Bourbonblues

The Handgun Problem

2008-06-27T03:33:05Z

Considering our current Supreme Court, today's ruling on gun ownership wasn't surprising. Here is my favorite quote from the AP article:

"Scalia noted that the handgun is Americans' preferred weapon of self-defense in part because 'it can be pointed at a burglar with one hand while the other hand dials the police.'"

I note that the handgun is the burglar's weapon of choice because it can be pointed at you with one hand while the other hand snatches the phone away from you.

I'm not an anti-gun activist in any sense, and I recognize how highly many people value their right to gun ownership. I passed the gun safety course and became licensed when I was 14 so that I could start bird hunting with my father. However, I do not think handguns should be legal in this country. Here is why:

On the average, if someone gets shot and killed, four out of five times it will be with a handgun. In 1997, for example, handguns were used in 79.4 percent of all firearm homicides.

From 1990 to 1997, handguns were used in a majority (55.6 percent) of all homicides; that is, they were used in murder more than all other weapons combined.

From 1990 to 1997, there were 293,781 firearm deaths—homicides, suicides, and unintentional shootings.

From 1990 to 1997 in the United States there were more than—

* 160,000 homicides

* 110,000 firearm homicides

* 89,000 handgun homicides

Handgun homicides hit record highs in the early 1990s, peaking in 1993. That year there were 13,258 such killings—out of a total of 16,120 firearm homicides. Source: VPC

To complement this post I tried to find a picture of James Madison pointing a musket at a burglar with one hand while the other wrote a letter for help post-haste, but for some reason Google Images failed me.

Review: "The Happening"

2008-06-15T07:35:39Z

Dear M. Night Shyamalan,

I want my $10 back.

The Empire Strikes Barack

2008-05-03T10:48:41Z

This is easily the funniest political video I've seen this primary season... the Democratic primary à la Star Wars:

Bizarro Charlie Rose vs. Bizarro Charlie Rose

2008-04-22T07:16:32Z

As some of you may know "Charlie Rose" is my favorite show on television. Therefore I was delighted to stumble across this absurdist imagining of what it would look like if Samuel Beckett had directed the show, with Charlie interviewing himself:

What a great time to be a Dodgers fan

2008-04-11T09:44:26Z

You would think you'd know you're in trouble when your ace is Barry "My Fastball Tops Out At 83" Zito and your cleanup hitter is Bengie Molina. As usual, The Onion reports it best: San Francisco Giants Band Together To Score Run

And to make the whole thing even better, the brilliant Giants' marketing team just came out with a new slogan: All Out, All Season. Wow. It almost makes me feel guilty for hating them.

Four Days in Denver

2008-04-08T12:03:09Z

"West Wing" writer Lawrence O'Donnell has a brilliant piece in the latest "New York Magazine" in which he imagines the upcoming Democratic Convention: Four Days in Denver: A Psycho-Political Thriller

To write a story? Six words.

2007-08-01T23:55:46Z

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.11/sixwords.html

I just ran across these at Wired. They had a bunch of different authors write a story... in 6 words. Most of them are bizarre, and some are brilliant. Some of my favorites:

Cryonics: Disney thawed. Mickey gnawed. Omigawd.
- Eileen Gunn

Wasted day. Wasted life. Dessert, please.
- Steven Meretzky

Gown removed carelessly. Head, less so.
- Joss Whedon

“Cellar?” “Gate to, uh … hell, actually.”
- Ronald D. Moore

Cross-Country Crutch Skiing (say that 3 times fast)

2007-07-14T07:08:17Z

The video to RJD2's new song "Work It Out" is incredible. The most amazing thing is that it appears to be a single shot:

Flight O' Conchords

2007-06-22T00:36:53Z

The new HBO comedy "The Flight of the Conchords" is brilliant- it's exactly like Prince's 1984 cinematic masterpiece "Purple Rain" except that it's intentionally funny:

Yabba Dabba Doo!

2007-05-24T13:37:46Z

I think the new Creation Museum in Kentucky would be a great place for the next Republican presidential candidates' debate.

Guy in a Reagan Mask

2007-05-22T19:24:32Z

Tom Tomorrow always seems to get it right.

Willie Nelson Loves America

2007-05-05T08:12:40Z

Dear Faithful Readers,
I am now officially accepting donations in support of the Support Bourbonblues' Cross-country Trip to see "Willie Nelson's Fourth of July Picnic" Charity Fund. Can you believe that lineup? Old 97's, Drive-by Truckers, Son Volt, and Willie himself, all in one day. Hot damn! It would be a crime for me not to go, really, a crime. Maybe I'll hitchhike to Washington.

May you live to be a thousand years old, sir!

2007-04-20T03:26:41Z

I just wanted to say that Joe Versus the Volcano is most definitely one of the greatest movies of all-time.

And I thought I had a lot of music...

2007-04-19T08:42:03Z

This New York music reviewer claims to have the largest iTunes library in the world... 849GB, 172,150 tracks, and 809.2 days of listening pleasure.

300: Crypto-Fascist Cinema at its worst

2007-04-16T06:30:31Z

We saw 300 today. As much as I wanted to like this movie, I'd have to give it a big, fat, D.

For a long time I've thought that the Battle of Thermopylae would be a great basis for a big-time CGI epic- I remember Derek and I talking about this years ago. But it wasn't the graphic novelized, ahistorical nature of the film that bothered me at all- I really don't think there's anything wrong with doing that, as long as you're not pretending to do otherwise. That being said... I can say with complete sincerity that this entire movie made me continually cringe. So here it is:

My Top 5 Reasons This Film Was A Piece:

1. The Spartans were no longer Spartan, but had been turned into unabashed fascists. If I want to watch a crypto-fascist film I'll stick to "Conan the Barbarian."

