumors of a tape involving Michelle Obama going batshit nuts on white people are false) it is easy to overlook the fact that our country is slowly (rapidly, even?) pushing the issue of race into the background. Young people are overwhelmingly becoming colorblind and the fact that an African-American named Barack Obama could be the next president is an incredibly important moment for America. Is race gone? Nope and you'll no doubt be hearing much more about it in the next 5 months. But its worth taking a moment to smile and recognize that America has changed and is changing. Who knows, in a couple more generations, race may not even be a major factor anymore. Gotta hope :)

I've got no idea where the next part of this blog is going to go. It's going to be a sort of stream of consciousness attempt to figure out why I "connect" with Obama as opposed to every other politician I've ever seen. I'm sure it will end up sounding overly gushy, but I don't really have a clear grasp as to why I care about "just another politician". I'm going to try and work it out, and probably fail miserably, but hey, this is my blog and I can write whatever I want :)

On a personal level, seeing Barack Obama win the nomination was incredibly satisfying for me. I've been following him since 2004, went to see him in person, donated a couple hundred bucks to his campaign and almost obsessively followed all of the ups and downs of the primary campaign. I feel like I've really invested a lot of time, money, and energy into a person I really believe in and to see, against all odds, that payoff is such a great feeling. I used to hear all these stories from members of my family about how amazing John F. Kennedy was. My grandma, as conservative as you can possibly get, would tell me how much she loved and connected with JFK. I'd ask her why and she couldn't really explain it, only that she really believed in him even though he didn't share her views. To this day, she'll tear up when you mention his assassination. For my entire life I couldn't relate to that. Most of my friends can't either. It's just a politician. In 2004 I was totally for John Kerry, but the guy didn't connect with me on any real level. Obama's different. Don't ask me why, I probably couldn't explain it. Obama supporters like to identify themselves as a family. Maybe there is something to that. I sort of feel like I'm supporting a friend or family member. I feel like we're on the cusp of changing America forever.

For all I know, these changes could be horrible. Obama could be the worst president in the history of our country. I have no idea. I'm not really talking about political ideology or inspirational speeches, I'm saying that on a personal level, the only politician out there that I connect with is Barack Obama. Why? I don't know. Maybe its a generational thing. Maybe its the hopeful, forward looking speeches. Maybe its that I agree with him on most of the issues. Maybe I just think the dude's cool. Who knows? All I know is that it feels different. I actually feel like I have a stake in what happens. I think it sort of goes back to that friend/family thing. If somebody tried to attack one of my friends, I'd take that as an attack on me as well. So everytime I hear or read some sort of anti-Obama rhetoric, I take it personally. I think its probably a lot like when conservatives get defensive if somebody says something bad about Ronald Reagan. Especially those who grew up really believing in Reagan the way people like me believe in Barack Obama. Did Reagan do some shitty things? Absolutely. Will Obama do some shitty things? You bet. But just like our friends and family, who also do shitty things from time to time, you still feel that connection to them, a sort of bond that can't be broken. Every once in a while a politician comes around that really moves people in a way that 99.9% of other politicians just can't. For me, Obama is that politician.

Trying to work through this, I think I've come to a much greater understanding of why people will defend certain politicians as hard as they do. It could very well be that said politician is doing something horrible, but that if you've connected with them in a way that creates some sort of internal bond (?), then you're far more apt to defend them to the end. For people who haven't connected and just don't give a shit, not only is it easier to criticize, but also to flat out disregard the supporters.

In any event, I've connected on some level with Obama. Am I sure what the thing is that is different about him than other politicians who have said the same things? No, but I'm sure all those Roosevelt, JFK, and Reagan devotees would have a hard time placing it as well.

In other news, Obama didn't even wait a day to start remaking the Democratic party. He has kept Howard Dean as DNC chairman (a great move) and has disallowed the DNC from taking money from federal lobbyists or PACS (a magnificent move). He's also allowing full transparency at all of his fundraisers by allowing the press to be present (wow. that's definitely a change. I wonder if McCain will let the press into all of his Republican fund raisers?)

The Democratic Party is changing for the better already!

aliens? you're really serious? asassination, really?

The vast majority of people who go and see Indy 4 are probably going to be utterly satisfied by what they see. They'll get lots of explosions, Harrison Ford donning his iconic fedora, and space aliens. Yes, space aliens. I thought Indy 4 was pretty much the epitome of everything that is wrong with "summer blockbusters". Whereas the first 3 Indy films grounded in some sense of reality, from the opening frames of Kingdom you'll be like "wait a minute, how can a couple dozen KGB agents take out an entire top secret military base? Everything in this movie is supernatural. From Cate Blanchett's psychic mumbo jumbo to aliens with skeletons made out of crystal, the entire film feels like George Lucas read Chariots of the Gods and decided to throw Indiana Jones into it.

You may say "well, even Raiders had the supernatural Ark", and you'd be right. But the earlier films only tossed in a spattering of supernatural elements. Raiders was more about Indy fighting Nazi scum and it was only the last scene where we finally got to see the power of the ark. Kingdom is nothing but CGI overkill in set piece after set piece of ridiculously over the top scenarios. I love Indiana Jones, but watching him stand and look upon a giant mushroom cloud that he just lived through by hiding in a lead lined refrigerator was one of the dumbest things I've ever seen (that whole set piece, by the way, was recycled from the original draft of Back to the Future). The film is just so void of any charm or substance. Cate Blanchett plays a stupid villain. Shia LaDouche is put in scene after scene of Lucasinian banal comedy. Oh look, Shia just got hit in the balls by a tree branch! How funny! Oh look, Shia is swinging through the trees with the help of CG monkeys! How cute! Harrison Ford fares no better. Does he do anything in the last third of the movie? Almost every scene involves some sort of nostalgia shout out in place of actual development. And Karen Allen? She shows up to say "Shia's your kid" and have some unfunny comedic bantering and then basically disappears from the film.

