Blog2L2
- Baldessari May 18, 2012 Derek Bridges
- Rewind May 11, 2012 Derek Bridges
- Going in the Opposite Direction May 8, 2012 Derek Bridges
- Rope Man with Cigarette April 25, 2012 Derek Bridges
Stupid Is As Stupid Does
Displaced Aggression League Report — Weeks 4 and 5
Week 4 came and went like an unclean prostitute in the night, leaving many team owners awash in self-loathing and regret; Few made it through untainted. And although ESPN’s projections would have us believe otherwise, several Week 4 matchups turned out to be close and competitive; two-peat former champion Dingobros edged out The Team Formerly Known As Dayment by just two points, Mental Garbage bested Hellfire Club by six, and the Turduckens, who came into Week 4 as an 0-3 pariah, managed to transfer some of their shameful stink onto the Mario Brawlers – also to the tune of six points.
Meanwhile, the Wackers continued to astonish fellow League members with its unexpected transformation from runt to powerhouse, moving to 4-0 at the expense of Token Female and continuing its trend of posting the week’s highest score while still leaving enough points on the bench to be competitive with the kind of starting scores typically posted by the League’s lower tier – this time scoring… Continue reading
Smells Like A New Season!
Displaced Aggression League Report -- Week 1
Greetings Team Owners, and many apologies for the delayed report in this, our opening week. Blame the bull skunk that left your League Manager blinded by unholy stink, as collateral damage in its 3am showdown with the League Dog. It was a horrifying turn of events that necessitated a hasty evacuation of the Command Bunker until the situation could be contained. But scientists tell us that, just like the start our football season, the sudden influx of these toxic rodents in urban areas is a sure sign that Fall is here and Summer is a distant memory.
Indeed, it’s hard to believe that, just a few weeks ago, many of us were still in family vacation mode: With personality conflicts sharpened by rolling blackouts and a maddening heat index, and in-laws forced to take shelter on shady porches in resentful groups. We draped ourselves over sticky wicker furniture and struggled to suck oxygen out of the steamy air, while the relentless screaming of cicadas was punctuated by the thumping of fat black flies the size of sparrows, trying to force their way through the screens to drink our blood. It was too hot to do anything – too hot, thankfully, for any of us to act on the paranoid and murderous impulses that skittered around our brains every time we glanced at each other.
Continue readingBoxing Dispatch: Carl Froch vs. Glen Johnson, 6/4/11
Showtime’s boxing coverage can be irritating at times, what with Gus Johnson’s carny-style, indiscriminate hyping, and Champion-turned-commentator Antonio Tarver’s creepy mugging for the camera as he reads from the teleprompter. It often feels light on substance, and you really don’t learn as much as you might while watching a fight on ESPN or HBO, where the commentary tends to be a little bit more thoughtful. But, to give credit where it’s due, Showtime’s recent experiments with international tournaments at Super Middle- and Bantam weight have turned out to be an innovation that provides the sport with a needed dose of hoopla.
While the two-round bantam weight tournament was interesting, most of the excitement has centered around Showtime’s “Super Six” Super Middleweight tournament, with four rounds of bouts spanning two years. The Super Six field has changed somewhat over that time, with Jermaine Taylor and Mikkel Kessler dropping out due to injuries, and being replaced on the fly by Alan Green and Glen Johnson respectively. Green ended up getting bumped from the tournament after two losses… Continue reading
BREAKING NEWS: Obama Defends Nuclear Power; Adopts Bush Pronunciation of Nuclear
WASHINGTON – At a press conference on Tuesday, President Barack Obama dismissed public concerns over the long-term impact of damage to Japan’s Fukishima reactor as well as the safety of U.S. nuclear facilities, declaring that “nukulur power will remain on the table.”
Following the President’s statement, White House officials defended the President’s embrace of “nukulur,” a pronunciation first popularized by former President George W. Bush, and whose use became a badge of honor among conservatives. “The President’s use of ‘nukulur’ is consistent with his conciliatory approach overall,” according to one official, “This is completely in line with his continuation of corporate tax breaks and the denial of habeas corpus, which were hallmarks of the previous administration.” He added “And we haven’t heard any complaints about that.”
(Cross-posted at Skundered!.)
How Much Are You Paying For War?
(Cross-posted at Skundered!)
The combined cost of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq has now reached $1.29 trillion , and the President asked for $170 billion more to keep these two projects on life support for another year.
As Truthdig’s Bill Boyarsky recently pointed out:
The Afghanistan request alone, according to the National Priorities Project, is enough to provide health care for 55 million low-income children for a year or hire 1.6 million teachers or furnish Veterans Administration health care for almost 14 million vets.
Now that we’re safely past April 15th, it’s a good time to reflect on exactly how much of this bill we’re responsible for as individuals. The folks at Rethink Afghanistan have put together a nifty tax calculator that allows you to determine the exact amount of your tax bill that went to pay for the war in Afghanistan and other military spending. They’ve set the form up in an invoice-template so that they can be printed out and presented to elected representatives as an I.O.U. Check it out.
