Month / January 2004

by DrMabuse

Public Transmogrification

I’m not much of a public transportation critic, but I’d say that this morning’s bus ride was unsatisfactory. It had nothing to do with the 350 pound woman who sat next to me, shoving her backpack into the veneer-like threshold between us, permitting me a space buffer of approximately 1.2 millimeters (less than a trusty bullet caliber) and the compression of my body into the area of (roughly) a burlap rucksack designed for someone of Twiggy’s physique. It had nothing to do with the extenuating circumstances of this. Because I was actually able to open my book and read, even if it involved an acute open book aperture angling approximately 27 degrees, with educated guesses on how sentences ended on the left page and began on the right page. (“It was a dark ______________. ____________ better things were afoot when the gentle ________________.”)

It had nothing to do with the bus arriving late, or the extremely crowded confines within, or the body odor and the vociferous cell phone conversations carried out over such substantial topics as Paris Hilton’s new TV show, of which I haven’t a damn scrap of knowledge about. It had nothing to do with what the MUNI ridership comes to collectively expect under these circumstances. I’m convinced that people have only the sweetest intentions at heart when they deliberately collide into your back and seethe, “Get out of my way, motherfucker.” And you respond with something along the lines of “Blessed are the peacemakers” or “Have it your way, my dear Boswell.” Of this, I remain irrevocably convinced.

No, the problem had much to do with the wavering velocity of the vehicle, the origin of which could be traced to a very militant driver who seemed to confuse a trundle up Market Street with the First Battle of Ypres. “Enter through the front,” she barked at some hapless passenger trying to garner pivotal square footage through the back door. I could only imagine what this driver would do with a Glock gun in her hand. The volatility was manifest in the bus’s motion. The bus alternately moved at a snail’s pace or hit the ground running with a sharp slam on the gas, followed by a sudden brake, buffeting people forward from time to time. I’m not sure if the physical results of this eccentric two-step can be adequately described outside of a dance floor, or if they have underlying value in an aerobic environment. But it did have a unifying effect on the passengers at large. We were united. United in contusions, united in bumping into the metallic seats in front of us, united in being terrified of the bus driver quite possibly working the thirteenth hour of her shift, though being paid a lot more than a lot of us.

Overall, I’d have to conclude that the bus ride was unsatisfactory.

by DrMabuse

Quick Quickies

Margaret Drabble on Bloomsbury (via ElegVar, a Unix-like acronym I couldn’t resist)

Journalista investigates the implications of Borders’ “category management” on graphic novels.

Unusual San Francisco Architecture and The Map Room (a blog abut maps) (both via Menlo)

Defective Yeti has a heck of a forward-thinking scheme for making money off conservatives.

Slate: Should students be allowed to hook up with professors? The great irony is that the article was written by Against Love author Laura Kipnis! (via Chica)

Jonathan Yardley takes on The Reivers (which is in my bookpile). (via Sarah)

by DrMabuse

Smile! You’re on Canted Camera!

The Harper’s Iraq lies piece with sources, efforts of which originated in this MeFi thread.

And fingerprinting and photographing foreign visitors is overkill. It’s bad enough that visitors are subjected to a silly little quiz (“Have you ever been a Communist?”) that, embarassingly, demonstrates how little this nation has evolved from its McCarthyist paranoia half a century ago, or that this is one of the few Western nations in which citizens and non-citizens are split up after a twelve-hour transatlantic flight, rather than conjoined in one queue (not always the case going the other way), with instructions articulated only in English. In fact, nothing of these questions, the fingerprints or the photographs is mentioned on the DHS page referencing procedure (again, only in English).

But I don’t see how photographs compared against databases will stop the true professionals, particularly when any real criminal can undergo plastic surgery, grow a beard, shave his eyebrows, or do any number of things to avoid being detected by a guy at customs who ain’t exactly the brightest bulb at the airport.

What’s interesting about the US VISIT program is that it’s actually been in the works since 2000, which suggests that this privacy-invasive program isn’t a direct countermeasure to Sept. 11. The Post article quotes spokesman Mike Milne as follows, “If we have your information in the system, it protects you as a passenger from someone being able to use your documentation.” Oh really? So say Joe Visitor comes into the nation, gets his picture taken by the DHS, and then gets his credit card stolen by some serious thief who uses the card (before Joe Visitor cancels it) to buy “questionable” goods like bullets or raw compnents with which to construct an explosive. Given what we’ve seen of the INS wilfully damning without burden of proof, and such sickening stories as the treatment of Maher Arer by U.S. authorities, can we really count on a non-ICC compliant government to stand by habeas corpus? (And here are a few more side issues: (1) How secure are the databases? (2) What other information is being compared against the photograph? (3) If accused of a charge, does the visitor have access to this data or would their right to fair trial be obviated by a military-style tribunal? (4) Given the current spending spree of the U.S. government — projected to hit a $500 billion deficit in five years — is there any possibility that the government will sell these databases off to a marketing organization to stave off insolvency?)

