THE MT VOID
Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
02/22/13 -- Vol. 31, No. 34, Whole Number 1742
Prince Charming: Mark Leeper, mleeper@optonline.net
Cinderella: Evelyn Leeper, eleeper@optonline.net
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Topics:
The Depp-th of Obscurity (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Interactive Comet and Asteroid Collision Simulator
(comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Strange Object Found on Mars (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
The Future of Newspapers (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
My Picks for Turner Classic Movies for March (comments
by Mark R. Leeper)
Streaming--*Still* Not ready for Prime-Time (comments
by Evelyn C. Leeper)
SIDE EFFECTS (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CONTINUUM: Any Sufficiently Advanced Technology ...
(television review by Dale L. Skran, Jr.)
COLD CITY: REPAIRMAN JACK: THE EARLY YEARS
by F. Paul Wilson (book review by Dale L. Skran, Jr.)
SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
SUPERPOWER (2008) (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
BLIND DESCENT by James M. Tabor (book review
by Dale L. Skran, Jr.)
The Verbinator (letters of comment by Rob Mitchell
and Lee Beaumont)
This Week's Reading (POSTVILLE: A CLASH OF CULTURES IN
HEARTLAND AMERICA and POSTVILLE, U.S.A.: SURVIVING
DIVERSITY IN SMALL-TOWN AMERICA) (book comments
by Evelyn C. Leeper)
==================================================================
TOPIC: The Depp-th of Obscurity (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
I am seeing trailers for the new film version of THE LONE RANGER
with Johnny Depp playing Tonto. Tonto was the sidekick, but I
suspect he will be the main attraction. It is more or less like
having Bruce Lee play Cato in the "Green Hornet" TV show. I find
it odd that Depp would agree to be second fiddle in a film in which
even the title denies he exists. [-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Interactive Comet and Asteroid Collision Simulator (comments
by Mark R. Leeper)
We are becoming more aware that our solar system is a pinball game
of floating debris. We just had coincidental meteor impacts at the
same time as the near presence of an asteroid. Purdue and the
Imperial College London cooperated to put this simulator on-line so
you can play with the parameters and see what destruction would be
done.
http://www.openculture.com/2013/02/impact_earth.html
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Strange Object Found on Mars (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
A strange object has been found on Mars. It appears to be metallic
and it would be hard to explain how it was created by nature. See
it here, and in 3D.
http://tinyurl.com/void-mars-object
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: The Future of Newspapers (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
This is a prediction from 1981 that in the future you might
actually be able to get your morning news from a computer!
http://tinyurl.com/void-news-future
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: My Picks for Turner Classic Movies for March (comments by
Mark R. Leeper)
It is time for my monthly recommendations for upcoming films on
Turner Classic Movies. All times listed are in the Eastern Time
Zone. Upcoming on TCM are three Westerns, two notable for their
realism and one that is just off the wall.
Look at TERROR IN A TEXAS TOWN (1958) from a distance and it seems
like a rather cliched Western. A bad guy is trying to buy up a
town. A magnate knows that there is oil under the town and he
wants to make those huge profits. He will buy out or burn out all
the current residents. The magnate has murdered the wrong man,
however. The dead man's son comes to town for vengeance. The
script could almost write itself. Get a little closer to this
Western and everything is weird. The film opens with a showdown
between a man with a gun against a man armed with a whaling
harpoon. The jovial Sebastian Cabot, rarely cast as a villain,
plays the oil magnate. The magnate's hired killer turns out to be
just about the most interesting character in the film. Time and
again cliches are turned on their head. That is because the writer
is Ben Perry and that name is a front for the blacklisted Dalton
Trumbo. The director, Joseph H. Lewis was also blacklisted, but he
was retiring and realized there was not much the reactionaries
could do to him. The camerawork is also particularly good.
[Tuesday, March 26, 05:00 PM].
Actually for more on the blacklist and the damage it did, TCM is
also running (the admittedly not obscure) THE FRONT starring Woody
Allen. This is probably the best film about the evils of the
Hollywood blacklist. It was directed by Martin Ritt, written by
Walter Bernstein, and features Zero Mostel, Herschel Bernardi,
Lloyd Gough, and Joshua Shelley--all victims of the Hollywood
blacklist. [Thursday, March 28 2013, 01:30 AM]
HEAVEN'S GATE was a tremendous box-office disaster in 1980. I
guess I have to say that while there are definitely some scenes
that seem interminable, there is a lot to like about this film and
I tentatively recommend it. Michael Cimino had two years before
made THE DEER HUNTER, which was very successful at the box office.
