last month, michelle obama and her two girls trotted out at the presidential innauguration in various wears from j. crew. apparently this, and michelle’s much touted appearance on jay leno last fall where she showed off a different j. crew outfit, haven’t been enough to save the retailer. but the question could be, has it actually in fact, hurt the retailer?
or could it be because the myopic retailer limits itself to the u.s. market. the stores are primarily confined to north america. and unlike l.l. bean, unless you live in japan or canada, it is impossible to order product from the j. crew. who knows.
the gloom and doom obama administration should probably consider no longer using the phrase ’since the great depression.’ and switch to ’since 1982.’ it would be a much better way to spin the current financial situation to the media.
but if the obama administration wants to make the comparisons. here we go. during the early 1930s, the hoover administration signed into law the smoot-hawley act, which was essentially a protectionist move to prop up american companies and jobs (a bit like the buy american bits that are in the current stimulus package). tariffs were increased on imports coming into the u.s. the world in turn increased tariffs on american exports. this in turn pushed the u.s. and the rest of the world deeper into a depression.
next the hoover administration raised taxes at the beginning of the depression in the hope of balancing the budget. in barack obama’s faux stat of the union address –the address to both houses of congress, obama laid out his plan to tax individuals who make over 200K and couples who jointly make over 250K. raising the current tax rate to somewhere around 39%. and not allowing the same people to deduct their donations to charity. given that charities are where struggling americans have had to turn to for food, clothing, and additional help, this bit flies in the face of reason.
the primary differenceds (thus far) between the two administrations is that, well, herbert hoover believed in the bootstrap concept and that charities should help bail out americans. that too was a disaster. the stimulus package that barack obama has signed has some good stuff in it. but the bit about giving $10M to one of nancy pelosi’s pet projects to save some obscure mouse that lives along the coast of san francsico should not be in this package.
amanda knox is on trial for the murder of british student meredith kercher, along with her boyfriend (at the time of the murders) raffaele sollecito. according to testimony given today, as reported by the bbc, knox and sollecito were told they had been acting inappropriately while they were at the police station for questioning back in 2007. the italian police squad chief recalled that knox had been turning cartwheels and flips while at the station.
in barack obama’s new tax the rich budget, rich folks (which for some inexplicable reason is attached to couples who make over 250K and individuals who make over 200K), will no longer be able to write off their charitable donations. well, we all know that joe biden gave about 1% of his salary to charity in 2007. so this sort of all ads up.
david cameron, the head of the conservative party in the united kingdom has lost his disabled son, reports the daily telegraph. his son ivan suffered from cerebal palsy and epilepsy.
last week, the german edition of vanity fair closed. after one year of publication, the zine reportedly had been losing 250K euros per week. now the publication is officially closed. according to der spiegel, it had been dead in the water for quite a long time.
a celebrity worship magazine with re-tread articles and photos from vanity fair u.s. was never a good idea. you can’t really transport culture, although god knows americans really do try. but the u.s. is one of the few countries in the world in which assinine celebs such as paris hilton, angelina jolie, and brad pitt are celebrated but not derided. look at the uk rags. everyone hated jade goodey, reality TV show loser, until she got sick with cancer. and now she’s the queen of the media. that’s generally how it works in euro-trashland.
according to biologist, the journal of the institute of biology, social networking is harmful to one’s health and as reported by the bbc, could increase health problems such as cancer, stroke, dementia.
reading nikki finke’s deadline hollywood about how this year’s might be the most boring ever. but in reality, perhaps that was last year’s and the year before that and the year before that.
out of all the films that have been nominated, perhaps one has been seen by more than half a dozen people. should we take our hats off to the academy for nominating obscure films?
the best part about finke’s deadline hollywood column is actually the comments section. the best one so far regarding the oscar’s sorry state is by anonymous: “Hollywood no longer has any actor/actress who qualifies as a star. All the men look like hoboes and the girls look like street walkers.”
although hugh jackman doesn’t remotely resemble a hobo. but brad pitt most certainly does. and angelina jolie as a streetwalker. anyone could imagine that.
