An emotional & touching moment for Civil Rights Icon & Congressman John Lewis. Absolutely incredible. ❤️?https://t.co/1A7aNoiqbe
— Ricky Davila (@TheRickyDavila) July 15, 2017
I watched this several times and was equally undone each time. A real American hero.
Hate on record. There are a lot of people who are going to want to deny their complicity when the wheels come completely off. Deny their support. Deny their hate. Good luck deleting the internet.
On a completely different note, Disney released this:
They keep trying to ruin this book with movies. I hope this one will raise the bar.
Open thread.
gene108
I started ready “A Wrinkle in Time” in the fourth grade, but I can’t remember, if I ever finished.
Will have to hunt down my old copy, I have it somewhere, and read it.
Major Major Major Major
Open thread?
Vulture has a fun interview about the history of The Simpsons’ Planet of the Apes musical.
Catherine D.
There should be a statue of John Lewis in every public square.
A Wrinkle in Time and From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs Basil E Frankweiler were two of my favorite books as a kid.
WaterGirl
Wow, it was scary even listening to that audio. What a great brave man. He truly is a national treasure.
I am growing to viscerally hate the racists and bigots. These people have no idea what they are destroying.
SiubhanDuinne
@gene108:
A Wrinkle in Time wasn’t even published until I was 21 years old, so was completely out of my genre at the time. I did finally read it and the other books in The Time Quintet about 20-25 years ago. Enjoyed them but don’t remember any details. Maybe I should haul them out and reread one of these days.
Chris T.
I had a somewhat odd thought or two while watching Maddow and the Russian-attacks analyst guy.
If you’re the Russians and you intend to get your hooks into all levels of government (remember penetration at all levels?), you have probably succeeded at more than just the one level.
The one level at which you have clearly succeeded is falling apart right now because President* Fart, his family, and his associates are such idiots. This is exposing the facts about the penetration. It may be time to cut your losses. Perhaps Peter W. Smith’s suicide really was a suicide, but perhaps it was to sever a link between those who are exposed (Kislyak et al) and those who are not yet.
What other shoes may drop, or not drop? Who else is compromised? The Principle of Mediocrity suggests that there are a lot of others who are compromised, and not just on the R side. How will we ever manage all of them?
SiubhanDuinne
There’s a lot wrong with Georgia, but for all its faults it gave us John Lewis and Jimmy Carter, two of the best human beings you will ever encounter. I have been vastly privileged to spend time in the company of both men. They are true heroes and inspirations.
Edit: Never met MLK Jr., but he’s another in the Georgia pantheon.
(Edit: Yes, I know John Lewis is actually from Alabama. But in the public mind, he’s a Georgian.)
clay
Wrinkle was, and remains, one of my all-times favorites. There is such wisdom in grace in that book that it really had a lasting effect in me.
There are some things in that trailer that intrigue me, but things like this don’t fill me with hope (from Wired):
SFBayAreaGal
John Lewis is my hero.
I read A Wrinkle in Time when I was a wee lassie. I need to read it again.
cynthia ackerman
That’s fairly devastating for those of us who lived through it.
While racism is clearly the root problem affecting this incidemt, I’m oddly reminded of a casual intetaction with a young African Americam woman at a car rental counter right at the start of GWB’s invasion of Iraq.
A ragtag band of nobodies had shut down a freeway here in Portland, and the Enterprise lady (I dealt with her a couple times a week) said she hoped the protesters got “mowed down” because they were scum.
My response, to her shock, was that she’d soon enough understand that those “scum” were right — Shrub’s war was going to be a disaster without compare.
It stunned me at the time, and since, that a person whose patents and grandparents could not count on unbiased treatment in the most mundane circumstances essentially parroted Fox News values. If she could have, I think she would have rapturously danced a “Make America Great Again!”
Mike J
ABC has a new Trump and Trumpcare approval poll coming out at 9PM PDT.
geg6
@clay:
Jay Z is quite the poet if you can get past your preconceived notions. Quite wise, actually. I read his book and, having done that, I think you may have the wrong impression of the guy. Read his book and Keith Richards’ back to back. I’m more impressed with both of them having done so. Wise men.
ThresherK
Countdown to butthurt white snowflakes non-ironically reenacting the sit-ins by shouting That Epithet in 3…2…1…
Ruckus
@WaterGirl:
I think that’s wrong. They do know. They know they are nothing in relation to the people they want to stifle, ruin and kill. They know they will never be anything and there is nothing they can do to change that because of who they are. They think their only chance is to stop anyone who is their better from being able to show how little and insignificant they are. They don’t hate people solely because of the color of their skin, it’s because of the color of their skin and that they are better than the haters. You said it yourself, John Lewis is a great man, a national treasure. And he’s black. President Obama is a great man and a national treasure. And he’s black. So the haters have to tear down everything he accomplished because he shows them up for being the losers they are. It’s the same thing for foreigners, they aren’t americans so they can’t possibly be smart or qualified in any way. The losers are losers because they can’t figure out how to be better, to rise on their own merits. Because they have no merits. Look at drumpf and family. He has education, the kids have education. Yet they are worthless as humans and will never be worth any more than they already are. They worship at the temple of money, not at the temple of humanity. John Lewis is the poster child for humanity. MLK was that in his day. They can look at the bigger picture and see humanity. Haters look at the bigger picture and see millions of people ahead of them and they can not abide that neither their whiteness nor their money can buy them a place in that picture except in the back.
germy
ruemara
I was watching his face and posture. He still has PTSD from what he went through. It’s amazing how much he accomplished, facing not just the abuse, but the continual abuse that happens in the mind.
And yes, these people know what they are destroying. That’s exactly why they’re destroying it. Interesting times ahead.
Looking forward to A Wrinkle In Time. I may have to reread it. I loved it so much.
Steve in the ATL
@SiubhanDuinne:
Great men all. but you can’t leave out Herschel Walker!
cain
@Chris T.:
I strongly believe that the evangelical movement is compromised. I think organizations like Focus on the Family are corrupted.
Brachiator
@gene108:
Never read “A Wrinkle in Time.” I loved SF, but stayed away from anything that was pushed or labeled as juvenile fiction.
