Brother Blue

You must see the movie Million Dollar Baby. It is best you see it before you talk to anyone who has, or before you have read any reviews that talk about the plot. All you need to know is it is about a woman from a deprived background who wants to be a boxer. It is one of the best movies I have seen in a long time. I can’t remember the last time I was at a movie in which the audience applauded.
The movie is based off the short stories found in the late FX Tool (pen name) book Rope Burns: Stories from the Corner. The short story Million Dollar Baby is the basis of the movie, with many of the other short stories becoming back ground stories in the movie. Much of FX Tool’s wonderful prose is used as narration provided by Scrap (Morgan Freeman).
An interview from a few years ago with FX Tool was replayed this week on NPR’s Fresh Air.

I am sure this is a statement about western society, but I don’t know what it is.

Full details on Darth Tater
[via D. Scott]

Here are two very cool resources you can find on line.
Wikipedia is an encyclopedia in which anyone can add information. The idea is the larger the community of experts the fast it will be to correct errors and the deeper the pool of information. Basically, anyone in the world can provide information and updates.
WordNet @ Princeton is dictionary, but it is also much more. Not only does it have all the functions of a thesaurus, but it also provides hypernyms. Hypernyms are defined as “this is kind of…” which provide 100’s of words related to your term.

In this weekend’s edition of the Financial Times (the British equivalent of The Wall Street Journal) there was an absolutely wonderful article: Into the heart of suburbia by James Harding.
James is an Englishman living in DC. His beat for FT is politics, so he spent much of the last two years following the presidential race. He spent weeks on end with both candidates traveling all over the country. The premise of article is an investigation in to why the center (geographically) part of the US voted for Bush. A question which puzzles most European’s (and many people who live on the two coast of the US for that matter.)
Their confusion comes from two facts. First, for most people who live in Europe the only issue on the US ballot was the war (and their personal disagreement with it). Second, when Europeans do come to the US they only interact with people in predominantly who live in areas of the country that voted Democratic (LA, NY, Boston). For example, the article sites the fact that only 5% of foreign visitors make it to Ohio.
Because of their lack of interaction with the midlanders it is easy (for Europeans and coastal Democrats) to dismiss them as nothing more than “uneducated hicks”. Fortunately James does not do this. He does a lot of personal investigation by spending time in Ohio talking Republicans and Democrats a like. A fact that he finds stunning is he can’t find a single Republican who is very much in favor of the action in Iraq. Most have misgivings. A recent CNN poll had more people dissatisfied with the direction the country is heading than satisfied.
So what gives? Why was Bush re-elected. His conclusion is very interesting. In the 60’s and early 70’s the Democrats ruled national politics. Regan commented in the 80’s “The Democrats waged war on poverty and poverty won.” The inference they lost their power because they were unable to live up to what they set out to do.
This is no great secret or great revelation; many people in the midlands are concerned with the direction culture is heading. They feel their faith and families are being attacked. The reason the Republicans won in this last election is they have waged war on modernity. They have waged war on the breakdown of the family, on the images they get over the airwaves, and abortion. They have waged war on what middle-America feels it is being attacked by.
The only problem, I don’t know if this is a war they can win.

They protest that a Teddy Bear is put is a straight jacket (Vermont Teddy Bear Co.). No one has every protested when I am put in one.

Full story
[via Rox]

I wish I was making this up.

There are now services from Genetic Savings and Clone that will allow you to clone your pet. At this point only the service for cats is available, but other pets are just around the corner.
The costs are modest. Depending on the health of your cat it costs between $295 – $1395 (shipping included) to bank the animal’s DNA. This year they are performing 6 commercial cloning. The cost? According to the web site: “our goal is to offer dog and cat cloning services in the low five figures.” A bargain!
In other cat cloning news Allerca is working on a hypoallergenic cat (meaning you won’t sneeze). Price tag $3500. You can get on the waiting list today for a $250 deposit.

As reported in the 12/23/04 enewslatter Rude Awakening
“SINGLE BLACK FEMALE seeks male companionship, ethnicity unimportant. I’m a very good looking girl who LOVES to play. I love long walks in the woods, riding in your pickup truck, hunting, camping and fishing trips, cozy nights lying by the fire. Candlelight dinners will have me eating out of your hand. Rub me the right way and watch me respond. I’ll be at the front door when you get home from work, wearing only what nature gave me. Kiss me and I’m yours. Call (404) 875-6420 and ask for Daisy.”
Over 15,000 men found themselves talking to the Atlanta Humane Society about an 8-week old black Labrador retriever.

11,323 days