Rich Hoffman's Blog, page 446
May 21, 2013
Government is TOO Big: Tea Party Protest in downtown Cincinnati at the IRS building
Before it was all said and done there were around 500 people who joined the crowd protesting the gross intrusion of the IRS into the lives of Tea Party Patriots.
By: WCPO Digital Staff
CINCINNATI – The furor over the IRS’s improper targeting of conservative groups went on full display in downtown Cincinnati on Tuesday.
More than 200 people turned out for a noon rally sponsored by local tea party groups, according to 9 On Your Side’s Scott Wegener. Some carried signs that read “Audit the IRS,” “Internal Revenge Service, Stop” and “Stop the Abuse of Power.” Some chanted, “Hey, hey, ho, ho, the IRS has gotta go.”
“I think we need to do something about the abuses of government,” said Dennis Hogan of Maineville.
After gathering on Fountain Square, protesters marched two blocks to the IRS office at the federal building at 550 Main St. That where IRS workers improperly targeted conservative groups in their applications for tax-exempt status over the last few years, a Treasury Department inspector general’s report states.
Lined up along the sidewalk, protesters chanted, “You work for us. You work for us,” while Homeland Security officers stood nearby.
“It’s ungodly, it’s un-American and it’s just plain wrong to target Americans because of what they say about the government,” said Paul Johnson of the Grassroots tea party of Boone County.
“We want them to cease and desist harassing us conservatives,” said Andrew Pappas of the Anderson tea party.
To that end, protesters signed a large placard and Ann Becker, president of the Cincinnati tea party, gave it to officers to deliver to the IRS.
“This isn’t about party. It’s about individual freedom,” Becker said.
Becker has called for the immediate resignation of all involved in the targeting scandal.
“There shouldn’t be a political attack based on our beliefs, and we believe that’s what the IRS has done,” Becker said.
“That it turned out to be going on in the Cincinnati office is fairly ironic considering the strong tea party presence in this area,” said George Brunemann. “I’d say there’s about 20,000 members in Hamilton, Butler, Warren and Clermont (counties).”
Brunemann said he and his wife were audited and his wife’s business was audited after they started the SouthWest Cincinnati tea party. He doesn’t believe the IRS officials who claim low-level Cincinnati IRS workers came up with the idea to target conservative groups.
“The IRS agent who told us we were being audited said it was directly because of our involvement with the tea party. She was almost apologetic,” Brunemann said.
He said he knows a small business owner who was audited by the IRS and investigated by OSHA after joining.
“To me, that’s what screams that this is not lower-lever IRS workers. This goes all the way up the food chain. The president might not be personally involved, but his people are,” Brunemann said.
Some tea party groups are planning lawsuits in connection with the investigation.
Five present or former Cincinnati IRS workers were called to Washington to give transcribed interviews in advance of a House committee hearing on Wednesday.
The scandal has already led to at least three congressional hearings.
You can read the Treasury inspector general’s report at http://goo.gl/o5mCN.
Rich Hoffman
“If they attack first………..blast em’!”
Justin Binik Thomas ‘Ways and Means’ Interviews: Matt Clark and Channel 9 get to the heart
I was at the Liberty Township Tea Party meeting when Katy Kern read the IRS harassment letter calling out Justin Binik Thomas as an individual. Justin is from Deer Park nearly a half an hour to the south of Liberty Township, Ohio and had no connection at all to the Tea Party group in my community. So the implication of why Justin, who was a founding member of the Cincinnati Tea Party, was obvious. The IRS was letting Liberty Township know that the leaders of the Tea Party effort were going to be targeted, and unless they wanted the wrath of the IRS coming down on them—they’d keep their head down. Well, it didn’t work. The Liberty Township group hunkered down and Justin went on the offensive letting every media outlet in the country know about the harassment he received. He’s been on virtually every news program in the country as a result and made a point to fly to Washington D.C. to attend the Ways and Means hearings. Upon arrival back into Cincinnati he gave two interviews, one to Channel 9 which is shown after the below video, and a radio interview with Matt Clark of WAAM in Ann Arbor, Michigan which can be seen and heard here:
The Channel 9 Interview is now listed below with the link to the original story here:
Posted: 05/18/2013
Justin Binik-Thomas wanted to know why a question about him was among 35 the Liberty Township Tea Party was instructed by the Internal Revenue Service to answer as part of the organization’s application for tax-exempt status last year.
Binik-Thomas, of Deer Park, believes he became the only individual to be singled out in any of the hundreds of questions asked by Cincinnati IRS employees who gave extra scrutiny to applications for tax-exempt status filed by conservative groups.
The 31-year-old was so concerned that he flew to Washington, D.C., to be present during the U.S. House Ways and Means Committee’s hearing Friday.
While Binik-Thomas didn’t expect the hearings to give him answers, he told 9 On Your Side prior to his trip to Capitol Hill that he thought it was important to be there to show the face of someone who has been directly affected by the scandal.
9 On Your Side interviewed Binik-Thomas to get his opinion about what he learned during the hearing.
His responses can be viewed below:
Q. What did you learn from the hearings?
A. I left confident that Congress has taken the [inspector general's] findings, IRS admission, and constituent concerns seriously. Special thanks to my representative, Congressman (Brad) Wenstrup, for working with Ways and Means colleagues on this issue. Congressman (Pat) Tibiri and Congressman (Erik) Paulsen included my story in their questioning.
Q. Are you satisfied with the answers you got from the experience?
A. There was little new information learned at the hearing proper, but there will be followup, written testimony and committee research over the coming weeks. I hope to learn more in this phase.
Q. What do you plan to do next?
A. I will continue to work with congress and this committee to support as needed and appropriate.
Q. What would you like to hear from IRS/administration officials?
A. I would like to know why I was included in the letter to Liberty Township Tea Party, what the information received will be used for, and where the information was shared. [I’d] also like assurances that it will not be used against me or my small business in the future. The same assurances should be offered to targeted groups.
Q. What have you received in the way of support from the local community?
A. My family and community have been supportive. It is chilling to be called out by the government.
Q. What would you like the public to know about what happened?
A. The IRS has identified an individual in a letter to an unrelated group. Risks include future audits to personal or business finances. It can happen to anyone unless there are systemic changes at the agency – true checks and balances – to assure this does not reoccur.
—
You can read the full story about Binik-Thomas at the following link: http://www.wcpo.com/dpp/news/local_news/why-was-justin-binik-thomas-singled-out-in-irs-tea-party-application
What Justin said about being targeted in a letter to an unrelated group is the crux of the whole problem. The IRS used Justin’s name as a way to intimidate the Liberty Township Tea Party, and in doing so, abused their power. This is the reason that no one organization should ever have so much power that can behave like a dictatorship in such a fashion. No matter who was at fault at the IRS, the deed was done and Justin has had to embark on at least two years of fearful harassment as a result. The IRS owes Justin more than an apology.
