December 29, 2012

The Glory Stompers - on Netflix

OMG where to begin? It's actually been quite some time since I saw this... thing... spectacle... whatever you call it, but it is difficult to admit that by "saw", I mean I actually watched the entire length of it.

Okay, it has Dennis Hopper. So you think, "Hey! Biker movie, Dennis Hopper... maybe this is an unappreciated influence on Easy Rider!"

Now, okay, I don't mean to get into a debate about whether Easy Rider is, or is not, a good movie or a bad movie. This is, after all, the age in which, if you want to see young Jack Nicholson act, you can do like Jefferson did with his Bible, and just watch the scenes with Nicholson in it.

But it doesn't matter whether you think Easy Rider was a good movie or a bad movie. I saw Easy Rider, I served in the Senate with Easy Rider, and this movie, sir, is no Easy Rider.

There are few things easy about watching this film. But, hey, it's got Dennis Hopper, and it's a biker movie, okay? Even if you didn't like Easy Rider, The Glory Stompers might actually make you think Easy Rider wasn't as bad as it could be. But this movie really defines "as bad as it could be".

What I don't understand about several of the B biker and hippy movies is - I mean really think about this - They made these things in California. In the 1960s. They were up to their armpits in ACTUAL bikers and hippies.

And this brings me, as it should bring your fast forward button after ogling Dennis Hopper, to the climactic hippy love-in in the woods. If you care about the plot, it takes a lot longer to get there, and that's really all there is to be said about that.

It's just like the Woodstock movie would be if only 25 people had showed up. But it made me realize something. When you hear one of your elders telling you how, "Yeah, back in the sixties, I hung out with all the Hollywood people and like, my friend's sister was Frank Zappa's babysitter..." - Those people... They were the ones who were brought in to be the extras in these bizarre caricatures which, at bottom, appear to be more like the earlier FBI movies on how, you too, can help us defeat godless Communism.

But I would not steer you astray by telling you that it has Dennis Hopper in it, and it is a biker movie.

December 23, 2012

How many private Christian schools have armed personnel?

Shouldn't they be leading the charge here?

December 23, 2012

People whom you know to have been shot

When I was about 12, I was with a group of friends at one of their houses and their parents were out. The kid who lived there took us to his parent's bedroom to show us the loaded revolver his dad kept in the night stand. One of the other kids walked into the room, picked it up and pointed it directly at my head, until the other kids shouted "It's loaded" and he dropped it in shock. I was pretty much frozen where I stood.

That was my first encounter with a loaded weapon.

So, I got to thinking, "Do I know anyone who ever shot one of those 'bad guys'?"

Well, let's see. My best friend's cousin, who, at 14, killed himself with the shotgun he got for Christmas doesn't count. Neither does the kid in my class, whose father was a law enforcement officer, count. He wasn't all that much of a 'good guy' but he too shot himself in the head, with one of his father's weapons.

A few years ago a partner in a Philadelphia law firm with whom my firm was consulting on a matter, had to take some time away from the case, since he'd shot himself in the leg with a pistol.

My former next door neighbor became depressed over a variety if things in her life and shot herself in the head. And more recently, I had lost contact with a client of mine, and ended up having to hire a PI to find out, according to the police and coroner reports, that he had shot himself in the head too.

So, let's see, my "personal life body count" is "4 dead, 1 wounded, 0 bad guys".

This is just off the top of my head. My father, of course, was awarded a medal for having shot several people dead. But after service during two wars, he never picked up a weapon again in his life.

So, apart from wartime, how many gun deaths have touched your life?

December 23, 2012

It's Time! Ashton and Demi To Divorce

According to the rules, it is no longer "too soon" to discuss gun regulation.

Now that a celebrity divorce is big news, "too soon" is officially over!

December 21, 2012

Having a probability mental block

Problem 1:

I have a bag of 136 unique items.

I reach into the bag, pull out one item.

I return the item to the bag.

I do this 45 times.

After the 45 draws from the bag, how many different unique items have I drawn?

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Problem 2:

I have a bag of 136 unique items.

I reach into the bag and pull out three items.

I return the items to the bag.

I do this 15 times.

After the 15 draws, how many different unique items have I drawn?

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I'm coming up with about 38 for Problem 1, and about 43 for Problem 2, rounding to the nearest whole number.

December 19, 2012

"But that wouldn't have stoppped THIS incident"

There are a number of arguments of the form:

Proposal X is ineffective because it would not have impacted the Sandy Hook massacre.

Arguments of this form fail to recognize what is "the problem", and how "the problem" may or may not be impacted by Proposal X.

People making arguments of that form fail to realize that "the problem" is not THIS incident. There is a larger and broader problem which has been brought to a head by the visceral impact of this incident.

Yes, every situation is different, and may be affected by an infinitude of factors. Against the daily - daily - carnage of misuse of firearms, the Sandy Hook incident is "off the charts"; waaaay out in the skinny end of the run-of-the-mill small horrors we have tolerated too long.

The thing is, the way you shift the skinny end of the curve is to shift the entire curve.

Quite obviously, this incident would have been totally preventable by having a law stating, "No person shall have a son named Adam Lanza and live in Newtown, Connecticut". That law would have impacted virtually NOBODY in the general population, and would have completely prevented this from occurring.

But "preventing THIS from occurring" is not the goal. This incident is the straw which broke the camel's back on the mundane casual gun violence we experience each and every fucking day.

So, may we please dispense with the analysis of "whether or not Proposal X would have had an impact on Sandy Hook"?

December 19, 2012

"he would make sure that the most vulnerable were exempted out from this change"

Since those words seem not to be included in "quotes" around these parts, I just want to make up for the lack of them elsewhere.

"he would make sure that the most vulnerable were exempted out from this change"

December 18, 2012

Disturbing video of kids acting out violent media

December 16, 2012

Shots Fired at Fashion Island

Source: Newport Beach-Corona del Mar Patch

Newport Beach police say one man was taken into custody after shots broke outside of Macy's at Fashion Island.

Read more: http://newportbeach.patch.com/articles/shots-fired-at-fashion-island

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Tis the season...