Based on its success Cimino was funded to the tune of a then
unheard of fifty million dollars to bring to the screen the story
of the Johnson County War. Lots of films show the tensions of
(usually immigrant) homesteaders against the cattle interests. The
peak of this conflict in real life was the Johnson County 1892 War
when toe Wyoming Cattleman's Association hired an army of
mercenaries from Texas to drive out and if necessary exterminate
the homesteaders and return their land for grazing. Films like
SHANE and PALE RIDER are set on a backdrop of these anti-immigrant
tensions, but the peak of the hostility was the Johnson County War
and Cimino really captures the texture of immigrant life under
siege. The subject matter of class war with money interests
against a largely immigrant lower class could hardly be more
timely. This film is still controversial, both artistically and
politically, but it can be a rewarding experience. Christopher
Walkin plays a gunman who leads the mercenaries. Kris
Kristofferson is a marshal who finds his job more than he bargained
for. Turner shows the full 219-minute version. You may want to
fast scan some of the admittedly over-extended scenes.
[Sunday/Monday, March 3, 12:00 AM].
If you are interested in reading more about the Johnson County War
see my summary at http://tinyurl.com/mrl-johnson.
Another Western that goes for a realistic feel of life in the West-
-and which also has the conflict of the working people against the
money interests--is MONTE WALSH. Inspired at least in part by
Charles Russell's paintings of cowboy life, it goes for realism
with nothing very melodramatic happening and not a lot of gunplay.
It is the antithesis of Sergio Leone's view of the West. This is a
film that realistically depicts the life of a cowboy, his work, his
fun, and just the texture and feel of the life, even as that way of
life is becoming increasingly rare with Eastern money going into
buying up the ranches. It is just the story of men who like the
freedom of the open prairie and a lifestyle that is being squeezed
out of existence. Lee Marvin plays Walsh, and you cannot go wrong
with Lee Marvin. Also featured is Jack Palance. [Saturday, March
23, 3:00 PM]
My pick for the month? There are no real gems here, but each is
rewarding. I would pick MONTE WALSH as the best. THE FRONT is
quite good also. [-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Streaming--*Still* Not Ready for Prime Time (comments by
Evelyn C. Leeper)
Hulu just had a "free Criterion film" weekend, where you could
watch any Criterion film free on Hulu. The goal, I suppose, was to
make you love watching Criterion films so much that you would
subscribe to Hulu Plus, which has them all the time. But there
were a few problems with this.
1) "Any Criterion film" meant "any Criterion film Hulu actually
has." We went through the Criterion catalog and found ten films we
wanted to watch that were unavailable on Netflix, and figured we
had a really full weekend. Then we started trying to watch them.
It turned out that of the ten, Hulu had only five.
2) The films were regularly interrupted by commercials.
3) The films often "stuttered" or "froze", indicating either
bandwidth or server problems.
4) Bringing up the film on a full screen occasionally left the
"Press ESC to return from full screen" message over the middle of
the picture, and the whole page had to be reloaded.
5) We had to watch the movie on our 19" computer monitor rather
than our 43" television.
6) In the middle of a couple of the movies, the picture would
disappear and we would be asked to turn off ad-blocking (in one
case) or if we wanted to play a trivia game (in another). In the
second case, when we clicked on "no", the movie just terminated and
we had to restart and then fast-forward it to where we got cut off!
Mr. Hulu, after careful consideration, I've decided not to endorse
your channel. [-ecl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: SIDE EFFECTS (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: Steven Soderbergh directs a script by Scott Z. Burns,
giving us a suspenseful story set in the world of medicine and
high-profile prescription drugs. When a doctor prescribes a new
drug, is he responsible for the side effects? Jude Law stars as
Jonathan a psychiatrist with a cozy relationship with a drug
company and who prescribes a drug that may not behave as expected
in a surprisingly complex medical thriller. Rating: high +1 (-4 to
+4) or 6/10
[Spoiler Warning: I think I have avoided spoilers, but the less you
know about the film before seeing it, the better.]
The pharmaceutical industry has come to be dominated by a handful
of giant corporations making large profits. One has only to visit
a doctor's office to see that pens, clipboards, and wall
decorations all seem to carry advertising for high-profile drugs.
And that is just a miniscule fraction of what the drug companies
spend to woo doctors and to get them to prescribe their product.
There is a lot of money to be made in and around big Pharma and
that rarified atmosphere is some of what SIDE EFFECTS is about.