"But there is action", you say! Too bad we've seen all of it before. Everything in this film was done and done better by Raiders without being a glorified ILM demo reel. And even then, I can't say that the CG was that good. Every shot in the film has a fake gloss to it, even down to horizon backgrounds. Its like George Lucas decreed that no film should ever have a normal, realistic sunset. Kingdom is two hours of bad acting, dialog, comedy, structure, pacing, plotting, coherency, and set pieces. It's pure spectacle excess that places its illogical storyline and massive plot holes front and center. There's no fun here. It's just an empty, hollow excuse to capitalize on a franchise that should have stayed finished.

Now that that is off my chest, what else am I doing? Way back when I quit Bear Eats Fish one of my major reasonings was that we only ever played the same 10 songs over and over again. I had multiple new songs written but it got to a point where nobody really wanted to spend the time to practice new stuff so we'd just play through our set a couple times and then head our separate ways, always with big plans to work on new material that would never come to fruition. Since we're having a BEF/THC reunion show late next month, I've been trying to remember some of my old stuff and have 2 completely new songs ready to go. I plan on forcing us to practice them :)

So the big news story of the past weekend is Hillary Clinton invoking RFK's assasination during an interview session. The quote exploded all over the internet and it has effectively given many Obama supporters the justification to unload on Hillary in a fashion that wasn't occurring before. There's a lot of bad blood between both groups of supporters. Hillary's forces are straight out pissed that she's lost, something they never would have foreseen since, you know, they've got that whole concept of entitlement. Barack's idealistic supporters are infuriated with the constant barrage of negative comments such as Hillary praising John McCain and saying he's ready to be president while implying Barack isn't, Bill Clinton's South Carolina Jesse Jackson moment, etc. Her assassination reference comes on the heels of her meltdown about the Florida votes being equivalent to civil rights, slavery, and women's suffrage and reports that Bill Clinton is trying to force her onto the ticket. Rightly or wrongly, that last report about Bill Clinton has been seen amongst Obama supporters as nothing less than blackmail, a sort of "Put my wife on the ticket or we'll make sure her voters don't vote for you in November". So you can see how Obama supporters were already in a heightened state of agitation when Hillary decided to drop her assassination remarks into the boiling political landscape.

First let me say that I don't honestly think that Hillary Clinton is waiting around for Barack to be assassinated. Hearing her comments, it is extremely easy for people to come to that conclusion though. For better or worse, the political climate is crazy right now. You can't expect any candidate to go through a 15 month process, with the media focusing on every single thing, and not say something stupid. I can't imagine how difficult it must be for a politician running for president to constantly be on guard about every thing you say. It almost seems like they have to constantly be self-censoring themselves just to make sure nothing comes out wrong and infuriates some group of people. But all these candidates are human and stuff is just going to come out wrong sometimes. I can give Hillary the benefit of the doubt on this.

But should she get off easy? You'll remember that when Barack said his now infamous "bitter" comments, Hillary took that opportunity to try and destroy him, turning herself into a Republican and pulling a page from their playbook. A lot of Obama supporters want him to give her the same non-courtesy, seeing it as a way in which to literally destroy her political career and permanently taint the "Clinton Legacy" within the Democratic party. A lot of people want this as revenge for everything she has done in this primary and probably more subconsciously as a way to permanently separate the Clinton's from the democratic party of the future, led by Obama. Piling on and keeping the story alive would definitely please the sadistic part of me. Karma is a bitch, after all, and I won't deny that with all the emotional highs and lows of this campaign, a part of me would like nothing better than to see Hillary knocked off her holier than thou soap box.

But of course, we don't need to pile on. Obama did the perfect thing by saying that it was an unfortunate statement, that he takes her at her word that she didn't mean it, and that the world should move on. He doesn't need to make this an issue because Hillary has screwed herself over on this one. Every Obama supporter in this country, myself included, lives with the frightening possibility that he may be assassinated. For a rival candidate to even mention an assassination, even in a historical context, is just stupid plain and simple. Hillary could have pointed to any number of Democratic primaries that lasted into June. Why did she bring up RFK's death as one of them? The reason there is such cynicism towards these latest statements is because she is the definition of "say anything, do anything" politics. Everybody remembers Tuzla and every Obama supporter thinks she's nothing but a habitual liar, so of course when she comes out with a pseudo-apology, people are going to look at it skeptically whether that was how she meant it or not.

A word of advice to Hillary Clinton: when you're in a historical race with an african-american candidate, don't ever use the word "assassination" in any context. You're just asking for trouble, especially in our hypo-politically correct world. Personally, I think the fallout from her comment is going to be felt far into the future. In the short term I think it will make a lot of those Hillary supporter holdouts shift to Obama. I think it effectively ends any leverage Bill Clinton was using to try and force her into the VP slot. The long term consequences may heal over time but that rift with the african-american community was probably damaged beyond repair. A future run for Senate or Governor of New York will now depend on whether or not the NY african-american community will forgive and forget. At least she's got a few years to work on penance.

But Hillary has a bigger problem. She absolutely cannot be perceived by the media and public as the person who took down Obama's presidential aspirations. This is an election year that the democrats should have no problem winning. If Hillary is seen as keeping her loyal voters from Obama in some way out of spite, there will be hell to pay in the future. The party is in transition right now. Half loyal to the old guard, half to the new. Whether Hillary likes it or not, Obama's people will be running the party in the coming decade and the last thing she wants is a party establishment that would like nothing better to muzzle her at every opportunity. And believe me, the grassroots liberal wing of the party won't forget and will probably salivate over the chance to take down her political career when the opportunity arises. They probably still will even if Obama wins the presidency.

