12/18/00 - Holy glowing green potatoes, Batman! These tubers need water!

Without delving into the specifics (for those, go here), the Post relates the saga of Claire and Brad (the cad), an unfortunate tale of the woes accompanying kiss-and-e-mailing (or, for that matter, kiss-and-blogging too.) Something to think about next time you get fwd-happy.

Oceans on Ganymede! How cool is that? I'm reminded of James Hogan's Giants trilogy, which if you like Science Fiction I highly recommend. In the near future, astronauts discover a human corpse on the moon. A 50,000-year-old human corpse...

FBI agents march on the White House to protest a possible clemency for Native American activist Leonard Peltier. I just wonder where they're going to find the G-men to watch and infiltrate this nascent protest movement.

Battle lines harden: The New Republic "disrepectfully dissents" from the Supreme Court's politically loaded decision in Bush v. Gore. Unsurprisingly, the National Review aims to argue the opposite position. (As if it needs to be said, I side with the former.)

Meanwhile, Dubya prepares for the 100 Days, the wholly unrealistic Presidential benchmark set by FDR's first term (when (a) the country was in crisis, (b) the President had to do something - anything to alleviate it, and (c) Congress was more than happy to let him do whatever he wanted.) In contrast, Bush faces a sharply split legislature that, even in his own party, run from skeptical to contemptuous of his goofy plans for massive tax cuts and Star Wars defense programs. Good luck.

Today's Garth and Chud-provided teaser poster is for the forthcoming Enemy at the Gates, starring Jude Law and Ed Harris as dueling snipers at the Battle of Stalingrad. No Spielberg-esque flagwaving to be had in this one - the U.S. was in no way involved.

In related news, Russia invites Canada to join together in order to offset U.S. domination. Uh oh. After all, avid RISK players know how crucial that Alaska-Irkutsk connection can be.

Political film auteur and amateur conspiracy theorist Oliver Stone will executive produce The Day Reagan Got Shot for Showtime. Included in the cast is Richard Crenna as the Gipper, Holland Taylor as Just Say Nancy, and Richard Dreyfuss as the original Big Time, Alexander Haig. But will Stone look into the Gates assassination?

Ebert and Roeper gave a whopping twelve thumbs up (six apiece) on last night's show, giving me some faith that a strong Christmas season might make up for such a dismal film year. Among the reviewed films were Traffic, their most highly rated offering, and Cast Away. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was featured (and approved) on an earlier show.

Peter Parker's Aunt May has been cast, and it's veteran stage actress Rosemary Harris. Also announced is Cliff Robertson as Uncle Ben and the cameo role of fan fave Bruce Campbell.

So Elaine and I received an early Christmas present from my folks over the weekend (Thanks, Mom and Dad!) We have upgraded from a Celeron 433mhz to Celeron 667mhz, with twice the RAM (64 to 128MB - speed...I like it), over three times the drive space (4.3 to 15GB...ah! uninterrupted, fully-installed Baldur's Gate II) and - here's the real kicker - a CD-R, which has already precipitated a Napster resurgence. I was throwing together some REM concert boots and a CD of Dylan covers yesterday, and it occured to me: Making mix tapes is a Zen art that I'd been neglecting since the waning days of college. It's good to be back.

12/15/00 - Hmmm...Gore and Bush could have saved us a month of trouble if they just had the temerity to do this. Ah, well...one of 'em would probably have stacked the deck anyway.

MJ hypes the Bull dynasty anew, while dogging both Chicago's organization and his pitiful, pitiful Wizards.

Three students at the North Carolina School for Science and Math, sister school to my high school alma mater, win a Westinghouse for their research on nebulas and supernovae. Congrats!

In other technology news, the first boon from the Florida fiasco may turn out to be this joint CalTech-MIT voting study, aimed to prevent any further outbreaks of chad in the future.

A poetic paean to Clinton and Ireland. Say what you will about the President, he's done his damnedest to bring peace to the Old Country. And only he has cache enough to get away with the "belly up to the bar"/"bunch of drunks" peace process metaphors.