In this world we have Emily Taylor (played by Rooney Mara), a 28-
year-old woman hospitalized after attempting suicide. Dr. Jonathan
Banks (Jude Law) is a psychiatrist assigned by the state to care
for Emily. Emily's depression may be exacerbated by her husband's
release from prison. Martin (Channing Tatum) spent four years
behind bars for insider trading. Now he is out only to find his
wife is imprisoned by her own mental state. Jonathan meets with
Victoria (Catherine Zeta-Jones), Emily's previous psychiatrist to
discuss the case. Victoria suggests a new experimental drug,
Ablixia, and suggests that Jonathan try it on Emily. After another
suicide attempt by Emily Jonathan agrees. But the side effects of
Ablixia may make the cure worse than the disease. What follows is
a complex maze of a story that calls for careful scrutiny from the
viewer to completely appreciate what is happening. Director Steven
Soderbergh directs this labyrinth created by Scott Z. Burns who
also wrote Soderbergh's excellent CONTAGION.
At one point Jonathan's wife asks him about a patient who is
accused of committing a crime while on a behavior-altering drug.
Did that person do it? Is that person guilty? Jonathan responds
that those are two very different questions. That is one of the
major issues of the film. Drugs change who we are. If a person
has his personality temporarily altered under the influence of a
drug, is that person still guilty? Can one punish someone who
existed for just a few hours and now is no more?
Rooney Mara is not yet a familiar name to most viewers, but she
plays or will play the complex and physically strenuous role of
Lisbeth Salinger in the US version of the "Girl with the Dragon
Tattoo" films. Here she more than holds her own against box-office
stars Jude Law and Catherine Zeta-Jones. Soderbergh directs from a
script by Scott Z. Burns. Soderbergh has said that following this
film and one other made for HBO he will be taking a "sabbatical"
form film making and will be exploring his talent as a painter.
It has been suggested that this is the sort of film that Alfred
Hitchcock might be making if he or someone of his talents were
around today. Actually it might be closer to one of Brian De
Palma's efforts. At the end of my review I have to say ironically
that this is a film to be seen rather than one to be read about.
There are more holes in the plot than a Hitchcock would leave, but
SIDE EFFECTS seems to have a sort of De Palma flamboyance. I rate
it a high +1 on the -4 to +4 scale or 7/10. I could raise that
rating on future viewings since there is a lot to take in here.
Film Credits: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2053463/combined
What others are saying:
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/side_effects_2013/
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: CONTINUUM: Any Sufficiently Advanced Technology ...
(television review by Dale L. Skran, Jr.)
The SyFy channel has brought to the United States another Canadian
SF series, CONTINUUM. Two other Canadian series worthy of note are
the first NIKTA TV series and the more recent LOST GIRL. In
CONTINUUM, a future Vancouver cop, Kiera Cameron (played by Rachel
Nichols), from the year 2077, is transported back to 2012 while
pursuing a group of terrorists. In Kiera's future the world is
ruled by giant corporations, and democratic governments seem as
distant as the feudal world seems to us today. Kiera is called a
"Protector" and she serves as part of the enforcement arm of the
"Corporate Congress." She is pursing a group of eight operatives
who call themselves "Lieber8" (get it?). Lieber8 operatives use an
extract from mutant pituitary glands to transform themselves into
super-soldiers, but as a member of the 2077 version of a SWAT team,
or more probably the 2077 version of SEAL TEAM 6, Kiera has more
than few cards to play herself.
Kiera faces all of those standard time-travel problems. She needs
to capture or kill the members of Lieber8 without changing the
timeline, and then somehow return to her future using technology
that Lieber8 is carrying with them. The plot of the second episode
focuses on her attempts to force Lieber8 to take her into the
future with them. She is not especially concerned that the future
she comes from doesn't seem to be the ideal human future, at least
by our standards. Mainly she wants to get back to her husband and
child.
Once in 2012, Kiera finds something rather odd. Normally she
communicates with headquarters via an implanted wireless device.
In 2012 only one other person uses this channel other than her, a
certain Adam Sadler (played by Erik Knudsen), who appears to still
be alive in 2077, and may be manipulating events to create a closed
time loop. Sadler is your basic tech genius, who has developed a
wide array of amazing technology in a barn owned by his anti-
corporate activist parents, who are so busy with various radical
meetings that they don't seem to realize they are harboring the man
who will found the greatest corporation of the future. Sadler
quickly figures out that Kiera is from the future, and falls into
the role of supporting her as she hunts Lieber8.
With Sadler's help, Kiera is able to convince the Vancouver Police
Department to allow her to join as an "anti-gang" expert, paired
with Carolos Fonnegra (played by Victor Webster). The main
coolness in this show is that although Kiera may be an ordinary
person from 2077, her technology makes her super-human in 2012.