Maybe I’ll take a look if it is a fast read. I have no particular expectations about the film. Some of the early promo plays up Oprah, which means nothing to me. Is she behind efforts to get this version done?
Amaranthine RBG
@Catherine D.:
Yes. He’s a hero.
A Ghost to Most
@cain:
Ya think?
ruemara
@Brachiator: Don’t let a YA label block you from good fiction. It is worthy of reading. And yes, Oprah is acting in it. Don’t see any signs of her producing on it.
Brachiator
There are white people for whom this stuff represents the “good old days.” And a good chunk of them expect Trump to lead the way in bringing them back.
Old Dan and Little Anne
I read A wrinkle in Time to 4th graders about 10 years ago. I had to read online summaries of each chapter at night to figure out what the hell was happening. My comprehension is bollocks whilst reading aloud. I could have read summaries before reading but where’s the fun in that?
SiubhanDuinne
@Steve in the ATL:
Or Nipsey Russell.
Are you still sweltering in Dallas?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
interesting if true…
I wonder if it’s medical, or if we’re playing a game of “Who does John McCain hate the most today?”
(and I don’t wanna use whom here)
West of the Rockies (been a while)
I wasn’t sure what to expect from the video. That was moving, humbling material. We need to work together to defeat those who still do not accept equality, who still hurt and hate their fellow women and men.
Steve in the ATL
@Brachiator:
We had a copy of “The Hunger Games” lying around the house for a while. I picked up and read it and the writing was so good I didn’t realize it was YA until the male and female leads got together and just kissed.
Patricia Kayden
The Civil Rights Movement was such a revolutionary time in history that, in my opinion, anyone who was involved in it has every reason to hold their head up with great pride.
It has been inspirational to other marginalized, oppressed groups and accomplished much for peoples of color here in the US. Racists can no more wipe that out than they can erase President Obama’s historic and successful presidency. I assume that’s why White Supremacists are so enraged even though they have an avowed racist in the White House,
Keith P.
LOL, John McCain is taking next week off due to eye surgery. Nice little monkey wrench there.
Steve in the ATL
@SiubhanDuinne: no, I’m now sweltering in Johns Creek. The daily rain has been great–would hate for the humidity to dip at all!
And my house has been extra humid since the pipe broke and we had 28″ of water in the basement. Which was full of…whatever is really valuable but not quite valuable enough to require an insurance rider.
japa21
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: That means he can’t vote on the healthcare bill. McConnell won’t let it be voted on this week. Which means more time to turn the screws on the “on the fence” senators.
Patricia Kayden
@Chris T.: Who do you believe is compromised on the D side?
Brachiator
@ruemara:
When I was growing up in Texas, the public library would stamp younger people’s card so that they could not check out more “mature” books. My mother lobbied to get me a card without most restrictions. Soon I learned that a lot of SF was dismissed as “not real or serious literature” and had a lot of mature material, especially about politics and sex. So I immediately headed for the most explicit stuff I could find.
I recognize that there is a lot of good YA stuff. And appreciate that it is taken more seriously.
Patricia Kayden
@japa21: I don’t recall all of this chicanery when the ACA was being passed. This is such a whole lotta drama.
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Obama. Always Obama.
Does this mean the GOP essentially can’t vote this week on Trumpcare?
Steve in the ATL
@Patricia Kayden:
QFT. Makes me sick when I hear people bitch about all the streets names after MLK. You know what’s reprehensible and indefensible? Stuff named after Ronald Reagan.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@japa21: even with all the on-the-fencers, he can’t get to fifty without flipping Paul back, I think. And that could happen.
I have no faith in Susan Collins’ decency, but if it’s true she wants to be guv’ner of Maine, she doesn’t want to be saddled with a huge budget/health care mess for trump or McConnell’s sake.
but he hasn’t seen Obama in a while, though Megan tells him he’s on that “internet” thing. Maybe Cindy made fun of him again and he’s gonna fuck trump care just so she doesn’t get that Ambassador title she wants for after he dies.
Baud
@Patricia Kayden: Yep. Even when they win, they lose.
clay
@geg6: I have nothing against Jay-Z himself, but the book references a much higher echelon of artitsts, philosophers and thinkers — Jesus, Buddha, Gandhi, Aristotle, Einstein, Bach, Leonardo da Vinci, etc. It was striving for a timeless feel, and succeeded.
To have Kaling’s character (um, spoilers, I guess) who is basically an angel engaged in an eternal battle against evil reference a current pop star as ageless wisdom just strikes me as wrong, tonally. It’d be like the book throwing Elvis (who was contemporary) in with the luminaries above.
Ryan
I hope Cummings agreed in advance. That did not look IRB approved.
Another Scott
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: TheHill:
Zooks!
crainotomy:
I wonder if this is somehow related to his weirdness in the questioning of Comey a few weeks ago…
Surgery inside the skull is nothing to mess around with. I’d be surprised if he was back at work after only a week, but I’m not an MD.
Cheers,
Scott.
Thoughtful David
@Chris T.:
Right now, you have to assume everyone in the Trump administration, Trump campaign, RNC, Republican leadership in Congress, and many Republicans in Congress, and many “conservative” advisors and think-tank types. Because, even if they aren’t actually directly involved with the Russians, they’re open to blackmail by the Russians. It doesn’t even have to be true. The Russians only have to claim or leak something plausible, and because there’s so much real shit there, plausible is good enough. All the Russians have to say is ” Hey, Rick Perry. Do what we say or we’ll leak that you were also in that meeting with Kislyak.” Doesn’t have to be true.
oatler.
@Keith P.: This had better not interfere with his talk show obligations. The shit-show must go on!
frosty
@Brachiator:
Try the Ashfall triogy: story of post-Yellowstone supervolcano written from the perspective of a teenager, so I guess that’s why it was called YA. I thought it was as good as any other SF I’ve read recently.
SiubhanDuinne
@Steve in the ATL:
I know what you mean. Even with the air conditioner going (I don’t really like to use A/C and try to keep it to a minimum even on the worst days of summer), I feel as though I am in a steam bath a lot of the time.
Wow, so sorry, I must have missed that! I’ve had a couple of burst pipes in my life, and it’s just awful. Hope things are soon dried out and that you’re able to salvage at least something of value from the sodden mess.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
very good, government subsidized health insurance, IIANM, in spite of his considerable personal fortune. To say nothing of his wife’s.
