35 Movies in 2 Minutes

Let this short below be your media interlude between watching last night’s Jon Stewart and the YouTube video of the guy moonwalking in WalMart.

There are 35 movies shown here in 2 minutes … go.

35mm from Felix Meyer on Vimeo.

Like 3rd Grade Recess

We all know 3rd grade recess is a mix of bullies and nice kids.  The bullies are loud and destructive. The nice kids share their silly bands with you and teach you how to climb to the top of the monkey bars.  In the world of US politics right now, the loud bullies are the pundits on TV.  The louder and more obnoxious they are, the more people watch and the more ratings they get.  They’re not interested in civil discourse.

And there are the nice kids, quietly building the community, obeying the rules, and making the playground an enjoyable place to be.  In the world of politics, no one can hear them above the screech of the bullies.

We wonder why Congressional and Presidential confidence is only in the 30ies.  But everyone’s listening to the bullies.  Think how much confidence you’d have in your security if the nice kids were always getting beat up (I’m assuming you’re a nice kid).

Well, anyways, here’s a group of people who are hard at work building a snow fort and avoiding the bullies.  Let’s wish them success in taking down the bullies.  They have a website: http://www.fiscalcommission.gov/meetings and their last meeting is straight out of nice kid parties 101.  But if you’re rooting for the nice guy, and you’re tired of the bully – it’s a good watch.

And then Repeat …

A Shorpy Followup - Fuel

Think our current fight to reduce fossil fuels is a late twentieth century creation?  From Shorpy, here’s a post on the Fuel Administration circa 1919.

According to a comment on the post and Wikipedia, the Fuel Administration was a government response to a major shortage of coal in the weaning years of WWI.  The organization had broad powers to regulate prices and distribution of coal.  Garfield was appointed by Wilson to head the agency.  Beyond regulating demand, its most famous legacy is Daylight Savings Time.

I wonder given the current Tea Party context how popular a similar organization would be for conserving oil?  Even Progressives might find the concept difficult.  It speaks to how conservative the nation has shifted.

Always Something Interesting: Shorpy

Jonathan “the new guy” in development threw out this site, a blog of really high quality historical images from around the US.   Seems to be lots of exploring in this site. 

End of the Line: 1921 talks about how when the streetcars were torn out of the roads, people found all sorts of uses for the old carriages.

 

 

There’s the Marilyn Monroe colorized section.

 

And this node was cool too for its before and after shots.  A restaurant in 1937, this Savannah Georgia address has gone downhill since.

When Should I be Paranoid? and My SCIF is Bigger than Yours.

The Washington Post front lined their 2 year investigation into Secret America today; a look into the over 1,200 US government and 1,900 contractor counter-intelligence organizations that have grown virally since 9-11.  This video clip is an intro to the Frontline production that will come out of the investigation in October.  It presents the lead investigative reporter and a data guy from Vermont (are we all from there?). 

I’m not one to become easily spooked or impressed with random numbers, but some of the findings definitely make me want to know more.

854,000 people hold top-secret security clearance.

33 building complexes have been build or are under construction near Washington DC for secret work.  The WaPo says it’s the equivalent real estate-wise of three Pentagons. 

51 federal organizations and military commands track the money to and from terrorist networks

The US intelligence budget is $75 billion, 2 1/2 times the size prior to 9-11

The NGA will soon have the fourth largest federal building in the DC area; a $1.8 billion expansion of the CIA.

The quote of the article is this though:

Every one of these buildings has at least one of these rooms, known as a SCIF, for sensitive compartmented information facility. Some are as small as a closet; others are four times the size of a football field.

SCIF size has become a measure of status in Top Secret America, or at least in the Washington region of it. "In D.C., everyone talks SCIF, SCIF, SCIF," said Bruce Paquin, who moved to Florida from the Washington region several years ago to start a SCIF construction business. "They've got the penis envy thing going. You can't be a big boy unless you're a three-letter agency and you have a big SCIF."

Immigration Roundup

Building on a history of immigration blogging, I wanted to point out this week’s New Yorker.   William Finnegan gives a nice summary of recent immigration reform.  Turns out that while we do have an immigration problem in our country, people only care when the economy’s in the crapper.  They care so much that they don’t notice there are fewer immigrants crossing the border now than pre 9/11. Either Mexicans are just getting lazy or they didn’t hear about all the free health care we’re going to give them.

It starts by smashing john McCain and then it gets better.

A few choice quotations:

• Yet anti-immigrant backlashes don’t always track closely with actual immigration. They track with unemployment, popular anxiety, and a fear of displacement by strangers.
• The problem of illegal immigration isn’t a matter of violent criminals storming the walls of our peaceful towns and cities.-- According to F.B.I. statistics, the four safest big cities in the United States—San Diego, Phoenix, El Paso, and Austin—are all in border states.

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