In The Shadow Of Mt Hollywood

To clear our palates after The Godfather Part 2 , we watched Mel Brooks's Spaceballs , a sendup of the Star Wars franchise, last night. Although there are no upper-class women with The Look in it, my wife warned me that it would lower my IQ by 20 points for some period of days. A scene I'd ignored in previous viewings was the wedding. This is probably because I hadn't watched the film since Anglicanorum coetibus , and I'd either taken the denomination of the archbishop for granted, or I hadn't given it much thought. But he's clearly an Anglican. The Spaceballs Wiki says he's in the First Intergalactic Temple (Reformed) of the Druids, but he's vested as a bishop, and since he's conducting a royal wedding, he must be an archbishop. But also, according to the Wiki, in the second attempt at holding the wedding, The [Archbishop] decides not to risk their wedding becoming interrupted by giving, "the short, short version," in wh...

Last night we watched The Godfather Part II on TV. i reflected on it overnight and looked it up on Wikipedia this morning. Wikipedia says it's one of the greatest films of all time. Yeah, and Joe Biden's Abraham Lincoln. The film wasn't even into the final credits when I realized it was an allegoery of the Patriarchy, with various jabs thrown at the Catholic Church. Wikipedia's plot summary misses the point. The story arc involves the careers -- or more specifically, the inescapable, Patriarchical character flaws of Vito Corleone, the original Godfather of Part I, and his son Michael. Vito must leave Sicily as a boy of 14 when the local Mafia boss, Don Ciccio, kills his father and sets about to exterminate all the sons of the family from the justified fear that if they survive, they'll avenge their father and kill Don Ciccio. Vito, basically a good guy, rises in the New York Mafia and is gradually corrupted. By the 1920s, he's prosperous enough to return ...

When I was taking anthropology as an undergraduate, I learned that there was, at least at the time, a great deal of controversy over whether there was such a thing as a Neanderthal man. One point that was made was that the bone structure of such individuals was hard to distinguish from human bones of people with hyperthyroid conditions. More recently, I read, or hear on TV or something, that we all have Neanderthal DNA, except we all also have pumpkin DNA, so I'm not sure what any of this proves. White House Press Secretary Psaki did little to clarify this yesterday in defendng President Biden's remarks about two governors: MS. PSAKI: The behavior of a Neanderthal, just to be very clear. The behavior of. But wait a moment. All we know about Neanderthals has to do with some bones and stone tools and such. What on earth do we know about Neanderthal behavior? But then I thought about another N word. What if Biden called someone the other N word? Would...

One puzzling phenomenon in recent weeks has been that Gov Newsom, facing a likely recall election this fall, with vaccinations underway, and with pandemic statistics plummeting, has made little change in his, or the state's, COVID messaging. In fact, in a clear rebuke to Texas, Florida, Mississippi, and other states, he's now recommending that Californians wear two masks, not one. “We are encouraging people basically to double down on mask wearing, particularly in light of all of what I would argue is bad information coming from at least four states in this country,” Newsom said. “We will not be walking down their path. We’re mindful of your health and our future.” Newsom’s remarks come after Mississippi and Texas governors ended their mask mandates. But Newsom recently faced criticism after making a Tik Tok video from inside a Fresno restaurant , where indoor dining is not allowed. What's puzzling is that it might be appropriate to recommend two masks at ti...

On Tuesday, Texas Gov Abbott and Mississippi Gov Reeves eliminated all state-mandated COVID restrictions within their states. President Biden promptly called them Neanderthals . His earlier message was: "When do I think things will get back to normal? I've been cautioned not to give an answer to that because we don't know for sure. But my hope is, by this time next year, we're going to be back to normal," Biden told reporters at the White House. Dr Fauci disagreed. “I don’t think we’re going to be completely normal a year from now,” Fauci said. “But I hope we’re well on the way to normality so that we can ultimately get the world protected at the same time as we get economic recovery so that all the unintended consequences of shutting down begin to normalize, including other health issues that have arisen because of the shutdown.” Both Fauci and Biden are sorta-kinda in any case, leaving themselves plenty of room to move the ...

The chart above gives the daily average of new COVID cases reported to the US CDC as of this week. The level now is basically what it was last summer, before new restrictions were imposed by various state authorities in the fall. From Monday's LA County health department press release: The County is steadily making progress in reducing the average number of daily new cases of COVID-19. The seven-day average number of cases by episode date has now decreased to less than 1,000 per day. There are 1,578 people with COVID-19 currently hospitalized and 31% of these people are in the ICU. Testing results are available for nearly 5,840,000 individuals with 19% of people testing positive. Today's daily test positivity rate is 2.5%. Public Health has not yet seen any increases due to gatherings that may have happened during the Super Bowl and Presidents Day weekend. This trend hasn't had much media coverage. In particular, as the LA County press release notes, the p...

In today's headliness: NY AG to launch Cuomo ‘harass’ probe, admin lawyers up on nursing home scandal Lower Down: Covid-19: The U.S. Is Edging Toward Normal, Alarming Some Officials Do you see a connection? I do. Let's back up. As Limbaugh used to say, politics is Hollywood for ugly people. Translation: an ugly guy can get a lot more action in elective office than out of it. There's nothing unique about Andrew Cuomo. In fact, the lizard people who run the planet like it that way, just as the ancient emperors in Rome and Persia did: if a procurator was corrupt, they'd tolerate it until it was convenient to remove him for corruption. Next, I don't think the current US political leadership is runnng anything directly. Speaker Pelosi and President Biden are both generally assumed to be working under seriously impaired judgment. They're surrounded and cosseted by handlers, with a few hovering in the background who are clued in to what's happening, much...