Sunday, June 15, 2003

Found on eBay...

You find the darnedest things up for sale on "The World's Online Marketplace." An auction house is currently selling the 1929 Caerulia, which was the yearbook for Polytechnic High School in Long Beach, California. This is of interest because one of the graduates therein was Lindley Armstrong Jones, who would later be world-famous as either the funniest bandleader in the business or the most musical comedian, Spike Jones. That's his class picture there, back from the days he marched in the school band (he was the drum major) without firing a single pistol shot.

I love old Spike Jones records, radio shows and TV programs and have avidly collected them for many years. He was a very funny man and when it came to music, he really knew what he was doing. But I'm not bidding on his yearbook. Some artifacts are too trivial, even for me.

• Posted at 8:01 PM · LINK

Comic Artist Website of the Day

Mort Walker has been producing Beetle Bailey since it took place in the Civil War, and also dabbling in other strips including Hi & Lois, Boner's Ark and Sam & Silo. I liked Sam & Silo even better in its original as Sam's Strip. He has lots of fun stuff over at his website. Fall in.

• Posted at 7:39 PM · LINK

More Pooh

An odd twist in the war between Disney and Stephen Slesinger Inc., the company suing The Mouse for royalties on Winnie the Pooh. I don't know what, if anything, this means.

• Posted at 2:06 PM · LINK

The Book

I haven't read Hillary Clinton's newly-released autobiography and as far as I can tell, neither have about 90% of the folks who are now reviewing it. Fox commentator Tony Blankley even nakedly admits he hasn't read it and then proceeds to trash the book, and he may be on to something. (At least, give the man some points for beings honest about it.) Even those who have actually turned some pages seem to have only done so to pull a few quotes they can use as evidence to shore up the opinions — pro or con — they were already going to write. If you want to see some real clumsy lying, go over to the page on Amazon where folks who've read the book (or claim so) can post reviews.

You'll see long-time Hillary-haters pretending to be unbiased observers who just happened to have gotten hold of a copy, read it and found it so boring and/or incredible that they just have to advise you to save your money.And you'll find the opposite faction: Pro-Clinton people pretending they came to the book with no opinion of Senator Clinton and her hubby and were overwhemingly convinced of their virtue. At the moment — it could change if one or two people become determined to change it — the vote is pretty much split. The average reviewer gives it two-and-a-half stars out of five, which is roughly the split that polls tell us Hillary inspires in Americans. It intrigues me that Amazon has become this barometer of political spirit in much the same way activists feel they've won something if they can bombard an online poll with thousands of faux votes and see their side win a victory. It's becoming painfully obvious to me that a lot of online polls are deliberately configured to inspire such manipulation. If I ever need to get my "hit" count up here, I'll install one and ask some hot button questions.

I don't know that having a best-selling book everywhere, let alone just on Amazon, means that the author is growing more powerful or is winning over America — a country where few read books, and most who do read books favor those that confirm what they already believe. But since there seems to be no other way to vote for or against Hillary at the moment, it's getting turned into a kind of referendum. Her book — briefly — fell from #2 to #3 on Amazon and when I visited a few of the conservative chatboards I surf, I saw cheering and the proud proclamation that the U.S. was catching on to her and that the book would be on the remainder table by next week. (Uh, couldn't it also have meant a brief surge in Harry Potter sales?) When Hillary quickly returned to #2, we got the conspiracy theories: Amazon is lying, Barbra is buying up tons, etc. The folks trying to spin this as Hillary's comeback are no better.

Sometimes, a hot dog is just a hot dog. Sometimes, book sales are just book sales. I don't think the tons of volumes that Michael Moore and Michael Savage were simultaneously selling prove that the country was moving in any direction, much less both at the same time. I don't even think it proves that any significant number of people have a favorable opinion of either Michael. If anything, it proves that those men were good at exploiting political sentiments in order to sell some books. Hillary and her publishers have obviously learned the trick.

• Posted at 12:49 PM · LINK

XML Feed?

Will someone who knows about such things check and let me know if I've correctly configured the XML syndication feed for this site? There was something wrong with it and I tried fixing it...which probably means I made things worse.

• Posted at 12:07 PM · LINK

William Goldman

Here's the transcript of a recent public appearance by the outspoken writer. It rehashes a lot of things he's said in other interviews and I'm really only posting this because I finally figured out how to link to articles on the Writers Guild website.

• Posted at 11:21 AM · LINK

The F.C.C. Decision

Alex Ben Block over at Television Week explains that "The Fix Was In."

• Posted at 11:08 AM · LINK

The Trouble With Marvel

Dirk Deppey over at The Comics Journal's ¡Journalista! site has been serializing a very pointed, on-target (I think) assessment of what's wrong with Marvel in their current approach to publishing. It's mostly about distribution and comic shops and if that kind of thing interests you, I recommend it. He's just collected it all in one place. Of course, it doesn't begin to tackle the most burning question of the comic book industry, which is what the hell I'm doing up at this hour.

• Posted at 10:17 AM · LINK

A Timely Thought

Writers should receive a bonus on scripts based on how late they stay up working on them.

• Posted at 3:47 AM · LINK

Cartoon Couple

Best wishes to Jerry Beck (of Cartoon Research) and Marea Boylan who are today tying the knot, getting hitched, becoming one...pick the cliché of your choice. They're getting married is what they're doing. To help finance the union, Jerry is selling some special wedding postcards designed by the splendid graphic designer, Leslie Cabarga. You can help the newlyweds go out and buy more cartoon stuff by purchasing a set of these cards here.

And while I'm at it, I'll mention that you can see Leslie's fine work — and buy some of his elegant fonts — over at his website. Check out his article and illustrations of the comely Ms. Boop.

• Posted at 3:27 AM · LINK

Comic Website of the Day

And since we're talking about Kevin Meaney...well, we'll make him our comedian link of the day. Put on your big pants, wipe that puss off your face and hustle over to his website. One of the funniest things I saw during the last presidential election — and as you well know, there were plenty of contenders — was a spot on Comedy Central where Kevin talked with children about the Gore-Bush contest. He kept asking three-year-olds, "Are you better off than you were four years ago?"

• Posted at 3:24 AM · LINK

June 14, 2003 • Current • June 16, 2003