She wears what might be called a "reaction suit" that somehow
generates and stores energy, perhaps as she walks, and certainly as
she is struck by bullets or other objects. The suit is able to
deploy this energy as a built-in TASER or as enhanced strength,
allowing Kiera to throw perps around like rag dolls while being
virtually invulnerable. The suit also allows her to become
invisible, and has a host of build-in processing. Apparently, the
entire suit is a computer and any part of it can be deployed as an
interface. Using the suit, she can easily open locks and generate
magnetic fields.
Kiera has eye implants that are linked to the suit, and uplinked to
Sadler, allowing him to see through her eyes. The suit (or
something in her implants) keep a thirty-hour video record that in
the future was used as evidence, and must be periodically uploaded.
Her eye implants provide super-human vision, including thermal
vision. She can also isolate fingerprints for uploading and
identification by Sadler, who seems to be a skilled hacker. In one
scene in the third episode, she uses her eyes to upload DNA maps
that Sadler then matches and sends back color-coded augmented
reality overlays to allow matches to be easily identified. Oh
yeah, she has a "smart gun" with an augmented reality display for
targeting that can only be used by her. She hides the gun most of
the time to allow her to pass as a 2012 cop, and instead uses a
modern semi-automatic handgun provided by the Vancouver police.
Kiera has the disadvantage of being forced to rely on Sadler to
help her fit in, and sometimes Sadler must leave his console to eat
and do chores at critical moments. Her suit is not all-powerful,
and seems like a real piece of technology rather than a magical
device. The second episode was overlay maudlin for my taste, but on
the whole this is a serious and interesting SF show. Recommended
for SF fans in general. There is a good bit of action, but the
show is probably okay for pre-teens and up, although younger kids
might have a bit of trouble following the complex plot. CONTINUUM
is much less violent and sexual (at least in the first three
episodes) than the immediately following BEING HUMAN and LOST GIRL.
[-dls]
==================================================================
TOPIC: COLD CITY: REPAIRMAN JACK: THE EARLY YEARS by F. Paul
Wilson (book review by Dale L. Skran, Jr.)
Imagine, if you will, that Batman, the superhero with no powers,
was a real person. He would not wear a cape. As demonstrated in
THE INCREDIBLES and WATCHMEN, a cape can be a fatal hazard to the
unwary superhero. Nor would he wear a bizarre costume or a mask
covering his face. Such oddments merely would call attention to
him and weigh him down. He would not be a billionaire playboy--
such a man in the real world would never be tough enough to spend
his life hunting criminals on rooftops. And sooner or later, his
secret identity would become known to his friends or enemies.
Finally, a real Batman, like Kane's original character, would
surely use a gun.
In the real world, the superhero would be an ordinary looking
person, so ordinary as to fade into the crowd. Brown hair, brown
eyes, average height--his disguise would be no disguise, simply to
never be noticed by anyone. He would have no name, no social
security number, and no fingerprints on file. Any identity papers
he carried would be false. Not being rich, he would work for money
as a mercenary for good. He would not often carry a gun, but when
he did, he would use it efficiently and ruthlessly.
However, in common with Batman, the real hero would have a vast
array of skills--the ability to fight well with virtually any
weapon, or with no weapons, to pick locks and burgle buildings, to
track his prey unnoticed, and to follow a trail relentlessly. If
he needed help, he would have someone like Batman's Alfred that he
could turn to for advice, suggestions, or a bigger gun.
F. Paul Wilson's by now iconic Repairman Jack is the Batman made
flesh. COLD CITY is the first of a three-volume origin tale
recounting Jack's early years. Among the items covered are how
Jack started taking on "repair jobs" and what he did for money
before that, how he met Abe, his arms supplier and best friend, how
he came to NYC, and his first "repair job." If you are a Jack fan,
COLD CITY is a must read. If you are not a Jack fan, COLD CITY is
a good introduction without any off-putting horror elements.
There is very little of a supernatural nature in COLD CITY. Only
the hard-core Jack fans will notice a few mentions of "The One,"
Jack's future superhuman nemesis, or the recounting of Jack's path
to NYC, which strangely relies on a woman making a phone call and a
dog stopping a truck. Jack fans will realize that the woman is
surely Gaia, the Earth Goddess and the dog her eternal companion,
starting the process of preparing Jack for enlistment in the never-
ending warfare between the Ally and the Otherness. Not simply good
and evil, they are two forces beyond human understanding for which
the Earth is only one of a billion battlegrounds.
