As I Please III
Recent events forced me to take an unscheduled sabbatical from this blog, thus depriving the great masses of my insight (coughs) for something like six weeks. How they survived I don't know, but now that I'm back, I have a few random observations to make, and nothing says "random observations" like the As I Please column. In case you've forgotten, or never cared in the first place, "As I Please" was a format invented by George Orwell about 80 years ago which I have shamelessly stolen. So without further ado, here I go....
* ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD is the first Quentin Tarantino movie I have seen since 1994's PULP FICTION that I actually enjoyed. One movie reviewer described it as "a glorious love letter to the movies," but it is actually a glorious love letter to late 1960s Hollywood, which is not quite the same thing.
Although the movie lacks a plot, and is as self-indulgent and occasionally boring as every other Tarantino film, it is missing the gleeful, capering sadism (including the sexual sadism) of just about every other movie he has ever made. The cinematography is lush without being distracting, and his reconstruction of 60s Los Angeles is impressive. Brad Pitt is unusually charismatic, grounded and likable in his role as tough-stuntman-turned-humble-gofer Cliff Booth, but Leonardo DiCaprio stuns as fading actor Rick Dalton, an insecure drunk trying to force a second wind into his flagging career. Both characters are sides of an archetypal coin I have had a chance to examine up close lo, these last 12-plus years: a coin that represents those who have spent their lives in the movie industry onlt to discover, in middle age, that it doesn't love them and won't remember them when they are gone.
* One distressing effect of COVID-19, the "novel coronavirus," is to make everyone an expert about epidemiology. People who, a few months ago, were insisting essential oils were as effective as vaccines against, say polio or rubella, are now calmly dispensing wisdom about how to avoid getting this unusually nasty strain of the flu. Since the later 90s, I have oft witnessed this phenomenon among Americans: a belief that reading a newspaper article, hopping onto Wikipedia, or watching a few YouTube videos or participating in a Reddit thread make them experts on a subject which, moments ago, they knew nothing about and cared even less. The ordinary person becomes an instant expert on everything from military tactics to the efficiacy of psychological profiles at the drop of a figurative hat. If this were merely annoying I would not comment about it, but in the case of an infectious disease it is downright dangerous. We have already seen the direct effect of the anti-vax movement; rumor-mongering and pseudo-science cost lives. In this case it could cost them in very large numbers indeed. America has plenty of doctors, scientists and public health officials who actually know what they are talking about. Listen to them (Mike Pence, not so much).
* The disastrous failure of Mike Bloomberg's presidential campaign is immensely satisfying to a very broad spectrum of Americans regardless of political affiliation. This has less to do with feelings about how Bloomberg might or might not have functioned as president than with his naked and completely shameless attempt to simply purchase the office. Say what you want about Trump, and I have, but he did not buy his presidency. However dull and insensate Americans have become in regards to grasping the behaviors necessary to avoid sliding into dictatorship or oligarchy, we still seem to understand that a tycoon with unlimited money should not simply be able to purchase the presidency like so many pounds of cheese.
* Speaking of Trump, I hope he is happy to have systematically destroyed or dismantled most of the governmental apparatus which was in place to fight global pandemics just like COVID-19. His obsession with destroying everything Obama touched, which seems to have been rooted equally in spite and some vague, unfocused desire to placate parts of his Obama-hating base, cased him to...well, I don't normally go for block quotes, but here is an article from FORBES that sums up his actions nicely:
The Trump administration recently requested $2.5 billion in emergency funds to prepare the U.S. for a possible widespread outbreak of coronavirus. Critics, though, are pointing out that money might not be necessary if the administration hadn’t spent the past two years largely dismantling government units that were designed to protect against pandemics.
The cuts started in 2018, as the White House focused on eliminating funding to Obama-era disease security programs. In March of that year, Rear Adm. Timothy Ziemer, whose job it was to lead the U.S. response in the event of a pandemic, abruptly left the administration and his global health security team was disbanded.
That same year, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) was forced to slash its efforts to prevent global disease outbreak by 80% as its funding for the program began to run out. The agency, at the time, opted to focus on 10 priority countries and scale back in others, including China.
Also cut was the Complex Crises Fund, a $30 million emergency response pool that was at the secretary of state’s disposal to deploy disease experts and others in the event of a crisis. (The fund was created by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.)
Overall in 2018, Trump called for $15 billion in reduced health spending that had previously been approved, as he looked at increasing budget deficits, cutting the global disease-fighting budgets of the CDC, National Security Council (NSC), Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and Health and Human Services (HHS) in the process.
