Skippy of the Day: Rep. Sam Johnson (R-TX)

After Dubya specified his position regarding Iran, promising there's no plan to attack but he's keeping all his cards on the table (Thanks for clearing that up, George), we're now getting some expert (cough) foreign policy advice from a Representative in Dubya's old stomping grounds:

"Syria is the problem. Syria is where those weapons of mass destruction are, in my view. You know, I can fly an F-15, put two nukes on 'em and I'll make one pass. We won't have to worry about Syria anymore."

Alright, let's not even get into the whole "I know where the WMD's are" malarkey this guy is peddling. Since the entire federal government couldn't find WMD's with mounds of intelligence, hi-tech equipment and several years of searching, forgive me if I consider Johnson's claim as spurious. The way he phrases it in the quote, it sounds like his claim is far less based on actual, you know, evidence and more on the paranoid instinct that drives other people to believe all black men who wear hip hop clothing are packing heat.

Let's turn our attention, instead, to Johnson's final solution to the problem. That phrasing is intentional, and is not one I use lightly. Since the whole Threaten/Invade/Occupy plan in Iraq has turned out far less than perfect, Johnson is advocating wholesale destruction of an entire country and it's populace the next time we suspect WMD's. The advantages of this being that we can say afterwards that all the evidence of WMD's were destroyed in the attacks and we can just trust the Government that they were indeed there. The disadvantages to this being...what, do I have to type you a list?!?!

This kind of apocalyptic rhetoric is nothing new to the right wing, but it's not normally so blatant and from the mouths of elected representatives. Furthermore, Johnson reveals before he says this that he gave this advice to Bush himself on a visit to the White House. There's a large part of me that refuses to believe that Dubya and his cohorts would ever go into the direction that Johnson advocates, but it still gives me pause.

If Iraq's stab at democracy goes awry due to the efforts of insurgents, and even die hard Bush fans have to acknowledge this possibility, then Bush will need to rethink his entire Middle East strategy that he's been preaching to the public for years. There is a small part of me that considers entirely feasible the sight of Dubya coming onto the airwaves, making a "Desperate times call for desperate measures" speech, and then revealing his unfathomable actions.

Nonsense, you say? Then let's hear it from the boy, shall we? Let's hear some Republicans renounce this Slim Whitman-wannabe. If Trent Lott deserves a slap on the wrist for his little verbal nostalgia trip to the days of segregation, then this little genocidal call to action certainly warrants the attention of the GOP.

There's a quote I remember from "Needful Things", which is spoken by Max Von Sydow as the Devil. He's certainly not the first one to say it, but it was the first time I had ever heard it and so it sticks: "Kill them all and let God sort them out". If Bush decides on such a philosophy change, then it will add a whole new catastrophic level to the administration's tendency to pass the buck.

Oscars Recap

I find myself making less of a big deal of the Oscars compared to years past. I still watch them, though, and here are some thoughts on the morning after.

Beginning at the beginning, Chris Rock did just fine as host. His "If you can't get So-And-So, Wait" bit was great and really cut into "popular people" such as Colin Farrell and Jude Law. Both of these actors were notably absent from the audience, but Law received a defense from Sean Penn later in the evening. As much as I like Sean, he should lighten up and realize that Rock was making fun of their ubiquitousness in films lately and not any lack of talent.

I don't normally go into the whole clothing and hair thing with the presenters, but let me make one brief observation. To Renee Zellweger: PLEASE go back to being a blonde. That black hair doesn't work in the slightest.

Easily the winner for most entertaining acceptance speech goes to Jorge Drexler, who won the best song Oscar for "Al Otro Lado Del Río" in "The Motorcycle Diaries". He came onstage, sang a brief snippet of a song in Spanish, said thank you and then left the stage. Most viewers couldn't understand what he sang, but it was such beautiful singing that nobody cared.

Speaking of Jorge, there was a definite Hispanic thread to the night as his Oscar was shortly followed by the Best Foreign Film Oscar going to "The Sea Inside" from Spain. For both of these awards, the camera cut to Antonio Banderas in the audience, who seemed ecstatic. Honestly, he looked happier at those two moments than some of the winners.

And speaking of being emotional for others, I am always touched not so much by the emotional award winners, but rather the people in the audience who worked with them. Such was the case with Kate Winslet who, though she didn't win Best Actress, seemed pleased beyond words when "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" and "Finding Neverland" won Best Original Screenplay and Best Score, respectively.

The tribute to those who passed was typically moving, though I preferred the orchestral music that accompanied the clip reel in past years instead of this year's solo done by Yo Yo Ma. It was also nice to see another mention of Jerry Orbach (He also briefly showed up in the Sidney Lumet tribute from his role in "Prince of the City"). However, they only showed a clip from "Dirty Dancing" for his name. I'm willing to bet that "Beauty and the Beast" will be a longer remembered role, but I suppose in the end his in-the-flesh role trumped an animated candlestick for the people who put the tribute together.