12/14/00 - The Federal Trade Commission approves the AOL-Time Warner merger, meaning that the ball is now in our court. Verrrrrry interesting...

MetaHotorNot (via Fairvue Central, and appropriately found through Metafilter.) Clever, clever.

Garth's been coming fast and furious with the teaser one-sheets lately (I posted the Potter poster yesterday over at The Leaky Cauldron.) Today's capture, the poster for Tim Burton's Planet of the Apes.

TheForce.Net offers a tantalizing and spoiler-laden spy report of the various planets and ships appearing in Episode II.

Across the country, Americans and journalists alike reacted favorably to Gore's "Don't Go Away Mad, Just Go Away" concession speech. Perhaps the Vice-President has finally found his true calling: loser. (Never let it be said that GitM is above kicking a guy when he's down.)

Now, with the election over, let the Cabinet speculation begin. Not to mention the congratulatory phone calls from world leaders.

Thwppp! The Showest teaser for Spiderman hits the web.

12/13/00 - Lots of great gallows humor around the office today. I particularly liked this one: "You know, now that I think about it, there's some irony to the fact that tonight Gore will be breaking into The West Wing."

Since the election is now finally over, I have updated Al Gore is a Chump for (hopefully) the last time.

The Supreme Court rules, and thus Gore will concede. Can't say I'm very happy about a Bush presidency, but then again, I wouldn't have been happy with a Gore presidency either, and I do believe that in the mid-to-long term this is absolutely the best situation for the Democrats. Congress is theirs for the taking in 2002, the base is fired up, and Dubya's rescue by the Scalia-Rehnquist majority smacks of illegitimacy. There's a lot of grist for the mill here for the Dems, and not much room to maneuver for the incoming Bush administration.

That being said, a few things do need to happen for it all to work out in the end. For one, Gore must not be the Democratic nominee in 2004. Therein lies the path to 8 - not 4 - years of Dumbya. Second, the progessives of the party - Bradley, Kerrey, Wellstone, Feingold, and Moynihan, to name just a few - need to wrest control of some of the party apparatus from the DLC hacks (who hopefully will be at least slightly discredited by this loss) and the old (labor) Left. As this election surely proved, if we don't stand for something we'll fall for anything. The Democratic party's standard should not be piecemeal Rockefeller Republicanism - Surely a loss to a moron like Bush should prove that.

We'll see. The atmosphere around here today is funereal, but I must say that I'm excited about the progessive possibilities opened by this turnout. I hope this loss will initiate some self-reflection among the Democratic ranks. If not, well, the Green Party is lying in wait.

In the short term, of course, this does mean that I will definitely be unemployed by noon on Inauguration Day, so it's time to get serious once again on the job front.

Maureen Dowd rips the Court a new one. When she's on, she's on.

Mary Jane Watson has been cast, and it'll be Kirsten Dunst. I see her more as Gwen Stacy than MJ, but nevertheless an excellent choice.

2001 is the year before us, Dubya is president, trouble brews in the Middle East, and there's an eclipse on Christmas Day. You do the math. Good thing I'm not much of a believer.

It seems Lara Croft is not a role model. According to a new study, many video games are "unhealthy" for girls.

The Times and the Post sing the praises of the much-maligned Larry Johnson.

Hello all. Sorry for the lack of updates. I just spent the past two days in the bowels of an editing room at the local ABC-affiliate, putting together a comedy video for a Chairman's dinner tomorrow night. So that's the reason for my Tuesday off. Between that, the search for new employ, three grad school apps due very shortly, the family in town this week, christmas shopping, a trip to Orlando to see Elaine's grandfolks over the holidays, and other assorted distractions it's gonna be a tough next few weeks, but hopefully Ghost in the Machine will keep rolling along.

12/11/00 - On the road today, so updates will be infrequent. Sorry!

Mithrandir walks among us.

Man, it's been a bad week for great blogs. High Industrial decides to hang it up. Good luck to ya, Raza, and stay in touch.

According to the New Republic, Gore's silence on "the third rail of Race" may cost him his 2004 comeback chances. Let's hope so. Nevertheless, given the severity of the tales of racial intimidation and disqualification emanating from Florida these days, why has the newsmedia been so preoccupied with Chad?