* I was going to write an uninformed rant about how irritating it is when someone who runs for their party's nomination for president, and fails, always "suspends their campaign" instead of formally dropping out. I assumed this was simply a petulant refusal to admit defeat. However, I took the 5 minutes necessary to find a credible source on the subject, and learned that if a candidate suspends their candidacy instead of dropping it, they can continue to raise funds to pay off their campaign debts, and also retain control of any delegates they have aquired in the primaries come convention-time. By taking these five minutes I learned something important and avoided looking stupid, two things I generally enjoy.
* Speaking of petulant refusals to admit defeat: Deontay Wilder recently lost his heavyweight titles to Tyson "The Gypsy King" Fury by seventh-round knockout. Unlike their first fight, this one was a blowout: Fury beat the brakes off Wilder, knocked him down multiple times, half-closed his eye, busted his lip and turned his ear into a blood-faucet. It was a flat-out ass-kicking, but after the loss, Wilder blamed his defeat not on the vastly superior boxing skills of Fury, but on a ridiculous 45-lb lighted costume, complete with crown, helmet and body armor, which he wore during his ring entrance. This costume, which Wilder referred to as "my uniform," supposedly tired out his legs during the short walk from dressing room to ring apron. Now, I have followed combat sports of all types since the 1980s and have heard a lot of excuses for defeats, but this one may actually take the cake. Wilder trains in a 45-lb vest and is known for his freakish ability to carry his knockout power into the later rounds of fights. To blame his costume for his defeat almost certainly guarantees he will be defeated again when he meets Fury for a third time this summer. To admit a mistake is the first and most important step in never repeating it, but it is an art which seems to be dying out in the world. (See the apology Trump never made about gutting our health organizations just before a global pandemic)
* The murder of rapper Nipsey Hussle and the death of NBA legend Kobe Bryant both prompted massive outpourings of public grief, especially here in Los Angeles, where both made their names and fortunes. I did take note, however, of some bitter remarks to the effect that "every time we (black folk) get some success, they (white folk) take it away from us." I shouldn't have to comment on the stupidity of this observation as it pertains to these two particular deaths, but I will anyway. Nipsey Hussle, at the time of his death, was still an active member of the Rollin' Sixties (Neighborhood) Crip set, the largest and one of the most violent of all Crip sets in L.A., and he was murdered by another Rollin' 60, i.e. by a fellow black man and gangbanger. In a sense, he died the way he lived -- violently, while still claiming gang affiliation. Kobe Bryant died in a helicopter accident caused, evidently, by bad weather and possibly pilot error, a tragedy which was nonetheless the sort of death only a very wealthy man could possibly suffer. The need some people have to put individual, personal tragedies into some broader, conspiratorial context is one of the salient features of our age and shows how little some people have actually changed within their own minds as the world changes around them.
* Every now and again I'm asked how I feel about reading bad reviews of my work. My answer is always twofold and the same: Firstly, and just to state the facts, I have had very, very few bad reviews in my writing career, so it has yet to become a factor in my daily life. Second, it's my strong feeling that anyone who actually pays to read my work has the right to speak their mind about it, and while I'd prefer they keep their claws in their sheaths and be diplomatic, it's not for me to tell them to do so. I rarely hold back in my own reviews of films, books, albums and so forth, so why should others be asked to do so when dealing with my work? Provided there are no libelous or slanderous claims made against me, have it it, if you feel the need. What's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.
* Building on this, I'd like to register how much I hate the character of Rose Tico in the latest STAR WARS trilogy and how little I am intimidated by the effort to classify criticism of this character or the actress who portrays her as racist, sexist, or any other "-ist." I have no ill will toward Kelly Marie Tran, but she's a terrible actress, and even if she wasn't, the character of Rose Tico is so poorly conceived and poorly written that she was almost certainly unsalvageable regardless of who portrayed her. I mean, really, if Al Pacino or Denzel Washington had portrayed Jar Jar Binks, would the character have been less annoying? Have we really reached a point where a woman or a person of color is immune from criticism on that basis alone? Because it seems to me that is simply sexism and racism by another name. Correct me if I am wrong, but the goal we are working towards as a society is the day when people are judged entirely on performance and character, yes? How can we do that if we have different sets of rules based on things like sex, gender, age, race and ethnicity?
* David Roback, half the driving force behind the legendary band Mazzy Star, died the other day from cancer at the age of only 61. A little over a year ago I had a chance to see one of the (so it turned out to be) final performances of this wonderful group at the Majestic Theater in Ventura, California. It had been an ambition of mine to see them play live since the summer of 1994, when I heard "Fade Into You" on the radio, and it was well worth the wait. I intend to write more fully about the impact of Roback upon my life, and the lives of countless others, very soon, so I will just say here that it was a great privilege to be one of his fans, and I will always hold his music very dear indeed.