So fair or not, what Hillary's "assassination" remark will do is force her into doing whatever she can to get Obama elected. People like to talk about the idea that Obama's sheen isn't as great as it was when he got into the race, but in relation to the Clinton's reputation, it's downright sparkling. The Clinton's have badly damaged their credibility and perception with millions of democrats across the country. They have effectively caused a rift and brought about the divisiveness that Obama and his supporters have been trying to end on a broader level. If Hillary goes out blazing, history will not treat her or her husband kindly. She has to help Obama succeed, else face the long prospect of being a leper in her own party. But this is also conditional on Obama giving her the olive branch. Telling, and convincing, his supporters to take in the person they've considered the enemy for the last 5 months.

Time will tell whether he'll embrace the Clinton's when this is all over, or tell them to screw off and take his chances.

Time flies

I don't know why I've forgotten about this blog, but I've got some time to kill before the next Splattercast.

just got word from my pal Bill that our film professor was floored by our video project dealing with african-americans in horror and wants to set up a public screening of the film for faculty members and impressionable Lincoln citizens. We'd also be doing a Q&A panel session afterwards discussing the representation of blacks in horror films. Essentially what this means is that the film professors that I greatly respect would be watching my film and then asking me questions. That's kind of funny to me. Anyway, all of us have voted "Yea" and it looks like this public screening is going to move forward.

The thing that sucks about it is that, though I am happy with the finished product, it could have been so much better. It's 20 minutes long, but I could easily made it feature length. Coming at it from a filmmakers perspective, I'm not totally happy with the structure. Our time limit was 20 minutes max, and so I had to make a lot of concessions in order to trim the film down such as deleting an entire sub-discussion on black female representation in horror. I wanted to originally do interviews, pull in some scholarly discussion, and focus more heavily on the trends, themes, and ways in which black representation has been handled in the horror genre. In other words, I wanted a lot more detail and focus rather than the broad "Here's a taste of what's going on" generalizations we ultimately had to go with. For our class, it worked just fine since we didn't view any horror films during the semester and it was all new to our classmates. But for an audience of professors and intellectuals, I think there may be a lot more depth needed to really make the film work. Still, we'll see what happens in the months going forward. If I find time, maybe I can add to the film.

In other news, I'm voting for Barack Obama in the primaries tomorrow. What a shocker, I know.

Man, its been a while...

Yeah yeah, I haven't posted here in a long time. I'm insanely busy right now and am taking a quick break and just wanted to post some thoughts about the debate tonight on ABC.

I missed the entire thing because I was at a talk about God showing beauty in monstrosities (it was damn interesting, by the way). However, I'm watching clips and post-debate reaction and it seems the consensus is that it was the "pile on Obama" debate. The first 50 minutes didn't deal with any policy issues, but rather Obama and the Weather Underground, Obama and his lack of a flag lapel pin, Obama and Jeremiah Wright, and more Obama "bitterness".

It was pretty much fast ball after fast ball trying to knock Obama off his game. Hillary pounced on every response. The liberal blogs are flaming and ready to burn ABC headquarters to the ground. My response? Calm down. The fact that Obama had all these questions thrown at him is pretty strong evidence that he's on the path to the nomination. The Republicans are going to bring all of this up and the best way for Obama to get it out of the news is to address it all early. Let him get roughed up a bit. It's better to be pummeled now than to be pummeled in an "October surprise", y'know? The rumors have been out there for weeks that Obama has tons of superdelegates locked up and ready to endorse him. They won't do it until after North Carolina. The only way he loses the nomination is if he starts losing the states he's supposed to win, such as North Carolina, Oregon, and South Dakota. Relax Obama supporters, he's fine. He's the frontrunner, you've got to expect this treatement. Besides, there's been 20 debates already. Everybody knows where Hillary and Barack stand on the issues. We've gotta get the controversies out of the way.

There's also another reason for Obama supporters not to worry. When pressed on whether or not she believes Barack can win in November, she said "Yes, Yes, Yes!". Kinda hard to make the argument to superdelegates that Barack can't win when you just told a national audience that he can. Also, for as much "baggage" as Barack has, it doesn't even scratch the surface of what Hillary has. I mean, if you're Hillary Clinton, how do you explain to a superdelegate that you can win an election when only 39% of people think you are honest and trustworthy? How can she explain her "Screw em" comment to southern working class voters? The only candidate that potentially can't win the presidency is Hillary and everybody knows it. Half the country hates her. She's gone so negative on Obama that it's become apparent that she will lose the "Obama vote". Could her "Girl Power" rallying cry carry the day? I thought so, but now I'm not so sure.

Also, though Obama is going through the motions right now, being "vetted" as the pundits like to call it, John McCain is going to get his day. I predict the democratic nomination is going to end in 4 weeks. After North Carolina, you're going to see the party leaders end it. The reason is two-fold: first, no democrat wants to see Hillary fight this out until the convention. The reason being that it will be nothing but negative press until August. If that happens, John McCain continues his free pass, but as soon as the democratic race is over, everything will get quiet and the press will go in their predictable cycle and start paying attention to him and his policies. I guarantee you, you'll be hearing about the "Keating 5" this summer and everything else McCain has said and done the 10,000 years he's been in office. And his health records. And the rumors about his post-tramatic stress disorder from being tortured in Vietnam, etc. etc. McCain's not going to coast.