250-1...I'll take those odds.

Wow. It's hard to underestimate how badly the U.S. Supreme Court has screwed up with its recent 5-4 decision to stop the manual recounts. Never mind that the conservative majority has made a laughingstock of their supposed philosophical commitments to states' rights and judicial restraint. Never mind that Justice Scalia has belittled himself and the Court by basically openly rooting for Bush in an unnecessary concurring statement. Worse yet, the Court's action in stopping the recount threatens to irrevocably taint the public perception of it as an independent, impartial arbitrer for at least a generation.

Now, as y'all know, I'm not saying this as a Gore supporter. I can't stand the guy. In fact, I also think that Dubya would have ended up winning the manual recount anyway (not that I like him very much either.) But the Court is venturing into very deep waters at this point, and for the life of me I can't understand why they'd be so imbecilic as to do what they've done, standing against the notion that every vote should be counted. It's pathetic. Hopefully, one of the two swing Justices - O'Connor or Kennedy - will rectify this grievous capitulation by the Court to their political interests.

12/8/00 - Angelina Jolie is Lara Croft. I didn't see Charlie's Angels, which is the first flick that comes to mind upon watching this trailer. Like every other video game movie, I'm sure this'll be terrible (and I don't even much like the game.) That being said, since I spent 7 bucks to see Tom Cruise do lousy wire work for two hours in MI:2, surely I could throw down the same amount of money to witness the lovely Mrs. Jolie do the same in an equally nonsensical, thinly plotted, wire-heavy summer film.

Well, well, well. How you like them apples? I'm starting to wonder how they're going to sort all this out by Tuesday.

R.I.P. John Lennon 1940-1980. It was twenty years ago today...To be honest, I can't remember when I heard that Lennon had been shot, being all of 5-going-on-6 at the time. My memories of the moment are conflated with other contemporaneous tales of death-in-the-news - hearing about John Wayne dying in 1979, for example, or of Hinckley shooting Reagan a few months later in 1981.

The fact of Lennon's death didn't hit me until fourth grade (1984), when my teacher - Ms. Quarles, a consummate Beatles fan - spent an entire week concentrating solely on the Fab Four. We read and analyzed their lyrics (inasmuch as a fourth grader can do so - I remember loving the hell out of "Eleanor Rigby" - even then, my musical tastes veered towards the melancholy.) We watched the famous "Ed Sullivan Show" appearance, along with A Hard Day's Night and Help. And I remember that when she told us that John had been shot four years earlier, her eyes welled up with tears and she had to leave the classroom to compose herself.

That was one of two one-week concentrations we did in fourth grade - the other was on Edgar Allan Poe. Both remain among my favorite and most-defining memories of elementary school.

Yet another permutation of the "Nader has destroyed all that is good and holy" argument, this time by Thomas Friedman. I'm tempted to take his Lexus and the Olive Tree out of the reading queue.

The San Francisco Ballet School is charged with size bias for not admitting a "short and muscular" 8-year-old. I'm not quite sure how I come down on this one. It seems strange to me that the school could make any valid determination of a person's eventual size before they've reached puberty. And if the girl can dance, the girl can dance.

On the other hand, I'd like to play in the NBA, and no one's complaining that there aren't enough 5'6"-players in professional basketball. Unfortunately for equality, I do think some physical talents - athletic, aesthetic, and otherwise - demand a certain body type at the highest levels. And, besides, who's to say that in such a subjective art as ballet that the eventual determinant of the girl's non-admission was her size anyway? Perhaps her dancing wasn't up to snuff. The whole thing reminds me a bit of aggravating white people who pop out of the woodwork every Spring to complain that they didn't get into their school of choice because of affirmative action, when it's almost always more likely that they didn't get in because they were just mediocre applicants. At any rate, I'm curious to see how this one pans out.

After a drubbing in Dallas, the Knicks rally past the Spurs 86-83. Phew. New York needed that win in the worst way.

Gore-supporting Dems prep for a Bush White House.

The Globe speculates on what Malcolm X's take would be of the 2000 Florida Fiasco.