This is so compelling, I am posting it in its entirety. 

The New Yorker, October 13, 2008

Never in living memory has an election been more critical than the one fast approaching—that's the quadrennial cliché, as expected as the balloons and the bombast. And yet when has it ever felt so urgently true? When have so many Americans had so clear a sense that a Presidency has—at the levels of competence, vision, and integrity—undermined the country and its ideals?

The incumbent Administration has distinguished itself for the ages. The Presidency of George W. Bush is the worst since Reconstruction, so there is no mystery about why the Republican Party—which has held dominion over the executive branch of the federal government for the past eight years and the legislative branch for most of that time—has little desire to defend its record, domestic or foreign. The only speaker at the Convention in St. Paul who uttered more than a sentence or two in support of the President was his wife, Laura. Meanwhile, the nominee, John McCain, played the part of a vaudeville illusionist, asking to be regarded as an apostle of change after years of embracing the essentials of the Bush agenda with ever-increasing ardor.

The Republican disaster begins at home. Even before taking into account whatever fantastically expensive plan eventually emerges to help rescue the financial system from Wall Street's long-running pyramid schemes, the economic and fiscal picture is bleak. During the Bush Administration, the national debt, now approaching ten trillion dollars, has nearly doubled. Next year's federal budget is projected to run a half-trillion-dollar deficit, a precipitous fall from the seven-hundred-billion-dollar surplus that was projected when Bill Clinton left office. Private-sector job creation has been a sixth of what it was under President Clinton. Five million people have fallen into poverty. The number of Americans without health insurance has grown by seven million, while average premiums have nearly doubled. Meanwhile, the principal domestic achievement of the Bush Administration has been to shift the relative burden of taxation from the rich to the rest. For the top one per cent of us, the Bush tax cuts are worth, on average, about a thousand dollars a week; for the bottom fifth, about a dollar and a half. The unfairness will only increase if the painful, yet necessary, effort to rescue the credit markets ends up preventing the rescue of our health-care system, our environment, and our physical, educational, and industrial infrastructure.

At the same time, a hundred and fifty thousand American troops are in Iraq and thirty-three thousand are in Afghanistan. There is still disagreement about the wisdom of overthrowing Saddam Hussein and his horrific regime, but there is no longer the slightest doubt that the Bush Administration manipulated, bullied, and lied the American public into this war and then mismanaged its prosecution in nearly every aspect. The direct costs, besides an expenditure of more than six hundred billion dollars, have included the loss of more than four thousand Americans, the wounding of thirty thousand, the deaths of tens of thousands of Iraqis, and the displacement of four and a half million men, women, and children. Only now, after American forces have been fighting for a year longer than they did in the Second World War, is there a glimmer of hope that the conflict in Iraq has entered a stage of fragile stability.

The indirect costs, both of the war in particular and of the Administration's unilateralist approach to foreign policy in general, have also been immense. The torture of prisoners, authorized at the highest level, has been an ethical and a public-diplomacy catastrophe. At a moment when the global environment, the global economy, and global stability all demand a transition to new sources of energy, the United States has been a global retrograde, wasteful in its consumption and heedless in its policy. Strategically and morally, the Bush Administration has squandered the American capacity to counter the example and the swagger of its rivals. China, Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and other illiberal states have concluded, each in its own way, that democratic principles and human rights need not be components of a stable, prosperous future. At recent meetings of the United Nations, emboldened despots like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran came to town sneering at our predicament and hailing the "end of the American era."

The election of 2008 is the first in more than half a century in which no incumbent President or Vice-President is on the ballot. There is, however, an incumbent party, and that party has been lucky enough to find itself, apparently against the wishes of its "base," with a nominee who evidently disliked George W. Bush before it became fashionable to do so. In South Carolina in 2000, Bush crushed John McCain with a sub-rosa primary campaign of such viciousness that McCain lashed out memorably against Bush's Christian-right allies. So profound was McCain's anger that in 2004 he flirted with the possibility of joining the Democratic ticket under John Kerry. Bush, who took office as a "compassionate conservative," governed immediately as a rightist ideologue. During that first term, McCain bolstered his reputation, sometimes deserved, as a "maverick" willing to work with Democrats on such issues as normalizing relations with Vietnam, campaign-finance reform, and immigration reform. He co-sponsored, with John Edwards and Edward Kennedy, a patients' bill of rights. In 2001 and 2003, he voted against the Bush tax cuts. With John Kerry, he co-sponsored a bill raising auto-fuel efficiency standards and, with Joseph Lieberman, a cap-and-trade regime on carbon emissions. He was one of a minority of Republicans opposed to unlimited drilling for oil and gas off America's shores.

Since the 2004 election, however, McCain has moved remorselessly rightward in his quest for the Republican nomination. He paid obeisance to Jerry Falwell and preachers of his ilk. He abandoned immigration reform, eventually coming out against his own bill. Most shocking, McCain, who had repeatedly denounced torture under all circumstances, voted in February against a ban on the very techniques of "enhanced interrogation" that he himself once endured in Vietnam—as long as the torturers were civilians employed by the C.I.A.

On almost every issue, McCain and the Democratic Party's nominee, Barack Obama, speak the generalized language of "reform," but only Obama has provided a convincing, rational, and fully developed vision. McCain has abandoned his opposition to the Bush-era tax cuts and has taken up the demagogic call—in the midst of recession and Wall Street calamity, with looming crises in Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid—for more tax cuts. Bush's expire in 2011. If McCain, as he has proposed, cuts taxes for corporations and estates, the benefits once more would go disproportionately to the wealthy.

In Washington, the craze for pure market triumphalism is over. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson arrived in town (via Goldman Sachs) a Republican, but it seems that he will leave a Democrat. In other words, he has come to see that the abuses that led to the current financial crisis––not least, excessive speculation on borrowed capital––can be fixed only with government regulation and oversight. McCain, who has never evinced much interest in, or knowledge of, economic questions, has had little of substance to say about the crisis. His most notable gesture of concern—a melodramatic call last month to suspend his campaign and postpone the first Presidential debate until the government bailout plan was ready—soon revealed itself as an empty diversionary tactic.