And during that time, Obama will be building his coalition, raising 500 million dollars, and preparing for the fall election. Then the media will hype his convention speech, he'll deliver it, it'll kick ass, and we'll get into the real race.

That's my prediction. Calm down Obama fans. You're invested in your guy and when the "Big Bad Liberal Media" piles on, the natural reaction is to lash out and be protective of your candidate. But everything's alright. Every0ne knows he wasn't going to win Pennsylvania. He's still going to lose it, but he's still got a grip on the nomination.

Unless he loses North Carolina...then he'll have a problem :)

MaT's Rule #1: Duke Sucks

Ha!

What a great night. Not only does Barack crush Hillary in Wyoming, but UNC beat those pussies over at Duke.

As a Carolina fan,I hate Duke. HATE. The hatred goes deeper than even the Miami Hurricane football team. And that's saying something, because I'm a Florida State Seminole fan.

So suck it down, Duke! Suck. It. Down.

UNC's gonna win the tournament this year. Just you watch.

Obama is about to have the worst week ever.

This is when we find out how tough a presidential candidate is: when the shit hits the fan. Do they come out swinging, or crumble meekly in a corner?

Barack Obama is about to have the worst political week of his life. He's going to lose Texas and Ohio tomorrow which will lead to not only Hillary proclaiming she's the reincarnation of the "Comeback Kid", but also scrutiny as to why Obama can't "close the deal" (putting aside the fact that he was down 20 points in both states as of 2 weeks ago). Not only will he have to deal with a gloating Hillary campaign, but the press is going to show no mercy in other areas. The Rezko trial started today and this conspiracy about NAFTA and the Canadian government pretty much assures that the entire week is a lost cause.

Barack hasn't really had to deal with anything too severe so far. Let's see how he deals with Hillary moving forward.

Meanwhile, somewhere John McCain is laughing hysterically as he taps some lobbyist ass.

P.S. I'm in a political blackout right now. I plan on turning on the television about 8pm tomorrow night to see what's happened. It's not gonna be good...

Oscar

No Country basically swept the big awards: Director, Supporting Actor, Screenplay, and Picture. The only "major" award it lost is Cinematography, and it almost feels like the voters gave it to There Will Be Blood out of pity. I was happy to see Sweeney Todd win an Oscar. Not because I thought it deserved it, but it's just so rare to see Hollywood honor a horror film on such a big stage. I was disappointed 3:10 to Yuma lost some of the technical awards to Bourne Ultimatum (huh?). How the hell did Transformers lose Visual Effects? Chalk that one up to the anti-Michael Bay sentiment that's all over Hollywood. Classy move for Jon Stewart to let the "Once" girl come back out after the commercial break and give her acceptance speech after her partner hogged the light and they cued her off the stage. That was ridiculous. Anybody else notice that Brad Renfro wasn't in the "In Memoriam" segment? They extended it from 2007 into 2008 to accommodate Heath Ledger. Tacky. Diablo Cody is such a flash in the pan. I'll eat my words if I'm wrong, which I'm not, but this chick is a one-Oscar wonder. She's like Cuba Gooding Jr. of strippers. Happy today, writing Snow Dogs 2, tomorrow.

I'm finishing up everything for the Splatcademy Awards. I think this will be fun. As far as I know, we'll be the only podcasters that have ever attempted something like this (I could be wrong on that. Honestly, I just don't listen to podcasts very often. I find them annoying) and maybe this will get us some more listeners.

Just some random pieces of useless information

Currently listening to Soundgarden's "Fell on Black Days", via Pandora.

Watched Werner Herzog's Rescue Dawn (B) and Curtiz's Casablanca (always an A) today.

Girlfriend is pestering me to go see Juno, which I might be seeing Monday afternoon. After that, I'll be checking out The Orphanage.

Did an interview tonight with some newspaper called Red Line (I think?) about politics and why Obama is so great.


Did anybody else notice tonight that Dwight Howard's "Superman Dunk"wasn't really a dunk at all? It was cool to watch, don't get me wrong...but the guy threw the ball into the hoop. That's not a slam dunk.

Watched the latest episode of Nip/Tuck tonight. This show jumped the shark in the 4th season (one could argue it happened in the first episode of the first season, but whatever) and it just added incest to its scroll of ridiculous plotlines. I love this show.

Next four films in my Netflix queue in order: American Gangster, We Own the Night, Gone Baby Gone, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.

Currently contemplating: Should I buy a cheap HD-DVD player and cash in on the bargain price discs before they go out of print, buy a stand alone Blu-Ray player, or buy a PS3 which comes with a Blu-Ray player (and will allow me to play this game when it comes out in 2010...it'll be delayed even longer, you just know it)?

Obama opens up a significant lead in the Gallup tracking poll. Best case scenario: double digit victory in Wisconsin, upset win in Texas, narrow loss in Ohio= Hillary out of the race

Did you know that this amazing band came from this amazing band (disregard fan made music video)?

Debating whether or not to see Jean-Luc Godard's Weekend...or Paul Verhoeven's Starship Troopers at the Ross this week. Decisions, decisions...

Do the Kennedy's still have "it"?

Obama pasted Hillary in South Carolina. Ted Kennedy, supposedly disgusted by the Clinton attacks on the future of the party, is going to endorse Obama and campaign for him. It's a big pickup. Obama also scored about 878 newspaper endorsements today and a potential VP candidate in the female governor of Kansas (I don't know much of anything about her, but apparently she's a "rising star" in the Obama vein, and she'll be the Democrat rebuttal to Bush's SOTU speech).

