Transportation Alternatives' Parking Spot Squat:

Very cool, not to mention edgy for TA. They're trying to showcase the fact that on-street parking can be put to all sorts of other uses.

Frank made the giant cut-out car. Go Frank!

Quotes from HST in late 1969:

I've been reading "Fear and Loathing in America: The Brutal Odyssey of an Outlaw Journalist," which is Hunter S. Thompson's collected correspondence from 1968 - 78. Here are some choice bits I came across last night that seemed to echo with contemporary relevance:

On The New Journalism:

But the whole concept of "new journalism" is bogus -- unless we admit that honesty in a journalist is something new. The old, Hearst-style journalists had a privileged relationship with power -- and they paid fr that privilege by keeping a lot of warts and chancres off the public record. This tradition is still strong, especially with big-city newspapers, TV news departments and national newsmagazines...

So the "new journalism" is nothing more than a repudiation of the whole concept of privileged communication between newsmen and their sources... Nixon learned this lesson in 1960 and '62. This year he treated the press like a bunch of scorpions, playing "influential" reporters off against each other and awarding private interviews like gold stars for good behavior. I spent 10 days following him around New Hampshire and by the time I was finally granted an audience I felt almost lucky. This feeling passed very quickly, however, and now -- on the basis of what I wrote -- I have no illusions about getting a job as a White House correspondent. For the same reasons, I'll have a jaundiced view of any correspondent who seems "close to Nixon."

On The First Freak Power Campaign

Hunter and his Aspen-based cohort of anti-development refugees from the coastal cities launched a spur of the moment takeover bid, and came within a few votes of installing a 29-year-old hippie lawyer and motorcycle racer as mayor. This near victory set the stage for Hunter's own campaign for Sheriff.

The idea was to first mobilize our hidden vote -- Freak Power -- and then, using that as a power base, go after the small but very vocal "liberal vote." I was convinced that we could win by putting these two blocks together... and as it turned out I was right: That combination would have won by at least 100 votes out of 1,200 -- but it never occurred to me that most of the local "liberals" would back off at the last moment, leaving us with what amounted, in the end, to an "under-30 vote" and a hundred or so defectors from the old, failed-liberal camp who said, "Fuck it, let's run flat out this time..."

...

Electoral politics is such a foul and rotten game that only a fool would play it except to win and move on to something better.

Quotes from HST in late 1969:

I've been reading "Fear and Loathing in America: The Brutal Odyssey of an Outlaw Journalist," which is Hunter S. Thompson's collected correspondence from 1968 - 78. Here are some choice bits I came across last night that seemed to echo with contemporary relevance:

On The New Journalism:

But the whole concept of "new journalism" is bogus -- unless we admit that honesty in a journalist is something new. The old, Hearst-style journalists had a privileged relationship with power -- and they paid fr that privilege by keeping a lot of warts and chancres off the public record. This tradition is still strong, especially with big-city newspapers, TV news departments and national newsmagazines...

So the "new journalism" is nothing more than a repudiation of the whole concept of privileged communication between newsmen and their sources... Nixon learned this lesson in 1960 and '62. This year he treated the press like a bunch of scorpions, playing "influential" reporters off against each other and awarding private interviews like gold stars for good behavior. I spent 10 days following him around New Hampshire and by the time I was finally granted an audience I felt almost lucky. This feeling passed very quickly, however, and now -- on the basis of what I wrote -- I have no illusions about getting a job as a White House correspondent. For the same reasons, I'll have a jaundiced view of any correspondent who seems "close to Nixon."

On The First Freak Power Campaign

Hunter and his Aspen-based cohort of anti-development refugees from the coastal cities launched a spur of the moment takeover bid, and came within a few votes of installing a 29-year-old hippie lawyer and motorcycle racer as mayor. This near victory set the stage for Hunter's own campaign for Sheriff.

The idea was to first mobilize our hidden vote -- Freak Power -- and then, using that as a power base, go after the small but very vocal "liberal vote." I was convinced that we could win by putting these two blocks together... and as it turned out I was right: That combination would have won by at least 100 votes out of 1,200 -- but it never occurred to me that most of the local "liberals" would back off at the last moment, leaving us with what amounted, in the end, to an "under-30 vote" and a hundred or so defectors from the old, failed-liberal camp who said, "Fuck it, let's run flat out this time..."

...

Electoral politics is such a foul and rotten game that only a fool would play it except to win and move on to something better.

Quotes from HST in late 1969:

I've been reading "Fear and Loathing in America: The Brutal Odyssey of an Outlaw Journalist," which is Hunter S. Thompson's collected correspondence from 1968 - 78. Here are some choice bits I came across last night that seemed to echo with contemporary relevance:

On The New Journalism:

But the whole concept of "new journalism" is bogus -- unless we admit that honesty in a journalist is something new. The old, Hearst-style journalists had a privileged relationship with power -- and they paid fr that privilege by keeping a lot of warts and chancres off the public record. This tradition is still strong, especially with big-city newspapers, TV news departments and national newsmagazines...

So the "new journalism" is nothing more than a repudiation of the whole concept of privileged communication between newsmen and their sources... Nixon learned this lesson in 1960 and '62. This year he treated the press like a bunch of scorpions, playing "influential" reporters off against each other and awarding private interviews like gold stars for good behavior. I spent 10 days following him around New Hampshire and by the time I was finally granted an audience I felt almost lucky. This feeling passed very quickly, however, and now -- on the basis of what I wrote -- I have no illusions about getting a job as a White House correspondent. For the same reasons, I'll have a jaundiced view of any correspondent who seems "close to Nixon."

On The First Freak Power Campaign

Hunter and his Aspen-based cohort of anti-development refugees from the coastal cities launched a spur of the moment takeover bid, and came within a few votes of installing a 29-year-old hippie lawyer and motorcycle racer as mayor. This near victory set the stage for Hunter's own campaign for Sheriff.