I admire Justin’s professionalism in his responses. He has a right to state his outrage in a much more colorful manner than he has, but he’s a nice guy who is immensely responsible. As a founding member of the Cincinnati Tea Party he has shown a willingness to allow the legal process to work the way it should by working closely with his congressman to see justice done to the IRS. For Justin’s sake, I hope he gets it. But I have my doubts. The IRS is a terribly corrupt organization that stands against virtually everything America was founded upon, so unless major reforms are put in place the status quo will remain and people like Justin will be attacked again.
Rich Hoffman
“If they attack first………..blast em’!”
May 20, 2013
Institutional Slavery to the IRS: Darryl Parks 700 WLW broadcast from Saturday May 18th 2013
It’s always the cover-up that brings to light institutional failure because the participants will stoop to no low to protect the organization of which they’re a part. With the same denials seen during the Penn State child molestation case where thousands of individuals protected Jerry Sandusky because of his legendary contributions to the football team’s defense, employees of the IRS are willing to do the same to keep their jobs and protect the institution. The IRS employs over 100,000 employees all across the nation, 4000 of which work in Cincinnati alone. It is a giant monster of a bureaucracy and no reform is possible due to the billions of dollars that are stolen out of the treasury to pay for all those employees—which are largely unmanaged positions with payroll values as ridiculously high as public school teachers teeming with incompetence for the same reasons. The IRS is the judge, jury and executioner of their own crime syndicate and every human being that works for them places their individual judgment into the back of their minds serving blindly an institution created by government to perpetually grow uncontrolled of service to itself and nothing else. This issue was particularly well articulated by Darryl Parks during his midday radio show on 700 WLW during May 18, 2013.
Darryl was right; there isn’t a politician in the Ohio region who will take on the IRS scandal any further than the Ways and Means hearings because they cannot in all consciousness go against the government institution for which they serve. People who think in such ways have lost their individual judgment, or their value assessment for other individuals because they are in service to an institution—and their primary task at that point becomes to protect that institution with any sacrifice necessary to further its continuation. That means lying under oath is on the table of possibility because most individuals who serve like slaves to the government and all its divisions have lost touch with their individuality not fearing even eternity in hell if the preservation of the institution can be preserved.
Local Republican politicians have known about this IRS scandal for over two years. I know personally because I have been intimately involved with the Liberty Township IRS harassment case. John Boehner knew all about it. Rob Portman knew all about it. Mitch McConnell knew all about it, yet nobody did anything about it because they all primarily serve the institution of the federal government. They do not serve the interests of the individuals who elect them. This is the fault of our social commitment to altruism which informs these institutional soldiers that individuals should always sacrifice themselves to the “greater good” and that individual judgment should be suspended for collective causes. Republicans willingly play their roll in preserving institutions at the expense of the individual—even at a cost to themselves.
If I had a quarter for every kitchen I stood in where the children disrespected their parents and the women looked wistfully toward every horizon for some great lover to sweep them off their feet in a passionate romance even though their families all live well in large houses with perpetual financial security, I would have already amassed all the world’s wealth in my possession. I can speak that in Cincinnati I have been on 90% of the roads of the city covering approximately 150 square miles. And at one point in time I have stood in the kitchen of at least one house in every neighborhood in all those communities and always the stories are the same, especially when one or both parents work for the federal government. There is a soulless look on the faces of such bureaucrats that is the direct result of such lack of individuality. The children of these households are attracted to any presence which might contain some sense of individual structure and they flow toward these personalities like water seeking a glass to hold some semblance of their personal identities. These children do not respect their parents because their parents do not serve the family, they serve their employer—the government first and foremost which is hidden to nobody. The women in such relationships if they are still young and attractive have affairs with any man with tattoos, long hair and some external exhibition of individual merit. Later, when they’ve become shells of their younger physical bodies and such men are no longer attracted to them, they fill up the nail salons’ getting manicures and pedicures so that they can have some sense of individual pampering trying to rekindle their individual identities which has been consumed by the institutions they serve. The effort is to feel individually special, since their jobs do not offer such entitlement—as they are in service to an institution. The men fare far worse in such arrangements. They drink to evade their social realities, they have affairs to feel young so to hide from themselves what they’ve become, and they all end up the same way. By the time they hit 40 they are physical wrecks often overweight with skin problems, eyesight deficiencies, and heart illnesses. Their broken hearts are more mental than physical, but the muscle of the heart reflects the broken dreams of every bright-eyed little boy who wishes to save the world with heroics, only to discover that they are middle-aged sell outs afraid of their own shadows. They become empty husks as the institutions they serve drain them of all their worth feeding off them like a parasite till their deaths.
The commitment to institutions over individual need is the leading cause of misery in American culture and the IRS is filled with these types of people. Most of them are suffering from the same ailments shown above, even though they have new cars, nice homes, and comfortable retirement packages. The 4000 employees who work in the Cincinnati IRS fit the above profile by nearly 95%. They are willing to trade their lives away for the security the IRS provides as an employer because the pay and benefits are good—better than they’d get at a comparable job elsewhere. They do not care that the value they reap as institutional employees is stolen from millions of tax payers with looted money in a system that mimics slavery in every definition of the word.
This is why the IRS is allowed to attempt ruining the lives of individuals no matter how severe the imposition. This is also why the IRS has so many supporters who are willing to lie on its behalf. This makes the testimony provided to the Ways and Means committee on May 17, 2013 that much more potent because if the IRS employees are willing to admit to their specific targeting of individuals in the Tea Party case, then what deeper imposition are they actually protecting? The IRS didn’t just decide to release a statement that it knew would anger millions of Tea Party protestors like a match thrown on piles of dry paper sprinkled with gasoline. The IRS itself as an employee of the much larger federal government is seeking to protect the institution of statist government from something the same way that individuals protect the IRS from institutional scandal. The answer to what that scandal is defines the real scoop of the current problem. For my money, I would bet on Benghazi.
Rich Hoffman
“If they attack first………..blast em’!”
Star Wars Rebels: The rebellion begins!
I am very happy with the title to the new Star Wars animated series coming to the Disney Channel during the fall of 2014. On the front of my very first car I had a license plate which said, “Proud to be a Rebel.” After several decades of being a “rebel,” I am still proud of it—which is a trend that will extend for many more decades. But when Star Wars Rebels makes its debut I will be more proud of being a rebel than ever because I can begin to share Rebels with my grandson, who will be the perfect age to watch this exciting new program with me and enjoy the fabulous mythology from a galaxy far, far away…….a long time ago.