Be on notice that very slowly the Repairman Jack series builds to
an apocalyptic battle with the Otherness in NIGHTWORLD, but along
the way there are a large number of fun reads as Repairman Jack,
urban mercenary, uses means outside the law to resolve
"situations." Normally Jack uses the methods of a con man to
resolve problems, sometimes manipulating criminals to strike
against each other. However, when the chips and down and the
situation demands it, Jack is a ruthless adversary. As one of the
bad guys says in a later novel after walking into a building Jack
has passed through--"So many bodies. You say one man did this?"
Since the Jack series is a combination of Elmore Leonard and H. P
Lovecraft, it's not completely clear to me who the audience is.
Any yet Wilson keeps writing them, so there seems to be an
audience. It should also be noted the F. Paul Wilson lives in New
Jersey, and almost all the action takes place in either NYC or New
Jersey.
Recommended for those who like this sort of thing. Adult writing
with violence and sexual elements, including human trafficking.
COLD CITY has minimal horror elements and is among the more
realistic Jack stories. [-dls]
==================================================================
TOPIC: SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: In this comedy/drama Pat, a bipolar man with violent mood
swings, is released from a mental hospital and tries to put his
life back together. Moving in with his parents may be a mistake,
with a father who has worse mind problems than he has. He meets an
unstable woman, Tiffany, who may be able to help him get back
together with his wife. There is some charm to the story, but the
final act is very neat, predictable, contrived, and not up to
originality of the first two. Rating: high +1 (-4 to +4) or 6/10
Pat Solitano (played by Bradley Cooper) has bi-polar disorder and
has violent episodes when he is angry. He has lost his job as a
teacher and has been institutionalized for the previous eight
months as part of a plea bargain. This was following a rage-attack
against his wife Nikki whom he found in the shower having sex with
another man (while playing the same song that was played at their
wedding). As the film opens Pat is being released and is looking
forward to getting back together with Nikki in spite of the
restraining order against him. He has to move back in with his
parents Pat Sr. and Dolores (Robert De Niro and Jacki Weaver). It
is clear that much of Pat's mental problems he gets from his father
who has rages just as violent and who entertains an unhealthy
obsession with the Philadelphia Eagles. Pat Sr., also unemployed,
wants to pull together enough money buy a restaurant by becoming a
bookmaker and mostly betting on the Eagles. In Pat Jr.'s efforts
to win back Nikki he might be able to get some help from Tiffany--
also mentally unstable--but who might be able to help him get
together with his wife.
Pat thinks that he has his mental problems under control.
Appreciating silver linings to problems play a major part of his
personal self-treatment. But he still falls into rages and he acts
irrationally at times. He has taken to running as a way to keep
his mind under control and for some reason not explained chooses to
do wearing like a poncho a garbage bag with holes for his head and
arms. And when he runs Tiffany seems to have an almost
supernatural ability to run into him.
Writer/director David O. Russell (who formerly helmed THE FIGHTER
in 2010) gives us another story of a violent person putting his
life back together after he has mismanaged it. While the film may
technically be a romantic comedy, it is one with a lot of pain that
overshadows the happy and the unhappy moments. And even the happy
moments at the end cannot be fully enjoyed because the plot at that
point is so heavily contrived.
The film is unpredictable in the first half, but as the third act
arrives everything starts falling all too neatly into place. The
final act seems to gloss over Pat's mental problems by simply not
showing any more violent episodes. Will love conquer all? Well,
it does not seem to have for Pat's mother Dolores. Played by
Australian actress Jacki Weaver, we can see in her eyes that she is
paying a life-long price for her love of the explosive Pat, Sr.
from whom Pat, Jr. has inherited more than just a name. We are
given no reason to believe that when times get a little harder that
Pat's personality problems may not rear their heads again. One
rather suspects that the aftermath of this film is not going to be
a happily ever after. I rate SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK a high +1 on
the -4 to +4 scale or 6/10.
Film Credits: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1045658/combined
What others are saying:
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/silver_linings_playbook/
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: SUPERPOWER (2008) (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: Sometimes the most stringent argument is not the most
effective one. Barbara-Anne Steegmuller directs, as well as co-
writes and co-produces, SUPERPOWER, a film which is virtually a
catalog of charges of the United States misusing and abusing its
military power all around the world with a government loyal only to
the military industrial complex. To her credit Steegmuller
assembles interviews from a stellar collection of dozens of
experts, largely dissidents, including Noam Chomsky, Sergei
Khrushchev, and Cindy Sheehan. Rating: 0 (-4 to +4) or 4/10
It is a common mistake in documentary film for the filmmaker to be
enraged by some situation and to bring his or her case to the
screen as a totally one-sided argument. There can be a litany of
charges against some political enemy. Very little consideration is
given to presenting the counter arguments. That is not surprising.