To Martin Scorsese: You weren't the only one who thought that this was your year. The only solace I can give you, and this is cold comfort, is that Alfred Hitchcock never won a Best Director Oscar, either. Let's just hope your upcoming remake of the Japanese crime film "Internal Affairs" (renamed "The Departed") will receive just as much love as "The Aviator" did.

And finally, in regards to the telecast as a whole, the proceedings went faster than in previous years and was very enjoyable. However, I have to wonder who made the inexplicable choice of the "Terminator 2" score as the overall musical theme for the Oscars this year. If the softer re-orchestration wasn't odd enough, then the jazzy trumpet solo that accompanied it during the end credits was downright weird. Let's just hope the trend doesn't continue and we won't hear a retooling of the bombastic and overused "Aliens" theme during next year's show.

Child Alonzo to the "Dark Tower" came

Years ago, I read the first three books in Stephen King's "Dark Tower" series and liked them very much. The fourth book, "Wizard and Glass", didn't draw me in as quickly as the other three and I eventually dropped it, hoping to one day return to the series.

Last year, King published the seventh and final book called, simply enough, "The Dark Tower". I decided to revisit the series and listen to all seven books back-to-back on CD in my car. For those numbers fans out there, my calculations on the entire series come out to 4,000 printed pages which in turn is about 140 hours of audio CD.

I'm currently near the end of "Wizard and Glass", which I found was much easier to get into in audio form. I plan on posting some comments when I'm done with the series, which I project will be sometime this summer.

Denis on DVD

One of the reasons I like The Digital Bits is their feature "Upcoming DVD Art". So instead of a site with a big glob of titles in text that tends to run together, you have a neat an orderly progression of cover art that conveys the information much more clearly.

The latest discovery from their gallery is the arrival of "The Job - The Complete Series" on DVD. Before Denis Leary starred as a NYC firefighter in "Rescue Me", he played a similarly conflicted NYC cop in this comedy that only lasted two seasons. One great thing about great TV shows that get cancelled early on is that, when they get released on DVD, it's usually in a single complete set (See "Sports Night").

I've curbed my DVD purchases significantly lately, but this one is shooting to the top of my "to get" list.

A pair of Yahoo headlines

Golf carts of old give way to flashy golf cars

Pretty much the definition of a slow news day, huh folks?

Oh, wait. I spoke to soon. Here's a real headline:

Canada opts out of U.S. missile shield

"So, like, if you go in half with me on this used Dodge Dart I'm looking at, then I can totally drive you around and stuff. What? No, I've never gotten the thing to actually start. Huh? Yeah, all the mechanics I talked to told me that the engine block is frozen solid and the drive shaft is missing. Listen, I don't like your attitude, man. What kind of friend are you, anyway? Maple syrup loving freak!"

Reviews: "Roger & Me" (1989) and "Super Size Me" (2004)

"Documentary" was once a term that, for most people, translated into "dry", "educational" and "boring". Then along came Michael Moore. He wasn't the first person to make documentaries entertaining as well as informative, but he was the most important. Fifteen years after Moore broke ground with "Roger & Me", filmmaker Morgan Spurlock followed in this tradition with his own documentary, "Super Size Me". Both films make for an interesting compare and contrast.

"Roger & Me" begins as the story of Michael Moore himself, a kid who was born and raised in the town of Flint, Michigan. He describes his Halcyon days in the 1950's where Flint was the model of the growing American town, and he has an entire family of General Motors employees to prove it. Flash forward to the 1980's, when massive layoffs by GM have transformed the once bustling Flint into a shell of its former self. Moore decides to take up his beef with the president of GM, Roger Smith. Getting in to see him is not as easy as he would hope, so he ends up filling us in on life in Flint and how things have changed since the layoffs began.

I first saw "Roger & Me" back in 1993 and thought it was simultaneously the most depressing and hysterical thing I had ever seen. It presented a sobering view of a town, once the ideal of 1950's prosperity, seeing its vitality bled away by a corporation who sought lower-paid workers in Mexico. Moore's attempts to get an interview with Smith, which even he must have known was never going to happen, is a punchline that takes a back seat to such Flint denizens as Deputy Ross, Bob Eubanks and, most notoriously, Rhonda "Pets or Meat" Britton.

Back then, Moore was not the lightning rod of controversy he is today, but his first film sewed the seeds of the resentment some people would eventually hold for him. During the film's second half, he details efforts by Flint to revitalize its economy with a new Hyatt Hotel, a convention center named Waterstreet Pavilion, and an auto-themed amusement park called "Autoworld". Though the inferred timeline suggests all this happened after the layoffs, they in truth occurred several years before. This bears examination.