NEW ANIMATED SERIES STAR WARS REBELS COMING FALL 2014
May 20, 2013
Production has begun on Star Wars Rebels, an exciting, all-new animated television series based on one of the greatest entertainment franchises of all time. Scheduled to premiere in fall 2014 as a one-hour special telecast on Disney Channel, it will be followed by a series on Disney XD channels around the world.
Leading the development of the series is a creative team of exceptional talent. Screenwriter/producer Simon Kinberg (X-Men: First Class,Sherlock Holmes, Mr. & Mrs. Smith) is an executive producer on Star Wars Rebels and will write the premiere episode. He is joined by Dave Filoni as executive producer, who served as supervising director of the Emmy nominated Star Wars: The Clone Wars since 2008. Executive producer Greg Weisman brings with him a wealth of animation experience with credits such as Young Justice, The Spectacular Spider-Man and Gargoyles.
Gary Marsh, president and chief creative officer, Disney Channels Worldwide, said, “The entire team at Lucasfilm has provided extraordinary creativity and innovation for over three decades, and we’re thrilled to be bringing the expansive and imaginative world of Star Wars to Disney XD’s viewers.”
“I couldn’t be more excited to explore new corners of the Star Wars universe,” said Kathleen Kennedy, president, Lucasfilm. “I think Star Wars Rebels will capture the look, feel and fun that both kids and their parents love about Star Wars.”
The action-filled series is set between the events of Episode III and IV — an era spanning almost two decades never-before explored on-screen.Star Wars Rebels takes place in a time where the Empire is securing its grip on the galaxy and hunting down the last of the Jedi Knights as a fledgling rebellion against the Empire is taking shape. Details about the show are a closely guarded secret at this point.
Star Wars Rebels will be produced by Lucasfilm Animation, featuring many of the key talents that made Star Wars: The Clone Wars. Fans attending Star Wars Celebration Europe will be the first to get an exclusive look at the new series. Casting will be announced at a later date. More information about this developing project will be found on StarWars.com and on Facebook at facebook.com/starwarsrebels.
Rich Hoffman
“If they attack first………..blast em’!”
May 19, 2013
The IRS Ways and Means Hearings in Washington D.C.:Justin Binik Thomas and Tea Party friends seek justice
What a lot of people do not realize is that Tea Party groups are educational organizations designed to get back into touch with Constitutional ideals and beliefs that were valued upon the founding of The United States of America. In essence they are like a giant book club where members get together and talk about the merits of books they have read like The Federalist Papers and The 5000 Year Leap. That makes the recent IRS scandal against the Tea Party that much more preposterous, which has been going on for over three years now, culminating in the testimony in Washington that is currently going on. All government entities from local schools to the smallest cubical in the IRS administration offices have in their culture an inherit desire to advance statism—and anything that is a threat to their statism they deem worthy of attack. If a school levy is resisted, the advocates of the tax increase believe they have a “right” to destroy businesses and any individual who stand in the way of their funding. The IRS does the same on a massive scale acting as agents of tyranny to those who oppose statist oriented government objectives. So as a supporter of Tea Party causes, it gave me great pleasure to listen to the testimony of May 17, 2013 and hear occasional cheers coming from the crowd sitting in the balcony—since I personally know a good portion of the Tea Party patriots making such a ruckus there.
Many people are just now arriving to where many of us have been for a long time. Justin Binik-Thomas is a friend of mine who was also up in the balcony, along with Rachael Proctor who I most recently discussed in another article. They were joined with most of the organizational heads of the Liberty Township Tea Party which is one that I have supported from the beginning as it is the group that is in my home district. In February of 2013, only a few months ago I had to provide the IRS through the Liberty Township Tea Party hard copies of videos I made which were shown at a picnic that was done at a local farm celebrating patriotic themes. CLICK HERE FOR REVIEW. To understand what the Tea Party is all about, watch the video I have at that link because it involves many of the people targeted in this current IRS probe, and it can easily be seen how ridiculously stupid the IRS probe of these people truly is. I remember vividly the meeting where it was discussed how the IRS had asked the Liberty Township Tea Party about their relationship with Justin Binik Thomas, who is one of the founding members of the Cincinnati Tea Party, and the cold chill that permeated the audience at that event.
Unlike my Tea Party friends, my interest in politics extends beyond education. I am an aggressive type of individual and I sometimes do and say things many of them would never consider. For that reason I keep a bit of distance from them so to preserve my right to exercise my intentions without bringing negativity into their direction, particularly from groups like the IRS or any other government body. So privately, frequent readers of my Overmanwarrior’s Wisdom got together with Justin Binik-Thomas to deal with this whole IRS thing. CLICK HERE TO REVIEW. I’m not the kind of person who believes in mass demonstrations and protests. I don’t do the group activity thing but I do respect those who do. The people who were in that Overmanwarrior’s group were not the types who would collect in mass to show the IRS that there is strength in numbers—they are the type of people who are prepared for the next tragic steps once government organizations realize that the Tea Party will not back down. They are people like Justin Binik-Thomas who won’t be frightened away from holding leadership positions in the Tea Party organizations, due to IRS intimidation. Knowing something about media relations myself, if those steps are necessitated, I don’t want my friends in the Tea Party splattered all over the news as a negative connection to me, so I keep a respectable distance—because that is where I am. I admire their kindness, and desire to learn. That much I share with them. But I have different methods for dealing with bullies that is much more direct than a lot of people feel comfortable with. I intend to direct that kind of attention toward one of the biggest bullies around, the IRS. So the meeting we had with Justin well over a year ago in the middle of this IRS scandal was to deal with those next steps should the IRS push the issue beyond pieces of paper and phone calls.
This is where the statist government types like Barack Obama are at a loss, and why they find themselves in the center of so much trouble. America is not Europe; we have not been beaten down by thousands of years of statism under kings and queens. America was founded by rebels fleeing Europe. Rebellion is so deeply ingrained into our DNA that it cannot be easily changed leaving a subtle and constant push against statism. Even though government education has trained the minds of generations toward statism, deep in their hearts Americans hate it, and they act against it any way they can. Most of the people I know are happy to peacefully protest, as they traveled to Washington to show a unified force against the IRS. But I prepare in other ways for events that are historically probable. I do not count on government to submit itself to the will of the American people, and I expect a fight from them. So I am always in a state of preparation. But what we all have in common, my Tea Party friends and some of my “other” friends who will strategically stay in the shadows until needed–is that we are not going to yield. Submission to government is not an option. We will never submit to United Nations authority, we will never submit to the tyranny of the IRS or any other government organization. I personally won’t even submit to a local trustee or zoning board. I don’t go out looking for trouble, I simply resist the imposition of my time, money, and energy by those who want something from me, and hope to force me to act in the way they desire through “thuggish” democracy—mob rule.
