Mole...It Isn't Just for Dinner Anymore

Part of my job at the bookstore is to read book reviews. It's a win-win situation in that I get to read the paper over coffee, appear in the know, and build my to-read list to the point of ridiculousness. Usually this is a pleasant enough task, but today I had the last filaments of shreds of hope torn asunder by Nathan Glazer's review in the New York Times of Hugh Wilford's book The Mighty Wurlitzer: How the CIA Played America. Not surprisingly, the CIA was sugar daddy to a number of so-called progressive organizations. Sadly, Gloria Steinem knew and didn't seem to mind:

A youthful Gloria Steinem had just spent a year and half in India, where, we are told, she befriended Indira Gandhi and the widow of the “revolutionary humanist” M. N. Roy, and had met a researcher who seems to have been a C.I.A. agent or contact. Attractive and progressive, Steinem was hired to run the I.S.I.[Independent Service for Information] and to recruit knowledgeable young Americans who could debate effectively with the Communist organizers of the festival, defending the United States against Communist criticism of segregation and other American failings.
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The C.I.A.’s connections to the I.S.I. and a host of other organizations and publications was exposed in a storm of magazine and newspaper articles in 1967, and just about everything that had once been secret became public. Steinem stood up bravely: “I was happy to find some liberals in government in those days who were farsighted and cared enough to get Americans of all political views to the festival,” she told The New York Times. And to The Washington Post she said: “In my experience the agency was completely different from its image: it was liberal, nonviolent and honorable.”

Maybe that is naive youth speaking. I'll have to read the book to find out. Was everyone on the bloody take? Oh, and by the way, Gloria thinks we feminists should all vote for Hillary.
From the New York Times:

What worries me is that some women, perhaps especially younger ones, hope to deny or escape the sexual caste system; thus Iowa women over 50 and 60, who disproportionately supported Senator Clinton, proved once again that women are the one group that grows more radical with age.

This country can no longer afford to choose our leaders from a talent pool limited by sex, race, money, powerful fathers and paper degrees. It’s time to take equal pride in breaking all the barriers. We have to be able to say: “I’m supporting her because she’ll be a great president and because she’s a woman.”

What worries me that someone who thought the CIA was "liberal,non-violent, and honorable," wants us poor deluded non-Boomer women (who can't possibly think for ourselves) to vote for a dynasty. Sigh. I'll stop the rant before it starts.

I wonder how this would pair with Tim Weiner's Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA, which is also on my long list.

The Other Oil Crisis

From today's New York Times:

This is the other oil shock. From India to Indiana, shortages and soaring prices for palm oil, soybean oil and many other types of vegetable oils are the latest, most striking example of a developing global problem: costly food.
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In some poor countries, desperation is taking hold. Just in the last week, protests have erupted in Pakistan over wheat shortages, and in Indonesia over soybean shortages. Egypt has banned rice exports to keep food at home, and China has put price controls on cooking oil, grain, meat, milk and eggs.
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A startling change is unfolding in the world’s food markets. Soaring fuel prices have altered the equation for growing food and transporting it across the globe. Huge demand for biofuels has created tension between using land to produce fuel and using it for food.

So ethanol, biofuel, and hybrids aren't going to save the world, huh? Who knew?

Slum-urban Planning

In his great Reckoning column in the Globe and Mail Doug Saunders discusses how "Slumming it is better than bulldozing it." (Jan. 12, 2008)

From the piece:

This is the crucial flaw in all top-down, slum-clearance plans: They are based on the belief that people are in slums because they have fallen out of mainstream society, but most slums are composed of people who are clawing their way into the mainstream — the new arrivals from the villages, the recent immigrants from overseas.

They know more than anyone does about what it takes to improve their condition. Given the right conditions — planning approval, utilities, accessible loans, proper deeds or leases on their property — they would probably advance to the middle class faster than any government agency could take them there.

Dynasty

About four years ago I had a burning itch to move to New York, launch my publishing career, and vote for Hillary Clinton in ’08. I had it all worked out. I was a woman with a plan. Now, with the US economy going down the shitter, after reading report after report about Americans not reading or buying books, and after seeing Michael Moore’s Sicko, I’ve changed my mind about a lot of things. Even voting for a woman for president.