We loyal Obama supporters have new life and enthusiasm after the results of SC, no doubt about that. But I still think the nomination is Hillary's to lose. I said that if Obama lost Nevada, he'd be toast. I still stand by that, although this rash of endorsements gives me pause. Obama's biggest problem now is that there just isn't time to be able to cut into Hillary's huge leads in all these big states coming up on Super Tuesday. Though the nomination won't be decided on that day, if Hillary builds up a sizable enough delegate advantage, there's nothing Obama can do other than to hope he can remain close and have Edwards send his delegates to him and hope that the super delagates, which Hillary has a commanding lead in, break his way for some reason.

And that's where Ted Kennedy comes in. The Kennedy's are Democratic royalty. The name is gold and Ted is pretty much the godfather of liberal ideals. In other words, his opinion carries weight with old school democrats, minorities, and union members. This will be his last go round in terms of impacting an election. He's gone all in and is supporting the young upstart over the establishment and he's going to do everything he can possibly do to see that it happens.

Think about it for a second. If Ted Kennedy swoops down as the "savior" of Obama, not only will the Kennedy name be revered by the next generation of Democrats, but he'll go down in history as the man who changed the party forever. He'll be the man who laid the hammer to the Clinton dynasty single handedly, crushed it, and assured that the name "Kennedy" will always usurp the name "Clinton".

But can he do it? This is going to end one of two ways: either Ted Kennedy will show Democrats that he is still relevant and is the true leader of the party, or he'll flame out on the campaign trail in embarrassment. He's drawn his line in the sand and it's going to be fascinating to see what happens in the next 10 days. Can the Kennedy name once again impact democratic politics? I think there is a lot riding on the line here. None of which I've heard anybody talk about.

Even more fascinating, can Ted Kennedy convince Al Gore to join the party? Whereas Kennedy has more of an impact on Obama's perception and gives him some "inside Washington" support, only Al Gore can have the sort of impact that would really make a ton of voters re-evaluate Hillary Clinton before Super Tuesday. Remember, there is a huge amount of democrats that were actively calling for Gore to get into the race. Everything he touches right now turns to gold. And he's got an incentive: Gore could potentially play kingmaker and crush his old boss at the same time.

Obama has got to get that endorsement. Preferably on Tuesday, so as to completely overshadow Hillary's underhanded sneak attack in Florida by making a speech, thus putting pressure on Howard Dean to seat Florida at the convention (which is another reason the Clinton's are pissing off the establishment at the moment, and Dean in particular).

p.s. rumors are swirling that Obama might open a campaign office in Omaha and Lincoln for the Feb. 9th caucuses. If so, I'll probably be knocking on your door telling you to vote for the future :)

Barack needs a xenomorph to visit Hillary

So I saw Ridley Scott's Alien on the big screen this past tuesday. It was great. Nothing like seeing the famous chestburster screen in a theatre full of people. Next up on my list of free movies this semester is Mad Max, Blade Runner, and Robocop among others. What I absolutely can't wait for is The Thing. That film is part of my Holy Trinity as far as movies are concerned (the others being BTiLC, and Halloween) so to see it in a theatre is hugely exciting for me. According to my mother, she took me to it when I was 6 months old. Unfortunately, I don't remember any of that experience :)

Obama is dropping in the polls in South Carolina, which leads me to think that Bill Clinton is single handedly beating him in this race. You know what the interesting thing is? Before Bill got personally involved in the way he is now, Hillary lost to Obama straight up. It was only when Bill Clinton started being the attack dog for his wife that Obama started losing. One South Carolina poll showed Obama's support amongst white's down to 10%. Unbelievable. It's ironic that John Edwards is actually keeping him afloat in South Carolina by splitting the white vote with Hillary when he's hurt him in Nevada and New Hampshire. Obama's support is coming almost solely from blacks in SC. I wouldn't be surprised if this becomes another New Hampshire scenario: a voting bloc that tells pollsters one thing (I'm voting Obama), and then votes Bill Clinton when they get to the voting booth. I'm sitting back and watching all of this with a big blank stare on my face. Bill Clinton has decided to run for president again and Obama really can't do anything to stop it. He's got to hope that something dramatic changes the dynamic, because he's toast. I'm beginning to think he won't even win South Carolina now.

New York is destroyed tonight

In a few hours I'll be watching a giant monster destroy New York. At least, that's what I hope to see. Hopefully the hand held nature of the film will allow for some real glimpses of the monster and not some "blink and you'll miss it" crap. A lot of people are saying Cloverfield is good and a lot of people are saying it's hollow disposable garbage. I'll find out tonight which camp I fall into.

Because I'm watching Cloverfield tonight, I'm going to miss the Democratic debate. In any event, below is the video that everybody is calling a "historic" speech by Barack Obama (it seems that that label is thrown around with him quite often, actually). I question the "historic" tag of it, but it goes to what I've always said that he's such a better speaker with a prepared speech in front of him. Whether you agree with what he says or not (Jeff, I can see your eyes rolling at the Scooter Libby Justice comment :) ), what can't be argued is that he does have a really magnetic and powerful presence when he speaks. I do find it great that he doesn't just pimp the black community (poor choice of words, sorry), but also tells them that the black community has been just as intolerant of King's vision as white's. C'mon South Carolina, don't bow to the Clintons: Vote Obama.

P.S. I won "Backloader of the Year" at Gallup's awards ceremony. I'll let your imagination try to figure out what that one means :)

There is no truth....or snow....

