Ha!

Hipster Hitler is the gift that keeps on giving.  Check out the latest cartoon here.

Robots Have Learned to Lie

Progress, indeed.  Tomorrow's headline: "Robots Have Learned to Run for Office."

"Beauty Is a Minefield"

Ain't that the truth.  Harper's has a thoughtful essay on the nature and history of beauty, prompted by (but not much lingering on) Umberto Eco's new book, History of Beauty.  The essay includes the first sound description I have come across of the distinction between the sublime and the beautiful - a distinction in which I have had a passive interest for some time:

Beauty, for instance, which is characterized by charm, harmony, simplicity, radiance, along with perfection of detail, derives from feelings of pleasure and has a relaxing effect on the "fibers" of the human body. By contrast, the sublime, which derives from feelings of pain, tightens these fibers. Beauty merely invites; the sublime commands.

This distinction comes from Edmund Burke, in his book known (in shorthand) as On the Sublime.  It might be right, it might be wrong - but it's a good starting point, anyway.

I had always thought On the Sublime would be a good place to start my inquiry, and I feel that more so now.  Perhaps I'll pick up a copy.  Or Eco's book, for that matter.

Luzhkov Out

In Russia, Medvedev has fired Moscow's mayor, Yuri Luzhkov.  (Yes, the president can do that sort of thing in Russia, thanks to Mr. Putin.)  Luzhkov is virulently anti-gay - but don't expect much improvement when his successor arrives on the scene.

Meanwhile, in Minnesota

Walter Mondale sees a bit of Carter in Obama.  Ouch.

Two Videos

Here's one on the failure of political leadership:

...and here's a bit of splenetics (with bad language):

Both with music!

HT: Savage.

Obama Heckled (on Video)

Not for the last time, I hope.

It Gets Better Gets Better

Dan Savage's "It Gets Better" was the noble project of the day yesterday. It still is today. One of his readers also touts the therapeutic value of Stephen Fry's letter to his younger self of 35 years ago. It, too, is noble and good, and uplifting. It is important to remember, for example, that

Gay people sometimes believe (to this very day, would you credit it, young Stephen?) that the preponderance of obstacles and terrors they encounter in their lives and relationships is intimately connected with the fact of their being gay. As it happens at least 90% of their problems are to do with love and love alone: the lack of it, the denial of it, the inequality of it, the missed reciprocity in it, the horrors and heartaches of it. Love cold, love hot, love fresh, love stale, love scorned, love missed, love denied, love betrayed ... the great joke of sexuality is that these problems bedevil straight people just as much as gay. The 10% of extra suffering and complexity that uniquely confronts the gay person is certainly not incidental or trifling, but it must be understood that love comes first.

And if Fry's letter is like a comforting blanket, there's a letter from the Master himself that's more akin to a bucket of cold water thrown at the face. He knows, better than most, that love is irrational, and causes you to do the most ridiculous things - to risk your fortune, to risk your freedom, to risk your health, to risk your happiness, to debase yourself, to immolate yourself, to jeopardize if not give away outright the better part of yourself.

May it always be so.

What's Foretelling the End of the World Today?

It's a coded back-and-forth concerning potsmoking. On Twitter. Between Snoop Dogg and Paulo Coelho. Double-take!

Amazing and Awesome

We have discovered two new dinosaur species - both related to the Triceratops. Super awesome! They are Utahceratops and Kosmoceratops. Know these names.  How exciting!

Juice Boxes and Kettle Chips Are Making Us Gay

Um.

HT: TDW.

PS: LOVE the t-shirt.

Christine O'Donnell's Flag

Ha!

HT: JMG.

Noble Project of the Day

Dan Savage and his partner are putting together a series of videos aimed at gay high school kids at risk of suicide; the project is called "It Gets Better."

The National Hangover

Today, of course, is National DADT Repeal Fail Hangover Day (NDADTRFHD). How does your head feel today? Mine is pretty banjaxed, I must admit.

Well, if you feel as I do, here's your aspirin: a Florida state appeals court today upheld a lower court ruling that the Sunshine State's ban on gay adoptions is unconstitutional. (It's unclear from the story whether that was the state constitution or the U.S. Constitution.)

Oh merciful God, some good news!

John McCain Is an Evil, Lying Bigot and Should Resign

Department of "The Root of All Evil"

So, what are the gays being blamed for now? Why, global warming and human trafficking, natch! (HT: JMG.)