Ok, don’t get me wrong: I’d love a woman in the White House. In fact (and I know I’ll take heat for this), I think it’s accomplishment to have a black woman not wearing an apron working for the president. Sadly, Condi Rice plays for the wrong side, but baby steps, ladies, baby steps. We had Madeleine Albright and Sandra Day O’Connor and now Nancy Pelosi. Our time will come.

But is Clinton our feminist messiah? Does she have all the answers? She certainly has pedigree, and as she puts it “experience.” She was the unelected ear of the US president for eight years. And if she wins in November the United States of America will have been ruled by two families for more than twenty years.

Yes, she campaigned for universal health care. She was First Lady, not an elected official. She was a the Spouse of the Commander of Chief of the American Armed Forces. Clinton is now the elected Senator for the state of New York…who voted in favour of the war in Iraq.

Clinton is no shrinking violet and she is no doormat, and for those reasons I think she’s great. Her experience in the de facto politics of the white house—elected or no—is undisputed. I just wonder if she’s the right choice for president just because she’s a woman. Is she the right person for the job? Must we women (ok, maybe not me since I’m not an American citizen nor will I ever be) vote for a woman out of some trumped up sisterly love? Just because she has a vagina, does that mean I have to take one for the team? Should I have voted for Margaret Thatcher? Golda Meir? Benazir Bhutto? Kim Campbell? Would that have been the right thing to do?

When pundits flog Clinton’s advocacy for universal health care they forget that that’s an easy motherhood issue…and a change that will not see the light of day even in two terms. Eight years for all the HMOs to roll over and play Red? Not bloody likely! We’d need the next Clinton in office, dear Miss Chelsea, before that gets any traction.

So where does that leave us? Watching the middle: John Edwards. The nice, obliging, rich, white guy in a suit. And that doesn’t leave me with any Hope for Change.

Now for part 2 of my electoral rant. I’ll be brief. Really. This past Sunday, January 13, the New York Times ran a great story "Rights vs. Rights: An Improbable Collision," about the rights issue; specifically enfranchisement for women versus black men. About twenty years ago I wrote an essay for a women’s history class on this very topic about how largely white middle-class women campaigned for the vote before full male suffrage, which would have included not only black men but non-landholding men. Now, if I recall correctly (my typewritten essay is MIA) I probably used the inflammatory term “racist” (I was twenty-something, it was the Eighties). My prof wrote some scathing remarks about scholarship, I believe, but she also took offence at the content. Nevertheless, two decades hence, I feel vindicated. And sad at the same time.

Art and Life and Death

Ike Turner died earlier this month. According to ex-wife Tina, he beat her up and abused drugs. He denied the charges. Regardless, he was one of the inventors of rock and roll.

Phil Spector stands accused of murdering Lana Clarkson. According to the State of California, he killed her. The defense called her death by a shotgun blast to the face a suicide. Regardless, he invented the “Wall of Sound.”

Music and art is full of men who are abusive and otherwise despicable. But I’d be a hypocrite if I said their art didn’t make my world a better place; indeed, I’d have to give up all my records and books if I wanted to absent their influence. Many years ago, I recall having a discussion with another feminist about how I could like many of the artists who behaved badly or criminally. How could I like John Lennon, for example, after he wrote “ Run For Your Life” for Rubber Soul:

Well I'd rather see you dead, little girl
Than to be with another man
You better keep your head, little girl
Or I won't know where I am

You better run for your life if you can, little girl
Hide your head in the sand little girl
Catch you with another man
That's the end'a little girl

Well you know that I'm a wicked guy
And I was born with a jealous mind
And I can't spend my whole life
Trying just to make you toe the line

You better run for your life if you can, little girl
Hide your head in the sand little girl
Catch you with another man
That's the end'a little girl

Let this be a sermon
I mean everything I've said
Baby, I'm determined
And I'd rather see you dead

You better run for your life if you can, little girl
Hide your head in the sand little girl
Catch you with another man
That's the end'a little girl

I'd rather see you dead, little girl
Than to be with another man
You better keep your head, little girl
Or you won't know where I am
You better run for your life if you can, little girl
Hide your head in the sand little girl
Catch you with another man
That's the end'a little girl

Pretty scary stuff. Pretty evil. Pretty amazing that the same guy late wrote “Imagine” and was hailed as a peace-loving anti-war hippie. Perhaps Yoko, that bastion of feminist ardor, reformed the bad boy.