Orangutan Island is kickass. The show follows a group of orphaned Orangutan's that have been saved and put together in close proximity with each other on a small island to coexist. The show is just fascinating. These animals are solitary by nature but put them together and they start using tools, helping each other, and testing their human constraints. In one episode, a group of Orangutan's from a neighboring island not only tested the electric fence, but started dismantling it when they found it unexpectedly shut off. I can't believe their are dickheads that go around killing them. Anyways, it's a good show and I recommend taking a look.

The professor of my Christians and Pagans class is bizarre. Just bizarre. He explained to everyone in class today how to prove that snow falling from the sky is just an illusion (objects can't move an infinite distance in a finite amount of space), how red is actually green and vice versa, and that there is no such thing as truth. Every fundamental institution and way of thinking is apparently not real at all. We're trying to wrap our heads around Cicero's "on academic scepticism" and it's mind-numbing. Seriously, try reading this. It'll give you a migraine. Luckily, my friend Jeff is in the class with me, so at least I have somebody to bitch to :)

My african-americans in film class is very interesting. Especially since one of the requirements is that we do a visual presentation of some kind for our final (i.e. a video). Luckily, one of my friends from past film classes is in it as well. I'm thinking about trying to convince him to make a blaxploitation film with me :)

My other english class started out like shit. I thought it was going to be terrible. Then we read Rip Van Winkle and had a fun class discussion about it and I was like "Okay, this might not be so bad". Then I found out that for the next two weeks we're going to be reading gothic horror/supernatural stories from the 1800's. Wow! I'm looking forward to that. Science in the Classical World is my "easy" class at the moment. I don't foresee any difficulty in that one.

Tomorrow night I'm going to a big awards forum at the State Theatre for my job. I've been hearing murmurs that I may be receiving something. I hope that's not the case. In any event, they are catering some place called The Green Gateau. Anybody ever eaten there?

Go Barack Obama! I have a feeling this caucus won't be close, but I'll cross my fingers. Hopefully when the awards thingy gets over a 9, I'll come home to a victory. I'm decidedly pessimistic about it though.

For what it's worth

For what it's worth, I just woke up from a really vivid dream of the Patriots losing. My dream overall was weird. It was of the kind that wasn't quite a nightmare but made me wake up suddenly. Has anyone ever had those? Where you feel fairly unsettled even though you can't really remember what you were dreaming about? I didn't wake up screaming or anything, just a little uncomfortable.

Anyway, the focus of my dream wasn't the Patriots. I was with some other people who were watching it and something bad happened. I can't remember exactly what the bad thing that happened was, but I do remember quite clearly watching the Patriots lose and walk off the field, players yelling at each other. The final score was 17-10 and the Patriots screwed up a chance to tie the game when the botched a 4th and goal play. The mood in the room was fowl and unfortunately, I can't remember exactly what happened after that, but I woke up suddenly in a jolt. Weird, but if this scenario plays out, you heard it here first :)

My classes suck. I'll get into more of that on another blog.

Hillary's anti-democrat shenanigans...

Well, the 800 pound gorilla in the room has finally begun to throw its weight around: race is now an issue in the Democratic primary. Make no mistake about it, this was all the Clinton campaign's doing and as a democratic voter, I am seething with loathing for Hillary. Everybody in their right mind can see as clear as day that when Obama talked about Martin Luther King in his speeches, it was in the context of dreaming for bigger and better things, not in a "Clinton hates black people" kind of way. Of course, the sad reality of the world we live in is that race is still a huge issue in this country. Hillary's people are smart, and they want to exploit that issue to their advantage.

By doing so, Hillary is pushing all her chips into the middle and daring Obama to do the same. The underreported storyline throughout all of this is that Hillary Clinton has no more opportunities to be president after this election. Let's assume that whoever wins stays 8 years, which both Bill Clinton and George Bush did. Hillary would be 68 years old by the time her next opportunity came around. I don't mean to be sexist, but voters aren't going to elect an old woman to be president. Therefore, Hillary has to do everything she possibly can to knock off Obama. The problem though, is that she is alienating democrats everywhere. I've already gone on record as saying I would not vote for her in the general election if she wins the nomination. Now I feel like joining democrats in trying to prevent her from getting into the white house. I can only speak for myself in this, but Hillary's recent tactics have been so low and unseemly that I would contemplate voting for the Republican just out of spite. I can only assume that many democrats around the country feel the same way.

As we were talking a bit about on Dead Politics 4, there is a huge change going on in both parties right now. Democrats are flocking to Obama in a way that hasn't been seen in a long, long time. Whether enough go to him to overtake Hillary is unclear, but my generation of Democrats have clearly seen the light, and that light is not the wife of an ex-president. Hillary's actions are what is causing this divide. There is an unwritten rule in Democratic primaries that our candidates are supposed to be "above" the political attacks that characterize the Republican side of things. You don't tear down another person in your own party purely for political gain. You don't bring up divisive issues of past admited drug use, or worse, race in an attempt to win. The Democrats are supposed to be the party that showcases the fact that race belongs in the past, not drudging it up in an effort to enflame racial tensions. What Hillary and Bill have been doing absolutely disgusts me as a proud democrat.

So the question now becomes: Can Obama transcend the race issue? Race is the ugly topic below the surface of America that nobody wants to talk about. There are deep seeded anti-black roots that are all over this country, not just in the south. Hillary bringing up race is obviously a southern strategy to get every state except South Carolina. Personally, I think Obama can do it, but he needs some help. He needs Colin Powell, one of the most respected black men in the country and who hinted at an endorsement but backed away, to actually step up to the plate and endorse him. He also needs, as I've been saying over and over, the endorsement of Al Gore. Those two are probably the most liked and respected people, arguably, in their parties and a major news event, particularly with Powell, would change the dynamic of the race. I don't know if it's going to happen, but I'm not sure that Obama has a viable counterattack to Hillary. Idealistic speeches can't overcome centuries old racist undertones. He needs to have some big name, respected politicians come out and say "This is bullshit, what Hillary is doing. We won't support her because she is pissing on what the democratic party is supposed to stand for".