Sheesh. What won't the gays be blamed for? Well, at least they can't blame us for hurricanes - whoops, spoke too soon there. Well then, surely not for terrorist attacks - whoops again. Well, they would never say that people with HIV/AIDS got what they deserved - argh, wrong again (those who say this then run for the Senate from Delaware).

Okay, let's try one last time. To my knowledge, gays have never been blamed for the death of Jesus. In the long history of nutjob accusations against gays, this is one bomb that's never been thrown. Whew.

It's no surprise, though. We all know who is really responsible for the death of Jesus, anyway. You know - those scheming evilmongers who engage in ungodly work and who are up to their armpits in the blood of Christian babies. That's right. The abortionists. Get 'em, Glenn Beck!

The Right Thing To Do

Ireland's president, Mary McAleese, declines to march in the New York St. Patrick's Day Parade because the organization behind that parade won't allow gays to participate. I've been amazed at recent indications of how tolerant Ireland is becoming, and appalled at how stubborn we are here. Why the surprise, in both respects? Have I been expecting too much from America? Not enough from Ireland?

Exactly.

HT: Sullivan.

And Just What Is This?

Did a staffer for Senator Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) post "all faggots must die" in the comments section of a gay blog moments after the vote on DADT? WTFF?

Coward.

UGH.

The DADT vote just failed.

The roll 'o jackanapes:

• Susan Collins, R-Me., for voting against.
• Olympia Snowe, R-Me., for voting against.
• Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., for voting against.
• Mark Pryor, D-Ark., for voting against.
• John McCain, R.-Ariz., for outright douchebaggery and disgracing his uniform.
• General James Amos, Obama's recent pick to lead the Marines, for opposing repeal hours before the vote.
• Barack Obama, for doing fuck-all on this.

But not, it seems, Harry Reid, who also voted against it. Apparently, under Senate rules, voting with the majority allows him to reintroduce the measure at a later date. Erm, okay. Pass, for now.

Quote of the day from Alexander Nicholson of Servicemembers United:

Today's vote is a failure of leadership on the part of those who have been duly elected to serve this nation and to put the best interests of the country ahead of partisan politics," said Alexander Nicholson, director of Servicemembers United, an advocacy group that sought the law's repeal. "The Senate could learn a good lesson from those who serve in uniform and who stand to benefit from proceeding to debate on this bill -- serving this country means putting politics aside and getting the job done. It is simply inexcusable that this vote failed today.

Anger is justified. Anger is the only appropriate reaction.

Reax from pro-repeal groups here. A good, detailed accounting here - shame on Susan Collins for voting against just because Republicans wanted to offer more amendments.

With Friends Like These....

Senator Dick Durbin has some advice for Rahm Emanuel on his possible/probable run for mayor in Chicago:

Rahm is an extraordinary Chief of Staff. I've seen him at his best and I've seen him do some things behind the scenes which will never be reported in history... But this a once in a lifetime opportunity. He could be a powerful force. He has to make his decision soon, get on the ground. You can't win this from the White House, you have to win it from the streets of Chicago.

Sound advice, yes - the election is on February 22, 2011, and that will be here in no time. But highlighting Emanuel's Svengali tendencies? I doubt that will play well.

And here's a funny clip from SNL, showcasing Rahm's hot head and salty tongue. (It's bleeped, but use your head if you're at work, would ya?)

A Bit of Good News

The sideshow that is Christine O'Donnell, the newly minted GOP Senate candidate from Delaware, doesn't look like it will go anywhere. Phew. If this holds, we can just grab the popcorn and enjoy the spectacle.

Please God. Let this hold.

HT: Political Wire.

More Folderol from the Family Research Council

Here's an exchange between Lt. Col. Robert Maginnis and the FRC's Tony Perkins, concerning gays in the military:

Maginnis: That's why countries like the ten largest militaries in the world, that have the ten largest militaries in the world say 'no, this isn't the thing to do.' They spin this as if Great Britain and we ought to copy them and the Dutch. Well the fact is that 80 percent of the militaries in the world don't embrace this particular view.

Perkins: Well, those that do, they're the ones that participate in parades, they don't fight wars to keep the nation and the world free. So there's a big difference.

That little dollop of vitriol got laughs and applause from the audience. Keepin' it classy, fellas. Video clip here.

HT: Sullivan.

Meanwhile, in Ireland

67% support the right of gays to marry. And a whopping 91% say they would not think less of a person for being gay. (I'm a little skeptical with this one.) These are amazing statistics.

But then, only 46% think gays should be able to adopt children, while 38% think they should not. These numbers make for a somewhat confusing composite - but what do you expect when opinion is in flux?