It doesn’t matter that Lennon changed his tune. That was up to him, the artist, to do so. Did he make good art apart from “Run For Your Life”? Yes. So did Phil Spector. I’d be a lying if I said I hated Spector’s influence on pop. The same holds true for Ike Turner. I have no doubt he assaulted Tina and abused drugs. But he made some great music. That doesn’t forgive him his trespasses, but music fans should not have to make a choice between good art and a bad person. That’s up to the individual. I’m not about to say I can’t like a record, but I can say I don’t like a person: I don’t ever want to be in a room with Phil Spector let alone have a beer with him.

If you really want to get angry about the war on women— and I do believe one rages—think of this: more women were killed by their spouses than US soldiers were killed in Iraq (see War on Women by Brian Vallee ). One teenage girl died in Toronto as a result of disobeying her father. Hundreds if not thousands of women are murdered by male family members because they “dishonour” the family by refusing to marry against their will. That has nothing to do with culture. That has everything to do with hate.

I read somewhere that women are a little safer now that Ike Turner is dead. What naïve simplistic shit: we are no more safe now than we were yesterday. And we won’t be safe for a very long time. There isn’t one cause that can be rectified to guarantee our safety. It’s complex and wrinkly and multifaceted. Like people.

I believe that Phil Spector killed Lana Clarkson, and he should be found guilty and locked up for life with no chance of parole. I believe that there must be more shelters for women seeking refuge from potentially deadly spouses.

And I believe that good, even great art, can be made by fatally flawed people. And I can still appreciate that art as a part of the human condition.

Dolcet Tones

This morning's Queen streetcar commute nearly rendered me postal before I'd even reached work. I had one of those drivers who just can't shut up. Short of announcing that there's an accident ahead and the car is delayed, or that we've been short turned, there is no further reason to chat up the passengers. Not now that the TTC has installed an automatic public address system that not only displays the next stop on a digital sign, but also announces it on the speaker.

Now before you get all Luddite on my ass, realize that this doesn't mean the driver, in a pique of civil mindedness, doesn't still feel the need to announce (or bloody sing in some cases) not only the stop, but the buses and the local services...within a ten-block radius...with a "time stamp." Who needs to know that the beer store is closed at 8am? If I do, I'm either unemployed or working nights and therefore asleep at home...not on the streetcar. The rest of us are sucking back coffee and thinking of our first proper drink at 5:15pm, thanks.

And so, as I shoved my anti-social iPod in my already hearing-impaired ears, I thought of Emma Clarke, the ex voice of the London tube; she's been sacked. Apparently, she suffered the wrath of an un-civil servant's lack of humour...or lack public transit experience.

From the Mail on Sunday online:

“The thought of being stuck in the Tube with strangers for minutes on end and having to listen to endless repeated messages of my own voice fills me with horror,” she told the paper.

The whole experience reminds me of a scene from the film Croupier starring the very lovely Clive Owen. His character, Jack Manfred, is heading to his new job as a casino blackjack dealer, is packed in a train like one of many sardines, and clinging to a handrail: "I hate public transport."

Kokomo-itis

If you're old enough to remember when the Beach Boys (minus Brian Wilson) released this crap single, then you may cotton on to what I mean by it: shit music made by has-been geezers to cash-in on nostalgia. Hawaiian shirts are optional.

Nostalgia is like tequila: fun in small doses, but know when to cut yourself off before it gets ugly. This goes for so-called 80s music as it does for 60s, but Generation X's market share isn't as big as the Baby Boomers', who, it seems can't hold their liquor.

To see that I'm not alone, check out Jon Fine's media column in Business Week where he comments on David Brooks' op-ed piece "The Segmented Society" in the New York Times.

Filled to Bursting

Planning a good ol' fashioned booze up? Well, there's a lot to worry about: cash for the tab, cash for the cab, having mates around to remind you how fucked up you were...oh and remembering to pee.

