Planetarium - politics/music/culture/smarts

We know, we already provided a link to the transcript. But the fact is, you need to see this for yourself. How else to put it: This is one of the greatest moments of TV in the past ten years. This is so much more important than what it looks like at first glance. What it ultimately reveals is just how fake the entire world of media, all of it, truly is. We all owe Jon Stewart a debt of gratitude. This is IMPORTANT. Please watch it, and leave a comment, because this is worth talking about.

Ladies and Gentlemen, click here to see what a true patriot does.

Posted by alex at 01:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

And it sounds like once we see "The Machinist" (click on title for the trailer), we'll be liking him even more. The NYT review of it is one of the most praiseworthy pieces on a so-called "genre" film that we've seen in quite some time. By all means, bring it on. Bale is an actor who's best performances thus far have been limited to the arthouse cinema, thereby guaranteeing a lack of Oscar nominations that he has earned several times over, by our estimation.

Posted by alex at 11:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As we finish our late shift here at Planetarium world headquarters, two things tonight were good, both from Comedy Central:

1. As a follow-up to our previous post, The Daily Show was inspired this evening. John Stewart: "Let's see, what did I do Firday........got a haircut......had a falafel sandwich........called a guy a dick on national television...". Later on: "By the way, all three of the other guys are just as big of dicks as Carlson. I didn't want them to be offended by being left out." God bless the man. And his moment of Zen was James Carville saying "I think Stewart is well-informed, I just think he's a pompous ass."

2. Nobody seems to have noticed, but Tough Crowd with Colin Quinn is actually a great show once in a while, you know, when the guests are all people sane enough to not start screaming over each other. When it's good, it's a funny, well-reasoned show with 4 folks from all over the political spectrum making intelligent points- and that includes right-wingers. As John Stewart would say, it's what Crossfire SHOULD be.

Posted by alex at 10:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Folks, if you missed John Stewart's glorious appearance on Crossfire last week, well, we just feel sorry for you:

STEWART: It's not honest. What you do is not honest. What you do is partisan hackery. And I will tell you why I know it.

CARLSON: You had John Kerry on your show and you sniff his throne and you're accusing us of partisan hackery?

STEWART: Absolutely.

CARLSON: You've got to be kidding me. He comes on and you...

STEWART: You're on CNN. The show that leads into me is puppets making crank phone calls.

(LAUGHTER)

STEWART: What is wrong with you?

read it here.

Posted by alex at 06:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wow, who would've thought? The usually insufferable Times' Arts section has a fascinating and insightful piece on the demolition of a watchdog media in America by the Bush White House.

"The fundamental right of Americans, through our free press, to penetrate and criticize the workings of our government is under attack as never before," wrote William Safire last month. When an alumnus of the Nixon White House says our free press is being attacked as "never before," you listen.

Click here for the whole story.

Posted by alex at 01:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Man.....we can't remember the last time a fucking TRAILER made us jump. Color us officially excited now. Hideo Nakata, the director of the original Japanese masterpieces, has jumped on board to helm this, and we can honestly say, we will never hear the sound of children's scissors cutting the same way again.

CLICK HERE to go "yipes!"

Posted by alex at 10:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Now, we at Planetarium aren't usually the biggest fans of New York Times film critic A.O. Scott, but he seems to have come up with a quite deft and insightful analysis of a movie almost ALL of us are going to see whether we think it'll be good or not, Team America: World Police. Most interestingly, Scott seems to latch onto a point that Planetarium has made several times in the past: despite their "equal-opportunity offender" mask, the South Park creators have quite the conservative streak. He notes that the movie ultimately ends up making an argument for America being not just the world's police, but even a Gestapo of sorts. And if a few priceless statues get blown up, a few thousand innocent people get killed, hey, it's the price of business.

What's that? Of COURSE we're still going to see it.

Posted by alex at 09:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Man, how many times can Planetarium be RIGHT?!?!?!

from today's Tech/News pages:

People who have used cell phones for at least 10 years might have an increased risk of developing a rare brain tumor, according to a study published Wednesday in the international journal Epidemiology.

A team of researchers at Institute of Environmental Medicine at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, found almost a fourfold increase of the tumors, known as acoustic neuromas, on the side of the head where the phone was most often held.

The work was done as part of the World Health Organization's cell phone research agenda, and experts in the field said it must be taken seriously and is likely to rekindle consumer worries about the risks of using the phones.