Which brings to mind a caveat that's always worth remembering when looking at numbers on gay issues: we can easily measure how widely support spreads, but it is harder to measure its depth. In other words, things can change just as fast in the opposite direction.

"He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts... for support rather than illumination."

Zing.

Now, Let's Make This Fast

I gotta solve world hunger on a conference call at 4pm.

HT: TDW.

Betty White Runs a Sweatshop

It's true.

I think it's pretty clear that the Golden Girls made a Tontine pact that whoever outlived the others would become the hippest of them all. As the oldest of the pack, Betty White must have been the long-shot - but look at her now!

Funny/True

Ha!

HT: NextRound.

Polymer Porn

Sometimes, when you've spent all day alone in the lab, studying complex molecules of repeating units strung together by covalent bonds, you need some release.

Hey - scientists are perverts people too.

Christine O'Donnell: There's More Evidence for Creationism Than for Evolution

Wha-wha-what?!?

Yes, this is what she argued - if you understand the word "argued" to mean "dreamt up" - back in 1996. Her evidence? Yeah, the Bible. Q.E.D., Christine.

What with this, and a forthcoming conference of those who believe that the world is really flat, there has been entirely too much medievalism of late.

Which is ironic, because if we were consistently medieval in our outlook, O'Donnell would of course be burned as a witch.

Gah

Well, here's one movie I won't be seeing.

May I Just Say

...that my tagline above has never been more apropos. It's a slight corruption from Tristan und Isolde, and makes a brief appearance in T.S. Eliot's "The Waste Land." Here's my translation:

Fresh blows the wind, the homeland's way;

My Irish child, why do you stay?

Exactly.

N.B. - The original text says "wo weilest du" (where do you stay).

Absolutely Unbelievable

An assistant attorney general in Michigan has launched a weird, perverse campaign against the openly gay president of the Student Assembly at the University of Michigan. This is just unreal:

More info here. And here's the AAG's blog itself. Unreal!

Gaga Does the Full Court Press to End DADT

I usually wince when celebrities weigh in on political concerns. But Lady Gaga does so with conviction and, more impressively, reasoned argument. Good for you, Gaga. It's worth watching the whole thing.

The Inscrutable Blair

I've read two reviews of Tony Blair's recent book ("A Journey"). One, by John Lancaster in The New Yorker, describes the man who emerges from the pages of the memoir as supremely gifted but emotionally and, perhaps, morally hollow. Coming from the other side is Christopher Hitchens, writing in The Atlantic, who contends that Blair "was a man of almost inordinate attachment to principle."

It's worth pointing out that Hitchens, a leftist who fervently supported the war in Iraq, serves himself by praising Blair - but Hitch is still Hitch and his thoughts always merit more than passing credit. Still, even in the world of politicians, where only protean shapeshifters seem to survive, it is striking to have two such divergent views of the same man. Who to credit?

Indeed, the more I learn, the more befuddled I become. For example: Lancaster makes the following point right near the start of his article:

Blair's reticence on some subjects reaches mystifying levels. On the six-hundred -and-eighty-two-page book that consists almost entirely of detailed accounts of politics, Blair writes, "I have always been more interested in religion than politics." It is just about the only mention of religion in the book. Blair nowhere says what his religious beliefs are, and nowhere discusses how they affect his politics or his decision-making or his daily life. It is a bizarre silence in a book of this type and title.

Cast in this manner, Blair seems disingenuous and insincere. And yet, from Hitchens, we have this:

When I went to interview Tony Blair, the newly elected leader of the opposition in the House of Commons, in 1994, I wanted to ask him about his membership in the Christian Socialist Movement, a very traditionalist affiliate of the British Labour Party. I had, I told him, by now read all his speeches since he had become leader, and could find no trace of any such commitment in his rhetoric. With the very disarming open-faced grin that so many people would later come to dislike, he replied that this was because he couldn’t stand the sort of politician who exploited religion for electoral purposes. His administration would become partly defined by a terse response from his highly unsentimental media chief, Alastair Campbell, to a faith-based question: “We don’t do God.” Toward the end of his time as prime minister, Blair had increasing resort to moral suasion and hints about faith as a means of defending some of his less popular positions. And he had barely retired from official politics when he was received into the Roman Catholic Church and set up a foundation in his own name with a vaguely ecumenical global agenda.

Hitchens' Blair does indeed come across as a sincere man of conviction. So who has the better measure? I'm at a loss to say. It seems odd, but I suspect that, if I were to read his memoirs, I would be further from an understanding of Tony Blair than I am now.