By contrast, Obama has made a serious study of the mechanics and the history of this economic disaster and of the possibilities of stimulating a recovery. Last March, in New York, in a speech notable for its depth, balance, and foresight, he said, "A complete disdain for pay-as-you-go budgeting, coupled with a generally scornful attitude towards oversight and enforcement, allowed far too many to put short-term gain ahead of long-term consequences." Obama is committed to reforms that value not only the restoration of stability but also the protection of the vast majority of the population, which did not partake of the fruits of the binge years. He has called for greater and more programmatic regulation of the financial system; the creation of a National Infrastructure Reinvestment Bank, which would help reverse the decay of our roads, bridges, and mass-transit systems, and create millions of jobs; and a major investment in the green-energy sector.

On energy and global warming, Obama offers a set of forceful proposals. He supports a cap-and-trade program to reduce America's carbon emissions by eighty per cent by 2050—an enormously ambitious goal, but one that many climate scientists say must be met if atmospheric carbon dioxide is to be kept below disastrous levels. Large emitters, like utilities, would acquire carbon allowances, and those which emit less carbon dioxide than their allotment could sell the resulting credits to those which emit more; over time, the available allowances would decline. Significantly, Obama wants to auction off the allowances; this would provide fifteen billion dollars a year for developing alternative-energy sources and creating job-training programs in green technologies. He also wants to raise federal fuel-economy standards and to require that ten per cent of America's electricity be generated from renewable sources by 2012. Taken together, his proposals represent the most coherent and far-sighted strategy ever offered by a Presidential candidate for reducing the nation's reliance on fossil fuels.

There was once reason to hope that McCain and Obama would have a sensible debate about energy and climate policy. McCain was one of the first Republicans in the Senate to support federal limits on carbon dioxide, and he has touted his own support for a less ambitious cap-and-trade program as evidence of his independence from the White House. But, as polls showed Americans growing jittery about gasoline prices, McCain apparently found it expedient in this area, too, to shift course. He took a dubious idea—lifting the federal moratorium on offshore oil drilling—and placed it at the very center of his campaign. Opening up America's coastal waters to drilling would have no impact on gasoline prices in the short term, and, even over the long term, the effect, according to a recent analysis by the Department of Energy, would be "insignificant." Such inconvenient facts, however, are waved away by a campaign that finally found its voice with the slogan "Drill, baby, drill!"

The contrast between the candidates is even sharper with respect to the third branch of government. A tense equipoise currently prevails among the Justices of the Supreme Court, where four hard-core conservatives face off against four moderate liberals. Anthony M. Kennedy is the swing vote, determining the outcome of case after case.

McCain cites Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, two reliable conservatives, as models for his own prospective appointments. If he means what he says, and if he replaces even one moderate on the current Supreme Court, then Roe v. Wade will be reversed, and states will again be allowed to impose absolute bans ..ion. McCain's views have hardened on this issue. In 1999, he said he opposed overturning Roe; by 2006, he was saying that its demise "wouldn't bother me any"; by 2008, he no longer supported adding rape and incest as exceptions to his party's platform opposing abortion.

But scrapping Roe—which, after all, would leave states as free to permit abortion as to criminalize it—would be just the beginning. Given the ideological agenda that the existing conservative bloc has pursued, it's safe to predict that affirmative action of all kinds would likely be outlawed by a McCain Court. Efforts to expand executive power, which, in recent years, certain Justices have nobly tried to resist, would likely increase. Barriers between church and state would fall; executions would soar; legal checks on corporate power would wither—all with just one new conservative nominee on the Court. And the next President is likely to make three appointments.

Obama, who taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago, voted against confirming not only Roberts and Alito but also several unqualified lower-court nominees. As an Illinois state senator, he won the support of prosecutors and police organizations for new protections against convicting the innocent in capital cases. While McCain voted to continue to deny habeas-corpus rights to detainees, perpetuating the Bush Administration's regime of state-sponsored extra-legal detention, Obama took the opposite side, pushing to restore the right of all U.S.-held prisoners to a hearing. The judicial future would be safe in his care.

In the shorthand of political commentary, the Iraq war seems to leave McCain and Obama roughly even. Opposing it before the invasion, Obama had the prescience to warn of a costly and indefinite occupation and rising anti-American radicalism around the world; supporting it, McCain foresaw none of this. More recently, in early 2007 McCain risked his Presidential prospects on the proposition that five additional combat brigades could salvage a war that by then appeared hopeless. Obama, along with most of the country, had decided that it was time to cut American losses. Neither candidate's calculations on Iraq have been as cheaply political as McCain's repeated assertion that Obama values his career over his country; both men based their positions, right or wrong, on judgment and principle.

President Bush's successor will inherit two wars and the realities of limited resources, flagging popular will, and the dwindling possibilities of what can be achieved by American power. McCain's views on these subjects range from the simplistic to the unknown. In Iraq, he seeks "victory"—a word that General David Petraeus refuses to use, and one that fundamentally misrepresents the messy, open-ended nature of the conflict. As for Afghanistan, on the rare occasions when McCain mentions it he implies that the surge can be transferred directly from Iraq, which suggests that his grasp of counterinsurgency is not as firm as he insisted it was during the first Presidential debate. McCain always displays more faith in force than interest in its strategic consequences. Unlike Obama, McCain has no political strategy for either war, only the dubious hope that greater security will allow things to work out. Obama has long warned of deterioration along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, and has a considered grasp of its vital importance. His strategy for both Afghanistan and Iraq shows an understanding of the role that internal politics, economics, corruption, and regional diplomacy play in wars where there is no battlefield victory.

Unimaginably painful personal experience taught McCain that war is above all a test of honor: maintain the will to fight on, be prepared to risk everything, and you will prevail. Asked during the first debate to outline "the lessons of Iraq," McCain said, "I think the lessons of Iraq are very clear: that you cannot have a failed strategy that will then cause you to nearly lose a conflict." A soldier's answer––but a statesman must have a broader view of war and peace. The years ahead will demand not only determination but also diplomacy, flexibility, patience, judiciousness, and intellectual engagement. These are no more McCain's strong suit than the current President's. Obama, for his part, seems to know that more will be required than willpower and force to extract some advantage from the wreckage of the Bush years.

