'Best of TBH Politoons'
Baron Dave Romm
Mapparium
By Baron Dave Romm
It's hot here in Mpls. Perhaps not Michael Dare hot, but hot. Too hot to seriously listen to music. Here are a few things I saw on my trip to Boston last week.
The Mapparium, in the Mary Baker Eddy Library at the Christian Science mother church in Boston, is pretty neat. You're inside this glass globe, 30 feet in diameter, on a glass and metal crosswalk hanging over Antarctica. A lecture beforehand explains a little about the decision to build the map in 1930. Completed in 1935, the countries of the world reflect the times and haven't been updated: "In 1939, 1958, and again in 1966, different committees discussed updating the map. In 1966, the estimated cost was $175,000 to create and install new glass panels. It was decided that the Mapparium held much more value as an art object, and the idea of updating was finally dropped."
Inside, you get to see the world in proper perspective, with none of the distortion inevitable on a flat map. The 20-minute recorded show is a wide retrospective on behalf of human rights, and the home country of the speaker lights up as they are quoted. A short ride for $6 (though I got my first Senior Discount due to being a member of AARP!) but well worth it. Admission also lets you tour the upstairs galleries, a series of beautiful interactive areas where you can listen to people's spiritual journeys, and leave your own. There's also a small exhibit of the Christian Science Monitor (published next door).
Nearby is the Massachusetts Historical Society, where my cousin Dean is working on the sequel to American Heretic, his book about Rev. Theodore Parker, one of the most important abolitionists of the mid-1800s. The building and collections are for scholars, so you've got to sign in: I'm not sure how much is open to the public. Still, the web site is worth exploring, and Dean's book is great.
If you're in Boston, worth a side trip to the Back Bay.
As long as I'm going on about maps, here are a few more:
All the world's maps. I've had this url in my bookmarks for years, and I don't think they've updated it carefully, but it still has lots of links to a lot of maps.
Earthview is sort of an early example of Google Earth. Still fun to explore, if you have a fast connection.
Terraserver is now a subscription service for finer views, and some of the satellite photography looks like it's from 1999, but can still be a good overview. Might as well directly use GlobeXplorer, which lets you see the close up shots (with their logo splashed over everything) while encouraging you to buy prints. Fair enough, I suppose. GX also has topological maps and others.
Terrafly was fun last time a tried it, on a different computer, but wants me to enable popups for a full tour. There's only so far I'll go for Bartcop-E...
At Convergence, the
Science Room had a large map of the world... in 3D. Wearing the 3D
glasses provided, the map was an astonishingly vivid topographical
portrayal. I couldn't find that exact picture, but the USGS
More anaglyphs (3D pictures requiring colored glasses) of: North Dakota and environs, Grand Canyon and Death Valley. Even a discussion of 3D web movies from PC World. This stuff is more popular than I thought. Here's a site with 3D glasses, among other places to go.
On a completely different topic...
Politics is a subset of science fiction humor. Two weeks ago, my guest on Shockwave Radio Theater was Keith Ellison, the DFL-endorsed candidate for the open congressional seat in my district. This week, my guest was Alan Fine, the Republican-endorsed candidate. My basic interviewing technique is to let the guest do the talking. I let them ramble on a bit, interrupting only when necessary. The Ellison interview will be up as a podcast/mp3 at some point in the near future. The Fine interview of 7/15 is still up on the KFAI Audio Archive page: Scroll down to Shockwave and it will be the most recent show until 7/22 and the previous show until 7/29.
I think I can interview anyone, even a person I disagree with. My views are strong and well-known, but an interview isn't about me; a completely alien concept in today's infotainment "news". It's a strange feeling to practice actual journalism despite being decidedly outside the mainstream. Blogs and science fiction shows are picking up the slack from the failure of traditional news media.
Lastly...
Happy New Year!
On July 20, 1969 [old calendar], the human race accomplished its single greatest technological achievement of all time when a human first set foot on another celestial body. That was Day 0 of Year 0 of the Year of our Moon Landing. On July 20, we will ring in YML 37. The US Space Program is the single most successful endeavor in human history, and we celebrate the greatest achievement -- the first step toward the stars -- on the the greatest spin-off -- the internet.
