Lev Raphael's Blog, page 21

How CNN Helps Spoil Our Elections

There are lots of pretty faces on that major news network, but not much thoughtfulness or insight for anyone following the race for the presidency.

Prince Deserved a Better Tribute

There've been lots of people defending Madonna's tribute to Prince at the Billboard Music Awards. They point out that she wore a flashy suit and there was a purple chair. Wasn't that well-staged?

Yeah, right, as if Prince was only about what things looked like.

Her singing was dull and boring. Think about it: would you ever use those words to describe Prince? Not even Stevie Wonder could save the day. Everything disappeared into a kind of artistic black hole and the tribute felt more like...

Prince Deserved a Hotter Tribute

There've been lots of people defending Madonna's tribute to Prince at the Billboard Music Awards. They point out that she wore a flashy suit and there was a purple chair. Wasn't that well-staged?

Yeah, right, as if Prince was only about what things looked like.

Her singing was dull and boring. Think about it: would you ever use those words to describe Prince? Not even Stevie Wonder could save the day. Everything disappeared into a kind of artistic black hole and the tribute felt more like...

Prince Deserved a Better Tribute

There've been lots of people defending Madonna's tribute to Prince at the Billboard Music Awards. They point out that she wore a flashy suit and there was a purple chair. Wasn't that well-staged? Yeah, right, as if Prince was only about what things looked like.

Does Facebook Make You Narrow-Minded?

That's the thrust of Frank Bruni's thoughtful column in the New York Times where he references social psychologists to assert that we're turning into "culturally and ideologically inflexible tribes."

Does Facebook Make You Narrow-Minded?

That's the thrust of Frank Bruni's thoughtful column in the New York Times where he references social psychologists to assert that we're turning into "culturally and ideologically inflexible tribes."

By bookmarking given blogs and personalizing social-media feeds, we customize the news we consume and the political beliefs we're exposed to as never before. And this colors our days, or rather bleeds them of color, reducing them to a single hue. We construct precisely contoured echo chambers of...

My Museum Love Affair

May 18th was International Museum Day and it made me think how lucky I was growing up in Manhattan. My parents took me to art museums there on a regular basis starting in elementary school. My first museum memory is of crawling through the legs of a huge throng at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1961 to get to the front and see the newly purchased Rembrandt, "Aristotle with a Bust of Homer."



I remember feeling very still before that majestic canvas, and I learned later on that the museum...

My Love Affair With Museums

It's International Museum Day and I'm thinking how lucky I was growing up in Manhattan. My parents took me to art museums there on a regular basis from when I was very young. My first museum memory is of crawling through the legs of a huge throng at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1961 to get to the front and see the newly purchased Rembrandt, "Aristotle with a Bust of Homer."



I remember feeling very still before that majestic canvas. But my real love at The Met was the galleries of Gree...

My Museum Love Affair

It's International Museum Day and I'm thinking how lucky I was growing up in Manhattan. My parents took me to art museums there on a regular basis from when I was very young.

"Scandal" Loves Skewering the GOP

Scandal is wild and addictive. And it's so easy to be dazzled by the sex, political wrangling, high-speed dialogue, and flashy camera work that you can sometimes forget it's a blistering satire of the Republican Party.

That's right. Shonda Rhimes' main target isn't DC's back stabbing and bitchery--it's GOP hypocrisy, venality, and corruption.

The handsome President got into office via blatant fraud. His chief of staff has been involved in murder, and so have many other people connected to...