Best Companies 2011: Continue Reading

Showing posts with label Continue Reading. Show all posts

Thursday, February 14, 2013

The worst of Valentine’s Day

I've always been a tad suspicious of the consumerist motivations behind Valentine's Day -- but that was before I became a "sex and relationships" writer. Now I'm a conspiracy theorist wearing a tinfoil-hat made of Hershey's Kisses wrappers. You need only take a glimpse of my in box around this time of year -- or better yet, actually read through the dozens of the scheming, hackneyed and downright bizarre V-Day pitches you'll find there -- to understand why.

I'm a fan of laughing instead of crying -- especially when it comes to the ceremonial excess of Feb. 14 -- so I bring you this year's 10 worst attempts to capitalize on Cupid's holiday.

[slide_show id="13199454"]

Town board imposes gag order on residents concerned with fracking

During my 12-year career as a newspaper reporter, I spent thousands of hours sitting through city council meetings, zoning board hearings, property tax appeals, school board work sessions, and just about every other kind of attention-sapping municipal meeting you could possibly imagine. (It wasn’t all bad: I met my wife at one.) At these meetings, it wasn’t uncommon for the same topics to come up over and over again, frequently with the same people making the same points about the same issues that everyone in attendance has heard a million times before. (Think “Parks and Rec” without any laughs.) So I sympathize, perhaps more than I should, with elected officials and public servants who would like to find a way to make topics they’ve heard about and debated endlessly just...go... away.

Still, I had never heard of a town that actually imposed a gag order on its own citizens, until the Natural Resources Defense Council (which publishes OnEarth) received complaints about a town board in Sanford, New York (population: 2,400), that told its residents they could no longer bring up concerns about fracking at town meetings.

Ke$ha drinks urine in upcoming documentary

In case you were wondering what makes pop singer Ke$ha's life so crazy and so beautiful (which you will get to know intimately in her upcoming movie,"Ke$ha: My Crazy Beautiful Life"), it's that she drinks her own pee. When talking to BBC 1 about her upcoming ~~home movie~~ documentary, the "Tik Tok" singer said, "It's my brother and his weird friend following me around for the past two-and-a-half years. We didn't know what we were doing per se, but it's my little brother and he's my best friend. He's got me wasted at 6am ... He got all the things you would want to see and all the things you wouldn't really want to see - making out with dudes, drinking my own pee, jumping out of a building, jumping out of aeroplanes, swimming with sharks..."

She elaborated on the urine: "I was told drinking my own pee was good, I was trying to be healthy ... Somebody tried to take my pee away from me and I said, 'That is mine!' So I snatched it up and took a chug and it was really gross so I don't do it anymore."

Stop calling us wives and moms

In the wake of President Barack Obama's State of the Union, a petition is taking him to task for his habit of framing women's equality as a struggle to protect the rights of "wives, mothers, and daughters." The campaign was inspired by one line in particular from last night's speech in which Obama said, "We know our economy is stronger when our wives, mothers, and daughters can live their lives free from discrimination in the workplace and free from the fear of domestic violence."

A totally righteous argument, right? But the petition, which has 716 signatures at the time of this writing, says that this sort of language is "counterproductive to the women's equality the President is ostensibly supporting." It goes on to explain, "Defining women by their relationships to other people is reductive, misogynist, and alienating to women who do not define ourselves exclusively by our relationships to others. Further, by referring to 'our' wives et al, the President appears to be talking to The Men of America about Their Women, rather than talking to men AND women."

Are liberals being hypocrites about Obama’s wars?

The Atlantic's resident thoughtful apostate conservative Conor Friedersdorf published a piece this morning arguing that progressives who furiously fought against Bush's "war on terror" have internalized many of its central tenets, now that it's being waged by Barack Obama. Friedersdorf says liberals made various critiques of Bush's foreign misadventures -- that they caused "blowback," that they were an abuse of executive power, and that they implied a forever war without any possibility of an ending -- that they are now largely not making against Obama, even though all those arguments still apply.

The reason for this, according to Friedersdorf, is that everyone hated Bush and knew he was incompetent, but people like Obama because he's clearly smart and conscientious, which causes people to defend actions they would have criticized under his predecessor:

Hagel’s fight unprecedented

If there’s any doubt remaining that we’ve ventured into uncharted territory on the use of the filibuster, this should put it to rest.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid this afternoon filed a cloture motion to break the Republican filibuster and end debate on the nomination of Chuck Hagel to head the Department of Defense.

“This is the first time in the history of our country that a presidential nominee for secretary of defense has been filibustered. What a shame. But that's the way it is,” Reid said on the Senate floor.

The move, while unprecedented, was not unexpected. It means that Democrats now need 60 votes to get Hagel confirmed, which could be a tall order, as only two Republicans have said they’ll vote for their former Senate colleague. But as Steve Kornacki pointed out, Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain may vote on cloture to help Dems get to 60, even though he will probably vote “no” on the final confirmation vote. Others senators concerned about the dangerous precedent set by the Hagel filibuster may join him.