Yeah, pee. Now for us light-weights, it pretty much happens without any prompting: two pints and I'm racing to the toilet. Then each pint after equals yet another trip. Some would think that was embarrassing, but the Guardian kindly put my mind and weak bladder to rest. You see, binge drinking can lead to...

EXPLODING BLADDERS!

You think that's funny? Well here's a yummy description:

The mechanics of this gruesome problem are relatively straightforward. Alcohol is diuretic - it makes you urinate more - hence the sight of drunk people urinating in the streets on a Saturday night. Alcohol is also an anaesthetic: it dulls the urge to go. The combination of large volumes of urine, and a dimmed, possibly non-existent urge to pee can result in a seriously over-full bladder.

While most people will just let the urine out one way or another (possibly in their sleep), some will be so "dulled" that they will not feel the urge to "void". If it is not emptied, the bladder will eventually be unable to contain the volume, and - like any over-full bag - can burst apart under the pressure. A minor trauma - say, falling down and bumping your over-full bladder during a drunken binge - can also increase the likelihood of this happening.

According to this article, the 3 to 4 cm rupture is big enough to allow urine poison you from inside.

Makes a person want to jump back on the wagon....ok no it doesn't. Just makes me want to pee.

The Latest Shiny Toy

Joel Johnson from Boing Boing reviews Amazon's Kindle, the latest ebook reader. Apparently, it's got potential. Still, I bet it would really suck if you got beach sand in it, or dropped it on the bus, or it fell in the tub, or your husband/wife tossed to the bedroom floor in the heat of passion.

Meanwhile, sadly, back on the home front, Americans are reading less and getting stupider as a result. In a New York Times story, a study by the National Endowment for the Arts shows that students' grades drop in most disciplines when reading isn't an active part of their lives. That's not just books, that's anything: magazines, newspapers, etc. While some would argue its a condition of income, the NYT reports that

Although some of those results could be attributed to income gaps, Mr. Iyengar noted that students who lived in homes with more than 100 books but whose parents only completed high school scored higher on math tests than those students whose parents held college degrees (and were therefore likely to earn higher incomes) but who lived in homes with fewer than 10 books.

So, in the future, there will be ebook readers but no readers of books?

There May Be Snow on the Roof

From today's International Herald Tribute

"There's a difference between love as it is presented in movies and music as this jazzy sexy thing that involves bikini underwear and what love actually turns out to be," said the psychologist Mary Pipher, whose book "Another Country" looked at the emotional life of the elderly.

"The really interesting script isn't that people like to have sex," she said. "The really interesting script is what people are willing to put up with.

"Young love is about wanting to be happy," she continued. "Old love is about wanting someone else to be happy."

Lovely. Fingers crossed...

Choke on This

From the Toronto Star:

"During the Leafs' final game at Maple Leaf Gardens on Feb. 13, 1999, team staff collected ice shavings the Zamboni had scooped off the ice between periods. The melted ice was cleaned and purified, and poured into about 2,500 acrylic pucks. Within days, the entire lot had been sold for $50 apiece for a net profit of roughly $125,000."

This from a team that hasn't, and I believe WON'T, ever win a Stanley Cup again. Why should they? They're the most profitable franchise in the NHL. They've been filling seats to capacity since the Ballard days. Now, however, the butts in the chairs are pinstriped; so much for a ticket boycott. Leafs Nation can't afford a passport to the game for which it bleeds blue. And yet fans till buy in.

Ever feel like you've been cheated?

Movie Version of "The Kite Runner" Delayed

Maybe it's my cold, maybe it's my experience from working in the film business, but something about this story stinks.

From the New York Times:

LOS ANGELES, Oct. 3 — The studio distributing “The Kite Runner,” a tale of childhood betrayal, sexual predation and ethnic tension in Afghanistan, is delaying the film’s release to get its three schoolboy stars out of Kabul — perhaps permanently — in response to fears that they could be attacked for their enactment of a culturally inflammatory rape scene.