"The Karolinska researchers are respected around the world, and this study will force health agencies to take a fresh look at mobile phone risks," said Louis Slesin, publisher of Microwave News, who has been covering the industry since its early days. "This study should put an end to the industry's call to stop mobile phone health research."

Posted by alex at 08:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well, the DNC has left Missouri, as of today. Not surprising, considering the DNC is a bunch of pussies, and their candidate was going over like a fart in church with the rural folks of Missour-uh. For anyone who's never seen it, and interested in the Democratic National Committee (the folks who basically run the National Democratic political machine at this point), we at Planetarium would direct you to the City Pages, where with a quick search, you can still find Steve Perry's illuminating essay, "Spanking the Donkey". \

You may have noticed the slim amount of posts this week. More trouble with the darned service at Planetarium World Headquarters. Should be resolved in the next day or so.

Posted by alex at 07:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

First of all, there's a new Krugman piece out, so everyone should go read it. But second of all, let us take a proud moment to point out that it's main point is almost verbatim what Planetarium was saying almost two weeks ago:

from the new Krugman:
President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have an unparalleled ability to insulate themselves from inconvenient facts...George W. Bush surrounds himself with people who insist that up is down, and ignorance is strength.

from Planetarium on 9.26:
What seemed like pathology in the beginning ("Clear Skies Initiative", "Healthy Forests") has developed into a clear sign that the administration has an unwavering belief in Machiavelli 101, that all politics should be cloaked in the guise of doing the opposite. Literally, whatever they call something, you know it's the exact opposite.

Thank you, thank you. Donate to Planetarium.

Posted by alex at 06:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

After a long day of hard work here at the Planetarium office, we decided to unwind with a viewing of the 1979 Lucio Fulci film Zombie. We were drawn to the film by the promise of one thing, and one thing alone:
ZOMBIE VS. SHARK FIGHT! ZOMBIE VS. SHARK FIGHT! ZOMBIE VS. SHARK FIGHT!
Sad to say, we were quite disappointed by this film. Aside from the anticipated scene, this movie was a lame knock-off of the undisputed master of Italian absurdist horror, Dario Argento. (If you haven't seen it yet, go rent Opera right now, you fool). You may know his daughter, Asia Argento, a very attractive- and totally demented- filmmaker in her own right. You may have seen her as Vin Diesel's co-star in XXX. Must be an odd family, seeing as how Dad also directed her in his own film, The Stendhal Syndrome, notable for it's very graphic rape of his daughter. ANyhoo, despite the fabulous notion of a zombie fighting a shark, we must sadly say, you should pass on this one. Sigh....

Posted by alex at 02:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Hey, if you haven't seen it before, we suggest checking out The Rude Pundit's blog, and seeing what he thinks John Edwards should say at the debate if asked about his trial lawyer history.

Posted by alex at 07:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Or should we say unsurprising? Fox News got busted posting a bogus post-debate story about Kerry last night, stating that he said things post-debate like "Women should like me! I do manicures." here's the link to it at Talking Points memo.

(5 minutes later)

They just don't stop! This time from Atrios (click here for the story): Fox News took a Kerry-bashing Republican group called "Communists for Kerry" and interviewed a 'member' of the group as though it were an actual pro-Kerry group.
Sample quote: "Even though he, too, is a capitalist, he supports my socialist values more than President Bush ... The North Koreans are my comrades to a point, and I'm sure they support Comrade Kerry, too."

Posted by alex at 05:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Just a quick weekend add- here's the website for the newest film by Marc Evans (director of the quite decent My Little Eye), Trauma. Starring Colin Firth, after viewing the trailer we're thinking this looks to be quite the effective little psychological horror film, even if the premise seems a bit trite.

Posted by alex at 01:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Planetarium is spending the day scouring reaction from the public to the debates, and will be attempting to find and post the best disses on the candidates here. So keep checking back, as this post will keep being updated.

On Bush: "Bush sounded whiny...like a kid begging his dad to let him use the car. I half expected him to say "But I was going to the Toshii station to pick up some power convertors!"

On Kerry: "All Kerry did was say "I am not Bush but I will act like him since people find him charming and I have a face that looks like an Easter Island statue and makes children flee in terror'."

On Bush: "Kerry could beat your ass into the ground any day of the week, much like playing chess with a retarded child."

Posted by alex at 10:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)