how not to conduct an argument

mr president: my opponent flip-flopped. he was saying one thing before, and he’s saying another thing now.
mr kerry: this is my position: this is what i said then, this is what i say now. notice that they are the same thing.
mr president: my opponent is a flip-flopper. he just is. trust me. flip-flop.

mr kerry: the president did not use troops as a last resort.
mr president: i am willing to use troops as a last resort.

mr president: we were attacked by an enemy: we had to go to war.
mr kerry: we didn’t go to war with the enemy that attacked us.
mr president: i know who attacked us! but i attacked someone else back.

mr president: i think vlad-i-murr putin was wrong to try and get away with removing checks and balances. but the patriot act is entirely necessary.

please, please, please, if you’re going to vote for bush, email me, ring me on the phone, send a carrier pigeon, anything, and tell me why.

also: if i hear “john kerry said saddam hussein was a threat, and then he said he wasn’t” one more time, i’m going to scream.

ikea horror

lea pointed out to me that i have been lax in posting to my website. it’s true. i’m lazy.

lea and i went to ikea this past weekend. (we went to the chicago branch, but i will assume that all of this applies to the twin cities version that recently opened, and that more of my friends and acquaintances will be familiar with.) it was an experience, to be sure. the building is huge, a cavernous edifice that flaunts its size with an open floor design and unfinished ceilings. there’s a lot of stuff there, and, almost invariably, one or two of the twenty-seven types of any given type of furniture struck me as aesthetically pleasing, while the others reminded me more of the less polished aspects of college dorm life than anything else. this is not such a bad thing, i suppose; it is, at least, to be expected. it was the people of the republic of ikea that really got to me. the vast swarms of people seemed to me a cross between the diverse and entertaining throng one generally finds at a mall, and the docile-yet-loudmouthed clusters of people clogging the lines in front of you during your infrequent visits to mcdonald’s. it’s the kind of crowd that shuts me up immediately; i feel compelled to hold my tongue, lest i loudly inform the two idiots arguing over which stupid-looking mirror frame looks better that both frames look awful. it’s also the kind of crowd that shuts me down; there was entirely too much noise, too much activity, too much hustle and bustle for my brain to handle. ikea is fast, cheap, and reliable, a poster-child for industrialization in general. the easiness of purchasing a piece of ikea furniture is as seductive as fast food, and probably about as good for you.

this is not to say we were not active participants in and contributors to this system: we walked out of the store with a small haul of our own, culpable to any blame or derision i would levy against the herds exiting with us. that being said, we still had several laughs at the expense of the idiot rednecks sitting on the back of their white (!) couch they had just purchased, swinging their grubby feet against it.

idiots.

day of the jackal

this falls into that list of old movies that are significantly better than their remakes. i think the last time i watched this was the summer after my freshman year of college, in an apartment up by lake calhoun. that was a long time ago.

ghost world

what better follow up to a “teen movie” than an anti-teen movie? it’s quite the modern tradgedy.

mean girls

though this movie is “just” a teen movie, it is still pretty funny, and not completely lowbrow. not as good a teen movie as, say, donnie darko, but still worth watching.

i am trying to break your heart

another fine documentary! this one is about the band wilco, and the tumultuous process of recording and releasing the album yankee hotel foxtrot. i don’t really understand reprise’s reaction; yes, much of this album is “challenging,” but at the same time, gems like heavy metal drummer rank high on the list of my favorite pop songs, up with the likes of the love-cars’ how i get and the shins’ cover of the postal service’s we will become silhouettes, and is generally catchier than any of the tripe getting played on the radio.

a great quote

“the world expects too much in one year and not enough in ten.”

amen.

brotherhood of the wolf

marvelous cinematography combined with a fun, albeit marginally silly premise make this a good watch. to wit: how many kung-fu werewolf period movies have you seen recently? one too few, is the answer.

the boondock saints

touching the void

another great documentary. this one is much more of a nail-biter than fog of war, and a captivating watch for anyone — especially those who are thrilled by the works of krakauer, etc (like me).