"No matter your politics, people want stimulation and information, not affirmation."

I think this statement should be true of news, I'm not sure whether it is. I think many people of various political persuasions don't want all of the news, they want news tailored to fit them, i.e. with the stuff they disagree with left out or made palatable, and with the news they like emphasized.

Bring up the anti-war flops in this context is interesting. People have varying ideas about what art should be, e.g. whether it should be didactic or should affirm some value or sense of life. I think the anti-war movies failed because most film-goers naturally prejudge (at least a little) a movie based on what they think it is about, i.e. its premises. If they don't see the film, it is because they don't think they'll like it. I think the quasi-documentary styles of the movies was an attempt to compensate for this obvious tendency on the part of moviegoers.

Ironically, I think many news programs are failing because they are the ones doing the "affirming", by means of selecting what stories to show and not show, et cetera. They wanted to gain viewership and they tried to do that by targeting their audience. They chose to reward the people tuning in who already thought Bush was evil and stupid and the wars are illegal and going badly, by showing them cherry-picked stories that affirmed their beliefs.

Perverse, that the "news" programs were (as others have said) crafting the narratives and the films were presenting "reality."

"Is this the D-Day for health care or just the beginning of what will be a long, hard debate?"

Both. Toward the end of the great, Patton, the general, about six months after D-Day and just before the siege of Bastogne/Battle of the Bulge, says "[My troops] realize, as I do, that we can still lose this war."

I use the analogy since it is apt, but I have to say no one should be entirely comfortable using military analogies in discussing politics involving himself and his fellow countrymen. We're all Americans here, and however unAmerican some people's ideas may be, we can't lose sight of what unites us.

That said, I believe we must be both relentless and logical. Cheap shots won't help us. Consistent and clear deconstructions of the arguments for the "reform" plan will serve us best. Pace Bill Maher and the Hollywood elite, Americans are not stupid. We might not all have umpteen degrees but we're hard to bamboozle and we don't like to be lied to.

We also must not let them dominate the debate by adopting their euphemistic terminology. (i.e. this isn't "reform," this is statism/socialism.) We're quoting the Founding Fathers and greatest economists, they're demonstrating an inability to do basic math. We're quoting the Constitution, Declaration of Independence, and Federalist papers. . . and they're throwing around the usual faux-intellectual liberal twaddle.

They have nothing, not one argument in their favor. Anyone who reads the bill, as Mr. DeMartini says, will see it for what it is. Such is why they wanted it pushed through ASAP. Yet we've drawn out the debate long enough for moderates to see the devils in the details, and the more consistent and clear we are in the upcoming months, I think, the better chance we have of sinking this boondoggle in toto.

"The entire Catholic community believes that health care for everyone is a basic human right."

Please don't put words in my mouth, thank you. I won't pretend to speak for all Catholics, but please don't assume that because Catholics have some, I'll just generally call them "humanitarian," beliefs, we believe health care is a right. For me and others I know, opposing this bill is not just about abortion issues. Part of the faith is the freedom of helping someone personally, not involuntarily being taxed to help someone via a vast impersonal bureaucracy. Again not speaking for everyone, some of us believe in limited government too.

Many thanks to him for his service and to your whole family. I intended no disrespect.

"Director Rob Zombie’s biggest mistake in 2007’s remake of “Halloween“ was in his desire to “explain” Michael Myers."

As much as I disagree with him politically, this is something Roger Ebert mentioned years ago in reviewing the remake of, "House of Wax." I agree it is a mistake.

Obviously this may vary according to the plot and what the creator wants, but at least sometimes a pure, anonymous, elemental evil is the most terrifying. (An exception is "Freddy Kreuger" whose mythology is explained very briefly and clearly and whose mythology is nicely incorporated into the plot. (In the first movie, anyway.))

But I am thinking of the original Michael Myers, Vincent Price's character in many of his movies, Anton Chigurh in "No Country For Old Men" et cetera. They're not "troubled" or "products of a bad situation." They're evil. Period.

Perhaps the best handling of this is the Joker in, "The Dark Knight." There, the Joker gives different a version of what drove him mad every time he tells the story. Does 'why he is evil' matter? He must be fought anyway. Could, perhaps, it have been anyone? Could anyone have had one of those things happen to them and gone mad? Perhaps, but it doesn't matter. The Joker is evil and is relentless. Here and now he must be dealt with.

Elemental evil. Usually scarier than "trailer trash" galoots.

My favorite quote about Woodstock is from Ayn Rand, who called it, "Prehistory in our own backyard."

It's almost inconceivable that someone made a movie praising a group of people whose claim to fame is, as Ayn Rand said, chanting and looking sloppy.

No problem, sir! I have to say I was mighty confused, though.

I also didn't mean to get into a snit, so I goofed too. :-)

I am, in fact, sitting at my desk at home, near a large bust of Beethoven, analyzing the first movement of the Missa Solemnis (which is, incidentally, pretty straightforward relative to the rest of the mass.) I say this not to brag, but rather to demonstrate that my esteem for the man and love of his music could not be greater.

I agree that John's analogy was unbalanced, and I myself would not have even considered using Beethoven as the vehicle for comparison.

Your points are well-taken and I essentially agree. Chuck Jones to Michaelangelo is a very good similarity. I agree with John, though, that there is room for analogy, but we must be wary and specific in the nature of our comparisons, lest we do injustice to those towering artists whose work has already endured for centuries and longer. In this case, regarding the comparison in question, there is a most profound gulf in scale.

That said, you are right to insist that the analogy itself inherently predisposes some sense of scale (in this case unfairly) and your forceful reaction is justified.

I'm afraid I don't understand what you've said.

If by "OT" you mean off topic, I think that's all relevant.

If by "OT" you mean, "over the top," and thus necessarily are referring to my opening line as somehow being "too mean," it is simply a more florid way of saying, "you've missed the point" which is not an insult but rather a statement of fact. Its degree of "meanness" may be judged only by the degree to which it is truthful. In saying said truth "artfully" (to use the word loosely) instead of literally I drew extra attention to it, (which was warranted, given the way the author misinterpreted the article) I didn't imbue it with "meanness."

Should you care to heed it, the object flitting around above your head is the point, i.e. that it is the left's selective presentation of events in an effort to impose a politically correct (i.e. Marxist) narrative over current events that Mr. Whittle is discussing.

(Incidentally, the colleges to which you refer the us are the ones at which professors specialize in imposing said narratives over the past.)

Again, it is the presentation and "shaping" of events that is at issue here.

Also, the videos recommended at the end of the clip are good: they elaborate on the history and feature [in part] David Horowitz (a convert from the left and owner of Frontpage Magazine ) and the great Roger Kimball (editor of The New Criterion.)