Hard News by Russell Brown

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Hard News: Because They Could

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  • Sacha,

    "Bomb and Bomberer" - classic! :)

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report

  • giovanni tiso,

    "Bomb and Bomberer" - classic! :)

    Well yes, thank you, and by the way it's copyrighted. I don't want any of those United Soviet Socialist Republic of the Creative Commons guys to get any strange ideas.

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report

  • Sacha,

    And here I was enjoying a break from #$%# copyright. Did anyone get to Lessig last night?

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report

  • Jolisa,

    Do I have it in me to resist offering cake and grief counseling?...nope. Very sad.

    Cake or death? Which is pretty much what's on the table. I am crossing fingers for cake, although my partner was wondering this morning if we should get a bigger Obama poster for the front door, in the event of a McCain victory and the inevitable civil disorder that would follow.

    Auckland, NZ • Since Nov 2006 • 1472 posts Report

  • Jolisa,

    So Amy, what kind of cake are you making? I'm just icing several dozen heavily symbolic dark caramel cakes with heavily symbolic white icing and blue "I VOTED" slogans, for the bake sale. Not feeling the need to ice any in red. They wouldn't sell in my town.

    (Is it weird that the American colo[u]r of the "socialist" party is blue, and that the Republicans nabbed red? "The people's flag is coloured.. uh... blue; we're slightly more liberal than you.")

    Auckland, NZ • Since Nov 2006 • 1472 posts Report

  • Jolisa,

    WHAT?! The American education system has been taken over by Gramscians and NOBODY told me?

    You got the memo from Pablo's prison notebooks in the other thread, right?

    I'll be there by noon tomorrow. Bake a cake, do something.

    Excellent. Cake stall @ Jepson school, you're on the noon shift. We'll make enough moolah to buy every kid their own copy of Das Kapital. No child left behind!

    Auckland, NZ • Since Nov 2006 • 1472 posts Report

  • Jolisa,

    Obama's grandmother just died :-( How I wish she could have hung on for another day or two.

    Auckland, NZ • Since Nov 2006 • 1472 posts Report

  • Kyle Matthews,

    But, seriously? I thought it was going to be special after 2000, when they were surely and obviously going to reform their political system right in front of me.

    Did anyone see Recount on Prime the other night?

    Even with the understanding that it had a bit of fiction mixed in with the facts, it was disturbing to relive eight years ago. Fucked up in a "oh no, we're not actually going to count the votes" kinda way.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Russell Brown,

    And here I was enjoying a break from #$%# copyright. Did anyone get to Lessig last night?

    Yup, and it was great.

    I have tasked Matthew Poole with writing a review of the lecture.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report

  • Amy Gale,

    So Amy, what kind of cake are you making?

    Current thinking heavily favours indoor-s'mores:
    - homemade biscuits
    - homemade marshmallow
    - dark couverture pistoles (from, yes, a 5kg box)
    - butane torch

    PRO: everyone gets to play with fire. CON: not symbolic.

    The last time I made cupcakes it was about 160 of them, each with a buttercream chrysanthemum, for a wedding last month. I was still coated in buttercream at the rehearsal dinner, and a wasp bit me. There will be no cupcakes.

    tha Ith • Since May 2007 • 471 posts Report

  • giovanni tiso,

    You got the memo from Pablo's prison notebooks in the other thread, right?

    Pricelessness.

    Obama's grandmother just died

    Sadness. I'm left hoping that the 109 year old daughter of a slave will make it.

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report

  • Sacha,

    I saw part of Recount - and still amazed that the party operatives like Katherin Harris get to call the shots. What a crazy system.

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report

  • Gareth Ward,

    Obama's grandmother just died
    Sadness

    Sadness indeed - and just when you thought the poignancy of the whole thing couldn't possibly get any greater...

    Auckland, NZ • Since Mar 2007 • 1727 posts Report

  • Jolisa,

    I'm cheering myself up with these lovely pics. (Warning: may cause spontaneous conception in susceptible viewers).

    Auckland, NZ • Since Nov 2006 • 1472 posts Report

  • giovanni tiso,

    According to ABC the tally is 0-0 at the moment.

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report

  • Kyle Matthews,

    I'm cheering myself up with these lovely pics.

    I don't know why, but the first photo of him in the bumper car is reassuring.