the thing about facebook, aside from having no via business model and being run by a bunch of kids fresh out of undergrad, there is nothing stopping anyone from setting up a page and assuming the identity of basically anyone and destroying his reputation. perhaps this was the original motivation for creating this social networking site. which has happened with the queen of the titantic, kate winslet. but it’s definitely one of the multiple reasons why facebook genuinely sucks ass.
it is amazing how many people willingly upload images of themselves and their family –let alone the family dog and believe that their pages are ‘private.’
two years ago martina gedeck was snubbed when ‘das leben den anderen’ (the lives of others) was nominated (and eventually won) an oscar. is it possible that von donnersmarck had the foresight to ditch martina and give the ticket to his wife so as not to have this never ending martial spat? and you know such things generally lead to divorce.
this year, the brilliant film ‘the baader meinhof komplex’ has been nominated for an oscar and martina gedeck, who plays ulrike meinhof in the film, will be in attendance. but now the question is will moritz bleibtreu be there?
ever wonder why matt drudge primarily only writes headlines and links directly to a news story? it’s probably neither because he’s busy nor lazy. but so he won’t get sued. media bloggers association, which helped wisconsin blog navigate itself out of a sticky oprah winfrey defamation lawsuit, helps bloggers navigate their way through the media biz and sort out legal insurance.
this organization is needed now more than ever as they’ve started offering online courses to help journalists sort out stuff like what the word ‘copyright’ really means. which is information that artist fairly whats-his-name could’ve used when he allegedly took an associated press photo and basically painted over it –i mean, transformed it into that so-callled iconic barack obama image. you know the one where ‘o’ looks pensive and is outlined with multiple colors from the u.s. flag. any way, if fairly had been a blogger and had actually signed up for this media bloggers association courses, he might not be in the hot water he’s in at the moment you know, standing on the precipice of handing over loads of money to the associated press.
due to the assistance of media bloggers association, ‘a blog about whatever’ was able to gain accreditation to the capital conference( NAA/ASNE)’s annual newspaper conference. over the course of a few days, ‘a blog about whatever’ covered the associated press’ annual meeting featuring john mccain as well as their luncheon, which feature barack obama as well as a separate event in which hillary clinton (who was a presidential candidate at that time) spoke.
corey rusk, like daniel miller of mute records, were only 2 of label bosses who reportedly gave their bands 50 – 50 royalty splits because they thought it was the fair thing to do. now, according to time out new york, touch and go will exist in name only and quit putting out new releases like under indie outfits like new red archives and lookout records.
this morning, cnn reported that david beckham (aka, becks) wants to stay in milan with AC milan. perhaps because since being loaned out to a real football team, he’s concluded that 1.) he can still play with the big boys and 2.) his game has suffered since he moved to l.a. yes, these two points contradict each other. but basically, in regards to the later, if he’s playing girlie ball with the americans, it’s quite obvious that he’s not really getting much of a workout. and so footballers would conclude that while he’s in l.a., he’s not fit. having had a bit of time to roll around in the mud with the italians in their league, he’s concluded that it is quite possible to raise his game back to world cup (or near) world cup level. and becks being becks and not his wife, posh spice, would obviously rather spent the last couple of years he’s got left as a footballer rolling around with the euro-fags as opposed to the girlie americans. you can read more details on the bbc news website.
so it seems that a few years back becks was anxious to boldly go where no footballer has gone and succeded. –the u.s. scoccer league (see pele, and franz ‘the kaiser’ beckenbauer). and now he wants to head back to europe. maybe the l.a. scientologitst have got him down. perhaps he needs to spend more time squeezing tom cruise’s e-machine.
last night, the turkish embassy hosted a swank party at the ritz carlton during the berlinale. the country has two films at the festival, ‘hayat var’ (my only sunshine) and ‘momma’ (the bogeyman).
turkey embassy hosts party at berlin film festival
the third roommate of meredith kercher and amanda knox testified in an italian court on sunday. according to this article on the guardian website, filomena romanelli’s testimony won’t help amanda knox, who her former facebook and myspace pals know as ‘foxy knoxy.’ foxy knoxy’s italian boyfriend, raffaele sollecito, who once had a web blog where he famously posed with a meat cleaver, is also on trial for kercher’s murder.