What else is the motive when a bunch of union inspired thugs attempt to vandalize the property of a target, or organize a mass protest in front of a home or business? What is the point of spying on a target so that weaknesses in their defense can be ascertained? What is the point of using the rule of law through the tax code or some other government inspired imposition to arrest a target and throw them in jail just because they have charisma and a following? The intent is to “win” at their intended strategic objectives, through force. The IRS did these types of things to the Liberty Township Tea Party because they wanted to send a strong message to a Tea Party group in John Boehner’s back yard. They wanted to tie up the efforts of the Tea Party into not protesting big government and national debt, but to put them on the defensive with red tape and bureaucracy. It was harassment with the intention of “changing” the behavior of the Tea Party groups. By targeting Justin Binik-Thomas the IRS wanted to send a message to the other Tea Party groups that leaders in such groups would be targeted—so to discourage leaders from naming themselves for fear of an audit.
I am happy to see the victims of this IRS harassment enjoying their moment in the sun. They deserve to look down from the gallery upon those who intended to bring harm to their lives—and the IRS did intend to use their authority to change Tea Party behavior. Justin deserves that satisfaction as does Rachael and the representatives of the Liberty Township Tea Party who were there for the testimony. It is nice to see justice being handed out where it is deserved. I’d rather get everything out in the open so that the pretense of politeness can be dropped and everyone can start dealing with reality.
As these scandals break, and justice comes to the aggressors of the IRS and the government that supports such a tyranny, what I believe will happen may be delayed, where the federal government out of frustration just turns on the American people with out-right force. Such peaceful resolutions are the intentions of the Tea Party and I’m happy to see them getting some form of justice from the efforts and worry they have expelled. But such victories are paper in nature and easily forgotten. They are not the kind of conflict resolution that I am thinking of. It would seem that for that, I’ll have to wait a bit longer as the government recalibrates for their next psychological assault. But what we all share no matter what the method is that submission is not an option. Statist government is not what we are willing to support, and there isn’t any amount of forced imposition that can change that basic premise.
Rich Hoffman
“If they attack first………..blast em’!”
May 18, 2013
Americans Love Socialism: Why the world regresses under collective causes
I can understand why the un-ambitious, physically frail, intellectually insufficient, culturally lacking and otherwise fearful human beings would be attracted to socialism. Competition is a frightening ideal to those who lack the confidence to advance themselves to a level of performance that is needed to overcome rivals. Such attitudes are what drive capitalism and bring freedom to the lives of everyone in subtle ways, yet the idea that there are winners and losers in life must be accepted. For the characters who wish to be handed victory trophies in life for simply existing—because they fear competition, socialism gives them the ability to feel they are equal to those who are clearly better at some skills and set the bar high for all others to meet. Socialism is more attractive to the weak and feeble masses because it keeps them from having to compete for merit. Socialism will always be appealing to those types of people.
But ironically socialism is not good for the collective society because it removes the merits gained through competition. When competition is missing from any endeavor, performance drops dramatically in every activity attempted under any effort. While socialism protects the individual from collective pressure exerted upon those who fall short in life it destroys the individual merits that a society enjoys because of competition driven by the best and brightest succeeding.
Americans for many generations, particularly since the 1930s have been inundated with socialism imported from the deficient European political theater, and it has harmed the American way of life dramatically. But since socialism was introduced so long ago, many modern Americans do not know life without it. They have socialism in their retirement packages, their collective bargaining agreements, in every aspect of their governments, in their taxation, in their medicine, in virtually every aspect of their lives because a democracy is ruled by the masses and the masses find socialism more appealing than capitalism—that is until they find their freedoms evaporating as a result.
When a football team starts losing because the best quarterback is on the bench because the head coach does not like the individual, or believes that other team quarterbacks deserve a chance but are clearly lacking in ability relative to the better player, the whole team loses and they will begin to embrace methods of capitalism to put the best players on the field so they can win. But such pressure is only introduced if the other teams are actually trying to win the game by putting their best players against other team’s best players. If all teams fail to recognize who the best players are from bad players then the game loses appeal to any audience as chaos and boredom are due to follow. Fans in the stands that pay money to be entertained and watch the game will quickly realize that they could perform at the same hapless level, and will stop attending football games. They’ll just organize their own games. So a level of competence and an attempt at becoming the best is required in such endeavors. Socialism harms this process.
Yet the same rules that make football a great game apply to science, business, education, even gardening—competition drives the level of society higher with quality being better wherever competition is present. The most dramatic example of such competition can be seen in Orlando, Florida. My absolute favorite McDonald’s to eat at in the entire country is the fabulous giant of a restaurant which resides just outside of Universal Studios. It is one of the largest McDonald’s restaurants in the world and is made that way out of a need created by competition. Universal Studios in Florida has two amusement parks just down the road and both are absolutely fantastic. But they became fantastic because they are in competition with the four Disney parks just down the highway at the next exit and all the wonderful entertainment options that connect the two multi-park complexes with International Blvd. And in between these two massive amusement destinations is the Sea World complex which has done so much good for marine wildlife research due to their excessive revenue generating capacity. It is competition and capitalism that make all the fabulous activity in Central Florida work so well. Without competition, Universal Studios could afford to cut corners and present the bare minimum investment needed to bring visitors through their admission gates. But they can’t, because Disney drove the market higher always pushing the other parks to become better, or go out of business. The result to all this dynamic is that an average fast food restaurant like McDonald’s which everyone takes for granted in their home town communities is driven to become better and more spectacular. Whenever I’m in Central Florida, I make a point to visit this McDonald’s so I can relish capitalism displayed in such a fantastic fury. There is no place on earth like Central Florida because capitalism has defined it and made it what it is.
Elsewhere, where socialism injects itself, such as in public education, any unionized effort, or any government position competition is missing. This is why such efforts struggle perpetually to maintain any level of quality—because they are essentially combating nature itself attempting to fight off the effects that destroyed the U.S.S.R and every communist country in the entire world that functions with a socialist foundation. Every village in Africa where starving residents struggle to live from day-to-day is due to the regulatory limits set upon them by their village authority. Those limits may only be religious, political, emotional, or any other variation, but they do not involved competition. Village chiefs do now as they always have, attempted to drive their collective society’s desire for competition into their military so that proof of valor and manhood merit is designated to bravery on the battlefield instead of creativity in manners of business. This is the result of socialism and has been going on since before such a term had a definition.