    There's a man who looks like he's not scared to just have some fun with his family. Looks like the sort of person you could meet at a family bbq and not leave feeling like you're covered in political slime.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report

  • Danielle,

    I'm cheering myself up with these lovely pics.

    It really helps that they're all so beautiful. Aesthetic appeal goes a long way in modern politics...

    Charo World. Cuchi-cuchi!… • Since Nov 2006 • 3828 posts Report

  • JohnAmiria,

    According to ABC the tally is 0-0 at the moment.

    Clear proof of media bias, as if needed. When will the MSM ever learn?

    hither and yon • Since Aug 2008 • 215 posts Report

  • Mark Harris,

    I like the dodgem one with his tongue sticking out "Line 'em up and knock 'em down!"

    Waikanae • Since Jul 2008 • 1343 posts Report

  • giovanni tiso,

    It really helps that they're all so beautiful. Aesthetic appeal goes a long way in modern politics...

    That kinda disturbs me a bit, they look like the stock black family of American cinema from the 90s onwards: clean, beautiful, two or three young children, lots of sexual chemistry between the parents; I often think it's a revival of white families in 50s cinema except if you put whites in there it would be just too uninteresting and possibly icky too.

    Anyways, I'm not knocking Obama for having a happy and beautiful family, it's just that when they are filmed in the same kinds of shot and with the same production values as a Will Smith or Denzel Washington joint, it's hard not to see what a tremendous asset it is, and to reflect on the fact that a single white man (much less a single white woman) just wouldn't have a shot at occupying that particular job, and their black counterparts even less so.

    That said: they're all gorgeous and the photos are lovely.

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report

  • Danielle,

    I think quite a few photographers are going for the JFK vibe, too. Has anyone linked to this series? Some of them are amazing.

    Charo World. Cuchi-cuchi!… • Since Nov 2006 • 3828 posts Report

  • Jolisa,

    You're right Danielle - can we say Camelot? (Without jinxing ourselves).

    I think part of the attraction is that they're not quite central casting, more like those friends of yours who kind of look like movie stars when they dress up, y'know? Gorgeous, fit, elegant, incredibly photogenic 99% of the time, but also kind of dorky-looking in a good way (the parents at least; those girls are just plain beautiful).

    Cute and geeky - a winning combo, for me at least!

    Meanwhile, I've embraced the impending win (must be all the sugar from the cupcakes) and moved on to imagining headlines:
    Yes We Did
    Barack To The Future

    Auckland, NZ • Since Nov 2006 • 1472 posts Report

  • giovanni tiso,

    You're right Danielle - can we say Camelot? (Without jinxing ourselves).

    Let's not say Camelot, shall we? Unless you want to start casting for the role of Marylin...

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report

  • Craig Ranapia,

    There's a man who looks like he's not scared to just have some fun with his family.

    But would once in a while wouldn't mind doing it without the press corps.

    It wasn't quite a Halloween nightmare on Obama street, but journalists on Friday drew a rare flash of anger from the normally unflappable Democratic presidential nominee.

    Barack Obama had taken a break from the campaign trail for a few hours of Halloween fun at home with his family four days before the election, but ended up visibly annoyed when news crews dogged their footsteps in their Chicago neighborhood.

    "That's enough. You've got a shot. Leave us alone," Obama told reporters as he walked down the block with his 7-year-old daughter Sasha in her costume on the way to a party at a neighbor's home.

    Obama, usually cool in public during a campaign that has turned him into the frontrunner for the White House, did not disguise his irritation when his surprise walk caused news photographers and camera crews to scramble for position on the sidewalk.

    What a fricking Mandingo mad negro! Seriously, if this is Obama losing his shit he is the Final Cylon. But there's also part of me that says he can't have it both ways where his family are concerned -- no more than anyone else in public life.

    Let me draw a domestic comparison, have I been the only person who cringes at this point in the electoral cycle when we have faux-intimate moments with Helen and Peter and John and Bronagh. They're fake, contrived and who really needs to know?

    North Shore, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 12370 posts Report

  • Danielle,

    I've embraced the impending win

    Zip! Zip! Nay! Don't say it out loud! I've decided that this is like sports: you can jinx your team by being overly confident. Evil little spirits are hovering over us, gaining strength with every assumption about tomorrow we make!

    (Yes, I am weird and superstitious and properly belong in a less scientifically enlightened past era. I know this.)

    Charo World. Cuchi-cuchi!… • Since Nov 2006 • 3828 posts Report

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