Perhaps Obama has some magic up his sleeve and maybe Karma will come back to bitch slap Hillary across the face.

p.s. I will be donating to the Obama campaign this evening because I feel strongly that this is the guy to make things happen. I also feel that by contributing a small sum, I'm at least making the effort to give a big middle finger to Hillary. I hope my contribution is put to good use.

New Semester starts Monday

Here's my classes:

African Americans in Film (English)
Pagans and Christians (Classics)
Science in the Classical World (Classics)
Short Story (English)

"Change" and looking forward hypothetically...

Hillary Clinton has always fallen back on the notion that, nationally, she is way ahead of Obama. That was always the silver lining. Losing Iowa and/or New Hampshire would suck, but in the end, the national support would win her the big delegate states. Oh how the mighty have fallen.

Stories today have been littered with Hillary's so called "demise". I, for one, am not willing to just concede Obama's inevitability. After all, Hillary was inevitable 2 months ago, and as we all can see, politics can turn on a dime. You never really know what's going to happen in the future. It could be just as possible that Obama does something stupid, or Hillary's rumored "dirt" has a big impact, or world events shift the electorate's priorities. In other words, Obama supporters can't just assume the nomination is theirs.

But this is the first time that national poll numbers are showing Hillary sinking and sinking fast. Which seems to tell me that the "Obama Wave" that the press seems so enamored by (Tom Brokaw said he hasn't seen anything like it since the days of Kennedy) is happening nation wide. The sheer immenseness of the Democratic electorate flocking AWAY from Hillary tells me that, her support was never that strong to begin with. Democrats are, at their heart, idealists. We want big things, big changes, and bigger than life politicians we can feel have our best interests at heart. But I think this is the first time, in my lifetime at least, that there is a Democrat with the resources to compete with the "establishment" candidate. Let's not forget that Obama, even when way far behind in the polls this past summer, raised just about as much money as Hillary. Even back then, signs were pointing to the fact that Democrats wanted "change".

What is this "change"? Everybody is jumping on the "change" bandwagon, donkey and elephant alike. Hillary is struggling desperately to tell voters that she is change. Mitt Romney has evoked Obama by telling Republicans that he is the only change candidate on their side, thus the only one who could beat Obama in the general election. Likewise, Huckabee and Edwards are chanting the mantra of "change, change, CHANGE". Let's not forget, that Obama and Edwards were, from the very beginning, the only candidates who offered this slogan. Obama's success has come not from just preaching "change", but from incorporating "hope" into his speeches. Obama has a way of making people believe that better days are just around the corner. That there truly can be an end to the horribly polarizing divisiveness of our country. He brings that across far better and more emotionally evocative than any other candidate. Now, whether or not he can deliver on that message is a different debate. But in the minds of Democrats across the country (and independents, and Republicans), that message is resonating in a way that has even the most hardened political pundits and insiders shaking their heads in disbelief.

Obama, by all accounts, is supposed to cruise to victory tomorrow. Gallup has him winning by 13%. I think it will be a lot closer than that, but who knows? There are two important things to look at tomorrow if he wins.

1) Did he win the Democratic vote? The common thinking is that Obama will overrun Hillary because of the large numbers of independent voters in New Hampshire. That could happen, but if he doesn't win the registered democrats, expect Hillary to go on the attack immediately. She'll frame it in a way that tells the upcoming states that don't allow independents to vote "Don't let outsiders determine our party nominee". That's a solid base rallying cry and it will may even enflare the paranoia and conspiracy theories that Republicans are "infiltrating" the democratic primaries in order to affect the outcome they want. Of course, Obama will counter that one of the entire points of his candidacy is that he can bring independents and republicans into the democratic ranks. But if he wins amongst registered democrats (he won 32-31 in Iowa), Hillary won't be able to use that as a line of attack.

2) Can he replicate the youth and 1st time voter turnout of Iowa? I think this will be the most important thing to look for tomorrow. Obama's candidacy is predicated on the notion that he can DELIVER new voters to the party and finally accomplish the democratic "holy grail": bring young Asses to the voting booth. The amazing thing about Iowa is that he did it. Now comes the real test: can he replicate it? If the polls show tomorrow night that more record turnout among youth and first time voters skew heavily in favor of Obama, then Hillary is toast. Why? Because no matter how strong her base may be in New York or Florida...it won't be enough when Obama's youth support come out in droves to offset Hillary's 65 year old grandmother's. Young voters are also far more forgiving. If Obama does have a screw up that the media magnifies, it will matter a lot less to a 25 year old kid with an iPhone than it would to an older voter. At the very least, the young voters would keep Obama competitive in the later states. However, if Obama does not duplicate his success in Iowa, then Hillary is certain to jump on the fact that Iowa was a mere aberration and that he only won New Hampshire because of the independent vote, and things will change as soon as they get to the closed democratic primaries.

Will an Obama victory tomorrow end the Clinton candidacy like some pundits are predicting? Probably not. There are rumors that Hillary doesn't have much money, but I don't put much stock in those. Hillary supporters can raise just as much money in a crunch as Obama supporters, probably moreso. What I think is troublesome for Hillary is that she's going to have to do a Rudy Giuliani, only focus on Feb. 5th, strategy. There's been a lot of talk about the delegate count. Hillary currently holds a commanding lead in "superdelegates" and that if she can pull out New York, California, and Florida, it won't matter if Obama runs the table. Looking at the numbers, this is actually a somewhat apocalyptic scenario (Hillary will automatically win Michigan since Obama ain't on the ballot). If Hillary does rely on her establishment buddies to secure her an insurmountable delegate count, that will have terrible consequences for the Democratic party.

