I'm embedding this but you really need to see it in high-def, which you can do at this page. So don't click on the embedded version below. Go watch it in HD. (Thanks to someone named Tom who sent me the link.)
Congress has voted to immunize telecoms for alleged illegal lawbreaking, terminate lawsuits against them for doing this, and pretty much bless any darn eavesdropping that the Bush administration wants to do on anyone without warrants or following the FISA provisions for warrants. Glenn Greenwald is as annoyed as I am, not so much at the Republicans but at Democrats, Mr. Obama included.
This was sold as — and reported in the press as — a "compromise proposal." But in a compromise, both sides give up something and regret some aspect of the agreement. A number of Democrats regret things in it but I don't see any Republicans unhappy at even a semi-colon in the bill. This kind of thing wouldn't happen if the Democrats had a majority in either the House or the Senate.
I could to some extent buy the argument that the telecoms should not be punished for doing what their government asked them to do. What I don't like is the precedent/principle that there is apparently no such thing as illegal surveillance any longer. I would like to see the following question put to those who supported this bill: "Give me a few hypothetical but possible scenarios for instances of government eavesdropping where you would say, 'Someone ought to go to prison for this.'"
If they can't name a couple then the Fourth Amendment is kinda meaningless, isn't it? And if they can name some, then the question is how we would ever know if they were occurring and how would we prosecute in an environment when the administration (any administration) could just say, "This is necessary for the War on Terror?"
I get deluged with samples of "small press" comics. I came back from Minnesota with a dozen and that wasn't even a comic book convention. They go into a couple of "read when I get the time" boxes here which, I'm ashamed to admit, probably have well over 500 books that may not get read in this or the next decade. If you have something in those boxes, please accept my apologies for not being able to deal better with the pile. It's my loss, I know, because there's obviously some pretty good stuff in there.
One "small press" guy whose work I've read and enjoyed is a fellow named Ryan Claytor, who does mostly autobiographical comics that are skilled and far from self-indulgent. Ryan is about to embark on a cross-country trip to sign and promote his work and if he comes near you, go see him and buy something.
He's also moving from California to Michigan for reasons that I gather are romantic in nature. I figure he'll either get a great relationship out of it or another great autobiographical comic...maybe, if he's lucky, both.
The membership of AFTRA ratified its contract offer by a margin of 62.4%. That's very low — these things usually pass by 90%+ — but it's enough to seal the deal and yank the carpeting out from under the Screen Actors Guild. They have a couple of options now but none of them are all that great.
So here's Mark's prediction. SAG has received essentially the same offer from the studios. What those studios will do now is to stonewall. They might better it in some small way...give them some tiny thing that AFTRA didn't get, on the condition that they put the contract offer to an immediate vote of the SAG membership. But for the most part, the AMPTP will stand its ground, taking the position that the negotiations are over and will not resume under any circumstances. They will note that what they've offered SAG is not unfair...after all, the other actors' union thought it was good enough to take. The suggestion will be made that the SAG leadership is out of control, on some sort of personal vendetta, shutting down the town and ruining its members' lives rather than admit they were making hysterical, unreasonable demands.
And I bet it'll work. To get out of this box it's in, SAG would have to vote down that same offer and authorize a strike...and by a much wider margin than 62.4%. Since the membership is already feeling outmaneuvered and divided, I can't imagine that happening. Most of 'em will probably think it's time to throw in the terrycloth and commence the slow, angry process of repairing the SAG/AFTRA relationship. That won't be easy but if they don't do it, it'll be even worse next time. Much worse.
Something I told you about the other day in my life is now up on YouTube.
You may recall that last Thursday night, I participated in something called The Cereal Mascot Smackdown at CONvergence in Minnesota. It was a panel with me, Len Wein (you'll see him on the far right in this video), Kelvin Hatle, Kenneth Hite, Christopher Jones, Joe Scrimshaw and Tim Uren. The host was Tim Wick, who was — for obvious reasons — dressed as Austin Powers and he was assisted by Melissa Kaercher. The premise was that we were supposed to argue whether various mascots from cereal boxes could beat the tar (or the high corn fructose) out of each other.
Also, we and most of the few hundred folks in the audience had to eat a lot of cereal. Did I mention when I first wrote about this that I'd eat arsenic-laced packing material before I'd taste another handful of Boo Berry? Ye Gods, what an awful substance. I've given up all food items with high sugar content but if I hadn't, that stuff would have driven me to that decision...even though it does turn the milk a lovely shade of aquamarine.
Anyway, we have excerpts from the panel. The video is shaky and the audio isn't great but maybe you can make out enough of it to be amused. In this first part, we're ad-libbing arguments about whether Boo Berry (the character) could defeat Captain Crunch in some sort of mano a mano competition...
And now, here's another hunk of this epic contest. In it, we're debating the merits of Toucan Sam (from the Froot Loops package) and Sonny, the bird from the Cocoa Puffs box. This is where I decided to cheat and phone a friend...
July 8, 2008