Lapassionara
@Ruckus: You are correct. This is right.
Chet Murthy
@geg6: I’m not the greatest fan of rap music. But hip-hop isn’t lost on me. I remember KRS-One’s Edutainment (I think it was). Three Feet Tall and Rising. And I remember the lyrical magnificence of Muhammad Ali in _When We Were Kings_, and a number of radio & TV interviews. [Lordy, what a Prince. I don’t watch boxing. Didn’t need to, to appreciate Muhammad Ali.] No, I can’t say I’ve been a fan of Jay-Z. But merely his stature in the field, tells me that he’s got stuff to say. B/c people who aren’t at his level, have (and had) stuff to say to me.
frosty
@Steve in the ATL:
In particular, and especially National Airport. Naming DCA after the swine who fired the air traffic contollers and broke their union was a travesty,
Ryan
@Another Scott: Be a shame if that falls under a pre-existing condition. Oh, wait, Congress ruled itself not subject to its own health care bill.
Ruckus
@Brachiator:
The city library where I grew up did the same thing. I’d read everything in the youth side and wanted to learn more. I was reading 4-6 books a week so it wasn’t to difficult to run out of material. My mom, bless her heart took me to the library and told them to give me a card. She was told it was inappropriate. I was young enough that I couldn’t swear to it but I still think my mom said, “What the fuck, you have a child who wants to learn and you won’t let him? Give him the damn card.” The look on the woman’s face was something to behold and she didn’t say a word, just went and made out my adult card. I think I was 8 or 9 yrs old. No one ever again questioned me about any books I checked out, no matter the title or author.
Another Scott
@Patricia Kayden: It wasn’t “chicanery”, of course, but remember that the passage of the PPACA was hanging on by a thread when Ted Kennedy was stricken – he was the 60th vote.
It would be interesting if McCain ends up being unable to vote and Trumpcare dies, and Obamacare (and Medicaid and all the rest) survives, because of it…
Cheers,
Scott.
Ruckus
@Steve in the ATL:
As an atheist I
rarelynever use this term, but fucking Amen.Ryan
@Another Scott: McCain stay home. That’s the best thing you can do for your legacy.
Mike J
@Steve in the ATL: The only thing I can think of named for Reagan is an airport, and everybody calls it National.
Chris T.
@Patricia Kayden: I have no idea. I just think that we should assume that, given that we know the Russians use extensive social hacking and that most people are average, they probably have succeeded many places.
Baud
@Mike J: There’s an aircraft carrier, I believe.
p.a.
Scholastic Books opened windows to worlds for a lot of kids who otherwise would have seen only walls.
Baud
List of things named after Ronald Reagan
Ruckus
@clay:
I know who Jay Z is but I’m not familiar with his work. But being old doesn’t make someone right or wrong, being current doesn’t either. It’s the work, the words, it’s what they do and say that’s important, not when or how they say it.
Another Scott
@Mike J: http://itcdc.com/ – it is the biggest building in DC (3.1 M sq ft). (The Pentagon is in Virginia.)
Cheers,
Scott.
Hal
I just saw the trailer and immediately thought of our current times. I think that’s also why Wonder Woman is so popular right now.
I see what you did there Ava Duvernay.
Patricia Kayden
@Steve in the ATL: While I’ve never heard anyone complain about streets named after MLK, I’ve heard plenty of commentary on how they’re often in the worst areas. Not sure if that’s actually true though. Looking forward to some Barack Obama streets myself.
Patricia Kayden
@Baud: McConnell needs every yes vote he can get to pass Trump Care so I would guess that he will have to wait for McCain’s return.
geg6
@ruemara:
Could be wrong but I think she is producing. Saw an interview online with her and Ava Duvernay talking about the film and left it with the impression she was one of the forces behind it.
Omnes Omnibus
@Ruckus: My library would let you take out just about any book. They just made you open it at random and read a page out loud. If you messed up fewer than five words, they figured it wasn’t too challenging and let you take it.
Ruckus
@Another Scott:
Is it possible, no, it can’t be, maybe, not it can’t be, I can’t believe that I’m even thinking like this, no it can’t be………
I wonder if gramps is going to sit out the vote. Won’t have to come out against but won’t have to say yes either. No it can’t be……
Baud
@Patricia Kayden: Ironic if a medical procedure saved people’s health care.
Ruckus
@Mike J:
The 118 freeway is named for him and it runs near his library in Simi Valley. Pisses me off every time I have to drive on it. Fortunately that’s not often any more.
scav
@Ruckus: No idea what the official policy was at our local library — local in that we only had access to an every other Thursday bookmobile. As I would run laps on their summer-long reading program without trying, it was the librarian that started me on adult fiction at about that age purely out of self-preservation.
geg6
@clay:
Elvis was a talentless poser who never wrote a damn thing. Worthless as a comparison. Guess only white people can impart wisdom.
SiubhanDuinne
@Baud:
I have a vague recollection that former Georgia Congressman Bob Barr headed up some kind of organisation whose mandate was to get at least one public tribute (thoroughfare, building, monument or statue, park, etc.) in every county or county-equivalent in the United States named for Ronald Reagan. That would be a minimum of 3,142 such tributes.
I don’t think even George Washington or Abraham Lincoln can match those numbers. It’s quite ridiculous.
Omnes Omnibus
@Ruckus: There are still people in the Chicago area who call I-290 the Congress rather than the Eisenhower.
efgoldman
@Steve in the ATL:
As I’ve noted several times, our kids live on US29 in Arlington, VA – [Robert E] Lee Highway. Still.
Not too far away is US1 – still Jefferson Davis Highway.
Lots of people would like to change one or both, but there are too may overlapping jurisdictions.
Arlington County is pretty much as blue as it can get; it has driven the state from red to purplish-blue.
Ruckus
@Omnes Omnibus:
I could see that as a problem for my city library. They had books with the word fuck used randomly. Reading that out loud in that city library might have made one have to talk to the cops. Of course you could have told them who made you read it out loud. BTW that town was dying until the old fogies were booted off the city council. It’s a much nicer place to live today.