Socialism is the easy way for the masses to avoid not feeling the pressure of competition. Socialism as we see it today in medicine, in education, and in all government would be equivalent to Universal Studios being allowed to exist without having to compete with Disney World. Another tendency of socialism is to use the power of pull to eliminate competition such as the theoretical circumstance of Universal Studios using politics to apply too many regulations selectively enforced on Disney World to attack the fact that they have a broader revenue base and force Universal Studios to perform at a higher level than they might otherwise do if they didn’t have to compete with Disney. Using politics to sap all the wealth of Disney away into nothing, Universal through socialism could eliminate their competition through regulation. This would mean McDonald’s would only have to build a normal free-standing store since Universal Studios would be the only park around, meaning McDonald’s wouldn’t have to compete with the restaurants that are in business down by Disney World in the absence of such competition, Universal could afford to do the bare minimum of everything driving up costs but dramatically lowering quality.
This is the situation with Social Security, Obama Care, the Post Office, public schools and virtually everything that socialism touches through government. Socialism allows the average to sell their services as “superior” because they have eliminated competition. This is the spirit behind every collective bargaining contract—they are socialist attempts at fairness—but the fairness comes at a cost to quality, and dynamics.
So when it is said that people want to see better things out of government, they have to reject the socialism that they are currently addicted to as a safety net to their own incompetence. It is easy to declare that the entire world should be fair, but the cost of that fairness is terrible, as it pushes society into a black hole where nothing of any good can ever escape. The grand myth by socialism lovers is that if they collectively believe in something through the power of democracy that they can deny the laws of nature, but they can’t. Their beliefs are never realized, and their commitments to socialism destroy the world for everyone instead of just the targeted well-to-dos which they rally against. It is those who are best whether it be richer, stronger, faster, or even more attractive which set the standard for all others to reach up to. Without such goal posts, society just flaps in the wind and recedes backwards. The masses may never achieve the level of greatness that comes from the best. Universal Studios may never be as great as Disney World and McDonald’s may never be a good as The T-Rex Café but it is the attempt through competition which raises the performance of all to achieve heights they otherwise would never accomplish. Before society can every become better at anything it must reject socialism and embrace capitalism—because until they do, there is no reason for the average and mediocre to attempt to be more than they currently are—to strive for greatness, and goodness in a spirit only competition can provide.
Rich Hoffman
“If they attack first………..blast em’!”
Star Wars Weekends 2013: The best the human race has to offer in one place
Every year I look forward to the Star Wars weekends at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. It is one of the wonderful opportunities for philosophy, fantasy, ingenuity and the best aspects of human nature to converge at a palace of capitalism and celebrate the existence of one of the greatest stories of all time. I love the energy, optimism, and opportunity that Star Wars offers individuals and families everywhere. Many die-hard Star Wars fans converge every year in the middle of May to attend the fabulous Star Wars Weekend events. For those who cannot attend, I offer these clips from the spectacle taken during the opening day ceremonies on Friday, May 17, 2013.
Sit back, grab a snack and enjoy the fun and pleasure of entertainment shown in the videos below!
Rich Hoffman
“If they attack first………..blast em’!”
May 17, 2013
Lakota Sings and Dances for Spina Bifida: Behind the mask of charity is the demon of public relations
One of the big problems the current White House is going through with all their scandals is due to a commitment to maintaining a positive public image instead of dealing with difficult problems. The White House is in trouble because they showed more concern about their public image than in doing what was right. Since The White House trouble is all the rage in the news at the same time the Lakota school system released their lip-dub video in dedication to Spina Bifida awareness. While watching the video I realized that Lakota was guilty of the same sins as their progressive older siblings in the federal government. I had been prepared to say good things about the video where the efforts of the entire school had been pulled together with thousands of kids involved, but as I watched the obvious attempt to cater to Ellen DeGeneres at the 8:30 mark in the video the line was crossed.
http://westchesterbuzz.com/2013/05/14/lakota-east-lip-dub-video-could-be-about-to-go-viral/
I am sure that many of the people involved in making the video believe superficially that they were working on this project in the hopes of raising money for Spina Bifida, which is a terrible ailment. The future treatment of Spina Bifida is certainly in the field of regenerative medicine and it takes money to generate that research. No human being should have to deal with the terrible conditions of Spina Bifida. However, as I’ve stated about many charity groups, often the intention is not what’s sold to the public, in much the same way that The White House has used victims of tragedy as a way to enact compassion to disguise their real intentions of increasing positive public relations. Lakota seems to be guilty of the same thing with their new video.
What I see when watching this video is a very committed attempt to shut down the entire school system, teaching the kids nothing during the filming of the video except to act in a music video. The amount of work was extensive and would have required hundreds of labor hours to decorate all those halls, coordinate the student efforts, and ultimately put on a production that is so large that Lakota could implement their stated objective of getting their effort noticed by Ellen DeGeneres. They even rented a helicopter for the crane shots! Based on what I know about the personalities behind the effort it appears to me that Lakota is using the tragic conditions of Spina Bifida as a shield gaining national exposure and the money that comes with such public relations. The money Lakota needs is to pay for heavy ended labor contracts that are about to launch the administration into a budget deficit. I wish that it wasn’t the case, but after carefully looking at the posters on the wall and the behavior of the coordination, the effort is more about public relations and appeasing Ellen DeGeneres than actually helping Spina Bifida victims.
These kinds of public relations tricks have been executed against communities for decades. The White House uses these tactics overtly because nobody would dare call them what they actually are, because the villainy is hidden behind goodness. In the case of Spina Bifida the little girl featured in the video needs help, and she needs money for research into her ailment. But if people really wanted to help, the left-leaning video organizers would contribute considerable portions of their pay-checks—especially the nearly 1000 employees at Lakota who make more than $60K per year to help Spina Bifida. Some of the people involved in that video have quarter million dollar contracts. A personal check for $1000 to $5000 goes a long way, and those school employees can afford it. But the intention of the video however was to convince “other” people to contribute “their” money while the school gets a pat on the head by a national celebrity. The school can then use that endorsement during their next levy increase campaign. I would say the same statements to those organizers that I have said to the local socialites who stick their noses in local charity efforts—just write a six figure personal check instead of buying another Florida condo, then you will have done something good for Spina Bifida and the little girl in the video. But putting up decorations all over the Lakota schools using staff members and shutting down the entire education process to film a video for a public relations effort with the intention of attracting a day-time talk show host’s airtime is public relations, not Spina Bifida awareness.