UPDATE: It just occurred to me: uncaviled praise to someone's religious sincerity, coming from Christopher Hitchens, has more than a taste of tendentiousness. Advantage Lancaster? Or am I a cynic?

Oscar Wilde Letters Discovered

The man was a pimp.

The More I Think About It, The More I Like It

You know who's playing Freddy Mercury in an upcoming pic about Queen? Sasha Baron Cohen, that's who.

A Harrowing Tragedy

CNN has a video story that features surveillance shots of a Connecticut woman withdrawing $15,000 from a bank while her family was being held hostage in their home. A short while later, she and her two daughters would be dead. Fortunately, however, her husband would survive, and would live to testify against his alleged tormentors. I remember hearing about this story back in 2007, when it happened. The mind reels before such evil.

Anatomy of a Meme

"This blended milk and ice drink of mine attracts young males to my front lawn. And thus they proclaim, 'this is superior to thine! Verily, it is superior to thine!'"

Verily.

Some of them betray a false ear for oldey-timey language ("I hath"??). However, I am quite fond of the following, in particular:

• Today I found it unnecessary to make use of my musket - I must say it was a splendid afternoon.
• Do not despise the racketeer - instead despise his sport.
• Male siblings prior to prostitutes.

What Does Your Bookmark Bar Say About You?

I just noticed that I have two items under my "Misc." tab: Mass hours and liquor store hours. There's a post-doc dissertation right there.

Death by Vagina Bubbles

It happens in Japan (stop acting like you're surprised!). Those engaging in sex via astral projection are especially at risk.

I could explain, but - well, actually, I can't explain. Just watch the video (not at work, though!) and marvel at the surpassing weirdness that is Japan.

Thanks, TDW. I think.

UPDATE: At the very start, does that guy ask for kimchee? Is that really the time?

Moments Meowsicaux (That's Right, I Went There)

This is so damn great - two choir boys performing the "Duetto buffo di due gatti," by Robert Lucas de Pearsell, based on excerpts from an opera by Rossini. How the two kids managed to keep straight faces through (most of) the performance is beyond me.

HT, TDW, of course.

But if you just took a boss rip on your bong, you may prefer this version:

Just try to get the song out of your head after watching either one of these videos. It'll be hard, trust me.

Chill and Thaw

As Arctic ice melts, disputes concerning maritime boundaries are heating up, reports Canada's Globe and Mail.

The Rise of the Nativists in Italy

An article in The New York Times today sheds light on the alarming degree to which, in Italy, Berlusconi's political fortunes are tied to the hard-right Northern League. They seem to be an odd bunch: fond of quasi-pagan rituals (pouring waters from the head of the Po River into the Venetian Lagoon - why, exactly?), and of crypto-Celtic iconography that's just plain weird, to say nothing of historically rootless.

While they may be giving voice to somewhat legitimate (or at least au courant) grievances - e.g., concerning immigration and the chronic financial reliance of the poor south to the rich north - they seem to have a passion for crude gestures, if not outright thuggery. Here's a particularly galling little number:

It is openly hostile to illegal immigration, an increasingly loud theme both in Italy and Europe. One Northern League deputy provocatively threw a pig’s head on the ground where a mosque was planned, defiling the lot.

That's rather startling, no? These jackanapes are power brokers?

And the non sequitur in that sentence from the Times is a bit too kind: that gross little gesture didn't display just hostility to illegal immigration, but to an entire religion and its adherents (whether legally present, illegally present, or indeed nowhere near Italy at all).

Young Master Brfxxccxxmnpcccclllmmnprxvclmnckssql-bb11116

It's pronounced "Albin," apparently, but alas, it won't do as a child's name in Denmark, where they have government bureaus overseeing this sort of thing. More fascinating facts about trends in first names in this article from the London Review of Books. It also sheds light on the rather humble meanings of ancient Greek names - think of "Stocky" (Plato) or "Flat-Nosed" (Simon).

And then, give condolences to poor Copreus of Teos. His name means "Shitty." Suddenly, Moon Unit doesn't seem so bad.

Fun Fact: "Aethelred the Unready" is a mistranslation from Old English into modern English. His actual sobriquet was "Aethelred Unraed," which means "Aethelred the Ill-Advised." Cold comfort, I guess, for that benighted king, but it's better than having a reputation through history for being caught off your guard.

Also: "Aethelred" itself means "Noble Counsel" - so, taken together, his name and sobriquet reflect more than a bit of irony.