Another Scott
@efgoldman: I’ve lived in NoVA for 25+ years (time flies) and I always refer those roads (and many others) by their US route numbers. It took me too long to get used to the traffic reports talking about the Shirley Highway and all the rest… :-/
Cheers,
Scott.
SiubhanDuinne
@Another Scott:
Oh, good catch! I wouldn’t be surprised.
Gvg
@Patricia Kayden: what I noticed about roads named for MLK Jr. Is that they tended to be some of the longest highways in the state. Can’t say how it is in other states nut in Florida parts of 441 are MLK too. Also I think some other long highways. If it’s long enough, some of it goes through bad areas. Also wonder if I just notice road names more or if it really is a thing to name mainly roads for him. I tend to not care about memorials so maybe I just don’t notice.
Patricia Kayden
@Baud: It’s infuriating that despite all the protests and angry Town Hall meetings, McConnell is still so close to getting this atrocity passed. Feels like Republicans couldn’t care less about their constituents.
efgoldman
@Patricia Kayden:
So question: Does it require an absolute majority (50+ VP) or a majority of those present and voting?
Ruckus
@Omnes Omnibus:
Out in CA few use the names, just the numbers. We also rarely tell someone how far something is, but how long it takes to get there at the time of day they are going. I’ve heard people ask how far when told the time and seen people just look at them in wonderment, because they don’t usually know that answer. It’s not really relevant in LA or SF. If you told them it was maybe 15 miles and takes 45 minutes they’d never believe it.
Baud
@Patricia Kayden: It’s that their constituents couldn’t care less about anything except hating Those People.
Another Scott
@efgoldman: Wikipedia says Reconciliation requires 51 votes in the Senate.
Cheers,
Scott.
Steve in the ATL
@Chet Murthy: Three Feet High And Rising.
Damn crackers.
(And yes I know you are not actually a cracker)
SiubhanDuinne
@Ruckus:
I’m reminded of a story my great aunt used to tell. She got it from one of her fellow teachers. Seems there was a class of kids who were taking turns reading a book aloud, and one child was faced with the unfamiliar word “precipice.” He took a guess and pronounced it “precipee.” The teacher, correcting him, said “No, Jimmy, it’s not pee. It’s piss.”
efgoldman
@Patricia Kayden:
Maybe because they really don’t give a flying fuck.
What’s more surprising is, they clearly don’t give a shit at all about their natural constituency: insurance companies, doctors, hospitals….
Ohio Mom
@Mike J: We have a highway in Cincinnati that used to be called Cross County (because duh, that’s where it goes) but was renamed after Regan.
People use both names. I never stopped to think if there was a pattern — older folk more used to calling it Cross County sticking to that? or proud Republicans happy to utter their patron saint’s name every chance? I’ll have to make a note to pay attention to that.
I seem to remember that there was a movement to make sure every state had something named/renamed after him. I just hope the idea to put him on the dime (replacing FDR!) never comes to anything.
Lapassionara
@efgoldman: That is my question too.
ThresherK
@Brachiator: I was let into the grownups’ library at a young age. I guess they didn’t have a lot of risque stuff, or I didn’t know what it was.
Spousal ThresherK lives on “YA” stuff, including the Harry Potter and Hunger Games stuff, plus she already had lots of Oz books and items when I met her. I understand that scared off weaker men.
frosty
@efgoldman: I can see a case for Lee Highway, after all the County is named after his estate, currently a cemetery.
But JD Highway? No way.
Another Scott
@ThresherK: rofl. :-) . Nice humblebrag!
Cheers,
Scott.
ruemara
@geg6: Can’t find a producer credit line for her. But I know she was definitely a force behind it for Ava. All I am is glad.
Ruckus
@efgoldman:
First, QFT
Second, they don’t give any other kind either.
efgoldman
@frosty:
A slave owner and a traitor.
Fuck him.
Ruckus
@efgoldman:
You know old man, I like your style.
frosty
@efgoldman: Well, it ain’t gonna be me making the case. Just so everyone’s clear on that.
Uncle Cosmo
@Brachiator:
I was in HS when an esteemed former teacher of mine who knew I loved SF (I’d been reading it since age 7, “adult” SF since 12 or so) loaned me his younger sister’s copy of AWiT a couple of years after it came out. I remember thinking it was an OK read, but it didn’t made enough of an impression to look (much less hope) for sequels. Frankly I wondered what all the award winning was about. The book struck me as science-fiction-ish, SF-for-people-who-despise-SF, similar in some ways to C.S. Lewis’s so-called “Space Trilogy” (which I have always loathed for Lewis’s scientifically-illiterate expropriation of “sy-fy” to grind his pet Christianist axes) although somewhat more respectful of the genre.
(TL;DR version: Meh.)
—–Disclaimer——
To me Robert A. Heinlein’s SF novels for young readers are the platinum standard of the field. IMO at least a half-dozen of them were as well written & as focused on significant issues through the coming-of-age lens & real SF (within the limits of what was then known) to boot. Heinlein’s peculiar genius in his “juveniles” was never to talk down to his young readers – his books embodied absolute confidence in their ability to follow some pretty involved concepts – & in this he had no peer. I occasionally reread them (Between Planets; Farmer in the Sky; Red Planet; Space Cadet; Citizen of the Galaxy; Have Space Suit, Will Travel; Tunnel in the Sky; etc.) with pleasure, nearly sixty years on.
Another Scott
@frosty: Lee Highway goes back to 1919, and given what we’ve read recently about what was going on in the USA around that time, it’s clearly intended to honor the Confederacy.
It’s far past time that US-1, and all the rest, be renamed to remove the name of that traitor to the Union.
Cheers,
Scott.
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
Never really read it, but a teacher in third grade read it to us and showed us a movie adaptation. I never really liked the religious undertones of it. Same with the Narnia series by C.S. Lewis. I hated the ending to the 7th book.
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@Another Scott: But he treated his slaves well and he never really liked slavery to begin with!
/unself-aware history buff
Another Scott
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?: I know you’re snarking, but if you haven’t seen Serwer’s piece on Lee, it’s a worthwhile read.
Cheers,
Scott.