Baron Dave Romm is a conceptual artist and a noble of Ladonia who produces Shockwave Radio Theater, writes in a Live Journal demi-blog, plays with a very weird CD collection and an ever growing list of political links. Dave Romm reviews things at random for obscure web sites. You can read all his music recommendations from Bartcop-E. Podcasts being reworked. Recent radio programs can be accessed on the Shockwave Radio audio page.
Thanks to everyone who has sent me music to play on the air.
--////
Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Edmund Conway, Economics Editor: U.S. could be going bankrupt (telegraph.co.uk)
The United States is heading for bankruptcy, according to an extraordinary paper published by one of the key members of the country's central bank.
Kevin Baker: Stabbed in the Back! The past and future of a right-wing myth (harpers.org)
Indeed, the right has distilled its tale of betrayal into a formula: Advocate some momentarily popular but reckless policy. Deny culpability when that policy is exposed as disastrous. Blame the disaster on internal enemies who hate America. Repeat, always making sure to increase the number of internal enemies.
Lydia Marcus: Interview with Andrea Meyerson (afterellen.com)
Her experience producing lesbian comedy led her to form her own film production company, All Out Films, and direct her first film, Laughing Matters, a documentary profiling lesbian comedy pioneers Kate Clinton, Suzanne Westenhoefer, Marga Gomez, and Karen Williams. Now Meyerson has made its follow-up, Laughing MattersMore!, profiling four more lesbian comediennes--René Hicks, Sabrina Matthews, Elvira Kurt, and Vickie Shaw.
Marcy Rodenborn: Can a Straight Woman Have the Hots for a Gay Star? (afterelton.com)
As long as there has been a Hollywood, there have been gay actors, mostly closeted. While many things have changed in the motion picture industry in the decades since the first moving picture hit the silver screen that has most assuredly remained the same. Women have moved up the industry food chain, African Americans play more than happy slaves, and many others in the film industry are out and joyously thank their boyfriends at the Academy Awards. Yet most major gay actors remain in the closet.
Lydia Marcus: Interview with Lesli Klainberg (afterellen.com)
Director/Producer Lesli Klainberg tracks the history of queer indies in Fabulous! The Story of Queer Cinema, premiering on IFC in July.
Lauren Ober: Review of Fabulous! The Story of Queer Cinema (afterellen.com)
In the 60 years or so of queer cinema, one theme has remained constant: a desire to see people like us on the silver screen. As Lisa Ades and Lesli Klainberg's Independent Film Channel (IFC) documentary, Fabulous! The Story of Queer Cinema, asserts, we have not yet hit the golden age of LGBT film. But we're moving steadily in the right direction.
Arlene Istar Lev, LCSW: Gay parents and gender-bending children (advocate.com)
Kyle's lesbian moms are worried that he likes dolls and girls' clothes. But shouldn't LGBT parents be more accepting of gender-nonconforming kids? Or do we worry they're bad PR for gay parenting?
Gays In Space! (out.com)
Bob Smith boldly goes where no man, woman or transgendered person has gone before.
Matthew Breen: Greetings, Earthling (out.com)
A gallery of sci-fi personalities who are gayer than you think.
Religious Joke of the Day (beliefnet.com)
Hubert's Poetry Corner
SECURITY HILL AND THE MASTER OF LOVE
A MOST UNORTHODOX APPEARANCE FOR THIS LEGENDARILY PLEASING PARAMOUR OF AMOROUS LEGIONS - AND THEN SOME!
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Hot, humid, cranky.
No new flags.
New Book Deal
Valerie Plame
Former CIA officer Valerie Plame, whose outing led to the indictment of a White House official, has agreed to write her memoirs for Simon & Schuster, weeks after a reported seven-figure deal with the Crown Publishing Group fell through.
Financial terms were not disclosed and no publication date has been set. In early May, Crown announced that it would publish Plame's book, but the two sides could not agree on a final contract.
Plame will not necessarily get to write about everything she knows. Because she is a former CIA official, the contents of her book are subject to an agency review. She was reportedly involved with intelligence gathering in the lead-up to the war in Iraq.