When President Obama brought in the families of the Sandy Hook shootings to Washington and gave a speech with them in the background, the President was guilty of using the tragedy of that catastrophic school shooting to advance his anti-gun policies. The situation was exacerbated when those families were encouraged to sit in the Senate balcony to apply pressure on the Senators as they voted on a proposed gun bill pushed by the Obama administration. The same type of subtle manipulation is being done by the government school of Lakota. The attempt at consensus by Lakota to use victims of Spina Bifida as an excuse to appeal to a national audience is using the mechanism of charity as a malicious and manipulative endeavor. Since altruism is generally a hand-off type of social judgment, assessment of charity value is never analyzed. It is never judged whether or not a charity event is successful or not, because only the intention is considered. This allows giant government schools like Lakota to use victims of Spina Bifida to actually gain public relations favor ahead of tax increase requests without being accused of using thousands of Lakota students and employees to illegally support school levy endeavors by hiding the intention behind a detrimental illness.
This is the danger of a government school being stuck into the center of a community and forcing property owners to contribute their money to such institutions under force. The progressive philosophy shown in the video, especially at the 8:30 mark is one that I do not support, yet I must support it because I own property near the school. And I also don’t agree with supporting an institution that exploits those who are less fortunate with the disguised need to further raise taxes. Public schools need to behave under competitive influence so that tax payers are given a choice of what kind of ideas they support, or don’t support, instead of being forced to provide thousands of private dollars in taxes to a progressive organization that thinks singing, dancing, and getting on Ellen’s television show is more important than the fundamentals of education, and living within a community established budget.
It may be considered by many to be “mean spirited” to point out such obvious schemes. But if someone really wants to help Spina Bifida, they need to put their money where their mouth is and help those who need it without seeking celebrity on television. In the case of this video, it is just a grim reminder that public education institutions see themselves as molds for a community, and they are driven by government parameters, so it is troubling to see such large conglomerations of collective effort believing that they are doing good, when the act is only an illusion. These are not the kind of messages that children should grow up believing. Even though the participants at the 8:30 mark in the video behave in such a flimsy way as part of their social act, the act itself is but one more reminder that the product produced in public schools are one of the many factors that are eroding away the ethical foundation of our present society with beliefs that are caused not for concern over Spina Bifida, but to become celebrities on Ellen with a production so big, and expensive, that nobody would dare question it.
Rich Hoffman
“If they attack first………..blast em’!”
May 16, 2013
Review of ‘Iron Man 3′: The Mandarin terrorism speaks more truth than the news wishes to admit
I saw Iron Man 3 last weekend and wanted to immediately provide a review of some kind because it was a very good film full of large concepts. The value in these comic book based stories is that they do not take themselves too serious as intellectual advancement devices. But like so many plot lines to video games these days, the writing, and concepts behind the plot are quite advanced allowing viewers to define abstract concepts in mythological dialogue that the human brain understands as a truth obtained no other way. When it is wondered why the Marvel films are doing such magnificent business it is not because of the great performances of Robert Downey Jr., or any of the primary actors, but because the bizarre plot lines have within them a truth that unifies all the fragmented evidence society is exposed to and presents the information in a way that makes sense.
But before going too far down the rabbit hole, let’s get the typical stuff out-of-the-way. Is Robert Downey Jr., worth the $50 million dollars he is getting to play Iron Man in these films? I’d say no. If it were me making the decision at Marvel Comics and Disney on how to pay Downey for Avengers 2, I would write Downey out of the story and let him sit it out for a film or two so that his agent does not have the contract leverage to continue driving up the labor costs. By paying Downey so much money, which I don’t think even he thinks he’s worth, it sets a dangerous standard that the other Avenger actors will expect in equality under the ridiculous standards of collective bargaining, and could wreck the magic of these films in the future. If Iron Man or an Iron Man type of character needs to appear in The Avengers 2 let it just be the suit with another actor doing the voice of Downey, or make it the Iron Patriot instead of Iron Man. Let Avengers 2 make a lot of money without Downey to take away the leverage and keep the budget under control—otherwise the Marvel films as a financial formula could be wrecked as the parasites of the entertainment industry will seek to concentrate on collective bargaining as a way to increase their own looting percentages. Downey’s performance as Tony Stark in the Iron Man films is brilliant, and I laughed out loud several times during Iron Man 3, but that performance is not worth $50 million dollars or more. I’d center the next Avenger film around another character and if the actors don’t come down in their prices, make it more about The Hulk as a CGI character to cut down the screen time of the other actors and call the bluff of the agents trying to increase payroll for the actors to over $200 million alone—as everyone now expects a Marvel Comics movie to pull in at least $1 billion at the box office. With that said I don’t think any other actor could have played Tony Stark as brilliantly as Downey did. The range of emotions Robert Downey Jr., performed in Iron Man 3 ranged from dealing with genius scientists, mechanical robots, romantic interactions, maniacal terrorists, to the innocence of young children—all done with comedic overtones. It was unique, and fun to watch. In spite of the money demands Iron Man 3 will place as a danger to contract negotiations between Downey and future films, I think all the parties will work out the situation in time and snap back into reality allowing Iron Man to return to the big screen played by Robert Downey Jr. I think Downey understands the situation and will do the right thing in the end giving kids more of his Iron Man.
What set this Iron Man 3 film apart from other movies of the same basic design was the way they portrayed the villain, The Mandarin, played by Ben Kingsley. As I read the reviews of Iron Man 3 and saw that so many young people were having a hard time accepting who and what the Mandarin was as a bad guy, I had to laugh a bit. Many people seeing Iron Man 3 had hoped that The Mandarin would be a villain of epic James Bond capacity, a treacherous villain worthy of being far superior to Tony Stark in order to drive tension into the film’s narrative. Instead The Mandarin was simply an actor hired to play a terrorist by the real terrorists who were working behind the scenes of a well-intended campaign to end human misery by re-growing lost limbs from victims of unfortunate tragedies. The real villains in Iron Man 3 were brilliant wide-eyed scientists and politicians who wanted to help the world, not destroy it. They simply desired to “nudge” society into compliance with their vision. This conspiracy went all the way into the President of the United States own administration and was handled very well by the writing and direction of Shane Black. Considering that Iron Man 3 was being filmed and finished in post-production after the events of the real life Aurora shooting, Sandy Hook, and Benghazi, the plot of Iron Man 3 was incredibly insightful. The difficulty with the various conspiracy theories involved in all those real life tragedies is to assemble them logically with the information that can be known. Figuring out what happened is not easy as it’s like trying to assemble a puzzle where someone has stolen most of the pieces and then tried to figure out what the picture on the puzzle was without most of it being put together.