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@Ohio Mom: Will always refer to the airport in DC as Washington National Airport
Gravenstone
@Another Scott: 5 cm is pretty fucking substantial for a clot.
Another Scott
@Gravenstone: That was my thought as well. Something was very wrong there…
Cheers,
Scott.
Omnes Omnibus
@Gravenstone: Two inches, but I was told there would be no math.
Uncle Cosmo
@Steve in the ATL: I read The Hunger Games in the course of looking over a friend’s PhD dissertation on themes in YA “sci-fi”. It was modestly enjoyable, particularly by comparison with Divergent, the other series she was treating in depth – I could not get even halfway through the first volume due to the overwhelming stupidity of the overarching idea, if one can call it that.
eclare
@Another Scott: Seems that way to me too…I reread several times, thinking, surely it’s 5 mg, or .5 cm
raven
@Steve in the ATL: We just watched Moonlight, I guess Mahershala Ali was in Hunger Games too.
Betty Cracker
We’re having a fierce thunderstorm here. Hope it doesn’t knock out our power. Aerating fish tanks manually sucks!
Patricia Kayden
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?: Me too. Nothing in DC should be named after that horrible man.
Patricia Kayden
@Another Scott: With so many roads, schools, etc named after “heroes” of the Confederacy, makes me wonder how many were named after heroes of the Union (not counting President Lincoln). Very odd that so many monuments exist to memorialize traitors.
Betty Cracker
@raven: How was “Moonlight”? I want to see it, but I’ve been hesitant because I suspect it’s depressing.
efgoldman
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?:
True, if you don’t count the ones he had his overseer whip, until their ribs showed.
He and all the rest of the Traitor generals should have been hanged or imprisoned for treason.
ruemara
@clay: Speaking as a writer, culture evolves. The tenets & principles you wish to convey don’t, but the methods do. A book that cannot adjust, will not be read in future.
mdblanche
@japa21: @Another Scott: The best laid schemes o’ mice an’
menturtles…Omnes Omnibus
@clay: @ruemara: Bob Dylan has a Nobel. Does anyone want to project that Jay-Z or Beyonce or Chuck D or someone else to be named later won’t have something similar happen?
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@Another Scott:
Never knew that. Lee was an even bigger piece of shit than I thought. He’s been lionized far too much
Mike in NC
We watched “Lion” on Netflix last night. An incredible movie.
hitchhiker
I first set foot in a library when I was 10 & thought I’d discovered Nirvana.
I think the real issue wrt McCain being out for a few days is that there just might be enough time to get a CBO score on the Cruz Amendment, which was conveniently left out of the most recent request.
We’re going to see a score on the latest version but that on Monday, which is why the goopers are out in force saying that the CBO is meaningless. If McCain can’t be there by the end of the week, should be time to run the numbers one more time.
Speaking as a person who leaves the building during tense sportsball events and always goes to the end of the book to find out what happens, this is all just untenable for me. So much at stake, so little to be done, and it just. keeps. going.
ETA: McConnell just announced they’ll delay consideration of the bill until McCain has recovered.
SiubhanDuinne
@eclare:
In the news stories I’ve seen, it very clearly says “five centimeters,” spelling it out rather than using numerals. And wow, that is one massive clot.
Omnes Omnibus
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?: He also wasn’t that good a general. He was seen as a master of Jominian principles – outdated by the time the Civil War.
Steve in the ATL
@Omnes Omnibus:
So we will just ignore Ice Cube tonight?
Patricia Kayden
@efgoldman: A resounding yes to your last sentence. That’s usually what happens to traitors.
Steve in the ATL
@Another Scott: in my defense, when I matriculated there, Lee had been dead for over a hundred years and the white population of the school was down to 96%
Capri
@Chris T.: The NRA certainly appears to be a hot bed of off the wall crazy. Wouldn’t be surprised if some comrades are goading things along.
efgoldman
@Omnes Omnibus:
He reminds me a bit of Montgomery: remembered by some as a great general, but actually (Monty) a putz who took a lot of credit for things he actually didn’t do.
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@efgoldman: Last fall, my professor in my Early American history had us do a list of 20 or so items of how we would do Reconstruction as the President.
Half-jokingly, I went the full Orwell and decided that any former confederate politicians/officers could no longer run for office or vote.
All Freedmen would be offered 20 acres of land.
Public schools would be set up to “Yankeeify” southern children.
The South would be divided into military districts and would be under martial law. An authorizing law would be renewed every 10 years or so. When it lapsed a process for readmittance would be set up.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steve in the ATL: No, and I didn’t forget about Dre.
Uncle Cosmo
@frosty:
I’ll look for that one.
IMO the key factor in YA literature is coming of age. This is the issue that occupies the target audience to the near-exclusion of all else; everything is viewed through that lens. They were kids last year, last month, yesterday; now they feel like…something different. Something larger, more far-reaching. And clumsier. In a world very different from their childhood that they’re feeling their way around, trying to figure out what it means to be full-grown & how to “put away childish things” & become.an adult.
It’s one of the great crises of the human lifespan, and it is every bit as accessible to the practice of literature as any of the rest. The fact that it only rarely results in great literature is that it needs to be accessible to the readers most concerned with the topic – who by & large haven’t yet mastered the literary scuba gear to descend into the depths. (The cynic might also point out that the prime directive of YA books is to sell, & books that leave their readers scratching their heads don’t.)
efgoldman
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?:
The historical counter factual really depends on whether you assume Lincoln survives and is able to continue in office. Then it gets interesting.
Omnes Omnibus
@efgoldman: I don’t join the condemnation of Monty. He was cautious. Caution isn’t always a bad thing in a general.
ETA: He was as vain as Patton.
Mnemosyne
I like the bar at this hotel near our apartment, but there is ALWAYS someone here wearing a perfume that I’m allergic to. Ugh.
SiubhanDuinne
Breaking from CNN:
Another Scott
@Steve in the ATL: :-) I was in the same class as David Brooks at Chicago, so I’m not throwing stones at schools. ;-)
Cheers,
Scott.
Omnes Omnibus
Let me just say that I love “To Have and Have Not.”
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?: Would also focus a great deal on public investments in infrastructure and modernizing the economy of the South to match Northern standards
Omnes Omnibus
@Another Scott: You kids were in my athletic conference at the time.
