Breaking Us In Two

From Joe Jackson.  A sinuous melody with a catchy keyboard part surrounding it.  Sorry about the cheesy 80s video.  Also see It's Different For Girls.

Just Another Day At The NY Times

THC could write every day about the hijinks at the New York Times but tries to restrain himself (his most recent failure to exercise restraint can be found here); nonetheless he can't resist alerting his readers to a couple of recent tidbits:

In its original story on the Kentucky county clerk jailed for refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, the Times identified the clerk as a "49-year old Republican".

Oops, at the end of the long feature the Times has now added this correction:

"Because of an editing error, an earlier version of this article misstated Kim Davis’s political affiliation. She is a Democrat, not a Republican."

Now we all know what really happened.  This was not an editing error.  The authors of the piece, Alan Blinder and Tamar Lewin simply could not conceive that the clerk was anything other than a Republican.  Further, that assumption fit neatly with the quotes they used likening the clerk to Governor George Wallace who was also a  . . . uh-oh, another oops here; Wallace was a Democrat too, though his party affiliation is not mentioned.

Traditionally, you could always tell in a Times story the party affiliation of a politician involved in a scandal or something the Times reporters and editors believed to be bad behavior - when the politician was a Republican their party affiliation would always be mentioned prominently; if they were a Democrat their party affiliation would not be mentioned or only mentioned near the end of the article.  With the Kentucky story the reporters for the Times took it to another level altogether - giving the wrong party affiliation.


And speaking of stories that would be handled differently if a Republican rather than a Democrat were involved do you remember back in the Bush Administration when one of GW's White House staffers attempted to shoot their significant other?  Of course not, because it didn't happen in the Bush Administration, it happened in the Obama Administration just last month.

The Times did manage to rouse itself to publish one brief AP story on the shooting and then let the matter drop.  This is the lead sentence:

A White House staffer is charged with firing the service weapon of an off-duty U.S. Capitol Police officer in what authorities described as a domestic incident.

There was a little more to that story than the Times reveals.  The staffer was not a junior intern; she was Barvetta Singletary, special assistant to the President and legislative liaison at the White House and former chief of staff and policy director for Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC), the third ranking Democrat in the House who, according to this article in The Week:

. . . turned her boyfriend's gun on him after he refused to reveal the passwords to his two cell phones, according to police documents. Singletary and her boyfriend were allegedly fighting about the victim's relations with other women.

"You taught me how to use this. Don't think I won't use it," Singletary allegedly said before firing a round in her boyfriend's direction.

(Singletary via Daily Mail)

This article adds some more details from the police::

 Police said Ms Singletary on Friday texted her boyfriend, who was not identified, “to come to her residence … for sexual intercourse,” according to the charging documents. Afterward, according to the criminal complaint,  Ms Singletary went to the man’s car with him and accused him of dating other women.

Singletary was recently indicted and resigned her position.

Let's be honest.  If this incident had occurred in the Bush White House how many articles would the Times have run on it?  How many investigative reporters would have been assigned? How many opinion pieces, or opinion pieces masquerading as new stories discussing the gun control, policing, security, racial and domestic violence implications of these events would we have seen?

Local Hero

In putting together another Dragontape mix - this one on Mark Knopfler - THC came across this video of the theme song from the movie Local Hero (1983), written by Knopfler.

Set in the Scottish highlands, it's about an American oil company's attempt to buy a small Scottish village so it can build an oil terminal - that is, to the extent the movie is about anything because it just sort of ambles along in a low-key humorous and oddball way.  The stars are Peter Riegert ("Boon" in Animal House) as an junior executive at Knox Oil, selected to make the journey from Houston to the Highlands because he's thought to be Scottish since his last name is MacIntyre, though his family are actually Hungarian immigrants who changed their name when they came to the U.S. and Burt Lancaster in one of his last films as the decidedly eccentric owner of the company, but the real star is the setting in Scotland.  THC and the Mrs (prior to them being Mr and Mrs) had camped in the area where the film is set while on a trip in 1978 so it provided a little extra jolt to see some of that beautiful coast again.  The best camping site we found was on a peninsula which provided a view towards the Isle of Skye across the sound to the south.  Actually it wasn't a formal camping site; it was the field adjacent to a cottage lying along a lonely coastal road.  We went up to the door and asked if it was okay if we camped on their property.  "Of course" was the response.

The movie was the centerpiece of a trio of films directed by Bill Forsyth in the early 1980s, the first being Gregory's Girl and the last Comfort And Joy, which is about the rivalry of two Glasgow ice cream companies and the secret to making ice cream fritters.  All are set in Scotland (we only understood about half the dialogue in Gregory's Girl as Scottish only seems vaguely related to the English language) and greatly enjoyed them all.  None of them had a traditional story arc; someone once wrote something to the effect that Forsyth made films "using the scenes other directors would cut".  After that he went off to Hollywood, lost his mojo, and never made anything watchable again.

The video features some of the Highland scenery we enjoyed so much. You can listen to a lovely live version by Knopfler here.  And this is another song from the film - Even The Lone Star State Gets Lonesome - sung by Victor, the Soviet fishing vessel captain who occasionally stops by the isolated village where the story is set.In this scene Victor and Mac discuss wealth creation and we are treated to a technical explanation of the Aurora Borealis.

Ten Or Eleven?

‘
"Ten should do it, don’t you think? You think we need one more? You think we need one more. Alright, we’ll get one more.’ 

Ocean's Eleven (from Tech Noir)

Also see The Thing With The Guy In the Place and George Clooney: Neocon

Geographical Definitions

For those who may need a refresher.  A fascinating map from 1870 via The Land of Maps.

Dangerous Roads

For those of you who enjoy driving, Dangerous Roads (which we've featured before) has redesigned and greatly improved its website so you can more easily explore some of the best and most challenging driving in the world.  Or if you don't like driving it's still fun to look at the pictures.

A couple of THC's favorites:

Tian Men Shan Big Gate Rd, Hunan Province, China
The text mentions that "The driver should be extra careful during the drive. Taking it slow and paying attention to every curve and turn. Not being overly careful could make it too easy to junk a car, or worse injure and even kill passengers."

D915, Trabzond Province, Turkey
The text advises "there are many excellent photo opportunities"!  The road is in the same region of Turkey described in the post on the Sumela Monastery.

And this is a road THC has driven several times; the Amalfi Coast Drive in Italy.  Fold in your side view mirrors before attempting.