Like Han Solo in Carbonite

O Blog prepara sua retirada from the Beautiful South, e por isso estara em animacao suspensa durante a Quaresma.

Intelligent Design

Hoje completa quarenta e dois anos uma grande razao porque nao tenho tanta certeza quanto o Richard Dawkins.

Rir para nao chorar...

*From http://nearingzero.net/

Rockin' the Casbah

Volta e meia chateava amigos que frequentavam second hand bookstores to keep an eye out for "A Savage War of Peace", an account of the Algerian war, que acaba de ser reeditado, after years out of print. Certamente ocorreu o mesmo que com o classico filme de Gillo Pontecorvo, people noticed some disturbing similarities to current events- it appears that The Battle of Algiers* is being screened regularly to officers at the Pentagon. No prefacio da nova edicao o autor relata que o staff do Rumsfeld lhe pediu uma copia for The Don, which he duly sent, together with a note "underscoring the evils of torture"- a comment which was not well received. O gajo, Alistair Horne, is one of my favorite historians, descobri quando comprei por acaso uma excelente historia de Paris ("Seven Ages of Paris").

O novo prefacio tambem traz esta perola:

"Though the parallels may be only partially exact, dark comparisons also offer themselves between the two former French colonies both "liberated" in the 1950s and 1960s: Vietnam, infinitely more devastated than Algeria in over twenty years of war, and lacking its natural wealth of oil and gas, but now rapidly emerging as the new Taiwan of Southeast Asia; Algeria wracked by internecine fundamentalism, and economically impoverished. Students of contemporary Islam and its incompetence in the world of material progress might wish to draw their own conclusions."

O livro vale a pena, if there's anybody out there, please let's help to keep it in print.

* a quem interessar possa: its now available on DVD with fantastic sound and image transfer on the Criterion label.

Usama to Get the Big Pussy Treatment

Muita gente anda sacaneando a escolha do Almirante William Fallon as the new commander of the Iraq and Afghan campaigns- afinal por um marinheiro in charge of two land wars quase eclipsa a escolha de um vendedor de cavalos como chefe da FEMA (but they, look how well that turned out).

Not so the NY Times, which found the really relevant qualifications:

"The admiral can be grizzly and tough, as befits a product of New Jersey."

A Kind Word This Holiday Season

O Washington Post publicou recentemente uma materia* about where New Yorker cartoons come from. Cada semana o cartoon editor, David Remnick, recebe mais de 1000 submissoes- from professionals- e aceita em torno de 20.

A conclusao de um dos cartunistas me parece good advice for anyone in the paper submission merry-go-round:

"Yes, I get frustrated a lot," he admits. "But that's not necessarily a bad thing. "If you have a pessimistic outlook on life, you'll probably do better," he tells the kid. "If you think nine out of 10 of your ideas will be rejected, you'll work harder."

And thats for all you boys and girls out there for whom this Christmas Santa brought around a lovely letter that includes phrases like "our limited space and the high number of quality submissions received", "we feel that a more specialized journal", "thank you for considering the Polynesian Poultry Science Post and we hope that this does not discourage you from in the future", etc...

My personal favorite? "This is the germ of very interesting paper."

Happy Kwanzaa

*http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/23/AR2006122300893_pf.html

EU NAO TENHO VERGONHA

“Rocky Balboa” is a great movie- and I don’t mean this ironically, sarcastically, or even in the classic good bad movie way (estilo “Attack of the Killer Tomatoes”). If you are the proud owner of one (01) or more testicles- or if you were once part of the now defunct East German women’s swim or weightlifting teams- chances are, you will agree.

Senhor Meu Pai contava que em 1970 a esquerda Brasileira estava atenta para o fato que a ditadura inevitavelmente exploraria uma vitoria do escrete canarinho na Copa do Mundo. Seria uma vitoria politica para as forcas da repressao. Which was absolutely true, o General Emilio Garrastazu Medici gostava de se deixar fotografar em jogos, incluso o radinho de pilhas colado ao ouvido and his regime milked every last drop of patriotic hoopla out of the occasion. Era o auge da repressao. Em termos de selvageria, o mais proximo que o Brasil chegou do abismo em quem cairam a Argentina e o Chile, foi durante os anos do governo Medici . A unica opcao para a juventude militante, preocupada com o destino do pais, enfim a malta valida, lucida e inserida no contexto, era torcer contra o Brasil. Preferably for the People’s Democratic Republic of Wherever.

Revolucoes nao acontecem no Brasil, and true to form, revolutionary fervor did not survive the walking out onto the field of Rivelino, Tostao, Gerson, Jairsinho e um ja nao tao jovem Edson Arantes do Nascimento- let alone an actual game.


And so off we go to see Sly, now 60, back in the ring, para rir. A intencao nao sobrevive aos primeiros sopros de Maynard Ferguson no trompete, como o sino de Pavlov. Bill Conti’s Flying High Now/Rocky theme goes straight to the limbic system e no cinema sente-se o efeito. People sit up, the Average American stops grazing on his extra large buttered popcorn and pays attention. Estao la na tela todas as falhas, todos os clichés antecipados, down to the mandatory training montage. Mas funciona. Nao queremos gostar, and failing that, nao queremos que ninguem saiba que gostamos. E' compreensivel. O blog tambem ja sofreu no escuro do cinema Paissandu, all through Cheiro da Papaya Verde para impressionar a miuda do Instituto de Filosofia e Ciencias Humanas (that too is a primordial biological response).

Enfim, nao conto mais, nao ha surpresas. It is exactly as you thought it would be. Sometimes that’s a good thing.