This is really interesting. Massachusetts is challenging the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act.

I won’t attempt a plebian explanation of the legal manuevering but I am floored by the fact that a finding for Mass. in this case would flip the social conservative gay-bashing paradigm on its head. The ubiquitous assertion by right wingers that marriage should be a matter let to the states now runs counter to the inevitable argument that would have to be made to defend DOMA. Brilliant.

Just finished the 1982 legal classic The Verdict. A few weeks ago I was reading a “what X celebrity’s top 5 favorite movies are” article and this movie was recommended. It sounded interesting so I had to disc sent over the July 4th weekend.

Rottentomatoes’ consensus of reviews has this movie rated at a 96%. I think they missed the mark by about 4 points. I loved this movie. Very often movies lack narrative structure and thematic consistency. In recent years movies have been concerned with either grand existential conflicts or over-inflated interpersonal drama. The Verdict is about individual redemption, it’s about the choice between the easy and comfortable versus the choice of the hard and just.

The film follows a washed-up, jaded, alcoholic ambulance chaser played by Paul Newman. The circumstances of his descent are later explained but for the first half of the movie Newman is trying to make a financial and professional comeback on the coattails of a malpractice lawsuit. Newman’s character is confronted with the easy choice of settling the case which would make his client’s next of kin and himself very rich, or fight for true justice. Power, money, and corruption stack the odds against him and his small cadre of allies as they take on a crooked legal system, the pervasive Catholic Archdiocese that administers the hospital, and the powerful “Prince of Darkness” opposing counsel.

The story is pretty standard fare. The apathetic lawyer transcends his money-grubbing reputation to become a champion for the down-trodden. What makes this movie damn near perfect is the narrative structure. 20 minutes in, I kept thinking that this feels like reading a heavy piece of literature. Every scene is significant, each character embodies a different mode of human behavior and philosophy. The film is dense with unspoken language, the art of conveying an idea without bludgeoning the viewer over the head. For example, Newman walks into the Judge’s chambers in huff as the smarmy opposing counsel leisurely waits. He awkwardly scans the room for a coat rack, finally resolving to hold it over his arm when neither men assists him. The ensuing conversation begins to suggest that the good ole boys network will dictate this trial rather than the law, but this was then confirmed when the judge removes his robes and the opposing counsel retrieves his cloak from the wardrobe that was not offered to Newman. This is just one of many scenes that makes The Verdict a delicious, almost literary treat.

Of course, the movie moves a little slow in that 70’s – 80’s style. There are some social issues that are indicative of the period that aren’t wholly fleshed out, but anyone with common sense should be able to cope fairly well. It runs for a little over 2 hours, and is pretty tolerable throughout. There is thematic consistency across the board, and the film gracefully displays its suggestion of the corrupting allure of power and money and the cleansing quality of redemption.  This movie is fantastic for anyone studying law or aspiring to do so, as well as anyone with a little faith in a single person’s ability to fight for justice by casting aside cynical platitudes and believing that they can both redeem themselves and help others do the same.

No long post here. I keep reading about how Obama is “failing” in his response to Iran. He should “do something”. As in…what? I have yet to hear a decent suggestion that would actually matter. It’s sort of an intractable situation when there is civil unrest in a foreign country. Even if you were resolved to do “something” what exactly can you do? Invade? Considering the numbskulls that are bloviating(read Charles Krauthammer) are the same ones that got us into Iraq, how about we just wait until there’s someone substantive to bitch and moan about.

I have been following the debate over health since late 2003 when I spent 10 weeks living and breathing it for a public policy course. Coming from a family half comprised of medical professionals I am exposed to several different facets of the issue. Both in terms of consumer and provider perspectives, there is a massive energy toward an overhaul of the American health care system. There is a national movement growing which includes both business and labor that sees great benefit to at least movement toward cost reduction strategies, if not necessarily to the extent of a public insurance option. Given all that, and the idiosyncracies of the current political climate, I wonder if it’s not in the best interests for the national Republican party to take a dive on this issue.

Here’s how I got there. Despite recent movement that threatens to bring him down to Earth, President Obama is a very popular president at this point in his term. More importantly, the general feeling, along with a recent poll, is that the national Republican party is experiencing a deficit of ideas and leadership. Looking ahead to 2012, the current big names don’t seem to offer Obama much of a challenge, barring some massive debacle. Romney, Gingrich, and Palin are cartoonishly weak candidates. I think the excessive length of the Minnesota challenge is going to bite Tim Pawlenty in a general if he made it that far. Cantor, Jindal, Boener, McConnell…these guys are jokes outside their constituencies. Barring some meteoric candidate from the right, for which the climate is not very fertile, I can’t see a dethroning of Obama.