Boxing Dispatch 4/16/11 — Berto vs. Ortiz
It says something about a fighter’s character when his immediate reaction to being handed his first defeat in 27 professional bouts is to say that he’s thankful that no one was injured. Those were the first words out of the mouth of a still-stunned Andre Berto, upon hearing the judges unanimously award his WBC Welterweight title to the younger phenom, Victor Ortiz. While words like class, grace, and dignity start springing to mind when you hear something like that, Berto’s other post-fight comments quickly brought him back down to earth; he rationalized the loss by claiming that he “felt off,” and said “that wasn’t me in there.”
Continue readingBoxing Dispatch – 4/8/11
(Originally posted at Skundered!)
I got hit with a double-dose of boxing disappointment last weekend: I missed the Finals of the Chicago Golden Gloves tournament, stood up by my usual partner in fandom — a retired suburban elementary school teacher who is the only other person I know who cares about the sport to any degree. There was also a major pay-per-view match that weekend that promised to be exciting, but was out of my reach financially. So, not for the first time, I turned to ESPN’s Friday Night Fights for my weekly boxing fix.
That night’s featured bout pitted David Lemieux, an exciting young Canadian fighter against Marco Antonio Rubio, a seasoned Mexican veteran, in a World Boxing Council middleweight title eliminator. The central theme of this fight — hot young prospect vs. cagey veteran — may have been a cliché on its face, but that could probably be said about a lot of what happens in boxing. At its best, boxing transcends its clichés, telling familiar stories over again with enough drama… Continue reading
National Security State vs. Freedom of Speech — Rounds 1 and 2
Note: This post provides additional information about a situation first written about on this site by Jimmy Gabacho back in October, and was originally posted at Skundered!.
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I’m no fan of the Patriot Act, but there is one small section of it that even I assumed would be non-controversial; the prohibition of material support for terrorism. Of course this does raise the question of how our enemies’ acts of violence tend to get labeled as terrorism, while similar acts of violence by our government and its allies never seem to earn that label. But, leaving that aside for the moment, it’s fair to say that most of us would probably share some general common-sense assumptions about the kinds of goods and services that might constitute material support for terrorism. That list might include things like providing weapons, explosives, money, training, or logistical help to a terrorist group.
Most of us will probably be surprised to learn that our government’s own interpretation of “material support” is far less intuitive, and, in fact, goes way… Continue reading
War on Wisconsin (Side effects may include…)
There is an unreported phenomenon taking place underneath Wisconsin’s historic labor struggle: the lives of tens of thousands of people, young and old, union and non-union, are being permanently changed by this experience. You can hear it in their words and see it in their faces.
A Labor Movement divided by differing levels of relative privilege has been united — hopefully for the long-term if not permanently.
Scores of ordinary people have abandoned blind party loyalties in the face of betrayal by elected leaders at every level.
They are beginning to recognize the moral bankruptcy of politicians attempting to disguise corporate-sponsored attacks on peoples’ rights and livelihoods as fiscal responsibility and reform.
For the first time they have directly experienced the corporate-owned media’s willful distortion of events that they themselves witnessed or participated in, and they are now starting to question what they read in the papers and hear on television.
They’ve gained the understanding – an understanding that is foreign to a culture in which individualism is so relentlessly promoted – that they are… Continue reading
Wisconsin Digest #4 (a brief one, I promise)
On Saturday, coordinated demonstrations in support of public employees and their bargaining rights were organized in State capitols all over the country by Moveon.org and numerous Unions. The crowd in Madison was thought to be the biggest yet, with estimates of anywhere between 70,00 and 120,000 protesters turning out. I’m confidently-inclined to believe that 100,000 is a safe bet: I was in Madison two weekends in a row, and this past Saturday’s crowd appeared to be significantly larger than the previous Saturday’s (when police estimates put the crowd at 70,000).
Madison protesters were able to maintain their 24/7 occupation of the Wisconsin Capitol building when police refused to carry out the Governor’s order to remove them by a 4pm Sunday deadline. It’s hard to overstate the unprecedented nature of the solidarity being shown in this struggle:
It was also reported over the weekend, that one Republican State Senator has defected to the side of the workers and is now opposing the Governor’s bill.
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In spite of an atmosphere of unprecedented anti-union hostility from Wisconsin’s… Continue reading
Wisconsin Digest 3 — The Empire Strikes Back
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All eyes are now firmly fixed on the Wisconsin Senate after Republicans in the General Assembly used a parliamentary maneuver early this morning to cut off debate and push through a vote on the Governor’s union-busting bill.
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It’s official: The Wisconsin State Police have been sent to round up the 14 State Senators who went on the lam to prevent State Senate Republicans from having a quorum with which to rush through the anti-union bill.
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Continue readingSupport for Cheeseheads that even a Bears fan can appreciate!
This is the latest, and most important statement of support from the Super Bowl Champions.