Obama is also better suited for the task of renewing the bedrock foundations of American influence. An American restoration in foreign affairs will require a commitment not only to international coöperation but also to international institutions that can address global warming, the dislocations of what will likely be a deepening global economic crisis, disease epidemics, nuclear proliferation, terrorism, and other, more traditional security challenges. Many of the Cold War-era vehicles for engagement and negotiation—the United Nations, the World Bank, the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty regime, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization—are moribund, tattered, or outdated. Obama has the generational outlook that will be required to revive or reinvent these compacts. He would be the first postwar American President unencumbered by the legacies of either Munich or Vietnam.

The next President must also restore American moral credibility. Closing Guantánamo, banning all torture, and ending the Iraq war as responsibly as possible will provide a start, but only that. The modern Presidency is as much a vehicle for communication as for decision-making, and the relevant audiences are global. Obama has inspired many Americans in part because he holds up a mirror to their own idealism. His election would do no less—and likely more—overseas.

What most distinguishes the candidates, however, is character—and here, contrary to conventional wisdom, Obama is clearly the stronger of the two. Not long ago, Rick Davis, McCain's campaign manager, said, "This election is not about issues. This election is about a composite view of what people take away from these candidates." The view that this election is about personalities leaves out policy, complexity, and accountability. Even so, there's some truth in what Davis said––but it hardly points to the conclusion that he intended.

Echoing Obama, McCain has made "change" one of his campaign mantras. But the change he has actually provided has been in himself, and it is not just a matter of altering his positions. A willingness to pander and even lie has come to define his Presidential campaign and its televised advertisements. A contemptuous duplicity, a meanness, has entered his talk on the stump—so much so that it seems obvious that, in the drive for victory, he is willing to replicate some of the same underhanded methods that defeated him eight years ago in South Carolina.

Perhaps nothing revealed McCain's cynicism more than his choice of Sarah Palin, the former mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, who had been governor of that state for twenty-one months, as the Republican nominee for Vice-President. In the interviews she has given since her nomination, she has had difficulty uttering coherent unscripted responses about the most basic issues of the day. We are watching a candidate for Vice-President cram for her ongoing exam in elementary domestic and foreign policy. This is funny as a Tina Fey routine on "Saturday Night Live," but as a vision of the political future it's deeply unsettling. Palin has no business being the backup to a President of any age, much less to one who is seventy-two and in imperfect health. In choosing her, McCain committed an act of breathtaking heedlessness and irresponsibility. Obama's choice, Joe Biden, is not without imperfections. His tongue sometimes runs in advance of his mind, providing his own fodder for late-night comedians, but there is no comparison with Palin. His deep experience in foreign affairs, the judiciary, and social policy makes him an assuring and complementary partner for Obama.

The longer the campaign goes on, the more the issues of personality and character have reflected badly on McCain. Unless appearances are very deceiving, he is impulsive, impatient, self-dramatizing, erratic, and a compulsive risk-taker. These qualities may have contributed to his usefulness as a "maverick" senator. But in a President they would be a menace.

By contrast, Obama's transformative message is accompanied by a sense of pragmatic calm. A tropism for unity is an essential part of his character and of his campaign. It is part of what allowed him to overcome a Democratic opponent who entered the race with tremendous advantages. It is what helped him forge a political career relying both on the liberals of Hyde Park and on the political regulars of downtown Chicago. His policy preferences are distinctly liberal, but he is determined to speak to a broad range of Americans who do not necessarily share his every value or opinion. For some who oppose him, his equanimity even under the ugliest attack seems like hauteur; for some who support him, his reluctance to counterattack in the same vein seems like self-defeating detachment. Yet it is Obama's temperament—and not McCain's—that seems appropriate for the office both men seek and for the volatile and dangerous era in which we live. Those who dismiss his centeredness as self-centeredness or his composure as indifference are as wrong as those who mistook Eisenhower's stolidity for denseness or Lincoln's humor for lack of seriousness.

Nowadays, almost every politician who thinks about running for President arranges to become an author. Obama's books are different: he wrote them. "The Audacity of Hope" (2006) is a set of policy disquisitions loosely structured around an account of his freshman year in the United States Senate. Though a campaign manifesto of sorts, it is superior to that genre's usual blowsy pastiche of ghostwritten speeches. But it is Obama's first book, "Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance" (1995), that offers an unprecedented glimpse into the mind and heart of a potential President. Obama began writing it in his early thirties, before he was a candidate for anything. Not since Theodore Roosevelt has an American politician this close to the pinnacle of power produced such a sustained, highly personal work of literary merit before being definitively swept up by the tides of political ambition.

A Presidential election is not the awarding of a Pulitzer Prize: we elect a politician and, we hope, a statesman, not an author. But Obama's first book is valuable in the way that it reveals his fundamental attitudes of mind and spirit. "Dreams from My Father" is an illuminating memoir not only in the substance of Obama's own peculiarly American story but also in the qualities he brings to the telling: a formidable intelligence, emotional empathy, self-reflection, balance, and a remarkable ability to see life and the world through the eyes of people very different from himself. In common with nearly all other senators and governors of his generation, Obama does not count military service as part of his biography. But his life has been full of tests—personal, spiritual, racial, political—that bear on his preparation for great responsibility.

It is perfectly legitimate to call attention, as McCain has done, to Obama's lack of conventional national and international policymaking experience. We, too, wish he had more of it. But office-holding is not the only kind of experience relevant to the task of leading a wildly variegated nation. Obama's immersion in diverse human environments (Hawaii's racial rainbow, Chicago's racial cauldron, countercultural New York, middle-class Kansas, predominantly Muslim Indonesia), his years of organizing among the poor, his taste of corporate law and his grounding in public-interest and constitutional law—these, too, are experiences. And his books show that he has wrung from them every drop of insight and breadth of perspective they contained.