The filmmaker is trying to expose some terrible wrong. Why give
the other side airtime? Well, there is a very good reason to
present the opposing side's arguments. It gives the viewer
confidence that the opposing point of view has been considered.
And if the viewer starts supplying his/her own alternate point of
view it calls into question for the viewer the filmmaker's
objectivity. The 80% that the viewer would trust the filmmaker on
is actually discredited by the 20% the viewer questions.
"America's Quest for Global Dominance through the Military-
Industrial Complex." That rather salty blurb on the box tells it
all.
SUPERPOWER is a documentary fueled more by rage than by objective
argumentation. The viewer is subjected to a disorganized rain of
charges against the United States. Watching it I wanted to stop
Barbara-Anne Steegmuller (director/co-writer/co-producer), with
questions and even a few "yes, but..." comments. But of course in
a film and on video that is impossible. For example in an
interview one April Najjaj says that the United States claims to
support democracies, but the only democracies in the Middle East
are Iran and Palestine. I would say that those are highly
questionable democracies at best and that if she cannot think of a
third country in the Middle East that is a democracy, why would I
even want to listen to her? By presenting one long catalogue of
tirades Steegmuller preaches to the choir and what may be good
arguments are wasted.
I have no question that Steegmuller strongly believes the case she
makes, and perhaps much is true in her charges. She tarnishes her
argument by not giving at least a little rebuttal from the opposing
point of view and from the shrillness of her presentation. This is
a film that will please those who already agree with her but will
alienate at least some fence sitters.
The interviews presented in the film are from 32 different
witnesses, mostly activists. Their testimony is full of
indictment, but without a lot of documentation or evidence for
most. This film is a scattershot look at a very large number of
accusations against the United States, mostly familiar and probably
no small number of them have more than a little basis in truth. It
is a good summary of what arguments are being made. It could serve
as an introduction of the far Left's view of the United States.
But my recommendation to the viewer is to not take the charges at
face value without further confirmation. I rate SUPEROWER a 0 on
the -4 to +4 scale or 4/10.
[Full disclosure: I come to this film with a strong skepticism that
the United States has any malicious policy to achieve the power to
dominate the world. Under some leaders it does try to use its
power in questionable ways, but I do not believe there is a unified
conspiracy behind those actions. The United States does
occasionally unilaterally elect itself the world's policeman in a
world that unfortunately desperately needs a policeman. In the
Bosnian Intervention Europe had wrung its hands for many long
months and asked why did the United Stated do nothing to stop a
conflict that was much closer to their doorsteps. Finally the
United States did intervene and stopped the violence. The is a
country very different from the one Steegmuller describes.]
Film Credits: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1311717/combined
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: BLIND DESCENT: THE QUEST TO DISCOVER THE DEEPEST PLACE ON
EARTH by James M. Tabor (book review by Dale L. Skran, Jr.)
I'm not a big fan of reading books about adventure sports or
outdoor activities, but I decided to make an exception in the case
of BLIND DESCENT, a 2010 book that chronicles the efforts of two
rival teams of cavers, one mainly American, and the other mainly
Russian, although both are, in fact, international teams. There is
one small but significant tie-in to my space interests, which I
will mention at the end of the review. There is also in indirect
tie, in that BLIND DESCENT has a lot of what makes sense of wonder
SF work--a brave band of heroes, some with significant personal
flaws, risking it all to go where no one has gone before.
In this BLIND DESCENT, the goal is to discover and explore the
deepest cavern on Earth. Please note that we are not talking about
the "biggest" or the "longest" cavern, but the "deepest." It turns
out that such caves are carved by water, and occur in limestone.
This means that in effect you are exploring an underground river
that is partially dry. Thus, long descents by rappelling are
followed by tight squeezes in little tunnels which lead to "sumps"
of freezing water that must be crossed to reach the next section of
the cave. Some sumps can be crossed by "free diving" and one of
the most horrifying sequences occurs in such a sump too narrow for
scuba gear very near the end of the book as the intrepid Russians
get close to their goal. Other sumps involve long immersion,
requiring the use of scuba tanks or special re-breathers developed
for cave diving.
