Month: December 2001

Tonight I feel like Elvis longing for his long lost twin.

Some morning terrorism links. George W. Bush’s initial reaction to the WTC attacks: “That’s one terrible pilot.”
White House Sought to Soften Anti-Terrorism Legislation for Tobacco Companies.
A LA Times piece on my favorite post-9/11 cliche, “If something something something, then the terrorists have already won.”

For new readers: Everybody is welcome to participate in our upcoming CD Mix of the Month trade. The deal: you burn a CD mix of a bunch of music you like. I do the same. We swap CDs; joy ensues. If people are interested, we can also start swapping amongst ourselves (e.g., Person A and Person B don’t just trade mixes with me — they also trade with each other.) Let me know if you’re interested, via the contact page or in the comments below. And to be clear, you don’t have to be in Texas to play.
For those of you who have already emailed me about participating, email me again to let me know if you’d be interested in doing the broader swap mentioned above, which would mean you burn a few extra copies of the disc and get a few extra mixes in return.

The guy who sits next to me said he suddenly realized, after months, who I looked like. See, his kid watches a lot of Cartoon Network, and he said he finally realized this morning that I look just like Shaggy of Scooby Doo fame.
I’m not buying it for an instant — for one thing, my arms don’t dangle down to my knees, australopithecine-like, and I’m not even a vegetarian — but it’s more flattering than the time a “friend” in college said I looked like Boris Yeltsin.
(And Casey Kasem does provide my voice, but I think that’s just a coincidence. Zoinks!)

The prez is on the TV right now, talking about the Holy Land Foundation. Their assets have been frozen because of their suspected links to Hamas. If any Dallas residents were upset we were generally missing out on all the terrorism fun, the HLF is based in Richardson. Members of the HLF were among those protesting in front of my employer every week for months because of our reporting on their group. (I could see them from the office window when I was interviewing here — made me wonder what I was getting into.)

Great piece by the estimable Ron Rosenbaum on the latest crackpot Hitler theory: he was gay! That rather unconvincing theory (at least unconvincing to me — the incest charges stick a little more in my mind) is being advanced in a new book. (Out just in time for Christmas! My shopping just go much, much easier.)
Aside #1: Have all the good ideas for Hitler book covers been taken? Compare this one from 1998 to this one from 2001.
Aside #2: Rosenbaum’s own book Explaining Hitler — which is a look at how different historians have brought their own biases and perspectives to explaining why Hitler was such a bastard — is quite good.
Aside #3: How does the this new theory correlate with the much more widespread Hitler-had-one-testicle theory? (A guy I know likes to refer to bad or evil things as “one-ball,” in homage to said theory.)
Aside #4: The best headline award goes to whoever decided to put “Queer as Volk?” on top of Slate’s story.

At last, America’s most insignificant war is finally getting the recognition it deserves. The Toledo War pitted Ohio against Michigan for control of the border town that would eventually become Toledo. One mule (or horse, depending on the storyteller) was the lone casualty. The war was finally settled with Ohio being granted Toledo, in exchange for Michigan getting the Upper Peninsula. In retrospect, it’s hard to call that a clear-cut Ohio victory.

In a piece not long ago in Slate, Mickey Kaus mused about about the cinematic possibilities of 9/11. What would be the key storytelling moments that could be turned into a movie (or, for that matter, a novel)? Well, I think we have the clear winner: John Walker, the idealistic 20-year-old from D.C. who decided to go to Afghanistan, join up with the Taliban, and fight against his American countrymen. “Bill Jones, a family friend in San Rafael, California, described Walker as a ‘very sweet, unassuming, very spiritual young man — rather frail, not an All-American football player or anything like that, certainly not a fighter.'” (Attention, Ethan Hawke — your agent is calling.) Be sure to check out the chilling video of Walker on that link.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but there has been real news to report in recent months, no? Which makes one question why, if you watch most local TV news around the country, November sweeps brought you the following hard-hitting reports: “Toxic tampons!” “Baby hoochies: pre-teen girls wearing clothes you’d expect to see on strippers!” “How to wear a thong!” “Expose! Germs in movie theaters!” “High heels may be the height of fashion, but your body may be paying a hefty price!” “Male prostitution!” “Real-life witches!” “The secret side to the circus!” “Is there arsenic in your yard?” “Could your hot tub be making you sick?”

Remember Ben Greenman, the guy from my college newspaper I blogged about who had the girl he had a crush on in high school grow up to make a movie about his crush? Well, his new book is finally out, and I regret to say I missed the epic Ben Greenman Week at McSweeney’s.