The exhaustingly, sometimes infuriatingly long campaign of 2008 (and 2007) has had at least one virtue: it has demonstrated that Obama's intelligence and steady temperament are not just figments of the writer's craft. He has made mistakes, to be sure. (His failure to accept McCain's imaginative proposal for a series of unmediated joint appearances was among them.) But, on the whole, his campaign has been marked by patience, planning, discipline, organization, technological proficiency, and strategic astuteness. Obama has often looked two or three moves ahead, relatively impervious to the permanent hysteria of the hourly news cycle and the cable-news shouters. And when crisis has struck, as it did when the divisive antics of his ex-pastor threatened to bring down his campaign, he has proved equal to the moment, rescuing himself with a speech that not only drew the poison but also demonstrated a profound respect for the electorate. Although his opponents have tried to attack him as a man of "mere" words, Obama has returned eloquence to its essential place in American politics. The choice between experience and eloquence is a false one––something that Lincoln, out of office after a single term in Congress, proved in his own campaign of political and national renewal. Obama's "mere" speeches on everything from the economy and foreign affairs to race have been at the center of his campaign and its success; if he wins, his eloquence will be central to his ability to govern.

We cannot expect one man to heal every wound, to solve every major crisis of policy. So much of the Presidency, as they say, is a matter of waking up in the morning and trying to drink from a fire hydrant. In the quiet of the Oval Office, the noise of immediate demands can be deafening. And yet Obama has precisely the temperament to shut out the noise when necessary and concentrate on the essential. The election of Obama—a man of mixed ethnicity, at once comfortable in the world and utterly representative of twenty-first-century America—would, at a stroke, reverse our country's image abroad and refresh its spirit at home. His ascendance to the Presidency would be a symbolic culmination of the civil- and voting-rights acts of the nineteen-sixties and the century-long struggles for equality that preceded them. It could not help but say something encouraging, even exhilarating, about the country, about its dedication to tolerance and inclusiveness, about its fidelity, after all, to the values it proclaims in its textbooks. At a moment of economic calamity, international perplexity, political failure, and battered morale, America needs both uplift and realism, both change and steadiness. It needs a leader temperamentally, intellectually, and emotionally attuned to the complexities of our troubled globe. That leader's name is Barack Obama.

—The Editors

I think that this profile of John McCain from Rolling Stone magazine should be required reading for all voters before November 4, regardless of party affiliation.  Be afraid, be very afraid.

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/coverstory/make_believe_maverick_the_real_john_mccain

A huge shout out to Bill Maher for making Religulous.  An outstanding and needed film.

Plus a shout out to Joe Biden for doing an excellent job.  How he could keep a straight face standing next to the Stepford Candidate is beyond me. 

Last night, I happened to see Trumbo, a documentary about Dalton Trumbo and the Hollywood blacklist. A good, if not great, film... and I'm always glad to see films getting made that cover important topics.

After the film, our discussion turned to the current presidential campaign, and I was bemoaning the latest Obama story that upset me quite a bit, just as I am trying to work up personal enthusiasm for him. Obama recently announced his intention to expand President Bush's program of investing federal money in faith-based charities.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/02/us/pol..itics/02campaigncnd.html?_r=1&ref=politi..cs&oref=slogin
Mr. Obama made clear, however, that he would work to ensure that charitable groups receiving government funds be carefully monitored to prevent them from using the money to proselytize and to prevent any religion-based discrimination against potential recipients or employees.

Depite that blurb from the article (and what I hope are honest intentions on Obama's part), the bottom line in my opinion is that faith-based charities DO have a religious agenda, and that to give federal money to them promotes that agenda, blurs the church-state separation line, and also siphons off money that could better be given to impartial charities. 

This morning, I finally got around to reading last week's Newsweek, and read a column by Anna Quindlen, which reflects many of my own views and feelings about the subject, and almost made me cry. http://www.newsweek.com/id/141491  That said, of course I am voting for Obama. I have read about a group of Ohio women who are trying to spearhead support for McCain because they are miffed that Hillary did not win the Democratic primary and are upset about the sexism.  Those women are short-sighted idiots who would cut off their nose to spite their face. Insane.

I returned home from my little trip up north last week and the following evening went to a wonderfully fun benefit drag show. Driving home down Sunset at about 11:15 p.m., I encountered several hundred bicycle riders going in the opposite direction, taking up all three lanes late at night on a busy Friday evening. The night was a vivid and fun contrast to the beautiful scenery I'd experienced in Santa Cruz, Monterey, etc., and a reminder of why I like living in Hollywood even though a part of my heart will always live in Monterey.  Here are some photos from the trip.  And... happy fourth of July... woo hoo!

Now that we have a Dem nominee, I visited Barack Obama's website today to register and find ways to support his campaign. It took me a few days to get around to pledging my support because I was still feeling frustrated and hurt by the sexist media coverage accorded Hillary Clinton. I could write a book about the pros/cons of Clinton vs. Obama... but time to move on and work on getting the Repubs out of the White House, and I am glad we have someone of integrity to back.

Obama's site has a reminder that today is Juneteenth. In part, "On Juneteenth we think about that moment in time when the enslaved in Galveston, Texas received word of their freedom. We imagine the depth of their emotions, their jubilant dance and their fear of the unknown. ... On Juneteenth we come together young and old to listen, to learn and to refresh the drive to achieve. It is a day where we all take one step closer together - to better utilize the energy wasted on racism. ..."

It reminded me that I wanted to comment on Sex and the City. I've always thought of SATC as shallow characters serving up mostly empty calories... sometimes funny but ultimately unsatisfying. I only went to see the film because it was free, but figured I'd at least be in for a few hours of fun. However, although much of the film entertained me, I was shocked at the blatant racism when Miranda shouted in relief, in an ethnic neighborhood, "White man with a baby!" My jaw is still somewhere on the theatre floor. (And similarly, I also wasn't happy with the delivery of the line by Charlotte, said in disgust: "It's Mexico.")  Where is the outrage?