From Team Captain (and NFL Union Rep), Charles Woodson:
Last week I was proud when many of my current and former teammates announced their support for the working families fighting for their rights in Wisconsin. Today I am honored to join with them.
Thousands of dedicated Wisconsin public workers provide vital services for Wisconsin citizens. They are the teachers, nurses and child care workers who take care of us and our families. These hard working people are under an unprecedented attack to take away their basic rights to have a voice and collectively bargain at work.
It is an honor for me to play for the Super Bowl Champion Green Bay Packers and be a part of the Green Bay and Wisconsin communities. I am also honored as a member of the NFL Players Association to stand together with working families of Wisconsin and organized labor in their fight against this attempt to hurt them by targeting unions. I hope… Continue reading
How Do You Shut Down The Internet, Anyway?
The answer is (thanks to Democracy Now’s Amy Goodman), not without helpful corporations.
Vodafone-Egypt (under a UK parent) used language worthy of a Nuremberg defense in a press release explaining its actions:
“All mobile operators in Egypt have been instructed to suspend services in selected areas. Under Egyptian legislation the authorities have the right to issue such an order and we are obliged to comply with it. The Egyptian authorities will clarify the situation in due course.” (1/28/11)
Vodafone—apparently without any sense of irony—went on to stress its opposition to the Egyptian government’s demand that it and other cell companies engage in mass-texting of unattributed pro-government messages intended to undermine the protests:
“Vodafone Group has protested to the authorities that the current situation regarding these messages is unacceptable.” (2/3/11)
Take that, Mubarak! Unacceptable (even though Vodafone sent them anyway)! They even used the word “protested,” which almost begs us to view Vodafone as a victim on par with the crowds in Tahrir Square, rather than as complicit in attempts to repress them.
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The technically-oriented among us might be interested in this explanation of how the shutdown actually took place.
Democracy vs. Corporations — Round 2
It has to start somewhere.
As reported by Christopher Ketcham at Alternet and on Democracy Now: On the eve of the first anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s shameful and terrain-changing Citizens United decision, a call has come from the Vermont Legislature to restore a measure of political balance through an amendment to the U.S. Constitution banning “corporate personhood.”
Continue readingStark Assessments and Unnerving Implications
Chris Hedges at truthdig recently criticized the liberal tendency to retreat into lofty conferences as the America of our imaginations becomes harder to square with an increasingly disturbing reality.
Continue readingWhat’s With Rachel Maddow Lately?
For a brief moment following the shooting in Arizona, it really seemed like a consensus was forming within the liberal (and parts of the mainstream) media and blogosphere; that the violent rightwing rhetoric which has become standard feature of our political discourse had finally gone too far, and that we as a nation were finally due for some rhetorical climate change.
Continue readingCat Transmissions
From a cryptic PowerPoint slide recently created by my wife's cat Pearl:
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Sportswriter Dave Zirin had this take on violent political rhetoric, reminding us of Sarah Palin’s March 2010 attempt at a satirical defense:
The point is that Palin revels in the idea that “reloading” against those she doesn’t deem to be “real Americans” is a completely legitimate part of national discourse. The point is that behind her flawless facade and frontierswoman packaging, Palin draws strength from visions of violence. The fact that she is a national political figure with an obsessive right wing cult following makes it all the more disturbing.
We should be honest and say that were Sarah Palin a Muslim, producing gun-sight propaganda aimed at Congressinal candidates, she’d be being interviewed by the Feds right now. I personally don’t want the Feds interviewing anybody for their words, no matter where they fall on the political scene. But that doesn’t mean we the people don’t have a collective accountability to stand up to Palin and all who feed the right wing hate machine. If this weekend taught us nothing else, it’s not enough to just “change… Continue reading
In The End There Can Be Only One
Displaced Aggression — Final League Report
A hush fell over the northwest suburbs on Sunday, as Dingobros and the Turduckens faced eachother in our Championship matchup. The ensuing action was less-than-pretty, but the outcome was not unexpected; It seems that, at least this time, the ESPN geeks got it right. The Dingos, after an oedipal elimination of their own father’s team in round 2, ended up posting their fourth-lowest score of the entire season – which was sad, but still enough to derail the hapless Turduckens, whose own dreams of glory were pinned on the unlikely prospect of Steven Jackson cranking out 34 points in Sunday night’s game. In the end he came up with 11, and the Dingobros held on to Our Beloved League’s virtual trophy for a second straight year. Anyone smell a dynasty?
Surprisingly, hot and heavy action continued outside of the Championship bracket, with six of our teams continuing to add and drop players through all three rounds of post-season consolation-play. N.O. Brass upped the number of Saints on its starting… Continue reading
And Then There Were Four
Displaced Aggression League Report -- Playoff Week 1
Round 1 saw our little corner of the world turned topsy-turvy, as the three top-seeded teams and a former champion/perennial spoiler were pitilessly eradicated by an assortment of malicious Cinderellas. In the end, grief counselors had to be bused in, and our League’s brightest and best were reduced to pointing out exactly where on the doll their opponents had touched them.
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