Another Fun Fact: The earliest recorded instance of the name "Alexander" comes from a treaty between a Hittite king and a king of Troy, named "Aleksandu" or some such thing. This was from the thirteenth century B.C. To put it in perspective, this is the time of the Egyptian King Ramses II ("the Great"); Homer was about four centuries in the future. (In fairness, though, the Great Pyramid of Giza was already 1300 years old by this time.) Fast-forward 3300 years, to 2010, and that name is ranked number seventeen in popularity in Great Britain. Now that's endurance!

You Go Shortie!

Raise yer hands in the a-yah, like ya just don't ca-yah!

HT: Yes, TDW again. Okay, okay, closing that window now.

PR Headache of the Day

I'd hate to work at the Vatican and face questions about this bit of tripe:

Anyway, we all know that the center of the universe isn't the Earth. It's me.

HT: TDW.

The History of a Dot

If I asked you to put together a thirteen-part slideshow and extended essay on the history of the polka dot, do you think you could do it? No, neither could I. But someone at Slate has. (Not very well, though, it must be said.)

Department of "How Fares Europe"

Two interesting articles on Europe from The New York Times this week. In the first, Germany's growing ability to be comfortable with its past is making it into a more assertive powerhouse. In the second, cash-strapped conservationists in Venice are forced to sell advertising space to keep their efforts going.

In the latter article, the author notes that other Italian cities are facing similar problems. Rome is thrashing about, looking for 25 million euros to fund a restoration of the Colosseum. And of course, the Sistine Chapel must cost something to maintain, what with all those grubby tourists about. Italy is indeed heritage-rich, and that is indeed a blessing - but not a cheap one, alas.

Paglia v. Gaga

The feminist par excellence can't stop reliving the good ol' days.

Seeing Things

Roger Ebert - who will, amazingly, resume his TV show in the near future - has some interesting ruminations on peoples' willingness to see ghosts, fairies, and whatnot in photographs. The videos at the end of his post are particularly interesting.

The Limits of Power

The New York Review of Books sees some push-back against Berlusconi in Italy.

The Statues of Rome - Part Two

Let's continue our meander through the statue garden of Rome, shall we? Last time, I trudged out some pictures of the city's heroic statues, while making a few observations and dissents from the aesthetic theories of Walter Pater. This time around, I have nothing so heady in mind: while I still have a theme, I have no theoretical axe to grind. Rather, I will merely focus on pictures of sculptures that embody the holy. (Yes, the next installment will focus on the profane.) Pack your Baedeker and let's get going!

The Holy

Halfway down the Piazza Navona sits the resplendently Baroque church of Sant'Agnese in Agone. In one chapel stands this statue of Saint Sebastian - immediately recognizable, of course, by the host of arrows that penetrate his body. I don't know when this statue was created, or by whom, but I was taken by its naturalism, and the striking juxtaposition of calm repose and physical agony captured in the work.

The Ponte Sant'Angelo, originally built by Hadrian, spans the Tiber in the shadow of the Castello Sant'Angelo. Along the rails stand ten Baroque statues of angels, holding instruments of the Passion. This statue - created by Antonio Raggi, a student of Bernini's - appears to be holding a chess piece, but in fact is holding a throne. This statue, and the others on the bridge, are a delight to photograph, out as they are in the clean Roman light.

These three statues are in the Castel Sant'Angelo itself. (The picture in the middle was included in my previous post on Rome's statues.) The marble statue, of the Archangel Michael, is by Rafaello da Montelupo, active in the 16th century; it originally sat at the top of the fortress itself. In 1753, however, after suffering damage, it was replaced by the bronze statue, executed by the Flemish artist Peter Anton von Verschaffelt. The bronze work, I feel, is far more striking and dramatic, and therefore more fitting for its perch - although the calm visage of Rafaello's statue brings to mind Michelangelo's David. It can still be seen in a courtyard in the fortress.

A delightful, multicolored stoup in St. Peter's, near Michelangelo's Pietà.

The Pietà itself. I wish this picture were better, but it is hard to get close to this, perhaps the most famous sculpture in St. Peter's.

A very animated depiction of Saint Veronica, in St. Peter's. This statue is part of the shrine to Saint Veronica. She carries, of course, the shroud that was reputedly used to wipe the face of Christ as he carried the cross through Jerusalem.

This is a very old statue, also in Saint Peter's, of Saint Peter Enthroned, reputedly created in the late 13th century by Arnolfo di Cambio. For centuries, pilgrims have rubbed Peter's left foot as they walk by. In the second picture, I join in this ancient tradition.