In other news, in the latter part of April I took a road trip to Napa/Berkeley with a friend, and visited with my son and daughter when he was in San Diego doing research.  The highlight of May was Mother's Day weekend spent with my daughter; one fun thing that we did was participate as "actors" for The Go Game's Hollywood scavenger hunt.  Later that month, I was also thrilled when I got to see her present a research project at her university.  So far, June has been great.  My daughter graduated from UCI and it was a wonderful day for all of us.  In addition, my son flew out for the event, and I got to spend some time with him before the graduation day.  One evening we went to the Griffith Observatory; I've never been there at night before (or looked through their big telescope) and it was fabulous.  Which reminds me... I also finally visited the Camera Obscura in Santa Monica!  I am a camera obscura fanatic, so that was a thrill.  In a few days I am heading off for another little trip with a friend; this time to Santa Cruz and Monterey/Carmel.  Of course, I've also been filling my days and nights with film screenings, plays, and events (e.g., Charles Phoenix at the Moonlight Rollerway!) that are some of the perks of living here . My favorite films of the past few months were Son of Rambow, Helvetica, and Ghost Town.

I just realized that I didn't mention that my son was interviewed by NPR in March.  It garnered a lot of attention, and he's still in touch with them (and also was contacted by The History Channel about the possibility of collaboration).  On top of that, he was published in several research journals this month.  Coupled with my daughter's graduation this month (next stop: grad school), I've been so proud of the two of them I could burst.

I'm rather amazed that it's been 3.5 years since I moved back to southern California.  It's been an interesting time, a time of transition and learning.  Each day, I try to remember this maxim:  "Life is rich, beauty is everywhere, every personal connection has meaning and laughter is life's sweetest creation." 

I recently watched The Crucible on television, the film with Daniel Day-Lewis, based on the play by Arthur Miller.  You all know the story, based on true events that took place in 1692 in Salem, Massachusetts, in which a group of girls began having fits and claimed to see the devil and accused various townspeople of practicing witchcraft.  On the basis of their word alone, nineteen people were hanged, others died in prison, and many more were imprisoned.  To quote Wikipedia, "The Puritans believed in the existence of an invisible world inhabited by God and the angels, including the Devil (who was seen as a fallen angel) and his fellow demons. To Puritans, this invisible world was as real as the visible one around them."

Today, most of us marvel that such a thing could occur.  If I told you I saw the devil perching on your shoulder you'd laugh at me.  Yet, think of how many people believe in God.  Or Gods.  Have any of us actually seen God?  Has God spoken to us in person?  Of course not.  Yet, millions believe in an invisible God. 

As we move from childhood to adulthood, we let go of our childish belief in Santa Claus, the Easter bunny and the tooth fairy.  But many don't let go of their belief in God.  Hey, if my parents taught me to believe, shouldn't I follow in their footsteps?  If so many people believe in God, who am I to question it?  If I have a social life built around my church, why should I acknowledge to myself or others that the Emperor has no clothes and risk being ostracized?  And thus the big lie of our societies, worldwide, is perpetuated.  Not to mention seized upon by would-be "interpreters" of God's rules as the basis for an entire industry (i.e., organized religion) whose purpose is to feed the mythology and profit from it.  In South Pacific we hear these words about racism: "they have to be carefully taught."  It's true of religion, too.

No one on Earth has ever produced one shred of verified, empirical evidence, yet many blindly accept the idea that God conveniently "spoke" to some men centuries ago who ended up writing a document riddled with inaccuracies, contradictions and superstitions that has come to be known as the Bible.  And Jesus... don't get me started on him.  If you ask historians they will tell you that it's doubtful he even existed.  If there ever was a "virgin birth" lo those many years ago, there was no doubt a more mundane and licentious explanation for it.  The New Testament is the ultimate AU fanfiction.

In one of George Will's columns, he used a phrase that stuck with me: we are hardwired for religion.  He said that in the context of a comment about our brains being predisposed to make sense out of what we cannot understand.  To continue from that thought, we explain star constellations as manifestations of immortals.  We marvel at the beauty and complexity of nature and assume some intelligence must have designed it.  We see someone recover from a near death experience and call it a miracle.  We fear oblivion and death and invent a world after death in which we can exist in happiness and comfort for all eternity. 

So, what's the harm?  After all, if I still believe in Santa Claus, what's it to anyone else?  There's harm when we cloak ourselves in righteousness and use religion as a basis for feeling superior to others at one end of the spectrum and waging wars at the other.  There's harm when we crave attention, or act in self-protection, and claim to see invisible devils perched on shoulders in Salem.  There's harm when people insist that the fantasy of creationism be taught alongside empirical evolution as an "alternative theory."  There's harm whenever we choose delusion over truth.

As it turns out, life and nature are inherently wondrous - they don't need supernatural explanation.  Death is the natural culmination, and not believing in a fantasy afterlife causes one to treasure all the more the time we spend on Earth.  Letting go of a belief in God makes the world inherently understandable.  The question that plagues so many, "how can God let bad things happen to good people?", is easily answered.  It will be a beautiful day when rational thinking rules the day instead of superstition. It will be a beautiful day when it is universally acknowledged that Gods are imaginary friends.  

And it will be a beautiful day when believers (those who were carefully taught and those who go along with the status quo in order to preserve their place in society) instead use their imagination as a force for truth, as a tool to break free of superstition and belief in otherworldly deities.  As John Lennon said in his song, Imagine:

Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today

I'm obviously not feeling much the Myspace thing lately.  Probably too much time spent blabbing away with friends over on LiveJournal.  And, I don't really know or keep in touch with many of you, or we do it instead by email or LJ.

In keeping with my recaps of things done (I'm still thinking of this blog as some kind of record to look back on someday), aside from what I already wrote about in the previous two blogs, in February I had some wonderful birthday celebrations, helped out at a math-science conference, and saw a bunch of movies/screenings. 