Cave exploration requires a large expedition, broken into separate
specializations, including "sherpas" who labor to move supplies
into the cave, "diggers" who clear obstacles," and "divers" who,
well, dive. Mutinies sometimes break out when things turn sour,
i.e. someone dies. Basically, any serious injury in a deep cave
tends to be fatal since it can take days to get out of the cave,
and ordinary rescuers lack the ability to reach the injured. Even
taking a body out of a cave in a bag is a life-threatening
activity, with the result that cavers are often buried near where
they die. Also, caving season ends when the rainy seasons starts,
and extending your stay by even one day can be a terminal
experience.
When added to the fact that the caves being explored are in Mexico
(often dangerous) and Abkhazia (located between Georgia and
Russian--always dangerous), just driving to the cave mouth can be
risky. Each cave (Cheve in Mexico and Krubera in Abkhazia) has
their own dangers. Caves in the area around Cheve feature
poisonous snakes, spiders as big as your hand, colonies of long-
legged spiders the size of basketballs, bloody feces from vampire
bats and deadly parasites. But Cheve is a "warm" cave--not warm
by normal standards, but warm compared to Krubera, which ranges
from zero degrees to freezing as a warm temperature. Cheve is
shaped like a big "L" with a long series of rope descents followed
by a series of passages and sumps. Krubera is one drop after
another, with each connected by a tiny crawlspace. In both caves,
descents are often made literally inside waterfalls.
As the cavers descend deeper, they set up base camps periodically
to which they can retreat to rest. The best of these camps are in
large caverns with comfortable sandbars and commodious tents. The
worst of the camps are on aluminum platforms hung on a rock wall
over a sump. In such a camp, a single misstep can lead to death by
drowning.
The effort to explore such caves involves hardships and dangers
that modern Americans can hardly imagine. In addition to all the
problems noted above, cavers fear what they call the "Rapture"--a
kind of insanity that takes over after a long period in a dark cave
that can lead rapidly to an accident and death, given that in this
sort of caving *any* mistake is usually your last mistake. Cavers
often leave lights off to conserve power, but hallucinations can
result, again sometimes leading to fatal accidents.
I noted that each of the exploration teams had at least one woman
in the lead group, and sometimes more. Conditions in cave
exploration are somewhat similar to combat conditions, in which men
and women live in tight quarters together, with minimal privacy.
With all the hauling and rope climbing, upper body strength is at a
premium. Everyone carries a large pack--up and down the cliffs.
Conditions are difficult, and cave diving is pretty much the most
dangerous thing you can do short of combat. Nobody would contend
that most women could do this sort of thing, but it is pretty clear
that some women can, and do. I'll also note that, at least in this
book, all of the fatalities were men.
It should not come as a surprise that the teams operate in rather
different styles, the Americans led by the fanatical genius Bill
Stone, and the Russians by modest team player Alexander Klimchouck.
Stone is a technical wizard who invented and built the re-breathers
used by his team, but is so dedicated to cave exploration that his
crew mutinies on a couple of occasions. Both Klimchouck and Stone
pay a great personal price. Although Klimchouck stays married to
the same woman, he becomes estranged from his son who joins a rival
caving group, resulting in a father-son battle to explore Krubera.
Stone separates from his first wife, and drifts from one "cave
woman" to another, each younger than the next, but all of whom
discover in turn that Stone has married adventure, not them.
I'm going to leave off the details of their explorations, and who
emerges as the final(?) victor. In a way, it doesn't matter. Both
sides do a lot of daring exploration, see things that have never
been seen before, do things that have never been done before, and
put their lives on the line over and over. Alas, only one team can
reach the deepest point--2,080 meters--in a chamber that they
appropriately name "Game Over."
And here is where the connection to SF begins. There may be some
expedition at some point that pushes one of these caves (or some
other cave) a bit deeper. However, in some real sense the great
age of supercave exploration, enabled by scuba tanks, re-breathers,
and modern climbing gear that allows "wet descents" in waterfall
conditions, is more or less over. Sadly, due to limited press
coverage during the 80s, 90s, and 00s, you probably didn't know
that there was a "golden age" of supercave exploration going on.
Appropriately, Bill Stone, the man who lives for adventure, has
moved on to new ventures. You can check out what he as been doing
lately at http://www.stoneaerospace.com/. He is building robots
to explore Europa, and was involved in testing the underwater robot
ENDURANCE in Antarctica. The wiki page at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stone_Aerospace has a nice summary.
It appears that Mr. Stone has been quite proficient in getting NASA
funding for various robots targeted at exploring the oceans on
Europa, since he is currently busy on his third NASA funded
project.
More recently it appears that Stone has taken on Lunar mining as a
hobby. He is the Chairman of http://www.shackletonenergy.com/.