Most people know or feel that the government as a self-preserving entity will knowingly derail information from the public which leads to all the wild speculations generated about the real intentions of a terrorist act. Even to this very day, conspiracy theorists are ridiculed by the government and their public relations machines for even asking good questions about what really happened in the 9/11 tragedy calling them “truthers.” This leaves people afraid to openly state their opinions, which is the design of the derogatory designation forcing society to relegate their opinions to themselves. Yet fantasy films like Iron Man tackle those conspiracies head on with creativity and attempt to assemble the missing puzzle pieces with some form of logic, and this is why films like Iron Man, and the Batman films are doing such ROBUST box office business. There is a truth in Iron Man that has more meaning for society than 24 hours of watching Fox News.
I watched an interesting interview from Bill O’Reilly a few days ago where he was confused by the enormous business that Iron Man was producing in sheer box office dollars. O’Reilly like all the other news makers of the day wants to believe that Iron Man 3 is good just because of the great performance of Robert Downey Jr. But it’s not. Iron Man 3 is about terrorism and radical extremists, something we all deal with everywhere in the world. Yet the way the terrorism angle was dealt with in Iron Man 3 was likely much more truthful than the typical plotline of any other blockbuster film. We all expected The Mandarin in Iron Man 3 to be a ruthless terrorist like Osama bin Laden, or Saddam Hussein—a mastermind, and ruthless despot. But when Tony Stark discovered who the real Mandarin truly was, he found that he was just an actor who has been playing the part of a terrorist in exchange for drugs—as he’s a recovering addict. That is the reason behind the success of Iron Man 3 and films like it.
Even in the wild over-the-top plot lines of The Avengers, the idea of aliens attacking earth through a wormhole has more plausibility than many of the plot lines that our society is fed by statist oriented governments who seek to placate the public with disinformation and manipulation in order to advance their version of solutions against the will of the people they represent. There is more truth in simple comic book stories than in any other plausible explanation, and this is not just a diabolical tragedy, but a stunning revelation. The magic of a story like Iron Man 3 is that it puts the plausible concept in the mind of the viewer so that rational emphasis can be added to actual reality. In the case of Iron Man 3, the storyline is unlikely, but the scenario of how the terrorists were able to get into the president’s own administration and manipulate vast sums of people with the fear “they” created with the fictional character in The Mandarin has roots in reality. The intention of the Mandarin was to get the eyes of the American public to look toward China or the Mideast for the source of the terrorist threat, not to Miami, Florida in a crack house filled with whores and a burnt out actor who had been hired by the terrorists to play a terrorist.
Iron Man 3 reminded me of a typical action film from the 80s in most other regards. I did not think the special effects where outrageously great. I thought the ending was telegraphed and was average. Coming out of the theater I asked Doc Thompson what he thought of the film from The Blaze and he said that he liked it, but that it was an average film—technically. He gave it 6 out of 10, which I tend to agree with. I would give it a bit higher score based on Downey’s performance alone. But the film is much better if the context is considered by the explanation of many conspiracies. It is in this explanation, or plausible one, that the Marvel movies thrive so boldly. There is truth in these fictions that is more relevant than the truth offered in real life that often turns out to be fiction. This is why Iron Man 3 has made nearly $1 billion dollars in just two weeks at theaters. As wonderful as Downey’s performance was, it is the plots that drive the heroics, and that rests in the hands of Stan Lee from Marvel Comics.
I read a lot of heavy material, and I often balance out all that weighty stuff with comic books to ease my mind and relax. In fact, for my 25th wedding anniversary my wife bought me a comic book. I like to read them, which only takes about 10 minutes, but I often enjoy just looking at the pictures which contain the visions of the authors and effort of their imaginations. They are often simplified outlooks at reality but occasionally, there are very sophisticated concepts that are approached in comics which can’t be explored in the deepest work of Carl Jung. I read recently a very good editorial from Dave Marshall at Dark Horse Comics in January of 2013 titled “Everyone Needs Stories.” Below are the first couple of paragraphs that remind me of why Iron Man 3 is so successful.
Too often stories can be taken for granted, bundled away as frivolous entertainment, but it only takes glancing at a newspaper, opening a book (nonfiction included), or having a conversation to see that storytelling is an inexorable part of communication, which in turn is an inexorable part of the human experience.
Stories are everywhere, yet our thirst for them remains unquenchable. We even consume products masquerading as stories in nearly immeasurable quantities if they are convenient, as our need is so present and demanding. This fact informs my work every day. I strive to contribute to books that give people the stories they need, with truthful characters who navigate authentic emotional experience in an intricately realized world, as opposed to merely growing the heaps of false stories, with motorized characters clicking through their roles in a mechanical plot, designed to lure people in and produce a predictable result (usually additional purchases).
When a story gives people what they need it becomes a part of them, integrating into their attitudes and ideas, and expressing itself in infinite ways, some of which the comics community knows well.
Dave Marshall, editor of Dark Horse Comics
Marshall is right, everyone does need stories, but not the kind that are produced in public relation firms and pumped out to keep the society at large in the dark as to the real truth of a matter. They need stories that can take the motivations of well-intended individuals and make them into treacherous monsters which is what Iron Man 3 is all about. It’s a fantastic story that has more relevance than the nightly news, and more truth than a White House press conference. As whimsical as Iron Man 3 is, it is more honest than the speech of a typical politician or government spokesperson, and that is why business is so good with comic book movies. They are not successful because kids and adults alike are escaping reality and reliving their childhoods through the characters actors like Robert Downey Jr., create, but because the stories are truthful, and honest about the human condition in a way that no other endeavor attempts to tackle. In that regard, Iron Man 3 is a 10 out of 10 and a movie that should be seen by everyone in every corner of the globe. And yet again, Stan Lee deserves a tip of the hat to his tenacious creations and ruthless honesty.
Rich Hoffman
“If they attack first………..blast em’!”
May 15, 2013
“To Walk in the Woods Where There is No Path”: Understanding the need to live a little dangerously
I am not used to as of yet reading through arguments where people I don’t know quote things I have said to validate their opinions. Yet I ran across just such a quote by accident seen below from my 2004 Symposium of Justice novel.
“Walk in the woods where there is no path. Live in conflict with those that are superior to you. You will learn, hopefully not too late, that life’s greatest fruits come to those who live a little dangerously. You’ll also find that if you make batters work for a hit, they’ll respect you more as a pitcher. If they get a home run off of you, it will mean more if they earn it.”
- Rich Hoffman, The Symposium of Justice.