Kay
Donald Trump’s voting czar attacks….voters:
We already have a DOJ and Kris Kobach isn’t employed there. Why do we need him? Anyone know how much we’re paying for Donald Trump’s low quality hires on this useless “commission” to make baseless accusations of felony voter fraud?
Kris Kobach has never been elected to anything outside Kansas. No one in Colorado hired him. We all really have to pay for this creep to give Brietbart interviews? I can’t tell you how comforting it must be to voters that Kobach “speculates” on which voters are ineligible. Top quality work, Kris. Pull “ineligible” out of your ass some more. This highly professional “data analysis” is going great, I can tell.
SiubhanDuinne
@Omnes Omnibus:
Bacall was at her peak of gorgeousness. Except for later on.
NYCMT
@SiubhanDuinne: The Bravest Little Clot. It would be rich irony if the ACA was saved because of a two-inch subdural hematoma in a richly insured eighty year old man.
Keith P.
Just got home from driving 10 miles out of my way to try what I had heard was the best pho in Houston. Ugh. The whole place was self-service, which I didn’t know until I told the cashier on the way out that it was the worst bowl of pho I’ve ever had since it had no herbs (and had tripe in it, which *really* needs some basil/cilantro/lime). I eat that stuff almost every week, so it really gnaws at me when I leave unhappy. It was actually the first bad bowl of pho I’ve ever had in my life.
Patricia Kayden
@Kay: ***blood pressure rising sharply***
Unbelievable that this is happening in a Democratic country. So what is Kobach going to do to punish those Colorado voters since they (and not he) are engaging in a ” political stunt”?
Omnes Omnibus
@SiubhanDuinne: She was rather gorgeous from 19 to 89.
Uncle Cosmo
@Patricia Kayden: Late last millennium I spent 2 years consulting, one week at a time, in Lansing MI. IIRC they had renamed one of the major roads near the airport for MLK, but because the road had been around for so long, everyone who lived there referred to it by the old name – not because they were racist, necessarily, mostly because they were used to it. Caused some confusion for us furriners.
No such issue in Baltimore. When time came to name a street for Dr. King, we had only recently opened a multi-lane divided highway bypassing the city center, & as the original name had never had time to take hold, it was a natural. I would guess not more than a small fraction of Baltimoreans recall that Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard started out as the bland “Harbor City Boulevard”.
Steve in the ATL
@Another Scott: I’ll see your David Brooks and raise you Matt Bevin
Another Scott
@Omnes Omnibus: National Champions! The Monsters of the Midway!!
;-)
Cheers,
Scott.
Omnes Omnibus
@Kay: Kay, you have front page keys. Why don’t you use them? Asking questions in a comment section is not the same.
khead
John Lewis should have some kind of “I can punch these people in the face” pass.
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@Kay: Shades of McCarthy. And “thousands” withdrawing their registration? That’s not good
divF
@hitchhiker:
I first encountered a public library (as opposed to a school library) the summer I turned 15 (1967) – it was the post library at Ft. Belvoir, outside of DC. They had just acquired hardcover additions of The Lord of the Rings, and had them prominently displayed. I checked out Fellowship, and spent the summer, in Ursula LeGuin’s words, inhabiting two worlds, the seen and the unseen.
The next revelation in this direction was discovering the half-price used-paperback section at Moe’s books when I arrived in Berkeley in 1969. $.17 for a D-series Ace double – heaven ! This was before anyone had a notion of such things as collectibles.
efgoldman
@Kay:
Ya’ think, asshole?
(*)That trusty news source.
How many states have actually complied? Last I saw, 47 haven’t.
That fucking asshole has to get perp walked in an orange jumpsuit, the same as the rest of them.
Frankensteinbeck
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Alas, spitting on people just like himself has been one of the hallmarks of what a shit McCain is. Former POW decides he doesn’t mind when other people are tortured!
@efgoldman:
Never think that the leadership of the GOP is much different from the voters: Mean, stupid shits who get off on hurting the weak and stroking their own egos for how brave that is. Also racist enough to seethe with a hunger to wipe Obama out of the history books. The heavy majority of them see this bill as an unalloyed good thing, and resent that anyone would dare object.
Uncle Cosmo
@efgoldman:
Aaaah, fer crapsake: We’re talking about the Global Oligarchy Party here, whose “natural constituency” is (quelle suprise) Global Oligarchs. Hospitals, insurers, doctors are at best local oligarchs & mostly local-oligarch-wannabes.
The whole contemporary Rethuglican playbook is to distract their faithful (in many senses) electorate with hatemongering, superstition & conspiracy theories while they lock in a “gerrymandate” allowing their bazillionaire bankrollers to pay no taxes & obey no laws while sucking the Treasury dry. That’s why they have no problem with Putin meddling with the Federal government – he is in their view just another Global Oligarch (albeit one with a thermonuclear arsenal & a propensity for murdering his political opponents – a crucial distinction which the rest of the GO’s won’t recognize as crucial till it’s too late) & his successful destabilization of the Federal government is helping to achieve their own goals.
Frankensteinbeck
@ruemara:
As a YA writer, I certainly try to make it at least as meaningful and sophisticated as ‘adult’ science fiction. My favorite Amazon review was a ten year old thanking me for not dumbing down my books, and commenting that kids his age get harder words in vocabulary tests. I have tried to let his words drive me.
Omnes Omnibus
Oh, and for people who are wondering why late night music threads no longer happen, the fact that the last FP post on a Saturday night was a John Lewis related thing hours ago might figure in.
SiubhanDuinne
@Omnes Omnibus:
I agree, and that’s kind of what I meant. I adored her.
Another Scott
@Omnes Omnibus: Everyone laughs when I sing (3:24)
Cheers,
Scott.
eclare
Am I the only one here who loved the Judy Blume books? I remember when we all read Forever in 7th grade. Also The Pigman series by Paul Zindel.
Felonius Monk
@Another Scott:
My father was the fullback of the opposing team that beat UChicago in its last game. He used jokingly say “We beat Chicago so badly in that game that they quit football.”
ETA: Somewhere in the mid 1930s.
