lulz @ Kain.

On a more serious and substantive note, I wanted to address Mike's points earlier up in the discussion and I think he is very much correct, and this point has led to many frustrations as both a liberal and a Democrat.

The fact that liberals tend to be more individually minded often times is a political handicap as liberals tend to misunderstand politics and frequently lack cohesiveness even at opportune moments. The liberal blogosphere during the 2008 general election was simply amazing to me and very uncharacteristic for liberals in general. Outside of that, it's not overly difficult to find liberals fighting just as much amongst each other as they will with Republicans.

What Mike touches on with Republicans may be better addressed by the League's conservatives and libertarians, but I have observed much more of a tendancy towards developing a cult of personality, for the time being, that personality is Ronald Reagan.

In fact, as I was covering the presidential primaries, I remarked numerous times just how frequently Republican candidates attempted to establish themselves as the next Ronald Reagan, invoking the late President's name over and over again, almost as though, if you said it enough, people would believe you were him reincarnated.

The funny thing is, I think these canonized figures of both parties will do more harm than good politically. If you are comparing yourself to Ronald Reagan or JFK, if you are using them as yardsticks, does that not only show your own shortcomings all the more?

On a final note, I do so love making the distinction between the different kinds of conservatism. From my point of view, there are actually only two types: actual conservatism based upon the conservative (dictionary definition) principles or Jeffersonian principles. To me, this kind of conservatism is equal across the board--smaller government in terms of foreign policy, economy, and social issues.

The other kind of conservatism with a broad stroke is much more malleable, and is defined as anything right of center which chooses to self identify as conservative. And now I must leave.

Well, this is weird for me because I don't think I would lose sleep if the Republican party dissolved, or, even better, just stayed way the hell out of power.

But the thing is, they are trying to get back into power, and everything they do comes with that context which severely undermines anything they do.

That's a sticking point, isn't it? The thing about the Religious Right is that it doesn't seem to stop to consider that even if Christianity were to become the official ruling religion, which sect of Christianity would dominate?

And this reminded me of the Catholic and Protestant street fights that occured at the turn of the twentieth century over which version of the Bible should be read in schools. It's as though no one stops to think that the way they practice Christianity may not be the way other Christians practice it. With the idea of abolishing marriage as a government sanctioned act, in my mind it kills two birds with one stone. It removes the government from what is effectively a religious endeavor (or decidely non religious endeavor), while at the same time granting homosexuals the exact same rights as non homosexuals. As a further bonus, this allows churches to move at their own speed. Some churches have proven to be very progressive in their acceptance of alternative and minority communities, whilst others tend to not be so quick on the uptake. And if you neither want nor need a church to decide you are married, then you are married.

Funnily enough, being the liberal that I am this strikes me as a very conservative approach to the problem. My little brother doesn't need a church or the government to tell him he's married should he find that someone special. Conversely, I've known a few heterosexuals who have gotten married not out of love, but solely for financial benefits--how is that a sanct marriage?

Thank you, Bob, that is the crux of the argument. I don't think it is the government's place to decide anything is sacred.

I'm not saying that gay people wouldn't be allowed to get married. Under this argument, they would be, because the government doesn't decide what marriage is.

You know, at this point, it's almost worth exploring exactly what a good faith argument and opposition is.

Thank you kindly sir.

I just wanted to make a small point that focuses on the videos. I thought the first Will.I.Am video was brilliant and politically well timed. I remember surfing the comments sections of some conservative blogs and the prevailing attitude at the time was, "How are we supposed to beat THIS?!"

Artistically it was well done, and if your were predisposed towards supporting Obama it was poignant and powerful. Politically it sent a different message, one that ultimately conveyed a truth about the Obama campaign; there's an awful lot of us out here, and we are REALLY passionate about our candidate.

So the first one I think on an artistic and substantive level, but also on a politically strategic level. All the rest of the videos in the same vain, however, have been... well... creepy. And what is worse is that they feed into the myth of cultism among the Obama supporters.

This is part of the reason why no one likes it when Hollywood gets involved, or at least why I don't like it when Hollywood gets involved. I don't give a crap about the whole "it's not fair that their voice gets so much attention because they're rich and famous" argument that I've heard time and time again. Conservatives have no right to talk about unfairly shaping public opinion based on fame as long as Rush Limbaugh is still flop sweating over a studio mic.