Valerie Plame
100 Million Videos A Day
YouTube
YouTube, the leader in Internet video search, said on Sunday viewers have are now watching more than 100 million videos per day on its site, marking the surge in demand for its "snack-sized" video fare.
Since springing from out of nowhere late last year, YouTube has come to hold the leading position in online video with 29 percent of the U.S. multimedia entertainment market, according to the latest weekly data from Web measurement site Hitwise.
YouTube videos account for 60 percent of all videos watched online, the company said. Videos are delivered free on YouTube and the company is still working on developing advertising and other means of generating revenue to support the business.
YouTube
Reruns On FX
'2½ Men'
Cable channel FX has snapped up rerun rights to television's No. 1 comedy, the CBS series "Two and a Half Men."
Its deal with the show's syndicator, Warner Bros. Domestic Cable Distribution, is valued at about $750,000 per episode, and begins in 2010, sources said. A Warner Bros. spokesman confirmed the deal but declined further comment, as did FX.
The "Two and a Half Men" sale, which closed July 13, comes less than a month after Warner Bros. unloaded "Men" to Tribune Broadcasting stations for fall 2007. Sources indicated the terms of the FX deal largely mirror that of the Tribune pact, including an online component that allows the channel to stream five episodes per week off its Web site.
'2½ Men'
Wedding News
Lavigne - Whibley
Punk-pop princess Avril Lavigne has married a fellow Canadian singer-songwriter, according to published reports. Lavigne married Deryck Whibley, the guitarist and front man for the band Sum 41, on Saturday, at a private estate near Santa Barbara, People magazine reported on its Web site.
Lavigne wore a Vera Wang gown, carried white roses and was walked down the aisle by her father as Mendelssohn's "Wedding March" played.
Lavigne, 21, and Whibley, 26, exchanged vows under an awning covered in white flowers.
Lavigne - Whibley
Joining '24'
Regina King
Regina King, best known for her work in such features as "Jerry Maguire" and "Ray," has joined Fox's drama "24" as a regular for next season.
Additionally, D.B. Woodside is taking on a bigger role. Woodside plays Wayne Palmer, the strong-willed brother and former chief of staff of the late President David Palmer, played by Dennis Haysbert. On the show's upcoming sixth season, he will be elected president.
King will play his sister, a powerful advocacy lawyer.
Regina King
Media Consolidation
Canada
Already the biggest media outlet in Canada, Bell Globemedia will soon appear before the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission with another order to "super-size me." BGM owns CTV and the Globe and Mail, along with 17 TV specialty channels, including TSN, MTV and the Discovery Channel. On Wednesday, BGM announced it had agreed to pay $1.4 billion for control of national rival CHUM Ltd., which owns 33 radio stations and 12 TV stations, headed by the Citytv channels in Toronto, Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton and Winnipeg. CHUM also owns 21 specialty TV channels and the Muzak background-music operation in Canada.
Will the CRTC approve the BGM acquisition? Industry observers believe so. It is widely assumed that Canada's media gatekeeper is about to green-light Torstar's recently proposed 20 per cent purchase of BGM (price: $283 million). This means that very soon, the country's largest city newspaper (the Toronto Star) and national newspaper (the Globe and Mail), along with Canada's most-watched TV network (CTV), one of our biggest radio chains, 38 specialty TV channels, and even the guys who select the songs we hear on elevators will all be affiliated.
The BGM takeover of one of its biggest rivals may not turn out to be a chummy deal for Canadians, however. Wednesday's announcement came with the grim news that 281 CHUM jobs were to be "eliminated." How will the TV channels survive with severely reduced staffs? One CHUM franchise, Ottawa's A-Channel, simultaneously announced the implementation of "Overdrive Automation," a system that would introduce wholesale robotic equipment to the newsroom. That's great news for the currently unemployed C-3PO and R2-D2, but a bad omen for the journalism industry and TV viewers across the country.
Canada
10th Anniversary
MSGOP
Since MSNBC switched on a decade ago, the question has hung over its executives' heads: Is there really a need for three all-news networks? MSNBC's energetic legal correspondent turned general manager Dan Abrams said it's a fair query, but really should be addressed to his competitors at CNN.