Ruckus
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?:
As I understand it they haven’t withdrawn their registrations, they have a right under the law to ask that their information not be public at all. That’s what they have done. KKKobach doesn’t understand that they can do that. He is after all a republican moron, but I repeat myself.
hitchhiker
@divF:
We’re the same age. I was brought to the Duluth Public Library as part of a pilot program for “gifted” kids (meaning, we took an early version of a standardized test & did well). That was the MN Public Education system being innovative in 1962. At home, there was Life magazine, the Reader’s Digest, and a few religious books (Lives of the Saints).
Can’t remember reading fiction in regular school, tho’ we must have, right? I do remember having piles of overdue library books under my bed, including one about a little black girl who was treated cruelly for trying to go to a white school. It puzzled me a lot … Duluth didn’t seem to have any black people so I had no frame of reference. What was the big deal?
And that’s full circle to the John Lewis clip. I highly recommend the trilogy of graphic memoirs he wrote; they’re amazing.
randy khan
@Another Scott:
(a) I have to say I wonder if 5 cm is correct – that’s nearly 2 inches, and that would be a huge clot. That’s about twice as big as the width of an eyeball, if I believe Wikipedia (which I do in this case).
(b) That sure sounds like brain surgery, not eye surgery, to me.
Patricia Kayden
@eclare: Judy Blume novels were special because they seemed so risqué at the time. Read pretty much all of them when I was a teenager. Before then I pretty much was obsessed with Nancy Drew.
Omnes Omnibus
@Patricia Kayden: She never hit my radar.
joel hanes
@Ruckus:
I was even luckier.
When I was still in the sixth grade and had read all the recommendations from my childrens’ librarian and every bit of SF in our pretty-good children’s library and all the Newbery winners to date and so was running dry, the children’s librarian walked me down the hall to the adult library, cut my new card herself, and made a note in my file that I was to be given the run of the stacks. I wish I could remember her name.
Juice Box
We had a fun evening. We went out for dinner and ran into some friends we hadn’t seen for a while. The talk drifted around to the president* who they loath and hope will be impeached in 2019 after the midterms or voted out of office if all else fails in 2020. They are Republicans. :)
randy khan
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?:
Same here – it’s National for me. Sadly, newer people call it Reagan. When I talk to reservation agents, etc., I call it DCA, since “National” might confuse them.
What was particularly awful about the renaming was that the Washington Metropolitan Airports Authority never would have done it because it was (and is) controlled by jurisdictions with Democrats in charge. And then Republicans had the gall to complain that DC Metro didn’t rename the airport Metro station fast enough and that the Park Service hadn’t changed the exit signs on the George Washington Parkway promptly, even though exactly no money had been appropriated to take care of the costs of the change. (In Metro’s case, it wasn’t just signs at the station – literally every map in every station and every subway car had to be replaced.)
Ruckus
@randy khan:
I believe it was brain surgery above the eye, from the description of the craniotomy that someone posted above and may have taken place through the upper orbital, which is why people are thinking eye surgery.
Another Scott
@Felonius Monk: :-) Yup. The administration sensibly decided that football was a huge distraction and ended varsity football in 1939 and left the Big 10 in 1946. Moving to Division III made much more sense, but they have the right to rejoin the Big 10 anytime they want. ;-)
The college paper would occasionally have fun declaring that Chicago was “National Champions!” followed by “in 1905” in about 3 point type.
Cheers,
Scott.
Lyrebird
@Uncle Cosmo: Dunno, you might find the next two L’Engle books (Swiftly Tilting Planet and whatever the next one is) more interesting, as they are less morality-play-ish and have more depth. Maybe not. My world was changed by reading AWiT, but I was younger… the later books are why I arrived in jr hi already knowing how to spell mitochondrion. Also, I enjoy comparative theology.
I even got through Perelandra & semi-enjoyed That Hideous Strength. Loved the first one in that sequence because of the anthropology side to it. Again, though, I read it for the first time when I was pretty young.
AGREED on Have Space Suit, Will Travel though! And what is it, the Rolling Stones? Heinlein was brilliant, but after a while his longer books got over-burdened with the old Time Travel (or immortality) To Support Inter-Generational
Nooky hobbyhorse. Those older YA ones are better stories imnsho.
Ruckus
@joel hanes:
That sounds much easier but mine had my mom swearing at someone who was causing me to miss reading. Hard to top that for defensive parenting. Mom was pretty good at that, considering how many doctors she had to take me to over the early years. I can’t forgive her for the dentist she took me to though, I think his name was Dr. Mengele, a son or at least an admirer of the original.
O. Felix Culpa
@Omnes Omnibus: Really? In all my years living in Chicago, I never heard it called that (the Congress).
How’s the Saab, by the way? I’ve been a little out of the loop lately.
randy khan
@Ruckus:
I think that’s right.
Lyrebird
@Patricia Kayden: Hm. Read them for the naughty sections but soon tired of her writing, I confess. But I read several of her novels, which is more than I can say for VC Andrews, whose books the other girls passed around, copies dog-eared at the most taboo sections.
rikyrah
@eclare:
I just bought several of them for Peanut.
I began my love for Blume with,
Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret and ended it with Forever.?
To me, she is timeless.
Uncle Cosmo
@joel hanes: The summer after I finished third grade they knocked out the wall between two classrooms & when I returned in September the remaining walls were lined with full bookshelves. My school finally had a library –
– & this bookwormy kid was thoroughly pissed off.
Ever since I’d aced the reading test in record time just before I started first grade, & they realized it was no fluke (I’d been reading the daily newspapers for a year by then), I’d been sent to the Principal’s Office one hour every week – & I was probably the only kid in recorded history who enjoyed going there. Mr DiStefano – who was thrilled that not only was there a seemingly-authentic geenyuss in his school but he was of Italian distraction – would ask me about what I’d been learning & reading. Then he’d take me upstairs to where all the books set aside for the yet-to-be-built library were stored. I could take as many books as I wanted, so long as I finished every one in time to turn them back in & tell him about them next time we met. I’d pull a half-dozen volumes off the shelves & never bat an eye.