can you make a coach redundant? chelsea has just let go luiz felipe scolari, the brazilian who did wonders for portugal in the 2004 european championships and helped them place 4th in the world cup. more information on the firing is on the guardian website.
in 2000 when the music industry sued napster and thought it had its day in court, it was already clear that the RIAA and the labels were merely rearranging chairs on the titanic. but the majors spent the next 8 years screaming about music thieves and hauling kids and single mothers to court and/or threatening them with lawsuits. in normal industries, this would never have happened (see the film industry) since you know, public relations and public perception is everything. and now the music industry is perceived as a bunch of cops. hence, people like george michael and domino records hiring a company to snuff out mp3 posts of their music online. and isn’t it telling that this company is called ‘web sheriff.’ and now apparently google is in on the whole thing. randomly deleting blog posts on blogger.com that have mp3s (see link to l.a. weekly article below).
is it any wonder that record sales are down. and one is hardpressed to find a teen who is remotely cool who dreams of working in the music industry?
this washington post article by david ignatius, who was famously walked out on at davos last month by the prime minister of turkey, profiles nouriel roubini, the israeli-american economist who some believe predicted the current financial crisis.
the world of online technology is riddled with bodies. remember netscape and alta vista? remember when every marketer’s wet dream was to appear on the AOL welcome screen? so, it’s completely plausable, and highly likely that once everyone discovers that google is merely a marketing company and not a technology company, it will slowly go the way of yahoo and then ultimately end up like toys.com. here’s a fairly insightful artilce from adweek.
are fertility clinics only for the likes of JLo and angelina jolie –you know, rich celebs. the southern california mother of 14 (8 plus the previous 6) is catching a lot of hate from the media.
in the early part of the 20th century, and prior to that when the world was primarily an agrarian society, it was not unusual to have large families of 10 or so kids.
according to the florida rag, the st. petersburg time, obama made over 500 promises during the marathon campaign season. here you can easily keep track of which ones he has kept and which ones he has thrown under the bus.
christian bale goes on a f**king rampage against the director of photography on set. christian bale tough guy, bad ass. we still love him here. and are v. excited about ‘terminator salvation.’ he still in the end calls the DP a nice guy.
actually this version with the f’##k yous bleeped out is far more entertaining.
is amanda knox having an anne hathaway moment? did she too get mixed up with a well off italian boyfriend who turned out to be not quite who she thought. or did her italian boyfriend get mixed up with an american who he didn’t really know. or is this what the italian media has protrayed as a sex game gone bad. last year about this time, her local leftie seattle weekly rag, the stranger tried to get to the bottom of the case via a free trip to italy.
when amanda knox was arrested, she did what any good american white woman would do, she fingered the black guy. lumumba, the owner of the bar where she worked. maybe this works in the u.s. but apparently it doesn’t work in italy. considering neither the guy’s fingerprints nor dna were discovered in the flat or on/in the body.
fully implicated by the italian press based on her allegedly conflicting testimony to the italian police. as well as web 2.0 including social networking sites such as her myspace page, where she was listed as ‘foxy knoxy,’ her facebook page, and random videos on youtube like the one below which show her considerably drunk and beyond obnoxious.
with the evidence that has been laid out and presented by the italian police and laid out by the italian media, it could be concluded (but not definitively) that knox along with her boyfriend had a hand in the killing and perhaps the question is to what degree. but we won’t know this until the end of the trial. and even then, perhaps we will never know the truth. the question for the court could ultimately be whether or not she was directly involved (30 years) or knew what was happening or had happened and helped cover it up and failed to ring the police (15 years).
the italian media has painted amanda knox as basically the poster child of american excess. fox news and the prolific herado rivera last week tried to make a case for knox by saying she won’t get a fair trial due to latent italian anti-americanism. but last i remembered, silvio berlusconi, the italian prime minister, is known for his love of all things american and was one of the few political figures in europe who maintained a good relationship with george w. bush throughout bush’s presidency. the trail starts february 6.
this blog is about a bit of this and a bit of that. a sort of ‘for the moment’ blog. and at the moment, it’s more about politics and less about other stuff. my byline has appeared in wired, l.a. weekly, s.f. bay guardian and i blogged about the film ... Continue reading »