Although their web site isn't very informative, the wiki page
provides more info on this company. Finally, you can check out a
Bill Stone TED talk on caving and lunar mining at
http://tinyurl.com/void-ted-stone.
For more info on super-caving, you can check out "Call of the
Abyss" in the May 2005 issue of National Geographic, and also "Cave
Quest" in the September 1995 issue of National Geographic. You may
also find Stone's book on some of his earlier adventures of
interest: http://tinyurl.com/void-beyond-deep. [-dls]
==================================================================
TOPIC: The Verbinator (letters of comment by Rob Mitchell and Lee
Beaumont)
In response to the article on the Lee Beaumont's "Verbinator" in
the 02/15/13 issue of the MT VOID, Rob Mitchell writes:
I question the Verbinator... I get that it's meant largely tongue-
in-cheek--perhaps for entertainment and only loosely as a source of
inspiration. But I'm underwhelmed by the results of the small
sample I tried. For "Democracy", the most common verb is "descry"?
For "Squirrel", the most common verb is "fetch"? For "Christmas",
there's no verbs at all?
Sorry, but I found it a barren source of amusement or
inspiration... [-rlm]
Mark notes:
I admit I have not found a use for it. For now I just find it a
curiosity. I think its intention is to solve a problem I do not
think I face. But I think it may be a "duct tape" sort of tool.
One can find any number of good uses for duct tape, but it was
never very good in it original intended use, repairing ducts.
[-mrl]
Lee responds:
Thanks for the prominent placement and kind introduction to the
Verbinator article in the MT VOID.
I hope your readers have fun with it.
I proceeded to purchase a better word frequency database to power
it. Unfortunately the provider of that database refused my
purchase request (actually a licensing agreement) because he felt
it would expose his database too much. [-lrb]
==================================================================
TOPIC: This Week's Reading (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
POSTVILLE: A CLASH OF CULTURES IN HEARTLAND AMERICA by Stephen
G. Bloom (ISBN 978-0-156-01336-9) was released in 2001 and told the
story of Postville, Iowa, a small homogeneous farming town which
suddenly found itself with a large Hasidic population *and* a large
Latino population when the Rubashkin family bought an old meat
processing plant and revived it as the largest kosher meat-
processing plant in the United States. There were some rocky
moments but things seemed to be working out.
Then the roof caved in (figuratively speaking). Immigration and
Customs Enforcement swooped down on May 12, 2008, and arrested 378
illegal workers as well as several company officials. The result
was that the main employer of the town was shuttered, and many of
the illegal immigrants who were not arrested were ordered to remain
in Postville as witnesses, but forbidden to work. Thus they became
a drain on the community, which was given no state or Federal
assistance in feeding or housing these people. The plant tried to
stay open, hiring a series of groups of people who could work
legally: released convicts, homeless men and women, Palauans, and
so on. Not surprisingly, this merely exacerbated the situation.
POSTVILLE, U.S.A.: SURVIVING DIVERSITY IN SMALL-TOWN AMERICA by
Mark Grey, Michele Devlin, and Aaron Goldsmith (ISBN 978-1-934848-
64-7) is in some sense a follow-up look at Postville. Grey et al
are somewhat dismissive of earlier studies of Postville, including
Bloom's, because the authors and commentators did not have the
academic credentials that they do. However, the fact that this
book lacks an index does not fill me with confidence in their
attention to detail either. In any case, I think the earlier book,
while it has its flaws, was reasonable at the time. No one could
predict the immigration problems would be as severe as they were,
and Grey et al try to analyze why that was the case. They dismiss
the notion of anti-Semitism, and note that other raids on meat-
processing plants are on large corporations where the managers can
reasonably claim ignorance of corporate policy, rather than a
family-owned business where they cannot. I am not sure this is
entirely plausible, since there are plenty of smaller companies
that also get raided.
In fact, most of what Grey et al have to say is fairly obvious,
e.g., as long as people want cheap meat, companies will not pay
their workers enough. And that if a company in a small town hires
people from seven different ethnic groups with seven different
languages and expects the town to provide interpreters for them in
schools and hospitals and government offices, the town is going to
go broke. And that a town that relies on a single employer to keep
it afloat and pay for all the civic improvements is putting way too
many eggs in one basket.
Then again, like Michael Apted's "Up" series, there is something
fascinating about revisiting Postville every few years to see how
it is doing. [-ecl]
==================================================================
Mark Leeper
mleeper@optonline.net
A publisher who writes is like a cow in a milk bar.
--Arthur Koestler