But when I started fourth grade there was a new principal (unimpressed with my geenyussness) & the new library. Which I could visit one hour a week, along with the rest of my class, & check out two, count ’em, two books. Which invariably I finished the same night. And there was no public library in walking distance. And Dad worked days, & Mom didn’t drive…
Grrrr…. /reminiscence
Ruckus
@Uncle Cosmo:
How many books do you think kids who grew up to be racist assholes read? I’m thinking not all that many.
Brachiator
@Betty Cracker:
Sweet Jesus, no!
I know some people who think it over rated. Or that it is like many other movies of its type, whatever that might be. I don’t agree.
I don’t know that I could watch it on a home tv. Even though it is very modest in scope, the composition and framing is exquisite. And the way that black bodies are filmed is exceptional, and is part of the theme of the film.
In a way, this dances around the question of whether the movie is depressing. I don’t think so. But even if it were, I would still love it.
J R in WV
@Baud:
Brachiator
@Ruckus:
Sadly, I must disagree with you on this. The learned Southern aristocracy could rationalize slavery in Greek and Latin.
joel hanes
@Uncle Cosmo:
Checkout limit at our public library was twelve books.
I had big square heavy-duty baskets on my bike (newspaper route), and it was only about two miles to the library, and my parents thought that children who weren’t allowed independence would turn out stunted in character.
I was there twice a week all summer from fourth grade on, and often spent much of any day I was there sprawled on one of the big chairs, looking at books beyond my twelve.
joel hanes
I loved Wrinkle in Time as a kid. For a while, “tesseract” was one of my favorite words and concepts.
Re-read it while in my forties, and wished I hadn’t.
I think it’ll be difficult to make a film that gets it right.
Looking at the faces above convinces me that this film will not be the one that does it.
Oh, they’ll do fine with the neighborhood of identical soulless Stepford people, and Charles Wallace temporarily losing his soul, but the casting director and I clearly have very different ideas about Mrs. Who and Mrs. Whatsit and Mrs. Which. And I’m terribly afraid that Meg will be conventionally attractive, rather than awkward and “plain”.
Brachiator
@Uncle Cosmo:
Very good point. I avoided youth fiction because the SF that interested me was focused on an adult future world that might possibly resemble the world that I might live in. I just was not interested in novels that dealt with a teenage perspective.
In a tangentially related way, I loved the original Star Trek series because it was about the careers of Star Fleet officers, and also began in the middle of their exploratory mission. By contrast, I never cared much for Buck Rogers or Flash Gordon, contemporary humans thrown into the future.
However, I loved Daffy Duck as Duck Dodgers in Outer Space. And Marvin the Martian.
Ruckus
@Brachiator:
Current racists. You know, the dumpf supporters.
Those ole southern boys were like our current day RWNJ politicians. Educated but not all that smart. Except when it came to using free labor for their own gain.
Ruckus
@joel hanes:
I think our limit was 4 books out at any one time. But you could check out as many per week/month as you wanted. I usually went 2-4 times a week.
Brachiator
@Ruckus:
Sorry, again you have the alt right and a tradition of intellectual racism which has never died in this country. There was a time when the National Review would publish erudite articles justifying segregation. You can still find this kind of thing pushed by conservative intellectuals in Reason Magazine, the Wall St Journal and very special web sites.
(((CassandraLeo)))
@Brachiator: it’s pretty much as far from being depressing as it could be with its subject matter, and at the risk of spoilers, the ending is probably about as hopeful as it could be without ringing false.
It’s also one of a small handful of films released during my lifetime that I’d consider absolutely perfect.
(Disclaimer: I’ve been personally acquainted with one of the producers for legitimately two-thirds of our lives. That’s not why I love it, though.)
Brachiator
@(((CassandraLeo))): Well, I slightly envy you for knowing one of the producers.
I don’t want to overpraise the film, but even though I had heard a lot of good things about it, I was caught off guard by how masterful it was. And how moving it was.
mskitty
@ Keith P. So where IS the best pho in Houston? or the top two or so? Want pho, will travel (from west Houston).
Julia
I loved Moonlight as well, and think about it often. I saw it before La La Land, and I have to say, thought it far superior. I was very glad to see the win for Best Picture.
randy khan
@joel hanes:
I had a similar experience. I read it when I was a bit older than the target age, but still loved it. Then years later I was in a science fiction book club and when we were choosing a book for our next meeting, someone mentioned it and about three people in the group simultaneously said “I loved that book,” so we went with it. And as a group we were uniformly disappointed on our second reading.
It made me think of my experience with Catcher in the Rye, which I didn’t read until I was a senior in college, and found to be kind of annoying. I figured I was five years too old to really get it.
Uncle Cosmo
@randy khan: Sometimes a book or an author crosses your path at the precise instant when the combination of your circumstances (age, condition, experience) makes it burst into fireworks for you. When I was a lonely bookish sneaking-up-on-16-year-old steeping in various minor infatuations, a hot mess titled This Side of Paradise bowled me over. I occasionally reread The Great Gatsby (written after F. Scott had near-perfected his craft) with pleasure, but I’m half-afraid that if I pull down the copy of TSOP on my bookshelf I’ll wonder what the hell I ever saw in it – or what the hell kind of imbecile I was for seeing anything at all.
louc
@joel hanes:
Me too!
As a plain 10-year-old girl with glasses, I really identified with Meg. I also loved the feminism, which, alas, disappeared from later books. In AWIT, Meg is a brainy math genius. And her mom was a scientist, too. In later books, Meg is a housewife and Calvin, who was better at English in AWIT, becomes the scientist.
I’m worried about the movie coming out in March. Usually that’s a dumping ground time of year.
joel hanes
@randy khan:
found [Catcher In the Rye] to be kind of annoying.
IMHO, that’s kind of the point.
Holden, the not-very-reliable narrator, sees through some of the pretenses of the adult world, and that’s what adolescents glom onto in the book.
But he also exhibits many of the limitations and character defects of the teenage urban wise-ass of his day. I’m pretty sure that he’s meant to be annoying.
I’d rather reread Franney and Zooey, or the Collected Stories, or even Raise High The Roofbeam, than read Catcher again.
joel hanes
@louc:
Did you read Podkayne of Mars about the same time ?
Or The Menace From Earth ?
Have you read Tanith Lee’s subversive The Silver Metal Lover?
IMHO, that’s a book about teen angst that’s still worth reading as an adult.