No, I despise Hollywood action because Hollywood activists are frankly pretty stupid when it comes to politics. They may be right on the issues from time to time, but they have no political instinct and mistake whatever artistic instincts they may or may not have for political instinct.

And, my new friends in this joint venture, I'm sure you will eventually learn that nothing aggravates me more than people who play politics without a lick of political understanding.

(also... ahem... I think I started this conversation, yes?)

Now you know this was going to get the question: which two politicians would those happen to be?

Wait, are you saying I should have wrote this whole thing as a start of a series, or I should have broken it up into several posts in a single series? I mean, I'm done with the topic now, unless someone else wants a piece.

Ah... okay.

Damn it, and after taking that long to write, I still think I missed something... ah well, at least if I'm incomplete, it will generate discussion I hope.

Interesting. As I started to get to your take down of the Dark Knight, I was all ready to defend it, but the problem is you make more than valid points. I really liked the movie, but if I were being honest with myself, it really was little more than a summer fun movie with the marked exception of a brilliant performance on Ledger's part (having not seen Brokeback, I won't argue which role was better acted, but I do disagree with you on the level of the Joker performance and its significance and artistic value and quality).

But even before this, there were parts that niggled at me about this movie. One was the disagreement between the "agent of chaos" and the Swiss watch intricate machinations of said agent of chaos. Also, while Ledger's performance was astounding (at least in my mind), he was surrounded by a cast that was lackluster, at times even laughable.

It's a sad thing to say, but the main character of the movie was ultimately a joke. I like Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne, but his Batman is god awful and has provoked my favorite afternoon radio show into constantly insulting the BatVoice.

But I really didn't want to talk much about the Dark Knight. What I did want to mention was that as I neared the end of your piece, another movie popped into my mind; Silence of the Lambs.

Now that was a MOVIE, and one that really did respect in many ways its viewers. Part of its success was the nature of the story. It was a dark psychological thriller, but as opposed to the modern day definition of the sub-genre, what we mean by psychological thriller is that actual (or perhaps fantasy, I'm no psychological expert so I admit to not knowing), psychology. Motivation is, thusly, a centerpoint of the movie. You know EXACTLY why Wild Bill does what he does because the lynchpin relationship of the film between Lecter and Clarise is centered firmly on understanding Wild Bill's motivations in such a manner that those motivations could be used to actually catch the man.

There's of course some of the hyperbolic fantasy involved. Lecter, much like the Joker, seems a bit too pressient, too capable of predicting human nature to the point where he can plot out strategies that would hinge on seemingly random events and decisions. But the movie doesn't go nearly as far as modern fare does in this regard.

The other thing that really makes SotL is that the movie making was phenomenal. Direction and cinematography were brilliant, and instead of just having ONE actor turn in a star performance, the entire cast brought the house down.

I'm an avid fan of Monk, and even though I've got five seasons on DVD, and watch each new episode religiously the moment it's available on the internet, I STILL get this weird feeling every time Ted Levine(sp?) comes on screen.

So I dunno, I just figured I would interject that what you are looking for, it would seem, is that the summer blockbuster machine would look more towards Silence of the Lambs for inspiration than for perhaps the latest greatest comic book movie to come down the woodwork (though, to defend the comic book movie genre, there have been a couple few that have been excellent as well. The first Spiderman, I thought, was very well done. I liked Iron Man because that really was the kind of movie you could write off as a summer fun movie without also trying to defend its artistic qualities. And, to be fair, I think the motivations for the characters in Iron Man might have actually been more believable than those in Dark Knight. And I will urinate on anyone who speaks ill of Sin City. ANYONE!).

The last point I wanted to make was that I think one of the things that has degraded the quality of the major blockbusters has been technology. I don't mean just CGI special effects, though that is a big part of it. But you know, the big movies have always had a certain feel to them. There's a certain polish on the production in a big movie, and once you cross that threshold of polish, it's like you are automatically leaped into a-movie status.

What with technology being what it is today, with digital pictures, and computer special effects, and even music composition taking a 2.0 flavor, you can take the biggest heaping turd and spruce it up to cross that imaginary threshold.

I dunno, it just seems like the turds are a lot shinier and that is really making a difference.

Hey guys. I"m not actually joining any dicussions just yet, just testing to see if my Gravitar thingie works.