Yearly Archives: 2003

Corporateering: the Gangs of America

Politics

Two new books worthy of our attention.

A new book by Ted Nace that you can read online.

From the Gangs of America website:

Corporations are the dominant force in modern life, surpassing even church and state. The largest are richer than entire nations, and courts have given these entities more rights than people. To many Americans, corporate power seems out of control.

And another book by Jamie Court with a forward by Michael Moore.

From the Corporateering website:

Corporateer: v. to prioritize commerce over culture; n. one who prioritizes commerce over culture

This book offers empowering strategies for counter-corporateering so we can reclaim our private lives, our right to health and safety, and other personal liberties.

Remember, knowledge is power.

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.