The nave of Saint John Lateran, the official cathedral of Rome, is lined with enormous statues of the Apostles, all dating from the early 18th century. This one is Saint Matthew, by Camillo Rusconi. One wonders what he is reading that seems to shock him so.

In a building across the street from Saint John Lateran are the Scala Santa (Holy Steps), said to be the very stairs in Pilate's palace that Christ climbed several times on his way to meet his fate. For centuries, pilgrims (myself included) have climbed the steps on their knees, praying as they go. These three statuary groups can be found at the base of the steps. They depict, in order: Christ's agony in the garden of Gethsemane, Judas' betrayal of Christ, and Pilate presenting Christ before the people of Jerusalem ("Ecce Homo").

The steps are marble but are covered with wooden planks for their protection. At various points, however, holes are left open in the wood; these indicate, it is said, the places where flecks of Christ's blood could be found. I didn't notice any blood as I peered through the little holes.

Pastor Terry Jones Calls Off "Burn a Koran" Day

Well, he clearly lacks the courage of his convictions. I propose an alternative: "Burn a Moron" Day. First on the fire:

Those chops'll catch like kindling!

I joke - in seriousness, it is never a failure of courage when one chooses to do the right thing. Congrats, Pastor Jones, on doing the right thing. Now let's never hear from you again.

UPDATE: The Guardian has a short but insightful article on Pastor Jones' past in Germany.

And Now, This (Why Not)

The Russian Red Army performs the traditional Russian song, Kamarinskaya:

And The Birch Tree:

And, of course, the famous Song of the Volga Boatsmen (sung by a guy who's not at all bad-looking):

Fecal Swastikas Are Streichlich Verboten

Who's the Nazi now...?

HT: TDW.

Is Your Son a Heterosexual?

Pray to God that he isn't.

Heil Hipster!

Goebbels really is a Deutschbag.

The site has several such installments and they are quite funny.

Strange But True

The appropriately amazing, appropriately shadowed life of Roald Dahl. I've read a few articles on him recently, and I've been intrigued. Perhaps I'll pick up a biography.

The award for funniest line (possibly intentional) goes to this: "Dahl had an idyllic childhood until the age of 3[....]" Well, you're usually in the clear by then!

And here's a well done paragraph (the last - sorry to give away the finale):

The endings of Dahl’s stories are almost always surprising, even when we know the twist is coming. This talent, it turns out, applied equally to the author’s own life. In a hospital, surrounded by family, Dahl reassured everyone, sweetly, that he wasn’t afraid of death. “It’s just that I will miss you all so much,” he said—the perfect final words. Then, as everyone sat quietly around him, a nurse pricked him with a needle, and he said his actual last words: “Ow, fuck!”

Um.

One would think it should go without saying not to do liver-clogging amounts of crack right before giving a stump speech. One would think so, but one would be wrong. Wow.

Filthy, Dirty, Smelly Tourists Are Destroying the Sistine Chapel

Big surprise. Present company (i.e., me) excluded, of course.

The Invisible Hand of the Free Market Is Really a Form of Witchcraft

What else to conclude from a recent story out of Romania, describing opposition to a proposed new tax by witches and fortune tellers?

Misinterpretation of the Day

Matt Taibbi's diagnosis of the Tea Party Movement in the latest issue of Rolling Stone suffers from a leftist strain of the same paranoia that animates the Tea Party crowd itself. Exhibit A:

The fact that Fox and co. are doing what they do for these dreary commercial reasons makes it even worse, of course; at least Hitler really hated Jewish people.

Oh, for Pete's sake....

The Incredible Shrinking City

Sometimes, it's not smart growth that a city needs. It's smart shrinkage. The article after the link makes the salient point that all cities face decline at some point - recognizing this fact gets you a long way toward choosing the proper policies.

Fortune Cookie Writers Are Phoning It In

I take it as a sign of the inevitable decline of Western culture that our Chinese fortune cookies are crap. Today, for instance, I ate at my favorite dumpy Chinese place in Philadelphia. When I was sated, I got my fortune cookie, and tore it apart with my usual eagerness for knowing what the Fates have in store for me. My fortune read: "You enjoy sports, horses, and gambling, but never to excess."

What is this garbage?, I said to myself. This isn't a fortune, it's an observation - and an almost entirely wrong one at that. (I do like horses, but not to excess.) A fortune cookie should give you a fortune - that is, a prediction of what lies in your future. (E.g., "Your children will resent you.") At the very least, it should offer sage advice of some kind. (E.g., "Confucius say: Get that thing on your back looked at.") Banal observation doesn't cut the kung pao, boys.