... The boys and their relatives are now accusing the filmmakers of mistreatment, and warnings have been relayed to the studio from Afghan and American officials and aid workers that the movie could aggravate simmering enmities between the politically dominant Pashtun and the long-oppressed Hazara.

In an effort to prevent not only a public-relations disaster but also possible violence, studio lawyers and marketing bosses have employed a stranger-than-fiction team of consultants. In August they sent a retired Central Intelligence Agency counterterrorism operative in the region to Kabul to assess the dangers facing the child actors. And on Sunday a Washington-based political adviser flew to the United Arab Emirates to arrange a safe haven for the boys and their relatives.

...In interviews, more than a dozen people involved in the studio’s response described grappling with vexing questions: testing the limits of corporate responsibility, wondering who was exploiting whom and pondering the price of on-screen authenticity.

...The producers dispelled one fear, that the filmmakers would use computer tricks to depict the boy’s genitals in the rape scene. But Ahmad Khan’s parents also pressed for more cash, the producers said.

On the advice of a Kabul television company, the boys had been paid $1,000 to $1,500 a week, far less than the Screen Actors Guild weekly scale of $2,557, but far more than what Afghan actors typically receive.

So what exactly did Hollywood film execs think was going to happen? That filming "authentic" rape scenes of two boys in an Muslim country (in any country)didn't bear consequences? How far in the sand did they bury their heads? This isn't just an American attitude, but also an artistic one; that to produce "good art" one must make it "real". Well, the translation of director Marc Forster's vision was lost, if it was ever properly conveyed at all.

Great spin, though boys. The book will continue to sell and its readers are frothing to see the flick.

Vote for Us....

...and we'll give you a day off! Yes, vote for Dolt McWimpy and he'll promise to consider legislation to think about a holiday in the bleakest month of the year: February.

Could you be more blatant, Mr. Premier?

Well, you could if you were the opposition:"As for the Liberal promise of another statutory holiday, the opposition critics agreed another one is warranted."

So, I guess regardless of how you vote, Ontarians will perhaps likely maybe sort of think about a stat holiday (that's 2.5 x/hour, folks) in February. One hopes. Fingers crossed. God willing. Planets in alignment...

From the Toronto Star

Surprise, Surprise

This is old news in many sad ways. According to Associated Press, a quarter of Americans don't read books. I'm not surprised, but I am disheartened. As may be evident from previous posts, I work in a bookstore where I'm constantly bombarded with the axiom "Well, at least they're reading" in response to purchases of The Secret and chicklit titles. That's like saying "Well, at least they're eating" when someone's diet consists of potato chips.

Some key points:

• "Of those who did read, women and pensioners were most avid readers, and religious works and popular fiction were the top choices."

• "Every other genre - including politics, poetry and classical literature - were named by fewer than 5% of readers."

• "There was even some political variety evident, with Democrats and liberals typically reading slightly more books than Republicans and conservatives."

• "Book sales in the US have been flat in recent years and are expected to stay that way indefinitely"

Why must people live up to stereotypes? Reading doesn't have to cost money. Libraries are free, and librarians are dedicated advocates for reading and the freedom to do so. So why, in this so-called free country, do people choose NOT to read thereby choosing NOT to express and exchange ideas? What exactly are they afraid of?

From the Guardian

Criticism of Richard Dawkins

Dominic Lawson pens an amazingly literate piece on Richard Dawkins called "Why Richard Dawkins is right on alternative medicine - but not when it comes to religion" for the Independent.

[Eighteenth-century Scottish atheist David]Hume was perhaps the first to make the point that we cannot derive "ought" from "is". That is to say, we cannot know how the world ought to be, simply from describing how it is - no matter how knowledgeable we are. Hume's point was later defined with more brutal simplicity by men such as Professor A J "Freddie" Ayer: all statements of ethics are factually meaningless, being no more than the expression of the view that we either like or dislike something.

Freddie (my late stepfather, as it happens) was the Richard Dawkins of his day, at least in the sense that he became this country's most celebrated anti-religious proselytiser; but his impeccable Humean logic is now the impenetrable shield that the churches can use to deflect the ideological bullets of his successor. After all, if religion has been forced to become little other than an assembly of ethical opinions - however passionately adhered to and however elegantly housed-- then it cannot actually be depicted as "wrong".

