Did anyone else notice that Project Runway judge Nina Garcia was wearing what appeared to be an iron cross on the last episode? See picture here: http://bmauer.blogspot.com/2006/01/nazi-fashion.html

That first film is of Eureka, California. I have a copy that goes all the way to the end of the street car line and as it comes into the station you can clearly see the name "Eureka" engraved on the station wall.

The first film is the basic material for a 1974 reworking by Ernie Gehr called "Eureka." Despite the title and the closing shot (which says "Eureka" on the train station wall), the original film was called "A Trip Down Market Street Before the Fire." Sorry about the incorrect attribution. This is indeed San Francisco.

Is anyone in the mainstream media talking about the Fitz investigation and whether it is impacting Rove's security clearance?

Some people are wondering whether this was comedy. It was an indictment.

The blogs go ape, but the media ignores the stories. There are all kinds of censorship. Colbert's performance and the Downing Street memos represent the "unthinkable."

Somebody please let that dog in!

The striking thing about the press's failure was that it was concurrent with other institutional failure that were equally massive. There was the failure of the Democrats to mount an organized opposition (23 senators doesn't cut it). There was the failure of congress itself which turned over constitutional powers that were not theirs to give away. They are still doing it today with their abdication of control over NSA spying. There was the failure of the courts, which to this day have largely defended the Bush administrations expanded powers. There was the failure of the military, which could have opposed the disastrous war plans. There was the failure of the churches, who signed on to the war as though it was a sacred cause.

With minor exceptions, the U.S. suffered total institutional failure. As an educator, I believe that the road back from failure begins with education. Educators must take the lead and strengthen their institutions to stand up against more lies and intimidation.

As of today, none of the institutions I mentioned have pulled themselves back from failure. We must begin the necessary reforms now.

As a Professor in English who sometimes writes on rhetoric, I have had occasion to write about some run-ins I had of the anti-speech kind. I detail these and discuss the rhetorical issues involved in confronting Bush and his supporters in my article "Speaking Freely in a Time of War." It was published in 2003. Here is the link:

http://www.ars-rhetorica.net/Queen/VolumeSpecialIssue4/Articles/Mauer.pdf

Wow! Springstein called her an idiot and she just went on and asked a follow up question as if nothing happened. . . thereby proving his point.

I just finished teaching a section of my "Modern Drama as Literature" class on Ionesco's play Rhinoceros. I drew an analogy between the rhinos in the play, who stomp and snort without restraint in their attacks on humanism, and the current administration and its apologists. If there was any doubt that the analogy was apt, Coulter's behavior makes it crystal clear that she is a rhino.

The most tragic part of Ionesco's play is that good people, in struggling to appear "fair minded," make apologies for the rhinos and do nothing to confront them or control them. The result? At the end of the play there is only one human being left.

As Greil Marcus points out, Elvis made an art of squandering his talent for most of the last years of his career. He was throwing poo at the audience and daring them to say they'd had enough. They never did.

It's kind of the same relationship the Bush administration has with its die-hard supporters.