If Obama is running through states with an overwhelming grassroots support and bringing new voters into the party, and Hillary tries some strange, seemingly underhanded tactic to win (putting aside that it is a perfectly sound strategy well within party rules) by calling in all her congressional and senate favors to throw their support her way even in the face of a huge movement against her...the party will disintegrate and she will have no chance in hell of winning the nomination in November. Obama supporters are nothing if not insanely passionate about the guy and if Hillary is perceived to be doing it more for the Clintons and not the party, there will be a rebellion against her by democrats in the general election. If this nomination process gets to that point (which I don't think it will, but I don't put anything past Hillary Clinton; I'm just talking hypothetically right now) you will see a nightmare scenario where the party fractures and it would probably kill any chance for the Democrats to ever get the youth out in huge numbers. You don't invest this much and then watch a politician sneakily come in the back door for the nomination, even if it is perfectly legit to do.

Wow, this went really long. These are just some of my observations about what may or may not happen. Believe me, I'm definitely stoked beyond belief that Obama has done as well as he has. It's sort of a validation for me on a personal level since I've been singing his praises for the past 4 years. But I'm also realistic and I know this could change at any moment. He very well could lose tomorrow in an upset and then the entire dynamic is changed.

But for now, I'm going to revel in Hillary's misery :)

It's ON bitches!

Ha! Obama completely blew away expectations tonight in a historic vote, crushing Hillary by 9 points in Iowa.

Not only did Hillary lose, but she got 3rd place! On top of that, Obama actually got the much maligned "youth vote" to actually get out and vote! Over 50% of his support was from people under 30. That is amazing. He also beat Clinton in the female vote. It was pretty much the worst case scenario for Hillary in every respect.

Here's hoping those New Hampshire independents see the light and forgo voting for John McCain (the only Republican I think could beat Obama or Hillary, for that matter) to back Obama. A McCain loss, and another Obama decisive victory will put major pressure on Clinton.

By the way, the much maligned Des Moines Register poll that was released this week that showed Obama up by 7% on Hillary, completely opposite to what all the other polls were saying...was actually the most accurate of them all. They predicted a huge independent voter turnout (though not as big as they expected), and showed Hillary up 1% on Edwards. The final vote showed Edwards up less than 1% on Clinton. Remarkably accurate for the second caucus in a row.

Gallup didn't do an Iowa poll, but they are doing a major New Hampshire poll this weekend that is supposedly going to be all over the news come Monday. We're actually staying open later on saturday and sunday to do it.

Oh happy night!

It's now or never....i think?

Well, this seems to be "it". The general consensus amongst the pundits is that if Obama wins the caucuses tomorrow night, it will catapult him to the nomination. If he doesn't, then we're stuck with Hillary as our nominee. It seems that every single poll has a different leader and other than the Des Moines Register poll, which shows Obama way ahead, every one is within the margin of error. On a pure fan of politics level, this is incredibly fascinating and exciting. It's literally a toss up. I was watching Hardball earlier tonight and Chris Matthews said he hasn't seen anything like this since Kennedy-Nixon. Usually in the last week, someone pulls ahead. Not so this year. Even on the Republican side it's too close to call. I'm going to go out on a limb and say John Edwards won't get nearly as much support as everyone seems to be saying he will. In fact, I think he'll finish at least 5 points behind the winner.

Tucker Carlson had an interesting point of view earlier tonight. When talking to some campaign manager, he said he thought the entire caucus process was undemocratic. By its very nature, the caucus excludes people. Soldiers overseas, people who work night shifts, single parents who can't leave their kids to caucus for 2 hours at night, etc. Carlson's argument stems from the fact that people just can't get out and vote like they can in a primary. It takes time to caucus. You've got to rearrange stuff in your life. It's not a secret ballot. You have to get in front of people and argue for what you believe in. Because it is so "difficult", you end up with a small amount of people who make the decisions for everyone.

Now, I can see Carlson's point. However, I think it brings up an interesting argument to the bigger debate of whether or not there should be a "test" in order to vote. I've said in the past that I believe everyone should be able to vote. However, I do believe that people should be able to answer some basic questions. As of now, I'd be for a weighted voted system: everyone gets to vote, but their vote isn't worth as much if you don't know what the hell you're voting for. Come to think of it, that's definitely another area in which I'm not "Leftist". I don't know a single liberal who would even consider a "test" to vote :)

Anyways, my point is that I think a caucus is sort of a "test" in a sense. The people who caucus are far more knowledgeable than the average primary voter who just drops their ballot in a box and leaves. Caucus goers have to interact with the presidential nominees. They have to actually get in front of their friends and neighbors and argue why their nominee is the right nominee. Isn't this a more democratic way of doing things? I'm not quite sure. It would be a good topic to talk about on the Dead Politics podcast. Obviously, one argument against this would be "well, that Iowa soldier in Iraq might really want to participate but can't for obvious reasons". Of course, there's plenty of people in primaries who have stuff come up as well. I don't know, it's an interesting thing to talk about.

One thing's for sure, I'm gonna have my popcorn out tomorrow night :)

I'm watching Leno and he's knocking stuff out of the ballpark. The Tonight Show and Conan are hamstrung by the writer's strike, whereas Letterman has struck a deal with them, so Leno and O'Brian are relying on themselves to do jokes and come up with bits. I have to say, Leno did a fair job. I can't wait to see what O'Brian does.