For the entire article, click on the heading.

Tony Wilson Dead

From The Guardian:

Anthony Wilson, the Manchester music impresario who founded Factory Records and the Hacienda nightclub, died last night, aged 57, after a heart attack on Thursday. A leading light in the "Madchester" popular culture boom of the late 1980s and early 90s, he had been battling kidney cancer since early 2006.

The Salford-born journalist brought bands including Joy Division, New Order, the Happy Mondays and James to a wider audience. His record label's pioneering approach to design and architecture also helped kick-start Manchester's transformation into a European cultural centre.

From NME

[Creation Record's Alan McGee]'Factory Records was the template for every indie label with its 50-50 deals [between artist and label] and I can honestly say without Factory there would have been no Creation. In fact if it wasn't for his talk to us in 1985 I might have quit music all together.'

Good books on Wilson and what he did:
Mick Middles,From Joy Division to New Order: The True Story of Anthony H. Wilson and Factory Records, (London: Virgin Books, 2002).

Chris Ott, Unknown Pleasures, (New York: Continuum, 2004).

Creakings from a Cranky Old Man

American Joe Queenan, who writes for a number of publications including the Guardian, penned an interestingly cranky piece about the Clash, London Calling (song and single), and the emotional hold it has on a generation. In short, he thinks we've been had just like the Boomers before us were, and all of the Clash's anthemic calls to arms were just a marketing ploy.

Ok, it's funny and well put. And in my more cynical "who gives a rat's ass" moods (which occur more and more these days) I would concede. Except he played the Hitler card:

The Clash, including the now deceased Strummer, allowed "London Calling" to be used in a Jaguar TV commercial in 2002. Jaguar is owned by the Ford Motor Company, which was founded by a ferocious anti-semite who invented the assembly line and was admired by Adolf Hitler. Ironically, top-quality airplanes built by the Jew-loathing Henry Ford helped defeat the Nazis and his zombies of death. War was declared. Battle came down. After all this, won't you give me a smile?

For fuck's sake, most popular technology has evil militaristic origins. Did you have to lose us there? I thought you were smarter than that.

Missing the Bus

The province of Ontario proposes to spend $15 million dollars to create green licence plates for environmentally friendly, low-emission cars and trucks. This means that Smart cars, hybrids and the like could park for free and use the carpool lane.

Isn't that missing the point? Leave the trendy car at home and take the bus. Premier Dalton McGuinty ought to dump that money into making the public transit system more efficient. Who told him that free parking will make an SUV driver see the light (through the smog) and switch to a Prius? If said driver was so aware, they wouldn't be spending $1.00/litre every to fill a gas hog.

Throw a toll on the Gardiner and the DVP. London has. It's just as much of a "step" as meaningless special plates.

Radio That Doesn't Suck

Just in case you're online, and you need something to listen to, try BBC Radio 1's Huw Stephens. The Welshman presents fresh new music. Tonight I heard Emmy the Great: Sandy Denny meets Mia Doi Todd.

Failing that, you can always haunt my alma mater: CKCU FM, the mighty 93.1

A Third Pint?

Sssh. The secret's getting out. Women don't eat like freakin' birds, and we don't all like fruity drinks either.

Nope. According to this article in theGuardian, real women drink ale. But the thing is the bright guys at the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) reckon we want cute little girly glasses. Thing is, this fancy stemware only holds a third of a pint. (Kind of like our wages being 75 cents to a man's dollar.)

Huh. That's just crazy talk.

Now, if someone had asked me, not only would I have set them straight about how I like my ale/stout/lager/cider/pilsner, but I would have insisted they buy me dinner, preferably a steak (medium, please, with chips, thanks). And I'm not alone in my appetites. The New Times reports that we ladies have gone off rabbit food and like a big ol' plate of protein with our carbs.

Red meat sent a message that she was “unpretentious and down to earth and unneurotic,” she said, “that I’m not obsessed with my weight even though I’m thin, and I don’t have any food issues.” She added, “In terms of the burgers, it said I’m a cheap date, low maintenance.”

So eating properly and drinking heartily are in. About bloody time, too.