In March, I went to an Ella Fitzgerald tribute concert at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, saw Wicked at the Pantages, saw Joan Rivers' show at the Geffen, went to see an American Idol show in person and ended up in the "mosh pit," and discovered a marvelous new (to me) restaurant in Malibu.  As usual, I went to a bunch of movies/screenings of old and new films, and March included several memorable events. 1 - An old favorite, "Hello, Dolly!," where I met Gene Kelly's widow and E.J. Peaker, who played Minnie Fae in the film. The former was nothing like I would have expected and the latter was so similar to her film role that I had to laugh.  2 - A simulcast screening sponsored by Americans United for Separation of Church and State.  It should be required viewing for everyone who isn't aware of all the insidious ways organized religion tries to infiltrate.  I truly think religion is the biggest crisis of our time; it distracts  people from focusing on real issues and is the antithesis of rational thinking.  Let's at least start by getting it out of our schools, military, government.   3 - "All You Need is Cash," attended by Eric Idle and the other Rutles along with a host of interesting folk such as Peter Asher, and including a performance by the Beatles (and now Rutles) tribute band, The Fab Four.  The screening was preceded a few days earlier by a very fun Rutlemania concert by The Fab Four as the Rutles (i.e., a tribute band performing as a parody band), also attended by the "real" band members, Eric Idle and company, and interesting folk such as Eddie Izzard.  If you're too young to know the Rutles, you've probably heard of Eric Idle, since among other things he wrote Spamalot.  Both events put big smiles on my face and a Beatlemania feel in my heart.  4 - It was very, very special to see "Rudy" at a screening attended by the real Rudy Ruettiger, the director David Anspaugh, and the star, Sean Astin.  What can I say.  Very special.

Before I share some political thoughts, here is a photo I took a few days ago from the lazy comfort of my beach chair. 

I'm still on the fence, Clinton/Obama.  I favor Clinton in some ways but have serious concerns about her electability.  The bottom line is that I'll volunteer for whoever gets the nomination.  It's imperative that we turn this country around from the destructive path of the past eight years. 

A friend sent me an email the other day that purports to be a passage from a new book by Lee Iacocca.  Whether really written by him or not, the email says it like it is ... in fact, the title of one of my recent blogs here was "throw da bums out" and I see this author has the same phrase in mind.  Here are a few excerpts:

"Am I the only guy in this country who's fed up with what's happening?  Where the hell is our outrage?  We should be screaming bloody murder.  We've got a gang of clueless bozos steering our ship of state right over a cliff, we've got corporate gangsters stealing us blind, and we can't even clean up after a hurricane much less build a hybrid car.  But instead of getting mad, everyone sits around and nods their heads when the politicians say, "Stay the course."

Stay the course?  You've got to be kidding.  This is America, not the damned "Titanic."  I'll give you a sound bite: "Throw all the bums out!"

You might think I'm getting senile, that I've gone off my rocker, and maybe I have.  But someone has to speak up.  I hardly recognize this country anymore.

Name me a leader who has a better idea for homeland security than making us take off our shoes in airports and throw away our shampoo?  We've spent billions of dollars building a huge new bureaucracy, and all we know how to do is react to things that have already happened.

Name me one leader who emerged from the crisis of Hurricane Katrina.  Congress has yet to spend a single day evaluating the response to the hurricane, or demanding accountability for the decisions that were made in the crucial hours after the storm. 

Name me an industry leader who is thinking creatively about how we can restore our competitive edge in manufacturing.  ... what are we going to do about it?

Name me a government leader who can articulate a plan for paying down the debit, or solving the energy crisis, or managing the health care problem.  The silence is deafening.  But these are the crises that are eating away at our country and milking the middle class dry.

I have news for the gang in Congress.  We didn't elect you to sit on your asses and do nothing and remain silent while our democracy is being hijacked and our greatness is being replaced with mediocrity.  What is everybody so afraid of?  That some bonehead on Fox News will call them a name?  Give me a break.  Why don't you guys show some spine for a change?"

We're having a wonderful heat wave right now and it's got my spirits soaring.  And some personal issues beyond my control that were dragging me down a little the past few months are resolving and I feel somewhat powerful again, if that's the right word. Whatever.  Just gotta ride the wave of happiness when it comes along and not analyze it to death, I guess. 

I really just popped in to share some pictures taken a few weeks ago within about a half-hour timespan on Hollywood Boulevard, as I was walking from the Hollywood & Highland complex over to The Egyptian for one of my volunteer shifts.  And to wish you a Happy Valentine's Day in advance!

I have some new photos to post, but they can wait for the next blog.  I'm sitting here at my desk with the window open; it's warm, the sun is splashing across the floor and I can hear birds chirping.  But I have other things on my mind right now.

Ironically, after a day spent, in part, taking my mother to one of many appointments at Kaiser the past few weeks, two nights ago I came home to find an invitation in my email to a last-minute screening of Sicko a block from my apartment, with a Q&A with Michael Moore. I was planning on catching Sicko via Netflix but this was so much better. I think VERY highly of Moore and subscribe to his website/emails, and have seen most of his films, plus have seen him one other time in person. So it was a very nice surprise.

Sicko turned out to be an eye-opener. Nothing surprised me in the part of the film that dealt with HMOs in America... neither the lack of sympathy/empathy within the system, nor the ironic emphasis on making doctors deny care to make a profit for the HMO. Examples of people going bankrupt to pay for medical bills, or having to make life/death decisions based on cost were heartwrenching. Even worse was when the decision was made *for* them... and they lost a loved one due to HMO greed.

What *was* a surprise was to learn more about how it works in other countries, specifically Canada, France and Cuba, which are highlighted in the film. I'd never really given it much thought.  People there laugh at the thought of paying for medical care, just as we in the USA would laugh at the idea of paying for fire or police assistance (although I saw a news story last week that said that Ventura County is considering charging $50 for a 9-1-1 response), and the cost of medicine is pennies on the dollar compared to what we pay, even if insured.

Moore showed up for the Q&A, having come straight from taping his appearance on Larry King. He stayed for two hours and covered much of the same ground as he did on the show. But he also talked about a lot of other things, some personal, and too numerous to rehash here.

By the way, Moore told us that when he was taping Larry King, they cut at one point to Anderson Cooper for a plug. King asked Cooper what news he'd be discussing on his show that night and Cooper started in about some Britney Spears update. Moore said that he interrupted and somewhat chastised Cooper for "reporting" on such mindless subject matter. Larry King then made a joke about his show being out of control. I watched the Larry King show when I got home and there was no cutaway to Cooper. Hah!