Given both Obama’s popularity and a faceless Republican party I wonder if it’s in the country’s or even the party’s interest to forgo the logjam on health care, and essentially hand Obama a victory, and likely a second term. In the process of bipartisanship legistlation it isn’t outside the realm of reason that this would actually allow the Republicans more substantive effect on the bill itself. Obama showed  an almost annoying willfulness to compromise on the stimulus package and the budget.

There are several caveats that likely make this wishful thinking. First and foremost, there is a genuine anti-Federalist, small government argument to be made against health care reform. I like to think of this as an intellectual exercise mainly because the “bureaucrat making your health care decisions” rings hollow for me. As someone who has had to contend with insurance companies’ commitment to not provide coverage, if you think you and your doctor are the only ones making those decisions, you are out of your mind. People that subscribe to that view are likely not going to change their minds. Second, the political aspirations of individual Republicans (and politicians for that matter) defy the logic of inevitably getting trounced. I’m looking at you, Sarah Palin, it’s not going to happen. Senator from Alaska is the closest you’re going to get. Finally, I have little personal experience with the life of a Presidency. For all the history books and documentaries on the past, you can’t substitute the feel of the moment. Given only being politically conscious through 3 cycles, Obama could be walking a very simliar path for all I know. Perhaps by 2012 we’ll be remembering him as Carter the 2nd.

As contentious as this issue has been in the past and as rabid as our politics can get, I can’t help but fantasize about a Zack Morris style “time-out” to get this job done. There is so much support across the board, and so much fear among the bloodsuckers(read health care insurers) if we can get some patent reform, tort reform, preventative care, cost conscious oversight, or maybe- just maybe- the Grail of universal coverage, it may be worth 8 years of Democratic rule. Hell, you can rail against it to win elections later, but maybe for now hug the mat…

E3 2009 has been a bounty of awesome gaming and tech news. I personally am still amped up about MW2’s release at the end of ‘09. Check out the gameplay trailer here.

I have a bit of an itch for filling my head with useless information. Also, I like words, and anytime I don’t have a good grasp on one I look it up immediately lest I make a fool of myself using it improperly. This leads me to Wikipedia quite often. I take an open document with a grain of salt, of course, but one part of the site I love is that they have this nifty thing called the “disambiguation page”. Essentially this page provides the searcher with potential alternatives to their search match, allowing to user to parse what they really wanted.

This may be a bit of a stretch but I was rolling the word around in my head(it has a great flow and texture; fun to say) and start applying it to life in general. I always felt that what separated people with an affinity for abstract analysis and those without it was a small bit of self awareness. Pretentious college students (can’t figure out if I fall in this category or not) often pride themselves on our ability to analyze our own actions and reactions and describe the experiences and tendancies that explain or even predict our behavior. After the shallow expectations of youth and post-adolescence, it would seem easy to become complacent after reaching that level of self-awareness.

Lately, however, I’ve wondered what was next. It seems like every iteration of maturity and of myself comes with an unwarranted sense of completion or certainty. In my mind I’ve come to expect that this is baseless, that we don’t stop evolving until we accept that we have. So the next logical question, what is the next plateau? This is where disambiguation came in for me. I feel that after identifying both the admirable qualities and flaws of myself – what were true causes and what were rationalizations – that the next step was this so-called disambiguation. I hope at this point I can pick and choose between my better angels and lesser demons as means to obtain or achieve the goals I’ve come to value.

I readily concede that there may well be parts of our personalities that we can exert no control over. But I feel, and sincerely hope, that over time we can tamp down our baser instincts in favor of what is best for ourselves and the people we care about. The belief in and active pursuit of disambiguation, coupled with acceptance that our potential to make ourselves better may well be limitless are heartening prospects for this too often cynical observer.

This line of reasoning has brought new meaning to that old adage “Know Thyself”. The counter-balance is, as always, remembering to keep my head screwed on tight when talking about all this fluffy metaphysical nonsense.

So for the last few weeks I’ve been following the rumor mill about the potentially WinMo 7/Zune/Xbox phone that is purportedly coming down the pipe.

I’ve made no secret my disdain for Apple and its line of iEverythings. I will readily admit they are geniuses of marketing. My dislike stems from the seeming claim of any kind of “invention”. Ingenuity, no doubt, but the history of mp3 players and mp3’s in general dates back to the 1980’s. To stand on the shoulders of giants and feign some kind of technological prowess is disingenuious at best. That said, their early introduction of flash memory based  drives while maintaining a robust interface was a game-changer. The dark side for me came with the 400% mark up over equally equipped items that was hidden by aggressive and misleading marketing. In any case, this is only tangentially linked to why I’m excited by the idea of well contructed and marketed iPhone alternative.

