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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
mikeyfil
Published Letters: 77
In response to a few things:
sealed indictments are not part of the public record--Prop Joe had a mole
in agreement with all those who mentioned that anyone who doesn't know/recognize Nick Sobatka does not really know The Wire
While Dickens has aspects/elements of sentimentality, he had a much darker vision of the world than some of the letter writers here give him credit for--you need to actually read his books and especially note the progression of pessimism and and sadness that informs his later novels--So, V. Woolf didn't think much of Dickens, apparently--not a surprise as his writing is so very different--But Dickens is a great novelist
I'm with you, hallo_world--I can't tell you how many Europeans I've met who love to trash the US but completely ignore how their own countries have many racist policies/perspectives--French people are particularly bad in this regard, in my experience.
Wow, I can't believe that you describe DDL as "blank" in the scene where he realizes the guy claiming to be his brother is a phony! His face was full of the kind of horror and revulsion a person like him would feel at realizing he had mistakenly opened himself up to the "wrong" person--his reaction goes a long way in "explaining" his misanthropic character--the man can't stand closeness, openness, emotional dependence. The character's "hamminess" I think is a result of a man who can't be close to people--he literally has to act around others. While I found his character difficult to empathize with, I think he is representative of a kind of destructive and essentially misanthropic "maleness" all too common in our country, where men like him are often quite successful. I could see a lot of my father in the character--terrified of emotional closeness while craving it, hating to see anyone else success because that somehow makes you "lesser"--the character was a kind of cautionary figure and I don't mind that it was at times a bit over the top.
I never watch CNN anymore but I was channel surfing and happened to stop on this "interview"--it appalled me enough to prod me to write CNN an email--I too had thoughts about Pravda while I was watching this. The outright propaganda served up on our "news" channels is getting incredibly blatant. This combined with the 60 Minutes story about Seligman and its being blacked out on Alabama tv sets, and coming across a related story on how some social studies teacher in Alabama who is also a Democrat connected to the state legislature was hauled out of her house in handcuffs for apparently not working as many school hours as was in her contract make me truly wonder what is happening to our country and what we can do to stop this fascism.
Didn't Obama make the point that, while he may not have been in the Senate, he was running for public office at the time we invaded Iraq, so for him to take a stand against the invasion at that time was actually quite risky, given that so many elected officials, like HRC, totally caved in to Bush's fear factor. As others here have pointed out, it was obvious to so many of us, without the benefit of "inside" knowledge, that Bush was lying. I do not want to vote for someone who is such an inept judge of character--she should have known better--or maybe she did but chose the safe way of going along with the fear-mongering. And I fail to see evidence ofObama's "condescension" towards her--I see him being continually complimentary towards her while she stoops to whiny, desparate attacks on him.
That said, Tim Russert is such a tool--his obvious delight in "getting" HRC has been obvious since her initial Senate run--he's a total sexist. Would that he would have used some of his focus to give some hardball questions to the Bush administration over the years.
Glenn, I love your work and your posts and you have brought up mountains of issues to think about in regard to the Spitzer affair and ones that call for outrage as well. But I think those who have raised the notion here that prostitution is very often inherently demeaning to women have an extremely valid point and deserve to be treated better than some of the more hostile responses indicate ("get off the cross" "you're no different than religious fundamentalists", etc.). And being gay is no kind of indication that misogyny is not part of the picture. The increases in violence world-wide towards women, the huge increase in sex trafficking, child pornography, the way women are so totally objectified in many cultures--all this is something to be taken seriously. And for the person who brought up Japan--Japan is one of the most ragingly sexist countries on earth--women are treated like dirt there. I think many men like to pretend that there is nothing psychologically damaging about being a prostitute--that enables them to keep the system going. I don't think anyone here mentioned the fact that Spitzer was probably exposing his wife to a host of STDs--didn't she have some kind of right to know about this?
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
219 Democrats and one Republican join in favor of the legislation, which passed by a narrow margin
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
Salon headlines in your mailbox
