Probably the only time I ever agreed with Stanley Crouch. 🙂  His view is now more mainstream among Black thinkers.
Category Archives: magazine
Transformer (I of III)
The key moment here is at the very end, when Mike is on the run from folks trying to capture him—detain him, constrain him, define him. The smile on his face as he infuriates King Eddie is more than just Bugs Bunnyish cleverness; it’s bliss. (He’s completely in his element here, a combo of Eshu, the Yoruba Trickster God and the mysterious magician from/for the [African] world.) He tries to run away. Seemingly trapped, he then turns into sand, confounding his opponents. The moment works because since it’s Michael Jackson, you think he actually did that. Fifty years of morphing into any shape, every shape. A half-century of re-defining American and world entertainment. Michael showed us that magic wasn’t just possible in fantasy, but actually present, in the world, in us. He continued to produce it, on his own terms, and allowed us to bear witness so we could tell the tale of a man who spent an entire life transforming pain into pleasure.
Have You Read…….
……Matt Taibbi’s great expose of Goldman Sachs in the latest Rolling Stone?
Too bad there’s not a link yet. [JULY 7th UPDATE: Thanks to our friend Saswat, here’s a link to a scan of the article:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/16752803/The-Great-American-Bubble-Machine ]
Man, talk about a wide-open conspiracy….. 🙂
One Step Forward, Two Steps Back
History was indeed made yesterday. It was the kind of history that Obama likes to make. The President had chosen someone in his own (personal and ideological) image.
If I wasn’t paying attention, I’d think that Obama was the most progressive president I’ve ever seen. And maybe he is. But maybe that’s just not good enough.
The more I turn on the radio, the more disturbed I get. Isn’t anyone going to challenge him on any of this? I think we can both enjoy the history and ask critical questions.
Progress Can Be Beautiful!
Meet Ms. Ida Ljungqvist, Playboy’s 2009 Playmate of the Year. She is the first African to be chosen as that and the 50th to be given that title.
The Last Word On………
“Star Trek” ? WOW! GOT-D*&N!!!!! And the movie’s great, too! LOL! 🙂
“X-Men Origins: Wolverine” ? Wait for the DVD. The filmmakers just didn’t care enough here, which in the post-“Dark Knight” era, is a sin.
“Doomsday,” “Smallville”‘s Season 8 finale? Powerful—from the little I saw of it. The Big Reveal near the very end was both a tremendous cheat and a great idea! I never thought he would die. 🙂
“Stand,” Tavis Smiley’s first (*snicker*) documentary? I heard him describe this on 89.3 WPFW-FM, and I curled up in a fetal position. If this millionaire’s idea of a documentary is giving him, West, Dyson, et. al. even more airtime, then we’re sunk. Thank God for the white folks at NPR and PBS, who fund real (softish) Black documentaries every once in a while. *SIGH* 😦
Elite Washington, D.C. Media Still Heart Obama :)
My Gosh! 🙂 Is there such a thing as good Black objectification? Ladies, I’ll let you answer this one. 🙂
Did You Watch………….
I Watched The Watchmen :)
…..and my quick verdict is this: it’s a great adaptation of the famous graphic novel. Now, as a movie….. dunno. I’ve seen it twice now, and I’d put in the Top 5 of the Best Superhero Movies ever just for effort. But it would probably be No. 5.
So, to sum:
APDAPTATION=A
MOVIE=B
200-Word (More Or Less) Book Review: "Plunder" by Danny Schechter
Plunder: Investigating Our Economic Calamity And The Subprime Scandal.
By Danny Schechter.
New York: Cosimo.
240 pp. $14.95.
Danny Schechter is one of my heroes, and I wasn’t afraid to tell him so when I met him. Ever since “South Africa Now” (showing my age here 🙂 ), he’s been a straight-up truth-teller. I used one of his books, “The More You Watch, The Less You Know,” when I was writing my doctoral dissertation.
He continues the tradition here, putting himself in the company of a few journalists who tried to inform America that a serious recession was coming. But, as usual, Schechter is ahead of the mainstream, warning of “a vast CREDIT AND LOAN COMPLEX every bit as insidious as the Military-Industrial Complex. Most Americans have no idea that this even exists.” And you can bet which government it funds.
Schechter blends charts, articles, books, interviews, journalistic observations and even poetry together, walking the reader month by month (almost day by day) through 2007 and 2008 to show it how capitalism unraveled in front of America’s eyes. He explains boldly how it’s actually American democracy that’s threatened by the economic disaster. The journalist-filmmaker-activist-blogger stays in the street and On The Street, and does a very good job of balancing both. Schechter once again earns the reputation he has gained, joining those who proudly stand in the shadow of muckraker legend I.F. Stone.
Drums in the Global Village 