Catholic school assistant principal fired over pro-gay marriage comments

A Catholic high school assistant principal was fired Monday over a personal blog post in support of gay marriage.

Following a heated debate with friends over President Obama's comments in his inaugural address about the rights of gay Americans, Mike Moroski from Purcell Marian High School took to his personal blog and explained his position on marriage equality:

"I unabashedly believe that gay people SHOULD be allowed to marry. Ethically, morally and legally I believe this. I spend a lot of my life trying to live as a Christian example of love for others, and my formation at Catholic grade school, high school, 3 Catholic Universities and employment at 2 Catholic high schools has informed my conscience to believe that gay marriage is NOT something of which to be afraid.

To me, it seems our time would be much better spent worrying about the economy, our city’s failing pensions, retaining our big business neighbors and finding creative, efficient, effective ways to fund our excellent Cincinnati Public Schools.

Not much time left over to worry about gay people marrying one another."

Beyoncé reveals all — or nothing?

Beyoncé’s self-directed, self-produced documentary all about herself, “Life Is But a Dream,” premieres on HBO this Saturday, following weeks of high-profile Beyoncé-ing, at the inauguration and the Super Bowl, and with much more Beyoncé-ing soon to come. Beyoncé’s persona has always been an exercise in extreme control, control so complete and perfect it’s sometimes indistinguishable from omnipotence. The woman — or, as some would put it, the robot, which is exactly the point — does not mess up, part of why the recent lip-syncing at the inauguration incident became such a melée, the rare human misstep, ultimately resolved with an overpowering show of vocal force.

Todd Akin: Rove is “trying to get rid of conservatives”

Todd "legitimate rape" Akin finally weighed in on Karl Rove's and American Crossroads' efforts to ensure that another Todd Akin doesn't make it through a primary. “It may be another example of big-government conservatism, to try to bypass primaries,” Akin told the Hill. “If they were successful, it basically helps kill the grassroots heart of the party. I think it’s very non-constructive.”

Akin was responding to the Conservative Victory Project, an effort by Crossroads to fund mainstream Republicans in primary races to ensure that unelectable conservatives, like Akin, don't make it to the general election.

Akin added that the Conservative Victory Project is a "misleading" name, and the group “is trying to get rid of conservatives, which is very thinly disguised."

“Beautiful Creatures”: A left-secular answer to “Twilight”?

I greatly enjoyed the camped-up teen angst of “Beautiful Creatures,” but I also suspect it might be analogous to those children’s books that are not so secretly meant for grown-ups. (My kids, for example, find the irony of the Lemony Snicket books impenetrable, and the adventures overly dark.) Adapted by writer-director Richard LaGravenese from a young-adult bestseller by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl, “Beautiful Creatures” plays like a funnier, edgier, Southern-gothic knockoff of the “Twilight” universe, with a distinct liberal-secular sensibility and without the virginal sexuality, po-faced seriousness or undertones of Christianity.

Precisely those factors – along with the fact that the movie’s real stars are Jeremy Irons and Emma Thompson, in scenery-chewing supporting roles – may well reduce its appeal to teenage girls, who presumably crave the ultra-earnest romantic intensity of the Twi-verse. I’d love to be proven wrong on that forecast, but for now I’ll just insist that “Beautiful Creatures” is surprisingly fun, and deserves much more of a look from adult viewers than it’s likely to get. LaGravenese, a Hollywood veteran with a wobbly but intriguing résumé that goes clear back to his Oscar-nominated screenplay for “The Fisher King” in 1991, has wrestled considerable humor, emotion and atmosphere from this pulpy and derivative material.

Making gun control inevitable

Barack Obama has become nothing if not a man of moral imperatives lately, with guns, gays and immigration topping his list of social issues.

The crescendo of his State of the Union speech elevated his newfound cause of gun control reforms as a crisis of conscience for the Congress. “They deserve a vote,” he implored repeatedly, ticking off a list of shooting victims as he urged lawmakers to move on his package of gun safety proposals.

But the president extended an olive branch to conservatives on immigration in the speech. He played up the need for strong border security, highlighting the fact that illegal crossings are at “their lowest levels in 40 years.” He also advocated that undocumented immigrants be obligated to meet certain requirements like paying back-taxes and learning English before being eligible to apply for U.S. citizenship — stipulations that have been shown to increase conservative support for what has become a progressive virtue in immigration reform, a pathway to citizenship.

The worst of Valentine’s Day

I'm a fan of laughing instead of crying -- especially when it comes to the ceremonial excess of Feb. 14 -- so I bring you this year's 10 worst attempts to capitalize on Cupid's holiday.

[slide_show id="13199454"]

Town board imposes gag order on residents concerned with fracking

Ke$ha drinks urine in upcoming documentary