But the silliest thing about US VISIT is that anyone coming into the United States by land will not be photographed. Given how easy it is to book a flight to Canada, rent a car and head south, this suggests to me that the program is more of a show of force rather than a legitimate countermeasure.

And it’s sure to perform wonders for foreign relations. In response, Brazil has begun performing the same tactics on Americans. The U.S. Embassy had this to say in response: “While we acknowledge Brazil’s sovereign right to determine the requirements for entry into Brazil, we regret the way in which new procedures have suddenly been put in place that single out US citizens for exceptional treatment that has meant lengthy delays in processing, such as the case today with a more than nine hour delay for some US citizens arriving at Rio’s international airport.” But is the Embassy more concerned with the delays or the singling out of American passengers? If the latter, the irony is dripping wet.

[1/23/06 UPDATE: Two years later, security regulations are now accepted as easily as brushing one’s teeth twice a day. While I recognize this post as a particularly heavy-handed one, I am not sure what to make of my feelings now. I feel like an absolute hypocrite. For it seems impossible now to imagine a traveling existence in which one is not required to hand over one’s ID or to be subjected to rent-a-cops who have the false impression that they’re today’s answer to Dirty Harry. This is the kind of Orwellian show of force that angered me as a teenager. And I wonder just how much of a prisoner I am in my own country, and why I (and most Americans) have come to accept this, even when the reasons behind the War on Terror have been rendered bunk. I don’t really feel any more secure than I did before September 11, but I have come to accept this existence as part of the risk of everyday existence and don’t let it get in the way of anything I do, save of course the whole handing the ID over thing.]

by DrMabuse

Queen Anne, Ordinary Life and Assorted Schlepping

Lisa Allardice dares to ask a question that some people have answered, but have refrained from voicing, fearful of being labeled some rabble-rouser to be dealt a harsh blow, never again to be invited to those swank cocktail parties: Is Anne Tyler washed up? Since I value my respiratory tract (and I’ve been known to cave when wine and cheese are placed beneath my nose, but only in weak moments), I’ll only say that I’ve liked Tyler’s books in the past, but reading Ladder of Years on a whim was a very bad idea. I suspect my struggle had to do with what Tyler considered to be the ultimate revolutionary choice for a woman: running away from your husband. And this in 1996 with a rising divorce rate. I think we can all agree that this precludes Tyler from the “contemporary literature” canon.

Also in The Guardian is an amusing and forthright essay from Danny Leigh, first-time novelist of The Greatest Gift. Not only does Leigh try to wrestle with the conundrum of whether his protagonist mirrors his life, but he also confesses that, as a human being, he figures his life experience is pretty banal. But that apparently didn’t stop him from discovering things about himself that he could throw an imaginative spin on.

This article on fan fiction doesn’t nail down any conclusions, but does offer a not-bad overview of K/S and other exemplars of fan fervor. (via Graham)

Heru Ptah apparently made a killing selling his book on the subway. To the tune of $100,000 and an MTV Books deal with an advance in the mid-five figures.

Great headline with disappointing followthrough: Diet books with prose to savor? Fat chance. If only. And this fillip in the Philly. I dare a major newspaper to assess the poetic value of The Atkins Diet.

by DrMabuse

Memo to Writers: Please Stop Dying!

Writer Roy Clarke has been kicked out of Zambia. The cause? Calling President Levy Mwanawasa a “foolish elephant” and two ministers “baboons.” Apparently, Fleet Street tactics don’t get you far in Africa.

Philip Pullman’s trilogy is now a six-hour play. But its staging hasn’t been without controversy. A few febrile fans have planned to picket the theatres. But if playwright Nicholas Wright “includes the Tom Bombadil scene,” the production should be in the clear.

Pulitzer winner John Toland has died at 91. In addition to writing Hitler: A Bigass Biography to Demolish All Bigass Hitler Biographies, Toland won the 1971 Pulitzer for The Rising Sun, which covered the Japanese Empire during the same time period. A few other people who departed from this earth over the weekend: Barbara Jeffris and L.A. underworld novelist Douglas Anne Munson.

And David Kipen has a nice tribute to the recently late John Gregory Dunne.

I’ll try and scoop up more news later, but, as all of you nursing vacation hangovers should know by now, today involves something of a shift back into gangly routine. And it’s probably more abrasive than casually replacing your bar of soap with Brill-O-Pad. In the meantime, why not try some of the folks on the left, many of whom are returning back to their respective perches?