Month: December 2015

The ‘Legend of Tarzan’ trailer.

Two reasons why I’m not entirely despondent over them doing another Tarzan movie.

First, Samuel L. Jackson is in it.  Second: “The film begins years after the man once known as Tarzan (Skarsgård) left the jungles of Africa behind for a gentrified life as John Clayton III, Lord Greystoke, with his beloved wife, Jane (Robbie) at his side. Now, he has been invited back to the Congo to serve as a trade emissary of Parliament, unaware that he is a pawn in a deadly convergence of greed and revenge, masterminded by the Belgian, Captain Leon Rom (Waltz).”

…You cannot be too over-the-top when describing conditions in the Belgian Congo.  They could pour blood on the movie screen for two solid hours and it’d still be not as bad as what actually happened in that unhappy land*. It’s actually an excellent choice of location and bad guy for a movie like this, because while modern critiques of European colonialism may sometimes need to be a bit more nuanced than they actually are, there was precisely nothing nuanced about the colonialism inflicted on the Belgian Congo.  So, hey, maybe the movie won’t suck.

Moe Lane

*Belgium should be expressly forbidden from ever expressing an opinion on human rights violations, ever again.  Or at least until after I’m dead of old age.  I’m a reasonable man, after all.

What you need to know about that Boston operator-less subway train joyride.

This is when I particularly miss my dad: he would have had a memorable response to this story about a Boston subway train that went on a joyride without the operator. A lot of people freaked out about the report of ‘tampering,’ but speaking as the son and grandson of railroad men, let me explain: there was tampering, but it wasn’t malicious.  Specifically, the operator tied down the deadman’s switch so that he wouldn’t have to keep holding on to the damned thing all day.  And, yes, I’m guessing – but the operator in question was a twenty-five-year man, so it’s informed guessing. A guy like that probably figures that he knows when to break the safety rules… and, to be honest? Most of the time, he’d probably have been right.

So… probably no terrorism and probably no elaborate plot. The guy just didn’t unhook the cord before he checked out the tracks, that’s all.  That’s also pretty dumba*s, to evoke my late, sincerely lamented father – but at least it wasn’t evil.

The REAL reason why Dan Pfeiffer is going from politics to GoFundMe.

Oh, sorry, background, blah blah blah…

…the main reason I moved my life to Chicago in the dead of winter to work for Barack Obama was because I believed deeply in his message that individuals working together can change their country. And it is that exact sentiment that has led me to join GoFundMe this week as the Vice President of Communications and Policy.

All very pretty and forward-looking, no doubt. But there’s this other, little detail: this is not going to be a good year to be a Democratic strategist.  Dan Pfeiffer, no doubt much like David Plouffe (who has likewise fled politics for corporate influence-peddling* at Uber) would like to not have a stinging loss on his political resume.  Besides: Hillary Clinton probably wants to eat Pfeiffer’s liver. Raw.  And I will admit, she has reasons for that desire.

Moe Lane

PS: Yeah, sure, we’re gonna lose, no doubt. Still… lots of people on the Other Side are bailing out of The Life, here. Not a good sign for the Democrats.

*I’d more ticked off about that, except Uber has turned out to be an awesome service that has made my life easier on several occasions.  I am allowing myself this little hypocrisy.  And I feel no shame about it.

Democrats demand the return of subsidized liberal propaganda programs.

Gee, it doesn’t sound quite so reasonable when I put it that way, huh?

House Democrats are adding a controversial new demand to the government funding talks: ending a 19-year old ban on gun violence research by the federal government.

Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) announced Thursday that Democrats will insist that the research ban be removed from law as part of the $1.1 trillion omnibus that Congress needs to pass by next week to fund the government.

…Or what, Nancy? You gonna shut down the government or something? Count the damn votes, madam. Spoiler warning: you don’t have a majority in the House.  You haven’t had one in four years. And when you did have one you threw it away on passing Obamacare.

So… no.

Tweet of the Day, Let’s You And Him Fight, With Flamethrowers edition.

Flamethrowers, at ten feet, in a room with a six inch gasoline puddle*:

That’d be spiffy, really.

Moe Lane

*Not original to me, but I forget who said it first.