There are basically two kinds of Moore critics. The first kind are whiplash conservatives who refuse to listen to his case no matter how much evidence he presents. These kind of people cannot be engaged in a rational discussion, so I'm not addressing them. The second group are earnest and non-partisan critics who question Moore's occasional efforts at misdirection and omission of pertinent facts. In the specific case of the altered Flint timeline, the difference is negligible. The city fathers end up looking slightly less silly for their efforts (Autoworld's animatronic autoworker singing a duet with the robotic arm replacing him on the line remains incredibly misguided). The overall message of the film remains intact and valid.

Moore's strategic editing is used to create a better object of entertainment. And he is in the entertainment industry, like it or not. His films aim for a wide audience and he continually gets it through his ridicule of the rich and powerful. All of this does not excuse his lapses, but provisions must be made for the storytelling process. The key question one must ask when discussing these lapses is this: Is the overall objective/premise still a sound one? Ever since "Bowling for Columbine", Moore has been on the defensive. And Moore has been up to the task, backing up every niggling detail in discussions on his website as well as others. In a sense, all of this serves to further the documentary's overall goal: Get people talking about the subject at hand. More on this in a moment.

"Super Size Me" is the story of a culinary experiment conducted by Morgan Spurlock. One Thanksgiving, Spurlock heard a TV report on a lawsuit filed in New York City by the parents of several overweight children. They claimed that McDonald's' food endangered their children's health. McDonald's disputed the lawsuit by claiming, among other things, that their menu can be a part of a healthy diet. Spurlock decides to take McDonald's up on their claim by eating nothing but McDonald's food for thirty days straight. As we track his progress, or rather descent, we are filled in on many aspects of fast food and American dietary habits.

Though Moore went for an emotional pull in his film, showcasing his dilapidated downtown with boarded-up storefronts, Spurlock goes for a clinical stance. This happens right off the bat as we are presented with the numbers concerning his health before the experiment. To be sure, there is an emotional aspect as we listen to his girlfriend's genuine concern for his health as he gains more weight. Overall, however, Spurlock goes for the rational arguments, bolstering his case with eye-catching graphics and a truckload of statistics.

Whereas some might say that Moore's passionate zeal make him blind to other sides of the issue, Spurlock is willing to poke fun anywhere that it's pokable. Sixteen years younger than Moore, he's a bit of a smart aleck, yet not so sarcastic or cynical as to be unlikable. At the same time he's taking issue with McDonald's marketing tactics and such, he's also showing how the lawyers handling the lawsuits against McDonald's are in it far more for the money than any moral or health crusade. He points out stupidity and crassness wherever he finds it.

Both filmmakers, and both films, have a wicked sense of humor. Much of this comes from the interviewed subjects themselves. Then there are other instances such as when Spurlock shows a series of picture cards to children to see if Ronald McDonald is more recognizable than famous historic faces. He shows one picture to a child and they guess that it's President Bush, only for Spurlock to turn the card to the camera and show us a picture of Jesus Christ. Both films also use "Animal House"-style epilogues for the people we've come to know (including an instance in both films of an executive getting canned shortly after the film was made, possibly for statements made to the interviewer).

The key similarity connecting the films is also the most obvious: Both titles end with the word "Me". This significant detail is not an indicator of ego. Rather, in the case of the subject matter in both films, the filmmaker's bias is a result of being themselves involved. These are personal stories that they are telling us. Some might say that for this very reason they shouldn't be the ones telling them. To that objection, I would say that it's quite possible these stories would never be told were it not for their efforts.

In this sense, Randall Adams was very fortunate when filmmaker Errol Morris made the excellent documentary "The Thin Blue Line". Morris did not know the people involved nor was he himself involved in the murder case. In fact, the Long Island native was about as far from Texas as you can get. He had no personal role in the story itself, so it's style could be viewed as Moore's polar opposite. However, what Moore and Morris share is a passion for telling a story in order to move, inform and stimulate interest in the subject. In the case of "Blue Line", Morris succeeded. The release and success of the film resulted in Randall Adams' case to be reopened whereupon he was later exonerated. That is the power of the medium, and Moore understands this more than anyone.

One final note on Moore. Above all the insults that are thrown at him (and liberals in general for that matter), the most ludicrous is that he hates America. Now, you may say his methods are unethical. You may say he's biased. You may say he's an egotistical blowhard. You can argue all of these points. But the one thing he has proven time and again through his documentaries is, like Flint itself, he loves America. That's why he does what he does. Saying the opposite is just indulging in the simplistic name-calling that is meant solely to push people's buttons. The fact that such tactics succeed in stirring up some groups of people doesn't make the slur any less hollow and baseless.

Some people have expressed sorrow at what they perceive as the death of documentaries. This is nonsense. Non-Michael Moore documentaries do exist and even thrive. "Spellbound", a moving film about eight young contestants at the 1999 National Spelling Bee, actually got a theatrical release that came to Jacksonville back in 2002. It's a superior example of the documentary form, and there remains plenty of room for films like it alongside its flashier cousins. And make no mistake that documentaries such as "Super Size Me" are not going away, and that's a good thing. We would have a poorer cinema without them.

"Roger & Me" and "Super Size Me": Nine out of Ten