And with that I wrap up both this installment of my blog and the As I Please column. I'm sorry for my absence, but sometimes life gets in the way of writing -- even for a writer.
* ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD is the first Quentin Tarantino movie I have seen since 1994's PULP FICTION that I actually enjoyed. One movie reviewer described it as "a glorious love letter to the movies," but it is actually a glorious love letter to late 1960s Hollywood, which is not quite the same thing.
Although the movie lacks a plot, and is as self-indulgent and occasionally boring as every other Tarantino film, it is missing the gleeful, capering sadism (including the sexual sadism) of just about every other movie he has ever made. The cinematography is lush without being distracting, and his reconstruction of 60s Los Angeles is impressive. Brad Pitt is unusually charismatic, grounded and likable in his role as tough-stuntman-turned-humble-gofer Cliff Booth, but Leonardo DiCaprio stuns as fading actor Rick Dalton, an insecure drunk trying to force a second wind into his flagging career. Both characters are sides of an archetypal coin I have had a chance to examine up close lo, these last 12-plus years: a coin that represents those who have spent their lives in the movie industry onlt to discover, in middle age, that it doesn't love them and won't remember them when they are gone.
* One distressing effect of COVID-19, the "novel coronavirus," is to make everyone an expert about epidemiology. People who, a few months ago, were insisting essential oils were as effective as vaccines against, say polio or rubella, are now calmly dispensing wisdom about how to avoid getting this unusually nasty strain of the flu. Since the later 90s, I have oft witnessed this phenomenon among Americans: a belief that reading a newspaper article, hopping onto Wikipedia, or watching a few YouTube videos or participating in a Reddit thread make them experts on a subject which, moments ago, they knew nothing about and cared even less. The ordinary person becomes an instant expert on everything from military tactics to the efficiacy of psychological profiles at the drop of a figurative hat. If this were merely annoying I would not comment about it, but in the case of an infectious disease it is downright dangerous. We have already seen the direct effect of the anti-vax movement; rumor-mongering and pseudo-science cost lives. In this case it could cost them in very large numbers indeed. America has plenty of doctors, scientists and public health officials who actually know what they are talking about. Listen to them (Mike Pence, not so much).
* The disastrous failure of Mike Bloomberg's presidential campaign is immensely satisfying to a very broad spectrum of Americans regardless of political affiliation. This has less to do with feelings about how Bloomberg might or might not have functioned as president than with his naked and completely shameless attempt to simply purchase the office. Say what you want about Trump, and I have, but he did not buy his presidency. However dull and insensate Americans have become in regards to grasping the behaviors necessary to avoid sliding into dictatorship or oligarchy, we still seem to understand that a tycoon with unlimited money should not simply be able to purchase the presidency like so many pounds of cheese.
* Speaking of Trump, I hope he is happy to have systematically destroyed or dismantled most of the governmental apparatus which was in place to fight global pandemics just like COVID-19. His obsession with destroying everything Obama touched, which seems to have been rooted equally in spite and some vague, unfocused desire to placate parts of his Obama-hating base, cased him to...well, I don't normally go for block quotes, but here is an article from FORBES that sums up his actions nicely:
The Trump administration recently requested $2.5 billion in emergency funds to prepare the U.S. for a possible widespread outbreak of coronavirus. Critics, though, are pointing out that money might not be necessary if the administration hadn’t spent the past two years largely dismantling government units that were designed to protect against pandemics.
The cuts started in 2018, as the White House focused on eliminating funding to Obama-era disease security programs. In March of that year, Rear Adm. Timothy Ziemer, whose job it was to lead the U.S. response in the event of a pandemic, abruptly left the administration and his global health security team was disbanded.
That same year, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) was forced to slash its efforts to prevent global disease outbreak by 80% as its funding for the program began to run out. The agency, at the time, opted to focus on 10 priority countries and scale back in others, including China.
Also cut was the Complex Crises Fund, a $30 million emergency response pool that was at the secretary of state’s disposal to deploy disease experts and others in the event of a crisis. (The fund was created by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.)
Overall in 2018, Trump called for $15 billion in reduced health spending that had previously been approved, as he looked at increasing budget deficits, cutting the global disease-fighting budgets of the CDC, National Security Council (NSC), Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and Health and Human Services (HHS) in the process.
* I was going to write an uninformed rant about how irritating it is when someone who runs for their party's nomination for president, and fails, always "suspends their campaign" instead of formally dropping out. I assumed this was simply a petulant refusal to admit defeat. However, I took the 5 minutes necessary to find a credible source on the subject, and learned that if a candidate suspends their candidacy instead of dropping it, they can continue to raise funds to pay off their campaign debts, and also retain control of any delegates they have aquired in the primaries come convention-time. By taking these five minutes I learned something important and avoided looking stupid, two things I generally enjoy.