Since any old fool can apparently pass off any old tripe as a fortune these days, I hereby declare that I am that fool - and here is that tripe. Drumroll, please:

"How about that local sports team?"

"You have some schmutz on your upper lip. No, the other side."

"Nice hat."

Sympathy for the Devil

In a recent article by Ian Buruma for The New York Review of Books, Christopher Hitchens is reported to say of his father, who was a commander in the Royal Navy during World War II: "Sending a Nazi convoy raider to the bottom is a better day's work than any I have ever done." I think we can all pretty much agree with that, not just for Hitchens' sake but for just about anyone else's as well.

Similarly, the execution of six Nazi collaborators on September 2, 1944, near Grenoble, barely a week after the liberation of Paris, must certainly rank as a good day's work as well. With the abstraction that distance provides, this is certainly true. But removing that distance provokes more mixed emotions - at least, it did for me. Here's a series of photos from Life of that grisly, though necessary event. Seeing these images of six young, doomed, and incalculably evil Frenchmen in their last moments on Earth left me hollow. I didn't give a silent cheer, and in fact I would shudder to think that I would. I guess the best way to describe a day's work like this is that it is laudable - but unsavory.

You Can't Copyright a Cocktail

That being said, a recipe certainly is a creative endeavor, and certainly has economic value. No wonder, then, that some people are "shaken" - and are "stirring" up discussion. (Two lame jokes in one sentence - not bad, Emmett, not bad!)

An Apparently Real Story, Followed by Three Childish One-Liners

The Swiss are creating drive-through booths for sex. Hot dog, a chance to make infantile jokes! Drum-roll, please:

1. Our slogan: "pull over, pull out, then peel off."

2. You may spill in your lap, but at least it won't be coffee.

3. Carpoolers welcome.

Should Have Sprung for the Frosties

How is Harrod's pricey muesli? Only so-so, it seems.

(Nice work, Zack!)

Oh - Heartwrenching

The Daily What has gotten all serious lately. Here's a short but very moving animated video of a World War II veteran recalling an awful experience. How tragic.

The Statues of Rome - Part One

In Studies in the History of the Renaissance, the old Oxford don Walter Pater rejected the notion that the various forms of high art were essentially interchangeable in their expressive capacity. Rather, he theorized that different arts were more appropriately suited for different kinds of expression. While "[a]ll art has a sensuous element," he explained, nevertheless, "one form of art, by the very limitations of its material, may be more adequate than another for the expression of any one phase of its experience." (The experience he was speaking of was the ancient Greek ideal, which Pater felt - with some justification - was most sublimely expressed in sculpture. Then again, no Greek music and precious little Greek painting has survived to our time, so our perspective may be skewed.)

Pater found sculpture to be the art form best suited to a depiction of man that is not self-analytical. I think he means, by this, that sculpture captures the intrinsic beauty of man - the beauty that is not relative, but rather is inherent - better than the other arts. Pater also found that sculpture was a weak medium for expressing situations, or what might be described as a narrative. "In poetry and painting," he declared, "the situation predominates over the character; in sculpture, the character over the situation." He continued:

Excluded by the limitations of its material from the development of exquisite situations, [sculpture] has to choose from a select number of types intrinsically interesting, interesting that is, independently of any special situation into which they may be thrown. Sculpture finds the secret of its power in presenting these types in their broad, central, incisive lines. This it effects not by accumulation of detail, but by abstracting from it. All that is accidental, that distracts the simple effect of the supreme types of humanity, all traces in them of the commonness of the world, it gradually purges away.

What to make of Pater's theory? Let's start with what he is not saying. He is emphatically not saying that there is a hierarchy of the arts - merely that the several arts have different capacities, and in this he is most probably right. He is not saying that sculpture cannot be allegorical or conceptual; and he is certainly right in his observation that the medium - any medium - imposes certain limitations that it would be folly to ignore.

And yet, Pater seems to have examples from ancient Greece too much in mind when he says that sculpture best achieves its purpose not by "accumulation of detail" but by "abstracting from it." One need only look at some of the riotous works of the Baroque to conclude that not everyone at every time took a "less is more" approach to sculpture. While Pater's theory might well describe the aesthetic values that the ancient Greeks ascribed to sculpture, it does not seem to fit so well on the aesthetic values of other places or eras.

More fundamentally, though, I believe Pater may be mistaken when he deprecates the narrative potential of sculpture. Allegorical sculpture can most certainly describe a situation, and, as such works do not depict any specific person, the situation (or at least the concept) predominates over the character. But even when specific characters are shown, the work can depict the "special situation into which they may be thrown," as well - sometimes to brilliant effect.