Moore shared that after Fahrenheit 9/11, he received death threats and his home was vandalized. He hasn't made personal appearance for 2-1/2 years. I hadn't realized that. He mentioned how all sorts of fines and levies ensued after the baring of Janet Jackson's breast on TV... but when Bill O'Reilly said that he was against the death penalty "except for Michael Moore," no one batted an eye. Great country we live in. The right wing has done so much to destroy our country with its reactionary policies and thug mentality... and needs to be stopped.

Speaking of which, last night I saw another political film. It was a preview rough-cut screening of an upcoming HBO film called Recount, about the Gore/Bush election recounts. It was very good, starring Kevin Spacey, Laura Dern, Tom Wilkenson, Ed Begley, Jr., and many other excellent actors.

I went with mixed feelings, because Recount is about a period in time that's still extremely painful for me to recall.  It was hard to watch the film and relive those memories.  But it got me thinking how many in the younger generation don't really know what it was like to live through that time - the rollercoaster ride of legal successes and defeats, the constant subterfuge and dirty tricks perpetuated by the Republican Party.  For example, my daughter (about 13 at the time) has heard it from my point of view but not really experienced it on a visceral, emotional level.  Hats off to HBO films for doing this project.  It will be a good history lesson for some and also a good topic to re-open before our upcoming presidential election.

By the way, I'd forgotten the details of how Katherine Harris (then-Florida Secretary of State and Bush co-campaign chair for Florida) disenfranchised the votes of 20,000 Florida voters, the majority of which were Democrat.  The film explained that part very well.  She commissioned a firm to identify felons by name and remove their names from the voter lists.  She also asked them to identify any names on the voter lists that were similar, even if not a match.  So if the felon was John A. Doe and your name was John C. Doe, you were not allowed to vote in that election.  Just one of many dirty tricks that shouldn't be forgotten.

My, how time flies... it's been three months since I last blogged here!  Of course, I didn't really shut up (who, me?) - I've been chatting away on livejournal with friends I have over there.  But I don't plan to abandon myspace for now, so am popping in to say hello and share a few photos.

Looking over my calendar for the past few months to see if there's anything worth mentioning, I see a lot of dinners, films, plays, parties, etc., as well as holidays shared with friends and family.  Highlights of November were finally seeing Glengarry Glen Ross (one of my favorite films) performed on stage, the wonderful Salvador Dali exhibit at the LA County Art Museum, and a delicious Thanksgiving dinner at Ms. Foodie's.  December highlights were my son's visit (he was on the west coast to do research at Caltech), a spur-of-the-moment trip to Las Vegas over Christmas, and celebrating the holidays with my daughter and friends (more good food at Ms. Foodie's, worth noting!).  January has included many fun times so far but has also been challenging (hence the "Mercury in retrograde" comment on my homepage) as I've had to deal with some family issues. 

My son and daughter-in-law are doing well and what a thrill it was for me to have him here for a week.  Among many projects keeping him busy (in addition to his dissertation), he is the researcher and website developer for a doc that had its premiere this week, and I've been having fun saying, "my son has a film at Sundance."  Hey, he's in the credits, so don't quibble.  ;o)  My daughter is doing very well... and I can't believe that she is already halfway through her final year at UCI.  As I said, my, how time flies!

You'd think I'd have a lot to say about the political scene right now, but all I can muster is "meh."  Bush is going to get a free ride until the end of his despicable, tragic term, no doubt. When was the last time we read or heard anything about the debacle known as Iraq?  The media's attention span is shorter than that of a goldfish and is now focused on the primary circus in full swing.  For now, I'm sitting on my comfortable Democratic fence, waiting to see which way the wind blows.  Once the candidates are in place, I'll no doubt get involved as usual.

At the Hollywood Farmer's Market.

At the Venetian casino in Las Vegas (this is all indoors - but you probably knew that, eh?).

Downtown Los Angeles, late afternoon.

A visitor to the downtown Los Angeles Public Library garden.

One more photo from the library, music score stacks (my photography group went there last weekend... it's an interesting place to visit).

Oh well, as usual, I've been remiss in updating here.  The title of the blog refers to a conversation I had the night of the Otis Redding party/film at The Egyptian earlier this month. I was handing out tickets and wristbands for the party and asked one woman if she wanted a wristband and she didn't hear me properly and thought I asked if she wanted a "fan."  I then asked her the question above and we had a laugh.

In view of the recent (and still ongoing in some places) fires, it seems a bit ironic that my default photo on Myspace for some weeks now has been a photo I took on a lovely day earlier this year in Malibu.  It will be a while before I venture back up that way.  The air quality from the fires was not too bad here in Hollywood except for a few days last week. I will be glad when all gets back to normal and I feel sorry for the people who sustained losses.

The news is full of the usual depressing fare.  One bright spot was Al Gore's Nobel Prize honor.  So far I am having trouble getting my head into the upcoming presidential election, but as it gets closer I think that will change. Clinton and Giuliani are the front runners right now, but there's a long road ahead for both of them.  FEMAgate was a bit of depressing news... did you read that they staged a news conference this past week with fake reporters?  And after they were found out, they had the nerve to try to pass it off as bad judgment, and to further strain credibility by saying the White House knew nothing about it.  It has White House stamped all over it... google the name "Jeff Gannon" if you think I am being paranoid.  And, this little tidbit was sent to me yesterday: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/10/26/22518/945.  It just never ends... incompetency at best, and underhanded tricks (they cc'd Cheney!...also try googling "Valerie Plame Wilson" on the subject of outing) at worst.  And, of course, the ultimate... Iran.  There may be legitimate reasons for fearing Iran and wanting to step in now, but frankly this administration cried "wolf" (aka WMD) once already to lead us into war and I am not buying it. 

In spite of the above, I've been enjoying myself.  Took a nice little trip up to Santa Cruz with my daughter a few weeks ago.  Also had a short visit from my daughter-in-law, which was great since she and my son live back east and I don't see them very often.  I did some work that took me down to San Diego for a few days (before the fires) and had a fun time while there.

