Summer’s nearly over, but there are plenty of oddball links to carry you through another week! Just click more!
Continue reading “Unrequired Reading: Aug. 22, 2008”
Georgia Rules
I haven’t written anything about the war in Georgia because I don’t know enough about the circumstances and history, and I figure there are plenty of other places you could go for uninformed ranting.
Over at Reason’s Hit & Run blog, there’s a good piece by Matt Welch on how various commentators see the war through their own prism. While the cited examples are funny, my biggest laugh came from the comments section, where frequent contrarian commenter Joe remarked:
I agree, it’s irritating when people project their own ideological interpretation onto complex events.
OT, does anyone else think this whole episode could have been avoided if Georgia had developed a better system of light rail?
I really am easily amused.
This is getting ridiculous
Today, the NY Sun (Official Newspaper of Gil Roth) managed to put out more articles of interest to me than any other paper would in a month:
- Revising our views on Arcimboldo in light of the Allegorical Head of the Four Seasons
- Revising our views on neoconservatism via World Affairs magazine
- Revising our views on Columbus Circle post-TW Center
- Edward Hopper: Wanna see my etchings?
- Death of a niche magazine shop in NYC
- And an art installation by my favorite electronic band, Underworld . . . ?
Talk about an embarrassment of riches! I half-expect tomorrow’s edition to include articles on Miller’s Crossing, Danny Wilson, and Roger Langridge.
And still champ!
I’ve been so busy lately, I haven’t checked the goings-on at The New York Sun. I wonder what’s in today’s Arts+ section?
- A review of David Lebedoff’s new book on George Orwell and Evelyn Waugh
- A review of Cyril Connolly’s “Enemies of Promise”
- A review of the best gins for G&Ts
- A sidebar on niche tonic-waters
I feel like Cliff Clavin on Jeopardy!, when the categories were “Civil Servants, Stamps from Around the World, Mothers and Sons, Beer, Bar Trivia, and Celibacy.”
Glad to see the Official Newspaper of Gil Roth is still earning its keep.
Missing the point?
If your presidential campaign has problems convincing Jewish voters that you’re on their side, I’m not sure it’s in your best interest to assemble a rally of 200,000 Germans. I’m just sayin’. . .
A Chip off the Old Karadzic
Last weekend, I wrote about my Sunday sidewalk brunch with Samuel Delany. I should have known something was wrong, the way Chip kept looking down the sidewalk and back into the restaurant, the way he kept nervously fingering his beard, the way he patted me down and confiscated my phone before we sat at the table.
But I didn’t understand why he kept trying to explain how the biggest influence on Dhalgren was actually the poetry of Dragan Dabic, in between complaints about how Marko Jaric was disastrously underused by the Timberwolves last season.
Now it all becomes clear: I wasn’t having lunch with Chip Delany! I was having lunch with Radovan Karadzic!
We’ve gone through the looking-glass, people.
It’s always the end of the world for somebody
Courtesy of Hit & Run, here’s a neat article from World Affairs on how the current crop of “America-in-decline” books & articles is nothing new:
As with the pessimistic intellectual troughs that followed the Depression, Vietnam, and the stagflation of the late 1970s and early 1980s, there is a tendency among declinists to over-extrapolate from a momentous but singular event—in this case, the Iraq War, whose wake propels many of their gloomy forecasts.
It’s always easier to
- call for the end of the world, and
- pretend that now is how things are always going to be.
Unrequired Reading: July 18, 2008
I have come back to tell you all . . . it’s time for links!
Continue reading “Unrequired Reading: July 18, 2008”
What It Is: 7/14/08
What I’m reading: The Dunwich Horror, by H.P. Lovecraft, Against the Gods
What I’m listening to: A stack of Mad Mix CDs
What I’m watching: Superbad and Cartwheel Fu
What I’m drinking: G&Ts with Plymouth Gin
Where I’m going: To NYC tonight to participate in a NYU graduate school panel on “media relations” or something. I find this funny because I’m the editor of a trade magazine, and thus not held in very high esteem by “legit” journalists.
What I’m happy about: Continuing to pile items like that one onto the resume of my career-by-accident/attrition.
What I’m sad about: Having no excuse not to get started on the September issue of the magazine, as well as preparing for our conference at the end of that month.
What I’m pondering: Whether the editors of the New Yorker are utterly tone deaf or just in the bag for Hillary.