I often write the things I do and move on to the next topic never thinking about what impact those statements might have on a reader. I simply offer the words in hopes of provoking thought in those who place their eyes upon my work. I told recently the story of how Peter Facinelli and I came to work on a project together and it all started with us meeting at a film festival. I was at that film festival because a college professor had read my book and wanted to do a film version of the story which matched my own intentions, so he came to my house for a weekend of picking at my thoughts regarding his screenplay version of my novel.
While staying with me during this visit, he continued to compare my work to Nietzsche extensively, which I thought was nice, but not relevant. I made only a passing reference to Nietzsche in The Symposium, but he had taken the dialogue to a whole animated level, which I thought was out of some inner need to attached meaning in his life to important things collected by his mind for the benefit of inner mythology. So I dismissed his appreciation for my work and instead wanted to focus on the shooting schedule for his film and how we would go about it. In my mind I had moved on from the intellectual concepts and onto something productive. That probably has something to do with why he was so shattered when I told him he was a terrible film director when he missed our film festival deadline with footage that was too dark, poorly cut together and virtually worthless. For me, it was just business. I didn’t think at the time that the entire reason he wanted to make the film in the first place was that The Symposium had an effect on him, and he wanted to live out a fantasy of becoming a film director with material he felt passionate about.
At another event that I was at a few years later, I had a fan who wanted my autograph and a picture because The Symposium of Justice had impacted him in such a way. As a person who never seeks autographs or pictures next to celebrities I wasn’t sure what all the hoopla was about. I had recently just returned from Los Angeles where I did the thing with Facinelli and noticed that everyone was taking pictures next to everyone else. So I stood next to whomever wanted to stand next to me for a picture. I didn’t understand it, but I played along. The good thing about Peter is that he made a point to drive me back to my hotel each day after the film shoot, so when we were in the car away from the set I asked him if he got tired of all the celebrity stuff. He laughed and said that he did sometimes, but that it was a necessary part of the job. So when I was at an event promoting the completion of my Symposium project called The Overman I signed autographs and posed for pictures playing along still not sure why anybody would want to do such a thing. An article about that event can be seen from a Yahoo News piece shown below.
JAMESTOWN, OH – Award-winning screen writer, author and stunt performer Rich Hoffman brought his most recent independent film project to Greene County, Ohio in March. Hoffman, originally from Middletown, Ohio, teamed up with Gery L. Deer, managing director of GLD Enterprises & Productions of Jamestown, to make a film that combines live action with the latest in high-definition computer generated imaging.
It took more than 12 hours to film the live action for the five-minute film short. Post production will take more than a month to complete and the film is scheduled to be released following its premier at the 2009 Indie Gathering independent film festival, August 14 in Cleveland.
The script is based on characters in situations introduced in Hoffman’s dark, futuristic, action novel, “The Symposium of Justice,” released in 2004. The project is professed to be on the cutting edge of digital video effects.
“Rich had an ambitious production schedule and a deadline that required us to do a great deal of work in a very short time,” said Deer, who is best known locally for his work as an independent journalist and entertainer but is also an experienced stunt performer and producer. “We had everything he needed to meet the production goals and, I have to say, short of a Star Wars movie, I have never seen so much green screen material in one place before; it was quite impressive.” All of the sets and background effects will be added in post production.
Green screen is a common term referring to the Chroma key technique used for mixing two images or frames together on film. In Chroma key, a color from one image is removed or made transparent revealing another image behind. This technique is also referred to as color keying, color-separation overlay, and bluescreen.
This process has been used for many years on weather broadcasts, where the presenter appears to be standing in front of a map, but in the studio it is actually a large blue or green background. In film and television production, the process is used to enhance visual effects or reduce costs on set construction.
Actors working on a green screen set perform among green-colored set pieces and backdrops. In post production, specialized computer software recognizes the green tinted background and makes it transparent and replacing it with digital effects. The actors, set pieces and props then appear to be in whatever setting required. Recent films like “300,” “Sin City,” and “Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow,” have used this process to create both characters and settings.
Everyone is donating their time to this independent film project, as so many Hollywood-based productions are doing today. GLD Enterprises & Productions provided the production facility and set crew and stunt performers for filming the live action as well as various engineering and technical services.
The hope is that the final product will draw new business for the cast and crew in this sluggish economy where production capital is hard to raise. “This will be a great way to show what our group can do,” said Hoffman. Fortunately, Deer and Hoffman came into the project with an impressive track record.
In 2006, Hoffman’s script, “The Lost Cannibals of Cahokia,” won the highest award possible for a feature screenplay in the horror category at the Indie Gathering international film festival in Cleveland. Since then Hoffman has continued to develop other projects and recently returned from Hollywood where he worked on another independent production as a stuntman and fire whip specialist. A fire whip is a Kevlar bullwhip which is soaked in a specially formulated combustible fuel used for the visual effect.
Deer’s resume includes multiple performance and contest awards and work as a property consultant and designer for the 2003 Universal Studios movie, “The Rundown,” as well as roles in several independent film productions. A writer, whip stunt coach, publicist, and voiceover artist, Deer has been featured on television programs like NBC’s America’s Got Talent and The Bonnie Hunt Show. Deer is also a registered Writers Guild of America screenwriter.
The work was done on a closed set and the details of the script have been kept secret pending the outcome of the film competitions No title has been released at this time. To see photos or get more information about the project go online to www.gldentertainment.com and click on Hoffman Collaboration.
Source http://voices.yahoo.com/ohio-production-company-plays-major-role-futuristic-3151948.html
I had to finish what that director had started which is what The Overman was all about. In reality it turned out to be a sample of firewhip work against greenscreen to demonstrate how those two technologies could be incorporated. We had to shoot all those scenes outside because of the fire and the intense light from the fire making keying in colors during post-production a nightmare, but it worked well and was an award-winning effort.
The purpose of all this is that I wrote The Symposium of Justice from the heart, and many people came to enjoy it, but I moved on to the next phases of my life without looking back much or taking much time to consider what impact that novel had on people. It does make me feel good that so many people enjoyed it, and wanted to work with me just to be near the person who wrote the words.
Now it is equally strange for me to see quotes of my novel appearing here and there as validation to philosophical positions which is a strange sensation—and I think I like it. I enjoy it in the same way that The Symposium gave me access to people and places that I wouldn’t have enjoyed any other way but to put a story out to the world which touched lives in ways that you always hope for.
I might have been too hard on that film professor—(wanna’ be film director). He wanted to make the film because he wanted to bring The Symposium to life even though he lacked the emotional tools to do so. As more and more people go to the trouble of using aspects of my work to support their growing understanding, I will make an effort to be more facilitating of their expanding horizons. And if that involves a keepsake, or memento such as an autograph, I will make the effort not to appear so stand-offish.
Rich Hoffman
“If they attack first………..blast em’!”