The REAL problem with Apple’s somewhat significant presence in the computing world is the cultural impact it has. Computers aren’t TV’s. They shouldn’t be proprietary fortresses that merely allow you access. We should customize them to our liking, pick and choose, trial and error; THINK about what we want out of them.

Think about the maintenance of a car. When neglected as our brains are on autopilot they last a few years and depreciate faster than any investment you can think of. If an active role is taken in the maintance and the intimate workings of our cars, they can last for as long as we want to keep them and cost us much less money in the process. With Apple’s one size fits all- “it just works” – pay us everytime your computer gets a hiccup – you don’t need to think about what you want out of your computing experience – pay no attention to the man behind the curtain approach to the relationship between their hardware/software/peripheralsand users, the potential of  the small time developer or kid in his basement isn’t tapped. Apple itself has acknowledged this fact through the user-contributed “apps store” that allows people to develop software for the iPhone.

The overall theme shared between the mp3 player market and that of laptop/desktop computing is the idea of competition breeding ingenuity. When there is a legitimate competitor to an otherwise dominate item the ensuing competition can only benefit the consumer. Each brand fighting for technological and pricing supremacy let’s the average joe get more bang for his buck. The current incrementally added amenity that requires another downpayment of $200-500 is just ridiculous. Hey you can play mp3’s, 6 months later pictures, another 6 months - videos, internet, phone, etc.

We need a space race in the mobile computing word. Palm has shown some promise since the disasterous Treo line, but the Pre hasn’t caught fire. Blackberry is a bloody joke. I feel like I have missed something completely because everytime I handle one my brain hurts from trying to figure out why people like them. Is it a status thing? They seem so bland and unremarkable for how hotly they are sold… Anyways, without a real competitor there is no reason for Apple to push the envelope, take risks, and come out with the best possible product for the best possible price. Hopefully Microsoft can pull off the rebirth of the Zune brand and the ensuing battle gives us products worth our time and money.

So I’ve been bothered in the last few days about a news story that has stuck around far too long. By now everyone has heard of this Miss California thing with the back and forth between parties about gay marriage and blah blah blah. I thought it couldn’t get any more convoluted, then Donald Trump showed up….

Brain aneurysm invoking personalities aside, what upset me was not these idiots on both sides and what they had to say. It was the fact that people CARED. In one corner we have a “beauty queen” and in the other we have an Internet blogger best known for flamboyant shtick and attempting to “out” other homosexuals. Neither are really famous for their depth of knowledge, analytical ability, or debate prowess. The little exposure I’ve had to the two calls into question their ability to form complete sentences, to be frank. Are these twits really the best we can come up with to hash out this issue?

The gay marriage issue is about equal protection under the law. It is about the basic responsibility of this country treat its citizens without regard to any arbitrarily defined rubric of social normality. It is a devastatingly important chapter in the book of our constitutional and moral progression as a civilized nation. Yet it is used as a crowbar to jam shadows of statesmen into office and to inflate the egos of brain-dead pseudo-celebrities.

The worst part of it all is that we have no one to blame but ourselves. Every time a news program shows the sniping between these morons and we don’t turn it off, we are validating the insanity. Supply will calibrate to demand, and these news outlets demonstrably gear their coverage to the moods and proclivities of their audiences.  Just like in our political parties, they play on the level of the lowest common denominator  and what suffers is our national conscience and the intellectual level of our discourse. Our voyeurism is choking off what little veneration there is left for intelligence, nuance, and progression. If you don’t agree, watch MSNBC or Fox News for 30 minutes. If you can avoid some bullshit about irrelevant nonsense at a time when existential threats subsist outside and within our country, you’ve done a better job than I have.

Good news is so hard to come by, but Maine’s legislature passed it’s bill recognizing same sex marriage.

I only personally know a handful of homosexuals but damned if I’m going to disregard blatant discrimination. Iowa, Vermont, Maine, Connecticut, and DC have all began to stem the tide of knee-jerk reactionary bigotry. Well done.

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UPDATE: Maine’s Governor was noncommittal throughout the process, but he signed the bill into law. Good for him.

Having a very productive day so I won’t expand on it for now, but I wanted to reserve a spot for a later write-up on Adventureland.

This movie is bloody fantastic. I had no intention or inclination to see it until some friends suggested it, so I went in with zero expectations or predispositions. This movie has a lot going for it and deserves attention later on.