The idea was to first mobilize our hidden vote -- Freak Power -- and then, using that as a power base, go after the small but very vocal "liberal vote." I was convinced that we could win by putting these two blocks together... and as it turned out I was right: That combination would have won by at least 100 votes out of 1,200 -- but it never occurred to me that most of the local "liberals" would back off at the last moment, leaving us with what amounted, in the end, to an "under-30 vote" and a hundred or so defectors from the old, failed-liberal camp who said, "Fuck it, let's run flat out this time..."

...

Electoral politics is such a foul and rotten game that only a fool would play it except to win and move on to something better.

Watched a little BattleStar Galactica last night with Luke and Steve and Julia. Re-runs for me and luke, but new stuff for the others. We went out around the corner to a lovely restaurant (kind of incongruously lovely for the 'Shwick... seems to be leapfrogging the neighborhood development) called Northeast Kingdom. Vry tasty organic chicken pot pie, $12. Cans o' Pabst, $2. Works.

Anyway, I'm reminded what a good show that was and I'm looking forward to picking up some Season Two action. Luke's got it on his HD. I can't imagine what it would be like to try and watch with commercials.

If TV people have any brains, they'll get behind initiatives like this Video iPod thing that let regular people do what us Nerds do when we use bittorrent, external hard-drives, some adaptors and couplers and a little patience to watch our favorite episodic video content at our leasure and without consumer propaganda interrupting it every 10 minutes.

Spent last night playing videogames (X-men Saga, Gamecube) with Cian and Abe and Jesse with Cian's special lady Ashley spectating, complaining that it was too easy for us, that she wanted to see us die. Good times. I haven't done anything like that in a while. Cian and Ashley have a really good thing going.

Now I'm up in Portland, getting music from Tommy for the drive east. In a minute we'll go see Todd Snider and then party for John Henry's birthday. I'm looking forward to it.

Spent last night playing videogames (X-men Saga, Gamecube) with Cian and Abe and Jesse with Cian's special lady Ashley spectating, complaining that it was too easy for us, that she wanted to see us die. Good times. I haven't done anything like that in a while. Cian and Ashley have a really good thing going.

Now I'm up in Portland, getting music from Tommy for the drive east. In a minute we'll go see Todd Snider and then party for John Henry's birthday. I'm looking forward to it.

I like to think that the work I did in 03/04 in some way had it's Genesis in the spirit of Brooklyn of that time. It was a good place to live post-9/11 for the intersection of a lot of smart artists, law-students and b-schoolers who were all waking up to the fact that their individual career tracks might need to be a bit more widely focused as it seemed the world was not, in fact, going to take care of itself. I don't know if that spirit still reigns, but the buzz on the Left coast is that Philly is the New Brooklyn.

What if you could do the following:

• Take the central organizing principle of MFA of bridging political activism, civic participation and cultural cool.
• Implement it on the ground through one of the few indipendent production groups that's been able to prosper in the fact of Clear Channel's aggressive colonization of the club-level music scene
• Employ the Tank's theory of creating all-day venues that build social capital while performing the usual task of having a show at night.
• Staff it up with some of the better young organizers on the East coast, and situate it in a centrally-located ballroom/restaurant that can seat as many as 900 people in Phillidelphia?

I think you'd have something pretty bad ass. At the very least you'd have a 21st-Century union hall. It's blowing in the wind. If anyone with juice still reads this old blog, I strongly suggest -- even more strongly than I suggest you watch Primer -- you get in touch with the right people and do what you need to do to let this happen. Today. Contact me if you're not already aware of who that is.

I like to think that the work I did in 03/04 in some way had it's Genesis in the spirit of Brooklyn of that time. It was a good place to live post-9/11 for the intersection of a lot of smart artists, law-students and b-schoolers who were all waking up to the fact that their individual career tracks might need to be a bit more widely focused as it seemed the world was not, in fact, going to take care of itself. I don't know if that spirit still reigns, but the buzz on the Left coast is that Philly is the New Brooklyn.

What if you could do the following:

• Take the central organizing principle of MFA of bridging political activism, civic participation and cultural cool.
• Implement it on the ground through one of the few indipendent production groups that's been able to prosper in the fact of Clear Channel's aggressive colonization of the club-level music scene
• Employ the Tank's theory of creating all-day venues that build social capital while performing the usual task of having a show at night.
• Staff it up with some of the better young organizers on the East coast, and situate it in a centrally-located ballroom/restaurant that can seat as many as 900 people in Phillidelphia?

I think you'd have something pretty bad ass. At the very least you'd have a 21st-Century union hall. It's blowing in the wind. If anyone with juice still reads this old blog, I strongly suggest -- even more strongly than I suggest you watch Primer -- you get in touch with the right people and do what you need to do to let this happen. Today. Contact me if you're not already aware of who that is.

When I first saw Clerks I thought, "wow, look what you can do with $30,000."

Tonight I watched Primer, which cost $7,000 and is all around a much more impressive film. The plot is incomprehensibly dense at the end, but the filmmaking is deft and the quality high. I hope Shane Carruth -- the writer/director/lead actor -- is able to really put a lot more into his next project.

I won't even try to get into what the film is about except to say that it's a movie with no special effects about time travel. Reminded me of Pi, but without being so aggressively artistic. The way in which the pace and style captures the life of engineers and techies at work is really quite endearing (Carruth was really an engineer apparently) and the manner in which the whole thing plays out is reminiscent of the work of the great Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky.

The film is about 1:15, and you can get it off Netflix. I liked it enough to look for the filmmaker's email in the WHOIS record for the movie's website and send fan mail. Strongly recommend.