2. Like many films that deal with pre-modern subjects, the protagonists are portrayed as the protectors of reason and logic against dogmatism and superstition. For example, in the final scenes of the film the Spartans claim to be warring against Persian "mysticism." This is anachronistic and stupid on several levels.

3. The entire film is strangely homo-erotic (Spartans fighting in speedos?) while being overtly homophobic. At one point the Spartan king, Leonidas, refers to the Athenians as "boy-lovers." The Persian king Xerxes is also portrayed as sexually ambiguous in contrast with the ultra-hetero Leonidas.

This is ironic, considering that pederasty was practiced and even formalized in Sparta, probably even more so than in any of the other Greek city-states. In fact, pederasty was such an integral part of Spartan culture that other Greeks often lampooned them for it. To quote Wikipedia:

The alleged sexual indulgence of Spartan pederasty was a running gag in the repertoire of Athenian comedians, and the verb λακωνίζω / lakōnízō ("to do it the Lacedaemonian way"; literally, "to laconize") took on the meaning of "to sodomize."

4. The Spartans are continually portrayed as the defenders of "freedom" in a distinctly modern sense, even though by modern standards their slave-based society was far less "free" than any of the other Greek city-states.

5. Egregiously wasted potential pisses me off. I could have written a better version of this movie in 15 minutes. It took a bit of searching, but I think this review over at The Onion's A.V. Club gets it right.

Behold Magnificence!

2007-04-13T06:23:17Z

In 1999 Ben Stiller directed a pilot starring Jack Black and Owen Wilson, called "Heat Vision and Jack." Although it was in all probability the greatest pilot in the history of television (or aviation... Charles Lindbergh was a hack), it was not surprisingly not picked up by any network.

This was the premise of the show: Jack Austin (Jack Black) was a NASA astronaut whose brain expanded "like cookie dough" when he flew too close to the Sun... this made him at least three times smarter than the smartest person in the world. Jack's best friend is Heat Vision (voiced by Owen Wilson)... a talking motorcycle. While on the run from the evil actor/NASA agent Ron Silver (playing himself), Jack and Heat Vision use their superhuman intelligence and motorcycleness to continually save the world/solve crimes/thwart evil.

Despite such an obviously awesome premise the pilot was canned, never to be seen again... until YouTube. So now, humble reader, I present to you, in its full half hour or glory...

Heat Vision and Jack!

God Bless You, Mr. Vonnegut

2007-04-12T04:09:33Z

If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph:

THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED
FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD
WAS MUSIC

In the Spirit of Easter...

2007-04-07T08:03:18Z

The above picture has nothing to do with this article: On Atheists and Easter... yet both are thought-provoking in their own way.

Commedia

2007-03-31T20:40:48Z

This week I've been reading Dante's "Purgatorio," the second book from the "Divine Comedy." I just found this site from UTexas: Danteworlds.
The artwork is beautiful, and the audio clips provide further proof that I need to learn Italian sometime in the next few years.

Quoth Batman: "Quiet or Papa Spank!"

2007-03-23T09:50:39Z

This is absolutely hilarious:
Top 15 Unintentionally Funny Comic Book Panels

Harrison & Dylan Duet, circa. 1970

2007-03-22T06:55:04Z

I just ran across this outtake from the Concert for Bangla Desh in 1970. It's Harrison and Dylan singing "If Not For You"... definitely one of my all-time favorite Harrison songs.

Slime River

2007-03-19T04:41:50Z

Rachel went downtown yesterday for St. Patty's Day and snapped these pics:

Fearless 2008 Election Primary Predictions (that will undoubtedly be proven completely wrong)

2007-03-16T19:00:01Z

In the spirit of March Madness, I thought I'd make some ridiculously early presidential prognostications.

Repubs: Mitt Romney will win in Iowa, with Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback making a close second. The two supposed front-runners, McCain and Guiliani, will surprise everyone by how horrible they'll do in the primaries.

Once it's a Romney vs. Brownback race the conservative masses will flood in to back Brownback out of fear of Romney's Mormonism...never underestimate the political power of the religious right, particularly in primary season when the average Republican voter is 87 years old. Look for Newt Gingrich as the VP pick.

Dems: John Edwards will have a better showing than expected in the early primaries by soundly beating out Clinton and Obama. Hillary will hang in for a long time... she campaigns like a Rove Republican and will have more money than Obama and Edwards combined. However, the bulk of the party will eventually realize that Hillary just can't win- look for a Howard Deanesque meltdown.

Obama will seriously under perform, but will have a strong enough showing to be picked by Edwards for the VP spot.

2008 Finals: Edwards/Obama vs. Brownback/Gingrich

Semiaquatic Broad-tailed Rodent Spotting

2007-03-11T08:53:11Z

Today, during a pleasant stroll along the Lake Michigan shore, Rachel and I spotted an honest-to-goodness beaver.
It looked exactly like this (except that it wasn't a hat on the head of a gout-ridden founding father, but was rather alive and swimming slowly around a half-frozen lagoon):

N.B. use caution (or if you must, joyful discretion) if you ever find yourself doing a Google image search of the word "beaver."

I bet it was a waterbed

2007-03-10T10:15:43Z

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