Abrams, a surprise appointment to replace Rick Kaplan last month, has moved swiftly to make changes. Tucker Carlson's show was moved to the late afternoon to fill Abrams' old time slot, renamed "Tucker" and beefed up with new segments like "Beat the Press," a daily review of news coverage. It even praised CNN's Larry King last week for his reporting on the scene of a New York building collapse (CNN, by the way, declined comment on Abrams using it as a sleep aid).
The boldest move was to cancel Rita Cosby's show and institute a two-hour block of documentaries starting at 10 p.m. EDT, the prime-time centerpiece out West. The "Dateline NBC" production team has contributed shows on life inside a prison, illegal border crossings, how crystal meth affects users and what states do to remove children from unsafe homes.
MSGOP
Exhibit Reveals Changing Faces
Wizard of Oz
She started off looking like a clownish crazy woman - her long hair in a wild braid and one eye popped wide open. Her petticoat and baggy skirt were more outlandish than frightening.
That was in 1900, when the Wicked Witch of the West made her debut in "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz." But since W.W. Denslow first drew her for the pages of L. Frank Baum's classic children's book, Dorothy's nemesis has changed faces several times.
In 1981, Andy Warhol silkscreened her as Margaret Hamilton, freezing the actress in the green-faced role she played in Hollywood's 1939 production of the story. Four years later, artist Barry Moser turned her into Nancy Reagan, placing the pointy-hatted first lady against a dismal black backdrop.
The original drawings and reinterpretations of the Wicked Witch and other characters from Oz are on display at The Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in an exhibit that commemorates the 150th anniversary of the births of Baum and Denslow and pays tribute to the story's staying power.
Wizard of Oz
Found In Kansas
Southeastern Gecko
There's a new creature crawling around Kansas. Herpetologists have confirmed that the Mediterranean gecko is taking up residence in the state, spreading north from the southeast United States over the past decade.
"We knew it got as far as Norman, Oklahoma, in the early 1990s," said Joe Collins, University of Kansas herpetologist. "Well, it's here."
The Mediterranean gecko is the third "alien" gecko to migrate to Kansas, Collins said. The other two are the Italian wall lizard and western green lacerta, both found around Topeka. The wall lizard also can be found in Lawrence, he said.
Southeastern Gecko
No Barney Fife Statue
Don Knotts
An unfinished statue of Barney Fife apparently won't be heading to Don Knotts' hometown after all. Knotts' widow endorses a statue but says the monument should be of her husband, not of the bumbling deputy he made famous on "The Andy Griffith Show." Knotts died in February at age 81.
"We consider the dissemination of his image to be a big responsibility that we take very seriously," Francey Knotts and Andy Griffith said in a statement. "No one cares more about Don's image than we do. It would be wonderful to have a statue in Morgantown, W.Va., of Don Knotts as Don Knotts.
"But this particular image does not fit with our understanding of Don's experience growing up in Morgantown."
Efforts to get a Fife statue in Griffith's hometown of Mount Airy, N.C., which was used as the model for the fictional town of Mayberry, have been unsuccessful.
Don Knotts
In Memory
Bill Miller
Bill Miller, who was Frank Sinatra's pianist for nearly 50 years until the singer's last performance in 1995, has died. He was 91.
When Sinatra died of a heart attack in 1998 at age 82, Miller played "One for My Baby (And One More For The Road)" at the funeral.
About six months after Sinatra died, his son convinced Miller to come out of retirement and the two had been performing together ever since.
Miller was born in Brooklyn, N.Y., and was largely a self-taught pianist. He began playing professionally at 16 and within two years had gotten an orchestra job.
He went on to play with giants such as Tommy Dorsey, Benny Goodman and Charlie Barnet.
In 1951, Miller was playing the lounge at the Desert Inn in Las Vegas when Sinatra came to hear him. The crooner liked Miller's understated style and asked him to join his TV show.
The two went on to share the stage for 46 years, except for several years starting in 1978 when the two had a falling out.
Bill Miller
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