Mainly, I have been doing the usual, lots of films and theatre.  Michael Clayton is a very entertaining film.  Gone Baby Gone has good performances albeit it is very depressing, and ditto for Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, and Rendition. The Final Season was a nice antidote to all of the depressing fare that Hollywood's been churning out lately.  In terms of theatre, I saw the excellent Michael Butler revival of Hair and loved it; of course, I knew I would since I was there for the original in the late 60s at the Aquarius Theatre (now the Nickelodeon Theatre on Sunset).  I also saw The Seagull at UCLA, in a production starring Sir Ian McKellen, which was another special evening. 

I attended a lecture at Caltech on the subject of peak oil and now there is one more thing that concerns me. There are various issues at play but the bottom line is that it's not all that farfetched to think the world might run out of oil within a decade or so.  If so, we will all literally grind to a halt, since new technologies are not developing fast enough and not enough scientists are sounding the alarm. (At least global warming is finally on the radar, thanks in large part to Al Gore.)  Check out Matthew Simmons' website for more info.

Having chattered on about gloomy news events and depressing films, I am trying to think of something upbeat to end this blog.  How about "have a nice day"?  Or, "today is the first day of the rest of your life."  Not buying it?  Hmmm.  Would you like a stalker or a screamer?  That ought to perk you up.

Tell you what, here's a photo of my daughter taking a picture on the Seventeen Mile Drive in Pebble Beach.

Happy halloween to all!

Thought I'd knock off a quick blog before heading out of town for a little fun. A few random observations, as it were.

It came to my attention today via the news that the new co-host on The View (Sherri Shepherd) "doesn't know" if the world is round or flat.  Need I even add a further comment? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkrkaH_V7fE  Actually, speaking of moronic remarks, I just did think of something to add.  Did you all read that at Bush's press conference this week he said Nelson Mandela is dead?  His supporters claim he was just making a subtle, intelligent use of Mandela's name as an archetype in the statement.  Yeah, we all believe that, don't we? 

The cable TV description of "Son of Lassie" reads: ""The collie follows his master (Peter Lawford) to war, and growls at Nazis in Norway."   Cute.

A recent discovery:  Terry Pratchett's Discworld books.  Very clever, adventurous.  (And his fictional world is flat, ha ha!)  So far in his universe I have read The Colour of Magic, The Light Fantastic, and Interesting Times.  Also excellent (not by Pratchett): Three Bags Full, a delightful mystery told from the POV of sheep who discover that someone has killed their shepherd.

I find it so sad that our legislators actually spent time this week on a resolution condemning the Move On ad.  It's so sad that we live in a country where elected representatives are so easily intimidated into faux patriotic posturing for the sake of their image.  I think I hear Lassie's son growling, loudly.  Or maybe it's me.

On a lighter note, except for the sobering 11th Hour: the films I've seen since last checking in here include 3:10 to Yuma (great), The Hunting Party (good), King of Kong (great!!!), The 11th Hour (great), and Dragon Wars (eh; glad it was free). Plays seen: Jersey Boys (great!); Invasion! The Musical (eh; glad it was free); Junk, the Rock Opera (good); and Chess (for years it's been my favorite musical... I was blown away as usual!!!).  Misc: my final visit this season to the Hollywood Bowl for the films of Paramount evening (great, and 'twas fun to see Leonard Nimoy as host); and the New West Symphony performing Gershwin (great).

So, it's been a busy month.  I've also been doing a bit of part-time work for my former employer, hanging out with family and friends, kicking around some new ideas for a novel, and volunteering at the Egyptian, which so far I am enjoying immensely and not just because of the perks.  And, well, pondering the meaning of life and the universe and who will win Top Chef... you know, the important things in life.  Have a great week... and if you venture out your front door, be careful you don't fall off the edge of the world.

Here are a few self-explanatory photos, for those of you who like that kind of thing. :o)

As a semi-involved politically liberal Atheist, my mail and email is frequently littered with messages from Al Gore, Bill Clinton, the ACLU, the Democratic Party and the like.  But this week was the first time the post office delivered a letter bearing the words, "A Message from His Holiness the Dalai Lama Enclosed" and "Tibetan Prayer Flags Enclosed." 

The Dalai Lama was writing to let me know that China was attacking the culture, religion and heritage of the Tibetan people by (1) picking their own Panchen Lama (a "Tibetan Buddhism senior-most leader") instead of the one chosen by the Dalai Lama, and (2) in 1995, detaining the boy recognized by the Dalai Lama as the reincarnation of the Panchen Lama.  Richard Gere, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the International Campaign for Tibet, added a note that he hoped I would support the cause and that I would use the prayer flags.  The flags, by the way, are quite beautiful, consisting of five colored paper squares stamped with gold ink designs, and strung together with string.

This morning, I happened to read an article in Newsweek that discusses China's abuse of Tibet from another perspective.  To quote: "In one of history's more absurd acts of totalitarianism, China has banned Buddhist monks in Tibet from reincarnating without government permission."  The article goes on to explain that the motive behind this act is to "... cut off the influence of the Dalai Lama, Tibet's exiled spiritual and political leader, and to quell the region's Buddhist religious establishment more than 50 years after China invaded the small Himalayan country."  The article further explains that the Dalai Lama is 72 years old and is in the process of planning (the location of) his reincarnation, and that 20 per cent of U.S. adults (and 25 per cent of Christians) believe in reincarnation.

I think the notion of reincarnation is a sweet, fanciful idea at best.  And the concept of regulating reincarnation is so inherently foolish that I barely know what to say about it.  I can see why the idea of eternally starting over appeals to some people even more than the notion of Heaven: instead of an eternity spent with family members and other loved ones amongst the clouds, some prefer the idea of perpetually hanging around Earth in hopes of finding greater happiness the second (or perhaps one millionth) time around.  Yes, it sounds lovely... but when will we live in a world where sanity prevails?

I can't help feeling sorry for the followers of the Dalai Lama, however.  People should be free to practice the religion of their choice, and it appears that China is hell-bent on persecuting the Tibetan Buddhists. Heck, I'd hang up the prayer flags if I thought it would help.