hello there. i've got a couple things to mention today but first something quickly that i was made aware of thanks to the little tv/infoscreen in the elevator: transformers set a record for first day dvd sales this week and has already sold more than 8 million copies. this is proof that america is stupid. it's proof that we don't all deserve the right to select the leader of our country. (i'll circle back to this topic later.) now, i'm not merely passing this judgement upon america based on the quality of the transformers movie--i never saw it so it might be worth watching, though i highly doubt it--i'm passing judgement on the sheep-like nature of too many americans. transformers' dvd release has been incessantly hyped in the last few weeks. i don't pay too close attention to these things, but it's been promoted as heavily as any dvd i can remember. and this promotion, naturally, has resulted in the highest sales ever. one seems to reasonably follow the other right? maybe if you're in advertising. to me, it is sickening. because something is promoted does not mean it has value. because something is talked about does not mean it is worthy.
i'm not going to blame the people for all of this. of course it should be your duty to always operate with free will, and to exhibit reasonable doubt toward things. but at a certain point, you've got to look higher and put the blame on those who are making the desicions that lead to the lowest-common-denominator mode of american entertainment. everything is presented--even the supposedly staid news--to us in a way that ensures only the greatest absorption of the message, and unfortunately that message is almost always consumerist.
i like to see advertising campaigns fail. it means that the audience has digested the message, considered, and rejected it. if advertising succeeds, you only know that it has not been rejected, you don't know if it's actually been thoughtfully considered or digested. call me cynical, but i think far too often people simply accept what is given to them, and that is a shame.

ok then. game one of the world series was last night, and being the dutiful american-bred being that i am, i sat down to take it all in. after a couple innings it was painfully obvious that we're heading to yet another lackluster, anticlimactic world series. i think i'd just assume that they play it out in a vacuum somewhere and then just tell me who won after the fact, as it doesn't seem as though i'm going to have any joy in the process this year. we haven't had a remotely interesting series since 2003 actually and i can't even remember the last time i had a strong personal rooting interest. maybe the indians in the 90s. so what this is leading me to is the admission that i was channel surfing, reading a magazine, and doing a crossword as early as 9:30 last night, and that this freedom from being anchored to a sporting event allowed me to catch a particularly interesting edition of charlie rose.
in fact, if you'll excuse the obvious analogy, this is two nights in a row that the charlie rose show absolutely hit it out of the park. tuesday night he had a very well-prepared, knowledgable, and clear guest (sorry can't remember his name) speaking about the dynamics of the supreme court. he'd written a book about the "secrets" of the court or something and done some more personal profiles of the justices than you are used to seeing. i don't know why but i find the supreme court fascinating and i agree with the guest in that it is terribly important in today's world. an all-around excellent interview.
last night's show was even better, if for entirely different reasons. it featured guest tavis smiley and cornel west in a dual interview, followed by a short one-on-one with jim lehrer. the lehrer interview was short and ok but not extremely distinguishable (though i did learn that he has written 17 novels. how about that?). it was the smiley/west interview that was fascinating.
if you don't know, smiley hosts a fairly nondescript talk show that airs on channel 13 right after charlie rose, and west is a fairly well-known black intellectual. evidently they are close friends. on last night's show, smiley was in the best form i'd ever seen him: very intelligently presenting thoughtful, agenda-less ideas. i was very impressed with him. west, on the other hand, was much rougher. let's say he was lucid but erratic. rose seemed like he has having a hard time controlling him, as though he were struggling through a difficult interview with an unwieldy child. he more than once seemed to almost desperately gesture at smiley to cut in and bring the interview back under control. west would have none of it, though not because he was being insolent; instead, he seemed completely unaware of the capriciousness of his comments. so it was ridiculously entertaining to watch. and, when he actually got into making a point, west was positively excellent. as with smiley, but very differently, i was quite impressed with west. completely unaffected, completely unpretentious, and that is truly refreshing. plus, he's fun to look at: the huge gap tooth, the puffy nappy hair, the greyish beard, the black suit that seemed too big and the very long-armed, french-cuffed white sleeves sticking several inches out of the jacket sleeve. when he kept saying "my brother," it never seemed anything but natural to him. let's just say that i would be very happy to spend some time in his classroom at princeton.
smiley actually produced a quote of west's during the interview which he said has influenced the way he lives his life: "you can't lead if you don't love and you can't save if you don't serve." i'm with smiley on that one: it's a very nice epigram.
perhaps the most interesting moment of the interview came from smiley, in responding to rose's questions about the presidential campaign. i think he used the word "despicable" in describing how candidates twist and turn in the desperate attempt to get elected, that no one has any convictions. he used mitt romney as an example, how he could never have been massachusetts governor under the platform he currently endorses. and he's right. not just about romney, but everyone. all of them are like that and it's probably the number one thing that turns me off about politics in this country. a man cannot be a man (nor a woman be a woman, to keep things current).
a candidate is simply a manufactured being. manufactured to be what their promoters think "the people" want. but these people are the same ones who have been beaten down into sheep by a similar system of promotion to gobble up just what they are given. so now the ones who would presumably be in a position of power and leadership are beholden not just to "the people" but to "the people's" manufactured desire. do you see the futility of this process? it's like the whole world is nothing but a constructed bit of fanciful nothing, only existing as much as it is desired or as much as it is told to be desired. despicable is indeed the word to use.