* Speaking of petulant refusals to admit defeat: Deontay Wilder recently lost his heavyweight titles to Tyson "The Gypsy King" Fury by seventh-round knockout. Unlike their first fight, this one was a blowout: Fury beat the brakes off Wilder, knocked him down multiple times, half-closed his eye, busted his lip and turned his ear into a blood-faucet. It was a flat-out ass-kicking, but after the loss, Wilder blamed his defeat not on the vastly superior boxing skills of Fury, but on a ridiculous 45-lb lighted costume, complete with crown, helmet and body armor, which he wore during his ring entrance. This costume, which Wilder referred to as "my uniform," supposedly tired out his legs during the short walk from dressing room to ring apron. Now, I have followed combat sports of all types since the 1980s and have heard a lot of excuses for defeats, but this one may actually take the cake. Wilder trains in a 45-lb vest and is known for his freakish ability to carry his knockout power into the later rounds of fights. To blame his costume for his defeat almost certainly guarantees he will be defeated again when he meets Fury for a third time this summer. To admit a mistake is the first and most important step in never repeating it, but it is an art which seems to be dying out in the world. (See the apology Trump never made about gutting our health organizations just before a global pandemic)
* The murder of rapper Nipsey Hussle and the death of NBA legend Kobe Bryant both prompted massive outpourings of public grief, especially here in Los Angeles, where both made their names and fortunes. I did take note, however, of some bitter remarks to the effect that "every time we (black folk) get some success, they (white folk) take it away from us." I shouldn't have to comment on the stupidity of this observation as it pertains to these two particular deaths, but I will anyway. Nipsey Hussle, at the time of his death, was still an active member of the Rollin' Sixties (Neighborhood) Crip set, the largest and one of the most violent of all Crip sets in L.A., and he was murdered by another Rollin' 60, i.e. by a fellow black man and gangbanger. In a sense, he died the way he lived -- violently, while still claiming gang affiliation. Kobe Bryant died in a helicopter accident caused, evidently, by bad weather and possibly pilot error, a tragedy which was nonetheless the sort of death only a very wealthy man could possibly suffer. The need some people have to put individual, personal tragedies into some broader, conspiratorial context is one of the salient features of our age and shows how little some people have actually changed within their own minds as the world changes around them.
* Every now and again I'm asked how I feel about reading bad reviews of my work. My answer is always twofold and the same: Firstly, and just to state the facts, I have had very, very few bad reviews in my writing career, so it has yet to become a factor in my daily life. Second, it's my strong feeling that anyone who actually pays to read my work has the right to speak their mind about it, and while I'd prefer they keep their claws in their sheaths and be diplomatic, it's not for me to tell them to do so. I rarely hold back in my own reviews of films, books, albums and so forth, so why should others be asked to do so when dealing with my work? Provided there are no libelous or slanderous claims made against me, have it it, if you feel the need. What's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.
* Building on this, I'd like to register how much I hate the character of Rose Tico in the latest STAR WARS trilogy and how little I am intimidated by the effort to classify criticism of this character or the actress who portrays her as racist, sexist, or any other "-ist." I have no ill will toward Kelly Marie Tran, but she's a terrible actress, and even if she wasn't, the character of Rose Tico is so poorly conceived and poorly written that she was almost certainly unsalvageable regardless of who portrayed her. I mean, really, if Al Pacino or Denzel Washington had portrayed Jar Jar Binks, would the character have been less annoying? Have we really reached a point where a woman or a person of color is immune from criticism on that basis alone? Because it seems to me that is simply sexism and racism by another name. Correct me if I am wrong, but the goal we are working towards as a society is the day when people are judged entirely on performance and character, yes? How can we do that if we have different sets of rules based on things like sex, gender, age, race and ethnicity?
* David Roback, half the driving force behind the legendary band Mazzy Star, died the other day from cancer at the age of only 61. A little over a year ago I had a chance to see one of the (so it turned out to be) final performances of this wonderful group at the Majestic Theater in Ventura, California. It had been an ambition of mine to see them play live since the summer of 1994, when I heard "Fade Into You" on the radio, and it was well worth the wait. I intend to write more fully about the impact of Roback upon my life, and the lives of countless others, very soon, so I will just say here that it was a great privilege to be one of his fans, and I will always hold his music very dear indeed.
And with that I wrap up both this installment of my blog and the As I Please column. I'm sorry for my absence, but sometimes life gets in the way of writing -- even for a writer.
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ANTAGONY: BECAUSE EVERYONE IS ENTITLED TO MY OPINION
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