All posts by Chris

VICTORY cigarette, anyone?

Politics

Our beloved John Ashcroft is touring the country to campaign for the PATRIOT Act, extolling it’s virtues in protecting us from terrorism. Why campaign for an act already enacted, you ask? Not only would he like to extend it, but soon we’ll see the new, improved VICTORY Act which elevates his power to that of a full-fledged police state. (There’s no little irony that Victory is the brand of choice in Orwell’s 1984.)

Angry? Then do what I did and oppose the VICTORY Act before it even has a chance to rear its ugly head. It’s an online petition, yes, but it’s one that has the Dean campaign behind it, so it’ll get press.

Issues with The Passion

Film

I love well-researched overview articles. The Independent has a great one about the issues surrounding Mel Gibson’s new film, The Passion. Basically, it’s likely to be: hard to watch, because it’s gruesome and in Aramaic; hard to believe, because it’s presented as “what really happened” but has major factual errors; and hard to swallow, because it will be seen as blaming Jews for the death of Christ.

It’s not the kind of film I’d watch, because the subject matter doesn’t interest me. More interesting to me are Gibson’s reasons for making the film and the general reaction to it. I actually like his idea of offering the film in Latin and Aramaic (with no subtitles, apparently). It will be interesting to see what kind of audience it can muster, since most Americans won’t even watch a foreign-language film with subtitles.

Athens 2004 (or so)

Fun

According to an in-deptharticle in the Union-Tribune, Athens is having a particularly Greek time getting ready for the 2004 Olympics.

I love that they find ancient artifacts whenever they dig. “History? Yeah, we got history lyin’ around.” You can’t build a thing without hitting a 2500-year-old Temple of Aphrodite complex, complete with brothel. Great stuff. I hope they can pull it off.