To put it simply, I suspect that Pater's theory suffers from a lack of universality. While I only read his book after returning from Italy, my still-fresh memories of the sculpture I saw there sprang immediately to mind as refutation. Italy is littered with such refuting sculpture, expressing very clearly the interiority of man and the situations in which he finds himself. Perhaps nowhere is this more true than in Rome, where a wild confusion of styles and periods abounds - in sculpture, certainly, but in all of the plastic arts as well.

What follows is a brief tour of some of the sculptural highlights of my time in Rome. While my favorite sculptures from my Italian tour are actually in Florence, those of Rome are more variegated. And while they do nothing to counter Pater's suggestion that sculpture is the ideal art form for an objective, extrinsic depiction of man (and he may in the end be right on this anyway), they do at least suggest that sculpture's depiction of man can penetrate to his interior life or can capture his relations with the world around him - and can do either very well. Sculpture can, in other words, depict man in a self-analytical way.

More importantly, though, sculpture can be beautiful - and that's the real purpose of this post. This will be the first of several posts treating the sculpture of Rome, and I have decided that we should begin with depictions of the active, the moving - the heroic. Let's get started.

The Heroic

Here are two images of one of the most famous statues in the world: the Apollo of Belvedere.

This statue is a Roman copy of a Greek original from the 4th century BC. It stands in the Vatican Museum. It depicts Apollo, just after he has let fly an arrow that will kill Python, a monstrous serpent that lived near Delphi. (For this reason, it is also known as the Pythian Apollo.) The god is not captured in a moment of tense activity, as one would suspect; rather, he maintains a calm and poised demeanor. Even the folds of his cape, while realistically depicted, are remarkably unruffled. This statue is an exquisite rendition of elegance in action.

Much the same can be said of this work as well - which shows Perseus holding aloft the severed head of Medusa. This statue, also in the Vatican, dates not from antiquity, but from 1801, and is the work of the Venetian sculptor Antonio Canova. Canova's Perseus, like the Apollo before, is gracefully restrained. And once again, the folds of the cape betray only the merest hint of action. But the head of Medusa, by contrast, is a frightful thing. She wears a face not of wrath or hatred, but terror - not unlike, one must imagine, the faces of those unfortunates who caught her eye while she was living. How neatly, by Canova's hand, have the tables been turned on her!

The heroic is not always so confident, as this grouping shows. It flanks the northern edge of the gargantuan, bombastic, and unloved monument to Victor Emmanuel II, first king of a united Italy. Begun in 1911 and completed in 1935, the pompous monument expresses the insecurity of a nation late to statehood and to the imperial game that was then beginning its wretched decline. The central figure, a warrior, brazenly struts, spear in hand and chest thrown forward. (In his arrogance, he seems to have forgotten the purpose of the shield he holds.) He barges before the two other figures, one pensive, the other watchful - action pushing its way to the front. And he brings to mind another Italian of the same era who also liked to puff his chest out.

Let's return to a more credible expression of the heroic - and for that, what could be better than the famous Laocoön, in the Vatican, dating from the first century BC? Laocoön was a Trojan priest who warned his countrymen against accepting the Greeks’ gift of a wooden horse (“beware of Greeks bearing gifts,” he said); they ignored his advice, with dramatic consequences. Spiteful even in victory, Athena, the protector of the Greeks, sent two serpents to kill him and his sons. This sculpture was discovered near Rome in the early 1500s, and Michelangelo was present for its unearthing. It helped to fuel the revival of classical notions of aesthetics in the late Renaissance.

The drama in this sculpture is breathtaking – especially in the sinuous movements of the snakes, which seem to come from everywhere. The fear on the face of the son to the viewer’s right is, I think, especially moving. When I read Pater's statement that, in sculpture, the character predominates over the situation, I immediately objected: "but what about the Laocoön?" Pater must have anticipated this, for a page after making that observation, he noted:

The Laocoön, with all that patient science through which it has triumphed over an almost unmanageable subject, marks a period in which sculpture has begun to aim at effects legitimate only in painting.

It is, he seems to say, the exception that proves the rule - though a remarkable exception, he implicitly concedes. Perhaps he is right; though I would consider any painting that achieves half the level of drama as this sculpture achieves to be a resounding success. Contrary to Pater's suggestion, this work - notwithstanding the limitations inherent in sculpture - does indeed capture an "exquisite situation" - exquisitely terrifying.